JURIST: Books-on-Law is edited by Ronald K.L. Collins and David Skover of the Seattle University School of Law

Editorial Consultants:

Kermit L. Hall, who serves on our Board of Editorial Consultants, is the editor of the just- published book, The Oxford Guide to United States Supreme Court Decisions (Oxford University Press, 1999) (cloth:$35.00; pp. 448).  Hall is Dean of the College of Humanities and Executive Dean of the Colleges of the Arts and Sciences, as well as a Professor of History and Law at Ohio State University.

The Oxford Guide offers concise and thoughtful accounts by a variety of scholars of over four hundred of the most important cases argued before the Court.   There are the classics: Marbury v. Madison and Scott v. Sandford; the landmarks: Brown v. Board and Roe v. Wade; and the precedents-of-the-day: Clinton v. Jones.  Professor Hall has collected these case profiles primarily from The Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States (Oxford University Press, 1999), of which he was the chief editor.  Some 47 new entries have been prepared for the new Oxford Guide; earlier entries were revised and updated where necessary.

The Oxford Guide is replete with case and topical indexes, citations, glossary, and an appendix on the Justices.  The work likewise contains the social and legal background of each case, along with an account of the reasoning underlying the decision.  And coming soon: Professor Hall’s next book, The Oxford Companion to American Law.

On a related front is the just-released A Practical Companion to the Constitution (University of California Press, 1999) by Professor Jethro K. Liberman of New York Law School.  This nearly 800-page tome is a revised, expanded, and updated version of a 1992 work titled The Evolving Constitution.  The paperback publication, with 25 new essays and 350 new cases, is subtitled "How the Supreme Court Has Ruled on Issues from Abortion to Zoning."  The entries, organized alphabetically by topic, were all authored by Professor Liberman.  There are, for example, entries on "abortion" (3½ pp.), "commercial speech" (3 pp.), "republican form of government" (½ p.), "tenth amendment" (1½ pp.), "psychic harm" (½ p.), and "zoning" (1¼ pp.).  There is also a useful concordance to the Constitution, biographical notes on the Justices, and a detailed index of subjects and names.  The book is current through the 1997-1998 Court term.

If you haven’t heard, Stanley Fish has moved.  The widely published professor of English and law has abandoned Duke to become the Dean of Arts and Sciences at the University of Illinois, Chicago.  (See David Yaffe, "The Department that Fell to Earth," Linguafranca (Feb. 1999), pp. 24-31).  The move coincides with the publication of The Stanley Fish Reader (Blackwell Publishers, 1999) (paper: $24.95; pp. 297).

Call him a cynic, radical, populist, gamesman, or a "jury-rigger" -- he minds not.  He loves engagement and quite often finds it, be it with Milton scholars or federal judges, e.g. the likes of Judge Alex Kozinski.

This reader is a collection of eleven essays spanning three decades; it is edited by English Professor H. Aram Veeser of the City University of New York.  The law-related essays include Fish’s widely-noticed "There’s No Such Thing as Free Speech, and It’s a Good Thing, Too" and his "The Law Wishes to Have a Formal Existence," which critiques methods of contracts interpretation, among other things.

In addition to Professor Veeser’s introduction, each of the essays is prefaced by headnotes written by noted specialists, including Joan Bennett (Milton), Jonathan Goldberg (the New Historicism), Bruce Robbins (Professionalism), Stephen Moore (poststructuralism), Judith Roof (the law), Judith Butler (free speech), Steven Mailloux (rhetoric), and others.

Fish fans take note: This July 19-23 Dean Fish will lecture at Cornell University.   The title of his forthcoming lecture is "Rhetoric, Politics, Law: The Endless Quarrel."  Among other things, his seminar will consider the tension between affirmative action and First Amendment law, and also the tension between fidelity to abstract norms and the desire to bring about certain outcomes in the world.  Fish, who has written for BOL, is also the author of the forthcoming The Trouble with Principle (Harvard University Press, 1999-2000).

BTW: Look for commentary on the Fish Reader in a future issue of BOL.

Two soon-to-be-published books are especially timely in light of news about war crimes and Rwandan extremists charged with genocide and offenses against humanity.  First there is War Crimes Law Comes of Age: Essays (Oxford University Press, 1999) (cloth: $65.00; pp. 352) by New York University Law Professor Theodor Meron, one of the world’s leading authors on international human rights law.  Then there is War Crimes & War Crimes Tribunals: Past, Present, and Future, vol. 3 (Joe Christenson, Inc., 1999) (paper: $30:00; pp. 350), edited by Susan Tiefenbrun and Leon Friedman of Hofstra University.  Some of the contributors to this work are among the most respected figures in their field.  Together, these two books offer many important insights into some of the pressing issues concerning war and justice.

In his edited collection, Professor Meron brings together an array of his earlier articles on war crimes and related subjects.  There is also a newly prepared concluding chapter.  The Tiefenbrun and Friedman collection includes contributions by Judge Claude Jorda of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and John Shattuck, Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor.  Other contributors include George J. Annas, David Stoelting, and Jean-Olivier Viout.

Coming Soon

The April 1999 issue of Books-on-Law is scheduled to contain the following:

• Two Perspectives on The Politics of Law:

• Andrew J. Morris, reviewing David Kairys, editor, The Politics of Law: A Progressive Critique (Basic Books, 3rd edition, 1998)

• Robert W. Gordon, offering a "counter-review" and response to Morris

• John C.P. Goldberg, reviewing Nan Goodman, Shifting the Blame: Literature, Law, and the Theory of Accidents in Nineteenth-Century America (Princeton University Press, 1998)

• Richard T. Ford, reviewing David Delaney, Race, Place, and the Law: 1836-1948 (University of Texas Press, 1998)

• Christine Littleton, reviewing Daphne Patai, Heterophobia (Rowman & Littlefield, 1998)

• Thomas Goldstein, reviewing Elliot E. Slotnick & Jennifer A. Segal, Television News & the Supreme Court (Cambridge University Press, 1998)

Ronald K.L. Collins & David M. Skover, Editors, Books-on-Law

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JURIST: Books-on-Law™ is edited by Ronald K.L. Collins and David M. Skover of the Seattle University School of Law.

Board of Editorial Consultants: Raj Bhala, George Washington University Law School; Miriam Galston, George Washington University Law School; Kermit Hall, Ohio State University College of Law; Yale Kamisar, University of Michigan Law School; Lisa G. Lerman, Catholic University of America School of Law; David M. O'Brien, University of Virginia Department of Government and Foreign Affairs; Judith Resnik, Yale Law School; Edwin L. Rubin, University of Pennsylvania Law School; Steven H. Shriffrin, Cornell Law School; Nadine Strossen, New York Law School; David B. Wilkins, Harvard Law School.

Administrative Assistant for Books-on-Law: Ms. Nancy Ammons

© Ronald K.L. Collins and David Skover, 1999. —————————————————————————————
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© Bernard J. Hibbitts, 1999. All rights reserved. These pages may not be copied, reposted, or republished, in whole or in part, electronically or in print, without express written permission.

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