A definitive history of the U.S. Supreme Court details the evolution of the legal institution from the early days of the American Republic to the present day, offering profiles of the justices, the Court's years under each Chief Justice, its influence on American life, and the issues, cases, and decisions they handled from the perspective of the time in which they came before the Court.

Product Description: A signal, violent event in the history of the United States Congress, the caning of Charles Sumner on the Senate floor embodied the complex North-South cultural divide of the mid-nineteenth century. Williamjames Hull Hoffer's vivid account of the brutal act demonstrates just how far the sections had drifted apart and explains why the coming war was so difficult to avoid...read more