Five Chiefs: A Supreme Court Memoir

by John Paul Stevens

When he resigned last June, Justice Stevens was the third longest serving Justice in American history (1975-2010)--only Justice William O. Douglas, whom Stevens succeeded, and Stephen Field have served on the Court for a longer time. In Five Chiefs , Justice Stevens captures the inner workings of the Supreme Court via his personal experiences with the five Chief Justices--Fred Vinson, Earl Warren, Warren Burger, William Rehnquist, and John Roberts--that he interacted with. He reminisces of being a law clerk during Vinson's tenure; a practicing lawyer for Warren; a circuit judge and junior justice for Burger; a contemporary colleague of Rehnquist; and a colleague of current Chief Justice John Roberts. Along the way, he will discuss his views of some the most significant cases that have been decided by the Court from Vinson, who became Chief Justice in 1946 when Truman was President, to Roberts, who became Chief Justice in 2005. Packed with interesting anecdotes and stories about the Court, Five Chiefs is an unprecedented and historically significant look at the highest court in the United States.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Law, Politics, Memoir, Biography, Legal

292 pages, Hardcover

First published October 3, 2011

About the author

John Paul Stevens, J.D. (Northwestern University School of Law, 1945; B.A., English, University of Chicago, 1941), served as a Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, 1970–1975. President Gerald R. Ford nominated him as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and he took his seat December 19, 1975. Justice Stevens retired from the Supreme Court on June 29, 2010.

Reviews

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

After reading the recent judicial memoir by former Associate Justice John Paul Stevens, I was eager to get my hands on more of his writing. This piece serves as another such legal/judicial memoir, though its focus is much narrower and anecdotes fewer in number. Stevens uses this book to focus primarily on the five Chief Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) with whom he had personal interactions, a daunting and interesting task in equal measure. Opening the book, Stevens gives readers a brief backstory about the other Chiefs and their legacy, from political and historical happenings durning their tenure at the Court, as well as some of the most important cases that came before SCOTUS. Stevens also spends a little time telling the reader how the role of Chief Justice differs from the other Justices on the Court and how more recent holders of the office used their role to shape America outside of the legal decisions made there. Once Stevens is ready to tackle those legal leaders who influenced him personally, the anecdotes come out, as well as discussions of key cases that came to the Court during these tenures. These cases are, at times analysed and their decisions commented upon with Stevens’ own editorialising. From the clerking with Justice Fred Vincent, Stevens developed his passion for all things SCOTUS. These were the post-war years of the Court, when constitutional discussions became more heated and complicated. Stevens speaks about the fraternal nature of clerks and Justices, working together effectively to push forward the legal agenda. The arrival of Earl Warren changed the flavour of the Court significantly, as can be seen through the analysis of many legal scholars. Many important cases were argued and decided under the Warren Court, pushing a liberal interpretation of the US Constitution. Warren Burger brought the pendulum swinging back and served as Chief when Stevens was eventually appointed to the Court. Some say that Burger sought to claw the more conservative and ‘law and order’ approach back to the Court, though Stevens is openly critical about the lack of structure and leadership that Burger had over the other Justices. He would often cajole and choose which side to support last, ensuring he was usually in the majority. He was also known to push for the vilification of certain Justices, turning them into the Court’s public face of a decision that would not parallel the sentiments of society. After a hasty departure by Burger, William Rehnquist took over in the latter part of the 1980s, a time when Stevens feels the Court came into its own and its impartiality was evident. Rehnquist was passionate about structure the the image of the Court, but also wanted to ensure the Justices had their voice. A stickler for the rules, Rehnquist stuck by time limits and did not enjoy repetition when it could be avoided. His death while still Chief struck all those around the Court very hard, but also paved the way for a new and vibrant generation, in the form of John Roberts. During the final years of Stevens’ tenure on the Court, Roberts sought to fill the shoes of his predecessor, while also carving out his own unique approach. Stevens explores many of the interesting cases that came before the Court during this time, including the reinvigoration of debates on capital punishment, the Second Amendment (gun control), and election spending. In his closing remarks, Stevens offers readers a view of life as a retired Justice and how the Court continues to respect those who left. While there was surely much change for Stevens and the country under these five men, there is sure to be a great deal more, especially once a woman assumes the role of Chief Justice. A great approach to the modern SCOTUS and great complimentary piece to The Making of a Justice, the new and thorough memoir to which I referred earlier. Highly recommended to those who love the law and its interpretation, as well as readers who have an interest in the Supreme Court.

I realise the law and constitutional discussions are not for everyone and this book is especially heavy on both accounts. Modern discussions of the core political rules of the American Republic can have many nuances that pull some readers in, particularly when juxtaposing the styles of the five men who served as Chief Justice during much of the discussion. Stevens seeks to draw many of the parallels, as well as keen differences here. The attentive reader will realise that the flavour of each Chief-led Court varies greatly on the types of cases that arrived and the other eight Justices who served alongside their leader. Stevens effectively presents cogent summaries of the cases throughout, a shorter summary that his full memoir, helping the reader to better understand many of the intricate details of the legal arguments, the struggles that occurred for the Justices as they sought to decide in conference, and society’s reaction to the rulings. While there is some technical nature to the cases and the overall narrative, it is easy enough to follow for those with an interest in the topics. Full of personal asides and anecdotes that are not captured in the decisions rendered from the bench, Stevens adds new angles to the memoir that may not be familiar to everyone. This added education adds depth and piques my curiosity to find even more in the coming months to understand the delicate balance between personalities and ideologies that shaped SCOTUS for the 35 years Justice John Paul Stevens was an active member.

Kudos, Justice Stevens, for a stellar, while also shorter, memoir that kept my attention from cover to cover. I thoroughly enjoyed this piece and will find the last piece you’ve written to discover even more of your views.

Love/hate the review? An ever-growing collection of others appears at:
http://pecheyponderings.wordpress.com/

A Book for All Seasons, a different sort of Book Challenge: https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/...

[Lorna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Five Chiefs: A Supreme Court Memoir was a delightful look at the musings and experiences of one of the longest-serving associate supreme court justices from the time of his appointment by President Gerald Ford in 1975 to the time of his retirement in 2010. Justice Stevens shares how as a young law student in 1945, he was so taken with the experiences that a beloved constitutional law professor, Nathaniel Nathanson, shared of many of the supreme court justices and landmark decisions he had witnessed. It is in this vein, that Justice Stevens imparts to us his experiences over the years with Chief Justices Fred Vinson and Earl Warren as well as his experiences in serving with Supreme Court Chief Justices Warren Burger, William Rehnquist, and John Roberts. Although rambling at times, one must feel grateful for the opportunity of sharing in all of these experiences and the thought processes behind so many landmark decisions. Besides you can't help but smile at the photo on the cover portraying Justice Stevens' engaging smile and signature bow tie.

"As a postscript to my brief comments about the first twelve leaders of the Supreme Court, I should add my opinion that five chiefs stand out as national leaders entitled to our highest respect: John Jay, John Marshall, William Howard Taft, Charles Evans Hughes, and Harlan F. Stone."

[Vanessa · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ehhhhhhh. Even in the realm of reading something as an homage to a jurist I very much admire, this was kind of a snooze. I still love you, Justice Stevens! I wore a bow-tie for your birthday! But your book is not that good.

[Jim Talbott · Rating 5 out of 5]

I gave this book a much better rating than most other readers, so I feel like I should explain why. 1. I'm a total Supreme Court gossip junky, and this has lots of little details about the justices and their spouses. 2. People want this book to be like Toobin's "The Nine," but I like that when you're reading Stevens, you know he's making himself look good because he wrote it. Whereas in Toobin's book, the people who agreed to divulge dirt on other justices got to look good, but you really had to read between the lines to figure that out. 3. Stevens goes out of his way to describe an ideal of jurisprudence in which concern for the institution of law, which includes justices being constrained by stare decisis, overrides personal ideology and a vision of the court in which collegiality continues in the face of deep ideological differences. He quite clearly understands that certain aspects of the court provide a type of theater that is meant to strengthen our faith in our legal institutions. Though that faith may appear quaint in this era of people on the right and left having lost faith in our public institutions, I strongly agree with Justice Stevens that it is a faith worth aspiring to and fortifying.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's telling that after serving on the bench for 35 years and retiring at 90, Justice Stevens publishes a Supreme Court memoir mostly about five other guys. Stevens does take the opportunity to disagree, a lot. But he remains constructive in his disagreement, which is an achievement considering how crucial the issues are (the death penalty, campaign finance and gun control). His criticism is unequivocal but he still doesn't harp on Citizens United (though he does refer us to his 90-page dissent). His treatment of Bush v. Gore is extremely pragmatic: he tells us that voting to deny the stay (which would have instituted the Florida recount) was a no-brainer, but as nothing more can be done about it, he declines to comment on the end result. Not even a glib aside, because Justice Stevens is too awesome for that. He saves his real energy for the Eleventh Amendment and sovereign immunity, which apparently really rile him up. Who knew?

I wish he had spoken about his Fourth Amendment jurisprudence (he authored Gant and never even mentions it!) but then, his focus is never on himself and primarily on what he feels must change. I'm almost (but not really) glad he retired before the Court decided Maryland v. King, the DNA collection case; he mentions being impacted by DNA evidence exonerating death row inmates, and if he had voted with the majority in King, I might have cried.

Reading this satisfied the law itch I didn't know I had. Now if I had only realized I could read books about the law instead of actually practicing it, where would I be?? Though I definitely geeked out when Justice Stevens refers to his "most frequently cited opinion." It's just super exciting to be one of the hundreds of thousands of lawyers who have cited it.

Trivia I learned: Justice Stevens' appointment to the Court was opposed by the National Organization of Women!

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book. Not a law professor’s book; not even the sort of law professor’s book that’s written for a lay audience. Nor does it get deep into the weeds the way Edward Lazarus’s Closed Chambers did. Instead, it was like a casual conversation with someone who was deeply involved in writing the world we live in.

It’s mostly conversational, but emotion does bubble up. On the retirement of Justice Thurgood Marshall, who he clearly had great respect for:
“Thurgood’s retirement may well have been the most significant judicial event of Bill Rehnquist’s tenure as chief justice. When I reflect on its importance, I think first about my memories of his contributions to our conferences and his personal friendship, and second about the changes in the Court’s jurisprudence that are attributable to his successor, Clarence Thomas.” (186) . . . “The importance of the change in the Court’s jurisprudence that is directly attributable to the choice of Clarence Thomas to fill the vacancy created by Thurgood’s retirement cannot be overstated. . . . [D]ecisions made by five-to-four votes in which Clarence was a member of the majority are evidence of that importance because I am convinced that Thurgood would have voted with the four dissenters in most, if not all, of them While Thurgood’s jurisprudence reflected an understanding that the Constitution was drafted ‘to form a more perfect Union’ – and thus to accommodate unforeseen changes in society – Justice Thomas’s repeated emphasis on historical analysis seems to assume that we should view the Union as perfect in the beginning and subject to improvement only by following the cumbersome process of amending the Constitution. Three five-to-four decisions in which Clarence provided the critical vote to invalidate federal gun control laws illustrate the point.” (187-88)

Which is a wonderful articulation of how the judge’s understanding of the constitution impacts the bottom line decision. Is it an instrument of the ongoing Enlightenment, or was it ghost written by the divine or invisible hand? I know what I believe, or at least, which tentative hypothesis I’m operating under. But I can’t say I’m without sympathy for the pragmatic view that giving judges the ability to announce what the Constitution really means amounts to an enormous delegation of power to those wearing the black robes. It’s all a rich tapestry. Movin’ on.

We spent weeks on Seminole Tribe in Federal Courts once upon a time. That’s the case where the court, via Chief Justice Rehnquist, found states had a type of constitutional sovereign immunity implicit in the Eleventh Amendment. The Eleventh Amendment says “The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.” The conservative majority of the court found this prevented the Seminole Tribe of Florida from suing the State of Florida for violation of its federal statutory rights. My eyes glaze over trying to remember the court’s reasoning now (amazing how rarely people ask state courts to figure out such things). Stevens is comparatively scathing in his condemnation of the chief’s reasoning, observing ““Depriving a state of the mysterious right to protect its dignity from its own citizens is equally necessary to protect the federal rights of those citizens.” (196). Which, if you know the embarrassing history of the 14th Amendment in federal courts during Reconstruction, is a devastating critique. Stevens is almost Hitchens-esque in his final observation on Seminole Tribe: “Like the gold stripes on his robes, Chief Justice Rehnquist’s writing about sovereignty was ostentatious and more reflective of the ancient British monarchy than our modern republic. I am hopeful that his writings in this area will not be long remembered.” (197).

In the USSC, when the chief is in the dissent, the senior judge in the majority makes the writing assignment. Stevens is dead on when he observed that “I do think I hit the nail on the head in at least three important cases (Blakely v. Washington, Romer v. Evans, and Grutter v. Bollinger) in which the chief was in the dissent. Despite vigorous dissent in each, these three excellent opinions will, I am confident, pass the test of time with flying colors.” (238) “Justice Kennedy’s opinion for the court in Romer v. Evans (1996) . . . sounded the death knell to Bowers v. Hardwick, the 1986 cases holding that the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment did not forbid Georgia from making it a crime for same-sex couples to engage in conduct that was assumed to be lawful for heterosexuals. By making mere animus toward a group an inadequate rationale for a discriminatory law under the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, Romer suggested that a criminal prohibition of homosexual sodomy would likely be struck down if challenged on equal protection grounds. Seven years later, in Lawrence v. Texas (2003), Justice O’Connor took this position.” (239-40). I can’t say I have never cursed Blakely and wished the court hadn’t just admitted it made a mistake, or at least, suffered a failure of imagination, when it said that legislatures could simply declare what was an element, what was a sentencing factor, but I cannot quarrel with its bottom line. The State should prove its case to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt, not persuade a judge on a preponderance standard. That works for me. Which they’d pointed that out A LITTLE EARLIER.

He also alludes to Parents Involved, a case I spent no little time on once upon a time. And because of him, I know that President Ford and I have more similar feelings than I realized.

A good book. Glad I read it. It won’t be on my shelf next to Cardozo’s The Nature of the Judicial Process, metaphorically, but it was still fascinating to see this sort of exploration of how the court operates.

Geoff Stone’s review is spot on. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/geoffre.... I'm not sure I have the same edition Good Reads had since the page count is off.

[Megan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoying this book is going to depend entirely on how fascinating you find Supreme Court procedures and rulings. If you are interested in personalities and gossip of high-powered Washington insiders, you will only get glimpses. Stevens, it seems, is a gentleman. He rates each of the Chief Justices under whom he worked (either as clerk, arguing advocate, or fellow justice). Stevens seems to strive to combine accuracy with tact and fairness in his analyses. He includes strengths and weaknesses for everyone in both rulings and Court management. He spends the bulk of the book discussing various rulings that he feels were significant under each chief, and cases he thinks exemplify the style of each chief. If you find Constitutional interpretation interesting (which I usually do), then you'll enjoy most of this book. Thrown among these cases are explanations of procedure and set-up which are sometimes interesting and sometimes more than I really needed to know. There are also the occasional looks at personalities and lightly humorous anecdotes. I'm sure Stevens could have provided more, and for many readers, it would have been nice to feel a greater connection to the people than the cases. However, Stevens obviously values the work of the Supreme Court over gossip, as well he should.

[Andy Miller · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting perspective by Justice Stevens on his time on the court; the focus on the Five Chief Justices that he knew including the three that he served with on his time of the court. There is some irony on this focus in that after leaving aside the administrative parts of the job, a theme of Stevens is that the Chief Justice is just one of nine in deciding the major legal issues facing our country.

While the book includes discussion of the legal issues and the perspective of Stevens on the major cases decided during his tenure including the origin and benefits of each Justice shaking every other Justice's hand before oral argument, the physical layout of the Court including the proximity of the lawyers to the Justices in oral argument, and the role of clerks and staff and description of the conferences and circulation of opinions.

What struck me the most is that Justice Stevens did not shy away from stating his disagreements with his fellow Justices during his tenure and why he believed that they came to wrong decisions and the negative consequences but that he described those disagreements with such grace and class and genuine affection for the Justices with whom he disagreed

[Cicely · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rambly schmably. I guess the description had me hoping for a slightly different kind of book - if it had been called "random thoughts on my awesome life and the people I ran into" by Justice John Paul Stevens, I was totally there. I thought there would be more about the transitions in the court from Chief to Chief, which I felt was lacking, except in a really superficial way, when Stevens seemed to remember that that is what his memoir was supposed to be detailing - accomplished with random, non-segued stuff about each chief's administrative capabilities. I had to give it three stars, because Justices of any kind give me the chills (read: they can say whatever they want, and I love them), and because I thought the historical anecdotes were delightful. I don't think I would have enjoyed the book nearly as much if I wasn't a lawyer (hahahhaa, I actually get to call myself a lawyer!) and hadn't read all of the cases that he cites. If I had to encourage a rewrite I would say TIGHTEN YOUR SHIP. But honest to god, when you're 90 years old, readers have to cut you some slack, right? Okay, that's enough.

[Catherine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perhaps only a lawyer or Supreme Court nerd could love this book, but I certainly did. Stevens writes with humor and intelligence about the Chief Justices of the Supreme Court, especially the five he has known. I particularly appreciated his bipartisan and fair minded approach, which reminds me of the now remote time when people disagreed respectfully.

[Lucy · Rating 3 out of 5]

weirdly insubstantial but enjoyed the stuff about the court’s operations. always down for slander about the majority opinion in seminole tribe tho

[RYD · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this memoir by Justice John Paul Stevens, though it suffers from an ailment that books by longtime public figures often have: it comes across in many places as too diplomatic and too unwilling to criticize.

That said, I found Stevens' perspective on Warren Burger the most interesting, since Burger has long been an object of ridicule, perhaps in part because of Bob Woodward's less-than-stellar portrait of him in "The Brethren."

It is clear that Stevens, by contrast, believes that Burger was a very good and underappreciated chief justice. Probably the only justice that Stevens has nothing good to say about is Clarence Thomas, the conservative replacement to civil rights icon Thurgood Marshall. As Stevens notes:

"The importance of the change in the Court's jurisprudence that is directly attributable to the choice of Clarence Thomas to fill the vacancy created by Thurgood's retirement cannot be overstated. ... [D]ecisions made by five-to-four votes in which Clarence was a member of the majority are evidence of that importance because I am convinced that Thurgood would have voted with the four dissenters in most, if not all, of them. While Thurgood's jurisprudence reflected an understanding that the Constitution was drafted 'to form a more perfect Union' -- and thus to accommodate unforeseen changes in society -- Justice Thomas's repeated emphasis on historical analysis seems to assume that we should view the Union as perfect from the beginning and subject to improvement only by following the cumbersome process of amending the Constitution."

[Jean · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stevens offers some engaging insight about each of the five Chief Justices he worked with, Fred Vinson, Earl Warren, Warren Burger, William Rehnquist, and John Roberts. He discussed the times, judicial approaches, opinions, respective roles on the court, administration abilities, leadership, personal and professional challenges and their relationship with colleagues. He also talks about the court as an institution. The book is a series of anecdotes, observation and musings that is enlighten and informative. Stevens made a point of explaining the strong points as well as the weakness and follies of each Chief. The beginning of the book starts with his clerkship to Justice Wiley Rutledge in 1947 under the Vinson court. When he was a clerk he tells watching Thurgood Marshall arguing, an equal protection case, before the Supreme Court and how impressed he was with Marshall’s skill. This book provides us with a glimpse of life inside the court. I read this as an e-book via my Kindle app on my Ipad.

[Pamela Okano · Rating 3 out of 5]

Chatty legal memoir by Justice Stephens about the five Chief Justices with whom he had dealings. Occasionally the discussion gets into obtuse principles of constitutional law. But there are other attractions to this book: for example, who knew that there are spitoons behind the US Supreme Court bench? Or that Justices Stephens and Breyer agreed that the Bush Campaign's application to stay the Florida recount was so frivolous that the Court would never grant it? Justice Stephens manages to roundly criticize some of the decisions by some in the conservative wing of the Court without resorting to name calling. And he didn't especially like Chief Justice Rehnquist's gold stripes, but confirms what other justices have said: that Rehnquist was a very efficient Chief Justice who was fair to all wings of the Court. A good read for lawyers and laypersons interested in the workings of the Court.

[Nicholas · Rating 2 out of 5]

Try as I might, I just couldn't finish it. I'm a fan of most popular writing about the Supreme Court--not just Toobin, but also biographies of justices. But this was just so dull. At once too detailed about some pretty mundane aspects of Stevens' life and almost too abstract about the role of the law. He also tended to talk about the intricacies of some of the major cases as if we are all necessarily familiar with them already. This was true for me for a few of them, but not most. I kept on telling myself it would get better the closer we got to the present, but I kept on being wrong. I gave up about halfway through Burger.

[Rick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Man, JP Stevens never forgets a grudge. And he never fails to describe a grudge in the politest possible terms. He spent like seventy-five pages not quite saying that CJ Rehnquist was a peacocking slacker who never read the Constitution. I love it, but you have to love that kind of stuff to love this book.

JP Stevens's editor could have used a heavier hand. Still, breezy, a quick read, and enjoyable.

Also, a good crash course on all of the terrible constitutional decisions in the last thirty years. Spoiler: Many were by Rehnquist.

[Jason · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was disappointing. I was expecting an examination of what the five Chief Justices are like and their contributions as seen by a longtime member of the court. Instead the book is partly a discussion of the chiefs but mostly its a rambling memoir, similar to but not as interesting as all the other books on recent Supreme Court history. In essence this is a way for Justice Stevens to get the last word on some cases, the outcome of which he disagrees with.

[Michael Kramer · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book focuses on the five Chief Justices that Justice Stevens had met, but also provides a short bio on all Chief Justices of the United States. The book gives a nice, behind the scenes look at the Supreme Court.

[Kathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Justice Stevens lived to 99 years of age. A Republican nominated to the Supreme Court by Gerald Ford, Stevens served from 1975 until he retired in 2010. He evolved into the court's "liberal lion" during his tenure.

In the introduction to Five Chiefs Stevens writes, "My objective in writing this book is to share memories of these men and their work.... I do not intend to provide a comprehensive review of their jurisprudence or tenures. Instead, I hope that my recollections will improve public understanding of their work and the office that they each occupied with honor and varying degrees of expertise." (p. 6)

The five chief justices that Stevens reminisces about: Fred Vinson (through the eyes of one of Vinson's clerks); Earl Warren (while a practicing lawyer, Stevens met Warren); Warren Burger (first when Stevens was a circuit judge and then when he became a Supreme Court junior justice); Bill Rehnquist (Stevens was a "contemporary colleague"); and John Roberts (Stevens was an "observer of [Roberts'] superb advocacy" and then Roberts became a justice).

In Chapter I, Stevens writes about the nation's first twelve Supreme Court chiefs.

In Chapter II the job description of the chief justice is delineated. The chief gets just a tiny bit more pay than the associates because of his (so far) additional duties. Supreme Court justices' salaries are lower than the private sector pays attorneys and Stevens wanted that to change.

In Chapters III through VII, Stevens discusses the five chiefs listed above. About each justice he tells how they made their way to the Court, some important cases that occurred during their tenure, and when Stevens felt that a decision was "unfortunate" or "correct." He discusses any operational changes that the chiefs made to the court's proceedings at the bench and/or in conference. Here and there Stevens talks a little about the personalities, interests, hobbies, and families of the chiefs, but not too much. All the while Stevens reminisces about his own life and career, the opinions he is proud of and his mistakes, and his friends and colleagues.

Chapter VIII is called "Second Among Equals." In it Stevens discusses his tenure as the most senior associate justice, from 1994 until he retired in 2010. The most senior associate is sometimes called the second among equals (the chief justice is known as the "chief among equals"). The most senior associate sometimes sits in for the chief when the chief is not available and "must often assign the preparation of Court opinions when the chief is in dissent."

Five Chiefs is nicely organized. An epilogue follows Chapter VIII. Then comes the Appendix, which is the Constitution of the United States and the "Articles to, and Amendment of, the Constitution of the United States of America, proposed by Congress, and ratified by the Legislatures of the several states, pursuant to the fifth Article of the original Constitution." It was very thoughtful to include the Constitution since, naturally, constant reference is made to it when Stevens discusses the opinions rising from the cases that came before the court. The Appendix is followed by Justice Stevens' Acknowledgements, which is followed by the index, which is followed by "About the Author."

Since I wrote a long and middle-school-ish "review," I'll include like only one interesting passage out of many from the book:

"It was in 1980 that the chief’s [Warren Burger’s] repeatedly stated views about the limited reach of the Second Amendment gained voice in Justice Blackmun’s opinion for the Court in Lewis v. United States….On a good many occasions he [Burger] went out of his way to criticize scholars who argued in favor of a broader reading of the Second Amendment. Although none of his colleagues shared his rather emotional reaction, I never heard anyone on the Court express any disagreement with his views about the Second Amendment. And in Lewis, Blackmun wrote on behalf of the Court that 'The Second Amendment guarantees no right to keep and bear a firearm that does not have ‘some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia.’ That uncontroversial statement remained an accurate characterization of the Court’s long-settled and correct understanding of the meaning of the Second Amendment up until the Court’s unfortunate decision in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), in which the Court held that the Second Amendment protects the right of individuals to keep a handgun in the home." (pp. 149-150)

[Fahad Qazi · Rating 4 out of 5]

“The chief justice of the United States has often been described as the “first among equals.” He is “equal” because, like each of his eight colleagues, he has only one vote. It takes a majority of equally powerful votes to support a decision on the merits in any case before the Court. To achieve a desired outcome, the chief justice must convince as many colleagues to join him as must any other justice.

For that reason, as Byron White—who served as an active justice for thirty-one years—frequently observed, the confirmation of any new justice creates a new Court with significantly different dynamics than its predecessor. One could argue that 2010, when Elena Kagan joined the Court as its 112th justice, marked the inauguration of the Kagan Court rather than the continuation of the Roberts Court. If so, the Court that Lewis Powell and Bill Rehnquist joined in 1972 would be better termed the Powell-Rehnquist Court than the Burger Court.”

“In some instances, the cases that the Court decided touched upon and even transformed the procedures through which the Court conducted its business. A small example of this phenomenon was United States v. Grace, a 1983 case in which we upheld the constitutionality of the statute that prohibits certain public demonstrations in the Supreme Court Building and on its grounds except insofar as it included the surrounding sidewalks. Supreme Court police officers responsible for enforcing the statute have long encountered a myriad variety of protesters. For instance, Mary Grace, one of the plaintiffs in the case, carried a four-by-two-and-a-half-foot sign on which the text of the First Amendment was written. On another occasion, a protester wore a large wooden sandwich board on which random spatterings of illegible hieroglyphics were inscribed. When the officer asked him what they meant, the demonstrator firmly responded, “That’s a secret.”

“The text of the Constitution does not mention the word dignity or the word sovereignty. It does, however, state in its preamble that one of its purposes was to "establish Justice." The term justice is not defined in either the Constitution itself or in any federal statute of which I am aware.

I shall therefore conclude by referring to two quite different ways of thinking about the idea of justice that are both described in Plato's Republic.

A serene and elderly gentleman named Cephalus accepted Socrates' suggestion that justice consisted of speaking the truth and paying one's debts, whereas Thrasymachus, a younger and more belligerent antagonist, proclaimed that "justice is nothing more than the interest of the stronger." Presumably the senior citizen would require a ruler to tell the truth and to pay its debts. For Thrasymachus, however, whenever it was in a sovereign's interest to rely on sovereign dignity as a reason for refusing to obey the law, it would be just for him to do so.

An Illinois lawyer named Abraham Lincoln shared Cephalus's thoughts about justice and my views about sovereign immunity. In his State of the Union message of 1861, he said:

It is as much the duty of Government to render prompt justice against itself, in favor of its citizens, as it is to administer the same between private individuals.”

[Bruce Cline · Rating 3 out of 5]

A limited memoir of uneven quality. Justice Stevens’ framework, that of reviewing the Supreme Court’s chief justices through his lens as a lawyer and jurist, with a focus on the last five with whom we worked in one fashion or another, might have been a monumental undertaking. Knowing that, he made no promise of any comprehensive history, but rather gave thumbnail sketches of the first twelve, focusing on overall contributions and noteworthy cases during their tenures. With the last five—Vinson, Warren, Burger, Rehnquist, and Roberts—he provides more personal and professional details and wades into his dissents and concurrences with some of the more notable or consequential court holdings. This is, after all, labeled a memoir. Additionally, he wanders into an odd assortment of observations and explanations of administrative practices, spouses’ teas, furniture arrangements, customs and courtesies, and other tangential aspects of the court. The narrative is strongest when he compares judicial philosophies and resulting holdings, but his purpose seems more to explain why decisions were rightly or wrongly decided based on his own thinking, rather than any loftier purpose. He gets downright snarky describing disagreements with Justice Clarence Thomas and Chief Justice Rehnquist. (Admittedly, those made me smile.) I’ll confess that it was a bit refreshing to read a justice’s critiques of his former colleagues rather than the extreme deference found in most justice’s writings, but overall I was disappointed in his wandering focus. I was personally pleased to read of his role in many noteworthy decisions, or admirable dissents, but that did not overcome the uneven quality of his memoir.

[Dallas Koehn · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a relatively short, accessible volume, though it’s less a history of the Court (or even its Chief Justices) than a series of personal remembrances and opinions by one of the more experienced justices of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. While structured as an overview of the Court’s history, particularly in regards to the traditional separation of “Courts” based on each new Chief Justice, it reads more like we’ve been invited to all the same dinner parties as Justice Stevens. Each time we get him talking, he has something else to share about his view of the Constitution, random cases that strike him as interesting or important, the different personalities associated with the high court over the years, or anecdotes from his personal life.

This isn’t a bad thing, but it’s the sort of book one finds interesting if already grounded in the basics of the Court and its major decisions. I’m not sure it’s a very good place to start, otherwise. I actually read this years ago as part of my effort to understand the Supremes a bit better, and found myself a bit disappointed by what struck me then as its rambling, uneven structure. Having recently read it again (and now knowing a bit more about various landmark cases and such), it’s more enjoyable than I gave it credit for. It’s still not much in the way of a useful reference tool, but it’s a nice side dish as part of a larger study of the Court.

[David Smith · Rating 3 out of 5]

A neat memoir from one of my very favorite jurists! Using a loose framing device centered on the tenures of the Supreme Court's five most recent chief justices, Stevens relates a plethora of tales from his own life and from the Court's recent history. I always deeply admired Justice Stevens as an opinion writer--not only for the values his opinions embodied but also for their lucidity--and his clarity of prose certainly carried over to this eminently readable book. I also appreciated Stevens' insights into the cloistered business of the Court as well as his relatively candid assessments of some of his contemporaries and their notable decisions. However, the book fell into something of an awkward middle ground between autobiography and history, such that it felt somewhat shallow as both an account of Stevens' life and of the Court's recent jurisprudence.

[Bonnie · Rating 3 out of 5]

John Paul Stevens has a unique perspective of the Supreme Court and its chief justices - he served on the Supreme Court for the third-longest term in American History. Along the way, he worked with and got to know five chief justices: Fred Vinson, Earl Warren, Warren Burger, William Rehnquist and John Roberts. In this book, he discusses some of their most important decisions and how they came about. The author also does a review of the other chief justices through the years. This book would be an important read for a scholar of the Supreme Court, and is also an interesting read for the rest of us.

[Melita · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some of the particulars of various cases were lost on me, but in general I liked hearing about the Supreme Court, something I don't know much about. The insider view of any Justice is interesting. He ends with a great quote by Lincoln, "It is as much the duty of Government to render prompt justice against itself, in favor of its citizens, as it is to administer the same between private individuals." Whether or not I agree with all his reasonings as a judge, I agree with his overall sentiment. Go Labbies!

[Eileen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. A very worthy effort by Justice Stevens. He eloquently and concisely explained the merits of various Supreme Court cases throughout our history, their immense significance on our society, as well as drawing back the curtain on many of the court traditions and some insight into the personalities within the Court.

I hope to someday sit in on oral arguments in person to observe.

Loved it!

[Mark Katerberg · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fairly approachable read that is far more focused on case law than on the palace intrigue. It gave me much appreciation for his humor and also a good view into which cases he found particularly interesting after the fact.

It requires a lot of reading between the lines with his sartorial understatement, but it was still a quick read that went deep on a few topics rather than trying to cover a lifetime in a couple hundred pages, which I appreciated.

[Edward Delaney · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'd give this one a star for ever Chief Justice discussed in depth. John Paul Steven may have been the best SCOTUS justice in the last century, and this should be a reading requirement in advanced legal classes.

[Simon · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really liked the parts when he writes about the inner workings of the Court.

[Dave · Rating 1 out of 5]

Terrible book - author comes across and pompous and self absorbed. Editor was completely negligent or cowed.