Second Thoughts: Presidential Regrets with their Supreme Court Nominations

by William T. Harper

What you see is not often what you get - especially in the field of law. And that goes for Presidents of the United States in picking the people they want to serve as Justice on the U. S. Supreme Court. When a Supreme Court having illicit sex in his judicial chambers…Is thrown into debtor’s prison – twice…Is involved in the shocking “Petticoat Affair…”Is recipient of a lifetime membership in the Ku Klux Klan…Is saying the president who nominated him should die…Is found to be lying about his military service…Is calling his President “a crippled son-of-a-bitch”…Is guilty of absolute and provable miscarriage of justice…Is voting to enhance his President’s chances of impeachment…Is deemed “partially deranged” by a colleague……a President might have second thoughts about a Justice’s qualifications for service on the Highest Court in the Land. Also, when a president later says of his nominee(s) ’s “a dumb son-of-a-bitch…”His nomination was the “biggest damn fool thing I ever did…”He has “less backbone than a banana” and when a President defines…His own four Supreme Court nominees – along with the other five members – are “bastards”……you know the President is having regrets about some of his nominations. "Second Thoughts" tells these stories and others about the “nine scorpions in a bottle,” as Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes called his brethren. Those woes and others herein are part of President Truman’s effort to “find out what make Justices of the Supreme Court tick.”Here's what some people are saying about "Second Thoughts": At Amazon (dot) com, there's a listing for Second Presidential Regrets with their Supreme Court Nominations. Among the 5-Star “Customer Reviews” for the book, is this “Refreshing. I believe I've read one too many dry legal tomes. 'Second thoughts' went down smoothly. The author hits just the right tone to lubricate the reader's travel through time from an amusing perspective. The narrator employs judicious use of tropes to liven up the material, and refrains from overindulging in speculative fiction. I highly recommend this to ALL the constitutional law profs out there as a MUST for their booklists….” Another reviewer “Harper doesn't get mired in partisan politics. Like the good reporter he once was, he just tells it like it was. He has a highly disciplined focus on the basic "second thoughts" theme. His book reveals legal savvy and is well documented.”And, said a lawyer who read "Second Presidential Regrets with their Supreme Court Nominations," “The book is very historical and beautifully written. It actually would be good for history as well as law classes. Where he gets all his info is amazing." And one other member of the legal community who read "Second Thoughts," reported that the book "sure contained a lot of stuff they never taught us in law school!" "Second Thoughts" is another of Harper's books to be recognized for laurels within the publishing world. B.R.A.G. (Book Readers Appreciation Group) awarded it the organization's much-coveted HONORS designation. And finally, for now, Nationally Syndicated Columnist Cal Thomas wrote that "'Second Thoughts' is fascinating for anyone interested in the history of the Court and our Nation and the regrets some presidents (and many of the public) have had in some of the Presidential choices."

360 pages, Paperback

First published August 28, 2011

Reviews

[gj indieBRAG · Rating 5 out of 5]

We are pleased to announce that Second Thoughts: Presidential Regrets with Their Supreme Court Nominations has been honored with a 2012 B.R.A.G.Medallion!