A Justice for All: William J. Brennan, Jr., and the Decisions that Transformed America. - book reviews

Commonweal, Oct 7, 1994 by Paul A. Sracic

Several significant judicial biographies have appeared in the past few years. It would be interesting to speculate about the reasons for this. Perhaps as we continue to engage in what appears to be a national identity crisis the lives of judges, dedicated as they are to explicating the constitutional principles that hold the nation together, have a talismanic affect. It is therefore doubly interesting to find in these biographies of William Brennan and Learned Hand, that the judges themselves have such differing perspectives about the Constitution and its interpretation.

Justice Brennan and Judge Hand (though considered for years to be the "tenth justice," Hand was never elevated to the Supreme Court) are archetypical jurists for the two principal schools of legal thought. Those who advocate for "judicial restraint" are fond of quoting the late Judge Hand's statement that he would find it "irksome to be ruled by a bevy of Platonic Guardians." Alternatively, one would be hard-pressed to find a better example of Guardian-like behavior than the often countermajoritarian decisions of Justice Brennan.

As the judges differ, so too do their biographers. Kim Eisler, though knowledgeable about legal issues (in 1986 he was appointed to manage the Legal Times), is ajournalist best known for the book Shark Tank: Greed, Politics, and the Collapse of Finely Kumble. Gerald Gunther, on the other hand, is a law professor and author of a very popular textbook on constitutional law. One expects to get from Eisler a very readable popular account and he does not disappoint. A reader need bring little or no knowledge of the Supreme Court to Eisler's book and still gain some understanding of Brennan's influence on American life.