Joanne R. Reitano

Charles Evans Hughes led a remarkable life. He was a lawyer, governor of New York, associate justice of the United States Supreme Court, Republican presidential nominee (losing narrowly to Woodrow Wilson in 1916), secretary of state under Warren Harding, and, finally, Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court. This is tough for a biographer because they have to be comfortable writing about diverse topics. Typically, academically trained historians specialize in one of these fields show more (political, diplomatic, legal), which is likely why it took so long for an historian to summon the courage to write a comprehensive life of Hughes that touches all of these areas. Moreover, there was a staggering amount of research needed to do required to pull it off. This alone warrants admiration for the author, Joanne Reitano. Overall, I think, that this book succeeds in making the case that Hughes was an important person whose life is worth reading about. show less