Nine Black Robes: Inside the Supreme Court's Drive to the Right and Its Historic Consequences

This is a history of the Supreme Court from 2016, shortly before Trump was elected, until shortly before the book was published in 2023, a time of great consequence for the country and the court. The history is told chronologically, primarily though a discussion of the court's many consequential decisions during this period. Through the decisions, we can see during the earlier years an incremental move to the right, but more recent decisions illustrate the court's move by leaps and bounds to the right, as it abandoned many of its earlier decisions with barely a nod to the doctrine of stare decisis. Along the way, the author includes a lot of anecdotal information about the various justices and the inner workings of the court.

As we all show more remember, Trump was able to appoint a justice almost immediately after he was elected due to Mitch McConnell's unprecedented actions in blocking Obama from appointing a successor to Justice Scalia after his death nearly a year before Obama's term ended. While Trump's first appointee, Neil Gorsusch, was a far-right ideologue, so was Scalia, and his appointment did not much shift the direction of the court. And, at that time, Chief Justice Roberts seemed very conscious of his role in history, and behind the scenes was working hard to prevent the Court from issuing radical decisions, seeking ways to decide cases on the most narrow grounds, constantly stressing stare decisis, and himself casting a deciding vote preventing the radical right-wingers on the court from going too far. This trend continued even after Trump was able to appoint a second right-wing ideologue, Brett Kavenaugh, after the retirement of the more moderate Justice Kennedy.

It was the appointment of Amy Coney Barrett after the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg that emboldened the radicals on the court to refuse to compromise, to refuse to rule narrowly, to throw out stare decisis, all in favor of an extreme political agenda. The 5 right-wing conservatives on the court seemed to rally around Clarence Thomas, who is one of the most radical of the group, and Chief Justice Roberts seemed no longer in control of the group.

The book takes us up through the Dobbs decision (striking down Roe v. Wade) and to the appointment of Kitanji Brown to the court. As I was reading this book in early July, the court ended its term with decisions striking down affirmative action in education (a policy first upheld by the court when I was in law school in the early 1970's), overruling Biden's program to forgive student loans (a decision that many legal scholars see as overreaching and an entirely erroneous interpretation of the law on which Biden's forgiveness program was based), and expanding the ability of a business to discriminate against gays. As the dissent in Dobbs stated, " No one should be confident that this majority is done with its work." This was a compelling and highly readable book, even if you are not a recovering attorney, like me.

And I will note that this book ended before the revelations about the ethics violations and conflicts of interests of several of these justices (and in particular Clarence Thomas and his wife Ginni). In case you are unaware all lawyers and every federal judge is bound by a code of ethics, EXCEPT for Supreme Court justices. They have no code of ethics, just whatever they decide. And Chief Justice Roberts has indicated he has no interest in pursuing anything along these lines.

4 stars show less

As the title suggests, this book explores both the Supreme Court justices and the cases they've decided over the past decade or so. Biskupic is a journalist and long-time Supreme Court reporter for the Washington Post, and her writing is succinct and easy to follow. She weaves in brief bios, working styles, and approaches to judging for most of the current Justices. At the same time, she explores the most impactful cases decided in the past few years. It's a very current book, with analysis focused on 2016 to the present.

I follow the Court pretty religiously, so none of this was new to me, but it was really interesting to read about it all at once and see the complete picture of what is happening. It's disturbing, maddening, and sad show more for me to read about. I'm not sure if the author would agree, but I think this book really is written for the liberal audience. I can't imagine any conservatives even picking it up. If you want a summary of the impact the Court has had on society and law over the past decade, this is an excellent place to begin. show less

TW/CW: Politics, violence, sexual assault, teen pregnancy

RATING: 4/5

REVIEW: Nine Black Robes is Biskupic’s polemic on the Supreme Court during (and after) the Trump Era. She examines the composition of the court as well as the decisions, giving short biographies on each justice.

I found this to be a very depressing book. While most non-fiction books that look at our current society have some speck of hope at the end, this one did not. It left me feeling kind of gross having read it and having been brought down into the hopelessness that Biskupic clearly feels.

Nonetheless, this is a well-researched, well written, and educational book for anyone who is interest in the Supreme Court, or even just the law in modern day America. It is also show more written for the lay person who might not have any background in constitutional law.

I’m glad I read it, but I do wish it had been less doom-and-gloom at the end. show less