From his historic governorship to his pivotal years as chief justice to his role as chairman of the commission that investigated the assassination of John F. Kennedy, Warren traversed the Depression and the Cold War, the struggles to defend America against foreign enemies, and the emergence of a muscular commitment to individual liberty. As chief justice from 1953 to 1969, Warren refashioned the place of the Supreme Court in American life, overseeing cases that desegregated schools (Brown v. Board of Education), established a constitutional right of privacy (Griswold v. Connecticut), outlawed prayer in public schools (Engel v. Vitale), created a right to counsel in state trials (Gideon v. Wainwright), codified voting rights (Baker v. Carr), and revolutionized police procedure (Miranda v. Arizona).
Through those cases, Warren became a target for conservative ideologues, but he also carved a place for himself as one of the Court's most respected justices and reconstructed American society into the institutions and values it upholds today. James S. Newton brings readers the first truly complete consideration of Earl Warren, taking advantage of unprecedented access to governmental, academic, and private documents pertaining to Warren's life, as well as the extensive cooperation of Warren's living children and associates. Newton illuminates both the public and the private Warren, the father of six whose own father was murdered, the stoic leader of the Masons who was touched by the difficulties of children, the sturdy yet prickly man.
The result is a monumental biography of a complicated and principled figure that will become a seminal work of twentieth-century American history.
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Background Information
Chief Justices of the Supreme Court, whose appointments are for life, have a single vote in decisions but are instrumental in forming court opinions. After the outbreak of World War II, anti-Japanese feeling was intense on the West Coast and Japanese-Americans were interned for the duration of the conflict. The Supreme Court is the highest judicial body in the country, and judges the actions of citizens and governments alike on the basis of the Constitution. The principle of "separate but equal" education, a mainstay of segregation in the Deep South, was overturned by the Supreme court in the case of Brown v. Board of Education. All justices of the Supreme Court have a single vote in decisions and all but the Chief Justice are known as Associate Justices.