Paul Finkelman is President of Gratz College.
[Supreme Injustice] tells the story of three United States Supreme
Court Justices…and their ‘slavery jurisprudence.’ Each of these
men, Finkelman argues…shared the belief that antislavery agitation
undermined the legal and political structures instituted by the
Constitution… Finkelman insists that the legacy of Marshall, Story,
and Taney had enormous implications…strengthening the institutions
of slavery and embedding in the law a systemic hostility to
fundamental freedom and basic justice. These are strong
allegations… Yet the evidence adds up… Finkelman remains an
important voice in legal education and has pushed scholarly
conversations about slavery in new directions.
*Los Angeles Review of Books*
Taken together, Finkelman’s accounts of the troubling underbellies
of the Marshall, Story and Taney careers offer an unsettling
meal…This book is a useful contribution toward a fleshing out of
the lives of three men who shaped the bulk of American law in the
formative years between our independence and our descent into civil
war.
*Pittsburgh Post-Gazette*
Supreme Injustice contains no call to topple monuments or to
rewrite history books. [Finkelman] simply lays out a convincing
case that we must in thinking about our national heritage grapple
with the unsettling truths about the humanity we denied slaves and
the legal protections we gave their owners.
*Washington Times*
Paul Finkelman is by any account one of our leading historians of
American slavery and the law. His incontrovertible and startling
findings about the involvement of Justice Marshall in slave owning
and selling, and Justice Story’s pro-slavery decision in Prigg v.
Pennsylvania, are essential reading for anyone interested in
American constitutional development in the antebellum era and its
enduring influence on American law and society.
*Sanford Levinson, author of An Argument Open to All: Reading
‘The Federalist’ in the 21st Century*
Scholarly, hard-hitting and relevant. Finkelman’s book is a
must-read for those who seek to understand the permeating influence
of slavery in the development of antebellum law.
*R. Kent Newmyer, author of The Treason Trial of Aaron Burr:
Law, Politics, and the Character Wars of the New Nation*
Sheds new light on John Marshall’s activities outside the courtroom
and his jurisprudence on slavery…Using census data and other
sources, Finkelman established that Marshall frequently bought and
sold slaves during his lifetime, an uncomfortable reality glossed
over or ignored by earlier Marshall biographers.
*Law.com*
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