Nixon's Court: His Challenge to Judicial Liberalism and Its Political Consequences - Hardcover

McMahon, Kevin J.

3.67

9 ratings by Goodreads

9780226561196: Nixon's Court: His Challenge to Judicial Liberalism and Its Political Consequences

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0226561194 ISBN 13: 9780226561196

Publisher: University of Chicago Press, 2011

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Most analysts have deemed Richard Nixon’s challenge to the judicial liberalism of the Warren Supreme Court a failure—“a counterrevolution that wasn’t.” Nixon’s Court offers an alternative assessment. Kevin J. McMahon reveals a Nixon whose public rhetoric was more conservative than his administration’s actions and whose policy towards the Court was more subtle than previously recognized. Viewing Nixon’s judicial strategy as part political and part legal, McMahon argues that Nixon succeeded substantially on both counts.

Many of the issues dear to social conservatives, such as abortion and school prayer, were not nearly as important to Nixon. Consequently, his nominations for the Supreme Court were chosen primarily to advance his “law and order” and school desegregation agendas—agendas the Court eventually endorsed. But there were also political motivations to Nixon’s approach: he wanted his judicial policy to be conservative enough to attract white southerners and northern white ethnics disgruntled with the Democratic party but not so conservative as to drive away moderates in his own party. In essence, then, he used his criticisms of the Court to speak to members of his “Silent Majority” in hopes of disrupting the long-dominant New Deal Democratic coalition.

For McMahon, Nixon’s judicial strategy succeeded not only in shaping the course of constitutional law in the areas he most desired but also in laying the foundation of an electoral alliance that would dominate presidential politics for a generation.

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About the Author:

Kevin J. McMahon is the John R. Reitemeyer and Charles A. Dana Research Associate Professor of Political Science at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut. His books include Reconsidering Roosevelt on Race, also published by the University of Chicago Press and winner of the American Political Science Association’s Richard E. Neustadt Award.

Review:

“Nixon’s Court provides the most definitive account yet written of the reasoning behind President Nixon’s choices for Supreme Court justicies and the legal and electorial consequences of those choices. . . . McMahon skillfully uses a combination of archival material (including the Nixon tapes), press accounts, personal interviews, and statistical data to make a persuasive case, breaking new ground in the understanding of Nixon’s leadership and its long-term impact on judicial and partisan politics. Entwining insightful historical and legal analyses with a lively narrative, McMahon’s book is highly readable for undergraduate students and general readers as well as academics. Nixon’s Court is an outstanding contribution to presidential studies and Supreme Court history that revises the understanding of the Nixon presidency and the Republican resurgence that followed. Highly recommended.” (M. N. Green Choice)

“Nixon’s Court provides a compelling case study at the intersection of constitutional law, judicial politics and presidential studies. . . . [McMahon] shows how the larger context of American politics shaped the judicial policies of a president who cared less about waging a jurisprudential counter-revolution and more about doing whatever was necessary to remain in power.” (Frank J. Colucci Law and Politics Book Review)

“The standard view of Richard M. Nixon’s staffing of the Burger court is that of ‘a counterrevolution that wasn’t.’ Nixon’s Court by Kevin J. McMahon effectively dispels this idea and replaces it with a well-researched, tightly written critique that demonstrates that Nixon cared about two issues—busing and crime—and that he was effective in moving the Court to adopt positions close to his own. . . . [A] valuable addition to regime literature. It vividly illuminates both the Nixon presidency and the Burger court.” (L. A. Scot Powe Jr., University of Texas at Austin Journal of American History)

“McMahon’s book is valuable for insights into Nixon’s mindset in selecting his Supreme Court candidates." (Leonard H. Becker Washington Lawyer)

“[A] balanced, provocative, and engaging book. McMahon’s valuable effort to correct the record on the Nixon presidency should not go unnoticed.”
(Helena Silverstein, Lafayette College Journal of Interdisciplinary History)

“[A]n engaging and wonderfully illuminating reassessment of the president’s judicial legacy.” (Pamela Brandwein, University of Michigan Perspectives on Politics)

“[A] careful study of how a president could (and in the case of Nixon, did) use judicial policy-making, from appointments of Justices to the nuts-and-bolts of executive enforcement of the laws, to foster political objectives. . . . McMahon has an important story to tell, and he tells it well.” (Reviews in American History)

“McMahon’s excellent account of how Richard Nixon’s judicial strategy was driven by his electoral strategy provides ample evidence that constitutional law is indeed shaped by broader political forces. It also challenges some of the conventional wisdom about the impact of Nixon’s appointments and his motives for making them. . . . It is carefully and thoroughly researched and clearly argued, and offers new insights into an important era that continues to have an impact on our judicial and electoral politics. . . . [A] very fine piece of scholarship.” (Katy J. Harriger, Wake Forest University Review of Politics)

“Kevin McMahon makes excellent use of the extensive archival record and the infamous oval office tapes to provide a persuasive case that Nixon chose his nominees largely on the basis of electoral calculations. . . . Nicely researched [and] well-documented.” (Matthew J. Dickinson, Middlebury College Political Science Quarterly)

“Kevin McMahon’s skills at archival research, statistical analysis, and constitutional law analysis combine here into a superlative account of Nixon’s judicial strategy, its impact on the Court, and the corresponding implications of Court decisions on his political fortunes. McMahon’s work will force a reconsideration of Nixon’s political strategy and will broaden the focus beyond the simplistic ‘Southern Strategy’ explanations to a consideration of all components of Nixon’s New American Majority. All students of the presidency will benefit from a close reading of this work.” (Richard M. Pious, author of Why Presidents Fail)

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