In the Stacks: August 28, 2012 | Sojourners

In the Stacks: August 28, 2012

Photo by Tischenko Irina/Shutterstock.com
Photo by Tischenko Irina/Shutterstock.com

Among my must reads are the Sunday New York Times Book Review and other book reviews I come across in various media outlets. There are too many books being published that I would love to read, but just don’t have the time. So, I rely on reading book reviews as one way of keeping in touch with what’s being written. 

Here is my pick of this week’s books.

“Rights at Risk”

By David K. Shipler, Reviewed by Jeffrey Rosen

“Rights at Risk” is David K. Shipler’s second book about the human stories behind the great constitutional cases that have shaped our civil liberties before and after Sept. 11, 2001. As in his first book, “The Rights of the People,” Shipler, a former chief diplomatic correspondent for the New York Times, combines a journalist’s eye for detail with a sense of moral indignation about what he argues are the many ways the U.S. legal system has curtailed the rights of the accused, many of them poor and powerless minorities. …

There are, of course, many books about the stories behind Supreme Court cases. Shipler’s distinctive contribution is the thoroughness and originality of his reporting: By interviewing the protagonists in landmark cases, he uncovers some surprising and relevant facts.

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