Rating: 
Summary: A story of justice and the function of the Supreme Court.
Review: What is this institution that is called the Supreme Court of the United States? Does it make law? Does it influence society? How do they come to a decision? Are their decisions final? How do they decide to review a case? Who represents the government? Who represents the client who brings the case to the court for review? All these questions and more are answered in the Gideon's Trumpet. The book brings to the reader an appreciation that although our society includes some laws that are flawed, the Supreme Court stands as a safety valve, relieving those intolerable social pressures that build up when legislatures are unresponsive to the urgent needs of society.Racial tensions in our society may not be as explosive as they were in the 1960's, but they are still evident. Can you imagine if the Supreme Court had failed to take the stand they did against Congress, and many Southern legislatures on the complex issues it has faced over the last 50 years? I cannot imagine the court failing us on such complex issues as the right to vote, to serve on juries, to use public facilities, and to obtain adequate integrated education, But if it had, I am afraid racial tensions today would be much more precarious than what they appear to be. Gideon's Trumpet contrasts the Supreme Court, and the functions of the legislatures. An important difference between the Supreme Court and legislatures is that the Supreme Court deals with individuals, and legislatures deal with large abstractions. A legislature may find it desirable to pass a statue to deport aliens who once belonged to an infamous group, such as the Communist part, But when the law is applied to a senior citizen who came to this country when he was sixth months old and during his youth briefly joined the party, the moral considerations seem very different. The Supreme Court can then look into the constitutionality of the law as applied to the individual. If the Supreme Court finds the application of the law unconstitutional on the individual, in essence it passes a law describing bad law. Gideon's Trumpet also gives the reader an insight into the identities of two counsels who argued the case before the Supreme Court and what they thought about the challenge. Both counsels came from different backgrounds and levels of experience. Abe Fortas, who represented Gideon was over 50 years old when he accepted the case. He recognized that the current of legal history was moving with him. Most importantly he was not overly confident, and recognized that the issue Gideon was bringing before the court was a constitutional case of fundamental importance that would affect relationships between the federal and state governments. Because of this he knew that for the good of the country he had to get unanimity in the court, although he believed his chances were slim to get nine justices to agree with him. A footnote on Fortas. In 1965 he was appointed to the Supreme Court by President Johnson and later was nominated to the Chief Justice. He resigned the Court in 1969. On the other side, defending to keep Gideon in jail was a much younger an inexperienced lawyer, an Assistant Attorney General, Bruce Robert Jacob, from the state of Florida. Unlike Fortas, he did not have a power law firm for research and support, and was left on his own to develop and make arguments. He knew he had a weak argument for the times, but wanted to do the best under the circumstances. It troubled him that the case was supposedly very important to the states and he did not want to be blamed for loosing the case. He turned to the states for assistance and asked them to provide briefs to the court. However, their support was tepid and not really helpful. In summary, Gideon's Trumpet chronicles the story of a poor, uneducated man who was heard by the Court. Unaided by the bar he wrote the Supreme Court asking that his case be heard. He succeeded because the Court itself was struggling with the issue he declared, and it was searching for the right case to overturn a bad decision they had made twenty of so years earlier. For his individual plight, Gideon could not have asked for better timing. The book describes that fairness in justice ultimately prevails, and it affirms that something things in life occur because of the right timing. rdl 7/4/99
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