Description:
In this concise, timely book, constitutional law expert Stephen M. Feldman draws on neoconservative writings to explore the rise of the neocons and their influence on the Supreme Court. Neocons burst onto the political scene in the early 1980s via their assault on pluralist democracy's ethical relativism, where no pre-existing or higher principles limit the agendas of interest groups. Instead, they advocated for a resurrection of republican democracy, which declares that virtuous citizens and officials pursue the common good. Yet despite their original goals, neocons quickly became an interest group themselves, competing successfully within the pluralist democratic arena. When the political winds shifted in 2008, however, neocons found themselves shorn of power in Congress and the executive branch. But portentously, they
still controlled the Supreme Court.
Brief description: Stephen M. Feldman is the Jerry W. Housel/Carl F. Arnold Distinguished Professor of Law and Adjunct Professor of Political Science at the University of Wyoming. He is the author of Please Don't Wish Me a Merry Christmas: A Critical History of the Separation of Church and State, Free Expression and Democracy in America: A History, and Pack the Court! A Defense of Supreme Court Expansion among other titles.
Review Quotes: "A remarkably concise and accessible overview first of the rise of neoconservatism, and then of its impact on the Supreme Court. Consistently illuminating and challenging."--Sanford Levinson, author of Framed: America's 51 Constitutions and the Crisis of Governance