Nine Black Robes: Inside the Supreme Court’s Drive to the Right and Its Historic Consequences

CNN legal analyst Biskupic (The Chief) updates the inner workings of the U.S. Supreme Court. Previously, Bob Woodward and Scott Armstrong’s The Bretheren and Jeffrey Toobin’s The Nine revealed the discord behind the cloak of collegiality. This book is a middle-ground between Woodward’s chronological discussion of significant cases and Toobin’s engaging analysis of the rise of the Federalist Society and its effect on the Court. Biskupic shows how the Senate’s rejection of vocal conservative Robert Bork led to conservative justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Samuel Alito, Brett Cavanagh, and Amy Coney Barrett. The book benefits greatly from interviews with Don McGahn, Donald Trump’s White House counsel who worked with the Federalist Society to place its members on the bench. The book remains a study of the workings of the Court, not in-depth profiles of the judges and how they think. Overall, this is an even-handed, well-written look at the U.S. Supreme Court, with the author despairing of the conservative takeover and lack of compromise.