Justice History

Award-winning investigative journalist Chris Woods explores the secretive history of the United States' use of armed drones and their key role not only on today's battlefields but also in a covert targeted killing project that has led to the deaths of thousands.

Beset by the personal cruelties perpetrated by her husband and a society whose rules were set against her, Caroline Norton chose to fight. She channeled her energies in an area of much-needed reform: the rights of a married woman and specifically those of a mother. She campaigned tirelessly, achieving her first landmark victory with the Infant Custody Act of 1839. Provisions which are now taken for granted owe much to Caroline, who was determined to secure justice for women at all levels of society from the privileged to the dispossessed.

1910 Rhondda Valley. Poverty and hardship bite as troops are brought in to control the striking miners. Megan Williams is eighteen and in love with striker, Victor Evans, but the only work she is offered is in the lodging house catering for police and soldiers. Shunned by friends and neighbours, for working for the enemy and disowned by her father who would rather see her dead than married to a Catholic, whose father and brother are strike ringleaders. Victor and Megan find themselves fighting for the right to love one another, remain together and build a future.

Rhondda 1905: Coal is king and no colliery owner wealthier or more generous than Harry Watkin Jones. His daughter Sali is about to marry her childhood sweetheart, when tragedy strikes. Four years later Sali is a penniless outcast, fleeing from a violent husband. She finds sanctuary and work in the home of colliers. But unrest and violence blight the valleys. Caught in the conflict, Sali finds herself denying her roots, her class, and even sacrifices her son's future, for the sake of the people she has grown to love and the cause they are prepared to die for.

This nonfiction legal thriller traces the 14-year struggle of two lawyers to bring the most powerful coal baron in American history to justice. Don Blankenship, head of Massey Energy since the early 1990s, ran an industry that provides nearly half of America’s electric power. But wealth and influence weren’t enough for Blankenship and his company, as they set about destroying corporate and personal rivals, challenging the Constitution, purchasing the West Virginia judiciary, and willfully disregarding safety standards in the company’s mines - mines in which scores died unnecessarily.

War Fever explores this delirious moment in American history through the stories of three men: Karl Muck, the German conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, accused of being an enemy spy; Charles Whittlesey, a Harvard law graduate who became an unlikely hero in Europe; and the most famous baseball player of all time, Babe Ruth, poised to revolutionize the game he loved. Together, they offer a gripping narrative of America at war and American culture in upheaval.

This book revisits themes within the Pentecostal movement from the vantage point of alternative interpretations of issues that have shaped the contours of the movement within the broader Christian. It suggests that more than simply a "tongues movement," Pentecostal spirituality has something of importance to contribute to a variety of conversations.

Time Skip is a twist on the usual time travel adventure. The story centers around Curtis Lovelle who doesn't exactly travel through time, he skips back in it. Curtis is a middle aged man with a happy life. He has a good marriage and little boy who is the light of his life. He can honestly say that if he were given the opportunity to do things over again, he wouldn't change a thing. He doesn't believe in fate. In his mind, every triumph and foible is essential in the journey to where he is now. But, when he wakes up in his parent’s house, eighteen years in the past, he finds out just how ...

David Delahass has scrupulously studied his ancestor’s papers, documents, and journals, handwritten on fragile papers of centuries past…pieces of history he believes hold the answers to Jeremy’s most guarded secrets…it was just a matter of finding them.Family Shadows is the third book in the Delahass Legacy series, the continuing saga of one family’s search for answers to questions that are rooted in events that took place generations ago in the middle of the twenty-first century. Within the home that Jeremy Delahass built for his family and all those to come after him, there is a...

John Jay was a master statesman and strategic diplomat who associated with all the great men of his day in the mid-18th century. However, his contemporaries said that he was modest and humble. They indicated that they could be at a party or gathering and guests had to coax him into discussing his role during the American Revolution or as the first Supreme Court Justice of the new nation.

Two Wisconsin soldiers stationed in Kentucky escort a runaway girl to Ohio's underground railroad while ruthless slave catchers track them. They must cross 100 miles of unknown territory, outrunning their pursuers, and avoiding John Hunt Morgan’s Thunderbolt Raiders to reach Levi Coffin and the Underground Railroad. This emotional story based on true events during the American Civil War is about finding common ground, overcoming ignorance, and fighting the good fight. Soldier Boy explores the relationship between its title character, who is learning to trust again, and Sgt. Jesse Berch, ...

In The Majesty of the Law, Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor explores the law, her life as a Justice, and how the Court has evolved and continues to function, grow, and change as an American institution. Tracing some of the origins of American law through history, people, and ideas, O’Connor sheds new light on the basics, and through personal observation she explores the development of institutions and ideas we have come to regard as fundamental.

Mary Fulbrook's encompassing book explores the lives of individuals across a full spectrum of suffering and guilt, each one capturing one small part of the greater story. Using "reckoning" in the widest possible sense to evoke how the consequences of violence have expanded almost infinitely through time. Fulbrook exposes the disjuncture between official myths about "dealing with the past" and the extent to which the vast majority of Nazi perpetrators evaded responsibility.

In Breaking In, veteran journalist Joan Biskupic tells the story of how two forces providentially merged - the large ambitions of a talented Puerto Rican girl raised in the projects in the Bronx and the increasing political presence of Hispanics, from California to Texas, from Florida to the Northeast - resulting in a historical appointment. And this is not just a tale about breaking barriers as a Puerto Rican. It's about breaking barriers as a justice.

Eleanor Roosevelt, Fighter for Justice shows young listeners how the former First Lady evolved from a poor little rich girl to a protector and advocate for those without a voice. Although now seen as a cultural icon, she was a woman deeply insecure about her looks and her role in the world. But by recognizing her fears and constantly striving to overcome her prejudices, she used her proximity to presidents and her own power to aid in the fight for Civil Rights and other important causes. This biography gives listeners a fresh perspective on her extraordinary life.

In Demand the Impossible, Robert L. Tsai traces lawyer Stephen Bright's remarkable career to explore the legal ideas that were central to his relentless pursuit of equal justice. For nearly forty years, Bright led the Southern Center for Human Rights, a nonprofit that provided legal aid to incarcerated people and worked to improve conditions within the justice system. He argued four capital cases before the US Supreme Court—and won each one, despite facing an increasingly hostile bench.

For two hundred years, the constitutionality of capital punishment had been axiomatic. But in 1962, Justice Arthur Goldberg and his clerk Alan Dershowitz dared to suggest otherwise, launching an underfunded band of civil rights attorneys on a quixotic crusade. In 1972, in a most unlikely victory, the Supreme Court struck down Georgia’s death penalty law in Furman v. Georgia.

The Legal Aid Society’s mission is to advance, defend, and enforce the legal rights of low-income and otherwise vulnerable people in order to secure for them the basic necessities of life. Everyday Justice is an on-the-ground history of the Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee and the Cumberlands, the story of how national debates about access to justice have impacted the work of its lawyers, and a warning about why the federally imposed limits on that work must be lifted in order to fulfill the pledge of justice for all.

In Eisenhower vs. Warren, two-time New York Times Notable Book author James F. Simon examines the years of strife between them that led Eisenhower to say that his biggest mistake as president was appointing that "dumb son of a bitch Earl Warren." This momentous, poisonous relationship is presented here at last in one volume. Compellingly written, Eisenhower vs. Warren brings to vivid life the clash that continues to reverberate in political and constitutional debates today.

Righteous Troublemakers shines a light on everyday people called to do extraordinary things—like Pauli Murray, whose early work inspired Thurgood Marshall, Claudette Colvin, who refused to give up her seat on a segregated bus months before Rosa Parks did the same, and Gwen Carr, whose private pain in losing her son Eric Garner stoked her public activism against police brutality. Sharpton also gives his personal take on more widely known individuals, revealing overlooked details, historical connections, and a perspective informed by years of working in the social justice movement.