State Laws

For thirty years, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Linda Greenhouse chronicled the activities of the U.S. Supreme Court and its justices as a correspondent for the New York Times. In this Very Short Introduction, she draws on her deep knowledge of the court's history and of its written and unwritten rules to show listeners how the Supreme Court really works.

Since the Supreme Court's 1984 decision in Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council, this judicial review has been highly deferential: courts must uphold agency interpretations of unclear laws as long as these interpretations are "reasonable." But the Chevron doctrine faces backlash from constitutional scholars and, now, from Supreme Court justices who insist that courts, not administrative agencies, have the authority to say what the law is. Recognizing that Congress cannot help relying on agencies to carry out laws, Merrill rejects the notion of discarding the administrative state.

In 1802, President Thomas Jefferson distilled a leading idea in the early American republic and wrote of a wall of separation between church and state. That metaphor has come down from Jefferson to 21st-century Americans through a long history of jurisprudence, political contestation, and cultural influence. This book traces the development of the concept of separation of church and state and the Supreme Court's application of it in the law.

Using his unique lens as a critical race theorist and law professor, Khaled A. Beydoun captures the many ways in which law, policy, and official state rhetoric have fueled the frightening resurgence of Islamophobia in the US.

Grimeswood, Alabama. After midnight as a heavy fog rolls in... When one of the town's finest residents, a sleepy sheriff's deputy, pulls over a mysterious car on a dark stretch of backwoods highway, he comes face to face with a deathly enchanting vampire of the night, the Empress of the Rose. But upon inspection of the vehicle and its strange driver, Oli Reeves just won’t hear what the lady has to say, nor does he heed the cryptic advice of the letters she uses as identification. A supernatural tale of the occult with creeping thorns based on the knowledge and imagery of the Tarot.

Indian peoples made some 400 treaties with the United States between the American Revolution and 1871, when Congress prohibited them. They signed nine treaties with the Confederacy, as well as countless others over the centuries with Spain, France, Britain, Mexico, the Republic of Texas, Canada, and even Russia, not to mention individual colonies and states. In retrospect, the treaties seem like well-ordered steps on the path of dispossession and empire. The reality was far more complicated.

Time and again, when confronted with serious challenges to their power and privilege, white Christian nationalists seek solace—and satisfaction—in state-supported forms of vigilantism. Vigilante Nation tells this story of the American Right marginalizing, subordinating, and disenfranchising the increasingly diverse and cosmopolitan members of the American polity. This book exposes the vigilantes’ plans, explains their methods—everything from book bans to anti-abortion bounties to attacks on government proceedings, including elections—and underscores the stakes.

Bought a car without a title? Don’t panic — fix it. Whether the seller lost the title, it was never transferred, or the paperwork is a mess, No Title? No Problem gives you the exact steps to legally title a vehicle in all 50 states — even if you don’t have a bill of sale. Inside this guide, you'll learn: How to get a bonded title or court-ordered title What to do if the car was abandoned, inherited, or never titled in the seller’s name How to track down the last titled owner (with sample letters!) When and how to use the Vermont loophole Legal options for tribal registration, ...

History remembers John Adams as a Founding Father and our country’s second president. But in the tense years before the American Revolution, he was still just a lawyer, fighting for justice in one of the most explosive murder trials of the era. On the night of March 5, 1770, shots were fired by British soldiers on the streets of Boston, killing five civilians. The Boston Massacre has often been called the first shots of the American Revolution.

Yes, they are watching, but with the right knowledge, you can escape the grid. Inside, you’ll discover secrets the government doesn’t advertise: the tricks of creating new identities from thin air, the art of misdirection (laying false trails to send manhunts the wrong way, and the gritty reality of living under the radar. Each chapter tackles a new obstacle in your path to invisibility. Worried about your digital footprint? Learn how to erase or encrypt the data that’s tagging along behind you. (One former skip-tracer shares how he found anyone online – and how you can stop people ...

Americans revere the Constitution even as they argue fiercely over its original toleration of slavery. Some historians have charged that slaveholders actually enshrined human bondage at the nation's founding. The acclaimed political historian Sean Wilentz shares the dismay but sees the Constitution and slavery differently. Although the proslavery side won important concessions, he asserts, antislavery impulses also influenced the framers' work. Far from covering up a crime against humanity, the Constitution restricted slavery's legitimacy under the new national government.

Buying the Vote analyzes the rise and decline of campaign finance reform by tracking the evolution of both the ways in which presidential campaigns have been funded since the late nineteenth century. Through close examinations of major Supreme Court decisions, Mutch shows how the Court has fashioned a new and profoundly inegalitarian definition of American democracy.

Robert Hurley was an Iowa State Trooper from 1979 to retirement in 2005. Born and raised in Dubuque, Iowa and graduating from Wahlert High School, he had enlisted in the US Air Force and worked as security police in Japan for several years. After service, he earned a bachelor degree in criminal justice at the University of Nebraska and worked on the police force in LaVista, Nebraska, later joining the Iowa State Patrol. Through all these years, Hurley kept a journal of his experiences. Here are his stories.

Shortly after a dismembered torso was discovered by a pond outside Philadelphia in 1887, investigators homed in on two suspects: Hannah Mary Tabbs, a married, working-class Black woman, and George Wilson, a former neighbor whom Tabbs implicated after her arrest. As details surrounding the shocking case emerged, both the crime and ensuing trial - which spanned several months - were featured in the national press. The trial brought otherwise taboo subjects such as illicit sex, adultery, and domestic violence in the Black community to public attention.

In the first of the three volumes of his projected comprehensive narrative history of the role of law in America from the colonial years through the twentieth century, G. Edward White takes up the central themes of American legal history from the earliest European settlements through the Civil War.

In this sweepingly ambitious volume, the nation's foremost experts on the American presidency and the US Constitution join together to tell the intertwined stories of how each American president has confronted and shaped the Constitution. Each occupant of the office - the first president to the 44th - has contributed to the story of the Constitution through the decisions he made and the actions he took as the nation's chief executive.

On a hot day in July 1919, five black youths went swimming in Lake Michigan, unintentionally floating close to the white beach. An angry white man began throwing stones at the boys, striking and killing one. Racial conflict on the beach erupted into days of urban violence that shook the city of Chicago to its foundations. This mesmerizing narrative draws on contemporary accounts as it traces the roots of the explosion that had been building for decades in race relations, politics, business, and clashes of culture.

Mahala: the Darkness Saga is the prequel to Darkness: A Slave's Story and the sixth book in that series. The latest addition to the saga takes us back to the beginning where Mahala's mother, Trini, is a young slave on a farm owned by an elderly couple, Ebenezer and Corabelle Smith. The Smiths have decided to free their slaves and gift their farm to them upon their deaths. Trini, her husband, Scotty, and the other slaves wait with mixed feelings as events unfold and change their somewhat comfortable lives forever. After her birth, Mahala is sold to Zeke and Mary Jennings, who raise her as ...

In his meteoric, 13-year rise to fame, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. led a mass movement for civil rights - with his relentless peaceful, non-violent protests, public demonstrations, and eloquent speeches. But as violent threats cast a dark shadow over Dr. King's life, Swanson hones in on James Earl Ray, a bizarre, racist prison escapee who tragically ends King's life.

When Abortion Was a Crime is the must-listen book on abortion history. Originally published ahead of the thirtieth anniversary of Roe v. Wade, this award-winning study was the first to examine the entire period during which abortion was illegal in the United States, beginning in the mid-nineteenth century and ending with that monumental case in 1973. When Abortion Was a Crime is filled with intimate stories and nuanced analysis, demonstrating how abortion was criminalized and policed—and how millions of women sought abortions regardless of the law.