The Oath

From the prizewinning author of The Nine , a gripping insider's account of the momentous ideological war between the John Roberts Supreme Court and the Obama administration.

From the moment John Roberts, the chief justice of the United States, blundered through the Oath of Office at Barack Obama's inauguration, the relationship between the Supreme Court and the White House h...

From the prizewinning author of The Nine , a gripping insider's account of the momentous ideological war between the John Roberts Supreme Court and the Obama administration.

From the moment John Roberts, the chief justice of the United States, blundered through the Oath of Office at Barack Obama's inauguration, the relationship between the Supreme Court and the White House has been confrontational. Both men are young, brilliant, charismatic, charming, determined to change the course of the nation—and completely at odds on almost every major constitutional issue. One is radical; one essentially conservative. The surprise is that Obama is the conservative—a believer in incremental change, compromise, and pragmatism over ideology. Roberts—and his allies on the Court—seek to overturn decades of precedent: in short, to undo the ultimate victory FDR achieved in the New Deal.

This ideological war will crescendo during the 2011-2012 term, in which several landmark cases are on the Court's docket—most crucially, a challenge to Obama's controversial health-care legislation. With four new justices joining the Court in just five years, including Obama's appointees Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, this is a dramatically—and historically—different Supreme Court, playing for the highest of stakes.

No one is better positioned to chronicle this dramatic tale than Jeffrey Toobin, whose prize-winning bestseller The Nine laid bare the inner workings and conflicts of the Court in meticulous and entertaining detail. As the nation prepares to vote for President in 2012, the future of the Supreme Court will also be on the ballot.

杰弗里·图宾（Jeffrey Toobin，1960— ）

《纽约客》杂志专职作家，有线电视新闻网（CNN）首席法律分析师。图宾曾任《哈佛法律评论》编辑，于1986年以最优成绩获哈佛大学法学院法律博士学位，先后担任独立检察官劳伦斯·沃尔什的助理顾问、纽约市布鲁克林区的联 邦助理检察官。1993年加入《纽约客》。

图宾其他已出版作品包括：《九人：美国最高法院风云》《开庭陈述：美国诉奥利弗·诺斯案》《辛普森案：一场世纪审判》《莱温斯基事件真相：一个没有英雄的故事》《法庭上的巅峰对决》。图宾曾获美国律师协会银法槌奖、J. 安东尼·卢卡斯非虚构作品奖。

于霄（译者）

上海师范大学副教授，律师。译著有《在世界与我之间》《我知道笼中鸟为何歌唱》《无辜的人：一个美国小镇上的谋杀与冤案》《正义的慈悲：美国司法中的苦难与救赎》等。