"The Great Decision: Jefferson, Adams, Marshall, and the Battle for the Supreme Court" by Cliff Sloan and David McKean (PublicAffairs 2009)

This was the book I brought with me when I went to visit my parents in Arizona during my school's Spring Break.  It is the first time in a long time I have gotten though an entire book in just a week.  It reminded me that I need to read more!

As a lawyer and an legal educator, I am of course familiar with the case of Marbury v. Madison.  However, I really only knew the very basics of the case and its importance in the legal history of the United States.  So I really enjoyed reading more about this obviously important case.



The US Supreme Court

In case you are unaware of this case, it is the landmark case from 1803 that gave the US judiciary the ability to determine whether laws are constitutional or not.  This is something we take for granted today but it was very much an open question early in our country's history.  Very few people at the time anticipated the strong and co-equal judicial branch we have today.  There were a lot of politics involved in the case because the actions being reviewed took place as John Adams was leaving office and Thomas Jefferson was taking Adams' place. Adams made some last minute federal appointments that Jefferson did not want to honor because there was an error in the delivery of the commissions.  The Court had to decide whether the men Adams appointed were entitled to their positions or not. 

I read a lot of historical non-fiction books and sometimes they can have a very academic and thereby dry feeling to them.  Fortunately, this book did not fall into that category.  It was a pretty fast read and it flowed really well in a story-like manner.  I really enjoyed reading it and found it hard to put down when I got into the meat of it.  I learned a lot of new things about the case.  I am going to add this to my list of books that I recommend to my paralegal students if they are interested in legal history.

"A Brief History of Ireland: Land, People, History" by Richard Killeen (Running Press 2012)



In January of 2014, I made my first trip to Dublin, Ireland.  I went there with my friend, Bridget, to scope out the city for the study abroad trip I was planning.  Probably my favorite site there was Kilmainham Gaol, a jail rich with the history of Irish independence from Britain.  I took the guided tour and realized quickly that I had no idea what I was really seeing.  Essentially, it would be like going to a US Revolutionary War site and never having heard of George Washington.  My knowledge of Irish history was pretty much limited to the potato famine and some vague understanding of issues between Catholics and Protestants, which is pretty embarassing considering many of my ancestors were from Ireland.


Kilmainham Gaol
 

In January of 2015 I led the study abroad trip that I was researching the year before.  I didn't get to Kilmainham Gaol this time but I left Dublin knowing I needed to learn more about Irish history.  So when I got home I went to Barnes & Noble, browsed the limited collection of books on Irish history and chose this one. 

"A Brief History of Ireland" starts with the prehistory of the island and finishes in Dublin in 2007.  It is definitely brief, in that is really only touches on the basics of each important phase of Irish history.  I knew already that I was most interested in the events surrounding the Irish Rising of 1916.  Modern history doesn't interest me much, so I sort of lost interest in the book once I got past that part.  But of course, that isn't the fault of the book.  The history of the development of Dublin was interesting as well, having just been there.  It was fun to know I had been to many of the places mentioned in the book.



Kilmainham Gaol

This book gave me exactly what I was looking for: a general understanding of the whole of Irish history.  With that background in mind, I will now look for a more in-depth book regarding the Rising.  I got a few ideas from bookstores I browsed in Dublin.  I have also already purchased a book about the potato famine.

I would definitely recommend this book to someone like me who was looking for something basic.  It wouldn't be approriate for someone who already had this understanding.  I would particularly recommend it to someone who was planning a trip to Ireland.  My first trip to Kilmainham Gaol would have been much more meaningful had I read this book first.  At least I know that when I go back, I will really comprehend the significance of the place in a way I couldn't before.