The Political Supreme Court

A Forgotten History

Rachel A. Shelden

• Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
• Year: 2026
• Print ISBN:
  9781469697130
• eBook ISBN:
  9781469686721
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: North American History
• Index: History

Today’s Supreme Court justices bristle at the label “politicians in robes,” insisting that they operate above the fray of partisan politics. But for the first century of the nation’s history, the Court was unmistakably a political institution, both by design and in practice. Justices were fully expected to engage in partisan politics—there was no concern that such engagement would lead to corruption or undue bias—and they remained deeply involved in civic debate and the electoral process while on the bench. In addition to hearing cases in the capital, each justice spent much of his time “riding circuit” and presiding over federal trial courts. On circuit and in Washington, nineteenth-century justices wrote for partisan newspapers, drafted legislation, advised partisan allies, campaigned for colleagues, and even ran for political offices from the bench. Through these political interactions, members of the Court helped shape debates about the Constitution’s meaning at a time when most Americans did not believe in judicial supremacy.

In this sweeping history, Rachel A. Shelden, one of America’s leading voices on the history of the Court, brings readers inside the social and political world of its justices, recovering their essential role in the era’s turbulent politics. She also charts shifts at the turn of the twentieth century, when members of the Court and the legal community refashioned the judiciary as an apolitical institution, setting the stage for an increasingly more powerful—and more isolated—modern Court. The Political Supreme Court is required reading for anyone interested in the legal and political underpinnings of today’s judicial power.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Halftitle Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Prologue: The People’s Courtroom
• Introduction: The Political Supreme Court: Partisanship, Power, and Judicial Representation in the Nineteenth Century
• Chapter 1: The Culture of Politics in Early America: John Marshall, Elias Caldwell, and the Uncertain Future
• Chapter 2: The Politics of Judicial Representation: Circuit Riding in Thomas Todd’s West
• Chapter 3: The Politics of Power in Jacksonian America: William Johnson, Smith Thompson, and the Federal Union
• Chapter 4: Political Questions and Political Answers: Joseph Story, Levi Woodbury, and the People of the First Circuit
• Chapter 5: Presidential Politics and Slavery on the Supreme Court: The Availability of John McLean
• Chapter 6: Wire-Pullers, Newsmakers, and Constitutional Politics: John Catron and the World of Dred Scott v. Sandford
• Chapter 7: The Supreme Court and the Politics of Secession: John Archibald Campbell and the Union in Crisis
• Chapter 8: The Politics of Personnel in Lincoln’s America: Jeremiah Black, Stephen Field, and the Western Supreme Court
• Chapter 9: The Political Stakes of Reconstruction: Salmon Chase’s Postwar Order
• Chapter 10: The Political Crisis of the 1870s: Joseph Bradley, David Davis, and the Election of 1876
• Chapter 11: Washington’s Supreme Court: Morrison Waite and the Politics of Reform
• Chapter 12: The Lawyers’ Supreme Court: William Evarts, Lucius Lamar, and the New History of Judicial Power
• Epilogue: The Marble Palace
• Acknowledgments
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index