Lawless - by Leah Litman (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

"Do you want to know why today's Supreme Court rules like it does? Leah Litman has the answer, and it is one that people should know. It's time to read this book!" --Los Angeles Review of Books
"Leah Litman's work leaves you fired up yet empowered to pay attention, ready to resist, and, frankly, hotter." --Jonathan Van Ness

Crooked Media podcast host Leah Litman shines a light on the unabashed lawlessness embraced by conservative Supreme Court justices and shows us how to fight back.

Something is deeply rotten at the Supreme Court. How did we get here, and what can we do about it? With the gravitas of Joan Biskupic and the irreverence of Elie Mystal, Leah Litman brings her signature wit to the question of what's gone wrong at One First Street. In Lawless, she argues that the Supreme Court is no longer practicing law; it's running on vibes. By "vibes," Litman means legal-ish claims that repackage the politics of conservative grievance and dress them up in robes. Major decisions adopt the language and posture of the law, while in fact displaying a commitment to protecting a single minority: the religious conservatives and Republican officials whose views are no longer shared by a majority of the country.

Employing pop culture references and the latest court decisions, Litman delivers a funny, zeitgeisty, pulls-no-punches cri de coeur undergirded by impeccable scholarship. She gives us the tools we need to understand the law, the dynamics of courts, and the stakes of this current moment and shows us how to fight back--even as she makes us chuckle on every page and emerge empowered to fight for a better future.

Review Quotes

An instant New York Times bestseller!

NATIONAL BESTSELLER

"Litman skillfully distills complex case law into easily digestible facts and offers helpful historical and political context for the immense power the court has accrued. ... Litman irreverently harnesses themes gleaned from television shows such as Game of Thrones and Arrested Development and the films American Psycho and Barbie to expose flaws in the court's rulings..... Law professor and podcaster Leah Litman deploys humor and pop culture references as she makes a persuasive case that the U.S. Supreme Court is no longer an impartial interpreter of the law."
--Shahina Piyarali, Shelf Awareness

"Litman has a serious argument here: We should understand the Supreme Court as part of the Republican coalition, undoing wide swaths of law to advance the party's political age.... She is at her most compelling when illuminating how the Court's opinions are part of this larger political and constitutional project, not isolated instances of constitutional interpretation. "
--George Thomas, Washington Monthly

"Compelling and timely. . . . In Lawless, Litman has succeeded in writing a lively and engaging book without sacrificing scrupulous legal research and trenchant analysis. . . . A thorough and alarming assessment of the current Supreme Court."
--Los Angeles Lawyer Magazine

"A scathing takedown of the Roberts court. . . . Litman ingeniously mines the past half century of conservative politics for comedy gold as she builds her case that the movement's bugbears are now driving the court..... A clear-eyed and alarming view of a court captured by far-right conspiracy theories."
-Publishers Weekly

"Lawless renders dense constitutional analysis into something urgent and accessible -- a field guide for navigating our current constitutional crisis."
--Alexis Coe, The New York Times

"Do you want to know why today's Supreme Court rules like it does? Leah Litman has the answer, and it is one that people should know. In her terrific new book, Litman pulls no punches, using her vast scholarly knowledge, together with down-to-earth language and fun analogies to movies and television shows, to persuasively demonstrate how the Republican Party has captured the Supreme Court ... It's time to read this book!"
--Laurie L. Levenson, LA Review of Books

"Lawless by Leah Litman is a sharp and stellar READ of the Supreme Court. The power and corruption of the conservative Supreme Court Justices affects us all, and Leah's work leaves you fired up yet empowered to pay attention, ready to resist, and frankly, hotter."
--Jonathan Van Ness, New York Times bestselling author of Love That Story

"Leah Litman has long been a brave and brilliant corrective to the sanctimony around the Supreme Court, someone with insider experience and deep knowledge who is actually willing to tell it like it is. This breezy yet authoritative explainer of the bad faith reasoning, extreme ideology, and shady tactics that characterize today's Court majority will ably arm readers for what's to come."
--Irin Carmon, bestselling co-author of Notorious RBG

"Leah Litman has long been the voice willing to say aloud what every other lawyer is thinking; the person prepared to fearlessly name some stunt or trick behind which the courts tend to hide bad behavior. With Lawless, Litman uses her sharp wit and sharper mind to build a bridge between a mystified supreme court and an American public that absolutely knows something is horribly awry at the high court, but can't put a name to it. This book is for everyone who wants to understand how the Roberts Court betrayed its mission and our values, and -- perhaps more urgently -- why they did so. (spoiler: it was the vibes)."
--Dahlia Lithwick, Senior Editor at Slate, host of the Amicus Podcast, and author of Lady Justice: Women, the Law, and the Battle to Save America

"The Supreme Court is radical, unaccountable, and very annoying. In Lawless, Litman draws on a legal canon that runs from Alexander Hamilton to Elle Woods to make this enraging story compelling, accessible, and really funny. She explains why you should trust your gut when it tells you that the Court isn't ruling based on legal principle, but on the hurt feelings of a bunch of angry rightwing weirdos. And in cutting these weirdos down to size, she makes the scale of our challenges feel more surmountable."
--Jon Lovett, co-host of Pod Save America and co-author of Democracy Or Else

"Way better than Dobbs! Litman puts the 'fun' in 'harrowing tale of judicial dysfunction'!"
--Alexandra Petri, author of Alexandra Petri's US History: Important American Documents (I Made Up)

"The Supreme Court is broken. In Lawless, Professor Leah Litman explains how it got this way, with the common sense of an Elle Woods closing argument, and the clarity of a Jay-Z diss track."
--Elie Mystal, bestselling author of Allow Me to Retort

"Lawless is a lively narration of how big special interests captured the Supreme Court and redeployed it to deliver on the least popular policy planks of the Republican Party. Litman ably documents the Court's devolution, as it was yoked into service to a political party and a billionaire class."
--Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse

"This is the book you have to read if you're bummed about our country and worried that the Supreme Court is wrecking it with legalistic pseudo-reasoning that masks its right-wing agenda. With brilliant wit and impeccable analysis, Litman rips off the mask, lays bare the illogic, and arms you with the tools you'll need to replace confusion and despair with clarity and determination."
--Laurence Tribe, author of Uncertain Justice

"Leah Litman's Lawless is an urgent book to make sense of our unsettling times. Litman writes clearly, accessibly and with desperately needed humor about the ways in which the Supreme Court has responded and adapted to right-wing political movements and, in turn, how the Court has shaped the contours of our material lives, our political system, and the future of our democracy and planet. Even as you want cry at the state of the world, Litman keeps you laughing and somehow in the dire picture Lawless offers, there is a story for how we find our way through."
--Chase Strangio, Civil Rights Attorney

"This impressive book tells the story of the ethical and intellectual collapse of the Supreme Court. But just as right-wing politics has wrecked the possibility of real justice on the Court, democratic politics can give us a chance to remake the Court and restore what has been lost."
--U.S. Representative Jamie Raskin, Democratic leader on the House Judiciary Committee and bestselling author of Unthinkable: Trauma, Truth, and the Trials of American Democracy

"A refreshingly accessible and outrageously funny indictment of robed partisans drunk on power. Leah Litman is the ideal guide for this tour of the Supreme Court's assault on democracy and civil rights: She's wise, witty, and totally fearless in reading the justices for filth. Lawless is an essential book for anyone seeking to understand how our judiciary became the most dangerous branch--and how we can fight back."
--Mark Stern, senior writer and Supreme Court correspondent, Slate

About the Author

Leah Litman is a professor of law at the University of Michigan and a former Supreme Court clerk. In addition to cohosting Strict Scrutiny, she writes frequently about the Court for media outlets including The Washington Post, Slate, and The Atlantic, among others, and has appeared as a commentator on NPR and MSNBC, in addition to other venues. She has received the Ruth Bader Ginsburg Award for her "scholarly excellence" from the American Constitution Society and has been published in top law reviews. Follow her on X @LeahLitman and Instagram @ProfLeahLitman.