The United States Supreme Court is the least examined branch of the United States government. Yet it has been at the centre of the major controversies in American history and Chief Justices like John Marshall and Earl Warren have shaped the United States as dramatically as any president. In this single-volume narrative history, Bernard Schwartz brings to life the personalities and the controversies that have animated the highest court of the United States.

Schwartz is one of the premier scholars of American Constitutional law, and with an ability to bring clarity to complex legal matters, he illuminates the cases that have changed the course of history. He sheds new light on the colourful personalities and the tense politics behind decisions like Dred Scott, Lochner, Brown vs. Board of Education, and Roe vs. Wade.