Customer Rating:  
Summary: A fine critique of modern legal philsophy in the US.
Comment: Antonin Scalia is blessed with a powerful intellect and a persuasive manner of expression. It's about time that a member of the US Supreme Court explained in terms intelligible to the average "newspaper reader" just what is going on in federal appeals courts. If not all of Justice Scalia's recommendations are correct, he certainly, at long last, has been able to ask the right questions. Proponents of judicial activism (and Scalia graciously shares space with two of the most famous, Tribe & Dworkin) will be hard-pressed to keep up the pretense that federal courts today are much more than arenas for elite social engineers to rework society in their own image and likeness. A fine study in modern legal philosophy, I recommend this work with few reservations. My complete review of Justice Scalia's book can be found in "National Catholic Register" 26 Oct. - 1 Nov. 1997, p. 6. I have seen the review posted on the Web as well.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Ignores data on literacy processes and social identities.
Comment: Unfortunately, Justice Scalia's views demonstrate a profound ignorance of any scientific understanding related to his topic.
His all too common scientific blindspot can be assessed by comparing his analysis to works like E. D. Hirsch, Jr.'s (1987), Cultural Literacy, and Tom Tyler et. al.'s (1997), Social Justice in a Diverse Society.
Quite correctly, Scalia identifies his approach as "an art or a game, rather than a science" (p. 8).
By contrast, Hirsch and Tyler et. al. show how reliable data can contribute to our knowledge of important literacy processes like reading, writing, and judging.
Hirsch's literature review related to "The Discovery of the Schema" (Ch. 2) leads him to conclude that most of the "meaning" from any printed page comes not from the text but from the reader's own literacy, i.e., prior knowledge, ignorance, and disinformation.
From research in social psychology Tyler et. al. show how relevant social identities shape our judgments of justice and injustice.
In this limited but increasing empirical light, we can understand our legal conflicts much better, e.g., the 1856 Dred Scott decision that denied federal citizenship to African Americans, the belated voting rights of women in 1920, and the Warren Court's recognition that suspects (like Richard Jewell) need and deserve meaningful constitutional protection.
Contrary to Justice Scalia, the key to understanding these historical and continuing conflicts is not "moral principles" that "are premanent" (p. 146) and tied to any text and its original context.
Rather, congruent with Professor Dworkin's "semantic intention" (pp. 118-119) and Professor Tribe's "abstract principles," the most valid literacy keys are the different ways that we perceive and value or devalue the identities of others.
(This should be quite obvious to anyone who takes the time and trouble to read the Dred Scott "reasoning" & "judgment," including the two dissenting opinions.)
The fundamental key to proper legal understanding begins with perceiving African Americans, women, children, suspects, and even prisoners as persons.
Then, as the introductory or Identity Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment says, "All persons born or naturalized in the United States" are citizens and, thus, are entitled to the due process of law and its equal protection.
Depersonalization of any of these persons undermines our literacy process, the Constitution, and the democratic morality that can unite as a one nation and People.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Recommended, but with reservations.
Comment: I assume you have seen a description of the book already. The book is good enough to be recommended overall, but there were some disappointments. First, the justice does not stay long on his professed topic, the interpretation of statutes, but goes over into constitutional interpretation. Those who make replies follow gladly, and there is really little on the whole about statutory instead of constitutional interpretation. Moreover, the justice did not make it clear enough to me how his textualist philosophy differs from literalism, which he explicitly disavows. Also dissappointing is that I think the justice could have made a much stronger case for what I do glean to be his philosophy by invoking legal principles already understood when the constitution was written, and especially by invoking Justice Story's brilliant decision in Martin v Hunter's Lessee. In that decision rules of constitutional interpretation are stated clearly and authoritatively, and are much along the lines of what Scalia advocates. Lastly, Justice Scalia's essay does not measure up to the keenness of insight and language he shows in his best dissents, though there are some good moments.
Despite these drawbacks, it is a very thought- provoking work and its brevity gives one less of an excuse for not reading it. It is largely free of technical vocabulary and there are no arcane discussions.
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