Justice Stephen Field

by Kens, Paul

• ISBN13: 9780700608171
• ISBN10: 0700608176
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1997-04-01
• Publisher: Univ Pr of Kansas

Summary

Outspoken and controversial, Stephen Field served on the Supreme Court from his appointment by Lincoln in 1863 through the closing years of the century. No justice had ever served longer on the Court, and few were as determined to use the Court to lead the nation into a new and exciting era. Paul Kens shows how Field ascended to such prominence, what influenced his legal thought and court opinions, and why both are still very relevant today. Gracefully written and filled with sharp insights, Kens' study sheds new light on Field's role in helping the Court define the nature of liberty and determine the extent of constitutional protection of property. By focusing on the political, economic, and social struggles of his time, it explains Field's jurisprudence in terms of conflicting views of liberty and individualism. It firmly establishes Field as a persuasive spokesman for one side of that conflict and as a prototype for the modern activist judge, while providing an important new view of capitalist expansion and social change in Gilded Age America.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	vii
Introduction	1	(10)
CHAPTER ONE A Forty-niner, Not a Miner	11	(33)
CHAPTER TWO California Dreaming	44	(26)
CHAPTER THREE Showdown at Las Mariposas	70	(23)
CHAPTER FOUR The Tenth Justice	93	(36)
CHAPTER FIVE Vise Grip on the Flow of Commerce	129	(40)
CHAPTER SIX Sound in Doctrine, Brave in Deed	169	(28)
CHAPTER SEVEN The Pacific Club Set	197	(39)
CHAPTER EIGHT Class Legislation	236	(30)
CHAPTER NINE Stephen Field's Legacy	266	(21)
Notes	287	(56)
Bibliography	343	(12)
Index	355