All the laws but one

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

In this lively account, Chief Justice Rehnquist tests the Roman maxim inter arma silent leges (in time of war the laws are silent) against American history and discusses the judiciary's response to government's wartime lawlessness. He begins with the Civil War, when the Lincoln administration "chose to suspend the writ of habeas corpus, interfere with freedom of speech and of the press, and try suspected political criminals before military commissions." Lincoln's defense of these practices gave the book its title, "Are all the laws, but one, to go unexecuted, and the government itself to go to pieces, lest that one be violated?" The tension between individual liberties and wartime necessities runs throughout the work as Rehnquist discusses several celebrated Civil War habeas corpus cases (Ex Parte Merryman and Ex Parte Milligan); political dissent during WWI; the internment of Japanese-Americans; and Hawaii's military government during WWII. Rehnquist reaches the considered conclusion that "the most important task is achieving a proper balance between freedom and order. In wartime, reason and history both suggest that this balance shifts to some degree in favor of order--in favor of the government's ability to deal with conditions that threaten the national well-being." Nevertheless, since the Civil War, courts have tamed the government's power to restrict civil liberties in wartime. Rehnquist is a diligent scholar and a compelling storyteller, who guides his readers to a consideration of abstract moral and legal issues in the light of specific historical circumstances.

Library Journal

The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court considers what happens to our vaunted freedoms in times of war.

Library Journal

The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court considers what happens to our vaunted freedoms in times of war.

Andrew C. McCarthy

What is the proper balance between...preserving civil liberties and protecting national security?....Today, foreign armed adversaries are tried by our civilian courts and given full legal privileges....[A] central lesson of...the book: when it comes to civil liberties in wartime, the pendulum swings back and forth. Soemtimes it swings too far in both directions. -- Commentary

Jeremy Waldron

...[Takes] us through the variety of cases, from the 1860s to the 1940s, in which civil liberty issues in time of war have arisen....Rhenquist presents full and fascinating human profiles of the major participants in these cases...and a level of detail about the hearings and the decisions that provides...some understanding of what it must have been like to grapple with these issues in a time of crisis. -- The New York Times Book Review

Kirkus Reviews

An enjoyable historical presentation with a frustratingly judicious conclusion. From the chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court you anticipate authoritative, decisive, even momentous opinions. In this volume, however, Rehnquist conducts a walk through the park rather than a grilling before the bar. To consider the status of civil liberties during national emergencies, he explores the suspension of habeas corpus during the Civil War and its aftermath, the suppression of civil liberties under the Espionage Act during WWI, and the internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII. The historical presentation is descriptive and conventional, yet pleasant, as Rehnquist focuses on legal actions attendant to the temporary restrictions of individual rights. There is much more information on the Civil War and Lincoln's assassination than necessary, and a more detailed examination of the relevant cases, informed by analysis along the way, might have better served his ends. Nevertheless, the exposition is well crafted and by late in the volume the reader is ready for the payoff: Rehnquist's conclusions regarding the clash of individual rights and national security. Unfortunately, the brief concluding chapter is more illustrative of how a cautious jurist approaches an inherently problematic question than of any principle that might provide an answer. The issue is clearly identified—achieving a proper balance between freedom and order—without defining "proper" beyond suggesting that the balance shifts "to some degree" toward order when national well-being is at stake. Rehnquist does eschew an absolute standing for civil liberties, if the circumstances absolutely require their suspension,and he apparently prefers to avoid suggesting general criteria that would inject content into this abstract stand. One imagines that if Rehnquist were asked how he likes his steak, he would reply with an insightful history of man's experience as a carnivore along with an injunction that meat must be cooked but not overdone. The chief justice raises an important question without resolving anything.