The People's Justice: Clarence Thomas and the Constitutional Stories that Define Him

Summary

Justice Clarence Thomas: The compassionate heart beneath the robe.

No Supreme Court justice has come from humbler circumstances than Clarence Thomas, yet critics denounce him as the "cruelest justice," a heartless traitor to his race who cynically sacrifices justice to ideology.

In this provocative new book, Judge Amul Thapar demolishes that caricature. Exploring the human stories behind twelve illustrative cases on which Justice Thomas has ruled, he demonstrates the coherence of Thomas’s judicial philosophy and the profound humanity on which it rests. It is precisely because of his fidelity to the Framers' original meaning that he can respond to the struggles of ordinary Americans.

In a death penalty case, Thomas demands that the Court take into account the lives shattered in a murderous rampage. In a powerful dissent, he describes the ordeal of the citizen crippled by chronic pain whose only medical relief the courts have taken away. From Thapar's gripping narrative of these and ten other compelling stories, Clarence Thomas emerges as a champion of equal justice under law.

"Finding the right answer," Justice Thomas has observed, "is often the least difficult problem." What is needed is "the courage to assert that answer and stand firm in the face of the constant winds of protest and criticism." That courage—along with wisdom and compassion—shines on every page of this book.