Why did Harlan see things differently? Because his life was different, He grew up alongside Robert Harlan, whom many believed to be his half brother. But he also shows how the courage and outlook of one man can make all the difference. Canellos chronicles the often tortuous and inspiring porcess through which Supreme Courts can make and remake the law across generations. In this monumental biography, prize-winning journliast and bestselling author Peter S.

When other justices said the court was powerless to prevent racial violence, he took matters into his own hands: he made sure the Chattanooga officials who enabled a shocking lynching on a bridge over the Tennessee River were brought to justice. He did the same when the justices robbed staters of their power to regulate the hours of workers and shielded the rich from the income taxx. When the court struck down antitrust laws, Harlan called out the majority for favoring its own economic class.

Ferguson, one of many cases in which he lambasted his colleagues for denying the rights of African Americans. 'Our Constitution is color blind and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens,' he wrote in his famous dissent in Plessy v. Derided by many as a loner and loser, he ended up being acclaimed as the nation's most courageous jurist, a man who saw the truth and justice that eluded his contemporaries. They say history is written by the victors, but that is not Harlan's legacy: his views-not those of his fellow justices-ulitmately ended segregation and helped give us our civil rights and our economic freedoms. In the long test of time, this lone dissenter was proven right in case after case. No one wielded this power more aggressively than John Marshall Harlan, a young union veteran from Kentucky who served on the US Supreme Court from the end of the Civil War through the Gilded Age. The story of an American hero who stood against all the forces of Gilded Age America to help enshrine our civil rights and economic freedoms.

Justice john marshall harlan