For most Americans, habeas corpus is the cornerstone of our legal system: the principal constitutional check on arbitrary government power, allowing an arrested person to challenge the legality of his detention. In a study that could not be more timely, Justin Wert reexamines this essential individual right and shows that habeas corpus is not necessarily the check that we’ve assumed. Habeas corpus, it emerges, is as much a tool of politics as it is of law.
Table of Content
Preface
1. Habeas Corpus and History
2. Antebellum Habeas
3. The Reconstruction of Habeas Corpus
4. From the Extraordinary to the Ordinary: 1915-1969
5. Innocence and Guilt: Habeas from Burger to Rehnquist
Conclusion: The Not-So-Great Writ of Liberty
Notes
References
Index
About the author
Justin J. Wert is the Second Century Presidential Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Oklahoma and recipient of the 2006 American Political Science Association’s Edward S. Corwin Award.
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