Shelf 6 of 8 · Who Gets to Sit
The Court’s Divides: Race, Religion, and Gender
Who gets to sit — the “Catholic seat,” the “Jewish seat,” the first women, and the racial reckonings of the modern Court.
The reading list — 12 books
Perry, Barbara A. A “Representative” Supreme Court? The Impact of Race, Religion, and Gender on Appointments. 1991.
Perry, Barbara A. The Priestly Tribe: The Supreme Court’s Image in the American Mind. 1999.
Dalin, David G. Jewish Justices of the Supreme Court: From Brandeis to Kagan. 2017.
Burt, Robert A. Two Jewish Justices: Outcasts in the Promised Land. 1988.
Hirshman, Linda. Sisters in Law: How Sandra Day O’Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg Went to the Supreme Court and Changed the World. 2015.
Gutgold, Nichola D. The Rhetoric of Supreme Court Women: From Obstacles to Options. 2012.
Kiel, Daniel. The Transition: Interpreting Justice from Thurgood Marshall to Clarence Thomas. 2023.
Chrisman, Robert, and Robert L. Allen, eds. Court of Appeal: The Black Community Speaks Out on the Racial and Sexual Politics of Clarence Thomas vs. Anita Hill. 1992.
Schmidhauser, John R. Stare Decisis, Dissent, and the Background of the Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States. 1962.
Ulmer, S. Sidney. Social Background as an Indicator to the Votes of Supreme Court Justices in Criminal Cases: 1947–1956 Terms. 1973.
Tate, C. Neal. Personal Attribute Models of the Voting Behavior of U.S. Supreme Court Justices: Liberalism in Civil Liberties and Economics Decisions, 1946–1978. 1981.
Jackson, Percival E. Dissent in the Supreme Court: A Chronology. 1969.
Back to the History of the Court reading room, or browse the justice-by-justice shelves. A link means we verified a place to find the book; where none is shown, we could not verify one rather than guess.