The Obama White House and the Supreme Court by Jeffrey Toobin

Tzer Island does not usually review essays, not does it usually publish reviews on Tuesdays. Having accepted the opporunity to read some essays published in the Vintage Short series, however, I've decided to review them this week and next on Tuesday and Thursay. Vintage Shorts are available in digital format for about a buck.

Published by Vintage on October 4, 2016

I like Jeffrey Toobin, but The Obama White House and the Supreme Court is an odd essay. The essay consists of excerpts from Toobin’s book The Oath, which shares its subtitle with the name of this essay. Unfortunately, the essay has almost nothing to do with its title.

Toobin’s essay begins with a description of the legal hand-wringing that took place after Chief Justice Roberts bungled the oath of office when he swore in Obama. Toobin provides a mini-biography of Roberts and notes ways in which Roberts and Obama are similar and different. That’s followed by a brief portrait of Obama as a community organizer and as a Harvard law student who was elected to the top position at Harvard Law Review.

Next comes a discussion of Obama’s view that politicians rather than courts are better positioned to advance the rights of disadvantaged Americans, a point of view that shaped his decision to go into politics in addition to teaching law and working at a civil rights law firm. Near the end, we hear about the Supreme Court’s evolving views on the Second Amendment and Obama’s evolving view on gun control as he moved from being a state senator to a United States senator. Then the essay ends.

All of this is interesting, but the essay has a piecemeal feel. The disparate components are never integrated into a larger whole. Presumably Toobin provides that integration in The Oath, but when the book was chopped into an essay, no effort was made to find a central theme that would bind the essay’s parts together. And apart from a late reference to gun control and an early discussion of Roberts that has little to do with his work on the Supreme Court, the essay tells us almost nothing about the Obama White House and the Supreme Court. That seems strange, given the essay’s title.

Toobin’s prose is always clear and lively, so the essay makes for easy reading. It also makes for informative reading, but it doesn’t make for purposeful reading, given the absence of a unifying theme. I guess the essay might be meant as a teaser to encourage readers to buy the book, but readers who are interested in the subject matter suggested by the title would be better served by skipping the essay altogether.

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