April 2023 MBR The Social Issues Shelf

The Social Issues Shelf

Courts of Law Not Courts of Justice: Why Justice is Hard to Find in America
Eric D. Oberer
https://ericoberer.com
Atmosphere Press
www.atmospherepress.com
9781639887620, $28.99 Hardcover/$18.99 Paper

https://www.amazon.com/Courts-Law-Not-Justice-America/dp/1639887628

Unlike most critiques of America's judicial system, Courts of Law Not Courts of Justice: Why Justice is Hard to Find in America does not assume a one-sided approach, but considers the problem of justice from a variety of viewpoints. It provides a huge service to law readers in exposing an array of opinions, precedents, and analyses from both sides of the legal bench, serving as a starting point of information for broader discussions about equity in judicial proceedings.

Eric D. Oberer comes not just from the usual worlds of academia or law, but spent much of his childhood in high-crime White and African-American neighborhoods. This lent his pursuit of legal work (as a "guns, drugs, and violent crimes" prosecutor in Baltimore) a special connection to street crime scenarios that allowed him to apply ideals of fundamental civil rights to scenarios of crime, punishment, redemption, and innocence. The history of America's legal system and the evolution of the modern urban criminal justice system's processes and patterns are nicely covered.

The survey probes definitions of evidence, reviews criminal investigations proceedings both within the court system and before and after its processes, and analyzes how miscarriages of justice are perceived and committed. Especially thought-provoking are connections between policing and racial perception which give rise to bigger pictures of social issues embedded in and reflected by criminal justice system operations. Footnoted references from the legal world accompany examples of court decisions, methods for generating arrests, and the limiting choices faced by the justice system in general and Baltimore City in particular: "Baltimore City could arguably move many more cases through the system if it hired more judges and court employees and built a new courthouse. But can you really bring thousands of citizens in each day for jury duty?"

That Courts of Law Not Courts of Justice proves as accessible to non-legal readers of social issues as it will to those studying criminal law and justice translates to a primer that should be in all kinds of collections, from law libraries and college student holdings to general-interest public libraries seeing patron interest in social and racial issues. Oberer's history, filled with case histories, commentary, and connections between past and present American judicial evolutionary processes, is a powerful consideration of what the definition of how the ideal of "Equal Justice Under Law" actually translates in modern American society. It's highly recommended reading for anyone either entering the justice system professionally or looking at its results from the outside.

US: The Resurrection of American Terror
Rev. Kenneth W. Wheeler
https://www.kennethwwheeler.com
Precocity Press
9798985149494, $29.95 Hardcover/$19.95 Paper/$9.99 ebook

https://www.amazon.com/US-Resurrection-Rev-Kenneth-Wheeler/dp/B0BM3HHFFJ

US: The Resurrection of American Terror is a memoir of Black anger and struggle, and comes from an Evangelical Lutheran pastor who identifies white supremacy as the real terrorist threat on American soil.

Using his experiences growing up in the Jim Crow South, Wheeler embarks on a historical and personal examination of racism and prejudice which exposes how its roots and spreading contamination have touched not only seven decades of his own life, but the experiences of every Black person in modern America. History blends with civil rights struggles and insights about the roots and impact of white supremacy as readers receive an unusual blend of scripture references and social examination that embraces scholarly and spiritual works alike.

From community-wide grief in response to senseless shootings to personal, political, and social examination on the deepest levels, Wheeler shows how his search for answers led him to look to Biblical references to explain and explore Black experiences: "When I learned of this shooting I immediately turned to Psalm 88. It is a Psalm that is rarely used in the Church because it conveys such total bleakness. The Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann calls Psalm 88 a Psalm of deep lament. The words of Psalm 88 are the words spoken by people who have faced an evil that has turned their world upside down. The evil has left them disoriented. The enigma of slavery was the beginning of our nation's disorientation. You stand in a place where everything that once gave you meaning and mooring and balance has been taken from you at an instant."

The heartfelt nature of this memoir reflects both a call to action, a drive for wisdom, and Wheeler's own experiences in a major white Lutheran denomination that was glaringly scarce in its own examples of racial diversity. The hopes expressed by such a congregation seemed more like "white noise" than sincere efforts to be inclusive or representative. The religious roots of the writer and US: The Resurrection of American Terror sets this memoir apart from most others.

Far more than another civil rights history or personal story of struggle, US: The Resurrection of American Terror offers an unusual blend of scholarship and religious inspection that make it especially recommendable to religious library holdings. These audiences, as well as libraries catering to diverse populations interested in issues of Black participation in largely White groups, will find US: The Resurrection of American Terror holds many groundbreaking insights that deserve to be included in book clubs and social issues discussion groups.

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