January 2024 MBR The Political Science Shelf

The Political Science Shelf

The Judge and the President
David H. Moskowitz
Huge Jam Publishing
www.thecreativepositivist.com
9781916604124, $25.00 Hardcover/$16.99 Paper/$5.99 Kindle, 337pp

https://www.amazon.com/Judge-President-Stealing-2020-Election/dp/B0CJ43R4WK

The Judge and the President is the third volume in The Judge and the Creative Positivist series, providing an important assessment of the judicial system and political ties which should be on the reading and debate lists of any serious political science student and general-interest readers alike.

Its legal analysis reflects the author's promotion and reinforcement of the notion of "creative positivism" as it casts a close lens of inspection on the 2020 Presidential election process and the legal, historical, and sociological precedents it both made and broke. The advantage of having such a survey come from the pen of a law professional is its ability to reference a wide range of supporting research, statistics, and documentation.

This approach places David H. Moskowitz's analysis of events above and beyond any subjective viewpoint. Scholars will find these references key to understanding and supporting Moskowitz's contentions, but the actual writing itself is presented in a style designed to appeal widely to non-scholar audiences, as well.

The examples are particularly thought-provoking in their considerations of not just federal but local legal systems, operations, and precedents: "Here are the questions. Are the Tower Health hospitals tax exempt according to the law in Pennsylvania? When the relevant state statute is ascertained pursuant to the rule of recognition, is there a difference between the law in Montgomery County and the law in Chester County, even though there is no relevant difference in the facts in the two counties?

The two judges that heard these two cases are at the same level in the judicial hierarchy. It necessarily follows that the rule of recognition provides a different answer to the question of the tax exempt status of Tower Health hospitals in two adjacent counties in Pennsylvania. Law-ascertainment is not the same in these two counties, even though the same statute is authoritative in both counties."

Consequently, when the judges in these two adjacent counties, each applying the same state statute, reach different verdicts - with one court holding that the Tower Health hospitals are tax exempt and the other finding them to not be tax exempt - the complexity in the law is illustrated.

The law is different in two adjacent counties applying the same statute to the same corporate entity. This is just one of many examples of the complexity of the law, including the law concerning the legal systems involved in the process for electing the president in the U.S. The opportunities spark thought-provoking insights throughout on more than just Trump's impact on the 2020 election process, giving readers a more solid foundation of knowledge about America's judicial and political system as a whole. This, in turn, will lend deeper, more solid insights into the relevance and impact of events which might at first seem singular or local in nature, but which hold wide-ranging results for ideals of democratic political processes.

Moskowitz expresses reasoned opinions that should serve as the foundations of classroom debate in legal and political issues circles, from high school to college levels and beyond. The result is more than a singular review of law or politics, but a series of cases, decision-making insights, and inspections of political and legal processes that form some of the foundations of American society.

Ideally, law libraries, political science students, and the general reading public interested in political and legal history and analysis will equally find value and important food for thought and discussion in The Judge and the President, which uses the 2020 election to analyze democracy in action.

Filibustered!: How to Fix the Broken Senate and Save America
Senator Jeff Merkley with Mike Zamore
The New Press
www.thenewpress.com
9781620977989, $27.99, HC, 256pp

https://www.amazon.com/Filibustered-How-Senate-Broke-America/dp/1620977982

Synopsis: If we want to fix what ails America, we have to fix the Senate. And if we want to fix the Senate, we must fix the broken filibuster.

In a compelling and powerfully argued book, the U.S. Senator from the state of Oregon, Jeff Merkley, with the help of his longtime chief of staff Mike Zamore tells an insiders' story of how the Senate used to work and how the filibuster came to cripple the self-styled "World's Greatest Deliberative Body" with paralyzing gridlock. And they make the surprising case that restoring a modified version of the old-style, talking filibuster may just be our democracy's best and only path back from the brink of legislative disaster.

For nearly two centuries, the Senate (as designed by the Founders) served the purpose originally envisioned: it was a deliberative legislative body where the nation's thorniest challenges were hashed out. Senators had the ability to speak at length and offer any manner of amendments to influence bills, and then when all had had a say, the Senate voted. Senators who objected to passing a bill could wage a defiant filibuster -- in the spirit of fictional Senator Smith who talked until he collapsed in order to block a corrupt railroad deal in the classic 1939 film Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. But at the end of the day, nearly all legislation, amendments, and nominations went to a vote, and the majority prevailed.

Today, however, thanks to abuse of a fifty-year-old reform intended to make it easier for the Senate to pass legislation, the exceedingly difficult, rare filibuster has morphed, plunging the Senate into dysfunction and threatening the very foundations of our democracy. Now, the minority party can simply declare a "no-talk" filibuster, insisting on a super- majority of sixty votes to pass nearly any bill or a lengthy process to confirm any of the president's nominees -- giving themselves a veto over the majority's agenda. Wildly popular bills languish, judgeships and administrative posts remain unfilled, military leadership positions go empty, but ordinary citizens can't see why because the obstruction all takes place behind closed doors.

With the publication of "Filibustered!: How to Fix the Broken Senate and Save America", Senator Jeff Merkley deftly combines a fascinating romp through key moments in filibuster history (from the first filibuster in 1841 through Southern Dixiecrat filibusters of civil rights legislation, up through Mitch McConnell's transformation of the filibuster into a routine tool of perennial gridlock) with firsthand accounts of recent high-profile legislative fights, and a compelling argument that the key to the Senate's future may be found in its past.

Critique: Every American citizen and voter who views congress in general (and the U.S. Senate in particular) as broken should give "Filibustered!: How to Fix the Broken Senate and Save America" by Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley and immediate and careful reading from first page to last. Exceptionally well written, organized and presented, "Filibustered!: How to Fix the Broken Senate and Save America" is especially and unreservedly recommended for personal, professional, community, and college/university library Contemporary American Political Science collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists. It should be noted for students, academia, political activists, and governmental policy makers that "Filibustered!: How to Fix the Broken Senate and Save America" is also readily available in a digital book format (Kindle, $14.99).

Editorial Note #1: Senator Jeff Merkley has served in the U.S. Senate since 2009 and has been a champion of reforming our democracy and a vigorous advocate for tackling inequality and climate change. He has written a number of proposals to restore the talking filibuster and responded to the Gorsuch Supreme Court nomination with the eighth-longest speech in Senate history, clocking in at nearly fifteen and a half hours. He is the author of "America Is Better Than This" (Twelve).

Editorial Note #2: Mike Zamore was Senator Jeff Merkley's longtime chief of staff and a twenty-two year veteran of Capitol Hill. The co-author (with Senator Merkley) of Filibustered! (The New Press), he is a leading expert on Senate procedure.

EDITOR'S NOTE:

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