Deadlocked: How America Shaped the Supreme Court

Most consequential cases of the 1990s rest with the decisive swing votes of Justices O’Connor and Kennedy—both nominated by Republican presidents and sometimes siding with the liberal bloc. Bush v. Gore divides the nation and challenges the perception that the Court operates independently from partisan politics. With George W. Bush’s nominees and his chance to dramatically shift the balance, the Supreme Court enters a new era of ideological polarization.

In the 1970s and 1980s, a new conservative legal and political movement emerges as a backlash to the Warren Court and the later Roe v. Wade decision. This quickly becomes an increasingly influential coalition that sets the direction of the Court and the country over the ensuing decades.

In the 1950s and 60s, Thurgood Marshall fights to tear down the segregationist system and uses the law to build a more just society, with the help of a Supreme Court led by Chief Justice Earl Warren. It’s an era of progressive decisions that expands the rights of minorities, criminal defendants, and the poor, as the Supreme Court’s role in American life becomes increasingly prominent and bitterly contested.