Justice on Trial

Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Supreme Court by Mollie Hemingway and Carrie Severino, 306 pages

Anthony Kennedy surprised almost everyone when, in June of 2018, he announced his imminent retirement from the US Supreme Court.  Immediately, both within and without the White House, discussion began concerning his replacement.  President Trump disappointed many diehard conservatives when he announced his nomination of Brett Kavanaugh, widely considered the safe, establishment pick.  What was always certain to be a difficult nomination process soon developed into a circus as protesters sought every opportunity to disrupt the proceedings, then descended even further when Senate Democrats produced a woman who accused Kavanaugh of having assaulted her over three decades ago, on an unknown date in an unknown location.  Despite all of the accuser's named witnesses contradicting her story, the truth of the accusation became an article of faith for many on the left and in the news media, and she was soon joined by others making progressively more improbable allegations, until the proceedings outpaced parody with earnest discussions of the possible sinister meanings of '80s teenage slang.

Milan Kundera wrote, "The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting."  Meanwhile, if he wasn't the first to say it, The Washington Post's Phil Graham at least popularized the idea that "journalism is the first rough draft of history."  By that standard, Justice on Trial is simultaneously vitally important and somewhat deficient.  In the midst of a deliberate if disorganized Orwellian project to rewrite history in order to fit an ideological narrative, the simple recording of facts that defy the narrative is a worthwhile accomplishment.  Hemingway and Severino do more than simply restate facts, however, adding in an entertaining and well-deserved seasoning of snark that, unfortunately, will give their narrow-minded critics all the excuse they need to ignore the book entirely.