Just stories

by Ross, Thomas

Backed by the power of the state, judges' opinions can send a person to death, dissolve a relationship between a mother and child, or sanction the racial division of a community. We like to believe that these opinions objectively enforce the law. But do they? In this stinging critique of our legal system, Thomas Ross reveals how in making and justifying their opinions, judges rely to a startling degree on personal constructs that all too often perpetuate the deep biases in society. Through close reading of judicial opinions from the late-nineteenth century to the present, Ross exposes a long history of judges' stories that claim objectivity but instead both reflect and reinforce prejudices.