The Law as It Could Be

"Refreshingly straightforward. Fiss writes in the style of John Marshall, sweeping the reader along with vigorous argumentation." (The Law and Politics Book Review) "An uplifting book." (Choice) "Owen Fiss is the moral compass of legal liberalism, and these indispensable essays are hisand ourguide to true north. Against the reaction of the Rehnquist Court and academic fashions for economics, Marxism, and emotionalism, Fiss calmly makes the case for unvarnished reason as the only and best guide to law and life. The book's brilliant, pathbreaking meditations on the structure of legal institutions reveal a profound faith that law can be not only the instrument of justice, but can actually embody justice itself. Fisss unswerving commitment to the possibilities of reason, justice, and law is more than timelyit is essential to the very project of the law." - Noah Feldman,author of After Jihad: America and the Struggle for Islamic Democracy