Politics Book Review Vol. Reviewed by William Haltom, Department of Politics and Government, University of Puget Sound.
Some authors do try the press for complicity in making spectacles of trials.
A few observers task reporters for propagating social, legal, and political myths. Other authors could not have been less forensic. Arrayed between an opening statement and a verdict, sixteen case studies justify no useful generalizations but do divert readers. Readers in search of diversion will find concise accounts of arresting cases. The average college student could learn about the Scottsboro Boys, Alger Hiss, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, the Chicago Seven, or the Haymarket Riot.