Department of History congratulates Marc Stein on the appearance of his latest book: Sexual Injustice: Supreme Court Decisions from Griswold to Roe (University of North Carolina Press, 364 pp.). The book was published today in the U.S. and will be available in Canada in October. Marc has kindly donated a pre-publication copy to the Department, and I have it displayed on the shelves with other colleagues’ books in the Chair’s Office. Please come by to take a look.
Here is a brief description of this path-breaking book that I’m sure will make a big impact:
The U.S. Supreme Court of the 1960s and 1970s is typically celebrated by liberals and condemned by conservatives for its rulings on abortion, birth control, and other sexual matters. In this new work, historian Marc Stein demonstrates convincingly that both sides have it wrong. Focusing on six major Supreme Court cases, Stein examines the more liberal rulings on birth control, abortion, interracial marriage, and obscenity in Griswold, Fanny Hill, Loving, Eisenstadt, and Roe alongside a profoundly conservative ruling on homosexuality in Boutilier. In the same era in which the Court recognized special marital, reproductive, and heterosexual rights and privileges, it also upheld an immigration statute that classified homosexuals as “psychopathic personalities.” How, then, did Americans come to believe that the Court supported the sexual revolution? Stein shows that a diverse set of influential journalists, judges, and scholars translated the Court’s language about marital and reproductive rights into bold statements about sexual freedom and equality. Creatively researched and persuasively argued, this book not only provides the first in-depth account of Boutilier, one of the Court’s earliest gay rights cases, but also will change the way we think about the Supreme Court and the sexual revolution.
For further details, see the UNC Press website: http://uncpress.unc.edu/browse/book_detail?title_id=1816 .
Many congratulations, Marc, on this fine achievement.