Sign In
    Wisconsin Lawyer
    April 01, 2000

    Wisconsin Lawyer April 2000: Book Reviews

    Book Reviews

    This Month's Featured Selections

    The Constitution & Religion: Leading Supreme Court Cases on Church and State

    Edited by Robert S. Alley
    (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1999.)
    545 pgs. $21.21.

    Reviewed by Jon G. Furlow

    One of the most vexing areas of constitutional law is the principled application of the First Amendment religion clauses. The cases demonstrate a fundamental tension between no state support to religion, however indirect, and the competing idea that religious practices must be accommodated by the state to prevent discrimination against religion generally. The former approach is embodied by Thomas Jefferson's "wall of separation," the latter has become known as the "benevolent neutrality" of the state toward religion. The law is murky, but The Constitution & Religion does an admirable job of providing some clarity to the issues and sorting out the case law.

    The principal contribution of this book is its meaty introduction that provides an outstanding historical overview of the passage of the religion clauses. The discussion offers a window to the history that led to the religion clauses. Endnotes contain additional historical source material. Most important, the book reprints the two fundamental historical documents that are referred to repeatedly when examining religion cases - James Madison's Memorial and Remonstrance and Thomas Jefferson's Act Establishing Religious Freedom. Another useful feature is a chart showing how the U.S. Supreme Court justices over history have voted on cases involving the religion clauses.

    With this historical foundation in place, the book provides a compendium of key Supreme Court cases. The cases are not full text, but are edited. Each case is preceded by a short introductory summary of the key issue and ruling. The cases are organized into three general subjects: establishment clause cases, free exercise cases, and cases addressing principles governing judicial resolution of internal church disputes.

    The establishment clause cases principally focus on aid to parochial schools and public school accommodation of religious practices. Other issues are also touched upon, such as the government display of religious symbols, access of religious groups to student fees, the use of public forums, and tax exemptions for religious organizations.

    The free exercise cases address constitutional limitations of state actions that infringe on religious practices. A variety of issues are addressed including Sunday closing laws, mandatory pledge of allegiance, denial of state benefits, compulsory school attendance laws, and restrictions on religious practices that are outside the religious mainstream.

    The section addressing the judicial resolution of internal church disputes is an interesting addition to the more traditional religion clause issues. This section, however, contains an oversight: The principal modern Supreme Court decision on the subject, Jones v. Wolf, 443 U.S. 595 (1979), is not included.

    The Constitution & Religion is no substitute for reading and analyzing the cases in entirety, but it is a useful desk guide. The historical material is useful and alone provides value to the book. The case law also will remain valuable, but more as historical material. Because this is a very active area of Supreme Court decisions with shifting coalitions of justices, a thorough analysis of a dispute concerning the religion clauses still requires independent research and careful updating of the cases.

    Jon G. Furlow, Minnesota 1986, is a litigation partner in the Madison office of Michael Best & Friedrich LLP.

    Examining the Work of State Courts, 1997: A National Perspective from the Court Statistics Project
    and
    State Court Caseload Statistics, 1997

    (Williamsburg, VA: National Center for State Courts, 1997.)
    105 pgs. and 223 pgs., respectively.

    Reviewed by John Keckhaver

    The Court Statistics Project (CSP) is a joint project of the Conference of State Court Administrators, the State Justice Institute, the Bureau of Justice Statistics, and the National Center for State Courts. CSP staff collects and analyzes data relating to the work of our nation's state courts. Examining State Courts and its supplement, State Court Caseload Statistics, include data compiled from more than 16,000 state trial courts in all 50 states. The CSP's mission is to provide a "broad-based framework for examining court workload and bringing national trends to light." The high quality of these publications indicate that the CSP has succeeded.

    The information contained in these works is not meant to aid trial attorneys in their daily decision-making in state courts. This project and the resulting texts are meant for legislators, government executives, judges, and anyone else interested in the problem of high state court caseloads and its ramifications for the effective administration of justice.

    In Examining the Work of State Courts, the editors have compiled an extensive review of state judicial workloads in the following categories: civil, tort and contract, domestic relations, juvenile, criminal, felony, and appellate caseloads. The editors include commentary on the statistics provided including the trends in each area and also offer some conclusions at the end of each section.

    State Court Caseload Statistics contains tables depicting each state's court structure, their jurisdiction and reporting practices, and their state court caseloads. A detailed explanation of the CSP's methodology and the sources of the data compiled from each state are included.

    The CSP has provided much more than raw data in these works. The commentary accompanying the statistics is clear and insightful. The editors' conclusions based on trends they have detected in court caseloads along with their analysis of state court structures should prove extremely useful to all those interested in how our state or other states administer their court systems.

    The CSP offers to provide clarification of the information presented in its publications and to give advice on its use. Information from and on the CSP (including ordering information) is available online.

    John Keckhaver, U.W. 1999, is a staff attorney for Dane County Circuit Court, branches 7 and 12.

    Absent Witness Absent Witness

    By Nancy Kopp
    (New York, NY: Penguin Putnam, 1999.)
    370 pgs. $5.59.

    Reviewed by Gila Shoshany

    Absent Witness is Nancy Kopp's third lawyer mystery. The author, a Wisconsin Supreme Court commissioner, had fun writing this. Characters share names (and traits) with court staffers and several prominent Wisconsin attorneys. This playfulness is carried out in the main character's irreverent attitude.

    Chicago attorney Carrie Nelson faces a mystery: Who impregnated her clients' comatose daughter? Subplots are deftly interwoven as the plot whizzes along to the answer. On the way, Carrie deflates egotistical senior partners, hostile doctors, slumlords, and obstinate detectives. Her developing private life also keeps her busy.

    Little details ring true. When Carrie reports the sexual assault of the comatose victim, she hopes hordes of squad cars will be dispatched to find the bad guy. When this doesn't happen, the author neatly captures the chagrin of a competent civil attorney practicing outside her field. Similarly, even surprise resolution of the whodunit doesn't end the novel - as in real practice, trial preparation remains after the discovery period ends. Cleverly, the author tucks another plot surprise into Carrie's discovery boxes.

    There are minor annoyances. For instance, even minor characters' appearances and manners are described in full, almost like a screenplay. Readers may resent this approach when they realize these minor characters are unimportant to the action. Similarly, the characters routinely speak adverbially: softly, wryly, bitterly. Although initially on an even keel, they may "explode" at a question. Invoking inner state by outer response is standard technique, but too many such characterizations make the characters oddly labile. Still, these cavils do not outweigh the pleasures of the plot.

    Lawyers looking for a fast-paced mystery will enjoy reading this one as much as the author enjoyed writing it.

    Gila Shoshany, U.W. 1987, recently retired from her position as a staff attorney for the Wisconsin Court of Appeals.

    The Legal Assistant's Practical Guide to Professional Responsibility

    By Carole L. Mostow and Arthur Garwin
    (Chicago, IL: ABA Center for Professional Responsibility, 1998.)
    210 pgs. $34.95.

    Reviewed by Natalia Walter

    This handy manual on professional responsibility should be required reading for every legal assistant and every attorney who relies on legal support staff. In 11 succinct chapters, the ABA Center for Professional Responsibility summarizes the field of legal ethics for nonattorneys. Easy to read charts, citations to state cases, and 80 pages of appendices supplement summaries of the most common ethical issues encountered in law offices. Attorneys will find it a useful tool to train support staff in the ethics governing the legal profession.

    While reminding attorneys of their responsibility for the ethical conduct of all law office staff, the authors also emphasize support staff's obligations in upholding legal ethics. Noting that the legal assistant/paralegal profession remains largely unregulated, the ABA urges the formulation of codes of ethics for legal assistants and the establishment of core competencies. The authors advise paralegals to monitor law office conduct and seek advice in ethically dubious situations.

    Particularly useful are the discussions of unauthorized practice of law and confidentiality. What, for example, constitutes "legal advice"? To what extent are paralegals bound by the rules of confidentiality that govern attorneys? The boundaries between legal support staff and the attorney are examined in each chapter.

    As the cost of legal services increases, offices are relying more heavily on support staff to provide a range of client services. This book will greatly assist in helping an attorney to determine efficient and ethical use of nonattorneys in her practice.

    Natalia Walter, U.W. 1994, practices immigration law in Texas.

    Boiler Room

    The Boiler Room & Other Telephone Sales Scams

    By Robert J. Stevenson
    (Champaign, IL: Univ. of Illinois Press, 1998.)
    226 pgs. $22.46.

    Reviewed by Gary Grass

    Here is an uncommon work of independent scholarship. The Boiler Room & Other Telephone Sales Scams has won academic praise for its rare investigation of disreputable phone sales shops. Erstwhile professor Robert Stevenson spent nine years covertly observing the operations of more than 20 telephone rooms, gathering perspectives from dozens of managers and house "pros" and hundreds of lower-level informants. His intense research has opened vistas into a fascinating netherworld of telephone pitchmen.

    Stevenson lets these professional talkers paint verbal pictures for us in their rich-hued jargon. We hear their full pitches, complete with inflections, their insights and metaphors, and their contempt for the "mooches" who get their calls. Stevenson adds his own expert eye for the ideology and economics of the boiler room, classifies a menagerie of boiler room types, and analyzes their pecking order. The inner workings detailed include secrets unknown even to insiders, who are routinely victimized by the boiler rooms' self-destructive rogue capitalism and poisonous internal "chemistry."

    Stevenson assesses social costs from the hawking of worthless or substandard wares or nonexistent services. How many accidents are caused by product houses' defective auto parts, or rubbing alcohol (diluted in someone's bathtub) sold to an airline purchasing department as de-icer? Stevenson considers a variety of tactics boiler rooms use to avid legal snares, but without venturing far into matters of law.

    For all its merits, a nonsociologist expecting a potboiler may find the detail agonizingly thorough and certain analyses perplexing. The Boiler Room has an index, notes, and references, but could use a glossary. The trade vernacular ("cooling out the mark") and sociological lingo ("interaction membrane") are erratically explained. A few typos appear, and the organization is not always transparent. Some conclusions seem tendentious.

    But when it's all boiled down, the unique and compelling material highly recommend this book.

    Gary Grass is a Milwaukee writer, teacher, and paralegal. He currently works as a supervisor at a legitimate telephone research company.

    Animal Law & Dog Behavior

    By David Favre & Peter L. Borchelt
    (Tucson, AZ: Lawyers & Judges Publishing Co., 1999).
    388 pgs. $89.50.

    Reviewed by Patricia Sommer

    Animal Law and Dog Behavior is exactly what one would expect from its title. The first half of the book is an overview of the body of law surrounding animals, from their ownership and regulation to cruelty laws and veterinary malpractice. The second half is a group of articles addressing canine aggression. The book is mildly interesting, but poorly edited.

    The book's first half is comprehensive and well-researched. The historical discussions were interesting, even though some of the issues presented were arcane. One problem with this section is that is repetitive - the same cases are sometimes discussed in multiple sections without distinct analysis justifying the rehash.

    The second section seems thrown together in order to justify publishing the book. Several articles written for other publications are included. These deal with dog behavior and aggression. Perhaps one more sympathetic to the industry of animal psychology might review this portion more favorably. That being said, this section might prove useful to anyone whose practice includes a lot of dog-bite cases: It contains checklists of possible causes of action and other aspects of trying such a case.

    One section struck a chord in light of our supreme court's 1999 decision in State v. Bodoh. Several states have laws imposing criminal liability on persons whose dangerous dogs injure others, much like the law envisioned by Judge Harry G. Snyder in his dissent when Bodoh was before the court of appeals. (See State v. Bodoh, 220 Wis. 2d 102, 116, 119-20, 582 N.W.2d 440, 446-48 (Ct. App. 1998).)

    Overall, the book is no page-turner, and it is annoyingly riddled with typographical errors and grammatical mistakes.

    Patricia Sommer, U.W. 1998, is a law clerk to the Hon. Richard S. Brown, Wisconsin Court of Appeals, District II.


Join the conversation! Log in to comment.

News & Pubs Search

-
Format: MM/DD/YYYY