What if the Supreme Court didn't have the power to strike down laws? According to the Constitution, it doesn't. From the founding of the republic until 1803, the Supreme Court was the final court of appeals, as it was always meant to be. So where did the concept of judicial review start? As so much of modern American history, it began with the battle between the Federalists and Anti-Federalists, and with Marbury v. Madison.
Thom Hartmann argues it is not the role of the Supreme Court to decide what the law is but rather the duty of the people themselves. He lays out the history of the Supreme Court of the United States, since Alexander Hamilton's defense to modern-day debates, with key examples of cases where the Supreme Court overstepped its constitutional powers. The ultimate remedy to the Supreme Court's abuse of power is with the people--the ultimate arbiter of the law--using the ballot box. America does not belong to the kings and queens; it belongs to the people.
Thom Hartmann examines the brutal role guns have played in American history, from the genocide of the Native Americans to the enforcement of slavery (Slave Patrols are in fact the Second Amendment's “well-regulated militias”) and the racist post–Civil War social order. He shows how the NRA and conservative Supreme Court justices used specious logic to invent a virtually unlimited individual right to own guns, which has enabled the ever-growing number of mass shootings in the United States. But Hartmann also identifies a handful of powerful, commonsense solutions that would break the power of the gun lobby and restore the understanding of the Second Amendment that the Framers of the Constitution intended.
Thom Hartmann traces the history of the struggle between oligarchy and democracy, from America's founding revolt against British aristocracy to the United States' war with the feudal Confederacy to President Franklin Roosevelt's struggle against “economic royalists,” who wanted to block the New Deal. In each of those cases the oligarchs lost the battle. But with increasing right-wing control of the media, unlimited campaign contributions, and a conservative takeover of the judicial system, we're at a crisis point as real and critical as those we hit in 1776, 1861, and 1932. Thankfully, Hartmann lays out practical measures we can take to break up media monopolies, limit the influence of money in politics, and return control of America to We the People.
Thom Hartmann is a progressive national and internationally syndicated talk show host whose shows are available in over a half-billion homes worldwide. He is a four-time Project Censored, Award-winning, New York Times best-selling author of 25 books currently in print in over a dozen languages on five continents.
Talkers Magazine named Thom Hartmann as the most important progressive talk show host in America for the past decade, and for three of the past five years, the #1 most important progressive host on their “Heavy Hundred” ranking. His radio show is syndicated on for-profit radio stations nationwide by WYD Media, on non-profit and community stations nationwide by Pacifica, across the entire North American continent on SiriusXM Satellite radio, and on cable systems nationwide by Cable Radio Network (CRN) and Free Speech TV. Furthermore the show is broadcast on its own YouTube channel, via subscription podcasts, worldwide through the US American Forces Network, and through the Thom Hartmann App in the App Store. It is also simulcast as TV in realtime into nearly 60 million US and Canadian homes by the Free Speech TV Network on Dish Network, DirectTV, and cable TV systems nationwide.
As an entrepreneur, Hartmann has founded several successful businesses which still are operating, and he has lived and worked with his wife, Louise, and their three (now adult) children on several continents. He was born and grew up in Michigan and retains strong ties to the Midwest, although he and Louise have lived in New Hampshire, Vermont, Georgia, Germany, Washington DC, and Oregon.