The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court
Jeffrey Toobin
Bestselling author Jeffrey Toobin takes you into the chambers of the most important--and secret--legal body in our country, the Supreme Court, and reveals the complex dynamic among the nine people who decide the law of the land.Just in time for the 2008 presidential election--where the future of the Court will be at stake--Toobin reveals an institution at a moment of transition, when decades of conservative disgust with the Court have finally produced a conservative majority, with major changes in store on such issues as abortion, civil rights, presidential power, and church-state relations.Based on exclusive interviews with justices themselves, The Nine tells the story of the Court through personalities--from Anthony Kennedy's overwhelming sense of self-importance to Clarence Thomas's well-tended grievances against his critics to David Souter's odd nineteenth-century lifestyle. There is also, for the first time, the full behind-the-scenes story of Bush v. Gore--and Sandra Day O'Connor's fateful breach with George W. Bush, the president she helped place in office. The Nine is the book bestselling author Jeffrey Toobin was born to write. A CNN senior legal analyst and New Yorker staff writer, no one is more superbly qualified to profile the nine justices.
Award History
1 wins · 1 total
| Award | Year | Result | Category / Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize | 2008 | Winner | Secondary source |
Experimental book profileGenerated by GPT-5.4 nano · may contain inaccuracies
This is an unverified interpretation of the catalog description, offered as an opt-in discovery experiment—not as bibliographic fact.
01 Central figures
None extracted with sufficient confidence.
These suggestions did not meet the normal display threshold and are more likely to be wrong.
- Anthony Kennedy62%
- Clarence Thomas60%
- Sandra Day O'Connor58%
02 Central places
- the Supreme Court85%
Show lower-confidence suggestions
These suggestions did not meet the normal display threshold and are more likely to be wrong.
- Bush v. Gore40%
03 Suggested argument
No argument inferred with sufficient confidence.
This suggestion did not meet the normal display threshold and is more likely to be wrong.
By profiling the justices’ personalities and interviewing them, the book claims the Supreme Court’s decisions and near-term shifts on abortion, civil rights, presidential power, and church-state relations are driven by their internal dynamics during a conservative-majority transition.
Model confidence 38%
04 Reading orientation
35 / 100 academicSerious trade
An estimate of intended readership and scholarly apparatus—not quality or importance.
Confidence percentages are the model's own estimates. Profile confidence: 48%.