IU law professors contribute to book about Rehnquist

Since the death of former U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist on Sept. 3, 2005, only one book has been published about him, and that one book was edited by an IU School of Law professor.\nThe professor, Craig Bradley, said he had the idea to examine Rehnquist's legacy in constitutional law for about two years. Since then, Bradley found several collaborating authors for the book, held a discussion conference and published the book, "The Rehnquist Legacy," which was released in December by the Cambridge University Press.\n"I had the idea to assess Rehnquist's legislation in constitutional law about two years ago, and I had originally invited Rehnquist to participate, though I was fairly sure he wouldn't want to," Bradley said.\nSo Bradley, the law school's James Louis Calamaras professor, set out to write the book, but not without help from other experts.\n"No one person could write such a book because you have to get into a lot of detail, including criminal procedure, and no one is competent in both (that and constitutional law)," Bradley said.\nBradley, who wrote one chapter, found 17 other authors to complete the other chapters of the book. Of the 17, three are IU law professors: Daniel Conkle, Dawn Johnsen and Joseph Hoffmann. Each author is an expert in the area he or she wrote about. Several are former Supreme Court clerks and some, including Bradley, are former Rehnquist clerks.\n"I had clerked for Rehnquist, so naturally I was interested in him, and I thought he was one of the most significant figures on the court," he said. "No one's ever written a book like this."\nIn fact, according to a Jan. 24 IU press release, "The Rehnquist Legacy" is "the first legal biography about a Supreme Court justice." In other words, "... it is a biography devoted entirely to assessing a justice's impact on the nation's highest court and the development of constitutional law," according to the press release.\n"It has nothing to do with his personal life," Bradley said. "It barely mentions his career. It's simply an analysis of his Supreme Court writings ... focusing on Supreme Court opinions."\nConkle's chapter deals with church-state relationships, especially in terms of government funding. He said he decided to contribute to the book because "too often people look at the court as an institution without looking at the individual jurisprudence of each member of the court."\nHe said the project seemed interesting and was important to him in his fields of interest: constitutional law, the First Amendment and questions of religious liberty in church-state relations.\n"Chief Justice Rehnquist played a major role in essentially loosening the restrictions on government funding in the form of vouchers that support religious schools and other potential religious activities," Conkle said.\nJohnsen contributed a chapter to the book about abortion. \n"It's an issue that the court has changed significantly since the time Rehnquist was on the court," she said. "He was one of two original dissenters in Roe v. Wade, and more and more justices were appointed who disagreed with Roe."\nJohnsen said the idea of the book and the group of collaborators inspired her to contribute.\n"The timing was perfect," she said. "It turned out to be exactly the right time to assess Chief Justice Rehnquist's legacy. It was also clear when we were writing the book that we were toward the end of Rehnquist's career and we had a substantial body of case law to analyze." \nExecutive Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at the IU School of Law John S. Applegate said in an e-mail that the law school is proud of the faculty participation in this book.\n"When you consider that four of the members of this absolutely stellar group of scholars are faculty members at Indiana Law, you realize what an extraordinary faculty we have," he said.\nBradley, who clerked for Rehnquist in 1975 and 1976, said he liked the justice.\n"He was a very nice guy and had a good sense of humor -- he wasn't at all pompous," Bradley said. "We didn't see eye-to-eye politically, but he liked to argue, so there was no problem voicing my views... (But) in terms of what the opinion would look like, I had a great deal of input. It was a very rewarding experience"