The trial in American life - Ferguson, Robert A. (University of Chicago Press, 2007)
Master and use copy. Digital master created according to Benchmark for Faithful Digital Reproductions of Monographs and Serials, Version 1. Digital Library Federation, December 2002
Includes bibliographical references (pages 337-392) and index
Where courtrooms and communities meet -- - Inside the courtroom -- - The punishing of Aaron Burr -- - John Brown : defendant on the loose -- - Mary Surratt on the altar of national identity -- - Traitors in name only : the Haymarket defendants -- - Killing the Rosenbergs -- - The trial in television America -- - Seeing justice done
In a bravura performance that ranges from Aaron Burr to O.J. Simpson, Robert A. Ferguson traces the legal meaning and cultural implications of prominent American trials across the history of the nation. His interdisciplinary investigation carries him from courtroom transcripts to newspaper accounts, and on to the work of such imaginative writers as Emerson, Thoreau, William Dean Howells, and E.L. Doctorow. Ferguson shows how courtrooms are forced to cope with unresolved communal anxieties and how they sometimes make legal decisions that change the way Americans think about themselves. Burnin