| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 93.1

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 93.1 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Justice Curtis in the Civil War Era: At the Crossroads of American Constitutionalism. By Stuart Streichler. (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2005. xvi, 271 pp. $37.50, ISBN 0-8139-2342-5.)
Through this biography of Benjamin R. Curtis, Stuart Streichler aspires to "present a constitutional history of the Civil War era" (p. xi). A preeminent constitutional lawyer, Curtis also served six years as a justice of the Supreme Court, resigning in 1857.	1
Introducing his book's seven chapters and conclusion, Streichler argues the centrality of constitutional issues to the Civil War, echoing the view common among legal analysts that the era marked a turning point in American constitutionalism. An initial chapter places Curtis within a sketchily outlined "Whig tradition." In each of the other chapters, Streichler addresses a different constitutional topic linked to a case or controversy in which Curtis was involved. In this manner he discusses Curtis's role in delineating state and federal power in the federal system, the rendition of fugitive slaves, the origins of "substantive" process of law, the Dred Scott case, the debate over the extent of presidential war powers, and the defense of President Andrew Johnson in the impeachment trial of 1868. Curtis played a leading part in all these controversies, setting the framework for debate and in some cases establishing principles that are still fundamental today.	. . .

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