"This concentrated and cogent statement on the preeminent object of his concern--the state of the judiciary--may be Bork's most important book for nonspecialist readers."

--Booklist

"Coercing Virtue is a model of lucidity, mordant wit, and scarifying analysis. . . . Like many profound books, Coercing Virtue does not attempt to say anything new. Instead, it does something that is at once more valuable and more difficult: It reminds us of old, familiar truths--so familiar that they are everywhere neglected."

--Roger Kimball, National Review

 

 

Former U.S. solicitor general Robert H. Bork examines the practice of many courts as they consider and decide matters that are not committed to their authority by any legal document. In general, courts have been activist in opposing majority views on such matters as sexual practices, secularism versus religion, rights of speech and expression and feminism. This judicial activism appears to impinge on the legitimate domains of the executive and legislative branches of government and constitutes the judicialization of politics and morals.

 

According to Bork, a number of courts tend to act in this activist fashion. As well, international tribunals appear to exceed their jurisdiction, posing a threat to national sovereignty just as the national courts threaten democratic government. This activism is more than a threat; Bork argues that both sovereignty and self-government have already been seriously damaged.

Coercing Virtue attempts to account for the phenomenon of why so may courts in democratic nations behave in an imperialistic manner and why the results almost always appear to advance the liberal political and cultural agenda.

Robert H. Bork is the author of The Tempting of America: The Political Seduction of the Law and Slouching Towards Gomorrah: Modern Liberalism and American Decline, and The Antitrust Paradox: A Policy at War With Itself. He served as Solicitor General and Acting Attorney General of the United States and was a U.S. Court of Appeals judge. Bork is a senior fellow at AEI. He and his wife live in McLean, Virginia.