The Pig Farmer's Daughter and Other Tales of American Justice: Episodes of Racism and Sexism in the Courts from 1865 to the Present

by Mary Frances Berry

2021-01-01 09:06:47

From the head of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights comes a landmark study of the ways in which prejudice has shaped American justice from the Civil War era to the present. With an ear tuned to the social subtext of every judicial decision, Mary Fra... Read more
From the head of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights comes a landmark study of the ways in which prejudice has shaped American justice from the Civil War era to the present. With an ear tuned to the social subtext of every judicial decision, Mary Frances Berry examines the stories told in more than a century's worth of state appellate court cases -- stories of seduction, rape, and murder, of contested paternity, property, and inheritance -- all of them dealing with racial and sexual relations. Together these stories form a vivid account of how the law has evolved -- or failed to evolve -- as society's attitudes have changed.

Ranging from a nineteenth-century Alabama case, in which a white woman was denied her divorce petition because an affair between a white man (her husband) and a black woman (his lover) was "of no consequence", to such recent, high-profile cases as the William Kennedy Smith and O.J. Simpson trials, the shocking, moving, ironic, and tragic stories in The Pig Farmer's Daughter each end in the laying down of law. And because the law perpetuates myths of race, gender, and class, they are stories that affect the lives of us all. Less

Book Details

ISBN9780375707469
Mary Frances Berry is the Geraldine R. Segal Professor of American Social Thought and professor of history at the University of Pennsylvania, and the author of nine books. The recipient of thirty-thre...

Compare Prices

Store Availability Book Format Condition Price
BetterWorld.com - New, Used, Rare Books & Textbooks In Stock Buy USD 4.73
Indigo Books & Music In Stock Buy CAD 20.95
BetterWorld.com - New, Used, Rare Books & TextbooksIn Stock
Format
Condition
Buy USD 4.73
Indigo Books & MusicIn Stock
Format
Condition
Buy CAD 20.95
Available Discount
No Discount available

Join us and get access to all
your favourite books

Sign up for free and start exploring thousands of eBooks today.

Sign up for free