This is the first comprehensive biography of Willie Brown, one of California's most enduring and controversial politicians. Audacious, driven, talented—Brown has dominated California politics longer and more completely than any other public figure. James Richardson, a senior writer for The Sacramento Bee, takes us from Brown's childhood, through his years as Speaker of the State Assembly, to his election as San Francisco's mayor. Along the way we get a riveting, behind-the-scenes account of three decades of California politics.
The Campo Indian Landfill War explores the timely and controversial topic of "environmental justice" through the story of an Indian tribe's struggle to develop its isolated and impoverished reservation by building a commercial garbage facility to serve the cities of Southern California. The environmental justice movement was born out of the conviction that the waste industry has targeted minority communities for facilities it can no longer locate in the backyards of those with greater access to political power. The Campo case is therefore an anomaly: The tribe is unified in supporting the landfill, while the project is opposed by their mostly white neighbors out of concern that it could contaminate the aquifer that is the sole source of drinking water for 400 square miles, and thereby render the entire region uninhabitable. The environmental justice community, including many Indians, charges that the waste industry is trying to exploit the poverty of the Campos and other tribes, making them offers they can't refuse for projects no one else wants, projects no one should want. The Campos admit the danger of exploitation, but contend that it is paternalistic - indeed racist - to assume that Indians are not smart enough to protect themselves in dealings with whites or wise enough to guard their reservation environment.
In the popular stereotype of post-World War II America, women abandoned their wartime jobs and contentedly retreated to the home. This work unveils the diversity of postwar women, showing how far women departed from this one-dimensional image.
"Burke drills deep into America's unique culture of litigation and is rewarded with a powerful insight: it is not the public or even lawyers that are so darn litigious, but American law itself. This meticulous, dispassionate book stands not only to advance the debate but—I hope—to reshape it."—Jonathan Rauch, author of Government's End: Why Washington Stopped Working "Lawyers, Lawsuits, and Legal Rights is a fascinating study of the American penchant for public policies that rely on lawsuits to get things done. Burke's analysis is insightful and original. This book compellingly shows that litigious policies have deep roots in our Constitution, culture, and politics."—Charles Epp, author of The Rights Revolution: Lawyers, Activists, and Supreme Courts in Comparative Perspective "Burke's authoritative book demonstrates that the highly litigious American system is not an isolated anomaly but in fact fits in with deeply-rooted elements of American political culture. Where citizens of other countries rely on expert or bureaucratic judgment to resolve disputes, Americans turn to the courts. Equally novel and compelling, Lawyers, Lawsuits, and Legal Rights marshals an impressive set of evidence and delivers a refreshingly well-written look at the state of American litigation."—Frank R. Baumgartner, co-author of Agendas and Instability in American Politics
