Last Branch Standing

“Amusingly myth-busting.”—The Washington Post

“Isgur’s book is an outstanding achievement… . Whatever your interests or credentials, if you asked me to recommend one book on the parlous state of contemporary American politics, this would be it.”—Bloomberg

“Put aside partisanship, argues Sarah Isgur, in attempting to make sense of the Supreme Court. She offers an alternate framework in this intimate look at the untouchable nine. How do political labels actually translate to a legal context? How might we preserve the Court’s legitimacy? Isgur has all your answers in these smart, snappy, clear-eyed pages.”—Stacy Schiff, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Revolutionary: Samuel Adams

“With legal principles challenged almost every day in America, the role of the Court has rarely been so scrutinized, making Last Branch Standing ever the more timely.”—Martha Raddatz, ABC News anchor and chief global affairs correspondent

“Sarah Isgur’s Last Branch Standing is as gripping and informative as her famed podcast, Advisory Opinions. Smart, incisive, nuanced, and funny, this book advocates for the Court—and does so with panache. Isgur succeeds where many others fall short because she illustrates how the Court is not made up of heroes and villains, but real people who do their level best in service of us all.”—Lisa Blatt, Chair, Williams & Connolly’s Supreme Court and Appellate practice; 55-time Supreme Court advocate

“Sarah Isgur does something truly remarkable: she manages to demystify the U.S. Supreme Court while maintaining her reverence for it.”—Jonah Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Dispatch, host of The Remnant podcast, and bestselling author of Suicide of the West

“Occasionally witty, yes. Actually, often witty. More important, often wise. In a word, winning. Before I dove into this volume, I thought I knew rather a lot about the Court and its justices. Now I know a ton more—and so will you if you are wise enough to open this book and start reading.”—Akhil Reed Amar, Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science, Yale University, and author of Born Equal

“Last Branch Standing is a strikingly illuminating introduction to the Supreme Court. Sarah Isgur humanizes the Justices, explains their work, and defends the Court’s integrity amid growing skepticism on both left and right. Last Branch Standing is the most accessible and engagingly written guide to the Court now available.”—Jack Goldsmith, Learned Hand Professor of Law, Harvard University

“[Last Branch Standing] makes the bold and convincing argument that the Court and its justices can’t be categorized using the same hyper-partisan talking points that permeate our other government branches … Readers looking for clarity on this fundamental institution would be wise to ‘grant cert’ (court parlance for agreeing to hear a case) to an engaged reading of Last Branch Standing.”—Booklist

Sarah Isgur is the editor of SCOTUSblog, a regular on ABC’s This Week with George Stephanopoulos, and co-host of Advisory Opinions, the nation’s top legal podcast. She served in the DOJ as the director of the Office of Public Affairs, helped run Carly Fiorina’s presidential campaign, and clerked for Judge Edith H. Jones of the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. She’s a graduate of Harvard Law School and Northwestern University.

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