The Wisdom Of Clarence Darrow

Clarence Seward Darrow (1857 - 1938) was an American lawyer, leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union. Notable for his wit, he became one of the most famous American lawyers and civil libertarians, and a very influential legal mind in the first part of the 20th century. His books on crime and punishment, as well as on the morality and origins of the system, are classics of the libertarian movement, and a cry for attention about all that is wrong in the legal system. His two more famous books, Crime: Its Cause and Treatment, and Resist Not Evil, -books that will change the way you see many things-, are now part of the Timeless Wisdom Collection.

The Story of my Life is an autobiography by Clarence Darrow. Darrow was an American attorney who became famed during the early 20th century for his contribution in the Leopold and Loeb murder trial and the Scopes "Monkey" Trial. He was also a leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union.

The celebrated American lawyer Clarence Darrow was renowned for his spirited, ruthlessly logical defense of populist causes and controversial ideas. Even today, Darrow’s words continue to frame public discussion about our civil liberties and our religious and civic life. In this timely volume, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Edward J. Larson and ethicist Jack Marshall assemble a broad and rich collection of the iconic lawyer’s words and writings–opening statements, trial arguments, lectures–accompanied by excerpts from his memoir and annotated with expert commentary. These selections showcase the mesmerizing power of Darrow’s passions and ideals, which have lost none of their impact or immediacy with the passage of time.

Clarence Seward Darrow (1857 - 1938) was an American lawyer, leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union. Notable for his wit, he became one of the most famous American lawyers and civil libertarians, and a very influential legal mind in the first part of the 20th century. His books on crime and punishment, as well as on the morality and origins of the system, are classics of the libertarian movement, and a cry for attention about all that is wrong in the legal system. His two more famous books, Crime: Its Cause and Treatment, and Resist Not Evil, -books that will change the way you see many things-, are now part of the Timeless Wisdom Collection.

Clarence Darrow is best remembered for his individual cases, whether defending the thrill killers Leopold and Loeb or John Scopes's right to teach evolution in the classroom. In the first full-length biography of Darrow in decades, the historian Andrew E. Kersten narrates the complete life of America's most legendary lawyer and the struggle that defined it, the fight for the American traditions of individualism, freedom, and liberty in the face of the country's inexorable march toward modernity. Prior biographers have all sought to shoehorn Darrow, born in 1857, into a single political party or cause. But his politics do not define his career or enduring importance. Going well beyond the familiar story of the socially conscious lawyer and drawing upon new archival records, Kersten shows Darrow as early modernity's greatest iconoclast. What defined Darrow was his response to the rising interference by corporations and government in ordinary working Americans' lives: he zealously dedicated himself to smashing the structures and systems of social control everywhere he went. During a period of enormous transformations encompassing the Gilded Age and the Progressive Era, Darrow fought fiercely to preserve individual choice as an ever more corporate America sought to restrict it.

Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Biography The definitive biography of Clarence Darrow, the brilliant, idiosyncratic lawyer who defended John Scopes in the “Monkey Trial” and gave voice to the populist masses at the turn of the twentieth century, thus changing American law forever. Amidst the tumult of the industrial age and the progressive era, Clarence Darrow became America’s greatest defense attorney, successfully championing poor workers, blacks, and social and political outcasts, against big business, fundamentalist religion, Jim Crow, and the US government. His courtroom style—a mixture of passion, improvisation, charm, and tactical genius—won miraculous reprieves for men doomed to hang. In Farrell’s hands, Darrow is a Byronic figure, a renegade whose commitment to liberty led him to heroic courtroom battles and legal trickery alike.