Democracy and Distrust: A Theory of Judicial Review

Abstract

John Hart Ely's Democracy and Distrust is an ambitious attempt to create a new theory of judicial review, breaking away from both "interpretivism" and "noninterpretivism" – a division Professor Ely regards as a "false dichotomy" (p. vii). The book is brilliant and provocative, so much so that one fears less that its faults will be obscured – there is little danger that polemic critics will fail to pounce on them – than that the flash of Professor Ely's reasoning and the controversy it generates will distract us from the genuine importance of the insight that powers his analysis.