The Bureaucratic Court
Courtiers of the Marble Palace: The Rise and Influence of the Supreme Court Law Clerk. By Todd C. Peppers. Stanford: Stanford University Press. 2006. Pp. xvi, 310. Cloth, $55; paper, $21.95.
Sorcerers’ Apprentices: 100 Years of Law Clerks at the United States Supreme Court. By Artemus Ward and David L. Weiden. New York and London: New York University Press. 2006. Pp. xiv, 337. $39.
In August 2006, the New York Times caused a stir by reporting that the number of female law clerks at the United States Supreme Court has fallen sharply in the first full Term in which Justice Sandra Day O’Connor is no longer on the bench. In an era in which nearly fifty percent of all law school graduates are women, the Times reported, less than twenty percent of the clerks in the Court’s 2006 Term—seven of thirty-seven—are women. In interviews, Justices Souter and Breyer viewed the sharp drop in the number of female clerks as an aberration from most years, when women typically comprise one-third of all clerks.