Crusaders and Criminals, Victims and Visionaries

In the 200 years since the ratification of the U.S. Constitution, Connecticut citizens have had many historic encounters with the U.S. Supreme Court.

Crusaders & Criminals, Victims & Visionaries: Historic Encounters Between Connecticut Citizens and the United States Supreme Court, edited by David Bollier, Connecticut Attorney General, 1986 (Revised: 2007). A popularized constitutional history of 31 major Connecticut cases that went to the U.S. Supreme Court over the past 200 years. Book is widely used in Connecticut high schools.

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In the 200 years since the ratification of the U.S. Constitution, Connecticut citizens have had many historic encounters with the U.S. Supreme Court. Some of the cases emerged almost accidentally while others were deliberately brought to the courts to test the limits of the Constitution. In most cases, however, there are rich dramas that lie behind the legal principles that eventually emerged.

This material examines both the human circumstances and constitutional principles of thirty-one major cases that originated in Connecticut. Some of the more famous cases include: In re Amistad, Griswold v. Connecticut, Adams v. Williams, Culombe v. Connecticut, Gaffney v. Cummings, and Zemel v. Rusk.

Edited by David Bollier. Sponsored by the Office of the Attorney General. 1986.