In May It Please the Court, artist Xavier Cortada portrays ten significant decisions by the Supreme Court of the United States that originated from people, places, and events in Florida. These cases cover the rights of criminal defendants, the rights of free speech and free exercise of religion, and the powers of states. In Painting Constitutional Law, scholars of constitutional law analyse the paintings and cases, describing the law surrounding the cases and discussing how Cortada captures these foundational decisions, their people, and their events on canvas. This book explores new connections between contemporary art and constitutional law.
Q. Why this book, and why now?
Miami artist Xavier Cortada painted May It Please the Court in 2002, an original series of seven paintings depicting major Supreme Court decisions arising from events in the State of Florida; the exhibit opened at the Florida Supreme Court and has been displayed at FIU College of Law since 2011. We recognized an opportunity to combine the study of law, art, and legal iconography, by inviting leading constitutional law scholars to merge analysis of cases with which they are deeply familiar with less-familiar analysis of artwork and visual imagery to explore how the visual captures the legal. Cortada added three paintings depicting post-2000 cases, allowing the series and the book to capture 60 years of Florida’s contributions to constitutional law.
Q. Who should read this book?
The book should appeal to those interested in law, art, and legal iconography. Lawyers and legal scholars should be interested in the analysis of ten significant constitutional cases. They also should enjoy the opportunity to explore and analyze the paintings, to interpret the images for themselves, and to evaluate how the authors captured each image and how Cortada captured each case.
Q. What is the most important takeaway you hope your readers gain from this book?
We hope readers will appreciate the way that art can inform law and vice versa. We hope they will enjoy the combination of beautiful visual imagery and sharp legal analysis.
Q. How did you decide on the title and cover art?
The cover art is Cortada’s painting for Gideon v. Wainwright (1963), the earliest case covered in Cortada’s series and arguably the most legally famous and significant of the Florida cases in establishing the right of indigent defendants to counsel. The painting depicts an isolated prisoner writing in his cell with a scroll of paper, evoking Gideon’s most unique feature—the case reached the Court on a handwritten petition from the prisoner.
M.C. Mirow is a founding faculty member of the College of Law and a member of the Florida bar. In 2019, he was elected a Vocal (Executive Committee member) of the Instituto Internacional de Historia del Derecho Indiano and a Corresponding Member of the Legal History section of the Academia Nacional de Historia (Argentina). The same year, he served as Chair of the award committee for the Peter Gonville Stein Book Award of the American Society for Legal History and a Visiting Professor at the University of Lille (France) and the Universidad del Salvador (Argentina). In 2016, he was a MacCormick Fellow at the University of Edinburgh Law School, and in 2014, he received a Golden Quill Award from the Florida Historical Society. He has previously served as a Fulbright U.S. Visiting Scholar in Chile, a Mentschikoff Fellow at the University of Miami, and a Kelley Lecturer at Davidson College. Mirow is on the Board of Editors of the Law and History Review and serves as a co-editor of the series the Legal History Library (Brill/Nijhoff). He is a Corresponding Member of the Instituto de Investigaciones de Historia del Derecho in Buenos Aires.
Howard M. Wasserman joined the College of Law faculty in 2003. Professor Wasserman teaches civil procedure, evidence, federal courts, civil rights, and First Amendment; he writes about the freedom of speech, the role of procedure and jurisdiction in public-law and civil-rights litigation, and recently on baseball’s Infield Fly Rule. He blogs at PrawfsBlawg, is the Section Editor for the Courts Law Section of JOTWELL, and is a Contributor at SCOTUSBlog. Professor Wasserman graduated magna cum laude from Northwestern University School of Law, where he was an associate articles editor of the Law Review and was named to the Order of the Coif. Following law school, he clerked for Chief Judge James T. Giles of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania and Judge Jane R. Roth of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. He has been a visiting professor at Saint Louis University School of Law and Florida State University College of Law. Professor Wasserman is a loyal Chicago Cubs fan.