The Burger Court: Once More in Transition

This chapter overviews the Burger Court and situates it in the political and legal context of the collapse of the New Deal-Great Society political coalition and ideological framework and the emergence of the new conservatism. The Burger Court marked a transition between the liberal activism of the Warren Court and the conservatism of the Rehnquist Court. Through accident of the appointment process and political and ideological proclivities of the major players, the Burger Court moved in a clearly conservative direction in very few areas, most notably criminal justice. In other areas of the law, the Burger Court either extended the activist legacy of the Warren Court or fractured into multiple competing visions of the constitutional future.