From the early days of European settlement in North America, Christianity has had a profound impact on American law and culture. This volume profiles nineteen of America's most influential Christian jurists from the early colonial era to the present day. Anyone interested in American legal history and jurisprudence, the role Christianity has played throughout the nation's history, and the relationship between faith and law will enjoy this worthy and unique study. The jurists covered in this collection were pious men and women, but that does not mean they agreed on how faith should inform law. From Roger Williams and John Cotton to Antonin Scalia and Mary Ann Glendon, America's great Christian jurists have brought their faith to bear on the practice of law in different ways and to different effects.

'I enthusiastically recommend this wonderfully conceived volume on the intersections of Christian thought and the American legal tradition. The editors Daniel L. Dreisbach and Mark David Hall have provided an enormous service by illuminating the enduring but contentious influence of Christian belief on some of the most prominent jurists in American history.'

Thomas S. Kidd - Vardaman Distinguished Professor of History, Baylor University, Texas

'If you dig beneath almost anything, you are likely to find religion or something closely akin to it.  Law is no different. The implications for law of one’s deepest convictions can be either thoughtful or not so thoughtful. Great Christian Jurists in American History contains essays about and by some of the people who have thought most deeply about the connections between Christian faith, morality, and American law. An understanding of the jurists discussed in these essays is essential for anyone who wants to understand the religious roots of American law and the critique Christian faith might bring to American law.'

Robert F. Cochran, Jr - Louis D. Brandeis Professor of Law and Founder of the Nootbaar Institute Pepperdine University, California

'This highly readable and invaluable volume is part of an impressive series by Cambridge University Press that describes and analyzes Christianity’s enormous role in shaping the history of law. The book analyzes the intersection of faith and law in the lives of nineteen distinguished American jurists. Profiling Winthrop, Penn and Dickinson as well as Jay, Story, David Brewer, Harold Berman, Scalia, Mary Ann Glendon, and Robert P. George among others, it will interest scholars in history, political theory, theology, and law.'

Joshua J. Bowman Source: Religious Studies Review