“The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court is a book written by Jeffrey Toobin. Jeffrey Toobin is a staff writer at The New Yorker, as well as a senior legal analyst at CNN. “The Nine” begins during the Reagan era and ends in 2007. Toobin discusses all of the major cases the Supreme Court ruled on during that time period. It also talks about each of the judges, their personalities, and how they came to make the decisions they made. One of the things I found most interesting about the book is that Toobin describes how judges become judges. Why the President, at the time, nominated them and who were the runners-up for the position. Toobin had a way of bringing each of the judges to life, showing glimpses of who they were. It captured their personalities and made me see them as individual people, instead of blending them together like the Supreme Court, like I did before reading this book. The book was based on interviews conducted by Toobin. One thing I didn't like was that he didn't say how he knew the judge's personal feelings. While reading the book, I wondered whether it was based on interviews with judges or whether it was second-hand information obtained. Illuminating book on the inner workings of the Supreme Court. From 1992 to 2005, Supreme Court decisions mostly reflected public opinion. After Rehnquist's death in 2005, the Supreme Court moved more in the direction of the conservative party than in previous years. The conservative agenda is becoming more important than it was under Rehnquist and before O'Connor retired. In addition to shifting the court to the conservative side, Rehnquist's passing also ended the longest-serving group of justices serving together. They had… half the paper… eye. While Toobin gave me great insight into the people who make up the Supreme Court, this book has become dated in some respects. Stevens and Souter are no longer on the Supreme Court. As this book shows, each individual justice constitutes the personality of the Supreme Court, which is now slightly different, without Justices Stevens and Souter. The nine judges in the book served together longer than any other group of judges. Toobin describes how each of the justices was appointed to the Supreme Court, including the failed appointments that ultimately landed each of the justices on the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court shapes our country in a way that no other branch of government can, because it is appointed for life. Ultimately, nominating a Supreme Court justice is one of the most far-reaching and lasting ways a president can shape our nation.