Clarence Darrow

This is a nicely readable, informative look at the life of attorney Clarence Darrow (1856-1938). Darrow left his well-paying job as attorney for the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad to defend socialist labor leader Eugene Debs in the aftermath of Chicago's 1894 Pullman strike. As readers see, Darrow would then spend the next four decades defending other outcasts and unpopular causes. Darrow would defend labor activists and strikers, millionaire killers Leopold and Loeb, racial integration in Detroit (the Sweet Case), and the teaching of Evolution in Tennessee (Scopes Monkey trial). His opponents would include not only prosecutors, but law makers, ex-Presidential candidates like William Jennings Bryan, and very often enraged public opinion. Readers see how Darrow combined shrewd legal strategy with superb ability to question and cross-examine witnesses. Of course, he was also recognized as among the greatest courtroom orators ever - Chicagoans fought to get courtroom seats for his summation in the Leopold and Loeb case. Darrow would also twice stand trial in Los Angeles, charged with jury tampering from the McNamara case - he was acquitted but left shaken by the experience. All is here in this interesting if slightly dated book written shortly after his passing.

I thought this author's interesting style was better than the other biographies on Darrow in the library. When Darrow found that the McNamaras were responsible for destroying bridges: "He felt like a man with a rumbling volcano in his pocket, trying to hold back the eruption with his naked hand." (p. 278) Does this quote sound odd to anyone else?

Okay, I'm not one to regularly demean other's comments, but sometimes silly libel has to be contended. The author Irving Stone is the well regarded writer of biographies on Jack London, Michelangelo, and Vincent van Gogh. I.F. (Isador Feinstein) Stone was a journalist and is known for being a vocal opponent to Joe McCarthy. The latter is the one mentioned in the Venona transcripts, and is an enemy to even modern right wing thinkers, for good or bad reasons. Whatever your politics on this doesn't matter. Irving Stone is not the man mentioned.I come from fundamentalist stock. I'm a conservative in politics, and very committed to my faith. Rather than being a distasteful book to me, however, this biography tells of a man who lived during a complicated era. He rejected the church, and yet in his work held up the most basic precepts of Christian thought, defending the poor, helping the helpless. This is not to say he was without his problems. And Irving Stone is not writing a hagiography, and so the reader becomes aware of his faults as well as his greatness. Stone is the master of primary documents, taking written and oral sources, as well as large amount of secondary material, and crafting these into a well told narrative. This is not a strick biography, seeking instead to envelop the reader into the story. My regard for the subject grew, despite my occasional disagreements on his stance. He stood his ground, and fought for those who were oppressed by the powers that be in that time. Darrow was also human, very human. This book is a superb introduction to the story of his life, and the era which he in many ways represented. Those interested in the early twentieth century, in culture wars, in the growth of labor movements, would benefit greatly from reading this. Such utter silliness as calling this book propaganda should be dismissed as both ignorance of the author, coupled with a hate for what Darrow did stand for. Read Stone's other books first if it helps, to see his credibility as an author and narrative biographer. Among all of those this remains my favorite, and well worth picking up, even if used.

This book is a good introduction to the life of Clarence Darrow. It spans all his major cases and leaves the reader with awe for a man whose ability as an attorney in the Dr. Oscar Sweet case in Detroit, Michigan in 1925 was as if God had descended heaven from Heaven to win the freedom of a black professional who was accused of murder in an America that already had witnessed the Tulsa, Oklahoma and St. Louis race riots. His defense of the poor in the anthracite coal case of 1902 and the rioters in the Haymarket case stand as models for Americans of any age. The only weakness in the book is that his addresses to juries are not included. Clarence Darrow is as important to Americans as Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Delano Roosevelt were in the eras of the Civil War and the Great Depression. I recommend this book for all Americans of all ages. He was a defender of the poor and a defender of the values and ethics of American society. Elliot Spitzer, the Attorney General of the State of New York, is some ways bears resemblance to Clarence Darrow. I recommend the book highly, the reverence I have for the life of Clarence Darrow is huge only for God do I have more.