Trials of the State: Law and the Decline of Politics. By Jonathan Sumption. [London: Profile Books, 2019. 128 pp. Hardback £9.99. ISBN 9781788163729.]

Abstract

An old adage about the difference between Oxford and Cambridge goes: 'In Oxford, they say, "That might be true but is it is interesting? But in Cambridge they say, "That might be interesting, but is it true?"' Recently retired UK Supreme Court judge Jonathan Sumption's short book, The Trials of the State: Law and the Decline of Politics, based on his 2019 Reith Lectures for the BBC, is certainly interesting. It contains, for example, Sumption's commentary on a number of leading Supreme Court cases (Unison, Evans, Miller no. 1 and Nicklinson among others, although not Privacy International, which was being decided as the lectures were being prepared) in the course of which he sets out his disagreements with some of the views of his former colleagues on the Court, especially those of Lady Hale, whose response, 'Law and Politics: A Reply to Reith' can be found on the Supreme Court's website. The question, however, is whether Sumption's claims are true.