Jonathan Turley
With an engaging writing style and eye to detail, Mr. Mahler…takes the reader through Mr. Hamdan's evolution from a street urchin to one of a handful of "high value" enemy combatants…The Challenge is not just a very readable account of an important case. It is also an intimate account of the lawyers who overcame personal conflicts, animus and flaws to produce a decision for the ages. It is an intriguing tale of how a unique convergence of personalities propelled an unlikely dabab driver from Yemen to international prominence.
—The New York Times
Publishers Weekly
In this account of the momentous Supreme Court case Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, Mahler (Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning) profiles key figures of the defense: JAG lawyer Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift, constitutional law professor Neal Katyal and the defendant, Salim Hamdan, Osama bin Laden's former driver. The book chronicles this legal odd couple-Swift, the gregarious blowhard, and Katyal, the diligent straight man-as they struggle to keep their client alive in Guantánamo Bay and craft a case challenging the legality of President George W. Bush's military tribunals. The author narrates their burgeoning relationship with each other and their client-in one endearing passage, Swift seeks counseling for his relationship with Hamden at the same time that he seeks therapy to save his marriage. While Mahler skillfully humanizes the characters and institutions at the heart of the case, the book sags under detailed forays into arcane aspects of the American justice system and irrelevant personal vignettes that feel forced and slow the pace. For whatever dramatic tension the book lacks, Mahler amply conveys the heroism of his protagonists. (Aug. 13)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Library Journal
In the case of Hamdan v. Rumsfeld(2006), the Supreme Court ruled that military tribunals established by the U.S. government to try its Guantánamo Bay detainees were unconstitutional. Mahler (New York Times magazine; Ladies and Gentlemen, The Bronx Is Burning) bases this book largely on interviews with the two principal defense attorneys, Neal Katyal, a Georgetown University constitutional law professor, and Charles Swift, of the U.S. Navy's Judge Advocate General's Corps. Mahler does an excellent job of presenting the complex legal issues surrounding the case in a highly readable manner, but at the book's heart are his characterizations of Katyal and Swift and their relationship with each another, with their families, with the military, and with their client, Salim Hamdan, a Yemeni man captured in 2001, as they worked passionately, and against high odds, to win the case. While the book is a great read, its impact may be diluted because the further fate of the military tribunals, and of Hamdan himself, remains unclear, matters of decision in subsequent litigation. Highly recommended for all law, public, and academic libraries. [See Prepub Alert, LJ4/15/08.]
—Bob Nardini
Kirkus Reviews
Near-exhaustive account of what some Supreme Court watchers consider "the most important decision on presidential power ever."Three days after 9/11, George Bush set in motion a program to try suspected terrorists as war criminals, not civilians, through military tribunals. The tribunals would be convened abroad, not just for security reasons but also to keep strict control over what information could leave the courtroom. An air base in Germany was considered and rejected, lest the Germans "try to exert a degree of authority over the facility," as New York Times Magazine contributor Mahler (Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning, 2005) notes. The Marshall Islands and other Pacific outposts lacked sufficient infrastructure. But Guantanamo Bay served well-it was remote from the press, yet accessible to the mainland. Up early for trial was a Yemeni jihadist named Salim Hamdan, initially recruited to go to Tajikistan and join an Islamic insurgency against the Russian-backed government. Instead, he fell in with Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan and worked as his bodyguard and driver. Captured in the American invasion, Hamdan was transferred to Cuba in December 2003. He made an ideal, low-hanging-fruit kind of defendant, since, among other things, he hadn't been rendered to a third country for interrogation, "which would open the door for his defense attorney to raise questions about his treatment." His defense attorney was a troubled naval officer who both belonged to the ACLU and recognized that he was committing career suicide, and who drew on a wide network of legal allies to press a constitutional case that argued, at its basis, that the president was overstepping the bounds of hisauthority. The argument made for strange allies (Ken Starr, anyone?) and an impressive array of foes, but it worked, convincing even a conservative Supreme Court. Naturally, the military and administration are working to get around the Court's decision, but for a brief moment, Mahler concludes, "the system worked."Though sometimes bogged down in legal minutia, quite understandably, Mahler's fluent account of events is essential reading for students of constitutional law-and anyone concerned with civil rights.
