100 Americans Making Constitutional History: A Biographical History presents 100 profiles of the key people behind some of the most important U.S. Supreme Court cases. Edited by Melvin I. Urofsky, a respected constitutional historian, each 2,000-word profile delves into the social and political context behind landmark Court decisions. For example, while a case like Brown v. Board of Education is about an important idea—the equal protection of the law—at its heart it is the story of a little girl, Linda Brown, who wanted to go to a decent school near her home. The outcome is accessible and objective “stories” about the individuals—heroes and scoundrels—who fought their way to constitutional history.

Morton Halperin

Morton Halperin

The Invasion of Family Privacy

“A Scandal would be Most Helpful Here”

Halperin v. Kissinger

452 U.S. 713 (1981)

Morton H. Halperin, born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1938, was a national security official in the Nixon administration. He sued the president and other officials for illegally wiretapping him and his family and, in the process, helped to define the limits of immunity against suit granted to government officials.

Halperin received a bachelor's degree from Columbia College in 1959 and a doctorate in International Relations from Yale University in 1961. From 1960 to 1966 he was an assistant professor of Government and a Research Associate at the Harvard University Center for International Affairs. During the presidency of Lyndon Johnson, Halperin was appointed deputy assistant secretary of defense for ...

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