Jeffrey Fitzgerald has published Sir Gerard Brennan: The Law's Good Servant (2024):
This is the first comprehensive biography of Sir Gerard Brennan, who is best known for his judgment in the Mabo case. It highlights the significant role Brennan played in the development of Australian law and in society more broadly. It traces his family background and life, education, and early career in Queensland before turning to the roles for which he is best known – inaugural president of the [Administrative Appeals Tribunal], judge of the Federal Court and High Court, and finally, Chief Justice of Australia. It provides detailed analysis of Brennan’s most significant judgments and compares his reasoning with that of other members of the court. In so doing, it provides valuable insight into his judicial methodology. The book explores how Brennan dealt with the sometimes competing demands of the strict application of legal precedent, and of the need to do justice in a changing social context.
The book also considers the way he sought to balance the compelling demands of his judicial duties and those he saw inherent in both his family responsibilities and his Catholic faith. The portrait which emerges does justice to Brennan the man, as well as Brennan the judge.
As Registrar at [University of Technology Sydney], the author worked closely with Brennan during the period he was Chancellor. He interviewed Brennan extensively, was given access to personal documents, and interviewed more than sixty of Brennan’s colleagues, associates, family members and friends. The resulting book is an important historical record of the life and times of a great Australian and will give readers a deeper understanding of the inner dynamics of the Australian court system.
William H. Clune, University of Wisconsin Law School, has posted a review in the guise of an interview of Fitzgerald:
This is a book review in interview format with me interviewing the book’s author, Jeffrey Fitzgerald. The book is a judicial biography of the famous and influential Australian jurist, Sir Gerard Brennan. Largely in chronological sequence, the book also identifies cross-cutting themes such as the evolution of his jurisprudence over time.
My questions are designed to highlight issues that have parallels in American law, thus introducing the book to American readers. A second focus is the interaction of law and society. Law and society issues pervade the book because it is a longitudinal account of the judge’s encounters with important legal issues that arose in a changing Australian society, his influence on that society, and the corresponding evolution of his jurisprudence. It is law as both a dependent and independent variable, a classic law and society formulation. The judge’s decisions and jurisprudence operate as “constitutive law,” reflecting both the influence of society on law and its influence on society while remaining relatively autonomous from both. Former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Steven Breyer’s recent exposition of judicial “pragmatism” is congruent with the jurisprudence of Justice Brennan.
The paper has eight parts with questions and answers as sub-parts: (1) the book and Brennan’s career; (2) constitutional law, federalism, separation of powers, judicial review; (3) civil rights, aboriginal people’s rights, racial discrimination, and other rights; (4) impact on other areas of law (e.g., torts, contracts, criminal law); (5) Brennan’s principles of jurisprudence (6) the High Court, its divisions, and politics (7) personal, family, and professional life; (8) conclusion: mutual influence of law and society.
--Dan Ernst
