Circuit Riding: A Traveler's Guide to Where American Justice Was Made
Forthcoming · 2026
Most of American law happened somewhere with parking.
The country turned 250 this summer, and the official itinerary ran through Philadelphia, Boston, and a defensible number of gift shops. All of it worth the trip. But the founders wrote the opening argument, not the whole brief, and the rest of it got made in considerably worse buildings.
A Panama City courtroom that got everyone the right to a lawyer. A Dayton bicycle shop that started the longest patent fight in American aviation. A Montgomery bus stop you already know about. A courthouse square you've driven past twice looking for a bathroom. Circuit Riding is a guide to those places, and to the people who spent years of their lives arguing in them.
Infrequent emails, because books are slow. Your address doesn't go anywhere else.
Riding the Circuit
Before there was a federal courthouse in every district, the judges traveled. They rode a circuit through the towns, held court in whatever room would hold a jury, and moved on. Lincoln rode the Illinois circuit twice a year for more than twenty years, in the weather that implies.
The rooms are still out there. Some are museums. Some are parking lots. Some are still courthouses, and they'll let you sit in the back and watch. This book tells you which is which, and whether it's worth the detour.