Nat Hentoff is one of America's most passionate and prominent writers about civil liberties and civil rights. In Living the Bill of Rights, he has taken what is too often thought of as an abstract issue and enlivened it by focusing on representative individuals for whom the Constitution is a vital part of life. As the late Supreme Court Justice William Brennan told Hentoff, Americans need to know how "American liberties were won—and what it takes to keep them alive." With characteristic eloquence, Hentoff covers the full range of American life in these inspiring profiles and stories about public and private heroes—Supreme Court Justices William Brennan and William O. Douglas, Dr. Kenneth Clark, and students, teachers, lawyers, and others who challenge assaults on the Bill of Rights.

Nat Hentoff is the author of many articles and books about jazz, politics, and education, including Free Speech for Me—But Not for Thee (1992). His syndicated column, "Sweet Land of Liberty," appears in the Washington Post and more than two hundred other newspapers, and he is a weekly contributor to the Village Voice. He lives in New York City.

"Justice Douglas is heroic in Hentoff's view not merely because he stood up for unpopular free speech, but because he actually encouraged it, believing firmly that the 'Constitution exists to nurture dissent.' . . . [Hentoff] has provided an invigorating and entertaining reminder of why freedom of expression matters, and what some heroic Americans have done to protect it."—Jonathan S. Shapiro, New York Times Book Review

"Hentoff has compiled a lively and timely guide to the U. S. Constitution in action."—Publishers Weekly

A New York Times Book Review Notable Book of the Year 1998

Nat Hentoff: A Civil Libertarian Takes on Obama and the World in the Huffington Post