Jamie Raskin

Subtitle: Trauma, Truth and the Trials of Democracy

This is Congressman Jamie Raskin's memoir of twin traumas: his personal trauma from the suicide of his beloved son Tommy, and the trauma the country suffered from the January 6 insurrection. I really wanted to read this to learn more about the ins and outs of the legal maneuvering of the second Trump impeachment trial, after having been so engaged in Adam Schiff's account of the first impeachment trial. I was a bit disappointed in this aspect of the book. It didn't seem to go into as much detail as Schiff's account of the first impeachment trial, perhaps because it all had to be done so quickly with not as much time or room for all the backs and forth. I also found Schiff to be a more engaging writer, which surprised me because I have seen Raskin many times on tv and he is an articulate speaker and I admire his grasp of constitutional law. His writing was at times however somewhat academic and scholarly (perhaps because he is a professor).

The parts of the book about his son Tommy and the tragedy of his suicide were of course moving. I did however feel that the connection between the two events (the suicide and the insurrection) was tenuous at best, and these perhaps should have been two separate books. There is no doubt however, that throwing himself into the events surrounding the second impeachment trial (and now his work on the January 6 Committee) was one of the ways in which Raskin was working through his grief, and as he states one way to honor Tommy's memory.

First line: "In the week between December 31,2020 and January 6, 2021, my family suffered two impossible traumas: the shattering death by suicide of my beloved 25-year-old son, Tommy, and the violent mob insurrection at the U.S. Capitol...."

Last line: "For a split second, I was bereft again, built then I looked down at my feet, and there I found my glasses."… (plus d'informations)