Playing it Safe POLITICAL SCIENCE / American Government / Local The Front Porch: Stories from

The Front Porch: Stories from the Soul of San Antonio takes readers through San Antonio’s neighborhoods to trace the cultural and human legacy of a city built on the margins

and urban life in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century and illuminating how they merged in unexpected and public ways

Erik Love draws on in-depth interviews with Middle Eastern American advocates

including Californians themselves

Playing it Safe POLITICAL SCIENCE / American Government / Local The Front Porch: Stories fromIt is one of the unspoken truths of the American judicial system that courts go out of their way to avoid having to decide important and controversial issues. Even the Supreme Court from which the entire nation seeks guidance frequently engages in transparent tactics to avoid difficult, politically sensitive cases. The Court's reliance on avoidance has been inconsistent and at times politically motivated. For example, liberal New Deal Justices,