"'The Benchwarmers' is concerned with the personalities and the politics of the federal trial bench - how a man is appointed to the judciary, and how he behaves once he gets there. The first chapter explores the appointing process, and how the varying demands of the Senate, the White House, the political parties and the organized bar are brought into sometimes precarious balance. There are two chapters on how the judicial system looks when it is working as it should - in New York, under Chief Judge David N. Edelstein; and in Washington, under Chief Judge John J. Sirica, of Watergate fame. There are two chapters on how the sytem can become botched - through a single judge, as in Oklahoma City with the ferociously erratic Stephen S. Chandler; and through most of a district bench, as was true in Chicago, where a goodly number of the judges were incompetent to serve for one reason or another. There is a brief look at the role of the circuit courts of appeal, the intermediate bench between the district trial courts and the Supreme Court, from the perspective of the circuit court in the district of Columbia - the most controversial in the nation. And there is an exploration of judicial self-government - the velvet-gloved and oh-so-private techniques the judges use in an attempt to make their wayward brethren behave, or retire." -- p. 17.