Paul Sabin traces how liberal public interest advocates of the 1960s and 1970s inadvertently helped create conditions for the conservative revolution that followed. Sabin, a historian at Yale, examines figures like Ralph Nader, whose consumer advocacy crusaded against corporate malfeasance, and the environmental lawyers who used litigation to force regulatory compliance. These advocates achieved genuine victories--safer cars, cleaner air, protections for consumers--but their tactics also undermined faith in government itself. By exposing regulatory capture, bureaucratic incompetence, and corruption, they provided ammunition for conservatives who sought to dismantle the regulatory state entirely. Sabin shows how the public interest movement's anti-institutional stance converged with libertarian critiques, how its procedural reforms created gridlock that frustrated liberal goals, and how its elite lawyer-activists failed to build durable political coalitions. The book is not a conservative critique of liberalism; Sabin respects his subjects' achievements while tracing their unintended consequences. He examines how movements for reform can undermine the institutions reform requires, how purity politics makes governing difficult, and how tactical victories can produce strategic defeats. The book illuminates a pivotal period in American political development while offering lessons for contemporary advocates grappling with similar tensions.