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Author: Robert W. Bennett
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 0801461111
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 223
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Book Description
Problems of constitutional interpretation have many faces, but much of the contemporary discussion has focused on what has come to be called "originalism." The core of originalism is the belief that fidelity to the original understanding of the Constitution should constrain contemporary judges. As originalist thinking has evolved, it has become clear that there is a family of originalist theories, some emphasizing the intent of the framers, while others focus on the original public meaning of the constitutional text. This idea has enjoyed a modern resurgence, in good part in reaction to the assumption of more sweeping power by the judiciary, operating in the name of constitutional interpretation. Those arguing for a "living Constitution" that keeps up with a changing world and changing values have resisted originalism. This difference in legal philosophy and jurisprudence has, since the 1970s, spilled over into party politics and the partisan wrangling over court appointments from appellate courts to the Supreme Court. In Constitutional Originalism, Robert W. Bennett and Lawrence B. Solum elucidate the two sides of this debate and mediate between them in order to separate differences that are real from those that are only apparent. In a thorough exploration of the range of contemporary views on originalism, the authors articulate and defend sharply contrasting positions. Solum brings learning from the philosophy of language to his argument in favor of originalism, and Bennett highlights interpretational problems in the dispute-resolution context, describing instances in which a living Constitution is a more feasible and productive position. The book explores those contrasting positions, to be sure, but also uncovers important points of agreement for the interpretational enterprise. This provocative and absorbing book ends with a bibliographic essay that points to landmark works in the field and helps lay readers and students orient themselves within the literature of the debate.
Author: Robert W. Bennett
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 0801461111
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 223
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Book Description
Problems of constitutional interpretation have many faces, but much of the contemporary discussion has focused on what has come to be called "originalism." The core of originalism is the belief that fidelity to the original understanding of the Constitution should constrain contemporary judges. As originalist thinking has evolved, it has become clear that there is a family of originalist theories, some emphasizing the intent of the framers, while others focus on the original public meaning of the constitutional text. This idea has enjoyed a modern resurgence, in good part in reaction to the assumption of more sweeping power by the judiciary, operating in the name of constitutional interpretation. Those arguing for a "living Constitution" that keeps up with a changing world and changing values have resisted originalism. This difference in legal philosophy and jurisprudence has, since the 1970s, spilled over into party politics and the partisan wrangling over court appointments from appellate courts to the Supreme Court. In Constitutional Originalism, Robert W. Bennett and Lawrence B. Solum elucidate the two sides of this debate and mediate between them in order to separate differences that are real from those that are only apparent. In a thorough exploration of the range of contemporary views on originalism, the authors articulate and defend sharply contrasting positions. Solum brings learning from the philosophy of language to his argument in favor of originalism, and Bennett highlights interpretational problems in the dispute-resolution context, describing instances in which a living Constitution is a more feasible and productive position. The book explores those contrasting positions, to be sure, but also uncovers important points of agreement for the interpretational enterprise. This provocative and absorbing book ends with a bibliographic essay that points to landmark works in the field and helps lay readers and students orient themselves within the literature of the debate.
Author: Dennis J. Goldford
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521845588
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 320
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Book Description
Located at the intersection of law, political science, philosophy, and literary theory, this book explores the nature of American constitutional interpretation through a reconsideration of the long-standing debate between the interpretive theories of originalism and nonoriginalism. It traces that debate to a particular set of premises about the nature of language, interpretation, and objectivity, premises that raise the specter of unconstrained, unstructured constitutional interpretation that has haunted contemporary constitutional theory.
Author: Steven G. Calabresi
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1596980605
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 370
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Book Description
What did the Constitution mean at the time it was adopted? How should we interpret today the words used by the Founding Fathers? In ORIGINALISM: A QUARTER-CENTURY OF DEBATE, these questions are explained and dissected by the very people who continue to shape the legal structure of our country.This is a lively and fascinating discussion of an issue that has occupied the greatest legal minds in America, and one that continues to elicit strong reactions from both those who support and those who oppose the rule of law. Steven G. Calabresi, co-founder of the Federalist Society and professor of law at Northwestern University School of Law, has compiled an impressive collection of speeches, panel discussions, and debates from some of the greatest and most prominent legal experts of the last twenty-five years.
Author: Johnathan O'Neill
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 9780801881114
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 308
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Book Description
This book explains how the debate over originalism emerged from the interaction of constitutional theory, U.S. Supreme Court decisions, and American political development. Refuting the contention that originalism is a recent concoction of political conservatives like Robert Bork, Johnathan O'Neill asserts that recent appeals to the origin of the Constitution in Supreme Court decisions and commentary, especially by Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, continue an established pattern in American history. Originalism in American Law and Politics is distinguished by its historical approach to the topic. Drawing on constitutional commentary and treatises, Supreme Court and lower federal court opinions, congressional hearings, and scholarly monographs, O'Neill's work will be valuable to historians, academic lawyers, and political scientists.
Author: Steven G. Calabresi
Publisher: Regnery Publishing
ISBN: 1596980508
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 370
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Book Description
What did the Constitution mean at the time it was adopted? How should we interpret today the words used by the Founding Fathers? In ORIGINALISM: A QUARTER-CENTURY OF DEBATE, these questions are explained and dissected by the very people who continue to shape the legal structure of our country. Inside you'll find: *A foreword by Justice Antonin Scalia and speeches by former attorney general Edwin Meese III, Justice William Brennan, Judge Robert H. Bork, and President Ronald Reagan *Transcripts from panel discussions and debates engaging some of the brightest legal minds of our time in frank, open discussions about the original meaning of the Constitution of the United States and its impact on the rule of law in our country *A debate on the original meaning of the Commerce, Spending, and Necessary and Proper Clauses *Concluding thoughts by Theodore Olson, forty-second solicitor general of the United States and a fellow at both the American College of Trial Lawyers and the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers. ORIGINALISM: A QUARTER-CENTURY OF DEBATE is a lively and fascinating discussion of an issue that has occupied the greatest legal minds in America, and one that continues to elicit strong reactions from both those who support and those who oppose the rule of law. Steven G. Calabresi, co-founder of the Federalist Society and professor of law at Northwestern University School of Law, has compiled an impressive collection of speeches, panel discussions, and debates from some of the greatest and most prominent legal experts of the last twenty-five years.
Author: John O. McGinnis
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 067472626X
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 309
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Book Description
Originalism holds that the U.S. Constitution should be interpreted according to its meaning at the time it was enacted. In their innovative defense of originalism, John McGinnis and Michael Rappaport maintain that the text of the Constitution should be adhered to by the Supreme Court because it was enacted by supermajorities--both its original enactment under Article VII and subsequent Amendments under Article V. A text approved by supermajorities has special value in a democracy because it has unusually wide support and thus tends to maximize the welfare of the greatest number. The authors recognize and respond to many possible objections. Does originalism perpetuate the dead hand of the past? How can originalism be justified, given the exclusion of African Americans and women from the Constitution and many of its subsequent Amendments? What is originalism's place in interpretation, after two hundred years of non-originalist precedent? A fascinating counterfactual they pose is this: had the Supreme Court not interpreted the Constitution so freely, perhaps the nation would have resorted to the Article V amendment process more often and with greater effect. Their book will be an important contribution to the literature on originalism, now the most prominent theory of constitutional interpretation.
Author: Robert W. Bennett
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 0801460638
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 223
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Book Description
Elucidates the debate between constitutional originalism and the "living constitution" approach.
Author: Lee J. Strang
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108475639
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 329
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Book Description
Provides the first natural law justification for an originalist interpretation of the American Constitution.
Author: Johnathan O'Neill
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 0801881110
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 294
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Book Description
This book explains how the debate over originalism emerged from the interaction of constitutional theory, U.S. Supreme Court decisions, and American political development. Refuting the contention that originalism is a recent concoction of political conservatives like Robert Bork, Johnathan O'Neill asserts that recent appeals to the origin of the Constitution in Supreme Court decisions and commentary, especially by Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, continue an established pattern in American history. Originalism in American Law and Politics is distinguished by its historical approach to the topic. Drawing on constitutional commentary and treatises, Supreme Court and lower federal court opinions, congressional hearings, and scholarly monographs, O'Neill's work will be valuable to historians, academic lawyers, and political scientists.
Author: Andre LeDuc
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 67
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Book Description
This Article completes a therapeutic treatment of the originalism debate. The long-running debate over constitutional originalism is pathological, more confused than insightful or important. This Article completes the course of therapy by sketching the constitutional discourse and practice we may hope for after the debate over originalism is transcended and left behind. In so doing, it disarms the final defense of the participants in that debate in that they have no alternative. Only by sketching what that alternative is can its existence be proved, and the ideopolises of the protagonists finally be reconstructed. This Article shows the constitutional theory and criticism we may aspire to if we are freed of the bonds of the debate over originalism and its underlying assumptions.First, the Article outlines what a post-debate constitutional decision process would look like if the judicial decision makers no longer felt compelled to articulate their opinions in the vocabulary of that debate. Second, it describes what constitutional scholarship could look like without the constraints of the Weltanschauung shared by the protagonists in the originalism debate. Third, the Article gives currency to the claim that abandoning the debate about originalism can revive the public discourse about our Constitution, what it says, what it does not say, and what it should say. Fourth, and finally, the Article suggest how abandoning the perspective of the debate about constitutional originalism frees even the principal protagonists in that debate to engage with the American Constitution -- and with those who would apply the Constitution very differently -- in a more direct and powerful way. The framework of the originalism debate constrains and distorts the argument and discourse rather than enriches it. At all of these levels, leaving the debate over constitutional originalism behind gives us a revived constitutional discourse and a more robust American Constitution.
