The Theory and Practice of Constitutional Change in America

The Theory and Practice of Constitutional Change in America PDF Author: John R. Vile
Publisher: Peter Lang Incorporated, International Academic Publishers
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 522

Get Book Here

Book Description
The only volume of its kind, this book provides diverse readings relevant to the topic of constitutional amendment and change. Beginning with sources that were part of the cultural heritage of America's Founding Fathers, the book proceeds to trace debates over the desirability and frequency of constitutional change and the adequacy of the constitutional amending process from the Revolutionary War period to the present. Included are debates over general principles, texts and discussions of individual amendments, and relevant judicial decisions. Where possible, readings are paired to show rival views; each selection is prefaced by an explanation of the reading's context and significance.

The Theory and Practice of Constitutional Change in America

The Theory and Practice of Constitutional Change in America PDF Author: John R. Vile
Publisher: Peter Lang Incorporated, International Academic Publishers
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 522

Get Book Here

Book Description
The only volume of its kind, this book provides diverse readings relevant to the topic of constitutional amendment and change. Beginning with sources that were part of the cultural heritage of America's Founding Fathers, the book proceeds to trace debates over the desirability and frequency of constitutional change and the adequacy of the constitutional amending process from the Revolutionary War period to the present. Included are debates over general principles, texts and discussions of individual amendments, and relevant judicial decisions. Where possible, readings are paired to show rival views; each selection is prefaced by an explanation of the reading's context and significance.

Responding to Imperfection

Responding to Imperfection PDF Author: Sanford Levinson
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400821630
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 341

Get Book Here

Book Description
An increasing number of constitutional theorists, within both the legal academy and university departments of government, are focusing on the conceptual and political problems attached to the notion of constitutional amendment. Amendments are, among other things, recognitions of the imperfection of existing schemes of government. The relative ease or difficulty of amendment has significant implications for the ways that governments respond to problems that call either for new structures of governance or new powers for already established structures. This book brings together essays by leading legal authorities and political scientists on a range of questions from whether the U.S. Constitution is subject to amendment by procedures other than those authorized by Article V to how significant change is conceptualized within classical rabbinic Judaism. Though the essays are concerned for the most part with the American experience, other constitutional traditions are considered as well. The contributors include Bruce Ackerman, Akhil Reed Amar, Mark E. Brandon, David R. Dow, Stephen M. Griffin, Stephen Holmes and Cass R. Sunstein, Sanford Levinson, Donald Lutz, Walter Murphy, Frederick Schauer, John R. Vile, and Noam J. Zohar.

Constitutional Change in the United States

Constitutional Change in the United States PDF Author: John R. Vile
Publisher: Praeger
ISBN: 0275949184
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Get Book Here

Book Description
The processes of constitutional change in America are particularly difficult to understand because of the constant interaction between the constitutional document of 1787 and the wider set of understandings and practices surrounding that document. This work is the first to examine systematically the relationship between changes initiated by constitutional amendment and changes initiated by judicial interpretations or actions of the two elected branches of government. By examining and comparing all three mechanisms of constitutional revision, Vile offers a more complex and dynamic analysis of this important constitutional issue than can be found elsewhere in the literature.

Constitutional Amendments

Constitutional Amendments PDF Author: Richard Albert
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0190640480
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 353

Get Book Here

Book Description
Constitutional Amendments: Making, Breaking, and Changing Constitutions is both a roadmap for navigating the intellectual universe of constitutional amendments and a blueprint for building and improving the rules of constitutional change. Drawing from dozens of constitutions in every region of the world, this book blends theory with practice to answer two all-important questions: what is an amendment and how should constitutional designers structure the procedures of constitutional change? The first matters now more than ever. Reformers are exploiting the rules of constitutional amendment, testing the limits of legal constraint, undermining the norms of democratic government, and flouting the constitution as written to create entirely new constitutions that masquerade as ordinary amendments. The second question is central to the performance and endurance of constitutions. Constitutional designers today have virtually no resources to guide them in constructing the rules of amendment, and scholars do not have a clear portrait of the significance of amendment rules in the project of constitutionalism. This book shows that no part of a constitution is more important than the procedures we use change it. Amendment rules open a window into the soul of a constitution, exposing its deepest vulnerabilities and revealing its greatest strengths. The codification of amendment rules often at the end of the text proves that last is not always least.

The American Polity

The American Polity PDF Author: Edward J. Erler
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317707591
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 144

Get Book Here

Book Description
First Published in 1991. This is a collection of essays which address themselves to the American concern for constitutional government and its attendant political liberty. Against a backdrop of the current international movement towards establishing new governing orders, this work explains the principles of the American founding and the politics which established them and now flow from them.

Unconstitutional Constitutional Amendments

Unconstitutional Constitutional Amendments PDF Author: Yaniv Roznai
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198768796
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 369

Get Book Here

Book Description
Can constitutional amendments be unconstitutional? Using theoretical and comparative approaches, Roznai establishes the nature and scope of constitutional amendment powers by focusing on substantive limitations, looking at their prevalence in practice and the conceptual coherence of the very idea of limitations to constitutional amendment powers.

Dred Scott and the Problem of Constitutional Evil

Dred Scott and the Problem of Constitutional Evil PDF Author: Mark A. Graber
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9781139457071
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 300

Get Book Here

Book Description
Dred Scott and the Problem of Constitutional Evil , first published in 2006, concerns what is entailed by pledging allegiance to a constitutional text and tradition saturated with concessions to evil. The Constitution of the United States was originally understood as an effort to mediate controversies between persons who disputed fundamental values, and did not offer a vision of the good society. In order to form a 'more perfect union' with slaveholders, late-eighteenth-century citizens fashioned a constitution that plainly compelled some injustices and was silent or ambiguous on other questions of fundamental right. This constitutional relationship could survive only as long as a bisectional consensus was required to resolve all constitutional questions not settled in 1787. Dred Scott challenges persons committed to human freedom to determine whether antislavery northerners should have provided more accommodations for slavery than were constitutionally strictly necessary or risked the enormous destruction of life and property that preceded Lincoln's new birth of freedom.

Recent Changes in American Constitutional Theory

Recent Changes in American Constitutional Theory PDF Author: John William Burgess
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 148

Get Book Here

Book Description
Examines the changes in American constitutional theory from the Spanish-American War to the 1920s. It argues that contemporary developments in constitutional theory and law could be troubling for the country and offers suggestions on how America can correct its course.

Too Young to Run?

Too Young to Run? PDF Author: John Evan Seery
Publisher: Penn State Press
ISBN: 0271048530
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 202

Get Book Here

Book Description
"Examines the history, theory, and politics behind the age qualifications for elected federal office in the United States Constitution. Argues that the right to run for office ought to be extended to all adult-age citizens who are otherwise office-eligible"--Provided by publisher.

Amending America's Unwritten Constitution

Amending America's Unwritten Constitution PDF Author: Richard Albert
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781009246804
Category : Constitutional amendments
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Get Book Here

Book Description
It is well known that the US Constitution has been amended twenty-seven times since its creation in 1787, but that number does not reflect the true extent of constitutional change in America. Although the Constitution is globally recognized as a written text, it consists also of unwritten rules and principles that are just as important, such as precedents, customs, traditions, norms, presuppositions, and more. These, too, have been amended, but how does that process work? In this book, leading scholars of law, history, philosophy, and political science consider the many theoretical, conceptual, and practical dimensions of what it means to amend America's 'unwritten Constitution': how to change the rules, who may legitimately do it, why leaders may find it politically expedient to enact written instead of unwritten amendments, and whether anything is lost by changing the constitution without a codified constitutional amendment.