Constitutional Stupidities, Constitutional Tragedies

by Eskridge, William N., Jr.

• ISBN13: 9780814751329
• ISBN10: 0814751326
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1998-06-01
• Publisher: New York University Press

Summary

The Constitution is the cornerstone of American government, hailed as one of the greatest contributions of the Western Enlightenment. While many seem content simply to celebrate it, those most familiar with the document invariably find it wanting in at least some aspects.This unique volume brings together many of the country's most esteemed constitutional commentators and invites them to answer two questions: First, what is the stupidest provision of the Constitution? "Stupid" need not mean evil. Thus, a second, related question is whether the scholar-interpreter would be forced to reach truly evil results even if applying his or her own favored theory of constitutional interpretation.The contributors include Lawrence Alexander, Akhil Reed Amar, Jack Balkin, Philip Bobbitt, Gerard Bradley, Rebecca Brown, Steven Calabresi, Lief Carter, Christopher Eisgruber, Lawrence Sager, Marie Failinger, Daniel Farber, James Fleming, Mark Graber, Stephen Griffin, Gary Jacobsohn, Randall Kennedy, Lewis LaRue, Theodore Lowi, Earl Maltz, Michael McConnell, Matthew Michael, Robert Nagel, Daniel Ortiz, Pamela Karlen, Michael Paulsen, Robert Post, Lucas Powe, Dorothy Roberts, Jeffrey Rosen, Frederick Schauer, Michael Seidman, Suzanna Sherry, David Strauss, Laurence Tribe, Mark Tushnet, and John Yoo.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction: Constitutional Conversations	p. 1
A Constitutional Accident Waiting to Happen	p. 15
Parlor Games	p. 18
An Agenda for Constitutional Reform	p. 22
"Clause and Effect": An Imagined Conversation with Sanford Levinson	p. 28
The One Senator, One Vote Clauses	p. 35
Our (Almost) Perfect Constitution	p. 40
Unnecessary and Unintelligible	p. 43
The Nominee Is ... Article V	p. 51
A Natural Aristocracy?	p. 54
"Neither Force nor Will"	p. 57
Presidential Elections and Constitutional Stupidities	p. 61
The Presidential Age Requirement and Public Policy Agenda Setting	p. 67
The Last Centrifugal Force	p. 71
Someone Should Have Told Spiro Agnew	p. 75
Old People and Good Behavior	p. 77
Divided Suffrage	p. 81
The Constitution of Fear	p. 84
Criminal Procedure as the Servant of Politics	p. 90
Our Unconstitutional Senate	p. 95
How to Violate the Constitution without Really Trying: Lessons from the Repeal of Prohibition to the Balanced Budget Amendment	p. 98
The Whole Thing	p. 103
How Stupid Can a Coasean Constitution Be?	p. 107
Constitutional Tragedies and Giving Refuge to the Devil	p. 115
The Meaning of Constitutional Tragedy	p. 121
The Tragic Case of Capital Punishment	p. 129
Constitutional Tragedies: The Dark Side of Judgment	p. 139
Good Constitutions and Bad Choices	p. 147
Jocasta Undone: Constitutional Courts in the Midst of Life and Death	p. 152
Constitutional Tragedy in Dying: Or Whose Tragedy Is It Anyway?	p. 162
Dramatic Jurisprudence	p. 172
Constitutional Farce	p. 180
Constitutional Merry-Go-Round: The First Time Tragedy, the Second Time Farce	p. 189
Glamis, Yes; Cawdor, Yes - but King of Scotland?	p. 203
Brown v. Board of Education	p. 207
Tragedy and Constitutional Interpretation: The California Civil Rights Initiative	p. 217
The Meaning of Blacks' Fidelity to the Constitution	p. 226
Tragedies under the Common Law Constitution	p. 235
McCulloch v. Maryland	p. 241
Antigone and Creon	p. 248
The Constitution of the United States	p. 257
About the Contributors	p. 279
Index	p. 285
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.