The Deconstitutionalization of America The Forgotten Frailties of Democratic Rule

by Barrus, Roger M.; Eastby, John H.; Lane, Joseph H., Jr.; Marion, David E.; Pontuso, James F.

• ISBN13: 9780739108345
• ISBN10: 0739108344
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2004-06-01
• Publisher: Lexington Books

Summary

The American Constitution held out the hope that ordinary people were capable of deciding their own fates, and in doing so it immeasurably elevated the dignity of common people. The organization and interplay of the parts that comprise the whole American government exist to provide people the opportunity to govern themselves and, at the same time, reveal the limits of democratic self-rule. The forgetting of these limits is not only destructive to the constitution but the nation as a whole.

Author Biography

David E. Marion is Director of the Wilson Center for Leadership in the Public Interest at Hampden-Sydney College.

Table of Contents

Preface and Acknowledgments	vii
Introduction	1	(8)
Chapter 1 James Madison's Constitution of Freedom	9	(16)
Chapter 2 Abraham Lincoln's New Birth of Freedom	25	(25)
Chapter 3 Woodrow Wilson's Progressive Constitution	50	(17)
Chapter 4 Franklin Roosevelt, the Great Depression, and the Rise of Interest-Group Government	67	(12)
Chapter 5 Congress: Increased Power and Institutional Weakness	79	(19)
Chapter 6 Presidential Leadership and the Two Publics	98	(14)
Chapter 7 The Modern Judiciary and Palliative Government: Still the "Least Dangerous Branch"?	112	(14)
Chapter 8 Deconstitutionalization and American Foreign Policy	126	(10)
Chapter 9 National Performance Review and Madisonian Constitutionalism: The Persistence of Wilsonian Administrative Thought	136	(13)
Conclusion	149	(6)
Selected Bibliography	155	(4)
Index	159	(4)
About the Authors	163