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October 12, 2018|commercial republic, Connecticut Compromise, Constitutional Convention, Electoral College, Equality, Gordon Wood, Slavery

Gordon Wood’s Reflections on the Constitution and Slavery

by John O. McGinnis|

George Washington speaks at the Constitutional Convention (Everett Historical/Shutterstock.com).
Many historians today tell a dismal tale of woe about our Founding, but Wood sees it whole with defects that do not blot out its real virtues.

June 4, 2018|American Founding, Declaration of Independence, French Revolution, Gordon Wood, John Adams, Massachusetts Constitution of 1780, Thomas Jefferson, Virginia Constitution of 1776

The Rivalry and Friendship of Jefferson and Adams: A Conversation with Gordon Wood

by Gordon S. Wood|

Gordon Wood discusses his book Friends Divided: John Adams and Thomas Jefferson

May 15, 2018|A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States, Federalists, Friends Divided, Gordon Wood, Jeffersonian Republican Party, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson

The Relevance and Irrelevance of Gordon S. Wood

by C. Bradley Thompson|

Because historicism drives Wood’s evaluation of Adams and Jefferson, categories such as true or false, just or unjust, hardly come into play.

January 17, 2018|Conservatives, Gordon Wood, John Adams, John Locke, natural equality, natural inequality, Progressives, Thomas Jefferson

The Divide Between Jefferson and Adams on Human Nature Is Ours Too

by John O. McGinnis|

Writing the Declaration of Independence, 1776. Benjamin Franklin, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson review a draft of the Declaration of Independence, by J.L.G. Ferris. From a 1909 lithograph by Wolf & Co.
Why has Thomas Jefferson become the progressives' favorite founder?

November 30, 2016|Bicameralism, Gordon Wood, James Madison, James Wilson, Separation of Powers, state constitutions, Thomas Jefferson

US State Constitutions and the American Contribution to the Theory of Bicameralism

by James R. Rogers|

Virginia State Capitol complex - old House of Delegates chamber

With the US House of Representatives representing the people, and the US Senate representing the states (more so prior to the adoption of the 17th Amendment, but that’s another discussion), the US Congress is a recognizable extension of the “mixed-government” rationale for legislative bicameralism.

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February 8, 2016|Bernard Bailyn, Gordon Wood, Herbert Butterfield, Ideological Origins of the American Revolution, Joyce Appleby, Leopold von Ranke, republican synthesis, Sometimes an Art, The Whig Interpretation of History

The Paths of the Historian

by Michael Zuckert|

The recent publication of Sometimes an Art: Nine Essays on History by Harvard Emeritus Professor Bernard Bailyn provides a welcome opportunity to reflect on Bailyn the historian and his contribution to the understanding of the 17th and 18th centuries. One cannot always trust the blurbs on the back covers of books, but in this case Jonathan Yardley’s judgment is no mere piece of puffery: “For approximately half a century, Bailyn has been the country’s most distinguished and influential scholar of the Revolution.” The one place where Yardley goes wrong is in limiting Bailyn’s portfolio to the American Revolution. It’s true that…

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December 11, 2015|Eric Foner, Gordon Wood, Jack Rakove, John McGinnis, Michael Rappaport, Originalism

Do Historians Understand Originalism?

by Kurt T. Lash|

I just returned from a conference of law-department and history-department legal historians discussing the Thirteenth Amendment (well done, Randy Barnett). As I listened to historian after historian explain to us law professors just what we are doing wrong, I was surprised by how ignorant some well-known historians are about public meaning originalism. While I appreciate Eric Foner’s bravely spoken declaration (to a room full of originalist scholars) that “there is no such thing as an original meaning of a text,” I respectfully disagree.

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November 10, 2015|F.H. Buckley, Gordon Wood, Michael Rappaport, Original Intent, Original Methods Originaism, Public Meaning Originalism, Randy Barnett

Public Meaning Originalism Is Not Indifferent to Evidence About the Intent of the Framers

by John O. McGinnis|

On this site Frank Buckley yesterday made a series of puzzling assertions about originalism. First, he says that “original meaning originalism” (which I believe most people call “public meaning originalism”) “dispenses with an examination” of what the Framers intended. At another point he states that public meaning originalism “collapses” into original intent originalism. These statements are in some tension with one another, but neither is accurate.

Few, if any, public meaning originalists believe that public meaning dispenses with examining what the Framers intended. What the Framers intended to do with words they wrote is often good evidence of what the public meaning was, particularly if they made their intent manifest publicly, as in the Federalist Papers. That is why almost all originalist scholarship of the public meaning variety regularly consults such materials.

On the other hand, the original intent does not collapse into public meaning. For public meaning originalists, the Framers’ intent does not constitute the public meaning conceptually and it may not even provide powerful evidence of that meaning if it were not known and contrary to other evidence of what their words would have meant. Moreover, there is ample other evidence from materials at the time that bears on the meaning of the words and phrases in the Constitution, such as newspapers and dictionaries of the time—material also regularly cited by public meaning originalists.

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May 11, 2015|Gordon Wood, James Madison, Joyce Appleby, Lance Banning, Sacred Fire of Liberty, The Federalist, The Jeffersonian Persuasion, Virginia Resolutions of 1798

Getting American History Right: Lance Banning’s Legacy

by Nathan Coleman|

In the forward to Founding Visions: The Ideas, Individuals, and Intersections that Created America, Gordon Wood writes that Lance Banning (1942-2006) was “no ordinary historian.” The essays compiled in this volume by Todd Estes, one of Banning’s most able students, make Wood’s remark abundantly clear. Known for his graciousness and kindness to students and colleagues alike, and for an unassuming and affable nature, Banning epitomized the idea of the gentleman scholar. These essays will remind readers of Banning’s continuing importance to our understanding of the Founding. For undergraduate and graduate students, they are testaments to how the historian’s craft should…

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Book Reviews

A Mirror of the 20th-Century Congress

by Joseph Postell

Wright undermined the very basis of his local popularity—the decentralized nature of the House—by supporting reforms that gave power to the party leaders.

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The Graces of Flannery O'Connor

by Henry T. Edmondson III

O'Connor's correspondence is a goldmine of piercing insight and startling reflections on everything from literature to philosophy to raising peacocks.

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Liberty Classics

Rereading Politica in the Post-Liberal Moment

by Glenn A. Moots

Althusius offers a rich constitutionalism that empowers persons to thrive alongside one another in deliberate communities.

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James Fenimore Cooper and the American Experiment

by Melissa Matthes

In The American Democrat, James Fenimore Cooper defended democracy against both mob rule and majority tyranny.

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Podcasts

Stuck With Decadence

A discussion with Ross Douthat

Ross Douthat discusses with Richard Reinsch his new book The Decadent Society.

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Can the Postmodern Natural Law Remedy Our Failing Humanism?

A discussion with Graham McAleer

Graham McAleer discusses how postmodern natural law can help us think more coherently about human beings and our actions.

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Did the Civil Rights Constitution Distort American Politics?

A discussion with Christopher Caldwell

Christopher Caldwell discusses his new book, The Age of Entitlement.

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America, Land of Deformed Institutions

A discussion with Yuval Levin

Yuval Levin pinpoints that American alienation and anger emerges from our weak political, social, and religious institutions.

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About

Law & Liberty’s focus is on the classical liberal tradition of law and political thought and how it shapes a society of free and responsible persons. This site brings together serious debate, commentary, essays, book reviews, interviews, and educational material in a commitment to the first principles of law in a free society. Law & Liberty considers a range of foundational and contemporary legal issues, legal philosophy, and pedagogy.

The opinions expressed on Law & Liberty are solely those of the contributors to the site and do not reflect the opinions of Liberty Fund.
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