What's Past is Prologue: Democracy in the Age of Originalism.

  • Published In: American Literary History, 2024, v. 36, n. 3. P. 797 1 of 3

  • Database: Academic Search Ultimate 2 of 3

  • Authored By: Kirsch, Geoffrey R 3 of 3

Abstract

This essay reviews three recent books grappling with the history and meaning of US constitutional democracy, written in a time when an originalist, conservative Supreme Court serves as the Constitution's final arbiter. Democracies in America: Keywords for the Nineteenth Century and Today , edited by D. Berton Emerson and Gregory Laski, and The Nation That Never Was: Reconstructing America's Story , by Kermit Roosevelt III, strive to appropriate originalist methods toward progressive ends. By contrast, Cass R. Sunstein's How to Interpret the Constitution evinces a pragmatic skepticism of any such historically bound modes of interpretation. The tension between these approaches, I suggest, has shaped US constitutional discourse since the nineteenth century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Additional Information

  • Source:American Literary History. 2024/09, Vol. 36, Issue 3, p797
  • Document Type:Article
  • Subject Area:History
  • Publication Date:2024
  • ISSN:0896-7148
  • DOI:10.1093/alh/ajae071
  • Accession Number:179512479
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