BLOG: Jonathan GIENAPP on constitutional originalism, methodology and historical thinking (AHA Process Blog, MAR 2017)

 

(image source: Process Blog)

First paragraph:

Thanks to President Donald Trump’s nomination of Justice Neil Gorsuch—a self-identified “originalist”—to the Supreme Court, constitutional originalism is yet again at the forefront of American consciousness. Historians would do well to take special notice. Because while most forms of American constitutional jurisprudence have drawn on the history of the Constitution’s creation, only originalism—the theory that seeks to construe the Constitution today in accordance with its original meaning when it was first enacted—implicates the role of historical study in constitutional interpretation. Moreover, despite several assurances through the years that originalism’s death knell had sounded, the theory enjoys more champions, and more influential champions, than at any point previous.

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