The Interbellum Constitution and the Spending Power

The Interbellum Constitution and the Spending Power
Author: Alison L. LaCroix
Publisher:
Total Pages: 47
Release: 2013
Genre: Constitutional law
ISBN:

Today, the mechanism of the spending power drives the gears of the modern federal machine. But early nineteenth century constitutional debates demonstrate that the spending power is essentially a workaround, and a recent one at that - a tool by which Congress achieves certain political and legal ends while respecting the formal boundaries set by Article I and the Tenth Amendment. This 'interbellum' period was enormously significant for American constitutional law, in particular the constellation of related doctrines concerning congressional power that we now place under the general heading of 'federalism': the spending power, the enumerated powers of Article I, and the anticommandeering principle of the Tenth Amendment. As a historical matter, political and legal actors in the early nineteenth century believed themselves to be living in what this Article argues was a long founding moment, in which the fundamental terms of the federal-state relationship were still open to debate. Constitutional scholars have mistakenly overlooked the constitutional creativity of the period. As a normative matter, I argue for an approach to millennial constitutional interpretation that recognizes the ever-changing nature of the landscape of constitutional permissibility, and that offers documentary evidence of the precise contours of that change. Studying the evolution of the spending power over time, especially where the text itself remains constant, demonstrates that ideas about federal structure are not fixed. Therefore, constitutional federalism itself is not fixed - a particularly important insight in an area of constitutional doctrine that is dominated by originalist approaches.

The Interbellum Constitution

The Interbellum Constitution
Author: Alison L. LaCroix
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 573
Release: 2024-05-28
Genre: Law
ISBN: 0300223218

A synthesis of legal, political, and social history to show how the post-founding generations were forced to rethink and substantially revise the U.S. constitutional vision Between 1815 and 1861, American constitutional law and politics underwent a profound transformation. These decades of the Interbellum Constitution were a foundational period of both constitutional crisis and creativity. The Interbellum Constitution was a set of widely shared legal and political principles, combined with a thoroughgoing commitment to investing those principles with meaning through debate. Each of these shared principles--commerce, concurrent power, and jurisdictional multiplicity--concerned what we now call "federalism," meaning that they pertain to the relationships among multiple levels of government with varying degrees of autonomy. Alison L. LaCroix argues, however, that there existed many more federalisms in the early nineteenth century than today's constitutional debates admit. As LaCroix shows, this was a period of intense rethinking of the very basis of the U.S. national model--a problem debated everywhere, from newspapers and statehouses to local pubs and pulpits, ultimately leading both to civil war and to a new, more unified constitutional vision. This book is the first that synthesizes the legal, political, and social history of the early nineteenth century to show how deeply these constitutional questions dominated the discourse of the time.

Rationing the Constitution

Rationing the Constitution
Author: Andrew Coan
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 281
Release: 2019-04-29
Genre: Law
ISBN: 0674239199

In this groundbreaking analysis of Supreme Court decision-making, Andrew Coan explains how judicial caseload shapes the course of American constitutional law and the role of the Court in American society. Compared with the vast machinery surrounding Congress and the president, the Supreme Court is a tiny institution that can resolve only a small fraction of the constitutional issues that arise in any given year. Rationing the Constitution shows that this simple yet frequently ignored fact is essential to understanding how the Supreme Court makes constitutional law. Due to the structural organization of the judiciary and certain widely shared professional norms, the capacity of the Supreme Court to review lower-court decisions is severely limited. From this fact, Andrew Coan develops a novel and arresting theory of Supreme Court decision-making. In deciding cases, the Court must not invite more litigation than it can handle. On many of the most important constitutional questions—touching on federalism, the separation of powers, and individual rights—this constraint creates a strong pressure to adopt hard-edged categorical rules, or defer to the political process, or both. The implications for U.S. constitutional law are profound. Lawyers, academics, and social activists pursuing social reform through the courts must consider whether their goals can be accomplished within the constraints of judicial capacity. Often the answer will be no. The limits of judicial capacity also substantially constrain the Court’s much touted—and frequently lamented—power to overrule democratic majorities. As Rationing the Constitution demonstrates, the Supreme Court is David, not Goliath.

Yale Law Journal: Volume 123, Number 6 - April 2014

Yale Law Journal: Volume 123, Number 6 - April 2014
Author: Yale Law Journal
Publisher: Quid Pro Books
Total Pages: 497
Release: 2014-04-16
Genre: Law
ISBN: 1610278798

The April 2014 issue of The Yale Law Journal features new articles and essays on law and legal theory by internationally recognized scholars. An extensive Feature explores the idea of Federalism as the New Nationalism, with contributions by Jessica Bulman-Pozen ("From Sovereignty and Process to Administration and Politics: The Afterlife of American Federalism"), Heather Gerken ("An Overview," "The Loyal Opposition"), Abbe Gluck ("Our [National] Federalism"), Alison LaCroix ("The Shadow Powers of Article I"), and Cristina Rodríguez ("Negotiating Conflict Through Federalism: Institutional and Popular Perspectives"). The issue serves, in effect, as a new and detailed book on new concepts and practices of U.S. federalism. In addition, the issue includes these contributions from scholars and students: • Article, "The Power to Threaten War," by Matthew C. Waxman • Essay, "Five to Four: Why Do Bare Majorities Rule on Courts?" by Jeremy Waldron • Note, "Dignity as a Value in Agency Cost-Benefit Analysis," by Rachel Bayefsky • Note, "Early Release in International Criminal Law," by Jonathan Choi • Note, "Ex Ante Review of Leveraged Buyouts," by Laura Femino • Comment, "Innocent Abroad? Morrison, Vilar, and the Extraterritorial Application of the Exchange Act," by Daniel Herz-Roiphe Quality ebook edition features linked notes, active Contents, active URLs in notes, proper Bluebook formatting, and full presentation of original tables and images. This April 2014 issue is Volume 123, Number 6.

Constitutions in Authoritarian Regimes

Constitutions in Authoritarian Regimes
Author: Tom Ginsburg
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 283
Release: 2014
Genre: Law
ISBN: 1107047668

This volume explores the form and function of constitutions in countries without the fully articulated institutions of limited government.

Harvard Law Review: Volume 128, Number 1 - November 2014

Harvard Law Review: Volume 128, Number 1 - November 2014
Author: Harvard Law Review
Publisher: Quid Pro Books
Total Pages: 640
Release: 2014-11-10
Genre: Law
ISBN: 1610278526

The November issue is the special annual review of the U.S. Supreme Court's previous Term. Each year, the issue is introduced by noteworthy and extensive contributions from recognized scholars. In this issue, for the 2013 Term, articles include: • Foreword: "The Means of Constitutional Power," by John F. Manning • Comment: "Slipping the Bonds of Federalism," by Heather K. Gerken • Comment: "The Supreme Court as a Constitutional Court," by Jamal Greene • Comment: "The Hobby Lobby Moment," by Paul Horwitz In addition, the first issue of each new volume provides an extensive summary of the important cases of the previous Supreme Court docket, covering a wide range of legal, political and constitutional subjects. Student commentary on Leading Cases of the 2013 Term includes recent cases on: content neutrality under the First Amendment; compelled subsidized speech; free speech and contribution limits; legislative prayer and the establishment of religion; search and seizure law as to anonymous tips, cellphones, and cotenant consent; equal protection and political process; right to counsel; Eighth Amendment issues for intellectually impaired defendants; standing and jurisdiction; class actions; tribal immunity; the Clean Air Act; immigration of children; misrepresentation of buyer and gun control law; and copyright law's Transmit Clause. Complete statistical graphs and tables of the Court's actions and results during the Term are included. Finally, the issue features several summaries of Recent Publications. The issue also features essays on substantive and procedural law, and judicial method, honoring Justice Stephen G. Breyer and his notable contributions to law and the Supreme Court. The essays are written by scholars Martha Minow, Martha Field, Cass Sunstein, Richard Fallon, Michael Klarman, Todd Rakoff, Joseph Singer, John Manning, Laurence Tribe, I. Glenn Cohen, and Mark Tushnet. The Harvard Law Review is offered in a quality digital edition, featuring active Contents, linked footnotes, active URLs, legible tables, and proper ebook and Bluebook formatting. This current issue of the Review is November 2014, the first issue of academic year 2014-2015 (Volume 128).

Ratification

Ratification
Author: Pauline Maier
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 608
Release: 2011-06-07
Genre: History
ISBN: 0684868555

The dramatic story of the debate over the ratification of the Constitution, the first new account of this seminal moment in American history in years.

The Federal Reserve and Its Founders

The Federal Reserve and Its Founders
Author: Richard A. Naclerio
Publisher: Agenda Publishing
Total Pages: 226
Release: 2018
Genre: Federal Reserve banks
ISBN: 9781911116035

Richard A. Naclerio investigates the events that surrounded the U.S. Federal Reserve's creation and the bankers, financiers, and economists who shaped its role over the next century. He sheds new light on the making of one of the world's most important financial institutions and how it came to have such crucial national and international influence.

The Stalinist Era

The Stalinist Era
Author: David L. Hoffmann
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 217
Release: 2018-11-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 1107007089

Placing Stalinism in its international context, The Stalinist Era explains the origins and consequences of Soviet state intervention and violence.

The War on Alcohol: Prohibition and the Rise of the American State

The War on Alcohol: Prohibition and the Rise of the American State
Author: Lisa McGirr
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Total Pages: 450
Release: 2015-11-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 0393248798

“[This] fine history of Prohibition . . . could have a major impact on how we read American political history.”—James A. Morone, New York Times Book Review Prohibition has long been portrayed as a “noble experiment” that failed, a newsreel story of glamorous gangsters, flappers, and speakeasies. Now at last Lisa McGirr dismantles this cherished myth to reveal a much more significant history. Prohibition was the seedbed for a pivotal expansion of the federal government, the genesis of our contemporary penal state. Her deeply researched, eye-opening account uncovers patterns of enforcement still familiar today: the war on alcohol was waged disproportionately in African American, immigrant, and poor white communities. Alongside Jim Crow and other discriminatory laws, Prohibition brought coercion into everyday life and even into private homes. Its targets coalesced into an electoral base of urban, working-class voters that propelled FDR to the White House. This outstanding history also reveals a new genome for the activist American state, one that shows the DNA of the right as well as the left. It was Herbert Hoover who built the extensive penal apparatus used by the federal government to combat the crime spawned by Prohibition. The subsequent federal wars on crime, on drugs, and on terror all display the inheritances of the war on alcohol. McGirr shows the powerful American state to be a bipartisan creation, a legacy not only of the New Deal and the Great Society but also of Prohibition and its progeny. The War on Alcohol is history at its best—original, authoritative, and illuminating of our past and its continuing presence today.