How to Read the Constitution: Originalism, Constitutional Interpretation, and Judicial Power

by Christopher Wolfe

Overview

Prominent constitutional scholar Christopher Wolfe challenges popular opinions by presenting an insightful and well-supported defense of originalist interpretations of the Constitution. He describes the traditional approach to constitutional interpretation and judicial review and then focuses his analysis on the due process clause, which has become the source of most modern constitutional law. Wolfe challenges the most influential defenders of judicial activism, including Laurence Tribe, Michael Dorf, Harry Wellington, and Mark Tushnet, and he persuasively explains the dire political consequences of taking the Constitution out of constitutional law.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780847682355
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	07/28/1996
Series:	168
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	240
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.55(d)

About the Author

Christopher Wolfe is professor of political science at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 Acknowledgments
Chapter 2 Introduction
Part 3 Part I: The Founding and Constitutional Interpretation
Chapter 4 How to Read and Interpret the Constitution
Chapter 5 The Original Meaning of the Due Process Clause
Chapter 6 Between Scylla and Charybdis: Powell and Berger on the Framers and Original Intention
Part 7 Part II: Twentieth-Century Judicial Power: Practice and Theory
Chapter 8 How the Constitution Was Taken Out of Constitutional Law
Chapter 9 The Result-Oriented Adjudicator's Guide to Constitutional, Law I: Laurence Tribe and Michael Dorf
Chapter 10 Law II: Harry Wellington
Chapter 11 Grand Theories and Ambiguous Republican Critique: Mark Tushnet on Contemporary Constitutional Law
Chapter 12 Constitutional Interpretation and Precedent
Chapter 13 Notes
Chapter 14 Index

Editorial Reviews

How to Read the Constitution is the mature reflections of one of America's leading constitutional theorists and, in my view, the pre-eminent defender of an 'originalist' approach to constitutional review by courts. Wolfe is in full bloom.

Gerard Bradley

One of the best defenses of an approach to constitutional interpretation that has few academic defenders, it is clearly and fairly well written both in its own argument and in recording the arguments of others.

Choice Reviews

One of the best defenses of an approach to constitutional interpretation that has few academic defenders, it is clearly and fairly well written both in its own argument and in recording the arguments of others.

Choice

One of the best defenses of an approach to constitutional interpretation that has few academic defenders, it is clearly and fairly well written both in its own argument and in recording the arguments of others.

CHOICE