The Roadmap to South Africa’s Constitution At the time of its creation, the South African Constitution was hailed as a landmark success for young democracies, especially in Africa. The New York Times in a 1996 article described the event as “What was once nearly unthinkable became nearly unanimous… as South Africa adopted a new Constitution … Read more
How Hungray’s Conservative Wing Wrote a New Constitution for Itself In 2010, Hungary embarked on one of the most important tasks for the survival of their government by beginning to draft a constitution. Members of the parliamentary drafting committee wrote the document on their iPad. The “iPad” constitution attempts to completely undue the nation’s communist … Read more
A Transformative Reflection The late Justice William Brennan stated that “the genius of the Constitution rests not in any static meaning it might have had in a world that is dead and gone, but in the adaptability of its great principles to cope with current problems and current needs.” Justice Brennan holds a reputation for … Read more
In 2009, 33 legal scholars pushed for a Judiciary Act implementing regular appointments to the Supreme Court, term limits for Justices, ousting aging Justices, and reforming the Court’s process of granting review. An observer might have expected the reformers to gain traction; after all, most of America’s government remains spectacularly unpopular. Yet such expectations proved … Read more
Political catch-phrase or principled doctrine? Penned by our Founding Fathers 224 years ago, the Constitution has long been construed differently by political forces to justify their own political agendas. Conservatives in particular have been active in using this document to advocate for fundamental changes in government policy. Their efforts have culminated with congressional proceedings questioning … Read more
Can America solve its current fiscal crisis? The rapid mushrooming of America’s national debt, combined with the resurgence of limited government sentiment, has revived interest in a once dormant legislative prospect: a federal balanced budget amendment. To be sure, the idea of constitutional controls on government finances is nothing new. In 1936, a per-capita limitation … Read more