Essays
Judgment / September 22, 2026
Every few years, somebody rediscovers Article V and mentions a convention of states. Official Washington reacts as if someone had proposed abolishing the...
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Ask most people what John Locke gave America and they will tell you *natural rights*-life, liberty, and property. Ask them what those rights require, and...
Every free republic rests on a simple bargain. The people make the law through their elected representatives, the executive enforces it, and the judge...
The recess appointment fight is usually argued like everything else in Washington: as a team sport. When your side holds the White House, the Senate's...
Every election cycle brings the same refrain. There is too much money in politics. The fix, we are told, is another layer of campaign finance law-tighter...
The phrase sounds harmless. "Amicus curiae" means friend of the court. But the modern amicus brief is not much of a friend. It has become a litigation...
Few phrases sound more American than political equality. Every candidate invokes it, every movement claims it, and almost no one stops to define it. That...
Most Americans treat the Twenty-fifth Amendment as constitutional plumbing. It sits in the text beside the succession rules, rarely discussed and almost...
Most Americans are taught that federalism was the price of union, a compromise between large and small states, a concession to local pride and regional...
Ask most people what the nullification crisis was about and you will hear a tidy story with familiar props: a punitive tariff, John C. Calhoun's silver...