Essays
Judgment / July 24, 2026
If you want to understand why the United States has endured as a free republic for nearly 250 years while countless parliamentary democracies have...
1 min read
Every schoolchild hears the same story. Andrew Johnson was a stubborn, racist president who stood in the way of noble Reconstruction, and the heroic Radical...
You remember the civics lesson: three branches, checks and balances, separation of powers. It is usually presented as a tidy diagram - Congress makes law...
You have heard the argument a hundred times. Caucuses are undemocratic. They are confusing, exclusionary, and time-consuming. They favor the most committed...
The word "franchise" gets thrown around in politics almost exclusively in the context of voting. The "franchise" is the right to cast a ballot. Who has it...
Let me say something that will make some people uncomfortable. The single most dangerous intellectual error in American politics today is the casual...
There is a procedural device in the House of Representatives that most Americans have never heard of, yet it quietly exposes one of the deepest tensions in...
You hear it everywhere now, this phrase "cooperative federalism," and it sounds so reasonable. Washington and the states working together, pooling...
You hear it everywhere now-"democratic erosion," "threats to democracy," "backsliding." The pundits wring their hands, the academics publish their grim...
Title: The Judgment That Saved American Liberty: Why Confederation Failed The Articles of Confederation are enjoying a curious revival among certain corners...