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Full-Text Articles in Jurisprudence
A Tradition At War With Itself: A Reply To Professor Rana's Review Of America's Forgotten Constitutions: Defiant Visions Of Power And Community, Robert Tsai
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
This essay responds to Professor Aziz Rana's review essay, "The Many American Constitutions," 93 Texas Law Review 1193 (2015).
He contends: (1) my portrayal of American constitutionalism might contain a “hidden” teleological understanding of the development of constitutional law; (2) my notion of "conventional sovereignty" sometimes seems content-free and at other times "interlinked with liberal egalitarianism"; and (3) a focus on failed constitutions "inadvertently tends to compartmentalize the overall tradition."
I answer in the following ways: (1) I reject any sense that constitutional law has moved in an arc of steady progress toward Enlightenment and instead embrace a tradition of …
The Triumph Of Gay Marriage And The Failure Of Constitutional Law, Louis Michael Seidman
The Triumph Of Gay Marriage And The Failure Of Constitutional Law, Louis Michael Seidman
Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works
The Supreme Court's much anticipated invalidation of gay marriage bans improved the personal lives of millions of ordinary Americans. It made the country a more decent place. Even Chief Justice Roberts, at the conclusion of his otherwise scathing dissent, acknowledged that the decision was a cause for many Americans to celebrate.
But although the Chief Justice thought that advocates of gay marriage should "by all means celebrate today's decision," he admonished them "not [to] celebrate the Constitution." The Constitution, he said, "had nothing to do with it".
Part I of this article quarrels with the Chief Justice's assertion that the …