Legal History Commons^™

Dietze: America's Political Dilemma, Paul G. Kauper

Michigan Law Review

A Review of America's Political Dilemma by Gottfried Dietze

The Constitution, Congress, And Presidential Elections, Albert J. Rosenthal

Michigan Law Review

It has been recommended by a prestigious commission of the American Bar Association and endorsed by the ABA's House of Delegates. The Bar Association of the City of New York, which had previously recommended a different proposed amendment, has now shifted its support to direct popular vote, as has Senator Birch Bayh, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Constitutional Amendments of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary. A Gallup poll indicates that 66 per cent of the nation supports this amendment, with only 19 per cent opposed.

It must be remembered, however, that a decision to amend the Constitution is, as …

The Supreme Court And The People, Everett Mckinley Dirksen

Michigan Law Review

There is only one circumstance, as I read the Constitution, which authorizes the federal government to intrude or interfere with the governmental structure of a state. That would occur under the provisions of section 4 of article IV, which, in pertinent part, state: "The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican form of Government .... " This was the question, if indeed there was a federal question, to be determined in the earlier Baker v. Carr and the reapportionment cases. To rely on the fourteenth amendment for authority to establish by judicial decree a new …

The Alternative Amendment Process: Some Observations, Paul G. Kauper

Michigan Law Review

The alternative method of formal amendment of the Constitution raises unresolved questions of interpretation. As a contribution to the formulation of procedures for the implementation of this method Senator Ervin has introduced a bill dealing with the matter in considerable detail. In dealing with the subject I propose to discuss not only the convention procedure provided in article V, and in this connection point up some considerations respecting Senator Ervin's bill, but also some basic questions relating to the formal amendment process and the role assumed by the Supreme Court in the process of constitutional change.

Article V: The Comatose Article Of Our Living Constitution?, Robert G. Dixon Jr.

Michigan Law Review

Capacity for steady--even startling-development and relative incapacity for formal change, are twin features of American constitutionalism often noticed but seldom analyzed conjointly. Even the most stalwart supporters of the status quo do not want an unamendable Constitution, but disagreement as to how change should be effected, and the scope of it, runs deep. Indeed, this is the central problem of Marbury v. Madison. That case was the effective innovator of judicial review, our "real" system for developmental constitutionalism. Interestingly, it also was one of the quite rare instances when a seemingly simple constitutional text was at issue (scope of Supreme …