Originalism and the Colorblind Constitution

The Ontological Foundations of the Debate over Originalism

Because the participants in the debate over constitutional originalism generally understand the controversy to be over a matter of the objective truth of competing interpretations of the Constitution, they do not believe that their mission is to persuade the other side. When what is at stake is a matter of objective truth, subjective opinions are of less moment. This Article begins the long ove...

The People's Constitution vs. The Lawyer's Constitution: Popular Constitutionalism and the Original Debate over Originalism

Essay Brown and the Colorblind Constitution

This Essay offers the first in-depth examination of the role of colorblind constitutionalism in the history of Brown v. Board of Education. In light of the recent Supreme Court ruling in Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1, such an examination is needed today more than ever. In this case, Chief Justice John Roberts drew on the history of Brown to support his c...

Columbia Law Review Sidebar

In Is Originalism Our Law?, William Baude has made a good kind of argument in favor of originalism. Rather than contending that originalism is the only coherent theory for interpreting a constitution, he makes the more modest claim that it happens to be the way that American judges interpret our Constitution.1 If he is right—if originalism is our law—then judges deciding constitutional cases ou...

Constitutional Interpretation and History: New Originalism or Eclecticism?

The goal of originalism has always been purity. Originalists claim that their methods cleanse constitutional interpretation of politics, discretion, and indeterminacy. The key to attaining purity is history. Originalist methods supposedly discern in history a fixed constitutional meaning. Many originalists now claim that the most advanced method-the approach that reveals the purest constitution...