sologdin’s Reviews > We the People: A History of the U.S. Constitution > Status Update

[His] strategy had always been better because it had broader application. It didn't succeed in overturning Brown, but [the originalist] argument, which was to present a single mode of constitutional interpretation as the only legitimate mode, had the important benefit of equipping opponents of the Warren Court's many other landmark decisions with an argument that could be against nearly all of them.

Progressives were in a pickle. To implement a federal income tax, they needed a constitutional amendment. To get a constitutional amendment, they had to get it through the Senate. To get an income tax amendment through the Senate, they needed a more accountable Senate. To get a more accountable Senate, they needed a constitutional amendment. They went back to the drawing board.

Looking back, the 1860s and '70s appear to have been as much a tragedy as a triumph, the sotry of three amendments that passed and yet somehow failed, too. Even the trial of Jefferson Davis was a chance for a kind of justice that never came.

One of the most illuminating remarks Story ever made about the Constitution, one that casts light, too, on his rules for interpreting it, came when he said, ‘I once saw a book advertised, entitled, New Views on the Constitution. I was startled! What right has a man to start new views upon it?’

legislative malapportionment was a far greater factor in limiting the political power of opponents of the Constitution. [...] In [GA] and [SC], delegates representing barely more than 10 percent of the population controlled the ratifying conventions. In three states--[SC], [NY], and [RI]--delegates who voted for ratification represented a smaller portion of the population than delegates who voted against it.

power without restraint was represented as the tyranny of men over women and, in particular, as the act of rape. This was true in 17th cent. England and […] in 18th cent. America. The metaphor was both ubiquitous and elaborate. The act of revolution, an uprising against tyranny, was akin to defense against a rapist. Political consent was akin to sexual consent. A social contract was like a marriage contract.