Randy Kozel: Precedent and Constitutional Structure
Michael Ramsey

Randy J. Kozel (Notre Dame Law School) has posted Precedent and Constitutional Structure (Northwestern University Law Review, Vol. 112, No. 4, 2018) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: The Constitution does not talk about precedent, at least not explicitly, but several of its features suggest a place for deference to prior decisions. It isolates the […]

Garrett West: Congress’s Arrest Power and the Limits of Liquidation
Michael Ramsey

E. Garrett West (Yale Law School, students) has posted Revisiting Contempt: Congress's Arrest Power and the Limits of Liquidation (forthcoming) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: This Article presents the first sustained challenge to the conventional wisdom. Beginning with the Constitution’s text, I argue that this power has no basis the enumerated powers of each […]

Andre LeDuc: Competing Accounts of Interpretation and Practical Reasoning in the Debate Over Originalism
Michael Ramsey

Andre LeDuc (Independent) has posted Competing Accounts of Interpretation and Practical Reasoning in the Debate Over Originalism (University of New Hampshire Law Review, Vol. 16, No. 1, 2017) on SSRN. Here is the abstract:  This article explores two assumptions about constitutional law and the form of practical reasoning inherent in constitutional argument and decision that have […]

Stephen Sachs: Originalism Without Text
Michael Ramsey

In the current issue of the Yale Law Journal, Stephen E. Sachs (Duke) has the essay Originalism Without Text (127 Yale L.J. 156 (2017)). Here is the abstract:  Originalism is not about the text. Though the theory is often treated as a way to read the Constitution’s words, that conventional view is misleading. A society […]

Rosalind Dixon: Constitutional Drafters as Judges
Michael Ramsey

Rosalind Dixon (University of New South Wales (UNSW) – Faculty of Law) has posted Constitutional Design Two Ways: Constitutional Drafters as Judges ((2017) 57(1) Virginia Journal of International Law 1) on SSRN. Here is the abstract:  Constitutional scholarship often assumes a strict separation between processes of constitutional drafting and interpretation. Yet on constitutional courts around the […]

Richard Primus and Kevin Stack on Serkin & Tebbe’s “Is the Constitution Special?”
Michael Ramsey

Richard Primus (University of Michigan Law School), Christopher Serkin (Vanderbilt Law School), Kevin M. Stack (Vanderbilt University – Law School), and Nelson Tebbe (Cornell Law School) have posted Debate (Cornell Law Review, Vol. 102, No. 6, 2017) on SSRN. Here is the abstract:  Do lawyers and judges use distinctive arguments when they interpret the Constitution? Should they? In a […]