Liberty Law Talk

The many schools of originalism all face the same questions: does it merely perpetuate the dead hand of the past? What about the exclusion of women and blacks at the Founding? What does one do with the mountains of non-originalist precedent? This next podcast with our own Mike Rappaport, prompted by his new book that he co-authored with co-blogger John McGinnis entitled Originalism and the Good Constitution, focuses on the rise of originalism as an intrepretative methodology for Constitutional Law and attempts to answer these and other questions with a new framework called original methods originalism. Our discussion thus focuses on…Read More

The many schools of originalism all face the same questions: does it merely perpetuate the dead hand of the past? What about the exclusion of women and blacks at the Founding? What does one do with the mountains of non-originalist precedent? This next podcast with our own Mike Rappaport, prompted by his new book that he co-authored with co-blogger John McGinnis entitled Originalism and the Good Constitution, focuses on the rise of originalism as an intrepretative methodology for Constitutional Law and attempts to answer these and other questions with a new framework called original methods originalism. Our discussion thus focuses on…Read More

This next episode of Liberty Law Talk is with Steven Smith on his new book The Rise and Decline of American Religious Freedom. Our conversation explores Smith's challenge to the dominant academic narrative that the Supreme Court's mid-twentieth century decisions imposing secular neutrality vindicated the religion clauses of the First Amendment. In this version, their essence was to secure a government free of religion, tout court. But what if the First Amendment's original public meaning and subsequent practice reflected a very different essence? Our conversation begins with the history of the ratification of the First Amendment. What do we make of…Read More

This next episode of Liberty Law Talk is with Steven Smith on his new book The Rise and Decline of American Religious Freedom. Our conversation explores Smith's challenge to the dominant academic narrative that the Supreme Court's mid-twentieth century decisions imposing secular neutrality vindicated the religion clauses of the First Amendment. In this version, their essence was to secure a government free of religion, tout court. But what if the First Amendment's original public meaning and subsequent practice reflected a very different essence? Our conversation begins with the history of the ratification of the First Amendment. What do we make of…Read More

This next episode of Liberty Law Talk is with Steven Smith on his new book The Rise and Decline of American Religious Freedom. Our conversation explores Smith's challenge to the dominant academic narrative that the Supreme Court's mid-twentieth century decisions imposing secular neutrality vindicated the religion clauses of the First Amendment. In this version, their essence was to secure a government free of religion, tout court. But what if the First Amendment's original public meaning and subsequent practice reflected a very different essence? Our conversation begins with the history of the ratification of the First Amendment. What do we make of…Read More

Herbert Hoover's legacy is perhaps forever linked with the failure of the American economy under his presidency after the stock market crash of 1929 and his ensuing defeat by Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the election of 1932. Further adding to his difficulties is the charge that he was progressive-lite in his policies before and after the Great Depression. The proper foundation, it follows, for advocates of a renewed conservative focus is Calvin Coolidge, a President who cut budgets and taxes. This discussion with Hoover scholar George Nash begs to differ. Nash, who previously appeared on Liberty Law Talk to discuss the…Read More

Herbert Hoover's legacy is perhaps forever linked with the failure of the American economy under his presidency after the stock market crash of 1929 and his ensuing defeat by Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the election of 1932. Further adding to his difficulties is the charge that he was progressive-lite in his policies before and after the Great Depression. The proper foundation, it follows, for advocates of a renewed conservative focus is Calvin Coolidge, a President who cut budgets and taxes. This discussion with Hoover scholar George Nash begs to differ. Nash, who previously appeared on Liberty Law Talk to discuss the…Read More

Herbert Hoover's legacy is perhaps forever linked with the failure of the American economy under his presidency after the stock market crash of 1929 and his ensuing defeat by Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the election of 1932. Further adding to his difficulties is the charge that he was progressive-lite in his policies before and after the Great Depression. The proper foundation, it follows, for advocates of a renewed conservative focus is Calvin Coolidge, a President who cut budgets and taxes. This discussion with Hoover scholar George Nash begs to differ. Nash, who previously appeared on Liberty Law Talk to discuss the…Read More

Kurt Lash comes to Liberty Law Talk to discuss his newest book, The Fourteenth Amendment: The Privileges and Immunities of American Citizenship. If you think the Slaughter-House Cases of 1873 gutted the Privileges or Immunities Clause of constitutional meaning and set us on our present course of strangely incorporating the Bill of Rights through the Due Process Clause, then you need to listen to this conversation. Lash argues that the original public meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment's Privileges or Immunities Clause is definite once you understand the context of the debate in the 39th Congress. Rather than emerging from the Comity…Read More

Kurt Lash comes to Liberty Law Talk to discuss his newest book, The Fourteenth Amendment: The Privileges and Immunities of American Citizenship. If you think the Slaughter-House Cases of 1873 gutted the Privileges or Immunities Clause of constitutional meaning and set us on our present course of strangely incorporating the Bill of Rights through the Due Process Clause, then you need to listen to this conversation. Lash argues that the original public meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment's Privileges or Immunities Clause is definite once you understand the context of the debate in the 39th Congress. Rather than emerging from the Comity…Read More

Kurt Lash comes to Liberty Law Talk to discuss his newest book, The Fourteenth Amendment: The Privileges and Immunities of American Citizenship. If you think the Slaughter-House Cases of 1873 gutted the Privileges or Immunities Clause of constitutional meaning and set us on our present course of strangely incorporating the Bill of Rights through the Due Process Clause, then you need to listen to this conversation. Lash argues that the original public meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment's Privileges or Immunities Clause is definite once you understand the context of the debate in the 39th Congress. Rather than emerging from the Comity…Read More

This next episode of Liberty Law Talk is a discussion with author and professor Grant Havers on his conservative critique of Leo Strauss. Many conservatives hold Strauss in high regard as a thinker who shaped their intellectual commitments. Havers discusses the question: what's so conservative about Strauss' philosophy? Havers' recent book Leo Strauss and Anglo-American Democracy: A Conservative Critique contends that Strauss was a liberal Cold War warrior who most wanted to defend the foundational principles of British and American democracy. Going to the heart of Strauss' philosophical principles and his grounding of modern constitutional liberty in classical Greek political thought,…Read More

This next episode of Liberty Law Talk is a discussion with author and professor Grant Havers on his conservative critique of Leo Strauss. Many conservatives hold Strauss in high regard as a thinker who shaped their intellectual commitments. Havers discusses the question: what's so conservative about Strauss' philosophy? Havers' recent book Leo Strauss and Anglo-American Democracy: A Conservative Critique contends that Strauss was a liberal Cold War warrior who most wanted to defend the foundational principles of British and American democracy. Going to the heart of Strauss' philosophical principles and his grounding of modern constitutional liberty in classical Greek political thought,…Read More

This next episode of Liberty Law Talk is a discussion with author and professor Grant Havers on his conservative critique of Leo Strauss. Many conservatives hold Strauss in high regard as a thinker who shaped their intellectual commitments. Havers discusses the question: what's so conservative about Strauss' philosophy? Havers' recent book Leo Strauss and Anglo-American Democracy: A Conservative Critique contends that Strauss was a liberal Cold War warrior who most wanted to defend the foundational principles of British and American democracy. Going to the heart of Strauss' philosophical principles and his grounding of modern constitutional liberty in classical Greek political thought,…Read More

Margaret Thatcher’s death one year ago sparked much commentary either critical or adulatory. You were certainly hard-pressed to find balanced commentary on her legacy unless you were reading Theodore Dalrymple’s thoughtful assessment on this site (his latest on Thatcher is here). Now contributing to this site's ongoing appraisal of Thatcher is Robin Harris, her speechwriter and policy advisor. He comes to Liberty Law Talk to discuss his highly-acclaimed 2013 biography of the Iron Lady entitled Not for Turning: The Life of Margaret Thatcher. Harris worked closely with Prime Minister Thatcher from 1985 until her departure from Number Ten. He left…Read More