Constitutionalism, Part I

 Hamilton opening number, 1.0

For Wednesday

• Wurman, ch. 4-5 
• Federalist  39, 45, 46,  49, 51.
  

In response to questions:

• Military spending is constitutional (Henry)
• The 14th Amendment and felony disenfranchisement -- and a modest proposal for reviving the reduction clause (Olivia)
• The 24th Amendment forbids poll taxes but does not forbid closed primaries.

What did you think of the constitutional provisions that I sent?

"Constitutionalism"

• Political constraints within the document (more on Wed.)
• Norms

The Constitution

(and things that are not in the Constitution)

Properties

• "Writtenness"(Wurman 26)
• Minimalism (compare with other countries)
• Rigidity
• Decision rules (process, not outcome):  contrast with California
• Institutional Competition
• Federalism
• Bicameralism 
• Separation of Powers

Ron Chernow's biography undercuts the notion that Alexander Hamilton was a well-born defender of privilege. Here is the passage that inspired the musical:

Let us pause briefly to tally the grim catalog of disasters that had befallen these two boys between 1765 and 1769: their father had vanished, their mother had died, their cousin and supposed protector had committed bloody suicide, and their aunt, uncle, and grandmother had all died. James, 16, and Alexander, 14, were now left alone, largely friendless and penniless. At every step in their rootless, topsy-turvy existence, they had been surrounded by failed, broken, embittered people. Their short lives had been shadowed by a stupefying sequence of bankruptcies, marital separations, deaths, scandals, and disinheritance. Such repeated shocks must have stripped Alexander Hamilton of any sense that life was fair, that he existed in a benign universe, or that he could ever count on help from anyone. That this abominable childhood produced such a strong, productive, self-reliant human being -- that this fatherless adolescent could have ended up a founding father of a country he had not yet even seen -- seems little short of miraculous

Threat One: Federalist 1:

[A]dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people than under the forbidden appearance of zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government. History will teach us that the former has been found a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than the latter, and that of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people; commencing demagogues, and ending tyrants.

Threats Two (Insurrection) and Three (Invasion)

• Federalist 8
• Federalist 9

Threat Four: Faction

• Federalist 10