The Constitutional State
The Constitutional State

Author: N. W. Barber

Publisher: OUP Oxford

Published: 2012-09-27

Total Pages: 384

ISBN-13: 0191637254

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The Constitutional State provides an original analytical account of the state and its associated constitutional phenomena. It presents the state as a form of social group, consisting of people, territory and institutions bound together by rules. The institutions of the state make a distinctive and characteristic claim over the people of the state, who, in turn, have a distinctive and characteristic relationship with these institutions. This account reveals the importance of at least two forms of pluralism - legal and constitutional. It also casts light on some of the more difficult questions faced by writers on constitutions - such as the possibility of states undertaking actions and forming intentions, the moral significance of these actions for the people of the state, and the capacity of the state to carry responsibility for acts between generations.

Dimensions of Dignity
Dimensions of Dignity

Author: Jacob Weinrib

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2016-09-15

Total Pages: 317

ISBN-13: 1107084288

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Offers a public law theory that elaborates the idea of human dignity to illuminate and justify innovations in constitutional practice.

Prohibition, the Constitution, and States' Rights
Prohibition, the Constitution, and States' Rights

Author: Sean Beienburg

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2019-06-20

Total Pages: 333

ISBN-13: 022663213X

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Colorado’s legalization of marijuana spurred intense debate about the extent to which the Constitution preempts state-enacted laws and statutes. Colorado’s legal cannabis program generated a strange scenario in which many politicians, including many who freely invoke the Tenth Amendment, seemed to be attacking the progressive state for asserting states’ rights. Unusual as this may seem, this has happened before—in the early part of the twentieth century, as America concluded a decades-long struggle over the suppression of alcohol during Prohibition. Sean Beienburg recovers a largely forgotten constitutional debate, revealing how Prohibition became a battlefield on which skirmishes of American political development, including the debate over federalism and states’ rights, were fought. Beienburg focuses on the massive extension of federal authority involved in Prohibition and the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment, describing the roles and reactions of not just Congress, the presidents, and the Supreme Court but political actors throughout the states, who jockeyed with one another to claim fidelity to the Tenth Amendment while reviling nationalism and nullification alike. The most comprehensive treatment of the constitutional debate over Prohibition to date, the book concludes with a discussion of the parallels and differences between Prohibition in the 1920s and debates about the legalization of marijuana today.

Europe's Functional Constitution
Europe's Functional Constitution

Author: Turkuler Isiksel

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2016

Total Pages: 305

ISBN-13: 019875907X

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Constitutionalism has become a byword for legitimate government, but is it fated to lose its relevance as constitutional states relinquish power to international institutions? This book evaluates the extent to which constitutionalism, as an empirical idea and normative ideal, can be adapted to institutions beyond the state by surveying the sophisticated legal and political system of the European Union. Having originated in a series of agreements between states, the EU has acquired important constitutional features like judicial review, protections for individual rights, and a hierarchy of norms. Nonetheless, it confounds traditional models of constitutional rule to the extent that its claim to authority rests on the promise of economic prosperity and technocratic competence rather than on the democratic will of citizens. Critically appraising the European Union and its legal system, this book proposes the idea of "functional constitutionalism" to describe this distinctive configuration of public power. Although the EU is the most advanced instance of functional constitutionalism to date, understanding this pragmatic mode of constitutional authority is essential for assessing contemporary international economic governance.

The Principles of Constitutionalism
The Principles of Constitutionalism

Author: N. W. Barber

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2018-07-25

Total Pages: 417

ISBN-13: 0192535684

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In this follow-up volume to the critically acclaimed The Constitutional State, N. W. Barber explores how the principles of constitutionalism structure and influence successful states. Constitutionalism is not exclusively a mechanism to limit state powers. An attractive and satisfying account of constitutionalism, and, by derivation, of the state, can only be reached if the principles of constitutionalism are seen as interlocking parts of a broader doctrine. This holistic study of the relationship between the constitutional state and its central principles - sovereignty; the separation of powers; the rule of law; subsidiarity; democracy; and civil society - casts light on long-standing debates over the meaning and implications of constitutionalism. The book provides a concise introduction to constitutionalism and a detailed account of the nature and implications of each of the principles in question. It concludes with an examination of the importance of constitutional principles to the work of judges, legislators, and others involved in the operation and creation of the constitution. The book is essential reading for those seeking a definitive account of constitutionalism and its benefits.

Semblances of Sovereignty
Semblances of Sovereignty

Author: T. Alexander Aleinikoff

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2009-07-01

Total Pages: 321

ISBN-13: 0674020154

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In a set of cases decided at the end of the nineteenth century, the Supreme Court declared that Congress had "plenary power" to regulate immigration, Indian tribes, and newly acquired territories. Not coincidentally, the groups subject to Congress' plenary power were primarily nonwhite and generally perceived as "uncivilized." The Court left Congress free to craft policies of assimilation, exclusion, paternalism, and domination. Despite dramatic shifts in constitutional law in the twentieth century, the plenary power case decisions remain largely the controlling law. The Warren Court, widely recognized for its dedication to individual rights, focused on ensuring "full and equal citizenship"--an agenda that utterly neglected immigrants, tribes, and residents of the territories. The Rehnquist Court has appropriated the Warren Court's rhetoric of citizenship, but has used it to strike down policies that support diversity and the sovereignty of Indian tribes. Attuned to the demands of a new century, the author argues for abandonment of the plenary power cases, and for more flexible conceptions of sovereignty and citizenship. The federal government ought to negotiate compacts with Indian tribes and the territories that affirm more durable forms of self-government. Citizenship should be "decentered," understood as a commitment to an intergenerational national project, not a basis for denying rights to immigrants.

Constitutional Law in the United States
Constitutional Law in the United States

Author: Robert A. Sedler

Publisher: Kluwer Law International B.V.

Published: 2017-10-20

Total Pages: 215

ISBN-13: 9041190589

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Derived from the renowned multi-volume International Encyclopaedia of Laws, this very useful analysis of constitutional law in the United States provides essential information on the country’s sources of constitutional law, its form of government, and its administrative structure. Lawyers who handle transnational matters will appreciate the clarifications of particular terminology and its application. Throughout the book, the treatment emphasizes the specific points at which constitutional law affects the interpretation of legal rules and procedure. Thorough coverage by a local expert fully describes the political system, the historical background, the role of treaties, legislation, jurisprudence, and administrative regulations. The discussion of the form and structure of government outlines its legal status, the jurisdiction and workings of the central state organs, the subdivisions of the state, its decentralized authorities, and concepts of citizenship. Special issues include the legal position of aliens, foreign relations, taxing and spending powers, emergency laws, the power of the military, and the constitutional relationship between church and state. Details are presented in such a way that readers who are unfamiliar with specific terms and concepts in varying contexts will fully grasp their meaning and significance. Its succinct yet scholarly nature, as well as the practical quality of the information it provides, make this book a valuable time-saving tool for both practising and academic jurists. Lawyers representing parties with interests in the United States will welcome this guide, and academics and researchers will appreciate its value in the study of comparative constitutional law.

Who Decides?
Who Decides?

Author: Jeffrey S. Sutton

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2021-10-29

Total Pages: 497

ISBN-13: 0197582184

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"51 Imperfect Solutions told stories about specific state and federal individual constitutional rights, and explained two benefits of American federalism: how two sources of constitutional protection for liberty and property rights could be valuable to individual freedom and how the state courts could be useful laboratories of innovation when it comes to the development of national constitutional rights. This book tells the other half of the story. Instead of focusing on state constitutional individual rights, this book takes on state constitutional structure. Everything in law and politics, including individual rights, comes back to divisions of power and the evergreen question: Who decides? The goal of this book is to tell the structure side of the story and to identify the shifting balances of power revealed when one accounts for American constitutional law as opposed to just federal constitutional law. The book contains three main parts-on the judicial, executive, and legislative branches-as well as stand-alone chapters on home-rule issues raised by local governments and the benefits and burdens raised by the ease of amending state constitutions. A theme in the book is the increasingly stark divide between the ever-more democratic nature of state governments and the ever-less democratic nature of the federal government over time"--