| Descript |
viii, 247 pages ; 22 cm |
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text txt rdacontent |
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unmediated n rdamedia |
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volume nc rdacarrier |
| Note |
Includes bibliographical references and index |
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Introduction: The return of the classical legal tradition -- The common good defined -- The classical legal tradition in America -- Originalism as illusion -- Progressive constitutionalism and developing constitutionalism -- Applications -- Conclusion |
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"The way that Americans understand their Constitution and wider legal tradition has been dominated in recent decades by two exhausted approaches: the originalism of conservatives and the 'living constitutionalism' of progressives. Is it time to look for an alternative? Adrian Vermeule argues that the alternative has been there, buried in the American legal tradition, all along. He shows that US law was, from the founding, subsumed within the broad framework of the classical legal tradition, which conceives law as 'a reasoned ordering to the common good.' In this view, law's purpose is to promote the goods a flourishing political community requires: justice, peace, prosperity, and morality. He shows how this legacy has been lost, despite still being implicit within American public law, and convincingly argues for its recovery in the form of 'common good constitutionalism.'"--Back cover |
| Subject |
Constitutional law -- United States -- Philosophy
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