Over the last couple of weeks we've been having an exceptionally tiresome debate about birthright citizenship. Two conservative legal scholars, Randy Barnett and Ilan Wurman, have been arguing in various public fora that the overwhelming scholarly consensus that the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment means what it
In the last few days, people have started wondering whether we're in a constitutional crisis. Sensible enough, given everything that's going on. But not everyone is convinced. There's certainly something afoot, they grant, but perhaps it is only a "constitutional moment," not
People are starting to talk about remaking the Constitution. It makes sense, right? We're in a state of constitutional collapse due to the election of a usurper president, and his campaign of usurpation since taking office sixteen days ago. Constitutional rules are being trampled left and right, indeed
Much is said of the danger to liberty from the Army program for deporting and detaining these citizens of Japanese extraction. But a judicial construction of the due process clause that will sustain this order is a far more subtle blow to liberty than the promulgation of the order itself.
Okay fine, I'll start. Last night I said on Bluesky that I want to see people laying the foundation, in the public discourse, for the idea that if and when Trump orders the military to go invade Greenland – because apparently he is quite serious about this whole "
How many amendments does our Constitution have? You would think this should not be a difficult question! And yet. You may have seen headlines recently to the effect that certain liberal activists are asking President Biden to declare that the Equal Rights Amendment has been duly adopted as the Twenty-Eighth
A week ago I wrote the following on Bluesky: I agree with this, BUT ALSO, I do sort of think we need a vision of a green-mana-aligned left-liberalism, that the current orientation is pretty anti-green in a way that bothers me — Robert Black (@hurricanexyz.bsky.social) 2024-12-08T23:45:11.264Z
This post is going to be a little weird, particularly if you're here for the legal theory. This is going to be different from my last primer, about the six modalities of constitutional argument. But I got involved in a discussion about this stuff on Bluesky over the
So the latest insanity is apparently Trump talking – how seriously is anybody's guess – about conquering and/or annexing Canada. He is said to have joked(?) with Canadian Premier Justin Trudeau that Canada should become America's 51st state. I have a better idea. In the couple of
His presidency will be unlawful from top to bottom. He is ineligible to the office of president, or for that matter any other public office state or federal, under Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment, which forbids those who (1) held public office and took an oath to support the
Hey remember that series of mine about How (Not) To Reform the Supreme Court? Have you been waiting patiently for the next installment? Yeah. So. I've been spending the time since the election... well, reeling, first and foremost. But as part of the reeling, trying to figure out
The essential premise of fascism is that the individual has no existence save as part of the collective. I've been wrestling with this ever since it became clear that Trump is going to get back into power last night. So much of my identity is wrapped up in