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America's Constitution: A Biography, by Akhil Reed Amar
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In America’s Constitution, one of this era’s most accomplished constitutional law scholars, Akhil Reed Amar, gives the first comprehensive account of one of the world’s great political texts. Incisive, entertaining, and occasionally controversial, this “biography” of America’s framing document explains not only what the Constitution says but also why the Constitution says it.
We all know this much: the Constitution is neither immutable nor perfect. Amar shows us how the story of this one relatively compact document reflects the story of America more generally. (For example, much of the Constitution, including the glorious-sounding “We the People,” was lifted from existing American legal texts, including early state constitutions.) In short, the Constitution was as much a product of its environment as it was a product of its individual creators’ inspired genius.
Despite the Constitution’s flaws, its role in guiding our republic has been nothing short of amazing. Skillfully placing the document in the context of late-eighteenth-century American politics, America’s Constitution explains, for instance, whether there is anything in the Constitution that is unamendable; the reason America adopted an electoral college; why a president must be at least thirty-five years old; and why–for now, at least–only those citizens who were born under the American flag can become president.
From his unique perspective, Amar also gives us unconventional wisdom about the Constitution and its significance throughout the nation’s history. For one thing, we see that the Constitution has been far more democratic than is conventionally understood. Even though the document was drafted by white landholders, a remarkably large number of citizens (by the standards of 1787) were allowed to vote up or down on it, and the document’s later amendments eventually extended the vote to virtually all Americans.
We also learn that the Founders’ Constitution was far more slavocratic than many would acknowledge: the “three fifths” clause gave the South extra political clout for every slave it owned or acquired. As a result, slaveholding Virginians held the presidency all but four of the Republic’s first thirty-six years, and proslavery forces eventually came to dominate much of the federal government prior to Lincoln’s election.
Ambitious, even-handed, eminently accessible, and often surprising, America’s Constitution is an indispensable work, bound to become a standard reference for any student of history and all citizens of the United States.
From the Hardcover edition.
- Sales Rank: #22116 in Books
- Brand: Amar, Akhil Reed
- Published on: 2010-08-18
- Released on: 2006-09-12
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.85" h x 1.45" w x 6.15" l, 1.61 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 672 pages
- Random House Trade
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. You can read the U.S. Constitution, including its 27 amendments, in about a half-hour, but it takes decades of study to understand how this blueprint for our nation's government came into existence. Amar, a 20-year veteran of the Yale Law School faculty, has that understanding, steeped in the political history of the 1780s, when dissatisfaction with the Articles of Confederation led to a constitutional convention in Philadelphia, which produced a document of wonderful compression and balance creating an indissoluble union.Amar examines in turn each article of the Constitution, explaining how the framers drew on English models, existing state constitutions and other sources in structuring the three branches of the federal government and defining the relationship of the that government to the states.Amar takes on each of the amendments, from the original Bill of Rights to changes in the rules for presidential succession. The book squarely confronts America's involvement with slavery, which the original Constitution facilitated in ways the author carefully explains.Scholarly, reflective and brimming with ideas, this book is miles removed from an arid, academic exercise in textual analysis. Amar evokes the passions and tumult that marked the Constitution's birth and its subsequent revisions. Only rarely do you find a book that embodies scholarship at its most solid and invigorating; this is such a book.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
Amar, a Yale Law School professor, approaches the Constitution with a perspective that is both accessible and unconventional. He gets into the formative process of our most revered doctrine of governance by placing it in the context of law, history, and political science. Yet he broadens his focus beyond the Philadelphia constitutional convention to include popular conversation and competing values. Amar views America's foundation as a corporate merger, reflecting 13 colonies with different legal charters and interests. He raises central questions: Was the constitutional process democratic? Was it pro-slavery? He explores the context of the subsequent amendments, initially the Bill of Rights, then those associated with the Reconstruction era through the civil rights era. Amar dares to incorporate contemporary concerns around the amendments that have often prodded us toward achieving our otherwise unrealized ideals. There is a fluidity to Amar's analysis that contrasts with those strict constructionists and those with vested interests in the original intent of our Constitution, as if such ground were sacred. Vernon Ford
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
About the Author
Akhil Reed Amar graduated from Yale College and Yale Law School, and has been a member of the Yale Law School faculty since 1985. He is the author of The Bill of Rights: Creation and Reconstruction and has written widely on constitutional issues for The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times. He lives in Woodbridge, Connecticut, with his wife and three children.
From the Hardcover edition.
Most helpful customer reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful.
Evolving Principles
By VA Duck
"America's Constitution..." is a serious, scholarly book, but so lucidly written that the lay reader will have no problem following the text or comprehending the theme. This book is a major work on the topic and so well done that 5-stars are easily earned. Other books of similar intent, such as Professor Jack Rakove's book Original Meanings: Politics and Ideas in the Making of the Constitution, may succeed in analysis, but frequently leave the lay reader with a hard slog for comprehension.
Professor Amar blends three perspectives in his look at the constitution: history, law and political science. And that three-viewed approach is what yeilds the depth of penetration that this book presents. The issue of the young nation's "peculiar institution" (slavery) for example, is shown to be infused well beyond what the casual reader might see in reading the constitution.
By illustrating the norms and mores of the late 18th century, citing the record of the constitution and ratification papers - both Federalist and Anti-Federalist, as well as analysis of court decisions that have followed - Professor Amar makes his case with clear documentation and solid logical argument for both the good and bad; and there is no mistaking that the "good" triumphs. He tells us what we need to know about our constitution, not what its detractors or its exalters insist on. Highly recommended if a very in-depth look at the U.S. Constitution, its original meanings and historic evolution are your interest.
-----kindle edition-----
It is always disappointing in a book such as this (one that can be used for reference) that hardcopy page numbers are not provided. References from kindle to hardcopy or the reverse are difficult to impossible. Digital media or not - page numbers are still (unfortunately) the only common denominator. And, if EVER a book needed an index - this is it. Re-finding passages of interest are now left entirely to highlighting which can become overwhelming in a 655 page book - especially one with as much to say as this one, yet NO index is provided. For expediency, the publisher has eliminated the index from the e-book version - but retains the same price as the paper copy! e-Book publication quality, ★★☆☆☆ for typically rapacious Random House.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
Focusing on the Constitution's Contemporary Scene
By Joseph Ryan
The U.S. Constitution is a huge subject, and Prof. Amar contributes in this book by keeping a focus on the ideas and debates that led up to or were contemporary with adoption of each of the Constitution's clauses. It touches on virtually every phrase.
A reader might come to the book looking for other things that Prof. Amar does not try to provide: in particular, lessons from his analysis of then-contemporary debates that might be useful for now-contemporary debates.
For example, on Presidential impeachment, Prof. Amar discusses the phrase "Treason, Bribery, and other high Crimes and Misdemeanors," noting that "high" was not used in the Constitution to describe the standard for impeachment of other officials, and noting that treason and bribery set the standard for what is referred to by the general terms "crimes and misdemeanors," etc. He closes by using Andrew Johnson's acquittal to illustrate. Period, end of story. I mean, what else could a reader from today's generation want to hear about, regarding standards for Presidential impeachment? (Good grief.)
In my case, I was interested in what the Founders thought about "enumeration," both in the sense of "census" (which the book does not touch on) and in the sense of enumerated and unenumerated rights. On the latter, Prof. Amar is clear: "While this book has focused on the written and enacted Constitution, I myself do not believe that all of American constitutionalism can be deduced simply from the document. At key points the text itself seems to gesture outward, reminding readers of the importance of unenumerated rights above and beyond textually enumerated ones. Thus we need at least one more book to start where this one ends." And yet this book does touch on the subject, assertively if lightly, in its discussion of "No State shall" under the fourteenth amendment, where the author states that the Supreme Court construes the Constitution as providing a right of privacy. The author also refers us to his previous book on the Bill of Rights.
In addition, I was interested in seeing what I could learn about the liberty-empire range of perspectives concerning U.S. colonial history.
First, I have to report that the indigenous peoples do not make much of an appearance in the book, the word "indigenous" not at all. While this may accurately reflect the level of interest in indigenous peoples in the Constitution's text and debates, it contrasts mightily with the book's substantial focus on African-Americans, who Prof. Amar notes are mentioned in the Constitution's text not at all.
In general, however, Prof. Amar is non-judgmental on empire. The "Territory" section of Chapter 7 on "States and Territories" notes the colonies' "struggle to wrest the [trans-Appalachian] West from England" as part of the independence movement. With respect to the subsequent Constitution, the book notes that "the union was broke," that Federalist Paper No. 38 characterized the West as "a mine of vast wealth," and that "the first wave of income would flow from land sales."
However, Prof. Amar's book doesn't mention that Britain also was broke from the expenses of winning France's withdrawal, or the role of the hated taxes in repairing that. The book's frequent references to George Washington's influence on the country's direction do not include mention of his role in conquering western land for commercial sale. The book does however slightly puncture the "no taxation without representation" rationale where it says, "Not that the colonists really wanted direct representation in Parliament. A small number of Americans amid a sea of British legislators would likely be consistently outvoted."
Contrasted with the book's adopting as a major theme the expansion of liberty accomplished through the Constitution and its amendments, the near non-treatment of empire places the book towards the right in the political spectrum in that particular regard.
While this gap regarding "empire" reflects an interest of my own, in a finite book gaps must necessarily be infinite, so I should close by saying that what is there in the book is substantial and worthwhile.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful.
Insights from start to finish
By Roanld Tenney
Another great book about the constitution. This approaches the Constitution from the Preamble to the most recent amendments.
This morning, (4/9/12) I finished this book. I found Akhil Amar to be a wonderful author. I would advise a reader to read the post-script first, and then return to the rest of the book. I was especially impressed with the chapter on the Preamble to the Constitution. I never considered that the most (only) lyrical part of the document was so laden with meaning.
As most other books confine themselves to the founding era, the summer of 1787 or possibly the ratification process, this book continues the story to modern times. Amar insists that the Constitution does not belong to the founders, but to "We, the people". I came to the same conclusion.
I feel like I am very sensitive to the role of slavery in the founding. I have read many works on the Civil war. I have a light-hearted but ongoing debate with some friends and family members on the role of slavery in America. But Amar takes my position and amplifies it greatly. I found this insightful, but ultimately biased. It is not that I condone slavery in any way, shape or form. It is that this filter of the slavocracy seems to inform his perspective at every turn. I grant that slavery was a fundamental motivation of many of the founders. But perhaps other factors may have had relatively greater roles in the evolution of America and our Constitution and his emphasis may overlook this.
I recommend this book. I came away more informed about how we came up with the Constitution, how amendments are made and the vital role of we, the people, in maintaining this document.
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