Presidential Succession Act: Hearing Before the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the House Committee on the Judiciary, 108th Congress

Examines the need for changes to the Presidential Succession Act which governs the transfer of power in the event that there is a simultaneous vacancy in the office of the presidency and the vice presidency.https://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/twentyfifth_amendment_congressional_materials/1001/thumbnail.jp

The Adequacy of the Presidential Succession System in the 21st Century: Filling the Gaps and Clarifying the Ambiguities in Constitutional and Extraconstitutional Arrangements

Program for The Adequacy of the Presidential Succession System in the 21st Century symposium, Fordham University School of Law, April 16-17, 2010.https://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/miscellanea/1001/thumbnail.jp

Of Time, Place, and the Alaska Constitution

This Article places the Alaska Constitution in historical perspective by comparing it with other state constitutions. It first considers how the convention delegates’ need to satisfy four audiences—Congress, Alaska residents who would ratify the constitution, those who would live under the constitution, and posterity—affected the constitution’s design. It next shows how the Alaska Constitution reflects the fact that it is the state’s first constitution, that it is a western constitution, and that it is a mid-twentieth-century constitution. Finally, it compares the Alaska Constitution with the Hawaii Constitution, which was drafted at the same time

Material Constitution

An annotated bibliography of important works on material constitution

What’s left of the political constitution?

This paper argues that we should move on from what has become a rather outdated contrast between the political constitution and the legal constitution. Taking as its focus the constitution of the United Kingdom, the paper analyzes the contemporary constitutional order as a mixed system of politics and law combined. It argues that such a mix may be a more compelling and attractive system than either the model of the political constitution or that of the legal constitution

Tragic Irony of American Federalism: National Sovereignty versus State Sovereignty in Slavery and in Freedom, The Federalism in the 21st Century: Historical Perspectives

A plurality on the Supreme Court seeks to establish a state-sovereignty based theory of federalism that imposes sharp limitations on Congress\u27s legislative powers. Using history as authority, they admonish a return to the constitutional first principles of the Founders. These first principles, in their view, attribute all governmental authority to the consent of the people of each individual state, not the consent of the undifferentiated people of the Nation as a whole. Because the people of each state are the source of all governmental power, they maintain, where the Constitution is silent about the exercise of a particular power-that is, where the Constitution does not speak either expressly or by necessary implication-the Federal Government lacks that power and the states enjoy it. Consequently, the States can exercise all powers that the Constitution does not withhold from them. \u27 These first principles define the national government, on the other hand, as \u27entirely a creature of the Constitution.” Its authority is therefore limited to those \u27few and defined \u27 powers the Constitution delegates to it. Moreover, even expressly delegated powers, such as the power to regulate interstate and foreign commerce, must be cabined. These essential first principles require the courts to limit even further Congress\u27s expressly delegated powers by interpreting them as having judicially enforceable outer limits. Constitutional federalism thus imposes on the Court the-duty of preserving entire areas of traditional state concern from national usurpation. This first principle of judicial review attributes to the courts the role of active overseer of legislative policy. According to this view, the Founders mandated this state sovereignty theory of federalism \u27to ensure protection of our fundamental liberties. Recent scholarship presents a much more complicated picture of the Founders\u27 first principles, as my colleague Martin Flaherty argues. Jack Rakove has shown that the essence of revolutionary constitutionalism was avowedly experimental in nature. He persuasively argues that the Founders did not [lock] into the Constitution at the moment of its adoption ... a set of definitive meanings.” It also appears that the Founders did not expect their opinions about the Constitution to control later interpretations. Larry Kramer shares this view of the Founders\u27 understanding of the Constitution and argues that the real founding occurred when the Founders put the ratified Constitution into practice. David Currie similarly maintains that [t]he First Congress was practically a second constitutional convention. He argues, moreover, that Congress and executive officials, no less than judges, interpreted the Constitution and participated in giving the Constitution meaning and definition in the decades following ratification. Unquestionably, the Constitution created a national government of limited powers. However, the Founders\u27 understanding of the scope of its powers was far less limited than the few and defined powers the current Court\u27s state sovereignty plurality asserts

The Lisbon Treaty: a constitutional document, not a constitution–a British perspective

The European Union has undergone a constitutional transformation in the past half century. It has evolved from its origins as the European Economic Community, promoting economic integration, into a supranational polity that has come to be perceived in constitutional and even federal terms. This paper will explore the extent to which the modern-day EU can be said to possess some sort of constitution. In doing this, it will be necessary to decouple such a constitution from the notion of state constitutionalism and instead define it as a unique transnational constitution. Despite this, useful comparisons can be drawn between state constitutions and that of the EU, in order to ascertain the form the latter may take. Particularly useful in this regard is the analogy between the British constitutional model and the EU constitution. This paper concludes that the EU possesses a composite constitution more akin to that of the United Kingdom rather than a formal written text, as is typical in continental Europe. As such, in the present writer’s view, the Lisbon Treaty would feature, along with the other treaties, as a constitutional document within the constitutional arrangements of the EU, without it becoming a formal constitution itsel

The Political System of the Republic of Turkey, Past and Present

The first constitution of the Ottoman-Turkish Empire was adopted in 1876 – the Kânûn-ı Esâsî (Eng. Fundamental Law). In its history, Turkey has had four constitutions. They were adopted in 1921, 1924, 1961, and 1982, with the latter being presently in force. Nowadays, the creation of a new constitution is the main issue on Turkey’s political agenda. The government of Turkey and Mr. Recep Tayyip Erdogan want to amend the constitution, and envisage creating an executive presidential system (Tur. Başkanlık sistemi), similar to that of the Russian Federation and the United States. Critics are concerned about what Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s motivation may be. This article analyzes the historical roots of the constitution, its amendments, the presidential system in Turkey and the arguments of the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) against the adoption of a presidential system. The key issues that the authors address are the changes that could be made under Turkey’s new constitution and whether all political power would be concentrated in president’s hands