TY - JOUR
T1 - "Plant Yourselves on its Primal Granite"
T2 - Slavery, History and the Antebellum Roots of Originalism
AU - Hall, Aaron R.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
Copyright © 2019 the American Society for Legal History, Inc.
PY - 2019/8/1
Y1 - 2019/8/1
N2 - This essay considers how the cultural authority of the constitutional Founding became legal authority in antebellum America. Examining a series of cases implicating the constitutional politics of slavery, it illustrates how legal professionals grasped the public power of constitutional origin stories. To produce meanings and legitimate rulings, lawyers and judges wrote and reproduced narratives about slavery at the Founding, converting ascriptions of original constitutional visions in formal constitutional law. This power derived from the ongoing popular construction of the Founding as a venerated and authoritative moment containing unwritten intentions, understandings, and promises binding upon subsequent generations. The essay argues that these developments belong to the deep history of originalism. By approaching originalism as a form of constitutional politics integrating public memory culture and legal reasoning, the essay locates the central public and juridical dynamics of originalism emerging in struggles over the constitutional identity of slavery.
AB - This essay considers how the cultural authority of the constitutional Founding became legal authority in antebellum America. Examining a series of cases implicating the constitutional politics of slavery, it illustrates how legal professionals grasped the public power of constitutional origin stories. To produce meanings and legitimate rulings, lawyers and judges wrote and reproduced narratives about slavery at the Founding, converting ascriptions of original constitutional visions in formal constitutional law. This power derived from the ongoing popular construction of the Founding as a venerated and authoritative moment containing unwritten intentions, understandings, and promises binding upon subsequent generations. The essay argues that these developments belong to the deep history of originalism. By approaching originalism as a form of constitutional politics integrating public memory culture and legal reasoning, the essay locates the central public and juridical dynamics of originalism emerging in struggles over the constitutional identity of slavery.
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U2 - 10.1017/S0738248019000348
DO - 10.1017/S0738248019000348
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:85068358794
SN - 0738-2480
VL - 37
SP - 743
EP - 761
JO - Law and History Review
JF - Law and History Review
IS - 3
ER -