The premise for this collection of a decade of essays is here. Today’s re-post, from Boston Review, late 2012, is on liberalism’s misguided effort to adopt its own form of what’s long been known, in conservative circles, as originalism.
The immediate political context of the day involved passage of the Affordable Care Act, the Roberts court’s upholding its constitutionality, the Tea Party movement’s so-called “constitutional conservatism,” and left-liberal criticism of Obama, with direct reference to what were then new books: Drift, by Rachel Maddow; The Mendacity of Hope by Roger Hodge; Republic, Lost, by Lawrence Lessig; and Covenant of Liberty by Michael Patrick Leahy. The underlying history issue: modern, misleading projections on James Madison by smart thinkers across the political spectrum. (Only four years ago — wow. Again, seems like a long time.) Having spent so much time on Hamilton, this was my first foray into criticizing the anti-Hamilton forces, both liberal and conservative, who think there’s a founding-era antidote to Hamiltonianism in Madison-Jeffersonianism.
Here it is: “Founding Fathers, Founding Villains.”
Next in the collection here.
William Hogeland 