Project MUSE®: Constitutional Studies

Project MUSE®: Constitutional Studies - Latest Articles https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/714 Project MUSE®: Latest articles in Constitutional Studies. daily 1 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 text/html en-US Vol. 1 (2016) through current issue Latest Articles: Constitutional Studies TWO Project MUSE® Constitutional Studies 2474-9419 2474-9427 Latest articles in Constitutional Studies. Feed provided by Project MUSE® The Limits of Veneration: Public Support for a New Constitutional Convention https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648783 Sanford Levinson (2006; 2012; see also Mann and Ornstein 2013) has argued that the Constitution is fundamentally undemocratic and a contributing factor to the widespread impression that contemporary American politics, especially on the national stage, is seriously dysfunctional. Thus, he asserts that the American people should demand a new constitutional convention to consider major structural changes that might alleviate both its undemocratic and dysfunctional aspects. Some of Levinson’s critics believe that it is pointless to contemplate a new convention because it would never garner sufficient public support. In this article, we challenge the strength of the assumption that the Constitution enjoys such ... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648788">Read More</a> Project MUSE® https://muse.jhu.edu/ 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/714/image/coversmall The Limits of Veneration: Public Support for a New Constitutional Convention 2017-02-21 text/html en-US The Limits of Veneration: Public Support for a New Constitutional Convention 2017-02-21 2017 TWO Project MUSE® 102940 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 2017-02-21 Secession and Nullification as a Global Trend https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648784 MUCH HAS BEEN WRITTEN about the global convergence on constitutional supremacy, perhaps even the emergence of a global constitutional order, and the corresponding rise of an Esperanto-like universal constitutional discourse, primarily visible in the context of rights (e.g., Law 2005; Möller 2012). The ever-accelerating advance of these trends may be linked to broader trends of universalism, globalization, post-nationalism and the corresponding erosion of the local and the particular. Yet, a closer look suggests that while these convergence trends are undoubtedly extensive and readily visible, expressions of constitutional resistance or defiance in the form of secessionism and nullification may in fact be ... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648788">Read More</a> Project MUSE® https://muse.jhu.edu/ 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/714/image/coversmall Secession and Nullification as a Global Trend 2017-02-21 text/html en-US Secession and Nullification as a Global Trend 2017-02-21 2017 TWO Project MUSE® 71429 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 2017-02-21 Challenging Constitutionalism in Post-Apartheid South Africa https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648785 TWENTY YEARS after the adoption of South Africa’s “final” post-apartheid constitution there are increasing demands for constitutional change. Political parties, both in and out of power, challenge the legitimacy of the constitutional order and assert that its failures are a product of its origins rather than its implementation. From Julius Malema and his Economic Freedom Front (EFF) calling for radical redistribution to the ruling African National Congress (ANC) suggesting the need for a “second transition,” the claim is that present failings in governance and particularly increasing inequality is attributable to the “negotiated” status of the Constitution. While these claims fail to distinguish between the ... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648788">Read More</a> Project MUSE® https://muse.jhu.edu/ 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/714/image/coversmall Challenging Constitutionalism in Post-Apartheid South Africa 2017-02-21 text/html en-US Challenging Constitutionalism in Post-Apartheid South Africa 2017-02-21 2017 TWO Project MUSE® 68825 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 2017-02-21 Democracy by Lawsuit: Or, Can Litigation Alleviate the European Union’s “Democratic Deficit?” https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648786 Like all international organizations and most nascent federal states, the European Union (EU) is a decentralized polity that lacks the independent capacity to govern predominantly from the top down. Specifically, because the EU lacks a military, an independent tax system, and a large bureaucracy (Cappelletti et al. 1986),2 it relies primarily on the decentralized enforcement of its legal rules, often by private parties. In fact, the EU is characterized by a participatory mode of “governance by lawsuit:” When a consumer, farmer, or import-export company lawyers up, sues a private party or the state for violating EU rules, and convinces the domestic judge that EU rules are binding, the EU’s ability to govern ... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648788">Read More</a> Project MUSE® https://muse.jhu.edu/ 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/714/image/coversmall Democracy by Lawsuit: Or, Can Litigation Alleviate the European Union’s “Democratic Deficit?” 2017-02-21 text/html en-US Democracy by Lawsuit: Or, Can Litigation Alleviate the European Union’s “Democratic Deficit?” 2017-02-21 2017 TWO Project MUSE® 125677 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 2017-02-21 Private Enforcement of Constitutional Guarantees in the Ku Klux Act of 1871 https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648787 FOLLOWING THE PASSAGE of the Fourteenth Amendment, promises of civil rights were challenged by terrorism of the Ku Klux Klan in the Reconstruction South. While the Amendment was aimed at state discrimination against freed slaves, the Ku Klux Klan largely operated with impunity in Southern states unwilling to punish their violent tactics. Reconstruction supporters feared that the inability of the federal government to end and prevent terror in the South would embolden segregationists and secessionists.2 Fear that the federal government would not have sufficient reach to stem the tide of violence led Congress to adopt a first of its kind “private enforcement regime” in which victims of racial violence and ... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648788">Read More</a> Project MUSE® https://muse.jhu.edu/ 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/714/image/coversmall Private Enforcement of Constitutional Guarantees in the Ku Klux Act of 1871 2017-02-21 text/html en-US Private Enforcement of Constitutional Guarantees in the Ku Klux Act of 1871 2017-02-21 2017 TWO Project MUSE® 59233 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 2017-02-21 Sober Second Thoughts: Evaluating the History of Horizontal Judicial Review by the U.S. Supreme Court https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648788 THERE ARE MANY THEORIES designed to justify the practice of American-style judicial review. Regardless of the details of the particular theory, the preferred mode of theorizing proceeds from a handful of critical cases. For many years political liberals took their bearings on judicial review from the positive example of Brown v. Board of Education (1954). For many years political conservatives took their bearings on judicial review from the negative example of Roe v. Wade (1973). The challenge of constitutional theory has been to provide an overarching normative rationale that can account for a small set of canonical cases (e.g., Brown; West Coast Hotel v. Parrish (1937)), while excluding a small set of ... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/648788">Read More</a> Project MUSE® https://muse.jhu.edu/ 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/714/image/coversmall Sober Second Thoughts: Evaluating the History of Horizontal Judicial Review by the U.S. Supreme Court 2017-02-21 text/html en-US Sober Second Thoughts: Evaluating the History of Horizontal Judicial Review by the U.S. Supreme Court 2017-02-21 2017 TWO Project MUSE® 85882 2026-05-16T00:00:00-05:00 2017-02-21