[Editor’s Note: In this special installment of I•CONnect’s Article Review Series, Reijer Passchier reviews Vicki Jackson‘s article on The (myth of un)amendability of the US Constitution and the democratic component of constitutionalism, which appears in the current issue of I•CON. The full article is available for free here.] Review by Reijer Passchier –Reijer Passchier, PhD Candidate at Leiden
Constitution Day in the United States
–Richard Albert, Boston College Law School Every year on this day, the United States commemorates the signing of the Constitution in 1787. The Library of Congress traces the origins of what is today known as “Constitution Day”: Constitution Day and Citizenship Day is observed each year on September 17 to commemorate the signing of the Constitution on
The US Same-Sex Marriage Decision: Unconstitutional Constitutional Change?
—Mikołaj Barczentewicz, DPhil in Law Candidate, University of Oxford Much will be written about Obergefell v Hodges, the momentous decision of the US Supreme Court endorsing a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, but in this short blog post I will limit myself to one aspect of the judgment: does it constitute unconstitutional constitutional change? It
Is the Constitution of Canada the World’s Most Difficult to Amend?
—Richard Albert, Boston College Law School Studies of constitutional rigidity suggest that the United States Constitution is one of the world’s most difficult to change by formal amendment.[1] In light of the low rate of amendment success in the United States, this is hard to dispute: of the over 11,000 amendment proposals introduced in Congress
Words to a Delegate: Crafting Article V
Special Series: Perspectives from Undergraduate Law Students J.D. Student Contribution –Larissa Warren, rising 3L, Boston College Law School [Editor’s note: The students in my advanced seminar on constitutional amendment wrote excellent papers in their take-home examination for the course. They were given a choice of two questions to answer: (1) “Is the United States Constitution Too Difficult to
The Liberty-Equality Debate: Comparing the Lawrence and Naz Foundation Rulings
Cross-posted with permission from the Oxford Human Rights Hub Blog. —Ajey Sangai, Research Associate, Jindal Global Law School Last month marked the 10-year anniversary of Lawrence v. Texas, where the United States Supreme Court ruled that laws that criminalized sodomy were unconstitutional. Like June 26 2013, June 26 2003, was also a historic day for the LGBT
The Unamendable Corwin Amendment
—Richard Albert, Boston College Law School Article V entrenches rules to formally amend the United States Constitution. It has been used to make and memorialize many democratic advances since the country’s founding, from the First Amendment’s protections for speech and religion, to the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of equality, to the Twenty-Sixth Amendment’s expansion of the
