1. The Chartered Rights of Americans: A Kirkian Case for the Incorporation of First Amendment Rights
- Author:
- Luke C. Sheahan
- Publication Date:
- 12-2019
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Humanitas
- Institution:
- The Center for the Study of Statesmanship, Catholic University
- Abstract:
- Traditionalist conservatives have often expressed hostility to the Supreme Court’s First Amendment jurisprudence, perceiving it as an attempt to accomplish social change undertaken by the court’s current justices while disregarding the original meaning of the Bill of Rights.1 According to this account, rather than recognizing the provisions of the First Amendment to be part of a larger constitutional project that upholds social order and traditional institutions, the court interprets First Amendment clauses so as to undermine the basic structural logic of the Constitution itself. An advocate of this position is the figure many consider to be the godfather of American intellectual conservatism, Russell Kirk.
- Topic:
- Law, Domestic politics, and Conservatism
- Political Geography:
- United States