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The Words That Made Us: America's Constitutional Conversation, 1760-1840
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About This Book
A history of the American Constitution's formative decades from a preeminent legal scholar When the US Constitution won popular approval in 1788, it was the culmination of thirty years of passionate argument over the nature of government. But ratification hardly ended the conversation. For the next half century, ordinary Americans and statesmen alike continued to wrestle with weighty questions in the halls of government and in the pages of newspapers. Should the nation's borders be expanded? Should America allow slavery to spread westward? What rights should Indian nations hold? What was the proper role of the judicial branch? In The Words that Made Us, Akhil Reed Amar unites history and law in a vivid narrative of the biggest constitutional questions early Americans confronted, and he expertly assesses the answers they offered. His account of the document's origins and consolidation is a guide for anyone seeking to properly understand America's Constitution today.
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Reviews
"Amar's distinctive contribution in this book is to recognize how corrosive the Three-Fifths compromise proved to be ..."
"constitutional project illustrates much about our historical memory and demonstrates that there is far more to the constitution than the document itself; all this complicates its understanding."
"A page-turning doorstop history of how early American courts and politicians interpreted the Constitution ..."
"collectively talked and wrote its way into being, according to this dazzling constitutional history ..."
"Amar's scholarly acumen."
"Amar is appropriately attentive to the relative absence of Black Americans, women and Indians from the constitutional conversation (though he notes that their participation grew over time)."
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