To Secure These Rights

The Declaration of Independence and Constitutional Interpretation

Scott Douglas Gerber

• Publisher: NYU Press
• Year: 1995
• Print ISBN: 9780814730898
• eBook ISBN: 9780814732502
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Constitutions
• Index: Politics & International Relations

To Secure These Rights enters the fascinating--and often contentious--debate over constitutional interpretation. Scott Douglas Gerber here argues that the Constitution of the United States should be interpreted in light of the natural rights political philosophy of the Declaration of Independence and that the Supreme Court is the institution of American government that should be primarily responsible for identifying and applying that philosophy in American life.
Importantly, the theory advanced in this book--what Gerber calls liberal originalism--is neither consistently liberal nor consistently conservative in the modern conception of those terms. Rather, the theory is liberal in the classic sense of viewing the basic purpose of government to be safeguarding the natural rights of individuals. As Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men. In essence, Gerber maintains that the Declaration articulates the philosophical ends of our nation and that the Constitution embodies the means to effectuate those ends. Gerber's analysis reveals that the Constitution cannot be properly understood without recourse to history, political philosophy, and law.

Index

Abortion: and constitutional interpretation, 180–83

interpretive difficulties of, 182, 183

politics of, 180–81

Rehnquist Court on, 181–82

Tribe on, 182

Abortion (Tribe), 182

Abraham, Henry: on appointment process, 157, 160, 255 n. 118

on constitutional interpretation, ix–xi

on double standard, 190 n. *

on judicial self-restraint, 151, 253 n. 96

Adams, John: on happiness, 54

as intellectual leader of American Revolution, 38–39, 218n. 111

as intellectual leader of constitutional period, 87–89, 200

on moral sense, 49

on natural aristocracy, 50, 131

on Otis, 35, 106

on Paxton v. Gray, 105

political philosophy during

American Revolution, 38–39

on property, 192

on sex equality, 259 n. 34

on virtue, 38, 216 n. 77, 217 n. 104

Wood on, 38

on writing of Declaration of Independence, 21, 31, 38, 217 n. 108

Adams, Samuel: John Adams on, 38

Dunn on, 39

as intellectual leader of American Revolution, 35–36, 218 n. 111

Thomas Jefferson on, 35

political philosophy of, 35–36

on virtue, 36

Adler, Mortimer, on preamble, 60

Advice and consent, and appointment process, 155, 255 n. 125, 256 n. 137

Age: and capital punishment, 178, 261 n. 73

and equality, 171–73

Agresto, John, on impeachment, 144

AIDS, and gay rights, 190

Akron v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health, O’Connor’s dissent in, 263 n. 87

Alienage, and equality, 171 n. *

American Commonwealth, The (Bryce), on early American constitutions, 90

American Founding: importance of liberty to, 53

Locke’s influence on, 56 n. *, 213 n. 27

Lutz on, 32 n. *

natural rights political philosophy of, 22, 75–76

Pocock on, 26–27

reference to, in enabling acts, 235 n. 155

state constitutions during, 90

Stimson on, 217 n. 94

Straussians on, 25 n. *, 83, 213 n. 27

Wills on, 27, 217 n. 94

Wood on, 26

American political thought: and Locke, 24

and Lutz, 32 n. *

and Straussians, 25 n. *

students of, 22, 24, 26

American Revolution: and Declaration of Independence, 17–18, 27–32

intellectual leaders of, 32–40, 64, 75, 77, 218 n. 111, 218 n. 113

Iredell on, 111

Lockean natural-rights philosophy of, 7, 15 n. *, 18, 23–40, 56, 199

relationship to Constitution, xiv, 14, 15, 225 n. 13

road to indepe...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword by Henry J. Abraham
• Preface
• Introduction: Liberal Originalism
• I The Jurisprudence of the American Founding
• II Natural Rights and the Role of the Court
• Conclusion: A New American Revolution?
• Notes
• Works Cited
• Index
• Footnotes