Property and the Constitutional Order
The major themes of constitutional order developed through fights over the nature of property. What makes power legitimate? How, if at all, can democracy and individual rights limit government power? Who is a member of the political community, and what does citizenship mean? What is personal freedom, and how does a constitutional order create or protect it? Our answers to all these questions were worked out through the English Civil War, the American founding, the battle over slavery, the jurisprudence of the Lochner era, and arguments over American colonialism and British imperialism. Throughout, the constitutional arguments depended on ideas about property and its relationship to political power, social order, progress, justice, and freedom. We will explore this history to deepen our appreciation of how economic order and political order create each other. This will help us to understand today’s property regimes in light of constitutional themes and to assess debates over intellectual property, privatization and “ownership societies,” and the nature of justice and citizenship in the twenty-first century.
Please note that course organization and content may vary substantially from semester to semester and descriptions are not necessarily professor specific. Please contact the instructor directly if you have particular course-related questions.