In commemoration of Black History Month, this week we’re sharing the courageous stories and legendary lives of African American constitutional visionaries throughout history—including well-known figures like Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Ida B. Wells, W.E.B. DuBois, Martin Luther King Jr., and Malcolm X, as well as some lesser-known but groundbreaking figures like Monroe Trotter and Pauli Murray. We highlight their fights to bring about constitutional change, from abolition

Did President Trump’s January 6 speech prior to the attack on the Capitol constitute the crime of incitement? Is it necessary to demonstrate that it did in order for the Senate to find him guilty of incitement as a high crime and misdemeanor under the Impeachment Clause and convict him? What are the relevant legal and constitutional standards? Catherine Ross, George Washington University Law School professor and author of the forthcoming book A Right to Lie? Presidents, Other Liars, and the First

What are executive orders, and how has the Biden administration used them thus far? Presidential power experts Cristina Rodriguez, professor at Yale Law School and author of The President and Immigration Law, and Michael McConnell, professor at Stanford Law School and author of The President Who Would Not Be King, join host Jeffrey Rosen to answer those questions and more. They recap what they think are the most notable executive actions President Biden has taken in his first weeks in office, what

A mob stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, leading to a ricochet of effects including the impeachment of President Trump. On this episode, experts Larry Kramer, president of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and Colleen Sheehan, Director of Graduate Studies at the Arizona State School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership, explore the history of mobs past and present, online and in-person. They discuss how “good” versus “bad” mobs played a role at the Founding, and how concerns

Judge J. Michael Luttig, formerly of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, and Professor Keith Whittington of Princeton join host Jeffrey Rosen to consider how to interpret the constitutional text and historical precedent surrounding the question of whether the senate can hold President Trump’s impeachment trial now that he’s left office. Judge Luttig explains why he thinks that the president cannot be tried and convicted by the senate after he has already left office, and why only the Supreme Court

The House of Representatives voted to impeach President Trump for a second time this week, with a vote of 232 in favor, 197 against, and 4 not voting. Prior to the vote, host Jeffrey Rosen sat down with two experts on the Constitution and presidential power—Cristina Rodriguez of Yale Law School and Michael McConnell of Stanford Law School. They shared their thoughts on the article of impeachment passed by the House; the charge against President Trump of incitement of insurrection in the wake of the

In the early morning on January 7, 2021, Congress certified President-elect Biden’s Electoral College victory after a pro-Trump mob stormed the U.S. Capitol. This episode reflects on the historic and constitutional significance of the events of “a date which will live in constitutional history.” Host Jeffrey Rosen was joined by Judge J. Michael Luttig, formerly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, and Dean Erwin Chemerinsky of Berkeley Law. They discuss the president’s debunked

A panel of experts dives into what early American founding figures—including Thomas Jefferson, John and Abigail Adams, George Washington, Mercy Otis Warren, and Phyllis Wheatley—learned from the Greeks and Romans, from their early education through adulthood, and how that knowledge came to influence founding documents such as the Constitution and Declaration of Independence and the scope and shape of the American republic. They also explore the founders’ philosophical understanding of passion versus

2020 was a tumultuous and eventful year—starting with the impeachment trial, and then the COVID-19 pandemic, crucial conversations about racial inequality, the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and addition of Justice Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, as well as the 2020 presidential election and ensuing court battles over it. How did the Constitution, and American institutions, prevail throughout? John Yoo, a professor at Berkeley Law who previously served in the Bush administration’s

Article II, Section 2, of the Constitution says the president “shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.” This episode explores presidential pardons past and present—from Thomas Jefferson’s pardons of people convicted under the Sedition Act, through President Carter pardoning Richard Nixon and George H.W. Bush pardoning those involved in the Iran-Contra scandal, to President Trump’s exercise of the pardon power today

In Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v. Cuomo (2020), the Supreme Court recently granted a preliminary injunction against (i.e. temporarily blocked) New York’s COVID-19 restrictions on attendance at houses of worship (pending further litigation), siding with the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn and two orthodox Jewish synagogues, who argued that the restrictions violated the free exercise of religion guaranteed by the First Amendment. Constitutional law experts Michael Dorf of Cornell Law School

Can non-citizens be excluded from the census count, which serves as a basis of apportionment and allocates seats in the House of Representatives? Janai Nelson of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund and John Eastman of Chapman University debate this question, which is at the heart of Trump v. New York, the 2020 census case that the Supreme Court heard on November 30. Jeffrey Rosen moderates. Questions or comments about the podcast? Email us at podcast@constitutioncenter.org.

The National Constitution Center’s Constitution Drafting Project brought together three teams of leading constitutional scholars—team libertarian, team progressive, and team conservative—to draft and present their ideal constitutions. The leaders of each team—Caroline Frederickson of team progressive, Ilya Shapiro of team libertarian, and Ilan Wurman of team conservative—joined host Jeffrey Rosen to share the process behind their approach to drafting their constitutions and agreeing on what to

A panel of experts from across the ideological spectrum joined National Constitution Center President Jeffrey Rosen on November 11 to consider what the 2020 election and its aftermath demonstrates about the political parties, polarization, and the state of American democracy today. They also explored how debates over what “truth” means have grown over the last four years, how that manifested in the election and its results, and where we’re headed next including the future of American values like

This week, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in California v. Texas—a recent lawsuit bringing another challenge to the Affordable Care Act. In 2012, in NFIB v. Sebelius, the Supreme Court upheld the ACA as constitutional exercise of Congress’s taxing power; but Congress in 2017 eliminated the individual mandate which served as a basis for the tax rationale—and a group of states and individual plaintiffs sued to challenge the law’s validity once again. This episode recaps the arguments and how

On November 4, as the nation watched and waited for election results, the Supreme Court continued business as usual, hearing oral arguments in one of the term’s key cases—Fulton v. City of Philadelphia. This lawsuit was brought by Catholic Social Services (CSS), a foster-care organization that works with the city of Philadelphia to certify prospective foster parents. When the city found out that CSS, due it its religious beliefs, would not certify unmarried or same-sex married couples to be foster

The Justice Department recently filed a lawsuit against Google, accusing the company of illegally maintaining monopolies over search and search advertising. This week’s episode details the ins and outs of the lawsuit, the allegations the government makes against Google, and what all this might mean for similar companies like Apple and the future of Big Tech. To figure out how we got here, we also look to the history of antitrust, including what happened when a similar lawsuit was brought against