James Madison

The official portrait of founding father and Supreme Court Justice James Wilson. Review of The Lost Founder: James Wilson and the Forgotten Fight for a People’s Constitution. By Jesse Wegman. Celedon Books. 384 pp.

Books

The Most Important Founder You’ve Never Heard Of

by George Thomas June 23, 2026June 23, 2026

James Wilson, later a Supreme Court justice, signed the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. He presaged Lincoln by insisting the former owed much to the latter.

After the Callais decision and now Allen v. Milligan, the Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Roberts is nearing a complete dismantling of the landmark Voting Rights Act.

Law and Justice

The Roberts Court’s Gutting of the Voting Rights Act Nears Completion

by Jack Rakove June 10, 2026June 10, 2026

Harvard, Yale, and other colonial colleges helped shape the founders. But during the Revolution, the campuses were hardly in favor.

Higher Education

America 250: Our Revolutionary Era Colleges Were Hotbeds of … Royalism

by Kirk Carapezza May 22, 2026May 20, 2026

What if? A look at how the structure of the U.S.. Senate was hotly debated in 1787 at the Constitutional Convention in ways that changed America, Here, is the painting "Scene at the Signing of the Constitution" by Howard Chandler Christy from 1940.

Law and Justice

The Great Might-Have-Been of the Constitutional Convention

by Jack Rakove September 17, 2025September 17, 2025

Politics

Madison’s Constitution is Coming Undone

by Daniel Carpenter, Paul Pierson, and Eric Schickler February 21, 2025February 21, 2025

Politics

Trump’s Fusillade of Tyrannical Orders

by Peter M. Shane January 30, 2025January 29, 2025

Politics

J.D. Vance, “Cat People,” and the “Childless” Presidents

by Paul Finkelman August 2, 2024August 2, 2024

November/December 2023

How the Founders Overcame Partisan Dysfunction

by Jean Parvin Bordewich October 29, 2023October 29, 2023

Law and Justice

The Supreme Court Will Consider Greenhouse Gas Emissions. Be Afraid.

by Peter M. Shane April 3, 2022April 3, 2022

Featured, July/August 2019, Magazine

Breaking the Faith

by Steven Waldman July 12, 2019January 9, 2022

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