On Aug 4, 2015, at 6:21 AM, Graber, Mark wrote:
"The bottom line is that one feature of American constitutional development is the tendency for different have-nots to wind up on different sides of the fences and get played off against each other."
My response:
This would make an interesting chart, listing poor whites, poor blacks, women, Indians, gays, immigrants, etc., the point being what?
That the people in control of constitutional interpretation are fine with rights for themselves so long as limited to exclude others belonging to disfavored groups?
Jefferson’s “All men are created equal” comes to mind.
I know, that’s the Declaration, not the Constitution, but still, it’s one of our more or less bedrock principles suffusing constitutional interpretation, sometimes, anyway.
The notional “separate but equal” that wasn’t is another example of doctrine that violates doctrine based on social attitudes.
As for this notional chart, the date, the era, the competing groups, the parties, the leadership, the Court, the cases, would illustrate a lot about us, I should imagine.
Somebody’s thought of this before, right?
rs
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