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The Transnationalists are Coming!

In this edition of Liberty Law Talk, I speak with John Yoo about how the American Constitution should interact with the proliferating sources of international law in treaties, conventions, agreements, and customary international law.  A growing array of transnationalist legal scholars believe international law should be more easily incorporated into America’s constitutional and domestic law however much it may interfere with popular consent. Yoo’s new book, co-authored with Julian Ku, Taming Globalization: International Law, the U.S. Constitution, and the New World Order, provides sturdy constitutional arguments for dealing with these questions. The Constitution’s core structure of separation of powers and federalism can be utilized, Yoo argues, in aiding America in the growing international legal environment by ensuring that the fundamental doctrines of the Constitution guide the process.

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A Jeffersonian Proposal for the Constitution

In the interest of starting a discussion about constitutional purpose, Sandy Levinson argues "We best honor the Framers, then, by exhibiting their own willingness to challenge the verities of their times and to cease our own often “blind veneration” for the Constitution they created. What has been long settled may not be subject to conversations about “meaning,” but it is surely past time that it be analyzed for its wisdom in a 21st century America." But, what we might ask, has been settled, and what is open for re-creation?