John O. McGinnis

John O. McGinnis is the George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law at Northwestern University. His book Accelerating Democracy was published by Princeton University Press in 2012. McGinnis is also the coauthor with Mike Rappaport of Originalism and the Good Constitution published by Harvard University Press in 2013 . He is a graduate of Harvard College, Balliol College, Oxford, and Harvard Law School. He has published in leading law reviews, including the Harvard, Chicago, and Stanford Law Reviews and the Yale Law Journal, and in journals of opinion, including National Affairs and National Review.

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Right Populism, Left Populism, and Constitutional Constraints

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Protest against the Macron government in Strasbourg, France, July 12, 2017 (Hadrian/Shutterstock.com).
A good constitution thus can cabin the damage that popular movements may do, while still permitting them to shake up complacent elites.

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The Campus Mob Comes for the Presumption of Innocence

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Harvard University (Jorge Salcedo/Shutterstock.com).
It is not necessarily surprising that students fail to appreciate the hard-won freedoms on which the modern university and our civilization rest.

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Judicial Statesmanship versus Judicial Fidelity

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Chief Justice John Roberts before the 2013 State of the Union Address (Joshua Roberts / Alamy Stock Photo).
Since the boundaries of left and right are always changing, a court focused on retaining its political capital would have the constancy of a weather vane.

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The Very Rich Do Not Threaten Democracy

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Image: Create Jobs 51/Shutterstock.com
The advocates for soaking the very rich or even abolishing billionaires offer no realistic mechanism by which the very rich threaten democracy.

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James Madison: A Great Political Theorist, But Not A Great Lawyer

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Federalist 9 and 10 (Everett Historical/Shutterstock.com).
For all his contributions to the convention, Madison was not put on the Committee on Detail that provided the penultimate draft of our fundamental law.

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How Populist Progressives Ignore the Unseen

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Senator Kamala Harris (D-Ca.) speaking at her 2020 presidential campaign announcement rally in Oakland, California on January 27, 2019 (Image: InFootage / Shutterstock.com).
What separates a wise political economist or politician from a foolish one is the ability to consider the unseen consequences of their policies.

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Why Some Progressives Make Unjustified Accusations of Racism

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Image: John M. Chase/Shutterstock.com
As Orwell saw, politics is a battle of language, not least because most people think reflexively and not deeply about public policy.

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The Dismal Plight of Pension Burdened States

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Who wants to shoulder taxes for past services, particularly when the costs include inflated compensation to public sector unions?

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The Left’s Foolish Romance with Mass Protests

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A masked demonstrator in the crowd during a protest in front of Trump Tower on November 19, 2016 in Toronto, Canada (arindambanerjee / Shutterstock.com).
Even legal protests mostly dumb democracy down, and when they are conjoined with illegality, they undermine respect for the rule of law.

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Why Bill Barr Is Trump’s Best Appointment

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William P. Barr appears before the Senate Judiciary Committee for confirmation as Attorney General, January 17, 2019 (Christy Bowe/ZUMA Wire/Alamy Live News).
No cabinet official can get a President in more trouble faster than his Attorney General, and Trump has made the right choice with Bill Barr.

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