Author: Rob Natelson

Rob Natelson is the Independence Institute’s Senior Fellow in Constitutional Jurisprudence and heads the Institute’s Article V Information Center. He was a law professor for 25 years, serving at three different universities. Among other subjects, he taught Constitutional Law, Constitutional History, Advanced Constitutional Law, and First Amendment. He is also the Senior Fellow in Constitutional Jurisprudence at the Montana Policy Institute. Rob is especially known for his studies of the Constitution’s original meaning. His research has carried him to libraries throughout the United States and in Britain, including four months at Oxford. The results have included several break-though discoveries. Click here for more information about Rob

An Attack on Conservative Podcasts from the Liberal Echo Chamber

The Brookings author probably thought she was being objective. But she was caught within her own echo chamber.

The ideas that formed the Constitution, Part 16: John Locke and the Ninth Amendment

Locke’s writings contained many specific observations realized in the Constitution

Fact Check: No, Mary Goddard Did Not Sign the Declaration of Independence

Another “woke” myth exposed.

The ideas that formed the Constitution, Part 15: James Harrington & Algernon Sidney

John Adams featured Harrington in the first volume of his encyclopedia of republican governments, which circulated at the Constitutional Convention.

The “Tax on Sacks:” More on Colorado’s stupid plastic bag law

The tax on sacks illustrates how power-freaks have highjacked Colorado.

The framers explained why the Constitutional Convention had authority to propose the Constitution

Key framers explained why the Constitutional Convention had authority to propose a new form of government.

The ideas that formed the Constitution, Part 14: Machiavelli

The Founders were far more interested in Machiavelli’s “Discourses on Livy” than in “The Prince.”

The ideas that formed the Constitution, Part 13: Tacitus

The most important lesson the Founders learned from Tacitus was that power corrupts.

Colorado’s plastic bag law —Part #2

Perhaps the old-style liberals wanted us to be more like Europe. But the current “progressive” crowd wants us to be more like the Third World.

No, a Convention of States Could Not Change the “One State/One Vote” Rule

Could a convention of states could change the “one state/one vote” rule to one based on population? The short answer is “No.” In at least 42 conventions of states and colonies over 350+years, there is no precedent for such a change. The possibility exists only in the fantasies of convention opponents. Defenders of the federal […]

Cynical partisan politics behind Colorado’s plastic bag law, Part I

The plastic bag law’s oddities comprise the first tip-off that HB 21-1162 is not really about the public good.

The ideas that formed the Constitution, part 12: Plutarch

About 40 percent of the title characters in Plutarch’s biographies ended up as pen names in the constitutional debates,