The Constitutional Studies Center combines careful, objective scholarship into the original understanding of the Constitution with advocacy for human freedom under law. It produces books, issue papers, articles, and legal briefs reporting the results of its research. Since 2010, the Center has had enormous influence on constitutional law cases and commentary, but also on policy makers and grass roots activists. For example, the Center’s research findings galvanized the massive and growing “Article V” movement to restore constitutional limits on the federal government.
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Latest Posts
Chickens come home to roost: Obama’s plan to cut federal aid to colleges that don’t limit tuition increases0
- January 29, 2012
I observe with some satisfaction that the higher-education establishment is finally learning that if you play with snakes you get bitten. It is no secret that academics were heavily in President Obama’s corner when he ran for President in 2008. Part of the reason was his commitment to transfer other people’s money to them—i.e., more
READ MORESome Questions for “Progressives” Carping about the Citizens United Campaign Finance Case0
- January 22, 2012
The Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v. FEC has generated a great deal of uninformed, and sometimes hypocritical, whining. In Citizens United, the Supreme Court held that people organized in the corporate form have the same First Amendment rights they enjoy when they organize in other ways. Some opponents of the decision are even
READ MOREII submits brief to protect states from Obamacare bullying0
- January 15, 2012
II is submitting not merely one, but two separate brief to the U.S. Supreme Court opposing Obamacare. One will show why the mandate that individuals buy government-approved insurance is unconstitutional. The other, which has now been filed, shows that Obamacare’s Medicaid mandates imposed on states also are unconstitutional. Both briefs are based on a powerful
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The Little-Known—but Seminal—York Town Convention of 17770
- January 8, 2012
The U.S. Constitution authorizes a “convention for proposing amendments” to offer amendments for ratification (or rejection) by the states. The mechanism has never been used (all amendments have come from Congress), and many people have been curious about how it is supposed to work. But that’s because they are unaware of the long series of
READ MOREAnother Treasure Hunt: Tracking Down Bits from the American Founding0
- January 2, 2012
Every once in a while I tell about one of my historical treasure hunts. Here’s another: When the Constitution was being debated, Anti-Federalists warned that it contained insufficient safeguards against an overweening government. They asserted that some constitutional language could be twisted by unscrupulous advocates of “big government” to justify centralized federal power. The argument
READ MORETo “regulate” Commerce means more than to “make it regular”0
- December 25, 2011
From time to time I punch holes in “progressive” myths about the Constitution and the American Founding. But conservatives and libertarians have their own myths as well. One is that congressional authority under the Commerce Clause (I-8-3) to “regulate Commerce among the several States” permits Congress only to facilitate trade among the States—i.e., that “to
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Contact
Rob Natelson, Senior Fellow, Constitutional Jurisprudence
Email: rob.natelson1@gmail.com
Phone: 303-279-6536, ext 114