Commentaries by Professor Stefanie Lindquist | ASU Law

In a letter written to James Madison from Paris, Thomas Jefferson opined that “no society can make a perpetual constitution, or even a perpetual law.  . . . Every constitution, then, and every law, naturally expires at the end of 19 years.”  Jefferson took this perspective because he believed that “he earth belongs to the [...]

The United States Constitution was signed by the members of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia on September 17, 1787. We have entered the 237th year of our national Constitution, which continues its legacy as the oldest written constitution in the world. Yes, we have the immense good fortune to live in the oldest constitutional democracy [...]