The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Constitution
I just finished reading Kevin Gutzman’s The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Constitution. I was drawn to this book after having read and loved Bob Murphy’s The Politically Incorrect Guide to Capitalism. Gutzman holds a J.D. and an M.P.A. from University of Texas at Austin and an M.A. and Ph.D. in American History from the University of Virginia. He is also a recurring contributor of articles on LewRockwell.com.
Gutzman does a terrific service by tracing the history of the writing and of the adoption of the constitution. Did you know that there were primarily three different groups at the Philadelphia Constitutional Convention? There were those who pushed for a monarchical system based on Britain (Alexander Hamilton); there were those who pushed for a strong central/national government (James Madison); and then there were those who wanted to keep the states sovereign and have a very weak federal government (George Mason). The last group–who were known as the anti-federalists, but were the true federalists–won the day. It was their constitution that was drafted and it was their interpretation of the constitution that was argued for in the ratification debates even by the Federalists–who were actually not true federalists.
However, within a few years, the Supreme Court, Congress, and the President began the usurpation of power. The Tenth Amendment was almost immediately ignored and the power grab was on. Gutzman traces the abuses primarily of the Supreme Court and its perversions of the constitution. For instance, the Bill of Rights were originally meant to limit the federal government, but a doctrine called the Incorporation Doctrine now applies the Bill of Rights to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment (which was never actually ratified).
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