Original Meanings
Politics and Ideas in the Making of the Constitution
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Narrated by:
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Steven Weber
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By:
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Jack N. Rakove
About this listen
Pulitzer Prize, History, 1997
What did the US Constitution originally mean, and how can we recover the intentions of its framers? These questions, which resound throughout today’s most heated legal and political controversies, lie at the heart of Jack N. Rakove’s splendidly readable work of historical analysis. In Original Meanings, he traces the complex weave of ideology and interests from which the Constitution emerged and shows how Americans have attached different meanings to their founding document from the moment it was published.
Original Meanings examines the classic issues that the framers of the Constitution had to solve: federalism, representation, executive power, individual rights, and the idea that the Constitution itself should become supreme law. Rakove pays particular attention to James Madison, the Constitution’s presiding genius, whose brilliance shaped the document’s framing, ratification, and amendment. The result is a major work of reinterpretation that should be read by every student of American history, law, and politics.
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- Unabridged
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Dr. Arnn, president of Hillsdale College, reveals this integral unity of the Declaration and the Constitution. Together, they form the pillars upon which the liberties and rights of the American people stand. United, they have guided history's first self-governing nation, forming our government under certain universal and eternal principles. Unfortunately, the effort to redefine government to reflect "the changing and growing social order" has gone very far toward success.
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Linking Declaration and Constitution.
- By Ed Bethune on 04-26-24
By: Dr. Larry Arnn
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The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution
- By: Bernard Bailyn
- Narrated by: Tom Perkins
- Length: 14 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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To the original text of what has become a classic of American historical literature, Bernard Bailyn adds a substantial essay, "Fulfillment", as a postscript. Here he discusses the intense nationwide debate on the ratification of the Constitution, stressing the continuities between that struggle over the foundations of the national government and the original principles of the Revolution.
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Bernard Bailyn is a genius!
- By John M. Crean on 04-21-19
By: Bernard Bailyn
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The Three Lives of James Madison
- Genius, Partisan, President
- By: Noah Feldman
- Narrated by: John H. Mayer
- Length: 34 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Over the course of his life, James Madison changed the United States three times: First, he designed the Constitution, led the struggle for its adoption and ratification, then drafted the Bill of Rights. As an older, cannier politician, he cofounded the original Republican party, setting the course of American political partisanship. Finally, having pioneered a foreign policy based on economic sanctions, he took the United States into a high-risk conflict, becoming the first wartime president and, despite the odds, winning.
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Cogently organized, meticulously balanced
- By Diana Black Kennedy on 06-15-18
By: Noah Feldman
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The Conscience of the Constitution
- The Declaration of Independence and the Right to Liberty
- By: Timothy Sandefur
- Narrated by: James Foster
- Length: 7 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Timothy Sandefur's insightful book provides a dramatic new challenge to the status quo of constitutional law and argues a vital truth: our Constitution was written not to empower democracy, but to secure liberty. Yet the overemphasis on democracy by today's legal community - rather than the primacy of liberty, as expressed in the Declaration of Independence - has helped expand the scope of government power at the expense of individual rights.
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Liberty!
- By David W. Norman on 05-03-15
By: Timothy Sandefur
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Corruption in America
- From Benjamin Franklin's Snuff Box to Citizens United
- By: Zephyr Teachout
- Narrated by: Jo Anna Perrin
- Length: 9 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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For two centuries, the Framers' ideas about political corruption flourished in the courts, even in the absence of clear rules governing voters, civil officers, and elected officials. In the 1970s, the U.S. Supreme Court began to narrow the definition of corruption, and the meaning has since changed dramatically. No case makes that clearer than Citizens United.
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Law Review+
- By Ben P. on 01-02-17
By: Zephyr Teachout
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American Dialogue
- The Founders and Us
- By: Joseph J. Ellis
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 8 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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The story of history is a ceaseless conversation between past and present, and in American Dialogue, Joseph J. Ellis focuses the conversation on the often-asked question "What would the Founding Fathers think?" He examines four of our most seminal historical figures through the prism of particular topics, using the perspective of the present to shed light on their views and, in turn, to make clear how their now centuries-old ideas illuminate the disturbing impasse of today's political conflicts.
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A fine work, even with the editorializing
- By Casey Kerrick on 11-24-18
By: Joseph J. Ellis
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The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Constitution
- By: Kevin R.C. Gutzman
- Narrated by: Tom Weiner
- Length: 6 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Instead of the system that the Constitution intended, judges have created a system in which bureaucrats and appointed officials make most of the important policies. While the government claims to be a representative republic, somehow hot-button topics from gay marriage to the allocation of Florida's presidential electors always seem to be decided by unelected judges. What gives them the right to decide such issues? The judges say it's the Constitution.
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The best PIG to date
- By Matthew Groom on 05-16-08
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Ratification
- The People Debate the Constitution, 1787-1788
- By: Pauline Maier
- Narrated by: Johnny Heller
- Length: 23 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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When the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia adjourned late in the summer of 1787, the delegates returned to their states to report on the new Constitution, which had to be ratified by specially elected conventions in at least nine states. Pauline Maier recounts the dramatic events of the ensuing debate in homes, taverns, and convention halls, drawing generously on the speeches and letters of founding fathers, both familiar and forgotten, on all sides.
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History Always Repeats
- By Howard on 08-27-11
By: Pauline Maier
What listeners say about Original Meanings
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Robert D Hunter
- 07-24-22
Too Academic
This book is best seen as a required reading for a class in Constitutional Law. It is too technical for the lay reader no matter how interested they are in the pros and cons of original intent.
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Overall
- Amazon Customer
- 08-18-11
Boring
The narrator is excellent but the author writes like a high-brow college professor's text book. Although he provides a lot of historical facts, his presentation is boring and hard to follow. I found myself struggling to stay interested.
In addition to that, the author starts his presentation with a false premise and then spends the rest of the book building his case on that foundation. The author is a either a Moderate or a Liberal because he tries to present every argument ever made about the Constitution as being equally valid. In this way, he tries to "prove" that there is no way we can really know for sure how to properly interpret the Constitution because everyone back then had their own personal understanding of what it meant.
If you're trying to gain a better understanding of the Constitution, this book is not for you. If you want a detailed analysis of all the historical facts that lead to the ratification of the Constitution and an understanding of all the arguments that were made from all sides, both for and against the Constitution, then you might like the book.
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6 people found this helpful
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- Leslie W. Stewart III
- 02-16-24
A master insight.
Very informative and very heady. I would had stopped listening to this audio a number of times, but it always gave me new insights into the processes of making this great, though hypocritical, country.
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- History
- 10-24-11
Epistemological in its approach ...
Any book that uses the word epistemological many times in context is probably a book you might better absorb in print. This is one of those books. Mind you, it is a very good book. It attempts to analyze the intent of the constitution by close examination of material (including dialogue, conversations, and so on) of those who wrote the document.
It is also a very complicated book, full of legal terms. Clearly a lot of scholarship went into its creation and there's a wealth of material for anyone seriously interested in constitutional law and this period in US. Which is exactly why it is difficult to absorb as audio. Many times, I would have liked to flip back the pages and reread an earlier section to improve context and understanding, but audio isn't amenable to that.
Which is not to say you shouldn't listen to it: do, if this is an area of interest for you, but perhaps if you are serious about it, you might want to also read it in print.
About the narrator: NEVER has a narrator worked so hard to make essentially dry material sound lively and entertaining. The narrator does absolutely everything anyone could do to improve the audio experience and should be given a medal for his valiant attempt. To the degree that this material could be made entertaining for audio, he did it. If he couldn't make the book compelling, he did manage to make it listenable. That is no small feat considering what he had to work with.
This is a fine book, full of anecdotal and historical information and legal analysis. Listen to it. And read it, too.
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22 people found this helpful
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- S. Chapin
- 05-24-12
Both sides of the story told
I was so tired of political histories claiming to be the real story but chocked full of political spin for one side or another. This has the story behind all the political spin during the making of the constitution. It gives both sides of the story. For those who like history or want to learn about the constitution.
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4 people found this helpful
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- Chris
- 04-23-21
I HAD TO STOP!
I may be the only person in America with the idiosyncratic view I’m about to share of this work, but I offer it, nonetheless, because it is my authentic reaction.
This work so meticulously addresses the tensions in the debates around our governing architecture (and with such great historical depth), you will come away feeling like a Constitutional scholar, and you will enjoy the zest the narrator brought to even the dryer concepts.
But the author has a “writing tic” that, once I caught it, I couldn’t turn it off, and it destroyed my joy. He writes as if he must get 500 SAT words into each chapter.
Lest people think I’m a hater because it was “above me,” there wasn’t a word I didn’t know, but it felt very much like having dinner with somebody determined to impress you, so he/she/they choose the most elaborate word on EVERY occasion, and it becomes overwhelming.
I recognize this is an abstract point I make, so I went at random into a chapter and pulled out two sentences to try to illustrate:
“Martin’s unswerving fealty to the primordial sovereignty of the states, and Gary’s knack for moving idiosyncratic and futile amendments had worn thin over the course of the debates. So had Mason’s self-serving penchant for casting himself the vigilant patriot, alone resisting the errors to which others were succumbing.”
If this prose excites you, I cannot recommend this book highly enough. But if you find the passage a bit....ostentatious, let’s say...you might want to consider if you can listen to phrases just like it for 18 straight hours.
I couldn’t.
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4 people found this helpful
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- VAHagel
- 10-13-17
awesome history of exactly what the title advertis
This was an incredibly good analysis of the thoughts and words of the men who wrote the Constitution, the issues debated at the Constitutional Convention, and the views of each of the critical players on the various parts of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, all based on contemporaneous sources.
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- Anonymous User
- 03-22-19
Boring presentation of important era
I usually enjoy historic commentary, but this was a boring presentation of an important time of competing factions and ideas.
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- BigWally
- 10-01-18
Meant for historians & constitutional scholars!
I bought this audiobook thinking it was meant for a popular audience. Alas, it is really intended for professional historians, constitutional scholars, law students studying constitutional law, etc. The reader was really outstanding. Clearly, the author is extremely knowledgeable about his subject, but the book went in to far more detail than I wanted or needed.
Gordon Wood, the distinguished early American scholar now retired from Brown University, has written a number of books for a general audience which are superb, fascinating, and a real pleasure to read. I was disappointed that this book was not addressed to persons having a real interest in the making and ratification of the constitution but who are not historians or law students. I suppose I will need to keep looking for such a book.
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