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Contra Scalia, Thomas, and Gorsuch: Originalists Should Adopt a Living Constitution

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Contra Scalia, Thomas, and Gorsuch: Originalists Should Adopt a Living Constitution University of Miami Law Review Volume 72 Number 1 Article 5 11-16-2017 Contra Scalia, Thomas, and Gorsuch: Originalists Should Adopt A Living Constitution R. Randall Kelso Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.law.miami.edu/umlr Part of the Constitutional Law Commons, and the Supreme Court of the United States Commons Recommended Citation R. Randall Kelso, Contra Scalia, Thomas, and Gorsuch: Originalists Should Adopt A Living Constitution, 72 U. Miami L. Rev. 112 (2017) Available at: https://repository.law.miami.edu/umlr/vol72/iss1/5 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at University of Miami School of Law Institutional Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in University of Miami Law Review by an authorized editor of University of Miami School of Law Institutional Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Contra Scalia, Thomas, and Gorsuch: Originalists Should Adopt A Living Constitution R. RANDALL KELSO* Two main approaches appear in the popular literature on constitutional interpretation: originalism and non- originalism. An originalist approach refers back to some as- pect of the framers’ and ratifiers’ intent or action to justify a decision. A non-originalist approach bases the goal of con- stitutional interpretation in part on consideration of some justification independent of the framers’ and ratifiers’ intent or action. What is often unappreciated in addressing the question of whether to adopt an originalist or non-originalist ap- proach to constitutional interpretation is the complication that emerges if one concludes that the framing and ratifying generation believed in the model of a living Constitution. Under such a model, later legislative, executive, or social practice, or judicial precedents, can change the meaning of a constitutional provision. Thus, while standard originalist supporters share the premise that the original meaning of constitutional text is fixed at the time each provision is framed and ratified, interpretation according to originalism actually does not commit the interpreter to a static or fixed interpretation of the Constitution. Instead, a true originalist form of interpretation can incorporate the principle that the provision was capable of evolution over time. * Spurgeon E. Bell Distinguished Professor of Law, South Texas College of Law Houston. B.A., 1976, University of Chicago; J.D., 1979, University of Wis- consin-Madison School of Law. 112 2017] CONTRA SCALIA, THOMAS, & GORSUCH 113 I. INTRODUCTION ............................................................... 114 II. THE FOUR STYLES OF JUDICIAL DECISION-MAKING AND CONSTITUTIONAL INTERPRETATION ............................... 119 A. Formalist Constitutional Decision-Making ............. 122 B. Holmesian Constitutional Decision-Making............ 123 C. Instrumentalist Constitutional Decision-Making ..... 125 D. Natural Law Constitutional Decision-Making......... 127 III. HISTORICAL EVIDENCE SURROUNDING THE APPROACH OF THE FRAMERS AND RATIFIERS ........................................ 129 A. General Observations .............................................. 129 B. Legislative, Executive, and Social Practice ............. 145 C. Judicial Precedents and a Living Constitution ........ 147 D. The Lack of Historical Evidence for the Static Approach to Constitutional Interpretation .............. 151 IV. NON-ORIGINALIST ARGUMENTS FOR VARIOUS VERSIONS OF ORIGINAL MEANING .................................................. 156 A. Arguments For and Against a Static Version of Original Meaning on Consequentialist Grounds ..... 157 1. ANTI-EVOLUTIONARY NATURE VERSUS ANTI- MAJORITARIAN NATURE OF A CONSTITUTION ..... 158 2. JUDICIAL RESTRAINT VERSUS JUDICIAL ROLE IN PROTECTING INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS ....................... 160 3. CONSTITUTION AS CONTRACT VERSUS CONSTITUTION AS A CONSTITUTION .................... 161 4. STATIC VERSUS LIVING ORIGINAL MEANING IN TERMS OF PREDICTABILITY ................................. 164 B. Arguments For and Against the Other Non-Originalist Approaches to Constitutional Interpretation ........... 171 1. CURRENT CONSENSUS APPROACH ....................... 171 2. PROGRESSIVE HISTORICIST APPROACH ............... 172 3. PLURALIST APPROACH ........................................ 173 4. TRUE ORIGINALISM AS THE BEST APPROACH FROM ANY PERSPECTIVE ............................................... 174 V. CONCLUSION .................................................................. 174 114 UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI LAW REVIEW [Vol. 72:112 I. INTRODUCTION Two main approaches appear in the popular literature on consti- tutional interpretation: originalism and non-originalism.1 As classi- cally defined, an originalist approach refers to some aspect of the framers’ and ratifiers’ intent or action to justify a decision.2 A non- originalist approach bases the goal of constitutional interpretation in part on consideration of some justification independent of the fram- ers’ and ratifiers’ intent or action.3 Among originalists, there is a debate whether the framers’ and ratifiers’ “original [subjective] intention” should govern (intent)4 or whether one should look instead to the “original meaning” of the words adopted by the framers and ratifiers (action).5 Even among 1 See generally Thomas B. Colby & Peter J. Smith, Living Originalism, 59 DUKE L.J. 239, 241 (2009) (“For the last several decades, the primary divide in American constitutional theory has been between those theorists who label them- selves as ‘originalists’ and those who do not.”) (footnote omitted); INTERPRETING THE CONSTITUTION: THE DEBATE OVER ORIGINAL INTENT 3–10 (Jack N. Rakove ed., 1990). 2 See generally Richard S. Kay, Original Intention and Public Meaning in Constitutional Interpretation, 103 NW. U. L. REV. 703, 703 (2009) (“By this they meant the sense intended by the people who wrote and ratified it.”); Henry P. Monaghan, Our Perfect Constitution, 56 N.Y.U. L. REV. 353, 375 n.130 (1981) (“Although the intention of the ratifiers, not the Framers, is in principle decisive, the difficulties of ascertaining the intent of the ratifiers leaves little choice but to accept the intent of the Framers as a fair reflection of it.”) (citation omitted). 3 See Richard H. Fallon, Jr., The Meaning of Legal “Meaning” and Its Im- plications for Theories of Legal Interpretation, 82 U. CHI. L. REV. 1235, 1238–39 (2015) (noting interpretation theories of purposivists, living constitutionalists, textualists, legislative intentionalists, and originalists); Cass R. Sunstein, There Is Nothing That Interpretation Just Is, 30 CONST. COMMENT. 193, 194 (2015) (not- ing approaches called “democracy–reinforcement, ‘moral readings,’ minimalism, or broad deference to political processes” in addition to originalism) (footnotes omitted). For a classic discussion of non-originalist approaches or, in his termi- nology, “non-interpretivist” approaches, see Michael J. Perry, Interpretivism, Freedom of Expression, and Equal Protection, 42 OHIO ST. L.J. 261, 263–65 (1981). 4 RAOUL BERGER, GOVERNMENT BY JUDICIARY: THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT 363–72 (1977) (specific historical intent should be the focus of constitutional interpretation); Edwin Meese, III, The Supreme Court of the United States: Bulwark of a Limited Constitution, 27 S. TEX. L. REV. 455, 456, 465 (1986) (arguing for a “jurisprudence of original intention”). 5 See ANTONIN SCALIA, A MATTER OF INTERPRETATION: FEDERAL COURTS AND THE LAW 17 (Amy Gutmann ed., Princeton Univ. Press 1997) (“We look for 2017] CONTRA SCALIA, THOMAS, & GORSUCH 115 each of these two approaches, there are variations. For example, un- der the “original intent” model of interpretation, is it specific or gen- eral historical intent that is most critical?6 For “original meaning,” is it literal text or purpose that is the most critical in terms of textu- alist interpretation?7 a sort of ‘objectified’ intent—the intent that a reasonable person would gather from the text of the law, placed alongside the remainder of the corpus juris . And the reason we adopt this objectified version is, I think, that it is simply in- compatible with democratic government, or indeed, even with fair government, to have the meaning of a law determined by what the lawmaker meant, rather than by what the lawgiver promulgated . It is the law that governs, not the intent of the lawgiver.”). But see Kay, supra note 2, at 703–04 (while noting that the pro- ponents of “original meaning” seemed to have “carried the day,” “recourse to original intentions is more consonant with the values underlying the originalist approach to interpretation”). 6 As elaborated by Professor Richard Fallon, One helpful division distinguishes between ‘specific’ or ‘con- crete’ and ‘general’ or ‘abstract’ intent. Specific intent involves the relatively precise intent of the framers to control the out- comes of particular types of cases . Abstract intent refers to aims that are defined at a higher level of generality, sometimes entailing consequences that the drafters did not specifically consider and that they might even have disapproved. Richard H. Fallon, Jr., A Constructivist Coherence Theory of Constitutional In- terpretation, 100 HARV. L. REV. 1189, 1198–99 (1987). Professor Ronald Dworkin has made the same point using the terms “conceptions” to describe the specific, discrete ideas or examples held by individuals, while “concepts” are the broader, more abstract idea reflected in the conceptions. RONALD DWORKIN, LAW’S EMPIRE
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