fbpx
Facebook Twitter Instagram Youtube Rss
Search
Close this search box.
Pillar

Politics & Law

The third pillar of a decent society is a just system of politics and law. Such a government does not bind all persons, families, institutions of civil society, and actors in the marketplace to itself as subservient features of an all-pervading authority. Instead, it honors and protects the inherent equal dignity of all persons, safeguards the family as the primary school of virtue, and seeks justice through the rule of law.

Gratitude, Now More Than Ever

By and
Read More

Learn more about Politics & Law: get your free eBook today!

Subscribe
Subscribe
Subscribe
Subscribe
Subscribe

Stephen Douglas and Donald Trump’s America: Lessons from Lincoln

By
Seeing in our contemporary politics the revival of Douglas Democracy in all its anxieties about freedom—and seeing it make such headway in Lincoln’s political party—is disheartening in the extreme. The imperative of learning from Lincoln, as Allen Guelzo’s work brings him to us, has never been stronger.

Dear Mr. Trump: If You Want to Make America Great Again, You’ve Got to Start with Marriage

By and
If you want to make America great again, you cannot afford to ignore the role stable marriage plays in motivating our labor force and in our nation’s economic growth as a whole.

The Problem of Character: Why Conservatives Must Reject Donald Trump

By
The face that is emerging for the GOP is the ugly face we have always been accused of having—misogynistic, racist, and gratuitously authoritarian. If we assent to his nomination, how can we still consider ourselves the flag bearers of the attempt to harmonize virtue and the political life?

Global Capitalism versus Christianity? A Response to David Bentley Hart

By
Christianity has never seen the pursuit of virtue as incompatible with private possession of wealth.

Unnecessary and Inappropriate Constitutional Conflict in North Carolina

By
If the federal government, via the interpretive activity of one of its executive departments, can issue mandates to the states regarding bathrooms, it is hard to imagine an area of local governance shielded from federal scrutiny.

Can Trump Be the Man Eisenhower Was?

By
It’s time for another Morningside Heights Declaration.

The Politics of Passion: The Lesson of Thomas More

By
If we want a just society, we must begin by recovering the right understanding of prudence. We must not commit the idealist’s error of making the best the enemy of the good.

Who Represents “We the People?”

By
Political institutions force individuals to cooperate, to listen to opposing points of view, and to think about the decisions they are about to make. They delay and complicate the way that consent is expressed, but this is precisely why they are necessary: they help ensure that the public will is reasonable.

The Meaninglessness of Our Political Discourse: A Lesson from George Orwell

By
If a slogan can mean anything to anyone, who could oppose it?

The Right to Be Differently Excellent: Why Christian Colleges Should Be Allowed to Be Christian

By
Vanderbilt is legally free to constitute itself as a non-religious university. The question is whether Gordon College will be left free to constitute itself as a Christian college. Will we have equal liberty, or only liberty for those who despise Christianity?

Antonin Scalia, Persistent Champion of Constitutional Republicanism

By
The students of Justice Scalia were not merely those who took his classes or served as his clerks. Through his opinions, he taught countless others the importance of the rule of law, republican self-government, and the virtue of courageous persistence in a good cause.

Constitution 101: A Lesson for Donald Trump

By
The American Founders understood that good government requires judicious “rigging.” Such rigging is only “crooked” if one wrongly assumes that consent alone is a sufficient condition for justice.

Renting Wombs is a Human Wrong, not a Human Right

By
The Council of Europe has rejected a report recommending the legalization of surrogacy. This decision is a victory for human rights: Despite arguments that surrogacy is “compassionate,” its history of contentious litigation and documented human rights abuses make clear that it is a grave wrong.

Federal Courts, Government Agencies, and Transgender Bathroom Policy

By
A federal court has said a student’s subjective understanding alters the meaning of an unambiguous, federal law. And it alters the meaning of the law for everyone in the Gloucester County school district and, potentially, everyone who resides in Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina.

The Bard, the Bathroom, and the Common Good: Shakespeare’s Timeless and Timely Political Thought

By
Whether we discuss the nature of marriage or the rules governing bathroom use, Shakespeare calls on us to remember who we are as human beings and how our nature should be reflected in our society’s mores and laws.

Inside the Refugee Crisis: Following Iraqis in Jordan

By and
At the heart of the international refugee crisis are political realities we are so far unwilling to acknowledge. Iraqi refugees wait in Jordan, powerless and running out of money and options, holding on to the hope that passage to the US or Europe will somehow materialize.

“Shut Up, Bigot!”: Civil Rights and Same-Sex Marriage

By
Supporters of “same-sex marriage” claim that its opponents are bigots, like racists or misogynists, whose views should not be tolerated in the public square. In fact, marriage traditionalists are not bigoted but rather are realistic and honest about what marriage actually is.

North Carolina’s Bathroom Bill and the Constitution

By
North Carolina’s state legislature recently passed HB2, requiring governmental bathrooms and locker rooms to be separate based on biological sex. Despite LGBT activists’ insistence that hateful animus against transgender people motivates this law, in reality the law does not discriminate against LGBT people any more than it does against other special classes, and instead offers a reasonable balancing of conflicting privacy interests.

Constitutional Conservatism: Its Meaning and Its Future

By
The project of constitutional conservatism must be about more than restoring limits on government. It must also invoke the ends of the American experiment in ordered liberty if the United States is to resist the siren-calls of egalitarianism and populism.

Aristotle Explains the Trump Phenomenon

By
Aristotle’s discussion of factional conflict in his Politics gives historical insight into Donald Trump’s meteoric rise to political popularity. Ordinary Americans are acting in defense of their perceived economic interests and against the reign of political correctness.

Sovereign Debt Crises, Justice, and State Authority

By
The significance of sovereign debt crises goes beyond economics. How we address these situations gives important insight into our understanding of the nature and limits of state authority.
Public Discourse

Freedom of Conscience and New “LGBT Rights” in International Human Rights Law

By and
“LGBT rights” are being elevated above conscience rights when the two come into conflict—but this trend is to the detriment of human rights, which can stand the test of time only when they are grounded in transcendent, fixed authority.
Public Discourse

An Originalist Critique of the Court’s Free Speech Tradition

By
Free-speech jurisprudence has reached a state where it is acceptable to abridge speech on matters of public concern, but not on vile or private speech. And the Supreme Court has usurped the authority of line-drawing from the people to empower itself.
Public Discourse

What Trump and Sanders Teach Us about America

By
Enthusiastic support for Trump and Sanders shows the stranglehold that materialistic individualism has on American political culture. Unless we can find a counterbalance to our excessive focus on economic interests, we should expect to be crushed beneath their weight.
Facebook Twitter Instagram Youtube Rss
Public Discourse © 2024 | All Rights Reserved

Get your free eBook for The Human Person

"*" indicates required fields

Get your free eBook for Sexuality & Family

Get your free eBook for Politics & Law

Get your free eBook for Education & Culture

Get your free eBook for Business & Economics