This book represents perhaps the single most important volume to be published on the Constitution during the Bicentennial. With over sixty contributing authors, it brings together the best of American constitutional scholarship for a comprehensive and provocative discussion of the Constitution's history, its principles and its current meaning. Contributing authors to the book range from historians and political scientists to Congressmen and Supreme Court Justices. Some of the better-known contributors include former Speaker of the House Tip O'Neill, former Chief Justice Warren Burger, Congressman Philip Crane, lawyer Phillis Schlafly, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Leonard Levy, former United States Senator Eugene McCarthy, and the venerable dean of United States historians, Henry Steele Commager. Most of the articles published in this volume appeared originally as part of the acclaimed New Federalist Papers newspaper series, which has been used by hundreds of newspapers across the country since 1984.
The book is arranged into seventeen different sections, each of which focuses on a major constitutional principle or institution. Topic areas include federalism, the separation of powers, Congress, the bureaucracy, the Presidency, the Judiciary, foreign policy, civil rights, economics, constitutional reform, and the relationship between church and state. The sections of the book were designed to parallel the standard subjects covered in an introductory college course. Co-published with Public Research, Syndicated.