We the People: A History of the U.S. Constitution

Lepore’s We the People joins a long-running national conversation about how the U.S. Constitution should be understood. For more than two hundred years, Americans have disagreed about a central question: Should the Constitution be read as a fixed document with a stable meaning, or as a flexible one that changes along with the country? Almost as soon as the Constitution was written, this question came into play. Both The Federalist Papers and The Anti-Federalist Papers, written mere weeks after the Constitution, challenged its principles. These two main approaches—originalism and living constitutionalism—shape everything from Supreme Court decisions to political arguments to everyday conversations about rights and democracy. Understanding these traditions provides the context for why Lepore’s reflections on the Constitution matter and how they fit within a much broader body of writing.

From the beginning of the republic, different leaders interpreted the Constitution in different ways. Even the framers—the people who drafted the document—disagreed about how much power the federal government should have, how strictly the text should be read, and how much future generations should be able to adapt it. But over time, these disagreements developed into two distinct ways of thinking about the Constitution. One group believed that the Constitution’s meaning should remain closely tied to what it meant when it was written in 1787. Another group believed that the Constitution was intentionally designed to grow with the nation, allowing each generation to reinterpret its core principles.

Originalism, in its modern form, became especially prominent in the late 20th century. It emerged partly as a reaction to the expansive decisions of the Warren Court (the period between 1953 and1969 in which Earl Warren served as chief justice of the United States Supreme Court), which used the Constitution to protect civil rights, expand voting rights, and secure new individual freedoms. Legal thinkers such as Robert Bork and Justice Antonin Scalia argued that judges should not update the Constitution to match modern values. Instead, they should look back to the historical meaning of the text: either the framers’ intentions or the way ordinary people in the 1780s would have understood the words. To originalists, this approach keeps power in the hands of the people rather than the judiciary.

By contrast, living constitutionalism views the Constitution as a document meant to adapt to new conditions. Supporters of this approach argue that the framers wrote the Constitution in broad and open-ended language precisely because they knew the country would change. Living constitutionalists believe that principles such as liberty and equality should be interpreted in ways that respond to contemporary issues: issues the framers could never have imagined. For example, living constitutionalists argue that questions about digital privacy, reproductive technology, or modern policing cannot be answered solely by looking through an 18th-century lens.

Critics of living constitutionalism worry that this approach gives too much power to judges, who might insert their own views rather than follow the Constitution’s original meaning. As noted in the University of Chicago Law Review, “The Constitution is supposed to be a rock-solid foundation, the embodiment of our most fundamental principles […] Public opinion may blow this way and that, but our basic principles—our constitutional principles—must remain constant. Otherwise, why have a Constitution at all?” (Strauss, David. “The Living Constitution.” Uchicago.edu, 27 Sept. 2010). Supporters respond that sticking rigidly to 18th-century interpretations will leave the nation unable to respond to new challenges: “It is one thing to be commanded by a legislature we elected last year. It is quite another to be commanded by people who assembled in the late eighteenth century” (Strauss). They argue that the Constitution has survived for so long precisely because it has been flexible, allowing courts and lawmakers to adapt its principles to changing circumstances.

These two approaches shape major political issues and influence how the public talks about the Constitution. Arguments about gun rights, voting rights, free speech, and the limits of government power are often shaped by whether someone thinks the Constitution should be interpreted as the founders understood it or applied in a way that fits today’s society. The rise of originalism within conservative legal circles has had a major impact on the federal courts, while living constitutionalism continues to influence debates about expanding civil liberties and protecting marginalized groups. As a result, constitutional interpretation is not only a legal question but also a cultural and political one. It reflects deeper questions about identity, authority, and what kind of nation the United States wants to be. In her book, Lepore uses these two camps to reveal a historical narrative that is continuously pushed and pulled by the opposing philosophies of traditionalism and progressivism.