Keith Whittington reconsiders the implications of fundamental legal commitment to faithfully interpret our written Constitution. Making use of arguments drawn from American history, political philosophy, and literary theory, he examines what it means to interpret a written constitution and how the courts should go about that task. He concludes that when interpreting the Constitution, the judiciary should adhere to the discoverable intentions of the Founders.

Other "originalists" have also asserted that their approach is required by the Constitution but have neither defended that claim nor effectively responded to critics of their assumptions or their method.This book sympathetically examines the most sophisticated critiques of originalism based on postmodern, hermeneutic, and literary theory, as wel