Product Description

In this thought-provoking polemic, an accomplished iconoclast whose knowledge of american history is as persuasive as his wit (New York Times Book Review) blames america's outmoded constitutional system of checks and balances for the political malaise and governmental gridlock of recent years. Index.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1646692 in Books
• Published on: 1997-06-17
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: 1.09 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 408 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Freelance writer Lazare offers a creative, constructive challenge to constitutional orthodoxy, arguing that the gridlock built into the Founders' design must be uprooted. The book moves slowly at first, with a large chunk devoted to an almost academic recap of American history viewed through the prism of constitutional interpretation. Lazare, refreshingly, looks abroad; while post-WWII European states devised new constitutions (Germany's encourages governmental activism), Americans reveled in a sort of "nostalgic conservatism." Thus, our uncoordinated branches of government have been unable to forge a real policy to address issues such as de facto segregation and urban safety. The author warns against our unrepresentative Senate, where California has weight equal to Vermont?suggesting the House of Representatives might dissolve it in a "democratic coup." Recognizing that his challenge presupposes an engaged citizenry, Lazare says Americans also must develop a "modern democratic movement" to guarantee their rights. Author tour.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
America is in a state of crisis. Society is fraying, and the government is unresponsive. The fault, claims Lazare, the New York editor for In These Times magazine, lies in adherence to an outdated system of checks and balances that guarantees inaction. In a historical examination of the Constitution and its antecedents, Lazare shows how that system arose and how we got from 1787 to now. Along the way, Gingrich, liberals, and Ross Perot receive their share of criticism, proving Lazare is, if nothing else, nonpartisan. One quibble: while Lazare spells out Constitutional problems clearly and well, he is somewhat less clear regarding the solutions he would prescribe. The book is bound to raise a fuss, and it should be considered essential reading.
-?Robert A. Curtis, Taylor Memorial P.L., Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Taking the constitutional law debate out of class and into the public square, journalist Lazare argues that the Constitution is decrepit and is incapable of being fundamentally amended, except for technical changes. If Lazare identifies one culprit, it is Article V's guarantee, unamendable in effect, of states' equality in the Senate. Indulging himself, Lazare ends with an imagined future crisis in which the House of Representatives unilaterally repeals the proviso. That scenario caps the essence of the Lazarean exegesis: that the Constitution, as a product of its era, unfairly lords the past over the present. In making the point, he cogently summarizes the English legal historical background to the founders' checks-and-balances scheme and moves on to pre^-Civil War criticisms of it. The postwar radical Republicans, he believes, missed a chance to effectuate his preferred supremacy of democracy, embodied by the House, over the supremacy of abstract constitutional law. One needn't agree with Lazare's centralizing preferences to be impressed by his flowing prose and well-deployed facts, which speak broadly to we the people, not just they the lawyers. Gilbert Taylor