Title

The Constitution, the Leviathan, and the Common Good

Authors

Steven Douglas Smith

Abstract

On its face, Adrian Vermeule’s Common Good Constitutionalism appears to do battle with the entire corpus of contemporary legal and constitutional theory. But the conflicts are mostly contrived. Vermeule picks gratuitous fights based on skewed descriptions of generic opponents; meanwhile, although seeking to revive “the classical legal tradition,” he does not systematically defend that tradition at the points where real, substantive disagreements exist. As a result, the book provides little illumination of any of its major themes-- the classical legal tradition, the American Constitution, or contemporary constitutional theory.

Keywords

American Constitution; classical legal tradition; constitutional theory; legal positivism

Document Type

Article

Year

2022

Digital USD Citation

Smith, Steven Douglas, "The Constitution, the Leviathan, and the Common Good" (2022). Faculty Scholarship. 106.
https://digital.sandiego.edu/law_fac_works/106