We the People, Volume 2: Transformations (We the People (Harvard))

In the second volume of a projected trilogy that seeks to provide the history of constitutional law in the U.S., Yale law professor Bruce Ackerman turns his attention to two periods: the post-Civil War era and the New Deal. Ackerman's historical research is prodigious, and We the People: Transformations is by no means light reading, but those seeking a lively intellectual workout will find it invigorating. Ackerman writes, with a touch of characteristic humor, of the need to adapt the aims of the Founding Fathers: "I aim to push the Founders off the pedestal without dropping them into the dustbin of history."

As Ackerman leads the reader through the tumult of Reconstruction and the great national transitions of the New Deal, he provides a lively account of the complex political machinations that went into adding various amendments to the Constitution, as well as the startling and subtle shifts in thought of American citizens toward the document that in a very real way defines their national identity. --Robert McNamara