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The Bonnie and Richard Reiss Graduate Institute
for Constitutional History Seminar
Fall 2023 Session
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The New-York Historical Society’s Bonnie and Richard Reiss Graduate Institute for Constitutional History is pleased to announce its fall 2023 seminar for advanced graduate students and junior faculty:
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Few issues in American law are as deeply contested as the meaning of the Second Amendment and the scope of permissible gun regulation. Contemporary Second Amendment jurisprudence is distinctive in its focus on using history to shape contemporary legal interpretation. The Supreme Court’s recent decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen, for example, means that gun-control laws of today must demonstrate a clear historical pedigree or genealogy to pass constitutional muster. Weapons regulations without such a historical foundation are likely to be struck down regardless of the modern public-safety rationale behind them. This seminar will explore the contested history of the meaning of the Second Amendment by exploring a variety of historical, legal, and cultural
sources. Although once a neglected field of historical inquiry, Second Amendment scholarship has been transformed by the rise of originalism and the Supreme Court’s embrace of this controversial but indisputably ascendant theory of constitutional interpretation. How do historians and originalists understand the constitutional past? What sources and interpretive tools do scholars employ to make sense of the historical record? How do we address the many silences in the record? This seminar will explore these questions and others as we make sense of the meaning of the right to keep and bear arms.
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Apply by October 11, 2023
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*Although we encourage students to attend the class in person, livestream participation will be offered to admitted students who do not live in the New York metropolitan area or who are unable to attend a class in person. If you are interested in attending some or all of the class sessions virtually, please indicate this in your application statement. |
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The Bonnie and Richard Reiss Graduate Institute for Constitutional History (ICH) is the nation’s premier institute dedicated to ensuring that future generations of Americans understand the substance and historical development of the US Constitution. Located at the New-York Historical Society, the Institute is co-sponsored by the American Historical Association, the Organization of American Historians, and the American Political Science Association. The Association of American Law Schools is a cooperating entity. ICH prepares junior scholars and instructors to convey the important role the Constitution has played in shaping American society. ICH also provides a national forum for the preparation and dissemination of humanistic, interdisciplinary scholarship on constitutional history.
ICH is supported, in part, by the Saunders Endowment for Constitutional History and a "We the People" challenge grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. |
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