Today is “Constitution Day” in the United States. On this day in 1787, most (but not all) of the delegates attending the secret Philadelphia Convention signed the first draft of the US Constitution, which was later submitted to local State conventions for ratification. So why do people celebrate the 4th of July but forget the 17th of September?
In any case, in honor of Constitution Day prior probability is sharing a recent paper published in the June 2013 issue of the Texas Law Review by Alexander Tsesis, a law professor at Loyola Law School in Chicago. His paper is titled “Maxim constitutionalism: liberal equality for the common good.”
In his paper, Professor Tsesis posits that “a simple maxim is at the root of the Constitution,” and according to Tsesis, this maxim is thus: “The underlying purpose of government is to secure equal rights for the common good.”
Does this beautiful maxim also capture the spirit of the French Revolution? And if so, is this particular constitutional maxim helpful, or is too general and vague to be of any use in deciding hard cases?
prior probability 