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Who's Checking the Facts?
My question is prompted by a recent book out about General James Wilkinson — An Artist in Treason, by Andro Linklater. It just received a respectful review from NPR, which absolutely baffles me. Wilkinson is a worthy subject for a book. He was the general-in-chief of the U.S. Army from 1797 (or so) to about 1808. He…
Read MoreThe Wisdom of Napolitano
I have always had a vaguely positive fealing about Janet Napolitano, former governor of Arizona and current holder of one of the Official Thankless Jobs of modern America, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. Now I know why! A profile of Napolitano in a recent issue of The New Republic includes the following passage: As…
Read MoreSunday Morning on C-SPAN2's Book TV
At 10:15 a.m. on this Sunday, March 28, C-SPAN2’s Book TV is scheduled to run an interview I did with them at the Virginia Festival of the Book last weekend in Charlottesville. The subject is Impeached: The Trial of President Andrew Johnson and the Fight for Lincoln’s Legacy.
Read MoreLeadership and the Constitutional Convention
Business guru Tom Peters (In Search of Excellence) has a new book out titled The Little Big Things, 163 Ways to Pursue Excellence. For me, what’s interesting about this book is that he reports that his inspiration to write it was my book, The Summer of 1787, The Men Who Invented the Constitution. What he writes is…
Read MoreImpeachment — It's Back!
Just when you thought it was safe to go in the water, impeachment is back in the news. Yesterday the House of Representatives unanimously approved four impeachment articles calling for the removal of District Judge G. Thomas Porteous of New Orleans. Porteous is accused of taking payments from lawyers who appeared in front of him while…
Read MoreBurr and Jeremy Bentham
After his plans for insurrection in the Mississippi Valley and Mexico came to ashes, and after winning acquittal on treason charges in 1807, Aaron Burr traveled to Britain to secure support for the liberation of Spanish colonies in America. He quickly formed a close friendship of political philosopher Jeremy Bentham, staying at one or another of Bentham’s homes for weeks at…
Read MoreHaiti in Memory
The history of Haiti — which has taken such a terrible turn tis week — is intertwined with the story of Aaron Burr’s western conspiracy. The slave revolt and war for independence in Haiti in the 1790s and early 1800s intersected with Burr in two important ways. First, many French refugees from San Domingo (as…
Read MoreChina and the Fourteenth Amendment
Most countries default on their debt now and again, but the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution says that the United States won’t. When President Obama visited China, I started to wonder about the significance of this guarantee to the massive to Chinese investment in U.S. government debt. Then I started wondering how good that guarantee…
Read MoreJack Miller, 1924-2009
I have known only a few great lawyers, and one of them was Jack Miller, a/k/a Herbert J. Miller, Jr., “poor old Miller” (how he referred to himself), and “Nixon’s lawyer.” He died over the weekend, and should be remembered. Jack’s achievements as a lawyer were remarkable. He argued and won important Supreme Court cases. …
Read MoreHappy Constitution Day!
OK, OK, it’s a contrived holiday, invented by Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia during those few moments when he hasn’t been scheming to transfer federal agency offices into his home state. (His triumph is the U.S. Coast Guard Operations Center in Martinsburg, WV, several hundred miles from any coast . . .. .)But, as…
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