Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-20T04:07:07.967Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Tragic Constitution: United States Democracy and Its Discontents

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 October 2020

Peter Lancelot Mallios
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Tragedy is a recurrent subject in recent constitutional law scholarship. But this scholarship theorizes tragedy through a single narrow model, generally applies it to a limited conception of the domain of constitutional law, and ultimately conceives tragedy only as a liability rather than as a positive potentiality of constitutional practice. This essay critiques one theoretical understanding of tragedy and introduces three more, to argue for an open-ended praxis of pluralist tragic engagement with the United States Constitution that is necessary for the sober, mature, demystified, and deliberative functionality of the constitutional system. Each of these four models of tragedy is paired with a domain of constitutional law: Aristotle's model with interpretation, Hegel's with structure and institutions, the radical Brazilian theater director Augusto Boal's with performance and public effects, and Nietzsche's with cultural and educational accessibility.

Type
Special Topic: Tragedy Coordinated by Helene P. Foley and Jean E. Howard
Information
PMLA , Volume 129 , Issue 4: Special Topic Tragedy , October 2014 , pp. 708 - 726
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 2014

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Works Cited

Ackerman, Bruce. The Decline and Fall of the American Republic. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2010. Print.Google Scholar
Alexander, Larry. “Constitutional Tragedies and Giving Refuge to the Devil.” Eskridge and Levinson 115–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aristotle. Poetics. London: Penguin, 1996. Print.Google Scholar
Balkin, Jack M. Constitutional Redemption. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2011. Print.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Balkin, Jack M. “Deconstructive Practice and Legal Theory”. Yale Law Journal 96 (1987): 743–86. Print.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Balkin, Jack M. “The Meaning of Constitutional Tragedy.” Eskridge and Levinson 121–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Balkin, Jack M., and Levinson, Sanford. “Law as Performance.” Law and Literature: Current Legal Issues, 1999. Ed. Freeman, Michael and Lewis, Andrew. Vol. 2. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1999. 729–51. Print.Google Scholar
Ki-moon, Ban. “New York, 9 June 2006—The Secretary-General's Remarks at the United Nations International School Graduation Ceremony.” United Nations. United Nations, 2014. Web. 7 Aug. 2014.Google Scholar
Boal, Augusto. Theatre of the Oppressed. Trans. McBride, Charles A. and McBride, Maria-Odilia Leal. New York: Theatre Communications Group, 1985. Print.Google Scholar
Bradley, A. C. “Hegel's Theory of Tragedy.” 1909. Hegel 367–88.Google Scholar
Brown, Rebecca L. “Constitutional Tragedies: The Dark Side of Judgment.” Eskridge and Levinson 139–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brown v. Board of Educ. 347 US 483-97. Supreme Court of the US. 1954. Print.Google Scholar
Brown, Wendy. “Nietzsche for Politics.” Why Nietzsche Still? Ed. Schrift, Alan D. Berkeley: U of California P, 2000. 205–23. Print.Google Scholar
Buckley v. Valeo. 424 US 1-48. Supreme Court of the US. 1976. Print.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butler, Judith. Antigone's Claim: Kinship between Life and Death. New York: Columbia UP, 2000. Print.Google Scholar
Camp, Elisabeth. “Perspectives in Imaginative Engagement with Fiction.” The Home Page of Elisabeth Camp. N.p., 21 Mar. 2011. Web. 4 Sept. 2014.Google Scholar
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. 130 S. Ct. 876. Supreme Court of the US. 2010. Print.Google Scholar
Constitution of the United States. Legal Information Institute. Cornell U Law School, n.d. Web. 6 June 2014.Google Scholar
Cornell, Drucilla. “From the Lighthouse: The Province of Redemption and the Possibility of Legal Interpretation”. Cardozo Law Review 11 (1990): 1687–914. Web. 5 Aug. 2013.Google Scholar
Dalton, Russell J. “The Social Transformation of Trust in Government”. International Review of Sociology 15.1 (2005): 133–54. Print.Google Scholar
Dienstag, Joshua Foa. “Tragedy, Pessimism, Nietzsche.” Felski, Rethinking 104–26.Google Scholar
Dimock, Wai Chee. “After Troy: Homer, Euripedes, Total War.” Felski, Rethinking 66–81.Google Scholar
Dred Scott v. Sandford. 60 US 393-574. Supreme Court of the US. 1857. Print.Google Scholar
Dreiser, Theodore. An American Tragedy. New York: Liveright, 1925. Print.Google Scholar
Dreiser, Theodore. Tragic America. London: Constable, 1931. Print.Google Scholar
Edelman, Martin. Democratic Theories and the Constitution. Albany: State U of New York P, 1984. Print.Google Scholar
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. “The Fugitive Slave Law: Address to Citizens of Concord.” RWE.org. RWE.org, n.d. Web. 3 Nov. 2012.Google Scholar
Eskridge, William N., and Levinson, Sanford, eds. Constitutional Stupidities, Constitutional Tragedies. New York: New York UP, 1998. Print.Google Scholar
Euben, Peter. The Tragedy of Political Theory: The Road Not Taken. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1990. Print.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fehrenbacher, Don E. Lincoln in Text and Context: Collected Essays. Stanford: Stanford UP, 1987. Print.Google Scholar
Felski, Rita. Introduction. Felski, Rethinking 1–25.Google Scholar
Felski, Rita, ed. Rethinking Tragedy. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2008. Print.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fleming, James E. “Constitutional Tragedy in Dying; or, Whose Tragedy Is It Anyway?” Eskridge and Levinson 162–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ford, Gerald. “Remarks on Pardoning Richard Nixon (Sept. 8, 1974).” Miller Center. Rector and Visitors of the U of Virginia, 2014. Web. 4 Nov. 2012.Google Scholar
Goldhill, Simon. “Generalizing about Tragedy.” Felski, Rethinking 45–65.Google Scholar
Hamilton, Alexander, and Madison, James. The Federalist Papers. New York: Penguin, 1987. Print.Google Scholar
Hegel, G. W. F. Hegel on Tragedy. Ed. Paolucci, Anne and Paolucci, Henry. New York: Harper, 1975. Print.Google Scholar
Jefferson, Thomas. Letter to R. Skipwith. 3 Aug. 1771. The Works of Thomas Jefferson. Ed. Paul Leicester Ford. Vol. 2. New York: Putnam, 1904-05. Online Lib. of Liberty. Web. 4 Nov. 2012.Google Scholar
Korematsu v. US. 323 US 214-48. Supreme Court of the US. 1944. Print.Google Scholar
Levinson, Jerrold. “Emotion in Response to Art: A Survey of the Terrain.” Emotion and the Arts. Ed. Hjort, M. and Laver, S. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1997. 20–34. Print.Google Scholar
Levinson, Sanford. Framed: America's Fifty-One Constitutions and the Crisis of Governance. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2012. Print.Google Scholar
Levinson, Sanford. Our Undemocratic Constitution: Where the Constitution Goes Wrong (and How We the People Can Correct It). Oxford: Oxford UP, 2006. Print.Google Scholar
Lochner, V. New York. 198 US 45-76. Supreme Court of the US. 1905. Print.Google Scholar
Lowi, Theodore. “Constitutional Merry-Go-Round: The First Time Tragedy, the Second Time Farce.” Eskridge and Levinson 189–202.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Madison, James. Letter to W. T. Barry. 4 Aug. 1822. Madison, Writings, vol. 9.Google Scholar
Madison, James. “Speeches in the First Congress—Third Session, 1791.” Madison, Writings, vol. 6.Google Scholar
Madison, James. The Writings of James Madison. Ed. Hunt, Gaillard. New York: Putnam, 1900. Online Lib. of Liberty. Web. 4 Nov. 2012.Google Scholar
Magliocca, Gerard N. The Tragedy of William Jennings Bryan: Constitutional Law and the Politics of Backlash. New Haven: Yale UP, 2011. Print.Google Scholar
Mallios, Peter Lancelot. Our Conrad: Constituting American Modernity. Stanford: Stanford UP, 2010. Print.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maltz, Earl M. “Brown v. Board of Education.” Eskridge and Levinson 207–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marbury v. Madison. 5 US 137-80. Supreme Court of the US. 1803. Print.Google Scholar
McConnell, Michael W. “Glamis, Yes; Cawdor, Yes—but King of Scotland?” Eskridge and Levinson 203–06.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McCulloch v. Maryland. 17 US 316-437. Supreme Court of the US. 1819. Print.Google Scholar
Munteanu, Dana LaCourse. Tragic Pathos: Pity and Fear in Greek Philosophy and Tragedy. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2012. Print.Google Scholar
Nietzsche, Friedrich. The Birth of Tragedy. Trans. Smith, Douglas. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2000. Print.Google Scholar
Plato. Laws. Dialogues of Plato. Trans. Jowett, B. Vol. 4. New York: Scribner, Armstrong, 1873. Internet Classics Archive. Web. 3 Nov. 2012.Google Scholar
Plessy, V. Ferguson. 163 US 537-64. Supreme Court of the US. 1896. Print.Google Scholar
Rocco, Christopher. Tragedy and Enlightenment: Athenian Political Thought and the Dilemmas of Modernity. Berkeley: U of California P, 1997. Print.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roe v. Wade. 410 US 113-78. Supreme Court of the US. 1973. Print.Google Scholar
Roosevelt, Franklin Delano. “First Inaugural Address (March 4, 1933).” Miller Center. Rector and Visitors of the U of Virginia, 2014. Web. 4 Nov. 2012.Google Scholar
Sands, Kathleen. “Tragedy, Theology, and Feminism in the Time after Time.” Felski, Rethinking 82–103.Google Scholar
Stow, Simon. “Agonistic Homecoming: Frederick Douglass, Joseph Lowery, and the Democratic Value of African American Public Mourning”. American Political Science Review 104.4 (2010): 681–97. Print.Google Scholar
Strauss, David A. “Tragedies under the Common Law Constitution.” Eskridge and Levinson 235–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sunstein, Cass R. After the Rights Revolution: Reconceiving the Regulatory State. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1990. Print.Google Scholar
Sunstein, Cass R. The Law of Group Polarization. 7 Dec. 1999. PDF file. John M. Olin Law and Economics Working Papers (2nd ser.) 91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sunstein, Cass R. Republic.com 2.0. Princeton: Princeton UP, 2009. Print.Google Scholar
Tushnet, Mark. “The Whole Thing.” Eskridge and Levinson 103–06.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Unger, Roberto Mangabeira. The Critical Legal Studies Movement. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1986. Print.Google Scholar
Vermeule, Adrian. “Government by Public Opinion”: Bryce's Theory of the Constitution. 9 July 2011. PDF file. Harvard Public Law Working Papers 11–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Villa, Dana. “Democratizing the Agon: Nietzsche, Arendt, and the Agonistic Tendency in Recent Political Theory.” Why Nietzsche Still? Ed. Schrift, Alan D. Berkeley: U of California P, 2000. 224–46. Print.Google Scholar
Williams, Raymond. Modern Tragedy. Stanford: Stanford UP, 1966. Print.Google Scholar
Yoo, John. “McCulloch v. Maryland.” Eskridge and Levinson 241–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer. 343 US 579-620. Supreme Court of the US. 1952. Print.Google Scholar