The Founders’ Constitution: The Preamble Through Article 1, Section 8, Clause 4

Originally published by the University of Chicago Press to commemorate the bicentennial of the United States Constitution, The Founders’ Constitution is arguably the most important of all resources on the principles of the Framers of the American republic. As the editors explain, the work consists of “extracts from the leading works of political theory, history, law, and constitutional argument on which the Framers and their contemporaries drew and which they themselves produced.” In cooperation with University of Chicago Press, Liberty Fund has prepared this new paperback edition of the entire work in five volumes:

Volume 1: Major Themes
Volume 2: The Preamble Through Article 1, Section 8, Clause 4
Volume 3: Article 1, Section 8, Clause 5, Through Article 2, Section 1
Volume 4: Article 2, Section 2, Through Article 7
Volume 5: Amendments I Through XII.

The documentary sources and inspirations reach to the early seventeenth century and extend through those Amendments to the Constitution that were adopted by 1835—that is, through the end of the era of Chief Justice John Marshall of the United States Supreme Court.

Philip B. Kurland was the William R. Kenan, Jr., Distinguished Service Professor in the College and Professor in the Law School, University of Chicago.

Ralph Lerner is the Benjamin Franklin Professor in the College and Professor in the Committee on Social Thought, University of Chicago.