lpetrich
Contributor
Declining influence of the United States Constitution Journalist's Resource: Research for Reporting, from Harvard Shorenstein Center
The Declining Influence of the United States Constitution by David S. Law, Mila Versteeg :: SSRN
(PDF of paper is open access)
The adoption of the United States Constitution is arguably the beginning of our current era of democratic constitutional republicanism and quasi-republicanism. I say quasi-republicanism to accommodate monarchies that have become ceremonial ones, sometimes also professional-celebrity ones.
The US Constitution has influenced many other ones, notably several Latin American ones. This influence is not only in being its existence as a written constitution, but also some of its content and features like judicial review. Some other constitutions even have word-for-word copies of parts of it.
But is the US Constitution's influence fading? DSL and MV have examined this issue in detail. They find that not only is its influence fading, but also that some recent constitutions have not had any special influence: those of Canada, Germany, South Africa, and India. Instead, what is happening is an emergence of a sort of collective body of constitutional practice that recent constitutions and constitutional changes have tended to follow.
DSL and MV first consider rights recognized in various constitutions. It was sometimes difficult to code what the constitutions state in suitable cross-constitutional form, but they succeeded in coming up with 60 possible rights. Like freedom of religion, freedom of expression, right to life, right to private property, right to access to court, right to vote, right to work, right to unionize, right to form poliical parties, right to education, right to information about government, right to bear arms, ...
Some of them, like freedom of religion, are much more popular than some others, like the right to bear arms, currently featured only in the constitutions of the US, Mexico, and Guatemala. In fact, protection of fetuses, though not a popular provision, is recognized by more nations. In fact, one can work out a bill of rights of commonly-recognized rights. The US Constitution recognizes some of them, like freedom of expression and right of access to court, but not others, like right to work and presumption of innocence. The US has some that are not in that generic BOR, like a right to bear arms and a right not to be self-incriminated.
Turning to structural features of the US Constitution, judicial review has been widely adopted, though often in the form of special constitutional courts. Judicial review, though a notable part of US constitutional law, is not explicitly stated in the US Constitution, though it is explicit in some other ones. Federalism, or strong regional autonomy has had only limited popularity, as has presidentialism. Parliamentary and mixed systems are more common. They ought to have also considered proportional representation, something that has become very common, though it is still rare in the Anglo-American parts of the world.
Close ties to the US have not stopped countries from having dissimilar constitutions, but Anglo-American nations and ex-colonies tend to have constitutions more like the US one than most others do.
As to why the US Constitution is such an oddity, it's a consequence of (1) its age and (2) the difficulty of amending it. Most other nations' constitutions are much easier to amend, and have been amended much more often. The average constitution has a 38% chance of being amended each year and a median replacement time of 19 years. But the US Constitution was adopted in 1793, 221 years ago, and amended only 27 times. The first 10 times were in a burst around its adoption, and the other 17 times were mainly in later bursts, in the 1860's, the 1910's, and the 1960's.
Not surprisingly, it has gotten a lot of criticism for its awkward and undemocratic features.
Even so, various laws and judicial decisions have acted as a sort of extracanonical constitution. Another approach that may become more popular is workarounds like the National Popular Vote -- Electoral college reform by direct election of the President.
The Declining Influence of the United States Constitution by David S. Law, Mila Versteeg :: SSRN
(PDF of paper is open access)
The adoption of the United States Constitution is arguably the beginning of our current era of democratic constitutional republicanism and quasi-republicanism. I say quasi-republicanism to accommodate monarchies that have become ceremonial ones, sometimes also professional-celebrity ones.
The US Constitution has influenced many other ones, notably several Latin American ones. This influence is not only in being its existence as a written constitution, but also some of its content and features like judicial review. Some other constitutions even have word-for-word copies of parts of it.
But is the US Constitution's influence fading? DSL and MV have examined this issue in detail. They find that not only is its influence fading, but also that some recent constitutions have not had any special influence: those of Canada, Germany, South Africa, and India. Instead, what is happening is an emergence of a sort of collective body of constitutional practice that recent constitutions and constitutional changes have tended to follow.
DSL and MV first consider rights recognized in various constitutions. It was sometimes difficult to code what the constitutions state in suitable cross-constitutional form, but they succeeded in coming up with 60 possible rights. Like freedom of religion, freedom of expression, right to life, right to private property, right to access to court, right to vote, right to work, right to unionize, right to form poliical parties, right to education, right to information about government, right to bear arms, ...
Some of them, like freedom of religion, are much more popular than some others, like the right to bear arms, currently featured only in the constitutions of the US, Mexico, and Guatemala. In fact, protection of fetuses, though not a popular provision, is recognized by more nations. In fact, one can work out a bill of rights of commonly-recognized rights. The US Constitution recognizes some of them, like freedom of expression and right of access to court, but not others, like right to work and presumption of innocence. The US has some that are not in that generic BOR, like a right to bear arms and a right not to be self-incriminated.
Turning to structural features of the US Constitution, judicial review has been widely adopted, though often in the form of special constitutional courts. Judicial review, though a notable part of US constitutional law, is not explicitly stated in the US Constitution, though it is explicit in some other ones. Federalism, or strong regional autonomy has had only limited popularity, as has presidentialism. Parliamentary and mixed systems are more common. They ought to have also considered proportional representation, something that has become very common, though it is still rare in the Anglo-American parts of the world.
Close ties to the US have not stopped countries from having dissimilar constitutions, but Anglo-American nations and ex-colonies tend to have constitutions more like the US one than most others do.
As to why the US Constitution is such an oddity, it's a consequence of (1) its age and (2) the difficulty of amending it. Most other nations' constitutions are much easier to amend, and have been amended much more often. The average constitution has a 38% chance of being amended each year and a median replacement time of 19 years. But the US Constitution was adopted in 1793, 221 years ago, and amended only 27 times. The first 10 times were in a burst around its adoption, and the other 17 times were mainly in later bursts, in the 1860's, the 1910's, and the 1960's.
Not surprisingly, it has gotten a lot of criticism for its awkward and undemocratic features.
Even so, various laws and judicial decisions have acted as a sort of extracanonical constitution. Another approach that may become more popular is workarounds like the National Popular Vote -- Electoral college reform by direct election of the President.
