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Diminishing the Bill of Rights - Barron v. Baltimore and the Foundations of American Liberty (Hardcover)
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Diminishing the Bill of Rights - Barron v. Baltimore and the Foundations of American Liberty (Hardcover)
Series: Studies in American Constitutional Heritage
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The modern effort to locate American liberties, it turns out, began
in the mud at the bottom of Baltimore harbor. John Barron Jr. and
John Craig sued the city for damages after Baltimore's rebuilt
drainage system diverted water and sediment into the harbor,
preventing large ships from tying up at Barron and Craig's wharf.
By the time the case reached the U.S. Supreme Court in 1833, the
issue had become whether the city's actions constituted a taking of
property by the state without just compensation, a violation of the
Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The high court's decision
in Barron v. Baltimore marked a critical step in the rapid
evolution of law and constitutional rights during the first half of
the nineteenth century. Diminishing the Bill of Rights examines the
backstory and context of this decision as a turning point in the
development of our current conception of individual rights. Since
the colonial period, Americans had viewed their rights as springing
from multiple sources, including the common law, natural right, and
English legal tradition. Despite this rich heritage and a
prohibition grounded in the Magna Carta against uncompensated state
takings of property, the Court ruled against Barron's claim. The
Bill of Rights, Chief Justice John Marshall declared in his opinion
for the majority, restrained only the federal government, not the
states. The Fifth Amendment, accordingly, did not apply to Maryland
or any of the cities it chartered. In explaining how the Court came
to reject a multisourced view of human liberties - a position
seemingly inconsistent with its previous decisions - William
Davenport Mercer helps explain why we now envision the Constitution
as essential to guaranteeing our rights. Marshall's view of rights
in Barron, Mercer argues, helped him navigate the Court through the
precarious political currents of the time. While the chief justice
may have effected a shrewd political maneuver, the decision helped
hasten a reconceptualization of rights as located in documents. Its
legacy, as Mercer's work makes clear, is among the Jacksonian era's
significant democratic reforms and marks the emergence of a
distinctly American constitutionalism.
General
Imprint: |
University of Oklahoma Press
|
Country of origin: |
United States |
Series: |
Studies in American Constitutional Heritage |
Release date: |
April 2017 |
Authors: |
William Davenport Mercer
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Dimensions: |
229 x 152 x 24mm (L x W x T) |
Format: |
Hardcover - Cloth over boards
|
Pages: |
296 |
ISBN-13: |
978-0-8061-5602-6 |
Categories: |
Books >
Law >
General
Books >
Humanities >
History >
General
Books >
History >
General
|
LSN: |
0-8061-5602-3 |
Barcode: |
9780806156026 |
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