Episode
Mark Peterson, "The Making and Breaking of the American Constitution: A Thousand-Year History" (Princeton UP, 2026)
- Published
- Sep 14, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 2331
- Processing state
not_requested- Canonical source
- https://newbooksnetwork.com
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Summary
Mark Peterson traces the American constitutional tradition to the control of land in medieval England, showing how the founders incorporated the aspirations of Magna Carta with the administrative principles of the Domesday Book, a meticulous survey and valuation of landed property commissioned by William the Conqueror. This framework encouraged the growth of democratic self-government in a young nation. It also institutionalized the colonization of territory and the expulsion of Indigenous peoples, establishing a legal blueprint for transforming tribal lands into revenue-yielding real estate for settlers. Peterson’s riveting narrative paints an arresting picture of a dynamic republic whose frame of government has changed enormously to meet the challenges of the modern age but whose written constitution has changed very little.