The silly little ritual of Supreme Court opinion days is a perfect illustration of the justices’ self-absorption. “We’re gonna decide cases but it’s a SURPRISE which ones, so just keep refreshing this browser tab to find out who still has civil rights!” Profoundly stupid institution. I loathe it.

I know it’s just an advanced reader copy, but look at this beauty!! Thank you so much for sending, @sonyabonczek.bsky.social! (Sonya’s the one to ask if you’re looking for one!)

Incredibly grateful to @gauthamrao.bsky.social for this!! Can’t wait until my copy arrives!

Also: from the convention through ratification Federalists argued precisely this—that national power would enlist state structures. It was a concession to Anti-Federalists (see Campbell's 2013 YLJ) but one borne of capacity constraints that are absolutely essential to understanding the founding.

I’ve read Prof. Wurman’s new book intro: americanmind.org/salvo/our-re... The second paragraph makes a claim that is fairly common, but inaccurate. It is worth highlighting because it’ll come up in court reform convos. He says, the “Act of Settlement of 1701, grant[ed] lifetime tenure to judges.”

Co-sign

Characteristically great piece from @jamellebouie.net citing the important work of the 19th c. Colored Conventions, which you can also learn more about & read from thanks to @profgabrielle.bsky.social @jimccasey1.bsky.social & others: coloredconventions.org www.nytimes.com/2026/06/10/o...

Anna is a great example of someone w/out a history PhD (her PhD is in political science) who cares deeply about the key principles of the historical method--immersion in the sources & recognition that the past is a foreign country. You don't need a history PhD to write an important work of history!

Deeply saddened to learn of Gordon Wood's passing. Few have had an equal impact on the study of the American Founding, or on my own intellectual development. No book is more responsible for making me a historian of early constitutional history than Wood's *The Creation of the American Republic*.

Plenary tonight was an incredible conversation about the Supreme Court with @gauthamrao.bsky.social @jamellebouie.net @nikobowie.bsky.social @rachelshelden.bsky.social @stevevladeck.bsky.social @kmtani.bsky.social. Several books from this crew I can't wait to read.

Wrote a little thing about why expanding the number of justices is a time honored tradition* that used to facilitate the Supreme Court’s legitimacy for @inquirer.com (gift link!) *not sure about this headline, though—folks often used “court packing” as an epithet even in the 19th c.

Can hardly believe it but there it is!!

Am reading every newspaper article I can find from April 7-16 on reaction to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1866. Not my main concern, or theirs, but every piece that says something says the act makes everyone born on American soil a citizen of the United States.

This conversation at the American Political History Conference this Friday was always important, but it gets more relevant by the day. 🗃️ Looking forward to talking with @jamellebouie.net @nikobowie.bsky.social @kmtani.bsky.social @stevevladeck.bsky.social @gauthamrao.bsky.social

Great way to get ready for aphc this week

I believe Callais must be overturned one day, either by a wiser majority or an outraged population, and the sooner it happens the better off we’ll be.

just finished this and i think it is extraordinarily relevant to our political moment. highly recommended. www.newamerica.org/insights/bos...

Counterpoint: no, they shouldn't. Relatedly: this is a good time for a reminder that "revisionist history" doesn't mean what many people think it does.

So thrilled for Heather and the folks at Missouri/Kinder! (I'll admit to bias as her dissertation advisor, but I can't imagine a better match!) 🎉🎉

People died for the Voting Rights Act.

Very few propositions command such wide assent among political scientists. Legislative term limits empower executive branches and lobbyists at the legislature’s expense.

Happy Publication Day, @gauthamrao.bsky.social! 🎉 Friends, if you haven't already ordered your copy, now's the time!! uncpress.org/978146969484...

Too often we hear complaints that historians aren't accessible to the general public. @shearites.bsky.social is changing this with this listing of scholars ready to talk to clubs, orgs, institutions about early America, civics, citizenship, and more. Please spread the word! civics.htm.dev

Best review essays/state-of-the-field essays in North American/US history, especially late colonial period to the present day? #skystorians

Thanks @myhnn.bsky.social for this excerpt from my new book about the origins of slave patrols: "slave patrols were emergency measures...But if the emergency never receded, then it became the norm. So, too, did the slave patrol." www.historynewsnetwork.org/article/the-...

We are going to need a lot more discussion in the academy about the rules for acknowledging the role of AI in research for undergrad/grad coursework & publications.

Rachel Shelden covered this pretty well in a thread in response to her original post: bsky.app/profile/rach... I would also add Gregory P. Downs, _After Appomattox_ to Rachel’s excellent list.

Thanks to Rachel for the shout out! In addition to the excellent sources Rachel cites, I’ll plug a roundtable that will be out in December in the @jcwe.bsky.social that discusses all the problems with 1877 and what happens to our understanding of Reconstruction when we abandon the compromise myth.

This is the common myth still taught in schools. The short version is, not really. The largest draw down in troops had already begun long before 1876. Upon taking office, Hayes did order some troops removed to barracks, literally just miles away. Yet other troops still remain in the South long after

My new one @slate.com: Why is John Roberts in a Rush All of a Sudden? slate.com/news-and-pol...

The @richardscenter.bsky.social was lucky to host the editors & authors of this special issue last year & it was clear they were opening really important conversations for scholars interested in law, slavery, race, & social history in the Civil War-era US & beyond. Thrilled to see the work in print!

What a crew!

History might offer us some lessons for the present, but only if we're honest about it. The "Hayes Tilden Compromise" is a myth. Reconstruction remained strong in some southern areas well after 1877 while, in others, white violence had effectively choked Black political success well before then.

Proud of my students for their research, which for the first time located the descendants of those enslaved by Columbia University's founders. www.columbiaspectator.com/news/2026/05...

And in 1910, a Republican, William Howard Taft, appointed Edward Douglas White, Jr., a former Confederate soldier and rumored KKK member, Chief Justice. White had voted with the majority in Plessy.

There’s even a history of a former Confederate-turned-U.S. Supreme Court justice espousing that view (and confirmed by the Senate in 1888 despite it being well known).

...also when justices feel the need to cite Marbury v. Madison, you KNOW they're up to some bullshit (and they do, too)

MAKE THE GUARANTEE CLAUSE GREAT AGAIN

Huge congratulations to @gauthamrao.bsky.social!! This book is going to have such a big impact! 🎉

There's been a running theme in Roberts & co's thought wherein the political process is corrupt and distasteful and the judicial process is not.

@rachelshelden.bsky.social has a new book out later this year that explores the history of the Supreme Court justices as political actors. you can preorder it now. uncpress.org/978146969713...

This is great, but two friendly amendments. The consolidation of judicial supremacy began long before the 1990s. And even as the Court holds that Congress may not respond to its decisions, Congress *does not need this majority’s approval* to check the Court’s power and respond anyway.

These remarks feature most of Roberts’ usual talking points but one quote stood out to me—that justices are “not simply part of the political process.” At a minimum, constitutional interpretation is absolutely part of the *political* process & always has been. To say otherwise is deeply unserious.

Could there be a timelier book? I think not.

you know, Abraham Lincoln was famously a man of the people who famously did not talk in "plain English."

“Americans have to reacquaint themselves… with the idea that we, the people, make constitutional meaning. To the extent that the Supreme Court claims broad authority to say what our Constitution means, it is in large part because we have given this authority to them through our indifference.”

Oh no

Great piece by @nikobowie.bsky.social & Daphna Renan, also reminding us of the constitutional culture we once had, when the people routinely claimed their authority over the Constitution and refused to let an unrepresentative Court dictate their future. (gift link: www.nytimes.com/2026/05/02/o...)

For a Court as fetishistic about “history” as this one, it is remarkable to read opinions in which phenomena like racially polarized voting and turnout gaps are treated as if they just kind of spontaneously apparate or vanish, with no relationship to law.

Here are young Reagan DOJ lawyer John Roberts's memos from 1982 opposing the VRA Section 2 amendment that Congress still passed and his Court just gutted 44 years later: www.archives.gov/files/news/j...