The Vision of the Founders: Dead and Gone

14. Dec, 2009
Comments 56

by Kevin R.C. Gutzman

Editor’s Note: Bill of Rights Day is Tuesday, December 15th. But as Kevin Gutzman points out in this article, it’s not a day of celebration. Instead, it should be a day of mourning for the death of decentralized self-government.

In 2008, the Supreme Court of the United States decided Kennedy v. Louisiana. In that decision, the Court created a new categorical right to rape a child without receiving the death penalty.

Although the majority made mention of the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of “cruel and unusual punishment,â€