Jill Lepore

It's one of the longer dry spells.

It's not the longest.

So...

Like any social scientist would immediately raise her hand and say, well, that's because of polarization.

Political polarization in the United States has been rising since 1968.

And there's no sign of it, really.

I mean, there's like some variability.

But the double supermajority requirements, two-thirds and three-quarters, that was devised before there were even political parties.

So that's one reason it's become much harder than was anticipated.

But now there are political parties and they're utterly polarized.

So...

I mean, this is a big news item and a hot take on my part, but Congress can do nothing.

Congress is useless.

Congress can accomplish absolutely zero.

So so they're really not going to get.

two-thirds of both houses to agree to anything, like anything, because of polarization.

So you would say that.

But also what happens in 1971 is that what comes to be called originalism is born in its modern form in a famous law review article by Robert Bork.

He is opposed to

Judicial activism, which when people say judicial activism, they usually mean amending from the bench.