Our Constitution

From January 1920 to December 1933, the Eighteenth Amendment prohibited the manufacture, sale, or transportation of alcoholic beverages within the United States. Studying nationwide Prohibition can inform an understanding of how the Supreme Court has interpreted the scope of Congress’s power to regulate commerce over time; how difficult it can be for the federal government to regulate individual social habits and moral choices; and how the Supreme Court’s Fourth Amendment jurisprudence evolved in response to enforcement techniques that federal or state authorities employed to investigate violations of Prohibition, such as warrantless wiretapping of telephone lines.
Part II of this two-part series examines congressional debates over the Eighteenth Amendment, relevant Supreme Court decisions, and the Twenty-First Amendment’s repeal of Prohibition.

From January 1920 to December 1933, the Eighteenth Amendment prohibited the manufacture, sale, or transportation of alcoholic beverages within the United States. Studying nationwide Prohibition can inform an understanding of how the Supreme Court has interpreted the scope of Congress’s power to regulate commerce over time; how difficult it can be for the federal government to regulate individual social habits and moral choices; and how the Supreme Court’s Fourth Amendment jurisprudence evolved in response to enforcement techniques that federal or state authorities employed to investigate violations of Prohibition, such as warrantless wiretapping of telephone lines.
Part I of this two-part series discusses historical events leading up to the Eighteenth Amendment’s proposal in Congress, including the temperance movement and early state prohibition laws.

On December 1, 2023, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor passed away at the age of 93. O’Connor served as the first female Supreme Court Justice from 1981 to 2006. She was known for her role in landmark Supreme Court decisions on abortion rights, affirmative action, federalism, the First Amendment, and many other issues.
This podcast episode examines Justice O’Connor’s life and some of the highlights from her tenure as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court.

For more than a century after the Constitution’s ratification, many states prohibited female citizens of the United States from voting in federal or state elections. Ratified in 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment prohibits the federal and state governments from denying or abridging a U.S. citizen’s right to vote on the basis of sex, thereby recognizing women’s suffrage—in other words, a woman’s right to vote.
This podcast episode will explore the evolution of the women’s suffrage movement in the United States and the events leading up to the Nineteenth Amendment’s ratification. It also discusses the ways in which the Amendment continues to have a lasting impact throughout society.

What were the Framers’ objectives when they structured the Constitution? This podcast centers the Constitution in its historical context, examining challenges the Framers’ faced in establishing the federal government, the reasons for the framework they adopted, and alternatives the Framers considered and discarded. In particular, this podcast considers the choices the Framers made when allocating federal power among the three branches of government.