A Tale of Two Americas
Kermit Roosevelt III* | 25.4 | Citation: Kermit Roosevelt III, A Tale of Two Americas, 25 U. Pa. J. Const. L. 939 (2023).
I appreciate Professor Rebeiro’s thoughtful and generous review, and also the opportunity to respond. The Nation that Never Was makes several different claims. They are of different types: some are historical claims about how certain actors thought or understood certain documents; some are philosophical claims about what the implications of a particular theory are. Some are normative or predictive claims, about what would help us move forward as a nation. And sometimes claims contain elements of more than one of these categories.
I am more confident about some of these claims than others. For some questions I do not think it makes sense to say that there is a single true answer: history often comes down to interpretation. For others I do not think truth is even the right criterion—creating a national story, for instance, mixes art with history and is probably closest to policy choice. And I’m sure there is more to learn about all of them. In this response, I will try to set out the main claims, to clarify what type of a claim each is, and to explain why I find them compelling.
***
* David Berger Professor for the Administration of Justice, University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School.