Constitutional Possibilities

What are our constitutional possibilities? The importance of this question is illustrated by the striking breadth of constitutional possibilities discussed recently in high constitutional theory. Contemporary constitutional theory ranges from Sotirios Barber’s reading of the United States Constitution as a guarantee of fundamental economic equality to Randy Barnett’s call to restore a lost constitution that guarantees individual liberty. The range of constitutional options includes James Fleming’s perfectionist reading of the Constitution as a charter for deliberative autonomy and Sanford Levinson’s proselytization for a revolutionary program of constitutional redesign that would abolish the Electoral College and equal representation of the states in the Senate. Are these constitutional possibilities real or illusory? And how can we answer that question? Theorists like Barber, Barnett, Fleming, and Levinson are conventionally understood as placing constitutional options on the table and as proponents of their