The United States spans six time zones. I have now lived in four of them (Eastern, Central, Mountain and Pacific), visited a fifth (Hawaiian-Aleutian) and flown over the sixth (Alaskan), so I feel comfortable addressing the question of which one is best with some authority. Eastern Time Zone I begin with a certain bias. Like most kids, I hated going
Read moreAnd so it was that on the eleventh anniversary of his birth, Ronan MacScottie came at last unto the sea.
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Adapted from a piece that originally ran in December 2011. _____ When the President does it, that means that it is not illegal. -Richard Nixon to David Frost British television journalist David Frost is dead at 74. While it isn’t necessarily clear that a man who spent time as a comedian and game show host ought to have his visage
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The original plan when we began this project was to offer the amendments individually, invite discussion, then produce a final document. The course of the process, though, has made a couple things clear. First, there needs to be a period to discuss the entire document in context, and second, while the original “Bill of Rights” approach perhaps had a certain
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Way back in March of 2008, as the campaign was running in high gear, I made clear that while I wasn’t in love with the Democratic frontrunners, the emerging alternative was worse: John McCain represented the third Bush presidency. I was undoubtedly right. But… You knew there was a “but” coming, didn’t you? Obama prepares for possible action against Syria
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August 13, 1993: I woke for my first day in Colorado. I had moved here from North Carolina for grad school. I had a van of everything I owned and barely a penny left after the 1600-mile drive. It wasn’t the first time I’d put my life in a truck and hauled it across the country to a town where
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Amendment XX No state or local government entity shall assert special privilege or exemption with respect to established rights granted by the Federal Constitution. Rationale In a free society there is no reasonable excuse for an unequal application of law and justice, especially based on something as arbitrary as geography. Yet the US is built on the assumption that it’s
Read moreNew York City. London. Oxford. Washington, DC. Western New York. Western North Carolina. Cleveland. The Upper Peninsula. Chicagoland/Indiana. Montana. Denver/Boulder. Owing to the fact that a majority of the founders either live in Colorado now or did in the past there has been a certain 5280-centric identity here at Scholars & Rogues. Nonetheless, the S&R staff is and always has
Read moreEarlier this week I received the distressing news that one of my fraternity brothers, Jose Fernandez, was dead. Jose – aka Joe – was in my pledge class, a small group that somehow earned a reputation for … underachievement? To be sure, we had our share of fuck-ups. But we also proved, when all was said and done, that were a
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Amendment XIX All workers shall have the right to organize for purposes of collective representation and bargaining. Rationale Americans are fond of the idea of upward mobility, although in truth we now rank at or near the bottom for class mobility among developed nations. This wasn’t always true. The decline in American upward mobility has been a direct result of
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Amendment XVIII In order to further the public’s interest in a free and independent legislature, elected officials shall not petition the body in which they served, either on their own behalf or on behalf of the interests of a third party, for a period of at least five years after the conclusion of their terms. Rationale As noted earlier on
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Amendment XVII Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted. Rationale Another one today that represents no change, although I’m very open to discussion on the term “cruel and unusual punishment.” This has historically been the center of any number of debates, and it may be time to articulate the concept in
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As the conversation has evolved, we’ve tripped across a number of issues that need addressing. As anticipated, our readers have thought of things that I didn’t. I have found myself devoting more and more energy considering language – specifically, how might we best lawyer-proof the wording of a given clause. The more I do so, the more I come to
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Amendment XVI In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed five hundred dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law. Rationale No fundamental changes. _____ Index: The
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