In mid-September 2011, as part of AEI’s Program on American Citizenship, we celebrated Constitution Day. In conjunction with that remembrance, we thought it appropriate to honor our longtime colleague and friend Walter Berns with a panel dedicated to discussing his scholarship on the Constitution and the American regime it supports.

At this event, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia will give opening remarks, and Leon R. Kass (Madden-Jewett Chair, AEI), Jeremy A. Rabkin (Professor, George Mason University School of Law), and Christopher Demuth (D.C. Searle Senior Fellow, AEI) will provide further insight into the work of Walter Berns.

Abraham Lincoln was the greatest of our presidents. He saved the Union, which made it possible for him to free the slaves. But he did more than this; without him we probably would have had no reason to celebrate the bicentennial first of the Declaration of Independence and then of...

"We say that a man can be known by the company he keeps. So I say that a nation, a people, can be known and be judged by its heroes, by whom it honors above all others."

Walter's great contribution is in seeing the Constitution whole--as much more than a set of legal doctrines or parade of court decisions--and in showing that it can illuminate the most vexing contemporary problems and controversies. There is no better way to observe Constitution Day than to read Walter Berns.

In a new book, eminent constitutional scholar Walter Berns reflects on American democracy, its constitution, and life in a free society.

On both sides of the Atlantic, “citizenship” is the subject of vital and often contentious policy debates. In the United States, a nation famously founded on a creed rather than blood ties, the question of what it means to be an American citizen has always been central to the country’s...

On both sides of the Atlantic, "citizenship" is the subject of vital and often contentious policy debates. In the United States, a nation famously founded on a creed rather than blood ties, the question of what it means to be an American citizen has always been central to the country's...