Summary of Reading the Constitution by Stephen Breyer: Why I Chose Pragmatism, Not Textualism

By GP SUMMARY

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This book does not in any capacity mean to replace the original book but to serve as a vast summary of the original book.

Summary of Reading the Constitution by Stephen Breyer: Why I Chose Pragmatism, Not Textualism

IN THIS SUMMARIZED BOOK, YOU WILL GET:

• Chapter provides an astute outline of the main contents.
• Fast & simple understanding of the content analysis.
• Exceptionally summarized content that you may skip in the original book

Stephen Breyer, a retired Supreme Court Justice, presents a compelling analysis that challenges the textualist philosophy of the current Supreme Court's supermajority and advocates for a better interpretation of the Constitution. Breyer argues that understanding the purposes of statutes and the consequences of a case is crucial for interpreting law. He examines significant cases in the nation's history, such as the Dobbs and Bruen decisions, which he believes were wrongly decided and have led to harmful results.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookRix
• Release date: Apr 2, 2024
• ISBN: 9783755473640

Book preview

PART ONE

PURPOSE VS. TEXTUALISM

Judges traditionally use various interpretive tools to determine the proper interpretation of statutes and the Constitution, including text, history, precedent, tradition, purposes, values, and consequences. There is no specific rank order among these tools, and which one proves more helpful depends on the particular case. Judges have long differed in their importance of certain tools compared to others, with some placing greater weight on text and related linguistic features, while others place greater weight on a statutory or constitutional phrase's purposes. Recently, the differences between textualist and purpose-oriented judges have become more pronounced. Many judges, legal scholars, and practicing lawyers claim to be textualists, focusing primarily on a phrase's text to find its proper interpretation or application. However, the textualist approach, particularly in its more text-exclusive versions, is an undesirable way to interpret legal text.

Purpose-Based Approaches

Purpose-based approaches to judicial interpretation focus on the purpose of laws and their intended purposes. These approaches are often closely linked to the common law mode of judging, which proceeds case by case, resolving new questions based on the particular facts of new cases. They are rooted in judicial pragmatism, which accounts for how a particular legal decision will affect other legal rules and principles, and often consult a hypothetical reasonable legislator to determine how a statute serves broader democratic ends.

Common law methods, which focus on the facts of a particular case, are often used to guide statutory interpretation. However, interpreting a statute can lead to narrow decisions, as the breadth of the holding is a matter for judicial decision. This allows judges to tailor their holding to the statute's purpose while leaving the full scope of the language to be fleshed out or decided in future cases. Common law decisions often exhibit similar, incremental characteristics, allowing judges to tailor their interpretation to the statute's purpose while leaving the full scope of the language to be fleshed out or decided in future cases.

In the 2020 case of County of Maui v. Hawaii Wildlife Fund, the Supreme Court debated the extent to which the Court should have left aspects of the problem to be decided in future cases. The Clean Water Act defines a pollutant as any substance that can be discharged from a point source into navigable waters. The court held that a sewage treatment plant in Hawaii may need a federal permit if the sewage mixture travels hundreds of miles before reaching the Pacific Ocean.

The Court reached a compromise that drew heavily from the common law method. Instead of adopting either extreme, the Court decided that a permit was needed if the addition of pollutants through groundwater is the functional equivalent of a direct discharge from the point source into navigable waters. The Court added considerations that would help lower courts determine when the functional equivalent standard applied, such as the length of underground travel, its duration, and its having mixed with other nonpolluted water.

The Court provided examples to guide future cases, such as discharges that fall five feet through the air between pipe and sea would still need a permit, while discharges that travel underground for fifty miles over several years would not. The Court left room for future development, recognizing the usefulness of the traditional common-law method in an era of