Yale law professor Akhil Amar discusses his new book The Words that Made US: America’s Constitutional Conversation, 1760-1840.

The legal scholar considers the living history of the United States Constitution in the decades after it was adopted. Recorded from a live stream broadcast June 3, 2021.

What do Americans have in common? Scholar Akhil Reed Amar says the one thing every single American shares is the United States Constitution. He shares why he wants Americans to better understand the words that made us. Click "Learn More" to display audio player and listen to this broadcast.

Yale University law and political science professor Akhil Reed Amar recounted the biggest questions and concerns that American citizens had regarding the Constitution after it was ratified.

Preeminent legal scholar Akhil Reed Amar of Yale Law School and host of the Amarica’s Constitution podcast joins National Constitution Center President and CEO Jeffrey Rosen for a discussion about the biggest constitutional questions early Americans wrote and spoke about, as described in his groundbreaking new book, The Words That Made Us: America's Constitutional Conversation, 1760-1840.

On the publication date of The Words That Made Us: America’s Constitutional Conversation, 1760-1840, Professor Amar reads excerpts from his new book that reflect on the three great Charters of Liberty: The Declaration of Independence, The Constitution of the United States, and The Bill of Rights.

When the U.S. Constitution won popular approval in 1788, it was the culmination of 30 years of passionate argument over the nature of government. But ratification hardly ended the conversation, and for the next half century, ordinary Americans and statesmen alike continued to wrestle with weighty questions such as the expansion of the nation’s borders […]

Akhil Reed Amar, Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science at Yale University, joins National Constitution Center President and CEO Jeffrey Rosen for a discussion on the Bill of Rights—its rights, its protections and limitations on government—and the process by which it was discussed, debated, and ratified

In honor of Constitution day, which is celebrated nationally on Sept. 17, the University of Oklahoma’s Institute for the American Constitutional Heritage hosted one of the most prominent constitutional scholars in the country: Akhil Amar, Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science at Yale University. Amar was a featured speaker and panelist at OU’s inaugural Teach-In which took place in February of this year. He teaches constitutional law at both Yale College and Yale Law School. He earned his bachelor’s degree summa cum laude from Yale College in 1980 and his juris doctorate in 1984 from Yale Law School, where […]

Leading legal scholar Akhil Reed Amar addresses the biggest and most bitterly contested debates of the last two decades and provides a passionate handbook for thinking constitutionally about today’s headlines as described in his book, “The Constitution Today.”

Our constitution only begins to map out the fundamental rules that govern Americans. But once we venture beyond it, how do we start and where do we stop? As a reply, Professor Amar offers a sneak preview of his forthcoming book, “America’s Unwritten Constitution”, to be published in 2012. Akhil Amar is one of our nation’s preeminent constitutional scholars. He is Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science at Yale University. This lecture was presented at the University of Scranton on September 17, 2011, at the Schemel Forum University for a Day program which features insights from […]

Yale Law professor Akhil Reed Amar passionately explains why he is a defender of an “original intent” interpretation of the U.S. Constitution and why FDR appointee Hugo Black is the greatest Supreme Court justice of the 20th century. He also shows off his large collection of pocket Constitutions. This Carnegie Council event took place on October 5, 2016.

In this talk we hear why our constitution may be more Jacksonian than we have been taught. Amar discusses why our constitution could be considered more democratic, perhaps more supportive towards slavery than intended (evidenced by the Civil War), and more supportive of national security. This is the fifth lecture in the Teach-In on America’s Founding presented by the University of Oklahoma.

In celebration of the 225th anniversary of the signing of our Constitution, Yale Law Professor and Constitutional Accountability Center board member Akhil Amar and Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas debate the past, present, and future of the nation’s founding document in a program titled, “The Constitution Turns 225” at the National Archives on September 12, 2012. Video provided courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.

What Almost Nobody Knows About the Presidency and Foreign Policy: From George Washington to Barack Obama October 29, 2013

RESOLVED: Lochner v. New York: Still Crazy After All These Years.

The Tenth Annual Rosenkranz Debate was held on November 18, 2017, during The Federalist Society’s 2017 National Lawyers Convention.

–Prof. Akhil Reed Amar, Sterling Professor of Law, Yale Law School

–Prof. Randy E. Barnett, Carmack Waterhouse Professor of Legal Theory, Georgetown University Law Center

–Moderator: Prof. Nicholas Quinn Rosenkranz, Professor of Law, Georgetown University Law Center

–Introduction: Mr. Eugene B. Meyer, President, The Federalist Society

Roosevelt House hosts the inaugural event of fall speaker series, “Filling the Court: From Midnight Judges to Court Packing to Garland, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh,” a talk by Akhil Reed Amar, Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science, Yale University, and one of America’s pre-eminent constitutional scholars. In his talk, Professor Amar will discuss the long and always fiercely political history of Supreme Court vacancies and replenishment, from the earliest days of the Republic to Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s 1937 “court-packing” plan, to more recent nomination controversies, including those surrounding Robert Bork, Clarence Thomas, Merrick Garland, and Neil Gorsuch—and Brett Kavanaugh, nominated […]

Akhil Reed Amar, the Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science at Yale University, clarifies distinctions between the Fifteenth Amendment, which focuses specifically on racial dimensions of voting rights, and the Fourteenth Amendment, which grants equality and citizenship to all U.S.-born persons. Amar points out that by guaranteeing fundamental rights and due process to all persons, the Fourteenth Amendment assures that even U.S. residents “who aren’t citizens also have Constitutional rights.”

Akhil Amar, professor of law and political science at Yale University, and Eric Foner, professor emeritus of history at Columbia University and author of The Second Founding: How Civil War and Reconstruction Remade the Constitution, discuss constitutional changes and challenges throughout our nation’s history. Kenneth Mack, professor of law and history at Harvard University, moderates.

The value of the electoral college has become an issue of public debate after multiple presidents in the past 20 years have been elected by the college despite losing the national popular vote. Reformation of the electoral college has become a campaign issue for some as we approach the 2020 presidential election. Join Prof. Akhil Reed Amar, Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science at Yale University, and Dr. Allen C. Guelzo, Senior Research Scholar in the Council of the Humanities and Director of the Initiative on Politics and Statesmanship in the James Madison Program at Princeton University, as they […]

May, 2020:  This is the first episode of The Legal Academy, a new show about law professors hosted by Professor Orin Kerr of UC Berkeley Law School. The guest is Akhil Amar, Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science at Yale University.