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Although constitutional originalism has attracted a remarkable degree of public and professional attention over the past several decades, little research has been conducted on the intellectual roots of modern originalism. This Article finds that American law schools housed few originalist theorists through much of the 1970s and early 1980s. However, after Edwin Meese III became U.S. Attorney General in 1985, the Department of Justice constructed a vibrant academy in exile, with government lawyers leading the way in the early development, theorization, and exercise of originalism. In addition to becoming the official mode of constitutional interpretation for Meese and the DOJ, originalism started to gain followers on the federal bench and within conservative social movements during the second half of the 1980s. As constitutional originalism grew in influence and professional use, academic interlocutors began engaging with and reimagining originalism more intently.

In order to better understand the growth of modern conservatism within the United States, scholars of American political development increasingly have set their sights on the 1980s and the Reagan Revolution. But key questions still remain about the part played by President Ronald Reagan's administration during this period of legal transformation. Additionally, political scientists have given short shrift to the legal ideas and idea makers that grew in prominence during the Reagan Revolution. This article connects these two loose strands through an exploration of the relationship fostered between the Reagan administration and the lawand-economics movement. Archival records and interview materials reveal the mutually beneficial nature of this relationship, which shaped both the legal academy and the federal government.

When coronavirus began to descend upon the United States, religious freedom advocates across the country sounded the alarm that citizens’ religious practices and institutions were under threat. Although some of the most extreme arguments championed by these advocates were not validated by our legal system, many were. This article explores the underappreciated gains made by religious freedom advocates before the U.S. Supreme Court over the past year. As a result of the “Pandemic Court”, religious freedom in the United States has been rewritten. This promises to radically change the educational, employment, and health prospects of millions of Americans for the rest of the pandemic and long afterwards.

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