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The Intention of the Framers: A Note on Constitutional Interpretation*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

William Anderson
William Anderson
Affiliation:
University of Minnesota
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Extract

In discussions of the United States Constitution, the phrase “the intention of the framers” is often used, but it is hardly ever adequately analyzed. The search for the intentions of the framers is made obviously in the hope of finding out what they meant by the words they put into the written Constitution. This leads to the examination of various evidences outside the Constitution, and implies a feeling that there is a lack of clarity in the words of that document.

The discussion that follows was written in order, first, to raise some of the questions that I think have to be answered before the phrase about intentions can have fullness of meaning as a tool of constitutional analysis; second, to express certain warnings against a too-confident assumption that “the intention of the framers” can actually be known; and, third, to consider briefly the possible significance today of the intention of the framers in case it could be discovered.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 49 , Issue 2 , June 1955 , pp. 340 - 352
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1955

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References

* This paper was first presented at the fiftieth annual meeting of The American Political Science Association at Chicago, Illinois, September 11, 1954. In revising it for publication I have had the benefit of suggestions from a number of colleagues, to whom I am grateful.

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