Legal Institutions, (R. Kag*n)

This is a two-semester seminar, although students may take either semester separately. It is designed to introduce students to the study of public law-- a subfield of political science that focuses on the relationships between law and politics, and between politics and the design, behavior, and impact of legal institutions. Fall Semester readings, drawing on comparative as well as American studies, focus on the political sources of the rule of law, judicial independence and constitutional courts; typologies of legal systems and legal institutions; explaining variation in the role of courts in governance; studies of decisionmaking by judges and other legal decision-makers; and studies of the capacity of law and courts to affect policy and social change. In the course of addressing these topics, the seminar will familiarize students with prominent approaches to research and explanation in public law.

The Spring semester focuses on the ways in which constitutional interpretation and judicial decision-making shapes and constrains political behavior, political thought and the development of political institutions in the United States and how those in turn influence judicial choices. The semester starts with the institutional setting and structure of the U.S. Supreme Court, examines both empirical and normative theories of constitutional decision-making, and the role the Court and Court decisions have played in American political development. The Course closely examines the Court's role in maintaining and defining the scope of national power, and the role of the States in the federal system, closely studying the struggles over the meaning and scope of the Commerce Clause, the Court's treatment of property rights and economic liberties before turning to the 14^th Amendment and individual rights, struggles over equal protection, the due process revolution and questions of personal autonomy. The Seminar then examines the struggle for power within the national government, examining the horizontal separation of powers with particular emphasis on foreign policy, emergency and war powers.