Review
A powerfully argued indictment of the growth of executive power in Great Britain and its former colonies, the United States and Canada. Buckley’s book is greatly enhanced by his expert knowledge of the constitutions and politics of these three English-speaking nations. He shows, as few scholars have, just how much of the time we live in a fog and create results we never intended.
— Gordon Wood, Brown University, author of The Radicalism of the American Revolution
The Once and Future King deals with constitutional issues at a more serious level than almost anything else I have read recently. The prose, moreover, is elegant and flowing. This is a beautifully written, very interesting, and largely persuasive book.
— Philip Hamburger, Columbia Law School, author of Separation of Church and State
The book is immensely enjoyable to read and to think about. It’s a bracing read, in every way.
— Sanford V. Levinson, University of Texas School of Law, author of Our Undemocratic Constitution: Where the Constitution Goes Wrong (and How We the People Can Correct It)
This is a bold and willfully provocative critique of American presidential power, how and why it got to be that way, and what we can do to change it. Buckley takes no prisoners in his trip back to the American founding, with forays into the British and Canadian political systems, questioning all the conventional pieties and received wisdom along the way. If history truly is an argument without end, this is a new entry in the debate.
— Joseph J. Ellis, Mt. Holyoke, author of Founding Brothers and Revolutionary Summer
The Once and Future King is a work of virtuoso scholarship—bold, iconoclastic, and practical-minded in the spirit of the Framers themselves.
— Christopher DeMuth, Distinguished Fellow, Hudson Institute
About the Author
F. H. Buckley is the author of The Morality of Laughter (University of Michigan Press), Just Exchange: A Theory of Contract (Routledge), and Fair Governance (Oxford University Press). A native Canadian, he lives in Alexandria, Virginia, with his wife, Esther, and teaches at George Mason School of Law in Arlington, Virginia.
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