Amar examines the collision between the U.S. Constitution's grand temporal ambitions and the tight deadlines of the popular press by reviewing how he himself has intervened as a vocal commentator on the biggest and most bitterly contested constitutional issues of the last quarter century. Assembled here along with new reflective essays, Amar's commentary looks to the U.S. Constitution's text, history, and structure for the specific rules and grand themes relevant to every vital organ of the American body politic"--