The Revival of Original Intent
February 13, 2023
732
33
7
5.46%
Search the Record
IndexedEvery word spoken in this episode is indexed. Type any phrase to jump straight to the moment it was said.
Type any word or phrase that may have been spoken. Click a result to seek the player to that exact moment.
Try a name, a topic, or a quoted line
The Heritage Foundation Episodes Around February 13, 2023
See what was published immediately before and after this episode.
1:03:37Now PlayingThe Revival of Original Intent
YouTube Description
as posted by the channelSince the 1980s, theories of constitutional and statutory interpretation that focus on the intent of the lawmaker have been on the decline, especially among originalists. But over the last decade, there has been a revival of interest in intentionalism. Originalism, though, is really a collection of arguments about what the words could mean, what the words should mean, and what we’d like the words to mean. Have we missed something more fundamental in this debate? Intentionalism recovers something that was believed since the beginning of written laws in the Western legal tradition, that is, the law was the written instrument that was made by a lawmaker. Where that once meant the king or crown, it now means for us, the legislature.
Is the revival of intentionalism a good thing, and should scholars and jurists reconsider the role of intent in legal interpretation?
Richard Ekins’ groundbreaking work on intentionalism has played a major role in its reemergence, as has Donald Drakeman’s recent work on originalism. Tara Grove, by contrast, has been one of the foremost critics of intentionalist approaches to legal interpretation. Join us as they debate whether a superior originalism understands that the core of interpretation is discerning and applying the will of the lawmaker.
Watch more episodes of The Kevin Roberts Show
Listen here...
Apple Podcasts(leave us a 5 star review!)
Still haven’t subscribed to The Heritage Foundation on YouTube? Click here ►
Follow The Heritage Foundation on Facebook
Follow The Heritage Foundation on Twitter
Follow The Heritage Foundation on Instagram
Links & Promotions
Guests & Subjects Covered
Sentinel Indexing in Progress
Metadata and chapters are available. Claim extraction for this episode is pending.
All video content is delivered via YouTube embedded players in accordance with the YouTube Terms of Service. Sentinel provides research tools that promote discovery and accountability across political media.









