To the chagrin of the vast majority of professors of constitutional law, President-elect Donald Trump has promised to appoint judges to the Supreme Court and throughout the federal judiciary who believe that the Constitution’s original meaning provides authoritative guidance in resolving cases and controversies.

In his farewell address last week, President Obama contended that his administration had accomplished more than one could have reasonably expected. But Donald Trump’s election threatens the legacy of the president who aspired to be transformative in the manner of Ronald Reagan.

President Donald Trump’s controversial executive order prohibiting nationals from seven countries roiled by jihadism from entering the United States for three months—and the administration’s bungled roll-out of the order—reminded foreign policy elites in both parties why they feared and loathed Trump. As if they needed a reminder. 

The allegation that Donald Trump’s presidency reflects the rise—or resurgence—of fascism in America has little basis in fact. But it is a sure way to amplify the scorn for Republicans gripping many on the left and the resentment of media and academic elites roiling many on the right. Such talk magnifies polarization and further debases American political discourse.

Administrative law is the collection of rules governing the welter of government agencies -- ranging from the Environmental Protection Agency and Food and Drug Administration to the Securities and Exchange Commission -- that are neither legislatures nor courts but which make binding law.

Donald Trump’s ascent to the presidency precipitated a rift of unprecedented proportions in American conservatism. To prevent a permanent split, conservatives must recover an appreciation of the enduring tensions that constitute their movement. Too few conservatives, however, are focusing on conciliation.

With the Trump administration careening from controversy to controversy, the denizens of Capitol Hill confirming the people’s low opinion of Congress, and much of elite media validating suspicions that they view themselves not primarily as reliable chroniclers of events but as a valiant political vanguard, it is easy to overlook the ideological pincer movement besieging classical liberalism from left and right. 

In the name of social justice and diversity, students at elite colleges are casting aside the very works that probe those topics so deeply. The central authors of the Western tradition—from Plato and Aristotle to Mill and Orwell—are no longer part of the required curriculum in the social sciences and the humanities. Their absence carries a high price.

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