Historical Rhetoric and the Images of Law: Legal Fundamentalism as Ideology

Abstract

Abstract The rhetoric and vocabulary that guide current debates over the role of the Supreme Court in judicial review reflect struggle between competing ideologies. Ideologies are preconscious explanations and rationales for guiding social action. In the political realm, ideologies provide the concepts and theories for policy, shape public discourse, and thus may become a form of rhetoric by which some groups attempt to persuade others in the value of their ideas. Hence, ideologies become one instrument in political struggle; they embody power contests between competing world views, policies and practices. In recent years, such a contest has occurred in the judicial realm, as legal fundamentalists have attempted to revise the history of Constitutional law as a means of implementing and solidifying political advantage. This paper examines “legal fundamentalism,” as exemplified particularly by Attorney General Edwin Meese, as an example of how historical interpretations reflect new ideologies that in turn h...