Translation Approaches in Constitutional Hermeneutics

• Published in: International journal for the semiotics of law = Revue internationale de sémiotique juridique Vol. 33; no. 2; pp. 299 - 323
• Main Authors: Lind, Hans, Mulligan, Christina, Douma, Michael, Quinn, Brian
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Dordrecht Springer Netherlands 01.06.2020
• Subjects: Applied Linguistics; Fundamentals of Law; Law; Law and Criminolgy; Legal History; Philosophy of Law; Theories of Law; Translation; German; Interpretation; Dutch; Originalism; Constitution
• ISSN: 0952-8059; 1572-8722
• DOI: 10.1007/s11196-020-09708-7

In this article, we suggest an alternate approach to interpreting the US Constitution, using founding-era translations. We demonstrate how both symmetries and asymmetries in structure and vocabulary of the languages involved can help in deciding nowadays’ problems of constitutional interpretation. We select seven controversial passages of the US constitution to illustrate our approach: Art. I, § 8, cl. 3 (“to regulate commerce”); Art. II, § 1, cl. 5 (“natural born citizen”); Art. II, § 2, cl. 3 (“recess”); Art. I, § 6, cl. 1/Art. I, § 8, cl. 10/Art. IV, § 2 (“felony”); and Art. IV, § 2, cl. 1 (“privileges and immunities”). Since these passages have recently been debated by constitutional scholars, reassessing them using our method can establish the additional value of our approach to constitutional practice. We presume that our approach is not limited to interpreting the US constitution, but suggest that constitutional hermeneutics in general could profit from adding a translation approach to the toolkit.