FROM SETH BARRETT TILLMAN: Sweeping and Forcing the President into Section 3: A Response to William Baude and Michael Stokes Paulsen.

Does the full “sweep and force” of Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment disqualify Donald Trump from the presidency? In a new article, William Baude and Michael Stokes Paulsen argue that the answer is yes because “essentially all the evidence concerning the original textual meaning of Section Three . . . points in the same direction . . . .” This sweeping conclusion is not accurate. Establishing the original public meaning of Section 3 is difficult because there is originalist and textualist evidence pointing in different directions. Our research is built on more than a decade of scholarship in areas that are, regrettably, neglected in modern courts and scholarship, but would have been well understood in the 1860s.

If you want to move America closer to a Civil War, make Trump supporters feel that the 2024 election is illegitimate. Especially if it is. It’s that simple.