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Bureaucracy in America: The Administrative State’s Challenge to Constitutional Government

by Joseph Postell

University of Missouri Press, 2017
Cloth: 978-0-8262-2123-0 | eISBN: 978-0-8262-7378-9
Library of Congress Classification KF5402.P678 2017

ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE

ABOUT THIS BOOK

The rise of the administrative state is the most significant political development in American politics over the past century. While our Constitution separates powers into three branches, and requires that the laws are made by elected representatives in the Congress, today most policies are made by unelected officials in agencies where legislative, executive, and judicial powers are combined. This threatens constitutionalism and the rule of law. This book examines the history of administrative power in America and argues that modern administrative law has failed to protect the principles of American constitutionalism as effectively as earlier approaches to regulation and administration.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Joseph Postell is Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Colorado-Colorado Springs, where he teaches courses in Administrative Law, American political thought and American political institutions, particularly Congress and political parties. He received his Ph.D. in 2010 from the University of Dallas.

Postell is the editor (with Bradley C.S. Watson) of Rediscovering Political Economy (Lexington, 2011) and (with Johnathan O’Neill) Toward an American Conservatism: Constitutional Conservatism during the Progressive Era. He has published scholarly articles in The Review of Politics, American Political Thought, and Perspectives on Political Science, and has written for a variety of popular publications including the Claremont Review of Books, the Washington Times, and National Review. He currently resides in Colorado Springs, CO.

REVIEWS

“Federal bureaucracy often seems to roam far beyond what Congress has clearly authorized and often does so without meaningful check from courts. Postell’s book demonstrates that Americans have worried about over-reaching officials since colonial times. Bureaucracy in America shows what we can learn from past efforts to secure the people’s rights, even from government officials.”—Jeremy A. Rabkin, George Mason University, author of Law without Nations?

“The labyrinthine edifice of administrative law can be neither wholly reconciled with the nation’s deepest principles nor wholly efface them, and Postell’s clear explication of what is at stake in this notoriously complex subject will make this book a landmark in the field.”—Johnathan O’Neill, Georgia Southern University, author of Originalism in American Law and Politics: A Constitutional History

“Postell’s book shines a light on the new reality of American government: Critical national policies are made, by and large, by bureaucratic agencies today, not by Congress and not even, in many cases, by the president. This new reality raises vital constitutional questions—questions which have, with just a few exceptions, been ignored in the scholarly literature. Postell’s examination of these vital questions is meticulously researched, balanced, and persuasive. Employing a unique combination of political theory, American political thought, and administrative and constitutional law, Bureaucracy in America will be an important work to scholars in all of these disciplines, and will also be of interest to citizens and policymakers alike.”—Ronald J. Pestritto, Graduate Dean at Hillsdale College and author of Woodrow Wilson and the Roots of Modern Liberalism

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Table of Contents

Introduction
Chapter 1 – An Improved Science of Administration: Administration and the American Founding
Chapter 2 – Well-Regulated and Free: Administration and Constitutionalism in the Early Republic
Chapter 3 – Executive-Centered Administration: Administrative Law and Constitutionalism during the Jacksonian Era
Chapter 4 – The Beginning of Bureaucracy? Administrative Power after the Civil War
Chapter 5 – A New Science of Administration: Progressivism and the Administrative State
Chapter 6 – The Crisis of Legitimacy: The New Deal Challenge to American Constitutionalism
Chapter 7 – “A Surrogate Political Process”: The 1970s Administrative Law Revolution
Chapter 8 – The Conservative Counterrevolution? The Rise of a Jurisprudence of Deference
Conclusion – The Ongoing Crisis of Legitimacy
Notes
Bibliography
Index

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