William G. Merkel
Publications
Articles in Law Reviews and Other Scholarly Journals
"Heller as Hubris, and How McDonald v. City of Chicago May Well Change the Constitutional World As We Know It," 50 Santa Clara Law Review 1221 (2010). [403 KB PDF]
"The District of Columbia v. Heller and Antonin Scalia's Perverse Sense of Originalism," 13 Lewis and Clark Law Review 349 (2009).
» Cited in Breyer dissent: McDonald v. City of Chicago, Illinois (U.S. Supreme Court, June 28, 2010, p. 3).
"Jefferson's Failed Anti-Slavery Proviso of 1784 and the Nascence of Free Soil Constitutionalism," 38 Seton Hall Law Review 555 (2008). (Selected for the Stanford / Yale Junior Faculty Forum, 2006).
"Parker v. the District of Columbia and the Hollowness of Originalist Claims to Principled Neutrality," 18 George Mason University Civil Rights Law Journal 251 (2008).
"Mandatory Gun Ownership, The Militia Census of 1806, and Background Assumptions Concerning the Early American Right to Arms: A Cautious Response to Robert Churchill," 25 Law & History Review 188 (2007).
"A Cultural Turn: Reflections on Recent Historical and Legal Writing on the Second Amendment," 17 Stanford Law & Policy Review 671 (2006).
"Scottish Factors and the Origins of the Second Amendment: Some Reflections on David Thomas Konig's Rediscovery of the Caledonian Background to the American Right to Arms," 22 Law and History Review 169 (2004) (with Professor H. Richard Uviller).
"Authors Reply to Commentaries on, and Criticisms of The Militia and the Right to Arms, Or, How the Second Amendment Fell Silent," 12 William and Mary Bill of Rights Law Journal 357 (2004) (with H. Richard Uviller).
"To See Oneself as the Target of Justified Revolution: Thomas Jefferson and Gabriel's Uprising," 4 American Nineteenth Century History 1 (2003) (read abstract).
"The Second Amendment in Context: The Case of the Vanishing Predicate," 76 Chicago-Kent Law Review 403 (2000) (with Professor H. Richard Uviller) (764 KB PDF; requires Adobe Acrobat Reader).
Books and Monographs
The Militia and the Right to Arms, Or, How the Second Amendment Fell Silent (with Professor H. Richard Uviller). Duke University Press, Constitutional Conflicts Series, 2003 (published in conjunction with the Institute of Bill of Rights Law at the College of William and Mary). Reviewed by Robert Shalhope, 108 American Historical Review 1442 (2003).
Chapters in Books
"Second Amendment" and "Raise Armies," Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States (David S. Tanenhaus, editor in chief) (Detroit : Macmillan Reference USA, 2008).
"Muting the Second Amendment: The Disappearance of the Constitutional Militia" (with Professor H. Richard Uviller) in The Second Amendment in Law and History, 148-178 (The New Press, 2001) (Carl N. Bogus, editor).
Book Reviews
The Founders' Second Amendment: Origin of the Right to Bear Arms, Stephen P. Halbrook, (Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 2008), 114 American Historical Review 1074 (2009).
A Well Regulated Militia: The Founding Fathers and the Origins of Gun Control in America, Saul Cornell, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006) 112 The American Historical Review 842 (2007).
Presentations
Speaker, "Bearing Arms: Policy, Policing, and Incorporation after Heller," Santa Clara Law Review Symposium, Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, California, January 22, 2010.
"Guns on Campus? The New Understanding of the Right to Bear Arms," A Dialogue, Discussion, and Debate sponsored by the Dorothy L. Thompson Civil Rights Lecture Series in celebration of Constitution Day, Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas, September 16, 2009. [Watch video of Merkel presentation (117:21 minutes).]
"The District of Columbia v. Heller and Justice Scalia's Perverse Sense of Originalism," Midwestern Law Schools Junior Faculty Forum, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri, October 3, 2008.
"Dubious Originalism and the Supreme Court's Second Amendment Decision," Faculty Symposium, University of Houston Law Center, September 8, 2008.
"The Supreme Court, Popular Constitutionalism, and the Right to Guns," Justice and Jury Trials in the USA Lectures, University of Parma Faculty of Law, Parma, Italy, June 25, 2008.
"Gun Rights, the Second Amendment, and the Coming Rapture," Law and Society Association Annual Meeting, Montreal, Quebec, May 29, 2008.
Chaired "Expounding the Constitution: Fulfilling the Founding Fathers' Ideal?" panel session and commented on four papers on recent trends in American federalism at the European Association of American Studies Biennial Conference, Oslo, Norway, May 10, 2008.
"Dubious Originalism and the Supreme Court's Impending Second Amendment Revolution," British Association of American Studies (BAAS) Annual Conference, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland, March 29, 2008.
"Dubious Originalism and the Supreme Court's Impending Second Amendment Revolution," University of California Hastings College of the Law Faculty Colloquium, January 23, 2008 and University of San Francisco School of Law Faculty Scholarship and Teaching Workshop, January 24, 2008.
"Parker v. the District of Columbia and the Hollowness of Originalist Claims to Principled Neutrality," George Mason University Civil Rights Law Journal Symposium, October 17, 2007.
"Jefferson and Anti-Slavery Revisited," faculty workshop paper at the University of Kansas School of Law, February, 2007.
"Jefferson, the Territorial Governance Act of 1784, and the Origins of Free Soil," fellow's forum paper at the International Center for Jefferson Studies at Monticello, Charlottesville, Virginia July, 2006.
"Jefferson's Failed Anti-Slavery Proviso of 1784 and the Nascence of Free Constitutionalism," Yale/Stanford Junior Faculty Forum, New Haven, Connecticut, May 2006 (best paper in constitutional history).
"Judicial Review & Popular Politics During the Jeffersonian Era," British Association of American Studies (BAAS) annual conference, University of Kent, Canterbury, England, April 22, 2006.
"A Cultural Turn in Second Amendment Scholarship," The Second Amendment: Old Problems, New Paradigms (symposium), Stanford Law School, Palo Alto, California, September 16, 2005.
"The New Contextual History of Marbury v. Madison," Oxford University Graduate Seminar in American History, Oxford, England, May 16, 2005.
"The Supreme Court and the Guantanamo Detainees," British Association of American Studies (BAAS) annual conference, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, England, April 16, 2004.
"Did the Fourteenth Amendment Change the Meaning of the Second Amendment?" Fellows' Forum, Rothermere American Institute at Oxford, June 11, 2003.
"Was the Right to Arms Designed to Protect the Slave Patrols Against Disarmament by the Abolitionists?" British Association of American Studies (BAAS) annual conference, University of Wales in Aberystwyth, April 12, 2003.
"Response to Comment and Critique by Randy Barnett, Sanford Levinson, and Jonathan Simon," conference launching Uviller & Merkel's Militia and the Right to Arms at the Bill of Rights Law Institute, William and Mary Law School, Williamsburg, Virginia January 24, 2003.
"Thomas Jefferson, the Doctrine of Justifiable Homicide, and Gabriel's Uprising," Washington & Lee Law Center, Lexington, Virginia, September 9, 2002.
"To See Oneself as the Target of a Justified Revolution: Thomas Jefferson and Gabriel's Uprising," British Association of American Studies (BAAS) annual conference, Oxford, April 7, 2002.
"The Sophists' Favorite Liberty: Locke, Blackstone, and the Constitutional Right to Armed Insurrection," Oxford University Research Seminar on American History, October 29, 2001.
"The Second Amendment in Context," Symposium on the Second Amendment: Fresh Looks, Chicago-Kent College of Law, April 28, 2000 (with Professor H. Richard Uviller).
