TODAY IN HISTORY: On October 27, 1787, the first of the Federalist Papers (this one written by Alexander Hamilton) was published and handed out on street corners in New York. Over the course of the next 10 months, 85 short little essays were hastily written by Hamilton, John Jay, or James Madison and distributed. Each explained some aspect of the proposed Constitution and advocated for its ratification.  They weren’t written for the ages, but a few of them nevertheless became classics of political theory. And they are worth reading as a group.

I once wrote a paper that asked whether law professors were following in the footsteps of the authors of the Federalist Papers by blogging instead of writing battleship law review articles that hardly anybody reads. But upon reflection … I must have been on drugs.