Ken Kersch and the Meaning of Development: Law, Ideas, and the Politics of Constitutional Change

This article honors Kenneth I. Kersch’s enduring influence on American Political Development (APD) and constitutional politics. It argues that Kersch transformed understandings of “development.” He did so by integrating ideational and institutional analyses and rejecting linear accounts of constitutional progress. His work—especially Con-structing Civil Liberties, The Supreme Court and American Political Development, and Conservatives and the Constitution—demonstrates how ideas, institutions, and actors inside and outside the courts interact to shape constitutional meaning. Our article highlights Kersch’s non-lin-ear model of development, where rights expand and contract through ideological struggle and institutional contestation. It also applies Kersch’s framework to the Roberts Court, showing how its contradic-tory rulings on executive and administrative power reflect competing conservative traditions and exemplify discontinuous development. Through historical depth and theoretical innovation, Kersch redefined the study of constitutional change, leaving a legacy that continues to shape APD, our own research, and the interdisciplinary study of law, politics, and ideas.