From the historic campus of Hillsdale College in Hillsdale, Michigan, where the good, the true, and the beautiful are taught, nurtured, and honored, this is the Radio Free Hillsdale Hour, bringing the activity and education of the college to listeners across the country.

Originalism can actually be very easily defined in one sentence, and that is the view that the meaning of the Constitution should remain the same until it's properly changed by amendment.

It's very simple. It's an idea just so simple that it

might just be right. And it's an idea that's been with us since the founding. This is your host,

Scott Bertram. Welcome to the Radio Free Hillsdale Hour, part of the Hillsdale College podcast network.

That was American legal scholar Randy Barnett. His brand new memoir is just

out, A Life for Liberty, The Making of an American Originalist. We'll talk in depth with Randy

about his story and the story of originalism in just a bit. First, we're joined by Dr. Joseph

Postel. He is Associate Professor of Politics here at Hillsdale College. Dr. Postel,

thanks for joining us. Great to be with you. Talking as the Republican National Convention

is about to begin here in 2024 and thought it would be a good conversation to talk about the

history of political conventions here in the United States and how they've changed, adjusted through the years.

How do we begin? How do political conventions get their start here in the U.S.?

Yeah, so the idea of a political convention is hatched out of a really tumultuous period in American politics that we call the era of good feelings,

but which was actually not the era of good feelings, it was actually a very nasty period in

American politics, roughly, say, 1808 to 1824. It's the one time in American history where

we didn't have two parties. We really only had one viable political party in the country.

And that was sort of the Jeffersonian Democratic Party.

They called themselves the Republican Party back then, but they actually were the Democratic Party today.

And the problem with that system was they really didn't have a good way to nominate presidential candidates because you didn't really have a system in which

somebody could be known throughout the whole country. And the system for nominating candidates

really wasn't devised by the Constitution. There's nothing in the Constitution about parties or

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