ABSTRACT
There is nothing novel about users of violence claiming legitimacy by linking their actions to interpretations of law, the Constitution or democratic theory. Indeed, late nineteenth-century vigilantes were particularly fond of demonstrating, at least to their own satisfaction, that not only had they done nothing wrong in executing alleged malefactors, but that they had acted wholly within the framework prescribed by the American constitutional system.1 Nonetheless, such highly elaborated rationalizations for violence are normally few in number and rarely visible to the larger population.
