ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a framework for examining the ambivalent and reciprocal connection between constitutional law and emotion in the antebellum era through three distinct lenses that correspond to three interrelated constitutional functions: text, instrument, and symbol. Weld's comment reflects a prolonged nineteenth-century struggle over the relationship between law and emotion in constitutional culture. Two dynamics – ambivalence and reciprocity – lie at the heart of the relationship between the United States Constitution and emotion. Ambivalence about emotion is hardwired into the 1787 Constitution through its simultaneous embrace of popular sovereignty and written constitutionalism. The dynamic between constitutional law and emotion is also reciprocal: just as constitutional law works to construct emotions, emotions work to construct constitutional law. Legal and literary historian Perry Miller called "the never-ending case of Heart versus Head" the "great issue" of nineteenth-century America, reflecting the dichotomous division within moral philosophy that characterized the era.
