ABSTRACT
While most observers agree that rights assertion in the United States is more common than elsewhere, their appraisals of its impact, effectiveness and appropriateness vary greatly. Mary Ann Glendon opines about an America gorged on rights, with individuals unburdened by a conception of the common good unable or unwilling to control their assertions of rights. I From an empirical base, Gerald Rosenberg argues that efforts to use the Supreme Court to achieve social and political change in civil rights, women's rights, and abortion have been less successful than is generally claimed.2 Cass Sun stein believes that a 'rights revolution' resulted from congressional and presidential initiative in the 1960s and 1970s, and has transformed our understanding of constitutional democracy.3
