Join John Kowal, VP of Programs at the Brennan Center, for a book talk on his forthcoming book, The People’s Constitution: How Social Movements and Civil Society Organizations Have Shaped the U.S. Constitution (The New Press, 2021), co-authored with SLS alumnus Wilfred Codrington III. The book evaluates the role of social movements and civil society organizations in effecting constitutional change in the United States. Broad-based social movements played a crucial role in many amendment fights: from the nascent organizing of Anti-Federalists who demanded changes to the new Constitution; to the powerful 19th century movements for temperance, abolition of slavery, and women’s suffrage; to the modernizing crusades of the Populists and Progressives; to the civil rights revolution of the 1960s. By the turn of the 20th century, these campaigns were increasingly shaped by professionalized pressure groups. These increasingly sophisticated civil society organizations, not necessarily representing movements, pioneered strategies of research, organizing, communications, lobbying, and political pressure to transform the politics of constitutional amendments. The book also draws lessons for activists thinking ahead to the next wave of constitutional change.

John F. Kowal is the Brennan Center’s vice president for programs, responsible for guiding the organization’s Democracy, Justice, and Liberty & National Security Programs. He also manages the Brennan Center’s Fellows Program. Kowal’s areas of expertise include constitutional reform and judicial independence. Before joining the Brennan Center, Kowal developed and led grantmaking programs at the Open Society Foundations and Ford Foundation on issues related to democracy, justice, human rights, and the rule of law. He began his career as a litigation attorney in the New York City law firms of Cravath, Swaine & Moore and Schulte Roth & Zabel, where he handled a wide range of civil and regulatory litigation. He is a graduate of New York University and Harvard Law School.