
Kody W. Cooper
Dr. Kody W. Cooper is Associate Professor in the Institute of American Civics at the Baker School of Public Policy and Public Affairs, University of Tennessee-Knoxville. He is the author of The Classical and Christian Origins of American Politics: Political Theology, Natural Law, and the American Founding (Cambridge University Press, 2022) and Thomas Hobbes and the Natural Law (University of Notre Dame Press, 2018). His essays have appeared in various outlets including Newsweek, New Oxford Review, Public Discourse, Crisis, Law & Liberty, First Things, Return, and The Federalist. He lives with his wife and nine children in Tennessee. He can be followed on Twitter @DrKodyCooper.
Read Kody W. Cooper’s Essays

It has been said that Marbury v. Madison is the most significant case ever decided by the U.S. Supreme Court. The accolade may be overstated because the legal dispute between Marbury and Madison was left unresolved.
Political thinking in the modern democratic era easily lends itself to the reliance on simplifying labels – in other words, ideologies.
Last year I decided to fix our deck. It’s big, about 600 square feet, nine feet off the ground, and it was falling apart. Joists were rotting, and the whole thing was resting on one beam, when there should’ve been three. My foot went through the floor a couple of times.
In this essay, one of our student authors examines how Roman ideals of civic duty and freedom influenced the Federalist and Anti-Federalist debates, revealing their lasting impact on America's founding and modern democracy.
Biographer Ron Chernow explains, “Mark Twain has long been venerated as an emblem of Americana.” In this fascinating biography, Chernow explains why. Though the book runs to 1200 pp, it never becomes tedious; on the contrary, it is an enthralling read.
Until recently, anyone who believed there was anything fishy about the U.S. organ donation system was labeled a conspiracy theorist. Yet now the old adage: “What’s the difference between conspiracy and truth? About six months,” rings true again, as so-called conspiracy theorists have been proven right by none other than the federal Health and Resources Services Administration (HRSA) itself.
“War made the state,” said the political scientist Charles Tilly, “and the state made war.” Tilly was talking about actual states, but the same could be said about metaphorical states: states of mind, or perhaps of the soul.
Charles Rangel and Gerald Ford were veterans of the Korean War and World War II, respectively. When Rangel was elected to Congress in 1971, history brought him together with then-Michigan Rep. Jerry Ford, first elected to Congress in 1948.