This open access book can be downloaded from link.springer.com
Legal studies and consequently legal history focus on constitutional documents, believing in a nominalist autonomy of constitutional semantics. Reconsidering Constitutional Formation in the late 18^th and 19^th century, kept historic constitutions from being simply log-books for political experts through a functional approach to the interdependencies between constitution and public discourse. Sovereignty had to be 'believed' by the subjects and the political elites. Such a communicative orientation of...