We the People: A History of the US Constitution

About the Book

WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE IN HISTORY 2026

ONE OF BARACK OBAMA'S FAVORITE BOOKS OF 2025

LONGLISTED FOR THE ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE IN NONFICTION 2025

THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

A THE ECONOMIST, HISTORY TODAY, NEW YORK TIMES, NEW YORKER AND WASHINGTON POST BOOK OF THE YEAR

On the 250th anniversary of America's founding - a landmark history of the US Constitution for a troubling new era.

The US Constitution is among the oldest constitutions in the world - and one of the most difficult to amend. Although nearly twelve thousand amendments have been proposed since 1789, only twenty-seven have ever been ratified. Tellingly, the Constitution has not been meaningfully amended since 1971. Without amendment, the risk of political violence rises. So does the risk of constitutional change by presidential power.

Leading Harvard historian Jill Lepore captures the stories of generations of ordinary people who have attempted everything from abolishing the Electoral College to guaranteeing environmental rights, hoping to mend their nation. Recounting the history of America through centuries of efforts to realize the promise of the Constitution, we witness how nearly all those bids have failed.

We the People is the sweeping account of a struggle, arguing that the Constitution was never intended to be preserved, but was expected to be gradually altered. At a time when the risk of political violence is all too real, it hints at the prospects for a better, amended America.

About the Author :
Jill Lepore is the David Woods Kemper '41 Professor of American History at Harvard University, where she teaches classes in evidence, historical methods, the humanities, and American political history. She is the author of The Name of War: King Philip's War and the Origins of American Identity (winner of the Bancroft Prize), New York Burning: Liberty, Slavery and Conspiracy in Eighteenth-Century Manhattan (a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize), The Secret History of Wonder Woman (winner of the American History Book Prize), If Then (longlisted for the National Book Award) and many other titles. She is a staff writer at the New Yorker, host of the podcast The Last Archive, and was the winner of the Hannah Arendt Prize for Political Thought in 2021.

Review :
It is impossible to imagine a more instructive text on a more timely subject by a more accomplished historian An arresting chronicle of Americans striving - if sometimes failing - to remake their republic We the People contains compelling accounts of the constitutional convention . . . As ever, Lepore writes with literary flair, offering striking character studies, often of Americans who fought for change but are now largely forgotten In her characteristically lively history of the US Constitution, Lepore argues that the document's capacity for amendment was not only central to the founders' political thinking but essential to its ratification . . . Lepore's passionate denunciation of this theory of constitutional interpretation paints it as one of the "stranger paradoxes" of American constitutional history Startling and innovative . . . A vivid portrait of mostly unfamiliar voices of constitutional demurral from this archive and beyond . . . Left hanging in the air at the end of this rewarding book is a dark question: At what cost have we abandoned amendment? We the People is most illuminating when it unearths long-ignored but prescient provisions that sprang from groups excluded from the body politic . . . a compelling case for the need to institute constitutional reforms and steer away from a system heavily reliant on the actions of a hyper-politicized Supreme Court Lepore's sweeping new history of efforts to amend the constitution is so relevant . . . thoughtful and engaging A gifted storyteller Traces the history of constitutional amendment and the significance of the constitutional tradition to the American state Offers an arresting chronicle of Americans striving - if sometimes failing - to remake their republic