Author Event: A.J. Jacobs, "The Year of Living Constitutionally"

Darien Library, along with The Mather Homestead and Barrett Bookstore, welcomes back A.J. Jacobs, who will discuss his new book, The Year of Living Constitutionally: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Constitution's Original Meaning.

A.J. Jacobs, having lived "biblically” for a year in his previous book, now turns to “living constitutionally”, and fans will love his lighthearted, yet meaningful experience in doing so. He learned the hard way that donning a tricorne hat and marching around Manhattan with a 1700s musket will earn you a lot of strange looks.

In The Year of Living Constitutionally, A.J. Jacobs tries to get inside the minds of the Founding Fathers by living as closely as possible to the original meaning of the Constitution. He asserts his right to free speech by writing his opinions on parchment with a quill and handing them out to strangers in Times Square. He consents to quartering a soldier, as is his Third Amendment right. He turns his home into a traditional 1790s household by lighting candles instead of using electricity, boiling mutton, and—because women were not allowed to sign contracts— feebly attempting to take over his wife’s day job, which involves a lot of contract negotiations.

The book blends unforgettable adventures—delivering a handwritten petition to Congress, applying for a Letter of Marque to become a legal pirate for the government, and battling redcoats as part of a Revolutionary War reenactment group—with dozens of interviews from constitutional experts from both sides. Jacobs dives deep into originalism and living constitutionalism, the two rival ways of interpreting the document.

Jacobs provides a crash course on our Constitution as he experiences the benefits and perils of living like it’s the 1790s. He relishes, for instance, the slow thinking of the era, free from social media alerts. But also discovers the progress we’ve made since 1789 when married women couldn’t own property.

In the wake of several controversial rulings by the Supreme Court and the on-going debate about how the Constitution should be interpreted, Jacobs has set out to understand what it means to live by the Constitution. Now more than ever, Americans need to understand its meaning and value. As politicians and Supreme Court Justices wage a high-stakes battle over how literally we should interpret the Constitution, A.J. Jacobs provides an entertaining yet illuminating look into how this storied document fits into our democracy today.

About the Author

A.J. Jacobs is a journalist, lecturer, and human guinea pig who has written four bestselling books—including Drop Dead Healthy and The Year of Living Biblically—that blend memoir, science, humor, and a dash of self-help. A contributor to NPR, The New York Times, and Esquire, among other media outlets, Jacobs lives in New York City with his family. 

A.J. visited Darien Library in the fall of 2022 to discuss his book, The Puzzler.

Books will be available to purchase, courtesy of Barrett Bookstore.