As everyone knows, the United States Constitution is a tangible, visible document. Many see it in fact as a sacred text, holding no meaning other than that which is clearly visible on the page. Yet as renowned legal scholar Laurence Tribe shows, what is not written in the Constitution plays a key role in its interpretation. Indeed some of the most contentious Constitutional debates of our time hinge on the extent to which it can admit of divergent readings. In The Invisible Constitution, Tribe argues that there is an unseen constitution--impalpable but powerful--that accompanies the parchment version. It is the visible document's shadow, its dark matter: always there and possessing some of its key meanings and values despite its absence on the page. As Tribe illustrates, some of our most cherished and widely held beliefs about constitutional rights are not part of the written document, but can only be deduced by piecing together hints and clues from it. Moreover, some passages of the Constitution do not even hold today despite their continuing existence. Amendments may have fundamentally altered what the Constitution originally said about slavery and voting rights, yet the old provisos about each are still in the text, unrevised. Through a variety of historical episodes and key constitutional cases, Tribe brings to life this invisible constitution, showing how it has evolved and how it works. Detailing its invisible structures and principles, Tribe compellingly demonstrates the invisible constitution's existence and operative power. Remarkably original, keenly perceptive, and written with Tribe's trademark analytical flair, this latest volume in Oxford's Inalienable Rights series offers a new way of understanding many of the central constitutional debates of our time.

勞倫斯·卻伯美國當代憲法學大師，1941年齣生於中國上海，二戰結束後隨傢人赴美，1966年獲哈佛法學院法律博士學位，此後任教於哈佛法學院，並長期擔任拉爾夫·泰勒憲法學講座教授，2004年起，晉升至哈佛大學最高教職，卡爾．洛布校級教授。他的主要著作包括《美國憲法》、《憲法中的選擇》、《閱讀憲法》，《看不見的憲法》是他最新的專著。教書育人主外，卻伯教授還曾在聯邦最高法院代理憲法案件達34次之多，其中包括2000年的布什訴戈爾，1986年的鮑沃思訴哈德維剋，被譽為“這個時代最偉大的上訴審律師”。在他的學生奧巴馬當選為美國總統後，卻伯還被任命為司法部“資深顧問”，負責窮人法律援助的改革項目。現己重返哈佛法學院任教。