Heather Gerken has a characteristically thoughtful response to my post on the “federalism insurance premium.” Heather agrees with me that willingness of the party in power decentralize controversial issues is weakened by each side’s intolerance toward ideological disagreement. She also agrees that more tolerance would be a good thing: When Democrats hold the Presidency, they should allow Red states more latitude to adopt conservative policies, and vice versa.
Heather disagrees with me, however, about whether constitutional conventions and institutions of federalism are relevant solutions to this problem. In her words,
“… the give-and-take has more to do with politics than institutions. Put differently, it’s not federalism that matters here, but pluralism. And a pluralist system only flourishes when both sides are willing to live and let live…”
The core of our disagreement is, in short, about whether and how legal institutions promote pluralist politics. After the jump, I will explain why I think that Heather is mistaken to contrast institutions and politics as if they are distinct mechanisms for promoting pluralism. As I have argued