Claes Ryn references this article in Humanitas: The Unraveling of American Constitutionalism: From Customary Law to Permanent Innovation, Joseph Baldacchino (pdf)

The deep roots of American constitutionalism in English political tradition and culture have been succinctly and persuasively demonstrated by Joseph Baldacchino in "The Unraveling of American Constitutionalism: From Customary Law to Permanent Innovation," Humanitas, Vol. XVIII, Nos. 1 & 2 (2005). The American colonists wanted independence not because they subscribed to ahistorical, abstract principles but because they saw King and Parliament as violating precedent and custom and introducing unacceptable innovation. The colonists protested a breach of continuity and sought to reclaim their historically evolved rights as Englishmen.