What's the source of America's greatness?
For Eric Lane and Michael Oreskes -- a professor and a journalist -- our "extraordinary success" is not because of our square-jawed politicians or our innovative businessmen or our hard-working farmers.
It's our "unique form of government."
Their starting point: Our form of government is "self-contained." There's no Higher Authority, either in the form of God or king. The Constitution acknowledges that people are selfish and generally care only about themselves; it forces us to compromise for the greater good.
In short, our 7,000-word Constitution is a radical philosophical breakthrough that's also rubber-meets-the-road practical.
And the result? The longest-lived democracy in the history of the world.
Lane and Oreskes were sufficiently alarmed by their countrymen's dangerous ignorance of American history to write The Genius of America, a 220-page primer on the Constitution. [To buy a bargain hardcover from Amazon.com, click here. For the Kindle edition, click here.]
Lane and Oreskes begin by telling the story of the years between 1776 and 1787, when the success of the American experiment was anything but certain. We've all studied that period; I had forgotten almost everything about its divisiveness. And its aftermath: Do you remember, for example, that in 1798 John Adams and his allies criminalized criticism of their activities -- and arrested their critics?
Entire books have been written about the years leading up to the Bill of Rights; for Lane and Oreskes, it's just the prequel. The real protein in these pages is what happened next -- challenges to the system from the Confederacy to Martin Luther King to women's rights, seen through a Constitutional perspective.
For me, the most fascinating passages are about events of the last century -- in historical terms, "current events." I thought I was up on the Depression, but I had no idea that, in Franklin Roosevelt's first inaugural address, he got a huge ovation for suggesting he might need extraordinary powers to deal with the economic crisis. And FDR wasn't alone; Barron's Magazine called for a "genial and lighthearted dictator."
As it worked out, FDR found other ways to get what he wanted. But surviving the Depression and emerging as a superpower after World War II didn't dampen that conversation. Our recent history suggests that we don't agree on much -- Lane and Oreskes frame the story of the last half-century as a debate between government-as-problem and government-as-solution.
Starting with Ronald Reagan, they write, Americans began to question the value of once-sacred institutions. To say this worries them is to understate: "We make mistakes as a country when we move away from how our system was built to work." Their warning is stark: "The wrong crisis at the wrong moment could push us over the edge before we realize what we have done."
The important contribution of this small book is to remind us that democracy is fragile -- and that we should not despair at the debate we are having. The framers would smile at our struggles; they knew them well. And they would presumably tell us what Lane and Oreskes do: Look back, look back. If we want to move forward, for the sake of our democracy, look back.
[Cross-posted from HeadButler.com]
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And no longer a young country.
Once more people will realize that any country is always a work in progress I think they will start paying more attention, vote and hopefully participate.
I know ... good luck.
And this is one good reason why it takes so much to make an amendment law.
It is actually surprizing how many people know so little about our history. Some even on HP seem to think that America goes back no further than 1946 and that we were a product of the UN and not the other way around.
It would also help if other nations like Mexico would quit trying to insert their two-cents into our national discussions. They don't understand at all how our system works and are terrified we will change parts of our Constitution they like.
"They're going to repeal the 14th Amendment!" Horsefeathers!
The laws going on the books that are questionable will eventually go to the SCOTUS and be measured against our sacred document. If they do not they can be thrown out or tweeked to where they do measure up.
What is scarey is that even people like Maddow and Oberman don't seem to understand the difference. It will take a lot more united Congress than we have to repeal an Amendment. Adjusting it takes a law that offends people that goes before the Supreme Court.
But yes the basics are written in steel if not stone and it can change but that takes a lot of work and the REAL will of the People.
With this in mind, the right-wing knows that they have an advantage, and they are taking advantage of it. The 2000 election, the PATRIOT Act, and the continuing appointment saga are all evidence of the malfeasance that the right-wing is getting away with.
We need major reform, and the justice system (particularly the SCOTUS) is high on the list. If nothing else, we need to have the ability to vote justices out of office, or the executive needs the power to remove them.
This is like calling one child screaming at another an intelligent conversation.