Can we keep this great American experiment?

00:00

{"text":[[{"start":6.05,"text":"Joanna, my wife, once promised our grandchildren that she would give $20 to each of them who learnt Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address by heart. Most did. Almost all of them learnt at least the first two sentences. Those two sentences are important, for they help explain, then and now, why we think of our country as a Nation of Documents and not a Nation of a Single Tribe. "}],[{"start":29.25,"text":"Consider the first sentence: “Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.” Those last few words had made their author, Thomas Jefferson, immortal. Jefferson wrote: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness — That to secure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” "}],[{"start":64.75,"text":"By the time I grew up, just after the second world war, we had elaborated further on these basic “unalienable rights”. We are a democracy, we search for equality, but we do more. We protect basic liberties, such as free speech, free press and others listed in the Constitution. We insist upon a separation of powers, vertically (states, federal government) and horizontally (three branches of the federal government) so that no group of individuals becomes too powerful. "}],[{"start":93.2,"text":"We follow a “rule of law”, self-governance through laws that we make collectively and not through the exercise of brute power. And some historians tell us that the words “pursuit of happiness” reflect an effort to devise a nation of laws based on reason and not simply upon emotion or what James Madison called “faction”. "}],[{"start":113.9,"text":"That first sentence thus encapsulated the basic values that have offered us guidance since the nation’s founding and to which Lincoln in the midst of the civil war referred. They are values that Joanna wanted our grandchildren to understand. But she wanted our grandchildren also to become familiar with Lincoln’s second sentence. It says, “Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.” "}],[{"start":141.75,"text":"The word often used to describe that to which Lincoln refers here is “experiment”. The “Great Experiment”, as George Washington wrote on January 9 1790, represented “the last great experiment for promoting human happiness”. It is an “experiment” in a republican form of government, written into our Constitution, which will continue to exist only (as Benjamin Franklin told the woman outside Independence Hall) “if you can keep it”. It is an experiment in government, “of”, “by” and “for . . . the people”, as Lincoln pointed out at Gettysburg. "}],[{"start":176,"text":"Can we keep it? There are some today who fear not. But I am not so pessimistic. I would invite the pessimists to come with me when I describe the constitutional job of the Supreme Court to law school, university or high-school students. I tell them that this document, the Constitution, is now theirs; they are the ones who must make certain the great experiment succeeds. "}],[{"start":197,"text":"I tell them something I first learnt working on the Senate staff. When you foresee opposition to your proposal or point of view, find someone you believe intelligent, who genuinely believes the opposite to you, and talk to them. Talk civilly. Wait. Don’t talk too much. Listen. Eventually they are likely to say something you genuinely agree with. Then say, “Stop. You have made a good point. Let’s see if we can work with that.” And you often, not always but often, will be able to work out a compromise. If you get 30 per cent of what you want, great! Take it. Don’t hold out for 100 per cent of nothing. And the students look interested. It is what they want. They will help. This is what makes me an optimist. "}],[{"start":237.75,"text":"Interest alone, of course, is not enough. The next generations, my grandchildren and their children, must learn how our governments work — federal, state and local. They must learn about the wisdom and values in our foundational documents. They must learn how to participate. And they must start early. "}],[{"start":255.85,"text":"As my colleague Sandra Day O’Connor pointed out, “The practice of democracy is not passed down through the gene pool. It must be taught and learned anew by each generation.” She was a fan of what used to be called “Twelfth Grade Civics”, and so am I. There are groups of teachers and citizens who are trying to see that civic knowledge is taught once again throughout the nation: iCivics, the Annenberg Center, the Miller Center, the Federal Judicial Center and many others. They are trying to help. Perhaps even more importantly, we must continue to learn and to practise what may be an American speciality: working together. This also starts early. We learnt to work together at grammar school, where my fifth-grade teacher would divide us into groups of four, assign a project to each of the groups and give one grade to each. Such lessons paid off when we saw the country work together during the Covid-19 pandemic, when, in city after city, people would form groups to check up on old and vulnerable people to see that they were all right, and help those who needed help. "}],[{"start":319.6,"text":"If we want practical instruction, we can still read the words of Alexis de Tocqueville, that great French scholar. He wrote in the 1830s that when he approached the United States, he heard “noise” and endless arguing. But he knew that was a virtue, not a vice. He feared a silent “aristocracy” producing inequality and suppressing liberty. That “noise”, he believed, was the noise of associations, many different associations, ranging from book groups to civil liberties unions, to town halls. When faced with problems, their members would debate, discuss, argue and suggest experiments. And those problems included all sorts of civic problems, from livestock grazing to elections. Perhaps today they would include how we should deal with the internet or AI. "}],[{"start":366.45000000000005,"text":"De Tocqueville would probably stress the need for broad and inclusive association that does not turn our nation of documents into groups of individually exclusive, indeed tribal, cultures. But he would not fear experiment. After all, he said that the “greatness of America lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation, but rather in her ability to repair her faults”. "}],[{"start":389.95000000000005,"text":"Perhaps because I am a judge, I feel there is one American virtue that helps to support the others. I mean the rule of law and its capacity to protect us against our worst impulses. In this spirit, I always suggest to my students that they read Albert Camus’s The Plague. It is ostensibly about a lethal plague that hit the city of Oran in Algeria. But, more likely, it is about France when occupied by the Nazis. When the plague left the city, there was great joy. But Camus wrote that “such joy is always imperilled . . . The plague bacillus never dies or disappears for good.” It goes into remission. It can lurk for years in “furniture and linen-chests”, “in bedrooms, cellars, trunks and bookshelves”. He warned that perhaps the day would come, to the misfortune or education of mankind, when it would re-awaken its rats and “send them forth to die in a [once-]happy city”."}],[{"start":445.40000000000003,"text":"The rule of law, I believe, is a weapon that not only helps to support our constitutional values but militates against the re-awakening of that “plague germ” of unchecked power. Along with those values, it uniquely helps to assure the success of our American experiment. My grandchildren, indeed the children of the 21st century, must learn the history of those values, discuss them with others, including those who disagree, and use them to lead the world by example. I hope they do so."}],[{"start":472.95000000000005,"text":"Stephen Breyer is a lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the US Supreme Court from 1994 to 2022"}],[{"start":483.00000000000006,"text":"We would love to make FT readers a part of our series about America at 250. What does America mean to you? In the comments below, please share a memory or experience that you feel encapsulates it. We will publish a selection of your responses on FT.com next week"}],[{"start":499.55000000000007,"text":"Find out about our latest stories first — follow FT Weekend Magazine on X and FT Weekend on Instagram"}],[{"start":513.7500000000001,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1783150736_4755.mp3"}

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{"text":[[{"start":6.05,"text":"Joanna, my wife, once promised our grandchildren that she would give $20 to each of them who learnt Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address by heart. Most did. Almost all of them learnt at least the first two sentences. Those two sentences are important, for they help explain, then and now, why we think of our country as a Nation of Documents and not a Nation of a Single Tribe. "}],[{"start":29.25,"text":"Consider the first sentence: “Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.” Those last few words had made their author, Thomas Jefferson, immortal. Jefferson wrote: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness — That to secure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” "}],[{"start":64.75,"text":"By the time I grew up, just after the second world war, we had elaborated further on these basic “unalienable rights”. We are a democracy, we search for equality, but we do more. We protect basic liberties, such as free speech, free press and others listed in the Constitution. We insist upon a separation of powers, vertically (states, federal government) and horizontally (three branches of the federal government) so that no group of individuals becomes too powerful. "}],[{"start":93.2,"text":"We follow a “rule of law”, self-governance through laws that we make collectively and not through the exercise of brute power. And some historians tell us that the words “pursuit of happiness” reflect an effort to devise a nation of laws based on reason and not simply upon emotion or what James Madison called “faction”. "}],[{"start":113.9,"text":"That first sentence thus encapsulated the basic values that have offered us guidance since the nation’s founding and to which Lincoln in the midst of the civil war referred. They are values that Joanna wanted our grandchildren to understand. But she wanted our grandchildren also to become familiar with Lincoln’s second sentence. It says, “Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.” "}],[{"start":141.75,"text":"The word often used to describe that to which Lincoln refers here is “experiment”. The “Great Experiment”, as George Washington wrote on January 9 1790, represented “the last great experiment for promoting human happiness”. It is an “experiment” in a republican form of government, written into our Constitution, which will continue to exist only (as Benjamin Franklin told the woman outside Independence Hall) “if you can keep it”. It is an experiment in government, “of”, “by” and “for . . . the people”, as Lincoln pointed out at Gettysburg. "}],[{"start":176,"text":"Can we keep it? There are some today who fear not. But I am not so pessimistic. I would invite the pessimists to come with me when I describe the constitutional job of the Supreme Court to law school, university or high-school students. I tell them that this document, the Constitution, is now theirs; they are the ones who must make certain the great experiment succeeds. "}],[{"start":197,"text":"I tell them something I first learnt working on the Senate staff. When you foresee opposition to your proposal or point of view, find someone you believe intelligent, who genuinely believes the opposite to you, and talk to them. Talk civilly. Wait. Don’t talk too much. Listen. Eventually they are likely to say something you genuinely agree with. Then say, “Stop. You have made a good point. Let’s see if we can work with that.” And you often, not always but often, will be able to work out a compromise. If you get 30 per cent of what you want, great! Take it. Don’t hold out for 100 per cent of nothing. And the students look interested. It is what they want. They will help. This is what makes me an optimist. "}],[{"start":237.75,"text":"Interest alone, of course, is not enough. The next generations, my grandchildren and their children, must learn how our governments work — federal, state and local. They must learn about the wisdom and values in our foundational documents. They must learn how to participate. And they must start early. "}],[{"start":255.85,"text":"As my colleague Sandra Day O’Connor pointed out, “The practice of democracy is not passed down through the gene pool. It must be taught and learned anew by each generation.” She was a fan of what used to be called “Twelfth Grade Civics”, and so am I. There are groups of teachers and citizens who are trying to see that civic knowledge is taught once again throughout the nation: iCivics, the Annenberg Center, the Miller Center, the Federal Judicial Center and many others. They are trying to help. Perhaps even more importantly, we must continue to learn and to practise what may be an American speciality: working together. This also starts early. We learnt to work together at grammar school, where my fifth-grade teacher would divide us into groups of four, assign a project to each of the groups and give one grade to each. Such lessons paid off when we saw the country work together during the Covid-19 pandemic, when, in city after city, people would form groups to check up on old and vulnerable people to see that they were all right, and help those who needed help. "}],[{"start":319.6,"text":"If we want practical instruction, we can still read the words of Alexis de Tocqueville, that great French scholar. He wrote in the 1830s that when he approached the United States, he heard “noise” and endless arguing. But he knew that was a virtue, not a vice. He feared a silent “aristocracy” producing inequality and suppressing liberty. That “noise”, he believed, was the noise of associations, many different associations, ranging from book groups to civil liberties unions, to town halls. When faced with problems, their members would debate, discuss, argue and suggest experiments. And those problems included all sorts of civic problems, from livestock grazing to elections. Perhaps today they would include how we should deal with the internet or AI. "}],[{"start":366.45000000000005,"text":"De Tocqueville would probably stress the need for broad and inclusive association that does not turn our nation of documents into groups of individually exclusive, indeed tribal, cultures. But he would not fear experiment. After all, he said that the “greatness of America lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation, but rather in her ability to repair her faults”. "}],[{"start":389.95000000000005,"text":"Perhaps because I am a judge, I feel there is one American virtue that helps to support the others. I mean the rule of law and its capacity to protect us against our worst impulses. In this spirit, I always suggest to my students that they read Albert Camus’s The Plague. It is ostensibly about a lethal plague that hit the city of Oran in Algeria. But, more likely, it is about France when occupied by the Nazis. When the plague left the city, there was great joy. But Camus wrote that “such joy is always imperilled . . . The plague bacillus never dies or disappears for good.” It goes into remission. It can lurk for years in “furniture and linen-chests”, “in bedrooms, cellars, trunks and bookshelves”. He warned that perhaps the day would come, to the misfortune or education of mankind, when it would re-awaken its rats and “send them forth to die in a [once-]happy city”."}],[{"start":445.40000000000003,"text":"The rule of law, I believe, is a weapon that not only helps to support our constitutional values but militates against the re-awakening of that “plague germ” of unchecked power. Along with those values, it uniquely helps to assure the success of our American experiment. My grandchildren, indeed the children of the 21st century, must learn the history of those values, discuss them with others, including those who disagree, and use them to lead the world by example. I hope they do so."}],[{"start":472.95000000000005,"text":"Stephen Breyer is a lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the US Supreme Court from 1994 to 2022"}],[{"start":483.00000000000006,"text":"We would love to make FT readers a part of our series about America at 250. What does America mean to you? In the comments below, please share a memory or experience that you feel encapsulates it. We will publish a selection of your responses on FT.com next week"}],[{"start":499.55000000000007,"text":"Find out about our latest stories first — follow FT Weekend Magazine on X and FT Weekend on Instagram"}],[{"start":513.7500000000001,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1783150736_4755.mp3"}

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