A discussion on court case with religious liberties and a conversation with cuban immigrant. After that, some of this years commencement speeches beginning with megan smith at the Graduation Ceremony at m. I. T. On the next washington journal Defense Technology editor will discuss Cyber Threats a u. S. Technological vulnerabilities. Nina release reese and Philip Lovell review congressional efforts to rewrite no child left behind law. Bloomberg editor and columnist Michael Reagan talks about the greek debt crisis, instability and Chinese Markets and how it impacts american investigators. You can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. Washington journal live at 7 00 a. M. On cspan. Conservative pollster and author of the selfie vote on dutch rents and technologies, the millennial generation and how the Political Parties are vying for the crucial voting block. Take a look at where peoples eyeballs are going. It used to be the television and political advertising was heavily focused on ads. Technology has changed so now if you walk in a room, not just a 20yearold but 60yearold. They are looking at their phone. For foes of the political world who want to reach the next generation or into the future, understand what political advertising is going to look at. Kandi crush or the latest again. Candy crush may be fading. Theres always something popping up in finding a way to get your message in front of people. It is really important. Sunday night on q a. Two attorneys who present were present both cases take part in a Panel Discussion hosted by the National Constitution center. They are joined by michael goertzen. This event took place recently in philadelphia. It is just over an hour. Welcome to the greatest assembly of defenders of freedom ever since Thomas Jefferson. We have peter getler, Walter Isaacson and Anthony Romero from the e. C. L. U. A big round of applause. [applause] the National Constitution center is a convening space for the greatest thinkers on freedom and our constitutional liberties but it is impossible to imagine a more distinguished, engaged and exciting gruche today. Im going to plunge right in. We have here on the side of the stage a very beautiful document. There are many exciting documents here at the National Constitution center. I hope you were able to see them as you came in. Our new gallery displaying one of the 12 original. This is a special document related to Thomas Jefferson. It is a broad side of his first inaugural address. Broad side means it was displayed right after he spoke. It was displayed in boston. Its printed on silk and you can see the nail mark that it was nailed up to some wall and citizens would gather around to see what president jefferson had said. Heres what he said. I think i can read it from my notes better. Every difference of been is not a difference of principle. We are all republicans, we are all federalists. If there be any among us who wish to dissolve this union pause for the changing of the page create some suspense on whats going to happen let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated, where reason is left free to combat it. Walter isaac stornings you are the great author of benjamin franklin. Was jefferson in fact describing a feeling of period of good feeling or were things just as bad then as they are now . They were just as bad, alas. You have to remember that don adams had just put Benjamin Franklins grangedson in jail. We had suddenly become partisan, because despite what jefferson said, there was a difference between the federalists and the republicans, whatever. But thats not necessarily a bad thing. Whats key to what jefferson said, i think, is that we may have differences of opinion. We dont have differences of principle, and that is something that i think was true back then. You know, because the founding of the nation was so new and so cool that people felt there should be a reward for coming together and finding Common Ground as opposed to the incentives of being di vicive. I was walking in today. I put a penny on dr. Franklins grave like youre supposed to. But when he was across the street when they were doing the constitution and they were pulling themselves apart that way, he finally got up. It was a big difference on the big statelittle state difference, when is a foundational difference in a way. He said when we were tradesmen putting together a piece of wood. Youd save from one side and a little from the other and have a joint that would hold together for centuries. He said here we must part with some of our demooneds. The point he made was compromisers may not make great heros, you be they make great democracies. Lets discuss why that spirit of compromise has been lost. Heres what were going to do. We dont all have to agree. I want to tease out agreements and disagreements in the Mission Statements of each of your organization. Lets focus on constitutional liberty. Were all going to disagree about policy. Here at the constitution we love to wave our pocket constitutions with the resisting introduction by yourselves truly and david rubenstein. I want to start with peter getler. Because i think cato is the most jeff sewnon of the organizations on this stage. And your Mission Statement says that you are founded because of catos letters, a series of sace published. These essays inspired. At cato, what is most important in defending liberty . Is it the rights enumerated in the bill of rights or the structural limitations on governmental power set out in the constitution itself . Its both. We have a relatively unique perspective from many people in the world today. In that you mentioned that there are copies of the bill of rights here today. We really like the bill of rights. In fact, we like all of it. And in this audience i suspect there are many people who would like to treat the 9th emailed as an ink blot and some people would like to treat the 10th amendment as an ink blood. When you mention differences in that was a very rancorous time. I think there was a more consistent view on the proper role of government and what was really being established by the constitution. Do you remember in the ratification debates, one of the great points of contention was whether there should be a bill of rights or not and many people believed that there didnt have to be a bill of rights because the powers of the federal government were strictly limited an enumerated. And that we ran the risk of having a bill of rights in suggesting that these were the only rights that were protected and at cato we have, obviously a very strong natural rights based view of liberty and i think it is you know, inherent in that pension that you mentioned in the constitution, you know, unenumerated rights and strictly enumerated powers. Anthony romero, im trying to think of the cato and the aclu have agreed on important cases and filed briefs in briefs. There was something that suggested that they care all about the bill of rights. I dont know. Was he suggesting that you care more about personal liberty than economic liberty . No. I think that, in fact, cato and the aclu have a long history of working closely together on a number of issues. But the issues of economic equality are very much at the core of our agenda currently and for us. Our Mission Statement. You have to take that parchment and make it come alive. They dont mean the parchment theyre on unless someone takes them seriously and implements them. In our history, weve done that. Everything from the scopes trial our very first major case to our defense of japaneseamerican internees in 1941 before the crort, 1944. To the converse around miranda the right to remain silence, be appointed an attorney, right for interracial couples to marry. The defense of marriage act. We took those principles and we made them real. Tanned idea that you needed an organization like ours to take the fullness of our aspireationaged to apply them in every day ways what it would mean 30 years from now, and i think we sit on the cusp of a majoring rights event, one of which ours is a country who has moved forward in the grant ing of rights this year will be the year that the Supreme Court grants full marriage benefits to the lgbt community. I dont think theres any way for us to lose, jeffrey. I hope im not wrong, you have to remember, that its taken decades to get there. The very first case was filed in 1971. And on 2015 were on the cusp of giving samesex couples the right to marry because ours is a nation under the law. The economic issue is hugely important. We brought a lawsuit, which would be interesting if we can find cato to join us, that goes from homeowner to investment bank. We have droid detroit homeowners who were targeted for subprime lending products by morgan stanley. It alleges racial discrimination, its been certified adds as a class. It looks at the recession and says its clearly racial dynamics behind the recession. It affected poor people and low income people of colors especially with the impact on the country. And so its i think its a place where we completely coincide. Where we decide to spend our energy and focus and ueons might be different but i think we agree in principle. There are areas of catos agenda that you would disagree with ranging from challenging the stult of the Health Care Mandate to striking down some forms of taking laws and aspect of the regulatory state on constitutional grourningsdz youre not kumbaya on all respects . I think theres evolution on all ends. And i think as soon as we have cato join us on my detroit prime lending debacle case, im more than blood to take a look at a issues that benefit white upper class. She said that one of her objectives was to find Common Ground but there are limits to comedy even on a panel like this. Arthur brooks, you just wrote the road to freedom. You say theyve made moral arguments and thats a mistake. You think moral arguments should be at the core of the statement which is devoted to expanding liberty, increasing individual opportunity and strengthening Free Enterprise. Tell us why you think moral arguments have been neglected and to what extent are constitutional arguments. Thank you, jeff. What an honor to be here especially with this patent panel where we all care so much about all of these arguments about freedom. At a. I. E. Weve been around since 1938. With a fighting for Free Enterprise. Thats not an economic mission. Its to give more people a better life. We have to back that up with policy. Here we are. If youll look at the language enshrined in the its not commercial language. Its moral language. Its that were enjoyed by our creator with inalienable rights, life, liberty and not property the pursuit of happiness. This is a really new idea in the history of a world. Its a new age idea in the world. You read this in the way it was intended by the way, Thomas Jefferson was asked a couple of years later, why did you use this language . He dropped the word property. Why . He said it was dictation of the american mind. But it really was dictation of the american heart. Thats what was really important at the time because the whole concept was the notion of building your life. This was whole country that was including today the daughters of the American Revolution and the descendants of the mayflower. They were riffraff with one direction to go and that was up. Thats the mission of my organization. Now, in the commercial republic, the stash yation of that requires a system. So what system does that that we take about a lot . It was the system that brought me into the movement for Economic Freedom. Its the system that has taken two billion people out of poverty since i was a kid. That system is one of globalization and Property Rights and rule of law and free trade and most importantly, the american style Free Enterprise system. Theres been no other antipoverty achievement thats come close in the world. What looks like an economic phenomenon is nothing more than stashation of a moral principle and the second paragraph of the declaration of independence that we can live today and share with people around the world, which is a prefound moral thing. If we dont see it as moral, were missing the boat. Theres no doubt the founders were inspired. We have this incredible new interactive that you can see. Cspan, people on line, see its historic antiseed ends that arthur brook noticed and trace that across the globe and compare the way the u. S. And others protected liberties. Its very based on the declaration of independence, on individual liberty. Theres not a lot of equality talk in there. Defight declarations names you have famous promise that all men are create, it took the civil war to guarantee equality for all americans. The senator Mission Statement talks about as progressive as we believe america could be a should be a land of boundless opportunity. We have to protect the planet, promote peace and share global prosperity. Are you more focused on equality and does that language of liberty resonate less with you . Neera no. I mean, i think that the i think of all of us share a profound commitment to liberty and freedom. I mean, the conflicts of our times are ones in which we are constantly debating the meaning of liberty and the meaning of opportunity and the meaning of broad equality. I mean obviously today we are focused with many folks on this on this panel the opportunity of real freedom around samesex marriage, an issue that nobody was talking about a hundred years ago. I think that some of the concepts around liberty and economic liberty and its conflict with ideas of opportunity and mobility where they exist, really go back not 200 years but a hundred yoors ago, and some of the debates we had a mun years ago where we had courts who were considering economic liberty as a paramount value in striking down protections based protections that the state offered to protect individuals themselves from a marketplace that was running amock against their, one could perceive running amock against their own interests. So i dont think these economic liberty issues as economic liberty as opposed to, you know, the state itself, often times these issues of economic liberty are where its one persons economic liberty against another. I think the case anthony row her oy mentioned earlier amount the subprime mortgage interest is not to be redlined. These are issues where economic interests are in conflict. And i think that we should have a robust discussion of what that means and we i may disagree with someone else. I may disagree with others on this panel about which value makes sense in that moment. But i dont have i would argue my view of liberty is as strong as theirs. Great. Well, and peter or arthur, she suggested that was a time when conservative courts were striking down in the way of economic liberty. Many of those were denounced. But now peter, there are distinguished cato scholars who argue that the court was right to strike down those laws and we need a new judicial engagement in order to protect economic liberty. Do you agree . Yes, absolutely right. You weve gone through an era when particularly conservatives were decrying judicial activism. But we think there is clearly a role for its about preserving the constitution, about the framework that we discussed earlier, and you know, the court put the court needs to be an important line of defense when the legislature oversteps its bounds. Our concern is that when coercion is newfoundland the economic arena, you know, that when the government you know coerces Economic Agents in order to generate a specific outcome is obviously something that is at odds with our idea of liberty. There are some conservative defenders who believe in this more engaged cato like method. Well, i think that to understand the differences of opinion here, and something that someone ems brought up, the con sent of liberlt today and a hundred years ago differ. What were faced with today is two kind of competing understandings of what liberty really means or freedom really means. Theres freedom theres the notion of an absence of coercion, which is the classic understanding of freedom, which is what our founders were talking about, and then later as there was a lot of progress in american philosophy, there was a notion that entered as freedom to certain rights. What were trying to y adjudicate today is the balance of fwreemed from and freedom to. I dont think theres anybody here who says we need to go back to what people were thinking about in 1760. But i think that a lot of us believe that the balance isnt quite right yet. The interesting thing in this adjudication process is figuring out if we need to go further in the realm of entitlements and personal rights, more freedom to as opposed to less and thats the dimension on which the real disagreement occurs at aei and on this panel as well. Peter jeffrey walter, youre the leader of this phenomenal educational institution, the Aspen Institute which brings together people of different perspectives. To what degree does this founders vision speak to contrary people wrestling with questions today . Walter phenomenonly well. Its always surprising how well when you go back, especially to the constitution and read things, you see how it applies but i do think arthur used the word balance, which i think greg used before. And we have to realize that theres a balance between conflicting moral principles at times. The most obvious being between equality and individual liberty or sort of a notion of community and the common good and the general welfare or Economic Freedom. One of the things the Aspen Institute was founded upon was this principle of a compass, in which you find the balances of values you need, Community Versus individualism, equality versus economic growth, whatever it may be, and what you try to do is understand that even though ire on a certain tilt one way or the other on any of these things, to understand what the other side is about and in theory to try to find some Common Ground where that moral principle can hold. I mean, arthur talked about the need to put it in moral terms. Theres a reason we are here and it is partly because we want to lead a moral lifer and understand how to create a moral society. One of your precursors, if i may call him that, was Michael Novak who wrote books about like the one youre about to right and the spirit of democratic capitalism, which gets at this balance well, this notion that capitalism exists but not just in and of itself as a natural right, but it is there to benefit the common good as well as to benefit the individual. So when you look at that balance, you say, ok, what could we do right now. Lets take concepts of, you know, more economic equality and you could say, well, one place we can find the Common Ground is on this notion of opportunity. That is a founding face of everybody from ben franklin who runs away from boston with three coins in his pockets and ends up on the wharf. If you work hard, somebody should at least start with some semblance of an opportunity. We have lost that in society even in the time ive been around, certainly since ben franklin, meaning when i went to school, there was a bunch of schools in new orleans. My dad you know went to same schools. This was after desegregation but now weve created a more separate society, most of america, where depending on your zip code or your family circumstances, this is the new bob putnam book which astonished me. Bob putnam isnt a liberal, per se. So in terms of the Aspen Institute that would be saying we balance a whole lot of values but wet get 70 to 80 of people to agree on these particular moral principles and well leave the 30 thats harder to agree, well leave the aside. The last time you were talking about weaponizing dispurekts im not sure that or society face as major crises of pizza parlor owners having to cater gay weddings. If you just calm down, somehow we try to make these things into disputes. Anthony romero, im curious about your reaction to this moral talk and also the aclu under your leadership has struggled impressively with clashes between liberty and equality. Ill take one specific one lathe hate speech, civil libertarians would have put Free Expression over dignity and equality when it came to speech. There are some today who would strike a different balance. How have you tried to reconcile those two values . You know, i think ultimately its when rights clash that we have the greatest challenge, we at the aclu and we as a society, because there are legitimate places where the rights of one group may be in conflict with another group. So you need to find a way to balance them out. The court had been the adjudicating body to decide the conflicting rights. I think those are tough issues. Where its not tough and to be provocative is the context of religious refusal. I was watching earlier the conversation, the question behind a pizza parlor owner having to serve a gay wedding. People demand their religious freedom and say that its under attack is because we made advances on lgbt evaluate. It is no surprise, they woke up and said my religious freedom is under attack. Thats not true. Their religious freedom is as strong as it ever was in america. They woke up and saw the political context around them changing, that lgbt people are getting their rights. So the plan b by some very, very cynical leaders came up with a rights striggle as a way to carve holes in the progress for lgbt quality. Its not the case of the individual pizza owner. You say the pizza owners dont dont have to serve the gays in their wedding, the gays wont get pizza anywhere. In odessa, texas, place where is we brought some of this work on churchstate separation, its not that you wont be able to get the one baker who will give you a wedding cake for the lesbians wedding and the other will, theyll all ban you. All the pizza owners will exert the religious liberty. Then the right of that samesex couple to have a marriage with dignity conferred to them by law will be nil. So i think we have to unpack this very cynical use of a rights framework which is really just a clothing for bigotry and discrimination. Lets call it for whats because thats what it was. And the resurgence of this desire to assert the religious liberty of these disenflan franchised poor little groups, its in no greater peril than it was years ago. Jeffrey thanks for those strongly expressed views, which we welcome here at the constitution center. We believe there are good arguments on all sides of every constitutional question. Peter, i dont know if this one is for you, but let me tee it up by saying senator mike lee was here on thursday and he gave a spectacular talk about his new book about our lost constitution and he very vigorously articulated the argument on the other side which is essentially, since the courts have not yet held that discrimination against gays and lesbians is not equal to those of africanamericans i can keep going by stating his argument. Does cato have a dog in this fight . Peter another easy one. Jeffrey its her gault fault. She brought us up and said we would all agree. Peter i think this is you know you answered asked the question earlier about the catos point of view and the aclu. Weve stood shoulder to shoulder with them on the issue of gay marriage. We have a difference of opinion on the other side, because we do think that there is a legitimate economic liberty argument to be made and religious liberty argument to be made of people being able to refuse participation in gay weddings. The issue of the photographer is, you know, to me, when youre actually participating in the ceremony in a significant way, the and its easy to make the argument that no one will be able to be served and the gay weddings will be theyll be changed, but we always place great faith in the market and the incentive of economic players to serve their best interest, and we think that there as walter said, there are many people are very sympathetic. Weve had a change in the country with respect to the pup opinion on gay marriage and that im just a little incredulous that people are not going to find pizza makers to cater their weddings. You want to weigh in on this easy and completely cuddley uncontroversial subject . I just want to point to the fact that i think right here is where we have liberty and trust on both sides, at least proclaimed. Now, i would note that the liberty interest of pizza owners, hotel owners, etc. , were all once a tick weighted in the 1960s in the civil rights struggle and the issue were dealing is do you think that lgbt folks should be a protected class, not subject to the discrimination. Thats really whats at stake here. You can articulate liberty and trust on both sides. I believe the liberty and trust of that person whos discriminated against is an important and paramount liberty interest. Because the feeling of being discriminated against because of who you are is very different from any other experience, and part of the beauty of the constitution is it recognizes recognized north interest in a democracy need to be recognized because the majority will not always respect that. The pute of this constitution is that its it has expanded its vision of who a citizen is from the kays of our first founding where africanamericans were three50s of a person to today were one of the most diverse countries, the most striving companies because we have had values of tolerance and acceptance and inclusivity as core American Values that started in the stugs. One more constitution. Jeffrey one more comment on that, peter . Peter i think one of the cornerstones of our philosophy and one of the reasons i find it so compelling, libertarian philosophy, is that we have been talking on this panel and the Previous Panel about issues that create a lot of rancor and strife in our society and it is always the case that this occurs when the state is involved in places where perhaps it shouldnt be. You know, if the state were not already involved in marriage licensing marriage, defining marriage, you know, we would not have had, you know, the very difficult discussion that weve had over the last few decades about about gay marriage. I dont want to go too far afield here but if we didnt have a government monopoly in schools, we wouldnt have demonstrations about whats in our textbooks and one of the reasons i find libertarian philosophy very attractive is that so much of the things that we argue about would really disappear and we have a lot of calls for civility in our discourse, and in our politics and the incivility is really injected when government power is used to do things that create disagreement. Jeffrey arthur, do you believe all of our rancor would go away if a libertarian philosophy were adopted . Peter i didnt say all. I said much. Arthur id be willing to experiment a little bit about that. Id like to say a quick word about civility. This is something we talked about internally at a. E. I. And institutions in washington. I think its dangerous when we talk about whats written on the hearts of people with whom we disagree. I write for a newspaper, a well known newspaper in new york city, not known for its conservative views. Once a month i write a column in the New York Times and i dont read my comments afterwards because i dont feel edified by people talking about my motives because its really ad homonym. I think theres a danger i take with a lot of respect what you said, anthony, about what conservatives are up to but i dare say let me give you an example. Im politically right of center, personally. Not a lot but farther than others here and perhaps more than many of you. The reason im in the conservative movement is because i care about poverty. Thats it. I dont care about billionaires. I dont care about their tax rates. I dont care. Thats not why im in the movement. I know it sounds insane to a lot of progressives to be in the conservative movement because you want to lift people out of poverty because thats my view but when i hear that i secretly want to give tax breaks to billionaires, i take great umbrage at that and i think its a dangerous line of argumentation. Were in a period of divisive leadership in this country. We need a period of optimism and unity around core American Values and the only way we can do that is with a fight against ad homonym even though i want to even though i want to talk about people who disagree with me and say you know what, they dont love their country as much as i do. I dont know that. Anthony peter, let me interrupt. Arthur go ahead, anthony. [laughter] anthony when someone refuses to serve a gay man at a restaurant because hes Holding Hands with his partner, that, in our society, should be unacceptable. Ive lived it. I know what its like. Ive actually checked into hotel rooms with my longterm partner in Foreign Countries and when i show up and its mr. Romero with a double bed and they found out its two guys at the front desk they say you cant stay here. I dare say that the affront to ones dignity cannot be minimized and yet i went to a hotel room down the street in the polanco district of mexico city. But it almost ruined the vacation. And our country that believes in equality for all of us, the equality under law, should not sanction the ability when a pizza man puts up a sign, pizza, subjects himself to the screening of the health department, puts up an exit sign like that to comply with local codes and laws. Arthur we can get rid of the health department, too. [laughter] neera i just want to advertise which Pizza Department does not want the health department. Im not sure we want that. Anthony they have agreed to enter this kind of government controlled space and that government should not allow that person then to determine who to serve and who not to serve and it might be for all sorts of different reasons, but i dare say that the reason why you find this resurgence of the use of religious liberty is because we have made progress on the lgbt front. When someone refuses to serve me at a restaurant or at a hotel based purely on the fact that im a gay man, i will call it homophobia. I wont call it religious liberty. It is homophobia that should not be sanctioned in our nation that believes in the rights of all people. This question of whether it is homophobia or legitimate desire to preserve tradition will be at the heart of the Supreme Courts decision in june. Chief Justice John Roberts said we would not be afraid to use the word bigotry. Justice kennedy disagrees. The fact that we can have this discussion in constitutional rather than personal terms is what allows this discussion to be so civil and rather than continuing this riveting debate, i would refer everyone to the phenomenal debates on these topics we are having. We just in washington two weeks ago launched first of our National Town hall debates about the hobby lobby case and on june 2 at the constitution center, we will have a debate on the constitutional issues about Marriage Equality with evan wilson debating john eastman from chapman. It will be incredible. We have nine minutes left to fulfill fredos charge which is that we have some notion of what the right and left and libertarians can agree about when it comes to liberty. Im going to throw out one possibility and see if anyone will say nay. The Fourth Amendment is much embraced by right and the left. I can do it by heart. Although you can all get your brilliant copies of the National Constitution center constitution which by the way thanks to mike bezos is now available on amazon. You can buy it there. The Fourth Amendment says the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated. The Supreme Court recently in a 90 decision held that the police cannot when they arrest me, god forbid, take my cell phone and read my email because a cell phone is not like a cigarette packet and the year before that it held that the police may not put a g. P. S. Or Global Positioning System Device on the bottom of our car and trace our movements 24 7 for a month. Any dissenters on the panel from the view that extremely intrusive ubiquitous surveillance that resembles the general warrant that sparked the American Revolution violates the Fourth Amendment. Some social law and order conservatives might question it. Arthur im not going to stand up for what you call extremely intrusive. [laughter] arthur lets hear it for extreme intrusion neera its a good one against the iranians and not our g. P. S. System. Theres an interesting issue there, which is privacy, which you can find penumbras as you know in the constitution, but when people debate privacy and im not coming at this from a big eyelash way, i often feel we havent gotten to the moral question of why do we want privacy. I know why we want it and i think i do but i dont think we start with the foundation of individual autonomy, you know, the whole moral question of what were building on and at times when does privacy, which we call , privacy, become anonymity and the reason you dont read your comments online or the reason i get an email from mandy grimwold today saying shes stuck in uganda and lost her passport will i send you money, is because anonymity allows people to hack into sony, whatever it may be. I am not making an argument here i am saying we havent had the full discussion of the moral implications of anonymity and moral rationale for what we call privacy. Jeffrey if i could, walter, you and i have had great discussions about this. When we become more abstract about the moral issues, the agreement goes away. Arthur can say ubiquitous surveillance is an unreasonable search, but if i say do you support a broad right of autonomy that allows vision individuals to decide the meaning of the universe and mysteries of life to uphold Justice Kennedys argument on roe v. Wade, i think a lot of people would get off the boat. Absolutely, and i think you and a lot of audience would object to that as well. Talk about an expansive intrusion into the understanding people have into natural law and morality that governs their lives. To say effectively you dont just govern your own life as you should in a system of rights and responsibilities within rational Public Policy but you can invent your own universe. Heres where were trying to find the balance. Neera and i were having lunch the other day and it was really interesting, you captured my imagination because heres the thing we really agreed on a lot which is the importance of dignity. The importance of individual dignity. Building your life as a question of dignity. Privacy is a question of dignity. Anthony should not be subjected to what hes put through when hes checking into a motel or going to a restaurant because of his dignity fundamentally. Thats what were talking about and thats what the framers were talking about. The framers werent saying this is an inefficient way to do things, to discriminate. They said it strips dignity from each individual to do that so fundamentally its immoral so we need a constitution and bill of rights to set out the ways that legally we can avoid that, but you know what . If were not decent people, all the paper in the world will amount to nothing. Look, the two books that were written by the hero of my colleagues at a. E. I. , adam smith, it wasnt just the wealth of nations, it was the theory of moral sentiments that came first 17 years earlier. He thought it was more important because he talked about the fact that you dont even deserve a republic based on these rights and freedoms if youre not a decent enough person to conduct yourself with basic morality and the same is true for each one of us today. We can have all the legal discussions we want and we should, by the way, about whether or not youre served, which i believe you should be, but look if we actually have to think that its a question of law, as opposed to a question of basic decency, thats what comes first in my view. And thats your point, i think. Walter thats the point i wanted to make but you did so more eloquently. [laughter] walter because this is an enlightened concept. Were sitting here between 1776 1789 whenever they do the bill of rights and is new in the enlightenment, this notion of individual autonomy and dignity and we have to figure out where that i think you said, peter, that the bill of rights is not like beethovens symphony where you can like the first and the fifth and hate the second and the ninth or something. You have to take it all as a package, and i think that package is sort of an enlightened notion, too. Neera i completely agree that it would be a better world if people were inherently decent. I just ask us to look through the last couple of hundred years of history of the United States and recognize that it was also people fighting for changes in law that created a world that better respected their dignity. Were in the 50th anniversary of selma. People had to protest to make the law recognize that they were true citizens of this country. And that was a legal change. And it needed to happen because people were not doing it on their own. The law interacted with society to create a changed world in which African Americans today are treated differently than they were. So, i wish we all were born that way, but it takes change in law that People Struggle toward and that is a great thing in america. That is a great part of this country, that we have institutions that can be changed by public protest, public action, to make it a more perfect union. Jeffrey with that beautiful sentiment, its time for closing statements. Fredos given us some homework and that is that each of your institutions, we hope will be inspired next year to mobilize americans across the country to debate, celebrate and learn about freedom. If i could ask each of you as crisply as possible to identify a freedom or set of freedoms that you think are important to promote and tell us what you and your organizations will do to inspire americans to promote it. Peter. Peter fredo, thanks so much. When we sat together at the waldorf 18 months ago and you said i have an idea for a new holiday, your sheer force of will and energy brought to us day to this day. And i woke up in a hotel with slow internet and it took a while for my newspapers to load into my ipad and for a second i did think, i guess the wall street journal doesnt publish on freedom day. [laughter] peter and you talked a lot about finding Common Ground. Cato institute is nonpartisan , and for a reason, because once we sit across the table from one another, youre a member of one party, im a member of another. Your ability to persuade, your ability to engage in honest, open debate, it is mortally wounded. I think we really do need to focus on trying to get ourselves up above the political process and thinking about oh, these are our guys, we love our guys. The people on the other side those men and women, you know, they dont have as arthur said, you shouldnt be impugning someones intent and integrity. And i think we have to find areas where, you know, we can rise above that. I think that there is an unbelievable kind of bipartisan assault going on in the rule of law all right now. The rule of law is ultimately what sets us apart from its what gives lets liberty work its magic when we are ruled by law and not by not by men and i think this is something if we are honest with ourselves and tried to take ourselves away from the political discussion, its something that we should be very concerned about and its not a sexy topic and its not around once fixit ticket issue one specific issue, so maybe its something that in a bigpicture way we can agree is a problem and agree is something we need to address and that the end doesnt justify the means, just because its in service of a policy outcome that we happen to support. Jeffrey thank you so much. Arthur. Arthur id like to ask that each one of us ask ourselves what am i doing today to set someone else free. The conversation about freedom typically in the United States , particularly as we go into another dreaded president ial election cycle, its at your throats again, im sorry to tell you if youre not reading the news is all about what we are doing to protect our own freedoms. Thats right and good and thats really important, but i think we have to ask, what am i doing as a warrior for the freedoms of others . Im not telling you what your balance on freedom is or what your explanation for freedoms is or what your definitions of freedoms is, but what are you doing . So i propose this i would propose a little examination of each of our consciences and im going to do this tonight as i go to sleep. Im not going to ask myself what mean thing did somebody say about me in the New York Times. I know its something. Im going to ask myself, how did i set somebody free and did all of my work go for the benefit of people with less power than the then me than me . If my answer is, no, then ive done something wrong but if my answer is yes, im coming back tomorrow to my office and im going to strap on my sword and my shield and im going to fight some more. Jeffrey beautiful. Walter i will build on that, i hope, by going back to your original question, what principle is most important underlying and what are we going to do about it. I think the principle most important to the foundational creed of the United States is the principle of opportunity. As a land of opportunity, that no matter where youre born or what state you are, when ben franklin comes over, its to avoid the class system and the hereditary aristocracy so that everybody has an opportunity. Thats why we have individual freedom. Thats also why we work as communities to make sure we build the right schools or do the right things so any kid, no matter who their parents are whatever their zip code is, will have an opportunity to succeed. And i think that underlies almost all of whats, you know, from the second sentence of the declaration, which is created equal, pursuit of happiness, to the bill of rights, the underlying principle is that americas a land of opportunity. This really does unite people who strongly believe in Economic Freedom and people who believe in pursuit of the common good. How do you do that . First of all, you try not to polarize that issue. We can easily polarize it. We can turn it into weaponized rights issues and stuff or we can say, you know what, were all in this together. After Hurricane Katrina in new orleans, and i was back there a few days later, you got the sense, ok, were actually all in the same boat now so lets figure out what were going to do. So, at the Aspen Institute, we were thinking about this over the past six months, what are we going to do you go going to do . So next month were creating a new division of the Aspen Institute on youth opportunity because every person in this room has had a lot of opportunities including to be in this room, meaning, enriching experiences. And when you were in high school, when you were in college, whatever, you had great chances in the summer to do cool things and great afterschool programs, and that used to be the thread of American History that we made things like that open to more and more people. Something wacky not wacky something horrible has happened in the past 30 or 40 years, is the divergence of the enrichment opportunities has widened rather than narrowed and this is the first time in our history that has happened. So i think instead of pontificating about it or getting on a high were going to try to make sure that every city has programs that the Aspen Institute tends to do. I see mike bezos here. He started us on this route with the aspen challenge, which went to urban high schools across this nation, said do a really cool project and then well find some funding for you to do it, well bring you the aspen to washington to show it off, but you from seed academy or mcdonough 43 or whatever schools in los angeles, denver washington, youre doing it in chicago, youre going to have that same opportunity that i had when i got out of school at 3 00 at newman and we started doing projects. So based on what mike has done and many other people, i think we could each ask ourselves after we ask ourselves the question that arthur asked, is what do we do not only to climb the ladder but to give somebody else a hand up on that ladder . Neera i couldnt agree more with that. I think to answer your questions about what well be doing, first, i would just like to acknowledge theres been a lot of rancor on this panel, but cato and cap have worked together for the last 10 years on issues of samesex marriage. And i know that might have been easier for us than for cato at moments, but they were early supporters and focused on that so there are many areas in which weve reached across the aisle. Another area and this is brought up by your Fourth Amendment question, if you look at the last several decades, the Mass Incarceration Movement is part and parcel of the decisions by the Supreme Court and the rest of the judiciary to really come in on the side of the versus the the state versus the individual in Fourth Amendment and other cases, but cap, aclu and conservative groups like americans for tax reform and Freedom Works funded by a Broad Coalition of folks from the Koch Brothers foundation to mcarthur, ford, and the arnold foundation, are all working on a new coalition to actually address mass incarceration, a whole range of issues. That coalition has very much talking about issues like forfeiture, but also issues like sentencing reform. This is an area where i think we all recognize theres a broad problem and a Broad Coalition , including conservatives and progressives, can solve it together. And im hoping that well have more Supreme Court cases that are recognizing the individual rights and the importance of the Fourth Amendment over the next several decades, but we hope there will be reform on the legislative side, as well. Anthony i would close by saying exactly that. For us, the place where we can work with individuals with whom we may not share everything, but we share a common goal of making a difference is in the area of mass incarceration. We will disagree with our opponents on religious refusals, we will disagree with our opponents on abortion, we will disagree with our opponents on lgbt rights, but on places where we can coincide, it is incumbent upon us to coincide. Like neera said, this is a remarkable opportunity. The window of opportunity has never been flung this wide open before. It is an economic issue. It is absolutely at the core of how the government is using taxpayer money into building this great epidemic of over incarceration, 2. 3 Million People behind bars. The highest rate in the world. What took us 50 years to build since the war on nixon will take us decades to undo. We are thrilled to be working with coke industries. We are thrilled to be working with the american executive council. We are thrilled to work with other groups that come not just with an economic imperative but moral imperative. At the end of the day, this is not just about balancing budgets and shaking deficits. This is about do unto others as youd have them do unto you, this is about turning the other cheek. This is about whether or not americas a country that believes in the value of redemption and whether each one of us should be judged for the rest of our lives for the worst act weve done on our worst day of our life. And if we dont believe that rule should apply to us, then it ought not apply in our criminal
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