Transcripts For CSPAN Conservatism Debate At University Of Notre Dame 20240713

Energized discussion and debate. Introduction has no implicit meaning. No tweets necessary. Ahmari has been an editor with the wall street journal and opinion pages in london. His spiritual memoir about his conversion to roman catholicism was published by Nations Press this year. It is our privilege to invite him to the Catholic Disney world here in disney notre dame. Is a best selling author. He is a graduate of Harvard Law School. He is also a former lecturer at cornell law school. He has served as senior counsel for the Alliance Defending freedom. Finally, dr. Charles kessler. Kesler. Of americanlar constitutionalism and the intellectual history of american conservatism. He is the author of i and the change, barack obama and the crisis of liberalism. The bestselling addition in the country. Editionaddition that he assigned it to his class that i am taking the spot. You gentlemen will speak for approximately 10 minutes. Mr. French will speak first, followed by mr. Ohmari and then mr. Kesler. What is conservatism in the age of trump . [applause] i want to thank notre dame for hosting. His is the second time you guys are fantastic post. My only regret is that i cannot go to the game on saturday to see what football is like outside of the sec. Is it 80 as good . 90 as good . I thought it would just go ahead and lose the room right off. I want to thank you for hosting me, this is a first for me. This is like three of my calvinist tour of catholic colleges. I was at georgetown last week. I understand there was some dissent on that point. I am here today and i will be at Benedict College in this two weeks. This is a treat for me. What is conservatism in the age of trump . That is the question. I would also like the answer. I am not quite sure what it is. There are competing conflicting strains of conservatism in the age of trump. Program, we read from federalist 10. That is my favorite federalist paper. I have no life if i have a favorite federalist paper. What is conservatism in the age of trump . Let me back up and say what is the strand of conservatism to which i have blonde that still exists in the age of trump. Belonged that still exists in the age of trump. One of these is the words from the declaration of independence. We have an l. A. Inalienable rights. Instituted among men to secure these liberties. A principal purpose of government. Not the only purpose by any stretch but the principle purpose of government to ensure these liberties. After the constitution was drafted and ratified, john adams was said something to the messages militia. The it is holy constitution is wholly inadequate for any other. He describes this as a constitutional structure that k to deal with widespread fight. The level of liberty in our culture was so great that that was all exercised if that was all exercised in a libertine way, america would be an unfit inhabitation. You create nondelegable responsibilities that are at the foundation of this republic. There is a nondelegable duty of the government to defend liberty, protect liberty of its citizens. Oxygen has been used to describe the role of liberty in the american republic. That is how essential it is. At the same time, it wont work. This wont work unless the people have a reciprocal commitment to exercise that liberty for virtuous ends. We are not always going to do that perfectly. The Founding Fathers knew that. They built in all checks and balances vertically and horizontally in the system so that no one set of bad people could wreck this place. We had internal resilience. I think that is an incredibly to build this country. Ourselves facing in 2019 in the United States of america . A lot of people would say that we face the horrible left. Others would say is it is a horrible right. One thing i think we can all agree on is that we face a tremendously negatively polarized country. What negative polarization means is that i have less affection for my own side that i have hatred for the other side. For example, even in the obama era, we can say negative polarization again with trump. Not even close, it has been arcing upward for a while. If you pulled the average republican, 82 would say the strongly dislike the democrats. If you pulled the average were far more tolerant, 78 . Hated the average republican. We have an incredibly divided country. We have an enormous amount of animosity. One of the things that i look at, i think it is a time in our country to rediscover the wisdom of the founders in the sense. Exaggerate uniformity. We apply modern standards of diversity to the whole country. We said they are all landholding white men. Tweedledee and tweedledum. We are so much more diverse now. If you run down the eastern in 1971,of america youll see a puritan ofsachusetts, rhode island people fleeing from puritan massachusetts. Youll see a heavily catholic maryland, pennsylvania, heavily criminal georgia. [applause] some things have not changed. What do you have there . How do you knit that thing together . You do it by giving people the think, express and act according to their deepest beliefs. If you move the threat to their deepest beliefs from the table, we can build a republic together. Of the foundational wisdom of the First Amendment. What was another way that you knit that together . Give them were autonomy over their lives and their ability to self govern. What is the say is project of the conservative movement now . One of our most urgent projects is to diffuse negative polarization. How do you do that . Reconnect with the wisdom of the founders. Grant people the rights that you would like to exercise yourself and defend those rights. What do you do about different communities with different questions opinions about how to govern themselves . You let them govern themselves. You try to ameliorate the tragedies and the consequences of the departures from that constitutional wisdom. The embraces we have made of Big Government and coalition that have heard so many lives. And what that looks like in specific policies, i probably agree with a number of policy changes i would like to see. I think the tax cuts were too heavily weighted toward corporations. I am open to things about family leave. This can repair some of the damage the government has done. In that circumstance, i think there is a lot to talk about. What i dont think we should do is abandon this concept of nondelegable duties. The government protects liberty. The people exercise liberty. This puts a special burden on conservatives. It really does. Theve long considered conservatives who say i dont think government can fix everything for everybody everywhere. The government can do more harm than good. This makes me walk my talk and be part of an energetic community that is remaking the culture from the ground up. If we change that and we try to remake culture from the top down, we will not only fail, we will further divide this country. [applause] i want to start by thanking the Notre Dame Press is organizing this and all of you for coming to this. This is my first time at notre dame. It is a place that is special to the priest that presided over the sacraments when i was accepted into the not a member of the congregation of the holy cross. It is really special to finally be here. Let me start by saying that this is broadly a debate between American Social conservatives. I have the utmost respect for the men and women who defend our liberties and the men and women who defend the nation by wearing the uniform of broad. I think you at the beginning of our last debate. I meant it. I want to thank you again for both of those things. Even in the notorious essay that set off this debate, i know that david french has devoted considerable and a long part of to the coalition square. We have profound disagreements. I would say that youll conservatives have a desire to renegotiation renegotiate some of this. The impetus to that is an immigrants love for his adopted homeland. I recall the line from this , this is basically a dystopian france not too far off in the future. The protagonist is a professor and he has a jewish girlfriend. As things go south she says i will go to israel. He says i dont have an israel. In my case, that is cool that is true. I have the anxious love of the father for my son. Last week i was joined by my daughter. The bottom line is that what i think about the american that my children will inherit, despite ,eing an aspirational immigrant i mostly just feel anxiety. I feel anxious about the boulder culture. Most people would have thought is a nonsensical. The fact that so many young men stay home and play video games, a massive pornography is asian of the culture, that is my impetus. They lead to some strategic disagreements beginning with my sense of how deep the crisis goes and how deep the crisis goes. When i see certain events where withren are interacting contentious behavior, i dont see that as the blessing of liberty that our founders had in mind. I see license with which they aboard. That assessment of they abhored. Orred. The battleground has shifted. Consensus conservatism has not kept up. For two generations, the left and the right of this country have pursued deregulation. The left, it has been moral and sexual deregulation. Phenomena itself is a symptom of those crises. It led to the rise of a woke corporation. Consensus conservatism defended cultural actors because theyre not from the state, they are private actors. Reach thedont often courtroom for that type of traditional religious litigation. They happen in a matter of hours or someone says something and a private actor destroys their lives. If mario lopez has to kiss the ring of woke special revolutionaries because he said a threeyearold has begun to transition or if drew breeze as to apologize for focusing on the fourecause he telling kids to focus on bringing her bible to school day. Rigid publichas a private distinction. Some of the social media companies, that is where free speech happens. Get them intion trouble. I had to much respect for market autonomy as a good in itself. That leads me to the special critique. This is mainly a sense of procedural posture. The woke left seek to systematically impose good on campus at the university, in the corporation, and the work lace, in the law, in politics workplace, in the law, in politics. We as conservatives meet them with procedural answers. We say just give me the right to talk. I want to tie you how good procedures are. See the substance procedure mismatch there. We dont offer a vision of the good. Conservatives would say that is the system we inherited from the founders. They just wanted to create neutral rules. I dont think that is the case. And themble constitution says this document aims to secure justice. It aims to secure the general welfare. That is the common good as catholics understand it. It is not a neutral document. Not authorize license. That view has held until recently. We need to advance a moral vision of the good. People where they are with the challenges we have today. We can do that if we insist on autonomy. We cant turn neutrality into a high principle. That is poison to a constitutional order. On a mans right to liberty. If we as the constitution as a neutral fundament and shift away from that, we cant allow liberals and i mean that in the broad sense to undo vote or demand that has been expressed. People want the politics of the common good as conservative nationalist movements around the world arts person that desire. Are expressing the desire. Have joineds liberals in seeking to undo the outcome of elections by various procedural means. I dont have all the answers to these problems. In newr you are present vision of conservatism, you will be met with the vision well established. The reason it is wellestablished is because it has worked for a long time. Nevertheless, i think we have to go back to this idea of promoting a nonneutral vision. We stand for a vision of the good. Our state should not be neutral. That will mean trying to reerect carriers that were destroyed over the past two generations. Disagreements, i am sure they will agree that the most fundamental limit of all is that mans destiny is in the hand of his creator. Thank you very much. [applause] it is a great pleasure to be here and to see my old charles it is a great pleasure to be here. It is great see my old and new friends here today. I started my trip here yesterday driverlouis where my van taken me from the hotel to the airport asked me where i was going. I said i was going to notre dame. He said ah, they have alot of teams. i said yes teams. I said yes. They have famous football teams. He said is it ivy league . Tholic. No, it is ca [applause] i will bill for therefore tell a joke about an irishman. It is a joke that Ronald Reagan told. An irishman finds himself in a suddenly a fight breaks out, a tv fight, people breaking chairs overheads and things. The irishman asks the bartender if this is a private fight or can anyone join in . I am coming inke the middle of this private fight that is going on but in the spirit of the fighting irish, i will join in. I wanted to start by saying something about trump since this will be a discussion about conservatism in the age of donald trump. There has never been a president like donald trump. For good or ill. The situation conservatives find themselves in is not so unprecedented. In many ways, the situation conservatives find themselves in they resembles that in 1950s when bill buckley was Founding National review in 1955 when the conservative movement was just beginning. We have forgotten that one of the major crusades of the conservative movement in its origins from 1955 to the next concentratedas attack on dwight eisenhower. Thathis new republicanism drove his administration as president. Magazineley in the attacked what they call the age of modulation. Meaning the age of moderation. The gop under eisenhower had accepted almost everything in the new deal and were treating world communism as a nonurgent or gardenvariety political problem. Buckley and the early conservatives were worried there on theense of crisis standard republican right. Sense that the fate of the world was involved in the next couple of years. Buckley saw that the magazine endorsed eisenhowers reelection, the official slogan was i like ike. The National Reviews version of that was i prefer ike. That was an attitude that many conservatives today would recognize. They have warmed to the example of President Trump. Preferable to the alternative to trump which was a continuation of you might say the age of bush. The bush era of conservatism and republicanism. That stretched from george h. W. Ush through george w. Bush it would have included jeb bush. They could have included jeb bush if donald trump had not famously come down that escalator in trump tower. There was a sense widespread theg conservatives that mainstream movement of the Republican Party had become interested in just running the machinery of government as it was. Anlacked a sense of accelerating moral crisis, the moral dissolution of American Society and of a certain kind of constitutional decay. The constitution is not very healthy right now. One of the things conservatism has to do is come to the rescue of our own constitution, i think. That is why one of the unifying factors among the conservatives that endorsed donald trump was that this was an emergency. This was a crisis in our politics. The single most famous essay, the flight 93 essay by Michael Anton in favor of trump and calling for the election of trump. It sounded that note of emergency. This is not just another election. The stakes are very high. In this trump election between trump and hillary. The second point i would like to make is that the trump policy agenda is not unprecedented or uncalled for. In some ways, what the Trump Administration has been pursuing to thes a return republican norm. The historicack to Republican Party from Abraham Lincoln to William Mckinley to herbert hoover, you will see an agenda that is very familiar when compared to President Trumps agenda. Here were the five biggest principles of comparison. First, protectionism. Through all those years, the Republican Party was the party of high tariffs. Trumps protectionism is a return to that policy. Why protectionism . To allow the working class to live a healthy and prosperous life, to protect them from what we would call third world standards of globalized competition. That was the gop as argument. Conjoined with an argument for the protection of Critical Industries either from a National Security point of view or an Economic Development point of view. A very familiar, oldfashioned republican theme, second issue, immigration. There are both in party was in favor of immigration through those years but they were concerned to keep the levels of immigration to the numbers that could be assimilated or americanized. It was possible to have too much diversity and to have it too fast. Even liberal social scientists have to admit that is true. Diversity can be good for a liberal democracy but too much adversity can be a problem for liberal democracy because people need to be able to identify with one another and trust one another. It may take time for those kinds of friendly ties to develop between people who are very different in their background and customs and so forth. Old Republican Party had a much more modest view of foreign policy. Its view was that we should pursue the national interest. There were not heavily invested at all. Whether it was exporting democracy or democratizing part of the world. They were very resistant to that trend. Teddy roosevelts famous slogan was speak softly and carry a big stick. That is not exactly john boltons program or even Donald Trumps program. But i think it is where the party and the movement are headed. One has to say that americas strategic position is very different. Some there will have to be real changes and accommodations. Lower taxes, calvin coolidge, one of the most famous achievements of his presidency was lowering income tax rates, reaganomics. Finally, judges willing to defend constitutional limitations on legislatures and trumps policies are a return to normalcy as Warren Harding would have said, at least republican style. On the question of style, trumps is unique. And oftenoductive problematic. Almost anyone who defends trump has to make some concessions and excuses on that front. I will mention only one word. Twitter. [laughter] charles partly, the constraint or the strange style that donald trump exhibits is evolutionary adaptation to an unprecedentedly hostile environment that he finds himself. Politicaljust correctness in general, the rush investigation, the charges of racism easily tossed around in , it is thelitics establishment he is up against. Establishment is an old word. It could be a good thing or a bad thing. The liberal establishment is increasingly radical and increasingly powerful on campuses and in our politics. He is in a very difficult position as a president. No president has been under the investigation he has been under. Was not under investigation but he was under intense pressure and fascination plots and so forth. The rumblings. Really, the situation that trump has been an, many of the people in his own administration have been investigating him and resisting and rebelling. Difficulte life very for him. His response has been more pavlovian that it would have been. The changes in policy will last. That will be a legacy of trump for the conservative movement and the Republican Party to some extent. Lesstyle will probably be repeated. I think the style will be confined mostly to this administration and to this unusual president. Thanks. Can i pose a question to you, david . You both used the phrase constitutional crisis. Do you agree we are in some sort of cultural and constitutional crisis . There are two things that i like that get the most negative reaction. The one thing is if i say we have a challenge, not a crisis. Christ. A sense of crisis. That of things that are very troubling and challenging. That is something that every american, every american should have front and center in their mind. Not every community but certainly the community i lived in for the last 12 years before i moved last year to the national suburb, the rural Tennessee Community either did first met opioids, it is clarify what is happening in this communities. The problem i have with words like unprecedented or crisis is smooth away a lot of the rest of American History and discard a lot of the lessons we have learned from the rest of American History and how to deal with challenges. Used. Edented was it is not even close to unprecedented. Some of you remember this, some of you dont. How many domestic terror on averagere there in the u. S. . For them. If you want to talk about cultural challenges and cultural crises, moving into the lake 1970s and early 1980s, the abortions in this country were skyrocketing. As was the rate of violence and Violent Crime rates, through the roof. Murder through the roof. Abortion through the roof. Some of you maybe even recently strained on netflix a movie called streamed on netflix movie called escape from new york. There were 2000 people murdered in new york city, more than 2000. At the same time that was happening, the war in court had obliterated the proper reading of the religion causes. Strongst amendment was in some areas. We are talking about the ation that was situation that was very serious. How did we respond to many of these challenges . The things that happened was the crime rate. It was a massive response on civic leaders, National Political leaders, rudy giuliani, it is a battle, is his finest hour 9 11 or have the actually helped new yorks crime dropso much that it helped the National Crime rate. You look at these challenges and American History. Liberty and the energy of local governments to an increasens and in the energy and the vitality theocal government, the response we are concerned about a culture that lies too much. We are very concerned about a culture that embraces porn. We are very concerned about drag. If you follow twitter, half of twitter on the conservative side is on the conservative side of things. What do we do when we are concerned about lies and adultery and porn and drag . We turn to a guy who has committed serial adultery with point stars. Of drag even a video when he buried his face into Rudy Giulianis fake bosoms. America depends on two things, this is oriented toward the good and toward virtue. A Political Party or a political system that undermines one of those, even as steadily for the sake of the other is dangerous. Since david mentioned new york city, i happened to observe the city and its politics and its conditions. I agree with david that things were very bad in new york of the nicest 70s and 1980s and then the turnaround under commissioner breton and mayor giuliani. Bloomberg consolidated those things. I would say that the sense of crisis is building up. Although major crimes in new york are not up yet, as much pressure as it is under, the nypd continues to do its best to do broken windows policing. Anywhere you go, there is someone high or aggressive on the street. The number of homeless on the street are often mentally ill and addicted to opioids. These types of crises, you can see parallels in rural communities. You see the parallels of the same crises. They require a politics of order and protection. The consensus conservatism i have been critiquing is only in the liberation gear. Are in a debate about whether marijuana should be legalized. The disagreement is no longer hey, should we demolish one last barrier . Goingght was a if we are to legalize marijuana, we better let the market distribute the proceeds. The left will say the war on drugs has hurt certain communities in the past so we should give this communities license so they can benefit more from legalization. Neither party is saying is this drug that does create psychotic youngsometimes and men and womens minds boggled all the time, do we want that . The homeless crisis in new york, is it a Mental Health crisis . It is because of the policies of autonomy that arose in the 1950s and 1960s. Both left and right began to open up Mental Health institutions in the name of autonomy for the mentally ill. Barriers tohard overcome. We have gotten rid of hospital beds. On the right, it has been sold as fiscal restraint and we have on community programs, inclusive programs are cheaper. On the left, it is about autonomy of the individual. We cant help people, they have to be committed. These movements go back to the politics of autonomy. We have room in our politics for a politics of consolidation, including national consolidation. A politics of order and cohesion. It seems like we have a politics of that kind in a totally different way from President Trump. Aboutses questions unrestrained mass migration. Professor kessler said he is vulgar but in some instinctive way he recognizes the nation wants protection and order now. I wanted to say to davids point, it is true. In many ways, we are still living in the 60s. 60s as talk about the if were still here. We are still coming to grips with that amazing decade but politically, we were much more united in the 60s and the 70s. Despite a number of bombings and other things. Lbj won election in 1964 with more than 60 of the vote. The negative polarization is not as deep as it was now. Donald trump did not create that negative polarization. He is trying to deal with it. As sometimes happens in politics, you can deal with it by denying it. You have to deal with it by confronting it and trying to shape a new majority. That would be a slightly different kind of conservative majority. Ofeone more along the lines what sohrab was calling for. We need to advance a moral vision of the good. And openness to state power. I will anticipate davids response. We are in a moment of moral crisis. If we are in crisis, how is the state going to advance a moral vision that is healthy . We met a lot of our challenges by state power. I would take an example on that squarely disagree. I am raising children now and i am deeply worried about their addition to screens. This is something a lot of parents have on their minds. My son is likely to encounter hard cryptography hardcore before he hits puberty. I will do my best to stop that. This thing that we have built, this autonomy, we should not build a garden of thorns and this was and then expect people to maintain thorns and thistles and expect people to maintain. There has been some legislation to try to curb that with some regulatory measures. For example, to reduce the kind of infinite refresh you get from social media that keeps you addicted. I said what are people saying on twitter about this . I am guilty of it as much as anyone. Making sure that videos dont start right away. I dont know if hollys measures are the way to do it, we should study them. At least he is trying say this is a real crisis. We met addition to cigarettes with government action, addiction to alcohol with government action. Nothing has not that it has stopped smoking. At least we should try to explore it. The consensus right will say that is republican daddy state stateism. Ublican that is how we create a civilization. It is a garden of thorns and thistles. 50 ofer why we have marriages fail. People are distracted. People are just lonely and so forth. Government has the rules to protect us, it always has. The joshamiliar with hawley legislation. It stops you from having a snapchat street. E fromvents youtub starting another video immediately. As if we havent been dealing with the ultimate autoplay couple of the last years, the television you have. I wonder what he will do about my sons time on fortnight. I am thinking about call of duty, discord. Google docs are a real issue. There is no substitute at the end of the day for human beings exercising responsibility. The moment we begin to look at the government and say i am having trouble with my son on social media, senator hawley, what do you have for me . That is the moment we are beginning to fail seriously as a people. We have a track record in this country. I will say every Government Intervention has been bad. There have been good Government Interventions. I should say that we will have a very healthy i will say that we should have a very healthy skepticism. We were reminded of this ronald thean statement i am from u. S. Government and im here to help. We have this ban unflavored vaping. Ok, i dont like it but on the basis of cultural panic as a result of some people tragically dying because they purchased illegal vapes. I dont know the lingo super well on this, there with me. Been lots of people winning themselves off cigarettes through these means. Are we going to kill more people because wethe method had a moral panic about something that is not eventually targeted by this ban . That is how the government so often tends to work. We have had a war on poverty in this country. Some of the brightest and most wellmeaning people in the world have been spending trillions of dollars. Trillions of dollars to direct longterm poverty. They have often exacerbated it. Have wellmeaning people wept spent hundreds of billions of dollars trying to reform in Education System that still fails so many. One of the greatest achievements of the conservative movement is liberating up to 5 million kids per year. Starting from a whopping zero. On the5 million kids Public School monopoly that is failing them so badly. System king about a order matters. Whose order . What policy . If you are going to enhance the power of the state to deprive me of autonomy, who will be at the levers of power . Censorship . S is it going to be Elizabeth Warren . That is a bad thought. The order so we can get rid of groups we dont like from public spaces, i guarantee we will have thousands and thousands of groups we do like banned from public spaces. All of these things have consequences when exercised by people on the other side. One of the first things you should think about when you think about a policy is how will this play if my political opponent has this power. That is one of the first things you should think about. Have talked about marijuana, it to consider the issues in bold. The ranksproblem in of poor and workingclass americans. One of the issues with family formation is the lack of due in part ton mass incarceration. We have to think really hard about how we can deal with mast incarceration. The crime rate is half of what it was, the rate of Violent Crime is plummeting. We are living in a future that if we lived in 1998 would say we are wildly optimistic. This is part of the project of the conservative movement. Look at what state power has done and ameliorate the negative effect of state power. Not to trust the state with more power and then hope we just when again and again and again. Recipe for continued and magnified polarization. Our version of the public order, the public order that christians would love to see is not the same vision of the public order that tens of millions of americans want to see. When we enhance state power to impose that from the top, i promise you you will not like it. Let me add a comment that will relax the focus slightly on these issues. There has been a liberal revolution in American Public life and Public Policy that really began in the late 1950s. It accelerated in the 1960s. To accelerate ever since. One of the aspect was the revolution in the course. Pornography used to be illegal. It was only in the 1960s that local laws restricting innography began to fall federal courts after new understanding of free speech. The revolution was not by legislatures that allowed pornography. That was from the top down. Why dont we try to reverse that revolution . Why not return to a more sensible Public Policy where the death the questions of obscenity and pornography would be regulated more or less at the local level or the state level. What we should be thinking about Going Forward is undoing much of the damage done by hyperactive liberalism in the last 50 years. It if ourible to do own conservative judges dont accept what has happened as irreversible and now the law of the land. Some of them want to do that but not the best of them. David i am happy to respond to that. Words protect freedom of speech meant something. It was just not something anyone wanted to say. Libel was never protected. Consumer fraud was never protected. Actual incitement to violence was not protected. This was not included in the freemen of speech. Freedom of speech. One of the categories was obscenity. There was a huge battle about this in the Supreme Court. There was this understanding that obscenity was not protected. There was this big battle in the Supreme Court to define it. There was this famous statement of you know it when you see it. That is when you know judges have run amok. When the standard is i know it is unlawful when i see that it is a mob. There is no governing principle there. Definition that is probably the best definition. No underlying cultural narrative that was designed to subscribe to the. Es that is an incorrect constitutional understanding. Even the federal government, the original government only applied it. They cannot do with that kind of expression. The problem that you have is i am fully on board with the notion that the category of obscenity should not be deemed First Amendment protected speech under the original understanding of the constitution. That theisagree of the problem of pornography has been exacerbated entirely by judges. Judges have also allowed municipalities to chase on shops of of the porn shops out parts of town that are frequented by children. Times square is different. Downtown nashville used to be different. The belt buckle of the bible belt. That is where the Southern Baptist convention is. It was full of peep shows in downtown. The courts have allowed their to be regulation that has changed chased a lot of this off of the Public Square. Problem now is we have a massive technical challenge on our hands. How do you practically deal with that . One of my students, as we were preparing for our conversation said to me two things. This was she was saying why she was attracted to trump. She likes that he was want to fight power with power. I like that he is willing to combat the sexual revolution. This was power with power to combat the sexual revolution. He realizes that corporations are a greater threat to liberty than the state. Can i address the corporations part . David no. No corporation will come at you with bayonets. No corporation is going to come at you with guns. Facebook is a very powerful corporation. , it ispen this phone off. I can delete the app. This book is out of my life. They are powerful. Facebook is out of my life. They are powerful. We have long had powerful invate const institutions our life. None of them can affect your life. He knows that he can crush these corporations with the power of the state. It is a symbol of the success of our newsmen that we have begun to pare back the power of the state that we can worry about facebook. I want to deal with one thing about this woke capitalism. Look, guys, we are really defining courage down in our movement. We really are. You know [scoffs] mario lopez had to correct himself. That true breeze had to correct himself. And did not. They did not. That is a difference the power of the state would say that drew breeze, if you do not apologized to focus on the family to jail to you. The power of the state would say to mario lopez if you do not apologized for your views on transgender issues to jail with you. That is the power of the state. What we have done is we have said this. We have said it, i believe it is absolutely intolerable i risk anything in the expression of my view. I will tell you a story. Right after we finish the debate , they told me not to say cua. Im trying to stick with the style guide. When i finish is a beta catholic, young men came up to me and he said you have no idea how it is. You have no idea how hard it is to be conservative on campus. Where are you conservative . At yale. He is one of the most power and privileged people in the history of the planet. He is a yale student and he feels deeply oppressed. I said, what is happening to you . Hat, peoplemy maga will scream it me. Im waiting. And, and . And . Come on. This is the world we are living in. I will have people come up to me and i give a speech, i call it the courage. Look, one of the things you need to do is speak with grace and truth and conviction. Do it. A lot of people did that to change this country. And i had a guy come up to me and the sense of crisis and hysteria is unbelievable. He literally said, i cannot do that that. Do that. It is east germany at my company. You mean they will take you in the middle of the night and dump your body in addition . We have to have a sense of proportion here guys. If we are talking about the most important values in our life, the most important values in our lives, i am not going to let the fact im shamed on twitter or shamed on social media to term me from saying this and here is what happens. The hesitance to speak is self reinforcing. Everyone is afraid. Then it creates a mass sense, a mass sense i cannot say anything. When the reality is you can and you should. Drew breest like that got dragged, and i like drew brees. Drew brees failed. We have reciprocal responsibilities. The courageous right has the responsibility to be a courageous right. If we are not going to uphold our end of the bargain we are going to faili in this culture and will be largely due to our own fault. Let the other panelists respond. We are about to turn it over to questions. Make your way to the microphone if you have a question. I want to address the courage point. I think we can be frank about this and say if its the case that a lot of people feel compelled to shut up and not share gospel truth and the teachings of the Catholic Church, for example, it is because the mode of censorship that works through our private ective, it is working. In a sense, you can tell, ordinary people to be courageous but, look, i work at a large media company. Massively critical of the trans movement. I can go on tuckers show and be critical and tucker and i sai d to each other, you and i are one of very few people who can do this. We know all the cases of people who, you know, because they ce jobout, theyll fa prospects in this country that are negative. They will face pressure on campus. You can say be courageous but as christian leaders we have to think the way Saint Augustine did. In his commentary on matthew when he says when the flock is under threat, the bishop draws the threat away. We should not expect the ordinary christian to become a marder and that has never been the standard for martyrdoms, right . We should create conditions in which they feel safe to share the gospel with others, and right now means confronting the power of woke capital. It isple are shutting up, doing something. There is a deep strand of come formnformism. We should not have christian leaders that can speak out and not get into trouble try to draw the threat away from the flock. Be more courageous. The standard has never been for our nerve seek out martyrdoms unless they absolutely have to. Were defining these and using words like crisis, like martyrdoms. These are words with meaning. And, when you use a word tyrdom. R possibly a loss of a job. When i was in law school, one of the tactics that some of the radical left us with use of Harvard Law School is when you spoke out in class, if you ticked them off, some of the would start to call the employer you were about to go work for and tell them that you are a rapist and a homophobe. They would put pictures of Federalist Society members, like all nine of us. Now harvard Federalist Society is busting at the seams. They would take pictures of Federalist Society members and they were literally, before cutting and pasting was a thing on a computer, they would take a picture of of society member, paste his face on gay porn and put it all over campus. You know, one of the things i realize was i dont even want to call it courage. Because, you know, there is courage when people, maybe im defining courage down myself, when people risk their lives for value. We have to have a sense of bravery and pluck that says i will not be silent. This does mean incurring some risk. One of the things as hes talking about the elevation of this crisis in this country as a matter of war and enmity. I have never been, never seen a war that did not require a mens bravery from the foot soldiers. If were participating in the battle for the soul of this nation, we cannot delegate that duty. So, each one of us is under a moral obligation to be brave. I guess i do want to none crisis. E down on the coliseum,lt and a modern society the coliseum and the not look like a coliseum in which there are lions. A good be destruction of peoples livelihoods like what happened to jack phillips. Again, to maybe have a biblical frame, maybe we do not have a coliseum right now but every day at planned parenthood right now is a restaging of the massacre on an insane scale. So, that is a crisis and we should be able to name things like that. Well, just a small point. David knows this well. On campuses, the problem is not just one that could be solved by courage. Although there are many aspects be solved byould courage, but there also deprivations of due process of law in sexual us all proceedings and so forth, which encouraged by the Obama Administration that dearfamous colleague letter. Their courage, although still and always necessary, is insufficient to solve that problem. The estimates of classical liberals began to nuke those title ix policy from orbit very quickly. Inspired ix policies have been ruled unconstitutional or unlawful that are commonlaw concepts by judges from every single modern president that were appointed by every single modern president. The is of classical liberalism absolutely nuked this and are still nuking this incredibly illiberal in position on the bill of rights. Patrick, introduce yourself. Thank you, all three of you very much for coming to speak. Im a sophomore Political Science student. A classicalis, its the station between public and private reason within political liberalism where the ideas that Public Policy should be justified on the basis of the interest that can appeal to people across different comprehensive doctrines. Your vision of a public sphere oriented towards the highest good, especially if it uses the conservative history of the founders, seems very bound up with a christian theory of the good and of sin and intricate disorder. Im curious if you think there is space for a version of this argument of more proper ordering in the public sphere that stays within the bounds of public reason as opposed to sort of falling into a religious base. Sure. Its called natural law. That is one of the founders, although they did not always use the term, or didnt use the language of classical natural law, they nevertheless were steeped in it. It is a language that says we can know the good. We can know it by exercising our reason. Its writtenay, into our hearts already in the form of a conscience. With revelation comes the added assurance that we know thou shal t not kill. At a level of conscience we know that we can reason about it. I think thats a framing that, the more classically steeped in the founders would have appreciated. Professor kesler can comment on that as well. So, that is not necessarily christian. But it may require some recognition of classical theis, which, again would not have been a group of mostly men who could not stop talking about god, the god of the nature, the better angels of our nature if you go back to lincoln. And so. Able to gohave to be back to that time and language, to say that the good is knowable by reason. I would like to follow up on patricks question. Is it right to see the distinction between [ indiscernible] david, you except more pluralism. As simply given, it is not going to go in. You are not willing to concede that . Is that a fundamental difference between the two of you . Ill answer. I wont speak for david, but i will say that moral pluralism in matters of sexuality if you believe that there is a moral law is a reality but that does not mean we should not strive to order our politics including in that area to the good. Because the good is noble. I would say that i think that fundamental moral differences are intrinsic to the nature of this nation. And the nature of those differences often change. Pluralism is a fact of life from its foundation of the country. Its one one of the reasons why like madisons paper so much. What is it that divides us . We have never been this religious and endlessly homogenous ethnically homogenous country like your. We have always been multiethnic, multi faiths and were going to be as long as this country is thi exists. Thats pluralism. Any giving flashpoint within pluralism may change. Societies change. But the the fact of pluralism is a permanent part of the american existence. If we take any action to impair the ability of us to live together in a pluralistic environment it is going to harm the fabric of this country. Ocqueville said for all the differences you mention, the americans whatever their faith have the same morality. That is not true anymore. Thats, theres a different sort of pluralism. Some would say there was a different sort of pluralism. I see him resisting that. And may be not to put words in your mouth but criticizing you for accepting it. I want to push on this disagreement because i think there is a real disagreement here. Charles, maybe you want to get in on this as well. Charles i am in the middle. I think the way the founders wouldnt put it and to some would have put it and even tocqueville would have said. All the religions teach the same rally. Same morality. To, uh, life, liberty, uh, uh, the pursuit of happiness. Theologicalheir doctrines will differ widely at the time but as long as they can agree on how we ought to regard our fellow citizens as human beings with rights, which no religious teaching authorizes us to violate those rights or to deprive them of those right. The right to practice our religion and the exercise of our religion is one of, from phils specialties. All of that really dependent upon the doctrine that we share the same rights. Our religious freedom is an aspect of the morality we all agree on. If, in other words the the basis of pluralism is consensus, a certain kind of moral consensus. If you do not have the consensus, thats a a problem for pluralism, i think. And poeeace even. Peace in society. And that is where the criticism hits. Whether or not the common morality is being degraded. But i think that is where we again smooth over some of these early american religious differences. Some of these early american religious differences were i cannot live around you people. Beingot even, maybe i am expelled. Maybe i find the atmosphere in the community to be so intolerable i cannot even live here. And this mirrors, if you look at Christian Europe, running up to the american founding, you have a lot of people in Christian Europe who had believed things onow as a, and morality that we would go, yeah. There are large areas of agreement. If you ride down flanranklin road in national, tennessee, you will pass a beautiful Catholic Church and you will pass a not so greatlooking assembly of god church. And all of them are based on the culture of the place, right . A before Presbyterian Church but not as beautiful as the Catholic Church because that would be wrong. The biggest conflict you have between groups now is can you get out of church fast enough to beat the rush . And, and, you know, rewinds 300 years and the Church Bulletin at a say, you know calvinist church, it would say potluck at 11 00. Papist burning at noon. You know . This is the level of disagreement and vicious anger that existed between these common strands, within small orthodox christianity, that we have almost totally forgotten. We have almost totally forgotten it. Lle ditzynk tocquevi elements of common American Culture did see elements of common American Culture. If you, including one which would be if nobody has committed pluralism committed to pluralism you cannot have a commitment to prolon pluralism. I am not saying that there is a situation where we can live and we have zero agreement, but im saying we going to live in a permanent condition in this nation where we have very substantial disagreement, very disagreement, and we have to figure out how to do it and the founders showed us the way. Very brief and then we will get point i wanted to make is that the best hope he founderse is in t to the extent that they recognize that religion, True Religion may be called classic theism is part of the common good. Special kinde, a of encouragement. Religious liberty plus. And evenms says jefferson says the relation that we have, including its diversity, broadly judeochristian, is a source of temporal part of a common good than the temporal power has some responsibility to recognize it and we should resist doctrines about absolute religious neutrality. I know this was a Heated Exchange and the let debate. That is a litigation strategy that so far has brought people who are christians in public spaces, but in the long term the doctrine of religious neutrality in a way relegates religion to a kind of private bias. Like, ok, you believe in one god who is a creator. You worship allah. We can all just share the same view. That is essentially the government of the United States, including courts. Imposing a kind of moral relativism that i think is very dangerous and also chips away at the funded in our accounting because our founding is based on this idea of [speaking latin] a a specific vision of god. If that vision is no more special than scientologists or whatever quackery, then we undermined our constitution itself. Well, these issues go far back in the countrys history, so the first Republican Party National Party platform condemned those twin relics of barbarism, slavery and polygamy. And the early Mormon Church, whether it could be accepted as part of the pluralistic world of aerican religion, it faced stumbling block from the practice of the doctrine of polygamy and iin the early church. There was an actual Supreme Court decision that outlawed polygamy in the United States, and the Mormon Church responded by forbidding polygamy as well. Olved happily to the point where it is, the Fastest Growing religion in the country of today. And essentially endorses the same morality as all the other religions. But, if you do have religions that endorse polygamy or many worse things could be imagined, child sacrifice or whatever, you could not have religious pluralism that would succeed. You would have religious warfare eventually. Let me raise the name ralph s. A name real fast. James blaine. He was an odious senator from maine who was an anticatholic bigot to the core. His vision of ordering society to the public good is he proposed an amendment to the United States constitution that prohibited any funding for sectarian or any state, sectarian schools. In our modern lens, we think denomination. Like a christian school. Back then, that had a very specific need. Under the ordering of the higher good in the years before the First Amendment was applicable to the states, the ordering of higher good meant that the Public Schools could be protestant schools where they read from the King James Bible theyhey sang hymns, prayed and sectarian schools were parochial schools and the Public Schools will be elevated and the sectarian schools, sectarian meant catholic, will be excluded. 37 states passed those amendments. 37 states, ordering the society for what they thought was the higher good. It was odious anticatholic industry. Were still fighting about that now. There is a case before the Supreme Court of the United States, espinoza, that is trying to finally drive the wooden stake through the vampiric heart of anticap at bigger tree in this country. And that is what i am worried about. James blaine, remember him. Remember when state power is , toted to depart from scale onhumb on the the side of one faith or another. James blaine. Well try to get as many questions as we can, ok . Go ahead, sam. Hello. A sophomore at notre dame. French, i was inspired by your call to speak the truth gracefully saliva question for you. A question for you. You mention the idea that we are in a challenge and not a crisis, we are facing harder challenges in the 1980s and the 1990s. I dont agree that we are in a better been material position. The main crisis is our crisis in international character. Do you think that our society objectivedes truth and virtue and not objective religion will create good leaders to face challenges in the future . In other words, has a been a government that has been pushing theal liberation and degradation or virtue or has that been free individual exercise of their liberty . Yes. Uh, its been both. Part of the moral battle and United States of america is that between people of very competing moral visions that have exercised their liberty and join the marketplace of ideas often with an assist sometimes on one side all too often on the other side from the government. Advancing ideas and values that i find repugnant. That i find repugnant. This is a constant fight. A constant fight. It will never stop. You will always have a battle between the, the truth and lies. You will always have a battle between justice and injustice. That is always going to exist. And the nature of that will change, like, how extreme it is at any given moment will change. Whether you are on top politically or on the bottom politically will change. One of the interesting things about this since the crisis i began seeing emerging and especially with the flight 93 is both essay sides think they are losing badly right now. I talked to a conservative group. Are you insane . The left wins everywhere. By 2014 theys democratic party, the instrument of our political power to incult urate this country was added 100 year low. Can you imagine how we feel if republicans were at a 100 year low right now . That is a real problem. What you have are two sides engaged in a battle of ideas. I want us to win. That i want us to win. But i also do not want to destroy the superstructure or impair the superstructure of this country for the sake of a shortsighted believe that political power can make us win this thing. Its not. If were concerned about state power, as we should be and as history teaches us we should be, we should be the most suspicious of granting the states more power over our moral lives. The history of the left 50 years is not good for that. Yeah, i mean, look, i think the reason both sides may be think they are both losing is because bottom line the conditions that we have are just serving both. Neither of them are the common good is they view it. Ou politics have beenr de politicized by judges and others. Were facing this kind of crisis of polarization and so forth. You know, i dont see how that evidenceays is not an for my side of the argument in a sense that if both sides feel like the regime is failing them maybe we need to rethink, we as conservatives, need to rethink what our goal is. A our goal to just be, stance procedure or our goal to present the vision of the good and bring more people to our side rather than both sides losing . Were going to go 10 more minutes and try to get as many questions and as possible. Hi. Im a first year law student at Mckinney School of law in indianapolis. Im curious how all of your faiths kind of influence the way you interact in the political sphere and how you treat people . You did not hold that belief, if you still think your methods would still be consistent when when you do hold those beliefs . Real quick. Your public witness. This will be fast. One of the reasons why have confidence in the marketplace of ideas. One of the reasons why have confidence that we can reorder society to a higher and better good to the power of our voice is i have seen with my own eyes the renewing power of the gospel in the lives of human beings who have absolutely no hope, who have absolutely no where to go. Ive seen that power is to be far more transformative from the inside out than any other power that i have seen in the united government, cultural, the power of the gospel is the most powerful force on earth. And the, the idea that we would retreat on key liberties that allow us to share the most powerful force on earth, to me, is one of the more selfdestructive and harmful ideas we could put forth in the Public Square. I was raised baptist. Is a religion deeply suspicious of saint power. I think as a reading of christianity, it is a very themes thatnder of actually would unite here. Reasonable t a that all the religions can agree the wordn a deep would be to use crisis in American Life and politics. Problem in america is about reason more than revelation. It is about what reason can know and whether we can know will know enough about the moral good to require everyone to live up to it. Age whenhy in an postmodernism has swept the , postmodernism stands and falls by the notion cannot tell us anything about what is right and wrong. Even beyond the ruling class into the ruled, as it were, it is politics of bitter emotional vitriolic irrationality. There are signs we are heading in that direction. I converted to roman catholicism and it has had a profound effect on how i look on the world. Actor, my primary , liberty of the church. I am grateful for what david has done for the liberty of the church. Faith,lso, catholic including its social teachings has made me reseen some aspects of american conservatism. Say, it is what it is. X number of people do not have insurance. This has happened to me. What would it be like if it happened to someone else . Virus and it can be very deadly and it requires a night of hospitalization. We got the bill and it was just monitoring him was 20,000, of which even though i work for a Large Corporation with a plan, i wasurance responsible for 3700 of that. My wife and i can handle that. I cannot imagine what is that like what that is like for working class americans and for poor americans. It we as conservatives does not mean the answer is always the state, but there has to be a degree of protection for people. There is far too much uncertainty in American Life and that is why a lot of americans do not take great risks. They do not make the great sacrifices that they should because of this pervasive since of uncertainty. Me anyion has not made less combative but it has been it has brought me to the sacrament of confession. [applause] i am a junior, sitting in philosophy and economics. My question is, after world war ii, germany banned the nazi party as an evil ideology that led a prosperous nation to its destruction. Is it prudent or effective for an certain ideas from the Public Square . The american state . Yes. Enoughhat a short answer . We do not have the culture of other nations. David has rightly called for a total war on the outright and i am with him on that for the ight and i am with him on that. Obviously, we have our First Amendment. Violents any kind of extremist component, that is where we can fight. Any incitement component, that is where we can fight. I would say, i do not to bring in the Library Thing again but i nevermind. Regime, we cannot do that. Conditions. Ferent warfareage ideological and we have against communism, fascism and other types of totalitarianism. Not it depends upon the circumstances. People whoivil war, had fought on behalf of of the confederacy were required to oath of loyalty to the constitution and the union until their Political Rights were restored to them. That was a very exceptional circumstance and a very exceptional remedy. I think it is possible for such remedies to be necessary. Please join me in thanking our panelists today. [applause] here is a look at our live coverage friday. At noon eastern, legal experts discuss some of the cases that will be on the Supreme Courts upcoming docket. That is followed by President Trump speaking at eight young black leadership summit at the white house speaking at eight young black leadership summit at the white house. Sunday, on q a, this was sunny and institutions peter on the history that smithsonian history. Ons on the you thatist will tell a tomato is a fruit. Tariff onariff put a vegetables and not fruit. Importer of vegetables wasted out that the tomato a fruit and he did not have to pay a tariff. The battle went on for quite some time and eventually the Supreme Court ruled that tomatoes were actually vegetables. It is an interesting ruling that had repercussions beyond just tomatoes. Sunday night at 8 00 eastern on cspan q a. Next, democrat of representative alexandria ocasiocortez held in herwn hall meeting district. She also talked about legislation she is proposing to address poverty related issues