Transcripts For CSPAN2 Constitutional Amendments - Social Political History 20221106

Good evening. My name is brent holmes and i have the privilege to serve as the acting director for the Hauenstein Center for president ial studies. On behalf of our partners at the gerald r. Ford president ial foundation and the gerald r. Ford president ial library and museum, i would like to thank you for joining us this evening to help celebrate constitution day. Tonights event event is part of the talking together series, a collaborative project with the paterno soros center for civil discourse. The Kaufman Interfaith Institute and media. In 1787, 55 delegates met in philadelphia and drafted the constitution. These four pages of parchment laid the foundation for this new government. Much of what we know as the constitution was written later through 27, ratified them, amend means to broaden the scope of our democracy. Tonights speakers will help us understand the history and the development of our National Charter. This evenings event would not be possible without the continued generous support of our donors. Hauenstein Center Memberships are a vital part in our ability to continue fulfilling colonel Ralph W Hauenstein vision of raising a community of ethical, effective leaders for the 21st century. We accomplish this Important Mission through through programing like this evening and work and the work being completed in the peter c cooke Leadership Academy. To learn more about membership or to renew your membership, speak to a Hauenstein Center staff member. Tonight we will hear from one of our peter c cooke Leadership Academy fellow candidates. Then jeff poulet, director of the ford leadership forum, will introduce tonights speakers. Our speakers will provide a brief introduction of their work, and then i will join them for a moderated conversation, followed by a question and answer session from the audience. Hauenstein center staff will be in the aisles with handheld microphones for the questions. Our Common Ground program manager, kahler sweeney, will wrap up the evening with closing remarks. I now get to share one of the best parts of my job. I get the privilege to introduce you to one of our peter c cook Leadership Academy fellow candidates who will share his leadership minute. Graham sarhan junior is a senior studying mechanical engineering. He was born and raised in london and is highly motivated to outwork his competition. Aziz believes he is defined by his work ethic and ability to create bonds with different people. He is often hard on himself, hoping that if he can be perfect, at least he can be excellent. Aziz believes before you can attain the level you want that you aspire to reach. You have to be willing to grind and sacrifice who you are to become who you want to be. He would like to make as many defining moments as possible on his journey. Please join me and welcoming aziz. Aziz. Good evening. My name is aziz graham, sergeant junior, and im happy to see quick Leadership Academy kennedy and middle eastern. Im african. Im extroverted. Im loud. And i would like to get something off my chest. I believe that only those who are born to be leaders should be leaders. I find that line somewhat somewhat ironic because has anybody in this room met somebody . Theres only one leader. I would like to transition into what i like to call the metamorphosis of what its been like on my leadership journey. I was approached by a friend who was at the time the president of the National Society of black engineers, who saw in me at, lets say, 2017 as somebody that would be a good Vice President. I declined abruptly because at the time i was teetering on the edge of academic probation. And on the verge of being sent back across the pond. I had in no way what it took to be a leader. I didnt have the shoulders to bear other peoples problems because i was barely able to deal with my own. However, i did what no want to represent what our great work ethic could overcome. So i repeat, at no point did i want to be a leader. However, because of this work ethic and because of this dream, i compromised with the president and we came up with the idea that i would be the Vice President until somebody better came along. But what i found as time passed on that through that passion, i found other people that shared similar dreams start to attach themselves to me. I found that they wanted to be utilized to find this common goal and essentially manifest what i considered at the point a dream and i agreed that, you know, as time passes by, you know, everybody will get to that point where they found like, okay, im getting closer to a dream, but i want everybody to think about the the fact that most of your journeys, including my own, some of a lot of parallels between the purpose of todays evening, which is the constitution, the constitution was not a one and done. It was something where a lot of amendments were made. In other words, with all the efforts that the Founding Fathers had made, they still faced repercussions and the bitterness of failure. The defining moment in leadership is not what happens when failure happens. Its what you do after him. And i want everybody to think about the paradox, which is success. Failure is the absence of success. But success is not the absence of failure. Which leads me to my final points. Leadership is authentic. Being you, allowing others to follow you, which means whenever you are shining and would ever greatness that you consider you. Theres somebody watching. Whenever you have a conversation with another person, i like to think of that as a trade in leadership. Youre learning from somebody as much as theyre learning from you. So when you are being that greatness, that is you, when youre questioning whether youre a leader, youre always leading. So lead with it from within. My names aziz Graham Sarhan junior. And im a leader. By. Oh, good evening, everyone. Jeff plot. I am the director of the ford leadership forum, part of the gerald r. Ford president ial foundation, and i am pleased as punch to be here tonight and partner of the Hauenstein Center and have the opportunity to introduce our two speakers. I would like to draw your attention to the your program, which has a lot of the biographical information about the speakers. I wont be repeating that. What i do want to talk about is for a few minutes as i introduce them, is what were talking about tonight. And thats this book which i had the opportunity to spend a couple of hours with last night and as i was telling the speakers earlier, its rather remarkable. I dont recall. And other book that takes a systematic look at the amendment process of our constitution. We are now 235 years into our constitutional history and its an interesting history in part because i think the length of time sometimes blinds us to some of the novelty of the whole thing. In fact, madison uses that phrase to describe the constitution in the federalist. Papers, or the novelty of the experiment. Part of the novelty of the thing is that its a written constitution. It is, to my knowledge, the first written constitution that a nation had to establish its government and bind itself together. And i often find myself wondering what the framers of the constitution would think if they came back to America Today to see what they have wrought and sort certainly they would be surprised by the size, the scope, the centralization of our government. They would probably be surprised by the weakness of congress, which they thought was going to be the most Dangerous Branch of government in many ways, they would probably be surprised that the things still exists at all. Im not sure that the i mean, there was a lot of pessimism at the writing of the constitution about whether this thing could do endure across generations. And one of the reasons the authors of this book did, john crowl and Wilfred Codrington do so brilliantly in this book is they show how built into the constitution, the people who wrote the constitution dealt with some really fundamental problems. Among these are the questions of how we separate what a constitution is and what a constitution means. A lot of times when we think about constitution issues, were obsessed with meaning, but theyre indicating in this book that the constitution is about more than just meaning. They understand that, as edmund burke says, a government that has no capacity to change. Neither has any means to preserve itself. And so built in to our constitutional system is a way of preserving the system by changing the system. They dealt with a fundamental problem of political life, and that is how can you create dynamic change within a political system while at the same time trying to figure out how to stable wise it and keep it from spinning in a kind of vertiginous, dizzying fashion and also how you can have a government that can adapt itself to changing circumstances without itself necessarily being the agent of those changing circumstances. And all these are the sort of difficult parties that they faced in the creation of our constitution. And one powerful means they established to help deal with these problems was to create the amendment process. And as a political scientist, i can tell you that it is a part of constitutional design and constitutional history that just has not gotten sufficient attention. So when the Hauenstein Center approached us and suggested this and i did a little bit of looking, read a couple articles by our authors, i thought, this is really interesting, and why has no one done this before . And its in part a testimony to just how interesting the book is that its kind of hard to believe that no ones done it before. I can tell you, based upon reading the book, you can tell from the biographies that our speakers, john cole and Wilfred Codrington, are experts in their field. But more importantly, their expertise is revealed in the text of this book itself, and im confident will be revealed in the deft way theyll be handling your questions tonight. So please join me in welcoming tonights speakers Wilfred Codrington and john kowal. Thanks so. Well, wilfred, john, again, thank you for joining us tonight to help us celebrate constitution day. Thank you, brendan. Thank thank you, everyone. We were so delighted to be here and we want to just begin by thanking grande about Grande Valley State University and the Hauenstein Center and the gerald r. Ford president ial foundation. Jeff, i want to thank you for your kind words. It meant a lot to us. And and i want to thank you, brett. Youve been just a wonderful host to us our whole time here. So to begin our book talked, we wanted to start with a thought exercise. So i want you to visualize something. I want you to picture a time in america when the country was sharply polarized along regional lines where the the east and the midwest were at odds with the rural, the south and heartland america. I want you to picture a time when our politics was gridlocked, when elections to congress were very closely fought, the control of congress switched back and forth every few years where the presidency president ial elections were also closely fought, and twice in a short period of time, the Electoral College delivered the victory to the candidate who did not win the most votes. I want you to picture a time when immigration was changing the face of the country in a way that worried a lot of people about what that meant for their own Life Opportunities and worried about what it would do to the character of the country. Yeah. And if you imagine further in america where you have Innovative New technologies that were transforming the way we communicate, the way we work, the way we live, making life more convenient and comfortable, but also creating a host of problems for democracy and our society more broadly. Imagine a time where economic inequality was increasing as a wealthy few hired the system to ensure that they could avoid contributing to the common good by paying their fair share of taxes. Now imagine a time when a conservative Supreme Court interpreted the constitution in ways that under mind, the fundamental guarantees of equality while blocking progressive reforms, advancing the interests of big corporations and the megarich, while ignoring the majority. Raise your hand if this sounds familiar. Well, yeah, well, maybe be surprised that were not talking about america in the 21st century. Were talking about america in 1899, the america of 1899 amending the constitution to revitalize an ailing democracy seemed impossible that year. The Washington Post published an editorial urging reformers to give up their hopeless efforts to add more amendments to the constitution. Its true, the paper said, that there is some disparities decide a faction with the constitution as it is. This is shown by the frequent proposal of amendments by the earnestness with which they are pressed. The attention of congress. They have been they have been demands made on congress for the submission of a woman suffrage amendment, an election by senators, by popular vote amendment, and various other amendments. Not one of them has any prospect of getting over that almost impassable route. For that reason, the editorials concluded, we may properly conclude that the constitution is un amendable, and yet just ten years later, in 1909, Congress Passed the First Amendment. In over 40 years, and by 1920, within just two decades after that dire prediction, americans added four very significant amendments to the constitution that really grappled with the problems of the time. So we added the 16th amendment, which made it which authorized the income tax and allowed modern government to exist. We added the 17th amendment that took the power to choose senators away from corrupt state legislators and gave it to the people. We added the ninth, the 19th amendment that gave women the right to vote after 50 years of campaigning for that, and we added the 18th amendment, which the prohibition amendment, which people dont think of as a reform. But at the time it was meant to launch a noble experiment that america would be more prosperous, safer, more modern if we just could get rid of the poison known as alcohol. So but then, you know, a few decades later, its though its 1937. President Franklin Roosevelt was at a key moment in his presidency fighting against a Supreme Court that was overturning his new deal reforms and as wrote, as roosevelt battled the nine old men of the Supreme Court, he was urged to settle the matter by proposing a constitutional amendment that would clarify that the government had the power to pass the to enact these kinds of reforms. And he had big majorities in congress. But the president was unwilling to take that risk. And he said that it is, of course, clear that any determined Minority Group in the nation, without any great difficulty, could block ratification by one means or another. In 13 states for a long time. This pessimist view has been the norm in American History, and it prevails today. Its very common among experts. For example, professor richard albert, whos been a great friend of ours, and hes a highly respected scholar, says the Us Constitution is best understood as constructively amendable. It gives the impression that everything is freely amendable, but really nothing today is amendable. Another really leading scholar of Sanford Levinson argues its next to impossible to amend the constitution with regard to genuinely controversial issues, even if substantial and intense majorities are in favor of amendment. So having said that, we agree thats an understandable point of view. It is certainly hard to amend the constitution. It has only happened, as well hear tonight in certain periods in our history. Weve only had 27 amendments, but in our book we argue that difficult is not impossible. And as our book illustrates time and again, generation of americans have overcome this feeling of powerlessness, this feeling that this important tool of democratic participation is out of reach and not worth trying to put their imprint on our National Charter through this constitutional amendment process. So our book, the peoples constitution, tells the story of how American People have taken an imperfect constitution, a document that was both profoundly visionary and fundamentally flawed and molded it into their own. They did this through their extraordinary efforts. They made their country more democratic, more inclusive, and more suited to the needs of a changing country. And that was through the amendment process. These changes have come primarily in four distinct waves, as john has mentioned, arising from some of the most turbulent periods in American History. The 12 amendments of the founding era address some omissions in the original charter, most notably the dearth of comprehensive protections for individual rights and liberty. The reconstruction era amendments that they promised. The second founding in the wake of the civil war, they abolished slavery. The guaranteed equal citizenship, and sought to extend Voting Rights for black men while simultaneously imposing substantial limits on rogue state governments. In the progressive era, which we just described, the amendments sought to grapple with a modernizing nation beset by corporate greed and public corruption, by authorize wrong the income tax, providing for the popular election of senators. Extending the franchise to women and outlawing the manufacture, sale and transportation of liquor and the civil rights era. In that era, through the amendment process as well. And those decided be less ambitious than the other constitution. All reforms of the prior eras, we continued to expand democracy, see the Voting Rights act, enfranchise long ignored populations, and to update president ial succession for the nuclear age. So if some of these additions to the constitution have brought really profound changes to our country and to our fundamental law, other amendments are best described as technical fixes. But if you look at the 27 amendments over this 200 year span of history in these eras, its no exaggeration to say that much of what americans consider the most important parts of the constitution, the heart of the constitution, and the heart of our national identity, everything from freedom of speech and religion to the guarantees of equal protection of the laws and due process of law are not found in the beat. A version of the constitution that the framers gave us there, found in the periodic upgrades over the years and its important to note, and its not really taught in school, that over 40 of our constitution was added after the Constitutional Convention of 1787. Nevertheless, despite this history, most americans today would agree with the editorial writers of the Washington Post. In 1899. You know, most people think its impossible to amend the constitution, and many actually think its unwise or possibly even dangerous. So that question came up at a lunch today. Thats a very common view. So we wrote this book as a forceful response to these critiques, in particular, the we hoped to inject a sense of optimism and possibility. Its admittedly hard, but but that its important to remember that it is viable and vital that we advance constitutional reform through this neglected means of change, and that its kind of impossible to think that this incredible history and well talk, well get into some of the details of it is over that it was something that past generations could do. But you know, americans in the 20th century are not able to do so. Our book is really a plea to put aside some of some of this defeatism, at least a little bit, to recover our constitutional imagination. In writing the book, we made conscious decisions about its style and substance to ensure that it was broadly accessible. This is not a book written for lawyers and legal scholars. Our chief executive was actually to blend lively prose with rigorous history to make a book that was readable and would reach a wide audience. We think its really important to reach ordinary americans who dont think every day about this, but americans who care about our democracy. Who care about the state of our country, to realize that there is one tool that we could use to actually improve our country. You know, we were we were extremely pleased. And this is perhaps a shameless plug. But Publishers Weekly wrote very nice things about our book. But they praised it as a really good read and as they put it, incisive character profiles, brisk historical sketches and lucid analyzes of legal and political matters make the peoples constitution an invigorating take on the history of american democracy. And we hope youll think the same thing as the peoples constitution explains. While our story of the nation and the nations charter began with the 1787 philadelphia confab, where 55 men in powdered wigs hashed out the framework that would shape the american experiment, it did not end. There. That was just the first chapter in a much longer story, a story that continues to today, as if in a Long Distance relay, they pass the baton to the successive generations of americans with the expectations that they would continue the race. The framers were far more numerous, far more diverse than the men who gathered in philadelphia, and the men who assembled in the state ratifying conventions. They live across two centuries and face a plethora of existential crises. So we wanted to write this book to tell their stories because they are also our stories. And we believe that our stories separately and collectively, there is power and important messages for every american who cares about the state of our democracy today. Closing id like to read a passage from the last chapter of our book. Perhaps no one has ever captured this process. Is the article five process amending the constitution . No one has ever captured this process more powerfully than thurgood marshall, the grandson of a slave who championed the civil rights and then in his later years earned the distinction of becoming the first africanamerican justice of the United States Supreme Court. In 1987, as the nation marked its bicentennial, marshall criticized the degree to which the celebrate asian invited a complacent belief that the vision of those who debated and compromised in philadelphia yielded a more perfect union. It was said that we now enjoy in a speech in tended as a counterpoint to the gauzy festivities organized in honor of the framers accomplishment. The justice offered a dissenting view. I do not believe that the meaning of the constitution was forever fixed at the philadelphia convention. Nor do i find that the wisdom, foresight and sense of justice exhibited by the framers particularly profound. To the contrary, the government they devised was defective from the start, requiring several amendments. A civil war, a momentous social. Social transformation to attain the system of government and its respect for individual freedoms and human rights, which we hold dear today. Then, when contemporary americans cite the constitution, they invoke a concept that is vastly different from what the framers barely began to construct two centuries ago. And the New York Times reported that marshal speech stuck. Perhaps the most negative note yet sounded in the bicentennial year by so prominent a public official, a stark contrast to the lavish praise of the framers wisdom and the devotion to liberty and justice by figures including president reagan and warren burger, the former Supreme Court chief justice. But this criticism surely missed the point. Marshall was merely saving his praise for the many framers who came after the men and the women who fought to expand the narrow conception of we the people to produce a constitu nation that is more democratic, more inclusive, and more just. As Justice Marshall noted, the men who gathered in philadelphia in 1789 could not have envisaged these changes. They could not have imagined, nor would they have accepted that the document that they were drafting would one day be construed by a Supreme Court to which had been appointed a woman and a descendant of an african slave. We, the people, no longer enslave. But the credit does not belong. The framers, but belongs to those who refuse to acquiesce to outdated, outdated notions of liberty, justice and equality, and who strive to better them rather than encourage a blind pilgrimage to the shrine. Of the original document now stored in a vault at the national archives, marshall urged americans to seek instead a sensitive understanding of the constitutions inherent defects and a promising evolution through 200 years of history. In doing so, marshall promised, we will see that the true miracle was, not the birth of the constitution, but its life, a life nurtured through two turbulent centuries of our own making. It was in this way, through periodic infusions of democrat energy, channeled through the article five amendment process that the framers constitution became the peoples constitution. That passage concludes our book. But john and i hope that it is the start of a bigger commerce and one more broadly and one tonight. And we really look forward to starting that conversation with you. Thank you. John walker, thank you so much for that overview of work. So its been more than 50 years since Congress Last proposed a successful amendment and nearly 30 years since the last amendment was ratified. Why write a book about this now, particularly when the chances of getting another amendment ratified in these polarized times seems remote . You want to . Sure. Yes. So we started writing this book in 2016. Some people at the lunch. Well, this will sound a little familiar, but at that time, we had another Electoral College where the president or the president elect had lost the popular vote. This happened twice in two centuries. And so we thought in this time, how could that be possible . Looking back, the sweep of American History has actually made our constitu even more democratic. Weve weve added a trove of amendments that just have expanded the right to vote and incorporate more people in our democracy. But that wasnt just it. There were other problems. We start to think about. We thought about problems. Maybe the Supreme Court problems with congress, all sorts of problems that are affecting our our, our democracy, our republic. And really, you had to kind of be introspective sometimes when you have problems like this, its not just the outside circumstances. There are structural problems and other problems that go to the heart of this right. And so we started this book to actually think about the ways that people have done this in, the path past and how it might create a path for us to look forward to reforming the constitution, going forward. Yeah, and i think i would add to that is, you know, the the thing about the Electoral College is, you know, it would be very hard to change immediately, but there isnt even really a serious effort to amend the constitution. There isnt anyone willing to say, i want to develop a multiyear, long Term Campaign to finally get it. And the story of our book is and what we were inspired to tell this story is, is that is how constitutional changes happen. It doesnt happen overnight. Our book is the story of a visionaries gadfly lives. You know, people who politicians, individual citizens who were determined to not let the constitution stand the way it was to bring this change about the story of the womens suffrage amendment. You know, they they you know, at the end, you know, after the final ratification of it, you know, a historian, you know, a Movement Leader said it was the product of 41 years of pause, less effort. Now, i know that doesnt sound very appealing, but ill give you another example of that. In world war two, a congressman from West Virginia thought it was wrong to send troops to distant islands in the pacific and not let them vote. He proposed lowering the age to 18. It didnt go anywhere at the time. They different attempts. It was really only in the vietnam war in the period of the Youth Movement when suddenly people felt like maybe this was a way to channel some of the youth anger that was in protest. But the so this jennings reynolds, the jennings reynolds, this congressman Jennings Randolph sorry, this congressman was still there, you know, 30 years later, a senator. And, you know, we got beat. Its really wonderful to tell the story of how he was finally on his 11th. Try able to get the amendment through. And so i guess, to answer your question, i think that less people willing to be committed to long term change than nothing is going to change. So so at the end of the convention, james wilson read a statement from Benjamin Franklin. And in that statement, it talked about how the document that they created was was flawed, wasnt a perfect document. That being said, why is it so hard to amend the constitution . Why did they make it so, so difficult . Well, you know, the as we explain in the book, one of the reasons we have this is the frustration many people had with americas first constitution. We you may know we had a constitution called the articles of confederation. And it provided for a fairly weak federal government. And people felt like, well, we needed to add more powers. But its unfortunate we had a provision that to change the articles of confederation every state had to agree. And so what happened time and again was that 12 states would agree and one state would not agree with it. In rhode island, the tie up in rhode island. And, you know, and and, you know, George Washington, James Madison were indignant that this little state was stopping these changes. So it was one of the reasons, you know, they called for a convention to, proposed changes to the articles. And once they locked the doors, they ripped up the articles of confederation and started over. So one of the things that was really important to them was to have a better means of amending it. They wanted something that would be more able to change with the times. But oddly enough, because they were so distracted with other important arguments, they spent precious little time really thinking about the process. And it changed a few times in the right at the end. They changed again. But its disappointing to see that they didnt spend quite as much time. And so, you know, its to say that they i dont i think they say one more thing that they were trying, though, even though theres not a lot of record to walk a middle path. They didnt want the constitution to be so rigid that its faults would, you know, bring it down. But they didnt want it so changeable that many of the hard they made over slavery over democracy, over states rights, they didnt want them wiped away easily either. You know, i mean, i have i havent i havent actually decided whether its a it should be easier to amend the constitution because then we might get a lot of bad amendments. But i think they did make it a little maybe little too hard. Yeah. And its not just the compromises like those. Its also just fundamental principles, things we think about in terms of the rule of law. So they may not have gotten all the balance right on a number of things, but there are things we think that are important to a democracy. So, for example, an independent judiciary and i was just mentioning that maybe that should be the subject of an amendment because maybe they didnt get the formula right for how to make a judiciary properly independent. But they still had this idea that they want to lock in and they didnt want that to be just tossed in the dustbin of history. It did take a long time. There were many starts and and false starts to actually get to a constitution and that was going to unite the people. And so they really wanted to try to have something to make the constitution amendable, but not a process that would make it to amendable, to make it, you know, to elevate it above what a normal statute regulates. Yes, but they did, you know, i mean, i think the evidence is clear that, you know, that, you know, in the lifetime of people who, you know, wrote the constitution, we added 12 amendments. You know, by 1804. I mean, they were all there. They saw that. So, you know, thats thats evidence that they did. They expected there to be amendments, i believe they would be surprised that there were so few at the end of the day. The whats. James im sorry, Thomas Jefferson. Who thought we should get rid of the constitution every 20 years. So i think he would certainly be surprised that we have the same. Can you share what you talked about it a little bit in your in your view, but can you share a little bit more about your argument that amendments come in cyclical ways . Yeah, it would almost be nice to have a chart to show this, because if you look at the actual pictorially, youd see a bunch of clusters at certain periods. And so the idea here is that, you know, we amend the constitution often before we do so, we think its impossible to do it. But it takes a lot to get us to this point where we want to amend the constitution. You shouldnt amend the constitution for just any thing, right . We want it to be for the most fundamental values and principles and things to structure our government. But often we get to a period after a long, long period time, decades, almost half a century, often where it looks like the nation is about to collapse, you know, and the initial founding period. Right. We we didnt know that we would have this constitution survive past the ratification. And then we added the bill of rights to actually pacify some of the people who didnt think that the constitution did enough to protect individual rights and liberties. You get to the reconstruction era that happened that the civil war, we literally had a partial dissolution. Right. And it was the amendments that actually kind of melded those fractures. It happened in the progressive era. It happened in civil rights era. In the civil rights era. Its interesting because we think about the violence and the political sort of discord we see today. And there was lot of that stuff going on then. It was before. My time, i have to admit. But its scholars of history and they know that that was a really turbulent time. And we also amended the constitution to add things. I was sure. So if you look at it, most of our amendments actually come in these clusters. We have a few stray amendments and different times but and we are about a period thats as long as it has been in previous periods before weve amended the constitution. Yeah, i think one of the reasons they seem to happen in clusters is that, you know, most of American History, the nation is closely divided. Polarization is not new. Its existed many times in our history. But then there are just these moments where the pendulum swings and a new coalition is in power and theyre often not in power for very long. Like reconstruction, congress or Progressive Congress in the twenties. And then at some point the pendulum swings back. But i want to revisit this very brief passage, because it always makes me chuckle a bit. So, you know, there were we told you about the four progressive era amendments and there was a fifth that they tried to put out there, which was an amendment to ban child labor. And its one of those amendments that basically to a reactionary Supreme Court that twice overturned laws in congress to end what was a practice, really horrible practice of children under ten working in mines and mills and and the Supreme Court said, you know, its you know, its repugnant to the constitution to take on this issue. So this amendment was approved, but really quickly and it went to the states, but there it stalled and and so i want to read this. But the path to ratification proved more onerous than anyone imagined. Amendment fatigue had set in as americans grew tired of progressive policy reforms. They have taken our women away from us by constitution amendment. They have taken our liquor away from us. And now they want to take our complained an exasperated state legislature. Later. Its funny, actually, when i talk about that period in constitutional history to my students, i say i asked them, i say, what would you think if we had an amendment to ban or allow congress at least to regulate child labor . And they say, like, why would we need that . And i kind of tell this story that we actually did at one point, we proposed this idea. I also, you know, have them think about this idea of babies going in minds with little lights on their heads and things like that. That always gets a chuckle, but its a real thing. It was a real concern. Its one its one of six amendments that Congress Approved that didnt make it through the ratification process. And and we tell those stories to in addition, we tell the story of each of the 27 amendments, but also these six other amendments and theyre interesting, too. And the most famous one, probably the, you know, obviously equal rights amendment. But there were six in our history that failed, including one very disturbing at the beginning of the civil war passed the morning of abraham lincolns inauguration as a last minute desperate attempt to prevent the south from seceding. It was an amendment that would have basically allowed slavery and perpetuity in the states where it already existed and abraham lincoln, you know, i a great man. But at his inauguration, he said nice things about it. And its something we should look into. And so thats it. So anyway, theres a lot theres a lot of interesting drama and twists and turns in this story. So looking at the constitutions article two covering the presidency, the theres no fewer than four amendments that were adopted to clarify the language. Why do you why is that . Yeah. So lets we can start here by saying that the when they were thinking about who was going to head the executive, we think about the commander in chief. We think about the president being sort of like the chief emissary to the world we think about the president taking on a lot of other things. But they didnt really fully know what an executive would do and they didnt define it. Well, if you look at article two now, it really starts out by saying the executive power shall be vested in a president of the United States. And then it tells a lot of stuff about how you elect the president and the transition and, you know, they get the welcome ambassadors, but not much more. And so there was a little thought about it. It was contentious. They knew that what an executive could be if tyrannical, that would be king george. They knew would executive could be if it was the aspirational type for them which was George Washington who was standing in front of the convention in front of them, but they didnt really think about the other georges we could possibly have. Right. And so weve had to amend the constitution on occasions to either help for how we elect the president or think about a proper transition. In the case of president ial death. And so that its been actually for people, again, who thought lot about these ideas deeply, its hard to kind of put it to paper to get the compromises on these these ideas and two, to really think forward what the president might have to deal with. Yeah, they only they had four months to do their work, but they spent the first two months in a heated fight that almost killed the whole enterprise over the representation of states, like whether we should have a government of the states where every state has one vote, like the articles of confederation, or whether we should have a government of the people where big states get more representation based on their popular version. That was settled through a compromise that gave us the house based on popular represented nation and a senate based on equal state representation. But so they had they had to rush through a lot of other stuff. And just to give you one example, you know, they they talk the way they created a president and they they did it about whether to create a Vice President. And they threw that in at the end. But they never, ever said clearly that when the president dies, that the Vice President becomes president. They said that the powers of the office devolve on the Vice President. So when the first president died, William Henry harrison, there was actually a controversy over, well, is john tyler president is he acting president . Is he and so he boldly asserted that he was president. And, you know, and we write that, you know, john quincy was indignant that he was so audacious to do that. But it was really only until the 25th amendment in 1967 that we clearly said that the that the Vice President becomes president also. And also they created the Vice President. But there was no way to replace the Vice President. So for like 37 years in our history, after a president died was no Vice President. They didnt. And so that and know were here in the city that remembers gerald ford. But, you know, gerald ford was the first person to invoke, you know, to invoke this principle where he was chosen to be Vice President. And then he he was the first person to formally, clearly be president under the constitution, without any cloud or confusion about that. Yeah. And sort of even to add to the Vice President aspect for a third of the time that you had Vice President fill vacancies, the person who was in line often by an act of congress determining succession, was a member of a different party. Could you imagine a republican replacing a democrat in the middle of an administration . And that seems a little bit out of whack. So they didnt really give much thought to that. And just to add one more part about the executive, right . I said its very its our constitution overall is very scant. Its not many words. Its one of the shortest in the world, an article two. Its quite short as well. And so to think about some of the things we connect to the presidency on the on the progressive side, for example, we think about administrative. There is nothing in the constitution about administrative agencies. Often on conservatives, they like to invoke the idea broad swath of of president ial privilege. Theres nothing in the concept about president ial privilege. All of this has come as we adapted to what the office requires over time and maybe some of it should be constitutional lies, but it seems like there are things that we can sort of figure out ourselves without the texts and then other times where the divisions are so large and so unclear, we to resort to article five. What what would you think the framers would think about how how we as americans consider the First Amendment today . Well, ill start and you know, i just want to say for full disclosure, im not a professor. Im a, you know, of an executive leader of an organization. But we do have a professor. And so im going to turn to him in a second. But i just want to say in the beginning, really more of something from our book, which is, you know, the you know, we rightly revere the bill of rights today and the fight over the bill of rights was an important early fight in our history. But the is there was very little enthusiasm for the bill of rights. You know, it was i mean, the bill of rights was basically used as a wedge issue by the antifederalist who wanted to kill the constitution. They didnt like the constitution because it gave too much power to the federal government. But the argument that, hey, youre creating this powerful government and not protecting rights was the one that really worked and threatened to kill the constitution. So after lot of dithering, the federalist promise, when we create the government will add it. But it there was very little there was a lot of apathy in Congress Like almost nobody wanted to do anything about it. And so its really James Madison almost singlehandedly. He kept coming back saying, i want to talk about this. And they would say, oh, we have more important things to do. He finally forced them to to vote on the bill of rights. They went to the states, even that it took a while and almost didnt pass in the states. You know, because the truth is, the people who were demanding it realize is that if we support the bill of rights, then were strengthening in the constitution that we hate and people who love the constitution didnt think we needed. And so when it finally was ratified, it Thomas Jefferson was the secretary of state and it fell on him to announce it. And he basically sent it out in a newsletter under something about a new law on fisheries. And then it just was this little note that the that these amendments were adopted. It was very little fanfare. Nobody said, well, now our rights are protected. It was really only later that the that the bill of rights and the First Amendment became so central in our in our lives. Yeah and so what would they think about it . Well, first of all, they would think that it they may be mad that its not the third amendment. There were two proposals to that came before it. So the bill of rights was initially a package of a dozen proposals, two of which werent to pass are adopted at the time. One eventually was adopted as our 27th amendment 200 years after. So it would have been our third amendment, but even more, i think they, would not be sure what to think of what happened. So certainly the idea was that we want this robust speech, we want debate. Its important for the character of a democracy and developing society and community civility. But im not sure that they would like one they couldnt envision the way we would think about it today in light of technology. So they werent tweeting. And im not sure that they would have really have thought about that. Right. They were they were sending pamphlets around. Its not i certainly dont think that they think it would have been used to protect corporations to influence elections. Right. The sort of idea of of Campaign Money being, speech, thats not what it was envisioned for. I think they would probably think what we think about most of constitutional law and a lot of these sort of broader images stick generalities. Right. That things that are not precisely defined, that there is a balance, theres a balance between what we need to have our liberty and continue a conversation for democracy on the one hand, but also to ensure that were protecting the equality and safety of other people on the other. And so its a balance like anything else. And so we cant go we cant have a cultish view of the First Amendment. We can have a cultish view of any amendment or any part of the constitution at all, needs to be thought about and and interpreted in context and with some balance. During your research and reading of the book, what characters did you meet from American History that have been under underappreciated or lost . Are. Theres a lot of characters and its very colorful i want to tell so john started to mention a counter intuitive story about the corps, an amendment that would slavery and would not have allowed congress to abolish it. Theres another story specified. Holland. Holland. Theres a massive global firm called holland knight. Its one of the largest in the world. He was one of the name partners there, but he was sort of this really trusted this resume right . He was he went to college, played baseball all was scouted to play in the majors. He was a state. He went to law school. He was a state senator. He was a local judge, a prosecutor became governor, ultimately was appointed to the senate and became a senator from the state of florida in his own. And while he was in the state house in florida and as governor, he led the crusade to end the poll tax, which is that pernicious device that was imposed to keep people from voting. And when he got to congress, he also led this fight finally successful, to impose to ban the poll tax the the twist is sponsored holiday in holland was an arch segregationist. And it just had us thinking like one of these like what is the segregationist do trying to get rid of the poll tax. Well, the chief reason and we found one of his letters to his constituents who talk about various reasons why he did it. But the chief reason was he thought about the poll tax. And this has to go with the nuances of how we think about elections, which are divided between the states and congress. He thought that the poll tax, if you had to ban it through an amendment, then the civil rights legislation, especially the civil rights legislation that was being proposed, deal with discrimination and voting, would also have to go through the amendment process. So by pushing the poll tax with the amendment process, then you would make it more difficult because of the higher to get an amendment through for all other civil rights legislation. Bizarre. So i would say thats one of the more interesting characters that i met. Yeah. I guess i want answer the question a little differently because i hes. Hes not a obscure character, but i developed i get far deeper appreciation for president Franklin Roosevelt. And in writing this and of course he he sort of is you know, hes the key goes against the narrative of the book is the story of Franklin Roosevelt is someone who came you know, who came to power at a moment of crisis. But also was one of those pendulum swings where the democrats came roaring back and he had the kinds of majorities where he could make enduring changes to the constitution. And as i said earlier, he just decided it was too risky. He felt in the emergency of the National Depression that it would take too long. But but i my appreciation for him has to do with one of the themes that runs through our book, which is the question of states rights versus national. And its very clear is that the story of the constitution was to get over the mistake of the week articles of confederation, to give congress the power to solve the nations problems. They wanted a robust government and the antifederalists hated it, but they lost the argument. They came and joined the union and became part of america, and they were very successful for most of American History and just pretending that they won. So in the courts and in politics, basically a states rights view, especially in the 19th century, prevailed. And we had courts that kept stopping congress from fulfilling the role that James Madison imagined. And what i admire roosevelt for is that, as he had this fight with the courts and he was, you know, being really pushed to go the constitutional amendment route, he decided he was going to take it to the people and basically argue for the vision of the constitution that would allow him to and congress to Work Together to solve the nations problems. And so that, you know, the famous story of the switch in time when the Supreme Court changes, but it set in motion a dramatic constitutional change without amendment. And so i, i just have developed a great admiration for his i had no idea that that how significant he was for that reason. So, you know, its sort of amended the constitution through other means. And were living with that today, although, honestly, we you know, you may see in the next few years some erosion in that vision because we now have a court that is, you know, similar in its views to those courts before roosevelt that kept finding reasons to say congress doesnt have power to act in this way, in that way. And so we maybe we may be refighting these fights and maybe having an amendment would have a locked it in a bit more than it is now. Yeah theres one constitutional theorists. Griffin is about tulane who says, well, maybe the Administrative State would be more secure if we had actually passed that child labor amendment. The idea that we can actually regulate these things through agencies or otherwise, which might be proving a little oppression at this point. Okay. I have one more question before we open it up to to the audience. Are we likely to see a wave of you hinted about this . Are we likely to see a wave of new amendments to the constitution in the foreseeable future . Well, look, we dont have a crystal ball and that but but if past is prolog we are i think likely. I mean counterintuitively to see amendments and in the last chapter of the book we will look at what we call kind of the green shoots of interest in amendments. So, you know, one, i think interesting example is the renewed interest in the equal rights amendment. Thats starting with the metoo movement. You saw people saying, well, what what . We dont have an equal rights amendment in the constitution. I think a lot of you know, i think a lot of americans think it is in the constitution. And you saw states try to ratify it and that is probably not going anywhere. But to me, its evidence that that that building wave is coming. We we want to talk a little bit about a theory and the different. Sure. Yeah. So when you look at the various periods where we amend the constitution, you start seeing some recurring themes or these green shoots that john was talking about. One is that theres polarization right before we amend the constitution. Sound familiar . Another is that you get these Supreme Court opinions that really people the American People, the majority are not for. We might be seeing that, whether with dobbs or citizens united. Another is that you get experiment station in the states, right. So you have these problems and the states are trying to resolve resolve them themselves under their own processes, because the american constitution cant do it. And we see that happening with this movement to sort of go around the Electoral College called the National Popular compact, which is about 75 the way there. Well see if it actually gets there. We see that the constitution is amended in or around period of crisis and war and pandemic. So those those are the types of things that we have seen as consistent themes and i do want to put a note of caution. We are we are believers that these are parallels, that weve seen. But history doesnt always repeat itself. It may rhyme. Right. Theres that. And theres the limitation that none of this was inevitable. This all took the work of powerful social movements, innovative leadership, hip and other people to be insightful enough to see that we have these problems and push to reform them. So none of this is set in stone. And if we actually want to cure these deficiencies, we need to do the hard work ourselves. One of the thing that gives me hope is that, you know, the National Constitution center in philadelphia has done these different, you know, pull together these scholars to talk about ways to fix the constitution. And so there was a group of scholars and libertarian conservatives and and i have to admit, i havent had a chance to read their full report, but they agreed on four amendments, one of which is one that we think is really important, which is to implement term limits for Supreme Court justices, not just term limits, but regular terms. So imagine every two years one person rotates off and a new person comes on. Every president would get two appointments in the term. No more gamesmanship, no more merrick garland, no more strategic retirements and all. Or just the, you know, death watch of whether it is when is this person going to die, you know, and just would add, it would prevent people from being to be there for 30 and 40 years and would make the court more it would reflect more the results of the president ial elections, which would have some democratic legitimacy. But i say that as a sign of hope, because they did agree that thats something that would be good. And that makes me believe i mean, if theres one good thing about the constitutional amendment process, i mean, its so hard. But when you get to that point, you actually are building supermajority treaties in the United States. And sometimes i think its really good to try to not win everything with 50. 1 of the vote, but to build consensus and this is a way to build consensus. And when you get to that point and you get an amendment through, it often opens the door for more amendments to come through, which is in line with our theory that they come in waves. Right. So you have this sense of impossibility. You get this overwhelming consensus to amend the constitution. And then so we have these other problems, too. Lets fix them while were at it, while we have this movement going to reform it. Right. Any questions the audience we are going to walk around with microphones. If you guys could wait until we run a microphone to you, just so that the cameras can still pick up all the audio and dont lose any of the content. So our friends online can still hear all the questions that would be great. Okay. Hi. Thank you for coming to grand rapids. I was just curious about how did the book idea get started at one of you approaches other . Were you approached together to write it or how did it come about as an idea . Oh, i work the Brennan Center for justice and we im involved in a lot of our hiring. And in an interview for a position, a different position in the organization, i met wilfred and i was very impressed with him. And we started to talk about we were talking about the Electoral College and we just we just, you know, he was really excited about it. You know, im really upset about it. And so, you know, the not that that was right around the time of the 2016 election. And so i wrote a piece in for the Brennan Center just sort of trying to understand that the 2016 election by looking at the ways our democracy is suffering you know, both suppression money and politics, gerrymandering. But one was the Electoral College, you know, and asking question, you know. Yes, its hard, but why isnt anyone trying to something about it so i still was trying to recruit wilfred. And so we met and he reminded me, i thought it was for coffee. It was over a manhattan. Im reminded, but its a which may have helped seal the deal and and we so i just talking about this idea and and you know, i have to say, you know, i mean, it was just a germ of an idea. And so we hired wilfred as a fellow and we just from the from day one we worked on this together and figured it out together. Neither one of us has ever written a book. So there were a lot of false starts, you know, does, you know, digging holes needlessly. But it took that once we got our groove, it was a, i think, a wonderful collaborative process. It was it was interesting, actually. We talked to the publishers. We had this idea about ideas for amending the constitution in itself. And we had like small part was about the history and the publisher was like, lets make more of it about the history. That sounds like the interesting stuff. So its just a whole of lesson about how a book project evolves over time. When you Work Together and talk to other people about it and have for years including a pandemic, that kind of changes and you know, changes your processes. Thank you once again for for in for this evening it was interesting because just today i was listening to the jeff rosen podcast that described the Supreme Court justice process that you just mentioned tonight. I found it very enlightening this 18 year and every two year term. That was a great idea. I thought. But in my short term memory, it seems that in at least maybe the last three president ial administrations, they seem to be operating a great deal more under executive orders or attempting to govern executive order in. Is that necessarily a failure congress, or is, do you believe, a potential constitutional amendment to help define that authority that can be executive orders, can be used to implement certain policies . Well, the constitution doesnt say anything about executive orders. Its one of the things thats evolved and its something we worked on in the Brennan Center from time to time. And what you see is at in times when there is a huge amount of of gridlock and polarization, but when when when is dysfunctional and cant pass legislation, the temptation arises to try to do more through executive action. And then the truth is sometimes times i Mean Congress i mean one congressman, jamie raskin, blurbed our book and was very kind to us and he i mean, ive heard him on multiple occasions say, you know you know congress is the first article in the constitution is the most Important Branch but. The truth is congress often abdicates. You know, it doesnt want to take on hard issues or, you know, so or wont make the reforms needed to allow the institution to function properly. I mean like, you know, the filibuster. You know, i mean, its a convenient excuse to not get anything done is one way of looking at it. I mean, im not sure i see an amendment to fix problem. What we really need is congress to do its job and then we would need executive orders. Yeah. And really, this book is about getting the idea started. So maybe there is an amendment, who knows . But we really want to get the process where people are thinking deeply about what is appropriate in light of the problem. So, you know, alexander hamilton, that the judiciary is going to be the least Dangerous Branch. We see that that is not the case. There is also fears, as i mentioned up front, that we might have a tyrant, an executive. You know, you make your own assessment of that. But congress was the body that they were most afraid of and congress is impotent. Part of it, as john said, is selfinflicted wounds. They they put in procedures like the filibuster. They dont fund themselves to build up a staff of experts to do these things, which means a lot of their sort of work is outsourced to lobbyists and things like that. And really they dont want to deal with some of the harder issues might make them politically vulnerable. They voted on whether we go to war in a decade and weve been in military engagements over this time. And its just theyre just letting the executive make those. And that was not in the constitution. So, you know, there are a lot of problems. All the institutions that sort of amount in lead to the president leading by executive order. And i think that there is a lot room for amendments kind of. Sure, some or many of those parts up, but it really is about brainstorming these ideas now so we can get that in motion. I think he had a question question. Thank you. My understanding is, is that the equal rights amendment was ratified or sort of five enough states to qualify it to become a part of the constitution, but that there was a violation, a time of limitation, and that the National Archivist hasnt physically added it can you explain exactly what is status of the equal rights amendment . This one certain right now. Actually, there is hearing for the new archivist either yesterday or today. So its interesting and im sure some of the advocates of the equal rights amendment would press that the new archivist nominee that question. But the idea there was you know there were there was the child labor amendment is what started a lot of this so the child labor amendment was proposed and it like it might get some support and then it was at the end of this period. So the sort of energy was zapped and later on later and in roosevelts presidency, it kind of started to come back to life again. Other states were like, lets ratify this thing. After a period of more than a decade. And so there was a process where for every amendment they would that was going to be proposed. They would put a time limit on it. They would give a. Seven year ratification deadline so that cant be out there in perpetuity. They did this with the equal rights amendment. And john, ill let you talk about this, because i know you wrote an interesting on this part. Let me let me lets go lets step back a bit. So we constitution doesnt actually say like where the process is to declare an valid its a kind of a metaphor icicle thing when three quarters of the states ratify it shall be part of the constitution. So and the constitution doesnt speak to time limits. And the first to the First Amendment to do it was the amendment actually. And the reason was that someone put it in because they were hoping that the states would not ratify it. Instead it was ratified very quickly. And so some states had the deadline and some didnt. That the the deadline for the era was added at the last minute by one of the enemies of the era, senator sam ervin, a whos well known for his during watergate hearings. But he also was well known as, you know, a segregationist senator and anticivil rights. And so and and the the the the the sponsor of the amendment thought, well, what the hell we have such we have such strong support. Its not going to make a difference. And alice, paul, who wrote the amendment in 1923, was alive in 1972, working behind the scenes to get it ratified. Alice paul said, were doomed. Weve the amendment because of that limit. And thats what happened. Know within a year, like 30 of the 38 states ratify the era. But then Phyllis Schlafly cranked up machine of opposition and it stalled at 35 states. So, you know, most people, to be honest, assume the amendment was a dead after they extended the deadline, but that that at that point, it would be a dead letter. But then with this new energy, people said, well, we can waive the deadline like the deadline was imposed by congress and congress can get rid of it. So imagine a scenario where the democrats were in charge of congress, virginia, that the 38 state ratified it. They could have rushed a bill saying we wave the deadline and we consider the era valid and part of the constitution that might have worked. You know there actually were a couple of amendments that were where there was a debate over enough states had ratified it. The 14th and 15th amendments where states were trying to withdraw their ratification. And Congress Just ignored them and said its valid. So but unfortunately that vote happened at a time of divided government. The house was willing to act and Mitch Mcconnell sat on it. And so so right now, i mean, i dont see much hope of that. I mean, but they are i would say one last thing, the archivist thing is just its subject to a law like at different times, somebody had the job of counting the states saying its ratified and its so its the job of the archivist. But he said, i dont want to do it unless a Court Directs me to the right answer. And thats thats where its stuck. And i think its sadly end to note that there was a court in the district of columbia that said that it was not valid, that sentence been appealed and actually, i think the hearing it might have also been this week. So its with a three judge panel and the Appellate Court in the district of columbia. So well see what they say. But typically the courts really havent been involved in amendment battles and that that almost perfectly clear so it kind puts a lot of ideas up against each who should really be involved in this amendment process. Should the court be interpreting refereeing the amendment process, particularly you think about the fact that we often amend the constitution to restrain the court or overturn their decision. So now how do we think about the court refereeing that process . And because its such a gargantuan task to do so, do you want to give sort of credit to that, that the task . So its a very long, circuitous uncertain status is what answer would say, but it has it has a lot of people really interested. The equal rights amendment, again. And there have been messy moments like that in the past, you know, and but one you know, theres always the possibility starting over which i really people dont they want to exhaust this option. But theres huge support for the equal rights. I mean, and you know, and right now, republicans used to overwhelmingly support the era president gerald ford supported it. You know, it became more polarized. But what if it what if they tried to get it adopted again . Dare people to vote against it . You know, run tv ads against them, defeat them, maybe scare a few people by defeating them and get them to approve it. I mean, theres overwhelm ing support for the vra in this country. We are one of the few constitutions in the world that does not guarantee gender equality in our constitution. Women are not even mentioned in the constitution in any way. You mean even the 19th amendment just talks about discrimination by sex, but it doesnt say the word or the women have rights . Yeah. Kind of. Question in the back. Thank you for coming tonight. I think its been extremely fascinating and pivotal, especially where were at in our democracy right now. I wanted to return to executive power for my question. Over the last few months, theres been a rise in rhetoric from sitting members of congress about Christian Nationalism. Do you think that we need an amendment to the constitution protect against cult of personalities or authoritarian leaders who try to circumvent our laws and take control. So i think when we amend the constitution, we want to be cautious about the substance of these amendments. So i think, you know, prohibit action is that sort of perfect example of being having to be thoughtful. Its the only amendment thats ever been rescinded. And that has to happen through amendment. And it was sort of regulating this policy issue that could be dealt with in the normal framework of the constitution. And i think we do have, you know, on the one hand, there are elements that we do need to amend to sort of shore up democracy and ensure that authoritarian ism, that strain is going to be vanquished. I think theres some important legislation we need to with and theres some important amendments we need to deal with. And so i guess the question goes to what the nature of those things do we deal with this particular thing that were seeing today or do we deal with the larger issue that has it possible today . And i tend to think that amendments given are constitutional sort of structure, given our culture, we do better at amending broadly and then filling in the details with legislation and regulation. So my, my my sense is that but, you know, thats my sense right now. I havent checked my phone and looked at the news to see or the latest sort of you. No problem was so my sense is we think about the larger problems that cause these things which i think are symptoms the structural deficiencies. Yeah i, i want to say i think youre raising a very important and and, you know and but when you think about the, you know, curing problems by constitutional amendment, i would begin by thinking well, how would you write that amendment . Like what . You know, i mean, its just theres just certain things that that make sense as an amendment and some that are just that are really you have to go to peoples hearts and peoples to democracy. And i guess im reminded the story that, you know, at the end of the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin was walking outside and a woman came to him and said, well, what was the result . Do we have a monarchy, a republic . And he said, a republic, if you can keep it. And the if you can keep it part is important because it really is important that that that we share the same ground rules of democracy i mean we do there are thank goodness there are provisions in the constitution that are relevant you know for example like no establishment of religion separate knows it and so that you know in terms of Christian Nationalism and we have a constitution that mandates a democratic process. I mean, when you see in other countries, what they do is they quickly amend the constitution to, you know, thats the biggest worry. Theyll amend it to it. Its a good question, though. I want to think more about how could we amended to strengthen the guardrails of democracy. And let me just actually add on a point that john said, what would that amendment look like . And i think that that is important. Question what would any amendment like . And john talked about fdr and how he sort of did not use the amendment tools or push for amendments when he could of because he had overwhelming majorities. But that was one of his problems he was dealing with Grave National crises in the economy and other things. And he didnt know what a good amendment would even read like. So thats a big problem. But then also broadly, were talking about a constitution and and it is important to have the structure of democracy to sort set up foundational principles that unite us and and other things but realize it is just parchment. It does take us to actually, you know, uphold values. Our constitution only as strong as we are as a country and a government to actually enforce those values. So, you know, we want to amend so that this is what is guiding us and united us in telling us how we should structure ourselves. But we also have an obligation ourselves to internalize and externalize the principles that we think are so sacred in our constitution. Well, wilfred and john, again, just want to thank for for joining us, helping us celebrate constitution day. And its truly been a pleasure to have you with us. Spend the day with us. So again thank you and thanks for your great work. Well, thank terrific and thank you. Thank you very much. And were happy to talk further outside of the book signing. If anyone has any burning questions. They didnt get to ask, thank you both very much and thank you, grand rapids. Its really thats our first time here and weve had a wonderful, wonderful time. Thank you guys for joining us so much. I also my extended thank you to aziz for a part of his story with us here tonight. Also, i extend thanks to our friends and partners at the gerald ford foundation, as well as, the ford president ial museum for joining us. I think was a very profound argument i think many of us can fall into the trap of thinking that the constitution was a eureka moment where everyone came together and said, this is it. You know, weve figured it out. Were all in agreement and the fact that it was a a long battle, many factions to it was a compromise and then there was a compromise. I think we can also fall into the trap of saying that should not be changed in that we have much respect for the intellectuals of time who created the document. I think we learned here tonight. In fact, we actually follow in their footsteps by engaging in compromise and continuing to think about the political structures and constitutional structures guide our society, our nation. So i think we respect them in continuing these conversations to to recognize that there may be room to improve on our constitution. For those who would like to hear more, john and wilfred that their book will be available outside in the lobby, i invite you to check out on the Hauenstein Center website our off the stage podcast. They shared a little about their life and their their leadership lessons they learned and what guided them into their professions. So thats another opportunity to engage with our excellent speakers here tonight. With that, i want to say thank you so much for being here. Safe travels and well hope ill see you at our next event. The cooke Leadership Academy alumni panel. That is at 4 p. M. Here and loose more on september. Thank you. Our speaker is doing this tonight from london and to his everlasting credit and i asked him you want to do this at a time thats easier for you . He said no, no we can do this at 7 00 eastern time. He said this gives me Good Practice for staying up for the super bowl