A cameo. When we get to the q a part there is a microphone in the back of the room and we will let you know when it is time you will line up there to ask your questions. It is always worthwhile to revisit the documents that set us apart from british rule and created the framework for our government. Our guest speaker, kermit roosevelt, explores these documents and shares interpretation of their meaning and relevance. Professor roosevelt teaches constitutional law at the university of pennsylvania law school. He was born and raised in d. C. And attended harvard and yale. Before joining, he served as a law clerk to Supreme CourtJustice David souter. His book sets standards by which citizens can determine whether the Supreme Court is abusing its authority to interpret the constitution. He also teaches creative writing and is the author of two novels. In the shadow of the law and allegiance. Please join me in a round of applause for professor roosevelt. [applause] thank you. Thank you all for coming. Happy super tuesday. [laughter] as you know, it is super tuesday, the democrats are in the process of choosing their nominee. Later on we will have the general election and choose our president. That choice will reflect something about who we are as a nation. That is what i want to talk about tonight. Who we are, how we decide who we are and what our sense of ourselves means for our relationship to the constitution and for our sense of ourselves as a country. So, who are we . We are americans. This is the most american slide i could find. [laughter] what does it mean to be an american and how we do we decide that . What gives us a sense of what america means . The first point i want to make is that stories tell us who we are. They organize the world. This is true of individuals. When people think about their lives they think about them in narrative form. They find meaning and experience. They find themes, heroes, villains. James joyce said this is the artists task, transforming the daily bread of experience into the radiant body of everlasting life. In that sense we are all artists. We are the authors of our own stories. Not because we decide what happens we dont get to decide that but because we decide what it means. We decide how it is interpreted and usually we pick interpretations that flatter ourselves. We end up being the heroes of our own stories. This is true for individuals and also true for nations. People have a sense of National Identity that comes from stories about the nations history. That is what im going to talk about. I will talk about different stories of america. Where they come from, how they relate to each other, but before i do that want to say one thing about stories. They are powerful. I am a law professor and before that i was a lawyer. I was doing litigation and it was my job in some ways it is still my job to make people agree with me about the correct understanding of the law. I learned something while working as a lawyer. That has been reinforced from experiences with legal scholarship which is that sometimes, on some issues, you can present a strong, logical argument and people will change their minds. Sometimes the voice that persuades is an analytical voice. That is not true all the time. In particular it is not true if youre dealing with an issue that relates to peoples identity, their sense of self. In those situations you can make the most logical argument in the world and it will not have any effect. Because logic does not make people change their minds about who they are. There has been social Psychology Research on this and it shows people are actually incredibly resistant to logical argument if it conflicts with their narrative of the world. If the conflicts with the story they tell themselves to make sense of the world. They did a study where the two people with certain beliefs and it was about climate change. They took skeptics and believers and they took each group and exposed them to facts that suggested their beliefs were wrong. They got different information and in each case they got information that challenge their belief. You would have thought this would make them less confident. The result was the people on both sides expressed greater confidence in those beliefs. They felt a threat to their identity and they responded by reaffirming it. Those beliefs were not just factual beliefs about the world, they were beliefs that signal membership in a community. Because of thats they were part of peoples identity, part of the story they told themselves. Heres an ordinary factual question is it raining outside or not . Your belief about that does not relate to your identity and with questions like that people do change their mind if they are presented with contrary evidence. With other things, beliefs that are connected to identity, you cannot dislodge those beliefs by facts. The analytical voice does not persuade. So what does . This is another thing i learned as a lawyer. I think it is the most import thing i learned as a lawyer. It is what i try to teach my students in the creative writing seminar i teach. If you are wondering why there is a creative writing at the law school, this is why. The narrative voice persuades. To change beliefs connected to identity, to the story we tell ourselves about the world and our place in it, you have to offer a different story. You have to offer a story that opens a different way of understanding the world. You can change peoples minds if you talk to them the way their interior voice does and for most people, the interior voice is not giving arguments, it is telling stories. Stories tell us who we are both as individuals and as countries. Stories are powerful. Frequently they cannot be dislodged by reasoned argument or logical analysis. You might have heard some people say it takes a theory to be a theory, i say it takes a story to be a story. What i want to do now is tell you some of the stories about america. About who we are. These different stories say Different Things about the past but, perhaps more important, they have different ideas of the essence of america. What it means to be american. Im going to compare them, analyze them, i will be doing some logical argument i cannot really get away from that but in the end, i hope you like the same story i do. Not because of the arguments but because it is a better story. It shows us in a better light. It is more inclusive, optimistic. It is, i am going to say, more american. I am going to start with what i call the standard story. According to this story the american history, the history of america as a nation, starts with the declaration of independence. Here we go. In a standard story should be similar this is what we say in our civic religion or basic celebrations of america. The standard story says long ago, back in 1776, our great founders wrote down some wonderful principles. They called these selfevident truths. All men are created equal, endowed by their creator with inalienable rights, including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Our founders fought a war for those principles. They built the society around them and the constitution was their vehicle for carrying those principles into execution. Hold on. Theres the constitution. The constitution, according to standard story, sets out our fundamental values. What are those . Liberty and equality. It tells us what it means to be american. It tells us who we are. For more than 200 years, our constitution has served us well because of the wisdom of the founders. Our tasks as americans is to live up to their example. To fulfill their vision of america. To be true to the principles that started in the declaration of independence were codified in the constitution. American history, the standard story, has not always been easy. We have not always looked up to those principles. We had slavery which is in direct conflict with the declaration of independence. But we fought a war for those principles again. The civil war was fought in the name of the principles of the declaration of independence. How do we know that . Abraham lincoln said so. That is an actual photo of lincoln delivering the gettysburg address. It is not very good but he is there somewhere. [laughter] in the gettysburg address lincoln looks back to the declaration as the birth of the nation. It takes a little bit of arithmetic to figure this out but he is giving the gettysberg address in 1863 and says four score and seven years ago and subtract that from 1863 and what you get . You get 1776 and the declaration of independence. Lincoln invoked this principles and says the nation is conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. The civil war is a challenge but also an opportunity for americans to move forward, to realize the promise of the declaration. Of course, the standard story concedes that even after the civil war, work is not done. Racism and discrimination persist. The Civil Rights Movement rises up to challenge the darker aspects of american life. It does so again in the name of the declaration. The Civil Rights Movement sponsors the march on washington in 1963. Martin luther king gives his i have a dream speech from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. This is a much better photo. [laughter] he talks about the founders, the architects of our public, the people who wrote the magnificent words of the constitution and declaration of independence. They promised, he said, all men, black as well as white would be guaranteed unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We have fallen short, he says, he points to segragation, to the right to vote, and reaches of the promises made. He dreams of a day when we will rise up and live out the true meaning that all men are created equal. Maybe that day has not come yet. The standard story concedes but it is getting closer because the story of america is living up to the ideals of our founders. The ideals that started us on this journey. We move forward but we are guided by the past, by the spirit of 1776. We remember, as john f. Kennedy said, that we are the heris of that first revolution and carried that banner. The flag of freedom, the flag of equality. Here you have three men marching forward and in the background, the betsy ross flag. This is what i am going to call our standard story. This is what we usually tell ourselves to explain who we are. We are the heirs of the first revolution. American history starts with that declaration. It starts on a high note and we are basically trying to sustain it. We are trying to live up to the ideals of the founders and signers. We are following their wisdom and for 200 years it has pointed the way to a better america and a more perfect union. I am going to tell you a couple of other stories. First, want to say a little bit about this one. The first thing to note is that it is a backward looking story. The declaration is the central document in the story, it may be more important, more american, than even the constitution. The foundersconstitution is important too. The constitution has the answers to our current problems. America seems to be adrift, people think. What is the solution . Go back to the wisdom of the founders. Focus on the constitution. Focus on the original understanding of the constitution. Live up to the ideals of the founders, be more like them, the way forward is by recovering the greatness of the past. First, backward looking story. Second, this is a Success Story. Yes, we have had our difficulties but if you look back, america always succeeds. We always triumph and why is that . It is because of the wisdom of the founders and the ideals of the declaration. The civil war is probably the best example. It is a terrible war, yes, that the ideals of the declaration triumph and we improve. We take a big step forward toward more fully realizing those ideals. Backwardlooking, success, and story continuity. It goes from the signers of the declaration, to the drafters of the constitution, to us in the present day. We are the heirs of that revolution. This is related to the fact it is a Success Story because it is telling us we are the same people we have always been. We are the same nation. The signers of the declaration, the drafters of the constitution, they got it right. We are living in the world they designed. We are fighting for the ideals they championed. This is a nice story in a lot of ways. You can see why it appeals to people, i think. It says we are basically good, we americans. We start with good ideals and we dont always live up to them but we are Getting Better. There is a sense of inevitable progress and when things look dark answers exist if we look back to find them. There is authority in the past. In a moment of unity everybody can rally around, everyone can sharon. Everyone feels a connection to the founding. One problem is that it really is not true. I know i said logical arguments do not dislodge stories but im going to give you a logical analysis of the story. Which might not change your mind. I hope that it will provoke you to question the story a bit. Im going to present you with some claims you will find surprising. That you dont hear in the standard story, you dont here very much at all. Heres the first one. The declaration of independence does not actually set out our modern values of liberty and equality. In fact, it is consistent with slavery. This should be a surprise. I dont think anyone else says this. Often if you are the only person saying something, its crazy and you are wrong. But hear me out. I have become quite convinced of this. Generally speaking people say, of course, there is contradiction between the declaration of independence. But let us look at the declaration and think about what its values actually are. Here is the preamble of the declaration at this is what people Pay Attention to. That is appropriate. After the preamble and a little bit of political philosophy we get grievances against king george. Bad things he has done. Those are not as important. That is evidence the founders are setting out in support of their argument but they are not the argument. The declaration of independence is an argument of political philosophy. There is an argument that tries to establish the companies are justified in declaring independence and throwing off the authority of the british empire. To understand the declaration the crucial thing is to understand how the argument works and the use it makes of these fundamental principles. I am going to talk about the argument the declaration makes in a second. First, i want to talk about the argument it does not make which is the against slavery. Why do people think the declaration is inconsistent with slavery . Because of these selfevident truths. They are endowed by the creator with inalienable rights including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Now, are those principles inconsistent with slavery . You can start with them and make an antislavery argument. It would go like this. People are created equal therefore no one is entitled, by birth, to demand someone else be his life. Someone might have the power to enslave someone else. Doing so could be considered a form of liberty just doing what you want to do but it conflicts with the slavesnatural right celebrity liberty. That is an infringement on natural rights. That is true. This is not justified because in the political world there are lots of infringements upon natural liberty. If you use your liberty to steal someone elses property, we will lock you up. We take away your liberty. If you commit a serious crime, will take your life. That is what we do even to our own citizens. Members of our Political Community because those deprivations of natural rights are justified. In fact, the hallmark of Civil Society is that when people come together to form a society they surrender aspects of their natural liberty. Their natural liberty is taken away from them. This is true of the people who form a community, of the insiders, and even more true of people outside our Political Community. How does our nation relate to noncitizens . Sometimes quite harshly. If you are an enemy soldier, we take your life without worrying too much about your natural rights. That is justified because we are protecting our Political Community. Different factors come into play when we talk about outsiders. The argument gets even more complicated. It is even more complicated if we are talking about a system where slavery exists already and the choice is not should we start slavery, but should be and slavery. It is possible to think and Thomas Jefferson did think best that the answer to the first question was no, slavery should never have come to america. The answer to the second question was also no. Given that slavery existed maintaining it was the best option. So, what if i said so far . I said that from the principles of the declaration you can get an argument that slavery is a violation of human rights. That does not actually tell you slavery is wrong. Some violations of natural rights are justified. That is particularly true if youre talking about outsiders, people not members of your Political Community, and more true if it exists already. To get to the conclusion slavery is wrong you need another step. You need to say the justifications put forward for slavery are inadequate. What were the justifications . Some people supported slavery as a positive thing. They said slaves get christianity, civilization. Then there were people who did not think slavery was good but nonetheless thought slavery in america should be continued. They said slaves, if freed, could not be assimilated into American Society. They would pose a danger to whites. This was jeffersons view. He said should be give our sleds freedom and a dagger . Those are terrible justifications. They are not true. You dont need much of an argument to review them but my point is the declaration does not give you argument of that form. It gives you a totally different argument. It gives you a different argument because it is not concerned with the liberty and equality of individuals. It is concerned with the relationship between political communities. Between one people who wanted to dissolve the political bands and assume separate and equal station. This is what the declaration says in its first sentence. It tells you what it is about. The laws of nature and natures god entitle individuals to liberty and equality . No. The laws of nature and natures god to separate and equal status. Status as nations basically. The argument the declaration of independence does make is no