Hello everybody, welcome back to the New Thinkery. We're here with the Special Press guest, Greg. What's going on? I'm not a special guest.
I'm always here. You're special. Okay. No, we're coming into life.
This is our Constitution Day episode. So September 17th will be the 200th anniversary of the United States Constitution. We're here in Douglasville, Georgia at the Fox Hall Resort with Ben Kleinerman. Thanks to Tom Cleveland, the Academic Director at the Jack Miller Center.
He's helped us organize a series of podcasts and interviews with some of the eminent professors around the country who have been lecturing to some of the less eminent professors on the virtues of American self-government. So Ben, thanks for coming. Thank you. Thank you.
So our guest today is Benjamin A. Kleinerman. He's Professor of Political Science at Baylor University at the University of Arkansas, R.W. Morrison, Professor of Political Science, but he's far outstripped R.W.
Morrison in fame. He's a graduate from Kenyon College and has PhD at Michigan State University. He just classes on political and political institutions. And he's also on the board of the directors at Jack.
Oh, right. He has a book. It's the discretionary president, the Promised and Peril of Executive Power available from University of Kansas, the President of the University of Kansas University. University of Kansas.
University of Arkansas. And you're ready for the crisis, isn't it? Benjamin A. Kleiner, was it A.
Kleiner for Adams or something? Adams. Yeah, my grandfather's mother was an Adams. I think I'm the only Jew who was also an Adams.
I thought the first Jew was Adams. That's true. Yeah. I know.
That's fine. Anyway, thanks, Ben, for joining us. We're happy to have you. We got to experience a lot of time to hear at this conference, learning about federal papers and thought it'd be something fun to share with our listeners and folks.
But before that, usually when we have folks on, we just sort of like to learn a little about them, where they study, when did they study, how did they become interested in what they study, how did you become interested in the federal papers, America, little theory, philosophy, political science, and wherever you consider yourself. You can get an influential teacher maybe who has sort of helped shape you and mold you. Started, I guess, you got turned on to political philosophy in my freshman year of college at Kenyon. Class was called, blessed for justice.
And I've intended to be a history major, but blessed for justice sounded pretty cool. So Rob Goldberg. No, Rob Goldberg. No, it was not what St.
John. So he was there for a couple of years in that his class. That started to turn around. Yeah.
But it's so frequently the case with energy. A lot of folks that they happened upon the study of little flossing terribly back, so it tended to do something else. Yeah, I had no intention. That wasn't something.
But looking through the course catalog and this seemed to what an education would be, the class for justice was a bunch of different readings. What do you read? Obviously read Nietzsche, Aristotle, Darkness at noon, by Cassius. Really?
Oh yeah. It's a great book. I read a wide variety of different things, novels, and now I can't even remember a bunch of people. Are you a professor at Kenyon that sort of stood out on your education?
Yeah, probably Fred Belman. Okay. Yeah, he's fantastic. Yeah, I learned a lot from him.
And then how did you choose Michigan State? Just that I wanted Arthur Milzer, Jerry Weinberger, and Warner Dan House, it was at that time there. And it's funny how I've come to American political thought, because I did my honors thesis at Kenyonan, Nietzsche, Nietzsche's on time and meditation, and wanted to go to Michigan State to study the Warner Dan House around Nietzsche. So then I didn't end up doing that at all initially.
That was the plan. What was the reason for the shift? Just got more interested in some other connections between politics and thought. So I was always interested in that, but I hadn't realized that was what I could do in American political thought, in American politics.
And you can figure out your shape, your thinking on American political thought, any scholars? My advisor in grad school was Steve Cauat, who passed away a couple of years ago. And he was pretty influential in the way I thought about American political thought. I think that's what I identify as important.
Rick? No, probably not. I should have someone else on my own. No, no, no.
You can think about it maybe at the end. We should have asked you any questions, like, are any answers to the post-it students should read or something. I think it's 45 minutes to remember Sally's name, you just shouldn't say it. It's about people on the spot.
It's not fair. So what are we doing? I guess we decided to talk today about the federal papers. We're going to do federalist 137 and then 4751.
So I imagine most of the folks at home would probably be familiar with the federal papers, but maybe there's a white, we have listeners in the United Kingdom, for example, and Zimbabwe and Kuwait and Kuwait. And Kuwait and a lot of us. New Zealand. A huge and Kuwait.
Yeah, zero in China, which I don't quite believe. They're in North Korea too. Yeah, that's right. So let's say for our non American audience, or for our illiterate American audience, maybe you can tell us a little bit about the real papers that you tell us about.
Yeah, so they're written in defense of the new constitution that had been formed over the summer and over that summer, 1787. And it's, you know, why the series of papers showing why they should be ratified. It was they were being submitted to the public for to be ratified in various state conventions. And James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, at least initially, John Jay, who was set out to write a series of papers, and mostly the New York press, defending the new constitution.
It was New York in particular because it was really critical that it passed in New York, and it was set for the time for the rest of the time. So these texts, you know, and some of you may say, they seem to me that they're serving two purposes. For a sweetie citizens of the state of New York to urge their legislators to pass the constitution, but also, I mean, that's maybe the best articulation of what the constitution is actually about, what it means. So it's sort of, I think that they probably had a wider audience mind, whether they started a new term audience, and maybe, yeah, there's a pedagogy in the federalist papers.
They were not only, they were writing for history, not just for the, to persuade persuasion was obviously important, but it's striking the extent to which their eyes are on bigger things than just persuading the people at their time. So, you know, and one of the things, let's start from the New York to a particular federalist 37, is how central that pedagogy is. We would have, as in, some out of some 47, where when he speaks to the Federation, anybody who got a cursive, they're thinking about the Federation for ancient things. They have to have their, you know, a sense of looking if I'm successful in actually achieving more of my ambition, who wants to do, I have to wait for a much wider audience.
Yeah, I mean, I think these weren't, these were men with big ambitions and big ideas, so these are papers that reflect those things. You know, and yeah, the veneration passage, this is about why this Constitution, because it's so good, will be venerated in the future, and that will bust buttress its goodness. We had Jim Caesar on, he's talked about Madison as self-consciously trying to recreate himself as a founder. And this, the Connecting, the religious language, sort of, quite fascinating, sort of, on the one hand, doing something very rational, I'm a scientist, a civil scientist, and on the other hand, he seems to be setting himself up as a kind of religious figure, right?
And the Valley Fathers sort of get mystified, as well. So what does it see, which says the Madison as the founder of founding, Seattle, you know, very self-consciously thinking of himself as founding this new idea of founding? Yeah, so he's coming up with a sort of reviving discussion. He points out, you know, the English tradition, you don't really talk about founding that much.
You know, so there's obviously the language in Rousseau, which is... And Machiavelli, and... Yeah, there's Machiavelli, you go back and then, you know, all the way to like Hurgis, right? Maybe even in Aristotle, the prominence of the walking, for example, in how you're sitting at institutions, it's, you know, one of the great themes of political philosophy that wasn't the prevalent in the English tradition, and here he is incorporating it into what they're doing with public...
I imagine a full sense of consequence of that language. Yeah, I mean, the English tradition doesn't have the same kind of notion of founding as that. Someone like Machiavelli does. I think, you know, it's also Madison talks about...
I'm not sure which paper it's in, but the extent to which this founding is also unique, because it's a number of people, usually an individual like Hurgis, and the founding, the regime. And this is a number of people coming together, and so it's a different kind of founding for its benefits and its drawbacks. The religious language also comes in at the end of 37, instead of the end of 47, so... Yeah, it's the one...
Yeah, that's it. He says, we're talking about all the things that have to come together, and to make everything possible, he says the following. We've been wondering if under the pressure of all these difficulties, prevention should have been forced into some deviations from that artificial structure, or regular symmetry, which is an abstract piece, such as by the Newton and Genius theorists, to bestow our constitution, planned in his cause, or in his imagination. The real wonder is that so many difficulties should have been surmounted, and surmounted with a unanimity, almost as unprecedented as it must have been unexpected.
It's impossible for any man of candor to reflect on the circumstance without painstaking of the astonishment, is impossible for the man of pious reflection, not to perceive in it a finger of that all mighty hand, which has been so frequently and significantly extended to our relief in the critical stages of the revolution. So he was consciously saying, look, a man of candor, this is quite astonishing, and it is, right? But for a man of pious reflection, this is a way this can be perceived as, looks like it's providential. From the revolution to the founding, this is God's hand at work.
We're quite lucky. And especially, I think, to understand the providential nature of the mistake governments were failing for the most part. So it didn't look like this was going well when the constitutional convention was called, and so the fact that they could come together and not fail, and actually produce a constitution that was pretty reasonable and national, is impressive. That backdrop makes it even more impressive.
I think there was very defensive, but it was very sound, very defensive, and very defensive. The critics are saying it's not perfect. Well, yes, it's not perfect. We're dealing with imperfect matter, human beings.
We're imperfect. And there's all these limits that we face, and actually, no, you read, actually, if you're honest and dispassionate about this, the man of candor will be like, yes, this is actually really dark, amazing, but you guys are able to put something good at this good, facing all the constraints that people face. And I was going to say, and in fact, 37, what's more, this is interesting, it's not just that human things are imperfect or that our perception of human things and our perfect, it's also that our perception of scientific things. Yeah, right.
But natural science, that's really good. So Madison uses natural science too, isn't perfect so far from wanting perfect, from thinking we can achieve perfect government, we can even get perfect natural science. Yeah, it has only one of the defects, right? The defects of perception, right?
Ordinary experience doesn't really show you what's happening in your body or something like that. But if you're able to deep down you see stuff, not only that, it's also fuzzy, and also language is quite, you know, an apt hearing. So if you think natural science has problems, it gets political sciences even worse. Yeah, I mean, it's kind of one of the things that strikes me as you go through the federal papers is how much the skepticism informs everything they're doing, skepticism about the possibilities of education and perfection and these sorts of things.
And it actually becomes a kind of education and skepticism that's something like the skepticism about natural science and skepticism about human things that is even more problematic than, or that human things are even talking to themselves. Human things are even more problematic than in terms of understanding the natural science. Yeah, that's right. I was really intrigued by your comments from March over the day because I focused on this passage and I was one that seems to incline the other direction.
So I was just waiting by what you'd say, so I'm going to push you out of my first hand. Maybe you can re-persuage me, but the federalist want to talk about, you know, this is the United States of America. This is the first time in the history that we've, that humans have had the opportunity to come together and deliberate and decide upon the kind of government that they're going to have as a result of reflection and choice. Like we actually can think about it.
We are scientists and we frequently call themselves for what they're doing political science. And so it seems as though there's this highly rational account of what we're doing. And so how does that, how does that fit in or how does this skepticism or how you lay that argument that actually the federalist is a sort of thermoing critique of the kind of rationalism. And so how do those things fit together?
So I think, or do they, I mean, federalist one, no, I think they do in this sense that federalist one begins with this high minded, high minded notion of reflection and choice. And then soon after you get a discussion of reason and they send to which reason, even their reason is connected to interests and inextricably slightly. There's no way of getting past that. And so amidst their hopes for reflection and choice is also an awareness of the limits of reflection and choice.
And I actually think that's part of the what they're different because unlike past republics where they put all their hope and reflection and choice on its own, they're aware of necessity and the difficulties in politics and build a regime within those difficulties. And that's really the genius of this, this constitution. As I was reading at this time, how much their procedure reminds me of Francis Bacon actually, where bacon starts with this. My project is the humiliation of reason and my friend Derek to plus you was here as well.
He pointed out actually, he's the same way that we talked about embarrassment and 37, we're going to do things. So, yeah, we're going to humiliate a reason. Oh, yeah, by the way, once you've humiliated a reason, you can master a concretation, right? You can develop a completely new political regime.
And it's got this, that motion of a critique of reason out of which you establish something. Awareness of the limits of reason is actually quite liberating and freeing because from that, you can develop a regime that is fine tuned to this defect. That's really the genius. That's the, you're aware of the limits of reason and so build a regime on the defects of reason rather than the hopes of reason.
And that's something you said in your talk, in a way awareness of the problem, frees you somewhat from. What do you think building might only have that fact? What do you think are some of the ways which the US Constitution exhibits this awareness of the defects of reason? Well, you know, the passage, so this isn't the passage that you were discussing earlier regarding the need for constitution to buttress reason.
I think just wanted to look at it, that the permanence of the Constitution and the difficulty of amending it and all the reasons Madison talks about not wanting a recon-constitucial convention is built on the premise that we're not going to reason as well every single time as we did this time. So it should depend on this time and the age that the veneration that will come with the age of Wisconsin. Okay, that's really good. What are some of the, when I teach the federal figures, I always try and I think the last time I came across it, I thought, sorry, Madison seems to me to be taking a lot from earlier little thinkers, right?
But I thought in some ways he's actually quite novel, like doing something entirely new. So can you speak about that? What are his principal sources that when he's trying to come up with a system of republican government and if you agree, what sort of new things has he actually introduced? Yeah, I mean, there's stories of Madison studying going, you know, his study being full of books in preparation for the Constitution Convention and reading ancient and modern thinkers, all with a view to seeing how what they, their understanding of what republics had done wrong and what they thought they could do right.
And, but I do think what Madison is a new thinker, you know, one tendency we have is to think of the founders as derivative and how they derivative of Locke, derivative of Montesquieu, derivative of Hume, I think in a way they're, they do learn from them, but there's something new they're doing. And in particular, I think this real conscious awareness of building a regime premised on the defects of past republics is something new. There's no hopefulness in what they're doing. There's a kind of skepticism regarding what reason is capable of and then a building on the basis of that, a reason after we've done that.
One of the things that I was, you're talking, I sort of hadn't really thought about before, I guess on one hand I had sort of the experimental character what they were doing, but whether to that the empirical character, whether they were looking at actual republics and sort of experimenting and making changes to our republics that had never existed. And so I wondered what extent, you know, looking forward into the future, they had the method of hindsight, might they take away, might they have done things differently, but it's we to think of the veneration part as a constitutional instrument fixed, but I mean, the way that they're talking about what they're doing is quite adaptable, quite innovative and sort of, well, this didn't work, so let's try that. We're, they've all had you to cancel, so let's split the bike. Yeah, I mean, I think that's sometimes underappreciated, especially in the legal community, whether looking at the founders of regional intent, trying to make, you know, judge things based on that original time, I think the founders were much more experimental or empirical.
And so I think that the evidence, you know, where, so really important to the whole formation of the Constitution is what's happened in states, you know, given what's happened in states, what do we need to do? Once the Constitution is formed, I don't see any reason why they wouldn't have in 50 years that are, well, what have we learned last 50 years about what Constitution requires. So they require veneration, but I think veneration can be oversold in a way that you need some experience. The proof is important, right?
So the veneration as a developed attitude with, you know, actual effect of sort of results from it. And then that idea of drawing on these, this one phrase, the experience of agents, right? So looking at history, and it's a little bit like Machiavelli, right? Looking at historical examples, and then in a process of induction, trying to reason about that and develop something that will endure the sort of illness of public.
But also just that passage, I forget which one it's in, because it's 9 or 10, but at least 10, where they say when you look at all the republics of the ancient Greece and Rome, they're just struck with horror. Like, this is just terrible. I love that passage. You know, it's great.
You know, it's great. You want virtuous people to rule. So happens just picks up to a person. And then he dies and then you clean it.
Great, he chose like the best guy. But now you've got to clean it out and now you chose him. And now what you do, right? That's what you did and prepare for clean.
But you can see in 51, especially, it really are. Right? It's great about it. Yeah.
I think that also, the beginning and then this one is this accident and force versus reflection and choice that when you're picking the great leader, you'll sometimes get it right and then see, sometimes get it wrong. That's just a matter of accident. So the real reflection and choice is building a structure where you don't have to depend on acts. That's something that people often miss is really thought of as a Hamilton.
once, there have been good governments, they just happened on accident or as a result of force. But we'd like to make it not be so open to the vicissitudes a chance. Let's see if we actually make something while lasting. And that's what my friends were like going like insane at Trump's election.
I was sort of like, what if the regime is going to handle somebody who's trying to push the balance of power? And the regime helped. It was a surprising extent. We were talking about in the session, the breakout session, that the January 6th was in some ways a tragedy, but it didn't work either.
The regime persisted past January 6th. Greg thinks it was a tragic different reason. He was the actual shot. There's so many more pages of fewer cowards, right?
I mean, we promised time we wouldn't be over it because that's so. No sex jokes, don't say talk. Sorry, I'll try to read these back to the next. Let's talk about 47 to 51.
So as I think about the innovations of the federal's papers, right? As a wisdom, I think, there's, representation is really important. Independent judiciary, there are two or three others that I can't remember. The biggest one is enlarging the sphere, right?
And I think that's where he really is novel. I don't, are there any instincts to argue for large publics? And he's the first, right? And he really turns the question of Republican governor on set and there was a really happy small, he says, no, they've all failed because they were small.
So the other part that I find somewhat still novel in his thought is this idea of separating powers and then checking those powers. There's some, there's some distinction between the two, right? And I think it often folks clash the two separating powers and checks and balances. I like the fact that I didn't realize that the term balances is even in the federal papers.
And so what's interesting, the most novel part to me is, sorry, we separated the powers in section, excuse me, number 47. And the question is, how do we keep them separated, right? And that's, that's where I also find analysis. Can you tell us a little about that movement from 47 to 51?
And what are some of the alternative ways that folks have thought about how you keep power separated? Yeah. So one of the principal anti-federalist critiques of the Constitution is the system of checks and balances that the separation powers in the state government said depended on legal separations and clear delineations in their state constitutions separating power. And that, you don't, the problem with checks and balances, the anti-federalist would have said is you're confusing powers if you have a presidential veto over congressional legislation that looks like maybe a president is a legislator rather than executive.
So these sorts of checks confuse the system. And what's interesting is in 47, Madison says that objection is, well, it's serious. It calls them respectable adversaries. So often the anti-federalist acts over respectable to Madison, but on this count, they're respectable that the concern that separation powers will get confused is a serious concern because you don't want it.
And so it's important to see that checks and balances for the founders is the way of preserving separation powers. They're not the same thing. And it's part of our confusion, precisely the anti-federalist's worry that we think they're the same. Because the movement of the papers is we've got them separated, what prevents them from concentrate.
And so he's like, well, just write it down. That they'll stay separated. That's not the best. That won't work.
That's the part of the famous parchment barrier language. And then his buddy, Thomas Jefferson, Tommy J, he's like, let's just have a Constitution with every 19 years. I assume that's the implicit target of the, was it 48 or 49? We talked about 49.
Yeah. So then Jefferson famous and what to have, every generation should be able to make its own Constitution because it belongs in use of our living in Tom's own state. And Madison says rightfully, you're not going to get veneration, which is the other. Jefferson's too rational in that point, right?
Like reasonable. If we're verbally rational, you're going to make a Constitution, but he's missing the veneration piece. And he's also too hopeful, right? That they got lucky to have enough statesmen at this time to create a real Constitution that works.
But in 19 years, it could be, you know, Andrew Jackson. It might have a different kind of Constitution. And he was hopefully hopeful about, I mean, Jefferson was very hopeful, right? That the enlightenment would grow and that people would become basically better.
Yeah. Yeah. And Madison didn't share that. Maybe not.
Madison's enlightenment is more realistic. Yeah, more realistic. It's kind of rounded in real skepticism. It also just sounds like he understands politics a bit better.
I mean, I think so. I mean, maybe people get enlightened and get better about this story. It's a fact that it was happening in every republic, right? So having bullwork against that sounds something.
I'm going back to this point about the size of the republic. And this jumped out of me this time. From the very end of 51, he says, it is no less certain than it is important not standing to contrary opinions, which happen entertained that the larger the society provided it live within a practical sphere, the more duly capable it will be of self-governance. Right.
So this is this point. And that actually needed this in 47, right? He says, actually, let's make a diversity of interest. You don't get large factions.
And happily through the republican cause, the practice of all sphere may be carried to a very great extent by judicial modification and mixture of the federal principle. This is the job that was to a very great extent, carry to a very great extent. What was that name of the steps? Does it mean it's actually empire?
Maybe there's this maybe there's sort of leading over that they need something that can be done that, but we're also stripping this qualification of judicious modification of extra deferrable principle, which is not clear that that necessarily happens as things are expanded. That was small one. One of the things is I read through these is the extension of the sphere is in the social sphere. So he's not talking about expanding the government for a second, right?
It seems to me that it's definitely expanding the territory. Yeah, so it's one of the people basically. Yeah. So you're standing society.
So the idea, I think the protections, the repulsive protections are separation powers, checks and balances. That's protection means the government encroachment on our liberty. Extending the spheres seem to be more protecting this from each other. Yeah.
So it's more of a social versus political. Yeah. That's the expectation that the extending the sphere incorporates enough diverse factions that we come to recognize that it's better. We all accept the common good, but then we fight amongst those various factions.
Yeah. What's next, Robert? Well, I was actually going to ask about something you might talk about in the breakout session. I don't want to speak about this, but a colleague and I were able to recently about the role of enlightened statesmen in Madison's thought.
So reading Federalist 10, Madison basically the way we're going to protect society's enlarging the sphere. And it's basically the pluralism that we may say by sort of watering out or crowding out any one particular fashion for coming to Darwin. But it seems to me to go up in the door that additionally, it would be very nice if enlightened statesmen occasionally were at the helm of government. I don't think he's relying on that.
My colleague was like, no, no, that's part of the plan. He wants enlightened statesmen. And he's right. He thinks that enlarging the sphere will produce enlightened statesmen.
I think he's saying it'll sort of maybe make that more likely, but not necessarily. I mean, the passage is enlightened statesmen will sell them. It will not always be a problem. Right.
So I don't know if your colleague is, but it strikes me as my name, strange to say that he expects them to be a town given that he's in the office making the grayer. So no, no, it's not. I mean, he says at the end of the vice of the global system the first is that Adam of government is actually what it is, making sure the government doesn't ask us. But the second one, the auxiliary is he thinks he says in late statesmen.
But my point when my colleague was like, well, that's the thing that you desire, the thing that you actually expect. Yeah, that's it's probably better. And you know, at the end of the day, when it at certain points, we needed the enlightened statesmen, I don't think we get through the civil war without like, I don't know. So the institutions weren't enough in that case.
But I think to my colleague's point, even if Jared even if Mass have hoped a little bit that there might be some enlightened statesmen, I mean, gosh, I mean, isn't it? That's accident force right there getting the power to go in. Yeah, so one thing that maybe this is a good point to transition to federalist 51 or the ambition, because one of the questions I have is, and this is related to our larger issues of like liberal education that are going on today is to what extent is the constitution in very meticulously preparing for the worst, and write these sort of petty tyrants who will try to grandize themselves and I think that's a common good to what extent does do they in preparing for the worst, actually, we encourage it by by, you know, so that, you know, it's very hard for like statesmen and Lincoln is remarkable at what he's capable of doing despite the checks and balances that despite getting pushed back away in his career. But maybe it's just sort of a real short passage from this, just to kind of give us a little bit of this in federalist 51.
But let me just reciduate ourselves before I'll treat it. So the problem is laid out in federal 47, and as I was offering all of this, okay, the constitution has separated the powers, we have an executive, a judiciary legislative, how do we how do we ensure going forward that they remain so, and then he goes through 4950, three alternatives, maybe just writing down the constitution, well, suffice no parchment barrier, once I have Professor Gres will very much love America, he would burn a copy of Constitution class to illustrate this one, like, ready for it? No, not put away. It was a Elkin actually, you remember, he got it?
Great job. Anyway, you know, the point to illustrate the point that just writing it down, he's scared doesn't make it so, and on the same point, I've taught in the very politics, I taught Stalin's 1936, all the Constitution rights, so like to show you, but like it was all written that they're all kinds of rights, but it doesn't matter, the point in the matters, the point that writing down doesn't make it so otherwise Stalin's Constitution is actually quite liberal. And so, all right, so it's not that, it's not Jefferson's predetermined Constitution of the United Nations every 19 years, it's not sort of a low standard for initiating constitutional vengeance, the answer in 51 is checks and balances, although that language of balances and there, so the answer is to figure out somebody to get the branches to be able to check one another, so that's laying out the problem. Yeah, that's interesting, you're very focused on there, I didn't know that.
It's completely true. No, but free is a democratic republic. Do you remember, where did you keep those anti-fascist? Do you remember when Ahmadinejad was in Columbia a few years ago, something like eight, ten years ago now, and he's being interviewed by some very nice progressive journalist and he says, you know, tell me about gays in Iran.
Ahmadinejad said there are no gays in Iran, he says, no, no, come on, we know the gays are what some percentage of population were wide, just by inference, there must be other have to be gays in Iran, Ahmadinejad says, there are none, and he goes, I'm sure there are, he goes, if you know, and you give me the addresses. There are no gays in Iran. All right, so you're holding Alex to give them. Sorry, does that qualify as a joke, the Cleveland's a little outside.
Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry.
Sorry. Sorry. I'll bring it back to you. The point is that there was a joking way of showing that paper documents don't guarantee freedom.
They don't guarantee your public force. So what does? And the main point, just to return this, is the concern about an over-consolidation of power, if you start putting together branches, it would do quite a lot. So he says, the greatest security against a gradual concentration of several powers keep the same department, consisting given to those who administer each department, the necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist incretrance of the others.
So the means are the constitution of the motives, person. So I'm getting an example of what's an example of the means that the executive has to check the legislative position of the vote. So that's the constitutional levers that they can pull. Yeah.
So if the legislature is trying to intrude too far onto executive powers, the president can beat up. And the legislative has one over the executive and over the judiciary. They already have these constitutional mechanisms. Anybody have a personal hood as well, but the legislature is going to pass this law.
It's going to make them as good as the opposition party. I need to get reelected. I'm going to check that. And if they have an opponent they can overcome it with.
But the means, I mean, just real quick, the constitutional means are really interesting. I think the constitutional is important here, but the more interesting political psychologizing, I find, if you can continue reading, like this is the more interesting part to me as someone who thinks about politics. Yeah. So it goes on to say, the provision for defense must in this, as in all other cases, be made commensurate to the danger of attack.
Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. If anybody followed time, leave, I don't swear he used to just have a right of politicians like their ambition counteracting ambitions. They just don't envision counteracting. Right.
So lower, we follow one of what is this Twitter hand? That's in Cleveland for real for real. It's not a fig. Now for the phone.
Of course. The interest goes on to explain mission must be made to counter activation. What you mean, as that we're the interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional right for the place. So this is where I think it's so psychologically interesting is you, you want power, you're finally given power, but the only way to exercise is in the constitutional means.
So you end up becoming a function of the constitution in that way. And therefore, in a way, meet more rational. Yeah, just to put some me on those bones. I mean, the the, so for instance, if you're president and you're ambitious, then you're going to assert the constitutional rights of the presidency, which are mostly about energy and stability, although these things that presidents in particular, or I talk about my current book, The Extension, which the presidency is about fulfilling the constitutional oath.
And so if you're president, that's going to be where you find most authorities in that kind of institutional authority. That's easy for me to see that I see presidents, I see all time. And I think you see it to a certain extent in the Supreme Court, right? And we used it to Roberts indignation, I think chastised by Obama at the State Union for example, that's just a small example.
You see me clearly see different court justice to start to behave as though I'm a justice dog owner. But when we're talking today, and as I was here, you talk, I mean, one of the things that sort of saddens me and makes me a word for the Republican, Madison, the Madison design force, I don't see it in Congress. And so I'm like, I'm sure that I'm sure that I'm listening to his chief of staff or a congressman, so hopefully we want to defend him. But Marco Rubio, for example, right?
Like, does he have congressional ambition? What does that look like? Yeah, it's one of the odd things. The Federalist worry most about the ambition of Congress, the way in which Congress will be the institution most likely to serve powers from the president and the Supreme Court, the judiciary.
And so, I think in a way, they overprotect the president and the judiciary, given what they think will be the over ambition of Congress, instead you get the opposite. That is that Congress isn't ambitious. And I think in the end, what's the political science term, collective action problems? That is the any individual Congress person can be ambitious without Congress being powerful.
Right. You know, they might even serve their interests for Congress, not to be powerful. So, whereas presidents need a strong presidency in order to be strong, I don't think any Congress, Marco Rubio doesn't need a strong Senate in order to make his name. Right.
You can always be affected in a way, you know, the Senate is kind of increasingly platform by which to go to the presidency. To try to in action in the Senate, if it's not on you, you know, it's a great model. Look, I want to get things done instead of not doing any other elections or more. Do you think it's historically been the case on have there been Congress people that have sort of been had a broader view as sort of saw themselves as whole works of this, the Senate.
Yeah, I mean, there used to be. I think you can bird and West Virginia was one of the last of these types that were real. They were Congressmen, you know, Bob Dole, you know, as a dog, they even that way, I think Mitt Romney is oddly kind of trying to try to get this new kind of notion of legislative virtue. But yeah, it's an increasingly rare specimen.
So, you know, but it used to exist. Why it used to exist and it doesn't exist anymore. I know. Yeah.
Yeah. I was always wondering, it seems to, I wonder if it tracks relative to like a power presidency has grown, of course, as United States. So, I wonder if it's tracks negatively with increased power to president, like the Congress has just become less important to national politics. Yeah, I think as the president, I mean, the part of the reason the president is gain power is because Congress isn't asserting, right?
You know, it's the ambition being made to counteract ambition. If there's no counteracting force in Congress and the president just going to keep us certain about it. Right. Yeah, you mentioned something along these lines about how Congress is so diffusing its number of members that they're isn't like an advocate in the same way that the might be with the Chief Justice or with the president.
So, it's sort of falls upon that. They end up going to the constituents and they have other concerns. And so, it's easy for the self assertion of the legislature to just sort of not the kind of thing. Yeah, they don't know that passage the constitutional rights of the place, they don't have the same interest in asserting the constitutional rights of the legislature that the president has in asserting the constitutional rights of the presidency.
I was wondering, I just think, I just expressed this thought to you earlier, I wondered what extent the Defanged Congress is just a symptom of medicine success actually that he had really, I mean, it was too successful. He actually did take away the pound. Yeah, well, the judicial view in the ministers, the state, that's an executive orders now, just going crazy. I mean, it just looks increasingly like there's not much they can take that through.
Yeah, maybe they over in a way, Madison might say that he underestimated the extent to which one of the things he underestimated the extent to which Congress wouldn't be that strong in this. I mean, I also think Madison may have underestimated the extent to which a popular president would be kind of dangerous in a way that he hadn't appreciated what it was in an article. We talked about this before, like in the federalist 39 where he talks about the kind of government that this must be, and it has to be Republican, why? Well, this is the principle of declaration.
But also the genius of the American people, like the spirit, like there's like, there are people who don't like monarchical governments. And so we talked about this as a spirit of the American people, changes over the course of 250 years to what extent is that still the system of government that might best fit them? I don't know the answer to that. But maybe a different way of asking, I'll be well, with Madison, I'll ask you this is not to work.
All you have to answer. What would Madison say, looking at a constitution, would he say, good job? Or would he say, well, I might take a little bit. Yeah, I think in the first place, the body matters first.
Become those. I guess I was pushing back some on the excess of pessimism. I think in some of the sessions earlier, that is that there is, we're still around. Yeah.
And we're still fairly strong and stable. And we've had a we've had consistent presidential success, you know, succession, one resident, replaces the other. And even in situations that tested that we've persisted. So I think in the first place Madison would say, all things considered, we've done pretty well.
And I think that often things considered view is really important to the founders because they precisely because they don't have that many hopes. You know, we can't hope for human beings to be calm, perfectly rational and not partisan. I just wonder if it was just an extraordinarily pleasantly surprised that this experiment, like it, 225 years, wow, I'm like way to go. You made it.
Yeah. You want to be mentioned that there was not a flying bird like that flying bird like. The Constitution, what do you think about that? No, the Federalist Nine is amazingly pessimistic.
Yeah. So I think they would have thought it perfectly possible that in 30 years, it's not. Yeah. And actually, I think when there's interesting letters, you know, where what Adams and Russia, I think it is, who are exchanging these letters where they're just like, what do you think it's all collapsing?
All right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Jefferson too. Yeah. Right. They all do a compassentistic and they think this is a market.
Right. Yeah. There's a lead letter about Jeff or something worried about the public. Yeah.
I think it was specifically as a bird sleeper. It was a very complex one. That's right. So maybe one last big theme for us and you've already hinted that a few times.
So if you don't have anything to add, we can just move on. But tell us about the Federalist Papers as pedagogy, as political education, trying to educate Americans. Yeah. I mean, I think in, as I was preparing, is thinking these things through this past, in preparation for this talk at the secular center, it struck me more than ever the extent which it's really an education oddly enough in skepticism.
Or even you might say an education in the impossibility of political education, you know, that we can't be educated to be better and more rational. We can be educated to see the limits of our reason. And then perhaps by seeing those limits to at least build upon those limits, you know, so the political education is an education in popular distrust of themselves, even that the people out distrust themselves. Federalist 1 begins with the account of the demagogue.
And this is convincing you to ratify this constitution. The first thing we're going to tell you is all the things you do wrong. And then you're going to ratify it. So you do this right.
Let's believe in ourselves, this is the people who are like, you do this wrong. Now we're going to do something better. Yeah. So if I just want small follow-ups, maybe folks at home, maybe they'll pick up some Federalist Papers, which ones would you turn listeners to?
Or do you have a handful? Oh, yeah, one edition and what we handful of a lot of edition. They're all online. I have the class of the Kessler-Rocitor version.
But Federalist 1, Federalist 10, and I'd say 47, they're 51. Those would be maybe 37, 37 is weird. I think I'm 37 less. They're still good.
I'm going to start teaching. I usually do 10, but I'm going to throw 37 as well. I mean, 10 is great, you know, in so many ways. But yeah, 37, it's interesting.
It's one that never gets taught. And then there's the ones in the earlier 30s, which are all about need for almost unlimited power. It's Hamilton, really driving all the limits of parchment barriers. Yeah.
It's Federalist 69 is what Griggs did. It's not true. Tom said no jokes about character. I'll actually just let it go.
All right, Aaron. How are we coming to the part of the show that Greg likes the best? And the best of us like the least, which is lighting round. Lighting round?
You've been brought on. Yeah, it's been. You're brought, right? And keep it quick.
Keep it punchy. Let's pass if you only answer. No explanation. Just.
No, we always try to derail. So, you know, I noticed this during the presentation. And you were very, very quick with answers. Oh, yeah, that's true.
I don't want to go up. Oh my gosh, you gave up grand. He was a jerk. I don't like him.
He's a mean. I don't answer. So three last questions. Yeah, it was awful.
Yeah. We gotta guess on the show. I really loved him. I was very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, yeah, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, philosopher or liberal thinker.
Favorite philosopher or liberal thinker? Um, no, since I'm talking to the public medicine. Okay. Fair enough.
Oh, what about your favorite philosopher? Go big. Me too. Yeah.
I still like me too. They like reading each other. I just play those deeper. What's your favorite word of nature?
Well, I just finished teaching recently. I got a chance actually recently to teach to postmodern political parties completely outside my wheelchair. It's fun, but probably beyond good people. Right.
Yeah. I love it. Yeah. I can't say to be an expert on just a, it's your hand.
What's your favorite work of literature? Probably trying to prejudice. I'm reading that right now, actually. For the time I have to, I love Austin.
Yeah. I feel a park. I think it's a deeper book. Not as much.
I think so. You're a big fan of prejudice and prejudice. Lots of prejudice. I mean, are you ready to think names that you're willing to share with it?
Let's see. I remember as a child, there was a client or monkey. A client or monkey? That's fun.
You climbed around a lot. It's just like, man, we got a client or monkey. I had some in college that I wanted to. Okay.
Sure. Meals have it on board. What was your first car? My first car was a Lincoln Continental.
I think it was 76 Lincoln Continental. It was one of those great big, long boats. It only had two doors, right? And then little windows in the back.
And just leather seats is beautiful. I know, love those cars. You know, it's like a romantic attachment to it. And that time it's just an old car.
It wasn't thought to even out. Now you had a car. Yeah. My first car was an 82 Mercedes, and I was driving like the same car.
He likes old cars. No, no, no. Now you have a classic car. Yeah.
I like those gaskets. It was a different age. Yeah. Right.
Lights out and these are still making big cars. Yeah. Go fast. You have a favorite sports team.
Bosses old. Bosses old. That's what I'm going to play going up. Yeah.
I'm going to play golf. Yeah. Originally from that boss in the area, Marshfield, Massachusetts, and used to go to Salt Lake. My dad had season tickets.
It's a lot back in the old Boston Gardens. During the 80s. Yeah. I guess I'm Larry Bird and Robert Parrish.
Yeah. I can't. I had a Celtics member of stuff all over my room. It was a Celtics trash can.
Wow. That's very cool. These are all? Yeah.
Yeah. Do you have any non-philosophic or non-economic in a college? No, I probably should have more hobbies than trying to think. Probably watching basketball.
Okay. Fair enough. That's one. Yeah.
What's your favorite anti-federalist pending? Favorite handy. I like the U. Just the most of the handicap I'd wear.
So you love them. I like a federal farmer. I like a federal farmer. That's not one of them?
Yeah. That's one. Like Philadelphia, Osman, and others. I don't know what to say.
I'm just saying all these funny things. I'm like, Kato, give me the pass. No. I like dogs.
But yeah, just too much. What do you think you would be if you had not become a professor? So I had the ambition I would come fairly young age to be a history teacher. Yeah.
A high school teacher or something like that. And then I guess my I decided that was too much work. It is remarkable. It's a remarkable mother.
I'm a Christian character. What was your, you think was the best politician you liked doesn't have to be American, but can't be? I'm not great. First job.
First job was actually working for my dad. He had a clan big business. Wow. And I was, I used to work and actually at a certain age, I could drive the truck and then I did it on my own.
That's very cool. So can you bake it in a clam? I can make the whole plan with the steamers and monsters. That sounds pretty nice.
Yeah. Just back in the cable a couple weeks ago and we had a clan. So I was introduced to my, yeah, I mean, Michigan now. So yeah, it's the steamers.
You got to only get in the message. Selfies and climax. So we all have Boston now. Very, it's definitely accent.
No, no, no, no. I decided this is going to come off as something that perhaps I should. I decided to fairly young age that the accent sounded really, right? All like, I really concentrated on getting rid of the accent.
Yeah. Yeah. I had to show off and especially I had some friends studying in Tulane. They're from the South Earth, studying science.
I'm like, where are you from? I'm like, oh, rural Alabama. I'm like, sound like I want to have a job. I went to a girl in New York City.
I was a teenager. It was my first, she was the one. I was a child. She was the one and she, you know, you're a dinner and she says, you're really smart for being from Georgia.
That's, thanks. That's really cool. Well, I guess that's about all we have. Ben speaks so much.
Your joints was great. This is Constitution Day, Happy Constitution Day, everybody. These books, oh, before you get to him, I just want to say, I was a Constitution Day thing. I'll let you go in with a praise and but look, it is a good country.
We're all very proud of what Mass was able to accomplish, especially if you've ever lived abroad or studied other places. It is a very decent regime. I love you. Yeah.
So again, the discretionary president, the Promised and Parable Executive Tower, and you're coming book raised, the crisis. The crisis, the crisis, the crisis, the crisis, the crisis, no, no, and constitutionalist.org. If you want to write about the Constitution or be about the Constitution, go there and there's nobody better to do it with clearly this client monkey is client. Thanks for joining us.
Thanks, folks. We'll be right here for me next time. Bye-bye.