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Bruce Ackerman: What we need is elections in which citizens come and say, "
Bruce Ackerman: Look, we're going down a disastrous course, the same course
Bruce Ackerman: that is being pursued in Turkey, in Japan, in Brazil.
Bruce Ackerman: We're going down the path to dictatorship. We cannot do
Bruce Ackerman: that. This is not the America we had."
Bill Curtis: That was the renowned Yale law professor, Bruce Ackerman. In
Bill Curtis: today's episode of Politics: Meet Me in the Middle, we
Bill Curtis: bring Professor Ackerman back, because the events occurring in cities
Bill Curtis: across America today have made his observations even more prophetic
Bill Curtis: than when we first featured his interview back in May.
Bill Curtis: He says, " Not to become complacent or to take our
Bill Curtis: constitutional rights for granted, and that the only insurance we
Bill Curtis: have against excess executive power is to hold our leaders
Bill Curtis: accountable through our ballot." Frederick Douglass wrote, eternal vigilance is
Bill Curtis: the price of liberty. This week's events show us that
Bill Curtis: those words are as true today as when they were
Bill Curtis: written back in 1888. In this episode, Professor Ackerman reminds
Bill Curtis: us that in order to protect our freedoms, we must
Bill Curtis: always be on guard against all enemies, both foreign and
Bill Curtis: domestic. I'm Bill Curtis. Allow me to introduce our panel.
Bill Curtis: Firstly, connecting through Zoom, our cohost Pulitzer prize- winning historian,
Bill Curtis: bestselling author, and worldwide lecturer, Professor Ed Larson. Nice to
Bill Curtis: see you again, Ed.
Ed Larson: Nice to see you, Bill. I'm still looking forward to
Ed Larson: talking with Bruce, one of the great names in legal academics.
Bill Curtis: Also Zooming in, Jane Albrecht, an international trade attorney who
Bill Curtis: has represented U. S. interests to high level government officials
Bill Curtis: all over the world. She's also been involved with several U.
Bill Curtis: S. presidential campaigns. Jane, nice to remotely see you as well.
Jane Albrecht: Always good to see you, Bill, Ed. Delighted to be
Jane Albrecht: here with Bruce Ackerman.
Bill Curtis: Well, joining by Zoom, our special guest today, as you
Bill Curtis: may have heard, Bruce Ackerman. He is a sterling professor
Bill Curtis: of law and political science at Yale Law School. He's
Bill Curtis: an American constitutional law scholar and the author of 19
Bill Curtis: books in political philosophy, constitutional law and public policy. His
Bill Curtis: most recent book published by Harvard University Press is called
Bill Curtis: Revolutionary Constitutions, which takes us on a world tour of
Bill Curtis: constitutional crises while examining today's assault on one of our
Bill Curtis: favorite discussion topics here at Meet Me in the Middle,
Bill Curtis: checks and balances. Welcome Bruce. Nice to see you Zoom in.
Bruce Ackerman: It's a pleasure.
Bill Curtis: Bruce. You don't describe yourself as a political scientist. You
Bill Curtis: are described as a political philosopher. What is that exactly?
Bruce Ackerman: What I've done is to actually spend the time to
Bruce Ackerman: go through the American constitutional tradition and try to understand
Bruce Ackerman: how the participants themselves understood things. There's this constant temptation
Bruce Ackerman: to look back and say, " Oh, well, this is how
Bruce Ackerman: it turned out, but it's not clear to them that
Bruce Ackerman: this is how it's going to turn out." Not at
Bruce Ackerman: all. It's just as obscure as it is to us.
Bruce Ackerman: We don't know how it's going to turn out 10
Bruce Ackerman: years from now. We know we have to struggle to
Bruce Ackerman: try to solve the problems of the 21st century and
Bruce Ackerman: our government as they reveal themselves to us. Well, that's
Bruce Ackerman: just the situation the founders were in. The idea that
Bruce Ackerman: this crisis which is real, is unique in American history
Bruce Ackerman: is simply false. The crises of the 1960s in which millions
Bruce Ackerman: of racist people, not only in the South, but in
Bruce Ackerman: the United States mobilized Brown against Board of Education. The
Bruce Ackerman: millions in the White Citizens' Councils were just as mobilized
Bruce Ackerman: and numerous as the movements led by Martin Luther King
Bruce Ackerman: for civil rights. In the 1930s, we had dramatic polarization in
Bruce Ackerman: the crucial election between Franklin Roosevelt, in 1936, and Alf
Bruce Ackerman: Landon. Roosevelt makes a famous speech just before the election
Bruce Ackerman: condemning these malefactors of great wealth and asserting that, We
Bruce Ackerman: the people will not tolerate this." The idea was that
Bruce Ackerman: the 1930s was anything less than this profound confrontation between
Bruce Ackerman: two polarized ideals of what America should look like resolved
Bruce Ackerman: by repeated elections. But, the notion that America is just
Bruce Ackerman: in the good old days, we adjust a spoke in
Bruce Ackerman: a civilized manner to one another. No, we have constructed
Bruce Ackerman: and reconstructed the foundations of our democracy time and again,
Bruce Ackerman: with a good deal of success. The question is, of
Bruce Ackerman: course, whether we will manage to do it this time.
Bruce Ackerman: This is a challenge for every generation, we have as
Bruce Ackerman: it were, a revolutionary tradition.
Bill Curtis: Were people more interested in fully knowing the facts at
Bill Curtis: that time? Or, were they just as partisan then and
Bill Curtis: heard everything through the filter of their own opinion?
Bruce Ackerman: The American people of today are by far the most
Bruce Ackerman: educated population in the history of the world. 99% of
Bruce Ackerman: Americans have high school degrees to be sure. Many college
Bruce Ackerman: degrees, many high school degrees are not very good. That's
Bruce Ackerman: qualitatively different from not having any serious education, which was
Bruce Ackerman: our condition only 50 or 75 years ago. We have
Bruce Ackerman: two sides of this equation. One side is, we have
Bruce Ackerman: the most educated, capable population for seeing through and analyzing
Bruce Ackerman: the news. On the other side, what we have is
Bruce Ackerman: as a crisis of serious journalism. The number of serious
Bruce Ackerman: journalists in the United States who are covering state capitals
Bruce Ackerman: is virtually nonexistent.
Bill Curtis: Why do you feel that's happened, why the seriousness of
Bill Curtis: the journalism research has fallen by the wayside?
Bruce Ackerman: Simple economics. Before the rise of the internet, newspapers around
Bruce Ackerman: the country were basically financed by [inaudible 00:06: 49]. Today, they've lost
Bruce Ackerman: their (inaudible) and so the serious journalists, let's say
Bruce Ackerman: something like the St. Louis Post- Dispatch, which was a
Bruce Ackerman: great newspaper. They have been wiped out by the internet revolution.
Bill Curtis: I'd like to dive in a little bit and define
Bill Curtis: a couple of things. Ed and Jane, is it reasonable
Bill Curtis: for a chief executive during a pandemic to describe himself
Bill Curtis: as a wartime president?
Ed Larson: The constitution gives particular powers to a president in war
Ed Larson: time because the constitution makes the president and only the
Ed Larson: president, commander in chief of the army. That's a unique
Ed Larson: distinction that's in cradled into the constitution. In contrast, the
Ed Larson: constitution, doesn't give the president any particular power whatsoever in
Ed Larson: a healthcare crisis because the constitution created a Federal Republic.
Ed Larson: When they created that Federal Republic certain areas like education
Ed Larson: and health and safety were primarily afforded to the States.
Ed Larson: But, when you're dealing with individual healthcare, that is historically
Ed Larson: been a state issue. You don't really have the same
Ed Larson: sort of idea, but commander in chief, because as we're
Ed Larson: finding with this pandemic, but it could go back to
Ed Larson: any other one like the Spanish flu of 1918, it's
Ed Larson: different in different places. Therefore, one reaction might be appropriate
Ed Larson: in Alaska or North Dakota, and another reaction might be
Ed Larson: appropriate in Georgia or California. Therefore, it's a classic issue
Ed Larson: of federalism. But, when you have a war effort, you
Ed Larson: don't say that New York should handle world war two,
Ed Larson: one way and California should have it in another way.
Ed Larson: Everyone would immediately see that, just absolutely ridiculous.
Bruce Ackerman: Jane, we understand that commander in chief of our armed
Bruce Ackerman: forces, that's a concept we can wrap our arms around,
Bruce Ackerman: but domestically, what is contemplated as a chief executive power
Bruce Ackerman: at a time like a pandemic
Jane Albrecht: Essentially, when Trump calls himself a war time president, it
Jane Albrecht: is to a certain degree and to a great degree,
Jane Albrecht: symbolic. The degree to which wartime powers in the constitution
Jane Albrecht: will kick in is questionable. There are certain areas in
Jane Albrecht: the constitution where the president's given certain powers in terms
Jane Albrecht: of foreign relations. The power to declare war is really
Jane Albrecht: in the hands of the Congress. To me, when he
Jane Albrecht: says he's a wartime president, it's mostly symbolic
Bill Curtis: President Trump declared that when somebody is the president of
Bill Curtis: the United States, their authority is total. They have total power.
Bruce Ackerman: Yes.
Bill Curtis: How do you feel about that in this particular circumstances
Bill Curtis: of managing a pandemic?
Bruce Ackerman: The bugs are not a war.
Bill Curtis: You don't think so, it seems like a war.
Bruce Ackerman: Listen, a war is human beings attacking other human beings.
Bruce Ackerman: This is as Ed pointed out a public health emergency.
Bruce Ackerman: We want to look beyond Trump. Unless we do something
Bruce Ackerman: constructive on this front, some future president, two presidents down
Bruce Ackerman: the line, he will feel himself free to intervene in
Bruce Ackerman: one or another conflict that he thinks is of great
Bruce Ackerman: importance, which is deeply controversial in the country and use
Bruce Ackerman: the equivalent of Trump as a great precedent justifying this.
Bill Curtis: You're hoping for a more benevolent law abiding president. But
Bill Curtis: how does the system, in fact, ensure that we're protected
Bill Curtis: against such things?
Bruce Ackerman: There's no insurance. There was no insurance, that the new
Bruce Ackerman: deal would be relatively successful. There was no insurance that
Bruce Ackerman: the civil rights revolution was going to occur. There is
Bruce Ackerman: no insurance at all. However, there is an opportunity Trump
Bruce Ackerman: dramatized to the American people, the danger of this kind
Bruce Ackerman: of unilateral executive power and the next president or the
Bruce Ackerman: president after that will have the opportunity to have to
Bruce Ackerman: use a metaphor that Ronald Reagan used and Franklin Roosevelt
Bruce Ackerman: used, the first hundred days. What should the first hundred
Bruce Ackerman: days be? What are the really crucial initiatives which we
Bruce Ackerman: should adopt immediately, so as to assure that another set
Bruce Ackerman: of abuses, like those of Trump will not occur?
Bill Curtis: In this case, what is Congress's ability to actually make
Bill Curtis: change, that allows anyone who comes into office and assumes
Bill Curtis: the role of King or dictator? What allows us to
Bill Curtis: control that environment? We're going to talk about that when
Bill Curtis: we come back from this break, because I've got to
Bill Curtis: go call my doctor and see if putting Clorox in
Bill Curtis: my coffee is appropriate. We'll be right back
Speaker 2: On medicine. We're still practicing. Join Dr. Steven Tabak and
Speaker 2: Bill Curtis, for real conversations with the medical professionals who
Speaker 2: have their finger on the pulse of healthcare in the
Speaker 2: modern world available on all your favorite podcasting platforms produced
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Bill Curtis: We're back with Ed, Jane and Bruce. Bruce, you said
Bill Curtis: the primary number one responsibility is to cast your ballot,
Bill Curtis: knowing what the issues are and choosing a representative on
Bill Curtis: the basis that they are pursuing the right direction for
Bill Curtis: the future. That is how you would describe that responsibility
Bill Curtis: that we have as citizens?
Bruce Ackerman: You see, there are two different dimensions. We have the
Bruce Ackerman: fundamental responsibility to train, to educate people, to be good
Bruce Ackerman: citizens by understanding and talking to the other side in
Bruce Ackerman: your classrooms. Civics is no longer a central element in
Bruce Ackerman: the curriculum. This is a tragedy. American history is no
Bruce Ackerman: longer at the core of our education. At the present
Bruce Ackerman: time, we have the homeschooling movement, which makes it virtually
Bruce Ackerman: impossible to have the child hear the other sides because
Bruce Ackerman: their parents are teaching them.
Bill Curtis: Are you saying that a primary responsibility of the citizen
Bill Curtis: is to educate each other or to insist that we
Bill Curtis: ourselves get educated?
Bruce Ackerman: The fundamental obligation of the older generation to the younger
Bruce Ackerman: generation of citizens is to educate the younger generation to
Bruce Ackerman: be citizens in the way that I'm describing it. Then
Bruce Ackerman: when these people grow up, they have another fundamental obligation,
Bruce Ackerman: which is the ballot.
Bill Curtis: You are saying that a requirement is to educate ourselves on
Bill Curtis: the issue and cast a ballot accordingly?
Bruce Ackerman: That's right. And, everybody realizes that. If they didn't, they
Bruce Ackerman: wouldn't show up at the polls at all. The minimal
Bruce Ackerman: requirement of citizenship is to cast informed vote. The second
Bruce Ackerman: one is community service. In The Second World War, It
Bruce Ackerman: took the extraordinary form of the draft. One of the
Bruce Ackerman: most significant things that has changed over the last 50
Bruce Ackerman: years is the 1973 decision to eliminate the draft. The
Bruce Ackerman: question is whether there's another form of community service that
Bruce Ackerman: is more appropriate in the 21st century. It's those three
Bruce Ackerman: requirements to educate the next generation for citizenship, to cast
Bruce Ackerman: an informed ballot, and to recognize your debt to the
Bruce Ackerman: community in a way that's meaningful in the 21st century.
Bruce Ackerman: Those are the three fundamental elements that we need to
Bruce Ackerman: reconstruct in a world where journalism has fallen apart, where
Bruce Ackerman: the public school system is in disarray and where we
Bruce Ackerman: don't have a structure of recognizing in a constructive way,
Bruce Ackerman: how much we owe to being an American.
Bill Curtis: Bruce, yesterday in our discussion, you were talking about your
Bill Curtis: feeling that there was a disintegration of the constitutional tradition.
Bill Curtis: Tell us what you meant by that.
Bruce Ackerman: Well, the question is, are we a democracy or are
Bruce Ackerman: we a plutocracy? Is our politics so dominated by big
Bruce Ackerman: money that this fundamental right of the citizen to cast
Bruce Ackerman: his ballot for a change or not change, been profoundly
Bruce Ackerman: undermined by the power of big money? After all, we
Bruce Ackerman: just see Bloomberg spend a billion dollars of his own
Bruce Ackerman: money. And, the courts have said, you have a constitutional
Bruce Ackerman: right to spend your own money. We have not only
Bruce Ackerman: big money, but we have the courts supporting the power
Bruce Ackerman: of big money. Is there anything we can do? Well,
Bruce Ackerman: there is. Working with Congressman RO Khanna K- H- A- N- N-
Bruce Ackerman: A, he and I have worked out a statute, which
Bruce Ackerman: is now been, he submitted to for consideration by Congress.
Bruce Ackerman: What we argue for is this, every registered voter gets
Bruce Ackerman: 50 democracy dollars to spend in presidential elections. So, each
Bruce Ackerman: registered voter starts talking to his friends and neighbors, who
Bruce Ackerman: should I spend this money for? You can't spend for
Bruce Ackerman: anything else.
Bill Curtis: You're still making it a popularity contest.
Bruce Ackerman: We're making it into an election, each citizen is going
Bruce Ackerman: to go to the polls and cast his ballot, and
Bruce Ackerman: now he has an effective way of changing the conversation.
Bruce Ackerman: The only people who'll get this money are people who say, "
Bruce Ackerman: I'm not going to use my own path, I'm not
Bruce Ackerman: going to ask people to cash. I'm only going to
Bruce Ackerman: finance my campaign with democracy dollars."
Bill Curtis: Well, so that seems like a reasonable concept in this
Bill Curtis: situation where you have to bring that to a body
Bill Curtis: of people to vote on, who are in power. And,
Bill Curtis: those people are in power, perhaps for the wrong reason.
Bill Curtis: Maybe they got their money through special interests or otherwise.
Bill Curtis: How do you convince them to actually vote in a
Bill Curtis: new concept that makes their position weaker?
Bruce Ackerman: You see, you're simply believing that the status quo is
Bruce Ackerman: invincible. Let's shake the green movement. Environmentalist, they'd love this.
Bruce Ackerman: They believe in grassroots participation, all the environs would latch
Bruce Ackerman: on, so will people who think that the right to
Bruce Ackerman: bear arms is really fundamental, because they think that they
Bruce Ackerman: will be financed by democracy dollars by their true believers.
Jane Albrecht: But, if they've chosen, as many of them have done
Jane Albrecht: already, not to participate in the public campaign finance system,
Jane Albrecht: because it will limit their fundraising and other respects. In
Jane Albrecht: other words, they've made the calculation. They think they can
Jane Albrecht: raise more without it.
Bruce Ackerman: What I'm talking about is something that looks like big money, compared to
Bruce Ackerman: what was done before. $ 50 for every American voter is
Bruce Ackerman: after all $ 7 billion.
Bill Curtis: It would be substantial, no doubt. But the question is
Bill Curtis: that the people who are in power got there through
Bill Curtis: being empowered with their own financing methods, and we're asking
Bill Curtis: them to make a change based on the greater good.
Bill Curtis: Generally we haven't seen a lot of politicians looking to
Bill Curtis: make changes and for the greater good in these days.
Bruce Ackerman: Well, that's what happened in the 1960s, the 1930s with Ronald Reagan.
Bruce Ackerman: You're just freezing this moment of status quo as if
Bruce Ackerman: it were eternal. If it is then American democracy dies.
Bill Curtis: Totally agree, and frankly, I would like to see all
Bill Curtis: forms of campaigning with advertising, be eliminated the way cigarettes
Bill Curtis: and tobacco has been eliminated. I don't think that-
Bruce Ackerman: Absolutely not. You want ignorant voters.
Bill Curtis: No. What I want is a press that has obligations
Bill Curtis: to do town halls and debates and constructive education as
Bill Curtis: you described before.
Bruce Ackerman: You cannot obligate media, there's freedom of speech in this country.
Bill Curtis: We used to be able to obligate media because they had licenses bestowed
Bill Curtis: upon them by the FCC, and they could obligate them
Bill Curtis: to a lot of things.
Bruce Ackerman: That system died in 1984. What you now certainly, and
Bruce Ackerman: I applaud you, certainly you're saying, " Aha, there's hope," what
Bruce Ackerman: we need is elections in which citizens come and say, "
Bruce Ackerman: look, we're going down a disastrous course, the same course
Bruce Ackerman: that is being pursued in Turkey, in Japan and Brazil. We're
Bruce Ackerman: going down the path to dictatorship. We cannot do that.
Bruce Ackerman: This is not the America we had."
Bill Curtis: Bruce, as long as there are intelligent people like you
Bill Curtis: offering us ideas on how we can adjust the status
Bill Curtis: quo or American democracy, we'll no doubt stay on the
Bill Curtis: right path. Well, that's it for the show. Thank you,
Bill Curtis: Bruce Ackerman for joining us today and giving us some
Bill Curtis: unique concepts to ponder. And, of course, thanks to our co-
Bill Curtis: host Ed Larson and Jane Albrecht. And, thank you for
Bill Curtis: listening. We'll see you next time on politics, Meet Me in
Bill Curtis: the Middle. I'm Bill Curtis. Stay safe, everyone. If you
Bill Curtis: like, what you hear, please tell your friends and let
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Bill Curtis: to your favorite podcast. This episode was produced and edited
Bill Curtis: by Mike Thomas, audio engineering by Michael Kennedy and the
Bill Curtis: theme music was composed and performed by Celeste and Eric
Bill Curtis: Dick. Thanks for listening.
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