we'll well good morning

everybody. i'm of the american enterprise institute. it's my great pleasure to welcome you to a set of conversations today. democracy and, the american founding, this gathering is the beginning for us of a large, ambitious project today. i and i want to say just a few words about it before we get going with our conversation. 2026 is a lot of you know is going to mark the 250th anniversary of the american founding. a lot of organizations, a lot of individuals will recognize that milestone in a variety of ways. but thinking through how we might best that here, we thought that the kind of contribution we could make would be some of lasting intellectual product through a set of conferences that will then yield a set of books, other kinds of educational materials that explore how americans now should understand our heritage, our

inheritance. the key and questions at issue in the american founding. those materials can outlast the anniversary and conserve educators, students and citizens in general. for many years to come. and to do that, we're going draw on a variety of scholars from a variety of fields with a diversity of viewpoints to offer americans some wisdom about our civic and political inheritance and. so over the course of more than two years, beginning, we will be eight scholarly conferences here at aei, each of which will be devoted to a particular facet of the american revolution and the founding and the character and the legacy of our country. our theme today at this first conference is democracy in the revolution. future conferences will explore themes like religion and the founding economics and the founding race and slavery law and global affairs and. more each will then result in a book a collection of essays or on that subject as well as

various kinds of video and audio and digital products. all of those will be gathered together into a collection to be published time for the july 4th, 2026 anniversary and to be widely as an educational and civic resource. we'll make them available to public libraries, to college and, high school instructors and more. our goal is really to help create 21st century literature on american founding and to help inform and reinforce growing movement, to strengthen civic and civic learning in our country. a movement that has really been building again in recent years and this first conference we'll be talking in particular about the question of and the founding. and we really could not be more pleased and proud about the extraordinary group of scholars that we will have with us today to take up that question, we're going to hear in further sessions this morning from danielle allen and greg weiner of peter berkowitz and bryan

garsten. but we're starting this morning with maybe dean of historians of american founding the great gordon wood. it would be it would be a fool's errand and a particularly long to provide you with a full biography of gordon wood. but he is an emeritus of history at brown. he's written several of the most important books in the study of the early american republic, including the radicalism the american revolution, which won a pulitzer prize, the creation of the american republic won the bancroft prize. many other books, important papers and articles in the field. he's really created some of the basic frameworks and categories that now help us define the study of the founding. one of our former research assistant today who was here today, i'll make sure you meet him. gordon, when he saw the lineup for today, describes himself as a gordon wood fanboy. and i think maybe we would use different terms but there are a lot of gordon wood fanboys and fan girls in this crowd and in the country in general,

americans who care about the founding and gordon has been a leading figure that work for a long time, half a century in preparation for marking the bicentennial of the united states, i put on a project that's somewhat similar in some ways to what we're doing now. they invited a group of leading scholars to to offer lectures on key themes in the american founding. and one of those, it was essential just is now to invite gordon wood. the lectures were put together in these little and in our library can find the one by gordon wood. and if an extraordinary lecture that i really recommend to it's online to it opens with a picture of you in and you haven't changed a bit as would imagine and just just as then it would be it would be crazy to try to start these conversations in any other way except to invite gordon wood to speak with us not only about democracy and

the founding, but about the of the 250th anniversary of the american revolution and the declaration independence. and so thank you, gordon wood, for being with us and for helping us to open these conversations. we'll talk about democracy, the revolution, but maybe the place begin is really with that broader question how we mark this anniversary, what do you think it would mean to do this? well, do this successfully. how we be marking the 250th birthday of the united states? well, i think project that you've got laid for us is is one of the great contributions leaving a set of documents that will be used and remembered by. i think that that's an important step that there'll be of other kinds of celebrations, a place like a i should doing that kind of intellectual contribution. i think that will be a wonderful way to honor that the 250th well

thank you very much thinking about the bicentennial, what was done? well and what was not done well in that celebration and what could we learn from that as we get ready to? well, there were lots of things that scholars probably didn't like, but i think there was a sense in the country that this was important and it was bicentennial of the revolution. 250th doesn't have quite the same kind. everybody is trying to learn how. to say semi coincidental. well, what you have decided not to say again today, because we'll get it wrong. but there was this tremendous interest in the founding and i'm not sure that it was stimulated by the bicentennial. certainly the founders became seem to become important in the culture then than they had been. but of course, we've always had an interest in the founders since. i think since abraham lincoln's time. and maybe we should look back at

the centennial in 1876. that was certainly a big celebration and see they did they publish lot of documents, too. nothing like the kinds of documentation have now of the six leading founders that. that's just an extraordinary project and not like duplicated anywhere else in the world quite quite so i hope that will be some kind of good things coming out of it. it's also the the death of of of jefferson adams that which will add to the i think the interest in in 2026. yeah. the the bicentennial by their deaths. 50 years right after. i mean it's seems such a coincidence that it had to be providential to people at the time 50 years after the declaration and to the two leading proponents of revolution

that just seem too much to to believe was was coincidental. what does it say about our country that take the beginning to be so crucial. it's not the british would do the french would do i don't know that they could even point to the beginning. even countries that could are our neighbors canada don't think in quite this way about the significance of of the starting point. yeah i think there's probably some modern similarity would be israel i mean real moment when you can remember when this the nation was created and that's certainly in 1776 that was the birth of the nation. the declaration of independence becomes, i think, the most important document, even more important in some sense the constitution, because it not only legally created the united states, but it infused into our. liberty the highest aspirations and noblest ideals of the of the nation, liberty, equality, the

well-being of ordinary people. these things come out of the revolution and. so when you want to look back, to find out what kind of people are we, you look at that that document and you look that founding. so it's interesting. you see liberty, equality, the well-being of people. we're talking about democracy and the founding democracy, a term that the that generation would have used to describe what they were doing or what they were aiming at. it certainly was not the barely mentioned in 1776 when they thought of that was certainly not the aim of the revolution. the aim of the revolution to protect liberty and, to break from great britain, which was threatening that liberty. but they thought democracy was insofar as it was of in any kind of positive way, was an aspect of kind of political science term, suggesting, of course, ruled by the people literally you could not have that outside of the new england town meeting.

so they knew that, but that's how they thought of it in terms of of governing obviously it's just democracy is important. you need the people a part of of a and since they couldn't meet together they they met through representatives. so have a house when they create their first state constitutions which are far more important in some sense than the federal constitution which is derived from the state constitutions. that constitution making electrified the world. all of the states in 76 and 77 created new government it's written constitutions, which set the model for making for the rest of 200 years. over 200 years. so when they thought about democracy, they thought of it as part of a balance government ruled by the people and they should participate in the government, but they aren't the whole government. so you have the house representatives which represents

the people. then you have senate which were kind of version of of the house of lords and a republican version which are designed to collect the wise and wise people of the community to to to be a second house in the legislature. and then you have an executive which represents a kind of monarchical this notion of balance government goes back to the ancient greeks ruled by one to the aristocracy. and then thirdly by the by the people. so that's how they thought of democracy and none of the greek heroes that recognized had anything good to say about democracy. neither plato nor aristotle nor two cities had they all feared democracy. it could run amok, it could be dangerous, but as long as it's balanced by the aristocracy and

the one of the more practical element, then all would be well. and so that's how they thought of it at the outset. by the time you get to the 1790s and the early 19th century, the term changed and become very much to what we think today, encompassing the government and its values well beyond rule by the it included all of the elements that we think of as part a democratic society. so is just a term that has changed. it's one of the things that's always stood out to me about your work is that you look at the period that we think of as the founding period from the earliest sort of rustling of unease about british policy, the 1760s until maybe the ratification of the constitution in 1780. and you think that as a time of change, as a period when ideas, priorities were changing dramatically, so there's not one

founding period, but there are phases by the time of the constitutional convention, there's tremendous about democratic majorities. and yet in the moment after the declaration, the states create constitutions that are quite democratic compared everything else in the world. they're a amazingly democratic. what in that period the change and what they meant by the term democracy and what and how they thought about the structures of democracy where they had so much confidence in in the people that they were virtuous and had the and so they gave a tremendous amount of to these lower houses of representatives, which are the democratic element in this mixed government governance, not have vetoes. the senate was a problem because they they really wrestled with the notion of the senate. how do you create a senate that's comparable to the house lords in a non hereditary situation. and it turned out that made that

a major problem throughout the whole period because it looked like you had two houses of representative and of course in the end that's what happened in pennsylvania. pennsylvania is good example of how ideas get changed. pennsylvania created a single house legisla and no executive wanted the most democratic polity you could possibly have in a large state. and so they elected single house, which then in turn an executive committee. but no single executive. well, immediately was considered a monster in the in the in the culture and elites everywhere condemned. and there was a major move create a second house in pennsylvania and the defender of the constitution said well you're trying to foist a house of lords on us. and they said, no, no, it's not a house of lords. and they ended up saying it's

just going to be a double represents section of the people. well, that's extraordinary statement to make, because if the people could be represented twice, why not three times? four times. and of course, in the decades, palin over the decade, from 70, 76 to 1787. that's exactly what happened. election became the criterion of representation. so you suddenly had a whole lot of bodies being representative of the people in the senate. by the time you get to the 1787 in in in most most of the elites were that all of the official roles in the government and state and the federal level are some ways representative of the people. and that's an extraordinary change in a very short period of time because. no one would have said that in 1776. no one was saying that. so in that sense, the the the the constitution was more

democratic, not less, though the rhetoric was more skeptical of demand rhetorically and in language, but of course, in reality it is was considered by the anti-federalists, the opponents of the constitution to be a very undemocratic institution. and some people would say today that it's undemocratic in various ways, but they what me in working in was essentially my dissertation was the extraordinary change ideas i mean. i'll give you another example of how ideas change in the middle of politics. hamilton in 78 federal is 78 is trying to argue that the judges have a right to set aside essentially judicial review set aside legislation by by house of representatives and of course people said how can they do that? how can judges set aside what?

and of course, it's still a problem today and today in america and today in israel, how can unelected set aside a democratically elected actions of democratically elected elected legislators? and hamilton says, well, who do you think you are you legislatures, you're not. you're really the people. you're just agents, the people. and so what the judges, agents of the people, that's the argument he makes in 78. and that to justify judicial review. in other words, he's taking away of the representative quality of the legislatures and giving it to the judges. well of course, the next step in the argument is, well, if the judges are really agents, the people, maybe we should elect them. and of course, that's exactly began happening. and now 39 states, not our federal, but 39 states elect their judges. now, hamilton, the last thing in the world that hamilton wanted

would be elected judges, but nonetheless, making that argument, he set in motion a notion that we picked up and used in a different way. and that's how the ideas proceeded through the whole period and still that's our intellectual life. you've got to watch what you're saying because other people can pick it up and use it in ways that you don't intend. it's an interesting thing. you know, this is an argument that you make the creation of the american public that every made in any direction ends up becoming an argument for more democracy in those those early years. why is that what was the spirit? there is a social force. the american revolution did have a social basis to it. and it. middling sorts of people who begin using idea of equality in particular to combat the aristocracy as they saw. gentry we had no aristocracy comparable to what in england or in france, but we did have a

gentry, people who claimed to be superior to other people and they these middle class begin contesting not only politically but intellectually and using the arguments of equality, in particular the of independence, says all men are created equal. it doesn't say are equal created. they were all very much lockean. that is to say they, believe that we were all born with a blank slate and whatever differences that emerge come from the environment, even many people argue not jefferson, but many people that blacks were. we're we're we're born equal to to whites and reason that and they argue this that they had lived in africa the they had been scorched by the african sun in a more temperate climate they would become white and intelligent people like david ramsey who was a south carolinian physician and

historian argues he saw, he said in a letter to, jefferson, he says, i think they've become whiter, just my own lifetime. i see blacks becoming more white. that may have been because miscegenation, but whatever was happening in south. but that's that was his view. that's how thought of equality but by. 1790 the middle class types who are emerging particularly in the north are arguing that not only are we created equal, we are equal. and in and there's no place in the world that this was carried. so and by early by the time he reached jackson, the jackson era people, our elites are very much under and finding it very difficult to distinguish any of social distinction in european

and who come here, see everybody, gentlemen. there's no distinction between and non general. and you can read something like middlemarch in or trollop and you realize that even in the late 19th century, the english drew a very, very sharp distinction between who's a gentleman, who's not in america, that gets blurred, except maybe in the south. in some ways, the line between democracy and, equality is relatively. but you mention liberty as the sort of key ambition, the key motivation for the american revolution. how do you think the connection between democracy and liberty? what in what sense was what they were for ultimately expressed in democratic forms? well, they debate, as i say, the imperial debate is really about liberty and the colonists are

looking for the they don't want to be under they under the of the british but the british making decisions about who's going to be taxed, not taxed and. that's how they thought of liberty and freedom. and that of course is very much in and we're very deeply embedded mean the united states is very deeply indebted to to our english heritage in that we we had common law and we had habeas corpus and we had english bill of rights and all of that played into the americans could not invented overnight all of their notions of rights individual liberties and so on. so liberty is is crucial but there's always a tension, of course, between liberty and equality and no doubt that in the decades that followed, equality really is the dominant force. i think it still is. to me, it's the most ideologically powerful force in

american history. melvil recognized. he called it the great god, liberty. it it it simply made a difference we were celebrating ordinary working people as being the the stuff of the society before any european country was doing it. and so we way ahead in and it's equality that led that that charge how how different are the north and the south in this story. oh very especially in the decades following the revolution. one of the important things that i've tried to emphasize is, is the celebration of work that emerges the north, because you see from from antiquity on people who worked particularly worked with their hands were considered inferior, incapable of virtue, capable of really being good citizens. well that all changes in the north and you have a celebration of work the point where a lawyer

edward everett in 1820 is running for some office has has to celebrate. look i'm a man, too, he said. i go into the office and and i work hard, too. and he's talking to to two people who are class people. and has to celebrate work and. that, of course, aggravated the the distinction between north and south because that's exactly the opposite of what the southern gentry were celebrating. they were they were people leisure and they saw this as as a good thing because this is what antiquity like you have to have an aristo proceed that has leisure so that you can do great things. not that the south was creating great literature, but that's how they thought of of society. and so suddenly north is, is, is going off in a very different direction, celebrating work and.

yeah. the slave rhythm society of the south is going in the opposite direction rhetorically. so the the distinctions between the sections are aggravate aided by this development of and southerners like madison that he said as long we have slavery, no matter much we emphasize restore thickly that we're a democracy. we really are an aristocracy and i think that was that that aggravated the sexual split and it was a real difference. some historians in past have tried to show that the south was just as democratic as the north, but it not true either rhetorically or substantively. help us think about you mentioned the term republican and in answering that. and i wonder you think about the distinction, democratic and republican. there is some effort to meld

them, of course, in the politics of the early republic. but there's also a kind of familiar argument in our time that says, well, the founders didn't found a democracy they found a republic. and i always wonder exactly what is it that people think they're conveying? well, yeah. what really does it? well, in 1776, they they did create 13 republics. what they by that was we're not going to have a hereditary you're going to have elected or people who are not in inheriting their position. blood is no longer going to matter in american life. merit should should matter. now, you could have various kinds of republics. republics could have a strong or not a strong governor or a three, three. as i mentioned before, the between monarch or aristocracy and, democracy.

many people argue in england as well that. the english monarchy really was a republic in saint john adams says john adams says that but other do what askew says that he says it's got a because it has a house of commons and of course there's no place else in the world that has a house of commons or a representative body representing people. so it's a very ambiguous term, but there are different kinds of republics and differently organized, but they have to have some of democratic element in it. and there's no doubt nobody ever denied that even in england, that all power ultimately came from the people. it's that's not the same as saying that people can. so having deriving your authority from the people and no good whig in england, whatever that the people are the source all authority.

there are very few people left who are arguing that divine right of kings. so you can have authority from people. but having the people rule another thing altogether and you can have a republic has a democratic element it but also has an aristocracy, a house of lords or a senate. i should say, or a governor so republic could be organized in different ways. but it's a republic when it lacks a hereditary rule. so your most recent work, your latest book is about constitution writing in the early republic, particularly the state constitutions, which on the one hand all created democratic republics. they all began the assumption that the power had to flow through represents. but on the other hand, placed some constraints. democratic power. why did the americans emerge

into the world as constitution writers writers of written constitutions that created these formal structures that both empower and constrained democratic public. well, that's an interesting question. i mean, because now when a state creates constitution, this was not true of israel. in in 48. but but now i since then since the war, every state that's been created, there have been dozens of they all have a written constitution. the british do not. the israelis do not. therefore, there are sort of unique in the in the world it time because you want write things down when you're uncertain of what should be done and the americans had experience with their charters. now not every colony had a charter, but those that did that charter, which had been at outset a corporate grant from the crown to a group of people to set up do something that the

crown afford to do, suddenly took on of being a kind constitution. that's how samuel adams thought about the massachusetts charter in sixth in the 17th sixties. he was thinking of it as a written document that limited the power of the english government and gave authorization to the colonies to run their colony. so it was natural in that sense to think of of a constant as a written document. so there was never much about that. they all wrote them and they rewrote them. now, the problem, of course, was how do you wrestle? you got to fund that. they knew it was a fundamental law, but but it's created by the same body, essentially that created that that legislated and this is something that really baa baa baa the jefferson the whole decade. how do you distinguish the fundamental from the statutes

and is an issue that of course is really a wrestling with and the first constitution in maryland i think said well we'll have to legislatures in other states had super majorities to write the constitution but that didn't satisfy people and certainly didn't satisfy jefferson, virginia constitution of 1776 was just an act of the legisla. and he said, we've got to do something more. it's massachusetts that today this is massachusetts comes to the solution because they they postpone constitution writing it becomes quite a big deal in 1780 that's for quite a few years full years later than than the others and they come up with the notion a convention especially the elected body with one function to elect to to devise a

constitution which would then be ratified by the people. and that becomes a model. the french follow it i mean, they pick up this notion of the convention, special convention and the ratification so that launches it. so it's understandable when the federal government is created that they would follow that that that model and then that they say that's picked up by other people elsewhere in ways at the center of the challenge is the question of majority rule, which obviously is essential to what we think of as democracy. and this question majority rule has been contentious and and deeply problematic in various ways throughout american in. maybe the greatest irony of our history the defenders of slavery in the middle of the 19th century appeal to majority rule and to and to democratic. how did the founding generation about majority rule? well, that the problem that that

rose in the 1780s with these state legislatures running amok they were doing things that really they many the elites were disturbed madison in particular he was really frightened by this because it was bringing into question republican and he in an older world might have said well because we having the democratic element going crazy we need to strengthen the aristocratic and the monarchical elements and maybe even have a king bring a monarchy. people did suggest that not too many and some people wanted washington to be a king the 1780s and he had nothing he would have nothing to do with that. but was really concerned about that and wrote a little working paper should be a major in our history it's never it was never published it was called vices of

the political system. the united states written some where in the early spring, late winter of 1787, in preparation for this convention, which was now going to meet in philadelphia and in this essay, which is very short you can call it up on your on your screen and read it in 10 minutes. he isolates the problems of the states and and he focuses almost exclusively on the states and the legislation that's being passed the multiple illicitly. he said the the big injustice of this legislature and the fact that it was in the mutability, it's constantly changing now you have to understand the state legislatures introduced the constitution so in 1776 introduced outside of new england was the innovation annual elections and the turnover in these elections that we studied seemed to be about

some up to 50% turnover each year. so there's a lot in the legislation have new groups of people coming in. they were enlarged in numbers. so you have sometimes double or three times the size of the old colonial legislatures. so you have a whole new crop of people coming in with all kinds of interests to promote and they're changing legislation and they're in particular, they're printing paper money, which was very, very harmful to gentry aristocrats who lived by lending money, essentially bankers in their community. there was no pomp. there was no currency to speak of how do people do business? do you borrow money? people went hat in hand to the man on the hill, who has a lot of and he's lend you money and

then you do what you want to do with it but with paper money you're paying back to he might have lent you and gold and silver and you're paying them back in in inflated paper. this is a very part of the crisis of the 1780s. and it's what madison was most objecting to and washington through all of them they were in the business being bankers in their community. they were no banks to speak of. so how did people deal? well, they they they used their local great man who had the money to lend them. and in particular was complaining about this because he was away fighting the war. he says these people took advantage of. so that becomes one of the major objections that madison has. and others, of course, he shared this view shared by many people, too. what's on in the state legislatures, and they want to curb those state legislatures

excesses of democracy, the way they labeled it. and that's it. those excesses. democracy are the major force in my opinion, of the major force in calling the convention. now, there are other problems with the of confederation. confederation. the you have to think of in 1776, 1778, when we create the articles. it's sort of like the eu and that's the way to understand it. you have 13 state house who see themselves as very independent with own sovereignty coming together for a few basic purposes the way the eu exists. there's no way that the eu can tamper too much with the sovereignty of. the people insofar as they do they drove england out of britain, out of the eu. each of those states sees itself as as independent and sovereign, and that's how the 13 states saw themselves. and so it's a very although it was a strong confederation as

confederation, it was a confederation. what we got in 1787, it's almost extraordinary to explain. did such a strong national government emerge? we take it. granted, it seems that we had to happen, but it did. i think it's more difficult to explain the constitution than it is to explain the revolution itself. and i think it is these excesses of democracy that really madison's thinking, the thinking of others he could never have carried way without having that political support from others like him. and he wanted a negative given to the congress over all state laws. it's so impractical. you can't even imagine. he would think about it. he has no idea. every bill that passed by the states would have to come to congress and get okayed before it became a law well. let the throw that out and we

article ten, section one, a section two, article one, section ten, which is a series of prohibitions on the states what they the one thing they can't do is print money and probably a good thing but the economy of the antebellum period would have been frozen if that had been rigidly enforced. and this is the way history works. the states got around that prohibition by channeling banks, which in turn the paper money. so by the time you get to to the eve of the civil war, there were about 10,000 different currencies flying how business was created. it's how did people handle this. i if you're if you're in providence and you get a note for $100 drawn and the first bank of ten of nashville. what are you going to do where you probably discounted it and tried to pass it on that's how

things operated. now it all that's changed with the civil war the the state banks are taxed out of business and we're into our modern world. but to think about what went on in that period, all of those state banks issuing currency which which is capital and that's the source of the bonanza of the of the antebellum. very risky. risky period and how businesses operated. there's still no good book on this as far i'm concerned. i don't see one, but it's that's the story in a the constitution really a reaction to excesses of democracy and it's built in our whole government is built in to limit democracy and causing some problems at the present, you know, and questions of how democratic is the constitution that was questioned in 1900 led

to certain kinds of direct election of senators and income tax amendments and we're probably heading for some kinds of changes in the future if we have another election in which the popular vote the person who gets the most votes does not get elected, there'll be rising opposition to, the electoral college. but at the the electoral college was a genius solution to a major problem of of how to elect the president. they i mean they didn't anticipate political parties. they lived participate tickets. so once you get past washington, then how would anyone in, say, new hampshire know who's talented in georgia to be president? so they had to wrestle with that. they they needed a kind of. college of electors or, a congress. they they suggested the congress

elect the president. but then they said well, the president would be dependent on the congress, and that's not good. well, maybe you will give him a seven year term, one term seven years. and they said then he wouldn't have to be dependent on the congress. but the same time. that's too long a term. so we went back and forth and they finally came with this notion, let's have an alternative and what the electoral college is or used to be. we added three electors to the for the house for the district of columbia. which do you think about those skip those forms of of democracy as elite phenomenon in the early republic or or was the public aware that democracy was getting out of control? was that. well, by the broader or what is this story that, you know, it's not shared by the i mean, the the the middle class people who were creating the successes of democracy were certainly not happy with the new federal

government was curtailing their power. that's why rhode island, my own state, refused to even meet to ratify the constitution. they just ignored altogether because they were the most notorious. issuers of paper money and the most capitalistic, if you want it. they took it as aimed at them. yeah, right. that's exactly. and they were the most capitalistic you'd say of the commercially minded of all the 13 states. it's not surprising that that's where the industrial, so to speak, of america began. and rhode island remained a they had more paper money, more banks per capita a poor town of any in the in the antebellum period because they had a lot of people who were making money and wanted that cash that capital. well i want to open things up to people here in the room if if you have a question for

professor would raise your hand and i only ask that you tell us who you are and do ask a question rather than just offer us a comment maybe. right here in the middle to begin with. we'll get a microphone in just a second and it comes. thank you very much. my name's bert ely, an independent banking consultant here town in days, donald trump has been reported as saying that if he's elected president, he'll root the vermin that exist within the the american population. i clearly am a burman in in trump size. so my question for you is this if trump is elected, what protection, will there be for vermin like. well, i think there are lots of of obstacles facing anybody who

wants to if they're going to be following the law at all. and and i don't see trump has lost the of the military and there's not much he can do as a single person without you people talk a coup de and so on there's no coup d'etat without having the military in command. so i don't think that's possibility. but he obviously using those terms, it's just beyond the pale. i think for many that that's calling other people vermin is not not we expect of political leaders so we're into new libya maybe reform that question in a way that speaks to early republic too. how do you think about populism as a force in american political life? how is it related to democracy see the sense that what democracy means is some way to empower the people against powerful right social. and then we've had a lot of movements of that sort and all

either get absorbed, the populist party did bye. in this case, the democratic party took on some of the the the program of of the populist in the late 19th century or they jackson's era was was really a very populist movement. i mean, when you think about although he he was a slave holder and but he was he did stress stand for the union but his also his program was designed to kind of culmination of that had begun in the 1780s and nineties he's he argued and anyone at all can hold public office it doesn't matter who you are, how much money you have, how much property you have, any person at all could serve in office. that's a major development. and no place else in the world that reaches that point and

that's the late 1820s and and that's the ultimate of democracy that and also paying salaries to property to public offices. you know, the terrorist movement suggests that in england that's as close as they come. but everywhere else in the world, people are not paid salaries because. the assumption is that this is a an obligation of an aristocracy in england, the land of the aristocracy dominates the house of commons until, well, they didn't start paying salary to mps until 1910. now think about what that means all kinds of people. that's exactly the kind of people that adam smith thought should serve as as political leaders. they have no he as said about the landed aristocracy, england, they have no interest of their own. their money comes to them from rents and tenants without exertion. they don't have to do anything.

money just flows in and that gives them the ability to be disinterested. and that's a term that george washington used all the time, was what he meant by virtue we use the term non to mean as a synonym for uninterested and. we've changed the meaning of the word. but in the 18 century there was only one meaning to that word. it meant impartial standing above interests and washington that and he works at it. the southern planters slaveholding planters came as close as anyone in our society to emulating the english. that is to say, they didn't have to work either. they didn't have to exert themselves, their money, their cotton growing money came without their exertion, so to speak. not not quite up what the english aristocracy had, but that gave them assurance that they were the true heirs of the

english system. and that's arguments they used through the antebellum period that they were the truest aristocrats and were free of capitalist money grubbing. those yankees are all in money and that's all they're interested in. and they can't be good. republicans with that. that's the kinds of arguments that went on. so help us in that to think about the mystery of thomas jefferson, maybe the most democratic of the founders yet also the most the most southern aristocratic of them. right. well, he's i guess we call him a limousine. that's what. but he is. he does he really has an image of what he wants to do in. 1776, he lays out for himself a whole program of reforms enlightened reforms. he looks forward the revolution. so he can implement those

reforms, reforms having to do with education, with antislavery, with separation of church and state, with inheritance patterns, doing away with primogeniture, and entail, and with criminal punishment. and these are are reforms that he has, in his mind and he tries to and with some success in virginia, no success, with with the with slavery, of course. but he does try but very successful with separation church and state that document that finally gets implemented by because his his plan for separation of church and state when he's in in paris madison carries it out in 1780 586. it's an document in our history and really there's nothing like it in the history of the world up to that time and separating it that now is religion is longer a matter of state

business. i mean we had had a meeting in prague with, a bunch of people discussing that document and people from from there were two muslims, one from indonesia, one from iran. and scholars, britain and europe and and the muslims could not begin to even comprehend what jefferson talking about if religion is important, then the state must be involved. it it's that kind of logic and and and jefferson's got it separates those much to our our benefit through the rest of our history. we didn't become less religious we became that more religious but but so jefferson is an extraordinary man in that sense. criminal justice reforms to. well, that's right. they they don't get were the agenda of reformers for 100 years. that's right in pennsylvania picks them up it isn't jefferson who's thinking this but he

really had worked out and he doesn't it isn't so successful in virginia certainly not with his education but that educational plan that he had get implemented first in massachusetts and. in pennsylvania, you have extraordinary liberalization doing away with capital crimes, capital crimes in just in one just in case of murder. that's just extraordinary. had 200 capital crimes on its books at the end of the 18th century. stealing a handkerchief could get you exact it now most cases the juries wouldn't they send them instead to either to america or later to australia but but so these are reforming elements in jefferson he's really full and he said ideologue to the to is i mean he really is supportive of the french revolution in a way that no other american leader was he really believed it it and that's

of the great conquests she has his friend so-called friend john adams. but but jefferson used to say his replacement in in paris still in 1793 mr. jefferson your friends of being your former friends over here are being executed and he says, well, that's just the price of fighting for liberty. it's just if only in the leave were left alive, left free, it would be worth it. i mean, that kind of statement led the the historian of i forgotten his name. now who he said, well, he's the pot of the of the 18th century jefferson was an extraordinary man. but in the end, he his he had some political skills and ambition and any moderated in action what he believed. he was a good politician too but

he he when he came into power is oppressive. he, in a sense, endorsed that middle class revolution. he had no idea of all of these middle class followers in the north what they were doing and what they were saying. but but he certainly was a spokesman for that. he never doubted the virtue of the american people. and that's what made him through much most of our history recently. the great, great man, because he was the only one that had no doubts whatsoever that the american people were with the greatest thing on earth. and as soon as we were holds, all of these varied interests together is something we could. democracy. yes. and he was a democrat thinker. beyond structure of government. but by early 19th century, the modern meaning of democracy, meaning our whole system, all of our values was summed up in the word democracy. so they included individual liberties, rights, everything, the whole system is summed up in that word. and so that's where it took on

its great power, but it happened in a very short period of time. extraordinary change, 1776 to 72, you know, 1800. you have this extraordinary change in the meaning of the word democracy for americans. and already the early 19th century, it has essentially the meaning we have for us today encompasses that we don't mean by just majority rule. we don't mean by just elections. we mean the whole package, everything that we value is summed up in the word democracy. so take another up here in front. thank you. hi, ben story. i'm here to eli foster. would your mention of jefferson's project for the university of virginia puts you in mind if we all know about the the university education projects that that emerged the revolution of the constitution, jefferson's project at uva,

washington's project, a national university that never bore fruit. i'm wondering about another side of this is collegiate education as a condition of the revolution in the constitution. jefferson collegiately educated adams was collegiately educated. madison was a princeton man. they have now washington didn't that kind of education but he wished he did. yeah so would you would you do you think there at the collegiate education of some of the founders was an essential condition of the project that created well they thought of very few people went to college of course but that was ticket as john adams said to being a gentleman. you graduated from harvard, got a b.a. from harvard. you were a gentleman just by that fact. and that between gentlemen and non gentlemen commoner is is

much more i mean we can't even begin to imagine how real that was for these people. it almost as is stark, a line of division in the society. the line between free in fact and, slave. you know, there were so many degrees of unfreedom that that was kind of blurred. it in the atlantean regime, the colonial period that's blurred. but but the notion between the idea of being a gentleman and non gentleman is really. and you get some sense of that some of the arguments the federalists make of course they're finding that there are so many non gentlemen who are emerging as leaders to be gentlemen. and when foreigners come trollope's mother comes. she's just stunned at the fact that some who's a workman somewhere is calling himself a gentleman. she can't believe that that would be possible. could the society put up with that? and that's happening in the north. so college education was a ticket to gentry.

now once everyone goes to college, then of course there's no everyone's gentleman. so with that falling away, we don't have that. and they also valued a liberal arts education as a way of of tempering one's acute acquisitive instincts. so you can't really be a gentleman. you think about money all the time and making of money. and of course, this is a theme used in, you know, in silas lapham that the novel is about kind of problem. how do you how can you write up and not think, you know, as a businessman and not think about money and then how do you become a gentleman in such a society that's a theme that runs english literature and also through american literature. that's that's sort of the college education is as a liberal what we think as a liberal arts education as a

temple thing of that kind of acquisitive notions and and so the colleges changed everything in our own eyes. we think of it as a means to as a vocation and that's exactly what's happening in our present. but they had a very different view of where the college meant. let's get another question up here here. professor, would j.r. roach a i you said that the skepticism democracy in 1780s was not shared among the american people. but then how did advocates of the constitution successfully the case for its ratification ultimately. well, that's a good story. it's the there's a lot of finagling that goes on. you have to read the pauline mayers book on is very good. it was a very shrewd move on the part of madison too to have

ratified he knew it had to ratified and he can't just have the constitution in it and then say this is it but he he said we don't need all of the states which was a real violation of what was going on. i mean and otherwise the constitution because rhode island and participé it at all. so nine out of the 13 needed to ratify and there was a lot of hankie panky that went on. i mean, the the federalists were very they controlled press and in when they didn't have the votes sort of postpone things until they could the votes and then momentum up and as several leaders someone like richard henry lee who was a kind of anomaly because he's an aristocrat says look it's either or nothing and that's what it comes down to because the articles had really collapsed the congress was just not meeting and suddenly people.

well, i don't want nothing. i don't want chaos. and someone like nathan smith, who is really the bright guy mind, emerged and who ends up debating hamilton in the new york ratifying convention, he really gives both hamilton and livingston, who are college graduates, a real run for their funds for the further thing i mean the date is very, very fascinating all about aristocracy and and and consolidate those are the two major anti-federalist content. yes this is a consolidation and it's putting worse autocratic people into and of course that was the plan in some sense were. no, they weren't wrong about that. but in the end, when new york votes and it was close smith votes for the constitution because he doesn't want chaos he doesn't want to go back to

nothing because there was nothing that was there. and in the end, the federalists had that advantage. but it is a very interesting politically to see the way they manage things in the various states, particularly in pennsylvania. there's no doubt that that's it's a real i mean, by present day standards, we call it we call it a kind of manipulated ratification. but any rate, that it was a tough fight, but they the only thing out there at this point and people wanted the people wanted something called the united states. and so that was this or nothing is i think in the end. but it got to get through and. then, of course, once jefferson takes over, the fight in the nineties is all about. what kind of nation are we going to be? and when jefferson takes over, he the power of the federal government. i mean, unless you you you get the mail delivered. but that's it how the government never touched you in any way.

there was no major army and there's no there's no except for customs duties, which you never felt so. and you had the mail coming in and that's the way you'd know you were living in the federal government. by 1810. let's take another question up here. we see a thing out here. they exist. i ask about the new army in the adams administration. how big a concern is the creation by congress? a second american army, and how serious a concern was it that hamilton leading it would use it against political enemies, i should say? this is corey sharkey runs foreign and defense policy know one of america's great experts on civil military niceties and there's always been a problem of why madison turns against the

administer the washington administration because he is such a nationalist in the 1780s he would be really engineered as anyone i think if anyone's going to be the father of the constitution it has to be madison and yet in the 1790 he turns and becomes an opponent and leads the he he really created the republican party jeffersonian republican party what washington and hamilton especially hamilton has in mind is to create what we might call a fiscal military state, which is going to have the same kind of qualities as a european state like us, particularly great britain. hamilton was fascinated by how this little island off the northwest coast of of of europe was able to to become the greatest empire in the world. how did that happen and it has to do with its fiscal policy and its ability to maintain military

force. and he's going to do that. and so there's he's really eager to create a standing army, but it can't be called a standing army because the last thing any of the americans wanted, and that's what throws into opposition and there's a real division in the society in the 1790s between the federalists project, if you will, which is really hamilton's project and, jefferson and madison in opposition representing, i think large ever increasing numbers of people. when you come to the civil at the end there is a possibility when the army is created washington there's such a fear a french invasion that washington out of retirement buckles on his sword, travels to philadelphia and suddenly realizes that this is not what he should be doing and sneaks to mount vernon,

thoroughly embarrassed by the whole thing. adams has never really been control of his own government, but there is a such a fear. hamilton's running this thing, and he wants a real. and he thinks that that army could could maybe do some good. you know, hamilton is although miranda in his play makes hamilton such a great hero on the eve of his death you know the fatal clash with with burr he writes a letter in which he says you know the thing poisoning this country is democracy. hamilton is about the least damage cratic of the of the founders. and he saw that as the great threat. what's happening in in that sense, his it's probably fortunate they died when he did because. he he would have ended up he never would have gotten public

office anywhere and given his views unless he disguised them. and in 1804 he he he was he was done. but the army fortunately didn't get didn't materialize. the french invasion materialize, although it was a real threat. i mean we can't minimize that. we know that it wasn't going to happen, but they didn't they didn't know that and i think it's the only the only comparable period our history and i mentioned this in of my books was was the fear of a japanese invasion in california, which led, of course, to the rounding up of 125,000 japanese, some some american citizens and, putting them in concentration camps. that was a real fear we had. it didn't materialize. the japanese had no intention of invading the united states in that sense. but we were frightened.

and the americans were frightened in 1798 as well. nick explore you. can't you you it's hard to to get rid of what we know in the future and say well of course that was crazy. john quincy adams who minister in holland, was writing to his father and to others that he was the the most important diplomat we had abroad. and he was telling everyone that the french were going to invade, come up through the south and. napoleon, after all, was invading countries all over europe and turning them into puppet regimes under french control. and there were so many french sympathizers in america, they figured that the french figured that they might just be able to take over the united states and make it another puppet regime, as they had with holland and switzerland and northern europe and northern italy. so the fear was real. and we need to understand and that our knowledge was not shared by them back then.

let me let me pick up on that that our time is ending and maybe it's it's nice to end with a a request, some broad guidance as we approach 250th anniversary about how to think about that founding generation. obviously, founding now is controversial for some good reasons and some bad reasons. it's controversial because people question the morality of some of the founders and what they created is tradition. is our inheritance good and bad. what's the framework you would offer americans for thinking our founding? and as anniversary comes, how do we think about these people what do we owe them? what do we what should we expect of them? what's the right attitude to have. well, they were an extraordinary generation and peculiar in that sense, because i don't think they'll ever be duplicated. that was a moment our history

where there was i say, a nice balance between what we might call democracy and aristocracy, a respect for elites, but a common for the well-being of all people. and that was balanced. these people they were interested in in doing well for the people they talked about that that's republic means rich people, the public things. so they were concerned for the people. at the same time they were elitist there's no doubt of it. they had no doubt they were superior to ordinary people and they could never imagine, in most cases ordinary people running things. but at the same time were concerned for their welfare. so you had this balance in and there's no place quite like except maybe in scotland and it's interesting that this was you know, it took place in we call the enlightenment, although they didn't know they were living in the enlightenment. they knew they were living enlightened times and they share

the values of this enlightened. and and they tried implement them. and in that sense, were the first nation to do that the others all in some cases succeeded, but not to the we did so we were created at a moment of of great in and the notion of all men being created equal. i think of what that meant because that was not the assumption of the ancient the aristocracy was of of going back to the beginning of european history. it always assumed that that people were all created on and could never be equal that that's such an important moment. and surely the legacy of slavery is what makes it so that's right so but is you need to understand that this is the first moment in which slavery is challenged in the history of the world in abolished legally abolished in

the 18th northern states now they have was a small number slaves only 50,000 perhaps in the north. but the implications of that were people were aware of that throughout the world and those southerners were aware of that and people in brazil were aware of that was now something to be eliminated. that was never nobody thought that in 17, ten or 17, maybe a few individuals a few isolated quakers, but there's no major movement questioning slavery. there hadn't been 3000 years and. all of a sudden you have with the revolution this fundamental questioning of the institution that it on they put it on the defensive and it sooner or later going to be eliminated was the sense that people had from the revolution. on it's the revolution that they set the english come late to this the american northern states are way ahead of the

english on this in implementing anti-slavery. so i think it needs this you to get a perspective on that now slavery had existed for so centuries without any substantial criticism, right? that needs to be understood what's new about the and these founders and jefferson certainly was eager to abolish slave he tried to do it in virginia in 1760. he he introduces a bill of course it goes nowhere. but the virginians were interested in the issue. virginia players in 1791 they would an honorary degree to granville sharpe william and mary the college of and mary the visitors are slaveholders the trustees an honorary degree to granville sharpe who the leading british abolitionist. now why would they do that? and that's question we need to

ask now. what happened, of course, is is the sentiment rebellion the haitian revolution in almost immediately following that awarding of this honorary to two shot and changed everything. the fear of a slave revolt of such a messy, bloody slave revolt in which whites were killed or to flee that that scared the bejesus out of the out of the southerners. and i think from that moment on, it's it's almost impossible to. think about their abolishing because they had so many 40% of virginia's population was where african slaves and 60% of south carolina population slaves. so they were not in it. suddenly when that when the haitian revolution out that that that was frightening. gordon wood thank you very much getting a story kids appreciate

it.