WEBVTT - A 6-Minute Masterclass on the Constitution and Declaration

0:00:10.280 --> 0:00:14.160
<v Speaker 1>This is Lee Habib and this is our American stories.

0:00:14.480 --> 0:00:17.640
<v Speaker 1>Up next, doctor Larry Arne, who's the president of Hillsdale

0:00:17.680 --> 0:00:21.400
<v Speaker 1>College and author of The Founder's Key. He was giving

0:00:21.480 --> 0:00:25.919
<v Speaker 1>a talk with the Hoover Institution at Hillsdale and he

0:00:26.079 --> 0:00:29.400
<v Speaker 1>was read a statement of his and asked to respond,

0:00:29.960 --> 0:00:33.280
<v Speaker 1>and that statement was, you can read the Declaration and

0:00:33.360 --> 0:00:38.519
<v Speaker 1>Constitution in a few minutes. They're simple, beautiful, can be

0:00:38.680 --> 0:00:43.840
<v Speaker 1>understood and retained. Here's what doctor Arne had to say

0:00:44.479 --> 0:00:45.720
<v Speaker 1>about that statement.

0:00:46.159 --> 0:00:49.239
<v Speaker 2>Well, they're very There have never been anything like them

0:00:49.240 --> 0:00:53.040
<v Speaker 2>in history. There still is nothing like them. But remember

0:00:53.120 --> 0:00:55.840
<v Speaker 2>the King of England, who was a nice man by

0:00:55.880 --> 0:00:58.920
<v Speaker 2>the way, and a humble man for a king was

0:00:58.960 --> 0:01:03.280
<v Speaker 2>referred to by the title majesty, And it took the founders,

0:01:03.480 --> 0:01:05.680
<v Speaker 2>a lot of them for a long time thought the

0:01:05.720 --> 0:01:08.280
<v Speaker 2>only way you can have stability is if some family

0:01:08.920 --> 0:01:12.880
<v Speaker 2>is appointed to rule. And so the king was a

0:01:12.959 --> 0:01:16.360
<v Speaker 2>very humble man. But when his son wanted to marry

0:01:16.840 --> 0:01:19.959
<v Speaker 2>somebody a noble but of lower station than the king's family,

0:01:20.000 --> 0:01:24.720
<v Speaker 2>he said, princes may not marry subjects, ever, no matter

0:01:24.720 --> 0:01:28.880
<v Speaker 2>what your heart says. So the one is that's the world, right,

0:01:28.959 --> 0:01:33.640
<v Speaker 2>that's what's known. And that's the first incredible thing about

0:01:33.680 --> 0:01:37.479
<v Speaker 2>the decoratives independence. They're three. The second incredible thing about

0:01:37.480 --> 0:01:40.759
<v Speaker 2>the dectritent's independence is in the last sentence, the decorative

0:01:40.760 --> 0:01:43.800
<v Speaker 2>of Independence was written by people for whom the military

0:01:43.920 --> 0:01:48.240
<v Speaker 2>was looking. General Gage had an order, and the order said,

0:01:48.760 --> 0:01:53.840
<v Speaker 2>find these people, even if it means complete war. Detained them.

0:01:54.000 --> 0:01:56.920
<v Speaker 2>In other words, they were guilty of treason. And now

0:01:56.960 --> 0:01:59.840
<v Speaker 2>they're going to put their name on a document and

0:02:00.120 --> 0:02:03.320
<v Speaker 2>send it to the king. And they write in the

0:02:03.400 --> 0:02:06.120
<v Speaker 2>last sentence in the mood that somebody who was about

0:02:06.160 --> 0:02:08.720
<v Speaker 2>to do that would write in support of this declaration.

0:02:08.800 --> 0:02:12.040
<v Speaker 2>We mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes,

0:02:12.080 --> 0:02:15.519
<v Speaker 2>and our sacred honor. That's how people talk on a battlefield.

0:02:15.960 --> 0:02:19.320
<v Speaker 2>They die for each other. We mutually pledge to each other.

0:02:19.960 --> 0:02:22.440
<v Speaker 2>That's the second extraordinary thing. And then the third becomes

0:02:22.440 --> 0:02:25.800
<v Speaker 2>more amazing because of the first two. The opening of

0:02:25.800 --> 0:02:29.360
<v Speaker 2>the decorations independence has nothing to do with them. In fact,

0:02:29.400 --> 0:02:33.640
<v Speaker 2>it demotes them. It's not our unique situation. It's not

0:02:33.919 --> 0:02:37.160
<v Speaker 2>us a special people here to do a grand deed.

0:02:38.480 --> 0:02:42.239
<v Speaker 2>It begins universally and abstractly, when in the course of

0:02:42.320 --> 0:02:45.120
<v Speaker 2>human events, means any old time, it becomes necessary for

0:02:45.200 --> 0:02:48.160
<v Speaker 2>one people, means any old people, to dissolve the political

0:02:48.160 --> 0:02:50.600
<v Speaker 2>bands that have connected them with another, and to assume

0:02:50.639 --> 0:02:52.760
<v Speaker 2>among the powers of the earth a separate and equal

0:02:52.800 --> 0:02:56.080
<v Speaker 2>station to which the laws of nature and of Nature's

0:02:56.120 --> 0:03:01.480
<v Speaker 2>God entitle them. It's an act of obedience to a

0:03:01.600 --> 0:03:04.880
<v Speaker 2>law that persists beyond the English law and beyond any

0:03:04.960 --> 0:03:07.639
<v Speaker 2>law that they might make. So for them to be

0:03:08.480 --> 0:03:11.480
<v Speaker 2>the particular people whose lives are at risk, and for

0:03:11.520 --> 0:03:14.840
<v Speaker 2>them to be turning over an entire way of organizing

0:03:14.919 --> 0:03:19.400
<v Speaker 2>society that had dominated for two thousand years, and then

0:03:19.440 --> 0:03:22.360
<v Speaker 2>for them to begin that way, it's very grand, but

0:03:22.440 --> 0:03:25.240
<v Speaker 2>also you can't miss it. It's partly humble. These are

0:03:25.280 --> 0:03:28.639
<v Speaker 2>the ways that people must comport themselves. We are going

0:03:28.720 --> 0:03:31.400
<v Speaker 2>to do that, and if you will do that, British,

0:03:31.440 --> 0:03:33.920
<v Speaker 2>we will get on and if not, we will not,

0:03:34.560 --> 0:03:36.440
<v Speaker 2>and we will be in the right because of that.

0:03:37.000 --> 0:03:39.960
<v Speaker 2>So that's what's remarkable about it and why it's very beautiful,

0:03:39.960 --> 0:03:45.320
<v Speaker 2>the declaration, and it connects to the Constitution. You have

0:03:45.360 --> 0:03:50.120
<v Speaker 2>to first know that modern scholarship claims and you know

0:03:50.200 --> 0:03:55.080
<v Speaker 2>Gordon Wood and Joseph Ellis and famous people excellent scholars

0:03:55.280 --> 0:03:59.000
<v Speaker 2>claim that there were two foundings, one for the Declorates

0:03:59.000 --> 0:04:02.480
<v Speaker 2>of Independence and one for the Constitution, and they mean

0:04:02.800 --> 0:04:06.560
<v Speaker 2>different things. Is the claim. That's a very powerful thing,

0:04:06.920 --> 0:04:09.360
<v Speaker 2>because if it's true that they changed their mind right

0:04:09.400 --> 0:04:13.000
<v Speaker 2>in the middle of the revolution, their example to us

0:04:13.080 --> 0:04:15.240
<v Speaker 2>might be we can change our mind whenever we want to.

0:04:16.400 --> 0:04:20.960
<v Speaker 2>But the Constitution doesn't read that way. The Constitution has

0:04:21.040 --> 0:04:25.720
<v Speaker 2>three grand things in it, and they're very lovely, and

0:04:25.760 --> 0:04:30.479
<v Speaker 2>they are all commanded in the Declaration of Independence. The

0:04:30.520 --> 0:04:35.720
<v Speaker 2>first is that government be limited in the Declaration, and

0:04:35.880 --> 0:04:38.840
<v Speaker 2>it's limited in obvious ways, right, it's a doctrine of

0:04:38.960 --> 0:04:42.320
<v Speaker 2>enuminerated powers. In the Constitution, there's a list of things

0:04:42.320 --> 0:04:45.120
<v Speaker 2>that the Congress can do, and the Constitution and the

0:04:45.200 --> 0:04:47.760
<v Speaker 2>other things that it's not listed it may not do.

0:04:48.560 --> 0:04:51.560
<v Speaker 2>And you'd think that some change from the declaration. But

0:04:51.720 --> 0:04:54.960
<v Speaker 2>in the declaration, the middle part of the Declaration of

0:04:55.000 --> 0:04:57.320
<v Speaker 2>Independence is the charges against the King, And if you

0:04:57.360 --> 0:05:01.919
<v Speaker 2>want to understand American constitutionalism, it's base read those because

0:05:02.000 --> 0:05:05.760
<v Speaker 2>the things that the king has done justify the revolution

0:05:06.320 --> 0:05:11.760
<v Speaker 2>and they amount to violations of constitutionalism. So he has

0:05:11.800 --> 0:05:15.080
<v Speaker 2>sent swarms of officials among us to eat out our

0:05:15.120 --> 0:05:20.040
<v Speaker 2>substance and harass our people. He has brought troops from

0:05:20.080 --> 0:05:23.880
<v Speaker 2>a foreign jurisdiction. So, in other words, it's a breach

0:05:23.920 --> 0:05:27.479
<v Speaker 2>of limited government. But once you have limited government, you

0:05:27.600 --> 0:05:32.960
<v Speaker 2>have a vast, big society that's independent, and you can

0:05:33.080 --> 0:05:37.320
<v Speaker 2>locate sovereignty in it. Now, James Madison takes pride in

0:05:37.360 --> 0:05:40.919
<v Speaker 2>the sixty third Federalist that this is the first form

0:05:41.040 --> 0:05:44.960
<v Speaker 2>of government in which the sovereign does not operate any

0:05:44.960 --> 0:05:48.039
<v Speaker 2>part of the government. And this is the second principle.

0:05:48.160 --> 0:05:52.920
<v Speaker 2>It is a representative form of government. It is limited,

0:05:52.960 --> 0:05:56.160
<v Speaker 2>and because it's limited, it's possible for it to be representative.

0:05:56.800 --> 0:06:00.440
<v Speaker 2>And what that means is in the government thing will

0:06:00.440 --> 0:06:04.640
<v Speaker 2>operate except that it gets its authority from outside. But

0:06:04.720 --> 0:06:09.680
<v Speaker 2>since everybody's human, who's going to get governed, then you

0:06:09.680 --> 0:06:12.760
<v Speaker 2>don't want the people outside to be of unlimited power either,

0:06:13.360 --> 0:06:16.120
<v Speaker 2>And so they can only act through the government. They

0:06:16.120 --> 0:06:19.000
<v Speaker 2>can't act directly. They can talk and talk and talk

0:06:19.040 --> 0:06:20.840
<v Speaker 2>and argue and argue in arg just like we are

0:06:20.920 --> 0:06:24.320
<v Speaker 2>right now, but we have to wait for elections to

0:06:24.400 --> 0:06:29.600
<v Speaker 2>do anything that makes us more deliberative. The charges against

0:06:29.600 --> 0:06:32.640
<v Speaker 2>the King and the Declaration of Independence are full of

0:06:32.680 --> 0:06:35.640
<v Speaker 2>a list of where the king, the executive branch has

0:06:35.720 --> 0:06:39.960
<v Speaker 2>messed with the legislatures and the judges and disrupted representative institutions.

0:06:40.760 --> 0:06:45.960
<v Speaker 1>And what terrific storytelling and what terrific teaching in the end,

0:06:46.080 --> 0:06:50.400
<v Speaker 1>and so often the best teaching can indeed be storytelling

0:06:51.320 --> 0:06:54.920
<v Speaker 1>the story of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence,

0:06:55.440 --> 0:06:59.080
<v Speaker 1>how the two are connected. No one tells that story

0:06:59.120 --> 0:07:10.480
<v Speaker 1>better than doctor Larry arn Here. On Our American Stories

0:07:30.440 --> 0:07:33.560
<v Speaker 1>Leha bib Here, host of Our American Stories. Every day

0:07:33.560 --> 0:07:36.000
<v Speaker 1>on this show, we bring you stories of America, stories

0:07:36.000 --> 0:07:38.360
<v Speaker 1>of us. And it's because of listeners like you that

0:07:38.400 --> 0:07:40.320
<v Speaker 1>we're able to tell the story of this great and

0:07:40.400 --> 0:07:44.000
<v Speaker 1>beautiful country every day. Our stories will always be free

0:07:44.000 --> 0:07:46.840
<v Speaker 1>to listen to, but they're not free to make. If

0:07:46.840 --> 0:07:49.720
<v Speaker 1>you love what you hear, consider making a tax deductible

0:07:49.720 --> 0:07:53.280
<v Speaker 1>donation to our American Stories. Is it our American Stories

0:07:53.320 --> 0:07:55.480
<v Speaker 1>dot com to give, give a little, give a lot,

0:07:55.680 --> 0:07:59.000
<v Speaker 1>any amount helps to our American Stories dot Com.