American Dialogue: The Founders and Us

Sydney M. Williams“American Dialogue: The Founders and Us”, Joseph J. EllisMay 27, 2019“The study of history is an ongoing conversationbetween past and present from which we all have much to learn.” Joseph J. Ellis (1943-) American Dialogue: The Founders and UsThe study of history allows us to better understand – not to idolize or condemn, not to excuse or justify – the past. It provides us the ability to debate today’s issues, many of which have roots in years long ago.As Joseph Ellis explains, the U.S. was founded on paradoxes: A Declaration of Independence was declared; a Constitution was drafted and confirmed; a government of three co-equal branches was formed. Yet slavery would be the future for African Americans; the lands of Native American Indians would be confiscated, and women would not receive the vote until 1920. These are the inconsistencies that consume Professor Ellis, and which make necessary a dialogue; for, as he sums up, “…we rise or fall together, as a single people.” He accomplishes this in four parts: Thomas Jefferson and race; John Adams and economic equality; James Madison and the judiciary, and George Washington and foreign policy. In a final chapter entitled “Leadership,” he reminds us that in 1788 four million newly minted Americans had a choice for President between George Washington and John Adams. Two hundred and twenty-eight years later, three hundred and fifteen million Americans had a choice between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump!Professor Ellis recently retired as Ford Foundation Chair of history at Mount Holyoke College. He is a winner of the Pulitzer Prize (Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation) and the National Book Award (American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson). He has authored a dozen biographies and histories about our founding years.In this book he engages four of the founders, their thoughts at the time and their impact today. Jefferson: “While his views on race were horrific, his words on liberty and freedom are magnificent. We should know both and not let the former destroy the latter.” Adams: “Reason holds the helm, while passions are the gales.” While we strive for equality, “inequality is the natural condition of mankind.” Madison: During debates as to whether sovereignty should remain with the states or reside in the federal government: “…argument itself became the abiding solution, and ambiguity the great asset.” He was the principal author of the Constitution and, with Alexander Hamilton, the voice behind the Federalist Papers. Washington: “The myth, the monument and the mythology are so mixed together they can never be disentangled.” He was the architect of foreign policy. “He saw Europe as the past and the American frontier as the future.”The American founding was a “collective enterprise,” with founders harboring different beliefs as to the meaning of the American Revolution and for what sort of government should evolve. “This political and psychological diversity enhanced creativity by generating a dynamic chemistry that surfaced in the arguments whenever a major crisis materialized. Diversity made dialogue unavoidable.” Given today’s focus on identity, there is irony in the diversity that emerged from founders who were all white, heterosexual (as far as we know) males of English heritage. Their diversity came to fruition in debate, formed from opinions derived from reading and were based on how and where they lived. It was from this furnace of invisible differences and visible sameness that our nation was born.“Conflict is part of the human condition and can never be eliminated. Neither can the desire for power and the tendency to abuse it,” wrote Wilfred McClay in his history of the U.S., Land of Hope: An Invitation to the Great American Story. Yet, by almost any measure the results of the Founders have been a resounding success, as Joseph Ellis tells us. For someone born in the developing world there is no other country where most would choose to live. Part of that is geographic. We are abundant in natural resources. We have no aggressive neighbors. As well, we have no landed aristocracy. We are merit based. Ultimate authority is embedded in our citizens. We are peopled with those from myriad lands and cultures. To travel to this country from afar required (and requires) aspiration, a willingness to work hard and self-reliance. Our system of government has been tried, notably during the Civil War and during the 1960s. We, the people, have prevailed, and we should again today, as divisiveness again consumes our nation. Professor Ellis quotes Alexis de Tocqueville on America: “I am full of apprehension and hope.” These thought-provoking essays provide reason for on-going dialogues and continued debate. For it is only when arguments cease and all seems settled, when silence reigns, that we should worry.Like us today, the Founders weighed the possible versus the ideal – “the distinction between a realist and an idealist, a skeptic and a believer.” Joseph Ellis recognizes the individual flaws of the founders, but he also acknowledges the extraordinary success of what they achieved – the nation and government they built. One does not have to agree with all opinions expressed to get the value of the message conveyed by Professor Ellis – an intelligent and necessary dialogue is only possible with knowledge of the issues and resolutions that were confronted and decided upon by those who founded this nation two hundred and fifty years ago. This is a book that should be read by all who care about the political and cultural chasm that divide us today.

You can read through Dr. Ellis' newest work over a weekend of dedicated sitting. As with most of his more recent works, 280 or so pages and nothing else, as Ellis often states in interviews, will get you an audience more likely than 4 or 500 pages. American Dialogue: The Founders and Us is Dr. Ellis' attempt to view our current political climate through the words, actions, letters and legacies of four of our founding fathers: Jefferson, Adams, Washington and Madison.I heard Ellis once describe Jefferson as the penultimate paradox of a man: how could the man who wrote the words "all men are created equal" also be an unapologetic racist? How could the man who wrote "All men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights - that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" own over 800 slaves in his lifetime - showing no regard at all for their pursuit of happiness. (One could make the argument Jefferson did this for The Hemings Family, but this would be ill-advised). In his chapter on Jefferson, Ellis points out repeatedly the multitude of character flaws and personal demons of our third president, who deemed his presidency so irrelevant a part of his life that he didn't even have it inscribed on his tombstone. Instead, the obelisk reads: Author of the Declaration of Independence, of the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom and Father of the University of Virginia.Adams is his, and my, favorite of our founding fathers - especially given how under-appreciated his legacy has been in our times (though the McCullough biography and HBO Mini-Series has helped in staging a sort of comeback for the erudite lawyer turned revolutionary orator and statesman). Adams feared our government would snowball slowly into oligarchy if we did not learn from history and educate ourselves about the fallibility of man. A deeply anxious mind, coupled with an overwhelming sense of responsibility and commitment to preserving the American founding, Adams spent almost his entire life after college and early law years dedicated to the service of his country; he was our first vice-president, second president, head of the board of war and ordnance, minister in the UK and Netherlands, and of course - a pinnacle delegate to the First and Second Continental Congress.The section on Washington, by far the most statuesque of the founders, is covered with tact, amusement and deep reflection. Here was a man who embodied leadership in all forms yet was so nervous of revealing too much about his personal life and inner-thoughts that he had his wife Martha burn their letters to one another upon his death. Washington commanded the Continental Army as best he could, though not without dire mistakes. He eventually took Adams' advice and started conducting Fabian tactics, what is also called battling in "a war of posts" were you attack your enemy and retreat as quickly as possible before they can retaliate. Washington knew, more than any other, that America had not to win the war for independence; they only had to not lose. (SIDE NOTE: this unfortunate strategy did not work out as well for the united states in Vietnam).The last sections covers Madison and his shaping and spurious calls to form our Constitution. Madison, more than any other member of the Constitutional Convention, it is widely acknowledged, is the pinnacle figure in creating what would become the law of the land and Ellis spends plentiful time arguing for his cause. He also mentions, briefly, how Madison feared a growing elite would usurp power economically in our nation without the proper checks and balances in place. (One note: Ellis brings up Pickettey's book Capitalism in the 21st century as a point of showing how bad income inequality has gotten; he even writes that the top ten hedge fund managers in the country have more wealth between them than every pre-K teacher in the country. I wish he would have talked more about the other side of the rational for income inequality, i.e. Walter Scheidel's remarkable book The Great Leveler: income inequality from the stone age to the twenty-first century.... but I digress.)This book is worth your time. It will challenge how you think about the current state of our countries experience together. By understanding the imperfections of those who helped in creating our republic, our responsibility should be to acknowledge our own imperfections and work to bridge the partisan divides that separate our country into camps red/blue and in between. Ellis is pragmatic in that he admits he is pessimistic about the future, but he does see glimmers of hope possible on the horizon. As Dr. King famously said (and I'm paraphrasing) " the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice."Let us hope to heed this progress, for all of our sakes and our children's.

This is a great book for everyone interested in understanding the historical roots of the American political debate. Joseph Ellis chose four topics - race, equality, rule of law and the role of America in the world - to confront what the founders thought with what today’s political actors stand for. Thanks to this approach, history becomes much more than just a theme of curiosity: it is also a useful tool to better understand the present.