It’s been a good run, Constitution, but today, Constitution Day, the New York Times says it’s over.
Exactly 230 years ago, on Sept. 17, 1787, a group of men in Philadelphia concluded a summer of sophisticated, impassioned debates about the fate of their fledgling nation. The document that emerged, our Constitution, is often thought of as part of an aristocratic counterrevolution that stands in contrast to the democratic revolution of 1776. But our Constitution has at least one radical feature: It isn’t designed for a society with economic inequality.
Someone thinks of the Constitution as an aristocratic counterrevolution? Often? Who knew, besides Vanderbilt lawprof Ganesh Sitaraman. I thought it was just a bunch of New England dry-goods merchants who hated watching their profits taxed to pay for the cost of their protection. But then, I’m no scholar.
But Sitaraman’s “radical feature” is kinda ass-backwards. The colonies were up to their eyeballs in economic inequality, which makes the Constitution all the more remarkable as it somehow managed to not only accommodate it, but provide vast opportunity to overcome it. Equal protection, yo.
There are other things the Constitution wasn’t written for, of course. The founders didn’t foresee America becoming a global superpower. They didn’t plan for the internet or nuclear weapons. And they certainly couldn’t have imagined a former reality television star president. Commentators wring their hands over all of these transformations — though these days, they tend to focus on whether this country’s founding document can survive the current president.
If this strikes you as a non-sequitur, you’re not alone. The Constitution provides an overarching design for governance. The nuts and bolts are for Congress to figure out. Much as I hesitate to speculate on what Ben Franklin foresaw in the future, what difference does it make if the founders failed to anticipate that America would be a global superpower? Would we have a king instead of a president?
But there is a different, and far more stubborn, risk that our country faces — and which, arguably, led to the TV star turned president in the first place. Our Constitution was not built for a country with so much wealth concentrated at the very top nor for the threats that invariably accompany it: oligarchs and populist demagogues.
So on Constitution Day, the New York Times has chosen to take its daily swipe at Trump, because the Constitution has failed us by allowing this “TV star turned president” to be elected? An endearing homage, kids.
What is surprising about the design of our Constitution is that it isn’t a class warfare constitution. Our Constitution doesn’t mandate that only the wealthy can become senators, and we don’t have a tribune of the plebs. Our founding charter doesn’t have structural checks and balances between economic classes: not between rich and poor, and certainly not between corporate interests and ordinary workers. This was a radical change in the history of constitutional government.
This sounds like a good thing. This sounds like the kind of thing that undermines the premise of the op-ed, that the Constitution is no longer viable because we have “oligarchs and populist demagogues.” How does Sitaraman bring it back to our expired Constitution?
At the time, many Americans believed the new nation would not be afflicted by the problems that accompanied economic inequality because there simply wasn’t much inequality within the political community of white men. Today we tend to emphasize how undemocratic the founding era was when judged by our values — its exclusion of women, enslavement of African-Americans, violence against Native Americans. But in doing so, we risk missing something important: Many in the founding generation believed America was exceptional because of the extraordinary degree of economic equality within the political community as they defined it.
Cite? How he claims to know what “many Americans believed” is a bit of a stretch. Indeed, maybe they weren’t obsessed with income inequality at all, and didn’t lose a moment’s sleep thinking about it. And in the process, he’s just contradicted his earlier, baseless, claim that the Constitution wasn’t designed for economic inequality.
For all its resilience and longevity, our Constitution doesn’t have structural checks built into it to prevent oligarchy or populist demagogues. It was written on the assumption that America would remain relatively equal economically.
On the contrary, the Constitution does indeed have structural checks built into it. It’s called elections. It’s called checks and balances. It’s called amendments. It’s got checks upon checks. What the Constitution does not have is a guarantee that the person you totally hate can’t be elected president. What it does not have is a guarantee that every citizen will live a healthy, wealthy and happy life.
Today is Constitution Day, and a glorious day it is. Whether our founding fathers were as brilliant as we believe, or just got lucky, may never be known, but what they created is quite extraordinary in that it provides a scheme of governance that has survived, and can survive whatever the future drops on our unworthy heads. If we were to try to do this again, there is little doubt that we would create a “Utopia” so authoritarian that it might not make it past midnight.
An anecdote, attributed to Franklin, goes like this:
A lady asked Dr. Franklin, “Well Doctor what have we got a republic or a monarchy.”
“A republic,” replied the Doctor. “If you can keep it.”
There will be another presidential election in 2020, and the people will express their will. The reason they can do so, and a bloodless coup may follow, is because we have the Constitution. If it was up to the New York Times and Ganesh Sitaraman, we would not, as they would “save our republic” by doing . . . something. I, on the other hand, prefer to keep it.
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SHG,
Ganesh Sitaraman, the author of the op-ed to which you refer, is Professor of Law at Vanderbilt Law School and a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress. He has been a longtime advisor to Senator Elizabeth Warren, serving as her policy director and senior counsel.
The professor, like Senators Warren and Sanders, uses the words “economic equality” to hide an authoritarian impulse. He uses the term to mean “equality of economic outcomes.” I would assert that the Constitution was premised on the principle of “equality of economic opportunity.” Or, as you put it, the Constitution was drafted to “provide vast opportunity to overcome” social and political barriers to economic success.
Under our Constitution, poor people are afforded the structural opportunity to become rich by the equal protection of the law. It is true that our Constitution does not dictate that poor people are entitled to become rich because they are poor. In my view, that is the brilliant balance of the Constitution.
That Professor Sitaraman and Senators Warren and Sanders wish it were otherwise and work to make it so is a not very veiled call to arms for class warfare. Indeed, I am surprised the op-ed lacked a reference to the guillotine and lyrics from Les Misérables.
All the best.
RGK (aka Inspector Javert)
I’m reluctant to taint Sitaraman with his association to a progressive think tank or the good senators, as I would expect his words to live or die on their own. That said, the New York Times chose to publish his op-ed to celebrate Constitution Day. I plan to enjoy a margarita in celebration later today, with a side of guac. Whats a drink without a nosh?
Scott,
I do believe that a white Jewish New Yorker celebrating with Mexican food is cultural appropriation.
It’s not like I make my guac with peas.
How about apples? Do you add apples?
Because apparently, that’s a thing now.
Bah! Humbug!
Do not bring this abomination to Texas as you will surely be run out of town on a rail. (Or have a successful “fusion” restaurant, if you open it in Austin).
As for this: “Whether our founding fathers were as brilliant as we believe, or just got lucky, may never be known. . .,” my ancestors (the Vikings) would purportedly rather have a lucky captain than a good one. I’m perfectly happy if the Founders were just lucky.
Lee
“Cultural appropriation” or “culturally appropriate”?
This is a perfect example of why I read this blog. There can be a healthy discussion on intents of 17-Sep that stemmed from an event on 4-Jul, then effortlessly include a gastronomic influence from 5-May.
Dates are just a social construct.
And Cinco de Mayo is an American beer holiday! (Not really celebrated in Mexico, like St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland).
America – land of the merchandiser! 🙂
What kind of idiocy (or dishonesty, but I prefer not to attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity) believes that “economic inequality” is uniquely a modern phenomenon? It’s been present since before there was anything we’d recognize as an economy–there have always been, and will always be, the haves and the have-nots. Christ himself said, “the poor you will always have with you” (Matthew 26:11*). To the extent that it’s a problem at all (which is questionable), it’s a problem that’s as old as humanity.
* Not a Christian? Fine–at a minimum, it shows that the sentiment was present 2000 years ago.
Is there a special name for the kind of idiocy that is deemed appropriate for publication in the New York Times?
Knowledge from 2000 years ago that the NYT refuses to understand or acknowledge shall henceforth be known as “Timesless.”
There might have been communal societies that pre-existed any of this stratification and hierarchy. It would be hard to have something your fellow doesn’t when you don’t have a concept of private ownership. To the extent you mean that people aren’t the same and won’t ever be, yep. I wish I could be something other than a disappointment.
There may always be haves and have nots, but nothing says what the haves should have that the have nots should not.
Well, that’s kind of an organic thing in a capitalist society. Then again, some would place limits on it. Stalin, for example.
I meant intangibles, like the ones Stalin was fond of using. Power and control and influence. Corruption is nauseating no matter where its found or to what ideology it pays lip service.
Cancer is organic too.
So I learned from Malthus. See how it all equals out in the end? Don’t be jealous of people for being smarter, harder-working and wealthier than you. They will eventually die, just like you. Except with more stuff and much happier. (It’s not like your mother didn’t warn you to do your homework.)
There’s no jealousy, just shame and guilt. What we have comes at someone else’s cost. My lot is a great one regardless of all my relative shortcomings. That we all die only makes the suffering some face that others don’t that much more pointless and unfair.
Life is unfair, but the point is to change the world, not just interpret it.
Some of life is a zero sum game. Not all, but some. So yes, it’s unfair. If you don’t like reality, try the alternative.
Live free or die, Pa.
That’s the spirit!
A guy that certainly voted for a former President’s wife, who spent 8 years in the White House, commands quarter-million-dollar speaking fees at Wall Street, hasn’t left Washington in 25 years, and seemed to be running for President because it was her “turn,” is going to bitch about oligarchy?
That’s hilarious.
When you put it that way, it sounds almost disingenuous.
Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Thomas Paine, John Adams, George Washington. The 55 delegates at the Constitutional Convention. “just a bunch of New England dry-goods merchants” Who knew?
Any problems with the constitution are not with its principles, but with implementation and enforcement, much of which the founders recognized. They also recognized that the solution to those problems required concentration of power, which would have defeated the whole purpose we revolted over.
The constitution is a brilliant attempt to overcome the foibles of man and government. It’s not perfect, but no one’s come up with a better plan yet.
Just so you know, your comment said absolutely nothing.
More of a side note, I keep seeing these “reality star turned president” type comments, and keep hearing that bit from Back to the Future. The one where Doc Brown asks who the president is, Marty tells him “Ronald Regan”, and Doc replies incredulously “The actor?!?”
Don’t hear what I’m not saying – Trump is no Regan.
I’m hesitant to use a prior profession as the sole discrediting factor for a potential/current holder of a given office. Schwarzenegger seemed to do well enough for a body builder action movie star turned governor…
One finds their derisive description where one can. That Trump was on a TV show is irrelevant, but it serves as a derogatory characterization when needed.
wat. The colonies didn’t have income inequality? Nevermind the slaves, what were those indentured servants, then? Did a Virginia plantation owner have the exact same quality of life as a New York City dockworker?
The men who had the time and education to argue over what sort of rules would govern us going forward had much more in common with the Soroses and Koches of our modern world than whoever Sitaraman seems to think is getting the shaft. Hell, populist demagogues… Has he ever even read the crazy stuff Jefferson and Hamilton used to say about each other?