Peter Levine
- students as part of the accountability puzzle September 3, 2010
- the value-added debate in education policy September 1, 2010
- Jonathan Lethem, A Fortress of Solitude September 1, 2010
- what happened to the new Obama voters? August 31, 2010
CAT | On Democracy
People, organizations and government are beginning to realize and leverage the immense power of the crowd through contests and challenges, especially using Web 2.0 technology, and offering prizes for success. The “crowd” simply refers to a large group of people or a community, usually the general public. Today, the Case Foundation is hosting a public-private strategy session with the White House about “driving innovation and civic dialogue through the use of prizes, challenges and open grantmaking.” It’s all about reaching new people and ideas through innovative means. The Foundation has successfully employed this model before, such as through the Make It Your Own Awards.
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The Problem of the Living Constitution
233 Comments | Posted by Nick Troiano in On Democracy
With the announcement of Justice Stevens’ retirement, the political world is abuzz about who should fill his seat. Although the balance of the court is not likely to change, a partisan battle will surely still ensue. The nominee to the high court will face many questions about constitutional interpretation, but the ultimate decision will probably be determined by Senators primarily based on the nominee’s likelihood to support or oppose particular issues that may come before the court (after all, they are accountable to we the people who have largely arrived at the mistaken belief that the justices should do as we want). We are polarized on these issues; hence, the recent partisan outcomes of Justice Sotomayor’s 68-32 and Justice Alito’s 58-42 confirmations.
It wasn’t always like that. Justices Stevens, O’Connor, Scalia and Kennedy did not have a single vote against their confirmations. That the opposite is happening is not just a reflection of growing partisanship in Washington, nor the attributes of the nominees themselves – but of the very real and growing problem of the idea of a “living Constitution.” If we were to treat the Constitution as it should be treated – a legal text whose meaning must be discerned within the context of what its words meant when they were adopted by the people, in order to apply it to various cases – then we would be looking for legal scholars who can do this job well and reasonably.
“If on the other hand,” Justice Scalia once said, “we’re picking people to draw out of their own conscience and experience a new constitution with all sorts of new values to govern our society, then we should not look principally for good lawyers. We should look principally for people who agree with us, the majority, as to whether there ought to be this right, that right and the other right.”
Thomas Friedman wrote in the New York Times last week that it is time for a Tea Party of the radical center – and by “radical’ he means “a radical departure from politics as usual.” Quoting a Sanford Univeristy professor, Friedman writes that it’s also time to fix our broken political system because, “If you don’t get governance right, it is very hard to get anything else right that government needs to deal with. We have to rethink in some basic ways how our political institutions work, because they are increasingly incapable of delivering effective solutions any longer.”
Congress in a Wordle: the most common adjectives used by respondants to describe Congress in a recent Pew survey.
As I wrote last week, the Coffee Party is a growing movement that might just answer that call. Over the weekend, I had an opportunity to attend my first Coffee Party as Busboys and Poets in Washington, DC. The event was televised on C-SPAN – you can watch the program online. Linda Killian from the Woodrow Wilson Center pointed out that 93% of Americans believe there is too much bickering in Washington and, according to a recent Pew survey, “dysfunction” was the number one term used to describe Congress. Though the crowd was overrepresented by the political left, it was clear the Coffee Party itself is not ideological. It is about finding solutions to make our government work better and reengaging citizens in the democratic process. So what kind of reforms are we talking about?
Looking ahead, what do you think will be the most important problem facing our nation 25 years from now? That question was posed to about thousand Americans in a Gallup poll released earlier this month, and for the first time in the poll’s history, concerns about the federal budget deficit topped the list. Some 14% ranked it number one, followed by the economy (11%) and the environment (11%). Usually, energy and economic issues have been most frequently mentioned, with Social Security making a debut around the time of the proposed reforms in 2005 and 2006. When asked what the most pressing problem facing the country today is, unemployment takes the cake followed by the economy and health care. Still, teh federal deficit was named the most important problem for 8% of respondents, and interestingly, “dissatisfaction with government” garnered 10%. The new National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform would do well to make note of this public sentiment, as would Members of Congress when the Commission produces its findings later this year.
Over the past year, we have seen our country grow even more polarized, particularly over the issue of health care. The Tea party movement on the right, most notably, has been on the ascendancy (check this YouTube clip I came across today). It seems the public square has been crowded by the loud, angry voices of those who have no regard for facts and no interest in engaging constructively – of course, they are aided by “news” organizations that magnify their influence and churn out what amounts to partisan propaganda. The result has been an awful public debate over really important matters that affect every American.
I have been very frustrated by this. Some friends have too. As it turns out, so have hundreds of thousands of other Americans – and they are joining forces in the Coffee Party Movement. What’s brewing in this new effort? Here’s the group’s statement:
“The Coffee Party Movement gives voice to Americans who want to see cooperation in government. We recognize that the federal government is not the enemy of the people, but the expression of our collective will, and that we must participate in the democratic process in order to address the challenges that we face as Americans. As voters and grassroots volunteers, we will support leaders who work toward positive solutions, and hold accountable those who obstruct them.”
