In the fourth week of Political Studies, fellows will take up one of the most powerful ideas in the American tradition—the promise of equality at the heart of the Declaration of Independence.

The first section, led by political scientist Diana Schaub, explores Abraham Lincoln’s statesmanship in light of his literary and moral vision. Through close readings of his speeches, letters, and proclamations, fellows will trace Lincoln’s political career and reflect on the nature of democratic debate—how passion and reason together can shape public life. Special attention will be given to Lincoln’s engagement with the Founding and his effort to preserve its principles amid the moral crisis of slavery.

The second section, led by constitutional historian Akhil Reed Amar and legal scholar Adam J. White, turns to the dramatic constitutional transformations that followed the Civil War. Over eight decades, four amendments abolished slavery, established birthright citizenship, and extended suffrage regardless of race or gender. Together, these debates and reforms illuminate the long struggle to realize America’s founding promise of equality.

Image: An Incident in Contemporary American Life, Mural by Mitchell Jamieson, 1940-1943

Prof. Amar on We the People

This course is part of our residential Political Studies Program. Fellows participate in morning seminars and meet prominent men and women in public life over afternoon and evening sessions. Up to 32 fellows will be selected.

Faculty

Akhil Reed Amar

Akhil Reed Amar is Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science at Yale University, where he teaches constitutional law in both Yale College and Yale Law School. He is Yale’s only currently active professor to have won the University’s unofficial triple crown — the Sterling Chair for scholarship, the DeVane Medal for teaching, and the Lamar Award for alumni service. He hosts a weekly podcast, Amarica’s Constitution.

Adam J. White

Adam J. White is the Laurence H. Silberman Chair in Constitutional Governance and senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he focuses on the Supreme Court and the administrative state. Concurrently, he codirects the Antonin Scalia Law School’s C. Boyden Gray Center for the Study of the Administrative State.

Adam J. White

Adam J. White is the Laurence H. Silberman Chair in Constitutional Governance and senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he focuses on the Supreme Court and the administrative state. Concurrently, he codirects the Antonin Scalia Law School’s C. Boyden Gray Center for the Study of the Administrative State.

Mr. White practiced constitutional and administrative law, particularly in the regulation of energy and financial markets. He started his legal career as a law clerk for Judge David B. Sentelle at the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.

Mr. White has testified often before Congress, including before the Senate’s Committees on the Judiciary; Commerce, Science, and Transportation; and Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs and before the House’s Judiciary and Financial Services Committees. In 2018, the Senate Committee on the Judiciary called him to testify in Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings to advise senators on Kavanaugh’s approach to administrative law.

In 2021, he served on the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States, where he criticized “Court packing” and other efforts to restructure the Supreme Court. In 2017, he was appointed to serve on the Administrative Conference of the United States. He also serves on the leadership council for the American Bar Association’s Administrative Law and Regulatory Practice Section, which he will chair in 2023–24. Before joining AEI, he was a research fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution and an adjunct fellow at the Manhattan Institute.

Mr. White has a JD from Harvard Law School and a bachelor of business administration from the College of Business at the University of Iowa.

Diana Schaub

Diana Schaub is a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where her work is focused on American political thought and history, particularly Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, African American political thought, Montesquieu, and the relevance of core American ideals to contemporary challenges and debates. Concurrently, she is Professor Emerita of Political Science at Loyola University Maryland, where she taught for almost three decades.

Preview the Syllabus by Week/Session

Readings:

  • To the People of Sangamo County, March 9, 1832, I, pp. 1–5
  • Address to the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois, January 27, 1838, Vol. I, pp. 28–36
  • Fragment on the Struggle Against Slavery, I, pp. 437–438
  • Selection from William Lloyd Garrison
  • Protest in the Illinois Legislature on Slavery, March 3, 1837, I, p. 18

Discussion Questions:

  1. What is your impression of the 23-year-old Lincoln? What is the nature of his “peculiar ambition”?
  2. Why is education “the most important subject which we as a people can be engaged in”? What is his attitude toward change in laws? Is he a conservative or a progressive?
  3. According to Lincoln, who has the harder task—the revolutionary generation or the current generation?
  4. What are the direct and indirect consequences of mob rule, and how are they related to “the perpetuation of our political institutions”? Does Lincoln’s solution—a political religion of reverence for the laws—allow for the possibility of civil disobedience, or is disobedience always uncivil?
  5. What is the link between mob law and the threat posed by those who belong to “the family of the lion, or the tribe of the eagle”? According to Lincoln, what is needed to recognize and repel the aspiring tyrant?
  6. In the first half of the Lyceum Address, Lincoln recommends a political religion of reverence for the Constitution and laws as the solution to the danger of mob rule; in the conclusion of the address, he recommends sober reason as the only resource for our future. Are these two recommendations (of reverence and reason) compatible with one another?

Readings:

  • Address to the Washington Temperance Society of Springfield, Illinois, February 22, 1842, Vol. I, pp. 81–90
  • Fragment on Slavery, 1854, I, p. 303
  • Speech on the Kansas-Nebraska Act at Peoria, Illinois, October 16, 1854, I, pp. 307–348

Discussion Questions:

  1. What sort of reformers does Lincoln praise and what sort does he criticize? What does this speech to the Temperance Society reveal about Lincoln’s understanding of human nature and rhetoric?
  2. If you were to apply what Lincoln says about the temperance movement to the abolition movement, what lessons would you draw? Does Lincoln’s “Protest” exemplify a different anti-slavery strategy?
  3. What is Lincoln’s view of slavery? Is he a bigot? In thinking about these questions, pay close attention to two passages (p. 316 and p. 346) in which Lincoln speaks of the role played by universal feelings in political life.

Readings:

  • Speech on the Kansas-Nebraska Act at Peoria, Illinois, October 16, 1854, I, pp. 307–348
  • Letter to Joshua F. Speed, August 24, 1855, Vol. I, 360–363

Discussion Questions:

  1. What does the Peoria Address reveal about the relation between public opinion and statesmanship?
  2. What are the “lullaby” arguments offered in behalf of the Kansas-Nebraska Act and how does Lincoln dispense with them?
  3. What about “the one great argument” (Stephen Douglas’s doctrine of popular sovereignty)? What are the elements of Lincoln’s critique of Douglas?

Readings:

  • Speech on the Dred Scott Decision at Springfield, Illinois, June 26, 1857, Vol. I, pp. 390–403
  • “House Divided” Speech at Springfield, Illinois, June 16, 1858, Vol. I, pp. 426–434
  • Address at Cooper Institute, New York City, February 27, 1860, Vol. II, pp. 111–130

Discussion Questions:

  1. Given what Lincoln said about reverence for the Constitution and the law, is he contradicting his own principles in criticizing the Dred Scott decision? What is his view of judicial precedent?
  2. What is Lincoln’s interpretation of the Declaration of Independence? How does it differ from the Taney/Douglas reading of the document?
  3. Why is there so much talk of racial amalgamation in this speech? How does Lincoln fend off the accusation that his view of equality will lead to “social equality” (i.e., race mixing and intermarriage)?
  4. In the Cooper Institute Address, how does Lincoln establish that the Framers agreed with the Republican rather than the Democratic view of the powers of the federal government respecting slavery in the territories?
  5. What is Lincoln’s message to the Southerners? Are the Republicans a sectional party? Are they conservative, as Lincoln claims?
  6. What is Lincoln’s message to the Republicans?

Readings:

  • Farewell Address at Springfield, Illinois, February 11, 1861, Vol. II, p. 199
  • First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861, Vol. II, pp. 215–224
  • Address at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, November 19, 1863, Vol. II, p. 536
  • Letter to James C. Conkling, August 26, 1863, Vol. II, pp. 495–497
  • Second Inaugural Address, March 4, 1865, Vol. II, pp. 686–687

Discussion Questions:

  1. What is meant by the “new birth of freedom”? Does it refer to the emancipated slaves? If so, what is Lincoln’s vision of their place within the polity?
  2. How does the new birth of freedom relate to the argument of the Lyceum Address about the requirements for the perpetuation of our republic? (You might think too about the ballots and bullets passage of the July 4, 1861 Special Message to Congress.)
  3. What interpretation of the Civil War does Lincoln present and why?
  4. What is Lincoln’s theology? What is the role of charity in political life?

Readings:

  • Ahkil Reed Amar, Born Equal, Introduction; Chs. 1–3 (pp. 1–99)
  • Supplemental Readings:
    • Declaration of Independence (1776)
    • Gettysburg Address (1863)
    • S. Constitution (1787)
    • Declaration of Sentiments (1848)

 

Discussion Questions:

  1. How did the posthumous and delayed publication of Madison’s Notes on the Debates of the Federal Convention in 1840 influence the debate over slavery at the time? Based on Madison’s Notes, to what extent were Lincoln and Frederick Douglass accurate in depicting the Constitution as a “glorious liberty” document versus Wendell Phillips, who viewed it as a pro-slavery document?
  2. One of the debates over Article I, Sec. 2’s three-fifths clause is whether it should be viewed as a two-fifths slavery penalty or a three-fifths slavery bonus (p. 51)? What do you think?
  3. The similarities between the 1848 Declaration of Sentiments and the Declaration of Independence are striking. Like the Declaration of Independence, the Declaration of Sentiments lists 18 grievances. The very first grievance of the Declaration of Sentiments – the right to vote – depends on many other grievances being redressed, especially the last four cited on p. 88. How are those last four grievances (reforming public sentiment, including religious beliefs) different from the ones in the Declaration of Independence?

Readings:

  • Ahkil Reed Amar, Born Equal, Chs. 4–7 (pp. 101–230)

 

Discussion Questions:

  1. How did the efforts of John Quincy Adams (“Old Man Eloquent”) to end the gag rule in Congress contribute to the extinction of slavery over the long term? How did the gag rule backfire on the South? What larger lessons might be derived from the practice of silencing the views of the opposition to advance one’s cause?
  2. Was JQA correct in asserting that George Washington was an abolitionist? Did being a founder’s son give JQA more authority on questions regarding the founders’ intent, and how do we square JQA’s views with those of another founder’s son and fellow Congressman, Henry Laurens Pinckney (p. 136)?
  3. How did JQA serve as a link between the founders and Abraham Lincoln? What were the similarities between JQA and Lincoln in terms of their heroic deaths? Study the Copley painting of Pitt’s death (p. 110) with Currier’s depiction of JQA’s death (p. 115). Why have JQA’s feats (like those of his father) faded in the American public’s historical memory over time?
  4. How could it be that all antebellum parties “wrapped themselves in the mantle of ‘the Constitution’ and ‘the Declaration,’ and yet “offered voters strikingly different interpretations and claims about what ‘the Constitution’ really meant” (p. 181)? Were America’s founding documents flawed in lending themselves to such radically different interpretations?

Readings:

  • Ahkil Reed Amar, Born Equal, Chs. 8–11 (pp. 230–375)
  • Supplemental Readings:
    • Abraham Lincoln, Excerpt from the Peoria Address (1854)
    • Abraham Lincoln, Excerpt from Cooper Union Address (1860)
    • Abraham Lincoln, First Inaugural (1861)

Discussion Questions:

  1. With the Compromise of 1850 and admission of California as a free state, the South “won” a victory in terms of the enhanced Fugitive Slave Act but did not foresee the full consequences of that legislative victory. How did the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act backfire for the South in terms of the northern response, especially New England’s?
  2. Harriet Beecher Stowe referred to slavery as a “patriarchal institution” (p. 257). How did Stowe’s perspective as a woman and a mother strengthen her argument against slavery in Uncle Tom’s Cabin and make her work resonate like no other abolitionist tract with the American public? How did the writing of Uncle Tom’s Cabin help the early women’s cause as well?
  3. Discuss Abraham Lincoln’s critique of the “indifference” of popular sovereignty in his Peoria Address. Is Stephen Douglas completely wrong to defend the democratic process in the Kansas territory and let its settlers vote slavery up or down? Why or why not? Consider that the voters in Kansas, after years of struggle and violence, voted in favor of being a free state.
  4. Does Abraham Lincoln concede too much ground to the South in his Peoria Address? How does Lincoln reconcile his belief in the Declaration’s principles of natural right applying to all people, including the enslaved, with his pledge to support the Fugitive Slave Law as well as his position (and that of the1860 Republican Party’s platform) that Congress cannot interfere with slavery in the states where it already exists (pp. 297–306)?

Readings:

  • Ahkil Reed Amar, Born Equal, Chs. 12–14 (pp. 376–497)
  • Supplemental Readings:
    • Abraham Lincoln, Emancipation Proclamation (1863)
    • Abraham Lincoln, Second Inaugural (1865)

Discussion Questions:

  1. How did the language of the Declaration lead many southerners to embrace a constitutional right of states to forcibly resist federal authority over time, from the Kentucky Resolutions (1799) to interposition (1828) to nullification (1832) and finally secession (1860)? How did Lincoln counter the claims of the secessionists and offer a different basis of union in his First Inaugural Address? Why do “some argue even today…that secession was justified on revolutionary principles” (p. 389)?
  2. Was Lincoln’s task in February of 1861 “greater than that which rested upon Washington” (p. 407)?
  3. Discuss how Lincoln “calibrated not just the tone but also the timing” of the Emancipation Proclamation (p. 443). How did Lincoln as commander-in-chief shepherd the Emancipation Proclamation through? What preliminary steps did he take (including the letter to Horace Greeley) to ready the public for it?
  4. Consider reactions to President Lincoln’s death: the drawings and eulogy of Harper’s Weekly (pp. 486–91) and Frederick Douglass’s assessment of Lincoln’s statesmanship (pp. 493–95). As a formerly enslaved person, do Douglass’s insights on Lincoln carry special weight?

Readings:

  • Ahkil Reed Amar, Born Equal, Chs. 15–17; Postscript (pp. 501–625)
  • Supplemental Readings:
    • Reconstruction Amendments (1865–70)
    • 19th Amendment (1920)

 

Discussion Questions:

  1. “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” Discuss the impact that Section 1 of the 14th Amendment had on the definition of American citizenship, the precedent of Dred Scott, and the right of the federal government to check the power of individual states (pp. 517–30).
  2. Women’s groups, who had been former allies of the abolitionist movement, were deeply disappointed to be left out of the 14th and 15th Amendments, and some, like Stanton, viewed the ratification of these amendments as major setbacks to achieving women’s equality (especially with the introduction for the first time of the word “male” into the Constitution in the 14th Amendment). Was Stanton’s reaction justified? What do you think of the distinctions Douglass made between the abolitionist and women’s right movements (pp. 591–600)?
  3. Seneca Falls happened 72 years after the Declaration of Independence was signed, and the 19th Amendment was finally ratified 72 years after the Declaration of Sentiments (and 50 years after newly freedmen got the vote). Why did the “deep forces” against women’s vote prevail for so long (pp. 591–95)? What mistakes did Stanton and others make in their rhetoric at times to set back their own success (p. 598)?

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Biography Image

Adam J. White

Adam J. White is the Laurence H. Silberman Chair in Constitutional Governance and senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he focuses on the Supreme Court and the administrative state. Concurrently, he codirects the Antonin Scalia Law School’s C. Boyden Gray Center for the Study of the Administrative State.

Meir Y. Soloveichik

Rabbi Dr. Meir Y. Soloveichik is one of the world’s preeminent Jewish thinkers and educators, and he’s one of America’s most influential religious leaders. He is the senior rabbi of Congregation Shearith Israel in Manhattan, the oldest Jewish congregation in the United States. He is also director of the Zahava and Moshael Straus Center for Torah and Western Thought at Yeshiva University. Rabbi Soloveichik has lectured internationally to Jewish and non-Jewish audiences on topics relating to faith in America, the Hebraic roots of the American founding, Jewish theology, bioethics, wartime ethics, Jewish-Christian relations, and more.