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Our Secret Constitution: How Lincoln Redefined American Democracy
In this perspective-altering new book, George P. Fletcher asserts that the Civil War was the most significant event in American legal history, an event that not only abolished slavery and changed the laws of the land but also created a new set of principles that continues to guide our thinking
today.
Much as historians and lawmakers strive to maintain a continuity with the Constitution of 1787, Fletcher shows that the Civil War presented a rupture not only between North and South but between two visions of the United States. The first Constitution was based on the principles of peoplehood
as a voluntary association, individual freedom, and republican elitism. The government chosen by "We the People" sought, above all, to protect the rights of individuals and to limit the leadership of the nation to a select few. It was a Constitution, moreover, that accommodated the most undemocratic
institution slavery. The second Constitution, forged on the killing fields of Vicksburg and Antietam, articulated in Lincoln's visionary Gettysburg Address, and enacted in the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments, reinvented the United States according to the principles of
organic nationhood, equality of all persons, and popular democracy. Fletcher shows how these higher principles, though suppressed for decades, shape our sensibilities today in our efforts to expand the range of those protected as equal under the law, to promote equality in the workplace, to
safeguard the interests of those who are at a competitive disadvantage, to rethink the limits of free speech and of religious liberty, and to amend the Constitution in the spirit of popular democracy.
Written with passion, clarity, and sweeping historical knowledge, Our Secret Constitution will fundamentally change the way we view our past and bring new clarity to the issues we confront today.
today.
Much as historians and lawmakers strive to maintain a continuity with the Constitution of 1787, Fletcher shows that the Civil War presented a rupture not only between North and South but between two visions of the United States. The first Constitution was based on the principles of peoplehood
as a voluntary association, individual freedom, and republican elitism. The government chosen by "We the People" sought, above all, to protect the rights of individuals and to limit the leadership of the nation to a select few. It was a Constitution, moreover, that accommodated the most undemocratic
institution slavery. The second Constitution, forged on the killing fields of Vicksburg and Antietam, articulated in Lincoln's visionary Gettysburg Address, and enacted in the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments, reinvented the United States according to the principles of
organic nationhood, equality of all persons, and popular democracy. Fletcher shows how these higher principles, though suppressed for decades, shape our sensibilities today in our efforts to expand the range of those protected as equal under the law, to promote equality in the workplace, to
safeguard the interests of those who are at a competitive disadvantage, to rethink the limits of free speech and of religious liberty, and to amend the Constitution in the spirit of popular democracy.
Written with passion, clarity, and sweeping historical knowledge, Our Secret Constitution will fundamentally change the way we view our past and bring new clarity to the issues we confront today.
- GenresHistory
304 pages, Hardcover
First published May 17, 2001
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
January 28, 2017
The thesis of Fletcher’s fascinating, readable yet scholarly book is that the post civil war area changes to the constitution were more than just significant revisions. They were in fact a new constitution. Similar to how the second french republic incorporated elements of the prior regimes but was still a new order.
The primary changes were as follows
From a collective of individuals to a nationhood (greater role of the fed vs states, nationalism with religious fervor).
From Freedom to Equality (dignity)
From Elite Republicanism to Popular democracy (greater expansion of voting rights)
Fletcher’s argument that Lincoln’s Gettysburg address is essentially a preamble to this new con situation, and his line by line analysis of that perfect piece of politically oratory is worth the price of admission. Gettysburg lays forth broad principles that can be expanded on as time goes forward. From there, Fletcher analyses each of the three new pillars - nationhood, equality, popular democracy. While his take on these items generally bends toward the progressive, he acknowledges how they can and have been used
Fletcher’s second major thesis is that this new Constitution essentially had to go underground, bending to the forces that make any radical change hard. Finally, Fletcher argues there has been a gradual, if uneven resurfacing of these ideals. For example, the original civil rights act in the late 1800s after the civil war amendments was struck down as unconstitutional. It was only in the 1960s that this same law was passed again, this time being upheld.
Of course we are still having an existential argument about this new constitution. As Fletcher sees it, the new constitution shifted the position of government from the original constitution - a 3rd party that we must be protected against - to a partner who is responsible from promoting equality, democracy, and nationhood. His afterword on Bush v Gore shows just how convoluted this argument is. The most conservative justices, most protective of state’s rights and individual freedom vs equality, used an argument that the states only have their rights to manage election by grant of the federal government. The irony is that in most cases progressives would applaud such reasoning.
The primary changes were as follows
From a collective of individuals to a nationhood (greater role of the fed vs states, nationalism with religious fervor).
From Freedom to Equality (dignity)
From Elite Republicanism to Popular democracy (greater expansion of voting rights)
Fletcher’s argument that Lincoln’s Gettysburg address is essentially a preamble to this new con situation, and his line by line analysis of that perfect piece of politically oratory is worth the price of admission. Gettysburg lays forth broad principles that can be expanded on as time goes forward. From there, Fletcher analyses each of the three new pillars - nationhood, equality, popular democracy. While his take on these items generally bends toward the progressive, he acknowledges how they can and have been used
Fletcher’s second major thesis is that this new Constitution essentially had to go underground, bending to the forces that make any radical change hard. Finally, Fletcher argues there has been a gradual, if uneven resurfacing of these ideals. For example, the original civil rights act in the late 1800s after the civil war amendments was struck down as unconstitutional. It was only in the 1960s that this same law was passed again, this time being upheld.
Of course we are still having an existential argument about this new constitution. As Fletcher sees it, the new constitution shifted the position of government from the original constitution - a 3rd party that we must be protected against - to a partner who is responsible from promoting equality, democracy, and nationhood. His afterword on Bush v Gore shows just how convoluted this argument is. The most conservative justices, most protective of state’s rights and individual freedom vs equality, used an argument that the states only have their rights to manage election by grant of the federal government. The irony is that in most cases progressives would applaud such reasoning.
Displaying 1 of 1 review