JUDGING PAROCHIAL FEDERALISM, VII

 

An advocate of parochial federalism continues his/her presentation[1] …

Eugene Meehan provides a list of concerns that guides a researcher in choosing a theoretical construct[2] by suggesting questions he/she can ask of a perspective construct.  This blog has identified this list and has used the elements of it to critically review parochial federalism not to guide research, but to guide the development of a civics curriculum.  That is, such a construct suggests the direction – what questions and themes it should pursue – that a curriculum should utilize in classroom instruction.

          To remind the reader, the list is comprehension, power, precision, reliability, isomorphism, compatibility, predictability, and control.  This blogger has added two more elements that more directly relate to the concerns of educators: abstraction level, and motivation.  Following the order of this listing as presented here, the blog has shared this presentation’s application of the first five elements (from comprehension to isomorphism) in its presentation of what an advocate of parochial federalism might judge this construct to be.

          That is, each element suggests a conclusion concerning the construct and this blog has reported how it sees parochial federalism measuring up to the ideals that this listing identifies.  The sixth conclusion is that parochial federalism is conducive to other explanatory theories/models of American government because it absorbs them all.

          Quite a claim to make, but here is how this assertion is offered.  All other theories or models are intermediary explanations that attempt to analyze some aspect of federalist theory as it pertains to the US.  Such constructs or theories or approaches are mid-range.  For example, systems theory (which will be further addressed as this blog presents the argument for natural rights) looks at complex interdependent attributes of some social/political arrangement and studies their interaction and control mechanisms.[3]  

While this is quite inclusive of governance and politics, it still does not address all the concerns a political science discipline sets out to address.  There is nothing in systems theory that refutes parochial federalism; they are parallel views – their distinction is in terms of normative concerns.  And here, one needs to consider why political study is conducted. 

According to Daniel Elazar, the purposes of political study are to:

 

·      pursue the quality of justice as an integral part of government’s role in establishing and maintaining order,

·      discover generalizable factors that correlate with various political acts within the polity under study, and

·      discover, communicate, and promote those policies that create and sustain a functional civic environment – through a civil society and a civil community.[4]

 

As utilized, systems theory ignores the first and third and focuses on discovering generalizable insights (the second aim). 

Why?  The utilization of systems theory was meant to reflect its advocates’ commitment to turn political science into being more “scientific” and avoiding normative concerns, which the first and third aims above are.  But to the extent the two constructs coincide in their attempts to reveal the reality of politics, systems theory helps one see why parochial federalism works in day-to-day politics from the perspective of this other systems model.

Another example is to compare parochial federalism to chaos theory.  By trying to explain the underlying order from what appears to be disorder,[5] chaos theory is a mid-range theory.  Specifically, chaos delves into the diverse forces of ethnic politics and centers on the challenges they pose the polity.  As such, it sheds light on the federalist processes which bring pluralist elements into a cohesive whole. 

Both chaos theory and systems theory are parallel in some focused factors to parochial federalist construct.  Parochial federalism is the all-encompassing theory for explaining and prescribing the operation and structure of an extended republic, i.e., one that attempts to bring together heterogeneous populations within organized cultural structures.  In America, that would be the Anglo-based foundation of its polity.

Moving on, the seventh and eighth conclusions from the above evidence (over the last several postings) are closely linked.  That is, the parochial federalist construct has both predictive and controlling power.  Given the explicit values prescribed by the construct, implementation of its principles and organizing tenets led and continues to lead to a healthy and viable republic.  As a matter of fact, any signs to the contrary can be attributed to the fact that America, since World War II, has no longer held this construct as dominant within its political culture.

While definitional issues had to be developed through the course of this nation’s history, as those mentioned earlier in this blog dealing with inclusions of groups such as African Americans, the basic logic and values were being worked out and truer federalist arrangements were manifesting themselves in a civil society.

The movement away from federalist/republican principles, as predicted by many founding fathers and a whole tradition of political philosophers – starting with Aristotle – has led to the level of incivility and lower levels of civic capital the nation is experiencing today.  The construct makes it clear that the way to recapture what one can describe as a fuller civil society is to reapply the same parochial federalist principles that launched this nation back in the late 1700s.  As such, the construct has demonstrated its predictability and control, the last two Meehan concerns.

And that leaves the two added concerns this blogger attaches to Meehan’s list:  abstraction level and motivation.  This blogger’s published book, Toward a Federated Nation, delves extensively into these elements.  Good marketing would merely state here:  go get a copy and not only be informed as to how federalism is of an appropriate abstract level and instrumental in being motivational, but also instructs the reader as to how it does these two desirable aims.

Albeit using another version of federalism (liberated federalism), the book not only addresses these two elements, but also gives examples of lesson ideas.  These ideas not only demonstrate how understandable (workable abstraction levels) the use of federalism can be, but also how motivating it can be.  That is the case since the construct encourages instruction to focus on local political-social subjects and, therefore, more apt to be relevant to the concerns of students and their parents. 

The book highlights the opioid crisis, tort law, and loss of jobs to low-wage nations such as China and Vietnam.  Each of these refers to current conditions that challenge the federated status of the nation by undermining equality within the American population.  For example, the opioid crisis has been the source of rendering to many Americans tragic personal fates in which their dignity and ability to engage in the American political experiment have become inoperative.

The next posting will boast of the methodology upon which parochial federalism relies.  By way of foreshadowing, this construct does not rely on reductionist methods, usually prevalent in political science today.  Instead, in a more conducive manner to how ordinary people talk politics, it relies on historical analysis.

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[1] This presentation begins with the posting, “A Parochial Subject Matter” (March 11, 2022).  The reader is reminded that the claims made in this posting do not necessarily reflect the beliefs or knowledge of this blogger.  Instead, the posting is a representation of what an advocate of parochial federalism might present.  This is done to present a dialectic position of that construct.

[2] Theoretical constructs provide guidance to researchers in that by representing descriptions or explanations, they suggest research questions and hypothesized resolutions to those questions.  By doing so, they identify specific research inquiries.

[3] David Easton, The Political System (New York, NY:  Alfred A. Knopf, 1953) AND David Easton, A System Analysis of Political Life (New York, NY:  John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 1965).

[4] Daniel J. Elazar, Exploring Federalism (Tuscaloosa, AL:  The University of Alabama Press, 1987).

[5] Daniel P. Moynihan, Pandaemonium:  Ethnicity in International Politics (New York, NY:  Oxford University Press, 1993).

JUDGING PAROCHIAL FEDERALISM, VI

 

An advocate of parochial federalism continues his/her presentation[1] …

This blog, at present, is attempting to demonstrate how isomorphic parochial federalism is – i.e., how much of a one-to-one match it is to what it describes and explains.  That would be governance and politics and this blog is relying on the federalist thinking that the founding fathers utilized in getting this nation started.  Basically, the recent postings have focused on a set of the founding documents such as the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut and the Declaration of Independence.

          This posting begins by reviewing the Articles of Confederation and the important role it played in the eventual constitution upon which the nation has relied since the late 1780s.  Of course, the Articles was the first attempt at a national constitution, and it was organized in the familiar compact style. 

It established a national governmental arrangement in which the created national government did not get direct authority from or over the citizenry, only from and over the states, despite the fact that it lacked the coercive power to enforce the states to obey the policies it enacted.  This lack of power pertained to the most fundamental governmental activities such as collecting taxes or enlisting soldiers during a time of war.[2]

As is commonly known, these deficiencies are the motivators for writing a new constitution in 1787.  What is seldom pointed out, though, are the innovations and provisions contained in the Articles that were incorporated in the US Constitution.

 

That the Articles were wholly replaced by the Constitution of 1787 is not exactly the case.  It would be more accurate to say that the 1787 document, although providing for a fundamentally different kind of government, was generally constructed around an amended Articles of Confederation.  Depending upon how one counts words and provisions, from one-half to two-thirds of what appears in the Articles was retained in the Federalist Constitution of 1787.[3]

 

Donald Lutz points out that these provisions which were later adopted include:

 

·      “full faith and credit,” “privileges and immunities,” and the return of interstate fugitives provisions of Article IV

·      provision for admitting new states

·      republican guarantee

·      specific grant of power (though the powers are obviously different)

·      list of prohibitions on national powers is similar in both documents

·      list of prohibitions on state governments is similar in both documents, and

·      provision that “… the free inhabitants of each of these states … shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of free citizens in the several states” (a fundamentally federalist provision in that it creates dual citizenship in state and national levels and helps define the structure of citizenship in the subsequent national constitution of 1787).

 

The Articles, Lutz writes, was the vessel which precluded the shape that the eventual national government arrangement would take under the new constitution.  Before they moved on to the US Constitution, it is important to note that the foundational generation did not easily relinquish their localism – intrinsic in state sovereignty and protected by the Articles. 

The practical necessities of gaining independence from Britain and other ongoing national forces – such as ever-increasing interstate trade – made the step toward federalizing at a national level essential.  That does not necessarily mean it was welcomed by all parties, but the tide was cast.[4]

Among the average Americans, the emphasis was still in local communities meeting their own concerns despite the call for more nationalistic approaches (for example, in the pamphlet by Thomas Paine, Common Sense[5]).  What one is apt to do is to assume that Americans up and down the Atlantic seaboard were familiar with their fellow colonists.  That was not the case.

This blog will end its treatment of isomorphism with this last document.  The US Constitution and the Bill of Rights amply demonstrate the culmination of how parochial federalism views governance and politics and, due to their ongoing application in the nation’s political affairs, they define the American view of governance and politics as the basis of its parochialism.  Hopefully, the reader can appreciate that that view reflects a national, parochial federalist perspective.

From this sampling of the concerns, the governmental issues that this blog has recently addressed, and how this blog has relied on the writings of Lutz, the judgement is that this review has amply demonstrated the isomorphism of this perspective.  Hopefully, the reader agrees and is willing to accept parochial federalism as the basis for the study of all aspects of the national governmental arrangement by using a historical, developmental approach.  That approach – under the designation of “methodology” – will be shortly addressed in an upcoming posting.

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[1] This presentation begins with the posting, “A Parochial Subject Matter” (March 11, 2022).  The reader is reminded that the claims made in this posting do not necessarily reflect the beliefs or knowledge of this blogger.  Instead, the posting is a representation of what an advocate of parochial federalism might present.  This is done to present a dialectic position of that construct.

[2] Donald S. Lutz, “The Articles of Confederation, 1781” in Roots of the Republic: American Founding Documents Interpreted, edited by Stephen L. Schechter (Madison, WI:  Madison House, 1990), 227-248.

[3] Ibid., 229.

[4] For an interesting account of this less than enthusiastic unionization among Americans, see T. H. Breen, The Marketplace of Revolution:  How Consumer Politics Shaped American Independence (New York, NY:  The Oxford University Press, 2004).

[5] See Richard B. Bernstein, “John Adams’s Thoughts on Government,” in Roots of the Republic:  American Founding Documents Interpreted, edited by Stephen L. Schechter (Madison, WI:  Madison House, 1990), 118-128.

JUDGING PAROCHIAL FEDERALISM, V

 

An advocate of parochial federalism continues his/her presentation[1] …

Continuing from the previous posting, Donald Lutz[2] points out that between the Declaration of Independence and the preamble of the United States Constitution, a national people is created, and the basic values and commitments of that people are laid out.  At first reading, the Declaration seems to be a list of grievances.  But these grievances represent a set of values.  The exact grievances are similarly found in the constitutions of several states.  They are also found in scores of newspapers of that time.

          The Declaration follows the covenantal formula first utilized in America in the Mayflower Compact in the early 1600s.  Lutz entertains the question of whether the Declaration creates one people or is the covenant of thirteen separate people.  There are references within the document that support both positions:  on the side of “one people,” the reference of the American colonists as separating from another – the British – and the quote, “good People of these Colonies,” supports the idea of a national people and the reference in the last paragraph, “Free and Independent States,” bolsters the idea of thirteen peoples.

 

Of course, Americans today possess something like dual citizenship whereby they are simultaneously citizens of the United States and of their respective states.  One could view the Declaration of Independence as containing implicitly the first statement of dual citizenship by more or less balancing references to a national people and to state peoples, thereby implying that both are created at the same time.  It is interesting that the document tends to use group language for the creation of a single people toward the beginning and language for multiple state peoples toward the end.  The list of grievances refers at times to things the king has done to hurt a colony or a colonial government, and at other times to things he has done to harm all Americans.[3]

 

Lutz states that this duality demonstrates a federalist conception in that the national union is being created but maintaining the integrity (and this case sovereignty) of the constituent parts.

          In addition, this “The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen States of America” reflects a unanimous decision.  The covenant was not unanimous on July 4, 1776.  New York did not agree to the covenant until July 15 and not all of the signatures were affixed to the document when the Continental Congress formally approved the agreement on January 18, 1777 (missing the name of Thomas McKean) and printed it.  Despite this, the document was re-titled to include the word unanimous.

          Lutz explains,

The change in the title was an attempt to present a united front against Britain.  One can also view the insistence upon unanimity as recognition that a compact does not bind those who do not sign it or agree to it.  If we are to have a national people, a national compact, both John Locke and the American colonial constitutional tradition required that the agreement be unanimous.[4]

 

What are some of the specific values expressed in the Declaration?  A review provided by Lutz demonstrates the connection between those values in this document and those established by the colonial, federalist tradition.

          With the provision, “separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them,” Americans saw themselves as equal to the British.  This equality was based on Americans’ inalienable (nontransferable) right to render their consent or withhold their consent to a British constitution.  In true federalist spirit, this was a God-given right because God distributed the ability to do so equally among all.

          Lutz writes, “Just as in the Christian tradition, a poor person and a rich one are equal in the sight of God, a small nation is equal to the largest nation once it forms itself by a compact based upon unanimous consent.”[5]  Therefore, “all men are created equal” not only refers to the notion of equal individuals, but also to equal peoples; i.e., the American people being equal to the British people.

          In terms of the pronouncement that the truths proclaimed in the document were “self-evident,” they were so from a biblical or an Enlightened basis.  The quote, “Nature and Nature’s God,” refers to either the belief in God from a religious perspective or in the natural law which the Enlightened thinkers argued included human nature.  Either way, religious or rational thinkers, Jefferson felt, should be able to see the correctness of the values expressed.

          The grievances contain the following values and commitments:  legislative supremacy with a deliberate process for securing the common good, freedom of movement, independent judicial process, frugality in government based on the consent of the governed (representative government), free trade, trial by jury of one’s peers, the duty of government to protect its people from foreign and domestic violence, and deliberate governmental processes in general.

          And finally, and very significant, the Declaration of Independence does call on God to witness the agreement making this compact a covenant – giving it a religious foundation.  This last bit of context becomes notable given how the eventual constitution in 1787 takes on a secular standing in that it does not call on God to witness that agreement.

          With an extensive adoption of equality as a founding value, one quickly turns to the value of liberty.  Equality demands duty and obligation among the citizenry if it is to be respected – humans are readily motivated to dishonor equality if to do so, an individual interest is advanced.  So how this covenant treats liberty becomes centrally important.  This should be kept in mind as the following is read.

          A source which was heavily influential in providing ideas to be contained in the Declaration, and in which Jefferson also had a strong hand in preparing, was the Virginia Declaration of Rights and Constitution.  Actually, drawn up shortly before the Declaration of Independence was issued, the document illustrates the importance and context that the founding generation placed on individual rights.

          Article one reads:

1.    That all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life, liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.[6]

         

This value, of course, falls logically within the federalist view of independent, consenting members to join and form a union or society.  But the question relevant to the concerns of this dialectical presentation is to what extent can resulting governments and their laws prohibit behavior, especially on moral grounds.

Article 16 identifies the bias of the founding generation and is central to federal thought:

16.  That religion, or the duty which we owe to our CREATOR, and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence, and therefore all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience; and that it is the mutual duty to practice Christian forbearance, love, and charity toward each other.[7]

 

In short, and taken with the ideas earlier shared by John Adams (in the last posting), the ideal of liberty was that a person was free to do what he/she should do.  To an advocate of parochial federalism, the legitimacy of a moral basis for governmental policy can be easily deduced from this passage and is part of the parochial / traditional federalism perspective.

          This posting will not continue and finish the presentation on isomorphism.  This blogger wishes to leave the reader with this last point to consider.  It zeroes in on the fundamental distinction between federalism and natural rights perspectives which, of course, is the central point of contention between the two constructs.

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[1] This presentation begins with the posting, “A Parochial Subject Matter” (March 11, 2022).  The reader is reminded that the claims made in this posting do not necessarily reflect the beliefs or knowledge of this blogger.  Instead, the posting is a representation of what an advocate of parochial federalism might present.  This is done to present a dialectic position of that construct.

[2] Donald S. Lutz, “The Declaration of Independence, 1776” in Roots of the Republic: American Founding Documents Interpreted, edited by Stephen L. Schechter (Madison, WI:  Madison House, 1990), 138-145.

[3] Ibid., 140.

[4] Ibid., 141.

[5] Ibid., 141.

[6] Donald S. Lutz, “The Virginia Declaration of Rights and Constitution, 1776” in Roots of the Republic: American Founding Documents Interpreted, edited by Stephen L. Schechter (Madison, WI:  Madison House, 1990), 150-165, 154.

[7] Ibid., 157.

JUDGING PAROCHIAL FEDERALISM, IV

 

An advocate of parochial federalism continues his/her presentation[1] …

In progressing through Eugene Meehan’s (plus two from this blogger) elements[2] of evaluative attributes by which to judge constructs, the next element is compatibility.  But before leaving isomorphism, this and the posting will share some related commentary by the founding fathers, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson.

          Consideration of isomorphism had the last posting look at and comment on the American colonial experience.  Again, the concern over isomorphism is:  does the construct line up, element-by-element, with that to which it describes, explains, and/or evaluates?  Or specifically to the concerns of this blog, how well does parochial federalism help civics educators in identifying those factors affecting the governance and/or politicking within the American republic?

To meaningfully address that concern, the last posting gave a general example of how parochial federalism functions.  How it relates to the colonial experience and, by doing so, demonstrates how inclusive its governmental/political factors are to anyone studying the political record of how the nation’s political arrangement came about.[3]  But one should keep in mind that his review is merely a case study to demonstrate its usability.

For example, a look at the expressed ideals around the time of the American Revolution will demonstrate how the foundational perspective survived and was instrumental in drawing up the constitutional framework of the nation.  In his Thoughts on Government, 1776, John Adams identified a moral basis for political arrangements:

 

We ought to consider, what is the end of government, before we determine which is the best form.  Upon this point all speculative politicians will agree, that the happiness of society is the end of government, as all Divines and moral Philosophers will agree that the happiness of the individual is the end of man.  From this principle it will follow, that the form of government, which communicates ease, comfort, security, or in one word happiness to the greatest number of persons, and in the greatest degree, is the best …

          If there is a form of government then, whose principle and foundation is virtue, will not every sober man acknowledge it better calculated to promote the general happiness than any other form?[4]

 

And with this, one can detect yet another domain of interest or factor that parochial federalism addresses, that being the moral domain. 

Adams succinctly explains that governments should be established to promote the happiness of its citizens and that end is best attained through foundation of virtue.  That is, the ideal is a state in which what is moral, righteous, responsible, and serious is sought.  As such, politics is not merely an area of practical concern, but also of goodness or evil, right or wrong.

Foundationally, the moral precepts that the Puritans first established seem fresh in the mind of this founding father.  The Thoughts on Government was a published work that proved to have a profound effect on many of the delegates to the Continental Congress as they went back to their respective states (the Declaration having already claimed the nation’s independence) and worked on devising the first state constitutions.[5]

Of course, the central document depicting the political perspective of the founding fathers was/is the Declaration of Independence, 1776.

 

The Declaration of Independence was not written in a vacuum.  It did not suddenly spring from the mind of a few men.  Thomas Jefferson himself said in a letter to Henry Lee written on May 8, 1825:  “Neither aiming at originality of principles or sentiments, nor yet copied form any particular and previous writing, it was intended to be an expression of the American Mind.”  Apparently [sic] Jefferson attempted to summarize what he felt were the beliefs generally held by Americans on the basis of what was written in the political documents, newspaper articles, and political pamphlets.  It could not have succeeded otherwise. [6]

 

But as this blogger reported earlier in this blog (“The Meaning of Unalienable,” February 5, 2019), here is another view:

A person’s life, liberty (to do good), and happiness are part of his/her nature.  The individual has a sense for morality, a sense that that is not subject to being alienable or transferable to others.  Therefore, they are unalienable.  In all this, according to [Gary] Wills, Jefferson was highly influenced by Francis Hutcheson and this latter writer explains this distinction between rights over one’s person and the right to pursue the moral sense. 

Wills [reports]:

 

Rights arises in, and because of, society; it is a power over others so long as benevolence or innocence are directing the powers.  The test is public good.

          Hutcheson … divides rights into perfect and imperfect.  The perfect, as essential to the public good, can be defended even with private force.  The first example he gives is the right to life.  The basis of the societal bond is benevolence, and no society can undermine its own fundamental value.  Yet security in the possession of life is not only the basis for all goods one can bestow on others; it is, more important, the necessary precondition for doing good – no man can be benevolent unless he is first alive…

          He asserts the right of liberty on similar grounds:  “As nature has implanted in each man a desire of his own happiness and many tender affections toward others in some nearer relations of life, and granted to each one some understanding and active powers, with a natural right [to] exercise them for the purpose of these natural affections, it is plain each one has a natural right to exert his powers, according to his own judgment and inclination, for these purposes, in all such industry, labor, or amusements as are not hurtful to others in their persons or goods, while no more public interests necessarily require his labors or require that his actions should be under the direction of others.  This right we call natural liberty.”[7]

Sorry for the overly philosophic language, but here is this writer’s understanding:  Liberty seems key, but the meaning of it takes on an unaccustomed turn in that it is ensconced in one’s social context or setting.  The term, natural liberty, today has been co-opted by natural rights advocates, a la an altered Lockean view, by its current devotees and dismisses this more social foundation. 

Regardless, parochial federalism leads to such questions and basic definitions that unfortunately have been mangled and distorted for a variety of reasons, not the least, short-term political goals.  The next posting will continue describing this evolving set of ideas in which the founders illustrate their task to bring their federalist precepts to meet the political challenge of their time.  Again, the effort is to illustrate how granular parochial federalism is in how it was utilized by those who established a new national polity.

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[1] This presentation begins with the posting, “A Parochial Subject Matter” (March 11, 2022).  The reader is reminded that the claims made in this posting do not necessarily reflect the beliefs or knowledge of this blogger.  Instead, the posting is a representation of what an advocate of parochial federalism might present.  This is done to present a dialectic position of that construct.

[2] Eugene J. Meehan, Explanation in Social Science:  A System Paradigm (Homewood, IL:  The Dorsey Press, 1968).  The complete list is comprehension, power, precision, reliability, isomorphism, compatibility, predictability, and control.  This blogger adds abstract level and motivation.

[3] Stephen L. Schechter, “Introduction,” in Roots of the Republic:  American Founding Documents Interpreted, edited by Stephen L. Schechter (Madison, WI:  Madison House, 1990).

[4] John Adams, “John Adams’s Thoughts on Government, 1776,” in Roots of the Republic:  American Founding Documents Interpreted, edited by Stephen L. Schechter (Madison, WI:  Madison House, 1990), 129-137, 129-130.

[5] Richard B. Bernstein, “John Adams’s Thoughts on Government,” in Roots of the Republic:  American Founding Documents Interpreted, edited by Stephen L. Schechter (Madison, WI:  Madison House, 1990), 118-128.

[6] Donald S. Lutz, “The Declaration of Independence, 1776” (138-145) in Roots of the Republic: American Founding Documents Interpreted, edited by Stephen L. Schechter (Madison, WI:  Madison House, 1990).

[7] Gary Wills, Inventing America:  Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence (New York, NY:  Vintage Books, 2018/1978), 216-217.  Emphasis in the original.