Abstract: On or about the Ides of every month except March, the Adams Institute will send two letters to prominent Americans whose words or actions are relevant to the proposed amendment, and whose contributions to the idea of democratic-republican government merit all of our attention. These letters will also carbon-copy other distinguished individuals who were somehow involved in the recipient’s words or deeds, or in our analysis thereof.
Our initial letters, along with correspondence explaining to copied individuals why they were copied, will be published as an open diary of correspondence in the hopes of inspiring discussion of our proposed amendment and emulation of the recipients’ good examples. PDF files featuring scans of all this original correspondence will be available for download, and the substantive content of each primary letter will be pasted in blog-post format.
April 13, 2024
Dear Ms. Parton:
Although many folks are frustrated by the fact of your partisan neutrality, all should respect your reasons for it. And the greatest reason is, as far as we can tell, that your Christian faith prohibits you from casting aspersions and condemnations upon others.[1]
Your partisan neutrality does not, however, translate to political mootness. Touching on the themes of women’s dignity and equality, migrants and poverty, many of your songs convey an egalitarian, tolerant, and compassionate political disposition. But perhaps your most provocative political lyrics are found in your recent song World on Fire from your latest album, Rockstar. This song seems to express your apprehension about a concern that we also share: the future of our republic (emphasis ours):
First stanza: | Liar, liar the world’s on fire Whatcha gonna do when it all burns down? [2] Fire, fire burning higher Still got time to turn it all around |
Second stanza: | Now I ain’t one for speaking out much But that don’t mean I don’t stay in touch Everybody’s trippin’ over this or that What we gonna do when we all fall flat? |
From the fourth stanza: | I don’t know what to think about us … |
Sixth stanza: | Don’t get me started on politics Now how are we to live in a world like this Greedy politicians, present and past They wouldn’t know the truth if it bit ‘em in the ass … |
From the eighth stanza: | How do we heal this great divide? |
The idea that our republic is going down in flames is the main theme of your song. Prompted by your words, we write to show how your premonitions of the collapse of popular government belong to a long political anthropology that stretches from our present authoritarian political trajectory, through the foundation of our republic, all the way back to Classical Antiquity. While we do have a policy concept informed by that analysis, we won’t ask you to endorse it out of respect for your neutrality. But, one thing your fans won’t dispute is that, so long as ours is a popular government, we want the best informed citizenry possible. It is from this educational standpoint – with a view toward improving the civility and quality of the public discourse – that we ask you to reflect on these ten lessons of history:
Our organization exists because we believe that the highest purpose of history is to protect the future from the mistakes of the past. The Dollywood Foundation’s Imagination Library project exists for a different but related purpose: to instill a love of learning in disadvantaged children at a young age so they may be happy and productive members of a free society. But, as these recurring patterns of republican decline show, it’s not only downtrodden kids who need educating. Our political and business elite are in dire need, as they are about to ram us into rocky shoals that have lain in plain sight for the past two thousand years. So, while we do not ask you to endorse any particular course of treatment for our country’s political afflictions, we do ask if you would lend your voice to hasten a proper diagnosis.
In his first inaugural address, George Washington said “the preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the republican model of government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.” If we are to keep our republic, we must understand what it means to have a republic. And if we don’t learn these lessons in school, we must still learn them somewhere.
It is in this spirit that we write to ask you if you would be willing to consider endorsing efforts to help educate the American people on our country’s egalitarian founding principles, and the rich political anthropology from which they were derived. This is not a request for financial support, but a patriotic appeal for moral support. And we agree there’s still time turn it all around, but we have even greater confidence that if we cannot first diagnose the disease, we can never hope to administer a cure.
Sincerely,
Tim Ferguson
[1] See Matthew, 7:1-3, KJV: “Judge not, that ye be not judged.” Luke, 6:37 NIV: “Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven.” Luke, 6:31, NIV: “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” James, 4:11-12 NIV: “Brothers and sisters, do not slander one another. …There is only one Lawgiver and Judge … But you—who are you to judge your neighbor?” Romans 12:18 NIV: “If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.” Ephesians 4:29 NIV: “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.”
[2] This line, or a variation thereof, is repeated ten times.
[3] i.e. Anacyclosis (ἀνακύκλωσις), the idea that every regime is eventually corrupted, and every corrupted regime is eventually eclipsed, as played out through a succession of Greek constitutional forms. Polybius holds that the natural and probable sequence of political evolution is tribal chiefdom, monarchy, tyranny, aristocracy, oligarchy, democracy, and ochlocracy or mob-rule. For the anthropology see, e.g., Pindar, 2nd Pythian Ode, Herodotus (III. 80), Thucydides (VIII. 97), Plato (Rep. VIII) (Laws, III. 676 A), Aristotle (Nic. Eth. 8.10; Pol. 1286b), Polybius (Hist. Bk. VI), and possibly Panaetius, Dicaercus, Isocrates, Protagoras, and Hecateus). See also Dionysius, (Rom. Ant. VII, 54-56) Cicero, De Re Publica, I, XXIX, II, XXV), Sextus Pomponius, Justinian’s Digest, I Bk. I, Tit. 2., 2. 1-11), and Machiavelli Discourses on Livy, Ch. I. Bk. II. See also John Adams, An Essay on Man’s Lust for Power, All Men would be Tyrants if they could, with the Author’s Comment in 1807 (describing Polybius’ sequence as “the Creed of my whole Life. See also Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 9, alluding to Anacyclosis. See also David A. Teegarden, Death to Tyrants!: Ancient Greek Democracy and the Struggle against Tyranny, Princeton University Press, 2014. Figure A1 therein shows that some form of monarchy was the most frequent regime from the first half of the 7th century BC through the first half of the 5th; oligarchy through the first half of the 4th, then democracy.
[4] The idea of the brake is that if no simple regime (e.g. monarchy, aristocracy, or democracy) can be trusted to maintain stability, the best constitution combines the best qualities of all three into one tripartite constitution. The tripartite mixed constitution is frequently attributed to the legendary Spartan lawgiver Lycurgus. For the anthropology, see, e.g. Thucydides, Peloponnesian War, 8.97.2 Plato, Laws, 681d; Laws, 712d; Menexus, 238b-d, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, VII.55, Polybius, Histories, VI.10-18, and Servius the Grammarian, Commentary on the Aeneid of Vergil, 4.682. See also Charles I, His Majesties Answer to the Nineteen Propositions of Both Houses of Parliament, 1642, Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws, Book XI, Chapter VI, John Locke, Two Treatises of Government, Book II, Chapters XII-XIII James Madison, Federalist Nos. 47, 48, and 51, and Articles I, II, and III of the United States Constitution.
[5] See James Harrington, Commonwealth of Oceana, Part I, a letter from John Adams to James Sullivan, 26 May 1776, John Adams, Defence of the Constitutions, Vol. III, Letter III (Padoua), Noah Webster, An Examination into the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution (1787), and Noah Webster, Miscellaneous Remarks on Divisions of Property (1790).
[6] See Euripides, Suppliants, Line 238 et seq., Plato, Laws 679b, Aristotle, Pol., 1291b, 1295b, and Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America.
[7] See James Madison, Federalist No. 10: “The most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property.” See also Aristotle, Politics, 1291b, 1295b. See also Tocqueville, Id. The collective first-hand observations of Aristotle and Tocqueville can be summarized with the general conclusions that where the middle class prevails, the people are too busy for demagogues, too optimistic for faction, too traditional for radical ideas, too independent for patronage, and too moderate for extremism.
[8] See Walter Scheidel, The Great Leveler: Violence and the History of Inequality from the Stone Age to the Twenty-First Century, Princeton 2018. He shows that structural inequality has only been reduced by the shocks of plague, revolution, mass-mobilization warfare, or state collapse.
[9] See Appian, The Civil Wars, I.1, Sallust, Conspiracy of Catiline, 10, 33. I; 37.3, 38, 53, The Jugurthine War, 4, Livy, History of Rome, Preface, Tacitus, Annals, 3.27, Florus, Epitome, I, XLVII, Lucan, Pharsalia, 1.63. In 104 BC, Marcus Philippus announced that out of perhaps some 400,000 citizens, only around 2,000 held any significant wealth. See also Victor Duruy, Histoire des Romains, II, 46-47, 1879.
[10] That America was born middle class, see remarks from British Colonel Lord Adam Gordon in 1764: “The levelling principle here, everywhere operates strongly and takes the lead, and everybody has property here, and everybody knows it.” See also a letter from George Washington to Richard Henderson, 19 June 1788, and Tocqueville, Id. See also Peter H. Lindert and Jeffrey G. Williamson, American Incomes 1774-1860, National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper 18396, 2012, showing that in 1774, New England and the Middle Colonies were the most egalitarian place in the measurable world. That the Founding Fathers would advocate intervention as necessary to promote wealth de-concentration, see John Adams, Dissertation, 1765: “Property monopolized, or in the Possession of a Few is a Curse to Mankind. We should preserve not an Absolute Equality – this is unnecessary, but preserve all from extreme Poverty, and all others from extravagant Riches,” Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 28 October 1785: “Legislators cannot invent too many devices for subdividing property,” James Madison, Parties, 1792, advocating measures to “reduce extreme wealth towards a state of mediocrity, and raise extreme indigence towards a state of comfort” and Noah Webster, Miscellaneous Remarks: “The basis of a democratic and a republican form of government, is, a fundamental law, favoring … a general distribution of property.” See also Mercy Otis Warren, History of … the American Revolution, 1805 Vol. I. Ch. I.: “Democratic principles are the result of Equality of condition.”
[11] See Aristotle, Pol., 1295b, and James Harrington, Id. That the intuition of ordinary Americans believes the middle should own half, see Michael I. Norton and Dan Ariely, Building a Better America – One Wealth Quintile at a Time, Perspectives on Psychological Science, Association for Psychological Science, 2011. By this criteria, the middle class has been deprived of about $30 trillion of national prosperity, when the middle class is defined as the middle three quintiles by income percentage or the middle forty percent (between the top ten and bottom fifty). The figure is significantly higher when the middle class is defined by wealth percentile. Q2 2023 Federal Reserve data shows that total U.S. household wealth is ~$150 trillion and the middling share is: (a) 28.1%, when defined as middle three asset quintiles by income; and (b) 28.6% when defined as the “middle 40%” (between the top 10% and bottom 50%), averaging 28.35%.
Property monopolized, or in the Possession of a Few is a Curse to Mankind. We should preserve not an Absolute Equality – this is unnecessary, but preserve all from extreme Poverty, and all others from extravagant Riches.
© 2024 John Adams Institute. All rights reserved. The John Adams Institute, operating as the Adams Institute for the Preservation of the Democratic-Republican Model of Government, is not a government organization or affiliated with any government organization. We do not endorse or oppose any specific candidates for public office. This website is not a government website. No statement or suggestion of government endorsement is intended or should be inferred. No endorsement of any of our ideas or activities by any person referenced on this website is intended or should be inferred unless otherwise explicitly stated. The John Adams Institute is a nonprofit corporation, is not a tax-exempt organization, and does not engage in commercial activities. No communication on this website is intended as a lobbying communication or as a solicitation for financial support but is only intended to stimulate intelligent public discourse. For full legal terms and disclaimers, visit our Legal page.
© 2024 John Adams Institute. All rights reserved. The John Adams Institute, operating as the Adams Institute for the Preservation of the Democratic-Republican Model of Government, is not a government organization or affiliated with any government organization. We do not endorse or oppose any specific candidates for public office. This website is not a government website. No statement or suggestion of government endorsement is intended or should be inferred. No endorsement of any of our ideas or activities by any person referenced on this website is intended or should be inferred unless otherwise explicitly stated. The John Adams Institute is a nonprofit corporation, is not a tax-exempt organization, and does not engage in commercial activities. No communication on this website is intended as a lobbying communication or as a solicitation for financial support but is only intended to stimulate intelligent public discourse. For full legal terms and disclaimers, visit our Legal page.
