=========================================================================
Date:         Mon, 1 May 2000 00:59:17 -0500
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Cindy Koeppel 
Subject:      ROBERT H. MICHEL CIVIC EDUCATION GRANTS
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ROBERT H. MICHEL CIVIC EDUCATION GRANTS

Highlights

$40,000 available in 1999-2000
Emphasis on practical classroom applications

Who is qualified to apply?

Teachers (4th through 12th grade), community and junior college faculty,
and college and university faculty teacher-led student teams, and
individual curriculum.  Institutions and organizations are not eligible.

What projects qualify for consideration?

Lesson plans or student activities, incorporation of historical materials
about Congress, the federal government, instructional technology,
activities that identify additional resources for the teaching of civics,
multi-disciplinary strategies, simulations exercises, curricular reform
efforts, and university-level methods curriculum.  The website
(http://www.pekin.net/dirksen/micheledgrants.html) lists all grants made in
1999 and 2000.

What is the deadline?

Preliminary proposals may be submitted at any time.  Awards will be made
periodically but no more often than quarterly.

How do I apply?

Submit a preliminary proposal in the form of a letter or e-mail message.
Visit The Center's website for complete information on about the elements
of the preliminary proposal.

How are recipients selected?

Visit The Center's website for the complete evaluation and selection
criteria-(http://www.pekin.net/dirksen/micheledgrants.html)

For further information, please contact:

The Dirksen Congressional Center
301 South Fourth St., Suite A
Pekin, IL 61554-4219
fmackaman@pekin.net or
309.347.7113
=========================================================================
Date:         Thu, 4 May 2000 15:18:12 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Pennee Bender 
Subject:      Linda Kerber's Opening Statement Delayed

Dear History Matters Forum Participants --

Linda Kerber will be sending out her opening statement on May 8, 2000.
Sorry for the slight delay in starting this forum, we will extend Professor
Kerber's participation into June if necessary to accomodate a full discussion
of teaching the Constitution in U.S. history.

Thanks, Pennee Bender
History matters Coordinator
=========================================================================
Date:         Thu, 4 May 2000 14:36:19 -0500
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         "P.D. Swiney" 
Subject:      Re: Linda Kerber's Opening Statement Delayed
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

hooray!  can't wait.  I love these. pds
=========================================================================
Date:         Wed, 10 May 2000 09:44:45 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Pennee Bender 
Subject:      Linda Kerber's Opening Statement

First an apology -- the CUNY server was blocking email for the past several
days so the forum is starting late --

Dear Colleagues,

 Once upon a time, not so long ago, a course in U.S. Constitutional
History was a standard fixture in college and university departments.  In
many states, Departments of Education required prospective teachers to
have taken such a course.   But in recent decades, required constitutional
history courses have slid out of the curriculum in many places, and
constitutional history has been left to fend for itself -- in the
interstices of constitutional law courses in political science
departments, making occasional appearances in U.S. political and social
history courses.

 Yet many of the subjects that appear in those political and social
history courses raise constitutional issues.  The early republic,
Reconstruction, the Progressive Era, and the New Deal are years marked by
legal and constitutional creativity.  Slavery was embedded in the
three-fifths clause and in the Fugitive Slave Clause of the Federal
Constitution of 1787;  there is no way to tell the story of the road to
the Civil War without attention to challenges to the Constitution of
1787.   The Fourteenth Amendment promises all persons "equal protection of
the laws"; constitutional claims have been central to civil rights
movements ever since.  Many of the different experiences of immigrants
from Europe and from Asia can be measured in their different legal
status.  Not until 1971 did the U.S. Supreme Court rule that different
treatment of women and men might be a denial of unequal protection of the
laws.   The meanings of freedom are often expressed in legal
measures: what counts as freedom of speech, association, press, religion
has changed over time.  As we teach about the changing meanings of
citizenship we find ourselves teaching legal and constitutional history.

 I am interested in hearing about the ways in which students are
now learning constitutional and legal history.  In what context  do
constitutional issues emerge in the courses you teach?  What themes do you
emphasize?  How much do high school students learn of the history of
civil rights and civil liberties?  What issues do you think are the most
difficult, needing more attention?  Have you had success in teaching
American legal history as you teach labor history, women's history, the
history of race relations, the history of immigration, the history of
medicine?  Do you teach courses that announce themselves as legal history
or constitutional history?  Do high school students still have courses in
"civics" or "Problems in American Democracy" like the one I took decades ago?

 I have been interested in legal history for a long time, and each
of my books has at least one chapter on the legal aspects of the subject
at hand;   my most recent and current research projects involve the
history of Americans' changing understanding of law and citizenship.  But
I warn participants in this forum at the outset that I do not have a law
degree;  I'm merely a historian who has found legal and constitutional
questions compelling ones.  Some of my most dramatic classroom memories
are from Henry Steele Commager's legendary course in Constitutional
History at Columbia in the late 1950's;  I remember him stomping around on
the dais, bellowing, "There are things majorities may not do!"  After
students have forgotten most of what I have to teach, I'll be reasonably
content if they remember that line.

 I look forward to your responses, questions, and suggestions.

Linda K. Kerber
=========================================================================
Date:         Wed, 10 May 2000 12:32:32 -0700
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Robert Cooksey 
Subject:      Re: Linda Kerber's Opening Statement
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

   I graduated from high school in '91 and was
required to take a civics course. But when I moved
from the rural Tennesee town where I spent the first
three years of highs school to Hollywood, FL, civics
was conspicuously lacking from the curriculum. I am
now double-majoring in history and philosophy at New
College of the University of South Florida. My
American History professor, Justus Doenecke, requires
much reading on Constitutional history and
interpretation. This is closely linked to political
and diplomatic studies in his courses. Unfortunately,
because our department is so small, we are unable to
offer richer, more detailed courses examining
Constitutional History. I am not completely certain
(actually rather uncertain) that they would be offered
if the dpeartment was larger. Not only do I see a lack
of such courses being offered in the universities with
which I or close friends have been affiliated, but it
seems that there is a lack of interest amongst
students. Even students who claim to be interested in
social history tell me that Constitutional studies
seem like nothing but the same old political history
that has been reiterated endlessly. I don't support
this opinion, but I cannot separate social or cultural
history from political history.
   There's my two cents...Anyone else?

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Send instant messages & get email alerts with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com/
=========================================================================
Date:         Wed, 10 May 2000 12:33:00 -0700
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Robert Cooksey 
Subject:      Re: Linda Kerber's Opening Statement
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

   I graduated from high school in '91 and was
required to take a civics course. But when I moved
from the rural Tennesee town where I spent the first
three years of highs school to Hollywood, FL, civics
was conspicuously lacking from the curriculum. I am
now double-majoring in history and philosophy at New
College of the University of South Florida. My
American History professor, Justus Doenecke, requires
much reading on Constitutional history and
interpretation. This is closely linked to political
and diplomatic studies in his courses. Unfortunately,
because our department is so small, we are unable to
offer richer, more detailed courses examining
Constitutional History. I am not completely certain
(actually rather uncertain) that they would be offered
if the dpeartment was larger. Not only do I see a lack
of such courses being offered in the universities with
which I or close friends have been affiliated, but it
seems that there is a lack of interest amongst
students. Even students who claim to be interested in
social history tell me that Constitutional studies
seem like nothing but the same old political history
that has been reiterated endlessly. I don't support
this opinion, but I cannot separate social or cultural
history from political history.
   There's my two cents...Anyone else?

---Robert Cooksey (undergrad)

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Send instant messages & get email alerts with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com/
=========================================================================
Date:         Wed, 10 May 2000 16:19:26 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Rick & Teri Malmstrom 
Subject:      Re: Linda Kerber's Opening Statement
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Linda--

    Thanks so much for the opportunity to discuss this neglected topic.
To begin, I should tell you that my career path has taken me from
teaching, to law school, to legal practice (commercial litigation), and
back to teaching again. A large (and rather expensive) circle which has
led me to The Ellis School, a private girls day-school in Pittsburgh, PA
where I teach AP and regular US history. I couldn't be happier.

    I suppose its natural that the evolution of the Constitution should
function as the core of my classes, but I'm surprised that others don't
seem to take advantage of this built-in structure.  After all, following
the American Revolution, there is no period, issue, or event in American
History that does not have constitutional implications. More important,
the issues which must be examined, such as freedom of expression,
presidential power, women's' rights, government regulation, equal
protection, etc., are as alive today as they were during the 19th
century.  Further, the personalities involved in these  issues -
Marshall, Holmes, Warren, Rehnquuist, etc. - help to bring these ideas
to life.  With adolescents, I think this is the key to success in
teaching.

    Unfortunately, I have found that there are very few resources which
address changing legal ideas (generally reflected by Supreme Court
decisions) and their connection to shifts in social, political, and
economic priorities  In particular, I've been looking for information
about the role of the courts in the development of womens' rights. Any
thoughts?  I look forward to this discussion.

Rick Malmstrom
=========================================================================
Date:         Thu, 11 May 2000 08:12:38 EDT
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         VNPB@AOL.COM
Subject:      Re: Linda Kerber's Opening Statement
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What a fine, inclusive view of the Const.! I have taught the US survey for 25
years, now, and still find constitutional issues, though vital, sometimes
difficult to engage students. Slavery and civil rts lend themselves easily,
as do the Am. Rev. and the Bill of Rights (I'm a colonialist) but
immigration, labor, business, etc. are difficult. I hope someone out there
has some teaching strategies for survey-level, and look forward to more of
this forum.
Virginia Bernhard
University of St. Thomas
=========================================================================
Date:         Thu, 11 May 2000 09:05:47 CDT
Reply-To:     carl@schulkin.org
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Carl Schulkin 
Subject:      Re: Linda Kerber's Opening Statement
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed

Dear Colleagues,

    I appreciate the challenge that Linda Kerber has posed for us as both
teachers and scholars, and I would like to contribute a brief, preliminary
response.

    I am a high school teacher, and I have been teaching AP US History for
twenty-five years.  About fifteen years ago, after reading Ronald Takaki's
STRANGERS FROM A DIFFERENT SHORE, I became interested in the constitutional
issues surrounding immigration and naturalization.  After conducting a small
amount of research with the help of an immigration lawyer, I decided to make
the evolution of our naturalization laws an integral part of my class.  I
devised a very simple inquiry lesson that I use at the beginning of the year
in an effort to pique my students' interest in the subject.  I write the
following dates on the chalkboard:

1790
1870
1952

I tell the students that these three dates represent an important sequence
of events in United States history, and I ask them to guess what the
sequence is.  After they flounder for a while, I then explain briefly the
evolution of our naturalization laws.  I fill in with a Supreme Court case
or two from the 1920s discussed by Takaki.  The result is not only a good
lesson in one significant aspect of our legal and constitutional history,
but also an important demonstration of the importance of race in United
States History.

Carl Schulkin
Pembroke Hill School
Kansas City, MO 64112
________________________________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com
=========================================================================
Date:         Fri, 12 May 2000 13:33:56 -0500
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Linda K Kerber 
Subject:      Rick Malmstrom's letter
In-Reply-To:  <3919C44E.F8ECAB1D@telerama.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII

        It's invigorating to hear from a teacher who has tried other lines
of work and chosen history teaching and "couldn't be happier."  I'm
reminded of a moment last week when I was heading for class, wearing a
suit with shoulder pads and hauling a stuffed briefcase.  I passed a
cheerful batch of 10-year (?) olds, in reasonably doubled lines,  trotting
along behind their teacher, (wearing an open-necked shirt and
khakis) headed for the university's natural history museum.  He looked at
me and grinned.

        "Bet my students are more fun than your students," he said.

        I bet they are. And more original, too.


        I'm glad to hear Rick thinks that "there is no period, issue or
 or event in American History that does not have constitutional implications.
 More important, the issues which must be examined, such as freedom of
expression, presidential power, women's' rights, government regulation,
 equal protection, etc., are as alive today as they were during the 19th
 century."

        Rick is in search of "resources which
 address changing legal ideas (generally reflected by Supreme Court
 decisions) and their connection to shifts in social, political, and
 economic priorities," particularly on  the role of the courts in the
development of womens' rights."


        Well, you've come to the right place.   I may go on too
long--don't let me bore you.  But having recently written a book on the
last subject, I'm a little like the ancient mariner.  Let me start by
responding to the question of women, and, perhaps in another post, address
the general question that Rick raises.

        Claims for rights often are articulated informally, as part of
social criticism or in the agendas of social movements.  Sooner or later,
many of these claims are litigated, and the courts play a major role in
stabilizing what Americans understand to be their rights.  Americans
inherited from  England a set of legal practices, sometimes called
"coverture,"  that confirmed married women's subordination to their
husbands and were  embedded in the
old law of domestic relations.  When American women became restive with
these relationships, they would necessarily have to try to reform the
law.  That meant they would have to persuade legislatures to change
statutes, and that also meant they would have to persuade courts to
interpret old statutes differently.

        That is why so many of the ingredients of the Seneca Falls
Declaration of Sentiments (1848) included demands for legal change:

--He has made her, if married, in the eye of the law, civilly dead.
--He has taken from her all right in property, even to the wages she
earns...
--He has monopolized nearly all the profitable employments...As a teacher
of theology, medicine, or law, she is not known.
--He has denied her the facilities for obtaining a thorough education...

        Even after legislatures changed the statutes, the interpretation
of those statutes could be a matter of argument, and the arguments have
often taken place in courts. The Fourteenth Amendment promises "equal
protection of the laws" to "all persons."  But argument has swirled around
the question of what "equal protection" as between men and women consists,
and these questions have often been left to courts to resolve.

        For example, Norma Basch has shown  (In "In
the Eyes of the Law:  Women, Marriage and Property in Nineteenth Century
New York," Cornell University Press, 1982) that even after New York state
passed Married Women's Property Acts in the mid-nineteenth century, courts
interpreted those statutes very narrowly.   Throughout the country,
married women's property acts protected primarily property that was given
to women, or that they earned outside their home  (as teachers, or
salespeople, etc.) Deep into the 20th century, courts often ruled that
married women had no right to any earnings for work in the home, like
taking in boarders or doing laundry.  Those earnings properly belonged to
her husband.

        Was the right to pursue a legal profession or trade part of
the promise of equal protection of the laws or one of the
"privileges and immunities" of citizenship?  Even though Myra Bradwell
had a thriving enterprise as  editor and publisher of the Chicago
Legal News, a weekly newspaper on which many relied for its coverage of
developments in courts and legislatures throughout the country, even
though she was trained in the law and passed the entrance examinations for
the Illinois Bar in 1869, and even though the law that gave the state
supreme court the power to license attorneys did not explicitly exclude
women,  her application was rejected by the Illinois Supreme Court on the
grounds that she was a married woman and therefore not a truly free
agent.  In BRADWELL v. ILLINOIS  (1873) the U.S. Supreme Court
agreed;  one Justice added his opinion that "The paramount destiny and
mission of woman are to fulfill the noble and benign offices of wife and
mother.  This is the law of the Creator."

        Was the right to keep one's birthright citizenship after
marriage one of the "privileges and immunities" of citizenship?  In
American practice, stabilized in law in 1907, when a U.S. born man
married a foreign woman, he automatically conveyed his citizenship to his
wife.  But the same statute provided that when a U.S.-born women married a
foreign man she lost her   own citizenship and took on the nationality of
her husband.  The statute was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in
MACKENZIE v. HARE  (1915), a decision I believe deserves to be better
known.   Thousands of U.S.-born women married to German men
had to register as "alien enemies" once World War I broke out; others were
rendered stateless.  The decision in MACKENZIE angered suffragists and
energized them;  as soon as suffrage was accomplished they turned to
repealing the Citizenship Act of 1907.  But the Cable Act of 1922 left
many loopholes, particularly for American born women who married aliens
from China or Japan, and even as the Cable Act was amended, not all the
changes were made retroactive.    In 1998 the U.S. Supreme Court sustained
a practice of different rules by which a child born abroad to a
non-married citizen man or  a non-married citizen woman could claim
citizenship.  [MILLER v.ALBRIGHT).

                                        ******

        Not so long ago, I believe, we lived through an important
Constitutional moment.  In 1971, in REED v. REED,  the U.S. Supreme Court
ruled for the first time that discrimination on the basis of sex might
be a denial of equal protection of the laws.  It could be said this is the
first clear affirmative response by the Supreme Court to the challenges
set in the Seneca Falls Declaration.

        Between 1971 and 1975, in a stunning series of decisions, the
Supreme Court placed the burden of proof that discrimination on the basis
of sex was reasonable on those who tried to discriminate.  Ruth Bader
Ginsburg, who was in 1971 a 38-year old law professor working
with the Ameican Civil
Liberties Union, wrote briefs and made the arguments in many of these
cases.  One of the most striking (and teachable) of these is the complaint
of Sharron Frontiero, an air force officer who was dismayed to discvoer
that she could not claim dependent's benefits for her husband on the same
terms that her male colleagues could for their wives.  The decision in
FRONTIERO v.RICHARDSON  (1973) is a complex one, in the course of which
Justice William Brennan reviewed the history of working women in the
United States, and Justice Powell commented on the need to wait to find
out whether the public would support the equal rights amendment.

        I could easily go on  (and I will, if our conversations flag or
folks want me to identify more judicial decisions):  the fascinating pair
on whether women's names must be put in jury pools on the same terms as
men's names are  (HOYT v. FLORIDA  1961; TAYLOR v. LOUISIANA, 1975);  ROE
v. WADE (1973), and its important  successor, PLANNED PARENTHOOD v. CASEY
(1992), ROSTKER v. GOLDBERG (1981) on military service.

        But this has gone on long enough.  Let me end with a shameless
advertisement for books in which I have written more on these
subjects, both of which I'm sure are accessible to AP students, and of
which you'll be the better judge than I about their accessiblity to
average students:

        NO CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT TO BE LADIES:  WOMEN AND THE OBLIGATIONS
OF CITIZENSHIP  (Hill and Wang, 1998,  paperback)

        co-edited with Jane Sherron De Hart: WOMEN'S AMERICA: REFOCUSING
THE PAST  (Oxford University Press,  2000, paperback)

Linda

=========================================================================
Date:         Fri, 12 May 2000 13:38:49 -0500
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Linda K Kerber 
Subject:      Re: Linda Kerber's Opening Statement
Comments: To: Carl Schulkin 
In-Reply-To:  <20000511140547.57204.qmail@hotmail.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII

Colleagues,

        I'm impressed by Carol Schulkin's dynamic "inquiry lesson,"  and
plan to adopt it myself.  The modification I would recommend is the
addition of one more date:  1965, the year of a major reform of
immigration law written from a much more expansive perspective than its
predecessors.  The statute is Public Law 89236,  79 Statutes at Large 911.

Linda
=========================================================================
Date:         Fri, 12 May 2000 13:54:55 -0500
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Linda K Kerber 
Subject:      Robert Cooksey
Comments: To: Robert Cooksey 
In-Reply-To:  <20000510193232.8068.qmail@web1001.mail.yahoo.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII

Colleagues,

It's good to know that Constitutional history continues to fit comfortably
in courses in political and diplomatic history.

I agree that legal and Constitutional history also belongs in social
history, not least because so many social movements have demanded legal
and sometimes Constitutional change.  Perhaps the most obvious example,
most easily fitted into the standard curriculum, are the cases that emerge
from working class demands for maximum hour, minimum wage laws.  On this
subject  there's a long constitutional "conversation" going on -- from the
U.S. Supreme Court's LOCHNER v. NY decision in 1905, to MULLER v. OREGON
in 1908, to ADKINS v. CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL in 1922, to a whole flurry of
New Deal cases,  all forcing a conversation about the proper role of the
state in setting standards for working conditions.  Current arguments
about regulations that should govern global trade and concerns about
sweatshop  labor in an international context are often grounded in in
choices that we made in the 1930s and 1940s.  As the current headlines
show, they may not be "the same old political history ....reiterated
endlessly."


Linda
=========================================================================
Date:         Fri, 12 May 2000 13:08:10 +0000
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Tom Sweeney 
Subject:      Re: Online Teaching
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

Colleagues: Is anyone out there teaching about law and the constitution online or
preparing to? I'd like to exchange ideas and information, since I will teach such
a course next fall partially online at North Central College in Naperville, Il.

cheers,
Tom Sweeney Ph.D./J.D.
North Central College

Linda K Kerber wrote:

>         It's invigorating to hear from a teacher who has tried other lines
> of work and chosen history teaching and "couldn't be happier."  I'm
> reminded of a moment last week when I was heading for class, wearing a
> suit with shoulder pads and hauling a stuffed briefcase.  I passed a
> cheerful batch of 10-year (?) olds, in reasonably doubled lines,  trotting
> along behind their teacher, (wearing an open-necked shirt and
> khakis) headed for the university's natural history museum.  He looked at
> me and grinned.
>
>         "Bet my students are more fun than your students," he said.
>
>         I bet they are. And more original, too.
>
>         I'm glad to hear Rick thinks that "there is no period, issue or
>  or event in American History that does not have constitutional implications.
>  More important, the issues which must be examined, such as freedom of
> expression, presidential power, women's' rights, government regulation,
>  equal protection, etc., are as alive today as they were during the 19th
>  century."
>
>         Rick is in search of "resources which
>  address changing legal ideas (generally reflected by Supreme Court
>  decisions) and their connection to shifts in social, political, and
>  economic priorities," particularly on  the role of the courts in the
> development of womens' rights."
>
>         Well, you've come to the right place.   I may go on too
> long--don't let me bore you.  But having recently written a book on the
> last subject, I'm a little like the ancient mariner.  Let me start by
> responding to the question of women, and, perhaps in another post, address
> the general question that Rick raises.
>
>         Claims for rights often are articulated informally, as part of
> social criticism or in the agendas of social movements.  Sooner or later,
> many of these claims are litigated, and the courts play a major role in
> stabilizing what Americans understand to be their rights.  Americans
> inherited from  England a set of legal practices, sometimes called
> "coverture,"  that confirmed married women's subordination to their
> husbands and were  embedded in the
> old law of domestic relations.  When American women became restive with
> these relationships, they would necessarily have to try to reform the
> law.  That meant they would have to persuade legislatures to change
> statutes, and that also meant they would have to persuade courts to
> interpret old statutes differently.
>
>         That is why so many of the ingredients of the Seneca Falls
> Declaration of Sentiments (1848) included demands for legal change:
>
> --He has made her, if married, in the eye of the law, civilly dead.
> --He has taken from her all right in property, even to the wages she
> earns...
> --He has monopolized nearly all the profitable employments...As a teacher
> of theology, medicine, or law, she is not known.
> --He has denied her the facilities for obtaining a thorough education...
>
>         Even after legislatures changed the statutes, the interpretation
> of those statutes could be a matter of argument, and the arguments have
> often taken place in courts. The Fourteenth Amendment promises "equal
> protection of the laws" to "all persons."  But argument has swirled around
> the question of what "equal protection" as between men and women consists,
> and these questions have often been left to courts to resolve.
>
>         For example, Norma Basch has shown  (In "In
> the Eyes of the Law:  Women, Marriage and Property in Nineteenth Century
> New York," Cornell University Press, 1982) that even after New York state
> passed Married Women's Property Acts in the mid-nineteenth century, courts
> interpreted those statutes very narrowly.   Throughout the country,
> married women's property acts protected primarily property that was given
> to women, or that they earned outside their home  (as teachers, or
> salespeople, etc.) Deep into the 20th century, courts often ruled that
> married women had no right to any earnings for work in the home, like
> taking in boarders or doing laundry.  Those earnings properly belonged to
> her husband.
>
>         Was the right to pursue a legal profession or trade part of
> the promise of equal protection of the laws or one of the
> "privileges and immunities" of citizenship?  Even though Myra Bradwell
> had a thriving enterprise as  editor and publisher of the Chicago
> Legal News, a weekly newspaper on which many relied for its coverage of
> developments in courts and legislatures throughout the country, even
> though she was trained in the law and passed the entrance examinations for
> the Illinois Bar in 1869, and even though the law that gave the state
> supreme court the power to license attorneys did not explicitly exclude
> women,  her application was rejected by the Illinois Supreme Court on the
> grounds that she was a married woman and therefore not a truly free
> agent.  In BRADWELL v. ILLINOIS  (1873) the U.S. Supreme Court
> agreed;  one Justice added his opinion that "The paramount destiny and
> mission of woman are to fulfill the noble and benign offices of wife and
> mother.  This is the law of the Creator."
>
>         Was the right to keep one's birthright citizenship after
> marriage one of the "privileges and immunities" of citizenship?  In
> American practice, stabilized in law in 1907, when a U.S. born man
> married a foreign woman, he automatically conveyed his citizenship to his
> wife.  But the same statute provided that when a U.S.-born women married a
> foreign man she lost her   own citizenship and took on the nationality of
> her husband.  The statute was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in
> MACKENZIE v. HARE  (1915), a decision I believe deserves to be better
> known.   Thousands of U.S.-born women married to German men
> had to register as "alien enemies" once World War I broke out; others were
> rendered stateless.  The decision in MACKENZIE angered suffragists and
> energized them;  as soon as suffrage was accomplished they turned to
> repealing the Citizenship Act of 1907.  But the Cable Act of 1922 left
> many loopholes, particularly for American born women who married aliens
> from China or Japan, and even as the Cable Act was amended, not all the
> changes were made retroactive.    In 1998 the U.S. Supreme Court sustained
> a practice of different rules by which a child born abroad to a
> non-married citizen man or  a non-married citizen woman could claim
> citizenship.  [MILLER v.ALBRIGHT).
>
>                                         ******
>
>         Not so long ago, I believe, we lived through an important
> Constitutional moment.  In 1971, in REED v. REED,  the U.S. Supreme Court
> ruled for the first time that discrimination on the basis of sex might
> be a denial of equal protection of the laws.  It could be said this is the
> first clear affirmative response by the Supreme Court to the challenges
> set in the Seneca Falls Declaration.
>
>         Between 1971 and 1975, in a stunning series of decisions, the
> Supreme Court placed the burden of proof that discrimination on the basis
> of sex was reasonable on those who tried to discriminate.  Ruth Bader
> Ginsburg, who was in 1971 a 38-year old law professor working
> with the Ameican Civil
> Liberties Union, wrote briefs and made the arguments in many of these
> cases.  One of the most striking (and teachable) of these is the complaint
> of Sharron Frontiero, an air force officer who was dismayed to discvoer
> that she could not claim dependent's benefits for her husband on the same
> terms that her male colleagues could for their wives.  The decision in
> FRONTIERO v.RICHARDSON  (1973) is a complex one, in the course of which
> Justice William Brennan reviewed the history of working women in the
> United States, and Justice Powell commented on the need to wait to find
> out whether the public would support the equal rights amendment.
>
>         I could easily go on  (and I will, if our conversations flag or
> folks want me to identify more judicial decisions):  the fascinating pair
> on whether women's names must be put in jury pools on the same terms as
> men's names are  (HOYT v. FLORIDA  1961; TAYLOR v. LOUISIANA, 1975);  ROE
> v. WADE (1973), and its important  successor, PLANNED PARENTHOOD v. CASEY
> (1992), ROSTKER v. GOLDBERG (1981) on military service.
>
>         But this has gone on long enough.  Let me end with a shameless
> advertisement for books in which I have written more on these
> subjects, both of which I'm sure are accessible to AP students, and of
> which you'll be the better judge than I about their accessiblity to
> average students:
>
>         NO CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT TO BE LADIES:  WOMEN AND THE OBLIGATIONS
> OF CITIZENSHIP  (Hill and Wang, 1998,  paperback)
>
>         co-edited with Jane Sherron De Hart: WOMEN'S AMERICA: REFOCUSING
> THE PAST  (Oxford University Press,  2000, paperback)
>
> Linda
=========================================================================
Date:         Tue, 16 May 2000 13:03:40 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Linda Kerber 
Subject:      Teachable Moment: Supreme Court invalidates part of VAWA

Colleagues,

 Today the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a 5-4 decision striking
down the provision in the Violence Against Women Act, passed in 1994, that
permitted victims of rape, domestic violence and other crimes "motivated
by gender" to sue their attackers in federal court.

 The decision, as the New York Times pointed out in today's report
by Linda Greenhouse, raises major questions of state-federal
relations.  It also offers a rich example of continuing debate over the
meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment.  If students still think that the
14th Amendment belongs only in the history of Reconstruction, this is an
opportunity to underline its continuing vitality in our own time.

 Among other things, VAWA had invoked the Constitutional
commerce clause, arguing that the widespread fear of violence inhibited
women from full participation in the national economy, because fear of
injury restricts their movement and reduces employment opportunities for
women.  The majority ruled that this was too broad an interpretation of
the commerce clause.  (They left standing the provision of VAWA that makes
it a federal crime to cross state lines to engage in stalking or domestic
violence.)

 The decision  also raises important questions of the remedies
available  to women victims of violence.    Christy Brzonkala was attacked
by two varsity football players in her dormitory room at Virginia
Polytechnic Institute.  The college found the players guilty of "abusive
conduct" but did not suspend them from school.   Brzonkala accused them of
rape and claimed -- with a degree of irony -- damages equal to the money
that   Virginia Tech had earned from the Sugar Bowl game in which the
athletes played.  When VAWA was being debated in Congress, the Senate
Judiciary Committee drafted a report, arguing that the criminal justice
system in the states often regulated rape and domestic violence in overtly
sex-based ways.  Is  protection against systemic
violence against women a civil right?  Is equal protection from assault
a core violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th
Amendment?   The Court ruled that victims must turn to the states for
redress, not to the federal government.  (36 states had filed briefs
supporting the federal law.)


 Today's New York Times has a fine report on the decision, and well
chosen extracts from the majority opinion (written by Chief Justice
Rehnquist, joined by Justices Sandra Day O'connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony
Kennedy and Clarence Thomas), and the minority opinion by Justice
David Souter, (joined by Justices John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg
and Stephen Breyer.  Justice Breyer also wrote a dissenting
opinion.)

 Only in thirty years ago, in 1971 (Reed v. Reed) did the
U.S. Supreme Court rule for the first time
that different treatment based on gender might be a denial of equal
protection of the laws.  Today's decision shows that  debate continues
over the specifics of what can be understood to be a denial of
equal protection.

Linda
=========================================================================
Date:         Wed, 17 May 2000 16:25:14 EDT
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         JDorinson@AOL.COM
Subject:      Re: Teachable Moment: Supreme Court invalidates part of VAWA
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
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Dear Linda: Thanks for your measured account. Let me add, less tactfully,
that the decision speaks to Mr. Dooley's cutting comment. "The Supreme Cout
follows the 'ilection returns." Clearly, the conservative majority has
spoken. From this vantage, unashamedly liberal, it seems that the electorate
must be heard in '2000. More justices of the Scalia-Thomas axis would be
injurious to men as well as women of good will. Respectfully, Prof. Joe
Dorinson, Dept. of History, Long Island University, Brooklyn Campus
=========================================================================
Date:         Thu, 18 May 2000 11:31:08 EDT
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Cheryl Willis 
Subject:      general interest books
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

Thank you to Prof. Kerber for leading this discussion and all of you who have
participated so far.  This comes at a particularly opportune time for me, as
I am an inexperienced graduate student facing my first teaching assignment
this summer--Constitutional History, of all things, beginning in a few weeks.
 The general focus of this discussion, I understand, is teaching
constitutional issues in survey classes, but I have found it quite helpful in
preparing for my 4000 level class also.

Because the summer course is condensed into a 2 hour/day, 5 day/week, 4 week
session, my advisor recommended finding videos or other material to break up
the lengthy lecture schedule.  Several people suggested a mid-1980s PBS video
series, The Constitution: That Delicate Balance.  I have found some of these
videos quite useful for my purposes, and think they might apply to Rick
Malmstrom's search for resources also.  Since they don't try to provide
comprehensive coverage of issues from the founding to the present, I don't
think their age renders them out-of-date.  The video that deals with
federalism can be easily tied to recent events, of course, by expanding
discussion to include cases such as the one handed down this week.

Since I have no legal background, I am steering away from a "legal history"
or "con law" approach, and am trying to focus more on social implications and
perceptions of constitutional issues, using Michael Les Benedict's Blessings
of Liberty and accompanying source book.  These are extremely brief volumes
(text: 350 pgs; docs: 300 pgs), and might prove useful in survey classes as
supplemental reading, or perhaps as an instructor's guide to integrating
constitutional issues.

I am in the process of compiling a list of suggested books for class
projects, and will try to direct students towards what I think of as "general
interest" books--books in the style of Kerber's No Constitutional Right to be
Ladies and ??? Ross's A Muted Fury: Labor, Populists, and Progressives
Confront the Court.  I like how these books address constitutional issues and
their social contexts without using a stuffy, strict case analysis approach.
The point, after all, is to make it interesting, right??!  Any
recommendations?

I look forward to your suggestions and to further discussion on all of the
topics addressed so far.

Cheryl Willis
=========================================================================
Date:         Thu, 18 May 2000 11:48:16 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         "Weitzel, Ronald" 
Subject:      Re: Linda Kerber's Opening Statement

     The number of responses to Linda Kerber's opening statement suggest
that the teaching of constitutional history is not as dynamic as some of us
would wish.
     I teach Government and Politics to h.s.juniors and have had some
success in getting them interested, especially with respect to civil rights
and liberties.  Two web sites have been particularly useful--
supct.law.cornell.edu and oyez.at.nwu.edu.  Both of those sites offer guides
to traditional Bill of Rights issues, especially first, fourth, and fifth
amendments.  The cases are usually available in their entirety, and range
from historically significant and landmark cases to the most recent cases.
My students find it difficult and challenging to read court opinions.
Digests are also  available.
     Our local paper keeps abreast of current  Sup. Ct. cases and usually
has a good story the day following oral arguments.   In using the news story
students can be shown/taught the constitutional questions at issue and also
asked to take a position and vote as they would do were they a member of the
court.  If we are lucky the Court's actual decision will come down before
the end of the year and we can then go back and review the case in light of
the "official" decision.
      I would also like to bring your attention to two publications.  The
first is a book by Caroline Kennedy and Ellen Alderman, In Our Defense: The
Bill of Rights in Action.  The 10 chapters of this book deal with landmark
cases that made an impact on the interpretation of the  10 amendments.
Chapters 1, 5 and 6 (representing the First, Fifth and Sixth amendments)
each have several court cases used as examples.  I also subscribe to a
publication called Courtroom and Classroom: Current Legal Issues for
Students.  This comes out of St. Paul, MN. and the editor can be reached at
jwsdev@aol.com.  Each issue discusses 3 or 4 very current cases, some at the
Sup. Ct. level, but others from other federal courts and also state courts.
The editor has done an excellent job in digesting the essential
legal/constitutional elements of each case.  He also includes excerpts from
the court opinions.
      I have made the teaching of these cases something of a centerpiece of
my class.  You don't have to go far today to find current controversies over
religion (posting the 10 Commandments on the courthouse wall, and of course
school prayer in all of its guises [student led, etc.]), search and seizure
(can an innocent high school student who runs from the police be stopped and
searched just because he runs?), drug testing for high school students
(athletes), due process and expulsions from high school (as in Decatur, IL),
and others too numerous to mention.  By the end of the school year my
students tend to view the protections of the Bill of Rights much more
broadly when  they are aware  of how pertinent they are to their own lives.
     Finally, there is publication entitled Lessons on the Constitution:
Supplements to High School courses in American History, Government, and
Civics, published by the Social Science Education Consortium, Inc and
Project 87, a joint effort of the AHA and the APSA.  Chapter V of this pub.
discusses 20 Landmark Cases of  the SCt., from Marbury (1803) to US v. Nixon
(1974).  Some of these cases would be available on line in their entirety.
      I strongly support teaching constitutional history and sincerely hope
more teachers can steer away from the traditional textbook approach which
touches lightly if at all on important constitutional issues.  I've enjoy
this forum and look forward to more comments.




> ----------
> From:         Linda K Kerber[SMTP:lkerber@BLUE.WEEG.UIOWA.EDU]
> Reply To:     Forum on the Constitution
> Sent:         Friday, May 12, 2000 2:38 PM
> To:   CONSTITUTION@ASHP.LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU
> Subject:      Re: Linda Kerber's Opening Statement
>
> Colleagues,
>
>         I'm impressed by Carol Schulkin's dynamic "inquiry lesson,"  and
> plan to adopt it myself.  The modification I would recommend is the
> addition of one more date:  1965, the year of a major reform of
> immigration law written from a much more expansive perspective than its
> predecessors.  The statute is Public Law 89236,  79 Statutes at Large 911.
>
> Linda
>
=========================================================================
Date:         Thu, 18 May 2000 15:16:25 -0700
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Garine Zetlian 
Subject:      Incorporating legal history in US history surveys
MIME-Version: 1.0
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              x-mac-creator="4D4F5353"
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Hello Linda and fellow legal history fans:
I want to introduce myself before sharing some of my thoughts on the topic that
brings us together.
My name is Garine Zetlian and I teach AP United States History at the
Polytechnic School, an independent college preparatory school in Pasadena,
California. For the past three summers I have taught "Law and Politics in US
History" for the Johns Hopkins University Center for Talented Youth. And next
year, I will also be teaching two senior electives: AP American Government and
Current Constitutional Issues.
I am a very big fan of the integration of constitutional issues into the general
survey of US history. I have tried to do this for the past 11 years of my
teaching, with varying degrees of success. I have found that students respond to
the issues better if there is an ongoing discussion of current constitutional or
legal debates in my classroom. These past 2 years, I have been very lucky:
impeachment trial, elections, involvement in Kosovo and the circumvention of the
war powers act, Elian Gonzalez, the Boy Scout case, the revisiting of the
Miranda case, and most recently the strike against a section of the Violence
Against Women Act. As I discuss these in class (through news and opinion
articles), I find that students are more responsive when we get to, let's say,
ex parte Milligan.
I have found that the most difficult issues for students to understand are:
federalism and the issue of states' rights, and the interpretations of the 14th
Amendment since its ratification. Especially difficult are cases when such
issues overlap (for example in civil rights cases). The other issue that is
difficult for students is the difference between a loose interpretation of the
Constitution and a strict, conservative one. Yet another area of difficulty is,
as one student put it in an essay, "how in the world did these justices live
with themselves after Plessy?" It is difficult for them to find the High Court
"guilty" of things that are considered illegal or unconstitutional today.
Part of the problem is that the AP US history textbooks are thin on legal
history. Most of them try to cater to the AP Exam which stresses political,
social, and cultural history. My school uses Paul Boyer's Enduring Vision, which
is solid and effective on social history but weak on political issues and
extremely weak on legal history. The references are made as an amendment is
ratified or a landmark case is ruled on. And then, you are lucky if you get a
line. And that line is not explained. Linda, I would love to be able to send you
a sampling for your review.
Having said that, I feel that I am still doing this integration piecemeal: I
raise the issues as they come up in the chronology. Sometimes I do debates. Some
students really enjoy those but I feel they are more interested in the
performance aspect of the exercise than the constitutinal issue the exercise
revolves around. The same with mock trials. I still find them useful though,
because they are exposed to the issues. One activity that has proven to be very
useful is the following: I give students cases which have provided varying
interpretations to a given amendment and I ask them to trace the evolution of
the Court's opinion and explain the circumstances that led to these differences.
However, I would like to find a way of better integrating this aspect of US
history and preparing students who are better informed and more engaged
citizens.

I want to hear your thoughts, suggestions for planning and resources, and
activities.
Thank you for having created this forum.

Garine Zetlian
Polytechnic School
Pasadena, California
=========================================================================
Date:         Thu, 18 May 2000 19:02:09 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         susan Maynor 
Subject:      The Constitution

I teach US History to 11th graders.  I have  problems in teaching the
Constitution as a separate chapter, and then as has been mentioned,
mentioning various cases or amendments.  I think teaching the course around
the Consftitution is interesting.
If there is anyone ou there who has suggestions as to how to do this,
please share your ideas.  My system has end of course testing for US
History, but if done right, I think it could bring renewed interest to this
wonderful document.
PLEASE, any ideas??
=========================================================================
Date:         Fri, 19 May 2000 12:52:43 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         "Linda K. Kerber" 
Subject:      Re: Incorporating legal history in US history surveys
In-Reply-To:  <39246BBA.1C135FAA@polytechnic.org>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

Colleagues,

        We can all be grateful for Ronald Weitzel's wonderful list of sources.
Oyez@nwu.edu is an invigorating site that includes the oral arguments
before the U.S. Supreme Court.    Ideas that sound abstract on paper take
on life when we hear them  actually argued before the Court, with Justices
interrupting the lawyers to ask their own questions, and lawyers having to
improvise on the spot.

        As for accessible, readable books, two by Anthony Lewis -- GIDEON'S
TRUMPET  (newly relevant as the Supreme Court revisited Miranda) and MAKE
NO LAW (on the Pentagon Papers) stick in my college students' memories when
they read them in high school.  Melton McLaurin's CELIA, a narrative of the
trial of an enslaved woman who probably killed her master/rapist in
pre-Civil War Missouri, is a book I use often.  Students are surprised to
find a serious attorney prepared to press a slave system to abide by the
rule of law.

        Garine Zetlian raises rich questions to which  I hope many on the Forum
will respond.    She is right that students -- indeed, most of us -- think
of civil liberties issues when we think of Constitutional history;  that it
is harder to teach some of the issues that are central to the main text of
the Constitution, such as federalism and the separation of powers.  Indeed,
I am told that in 1987, when many states held competitions for student
essays on the Constitution, virtually all the students chose to write about
Bill of Rights issues, even though the bicentennial of the Bill of Rights
was still two years away!

        Garine makes the point that textbooks are often solid in social history
and weak on legal history;  the reverse is also true -- books that offer
themselves as legal histories are often abstract on the law and weak in
social history!  The fallacy is the assumption that the cases arise on
their own rather than out of the lived experience of defendants,
plaintiffs, attorneys, judges, and the legislators who made the laws by
which  what is legal and what is illegal is measured.

More soon.  I'm learning a lot from this and enjoying it immensely.


Linda
=========================================================================
Date:         Sat, 20 May 2000 10:26:50 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Richard Lee Matthews 
Subject:      The Constitution and other matters

In the public schools especially, a paradox exists concerning the teaching
of America's founding and other aspects of American history. For instance,
just how "reverential" do we make America's story, yet still retaining some
semblance of actuality?  Even some present-day scholars of the Early
American period are from the "reverentialist school" of interpretation.
This school dates back to the days of David Ramsay early on, and George
Bancroft later. Prominent historian Gordon S. Wood in his award winning
book, "The Radicalism of the American Revolution"(1991,1993--), makes the
statement that "All Americans believed in the Revolution and its
goals"(230). But did they really believe this, and how could a university
scholar make such a blanket statement?  He also writes that "Equality was
in fact the most radical and most powerful ideological force let loose in
the Revolution"(232).

We can tell our students this, but should we also tell them that the
very "tyrannical government" we Americans deposed, that being the British,
allowed "equality" sooner than we did? England abolished slavery in its
remaining colonies in 1834, thirty-one years before the "enlightened"
government of the United States did. Also in the same year, Britain
reformed child labor laws. In August,1838, "The People's Charter" calling
for universal suffrage without property qualifications was very nearly
approved. Also, women in Britain and some other European countries were
granted the right to vote before those in the United States.

Gordon Wood, other historians, and consequently, history textbook
publishers, apparently confuse the act of proclaiming equality with the
process of achieving it. The Founding Fathers may have rhetorically
espoused the idea of universal equality, but did not believe in it enough
to provide IMMEDIATE provisions for it.  Major segments of the American
population remained in literal and political bondage for decades, including
Blacks, Native Americans, and Women.

America is a great nation, and as a "people" we American's have achieved
great things. But this does not mean that this has always been true; we
have many unpleasantries in our past that have been camouflaged and glossed
over during the past two centuries. Students realize this, and perhaps one
reason many of them dislike history is because they know there was more to
America's past than the reverential version they have been "force-fed."

If we allow our love of America as it is today, to cloud our teaching of
what actually happened in its past, then we are practicing pure relativism,
and as we have been told since the days of Beard and Becker, relativism is
a taboo concept among the "keepers of the history."
=========================================================================
Date:         Sun, 21 May 2000 11:39:15 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         jsawyer 
Subject:      Re: CONSTITUTION Digest - 19 May 2000 to 20 May 2000 (#2000-15)
MIME-version: 1.0
Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT

Richard Lee Matthews, et al.,

I find this statement troubling.

"Gordon Wood, other historians, and consequently, history textbook publishers,
apparently confuse the act of proclaiming equality with the
process of achieving it. The Founding Fathers may have rhetorically
espoused the idea of universal equality, but did not believe in it enough
to provide IMMEDIATE provisions for it. Major segments of the American
population remained in literal and political bondage for decades, including
Blacks, Native Americans, and Women."

I beleive it seeks to measure the beliefs and actions of people living in the
1780s and 1790s against your view of perfection rather than against realistic
historical alternatives (e.g., European societies, other colonial empires) or
genuinely comparative realties (asian societies).

I suspect it's a good idea to help students of our "founding era" understand
the importance of political and moral ideals, but also to come to grips with
their contexts and limitations, not to mention rhetorical exploitation.

Jeffrey Sawyer
Legal, Ethical & Historical Studies
University of Baltimore








>===== Original Message From Forum on the Constitution
 =====
>There is one message totalling 50 lines in this issue.
>
>Topics of the day:
>
>  1. The Constitution and other matters
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>Date:    Sat, 20 May 2000 10:26:50 -0400
>From:    Richard Lee Matthews 
>Subject: The Constitution and other matters
>
>In the public schools especially, a paradox exists concerning the teaching
>of America's founding and other aspects of American history. For instance,
>just how "reverential" do we make America's story, yet still retaining some
>semblance of actuality?  Even some present-day scholars of the Early
>American period are from the "reverentialist school" of interpretation.
>This school dates back to the days of David Ramsay early on, and George
>Bancroft later. Prominent historian Gordon S. Wood in his award winning
>book, "The Radicalism of the American Revolution"(1991,1993--), makes the
>statement that "All Americans believed in the Revolution and its
>goals"(230). But did they really believe this, and how could a university
>scholar make such a blanket statement?  He also writes that "Equality was
>in fact the most radical and most powerful ideological force let loose in
>the Revolution"(232).
>
>We can tell our students this, but should we also tell them that the
>very "tyrannical government" we Americans deposed, that being the British,
>allowed "equality" sooner than we did? England abolished slavery in its
>remaining colonies in 1834, thirty-one years before the "enlightened"
>government of the United States did. Also in the same year, Britain
>reformed child labor laws. In August,1838, "The People's Charter" calling
>for universal suffrage without property qualifications was very nearly
>approved. Also, women in Britain and some other European countries were
>granted the right to vote before those in the United States.
>
>Gordon Wood, other historians, and consequently, history textbook
>publishers, apparently confuse the act of proclaiming equality with the
>process of achieving it. The Founding Fathers may have rhetorically
>espoused the idea of universal equality, but did not believe in it enough
>to provide IMMEDIATE provisions for it.  Major segments of the American
>population remained in literal and political bondage for decades, including
>Blacks, Native Americans, and Women.
>
>America is a great nation, and as a "people" we American's have achieved
>great things. But this does not mean that this has always been true; we
>have many unpleasantries in our past that have been camouflaged and glossed
>over during the past two centuries. Students realize this, and perhaps one
>reason many of them dislike history is because they know there was more to
>America's past than the reverential version they have been "force-fed."
>
>If we allow our love of America as it is today, to cloud our teaching of
>what actually happened in its past, then we are practicing pure relativism,
>and as we have been told since the days of Beard and Becker, relativism is
>a taboo concept among the "keepers of the history."
>
>------------------------------
>
>End of CONSTITUTION Digest - 19 May 2000 to 20 May 2000 (#2000-15)
>******************************************************************
=========================================================================
Date:         Sun, 21 May 2000 10:18:22 -0700
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Robert Cooksey 
Subject:      Re: general interest books
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

I recently read the letter from soon to be Professor
Willis concerning the Constitutional History...Youa
sked for suggestions...I know that summer classes
often restrict time, etc.; but I was reminded of a
course that I took several years ago that dealt with
Constitutional history...perhaps you might like the
idea...

The professor broke the class into small groups, and
each group was responsible for taking a position in
one of the many serious Constitutional issues that we
covered (i.e. Federalist anti-Federalist, state
rights, etc.) and to debate these issues for the
class.
In doing so, students were forced to really think
about the constitutional issues at stake and the
relevance of past precedents and future goals. I found
it incredibly helpful in getting to the deeper issues
below the rhetoric...

Hope your class excites many...including yourself.

Robert Cooksey
New College


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=========================================================================
Date:         Sun, 21 May 2000 15:48:54 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         "Robert J. Safransky" 
Subject:      Re: CONSTITUTION Digest - 19 May 2000 to 20 May 2000 (#2000-15)
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If you are looking for ideas on how to teach American Government - try
www.socialstudies.com which is the School Social Studies Service page.  When you
get to the page you will find links like - Constitutional Rights Foundation Web
Lessons - www.crf-usa.org or click on the U.S. Government Lesson Plans - several
teachers have their course outlines in great detail on the site - when you read
the announcement about the course pages there are three interactive quizzes that
you may take and find out what your score is and what the correct answers are.
When you get the School Social Studies Service Page up you will find there are
approximately 84 links with 20 per page - the links are worth looking at -
Think this site is a great one for sharing teaching ideas.

jsawyer wrote:

> Richard Lee Matthews, et al.,
>
> I find this statement troubling.
>
> "Gordon Wood, other historians, and consequently, history textbook publishers,
> apparently confuse the act of proclaiming equality with the
> process of achieving it. The Founding Fathers may have rhetorically
> espoused the idea of universal equality, but did not believe in it enough
> to provide IMMEDIATE provisions for it. Major segments of the American
> population remained in literal and political bondage for decades, including
> Blacks, Native Americans, and Women."
>
> I beleive it seeks to measure the beliefs and actions of people living in the
> 1780s and 1790s against your view of perfection rather than against realistic
> historical alternatives (e.g., European societies, other colonial empires) or
> genuinely comparative realties (asian societies).
>
> I suspect it's a good idea to help students of our "founding era" understand
> the importance of political and moral ideals, but also to come to grips with
> their contexts and limitations, not to mention rhetorical exploitation.
>
> Jeffrey Sawyer
> Legal, Ethical & Historical Studies
> University of Baltimore
>
> >===== Original Message From Forum on the Constitution
>  =====
> >There is one message totalling 50 lines in this issue.
> >
> >Topics of the day:
> >
> >  1. The Constitution and other matters
> >
> >----------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> >Date:    Sat, 20 May 2000 10:26:50 -0400
> >From:    Richard Lee Matthews 
> >Subject: The Constitution and other matters
> >
> >In the public schools especially, a paradox exists concerning the teaching
> >of America's founding and other aspects of American history. For instance,
> >just how "reverential" do we make America's story, yet still retaining some
> >semblance of actuality?  Even some present-day scholars of the Early
> >American period are from the "reverentialist school" of interpretation.
> >This school dates back to the days of David Ramsay early on, and George
> >Bancroft later. Prominent historian Gordon S. Wood in his award winning
> >book, "The Radicalism of the American Revolution"(1991,1993--), makes the
> >statement that "All Americans believed in the Revolution and its
> >goals"(230). But did they really believe this, and how could a university
> >scholar make such a blanket statement?  He also writes that "Equality was
> >in fact the most radical and most powerful ideological force let loose in
> >the Revolution"(232).
> >
> >We can tell our students this, but should we also tell them that the
> >very "tyrannical government" we Americans deposed, that being the British,
> >allowed "equality" sooner than we did? England abolished slavery in its
> >remaining colonies in 1834, thirty-one years before the "enlightened"
> >government of the United States did. Also in the same year, Britain
> >reformed child labor laws. In August,1838, "The People's Charter" calling
> >for universal suffrage without property qualifications was very nearly
> >approved. Also, women in Britain and some other European countries were
> >granted the right to vote before those in the United States.
> >
> >Gordon Wood, other historians, and consequently, history textbook
> >publishers, apparently confuse the act of proclaiming equality with the
> >process of achieving it. The Founding Fathers may have rhetorically
> >espoused the idea of universal equality, but did not believe in it enough
> >to provide IMMEDIATE provisions for it.  Major segments of the American
> >population remained in literal and political bondage for decades, including
> >Blacks, Native Americans, and Women.
> >
> >America is a great nation, and as a "people" we American's have achieved
> >great things. But this does not mean that this has always been true; we
> >have many unpleasantries in our past that have been camouflaged and glossed
> >over during the past two centuries. Students realize this, and perhaps one
> >reason many of them dislike history is because they know there was more to
> >America's past than the reverential version they have been "force-fed."
> >
> >If we allow our love of America as it is today, to cloud our teaching of
> >what actually happened in its past, then we are practicing pure relativism,
> >and as we have been told since the days of Beard and Becker, relativism is
> >a taboo concept among the "keepers of the history."
> >
> >------------------------------
> >
> >End of CONSTITUTION Digest - 19 May 2000 to 20 May 2000 (#2000-15)
> >******************************************************************
=========================================================================
Date:         Sun, 21 May 2000 16:21:01 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         susan Maynor 
Subject:      Obligation

As a teacher of US History I feel an obligation to my students to teach.
America is no different than anyother country, we have had and will
continue to have problems.  Of course the negative aspects of our history
need to be taught.  Don't shortchange the students.  They have opinions and
are more than willing to share their ideas and opinions on history.  What
good do we do if history is not taught as it happened?  What do we expect
this generation to know, only pc history?  Shame on us in the education
field.
You don't have to tell students about the evils of the Europeans on Indians
or on Africans, they already know all about it.  What we have to do is make
sure they understand why it happened, so that it wont happen again.  Our
Constitution is a wonderful, living document.  It speaks for itself.  The
Constitution did not come into being easily.  Our history has been one of
good and bad, but we have survived.  I am not a flag waving person, but I
think if we teach history or government, we have an obligation, no, a duty
to teach it as it happened.
=========================================================================
Date:         Sun, 21 May 2000 18:34:20 EDT
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         MurphyMo@AOL.COM
Subject:      Re: CONSTITUTION Digest - 19 May 2000 to 20 May 2000 (#2000-15)
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As an American history teacher, I teach the reality of what life was like in
the different eras of our history.  I try to show ethnic issues and gender
issues as they were. The constitution really becomes stronger as the years go
by as the rights of all people become a reality. I think it is a blessing we
have such a fine instrument that finally through the court system, laws and
amendments, becomes more inclusive.

But the interpretation of the Constitution changes as America changes.  I
think American History is ever changing yet we need to remember the mind set
of those who lead our country or who sat on the Supreme Court to see why the
rights, that so many students take for granted today, had to be won over the
years.

I do not think we should always hold the English up as heroes while we are
villains.  The English made large amounts of money on slave trade.  They
treated their colonials, though not enslaved, as second class citizens. While
the French intermarried with the Native Americans, the English kept their
distance.  Aren't the English the people who kept India from becoming free
when they were ready to do so?  Aren't the English the people who let over a
million Irish die during the potato famine and sent ships of sick people to
the United States from Ireland where children without living parents were
left on the docks of a foreign country to fend for themselves?  The
industrial revolution occurred first in England, so the labor laws were
written there first but it doesn't mean they did not go through the same
adjustments in family and society as we did.

I think this country, as far as the rights of the individual is concerned, is
getting better. But I teach my students that they need to guard and protect
those rights.  I teach them that if anyone's rights in this country is
denied, then all of our rights are in jeopardy.

 And I think while we need to be honest about our history, we do not need to
be ashamed that we are Americans in the year 2000 nor of our country's
history.  It is one of growth and sometimes painful development and hopefully
we will continue to grow but as we do there will inevitably be more growing
pains.

History is what it is and we must reconcile with the fact that we can't
change history but without it we cannot understand who we are today nor
decide who we will be tomorrow.


Maureen Murphy
Hoover High
Des Moines, Iowa
=========================================================================
Date:         Wed, 24 May 2000 12:24:33 -0400
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Deborah Barnes 
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I have asked to be dropped from this listserve and was told that I was.
Please take me off.
Lifting as we climb,

                        Dr. Deborah H. Barnes
Associate Professor of English          Vice President, Toni Morrison Society
Gettysburg College
(717) 337-6759
dbarnes@gettysburg.edu
=========================================================================
Date:         Wed, 24 May 2000 23:16:12 EDT
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         HSJHATCH@AOL.COM
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please take me off of this listserv.
=========================================================================
Date:         Thu, 25 May 2000 12:03:21 -0500
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Linda K Kerber 
Subject:      Constitutional History as the history of ethical choices
In-Reply-To:  
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Dear Colleagues,

        I'm sorry to have been out of touch so long.  The weekend was
interrupted by the birth of our first grandchild!  Somehow I couldn't
focus on anything else, and I know you will understand.

        Richard Lee Mathews' post of May 20, and the respondents to it --
Jeffrey Sawyer and Maureen Murphy -- raise some powerful moral questions
that face all teachers, and especially, I suppose, those of us who teach
the history our own own nation to students who inhabit that nation
(which is to say that in the abstract these questions are shared by those
who teach the history of, say, France to French students or the history of
Japan to Japanese students).   Against those who believe that the primary
outcome of historical study should be national pride are those who
understand historical study to be an opportunity to analyse choices that
people made in the past, of seeking to understand politics, social
movements, literary imagination, war, illness and death, in all their
human -- tragic, comic, heroic, cowardly -- complexity.   As we teach
history we are also teaching citizenship, and it's in the tension between
the two  that anxieties emerge.

        To lock our understanding of the meaning of the American
Revolution into the binary opposites of "freedom" vs. "tyranny,"  or
"hierarchy" vs. "equality" is to deny ourselves the opportunity to ask the
most challenging questions. It's true that the stories of the
revolutionary generation -- the midnight ride of Paul Revere, John Hancock
signing his  name so large that King George could read it without
spectacles -- have become our basic lessons in
citizenship.  But these stories are also legends, and they do not
encourage critical questions.

        Some of these questions are philosophical:  How best can
people put limits on power and authority?  How can a person be understood
to be free and yet at the same time subject to law and to constraint?

        Others are historical:  Why did the least-taxed people in the
Western world make a revolution about a modest increase in taxes?  Is the
American Revolution best understood as a conservative or a radical
upheaval?  What did they mean when they claimed equality but sustained a
system of hierarchy in relations between master and slave, master and
indentured servant, husband and wife?    How did a disparate set of newly
independent states stabilize their revolution and create a lasting
nation?  Was the nation they  established actually stable, or did it take
the Civil War -- as Thurgood Marshall observed some years ago -- to
complete its agenda?

        Some questions are comparative:  What goals did Americans share
with other radicals in an international Age of Democratic
Revolution?   To what extent were their challenges easier  (it was far
easier for the French crown to exercise authority in Paris than for the
British crown to exercise authority in, say, Philadelphia or New
York).  To what extent did they attempt less  (Jacobins attacked
slavery).  How did U.S. revolutionaries deal with the system of slavery
in their midst as compared, say, to revolutionaries in Argentina?

        Richard Matthews' statement should be read with some caution.  The
suffrage that was granted to women in Great Britain before 1920 was
limited;  Britain did not grant complete woman suffrage until
1928.  Moreover, many states had granted U.S. women the right to vote, and
often to sit on juries and hold office, well before 1920.  Indeed it seems
probably that the members of Congress who already had women in their
constituencies were crucial in providing the votes for the Nineteenth
Amendment in 1920.

                                *****

        At the risk of making a long posting even longer, let me add a
thought about teaching strategies that is prompted by the last paragraph.
So far most of our conversation about teaching legal and constitutional
history has taken up matters from a national vantage point.  But there is
great opportunity in local and state legal and constitutional
history.  Indeed, so much remains unexplored that serious high school
students have a chance of making real contributions to our knowledge.

        For example, the U.S. Supreme Court has not yet ruled in an
expansive way that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is a
denial of equal protection of the laws.  Currently, the claim to
equal protection for gays and lesbians is grounded in municipal ordinances
and the interpretations of some state courts.  If ultimately the Supreme
Court expands its narrow ruling in ROMER, these municipal ordinances will
have had a lot to do with it.  Yet almost no one has studied the history
of these ordinances.  A sophomore in one of my classes decised to write a
paper on Iowa City's ordinance, passed by the City Council some ten years
ago.  She found that even those who had been members of the Council at the
time had only the vaguest memories of the arguments that had been made at
the time, of the choices made in drafting the ordinance.  No one had any
clue about how the Iowa City ordinance compared to its counterparts
elsewhere.  That was left for the sophomore to figure out, and she did it
brilliantly.

        Opportunities exist for students to work on local questions
earlier in the century as well.

        Long before PLESSY, black men and women claimed
access to public conveyances: many  stories of these challenges remain to
be written.  Long after the Supreme Court ruled, in 1897 (STRAUDER v. WEST
VIRGINIA) that it was illegal to exclude people from jury service on the
basis of race, juries in many regions firmly excluded African
Americans; what happened in your locality?   In many states women voted in
school board or municipal elections long before they could vote in state
or national elections.  Who has studied their participation in these
elections, or their elected public service even before they had the right
to  vote?  When Puerto Rican women attempted to register to vote in 1920,
the U.S. Bureau of Insular Affairs decided that the Nineteenth Amendment
did not automatically apply to U.S. territories.  Not until 1935 was
universal suffrage established in Puerto Rico.  Students who read
Spanish will have a special advantage in writing about this history.

I look forward to your responses, and especially to hearing examples of
local history projects that you have found productive.

Linda
=========================================================================
Date:         Thu, 25 May 2000 15:00:10 -0700
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         fe baran 
Subject:      On the birth of your grandchild
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

I'm a reader of history and a teachers' fan, and I've
been following your interesting discussions.  I'd like
to say what an excellent moderator you are and I'm
sure a great grandma as well.  Congratulations!

Fe Baran

=====
f_baran@yahoo.com

for Charlie Brown & his friends...

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Kick off your party with Yahoo! Invites.
http://invites.yahoo.com/
=========================================================================
Date:         Thu, 25 May 2000 15:13:41 -0500
Reply-To:     joeberry@igc.org
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         joeberry 
Subject:      Re: Constitutional History as the history of ethical choices
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I would just like to comment on a little part of Linda's remarks. Regarding
the abolition of slavery (Jacobins opposed, et al) my impression, perhaps
wrong, is that the places in the Western Hemisphere where the independence
struggle was led by European settlers, as opposed to either the indigineous or
the slaves, or mixed race folks, anti-slavery was not part of their agenda, no
matter what their political allies in Europe might have said there. Haiti is
the example that comes to mind, where slavery was only abolished when the
struggle became more than and jacobin-royalist fight among whites and became a
slave insurrection. The contradictions that need to be illuminated here for
our students (I teach community college US history and labor education) are
vast, as Linda noted.  Is the US revolution more like the Boer War than some
later national liberation struggles?However, these later fights made great use
of the rhetorical precedents of the US struggle, especially the Declaration of
Independence, the Constitution less so. Reactions?

Joe Berry

Linda K Kerber wrote:
>
> Dear Colleagues,
>
>         I'm sorry to have been out of touch so long.  The weekend was
> interrupted by the birth of our first grandchild!  Somehow I couldn't
> focus on anything else, and I know you will understand.
>
>         Richard Lee Mathews' post of May 20, and the respondents to it --
> Jeffrey Sawyer and Maureen Murphy -- raise some powerful moral questions
> that face all teachers, and especially, I suppose, those of us who teach
> the history our own own nation to students who inhabit that nation
> (which is to say that in the abstract these questions are shared by those
> who teach the history of, say, France to French students or the history of
> Japan to Japanese students).   Against those who believe that the primary
> outcome of historical study should be national pride are those who
> understand historical study to be an opportunity to analyse choices that
> people made in the past, of seeking to understand politics, social
> movements, literary imagination, war, illness and death, in all their
> human -- tragic, comic, heroic, cowardly -- complexity.   As we teach
> history we are also teaching citizenship, and it's in the tension between
> the two  that anxieties emerge.
>
>         To lock our understanding of the meaning of the American
> Revolution into the binary opposites of "freedom" vs. "tyranny,"  or
> "hierarchy" vs. "equality" is to deny ourselves the opportunity to ask the
> most challenging questions. It's true that the stories of the
> revolutionary generation -- the midnight ride of Paul Revere, John Hancock
> signing his  name so large that King George could read it without
> spectacles -- have become our basic lessons in
> citizenship.  But these stories are also legends, and they do not
> encourage critical questions.
>
>         Some of these questions are philosophical:  How best can
> people put limits on power and authority?  How can a person be understood
> to be free and yet at the same time subject to law and to constraint?
>
>         Others are historical:  Why did the least-taxed people in the
> Western world make a revolution about a modest increase in taxes?  Is the
> American Revolution best understood as a conservative or a radical
> upheaval?  What did they mean when they claimed equality but sustained a
> system of hierarchy in relations between master and slave, master and
> indentured servant, husband and wife?    How did a disparate set of newly
> independent states stabilize their revolution and create a lasting
> nation?  Was the nation they  established actually stable, or did it take
> the Civil War -- as Thurgood Marshall observed some years ago -- to
> complete its agenda?
>
>         Some questions are comparative:  What goals did Americans share
> with other radicals in an international Age of Democratic
> Revolution?   To what extent were their challenges easier  (it was far
> easier for the French crown to exercise authority in Paris than for the
> British crown to exercise authority in, say, Philadelphia or New
> York).  To what extent did they attempt less  (Jacobins attacked
> slavery).  How did U.S. revolutionaries deal with the system of slavery
> in their midst as compared, say, to revolutionaries in Argentina?
>
>         Richard Matthews' statement should be read with some caution.  The
> suffrage that was granted to women in Great Britain before 1920 was
> limited;  Britain did not grant complete woman suffrage until
> 1928.  Moreover, many states had granted U.S. women the right to vote, and
> often to sit on juries and hold office, well before 1920.  Indeed it seems
> probably that the members of Congress who already had women in their
> constituencies were crucial in providing the votes for the Nineteenth
> Amendment in 1920.
>
>                                 *****
>
>         At the risk of making a long posting even longer, let me add a
> thought about teaching strategies that is prompted by the last paragraph.
> So far most of our conversation about teaching legal and constitutional
> history has taken up matters from a national vantage point.  But there is
> great opportunity in local and state legal and constitutional
> history.  Indeed, so much remains unexplored that serious high school
> students have a chance of making real contributions to our knowledge.
>
>         For example, the U.S. Supreme Court has not yet ruled in an
> expansive way that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation is a
> denial of equal protection of the laws.  Currently, the claim to
> equal protection for gays and lesbians is grounded in municipal ordinances
> and the interpretations of some state courts.  If ultimately the Supreme
> Court expands its narrow ruling in ROMER, these municipal ordinances will
> have had a lot to do with it.  Yet almost no one has studied the history
> of these ordinances.  A sophomore in one of my classes decised to write a
> paper on Iowa City's ordinance, passed by the City Council some ten years
> ago.  She found that even those who had been members of the Council at the
> time had only the vaguest memories of the arguments that had been made at
> the time, of the choices made in drafting the ordinance.  No one had any
> clue about how the Iowa City ordinance compared to its counterparts
> elsewhere.  That was left for the sophomore to figure out, and she did it
> brilliantly.
>
>         Opportunities exist for students to work on local questions
> earlier in the century as well.
>
>         Long before PLESSY, black men and women claimed
> access to public conveyances: many  stories of these challenges remain to
> be written.  Long after the Supreme Court ruled, in 1897 (STRAUDER v. WEST
> VIRGINIA) that it was illegal to exclude people from jury service on the
> basis of race, juries in many regions firmly excluded African
> Americans; what happened in your locality?   In many states women voted in
> school board or municipal elections long before they could vote in state
> or national elections.  Who has studied their participation in these
> elections, or their elected public service even before they had the right
> to  vote?  When Puerto Rican women attempted to register to vote in 1920,
> the U.S. Bureau of Insular Affairs decided that the Nineteenth Amendment
> did not automatically apply to U.S. territories.  Not until 1935 was
> universal suffrage established in Puerto Rico.  Students who read
> Spanish will have a special advantage in writing about this history.
>
> I look forward to your responses, and especially to hearing examples of
> local history projects that you have found productive.
>
> Linda

--
Joe T. Berry
1444 W Taylor St. #3B
Chicago, IL 60607
Phone/fax: 312-733-2172
E-mail: joeberry@igc.org
=========================================================================
Date:         Mon, 29 May 2000 12:46:51 -0500
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Linda K Kerber 
Subject:      Re: Constitutional History as the history of ethical choices
Comments: To: joeberry 
In-Reply-To:  <392D8971.28DE0C02@igc.org>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII

Dear Colleagues,

        Joe Berry calls us to attend to key central issues in the
Revolutionary era, and especially to important ironies and
complexities.  Getting students to struggle with these matters seems to me
of great importance;  it's where they learn not to jump to easy
conclusions; to understand that good and evil exist simultaneously; and to
understand that contemporary issues rest on complex historical
experiences.

        He is right to say that slaves could not rely on European settlers
to make anti-slavery central to their political agenda.  And he is right,
I think, to point to Haiti as the example that challenged the U.S. to take
a position on whether democratic revolution was for whites only.  [I have
long admired Michael Zuckerman's essay:  "The Power of
Blackness:  Thomas Jefferson and the Revolution in St. Domingue."  It's
included in his collection of essays,  ALMOST CHOSEN PEOPLE (University of
California Press, 1993) and deserves to be better known.  Zuckerman
emphasizes how much support Toussaint L'Ouverture got from people we think
of as conservatives --  Federalist merchants and the Federalist
administration in the late 1790s, and how quickly that support evaporated
when Jefferson, who could not countenance black revolutionaries,  became
President.  Zuckerman sees a great irony here; when Napoleon gave up on
the task of suppressing St. Domingo, he no longer could imagine a great
French empire in the western hemisphere, and cut his losses by selling
Louisiana to the United States.  Had the U.S. supported a war of
liberation in Haiti, it is unlikely it would have been able to acquire
Louisiana.]

        At least since 1913, when Charles Beard's ECONOMIC INTERPRETATION
OF THE CONSTITUTION linked support for the Constitution with the Founders'
economic self-interest, historians have understood the Revolution to have
involved class interests as well as political theory.  Revolutionaries
take the risks of violence largely because they understand their own
self-interest to be at stake.  The sad irony of American politics in the
early republic  is that although  the language of equality and freedom was
expanded [and the petitions of slaves to the Massachusetts legislature
show clearly that slaves got the point] the Revolution was stabilized in
large part by solidifying the system of slavery -- embedding the
three-fifths Compromise and the Fugitive Slave Clause in the Constitution.

        Joe Berry is right to say that that slaves could not  rely
on European settlers to make anti-slavery central to their agenda.  There
are, of course, individuals who manumitted their own slaves; there is
always the example of the Massachusetts court that ruled in the Quok
Walker case in 1783 that "the idea of slavery is inconsistent with our own
conduct and Constitution."   Slaves found that advocates of "freedom and
democracy" generally offered less than the British. Lord Dunmore
raised an "Ethiopian Regiment" 800 strong in Virginia.  And the British
sea lift of fugitive slaves offered the only opportunity in the entire
pre-Civil War period for substantial numbers of slave families to escape
(both before and after the war, runaways were overwhelmingly men without
their children.)  Slaves used the war and its aftermath to construct their
own freedom by flight to the British, by purchasing their own freedom, or
by serving with the patriot army. (This last strategy usually but not
always resulted in freedom.)

        But slavery persisted as a system in the North
as well as the South.  Gradual manumission laws in some northern states
meant that parents might be freed but their children would remain
indentured servants until they reached their mid-twenties;  this was the
experience of Sojourner Truth.  [The opening chapters of Nell Painter's
SOJOURNER TRUTH: A LIFE, A SYMBOL (Norton, 1996) are a rich description of
slavery as experienced in revolutionary-era New York; also Shane White,
SOMEWHAT MORE INDEPENDENT:  THE END OF SLAVERY IN NEW YORK CITY,
1770-1810, (Univ. of Georgia Press, 1991).]  Once manumitted, freedom for
blacks was not the same as freedom for whites:  the Naturalization Law of
1790 welcomed as citizens only free white persons.  Although some northern
states permitted black men to vote they often had limitations that did not
apply to whites (e.g. in New York black men had to satisfy a property
requirement long after it had been dropped for whites.)  And although the
Northwest Ordinance forbade slavery, masters brought slaves into the free
territories of Ohio, Indiana and illinois and quickly turned them into
indentured servants, vulnerable to punishments that included
whipping;  Illinois enforced such indentures until 1850.

        Part III,  "Slave and Free:  The Revolutionary Generations" of Ira
Berlin's MANY THOUSANDS GONE  (Harvard University Press, 1998) is a good
place to go for an overview of the impact of the Revolution on slavery.

        That European settlers had broken from the British Empire did not
mean they were unwilling to develop an empire of their own.  They spoke
often of an "Empire for Liberty" and enacted it by expanding rule over
Indian peoples.  [Francis' Jennings' forthcoming THE CREATION OF
AMERICA: THROUGH REVOLUTION TO EMPIRE (Cambridge University Press,
2000) will make this case forcefully.

        Yet the defense of slavery was deeply shaken in theory by
the Revolution's egalitarian principle, and the institution of
slavery was shaken in practice when blacks took advantage of the
disruptions of the war.  Future wars of national liberation and
democratic revolution, as Joe Berry reminds us, have found in the ideology
of the Revolution strong grounds for making claims of their own.

        This contradiction is at the heart of the story of the founding of
the United States.  It raises questions that remain central to how
democracy and equality are experienced in the present.  The current
discussion of reparations for slavery is an example of this;  today's New
York Times has an op-ed by Glenn C. Loury meditating on the implications
of economic "reparations" as contrasted with the kind of closure brought
by the historical truth-telling elicited by South Africa's Truth and
Reconciliation Commission.

        How do we convey these contradictions and complexities in our
classrooms?

        Linda

> I would just like to comment on a little part of Linda's remarks. Regarding
> the abolition of slavery (Jacobins opposed, et al) my impression, perhaps
> wrong, is that the places in the Western Hemisphere where the independence
> struggle was led by European settlers, as opposed to either the indigineous or
> the slaves, or mixed race folks, anti-slavery was not part of their agenda, no
> matter what their political allies in Europe might have said there. Haiti is
> the example that comes to mind, where slavery was only abolished when the
> struggle became more than and jacobin-royalist fight among whites and became a
> slave insurrection. The contradictions that need to be illuminated here for
> our students (I teach community college US history and labor education) are
> vast, as Linda noted.  Is the US revolution more like the Boer War than some
> later national liberation struggles?However, these later fights made great use
> of the rhetorical precedents of the US struggle, especially the Declaration of
> Independence, the Constitution less so. Reactions?
=========================================================================
Date:         Wed, 31 May 2000 13:02:13 -0500
Reply-To:     Forum on the Constitution 
Sender:       Forum on the Constitution 
From:         Linda K Kerber 
Subject:      Winding down...
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII

Colleagues,

The semester is winding down, I bet everyone is distracted with final
exams and graduations, and I am about to leave on three weeks of
travel.  I'll take my computer with me, but I'm not sure whether I'll be
able to respond until I return home.

Can I suggest that we welcome some last comments, questions and
suggestions?

I won't say goodby yet, and I promise to respond and perhaps
summarize later in the month.  But I do want you to know how much I've
enjoyed this conversation, and how much I've learned from it!

Many, many thanks,

Linda