To 100 libraries in 50 states in which we will present programs that invite the community to and about the founding era programs and issues people are talking about today. The project is founded by the National Endowment for the humanities, the largest grant awarded in the last year for which we are eternally grateful. Would tell you a few words about the institute and what we do and how we came to do this project. The Gilder Lehrman institute is rather young. It was founded in 1994. The mission is to promote the knowledge and understanding of American History through programs and resources. Havee present time, we 65,000 documents in the Gilder Lehrman collection which is the core of our programming. The collection is drawn upon to do programs come outreach, to contribute to a website visited by 7 million people, and also to support a network of 6500 affiliates to whom we send materials on a monthly basis, as well as teachers and seminars. It is the collection that really gives us the capacity and ability to bring people face to face with primary documents and in understanding the people, events, and controversies that shaped our history over time. I would theater term, like to say, interhamilton. Based on our work over the past 20 years or so, in 2015 the groups came and talked to the institute about developing a Hamilton Education program. With funding from the rockefeller foundation, we developed an incredibly Important Program that has title i students come for a matinee of hamilton. In anticipation of going to the matinee, they receive a very guide in whichs they get a chance to look at documents and think about how they might plan a presentation based on one of the characters or events of the founding era. They had a chance to perform this in the morning. I went to some of these performances. They were really astounding. All of a sudden, kids were thinking about people and events. The founding era was not some dusty thing, why should i study American History . It really came alive. One student said to me i fell in love with hamilton, but beyond that i started to fall in love with that dusty thing called American History. This program has not only been successful but is now replicated all over the country wherever the Hamilton Exhibition and musical go. Success ofwas the the Hamilton Education program that encouraged us to apply to the National Endowment for the humanities for a grant to support what we call revisiting the founding era, a documentbased project over three years that will provide libraries with a reader, materials, and other resources to start conversations. Obviously, we are very different than those people were. But maybe some of their ideas, events, and people resonate as we start to talk about what is of concern to us in the 21st century. The centerpiece of this project is a reader. In your folders, he will each find you will each find a revisitingt called the founding era town hall, in which there are two documents from the Gilder Lehrman that they will be talking about later this evening. We encourage you to read the documents and join the conversation afterwards. At the present time, the institute is working with the American Library association to accept applications from libraries to host these Community Programs and receive grants to do that programming. Im happy to report that as of today, 187 applications have come in. The deadline is not until january 30. We know there is interest in this. We want to have the biggest distribution as possible. We would like to have two programs in every state. , please take the card about applying. Please encourage your local library and to submit an application immediately librarian to submit an application immediately. I want to come back to why americans are talking about founding era ideas now. Hamilton the musical has blown across the country and is being visited by hundreds of thousands of people who try to get tickets to the show. With its multicultural cast and hamiltonre, brought the issues of the founding era to the 21st century ands popular era. From the perspective of learning and historians, we believe in these unsettled times we are being bombarded by conflicting arguments and images from the press, media, politicians all based on the founding era. What did happen in the founding era . All these arguments raise questions about the fundamental nature of democracy in the united states. You cannot saying, know where you are going until you know where you have been. Many people know are feeling they need to look back and see how it all got started. In the face of uncertainty about the future, it is more important than ever for us to consider the people and events and ideas that have shaped and supported our nation for the past 240 years. Please look at that folder and the two documents. These documents will be the centerpiece of a conversation with panelists about to come up on the stage. We invite you to join the conversation after the panelists talk about these documents and think about how some of these forments may resonate issues about which you are speaking in your communities today. Now, i would like to introduce carol berkin, who will moderate the panel. Her c. V. Is so long i have to read it to you, so excuse me. Carol berkin is the president ial professor of history emeritus in the Graduate Center at the university of new york. She is the author of several including inventing the american constitution, revolutionary mothers, civil and a book on the wife of ulysses s. Grant. , the bill ofty rights, and most recently a sovereign people. Frequent birkin is a contributor to pbs and the History Channel documentaries on early American Revolutionary history. She has an online journal which you can find on our website. We invite you to visit our website. She serves on the scholarly boards of several professional organizations including the. Useum of american women now i would like to introduce carol berkin who will introduce the panelists. Thank you. [applause] carol hello. Greetings. I think we have some good conversation that is going to start up here and continue with questions from you. Susan asked me to talk a little bit about my connection to Gilder Lehrman. I have been working with them. Or maybe 20 years i have run summer seminars for them. I have done teaching American History grants in virtually every state in the union for them. I added history now, which is our online journal. I have done an online course on hamilton. And now, i am the director of the Online Masters Program which produced that course. The reason i do all of these things for them as i believe intensely and sincerely in the mission of Gilder Lehrman and in their unbelievable devotion to bringing history to schools and the general public. I want to introduce the panel. We have been having a wonderful time all together. Denver, julie, and i have been on panels many times together before. Farah is the newest addition to our family here. Denver brunsman is associate professor and director of undergraduate studies in the History Department at George Washington university, where his courses include George Washington and his world, which he teaches annually at mount vernon. Necessity,he evil received the walter memorial prize for outstanding work in 18thcentury studies. Of thelso a coauthor leading college and a. P. History textbook. Liberty, equality, and power in history of the erican people, as well as George Washington at establishing the presidency. Farah jimenez is a committed social entrepreneur, which means she likes to try to tackle large social problems with the thinnest of available resources. Isrently, her focus improving the rate at which Philadelphia High School students graduate from high school to college through a campaign called project high school. As president as c. E. O. Of the philadelphia educational fund, she oversees this campaign as well as philadelphias longest College Access program and largest privately held scholarship program. Prior to joining the philadelphia education fund, she led the Peoples Emergency Center of West Philadelphia community for families expressing homelessness and a northWest PhiladelphiaCommunity Development corporation. Julia silverbrook is the executive director of the constitutional sources project. She holds a jd from william and Mary Law School where she received the National Association of women lawyers award and the Thurgood Marshall award. She served as senior articles maryr on the william and bill of rights journal. She graduated from George Washington university with aba and Political Science in Political Science. Distinguishedhe scholar award, the highest academic award given to students in the arts and sciences college. If you are doubting that these people are experts, doubt no more. I wanted to start with them. And now i am going to join the panel. I want to be with you. By asking them briefly to answer that question every one of us who has ever taught history at asked eventually by our students. Why study history . What difference does it make . Why should we look at these documents . What value does it have . And i want you to answer it while standing on one foot and not cursing. Denver . Denver obviously, im biased. But i cannot even imagine taking about our present problems without having historical context. History might not offer the exact answers to all of our problems, but i dont think we can even understand the problems without looking to the past. The eminent historian gordon wood has a great phrase, he talks about the fog of the presidency. We often think about the fog of war and the fog of the past. We dont know anything about our own times. We need all the help we can get. I think history can provide that. I think there is an additional reason specific to the united states. It has to do with the founding era. This country was founded on a , sometimes called a credo nation, as opposed to being founded by a certain ethnicity, religion, or type of people. We are founded really on a set of ideas. I think we have to go back to those ideas consistently. That is one reason why our founding is so crucial and why this conversation is so important. Carol thank you. Farah . Farah is the nonhistorian in the group, i will probably have a different response about unlocking peoples potential. A key ingredient is a sense of self. That begins with having a sense of gratitude. Understanding our history helps us to understand where we have been and how grateful we should be for where we are now, for the people who sacrificed their lives to give us the freedoms we have today, for the incredible vision of the Founding Fathers who helped create a country based on ideas and debate and community. And also because, quite frankly, even today when we look back in lived and theople quality of life we get to live today, it is vastly improved. The things we dont like about our history can also inform our gratitude that they are no longer part of our present. So i would say from that perspective, it is important to look at that because it can shape a real sense of yes, we are in a difficult place today but we have come a long way and should be really grateful. Carol thank you. Julie im going to repeat a lot of the same things because i think it is true. Im going to pick something denver said. We are not a country founded on a single unifying faith. Race or ethnicity. What binds us together are these principles and the history of this country. I think particularly at a time of political polarization, it is so important to study that history and feel that we have this common history that is the. Lue that holds us together like you said, you cannot understand january 10, 2018, unless you understand everything that came before it. It is overwhelming because i am not just talking about American History. You have to understand world history, too. But it is especially important if you are a citizen of this country to understand how we got to this present moment and how things that happened in 1776 and 1787 laid the groundwork for the increase in liberty and equality over time. And also laid the groundwork for the present political conflicts of today. That is something i think we will hit on one we are talking about these documents. There are perennial issues that come up throughout American History. Havingstill in many ways the same debates they were having when they were deciding whether or not they were going to amend the articles of confederation or start a new system of government, whether they were going to ratify the constitution or not, whether they were going to add a bill of rights or not, whether they were going to modernize the economy or not. Those are the conversations we are having today. History does not always offer that clarity and solution. I think a lot of times, people want to look to history for that. But it can provide a framework for understanding a path forward and to see how the compromises of the past were hatched out. Compromise is a really important part of American History, compromise both for good and sometimes compromise that was done, and maybe now based on our modern morals, we view as wrong. We may or may not have the opportunity to talk about that. Slavery in the constitution is a compromise to get the Southern States on board. Compromise bytive todays standard but was considered a positive compromise because it helped form the union in the first place. You can gain an appreciation for all of this by studying history. Carol thank you. Thank you. I take all of their courses. We chose two documents for you today that raise exactly kinds of issues that we grapple with today. That is, we are still talking about power versus liberty. We are still talking about competing interests between regions were among regions. We are still talking about National Versus state power and control. Alexander hamilton got out in one of the rare moments that he spoke at the Constitutional Convention when he was listening to a discussion about federalism, which said some power will be in the hands of the National Government, some power will be in the hands of the state government, and some powers will be shared by them. , who never had much of a sense about the political mood, but always spoke his mind. He got up and said this is never going to work. We will just be fighting about who has ultimate power over issues forever. And of course, he was right. Of course, his solution at the time, at a time when states were the legitimate governments that people knew and understood, and when people thought of themselves as pennsylvanians or new yorkers, they did not think of themselves as americans yet. Hamiltons solution was just to abolish states. I always pictured everyone in the room saying, sit down, alex. We have picked two documents i think do two things. One, they introduce you to the human side of an era that is often written about as if everybody was a statue in the park with a pigeon on their shoulder. Great moments in American History. You togoing to introduce the way in which it looked to the people who were living through it at the time. Warren. T is mercy otis we are starting with two women from 1787. Im going to ask them for to give background about who these two women were in case they are not household names in your household. Denver this is such an exciting document. It is from late september, 1787. It puts us at this moment just three days after the constitution has been published in the united states. You really get a sense of the wonder. Mercy otis warren was a political advisor to the founders. She was a great writer, propagandist, historian. She wrote the best early history of the American Revolution. In this document, she is writing to another historian, catherine mcauley. It is important to note that mcauley is in england. A lot of the great letters we get from the founding era were written to her. A lot of the founders wrote to her. She is not in america so they have to explain things to her, what is in the air, what people are feeling. You really get a sense of astonishment and appreciation that warre had for the constitutionn even though she would eventually oppose it. She has this great phrase in this document. She says, this is going to set in motion the pens and tongues of the political world. I think it will give you a sense of why we chose this document. Carol it is in your folder. Basically, she is explaining to or telling mcauley that we stand at a kind of crossroads. Do we preserve the sense of liberty and local control that we fought the revolution for or are we going to be sensible and create a National Government that can protect us from invasion and do the business we need of the National Government . She is going to come down on the side of it is better to have 13 separate sovereign nations than ofrecreate the terrors the British Government that had been oppressing us for al