Grab a Dictionary, Save the Republic A new book the author calls “an owner’s manual for American citizens” recovers a lost language that Americans need to talk with each other about things that matter. May 23, 2021 • David Kidd/ Governing You can listen to the companion audio version of this and other essays in the series using the player below or on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher or Audible. Distressed at the dearth of civic understanding in the United States, Ed Hagenstein worked for over two decades to create The Language of Liberty: A Citizen’s Vocabulary. Its purpose is simple: the constitution demands consensus and our form of government requires discourse, which depends in turn on a precise and nuanced vocabulary of its own. Hagenstein has set out to recover 101 words that are essential to the American experiment, many largely lost to disuse or misuse.