Substance of his arab spring lecture to the Wisconsin Historical society as part of their lecture series. This talk is just over one hour. It is a pleasure for us to welcome professor wood to madison. It has been 40 years since professor wood has been here. Every 40 years, we are going to have him back. Gordon wood is recognized as the premier historian of the early american era in when i say that, i do not mean only active historians, i mean of all historians. He is recognized as at the top of his profession. It is an honor to have him here in madison. Professor wood went to tufts and harvard and studied under bernard bailey. It is pretty difficult to top that. Just marvelous. Professor wood is noted for his productivity and the quality of his work. I had lunch with him today and i asked him how many books he had published. I told him, i counted 26. He said, that is far too many. He has so many books, he doesnt know how many that he has. Three of them stand out. The creation of the american republic, a seminal book that tied everything together in a discussion of the American Revolution. He won the bancroft prize for that. Then, the radicalism of the American Revolution. And then recently, empire of liberty. Many other volumes in between. The last five are documentary editions. Three volumes on john adams and two volumes of pamphlets from the revolutionary era. Professor wood is working on a book on john adams and thomas jefferson. What professor wood has done is he has taken all kinds of interpretations about the revolution and he has synthesized but also delved into the primary sources and has come up with an interpretation of what the revolution was and almost as important, what that revolution how the revolution transformed the American People and made us a unique people that others might look to. And so, that is what he is going to be talking about today and i think you will enjoy it. [applause] prof. Wood with an introduction like that, i have to reciprocate and tell you of that about what john is doing to historical research. What john and other editors do is longlasting. We historians, those books are very ephemeral. History is a quasiscience. What john is doing will last as long as the republic. Given what is happening, that may not be very long. [laughter] i want to emphasize how important it is. Collecting these needs to be at the sized interested in collecting these debate needs to be emphasized for anyone interested in political theory. John has already collected 25 volumes of these ratification debates. These debates that took place over whether the country should ratify the constitution contain every major issue of politics, anything you can think about in politics is included. They are the richest debates ever recorded. Maybe athens had richard debates but we do not have the maybe fifth century athens had richer debates but we do not have the documents. Maybe england had richer debates but we only have fragments of their discussion. Here we have in three dozen volumes and unbelievable collection by elites, ordinary people. It is incredible to know that it is all hours. All ours. Its american. And yet, i believe it is the greatest collection of discussions about politics that the world has. There may have been greater ones, but they did not get collected by people like john. So i want to pay tribute to all editors of documents for keeping these things alive. But i want to talk about is entitled, advice to the egyptians from the founding fathers. Three years ago in 2013, csis, a think tank in washington a stance for the center for strategic and international spring, they the egyptians, two years after the arab spring they invited 30 egyptians, journalists, politicians, academics, women, to members of two members of the freedom and justice party, the Muslim Brotherhood present among these. In that spring, president mohammed morsi, the Brotherhood Party had just been elected and probably the fairest election egypt had ever had and yet things were not working out in the streets. There was a good deal of fear. Democracy was not working out for the egyptians. Csis invited them to talk about the problems facing egypt could the arab spring survive . They thought it would be interesting to invite an american historian of the American Revolution to come and talk to tell these egyptians, how did we do it as if somehow lessens might be learned from the American Revolution. That is why i was there. When i am going to talk to you about is i am going to give you the lecture that i gave those egyptians. Before the arab spring, there was an atlantic spring, a series of democratic revolutions that spread from the Third Quarter of the 18th century and went on for 75 years, climaxing with the revolutions of 1848, intense by attempts in almost all of the european states to overthrow the monarchys and establish democracy. All of the revolutions failed and by the time you get to Abraham Lincoln he realized, and , this is the context for his speeches where he says the last best hope it looked like democracy was failing everywhere and Abraham Lincoln is saying, if we dont survive, then maybe the whole dream of democracy will fail. The American Revolution was the first of these revolutions. In 1776. It was no colonial rebellion like the algerians throwing off french rule in the 1960s. In american eyes, it was a world historical event. In the eyes of many radicals in europe at the time richard price, the unitarian minister, in 1785, said, the American Revolution is the second most important event in the history of the world. The first, of course was the , birth of jesus christ. That was the excitement among a lot of radicals, including french radicals. It was excitement over the American Revolution. The french revolution erupted 13 years later and because it was such a momentous of people, it upheaval, it tended to dominate western consciousness. But keep in mind, it followed the American Revolution in that havemething the french never forgiven us for. Many leaders believe the American Revolution was the stimulus for their revolution. Lafayette took the key from the best deal bastille and sent it to washington as a mark of your contribution. Of course, it hangs today in mount vernon. Revelation was not just colonial but the overthrowing of monarchy. It is a little confusing to use 18thcentury terms because we have a lot of monarchs in europe that we happen to like. You cannot think about monarchy in modern terms. The same way the 18thcentury did. Republics, Hosni Mubarak in egypt, cuba, china, Saddam Hussein in iraq to use republic in opposition to monarchy is confusing but if we think of monarchies in terms of authoritarian governments, we have a clearer understanding of what it meant to be opposed to monarchy. The americans did not intend to just to get rid of british tyranny, they wanted to end it tyranny for all time, they wanted to set an example for the rest of the world. They had a key responsibility, a responsibility to show the world theto become to show world a new libertarian democratic future. It is important to keep in mind that our experiment with democracy was not an immediate success. The United States was not a united country. There is over a decade between the declaration of independence and the constitution. Americans forget that. They tend to blur the two. Think the declaration of independence is in the constitution. They are separated by a decade and it was a very awesome decade. There was a real crisis in the 1780s. Many thought that the country would fall apart. The republican experiment seemed in peril. It was not an immediate success. Our experiment with republicanism. The United States constitution , which brought stability and unity to the country, was not something that anyone even imagined in 1776. There is not a single document that ive never been able to find where someone said this is the government we ought to have. Even those not happy never conceived of such a constitution. Something had to happen in that decade to change peoples minds. They had to think about this new Strong National government. In 1776, they established 13 independent democracies. Women, blacks, black slaves did not vote. Among the white population, three quarters of adult white males could vote, and extraordinary proportion, higher than anywhere in the world at the time. Even britain, only one out of six adult males could vote. The new United States has the most democratic policies in the world. The declaration of independence was a declaration of 13 independent states with their own constitution. They were writing the constitution before the declaration. There was no National Government. There was very little sense of nationhood. Jeffersons opening line, that is just a hope, not a reality. There is no sense of nationhood as of yet. When jefferson referred to my country, he meant virginia. When john adams said my country, immense massachusetts. The sense of being a United Nation is not yet clear. The United States, legally created with the declaration, was still a plural verb. That was true until the civil war the United States are. After the civil war, the united today,becomes as it is the United States is. Think about it. Most people do not think about the technical meaning of that. Separate states, united, but not until the civil war, not really united. These states eventually came together in a loose union called the articles of confederation. Keep in mind, the articles are not an early version of the constitution. They are a different thing altogether. They are a league. A treaty of these states coming together, like the e. U. That is the closest parallel in modern times to what they are doing. That clarifies what the articles were, instead of thinking them as an early version of the constitutions. They were not ratified for various reasons. People werent happy with this treaty. There were not ratified until march of 1781, six months before the battle of yorktown. 1781, the battle of yorktown ended the british will to continue the revolution and was the ending of the war. The new state constitutions ever that were drafted in 1776 were terribly important, more important than the federal constitution that followed. The federal constitution was derived from the experiments worked out. They were written documents and from that moment on, when people created new constitutions, everybody who wants a constitution wrote it down. That was not true earlier. If you are going to have a new constitution like in iraq, they wrote it down. That was a grand innovation. More important was the notion of separation of power. It does not mean just legislation, it is the prohibition on members simultaneously Holding Office in the legislature. By prohibiting that, you prohibit a rise of cabinet government, which has been more adopted by the world then our system so that when Hillary Clinton became secretary of state, she had to resign her senate seat. If she were in england, she would have to remain in the house of lords to get into the cabinet. That is the difference between our systems. The American Revolution created that separation of power. They thought that that was corruption, that the executive would corrupt the legislative. That barrier created our separation of power. In these constitutions, a great deal of power was given to popular state legislatures. Most of them maintained governors. Most of them had governors. The powers of these governors, the prerogatives were greatly reduced. They had no power of appointment to anybody in office. They had no power of veto. They were emasculated. Jeffersons proposal said, he is no longer a governor. Even the pardoning power which seems essentially magisterial was taken away in many states. That is how severe the stripping of power was. Almost immediately, the states began abusing their power. The state legislatures were acting minorities were being tyrannized by popular majority. That was not something the patriots expected. There was a debate between Daniel Leonard and john adams, who was defending the whig party. Leonard charged that the congresses would become tyrannical, abusing their power. John adams dismissed this. He said, it is impossible. The people cannot tyrannize themselves. He said that democratic despotism is a contradiction. 10 years later, he changed his tune. That was exactly what was happening. The legislatures were becoming despotic and it was a learning situation. An alarming situation. James madison summed it up in an unpublished essay. This is the most important document between the declaration and the federal constitution, the most important document written in that interval. He was region in early 1787. It is a working paper. He was always a clear thinker and he wanted to get, what is wrong with america . He wrote these ideas you can call it up on your ipads. The vices of the political system of United States. He outlines what is wrong with america and popular politics. These excesses of democracy. The popular state legislatures were being annually elected, which was an innovation in most states. The turnover in some states were 60 . 60 new people. Each legislature had new things to enact. The multiplicity he outlined three evils, mutability, multiplicity, and injustice. That is his main objection. Multiplicity comes from the numerous legislatures, the turnover. More laws enacted in the decades since the declaration then the entire colonial period. More laws then in 100 years. And the laws were constantly changing. In this flood of legislation with new people every year, all been acting their narrowminded Interest Group legislation. Most important was the injustice. He is concerned about minorities being oppressed by majorities. The principal is the same, how do you protect minorities in a democratic polity . What the legislatures were doing were passing all kinds of legislation and the printing of paper money which creates inflation so that people were getting paid back they might lend 100 pounds and they were getting back pieces of paper issued by the state which said 100 but they were not worth 100. Prices have been inflated. Many of the american elites, the aristocracy, and this includes slaveholders, they are learning a lot of their money not from what they sold, although, the southern planters were making money from rice and put tobacco wasnt quite what it used to be but many of them were acting as bankers, lending money. As you know, the english aristocracy lived off of rent and that was true until the 1920s if you watch downton abbey. The lord is still charging rent to succeed. That was not possible in america because there was very little tenantry. There is some in new york and some in virginia, but not much. Land is too plentiful. So the gentry are living off this interest paid from loans but that interest is been inflated so they have a vested interest in preventing this kind of paper money. All of these problems, said madison, and this is true for any minority , and themajority rule big problem in the middle east today, as you know. Im quoting madison, brought into question the fundamental principle of republican government that the majority that rule in such governments are the safest guardians of the public good and minority rights. That was a major problem. I cannot think of a more major problem. How do you curb majorities without doing violence to majority rule . That is still problem a problem. The theory going back to aristotle would be, if you have too much democracy, you have to bring some monarchy into play. Some authoritarian ruler. Give the authoritarian ruler more power, curb the democratic excesses. In 18thcentury terms, you would have to say that these governments needed monetary. Needed monarchy. Some americans in the 1780s suggested that. Barrett things they got to go the way were really keen on having a monarch. He says nothing else will work. Some thought washington himself should become the king or a dictator. These suggestions were made to him and he dismissed them out of hand. As you know, we came close to a military coup detat headed off only by a brilliant speech by washington to the military officers who were plotting to march on the continental congress. Madison did not want to go in that direction. What he wanted i want a republican remedy for republican ails. How do you do that . The creation of a new federal government becomes his solution. By the 1780s there was a consensus that the articles of confederation were not working out, Confederation Congress lacked the power to tax and regulate. The reason for that is because congress was a substitute for the crown. The crown could do a lot of things, wages war, appoint offices, and so on. What it cannot do, it cannot tax or regulate trade in that is why the congress which was supposed to be a substitute for the crown was deprived of those powers. Now people are thinking, this system is not working. By 1786, the entire political nation i dont think anybody objected to this was ready to add those two powers to the articles of confederation so there is a consensus building up. Rhode island was very cantankerous, turning down things. They came around to accept the idea of giving a 5 duty tariff duty tax power. Everyone is ready for those kinds of reforms. What happened is that madison and his followers, takes advantage of this consensus and hijacks this Reform Movement to create something entirely different. His virginia plan is much more than a couple of articles added to the articles of confederation. He scraps the articles and asserts a powerful government that is a real governments, not a league, not a treaty a government that reaches directly to the people. The government that we have, essentially. So he is going to solve two problems at once. He is going to take advantage of that con