What were you like when you were 19 . He would probably not fighting in a revolution. He was an interesting individual. His influence with the french helped the revolutionary cause. When he came back in the 1820s, he was invited by president munro for the purpose of remembering the revolution. Saw that people are starting to die off, the revolutionaries were starting to leave. Lafayette was still a living connection to the revolution. And thise back in 1824 is an amazing tour of what was then the United States, in an era where there were not trains, automobiles. Carriages s and crossingd carriages the United States, hitting so many places from new york down to charleston. Think it is remarkable. When he comes to the u. S. This is another reason for celebration. , there was a spontaneous outpouring of interest and for the revolutionary war veteran. We were discussing while exhibition, was this an instruction . On,people get instructions lafayette is coming, you need to do this, you need to have a parade, you need to have a ball. The president didnt send out letters to the governors saying, you need to do something. Out in it was outpouring but this of sentiment and people coming in wanting to see lafayette was very much spontaneous. My favorite item relating to areyette and his visit these flippers. These were born to a ball that was held in new york city. They are very fragile. You can see that from the picture. They are linen and silk. Dance andorn just to nothing else. We know who are these slippers, her name was angelica james. It is another wonderful connection that we have the identification to go along. James is connected to these flippers through the story. Announcer you can view all American History programs online. Independent media is the oxygen of a democracy. It holds those in power accountable. Serve somethere to kind of corporate agenda. N we cover war and peace goodman of amy democracy now talks about her book. It will back at the stories and people the show has covered. Idea has not changed. The voices of the grassroots around the world. They very much represent the majority of people. Concernedople who are about war and peace, about in thisinequality country, about Climate Change are not a fringe minority, not even a senate majority. A silent majority. Tonight at 8 00 eastern on q a. Author mau vanduren discusses his book. The United StatesHistorical Society hosted this program. It is about 15 minutes. Inutes. This event gives us the chance to try different food, if nothing else. We have a delicacy i dont know if it is a delicacy. Help yourself, it is a dutch food. Please help yourself. I want to introduce the speaker vanduren. If any of you have gotten a chance to read his biography, you will know that he is an independent scholar. Is abrings him here today wonderful demonstration of what independent scholars are capable of in the field of early American History. Among his other biographical information, he likes to vacation in virginia. Netherlands. The he is not the only valuable input from the netherlands to the United States. , theretitle suggests were many heads and hands involved in writing the u. S. Constitution. E always harken back in montesquieu. It shows that this is mostly a dialogue with ideas of republicanism that goes further back than that. That is what i hope we can hear more of. There will be time for questions and answers afterward. Feel free to open it up. Thank you. Me . Can everybody hear did nobody here me . [laughter] mau in the meantime, i will yell. Thank you so much for being here. This is going to be much more interesting than the civil disobedience outside. Mauame is now vendor in vanduren. Historian. Teur i got interested in the stuff back when i first came to the United States in 1982, following my sweetheart. The book starts with an episode that goes way back in time. The reason i do that is to show that rules and laws come about for a reason. 100 cc 3000 years ago. Does that cave show . It shows that there are people that have developed different skills and if you have different skills, you can trade skills. Then the book flies through time, going to western europe and other places. , we come to the shores of the americas and eventually the United States. Lets see if this works. There we go. We have our typical american values. That was the battle cry of the resolution, basically. Religion, them of separation of church and state, a free press, and independent judiciary. These are things that we find more or less in our constitution in different forms. How did the constitution come about . James madison did not write the bill of rights immediately, that came later. He saw the need for a better structure for our country. The act of confederation made us somewhat dysfunctional. If you look at it is government, you may think we are still dysfunctional. That is functionality at the time was really so bad. The states were supposed to work together. They were supposed to trade but they were more working against each other. Madison saw the need to do something about that. Montpelier. He locked himself in his library in 1780 678 he could study what other countries had done to design a system that would work to us. Carefully, we can see him sitting in the library there. He is reading the newspaper, apparently. Where did these values come from . Hey came from people when people came to this country very early on in the early 17th century, they brought with them their families, cattle, tools, furniture. Most importantly, what they brought was what was in their heads. What was in their heads were obviously all of the values they had from back home. The various colonies that they settled each reflected those values. See is that one colony, Plymouth Foundation plymouth plantation, was founded by separatists from england, who had also lived in the netherlands. Was they picked up their democratic government, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom of speech. The freedom of religion attracted them in the first place but it also eventually repelled them because they thought there was too much freedom. They were losing youngsters to other denominations, is how it goes, right . The attraction of men and women will make you forget your religion. They decided that they needed to leave. In 1620, they sailed to massachusetts. There is a long story in the book about this, why they ended up in plymouth because it was probably not where they were supposed to go. They introduced all of those values in the colonies. Another comedy was the andachusetts bay company they included their values in their system of government. They were puritans. They had not lived in the netherlands. They were not aware of the was going on there. They came to this country with english values. Even though they had a separation of church and state, they also made it very difficult for people who were not puritans to have any say in their government. Then there is the new netherlands, new amsterdam, now new york. They brought with them the values they had in the netherlands. All of the touch laws apply dutch laws apply to, but it is a property of the Dutch East India Company. That meant that the corporate interest trumped appropriate word trumped the civic interest. O there is a real conflict the director of the Dutch East India Company is also the governor of the colony. One interesting thing at the bottom, there are a lot of records welcome, find a seat anywhere there are a lot of Court Records that show that slaves were indeed suing their owners for mistreatment. Quite interesting. Where are we . Back i am rushing through this a little bit because i am told i only have a half an hour. So, keep your questions for then. Lets go back to massachusetts and see what the effects are of one person who travels through all of these colonies. There are some interesting records about him. He is going to be our forests gump. His name is Francis Doughty. He arrives in plymouth plantation around 1638. He is the son of a brewer. Off with the ran inheritance and his wife and children. He arrived in plymouth plantation, which is interesting because it has changed somewhat already. They had all of these wonderful values but they were under aneat because there was influx of other people into the company. There were failed colonies to the north, and more rough folks joined them. Apparently, he does not experience any problems in plymouth plantation and stays there for five years. Then he moves to dorchester near boston. Sister followed him from england and is suing him in court for the inheritance. He takes on a position in cohasset, west of plymouth. Yet, he doesnt stick to the law very well. Drunk andt is a unruly character. Lastly, there is a baptism dispute with the local church. E is a minister, after all theays if you baptize parents, the children should also be baptized. Limits effect and find a p a bout thatriteu a bout that. Shortly after his appointment, a scout arrives from boston. Either they resent to check on francis we do not know, however, trouble came when francis asserted that the children of the baptized also should be baptized. Apparently that belief did not go over well with superior to and. They told him that henceforward, he had to conform to. Views. Francis refused. He has been preaching this way from the beginning. The boston ministers believe that they were in the right and appealed to the local magistrate judge to intervene and rule in their favor. The magistrate who was secular official ordered the constable to arrest the offending minister. Apparently the constable chose to do this during a Church Assembly and francis was dragged out. And he was case expelled from the colony. So, francis leads. Leaves. He goes to rhode island and make some friends there, probably because it is a free place. He decides he doesnt want to stay there. And641, he travels to obama he travels to long island. They go to long island and you see there this is an old map we have here there you go long island, here. New amsterdam is there. Here is the hudson river going up. Rhode island is to the right there. Eventually when he settles , and, he meets a fellow educated lawyer from the who traveled up the as a river where he got a job to be a Police Officer in one of the dutch colonies. Instead of policing, he is helping the workers, preventing the natives. 1643, he doesnt get his contract extended, so he travels to new amsterdam. Ass guy has the same notion Francis Doughty. They set up a secret partnership after meeting in new amsterdam. They are each joining a group of getle who are trying to more democracy instituted in the colony. The company doesnt like democratic structures because it has to come from the top down. But the colonists who want to have some influence. A piece ofhey make paper that they send to the state general in the netherlands to influence the state general to tell these governors that they need to institute a more democratic form of government. How are we doing on time . They send the document off to benevolence off to the netherlands to the governor is hiring this off to the netherlands. The governor is hiring this lawyer to help with the natives because after all, he is so familiar with them. They sign a Peace Agreement with the governor is so grateful that he gives a landgrant to the lawyer. A couple of years later, there is a court case. Is takingughty somebody to court, suing him for defamation of his oldest daughter, apparently this fellow but it was a song bad and so he is in court. He then meets the oldest daughter and nature takes its course they get married and they moved to the place that we now know as yonkers. Word whicha dutch means young lord. Is basically named after the lawyer. Paper isantime, this in netherlands in the state general more or less agrees that something needs to be done about im skipping over a few things here so we can have more questionandanswer that the governor needs to be recalled and a new governor is coming in. That is a fellow by the name of peter stuyvesant. Rule it role is still hidden. He moves to flushing, on the northern shore of long island where he becomes a minister. He was granted limited participation in government. Donck is elected to a government board. Just when you think things are going away, outside influences are throwing a monkeywrench into the thing. Around that time, king charles is taken prisoner by parliament. Decides to end once and for all and that is when he becomes lord protector. Vander donckme, has gone to the netherlands to make his case. He wins the case but a few months later, the english and dutch war breaks out. Allstate general rescinded orders. The whole project is off the table. Allowed tok is not return to the colony for a while, so he starts to work on a book about new netherlands, which is really interesting all of thedescribes animals and people that live in that part of the world. Vision in the vision is that america should become, just like the netherlands was at that for refugees from all over europe, and that they would have a free government and a lot of the things that we have now. This is pretty revolutionary, 1655. In the same year, unfortunately, he dies in and indian attack. Dead,mocracy project is so he leaves for maryland and virginia. His starter his daughter follows him. Stay behind. Flashing renaissance is quite a unique document. It is a document signed by english protestants in defense of quakers. Quakers were despised in those days i dont know why, but they were. They were not allowed to participate even in the Plymouth Colony government, certainly not in massachusetts. They were persecuted just about everywhere, including somewhat in the dutch colony. It was quite unique that a group of people came together and signed a petition on their behalf to send to the governor. Flushing next month to talk about that same event at the house where it was signed. It is still the original house. Here. See we flew through this pretty quickly. Lets see where we have ended up. Daughty goes to virginia. There,fore he gets virginia is basically at war with england. Right . Eard of this, weird. The navigation act, the second stipulated that the colonies, the english colonies could only trade with england, not with the dutch. Largesth was virginias trading partner. The dutch were actually the largest trading partner all the way until the 16 70s, the largest trading partner in virginia. The virginians refused, saying they are not going to do that. ,he british sent a fleet arriving in 1652. The Virginia Governor is asking the dutch to help in the fight. Immobilizes 1200 troops. He mobilizes 1200 troops. They sign a treaty. Virginia thee give right to tax itself and the king is no longer allowed to tax them. Revolutionary. They also grant them a continuation of the democratic government they had ever since the 1620s. He arrives in this particular place and he again becomes a minister. He settles in northampton county. He becomes director of the fiscal church, where he is loved by some and hated by others. After a while he leaves which seems to be his habit. Twice gets married to a widow of ministers of the church. And hes in that circle eventually moves to Rappahannock County in six and 62. Anyou think that virginia is enlightened place, you may be interested to hear what the governor of virginia had to say. I think god that there are no free schools nor printing, and i hope we shall not have these for 100 years for learning has brought disobedience and sects into the world. And printing has divulged them and libels against the best government. I think he conveniently forgot that he was a protestant himself only by the virtue of the reformation which, of course, was supported by the Printing Press and new ideas and so on and so on. But thats how it goes often, huh . All right. Then we dont know for sure what happens to doughty. Some records say that he went back to maryland. And others say that he lets see here. Let me read. One source said that Francis Doughty moved to maryland and he died there. The doughty dna project states that he died in maryland on march 2nd, 1682. This author has not been able to confirm this. In every colony he visited and this is the significance of our forrest gump. In every colony he experienced the birth, the infancy or the growing pains of virtual republics and saw the development of the rule of law and democracy. He suffered of small mindedness of religious intolerance in massachussetts. Lived among the free and learned about the politics of the people of new netherlands and witnessed the government in both virginia and maryland. Mostly he followed the foot steps of others but in new netherlands he was briefly a pioneer. He mixed with the movers and shakers and quite literally lived the beginning of what would become the american nation. And so i lifted out this particular episode of the book because it shows a little bit of how these values arrived here and and what we did with them. And of course, the story doesnt end here. And the story doesnt end here. We have civil disobedience going on on the steps of the capitol, i believe. We have protests. We have a socialist running for the presidency. We have a demagogue also running for the we have everybody. And thats a good thing. Because as somebody said, the american experiment is never finished. We will continue to work on it. And i think thats one of the things that you see the beginning of. Not just in this country but in other countries back in history. Lets see if i have anymore wisdom to divulge about that. Eventually, we get a constitution. Everyone understood that the document was a compromise. Were still fighting over some of these things, right . In the supreme court. The expectation that the convention should provide a more Perfect Union than under the current articles of confederation proved a powerful argument during the convention. Madison repeated the argument in federalist 38 writing. It is not necessary that the former should be perfect. It is sufficient that the letter is more imperfect, meaning that the old rules were worse than the new ones. They understood that the perfect author was the enemy of the good. Many understood that the documents were of a temporary nature, that future generations would mold it to their needs and there would be groups and individuals to find ways to recruit the constitutions provisions t