Speaker 1: John's in Switzerland and Steve's in Regievik, and I know,
Speaker 1: well whiskey, come and take my pain, my hondys.
Speaker 2: My brain.
Speaker 3: Oh why think alone when you can drink it all
Speaker 3: in with Ricochet's Three Whiskey Happy Hour. Join your bartenders,
Speaker 3: Steve Hayward, John You and the international woman of Mystery,
Speaker 3: Lucretia where.
Speaker 2: They lapped it up and live it Ain't you leave
Speaker 2: me on the should have got to give me and
Speaker 2: let that whiskey.
Speaker 4: Good morning everyone. This is going to be the craziest
Speaker 4: podcast that you've ever heard from the Three Whiskey a
Speaker 4: Happy Hour because not only are John and Steve awall,
Speaker 4: nobody knows where they are.
Speaker 1: A rumor has it that they're trumping somewhere across the
Speaker 1: glaciers in Iceland, and and I believe it's John who's
Speaker 1: in some castle in Switzerland somewhere plotting world dominance for
Speaker 1: the neo cons. I don't know what they're doing, but
Speaker 1: they skipped out on the podcast and rather than listen
Speaker 1: to me the whole time, I have the very special
Speaker 1: guest with me. Who is going who's a favorite of listeners.
Speaker 1: The last time he was on, I got a lot
Speaker 1: of positive comments, and that is Vincent Philip Muno So
Speaker 1: better known as Phil at least to me, Phil tell
Speaker 1: us really quick, a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, thank thanks for having me. Happy to spare
Speaker 2: the listeners A week from John and John and Steve.
Speaker 2: So I got my PhD from Claremont.
Speaker 4: Like I was the rest of us except for John, as.
Speaker 2: One of the last undergraduate students of Harry Jaffa. Doctor
Speaker 2: Jaffa was forced to retire in nineteen eighty nine and
Speaker 2: I arrived in nineteen eighty nine, so he wasn't teaching.
Speaker 2: He was emeritus by that point. He would just drop
Speaker 2: in on other people's classes. So I wrote my undergraduate
Speaker 2: thesis with him, and then I decided to go back
Speaker 2: to Claremont for the PhD and been writing on the
Speaker 2: constitution and religious liberty ever since. And now I've ended
Speaker 2: up at Notre Dame where I'm a professor.
Speaker 1: Here, and also, as I understand, a fellow at the
Speaker 1: Civitas Center in Texas.
Speaker 2: Yes, i was visiting a scholar visiting a faculty member
Speaker 2: at the School of Civic Leadership at the University of Texas,
Speaker 2: and I'm still a fellow there. A great project with
Speaker 2: great leadership. They're not perfect. I think they are trying
Speaker 2: to hire John but and me, yeah and yeah, No,
Speaker 2: it's a wonderful. It's a wonderful. It's probably the most
Speaker 2: exciting thing happening in higher education. There are these new
Speaker 2: schools of civic leadership, and the one at the University
Speaker 2: of Texas will be the best of them, I think.
Speaker 1: Yeah. The Chronicle is trying very hard to make it
Speaker 1: sound as if these are horrible plays is filled with
Speaker 1: with animosity and rife with all sorts of backstabbing. There's
Speaker 1: an article every other day, which I because I think
Speaker 1: what they realize.
Speaker 4: They're scared to death of them.
Speaker 2: Because they're scared to death. I mean these they're portrayed
Speaker 2: as you know, right wing conservative. They're right wing and
Speaker 2: conservative because they teach things like the federalist papers, political.
Speaker 4: History, or even even normal.
Speaker 2: Economics, economics, philosophy, Western civilization. They're actually doing what universities
Speaker 2: used to do. And it is true that many of
Speaker 2: these are the creatures of red state legislators or public
Speaker 2: university University of Florida, Ohio State University, University of Texas.
Speaker 2: There's a new one, University of South Carolina. But it's
Speaker 2: true that they've been created by red state legislatures in
Speaker 2: red or purple states. But the education they offer is
Speaker 2: it's an American education.
Speaker 1: Well, my state started one that both of the big schools,
Speaker 1: and they've the one in ASU I think is it's
Speaker 1: pretty much a libertarian economics focus because it also got
Speaker 1: some Koch Brothers money. I guess ours did. To The
Speaker 1: one at my university is so lame. It's run by
Speaker 1: some feminist and it's no longer even there's no conservative
Speaker 1: viewpoint to it at all, or even an American civilization
Speaker 1: we American slash Western civilization viewpoint.
Speaker 4: So I don't have anything to do with them.
Speaker 2: But well, this is always the danger in academia because
Speaker 2: even at Notre Dame, the College of Arts and Letters,
Speaker 2: it's overwhelmingly left in the faculty. So there's always a
Speaker 2: tendency to drift left. If you're not very countercultural, explicitly countercultural,
Speaker 2: you're going to drift left and really really drift left.
Speaker 2: But I'm very optimistic about these new schools, in part
Speaker 2: because the leadership dean at the University of Texas justin
Speaker 2: Dyer is just phenomenal. Yeah, there, it's a place where
Speaker 2: conservatives are welcome, which is a change, but really it's
Speaker 2: a place their mission focused, and their mission is restoring
Speaker 2: the principles and teaching the principles of the United States constitutionalism,
Speaker 2: and the and the debates, all the debates left and right,
Speaker 2: all sides. So it's it's very exciting, I think, John,
Speaker 2: and hopefully you are going to be headed to text
Speaker 2: Steve Man Steve too, and maybe all in up there
Speaker 2: as well. But we did something similar Notre Dame. We've
Speaker 2: actually been doing it at Notre Dame for over a decade.
Speaker 2: In fact, I was down at Texas to help them
Speaker 2: set up their curriculum. So there are these pockets of
Speaker 2: a traditional education around the country. So you listeners with
Speaker 2: college age kids or high school age kids, you should
Speaker 2: look for these new schools of civic leadership. As I said,
Speaker 2: one of the most promising things, promising developments in higher education.
Speaker 1: I think so. And actually I believe it or not.
Speaker 1: People do ask us all the time, where can I
Speaker 1: send my kid? And you know, the usual answer was
Speaker 1: always his Hillsdale, But so there you go. Texas Texas
Speaker 1: is another option. Maybe we'll do a whole show on that.
Speaker 1: One of these days. I do want to mention a
Speaker 1: couple of things. I'm very excited about the renaming of
Speaker 1: the Department of Defense to the Department of War. They
Speaker 1: have already as a what was it two days ago
Speaker 1: that Trump announced this? The website, the Department of Defense
Speaker 1: website is now war dot gov.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I saw the New York Times headline, and I
Speaker 2: immediately forwarded to John. And John's response was, I might
Speaker 2: have to go back in the governor. Governor. Yeah, I
Speaker 2: want a business card that says Department of War.
Speaker 4: I know, it's so great. What are those crazy things
Speaker 4: this week? I do want to talk a moment.
Speaker 1: I don't even know what you think about all this
Speaker 1: because I had a we had a rather I don't
Speaker 1: even know if it's fair to say it was rancorous
Speaker 1: debate with Ken Green a few times ago. But can
Speaker 1: Green considers me a conspiracy rfk nut?
Speaker 4: But I'm I'm all.
Speaker 1: In, by the way on eating clean, shall we say?
Speaker 1: I don't need processed foods and this and that. And
Speaker 1: I'm also becoming more and more suspicious about the whole
Speaker 1: vaccine thing. Not because I think vaccines have always been
Speaker 1: a terrible thing or anything like that. I mean, they
Speaker 1: saved America from smallpox and polio, But do you know
Speaker 1: how many vaccines a child gets now by the time
Speaker 1: they're eighteen.
Speaker 2: You know, I have three kids, and I don't know
Speaker 2: how many, but I do remember the you know, the
Speaker 2: standard advice we got, and they just it's not only
Speaker 2: how many, but at the same time, yeah, yeah, it
Speaker 2: just overwhelmed. It's a small body. So we space We
Speaker 2: think we did all the vaccines, but we spaced them
Speaker 2: out differently.
Speaker 4: Well, my daughter.
Speaker 1: Is thirty six and when she was at her second
Speaker 1: I believe it's around two months old, her second appointment
Speaker 1: for vaccines, they wanted to give her a hepatitis B
Speaker 1: vaccine and her father was a had a degree in microbiology,
Speaker 1: didn't make him a medical expert. But he's, you know,
Speaker 1: why would you do this? I know what they had.
Speaker 1: The nurse couldn't answer. She said, well, it's really just experimental.
Speaker 1: He says, you want to do an experiment on That
Speaker 1: was thirty six years ago. Now they routinely give the
Speaker 1: hepatitis B vaccine to infants immediately on the off chance
Speaker 1: that their mother might have been excuse the expression a
Speaker 1: crack hor and transfer hepatitis b it's crazy anyway. So RFK,
Speaker 1: it's funny because you also see the conservative world divided
Speaker 1: over RFK and even over his testimony. New York Post
Speaker 1: had a New York Post opinion, the editorial board opinion
Speaker 1: just calling him a total quack and blah blah blah
Speaker 1: blah blah. And then another article, opinion article by someone
Speaker 1: I forget, just saying how incredibly right he was because
Speaker 1: he's not saying no vaccines or anything like that. He's
Speaker 1: just saying we need to follow the science. But the senators,
Speaker 1: did you say, you're probably too busy to have watched
Speaker 1: even a moment of the testimony.
Speaker 2: I didn't. I didn't watch any of the testimony. My
Speaker 2: general line on this is I'm distrustful of experts, all experts.
Speaker 2: So the parts I like of RFK are his sort
Speaker 2: of hey, let's pause, I'm not sure. And doctors, I mean,
Speaker 2: I have lots of friends who are doctors. Doctors are
Speaker 2: used to being the smartest people in the room. They
Speaker 2: rarely tell you what they don't know. So I just
Speaker 2: have a real healthy skepticism. So that skepticism I appreciate
Speaker 2: and I think is needed. No, I don't know if
Speaker 2: he's right either, but I think we need a lot
Speaker 2: more skepticism. I mean I grew up eating the food pyramid, right,
Speaker 2: stuffing myself with kicks and bread for you know, carbohydrates
Speaker 2: which we were supposed to I mean you remember the
Speaker 2: old food of course I do. Oh And now they're like,
Speaker 2: that's exactly wrong or at least that's not right.
Speaker 1: Well some people are at least. Yeah. Then remember fats
Speaker 1: were at the top, and you know, I make it
Speaker 1: a point to eat as much butter as I can margin,
Speaker 1: you know, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2: I'm almost told me she was supposed to feed his.
Speaker 1: Margarin, right, you know, yeah, I used to. I've told
Speaker 1: the story before. I used to bootleg cases of blue
Speaker 1: bonnet margin to my grandparents up in the north shore
Speaker 1: of Minnesota, Lake Superior, Minnesota because they insisted you had
Speaker 1: to margin, but they lived in Minnesota so you.
Speaker 4: Couldn't buy it. Yeah. Crazy.
Speaker 1: I hope that they don't to actually force him out
Speaker 1: because I do think he's doing all the right. People
Speaker 1: are leaving because of him, and I think that's a
Speaker 1: good sign. If you go into just you know, if
Speaker 1: you go into a bureaucracy, that's you know, just just
Speaker 1: sclerotic and people are so upset they leave. I think
Speaker 1: that's a really good sign.
Speaker 2: Yeah, often it is. You know, the person I trust
Speaker 2: in this realm more than anyone is Jay Batcheria, the
Speaker 2: director of the Nationalist super Health. I mean, I've had vacation,
Speaker 2: I run a program here at Notre Dame, and we've
Speaker 2: had him come speak a few times, including just a
Speaker 2: few days before he was nominated for the head of
Speaker 2: the NIH. And you know, he's a top scientist, he
Speaker 2: has all the credentials, but he's intellectually, epistemically humble. Yes,
Speaker 2: I'm not afraid to say what he doesn't know, and
Speaker 2: to my mind that gives him great credibility, both his
Speaker 2: intelligence but his humility and courage.
Speaker 1: Though at the same time along with the humility, remember
Speaker 1: he was he probably came close to losing his entire
Speaker 1: career over the Great Barrington Declaration.
Speaker 2: And for people who don't know, he's a Stanford epidemiologist
Speaker 2: PhD in economics. I mean, this guy is as credentialed
Speaker 2: as anyone could be. And very early in COVID he said, hey,
Speaker 2: wait a second, and he did some studies that showed,
Speaker 2: you know, COVID is our there's no possibility of zero COVID.
Speaker 2: I mean, it was out. Everyone was going to get
Speaker 2: it sooner or later. And he was saying these things
Speaker 2: in February March. Remember we all shut down around mid March.
Speaker 2: He was saying these things very early. Then published a
Speaker 2: great Barrantine declaration, and his colleagues at Stanford just went
Speaker 2: after him. It was terrible. I mean, so I told
Speaker 2: him he needs to write a book. There needs to
Speaker 2: be a movie made about him. He's a real hero.
Speaker 1: I mean I yeah, and his friends got at less
Speaker 1: did write a book.
Speaker 4: It's a very interesting one, and.
Speaker 2: Both those guys. Yeah, deserves a lot of credit. So,
Speaker 2: I mean, he, you know, Jay Batcheria, I hope before
Speaker 2: this term ends this administration and gets the Presidential Medal
Speaker 2: of Freedom because he he really is a hero for
Speaker 2: standing up for science but also freedom of speech.
Speaker 1: And give Trump some credit here too, for being willing
Speaker 1: to say, you know, I considered the operation Warp Speed
Speaker 1: one of my great accomplishments, but hey, let's look at
Speaker 1: it given credit.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, one of my one of my good
Speaker 2: friends here at Notre Dame sent me that statement and said,
Speaker 2: have you ever seen a president be willing to make
Speaker 2: himself so vulnerable in a way. Well, let's you know,
Speaker 2: I did this. I think it worked. But let's let's
Speaker 2: you know, they're presenting me with all sorts of evidence,
Speaker 2: the President said, but they don't put it out in
Speaker 2: the public. Let's put it out in the public.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I mean my response to my my colleague who sent
Speaker 2: me that was this is why people love him.
Speaker 1: Actually, yeah, yeah, because there are a lot of his
Speaker 1: actual mega people who think that was his probably worst
Speaker 1: thing he did. Many of them believe that he, you know,
Speaker 1: he was taking advice from people he thought he could trust, experts,
Speaker 1: experts like Fauci and Deborah Burghs whatever name.
Speaker 4: Is, you know.
Speaker 1: He he he thought he was doing the right thing.
Speaker 4: He's not a doctor, he has no medical training.
Speaker 1: And so he looks back on it and says, let's
Speaker 1: let's let's see what really happened there.
Speaker 2: Good for let's see No. So, I mean, I think
Speaker 2: when we're you know, the books are already starting to
Speaker 2: come out on you know what we got wrong? And
Speaker 2: Steve Mosito, very distinguished Princeton professor, very much man of
Speaker 2: the left, has a new book out like we got
Speaker 2: it all wrong? You know what, we the left got
Speaker 2: it all wrong for, you know, very lefty Princeton professor
Speaker 2: to say that. I mean, that's something else.
Speaker 1: So yeah, so tell me about your book. Excuse me,
Speaker 1: your article I was thinking about. You showed me the book.
Speaker 1: We'll come back to that. Tell me about so let
Speaker 1: me first say, I'll show it because if Steve does,
Speaker 1: this is uh an addition of national Affairs. It's I
Speaker 1: don't know if it's going to show very well, but yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a little blurry, but it includes an article by John,
Speaker 1: an article by Steve and me, and an article by
Speaker 1: Vincent Philip Munos, and we're gonna we're going to just yeah, no,
Speaker 1: we're going to discuss that one article today because without
Speaker 1: John here, it's really awful that whenever we have to
Speaker 1: discuss these deep philosophical issues, it works better to school
Speaker 1: John when he's actually not in the room, because then
Speaker 1: he doesn't lawyer us. But we'll give him, we'll give
Speaker 1: him equal time. Tell us a little bit about the
Speaker 1: the thesis.
Speaker 4: Of your article.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, thanks for asking about it. It's called the
Speaker 2: American Revolutions of seventeen seventy six revolutions plural and in
Speaker 2: the article I try to explain sort of three core
Speaker 2: elements of the Founding political philosophy, all of which are
Speaker 2: encapsulated in seventeen seventy six. The first revolution is that
Speaker 2: legitimate government is via consent. Legitimate government is via consent
Speaker 2: because all men are created equal, all people are equal
Speaker 2: by nature, No one has a right to rule. No person,
Speaker 2: no class has a right to rule by nature. So
Speaker 2: that's the first revolution, and we can come back to
Speaker 2: that because that gets right to the part of the
Speaker 2: theological political problem which I know you've been talking in
Speaker 2: recent episodes. So the first revolution is legitimate government is
Speaker 2: instituted via consent. Second revolution is the purposes of government
Speaker 2: are to protect natural rights, not to save citizens souls,
Speaker 2: protect their rights. The third revolution, connected to the first two,
Speaker 2: especially the second, is that why do we limit government
Speaker 2: to protecting rights, protecting natural rights and not saving souls?
Speaker 2: And we limit government to those more limited ends to
Speaker 2: leave room for church authority out of deference to and
Speaker 2: respect for church authority. Perhaps this is the most novel
Speaker 2: aspect of the article. I say, I try to connect
Speaker 2: and I think this is the Founder's understanding. We limit
Speaker 2: the authority of the state because the state doesn't have
Speaker 2: authority over our souls. Who has authority over our souls? Well,
Speaker 2: ourselves will to God and our churches. And so we
Speaker 2: limit state authority out of deference in respect of religious authority. Okay,
Speaker 2: that's the Third Revolution. So those are the government by consent,
Speaker 2: limited government protecting natural rights. We protect natural rights and
Speaker 2: due regard in deference to church authority, our obligations to
Speaker 2: our creator. Okay, So the revolutions of seventeen seventy six.
Speaker 1: Right, So I would only argue that in your second
Speaker 1: to revolutions, you don't go far enough. And this is
Speaker 1: this is why I will say so. First of all,
Speaker 1: the reason that that you don't have a government responsible
Speaker 1: for saving souls is because I agree with you, not
Speaker 1: so much out of deference to church authorities, but the
Speaker 1: absolute belief that Jefferson says, I should have pulled it
Speaker 1: up before this. You know that it makes one half
Speaker 1: of the world fools and the other tyrants. Right, is
Speaker 1: that that the phrase something like that if you try
Speaker 1: to force beliefs on people, you can't do it because
Speaker 1: Almighty God hath created the mind free. So from the
Speaker 1: point of view of human nature, Madison calls the right
Speaker 1: to conscience a natural right, and Jefferson certainly thought of it,
Speaker 1: included it in the idea of the rights of the
Speaker 1: natural rights. Among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit
Speaker 1: of happiness. The reason that it's a revolution, and that
Speaker 1: I agree with you about this, is it's the first
Speaker 1: time it ever happened. It's I mean, all throughout ancient history,
Speaker 1: the political authorities were the religious authorities and vice versa.
Speaker 1: They were one and the same, and your piety was
Speaker 1: the same as your patriotism. If you obeyed the laws,
Speaker 1: you obeyed the gods. Christianity comes along and it's a
Speaker 1: universal god, monotheistic religion, and you could have a loyalty
Speaker 1: to God that might be different from your loyalty to
Speaker 1: your political authority, to the political SoC and even see
Speaker 1: some evidence of why that's problematic in the Gospel and
Speaker 1: in some of the letters the epistles. But over the
Speaker 1: years those things became joined. You had the Holy Roman Empire,
Speaker 1: you had the King of England becoming the head of
Speaker 1: the Church of England, where all of a sudden, now
Speaker 1: you have religious wars. You have religious wars which define Europe,
Speaker 1: and even in many cases of wider conflicts for a
Speaker 1: thousand years at least, if not more. And you know,
Speaker 1: America was founded by people wanting to practice their own
Speaker 1: religion here in America that they were prevented from practicing
Speaker 1: over in Europe. So religion and politics is probably the
Speaker 1: single most important conflict in human history.
Speaker 2: I would say, yeah, I mean, you're getting right at
Speaker 2: the heart of what we talk about limited government. Sometimes
Speaker 2: conservatives confused limited government with small government. I mean, we
Speaker 2: conservatives used to like small government, you know, lower taxes.
Speaker 1: And I still do because the more government does, the
Speaker 1: less liberty you have.
Speaker 4: But yes, I get your point.
Speaker 2: But limited government is there's certain things that the state
Speaker 2: governing powers people who have the guns can't legitimately do.
Speaker 2: An example I like to use is I'm in Indiana,
Speaker 2: the state of Indiana, or the state of California, or wherever.
Speaker 2: We license doctors, we license lawyers, we licensed cosmetologists, we
Speaker 2: license everything. To get married, you have to get a license,
Speaker 2: But preachers don't have to get a license the state
Speaker 2: from the state from the state. The state of Indiana
Speaker 2: doesn't issue preaching licenses. And why not. You can imagine
Speaker 2: Governor Dowse some saying there's an epidemic of hate preaching,
Speaker 2: and so we need the licensed preachers. And the correct
Speaker 2: response was would be, you don't have authority to do that.
Speaker 2: You don't you the governor of California. You don't have
Speaker 2: authority to determine who is and who is not a
Speaker 2: legitimate preacher. Sure, that's what we mean by limited government.
Speaker 2: There's certain things that the state can't do. You were
Speaker 2: pointing to the foundation of that limit as a sort
Speaker 2: of government and competence, or you know, government can't So
Speaker 2: what Jefferson says, you know government, government can't make you
Speaker 2: believe in the true religion. And I think that's true
Speaker 2: to some extent. I mean, that's Locke's argument. Jefferson gets
Speaker 2: it from Locke. It's the classic argument of the letter
Speaker 2: concerning toleration. I mean that's true to some extent. I
Speaker 2: think it actually overstates the case. Really, yeah, you know.
Speaker 1: You mean, because you look at it, say, an is
Speaker 1: a Muslim country where they're actually pretty successful at it.
Speaker 2: Well, yes, you could do that or sat Augustine actually
Speaker 2: writes about this and he says, experience taught me with
Speaker 2: the Donatis. So these, uh, this is this heretical group.
Speaker 2: He says, these people were confused in their in their
Speaker 2: in their laziness, confused on an account of their laziness,
Speaker 2: the accustom. They had certain beliefs which were wrong, religious
Speaker 2: beliefs that were wrong, at least in Augustine's point of view.
Speaker 2: And he said force can shake them out of their slumber.
Speaker 2: So so it is true that compulsion alone can't can't
Speaker 2: make you believe something.
Speaker 4: But where does that compulsion come from? For Augustine, Well.
Speaker 2: It's from the state, from those who have, you know,
Speaker 2: those who have the guns. Force can make you consider arguments,
Speaker 2: it can shake you up, it can end customs. You know.
Speaker 2: Belief is a complicated thing, sure, suation of upbringing, and
Speaker 2: force can affect those background conditions, if I can put
Speaker 2: it in a sort of social scientific way. So it's
Speaker 2: not that force is completely impotent. So I think Jefferson
Speaker 2: and Locke maybe go to I mean, it's not what
Speaker 2: they say isn't true. It's just not the whole story.
Speaker 4: I get that.
Speaker 1: I also think that it's in the rest and it's
Speaker 1: by the way, it's half of the world hypocrites and
Speaker 1: the other fools, not times hypocrites. And and of course
Speaker 1: that is also an instrumental argument, because remember it goes
Speaker 1: further and says that God asks us for our our faith,
Speaker 1: our belief as a personal choice.
Speaker 4: And so you are, in.
Speaker 1: Fact legitimizing genuine religious belief.
Speaker 4: That's not the right word. You are by keeping.
Speaker 1: Government out of the business of saving souls. As you
Speaker 1: put it, if my soul is saved, it's genuine. If
Speaker 1: my soul is saved on account of laws and regulations
Speaker 1: that will punish me for lack of faith, then it's
Speaker 1: not all that genuine. And so he says, the true
Speaker 1: religion prefers this freedom of conscience, freedom of.
Speaker 4: Will to choose it.
Speaker 1: And I think again, to a great extent, that's an
Speaker 1: instrumental argument, because they want the separation of religious authority
Speaker 1: from political authority, because that gives human beings the greatest freedom.
Speaker 1: I think it's not that I want to leave this subtopic,
Speaker 1: but it takes me to Steve asked us to consider
Speaker 1: discussing this article that our good friend Glenn Elmers wrote.
Speaker 1: And I believe the name of the article is something
Speaker 1: like the Founders wanted Religion, but not I forget exactly.
Speaker 2: What it is mister Wilson's article.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I don't even know who that person is.
Speaker 2: Sorry, I say one thing on the last point, just yeah, sure,
Speaker 2: of course there's a prudential argument and then a more
Speaker 2: principled argument about religious freedom and separation of church and state.
Speaker 2: The prudential argument, as you were getting at, is, you know,
Speaker 2: when we have the union of church and state. Religious peoples,
Speaker 2: my post liberal friends they say, well, if we had
Speaker 2: a closer connection between church and state, well, then church authorities,
Speaker 2: you know who we respect, or the churches we belong to,
Speaker 2: they'll govern the political authorities, and then the political authority
Speaker 2: can be used to, you know, to if not save souls,
Speaker 2: at least help form souls in the proper direction. But
Speaker 2: in fact, history teaches us the opposite is true. It's
Speaker 2: not for church authorities direct political authorities. It's that political
Speaker 2: authorities direct the church authorities. Yes, absolutely. At the time
Speaker 2: of the founding, the class of people who are most
Speaker 2: against the American Revolution the Anglican bishops. And why were
Speaker 2: the Anglican bishops the established clergy. Why were they against
Speaker 2: the revolution? Well because who was their patron? The power
Speaker 2: came from the crib who owned all the church property,
Speaker 2: who their appointment? They were government officials and Madison's argument.
Speaker 2: Jefferson's argument. Part of the argument is just prudential. Look,
Speaker 2: when you have a union of church and state. You
Speaker 2: can see this Catholic church in Germany right now, which
Speaker 2: gets its tax dollars, gets tax dollars from the state.
Speaker 2: When you have a union in church and state, the
Speaker 2: state always ended up controlling the church.
Speaker 1: Let me just add one small point to that. Having
Speaker 1: lived in Germany and enjoying all of those actually not
Speaker 1: enjoying them because they didn't really apply to us. There
Speaker 1: are more religious holidays in Germany that are federal national
Speaker 1: government sanctioned holidays. I can't even imagine how to get
Speaker 1: anything done, to be honest with you. I think there's
Speaker 1: two a week or something like that.
Speaker 4: It seemed like. But the point was, with.
Speaker 1: All of that government sanctioning of religion and support for religion,
Speaker 1: the churches were empty. There is in fact no discernible
Speaker 1: religious community in Germany anymore. You know, my daughter was
Speaker 1: confirmed in a twelve hundred cathedral from that it was
Speaker 1: built in the twelve hundreds, and it was the most
Speaker 1: people because it was a bunch of military families there
Speaker 1: that that church had seen in like ten years in
Speaker 1: a mass.
Speaker 4: You know, it's just which is.
Speaker 1: You know, that kind of proves the point that if
Speaker 1: the state gets involved in religion, it no longer leaves
Speaker 1: it up to the individual to decide. And I think
Speaker 1: it underminds and cheapens the religious experience. But I don't
Speaker 1: think that was necessarily the founder's central goal. I do
Speaker 1: believe it was. They believed it was necessary to separate
Speaker 1: the idea of church and state. And the way they
Speaker 1: did that is in some ways it's brilliant. And I
Speaker 1: think it's all tied up in the phrase. We laughed
Speaker 1: about it last week because Claremont has hats that say
Speaker 1: this nature and Nature's God. So for the first time
Speaker 1: you've had a country founded on the idea that both
Speaker 1: revelation and reason supported the notion of human equality and
Speaker 1: the need for government based upon consent. And my way
Speaker 1: of introducing that to students, and you saw that I
Speaker 1: wrote about it is I really do think that this
Speaker 1: is sort of revolutionary in and of itself. When Jesus
Speaker 1: goes to the well and the he's by himself, as
Speaker 1: does disciples have gone to get food or something, and
Speaker 1: the Samaritan woman comes up and he talks to her.
Speaker 1: We don't have a sense of what that means. We
Speaker 1: talk to anybody, but for a rabbi to talk to
Speaker 1: a woman, first of all, an accompanied woman, second of
Speaker 1: all a Samaritan, not a Jewish woman. And third of all,
Speaker 1: it's you know, they make it so she's probably a prostitute,
Speaker 1: and he talks her like she's a human being. That
Speaker 1: to us, it's it's hard to fathom how revolutionary, how
Speaker 1: that single passage in the Bible was, but it's it's
Speaker 1: clear she and remember what happens. Then he says, you know,
Speaker 1: I know you're a sinner. You're living with a man
Speaker 1: who's not your husband. And he forgives her, and then
Speaker 1: she goes back to her Samaritan community and talks about
Speaker 1: and so for the first time, what you see is
Speaker 1: not only that salvation is not just for the Jews
Speaker 1: or just for men, or you know, or it's the
Speaker 1: opening the recognition by Jesus that all human beings are equal,
Speaker 1: and that notion of equality takes a long time, but
Speaker 1: in my opinion, is embalmed in the Declaration of Independence,
Speaker 1: but not based upon religious authority alone, based upon the
Speaker 1: idea you said at the beginning that human beings, by
Speaker 1: nature are not.
Speaker 4: Fitted with rulers and ruled. You.
Speaker 1: You can't tell by nature who is a ruler and
Speaker 1: who was born to be ruled, and therefore.
Speaker 4: We are are our own natural rulers.
Speaker 1: That's to me, the biggest revolution of all of them
Speaker 1: is that religion and reason teaches us that human beings
Speaker 1: are fundamentally equal and the most important respect.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's three interrelated ideas which you are articulated all
Speaker 2: of them. I mean, the first really comes from the
Speaker 2: Jewish scriptures. There's one God, a monotheism. You mentioned this earlier.
Speaker 2: I mean that there's so in the ancient world and
Speaker 2: the non Jewish world. I mean, you can see this
Speaker 2: in the Old Testament too. You know, when when you're
Speaker 2: when your country went to war, your gods were waging
Speaker 2: war against their gods. That is, it wasn't a world
Speaker 2: of monotheism. What Judaism brings to the world is there's
Speaker 2: the one God and he is the true God. That is,
Speaker 2: those other gods are not really gods, they're false gods.
Speaker 2: So okay, that's the first. The second is there's one
Speaker 2: God and he's the god of everyone. We are all
Speaker 2: sons and daughters of the One True God. I mean
Speaker 2: that idea we don't appreciate. The left especially does not
Speaker 2: appreciate how revolutionary that idea is. I mean, this is
Speaker 2: why we have what we call human rights slots. That's
Speaker 2: why we don't just we take prisoners of war. We
Speaker 2: don't shoot them. You know, why do so? We're at war,
Speaker 2: they're in uniforms, the opponent is in uniforms. We capture them.
Speaker 2: Why don't we just shoot them? Right? We house them,
Speaker 2: we feed them right right well, because look, they may
Speaker 2: be our enemies in battle, and it's legitimate to kill
Speaker 2: them on the battlefield, but once we've detained them, taken
Speaker 2: away their guns, once they can't harm us, they are
Speaker 2: still children of God.
Speaker 1: It's why my favorite Christmas song, I won't call it Carol,
Speaker 1: is Snoopy's Christmas. To me, it's the perfect emblematic idea
Speaker 1: that our humanity uh and and the what Christmas means
Speaker 1: to humanity is even more important than uh, than than
Speaker 1: than enemies clashing exactly.
Speaker 2: I mean that that our enemies are still children, sons
Speaker 2: and daughters of God. That that is a as a
Speaker 2: revolutionary concept that Christianity brings, brings to the.
Speaker 4: World and that Lincoln reminded us of and we use.
Speaker 2: The language of human dignity today.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, we're gonna get comments about that, but we're
Speaker 1: gonna leave that.
Speaker 4: I get what you're all going to say.
Speaker 1: Human rights today doesn't necessarily mean exactly what what Phil
Speaker 1: has in mind here, but I understand what he means
Speaker 1: by that. It's the recognition of the natural rights of
Speaker 1: other human being.
Speaker 2: And we all have them, not just Americans, but they're
Speaker 2: natural rights, we all humans. And then the third idea,
Speaker 2: which is to connect to the equality idea, is so
Speaker 2: there's one God, it's a god of all of us.
Speaker 2: But that God doesn't appoint political rulers for our political communities.
Speaker 2: I mean, we participate, you could say, in the divine
Speaker 2: governance of the world. I mean, I don't want to
Speaker 2: be flip about it, but God says, look, your social beings,
Speaker 2: by nature, you need to live together, figure out how
Speaker 2: to live well using your mind. Right, I don't have
Speaker 2: to appoint rulers for you. You're equal. Right, form a community.
Speaker 2: Do it on the ground of equality.
Speaker 4: You're You're in the gospels.
Speaker 2: Give to Caesar, what is Caesar's So Caesar has a
Speaker 2: legitimate authority give to God. What is God's Caesar's authority
Speaker 2: is not appointed directly by God. This particular ruler is
Speaker 2: not a pointed by God.
Speaker 1: But it took seventeen one hundred years for call it
Speaker 1: political states and political philosophers to.
Speaker 4: Figure that out.
Speaker 1: Because remember what ruled Europe for centuries was the notion
Speaker 1: of the divine right of kings. It was the controlling
Speaker 1: philosophy of government, call it that theory of government before.
Speaker 2: Consent, a heresy that is convenient for those who want
Speaker 2: to have power or hold power to say, my power
Speaker 2: comes from God.
Speaker 1: A very powerful heresy, very powerful heresy, very powerful heresy.
Speaker 1: And as Jefferson says, you know, we finally come to
Speaker 1: the point where we're no longer being ruled by monks
Speaker 1: and superstition ignorant, right.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's a dig at the Gallic Church, but
Speaker 2: it is No church is perfect. So yes, you could
Speaker 2: say that you cannot go all the way back to Erstutle,
Speaker 2: that you can go to other earlier thinkers who understand
Speaker 2: that there's a problem with the divine right of kings.
Speaker 2: But in terms of actual real politics, real governance, it's
Speaker 2: the great contribution of the American Founders to not only
Speaker 2: us as Americans, but to Western civilization to the world
Speaker 2: is the creation of a system of government that respects
Speaker 2: human equality, yes, and religious authority and religious liberty. And
Speaker 2: I think this is the point you're driving at that
Speaker 2: the Founders in this sense solved the theological political problem.
Speaker 2: They advised an arrangement that they devised an understanding and
Speaker 2: then a political political institutions that both respect religious authority
Speaker 2: and legitimate and legitimate political authorities. And they showed how
Speaker 2: religious authority and political authority could coincide. That by limiting
Speaker 2: political authority and saying that those who religious authorities don't
Speaker 2: get to govern on account of the religious character. Right
Speaker 2: in a nutshell, that's how you solve the theological political problem.
Speaker 2: I've really simplified here, let's be honest, So John will
Speaker 2: hopefully understand this. But that's the genius of the American Founding.
Speaker 1: One more addition to that, and that is it's very important.
Speaker 1: I thought of it when you were talking about human rights.
Speaker 1: It's also necessary, as the first paragraph of the Declaration
Speaker 1: tells us that that one people have to come together
Speaker 1: in recognition of those natural rights, with the goal of
Speaker 1: securing those natural rights. And it is so that's why
Speaker 1: I sort of hesitate a little at the notion of
Speaker 1: calling them human rights, because human rights implies to me
Speaker 1: today the notion of a un or global global government.
Speaker 1: It can't be done by global governments. It cannot be
Speaker 1: done in a way that does not allow for the
Speaker 1: sovereignty of the people to exercise their consent on a
Speaker 1: continuous basis in some way. And that consent is a
Speaker 1: mutual consent with each other, it is that's the important part.
Speaker 1: It's consent with your fellow human beings inside of what
Speaker 1: you create as a political community. And then you choose
Speaker 1: a government to secure your natural rights. And never forget
Speaker 1: the Aristotilian ends of safety and happiness. The government is
Speaker 1: there to secure your natural rights, to conduce to your
Speaker 1: safety and happiness, which of course are the alpha and
Speaker 1: omega of Aristotle's political ends political tilos. So I want
Speaker 1: to move that discussion then to a discussion of how
Speaker 1: that informs our constitution, because I do think that that
Speaker 1: question may be the most important question not only between
Speaker 1: the left and the right today, but also between elements
Speaker 1: of the right itself. Even my good friend John claims
Speaker 1: that our Constitution is not based upon these natural rights ideas.
Speaker 4: He calls it the.
Speaker 1: Natural law, and he says the natural law in seventeen
Speaker 1: seventy six is not the same as it was when
Speaker 1: the fourteenth Amendment was passed. And you know, I think
Speaker 1: sometimes he just does that to tweak me, but he
Speaker 1: does say it. Does our constitution have a basis that
Speaker 1: is greater than simply the agreement the consent that you know,
Speaker 1: the method of consent that the constitutional Convention decided, you know,
Speaker 1: or send it to the people, not to the states,
Speaker 1: send it to the people in ratifying conventions after elections
Speaker 1: in their state. Does it have a greater force? Are
Speaker 1: there more principles?
Speaker 4: Are there?
Speaker 1: Is there a natural law basis to the Constitution that
Speaker 1: is how would you say operative? I hate to use
Speaker 1: that term, but I think you know what I mean. Ken,
Speaker 1: Our politicians are elected officials, and our judges turned to
Speaker 1: that natural law basis of the Constitution to inform them
Speaker 1: on how to interpret the provisions of the Constitution in
Speaker 1: a meaningful practical way. I think that's the biggest question, right.
Speaker 2: So there are two issues here, and I think it's
Speaker 2: really important to at least analytically keep them separate. The
Speaker 2: first issue is what are the purpose? Why do we
Speaker 2: have the constitution? We do? Are the what are its purposes?
Speaker 2: What are its ends? Why did the founders design it
Speaker 2: as they did? And here positivists and sometimes John who
Speaker 2: likes to flirt with positivism, says he thinks he is
Speaker 2: a positive. He's not really, but he thinks he is.
Speaker 2: He says, Look, it's simply a matter of will. That's
Speaker 2: the constitution they gave us, and the people ratify, and
Speaker 2: so it's really the people's will. We have the constitution
Speaker 2: we have simply because that's the constitution we gave ourselves.
Speaker 2: I don't think that's right. It's true the necessary condition
Speaker 2: of authority is that it was ratified by the people.
Speaker 2: But that's not sufficient because the people could make a
Speaker 2: very bad constitution. The purpose of our constitution? Let me
Speaker 2: take one constitutional provision, the taking's clause. Government can't take
Speaker 2: your property except for public use and just compensation. Why
Speaker 2: is that provision in the constitution. We's in the constitution
Speaker 2: because the founder said the purpose of the constitution is
Speaker 2: to protect our natural rights, including our right to property.
Speaker 2: The problem of demand, and I especially yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: the fundamental problem of popular government or democracy is the
Speaker 2: many taking the property of thew And that's wrong. It's
Speaker 2: wrong even if it's done lawfully. You can't just the many.
Speaker 2: Can't just plunder the few. The fu shouldn't plunder the many.
Speaker 2: But why do we have a right to property, a
Speaker 2: natural right to property? Well, because if I pick the apple,
Speaker 2: it's mine. No one owns the apple tree I'm out there.
Speaker 2: If I'm out in the ocean and I cast a
Speaker 2: line and catch a fish, it's mine. Why do I
Speaker 2: own my property? Why do I own my labor? But
Speaker 2: why do I get the apple? Who made that rule?
Speaker 2: That I own my own labor? That's by nature. That's
Speaker 2: what it means to be a person to own your
Speaker 2: own labor. Slaves are people who don't own their own labor.
Speaker 2: Slavery is wrong. Now those moral pronouncements I just made
Speaker 2: that the apple, if I pick it is mine. That
Speaker 2: slavery is wrong. If I enslave someone, the slave picks
Speaker 2: the apple, I take it. Those those moral pronouncements are
Speaker 2: not because of some positive law we made. Those are
Speaker 2: that is the natural law.
Speaker 1: Okay, So here's I'll be John for a second. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he just says that that's a cost benefit. The reason
Speaker 1: that we protect property is because it leads to economic prosperity,
Speaker 1: which it does.
Speaker 2: It's true it does, but that's not the reason we
Speaker 2: protected The reason why we we think slavery is wrong
Speaker 2: is not because it's inefficient. It's because, no, the slaves
Speaker 2: own their labor too. I mean, Abraham Lincoln says, you work,
Speaker 2: I eat is the root logic of despotism.
Speaker 4: Yep. No different from kings or tyrants in the past.
Speaker 1: Yes, so I want to read to you really quickly.
Speaker 1: This was a story. But you said you didn't have
Speaker 1: time to pay too much attention to the headlines. Senator
Speaker 1: Kine from Virginia when he was questioning a nominee to
Speaker 1: actually the nominee was to I don't even Assistant Secretary
Speaker 1: of State and the Riley Barnes in his opening his
Speaker 1: I guess opening statement, Riley Barnes says, we are a
Speaker 1: nation founded on a powerful principle, and that powerful principle
Speaker 1: is that all men are created equal because our rights
Speaker 1: come from God, our creator, not from our laws, not
Speaker 1: from our government. He warned that when rights are untothered
Speaker 1: from that principle, they can be easily manipulated by authoritarians
Speaker 1: and bad actors. OK.
Speaker 4: You and I would agree with that.
Speaker 1: I think it's true simply speaking, and that's a secondary issue,
Speaker 1: that it's problematic if you don't abide by that principle.
Speaker 4: But Cain said that the.
Speaker 1: Notion was extremely tru bling, that it should make Americans very,
Speaker 1: very nervous, because the notion that rights don't come from
Speaker 1: laws and don't come from the government, but come from
Speaker 1: the creator. That's what the Iranian government believes.
Speaker 2: I mean, has he not read the Declaration of Independence
Speaker 2: by our creator? Our rights are endowed by our creator.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's but it's an embarrassment that the United
Speaker 2: States senator would say that. I mean he's directly contradicting
Speaker 2: the Declaration of Independence.
Speaker 1: Of course, But is it not emblematic or symptomatic of
Speaker 1: the the rot in our government and amongst the left
Speaker 1: and left and so forth that he could say that
Speaker 1: and not be laughed off the stage?
Speaker 2: Well, because he actually believe. It's not just ignorance, it's
Speaker 2: what he actually believes. I mean, it's the modern left.
Speaker 2: I mean, this is intellectually you go back to Herbert
Speaker 2: Crowley and Woodrow Wilson. They actually believe no rights are
Speaker 2: a product of historical development. They're a product of the state.
Speaker 2: You only have property rights. To go back to our
Speaker 2: own example, you only get the apple because we made
Speaker 2: laws to say that you get the apple. That your
Speaker 2: property rights are a product of the state. They're granted
Speaker 2: by the state, and then they're readjusted over time, right
Speaker 2: by whatever the state decides as best for human development. Sure,
Speaker 2: that is the modern conception, the modern progressive conception of government.
Speaker 2: So Senator Kane, you know, we say it's laughable because
Speaker 2: it's against the Declaration of Independence, which he obviously is
Speaker 2: unaware of, but he's actually speaking of truth. He actually
Speaker 2: thinks rights come from the state.
Speaker 1: There's I think a secondary issue there too, and that
Speaker 1: is this is my bias against the left. For all
Speaker 1: of their talk about all quality and equity, what it
Speaker 1: really means is if it's God who gives us our rights,
Speaker 1: or call it even nature, nature being some unchanging principle,
Speaker 1: then of course you're limited as a politician, and you're
Speaker 1: just not just a servant of God but a servant
Speaker 1: of the people. That's the whole idea of American political
Speaker 1: power that is consistent with the Constitution that our representatives
Speaker 1: are senators, our president, even though our judges are our
Speaker 1: servants who have been given the sacred responsibility of governing
Speaker 1: the American people. But of course Kine doesn't think of
Speaker 1: himself that way, not even I mean, not even close.
Speaker 1: He thinks that, you know, if power comes from God,
Speaker 1: it means I don't have power.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And if rights come from the government, he is
Speaker 2: the bestower rights.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, and so there's an incredible arrogance about this,
Speaker 1: but it's very because of course, then the other thing
Speaker 1: that that the left likes to do, in my opinion,
Speaker 1: that once you no longer believe that rights come from
Speaker 1: God or from nature, from from a rational understanding of
Speaker 1: human nature, then you can make rights and be anything
Speaker 1: you want them to be. Like you talked about back
Speaker 1: back somehow, uh, turning us back to a place where
Speaker 1: the many can take away the property of.
Speaker 4: The rich or vice versa.
Speaker 1: Or turning us to a place where you can say,
Speaker 1: there's a right to health care, a right to uh,
Speaker 1: you know, a right to a fair and appropriate public education,
Speaker 1: a right here's.
Speaker 2: Your gender, right to do whatever you want. I mean
Speaker 2: that there's no nature, yes, right, there's nothing stable. There's
Speaker 2: nothing fixed, there's nothing that limits the power of the government.
Speaker 2: To get back to our earlier point or first point
Speaker 2: was one of the revolutions was we limit the power
Speaker 2: of the state. But if there are no natural rights,
Speaker 2: it emancipates the state. And that's really what Tim Kain thinks.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, and you know the idea that he didn't
Speaker 1: lose his seat, that he wasn't the whole Senate didn't
Speaker 1: censor him for saying those remarks. Again, I think it's
Speaker 1: a rot at the center of our government these days,
Speaker 1: and I think, pardon me, that, excuse me, I'm so sorry.
Speaker 1: That's one of the things to go back to the
Speaker 1: very beginning of our discussion that Civitas and some of
Speaker 1: these other civic education are trying to reintroduce.
Speaker 2: I am.
Speaker 1: Optimistic, not just because there are places like Civitas, but
Speaker 1: also because I believe that Trump's success. I don't think
Speaker 1: Trump is perfect. Don't anybody accuse me of that. But
Speaker 1: Trump's success is that there's a lot more common sense
Speaker 1: out there in America that understands what Tim Kaine does
Speaker 1: not understand.
Speaker 2: I think every day, everyday Americans are still a very sensible.
Speaker 4: Bunch, and they may not understand it the way we do.
Speaker 2: But we should get back to our point, because there's
Speaker 2: the first point you asked about natural rights and constitutional government.
Speaker 2: Our first point was that there is a moral foundation
Speaker 2: in nature, Nature and Nature's God and human rights and
Speaker 2: natural rights that our constitution is meant to protect. So
Speaker 2: there's natural rights. The fact that I get to own
Speaker 2: my own labor, that's a natural right. The natural right
Speaker 2: of property, or natural right to acquire property, that's part
Speaker 2: of the natural law. The natural law is just to
Speaker 2: say what's reasonable. It's not reasonable that if I pick
Speaker 2: the apple you can take it from me. Right, you
Speaker 2: can't take my property. We all understand that right, and
Speaker 2: that's that's the natural law. We create a constitution to
Speaker 2: protect our natural rights. So the natural law, the natural
Speaker 2: rights are inform the constitution. Now John thinks he makes
Speaker 2: a quick jump. He says, if you belie believe that,
Speaker 2: then a judge can always invoke the natural law to
Speaker 2: adjudicate a case. And he says, well, but different people
Speaker 2: disagree about what the natural law is. Therefore you're just
Speaker 2: emancipating judges to be policymakers, to be philosopher kings. That's
Speaker 2: too quick of a jump. Okay, So the constitution is
Speaker 2: informed by natural law. Again, natural rights are just part
Speaker 2: of the natural law. Right. The natural law is simply
Speaker 2: the law of natural justice.
Speaker 4: We create there on the hearts of men according to luck.
Speaker 2: And the gospels, and the and the and the we
Speaker 2: create a constitution to secure justice. The legislative power is
Speaker 2: the body. The body that makes the law is to
Speaker 2: make laws, to make good, positive laws for the community
Speaker 2: that determine or effectuate the natural law. So we have
Speaker 2: all sorts of laws to regulate property, to protect property right.
Speaker 2: We divide up the land into parcels. That's all done
Speaker 2: by the legislature so people can own it. So law makers,
Speaker 2: when they're passing laws, how do we know if a
Speaker 2: law is good or bad? What's the standard? I mean,
Speaker 2: they're legal because they're laws as long as they're passed
Speaker 2: according to the due procedures. But we can say some
Speaker 2: laws are good, some laws are bad. Slavery was legal
Speaker 2: in the Southern States, but it was a bad law.
Speaker 2: Why can we say it's a bad law, Well, because
Speaker 2: it's against the natural law. So the political body, the
Speaker 2: institution that's most responsible for articulating and then instantiating the
Speaker 2: natural law for our political community is the legislature through
Speaker 2: passing positive laws. So the civil law, when it's good,
Speaker 2: reflects the natural law. This is exactly what Martin Luther
Speaker 2: King says, by the way, in his letter from the
Speaker 2: Birmingham Jail, he says, look segregation right, the dividing people
Speaker 2: by race by law, saying you know, no blacks can
Speaker 2: be at the public in the public schools, or the
Speaker 2: public swimming pool, or if you own a business, you
Speaker 2: must segregate on the race. Those are laws. They're just
Speaker 2: deficient laws. They're unjust laws. They're immoral laws because the
Speaker 2: positive law is not consistent with the natural law, and
Speaker 2: therefore those laws should be overturned. They should be sorry,
Speaker 2: those laws should be rescinded. As King's argument, Okay, now
Speaker 2: here's the question. If you're a judge and you have
Speaker 2: to say the law of segregation or the law of slavery,
Speaker 2: what's your authority. The law is the positive laws against
Speaker 2: the natural law. But the institution that's responsible for instantiating
Speaker 2: the natural law is the legislature. So here's where I
Speaker 2: actually agree with John. It's not the role of judges
Speaker 2: to overturn the positive law into the in light of
Speaker 2: the natural law. The role of the judge in our
Speaker 2: system is to articulate in a case by case basis,
Speaker 2: what the positive law is. That's the role of the judge,
Speaker 2: simplifying a little bit, but it's to interpret the constitution.
Speaker 2: The Constitution is a positive law, so the role of
Speaker 2: the judge is not to go over the positive law
Speaker 2: the Constitution to the natural law to strike down. That's
Speaker 2: just not the role of the judge. So you can
Speaker 2: have both a judiciary that understands its role is limited
Speaker 2: to articulating the meaning of the Constitution and say the
Speaker 2: Constitution is a product of the natural law. Those are
Speaker 2: not incompatible positions. Okay, now one.
Speaker 1: Can't bring that up at the end of the podcast.
Speaker 4: I'm sorry, Phil, that's unfair.
Speaker 1: Go ahead.
Speaker 2: One refinement. Part of the positive law, part of the
Speaker 2: Constitution are natural law principles, so the freedom of speech
Speaker 2: or the free exercise of religion. So you're judge and
Speaker 2: you say, well, the First Amendment says Congress can't pass
Speaker 2: a law a bridging the freedom of speech, Well, what
Speaker 2: is the freedom of speech? That text, that constitutional text
Speaker 2: reflects a natural law principle. The natural law principle is
Speaker 2: people have a right to say things that are reasonable,
Speaker 2: and they should not be punished for saying things that
Speaker 2: are reasonable. But libel, saying false things, Maliciously saying false
Speaker 2: things about something someone is not reasonable. You can't destroy
Speaker 2: someone's reputation that's actually a real harm to them. So
Speaker 2: libel is not part of the freedom of speech. So
Speaker 2: a judge in interpreting the positive law the freedom of
Speaker 2: speech the First Amendment. When a judge is interpreting the
Speaker 2: First Amendment, to interpret it well, according to the text,
Speaker 2: you're going to have to understand the natural law principles
Speaker 2: that inform the text. That's why a judge can say
Speaker 2: libel is not part of freedom of speech. Publishing pornographic
Speaker 2: images is not part of the freedom of the press.
Speaker 2: So it well, it's true that the role of the
Speaker 2: judge is only to interpret the positive law. To interpret
Speaker 2: the positive law requires knowledge of natural law principles, because
Speaker 2: our positive law is informed by the natural law.
Speaker 1: Yes, and I would love to carry on with this
Speaker 1: conversation quite a bit more because it deserves more discussion,
Speaker 1: but unfortunately, not only do you have to be someplace
Speaker 1: I'm to understand, but we are out of time. So
Speaker 1: I thank you very much for joining us joining me
Speaker 1: today on the three Whiskey Happy Hour. By the way, folks,
Speaker 1: I have to tell you that we didn't talk about
Speaker 1: whiskey because it's actually we started at six fifteen am
Speaker 1: Pacific time. It's a little early for me because itself.
Speaker 1: I do have my eighteen twelve commemorative death Wish coffee cups,
Speaker 1: so I guess that'll have to do for this week.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna throw a few really quick Babylon bees because
Speaker 1: we didn't get to some of the things we were
Speaker 1: going to discuss, because you know, that's how it always goes.
Speaker 4: But let me.
Speaker 1: Start with report Chicago shootings are down. As the official
Speaker 1: guy who keeps track of all the shootings got shot.
Speaker 1: English Bobby's raced past five stabbings to tackle offensive social
Speaker 1: media poster man.
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 2: It's really the corruption of the West right there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean they're pushing back. There's obviously it's similar
Speaker 1: I think in Great Britain, parts of you know, Scotland
Speaker 1: and Ireland, where the middle class, the lower middle class,
Speaker 1: the heartland people, if they have them there, they're a
Speaker 1: lot smarter. They have a lot more common sense than
Speaker 1: their leaders. Do that. You know that gives me a
Speaker 1: lot of hope. It's why I tend to flock with
Speaker 1: them rather than my elites. Sorry, I know that's not
Speaker 1: very nice. Newsome announces he is anti crime until the
Speaker 1: next election. Kamala Harris last scene fleeing dozens of international
Speaker 1: assassins after Trump counsels her secret Service protection. Just covering
Speaker 1: all those headlines we didn't get to Russia, Ukraine reached
Speaker 1: new type of truth where they just keep bombing each
Speaker 1: other and finally study finds women in denteds to make
Speaker 1: other women look stupid. You won't appreciate that, but I do,
Speaker 1: all right, Phil, Hey, you want to take us out?
Speaker 2: Well, I suppose I'm supposed to say, always drink your
Speaker 2: whiskey meat, but I actually preferred on the rocks.
Speaker 1: Oh heresy, Thank you, Phil. I hope to see you
Speaker 1: on here again soon because John's gonna want a piece
Speaker 1: of you. Have a great week, everyone.
Speaker 2: Ricochet join the conversation.