letterpress offers joseph ellis and stacy schiff took a look at the political climate in america following the american revolution. they examine why america's newly independent states decided to accept the centralized government. >> we are so pleased to welcome joseph ellis acclaimed author and historian. he recently retired his position as the ford foundation professor of history where he taught courses in american history since 1972. joseph ellis has also published over ten books including his book on thomas jefferson which won the national book award as well as the book founding brothers which one a pulitzer prize. most recently, he wrote the second american revolution which you hear about tonight. our moderator for the evening is

stacy schiff. in 2000, she received a pivot surprise for her book. she also won several literary awards including george washington book prize and the ambassador book award for the great improvisation and the birth of america. as well as the number one national bestseller. she's currently working on a new book re: 1692 salem and we are looking forward to having her return next winter. succumb if that one person come if you are here sign up for our brochure and you will get all of that wonderful news. so before we begin i just want to ask that you please turn off your cell phone or any other electronic devices and note that photography is permitted except

for the house photographer. and with that now please join me in welcoming the wonderful guest tonight. thank you. [applause] >> let's see how this goes. this is a very radical book that you've written. you've reminded us here that the continental army waged a war for independence not for union. the idea of nationhood comes later. only in 1787 to be become one nation indivisible. >> we get a government that is a national government before a nation. >> so that we backtrack a little bit as you say it post-independence pre- nationhood was meant doesn't

bubble up from the people. it's imposed by the small group of collaborators working together. you talk about their work as a brilliant rescue from the core ideals of the american revolution. what do you mean by that? [laughter] >> it's okay. i can answer that. if you think about the argument that the colonists made to justify independence, the resolution on independence written by robert henry lee, richard henry lee voted on july 2 read these colonies are and have every right to be independent states. that was the resolution for independence. we did not rebel against britain as a nation. we rebuild as a series of independent states. if you think of the arguments they've been hurling at the parliament from 1765 to 1775

they are not arguments for nationhood. they are arguments for the sovereignty of their state legislatures. the parliament can't rule for us. our state legislatures are the sovereign units so that the most famous speech in american history has at the stake in the first clause fourscore seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation. no they didn't. >> you put in the book that was a mistake. there was a purposeful propagandizing years later, right clicks >> i do not want to be gradually gained since it's the only way in 1863 he can justify the civil war because if he's wrong, and unfortunately he is wrong for the confederacy has a legitimate argument and its right to succeed because they succeed as

a sovereign state as a confederacy and we really don't create a nation we created a consideration. so they don't have the moral argument but they have the constitution argument on this side. we can forget lincoln for revising the sense in the end unless you think it is a bad idea that he won the civil war by making the point that in 1776, and then again at the end of the war in 81 when the treaty comes in and 83 history isn't moving towards nationhood. all the forces are centrifugal. and so history is moving towards the creation of a kind of therapy and north america. america is about to become some version of the eu.

>> who is greased? [laughter] >> georgia. >> so essentially you have a group of collaborators that see this coming at each of them for his own reasons he's urging a reinterpretation of the american revolution. >> you have to change according to the ideological rationale for the rebellion, no nationstates are possible because any powerful central government is far away from you and therefore doesn't represent your interests. if you are looking for the real seeds of the tea party -- the anti-federalists are going to

argue that any central government can even one in which we elect people doesn't represent me. patrick henry is going to say if there's a tax proposed and they vote against it and it passes we are being taxed without our consent because the average american is born, lives with his or her life and the guys in a 20-mile radius. i know you don't believe this but they didn't have iphone's. [laughter] and they don't communicate or think nationally. they think locally. and the political institutions reflect that and therefore in order for you to create a nationstate for the republican government, you're going to have to change our definition and it's going to have to be larger.

they think i'm represented by 30, one representative in the house represents 30,000 house represents 30,000 people, which they did in 1788. that's not really representation so someone like ted cruz thinks i get this and it's also a paranoid plaintive view mainly that any cluster of political party in a faraway place is almost inherently tyrannical. >> you can't can't call it closely paranoid when you just have thrown off. there is a reason for that. >> it is heralded as truth. >> let me go back half a step because you mentioned the word republic. >> you don't become a democracy.

>> in the 1780s between small tools. >> on the basis of the popular opinion but in the then the popular opinion has to be filtered through several layers of deliberation because that is the difference between a democracy and republic. things of the public. >> so there's a lot of democracy in the. >> and the public is different from the people who.

it's like attacking mexico after the attack on pearl harbor. but it's so necessary to satisfy the public opinion and so the founding generation is a pre- democratic administration and there are natural aristocracy is not what jefferson called. hamilton comes further back than franklin that the american republic is a very public. it's not a democracy and we have

to get over the assumption that democracy is always right because it easily isn't. >> which is something that you force them here and they clearly realize instinctively because they've been reading through the book and others because it is instinctive but i want to do for your titles through one second. you have this wonderful phrase that illegal project. this is confusing of what the men are doing. >> if you keep looking at it often sounds of his implied violence.

>> it can be misunderstood. it is a bit of a conspiracy. you said fabulous for. i don't want them to be thought of as superheroes. i spent 35 years of my life writing books about the founders trying to say that they are flawed creatures. it didn't appear over their head at any time during the constitution convention. they are all people who have discernible weaknesses and indeed if they were perfect with what we study them for simply have nothing to learn from since all of us are imperfect creatures ourselves? nor am i arguing that they did it by themselves. there are 55 people in the constitutional convention at

1,648 people that meet in the ratifying conventions until states in 1787 and 88. but there's a group of people do the following things. he instigated the calling of the constitutional convention. it wouldn't have happened without hamilton and madison. they recruited washington and without washington it's not going to work. washington says almost nothing throughout the convention but if he isn't sitting there this is an illegitimate thing. they set the agenda the first day of the convention which is a radical agenda and because the mandate from the confederation congress is to revise the articles. >> they said there's only one reason to try this. we go for broke.

even if we fail it is better to fail at the right cause them to do something that isn't going to make a difference. they then lose a lot of fights in the convention and if you want me to i will explain why it's almost structurally impossible. and i won't say it quite so boldly that is what is said in the convention almost makes no difference. the people want radical change. there's got to be a compromise between the groups.

the second group controls all the small states. they can block anything. so the big compromise is going to be in july when they come up with representation by the state and the senate and by population in the house. if you want to know what happened in western new hampshire in august 1788 and why someone thinks they are going to succeed, she has everything in their. and i say the most important thing to notice about the ratification after you've gone through all this is that there is no pattern.

they do not know how to match a national conversation. they can't think nationally. they are thinking nationally and by the way the new yorker's stock is going to go up because the papers are coming up now. if you want to go along, i'm telling you -- [applause] [laughter] when there is a surge it is going to be -- a spec that's right. let's go back to what motivates these men and i also want to ask you come is the reason that this particular group of people are thinking nationally something to do with how young they are.

officers from the continental army. it's in the continental congress. those are the people that have seen the problem of the revolution of the war and the postwar from a larger level than the state or local level and that's the big thing to distinguish. if you do an analyst is in the kind of marxist way one of the things that shows up that's interesting is that the people are wealthy to the people that supported. >> that's an interesting point. it seems that you identify three things that are really motivating them on the greater plane when they are able to see at other local interest. this is the number i love. you mentioned in the post

revolutionary years 1781 the congress asked for $3 million from the states state and get $39,138 in revenue. so the states won't pay their tax bill. bills. what will -- >> that's democracy. what role does the death play in what is about to happen? >> quick >> a big role because we have no credit. the american republic is a great thing. it is a banana republic. the european backers regardless of a complete loss. we can't pay the debt when we had a 40 million-dollar debt increasing every year and becomes 77 million by the time you get to 1789. and there is no way to pay it off. because the states want to retire their debt but they say that it's worse than that. when the continental army -- database this guy is a villain

in a lot of the books. in the reading of the gilded age he's probably the wealthiest guy in america that he becomes the superintendent of finance. because the financier. and like when a perfect storm of a benevolent sort happens and the french fleet comes up from the caribbean's and he puts himself on the tidewater peninsula and got them that you can get the continental army and french army down there. some of the generals are wearing cloth. they haven't been paid in two

years. $687,000 he writes a personal check for 687000 that's how we win the battle of yorktown. the same thing happens when it's disbanded and promised promised in june for five years and there is no money to pay them. so he says i'm going to write a check that everybody gets $50 into security $500,000 check. >> how does the the follow through with what happens at the convention next >> while, it is fairly clear that if we are going to be a viable republic, we have to have a federal government capable of managing the economy and taxing taxing estates in ways that are not voluntary. >> and who is the mastermind behind that? >> everything that he does is

exactly the same thing that morris does but he can't enforce it. the assumption of the state that and everything that hamilton does is exactly what he would have done. and hamilton says that. either by the way, i am jealous of the turnout because somebody made a plea of hamilton. [laughter] and apparently a great play. i can't get a ticket to the thing. >> maybe if you wrote a book about john jay. [laughter] >> iacs now. is it undermined the convention -- >> let me say something. >> it's your evening. >> august 3, 1782, he is in paris in this room in parkland

of florida who is a spanish minister to the french government. there is a map on the table. it's the battle that actually knows bible that actually knows something. >> as opposed to everything? he puts his finger on what is now eerie pennsylvania and he draws the line down through toledo and he says everything east of that is yours. they say everything is east and it is nonnegotiable. and by the way we are going to

break instructions from the continental congress that requires us to do everything and receive consultation from the french because the french have the treaty with spain we are going to sell them out &-and-sign our and sign our own treaty. he goes to franklin county is not able to walk and he throws his pipe into the fireplace and says we will not break the resolution. he comes down from where he's been negotiating and he says i've been waiting to break these forever. so they sign a separate treaty and we get the continental. why does he seem wise and every other account prefer to visit detroit than to go to paris.

>> it's a request from lafayette. after the war he says you are the greatest hero of our time in part because he won the war but mostly because that stepped and i think you should take the grand tour paris vienna, berlin. [laughter] >> and washington says now let's go to detroit and then up to new england that is the future. that's what is important. europe is dead. the future is out there. >> but do you radicalize at that

point? >> foreign-policy is not going to be in europe about native americans. >> but do they realize that it's something that the states are going to have to collectively face? >> this is one of the reasons. already georgia. you want people to pursue a. north carolina is breaking of treaties. and so they are worthless because each state says by the way, georgia thinks that it's porter is mississippi.

guess what virginia thinks it's porter is? >> does it nor the pacific is not quick >> it thinks it does. there is a map that they have that was written in the 17th century that they call the south sea is only 200 miles west. [laughter] >> isn't that the cartoon basically quick >> somebody stole that. [laughter] >> let's talk about the convention for a minute. the 55 delegates if i don't ask you someone else is going to ask you. of the 55 delegates, 25 are slaveowners, do i have the right? is also one in the room throughout the deliberations. the >> there's also a delegate that on 300 but on 300 slaves but denounced the institution of slavery. >> george mason. >> what role does this play in terms of unifying our dividing? >> it is divisive.

there are two. one is talked about all the time and they are terrified of it. any robust expression of executive power. as if you try to figure out what the president can do by reading the constitution permitted can do almost nothing. >> and is that why? >> they have all this and they created this thing called the electoral college. >> but they don't want to talk about what he can do because that's that. but the other big -- >> do you think obama knows that? [laughter] >> i think that he's used executive power that would be called tyrannical and no i wouldn't agree with that. the other is slavery which they can't mention. it's so divisive and so potentially explosive that do raise it is to risk ending the convention.

there is a group of people like the founder of the society. franklin wants to put an article in the constitution saying that it constitution saying that it should be put on the road to extinction. morris gives a great speech against slavery saying this is a form of feudalism that we are trying to get away from. but, south carolina says if you insist on putting slavery on the agenda, we will walk. and virginia probably walked. they like to sound like they are against slavery but they are not. they are against the slave trade. they want to see the trade ended because they are well stocked and increases the value that they are going to so.

but in fact they become the major cash crop. they sell just about a million from the northern states into southern states. so if you teach the subject of the the college -- i taught at your alma mater and this one says slavery is such an obvious wrong that's no argument can be made to justify its extension or its preservation. ..

i have got this theory which i can't prove the way in which madison writes which is one of the reasons there's not a great biography of medicine is that he is boring as hell. [laughter] and his writings reads like an insurance policy. it's reasons lawyers love him you know and there are certain

certain -- circumlocutions. the sentence begins here and you think okay and it turns around to mean just the opposite. i think if you grow up in virginia in the middle to late 18th century with slavery around you you learn to think in elliptical ways. you learn to negotiate psychologically and in your vocabulary and your very syntax. it's more fluid than that. your whole personality shaped around evading confrontation on this issue. anyway that is what --. >> the street chic decision is to evade the issue. >> yes. it's a dinner party please let's not talk about this, okay? so it says i don't care what you

say professor ellis but actually i do care because you are going to grade me on this course but i don't care because they were wrong and therefore slavery is in covenant with death and therefore nothing you can say about the founders and nothing you can say about convention is going to get past that. to what i say okay if you want to argue that you have to show me let's all agree this is a tragedy. slavery is it tragedy. is it a greek tragedy or a shakespearean tragedy? if it's a greek tragedy, it's the will of the gods. it's intractable. we are going to have to have the support. better to have it in 1861 then

1788. >> because there's less fragility. >> yes in the south probably wins or is that shakespearean meaning there was a way to end it with the proper leadership and the answer to that is i don't see how it couldn't. there's an economic answer. if you really say we know this needs to be solved and you know we are going to call the bluff on south carolina. now that's dangerous because we know they are going to fired up for shot in 1861 but we are going to commit ourselves to ending slavery gradually, not right away. we need to raise money. they don't know yet about the louisiana purchase but that's going to happen in 1803. they are going to collect several hundred million dollars from the acreage they paid $15 million for. let's put some of that in the

pot and pay off the planters. there's a much economic answer to this but there's no answer to the other question and this is really embarrassing but it's true. what happens to the slaves when they are free? if you look at the appendix of uncle tom's cabin harriet beecher stowe at the end of the book says here's where we are going to send them. liberia, the caribbean. if you listen to linkin up until 1864 he sent the whole team down to panama to investigate where we can send them. there is virtually nobody of significance in the united states who believes that blacks and whites can live together in the same society peaceably. >> let's discuss another one of those intolerable speakers you are in in new york and i want to

ask about this. as an epilogue to the ratification story and the idea that new york would secede from the union including hamilton's new york seceding from the region and the new york city resume will secede from new york via. >> i love that. isn't that great sex should we go to jersey or should we go to connecticut? >> you want to talk about that? >> the new york ratification convention is dominated by the the -- because george clinton and many time elected governor has the kingdom in new york that is his baby weight. they are collecting tariff duties on imports from new jersey, rhode island just for themselves. they don't have to share this with anybody. they're also confiscating loyalist estates. that's a big source of revenue even though it violates the treaty of paris because the treaty of paris says you can't do that except to loyalist to

poor arms against the rebellion. most of the loyalist in new york just went away and they want to come back to get their housing that but they're not going to get it. anyway is a 3-1 majority in the convention. there's no way argument makes no difference so jay and hamilton are both arguing against this in the new york convention know that they can't win. their strategy becomes delayed. wait until virginia votes and the virginia goes forward that's the ninth state. they have decided nine states puts it in operation. another illegality by the way because it's supposed to be unanimous vote that we know it's never going to be unanimous because of that state called rhode island. >> this is one of the biggest cons in american history. >> it is a con but it's a good con. it's a benevolent perfect storm.

>> it's like oceans 11. >> i should have thought of that, yes. >> i want to run a time before we talk about the bill of rights. a couple of months later it's like a spoonful of sugar to make the medicine go down. >> madison doesn't think it's some sort of marvelous magna carta thing. he doesn't think you need a bill of rights. he spends the ratification process including the federalist papers saying only monarchies need those. >> and what's the objection it? >> because everybody at the convention is saying why do we need a bill of rights and he realizes that a lot of their objections would have been answered if they did a bill of rights. so the question is why didn't they do a bill of rights? >> answer is was because they

were tired and i wanted to go home. george mason said can do this and a half a day. we stick around for half a day and then they spent half the day and it's going to take longer than a half a day so we are going home. madison made these arguments and by the way he put together a bill of rights and listed all the rights. suppose you miss some or you leave some out. and that's going to be flawed but after ratification there's a movement for a second convention in new york and virginia. this is a the way to upset everything. six states have ratified with recommendations. the recommendations are allowed to be only suggestive not mandatory. that's another thing that madison does this is a con. how does he get the authority to do this? >> simply says recommend all amendments must be their recommendation. they're mandatory you have not ratified.

it's an up-or-down vote, yes or no to the constitution. yes we have it no we go back to the articles. there is no middle position. removing the metal is a big strategic move because that is where most people really are. that is where they would like to go and he eliminates that. but after the ratification now in order to woo these people back into the national government and some of these people in virginia and massachusetts are good folks let's do a bill of rights. >> it's a peace offering. >> that's exactly what it is and when he first writes thinks it should be inserted in the document. he is trying to corkscrew these things. where does this one-to-one word is that one go and then somebody tells them you can do that because the people signed this document without those insertions and therefore it can't be inserted that way. it has to be listed as a coda

still so at the end. everybody thinks of it as a great epilogue and it would have been that if madison would have gotten his way. i spent some time because i have a sort of what's the word, but session with the ridiculous update doctrine. what do you call it original intent. especially on the 2nd amendment. >> that's the amendment we talk about more than any other today, right? >> week have because of the d.c. decision and in 2008 i think. is that right? and the decision is written by scalia or his clerks and it's 32 pages long.

the ones i have got our single-space in times lambs to be the poster child for original intent. the original intent of the framers it was to guarantee a person's right to bear arms. how did he write the second one? he gathered all the recommended amendments. there are 132 of them. and he says okay do people recommend? 's a lot of states recommend that taxes will be voluntary. the deep sixes that. we are not going to talk about that. does anybody say we are worried about our right to bear arms? for state say we are worried about a standing army. we are worried that the defense of the republic will be in the

hands of a professional standing army and we want to be in the hands of a militia under the control of the state. that is what the 2nd amendment is all about. it has nothing -- so the right to bear arms is a derivative right not a natural right and the decision by scalia is a preposterous thing. [applause] a former student of mine went to harvard law school wrote all about this stuff too and what i don't like from the legal profession for which you are now member of the talk about original intent as if it's a serious theory. they talk about it like it should be taken as a plausible way of understanding it. it is total garbage. it is created for the sole purpose of destroying start to spaces on crucial decisions.

starry displaces on crucial decisions. it's probably the worst decisions since dred scott reid. [applause] and the only thing that all the framers agreed upon with regard to original intent is that they didn't want their views to be preserved as original intent. they all said that. >> you have a wonderful line where you saved the constitution is left to resolve arguments and to make arguments itself the solution. >> that's right. >> so the intentional ambiguity. >> it's inherently living document. >> many of us have literally forgotten. before we get too political. >> you can see the republicans have not invited me.

>> i can see where you're going with this. in order to keep joe out of trouble let's turn questions over today audience. we would love it if you approach the two mics on the side and we would be grateful if we get questions rather than answers and brief questions for professor alice and we would love to know your names as well. i think we'll start on the side. >> giving the federal government much more power than any of the founding fathers wanted, you talk a little bit about that in creating a bank that paid off that enormous debt that we had? >> one of the reasons that hamilton hamilton served in the continental army and he sees the problems. hamilton and washington boasted

of the continental congress have been able to give us what we need in terms of men and money we would have ended the work two years ago. we want 80,000 troops. we never got more than 15,000. demographic weight we could have fielded an army of 200,000. there is a population sustainment but the states wouldn't do it. he comes from that experience. in addition think about this hamilton doesn't have state allegiance because he's an immigrant. he is an american. he is not a new yorker or anything. he eventually becomes a new yorker but he doesn't have a problem that madison has. hamilton is also the most audacious. i know obama used the word audacity of hope thad hamilton is like the guy that would get

the highest score on the lsat t. and then would challenge everybody that the a.c.t.s were worthless ways of measuring anything. and he is the smartest guy but he's the most dangerous guy. if you leave him alone he has totalitarian instincts and we don't want that. when washington retires that's what happens. >> i very much enjoy your books. the question i have is with respect to the necessity of the bill of rights i recently read that some have -- because of institutional limitations of the original constitution and that's why a bill of rights wasn't necessary and ultimately those structural protections ultimately protect freedom better than any bill of rights could. i was wondering how the various founders came out on that issue of necessity of a bill of

rights? >> madison thought the protection of rights would occur within the structure of the constitution now but the bill and jefferson disagrees fundamentally on this. he thought the real threat to rights would come from below from the people rather than from above, the government. jefferson completely disagrees. they are really on different planets on that right now. madison's motive for putting the bill of rights in our totally political. jefferson cares not at all about the constitution. the only thing he cares about is the bill of rights. he doesn't care about what government can do. he thinks government not to change every 19 to 20 years anyway but he cares what government cannot do and that's what the bill of rights will protect and will assure. >> good evening professor alice. you have not mentioned perhaps by design the supreme court.

>> i have mentioned some of the judges. >> he is only mentioned them by name. >> you mentioned citizens united that you didn't say the court that anyway to what degree did the so-called fab four or aside from the fab four, the founders have the impression d.c. eventually questions of federalism and questions of states rights have you -- what have you would have to be decided by the high court even before marberry and even before landmark decisions which defined the supreme court's power? do you they see the supreme court would eventually be a key element? >> you can detect glimpses of that and hamilton federalist 46 or something like that. but if you read the constitution on the judiciary, the one thing

that you can say for sure is they don't want the supreme court to be supreme. they don't envision, if they had envisioned marbury versus madison which by the way doesn't really make a difference. the big decision that does this is dred scott in 1957 that they would conceive of a supreme court that is the ultimate arbiter of the constitution is the ultimate source of tyranny and fear. madison later in his career in 18282 to 32 during the notification crisis suggest that he thinks that's the proper place to ultimately resolve issues peacefully. in 1787, 88 the notion that the supreme court would serve that

crucial function is inadmissible with the political culture that exists. >> thank you. >> hello professor alice. it's good to have you here. i read somewhere a long time ago that the french pays the salaries of the americans. any truth to that? >> robert morris paid the salaries that the french the french troops won the battle of york. the french had engineers. we don't have any engineers and they won the battle and washington was a commander. now what we have on the war without the french? >> i that it would have taken a lot longer. by the way the french bankrupted themselves in supporting us in money and troops and you can say the french revolution is in part a function of the debt that they

accrue to that forces the king to call the states general and when they called the estates general all hell breaks loose in france so the french revolution is caused by the death that occurred at our expense and one of the reasons that franklin for a long time resist the notion that we are going to sign a separate treaty without the french. he really thinks we owe so much to them. paying the salary of their no. >> hi my name is greg wilker. obviously madison is close with jay on washington and hamilton during the -- and then becomes a democratic republican. >> they don't call it that. it's in the textbooks and it's wrong. it's republican. they don't call them democratic republicans until 1860. >> is there a reason he joined

the republicans are not the federalist? >> there are people that disagree about this and the one answer is jefferson comes back from paris and become secretary of state and he lands and madison changes his mind about everything. and goes from the most ultranationalist federal veto. this takes a woman to be able to see this as a noble thing. he actually starts his conversion before jefferson. he has to run for office in virginia and they have gerrymandered districts so it's going to be tough and he's running against monroe. in a campaign he has to promise things to get elected like i'm not going to allow them to assume the state debts and we are not going to have a national banks a part of it is he comes into contact with his constituents in a way.

but the degree to which madison switches in the 1790s it's 180 degrees. he goes from the ultimate defender of several solo -- federal sovereignty and they revolution's writing later calhoun will save the defense of states rights that the confederacy of 1861 is going to go with. by that time he says that's not what i meant and madison he is a kind of political man. he thinks like a lawyer. even though he wasn't trained as a lawyer he says who is my client? you tell me who my client is unlike and prepare the arguments to support him and attack his

enemies but somebody has got to give them the client. jefferson gives him his client and then that's what he does. he is like a hired mind and underneath it is the realization that the thad hamilton program the mercantile north is going to dominate the agrarian south. and all these people that are contributing to the bank and everything but virginians don't think about money. they think about land and accounting his wizardry to them. that is why they all go broke. but beneath that all is if you let the federal government say that it has control of domestic policy guess what? at the end of slavery.

and we can't talk about that. >> hi i am one of the editors of one of the papers of john jay jay. >> thank you. >> you mentioned internal foreign affairs. could you say a little bit more about jay's experiences during the 1780s and how that developed his feelings? >> you are absolutely right. he comes back from france are actually madrid i think and they immediately elect him the equivalent of secretary of treasury for the confederation of congress. not only did they want him to do it he says i don't really think that i can do it if i have to go to wherever the capitalists at that time, is an annapolis or trenton? they say will move the capital to new york. that's how the capital moved to

new york and he is superintendent of foreign affairs and he's frustrated and normatively by the fact that each state seems to have its own definition of proper foreign policy. there is also crisis that happens from the mississippi question. spain says we want to close the mississippi and in return for that we will have the most favored nations trade with you and he says okay that's probably a good deal because the demographic wave is not going to hit the city for another 30 or so we can make a deal. by the time we get out there they are not going to be up to stop us anyway. we are going to take over so we will make this deal but a lot of the states especially the southern states oppose that. it will affect the land buyers assessment of the value of the land of the west.

we don't control the mississippi completely now. maybe it's not going to be good investment. maybe other countries like spain will come in and take them so it's a big fight and he basically finesses it and he is defeated by the promises the minister, well you know all of this, that okay we are not going to go to war about this and let's just -- but he sees that no republic -- republic in the structure -- would structure the government the way it is. jay is remarkably serene about things. it's like that's obvious and of course is going to happen the same way we won the revolution is going to happen and do you realize this is going to be hard and he never loses faith. >> remember this is the man who cooled his heels without anyone

inviting him to dinner. >> you know more about that site than i do. >> thank you. this was fabulous. [applause] joe ellison and stacy schiff thank you so much. it was a great night. please join them everyone for the book signing. thank you all for coming and thank you all for being such great members and we will see you again. goodnight.

next on booktv "after words." "usa today" columnist and fox contributor kirsten powers argues while lebron's -- liberals were tolerant of free speech they are the opposite today. she's interviewed by sharyl attkisson author of stonewalled and a former cbs news correspondent. >> kirsten at so great to be speaking with you. welcome. >> guest: thanks sharyl. it's great to be talking with you two. >> host: let's talk about a couple of definitions right of

the top. what would you say is a liberal and what would you say is a conservative? >> guest: just to be clear my book isn't a liberal versus conservative book that when i use those terms liberal is somebody was left of center and a conservative is someone who is right of center and every conservatives does not believe the same thing in every liberal does not believe the same things that they will share basic ideas about the role of government and liberals tend to see the role of government as a positive force for good and republican seat is more of a problem. >> host: your book talks about what you call that a liberal left and i will read it. part of one paragraph he said with no sense of irony or shame feet to liberal left will engage in attacks and in an