economic policy, tend to have different views than the 99%. one example is on the federal minimum wage. we know that general public opinion, support is very high for a minimum wage in that when you're working fum time, you should not live in poverty. i think 80% of the party supports that. the donor process, i feel like affluent and the united states and the support for that level minimum wage at the federal level is much less. it's about half of that. you know, we've seen congress be stagnant on the medical minimum wage even though we have high national support for increasing the minimum wage. and i think other areas in our economy are also impacted. i think about student death and

the burden of taking on student debt to go to college. something aboutle 0, 70% should do many to make sure college is affordable. yet, again, we've seen congress be sag nant on these issues. >> one thing to emphasize about how the way they've approached this issue, citizens united have come to have symbolic value well beyond what the decision actually said. the decision was about koorp rat independent expenditures, it allowed corporations to make independent lectures independent of candidates. when the there was growing recognition and acknowledgment about the growing economic and

equality in the u.s. and the world as a whole. and the breeken campaign finance system and the amount of money that flooded into our elections after citizens united really showed this vast economic and equality being transferred into political equality and citizens united has come to symbolize these much broader issues of equality and much broader issues about corporate power. the people who have this power partially as results are older, they're whiter. they're malar than the country as a whole, and particularly, older whiter, malar than millennials and it's not a surprise that government is acting -- as a result of economic inequality being transferred into political equality, it's not surprised they're acting in the interest

of the donor class and not in the interest of the rest of us, and particularly not in the interest of any of us. >> i mean, girve our arguments, there are dispositions of this, we think we're on the right side of issue. it's got big sweeping values like economic inquality and what we can do about that. and they looked at the racial and gender make up of those courts i want to prompt you all with just a few numbers nationally, women of color make up 19%. u.s. population, state court that's 8%. men of color, it's 19%.

on the other hand, white men 30%, and whopping 58% of allstate court judges. they were able to train when opportunity fall off and becoming a judge what does this environment say about this field. that it feels like we have a lot, but yet the current make up of the democracy field isn't that too dissimilar from what that study was able to find. >> i think that known profits reflect the power structure and the fundamentally racist background of our society as a whoa. and i think the type of people get the education and have the ability to do uchb paid internships, in particular, to access these positions is definitely huge problem. we have to be able to pay people who are working their way to

school, taking on an increditab increditable, on the other hand, i don't think most movements are only professionally staffed. we should be after tiny minority. wa a ballot issue. 88% were volunteers. does not need to be staffed. certainly, if we want lower income folks of all races to be in this movement, there needs to be funding aspect that's bigger than what we have right now. >> in communities of color, we all know that the preamble of our constitution starts with wet

people. generation after generation the calling of social movements have been to expand that and include many framework because i was hourly glad. >> the structures of today look, so there's always been this psychological distance mockst representative civil society organizations. so this trust company i, plays itself out as third party as both our democracy sfchl they'll see government as a they or they might see some of the organizations and fighting around money and politics they don't see it as a we. so the fundamental question on this, it's not just more diversity because you could have more diverse voices, socially, keeping the system as it is and

people still having the psychological distance. we need to move from talking about diversity to equity. and how do we build a more inclusive we? one way we do that is starting with trust, that we need to be in conversation with communities of color who may have different theories of change about how it gets done, they may not see inside strategies at the local level being the most productive way to get change. are we open and willing to listen to their voices and be in dialogue with them. if we can close that trust gap with communities of color. ty think we'll get more equitable and influential movement. millennials we get shade, for votingless frequently than other african groups. we eerp certainly most indebted. at the time we're the most generated. we're the most racially diverse. what can we do differently, if

you know of some say successful models that folks have been able to push forward under more inclusive framework and coalition, you know, what have they done to be able to get those things, get points on the board. >> i'll say one quick one because i think it's an out liar that we've talked about a little bit in the donor class. there are successful efforts to organize a base of don minors who share the values that we share here. one example is victory 2021 fund, which is where you have donors coming together who are wealthy individuals and bundling their money to support some of the valid initiatives and some of the campaign that we talked about earlier. there's a book that i recommend to folks if you're interested by

by david callahan. it's an older book, i think it's 2008 or '09. but what it goes through tlrks's a fundamental demographic shift, not just among millennials but within the donor class. donors who went to liberal universities and thigh ear acs man talks like this one. to me, that's an example of one of the strategies we should have, is how do we engage directly the donor class, particularly, millennial donors? i will say on the local level i think it is very very specific, here in the direct we have an aaffordable housing crisis. i think they all clear. they love the serious policy sblo duction that would actually

change the problem and it's partly because of the funding system here locally. that's an issue that matters deeply. the bleeding edge of the justification. it's worth 798 akosz the rivecr. thankfully the dc elections coalition is already a pretty diverse group. dc fair budget which represents a lot of the service organizations, but also people's organizations in the district has been a partner from the beginning and i think there's continuing work to have as many conversations and community as possible. i think one shining example of where we're trying to go in the democracy movement, democracy awakening and spring that's happening this past spring. the naacp, they most came

together and had about 5,000 people here in the district protesting for both voting rights and money and politics. unfortunately, money and politics, up until that point, has largely been white grass roots based supported issue. we've been working very hard to mobilize majority white members to work on voting rights as well as money and politics. it is a long journey, for sure. >> i want to ask, there are so many that are high priority value. how is that created and how is that supported and what resources came to be if this was able to be something that is now 40, 50 organizations behind. you see any trends in there from the folks around the country can pick up on. >> again, showing up in person, like i've gone to probably half dozen africa american churches, i have eve showed up after

service or sat through service and worked with members of the community that way. i think we have to be willing to go in person and talk to people and show that you're committed and willing toll go anywhere in the district where people want to organize, you know, across rachel lines, especially, i still exist. i think that's one piece. but, also, here, i mean, the corruption is so blatant, you know, he's having a district spend $60 million building him a new practice facility and he was major do no in this last election. he helped the mayor's coalition and that's not where we want to be spending our money when we've had dogs programs that have not been funded again the way they should for our youth. help those who don't have friends that can get them internships and can afford to do internships, a chance to get some experience and work together.

>> some of the work that demos is doing and aleck is here representing demos. a lot of your program has been researching money and politics. putting out research and studies and naming name and putting numbers and facts about how they're happy and certain communities -- talk to aus little bit about what you guys have been doing. >> i recommend everyone checking out our important stek deck. i think, you know, it's important to keep in mind that, you know, austin talked about the trust staff, we also have a big racial web gap because of exclusion of people, not just

from our democracy from our economy as well. and this matters because the entrenched donor class, hopefully this will be changing. the intense donor class is likely to prioritize the people of color. so in this context, in the context of the trust gap. we know that candidates of color are less likely to run for office in the first place. when they do run, they raise less money. and i think these are patterns that millennials should seek to interrupt. in terms of fund-raising, i think this is an area where white people have an extra responsibility to show up and support candidates of color and groups like that, people of color, and, in a way that we probably have not been done, i

think white millennials could be leaders on that. >> another way that i requested is what's called -- democracy project, which is a coalition between demos and grass roots organizations, leaders around the country and these grass roots are not democracy, which these are -- they're working on different issues, immigrant rights. the purpose of the idp, it sees democracy reforms as a tool for building political power. structural reforms like, public financing of elections, automatic voter registration, restoring the rights of people to vote who have felony convictions, these are all ways that can facilitate our broader

platforms and the changes that we need this country, like racial justice, gender justice, economic justice. members of this cohort helped draft the movement for black lives policy platform on political power, which i definitely recommend checking out if you haven't yet. >> great. so we're going to move to the last part of it. this is the optimistic, brighter day, tomorrow portion of our talk. you know the prompt is given that with sl the opportunity over time, which seats so much of the policy that we live under, campaign finance and voter rights, what can be possible with the different orientation, so, you know, a couple of the fair courts angle, imagine jurisprudence where you have expansive that is upgrading. >> that is a party of the case,

gives the judge a few thousand dollars, certain amount of money or spends money on independent expenditure or attack on the judge during election season, with expansive due process mindset and you'll be able to limit the amount of money that follow xs could put into that, if we come prenice. potentially compromise the judge's ability to remain fair and impartial. talk to us about your respective organizations from jurs prudence that we have from 2016. >> well, maybe i'll do two things. first of all, the organization strategy, the strategy on the ground is linked to but distinct from the strategy in the courts. i think -- as everybody has explained. we're at a real moment where people are engaged with this

issue, others eewemingly, financial reform, overwhelming recognition that they're a problem and people want it overturned. historically the knock against campaign finance reform it was something that people cared about but not voted about. i think that really is beginning to change especially among younger people. as often said there was a question of building a grizzly bear or a teddy bear, what do we want this movement to look like. on the ground, it should be a grizzly bear. to certain extent broad public with campaign financial system, will have some kplunss on the courts. i will -- the appointment of the youth is supreme court, the court to reverse cover over years. >> the court as a whole is

concerned about its own legitimacy and unlikely any justices are going to entirely reverse themselves. for the media turn, the opportunities are expanding -- are looking for opportunities within tfd court's jurs prudence. so going back to the decision that was mentioned earlier, the restrictions can be based on sees of combatting corruption, but the appearance. but the appearance och corruption is not a fully disdeveloped theory. in his briar and extent to the -- explain how the laws can actually further first amendment and congress. can further -- the public's interest in self government. and getting the court to expand on that and recognize that, first amendment that campaign finance restrictions can advance first amendment values to move us beyond this, this balancing

test, where any campaign law is balanced against the supposed infringement first amendment rights. and the legal strategy is also distinct from the school desegregation, legal strategy, for example, we have ear not challenging existing laws. we're not trying to lock down -- do you use segregation month. we're trying to defend good laws. any successful case will result to to a challenge. any successful law is tailored is almost -- 0 localized record or election or corruption, those are the general rules that we're thinking about and as we anticipates the courts jurs destruction prix. what's happening on the ground,

at best if we do achieve the new jurs prudence that we're hoping for, that's going to create opening for new ballot initiatives. that's where the importance of really having people continue to engage with these issues and organize around it and motivate that's where we're becoming so important. >> yeah, just picking up on that, completely agree with what brendon has said. i think looking at the longer term, for us we see citizens united as real useful tool to help spark activism. but we kind of see it as the tip of the iceberg and what we got right. as early as -- the court has put a lig on limit as i politics. and we see what that looks like in the current system, you know,

we're wealthy on their own campaigns. the individuals can spend as much as they can to elect favorite candidates. they do so independently. and maybe more importantly -- awesome potential candidate, never boller res for payments. this is all on corporate spending on elections which was unleeched by citizens united. i think it's important that a new jurs -- and not con fine us to a certain, clean government or anticorruption lens. i think millennials see that the problems of racial and political and economic and equality are deeply kpikted. and it's time for a court to enter for the constitution in a way that doesn't ban us from addressing these problems,

that's pretty much what the current doctorate does, especially, and although while aforwarding heightened privilege and individuals to healthy interests. we're optimistic that things can get better on the court. >> also, we want to strategies, with with new democracy jurs jew ris prudence. >> that's exciting. and they were to let's do something that could actually lead to a challenge to citizens united or buckly or another piece of this puzzle. i also think that we have united states senate that does not respect the shugs, court and confirmation process. and so, you know, we're at a

point in general where we kind of held the congress in this trust that they would fulfill their duties to make sure that the balance of power remains, that we have fully staffed, i guess, court, that's probably not the right word for it. they failed, is there any punishment for that at all. the big money is in the senate races and it's real out there, are millennials mobilizing for the senate races, i think sochlt there's probably a lot more we can do. until there are consequences for breaking our courts, it provides an incentive for us to continue those who don't think the senate has a duty to confirm whoever the president, at least have hearings to consider whoever the president nominees wharks's to say that's going to continue. are we mobilized enough to really have a strong voice on that. >> okay. folks. it's time for q and a.

we have some questions if you want to answer them. tell us who you're representing. floor is open to questions. >> i was just thinking given that this election has exposed most of the republican base does anybody have any idea how congressional policy and maybe some sort of coalition in the upcoming congress, with president clinton to take action on campaign finance reform. >> so one problem that i think

that -- as you describe and as this election has really demonstrated and has polls demonstrate, the republican voters care about this issue a great deal. it's republican politicians who block reform at every turn. and you've seen, with some of donald trump's messaging, he attacks hillary clinton as corrupt. he said she's beholding to her donor, he has yet to put forward any policy solutions that would address the broken campaign system that he's in many ways questions. it's a question of whether or not the republicans voters will hold their officials to a count. i described earlier that there is a bipartisan fes reform bill that -- fec reform bill, that different congress is strongly overwhelmingly supported by republican voters, as well as

democratic voters, that's something the next congress could address. is where republican officials will do show what republican voters actually went. >> i think there has been a proposal on congress, at the local level there's more room for motion like in south dakota, the ballot initiative there is actually a tax credit system for public financing, which a lot of republicans feel really good about it and there are some changes with that, in terms of people with lower incomes waiting until they get the tax credit back, might impede their participation to some extent, but, you know, it's definitely ground zero for that question of whether we can really get some serious change on the ground. and that is like both in south dakota and in washington state, the public financing proposals

there are vouchers and credit and they have report at the grass roots level pushing those. >> all right, next question. is that basically to get citizens united overturned, you need a case, but in this case we're not really about the laws at hand for gay marriage and civil rights, it was challenging bad laws here we're trying to defend halfway decent ones. so why would one take the course to do is literally things for that. try to get over it the best way you know how. >> that's a good question. i don't know. i mean, you've consistently seen

conservative legal groups challenge finance laws when they're that have been on the books for a long time. i think it's a question that you have to ask for center for politics. it's a good question. >> it's a great question. and i hope that they simply can't contain themselves. >> it's not a unified structure. i'll say that. these folks aren't always working in such tight quarters. there isn't exactly anticup churl group we're down the street. that is reason.

>> hi, stuart mc -- brief response to that comment, for two strategies if you referring to a challenge, one would be getting a small -- that bring action if and when it's challenging and that would raise the opportunity. their option will a actually provide failure to act and act contrary to law. those would actually try to get to see to change its activity and the court case and facing the carrier, but through that, you can get it to be considered, trust me. >> anyone want to respond to that. i would say free speech for people, it's pursuing both of those avenues right now. we have a complaint pending at the sec that's challenging and

folks in st. peters group florida are leading legislation if passed could provide a challenge that potentially take a shot at citizens united. okay. other questions we have a few more minutes. >> wonderful panel and great to see you. my question is in regards to engaging donors in it being the case we've got billionaires of warren buffet and facebook founders, basically, giving the majority of their wealth away. what do you think it will take for some of that money to go for structural reform and sexuals, any number of thing that is we're talking about tonight, given the fact that so many of the topic of concerns, not just the millennials or that's a car

local place. >> that's a good question. >> i don't know if you can hear me without the microphone. i would say that the short answer is that it's going to take time to get folks there, one reason why this is so -- it's going to take some patience is because a lot of the tech donors right now who are emerging and are going to far surpass the older money that's help ping in the landscape. they've not been engaged at the level they should up until this point around these kind of bedrock issues. and so there's a massive transfer of wealth from baby boomers going to millennials in the ballpark area over a trillion dollars. and so now is the time to take the patient step it is to cultivate, real relationships with donors. some of them might be inheriting

wealth in this room that we don't know and they're beginning to shape their world view. it's important to get there when they're in spaces like this, as young folks. and it takes a lot of donor education. there's a statistic on this around focusing on these donors when they're young and that is -- the "new york times" and catalyst did a study that shows events that happen at the age of 18 are three times as powerful that happen at the age of 40. if you want to change, you really have to start younger down the pipeline, call resource generation that's focused on that and finding young high net worth individuals and bringing them together and solid air that's done a lot of movement work and doing in the bay area recently trying to cultivate those relationships. that's the one factor. the second one is, a lot of direct action in continuing to

change public sentiment. when occupied wall street got on the scene back in 2011 and people were saying 99% and 1%. that polarizing kind of action, for better or worse, depending on your perspective, did draw a lot of young donors to the side of the 99%. where their moral conscience were touched through the heroic of the actions, i will say it's a combination of the donor education, for long term view of relationships that need to be built there. and secondly, sometimes it will take holding high net worth individual donors and corporations about their relationship to our democracy. >> we've got time for one more question if it's out there okay.

well, this has been a presentation of the american -- we have one more. oh, i'm sorry. go ahead. >> hi, i was curious with the lack of diversity on our federal benches. what role do you think that plays. i know you touched on it earlier. what role do you think that continues to play in our campaign finance laws and do you think it's necessary for us to change the diversity of -- in order to change the people. >> yeah, it's a great question. and i think there's probably a degree to which they are int

intertwined or interrelated. but it wasn't entirely detached from reality. i don't believe that any of the current city justices were elected officials. they don't know how the campaign finance system operates. there were assumptions in that case and that like they were entirely off base. and it was similarly to the degree to which the justices are unrepresentative of the country as a whole, there's going to be a lack of recognition about how their decision ls impact the country as a whole. i think the two are very much interrelated, anybody else? >> leave it at that. this is the product of the american constitution society, d.c. lawyer chapter. thank you for coming out.

could we have our board members put your hands up in the room. these are chapter ambassadors, find them, engage them, buy them a drink at the bar. thank you to gw for the space. thank you to c-span, now you are all now free. thank you all. thanks to our passenger. [ applause ] >> if you guys didn't get food. there's plenty left in the room right over there.

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cspan.org on your desk top, phone or tablet for the presidential debate. >> good morning, everyone. it's wonderful to have you. my name is charles haynes, on behalf of the religious freedom center, i want to welcome you to our humble abode, otherwise known at the night conference center at the museum.

we welcome those of you who are joining us cspan and abc viewers.com. thank you all for being here, i think we can all agree timely and much-needed discussion about one of the most challenging questions of our time, and that is, of course, how will we live with our deepest differences? we're very pleased to cosponsor this event with the federal society for law and public policy studies. i would like you to please join me in acknowledging gene meyer who is here with us today. where is gene? there he is, there in the back. modestly in the back. and a special thank you to the john tipple ton foundation helping to make this event possible. david green austin director of the fre markets program, i think it's also in the house, i haven't seen david, if he is, i

want to acknowledge them. let's acknowledge them for their support. well, at the heart of our mission here, religious freedom center is a commitment to compare leaders with the knowledge and skills they need to uphold religious freedom for all and to work across differences for the common good. so in our audience today, there are 27 religious and civic leaders currently enrolled in our religious freedom courses. they represent 22 different traditions of religion and belief. they come to us from 9 different states. i'd like to enroll in our courses to please stand and be recognized. [ applause ] that's our future. we are thinking carefully about how to prepare leaders and the

various sectors journalism, education, and religion to carry this division forward on one nation for many people, freedom of conscious for every human being. let me turn the podium over to someone who made this program possible, she's senior vice president and she's going to introduce our keynote speaker. thank you very much. li? [ applause ] thank you so much, charles. and let me extend our warm thanks and appreciation to the museum institute and its religious freedom committee for hosting this splended event i would like to particularly thank

charles, as well as walker, the executive director, stephanie, the fellow here and ashley hampton who have done an extraordinary job in making this all come together. i would also like to thank the john templeton foundation for its generous funding of this event, which is a combination of series of book events and other activities that the federal society has -- has been hosting over the past three years. i wanted to welcome everybody on behalf of the federal society, i -- we don't have short movie, but i will just say one minute about the federal society, it's an organization of conservative

and libertarians interested in the current state of the legal order. it's founded on the principles that the state exist to preserve freedom. that the separation of governmental powers is essential to our constitution and that it is duty of the judiciary to say what the law is about what it should be. we seek to promote awareness of these principles and further their application through our various and one of the core ways in which we do this is by sponsoring events where there is, we hope, lively and civil discussion on various topics among people who do have significant and important disagreements. so this event is a particularly

splendid opportunity for us to do that we hope. i would also like to say, to briefly introduce our keynote speaker, john inazu. john is the sally d. danforth distinguished professor of law and religion and a professor of political science at washington university in st. louis. he's a graduate of both duke university and of the university of north carolina chapel hill. so this may tell us something about how he's come to live peaceably among people with whom he has deep differences. his scholarship folks on the 1th amendment -- on the 1st amendment's freedom of speech, assembly, religion and related questions of legal and political theory. most significantly for present purposes he's the author of a terrific book, "confident

pluralism: surviving and thriving through deep differences." john? >> well, good morning. it's a great pleasure to be with you all today and i'd like to extend my gratitude to the newesum and federal society for having me. these brief introductory comments i'd like to set out the basic idea of confident pluralism and offer tentative reflections on the challenges it confronts today. the need for confident pluralism begins with the recognition of the deep and irresolvable differences around us. we don't choose to have these differences. rather, we encounter them in the world as we find it.

i seek three responses to this challenge of difference in pluralism. chaos, control, or co-existence. chaos is not sustainable in the long term. it falls flat as a political possibility. it leads ultimately to a violence that destroys lives. 15 years ago, i sat in my pentagon office a few miles from where we gather today. as people who saw only the possibility of chaos smashed a plane into that building. avoiding kay wrchaos is a matte survival. control finds its logical end either in theocracy or totalitariani totalitariani totalitarianism. some people in our country are lured by this possibility of control. we have seen this in the nostalgia and nativism from some on the right. we also see it in the moralistic assurances by some on the left who believe that opposing viewpoints are simply bigoted and ignorant and therefore

worthy of suppression. neither chaos nor control represents the best of this country or its people. i've been writing lately about this third possibility of co-existence through what i call confident pluralism. confident pluralism argues we must and can live together peaceably in spite of our deep differences over politics, race, religion, sexuality and other important matters. can do so in two interrelated ways. constitutional commitments that honor and protect difference and by embodying sisk pa ining civi our relationships across difference. the two dimensions the legal and the personal are interrelated. the inclination to shut certain viewpoints out of the acceptable bounds of civil society begins with personal antipathy but it ends with legal prohibition. or refusal to extend the protections of the laws to one's

adversaries and ultimately an effort to turn the law against them. the legal and personal dimensions of confident pluralism both require significant reform in our present day. when it comes to the law, we need the ability to form and sustain groups of our choosing. we need the ability to meet and protest in public spaces. and we need fair access to some forms of government funding to sustain those possibilities. our current constitutional approaches to the right of association, the public forum, and certain kinds of public funding are both undertheorized and underprotective. we must insist that the people we entrust to govern us honor basic constitutional principles that protect difference and dissents. the confident pluralism also depends on us and the everyday decisions that we make without the constraints of law and what we say and how we interact with

others. in other words, the shortcomings of our civic practices are ours to overcome. to do so, we might focus on three dispositions. tolerance, humility, and patience. tolerance recognizes that people are for the most part free to pursue their own beliefs and practices, even those we find morally objectionable. tolerance does not require embracing all beliefs as equally correct. instead of an anything goes kind of tolerance, we can embrace a practical enduring of difference for the sake of co-existence. it does not impose the fiction that all ideas are equally valid or morally harmless. it does mean respecting people, aiming for fair discussion, and allowing for the space to differ about serious matters. the second disposition is humility which recognizes not only that others will find our beliefs and practices

objectionable, but also that we can't always prove why we are right and they are wrong. some of our most important beliefs stem from contested premises that others to do not share. the third disposition is patience. patience encourages efforts to listen, understand and empathize. that does not mean we ultimately accept a different viewpoint. in fact, it may turn out that patience leads us to a deeper realization of the error or harm of an opposing view, but we can at least assume a posture that moves beyond dismissing others before we even hear what they have to say. tolerance, humility and patience help us to build relational bridges across difference. they help us to find common ground even when we can't agree on a common good. but finding common ground begins with acknowledging the reality

of the differences between us. without the ability or the avenues to air real disagreements, genuine dialogue occurs less frequently and contested assumptions go unchallenged. tolerance becomes a demands for acceptance. humility is supplanted by moral certainty. and patience loses to outrage. i worry our failure to practice genuine dialogue across real differences ultimately deprives us of our capacity even to have such dialogue. we see this across a range of issues but perhaps none as heated currently as our differences about race. people in this country are deeply split about the causes and the solutions to our current challenges. and in some cases whether these challenges even exist. this tension is particularly evident in current debates over the relationship between law enforcement and communities of color. in the midst of our differences

about race and other important matters, we also confront a crisis of authority that feels relatively new. the weakening of major institutions across politics, education, the media, and religion, the demise of truly national leaders in any of these sectors an the rise of social media have all contributed to this crisis of authority. they've also created a lot of noise. it's hard to know now who or even what to believe these days. the fractures of authority in institutions poses significant obstacles to attaining what i call in the book a modest unity. the minimal amount of consensus and sense of belonging that we, the people of this country, need to believe and experience in order to make possible confident pluralism. so is there any place for hope in this vision?

some people accused me of asserting a naive optimism in "confident pluralism." one reviewer who was otherwise fairly positive about the book nevertheless argued it was, quote, doomed to immediate irrelevance because it lacks an audience that can comprehend and respond to it. i don't think that's right. for all of the challenges that lie ahead, and there are many, i remain hopeful. one reason for hope is the american experiment in pluralism for all of its failures and shortcomings has actually worked pretty well for much of our nation's history. this is no the first time we have confronted racial tensions, divergent views of morality, religious differences and course rhetoric. in many ways the success of the american political experiment has always required finding and maintaining a modest unity against great odds. second, we have a lot of smart, caring and creative people in

this country. this election season has not highlighted our best, but we ought not to forget the everyday americans who are doing a great deal of good outside of the spotlight. and we need to tell each other the stories about this good work, the work that harnesses our collective imagination toward a shared future. one challenge that we confront in imagining this shared future is that some people are still looking to the past. an important book "the fractured republic" describes a deep nostalgia from both left and right that longs for a bygone era, albeit different eras for both side, in which the world seemed to work better. of course, many people in this country are not interested in any kind of retrieval project. going back to the good old days is not a good bet if race, gender, religion, or sexuality placed you outside of the political consensus that ruled

those times. this tension between those who long for the past and to who have happily transcended it is one of the inherent tensions of a pluralistic society. the more we realize the actual differences among us, the less consensus we're able to assume. even if the nostalgic claims are correct, their timebound solutions do that help us today. emerging trends in immigration, social media, the global economy, technology, and other facets of our life make political solutions of past eras both antiquated and unworkable. we need new solutions and new possibilities, and that will require a greater imagination than anything we have seen in recent months. part of our collective imagination begins with actual conversations. this morning's gathering is one such example, in some ways it

enacts a confident pluralism by drawing people together of different backgrounds to talk about issues of common concern. not everybody has the luxury of devoting two hours on a tuesday morning to such a discussion. that means we have to be creative in how we facilitate imaginative conversations. we have to put time, money and effort into creating efforts that are scaleable, portable, and realistic. my hunch is that these kinds of efforts will work best on a local level and they will happen only through institutions. that is one reason that part of the constitutional vision of "confident pluralism" is to strengthen protections for the private institutions of civil society so that they can flourish on their own terms. inevitab inevitably, this set of protections will benefit groups that you and i dislike and even those we find immoral. and our list of groups will differ.

that smart of the reality of pluralism. this diversity of groups and ideas comes with a tremendous upside. it offers the possibility of better and more creative solutions from working across difference and navigating the challenges of pluralism without succumbing to the despair that leads to chaos or the fear that leads to control. this is in the end a relatively modest vision but it is an important one. kflt pluralism does not give us the american dream but might help avoid the american nightmare. that is a possibility for which we cannot lose hope. thank you very much. >> thank you so much, john. let me invite our panelists to come up to the stage and while they're doing so, let me

introduce our distinguished moderator. laurie goodstein is the much decorated national religion correspondent for "the new york times" where she's been for nine years. she previously was a reporter for the "washington post." much of her reporting focuses on how americans live out their faith in an era of increasing religious diversity and conflict and about the limits of religious expression. she's received many awards for her reporting and she's a graduate of berkeley college in the columbia school of journalism. let me turn this now over to laurie. >> thank you. it's really a delight to be here to try to tweeze apart some of the issues that we are all confronting and certainly in my reporting i confront.

hearing john's discussion, my reaction was similar to something my mother said when she first met my fiance many years ago which is, what's not to like? you know, it's a vision that -- of the country that i think is possible but how do we get there? so that's what we're here to do today is to do some of the heavy lifting, the hard work. what are the on staobstacles ine way of confident flupluralism a concrete issues that are now blocking us? so to unpack this a little bit i want to introduce really a wonderful panel we have here today. i think i'll go from close to me here to the end here. big panel here. here we go. yuval levin is the editor of "national affairs." her talk fell row low and -- se

editor of "the new atlantis" magazine and contributing editor to the "national review" and weekly standard. member of the white house domestic policy staff and executive director of the president's council on bioethics. john, we have already had you introduced. so we're familiar with john. charles haynes should be introduced, he's the vice president of the newseum institute, founding director of the religious freedom center and senior scholar at the 1st amendment center. he writes and speaks extensively on religious liberty and religion in american public life. he is also a go-to person for journalists trying to clarify religious freedom issues. he's best known for his work on 1st amendment issues in public schools and three of his guides on religious liberty were distributed by the u.s. department of education to every public school in the nation trying to solve issues, you know, all kinds of issues that

school administrators face. we may talk about some of that today. meira neggaz, social director of the institute for social policy and understanding. before joining ispu, meira was the senior program officer for marie stopes international. before that, she was the first executive director of wings in guatemala where she brought the organization from its beginnings to become a national leader in the health sector. and she was the guatemala country representative. and then we have brett mcdonnell, he's the dorsey & whitney chair in law at the university of minnesota law school. he teaches and writes in the areas of business associations, corporate finance, law and economics, securities regulations, mergers and acquisitions, contracts and legislation. and perhaps he thinks the reason he's here with us today is an article he wrote just last year

in the "arizona law review" that is called the liberal case for hobby lobby. and then finally we have garnette cadogan, visiting fellow at the university of virginia. he's editor at large for "nonstop metropolis" a new york city atlas. his current research explores the promise and perils of urban life, vitality and unequinequalf cities and challenges of pluralism. his article, "walking while black" has been widely read and discussed. so, welcome to you all. i wanted to start with a little bit of diagnostics so that we're all on the same page. can we diagnose the problem a little more clearly? when we talk about problems with

pluralism and religious liberty, can each of you describe perhaps a particular contemporary issue that has gotten us to this situation that is perhaps different even than what the united states faced in the past? so we're all aware of what's on your minds and how you diagnose the problem. yuval, you want to begin? >> well, sure, thank you. thank you to the newseum and society for doing this. i would say one overwhelming sense that is so powerfully felt in this election year that has to do with our subject this morning is simply the sense of frustration. our institutions seem to us to be dysfunctional. seems that we're at each other's throats all the time over everything. every question becomes a federal case often literally and we've

somehow lost the ability to resolve differences in the ways that our meet yadiating institu have often enabled us to do it. a lot of people have the sense this is being done on purpose by people they disagree with. one example of that from one side is the sense that a lot of religious traditionalists in america have that the obama administration picked a fight with them over religious liberty by create iing by choice, not i the law, a requirement in the affordable care act that raised this divisive issue of whether employers need to fund health insurance that includes contraceptions and some abortifations. the argue is not only about the substance of that but the needlessness of it, the sense that someone's picking a fight and forcing this issue -- people feel it isn't necessary for businessowners to suddenly raise

objections, say, to the type of event for which they're baking a cake. they've never asked that in the past. they don't ask you, you know, is your daughter well behaved before i make her a birthday cake? and now suddenly there are fights about these things and seems to people on the other side as though those fights are being picked on purpose. i think that's part of the sense we live with now on these questions of pluralism that it's not just our society a awfully diverse and hard to live together, it seems as though people are picking fights with each other and trying actively to create situations that divide us. i do think that's part of the sense we have that makes this time in our political life and common life in general so hard to take. >> i think there's a challenge of sort of a special pleading that sometimes goes on that pluralism is good for my people and my interests but not necessarily for others so it's a sham of an argument if it only

works to one's own benefit but there are a lot of people out there from really different perspectives that are arguing that then a related sense it is me and my group that is most undersieged. those most left out of the conversation, most denied the protection of the law, very little empathy to how that translates to other people and other groups especially across ideological divides so there's a growing sense of urgency for one's self. >> we have data on that even recently. pew recently did a poll on religious freedom where they looked at do you have sympathy for people who are on the other side, for instance, can bidsowners deny service to gray couples? can you see the other point of view?

in fact, very, very few americans had any sympathy for people who disagreed with them. >> i'll echo what john just said, having negotiated nine agreements on religion in schools over the past couple decades, and also worked in local communities struggling to find common ground, i would say we are capable of doing this and doing it in many ways that are not reported or discussed widely unfortunately. i think what's missing in our national conversation is trust. all the agreements we've reached have to be built on trust, a sense that there's going to be fairness in the process. and of course there are going to be winners and losers at there are in any public policy

dispute. if people are treated fairly in the process and their voice is heard, they tend to accept the outcome. by building that trust i think is difficult in this current environment and that's i think the great challenge we have. we need a unity in the country but it has to be a unity that's not at the expense of our differences, our diversity, as it has been for much of our history, frankly. it has be a unity in the interest of our differences, our diversity. that's i think what confident pluralism is about. it's finding what it is that unites us in order to help us negotiate those deep divisions that are very important in our lives. reenvisioning a shared vision of the common good, shared understanding of the role of religion in public life is very deeply important if we're going to get through this. religious freedom now is a contentious word, a phrase that many people think, you know,

signifies bigotry. others think it's being -- it's being denied at every turn. so to reestablish a shared vision for what that means and for what the appropriate role for religion is in public life is, i think, an urgent necessity as we grow more religiously diverse. >> my sort of role here is as the head of a research organization that does research both for and about the american muslim community, so my lens on this comes from that back gound. i think one of the greatest challenges to religious pluralism is actually fear. fear is very -- very strong factor. i think in the way that american muslims, in particular, are treated, and sort of their place in society, fear, you know, neuroscientific studies have shown that fear kind of allows people to do things they might not normally accept in a normal

society so things like authoritarianism become much more palatable when someone is scared. i think we need to disentangle that from some of the other issues because fear sort of allows people to step outside the box and say, you know what, i totally agree with religious pluralism but not when it comes to this group because i'm kind of scared of them. we're going to do things that are kind of outside of the box. i think this fear has played into, for example, the french debate over the headscarf, or bikini wearing at the beach where for many people that's a valid outward expression of their faith. for others they see it as a way to cover up, you know, cover up mass am nemunition at the beach. to ban something for many people

is just a normal everyday piece of clothing. so i would say fear. >> so i distinguish a couple different types and layers of religious liberty and there's debates going on on all of those levels. so the most basic level, there's individual speech and assembly. the ability of individuals to express their religious belief, groups collectively to come together and practice the assembly, something john has stressed a lot. that's still relatively well established this country but, for instance, some of what's going on in mosques around the country raises concerns there. so there's that level. there's a level that focus -- that looks at anti- -- that discrimination that's deliberate, explicit discrimination against racial groups or potential discrimination against religious groups, my mind, deeply disturbing we're seeing some of that happening in the election

today, the proposed ban on muslim immigration. wherever that stands. that's an example of sort of explicit intentional discrimination. i think it's very troubling to me. and then, the highest level, one that gets a lot of attention, the rifra case, the religious freedom restoration act, so this is dealing with cases where you have nondiscriminatory on their face laws but laws which in practice burden the actual practice of religion for some groups. rifra for me is the hardest one. it raises a lot of tough questions. maybe we'll dig into some of those like the anti-gay discrimination versus religious free exercises is one area where that is a major debate. it's a hard case but i do think people on my side of the political aisle, progressive, liberals, whatever you want to call us pulled bang on the traditional strong support for

that principle of religious freedom. the hobby lobby case which i've written about. the reaction of people on the left was very disturbing to me, the indiana rfra law. so that's a tougher area for me because there really are hard -- i think part of the reason there's such debate there is because it's a really hard -- it really is hard to know how to strike the balance. both sides in that debate don't seem to recognize in many cases the strength of argument on the other side. >> one of the things that -- issues that has been bearing down on us -- can you hear me? is the increase, numerical effect of pluralism, there's this increasing march, citizen urban areas, a lot more people that look differently, that think differently, that speak a different language than you.

and so what is happening in many instances, we're seeing in debates over the name of buildings, or seen it fight in debates about civil war monuments. we're seeing it even in our aware awareness of things happening abroad, brexit, or refugee crisis, is how do we co-exist in public space? what does it mean to co-exist and have a shared space in a much more shared vision in public space? and this issue -- a velocity that's unlike anything we've experienced before. these are questions we've been asking for some time, but it feels especially within the last two or three years, just a velocity, in confederate monuments in or not, should we have woodrow wilson's name on a building at princeton?

should we -- and, you know, syrian refugees coming in. what do we think of brexit? so all these issues having to do with kpco-existing in public space, an environment, a much more pluralistic world, you're more mikely to encounter people differently from you and have, you know -- so much more fraught than they've been before. >> it strikes me, meira spoke about fear, and how that's affecting the muslim community. one of the things we're seeing that is -- has not gotten a lot of public attention is that right now i would say almost every week i am hearing reports of houses of worship that are being vandalized, that are being fire bombed. members of religious faith that

are being physically attacked. sometimes very seriously injured. and i'm talking about mosques and the muslim faith. we also have examples of the institutional level where mosques attempt to get zoning permits or building permits to build a mosque, the muslim community is asking permission from a city council or from a zoning board and they're denied. you know, often told that there's a reason, perhaps, it's parking or noise or something like that. if this were happening to other kinds of houses of worship or people in another faith group, do you think -- what would be going on? why is this not a bigger issue for our country?

who wants to take that? doesn't have to be meira , by te way. it can be. >> i'll start. part of it goes back to my previous comment about the insular looking focus on protecting one's own freedoms to the neglect of others. so a lot of religious conservatives, christians and catholics, for example, are very concerned about current challenges to religious liberty. some of them not only ignore muslims but sometimes actively oppose -- that's not a sustainable view of liberty. to add to the mosque scenario, governments and law enforcement infiltration of muslim groups. this happened to muslim student associations a few years ago as well. when you think about -- think of your own religious group if you're not a muslim, what does it mean when you pull back in a safe place to pray and to deliberate with one another, someone is a secret agent trying to infiltrate your group and there's no evidence on a front end there's a reason for that person to be there.

think about the tremendous loss of trust and safety and security that you would feel and to recognize that there are fill l fellow citizens experiencing that right now, demands a much stronger reaction than we've been seeing. >> i'd like to say, add to that, that prop daganda works and religious illiteracy hurts. combine those two and i think that's why we're in a crisis here. people have for the last decade spent tens of millions of dollars. i think it's about five groups or so. convincing the american people under the radar but in pews and places around the country that islam is the root of the problem, of the terrorist problem, that it is not just some muslims and so forth and so on, but it's actually islam, itself, that is the problem. this is very convincing to

people and it has gone unanswered in many of these venues. i've been traveling around the country during this period and i come across this all the time and i meet great many americans who feel that they are already deeply educated about islam, thank you very much. and they want me to educate myself and they give me books and they give me -- they know or they think we know. if we wonder why protests in 30, 40, 50 communities when a mosque is proposed and a mosque is being built, well, there are lots of people in those communities. they're not ignorant about islam, in their view. they're knowledgeable and they know the enemy is coming to build an institution there. and i think this is a very underappreciated problem in our country. if i had tens of millions of dollars, some estimates as much as -- if i had that money to counter that narrative, maybe it would be better. and the other side of it is, we're religiously ill literate

this country. we're not educating young people k-12. i worked for 20 years to try to make it better in public schools. i guess i haven't done a very good job, but it is somewhat better than it was. chris murray sitting there teaching religion in montgomery county, and doing a great job, but we still don't take religion seriously in our curriculum in our public schools. so what do we think people are going to -- how are they going to respond? they're going to respond to the ignorant and poor scholarship, or lack of scholarship, that they are fed. they don't have any knowledge to counter that kind of narrative, so religious illiteracy i think is at the root of a lot of the problem. there are others but those are the two that i think are most dangerous. >> i can just add to that, too, the challenge is not just k-12 but the university level. >> that's right. >> college and universities today are very good on many

metrics of diversity but not so good on recognizing and educating on religious diversity. the fact is we're producing college graduates who are functionally illiterate on many measures of religious diversity so people, interfaith youth corps are important to educate the educators on why this is an important part of our pluralism today. >> i think some of the most serious problem -- i agree with that, but some of the most serious problem has to do with people who do take religion seriously but don't take pluralism seriously so the -- i had the experience last year of going around giving a couple of lectures about religious liberty. people would show up to lectures about religious liberty. the first question that arises after the talk which was about how our tradition of religious liberty came out of very complicated relationships between catholics and protestants in the english common law tradition. the first question was surely you don't mean a slum. from people who are very concerned about religious

liberty but who don't take it to apply generally and the answer surely i do mean islam, pluralism has to mean that we live together with people with whom we have serious disagreements, that we believe they take seriously, and we take seriously, is a very, very hard answer for people to accept. pluralism is difficult. it's especially difficult that you do take religion seriously, if it does matter to you if you believe it to be the truth and yet you are required to live together with people who believe the truth is something different. that's the challenge. that's the challenge we have to rise up to. pluralism is difficult. it is genuinely hard. but it's what makes it possible fortous have a free society that allows us to take religion seriously and yet not be at war with each other. it's an enormous challenge and i do think today the question of islam is right at the tip of that challenge for our society. >> i think one of the things that sort of comes up in the

first few pages of john's book, to have confident pluralism, there has to be, as i understand it, sort of a general understanding across americans or across groups of people that we all have kind of a base common commonality, right, that we all aspire to democracy, that we all aspire to sort of living together. there's sort of a base understanding that despite our vast differences, we do have these commonalities and i think what's been really dangerous especially through this election cycle is that muslims and islam are almost seen outside of that grouping, right. so every other american has this base commonality but muslims are different or islam is different and that is really dangerous. i think that has allowed a lot of this to happen. a lot of these zoning issues and msa infiltration and d discrimination to occur under the radar or seemingly no one cares. they're like, well, they're different from us, that wouldn't

happen to us because they're different. and that is very, very dangerous. if we think back about 100 years, catholics were sort of in the same situation, right, 100 years ago, late 1800s, catholics were seen as this other. they were otherized. there was a political party, the know-nothing party to sort of counteract the catholics, right, to deal with that issue. the blaine amendments were brought into effect, this legal grouping of amendments that restricted funding to parochial schools and religious garb laws came into effect so that nuns effectively couldn't teach in schools. these same laws where they're still on the books are now being used to discriminate against muslim women, for example, who wear the hijab. so i don't think we can be complacent about this issue. it's not just a muslim issue. this is an issue that, muslims may be the menu de joer today

but will be somebody else 100 years from now and the same discussions are going to continue to happen unless we accept that we all live under this umbrella and have this base commonality. >> just as a footnote to that, the roman catholics were attacked for being a political movement. they follow a foreign prince and so forth, and the same narrative we hear now about islam. islam is not a religion, or if it is, that's not what we're concerned about, islam is a political movement that will subvert the constitution and take over the country. that's their agenda. roman catholic, the same charge. they're coming, they're going to take over, they're going to substitute their way of life, their political way of life, for ours. so, lot of the people i hear around the country are trying to remove religion from the discussion of islam in order to advance their opposition to the mosque or to propose these

so-called sharia law legislation which is pretty much nonsense because they don't understand what sharia law is. but i think, just to add to what you're saying, it's that labeling of people as not religious because there are -- there's a great well of support for religious freedom in the united states even for people that when we take polls, most americans are, say that they would support religious freedom for groups, even groups that are extreme or they find offensive. but islam is treated differently often because of this, again, propaganda that islam is really trying to become a political movement in the united states and take over our constitution. >> so two points expands on what's already said, one, social isolation and ignorance. so the promise, obviously, most americans, they don't know anything who's muslim, they really don't know much about it. the civil rights group, organizations i've been most

involved in in my life are gay rights organizations. i've seen a huge change in my life. a big part of that is people coming to know gay people individually, seeing it in "will and grace," seeing it in the culture. that's had a huge impact. that's the kind of thing i think needs to happen with muslims and i will say playing off the points on catholics, if one takes a really long unhistorical view, i'm actually a little bit optimistic, jews, catholics, mormons, those were all groups that were way outside, you know, protestant christian groups, mainstream groups were totally s solvenist. now they're part of the conservative, many ways, part of the conservative christian -- conservative religious movements today. it would not shock me if 50 years from now muslims are actually, many muslims are a part of the sort of conservative religious political action. there's actually a lot in common there. if they get to know each other.

>> go ahead. >> one of the problems -- discuss contradictions or even hypocrisies of some religious groups, stand up enough for some of the things you mentioned. one of the problems seems to be also, attention seems to be a good thing. the love for tolerance and idea and celebration of tolerance. actually having a negative effect. being that we have an almost minimal approach and it increasingly seems that way. rather than max mall idea of toleration, it's this minimal idea of toleration and pluralism. in other words, it's this thought of co-existence. so expand the idea of what is tolerable. so, come to me, state my own name and said i failed to recognize that in an offense

against in another group is an offense against us all and failure to advocate for them, stand up for them, is a failure to stand up and advocate for yourself. it's an idea of toleration is merely co-existing. it's the ability for all of us to have in our beliefs and to have the freedom of expression and freedom to believe what we want and to express it in different ways of worship and assembly and then being left alone rather than a more expansive view in a more maximal view of tolerance or pluralism, says it's more than just co-existent, means being able to advocate for others, rights, not ourselves, others, but those who think, act differently than we do. >> and yet do you -- do any of you, doesn't have to be all of you answer, but is there anybody who sees examples where that is happening in this country? for instance, when there is an individual or a house of worship

that has been targeted, you know, we've had six as well, people who are mistaken for muslims because they're wearing a turban who have been attacked. are you seeing examples where there's that stepping forward and advocating for another going on in a very local level? >> every day. >> yeah. >> every single day. i think we can all agree on that. it's unbelievable. whenever these things break out in the community, to see the response, and also want to give some credit to some government officials in some of these communities who've stood firm. we're going to build this mosque wee , we're going to get a permit whether you like it or not. was not easy in murphysboro, tennessee. some government officials actually have made me proud to be an american because they really stood up and said exactly that, you know, we're going to treat you just like we treated

the baptists when they came for a permit. the local level, people who organize -- they always outnumber the objectors in my experience in these communities, you might have a different -- my experience, you know, they have these huge crowds of digit faiths. you know, surrounding pastor jones' place, you know, or going in support of the muslim community in murphysboro, and they are -- or here at american university when westboro baptist church came and protested with their little band of hateful people. all the students went organizing, you know, so i actually think that if we look at the conflicts around the country in local communities, all these mosque conflicts in most of the cases, we will see a vast outpouring of support for the rights of others, for the rights of people that are digit fr different from us. do you experience that? >> definitely. i don't know if you remember, i

think it was last year, there was a call to have armed ral li rallies around the country. >> yes, yes. >> i don't remember what they called it. it was reallyhateful protests at mosques across the country. we saw absolutely two protesters, two people would turn up to sort of protest the mosque and hundreds of interfaith and other activists would be around the mosque or in the mosque supporting them. so i agree with you. i wanted to point out one other thing, though, it's not just in the religious space where i think communities are starting to recognize this interconnectedness. our research showed, we tracked or we mapped legislation that largely infringed on the rights or restricted rights of minorities or other vulnerable people including anti-sharia measures at the state level so these laws that were being

proposed or passed that basically said that sharia won't be the law of this land which there was never a threat of that in the first place but there's a big movement to adopt these -- these anti-sharia mseasures. we mapped that with other restrictive measures at the state level. what we found is there's essentially an 80% overlap in legislators legislating these anti-sharia measures and measures that largely restrict the rights of other minorities and there's a growing recognition that this is actually the case and what we described was that muslims are almost being used like canaries in the coal mine. in the coal mining days they'd put a canary, if the canary died, air was toxic and you didn't go down that day. muslims with being used like a test case, if we can pass this

anti-sharia measure maybe we can sl -- nobody's going to complain about restricting the rights of muslims. s there's been growing recognition this is the case, there are examples where communities have come together to fight restrictive laws recognizing this interconnectedness. >> part of it is the selfish part of what you said, that is if i stand up for the rights of other people, i'm standing up for my own because it's you today, tomorrow it's going to be me. and these anti-sharia laws are precisely, you know, they are now not called anti-sharia laws because that's too blatant. they are -- a religious law can't be imposed. well, or religious law can't be used, referred to in the courts. well, jews and catholics and others for whom religious law is part of their life and who they are understand that unless they stand up now for these -- against these laws, their laws

will be interfered with. their ways of living will be interfered with. >> okay. we've had a lot of agreement here. let's move on to a really pressing issue where it's been very hard to find agreement. and i think you probably know where i'm going, which is that, you knows, the legalization of same-sex marriage has, you know, is now presenting all kinds of conflicts, legal, social, otherwise all across country. and we've seen, one of the ways we've seen that play out is with businessowners who because of their faith object to serving gay couples who are coming to them for services involving weddings. so we have florists, we have, you know, owners of wedding

venues. what else, cake bakers. photographers. and it's not a lot of cases but it is enough across the country. so what to you think, i mean, that -- should businessowners be allowed to deny service to same-sex caouples, and if so, te question i hear all the time is if we would permit that, why is that any different than being allowed to deny service to people of other races or, you know, to assist with the wedding of, you know, a couple of two different races? you know, we have tcome to a point in this country, that's nonacceptable, so people have asked well how is this -- many people ask how is denying service to a gay couple any different than denying to service to a couple on the basis of their race? so anybody care to take that on?

>> i want to know the answer. >> look, i think in a very general matter, first of all, i think the instances we look at are best addressed at an interpersonal level and on a case-by-case basis. oftentimes the way these kind of debates end up being legal cases creates enormous problems for pluralism because when you are facing a judge and you have to prove that the other side is irrational, you're going to make different kinds of arguments than when you're facing your neighbor and have to figure out how to live together. so it seems to me, and maybe this shouldn't be said in a pluralist society event, but i think keeping this out of the courts is what victory looks like and what saving pluralism looks like. it has to be said in american life for reasons that are obvious and overpowering and right, the race question is different than any other question that we deal with in our national life.

and so to be a free society, you do have to have some default assumptions in favor of freedom of association. in favor of allowing people to make their own decisions together. but when it comes to race, we have made exceptions to those fundamental premises of our national life for reasons that are valid reasons. that draw on our history. we don't -- the life of a country is not simply applied philosophy. we don't just take abstract principles then make people live by them. we have a history. we have -- we are an organic society that's lived across generations and there is this enormous sin around the question of race that we have to continue to live with. and that we have to continue to atone for and address the consequences of. and so it seems to me that it is right that we make certain exceptions when it comes to race, exceptions to the ways in which we normally allow people to have enormous freedom to make their own decisions to run their own business, to do whatever they want, where in other places

we might show a preference for freedom of association, but when it comes to race, we have to say, no, this has been the darkest side of who we are and it cannot be. now, exactly where those lines are drawn, it seems to me has to be done as much as possible on a case-by-case basis as locally as possible, as politically as possible, rather than legally. there's no simple answer. there's no simple formula. but i don't think it's -- i don't think it's irrational that sometimes race is different in america. >> i also say that i think that's right, but i think the wedding vendor issue in my view is being used as a wedge issue on both sides. to avoid the larger question of how we're going to uphold nondiscrimination and also protect liberty of conscience. how are we going to do that? that's the larger question. and we are not -- we have not generally -- there are some people in this room who are doing a good job at talking about this, but we have not generally talked about this and worked together across our

differences to find the answers to that question. if we did that, there would be yeses and nos on both sides like we had in utah, but, you know, we would -- we would have agreement at the end on a number of the key issues. taking the wedding vendor issue by itself is a nonstarter. because it doesn't really address the larger question of how do we protect conscience and how do we uphold nondiscrimination? it polarizes immediately. having said that, in my view, it may be possible to find some agreement on how to deal with those issues in whys that protect conscience. in the way that in utah they have protected clerks to opt out of giving, performing same-sex marriages but nobody knows it. the couple doesn't know who it comes in the office. in the same way, could there be

a carve-out, especially if there's nondiscrimination protection for lgbt people in that community. right, which the same people who want religious exceptions oppose. so, oh, we want a religious exemption but we' exemption but we're not willing to protect you -- you can get married in our state, we don't like it, tomorrow you can get fired, denied housing. we're not going to do anything to protect you, oh, give us an exemption over here for baking the cake and so forth. really? nobody's going to do that. that's ridiculous. so if there is nondiscrimination and support from it from people on all sides, then we can talk about how we might do some carving out for people who are not discriminating against lgbt people in their mind, serve lgbt people, hire lgbt people, but can't participate in a same-sex marriage ceremony. well, maybe we could figure that out as others have tried to do,

figure out a carve-out. i'm not sure we can, especially in isolation. but give me a whole menu of things where you're going to get this combination, you're not going to get this. i think we can come to agreement. why haven't we done this? well, there's finger pointing on all sides but i will say those people who most want religious liberty protection have waited too long and still are waiting, and we're still waiting to hear from them to say we're in favor of nondiscrimination in these ways. then i think they would get more of a hearing on the religious liberty. on the lgbt side, it's why should we accommodate you? we're going to win this and we don't need any longer these tortured conversations about religio exempti religious exemptions and so forth because frankly we don't trust you and don't think you care about our rights. we've come to this terrible place but i think we can still

redeem ourselves by sittingin i to -- they dud it in utah, folks. we can find some common ground. it discussed a range of issues other states are still battling. i think we can do it. >> can you spell out what happened in utah? often called the utah compromise. >> what happened in utah, it's underappreciated, because utah has different laws than other states, lot of protections for religious freedom, institutions to begin with. so, yes, it's a different place. that can't be replicated elsewhere. what can be replicated is the process. and equality utah, the leadership of the utah legislature, leaders of the lds church, sat together. what a concept. you know, this is the -- this is the american way in its best sense. they came together and they said we'll never agree on marriage or

these issues but we have got to live together in utah. we understand that. we have are to figure out a way that you feel safe if you're -- from being fired in the workplace, housing discrim -- we acknowledge that we, lds, political leaders, we should support that. we ask for you to recognize that religious exemptions and protection for religious liberty including what people say about same-sex marriage needs to be protected as well. can we do that? and they worked and worked and worked over a period of time. a precursor to that was the lds church going to the utah city council when they were discussing nondiscrimination legislation for salt lake city and saying we're in favor of this legislation. so that was kind of the first bre breakthrough and that came before this negotiation, but then in this negotiation, which wonderful law professor from university of illinois, robin

fretwell wilson helped to broker behind the scenes. wonderful majority leader of the state that in utah, senator stewart adams who is kind of a ladder day roger williams in my mind. he said, you know, i disagree with these people. i don't like what they -- but my faith tells me i need to stand up for their rights if i want mind protected and because he said it's just the right thing to do. and so the legislation that was passed tries to do both. it tries to be, protect people from discrimination and important ways, and uphold religious liberty. that's what we need to do. >> yeah. a couple things. one, part of what charles says illustrates what is just so puzzled me about this debate which is there are actually very few jurisdictions right now that have both an anti-gay discrimination law and a sort of

rfra-type religious protection. for the most part. there's very few places where there's at the moment a legal conflict. the indiana case, there was so much storm over it but as in, like, we're going to allow religious employers to discriminate, they could already discriminate because indiana didn't have any anti-gay discrimination legislation. i think most people just assume that we have that in the united states now and most states, and at the federal level, we don't. so to some extent, the debate has been really ill-informed, where you actually do join the issue, where you do want to have -- where you actually have anti-gay discrimination legislation in place and what you do about accommodation. that is a really hard one, actually, i think both sides have good arguments there and what you do -- i'm not sure where i stand on it. i'm -- "a" i'm inclined to think yuval is right. can avoid these issues most of

the time and keep it out of court. don't insist on going to someone who doesn't want to sell you a cake, or sell them a cake, whatever. both sides are silly. that conflict shouldn't be in court. but where the conflicts do come out, i'm inclined to say that probably employment discrimination, you're going to have a much narrow set of accommodations. employment is such a fundamental economic right that your accommodations are going to be narrowly carved out for churches and very religious non-profit institutions where religion is absolutely at the core of that organization whereas for public accommodations, the cake case, other kinds of things, i think you could have a broader carve-out for, that could include as in hobby lobby, for-profit but religious employers. so i think it may be different kinds of discrimination, you strike the balance in different ways. >> how does it not become a slippery slope?

i mean, i understand yuval saying, you know, race is different, but i am sitting here thinking about, you know, what if a, you know, jewish couple and the man is wearing a yamaca shows up at the business, says i don't serve jews or the buddhist shows up in a robe, i'm sorry, i don't serve you. why is religion not the same -- not in your mind the same equivalent as a racial discrim -- outright racial discrimination? why shouldn't there be laws? >> it's a slippery slope in both directions. why don't we accommodate everywhere? that's a slippery slope. there's a slippery slope in opposite direction. apply employment discrimination laws without discrimination, does the catholic church have to employ female priests? that can't be right, right? if you push the logic of both sides to their limits, it breaks down. it can't be right which means

you're going to have a possible slippery slope in both directions and you just have to muddle through. >> you never take any idea to its logical conclusion. we just -- all of -- all of life in a society like this is accommodations. there's a certain amount of common sense that says if we follow this abstract principle all the way down, then maybe we have to kill each other, so let's not do that. you know, the fact that it doesn't make sense in theory doesn't mean you can't live that way. our society doesn't make much sense in theory but it's okay. it works well. and, you know, there are -- there's theory and there's theory. there's ways of articulating an understanding of how to live together that speak to us as human beings even if ultimately as a set of logical statements they don't quite work out all the way to the bottom. i think that's what it takes to live together in general. i mean, just, you know, look around the thanksgiving dinner table. there's a lot of accommodation

involved. in living together. and, you know, i think we have to make room for that and not expect society to make more sense in principle than it's going to. >> i also think liberty of conscience is at stake here so we have to work harder. i think, on this than we have been. we have to work hard. liberty of conscience to me is our first freedom. it's fundmental. if we don't have freedom to follow our conscience, we don't have freedom at all. we as a country have lost the importance of liberty of conscience as a preeminent right. u.s. civil rights commission came out with a report this fall that said it was subordinate right. that's wrong. in my view, that's wrong and dangerous and, but it feeds i think a public perception that these plains of conscience are a nuisance, a joke, this woman

won't do this, this bakery won't do that. now i understand the emotion around that and i have certainly sympathy for people being served in public accommodations so i'm not suggesting that isn't important. what is important is that these are claimi ining ins of conscie claims of conscience, whatever you think of the content, for james madison, for others, or first, foremost, i mean, that's why it's first in the 1st amendment. and yet, now it seems to be the last afterthought. well, let's do this, this and this and maybe we'll worry about this poor person whose conscience is burden. burden and conscience is, if you'll forgive the expression, roger williams called it rape of the soul. this is soul liberty. so i think that's what's at stake and why we try to work this out in spite of the fact, laurie, it's very different to get carve-outs, this and that. when public schools have to give

exemptions for somebody has to wear a head covering for religion but nobody else can wear head coverings, they work at this and that's a good thing. that's what america is. we work at carving out for conscience shake. we a another example, and i'll stop, another controversial example, i think, pharmacists. this is controversial, you won't agree with me. many of you might not agree with me but i think a pharmacist who cannot prescribe certain things, if that prescription can be given immediately to the person or almost immediately, somebody else is there to give the prescription or whatever, if there's no harm, dignity, harm, to the person who's coming to get their prescription filled, then why in the heck not have an exemption, religious exemption, so that that person dioesn't hae to violate his or her conscience? pharmacy, hired to do this. wait a minute, liberty of conscience has to always be in the equation whether it's a

public accommodation, whether it's a church, wherever else, manyin my view. my view. i think this is james madison's view, also, frankly. it is roger williams' view. i don't think i'm alone in this. if we can do that, if the county clerk in utah captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2008 captioning performed by vitac