and that statement applies is to the religious right, because there's a common misperception out there that the christian conservative movement began as oppositional toward abortion and maybe gay rights, but in reality, christian evangelicals voted the first time in large numbers for jimmy carter. in 76, they turned against him in 1980 and supported his opponent ronald reagan because carter been aggressive in punishing christian elementary and secondary schools in the south that, refused to admit black, latino and native american students. so the religious right was born and and by way the religious right leaders all discussed this openly. randall balmer, who's one of the best historians of american

christianity, he's written about this in a number of his books. this isn't something they tried to hide. they began as a move meant for racial segregation. so in some sense, it's that they would continue as a movement sort of resistance against. the integration of lgbt people, integration, people of color into all of sectors of society. and christianity's at the same time christianity has morphed into this this muscular version scholar of american calls it jesus and john, that many wing evangelicals have convinced themselves that they need someone operates outside the bounds of christian ethics to win a victory for christian

ethics and something else that's interesting that relates to the geography of the book and the cultural geography of the book is that traditional churches such as the lutheran one, in which i raised and that i write about are dying. while megachurches to grow and continue to their numbers. well, so many megachurches have become citadels of christian nationalism, whereas the corner communal charitable church is struggling for members. so that's made american christianity much more aggressive, much more exclusionary, and much hostile in its political posture and its social comportment. yeah, and i should say that most megachurches are in exurbia.

that's that started for very practical reasons. the land was cheap and there open spaces. it hard. it would be hard to build mega church in the middle of. yeah in the middle of chicago or a densely populated suburb. but they could build in an exurbia. but then there's another symbiosis at work in that these megachurches then act as a magnet for people to move to those towns because some of the megachurch members are very devoted and they they're not only on sunday but for mid-week and bible classes. so they move to that town or they move close to it, helping to shift town in an even increasingly right wing direction. well, thank you. maybe the last question before you open up the question, do y'all the question of optimism? we talked to you in the book with a glimpse, a potential, and it kind of gathers together a bunch of other glimpses throughout the book. but how can we begin to assemble

those glimpses into something like a motivation or a program or real sense of direction? because, you know the other part of reading the book was, you know, frequently think the direction things are going is sort of too far gone to. it's that we can't recapture that we can't back, that we can't continue to build on the progress that had been made because we have to spend so time fighting off the right. yeah. and that is, that is the frustrating part i'm going to get to part about hope because it's very important that is the frustrating part is that we spend so much of our time playing defense that it colonizes and cannibalizes our political discourse and we're not talking about things like how to subsidize child or how to create a health care system that's more access able, affordable and equitable or how to make sure that people can get a bachelor's degree without

having to spend 20 to 25 years making student loan payments. so that's the frustration of these culture and the right wing movement against democracy that we all have to guard against is it takes up precious time. we're not talking about climate change. we're not talking about other issues. but i would say that i mentioned jesse jackson once earlier. i once asked him how you end every speech you give the words, keep hope alive. and i, i listed to him myriad problems and crises have as a society and you say keep hope alive every speech and you seem to mean it. you seem and he talked about the he had in his childhood was arrested the first time trying to check a out of a public library. he witnessed the assassination of martin luther king that was in his childhood but he mentioned that experience as well and he said i'll never

forget when he said this. he said when you're climbing your way out of a hole, sometimes times you become so focused on the distance you have yet to climb that you forget to look over your shoulder, see how far you've already come. we've come so far as a country on of race, on issues of gender on issues of lgbtq acceptance and opportunities that we could continue, that we should use that as motivation to harness of that energy and replicate some of those tactics and. work on the issues that still elude us. those issues of economic justice, the issues of making our democracy, more robust and, accessible and representational. and what it requires that, first of all, we have to vote. i know that there are many

people who are cynical about voting and there are many people who are disappointed that we have this version. form in an alley that nobody wants, you know, like it's like the rematch. nobody wants to see. but if we if we don't vote, then we're essentially guarantee being our loss because then we're going to have to play defense against the trump or a gubernatorial administration. so voting is very important, not just on the national level. one of the things i write about and i hope people take away from this book is that there's a necessity of at the local level. we see this come alive in technicolor in recent years with all of the book bands the book bands are happening at the the local town council, the county, the school. the only way to fight that is to

get involved at the local level, at the county level, with the school board. so many of the most important battles that take place, as i quote, the great novelist james lee burke in the first line of the book happen, in places few people care about. so if you live in one of these places that few people about well, you care about that. your friends and neighbors care about that place. so you need to get involved moved in that place because that's exactly what the right wing is doing. that's why we see these astroturf organizations like moms for liberty, and that's why we see steve bannon using his podcast to instruct his audience to get involved with the local election or the school board or the library, if they're doing it and the democrats, liberals, lefties, socialist, whatever you want to call, are not doing it,

well then you're guaranteeing the outcome. and again, this militant movement against democracy, reactionary, reactive. it's only so aggressive and vociferous right now or vehement right now, i should say, because they don't the progress that they've seen take place. so we need to unite in an effort to advance and continue progress rather than withdrawing from the very practices and procedures that made possible. okay. thank you. all right. questions for david. if you could look into the future and at time when trump is gone or irrelevant and the republic party regains its sanity. where do you see the people

exurbia well, that's an interesting so first of all, i would say that doug did such an outstanding job tonight thank you very much. originally my interlocutor is supposed to be a guy named david ferris who wrote a book, the kids are all left and that is about how younger generations of americans are more progressive than any previous generation. they're more politically involved than previous generations, and that's unlikely to change for a whole host of reasons that he documents and describes in the book. so that's another reason for hope. and that's another reason why will they vote? will they vote. that's the that's the big question. that's the big question. know that you know, joe isn't an exciting candidate to name the big race, but they should vote. if you're watching this, you should vote.

but exurbia gore vidal wrote, it's bit of a cliche, but he wrote that a clock ticks only in one direction and exurbia is going to become like the rest of america. in fact, in some sense, it's already happening in. parts of rural america, all of discussion of rural america is about voters underlining and underscore a certain bias that exists in the media. but voters of now make between 25 and 30% of rural america. that's going to happen in exurbia well. the eat the will become more diverse and the people who are opposed to that diversity and opposed to the progressive politics that invites they're not going to have anywhere to

go. so i think that the future is bright. if we can emerge this short term danger that currently presents itself against us and of the things that makes the short term so severe, is that the political system works to the advantage the current exurbia night. so we have an electoral college that more weight to land than voters. we have a skewed senatorial representative system. there are 3 million people who live here in. that's more than both dakotas combined. and yet the dakotas have four senators in washington, d.c. illinois has only two. so there some major structural but culture. the united states of america is becoming an increasingly diverse

and progressive polity. so that will an interesting collision. just maybe a follow up and perhaps a little of pushback on that. is i feel like just because trump leaves the scene doesn't mean trump is on leaves the scene. so i think, you know, the party has probably shifted to the right for the foreseeable future. and secondly, there there's a lot data polling out that biden is losing just we can't just rely on diversity just having a non white electoral population necessarily leaning left. african-americans tend to be more socially conservative, perhaps same thing with hispanic americans. can't just rely on that. so how do we also shift the

narrative, kind of get that back in without necessarily just assuming they're going to come back? that's that's a great question. so in no effort to duck or the question, i do think that biden has his own unique problems. we sometimes to forget that these political figures are individual roles and therefore they have individual problems or strengths or weaknesses. if if biden dropped out of the race months to a year ago, i think whatever. whoever would have replaced him on the democratic side would be polling much right now, including with all of the groups that you mentioned. but i understand questions much deeper and broader than that. so i would say that, first of all, there are some things about the society that we've that are unsustainable. on easter, my wife and i were

talking to my wife's niece who has a two young children and. she was talking about how the cost of daycare for the two young children is, what, $3,000 a month or something like that approximate. and this isn't anomalous. it's not like she's experiencing some fluke freak situation. so that's not sustainable end to your earlier about economics. there are people who are going to react adversely against and demand something different just out of necessity not necessarily even out of a political sophisticated or political aptitude. it's just the feeling that we can longer live like this. we can no longer live with a crippling student debt. we can no longer live with going to the emergency, as i did, i had high blood pressure and then

getting a bill for $3,000. and i was there for all of half an hour. so some of those those crises that descend upon people on a daily basis will bear political fruit. but what we need are democratic leaders who are willing to speak to those crises aggressively, but also speak to those crises aggressively in a way that doesn't cancel out issues of identity. because my fear is, is so often people create a binary choice in we can talk about economics or we could talk about culture. we can talk about class or, we can talk about social groups. those issues go together hand in hand. if you're raising a a gay or

transgender teenager right now in the state of florida and you're also having trouble paying for your health insurance, you're not going to live in a way that separates those two concerns. so we need leadership that meets the the moment by speaking in such a way that these issues are not contradictory but complex entry and i don't have the magic bullet for it i mean if i did i wouldn't be here be sitting in the oval office or something like that. but but that's what the future demands in that we have to speak to people's actual lives. and we also have to see that. class. and you class in economics and sociology are all a piece of the same situation situation.

and there's something there's something to your point. i mean, you are correct that many black be because of high levels of religiosity have some social conservatives. same with latino voters but they're also we act as if the maga movement isn't dangerous. but there's something pathetic about it as well. i and and it's it's maybe a little risky to speak this way because you don't want to downplay the threat that it presents but when trump hawking the lee greenwood god bless the usa bible. i it's very difficult to imagine anyone who has actually read the

bible or read any other book putting down the money to make that that purchase. if you're around anyone under the age of 40 as we are routinely it's very difficult to imagine anyone in that cohort out buying the lee greenwood god the usa bible there's there's a quality of punching against the wind with this movement that i if if if the democratic and if leftist organizers can politically suffocate it will be difficult for them to come at least in the short term. but i say that because the united states of america history always moves in cycles, and these reactionary, paranoid pop pop up excuse me, these reactionary, paranoid pop up, and then put down and then something and they pop up again.

so an ongoing battle, but there's something quixotic about all these right wing movements in that they're the source of. their defeat is built into it from the start. it's just a matter of people voting, their numbers in and getting involved. the national and local level. well i will say congratulations on the book. thank you. just before the conversation i had to cram read it over the last 24 hours. so i'm looking forward to rereading and lingering over your anecdotes so that certainly a delightful part of the book as said, i learned a lot about you and i think that was a kind of a brave choice, an interesting choice, a way to kind of thank you, kind of your own experience and observation, reflection. you named an interesting further establishment. so i want to well, check out well we'll go together the exurban tour. yeah and i say doug is my supervisor at indiana university

northwest so i took a major risk him to do this it could not only lead to an awkward conversation, but termination of employment possibility. so i'm glad glad you liked it. sure of writing you have this autocratic power. yes. thank you for coming, erica. thank you.

ss the future of the alliance. ♪

>> in partnership with the library of congress, c-span brings you books that shaped america. we explore key works of literature that had a profound effect on the country. the federalist from 1788, essays written by alexander hamilton, james madison and john j. >> in 1787 the newly drafted constitution was sent to the states for ratification. two camps emerge, the federalists and the anti-federalist. starting in october 1787, essays published under the pen name publius began appearing in newspapers, urge and the ratification of the constitution. written by alexander hamilton,

james madison and john jay. theory were later combined into a book called the federalists. because of the authors addressed a wide range of political issues including conflict between the states, taxation and foreign influence, they are still considered vital documents today for understanding the original intent of the constitution. the federalist papers continued to have an impact on the issues of contemporary america. >> welcome to books that shaped america, our c-span series that looks at how books have influenced who we are today. in partnership with the library of congress, this 10 week series looks at different eras, topics and viewpoints. we are glad you are joining us for this walk-through history. tonight, our focus is the federalist, compilation of essays written by alexander hamilton, james madison and john jay.

essays known today as the federalist papers. our guest this evening is judge gregory maddox and colleen sheehan, politics professor at arizona state university. professor sheehan, back in 1787, what were the purposes of the federalist papers? >> the federalist papers as it is commonly called, was the brainchild of alexander hamilton. hamilton was born in the caribbean on a little island called me this. hamilton came to the united states when he was a teenager, went to kings college, now columbia and attended the constitutional convention. but he was outvoted there by the

other two new yorkers who attended. new york is going to be a very important state for the new constitution. hamilton put together a team to push for the ratification of the constitution and he enlisted the support of john jay local jes madison to work to persuade the voters of new york to ratify the constitution. >> judge, our partner in this endeavor, the library of congress on its website describes the federalist papers the most significant american contribution to political thought in our history. do you agree? >> i think it is true. there were a number of unique contributions to political science that came out of the federalists. in discussing the nature of government, madison said the

government had to accomplish two things. it had to be able to control itself. the three things he pointed out were essentially new things -- separation of powers, but he also focused on the checks and balances, where each house would check the other house, each branch of government would check the other branch. perhaps the most original contribution was federalism, the idea they having two governments would do more to preserve liberty than just having one government. >> let's range from the federalist nume. this is alexander hamilton. after an unequivocal experience of the inefficiency of the subsistent federal government, you are called upoto deliberate on e w constitution for the united states of america.

thsuect speaks its own importance. comprehended in its consequences nothing less then the existence of that union. what was alexander hamilton saying there? >> that is the opening salvo of the federalist. it goes on to say it seems to have been reserved to the people of the country to decide the important question whether society is a minor capable of establishing good government or whether they are forever destined on accident and force. think about that. what he is saying essentially is free government has never worked. in the history of the world, there are momentary rains of glory that break forth from the gloom and while they dazzle us with fleeting brilliance, popular government is a history

of failure. we have the chance hamilton is saying to do it right. to show that all people is really capable of governing themselves. that is what the american project was about. the federalist papers starts out by saying so. >> judge, structuring society in a sense. >> yes, i think in your quote, one that -- thing that comes across is sounds like the articles of confederation was a disasters. in many ways that was an overstate. if you read the federalist, they were quite respectful despite seeing its flaws. under the articles o confederatio cgress kept the union together. it won a war, and negotiated a favorable peace treaty