newsmakers, president stephanie talks about the organization strategy and priorities heading into the 2020 elections. in 1985, aimsnded to elect democratic female candidates to political office. 6:00 p.m. eastern. you can also watch online or listen on our free radio app. >> congress is wrapping up its district work period. a 700 billion on dollar defense programs and policy bill for 2020 on monday. when the senate returns tomorrow, they work on several judicial and executive nominations, including assistant executive nomination and labor secretaries. watch the senate on c-span2 and the house on c-span. ,ost: this is kimberly wehle the author of the book "how to read the constitution and why."

i will start with a question that you posed with your title. why is it important to read it, and how you read it for the average person? it's important to read it because we are seeing issues of massive and constitutional importance in the headline news. at that level of the presidency and in congress we have called for concern over the constitution. as an educator, i felt it was important to produce a book that is accessible by regular people so people can educate themselves on how the constitution functions as well as their constitutional rights, and get on that bike and ride it themselves. make their own decisions about what's going on in the country. many scholars, including myself, are worried about the state of our democracy, our republic, and well -- and whether it can sustain the body blows happening to the separation of powers.

if people care about having their independent -- individual liberties going forward, educating themselves for the sake of their children and grandchildren about what to do in this moment is really important. you write is,what the constitution is becoming sort of an anti-jaywalking law. it can be violated with no consequences. .ew people realize it a big reason is that most people don't know what the constitution says and does. can you expand on that? parts ofere are two the constitution. one is the separation of powers. the three branches of government. it is not actually in the constitution, those words, separations of power. the second part is the bill of rights. students for law 13 years. there is nothing really too basic or too simple that is not

worth breaking down for them. school need basic instruction on what is a case. what is a law and how is it passed by a legislator, different than a law that is created by the supreme court? concepts, my core students benefit from them, and the book is almost a first-year law class. it breaks it down in common sense language. you mentioned the jaywalking law. people don't understand that the constitution is like a contract to renovate your kitchen. if the contractor walks off on the job with your $10,000 deposit after demoing your kitchen, the piece of paper itself will not get your money back. you have to enforce it by going to court. that's expensive, it's difficult, it takes blood, sweat and tears. that's the same what the constitution. if this president, the next president, or the last president

bulldoze his over the limits set zes over the limits that are set forth, it it no longer exists and that will goes into the presidential toolbox for the next president. it might not be a president you like. if we expand the office of the presidency, then i think we are all at risk for having a government that is a bully. that has to much power down the line. when we care, it might be too late to take that tool out of the twill box. host: spell out what the constitution says about the powers that a president has. guest: the constitution has vesting clauses. it gives congress a bunch of makes, mainly powers to laws. it gives the president the power to execute those walls. -- those laws. i tell my students to think

about a prosecutor or police officer. a police officer does not decide what the speed limit is, they flag someone who is violating the speed limit and hands it off to the prosecutor to prosecute that person for violating the speed limit. it is a lot faster these days, you get something in the mail. the idea is that the president does not make the laws, the president enforces them. ther our system right now president is a lot of lawmaking. we have heard a lot about executive orders. that is not in the constitution. the president will issue an executive order and make a law that way. that is the power of congress. aboutr a lot administrative bureaucracy. we have too much regulation. this is a fight we saw at the supreme court level around the citizenship question. that question was not about presidential power, it was about agency power. authority tothe

set forth the limits on what goes in the census for him -- census forum. congress handed off what i call the legislative baton to the department of commerce and said, you fill in the blanks for us. you make regulations for us. and commerce did. that is the part the supreme court struck down. the agencies lawmaking at the behest of congress. this is a nuance that is complicated and theoretical. it is under administrative law. center in ourd headlines. it's something people feel strongly about. people don't really understand sometimes. the other thing that is happening in the last 20-30 years is social media. massive amounts of new technology. we have all kinds of information coming at us but did not exist when i was a kid. we had a few channels in a few newspapers, now it is hard to

determine what is accurate and what's not. muellerfrom the robert investigation, the 2016 attack on our electoral process, that other foreign powers, in this instance, russia is implanting misinformation and our inboxes. my objective with the book is to encourage people to go back to basics. the book walks people through the language of the constitution. it is not an easy beach read. but for people that want to understand the baseline. they can rely on their own knowledge and old analytical abilities -- own analytical abilities. kimberly wehle host: our guest .- host: our guest teaches law if you want to ask her questions, democrats, 202-748-8000. republicans 202-748-8001. independence, 202-748-8002.

host: there has been debates over whether it is a living document, where do you find on that duality? dichotomy.s a false it's not a real debate because the constitution is old. 230 years old. leaving a lot of definitions undefined. if we had everything spelled out in the constitution it would be like the tax code. volumes and volumes. by definition, conservative justices and more liberal justices have to fill in the blank here it we have to define what is an unreasonable search and seizure under the fourth amendment. the word unreasonable is not defined in the constitution. i introduce this concept with a poem, and talk about different ways of interpreting and how your point of view can determine or affect what you think the meaning of is.poem

what your worldview is in a moment. judges are the same way. some judges will look to their common sense and say this is an obvious reading of the constitution. i think that is a fallacy because we have a lot of 5-4 decisions, which means there are ys of reading it. some justices might say we look to the objectives and goals of the competition. well,stices -- conservative justices might say, me want to see what the framers at the time of the framing of the constitution believed that term when mean. when you are talking about a formal imaging machine determining whether there is marijuana inside of a house, scalia saw that as a

search issue. we are departing from what the framers anticipated in the 18th century. we are going to other sources to determine the meaning. we can debate which of those sources are better for resolving ambiguity, but the notion that there is a clear way, and an out-of-the-box living constitutional way, i think that is a way most americans don't understand. it's not their fault. it's framed that way and it is not accurate. host: eric is in seattle washington on the desk seattle, washington on the democrats line. caller: the constitution is obsolete. from the verye beginning. it was a flawed document. it was basically a white manifesto document. i mean you can look at the end ofution on the polar

it. no one is right and no one is wrong. it in the supreme court, we have known -- judges that one believes this and one believes that. no one is right and no one is wrong. it's left up to interpretation. it is a flawed document because it is left up to decisions. it should be rewritten. we should have a new constitution written in because black people were slaves during it. i would like to address this. no one is right, no one is wrong, slavery was justified under the constitution. no one is right and no one is wrong. host: we will let our guest respond. professor wehle. guest: do you make a good point. the constitution was written in for white land owners

gentry male land owners. it not only excluded african-americans and enslaved people, it excluded an entire gender, women. that is a critique of the cop to shin. i believe it has worked this far and is the best -- of the constitution. i believe it has worked this far and is the best we have. if it is in force it creates a boss for our elected leaders. the design of the constitution, and of course it has been amended many times for these inherent problems like you identified by excluding and authorizing enslavement of african-americans, but the document has been amended to address these problems over the years. designed to ensure that the individual citizen, the individual voter is empowered to

govern themselves. the constitution, the revolutionary war, we just celebrated the fourth of july, was about not having a government that had so much could snapthe king his fingers and arbitrarily throw someone in jail. we get this wrong sometimes. we throw people in jail that don't belong. the system is set up to limit that kind of arbitrary power. we have the due process clause. we have rules that apply to judges and limit their power. as a nation we respect those institutions. if we allow judges orders, and we have seen this in the last to bears, judges orders flouted or treated as if they are not serious or real, to be attacking legitimate, opposing points of view, that destabilizes the whole system.

i want to pick up your point on a new constitution. there are two ways of amending the constitution. one is through an amendment and the other is to have a constitutional convention. the last one we have produced our current constitution. amend thealled to articles of confederation, which was the document in place prior. it was supposed to be an amendment constitution. they threw that out and started from's wretch -- from scratch. away, sixew states states away from calling a new constitutional convention. my concern is that in this polarized environment -- an environment that is lacking in compassion and core values -- the document we could end up with would look nothing like what we have, and we would roll about a tremendous amount of protections that are in the current document. if you start from scratch, we don't even know what we would get. even the late justice scalia

said, this is not a century to start over with the constitution. we have to work with what we have. people understand that it does not mean anything if we bulldoze over it. if we don't enforce it, it will not help ourselves. we don't ask someone at the end of the driveway they are making the short -- making sure the constitution is in force. host: republican line from missouri. caller: i was recently reviewing part of the constitution and iran entire article one, section into article one, section 10. i am familiar with traffic regulations. i am wondering, i believe those were authorized by congress, but it appears to be congress has to authorize any compacts.

i don't think congress is taking efforts to legalize the compacts of that electoral college. you have any ideas about that? guest: not that particular question. but you raise an excellent point with respect to congress. congress does have not just the power to make laws, but there are many powers. the power to tax, the power to declare war, the power to , the power to allow a president to get an all human or gift. -- to get a gift. congress has fallen down the past years. it is not doing its job in the way the constitution envisioned that it would do, and the framers envisioned it would do its job in a bipartisan way. we don't know the answer, let's look at the problem.

let's come up with options and think what the best outcome might be. we have all been in this situation where we are starving -- solving a heart problem. you come up with a good solution. policy making that for function is not happening anymore. so polarized. something is predetermined and it is either a yes or no vote. you mentioned a rights, federalism is another big important -- the idea of states having her own independent rights to make their own laws and to function as independent states. that is another check on government howard. the framers were worried about having a federal government that was so powerful that individual liberties, my right to walked on the street, my right to raise my children the way i want. ,o go from one state to another that stuff would fall apart if big becauseot too

it is human nature to amass power. from syracuse, new york on the independent line. caller: great discussion, i would be interested in reading the book. i would like to mention that the last color before this last one spoke about arbitraryness. , itt's not in your book should be. the reason for the constitution. mention hear anyone this, but if you read the declaration, you cannot separate those two. the reason for the constitution is to keep us from killing each other. it's not meant to satisfy everybody. it needs to be a political solution in every sense. that's why we go back and forth from one -- from the left to the right, to the middle and back and forth. it is ultimately so we do not

kill each other. the articleng, seems to come -- the author seems to come from one position. issue of the current the day. basically that trump is usurping the congress. that is a political argument. she should have started with somebody on the other side also. this usurping did not start which from, it is happen in every presidency. barack obama ignored the constitution in so many ways. host: we will let our guest respond to all those things. certainly did not mean to pick a side. the book does not pick a side. i am not interested in picking a side. i agree with you about prior presidents, barack obama and others have utilized and expanded the scope of the president power. this is not a trump problem,

this has been a problem over decades, and a problem with congress also not protecting its prerogative to ensure that it maintains its own powers. and that ensures that the other branches don't step outside of their boundaries. are living in a world today where we have a certain president and those issues have become front and center more than ever before. not entirely for sure because of donald trump. this is not an anti-trump book or a program book, it is april rule of law book. i agree that i don't talk about from killing each other, but the idea behind the constitution is to put the power back in the people with limits on it. with some rules. some rules of the game. the rules have to be implemented fairly. i am ahe analogy, mother, you go to your kids and if your kid

loses you don't know how the calls were called, but they were done fairly, you feel like you go home and you take your kid out for a burger and you go on with your life. if you feel that the rules were side hador the other an unfair advantage, then you get angry. i think that is where we are right now. the system is set up to protect people regardless of political .trike the book is not a red versus blue book, it is a right versus terms of how we think about the government and how our individual rights are protected across any presidency and any congress. host: professor, you write the text of the first amendment has two major areas congress must be clear of, religion and speech. congress must be careful when it comes to religion and speech.

to plain language, can't just congress cannot hamper speech or the press. -- congress cannot hamper speech or the press. talk about free speech. what does it say and what does it not say? are two big parts of the first amendment. there is religion and speech. back to your other point about, is there plain reading? under the first amendment is extremely layered and compensated. not because the clause is complicated, but the supreme multi-tests. up it depends on the kind of speech, who is speaking, it depends on who is limiting the speech. the primary thing i think people need to keep in mind is that the framers believed that, if the government limits your speech, pretty soon the government is limiting how you think. if you are limited and how you can speak, you start not speaking.

you start speaking in ways that are consistent with what the political win says you should speak. then it affects your speaking. that is a primary infringement on individual liberties. the other things i remember about the first amendment is that it is about government limiting individuals ability to speak, not the other ways around. we hear a lot about first amendment rights of government employees. they have limited first amendment rights when they were actually working in their governmental capacity. that's because they have the power and the first amendment worries about individuals having the power over their own self-government. debaten, there is some as to how to read that. does the limit on the government's ability to infringe on religion extend to just beyond establishing a national religion? off-limits, but

how much entanglement with religion and government is appropriate. that theomething courts hash out and continue to hash out. subjectiveat will be . the people on the supreme court of the united states, like it or function like many legislators. they are judges, they are there to resolve individual disputes, but because what they do is essentially read between the lines in the constitution, they add meaning and definition to the constitution. the constitution cannot be amended by congress. it has to go through a very complex process. when the supreme court reads the constitution in a certain way, that is as set and stone as we get an american law. these folks are not elected. we cannot decide we don't like this president so we want a different one. we don't like this member of

congress, we don't like we have empowered congress we will switch it. with the supreme court of the united states we don't have that power. that is a nuance people don't understand. we talk about rights on the supreme court level. that is important on both sides, but the supreme court has powers that extends beyond that that affects our individual lives. understanding how that works and how it functions in relation to the other two branches is really important for every american. host: the book is called "how to read the constitutions and why"" kimberly wehle joining us for this discussion. republican line, you're next. caller: i believe wholeheartedly in our constitution. i don't think it should ever be changed. i am disappointed with the supreme court decision over the on the census.n i think everyone in the country

be counted for. host: finish your thought. i just feel that that decision was very wrong. bill is in virginia, independent line. i am gladofessor, that you have written this book in my discussion with folks, so many americans don't understand the constitution because they don't understand the basics. i am going to cite a ninth amendment and ask you a question. the ninth amendment says, the and numeration in the constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny retained by others the people. professor randy barnett, but you probably have met him, has written about this. others have written about it as well.

yourld like to ask amendment -- question. it seems like the ninth amendment has been dead for over 100 years. it is sort of a libertarian type of language. do you think that the ninth amendment will ever be brought back to life? when i mention it to people, they have never heard of it. it's in the bill of rights. i would just like your opinion. a great example of not enforcing or not finding meaning in a particular part of the constitution. take out your black sharpie and cross it out. as you suggest, the ninth amendment would be that even though there is not a right enumerated, we have a right to a right of freedom to religion. arms.e the right to bear all kinds of rights and numerate it in the constitution, but there is a lot we don't have. we don't have the right to

decide how to educate children. constitution.the the court has read that into the constitution of the dust under the due process law. fore is no express look these rights. we certainly don't want government telling us how to raise our children or what kind of medication they are allowed to have. some believe the ninth amendment is that provision. listen, this does not mean it is exhausted. you can add rights. the problem, as you mention, the court said, that is so vague, open and wiggly and we don't know how to fill that in. so we are not going to try. it is too broad. we saw this recently with the gerrymandering decision. a majority of the court said, we don't know how to fix partisan gerrymandering so we are not even going to try. to answer your question, do i

think it is going to be resurrected? not with this particular supreme court. puttingeful about labels on justices either way. we have seen in this particular term, conservatives join with liberals and liberals join with conservatives. that political divide is not accurate at the supreme court level. i do not see a conservative majority identifying many new that are already established in the law or under the constitution. you're not going to read new rights into the constitution. if that happens it would have to happen through the congress. as i suggested before, congress is not making new policies. they are not making new rights, new laws, new limits. with thethat happens civil rights era, the civil rights act, the americans with disability act. environmental legislation.

massive social reform, environmental reform, etc., we have not seen that we are not likely to see it in the congress anytime soon. hollywood, florida, democrats line. hello. thank you, professor p right god bless you for writing this book. i think it was a great idea. so many people do not understand the constitution. i have read it and had to read it very closely to try to understand it. i totally agree with you that we should not think about getting , be it ae constitution mistake of biblical proportions. i think in this climate right now we would have a constitution and favorite -- in favor of the corporate people instead of the individual, which is not what the framers had in mind. individual rights would go out the window.

that some presidents, even president obama skirted the line with the constitution on certain things. but this particular president made so many egregious violations, not since richard nixon have we seen such blatant disregard for the rule of law, which is ridiculous. you, we need the congress and the senate to get and do their job, and protect the constitution and follow it since this president has disregarded it in so many times and in so many ways. host: professor, go ahead. guest: this goes back to my toolbox analogy, filling out the

belt and suspenders, if we allow the office of the presidency -- say you like this president, you allow the office to expand in its powers, that power goes to the next president. there is no president that sits for more than eight years. if you love this president, you don't have problems, he might have problems with the barack obama or donald trump. the idea is that donald trump has pushed the boundaries in ways we have never seen before, historically. the congress is allowing it. we are not seeing push back. that office of the presidency is .etting more and more powerful that amount of power gets handed to the next president and it could be a republican president, it could be donald trump, it could be a democratic president, it could be an independent, we don't know. presumably there will be a president that most people don't

like at some point. it only their policies or anything about them. we are allowing that office to get that much larger for the next president. celebratede just fourth of july. the american revolutionaries did not -- many women did not fight and die for independence from england to have a more powerful presidency. back their to take power over their own government and put it back in the people. i'm glad you mentioned the concept of corporate america. book, ion i wrote this started writing a more academic book. , whenks about how corporate america does stuff for government, the constitution does not apply at all. the more we shift our government power into the private sector, that is going outside any limits of the constitution. of course we have a lot of money coming into campaigns from

corporate america. that's because of the supreme court's controversial citizens thatd decision corporations are first amendment rights like you and me. the cousin that, the congress is arguably working more for these profit making centers and for their individual constituents. marriage that the normal desire to expand power boss -- people, and no going back on that power, note to get on the windshield, one parking spot that says it's illegal, it never tickets are you part there every time. you go to that coffee shop because you know you will never get a ticket. youday you get that to get don't part there. if this president does not get a ticket or barack obama does not get one or bill clinton does not get one. that office gets additional power.

that is the message that i hope comes across regardless of where we are on the political spectrum. we are all americans together. arnold thing anyone wants a government that can bully us and our children. hannah ins hear from california, republican line. about: i have a question the powers of the branches of government. i was hoping that you could speak about that area. of decisions being made about which branch of government, especially congress or the president holds these powers seems vague. likef the comments i would to make an like you to respond to. i watch c-span 18 hours a day. i amch c-span because reason whylar to the

you wrote your book. i wanted to see what was going on. when you're in a position to watch this all day long as i am, you see folks that are horrifying. , you have to watch c-span to see the congresswoman who ranted and raved on the news media that no citizen should be allowed to make fun of a congressperson. to it thatd to see people that did that were prosecuted. me that thiso woman that probably never read the constitution, or the bill of rights -- host: i apologize, we will have to leave it there because you put a lot before that. guest: first you asked about the enumeration -- the numerator powers. if anybody has watched the crown or anything about a monarch, imagine the constitution is like , and thecription

monarch, that's us, we the people gave congress certain powers. president has the executive power. judges have the judicial power. i call them sandboxes. you have to plan their sandbox. we know there is some blending of powers that is just normal, but the supreme court's job, when they take these cases, is to make sure each branch stays in their sandbox. if they take over another sandbox, then we have to radical power. power.nnical every agency, if anyone has been a washington, d.c. and you drive you see these big buildings that they department of something, those are all within the executive branch. to the president and they make laws. we call them regulation. the supreme court has said it is ok. that is an example with the president is dipping his toe, or

her toe in the sandbox of congress. congress gave it all away in the statute. me.cies make law for you have more expertise, i have to get reelected, i don't want this political hot potato. whatever the reason, that is it. this gets very complicated. in the book i lay out ways of thinking about -- the question is so good because it puts your finger on how nuanced the constitution really is. it is not black and white. people want it to be black and white. my students and loss -- in law school get frustrated when they don't get an answer. no one will pay you lots of money if the answer is on wikipedia. the book walks through each of the three enumerated powers and asks and explains that the plain language means, where the wiggle room is, how to fill in those blanks. on glad you put your finger

that particular question. i cannot recall if there was a second one you wanted answered. host: chapter five, speech and religion, chapter six, guns, chapter seven, the fourth, fifth and six amendment. it goes on from there. of the book is here to talk about this for the next 20 minutes. both go to market in new jersey on the independent line. -- let's go to mark in new jersey on the independent line. caller: i'd like to address obama going around the congress and the senate and forced public schools by threatening to it andd federal funds, force the public schools to allow men and boys to work -- walk into innocent girls school bathrooms. what resulted was males with cell phones, not only using them by taking pictures and

in one case,, and sexually assaulting an innocent six-year-old girl. is that somewhere in the constitution that these innocent children have rights? host: what are you planning to specifically as far as the violation to the constitution? caller: i am asking your guest. the fact is, this has resulted in innovation in privacy. children have been video. host: you made those points. we will let our guest go ahead. guest: i have to say, idol have -- i don'tn that have expertise in that narrative or reporting with respect to that. state of like a sad affairs. i can talk about the constitutionality of when a president decides to withhold funding, for example. the prior caller asked, where are the lines between what various ranches do.

congress appropriates money to the presidency to various agencies. the constitution says, the president shall take care that the laws are faithfully executed. shall take care. some people say the word shall is shall. that is the president has to execute the law and congress requires it. every person who violates this speed law gets a ticket. you don't pick and choose who gets tickets. the counter argument is, that is .ot realistic we don't have the enforcement authority or enough police officers and prosecutors to prosecute everybody. but if the president gets the money and then says i am not going to do anything with that, there is an argument that the president has refused to take care that the laws are executed.

specificallyh in on president obama, but this is a tool in the president's toolbox. then the question becomes, always, what do you do about that? whether it is obama, clinton, george bush, the criticisms of presidents are across both political spectrums. what do you do? there are two options. you use the ballot box and take that person out of office. sometimes it's not a good solution because you have to wait for the next presidential election. two, you tell congress to do something about it, but the congress has to say if they really meant what they said. that is highlighting and the prior law does not do anything. i think president trump knows that he can do what he wants to do so long as there is not a consequence.

part is to go to court. in your circumstance, if a child school, thatin a child might have a claim in court to get money or an school,on against the maybe even at the levels of the presidency, that is a complicated legal question. but then you go to the courts. a three branch system works. one branch does something wrong, the first question we ask, where is the cop to give that branch a speeding ticket? it is either congress or court. if it's neither, then that branch has more power. it has expanded its authority. ultimately the idea is, the framers side as there will be in that position of power that will utilize that youive authority in a way

don't like. it is too late to put the toothpaste back in that too. you cannot rewind and say we did not mean for the president to have that power. host: on the democrats line. happy: good morning, fourth of july. i am a democrat. within the last week i received an official looking letter, which was the arizona republican census form. identical, two pages front and back, and asked questions about how do you feel about the president's policy, etc., etc. at the end, it asked for a political donation and directed you to a website. census question,

hypothetically, if you had 100 building in the elevator stop at the 50th floor and 12 people wanted to get on and the elevator could only hold ten and it had a weight, and you asked the weight of everybody, if they did not give it, then something will happen on the elevator. host: the question for our guest caller is what? is, we the question don't have the proper , weesentation and resources don't know if the census is going to give us that. host: that is anthony. you can address that as you wish. theme i think that comes out of his question is, it has to do with the reliability of information that we get. i mention this earlier, big data

technology, 24/7 cable shows, all of this has really distorted our understanding of what the , how towhat facts are think about these things, what's real, what's not real. one of the prior caller's mention the id. -- idea of watching c-span to get some grounding. my students, people do not take my words for it, not take commentators, legal analysts on a tv shows word for we need to retrain ourselves to go back to first principles and sources. the constitution is too complicated to just read and understand. it's hard because the supreme court is added onto it. don't just take my word for it, you can do additional reading. there are sources in the book.

we just went through this robert mueller investigation for two years. if you want to know what he really decided, do not take bill bars word for it, read the summaries of the report. you want to know what the .ussians did i say did because most of our intelligence officials believe that in a has not been refuted. read the indictments against the russians. there was one in fairbury and one in july -- in february and one in july. robert mueller lays out in great detail. that is happening for 2020. read it yourself and make your own conclusions. it takes a little more time, but i think this is a skill we all so that we back to can make these decisions ourselves based on facts. we have a grounding, this is real, we can debate what to do about it and whether the

president or congress is using right or wrong. we can unfortunately not rely on elected officials anymore. or for the accuracy of what's coming up through the television screens. host: thomas on the republican line. thank you for taking my call. kimberly, thank you for coming on. i do have a question and it is to you kimberly. but before that, my quick, is, trump bashing has become a blood .port liberal versus conservative has become so oversaturated with information, as you said, from 24/7 new cycle. it is very difficult for someone who loves0 years old this country. i am a veteran.

. really do love of america i was moved the other night watching the blue angels. my question to you and your , the way inal smarts , thethe constitution president does have the right to put the census question on the 2020 census. judge understand is that roberts decided that he did not like the way it was there. the reasons, to take it back to lower court. that is pretty much a the way. i believe we need that question on there. it's my viewpoint. i believe if we are going to count, we will spend billions of dollars to count, that question needs to be on there. there are underlying reasons.

we need to know who they are, who we are and that is a big deal to decide our future for 10 years. that is thomas in texas. we will let our guest respond. guest: i want to make one point on your first reaction and first point, which was about the polarized nature of our conversation and how unfortunate that is. most is not black and just black and white, it is great. team x, team why, whether it is trump or whatever. i agree with you completely. oft is a very toxic way going through difficult problems. the framers, and i think congressman of michigan who just left the republican party wrote a piece on the fourth which quotes george washington and how

george washington mentioned and flinches at the notion of political power. constitution says nothing about democrats and republicans. we can have another conversation around that another day. party versus it is party versus country first is a problem across the board. on the citizenship question, and this has come up a couple of times so let me get into more detail because it sounds like people want to understand it. in theeration clause constitution gives congress conduct the census. the constitution makes clear it is about head counting. it's not about counting citizens, it is about counting human beings. the supreme court said that wilbur ross, secretary of commerce, did not violate the enumeration cause in wanting to

add the citizenship question. there are two parts here. one is, the constitution does not care about citizenship. by adding it it was not a problem with the constitution. the problem with the citizenship thing is actually the power goes to congress, congress gave it to an agency that answers to the president. the president does not get the power under the constitution. it goes to an agency. the agency is basically power.ing congress' it's weird because the agency is in the president's chain of command. some scholars think it is unconstitutional. should not even give it to wilbur ross. with the court said is, under the other statute, administrative procedure act.

an agency does make laws for congress, they have to cross --. their eyes and cross their teas. there is a higher standard because they cannot be thrown out of office like congress. that is the part that justice roberts said was done in properly. you are right. they can go back and do it better. but they won't be able to do it in time for this particular census and the implications are big for how many members of congress they get, and how much money they get from the federal government. the reason that is important is that agencies do all kinds of other things to regulate our lives. to make sure that planes don't crash into each other in the sky. they regulate the environment, they regulate the economy, we don't want agencies having so much power that it really belongs to congress and its

unchecked. host: from ohio, independent line. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i want to start a conversation about the second amendment. militia for the security free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be of breach. we are familiar with the second part. i want to talk about a well regulated militia. what is a well regulated militia? for what itous means. us to decideor what will regulated is. host: we will leave it there for our guest. well regulated militia, presumably against power to -- to put limits on a militia. an army that could be pulled

together to fight against england. we did not have -- the revolutionaries did not have an organized army. there was no federal government. they wanted to preserve the ability to do that. originally the supreme court read the second amendment as just protecting that in that heller case of versus the district of columbia. courts changed its point of view on the reading of the second amendment and said there is a right to bear a handgun in a home for self protection. that is the limits of the second amendment based on the last pronouncement from the supreme court. whatr as how to determine will regulated means. in a favorite case, marbury versus madison, the supreme decided how to read the constitution. that terminology, if it came up in a case, in a dispute, may be

a government did not regulate a militia, or did in a way that people are not happy with, that case would have to be filed into a lower court and go to a supreme court to get a definition. i would study that. i don't own the answer to that right now. from joseph in new jersey, republican line. first i would like to strongly recommend a publication court."the supreme which was published by c-span in 2009. they are excerpts from a number of interviews by brian lam and others. each of the supreme court justices that were sitting at that point. it is a fascinating, fascinating insight into how the supreme , how cases are

chosen, etc., etc. it is my understanding that about 8000 petitions are made each year to the supreme court. of that 8000, only about 80 or 90 cases were actually heard. it is my understanding also that each supreme court justice has four clerks that are working for them. my question is, how much influence do those clerks have on the various cases that are being considered? it is my understanding that they do a lot of the work in preparing the cases for the supreme court justice to review. host: thank you. everything that you said -- i did not clerk on the supreme court so i don't have personal knowledge of how it works, but i do know a number of former clerks in the supreme court. the supreme court also has a

band of lawyers that work for the supreme court as a court. it manages some of its business. the motions that come in. -- i did click for a federal judge, it was a lower court judge. the relationship between the clerks or the judge and the justice is very personal. in my experience, some judges actually would ask their clerks for insight and their thoughts and views on the case. other judges might say, this is how i want to come out, write the opinion. on the supreme court, but at either extreme, the clerks are really important. pen toclerk is putting paper on behalf of the justice, which happens sometimes, how those words are framed can have a tremendous influence on many cases later.

a as i said earlier, because there are so few cases that go to the supreme court, and because supreme court is the entity that tells us what the constitution means, when a court issues a decision on one case, those become precious. lawyers carefully look at them and try to discern them in the next case and so on. if a clerk is the person that phrase, that could have tremendous influence going forward. court level, much more so than the district court or trial court level. most federal judges are well-versed in the cases before them. but supreme court justices personally understand, before they sit down, the in's and out's of what everybody is bringing before them. the clerks are presumably a big heart in informing the justices. they might do a bench memo summarizing the various points of view.

that is some tailoring that requires exercise of judgment. there is a team behind the court, not just the individual justices that produce what we know. host: the book includes the complete text of the united states constitution. it's called "how to read the constitutions and why." that's by professor kimberly wehle. thank you for your time this morning. journal,'s washington live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. elana,up monday morning, and the philadelphia inquirer's jonathan previews the week ahead in washington. the former commerce secretary and former u.s. ambassador to china discusses his role with the past u.s. mca coalition and current u.s. trade policy. you sure to watch c-span's washington journal live at 7:00 eastern on monday morning. join the discussion.

washington journal books are available at c-span's new online store. check out the washington journal mugs and see all of the c-span products. for 35 years, emily's list has been working to elect pro-choice democratic women to state and local elections. thank you for being with us. >> thank you for having me. >> we should tell our audience that you had a big announcement that you are committing $20 million to 20 races to flip state legislatures in 2020. we will talk about that and lots of other electoral politics questions.