to hear cases against president trump. we also expect the senate to take on the u.s.-mexico trade agreement known as usmca. congress will hear the state of the union address. watch the house live on c-span and the senate live on c-span2. host: joining us live from new york city is the senior editor of the national review. a long time writer and author of this book titled give me liberty, the history of america's exceptional idea. , you write ask you that the need for telling this what i see around me. this is the most confused moment

i have lived in. how america's national essences being ignored, trampled or distorted. what else are you saying here. to direct ourying fromtion away from moment the political mania that has surrounded us for 363 days so far this year and we've got two more to go. oversday we start all again. i just want to take a break from that and have us look at 400 years of our engagement with the idea of liberty. my argument is that is the ourmate of america, of nationalism. it's the exceptional american idea. it is something that americans have been talking about, writing about, fighting for for for centuries. -- four centuries.

some of them are famous. some of them every one of you has read. allrs are obscure but they laid down principles that affect us waiting to liberate us today. i want us to be proud of that. i must to think about it. i want us to be inspired. host: we will take your calls in just a couple of minutes. republicans can call 202-748-8001. democrats 202-748-8000. .ndependents 202-748-8002 you mentioned the 13 documents that you review in order to tell this story about liberty. we are going to show all 13 documents.

we begin with the jamestown papers. go ahead and talk about these documents if you can. the, let me just go through 13. the meetings -- the minutes of the meeting at jamestown and that establishes the principle of self. this was villagers in the town of flushing it rebuking general peter stuyvesant. he forbade quakers from coming in the dutch colony he ruled. flushing said we are not going to obey.

his lawyer got the jury to acquit him even though it was jury nullification. this established freedom of the press in britain's american colonies. 1776 this was our national birth certificate. 1785 the minutes of the new york manumission society. state in ordere to put the road to abolition. serious one. the existence of chattel slavery. 1787 the constitution written

and ratified the following year. the munro doctrine is a foreign policy doctrine that also has a political and ideological component. we were not only telling european powers they couldn't colonize further in the new world. kings in the western hemisphere. that is what james monroe was telling congress and the world. in 1848, the declaration of sentiments of the seneca falls women's rights convention this was a call for women's rights, including the right to vote. it would not become a constitutional amendment for another three quarters of a century. 1863, the gettysburg address.

lincoln's great summation of america's struggles for liberty so far. he specifically links the end of slavery,the war to end to the declaration of independence and the preamble of the constitution. 1883, the new colossus. a poem written to raise money for the statue of liberty, which goes up in new york harder -- new york harbor. 1896, the crossings gold speech. important principle about the equality of men and women in the workplace and in the economy. 1940 franklin roosevelt's ofeside chat, the arsenal democracy. he is saying america's commitment to liberty involves preserving liberty in britain.

it will help britain defend itself. year before we enter world war ii. one, ronald reagan's tear down this wall speech in berlin. 1987. he says our commitment to liberty requires us to tell the soviet union at the berlin wall cannot be a permanent landmark. a permanent scar on the face of central europe. of central and all and eastern europe will ultimately have to be free. those are the 13 documents. there could be another set. probably, he would certainly want the declaration of independence and the get a burger address, and the constitution to be in anyone's list of american liberty documents. you could have other ones also. they are junior

or varsity, i'm not saying they are less important. we have generated other liberty documents. these are the 13 i picked to tell the story of liberty in american history. we should be proud of it. years,pending those 400 when you look at those documents , what do those documents say to this country right now? about how to conduct ourselves? guest: it says two things. it says, look at our past, look at the men and women over 400 years. some of them famous, some of them ordinary. some of them all we know about them is that they were there at a moment when they signed or endorsed one of these documents. at crucial moments, americans have stood up for the principle of liberty and made it real in

our national life. the second thing it says is, this is great, but we have to keep doing it. it is not something that automatically replicates itself. it is not a perpetual motion machine. it is in our national character. it is good that it is. it is something we can be proud of and something that can encourage us. in every generation we have to be aware of it and we have to continue to work for it. that is the message i hope people would take from this book. host: we do have calls coming in. let's take our first one from sal. independent scholar. go ahead, please. caller: good morning. i think the average american citizen has no idea of the power and wealth that is possessed by the hasidic community. your previous caller, who spoke

about the schools was 100% correct. in lakewood, new jersey, which is home to the look you're just -- to the largest yeshiva in the world. -- decimatedaf public school system. to thee to look pardoning by president clinton mark rich and pinker scream. the average person cannot have any idea. do i believe in murdering these people? absolutely not. that is a ridiculous thing. host: that might have been a color for my last segment. a veryand not intelligent one either. is there any -- host: is there anything you would like to say about what he had to say? guest: he could read chapter two

about the book. that is almost 400 years ago, there were 30 men in flushing, a little village outside what was then webster. they were told by their governor, who they had no power over -- there was nothing elected about him -- they were told, no quakers in my colony. anyone who hosts them, that is a crime. any ship comes in bringing them, they will be fined. an official town protest. saying we cannot obey this directive, because our religion teaches us not to. there weren't quakers sticking up for themselves. there were ordinary men who put their names to a document, saying that our faith tells us

to do unto all men as we would have all men do unto us. our saviors saith, this is the law and the profit. caller, int the last would want everyone listening to this -- i would like everyone in america to be aware of this document. these were 30 people stepping up , six of them could not sign their own names. they made their marks on this letter to their director general. theylay down a marker, said, we are not going to obey you on this because our faith tells us not to. that is the beginning of a principal that we continue to enjoy. we ought to remember these brave men and honor them for it. and follow their example. host: let's hear from j. independent caller.

morning.ood thanks for taking my call. -- you doring if you recognize that all of those documents do refer to connecting the human part of us to the belief that is in an environment of domestic tranquility that we advance into the infinite capacity of natural science knowledge. while ronald reagan was making , he hadech, in germany already initiated an economic system in this country that was a social darwinian in nature. where the at a point levels of animalistic competition and -- in our society are so extreme that they almost reach the level of a

greed, jealousy, fear, and anger. i am not sure that can be stopped. i am so distressed about it. thank you. host: mr. brookhiser. guest: look at chapter 11. that is the gold speech. williamthe speech that jennings bryan gave in order to win the craddick presidential nomination in 1896. he was hoping to stampede the convention. he succeeded. this was a 20 minute speech that was followed by a 30 minute ovation. people who were there after he finished said the applause, they compared the noise to artillery or to niagara falls. blue people away. crosseech is known as the of gold speech because his final

downis he will not press on the brow of labor, this crown of thorns. he will not crucify mankind on this cross of gold. was whetherat year america should be on a gold standard. was sticking up for the latter. he himself said the best paragraph in that speech was not his closer -- it was not the lines that give a speech its name, which he had used in speeches before -- he said the best paragraph that night was one he had written the night before. the reason i put the speech in my book, it is the opening sentence of that graph. it gets your attention. rivals, heing to his says, you have defined businessmen too narrowly.

the man who works for wages is as much a businessman as the man who pays him his wages. i think that is a principal and a point that we always have to keep in mind. in our economic system there are people who win a lot. there are people who win very little. there are people who wash out. there are people who are born with advantages, there are people who aren't. there are people who have it made, there are people who have to make it all. they are all equal participants in this system and we have to think of them that way. just because bill gates, sergey brin, motet billionaires, it does not make them fundamentally different, more worthy of honor than the people who work for them or the people who temporarily are not working. as men who earns wages is

much a businessman as the man who pays him his wages. william jennings bryan, 1896. host: economic equality, that has been a topic in the democratic presidential debates. makes me want to ask you about this year's cycle. what are your observations on the presidential race? and the way we are doing politics in 2019? guest: i gave up predicting. i did not see the result we had four years ago. three years ago. 2016. i am not going to give you any predictions. interesting times. i will say, people are ringing their hands and saying, politics is sacred and it is awful. which it is. i hear people saying we are in a

cold civil war. i hear that term bandied about. that distresses me because -- we had a real civil war. 750,000 men were killed. 620,000,o think it was but the figure was update you years ago. i met the historian who raised it. he is a demographic historian and he did it by looking at since his returns. he said, we are missing 130,000 men. 130,000 morehat men had been killed in the real civil war than we previously thought. when people say, we are in a civil war now. of interest in history. backon't even have to go to the civil war. i am old enough to remember 1968. that was much worse than now. worse than now.

you had martin luther king jr. assassinated, you had robert kennedy assassinated, you had riots in american cities, you had a war that seemed to be going nowhere, had a right at the democratic convention that year. that year was much crazier, much moreaccurate than -- much acrid than what we have now. out, look down, chill back at the past. chill out. don't chill out. i am not trying to turn you into californians. don't be so frantic, don't be so despairing, don't be so unreasonably excited i all of the excitement and madness around you. because it has been worse. it has been much worse, it has been worse in my lifetime.

host: richard brookhiser is in new york. he is the author of the book "give me liberty: a history of america's exceptional idea go --." john.independent caller, caller: you forgot the preamble to the l of lights -- bill of rights. there.no, it is in sorry, it is in there. declaration of independence. that is the preamble to the declaration of independence. chapter four. caller: my question is, the federal reserve determines how much happiness i have, and they are not even elected. they have so much power to determine the quality of life i have. it is wrong. they should be advisory, not

dictate how much money i have in my pocket. thank you. host: thanks for calling. let's hear from brian. somerville, pennsylvania. caller: good morning, gentlemen. actve a copy of the patriot in my library. i haven't looked at it for several years, i seem to remember not got the copy of it, most of it was redacted. i am wondering what you are guest thinks about the patriot in my opinion, it opened an era of unsurpassed surveillance into the private citizenship of our country. and youne monitoring, mentioned a little while ago about the civil war and comparing it with modern-day stuff. you mentioned 1968.

i would like your opinion on the attacks on religious in this country. it seems to be on the uptake. so, that is about it. i will just hang up and thank you. host: thank you, brian. the people being attacked, i caught the end of the last segment talking about the attack in muncie. there was jersey city before that. of course, attacks on jews that have not been fatal and, maybe go under the radar in the news. of course this is terrible. of course this is awful. when i am saying 1968 is works -- is worse, i am not saying that bad things that happen now are not bad. as far as the patriot act goes, in wartime, in times of war,

rights get clipped. there are sedition laws get past, there are restrictions on habeas corpus, certainly in the civil war. the constitution does around the of habeas corpus to be suspended in times of invasion or rebellion. that was the grounds for which lincoln and then congress suspended it then. yes, that is in the american record. that is something that has to be watched. lincoln himself compared to a a medic during the disease. he said, when the disease is over, but the man continued to take a medx? no, we will stop at once the disease ends. it is something that always has to be watched. medx is a --n to a

it is painful, it is something we don't like when we are taking it. the metaphor for what happens to civil liberties during wartime is very on point. yes, this is something that does happen. and it is something we have to be mindful of. host: we have about one half hour left. brookhiser, i wanted to talk about the connection you make between liberty and nationalism. are we hash our read just a bit from the book again. nationalism is a given. it supplies feelings of belonging. it finds us to our neighbors, tells us who we are, and makes others notice us. it takes different forms from country to country. the unique feature of america's

nationalism is its concern for liberty. we have been fighting for it for 400 years. we have been doing it since we are for a floundering settlement. long before we were a country. ando it now on podiums battlefields beyond our borders. guest: nationalism is all the rage, right? everyone is talking about it. tones,es in very worried sometimes with excellent reason. the trump presidency is thought of as an app -- an upsurge of american nationalism. britain seems to be going through a similar thing. there are certainly malign examples of it all around the world. i'm not going to spin the globe, but just think about it. let me take one example. myanmar. the expulsion of the rowing goa, by a nobel prize winner.

a genocidalt to be monster. yeah, nationalism is up there. nationalism can take bad forms. my argument in this book is that, the essence of america's nationalism, what makes it distinct from other nationalism's is our concern with liberty. this is something we have had before we were a country. instances i 13 cover are before american independence. just tell the story that in the book. this is directly relevant. this involves a meeting that ulysses grant had after he was president. termst office after two

in 1870 -- 1877. then he took a tour of the world. a reporter from the new york herald accompanied him and wrote up the things he saw and said, and dead. when he went to berlin he met otto von bismarck, who was the chancellor of the new german empire, which, bismarck more than anyone had created. late 19tho heroes of century nationalism. had ulysses grant, who had crushed the rebellion, and you had bismarck, who had created a new empire in the heart of central europe. a new german nation. iny have a little chat berlin. grant calls on this market. bismarck knows english. have a lot toot say to each other because they

have never met before. so they talk about current events, they talk about people that they know in common. then bismarck says, a terrible thing about your war is you are fighting your own people. that is always the worst thing to do. grant said, yes, but it had to be done. course, toid, of save the union. red said, to save the union and to end slavery. but of course saving the union was the main thing. atnt replied, we thought so first. but as soon as the flag was fired upon, we realized the withoutuld not be saved ending slavery. at men and women could no longer be bought and sold like cattle.

says, it was a great victory and i'm sure it will be a great piece. there you have these two figures, and it is almost like a railyard or a subway yard where you have two train tracks going along together, within they are starting to split. whatrck is saying nationalism means is unity. him,grant is telling american nationalism means unity, but it also had to mean ending slavery, because it also means liberty. we finally realized it. we had to make this right, we had to rectify this. it cost 750,000 lives, and it had to be done. that is an important moment. that is the one i chose to and this book on. i think it is food for thought. host: next call. it is ed.

independent caller. go ahead, please. caller: i would like to ask mr. ,rookhiser, according to me history is according to the man that writes it. is that true? well, yes, the short answer is yes. writeou know, if you something that is so off-the-wall that no one will believe it, then the answer is no. whataccount has to match your readers know. what your readers may know to be true. of course, that leaves a lot of wiggle room. people know a lot that isn't so and writers can confirm them in their mistaken notions. over time, you have to stick to the record. you are not the only one

writing. there are going to be other people coming along, they're going to be looking at your judgments, they're going to be correct in your judgments. history is always being modified. we hope it is always being made more clear, that are understood. it is a process. rewrite about dead people, they are not going to do anything new anymore. in a way they do, because we understand them better later. we learn more things about them. we discover more about their motives, whether blind spots. about what iing do, what my books are about. it is acess is, restless one. we have to do our best and try to get it as true as we can. there a person or

episode that led you to ask that question? ed, are you still with us? caller: he was talking about new amsterdam. people, they didn't want to let the quakers in. little bit of history, which i liked in school, the pilgrims allowed many -- allowed no other religion except their religion. am i correct or am i incorrect? puritans, nothe the pilgrims. the pilgrims come in 1620, and then the puritans is 10 years later. it is the puritans who end up setting the tone of the massachusetts bay colony. they could be very harsh on people who were not puritans. particularly quakers.

if you were a quaker, they expelled you. if you came back they hang dear. they did hang for men and women in the 17th century. there is that blood on their hands. on theying to focus positive story of people being aware of liberty and trying to achieve it. said syverson, the man who no more quakers, it wasn't just quakers he disliked. onalso tried to crack down lutherans and jews. he got his chain yanked when he did that by his employers. he worked for a thing called the dutch west indies company, which literally owned new amsterdam. they had directors and investors who were jews and lutheran. when syverson is leaning on

those two religions, he gets word from his bosses in holland, candid out. he probably thought he could get away with this when the victims were quakers, because quakers worry religion. there were a countercultural religion. quakers did things like, there would not take their hat off in the presence of their social superiors. they let women preach as well as men. that seemed very shocking in the 17th century. quakers were very out there and dislike of them was not peculiar to himself. , ultimately thanks to the resistance of people like. host: moving on. democratic caller. book,: the title of your

"give me liberty: a history of ," inca's exceptional idea light of today's political , inate, the rhetoric particular i'm >> the monroe doctrine, the fact that in america we do not want the foreign way of governing to infiltrate into the new america. now, i am concerned about our democracy and our republic with the person we have, currently have in the white house. it seems to me, that we are heading for an autocracy, kingship. response, i have your thank you.

>> before you respond, what you think of president trump and how he is running his office? >> i'm not going to answer that and it is related to a question i have gotten a lot. what document would you pick after 1987 connor ronald reagan's tear down -- ronald reagan's tear down the wall speech. what would you pick after that? and i say, i deliberate lee stop it 1987. i do not want anybody to not read this book, to not think about this issue, because of a current political controversy that i might inadvertently offend them. that all principles americans, republican callers, democratic collars, independent colors, all americans should be mindful of these episodes and

these documents. past,se instances in our and the importance of liberty to the history of this country. i want to direct their attention to that. you know, you can go back to the 24/seven politics we have had in 363 days this year. up again after the segment ends in a few minutes but i want to get peoples's attention from moment and directed to something bigger and i would say more important. what about the last colors concern about the monro doctrine -- caller's concern? andortunately, we can vote we can vote in meaningful elections. it is not like russia. right?

well, turkey just had a meaningful election. it was kind of surprising. the would-be dictator there got rebuked, his party lost the race for the mayor of istanbul. that is a problem for dictators is that they let elections keep going, sometimes they will lose them. china is seeing this in hong kong also. yes, if they are problems out there, do something about it. you can. you can donatee, money to candidates. you can vote for them in caucuses and primaries. and in elections. we have these freedoms and these opportunities and they were one for us by americans going back centuries. minutes left 20 with our guest. jeff and into penny color from logan, utah. caller fromt

logan, utah. kaiser,te from the liberty is not a perpetual motion machine. it has to be maintained, it has to be understood, and to be upheld and the more i have listened, the more curious i have become. questions, answer my all the ones i have had as i have been listening so my only question now is, because you both have done such a good job, is if you would expound upon, he mentioned things people could do, he said it stopped after reagan. what can we do to maintain liberty and uphold it? >> think about it first. .hink about it, understand it understand what we have, how we got it. understand why we have it.

up one point. liberty is not some thing we create. that is part of the american understanding of it. it is not something that thomas jefferson dreams up and slipped into the decoration of independence. it is not something that the continental congress voted on and the majority of them liked it so therefore we had it. our understanding of liberty is that it is something that people have because we are people. because we are men and women, therefore we have it. we are entitled to it. the source of liberty is extra human. people, beyond the decisions of people. were of thewords laws of nature and nature's god. that's a pretty broad definition

of the source. you can be an atheist and sign off on that. jefferson was not an atheist. he was not an orthodox christian either. but certainly, he was a theist of some sort. the point is, liberty is ours because it is our nature. it is not something that is given to us by some other people. or even by our own choice. it is something that we are entitled to because of who we are. because we are men and women. that is why it is worth fighting for. that is why is worth trying to achieve, and trying to maintain. and anyone who comes along and says, well, because of the course of history or because of the decisions of popular will or because i am smarter than you are and i figure things out

better than you have, therefore i can take your liberty way, that person is telling you alive. do not listen to that person -- telling you a lie. do not listen to that person. you're entitled to liberty because you are you. because you are who you are. >> richard burr kaiser is in new york city, senior editor at the national review. brookheiser including the new yorker, cosmopolitan and vanity fair, and is author of this book called, give me liberty. we have been working our way through the documents over 400 years of history that mr. broo kheiser has put into his book. you mentioned you can do and be less to see less, idealist and a list of documents. is there another document not in this book you would like to turn our attention to is a think about the country right now?

, 1620,mayflower compact they are after jamestown. obviously very important. the pilgrims were trying to get to virginia, by the way. that was their destination, but they ended up in what we now call massachusetts. so they were originally part of the same project. the federalist papers. george washington's letter to the hebrew congregation at newport. this is, washington made a trip to rhode island. and in newport, among other places, he was greeted by a jewish synagogue that existed there. lettery sent him a congratulating him. [applause]