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visit c-span dawgs. donate or scan the code on your screen to make your tax deductible. contribute portion today. together, we can ensure that c-span remains a trusted resource for you and future generations. we joined now by david bobb, who is the president of the bill of rights institute. welcome to washington journal. it's wonderful to be with you, kimberly, can you tell us a little bit about your organization and what you do and why it was to set it up? the bill of rights institute teaches history and civics. we equip young people, especially to be able to live out the principles of the declaration of the constitution so that they can see a just and free society come about. it's important to learn about the past, but it's also important to take the principles of our founding and put them into practice. that's why we were started.

teachers have a hard job when it comes to being in the classroom and talking about these ideas. it's always been challenging because we have to learn from our past. we have to think about these these ideas. these ideas don't come naturally to us. maintaining a free and just society is a learned in practice. and so we were started to be able to help teachers to come them in this very task of teaching history and, civics. we've been doing it for about 25 years. we're excited because we have 77,000 teachers across the country that rely the free curriculum and the teacher training programs that the bill of rights and statute offers. so let's talk about today, bill of rights today. can you remind us an overview of what the bill of rights is and when and why? a day to honor it was established? the bill of rights is the first or the first ten amendments to the united states constitution. the story is complex, but to boil it down, when the constitution being debated and the idea that maybe we should have a supreme law of the land, the people across country looked

at, well, what do we want to put into it? you know, when you write things down, it tends to memorial ize them. we hadn't had an effective constitution up until that point. so there was a constitution only convention for long, hot months in the summer of 1787. and a bunch of delegates got together and debated this. and what they started to see as their negotiations ended is, that there was an emerging group, a minority voice, to be sure. but there pretty loud minority that was saying we need to protect individual rights more in this document. and so the people who debated that thing sent it out to the states for ratifying. and there was a pretty bruising battle. and a lot of the states were saying, we're not going to approve it unless there is a more concrete statement about what kind of rights individual human beings have. take a step back to the declaration of independence, write that document which declared our independence. talked about the rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. so i think was a through line

here to the debates that happened after the constitution and what the people across the country said is you've got to you've got to do better. and so some of the politicians initially who were not in favor of a bill of rights, notably alexander hamilton and james madison, started hearing the will of the people. and it was madison who was very careful. he was attentive. he assembled a list. the list was more than 200 in length. and then they took that list and started saying, all right, we're going to have to whittle it down if we're going to have a kind of negotiated settlement to. this whole thing, what list would make sense? it got down to about 20. then it became 12 of the 12 were sent out to the states for ratification and the 12 came back with ten. mm. so three through 12 were adopted. and on december 15th, 1791, the state of virginia became the last to that was needed for ratification. and the bill of rights became

the first ten amendments to the united states constitution. now then, according to this year's annenberg constitution day civics study, only 7% of respondents could name all five rights guaranteed. just under the first amendment rights and 21% couldn't name any. and just a few more numbers for that. only when asked to the rights guaranteed by the first amendment. 74% knew it included freom of spee. 39% knew it. include include it. freedom of religion. 29%. freedom of the press. 27%. the right to assembly. only 11% knew that they had the right petition, to petition the government. under the first amendment. why do you think that people aren't more aware of what both this amendment and some of the others in the bill of rights actually have in them? one of the things that i've seen over the years and it may be particularly true in washington, d.c., where we are now, is that

the sense of the constitution being for the people of the people and and by the people is lost a little bit. it's complex, right? there's a lot of court cases. there's a lot of a lot of complexity to it. at the end of the day, though, it's not the province of attorneys and judges. it's a document that if you sit down and read, it takes about a half an hour. we've made it a little bit more complicated. we've needed. also, we're not devoting enough time in our schools. for example, an elementary school has maybe if she's lucky, 20 minutes per week to talk about these things. so we need to start with the stories, start with the declaration independence. it said something that no government in history of the world had said before, which is that people have rights because they're people, because they're human beings. and it took us longer than we wanted. it took a long before we extended those rights, all people in this country. but we laid down a marker and we said that you, a human being, have the right to life, liberty and property, right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. and that pursuit of happiness. quest is one that we're still on

today. one thing that i'll note, too, about those rather abysmal numbers is that we don't find that young people want to stay in that state of ignorance. and i think we ought not to blame them and not even our teachers. what we have to do better is model this for them and show it why it matters. civics is a very practical thing, but yet it's made into something that sometimes is very abstract out there. doesn't apply to me. let's make these things apply to everyday and show people that the promise of the declaration of independence, the promise of the constitu and the promise of the bill of rights is something that really matters to their everyday life. and speaking of this topic, mattering to our current state of affairs, you had a recent opinion piece with the headline election highlights need and warnings about civic education. what exactly are these warnings? well, i think one of the things that i just mentioned, the need for more time in our schools, we have a challenging system in this country, but it's a good

one. and that is that the top education is local. that means that there's a lot of decision makers and we're negotiating these decisions all the time at the local level. think of it, parents are the first educators they can entrust their kids then to different schools and then teachers complement the work that parents do in learning about history and civics. how do we make sure that every child in america is growing up with a sense of what this country is about? that's a big challenge. and the further we get away from the local level, the more that washington, d.c., or even state capitals capitols, governors insert themselves into these things in a political or ideological way, the worse off we're going to be. because of the things that we've seen as we become more polarized we think we're more divided than we actually are. americans actually anchor around the principles of the declaration and constitution. but we perceive that very, very divided. and when seize on that and use civics as a means to kind of

stoke disagreement, that's a problem. and what we don't want, i don't think is for washington, d.c. to take these things over and to say, here's the kind of official civics we're going to have from the government. that's never been a part of our government. and i think it's a real strength. for example, in tyrannies globally, we've just seen the toppling of the dictator in syria. but even in regimes that aren't dictatorial, oftentimes what they'll do is have a big fight over who gets to write the textbooks. and when you have that fight, what you tend to do is to reduce the value of the civics and history. people just say, well, that's just the politicians. that's what they want me to think. civics and history has about has to be about people taking these ideas, making them their own, and then putting them into practice in everyday life. the more that we make this ideological or political thing, the worse off, we're going to be. i'll point out that some other resources teachers, when it comes to civics education, are coming from c-span directly on

c-span dot org. we have a program called c-span classroom, which includes free video based materials, social studies, teachers on various civics related topics. you know how do you think, especially in our politically divided environ civics, might be able to help bridge that divide? you know, we've been pleased to partner at the bill of rights institute with c-span classroom. the resources are excellent, and there's nothing better than going back to primary source documents when ask americans what, what, what do you anchor on? it's that sense of that the declaration and constitution do matter. the way to bridge political divides is by having conversations that matter, by not shirking that and ducking them. two out of five young people in this country are in high school. feel uncomfortable disagreeing with their and their peers in the classroom. that's got to change. what we have to do, i is disagree better.

let's let young people know that if they disagree on matters of significance, it doesn't mean you're going to lose your friends. and for young people to take that seriously, going to have to see more models of that of thing. it's the kind of deep it's a civil discourse and it's a valuing of free speech that says it's okay to talk about religion and politics and financial things. you have to do it in a way in which you're respecting the other person and bringing these controversial subjects into the classroom. when you anchor on source documents, it of gives us a new footing to those conversations for young can say you know, i do want to see your viewpoint it may be different than mine. and that's okay. i want my perspective to be challenged by yours because we're sharper, we're better off and critical thinking results from that. we're taking your calls with questions for david barbe of the bill of rights institute. our for republicans, 202748 8001 for democrats.

202748 8004 independents 22748 8002. you can also send us questions via text or social media. we received a text message comment really from in morristown, new jersey, who says all americans should able to pass the citizenship test. what do you think of that? you know, i think it's as a mental kind of model. it's it's the right idea for those of you who who don't aren't familiar with this, there's 100 questions. it's about pretty things related to what it means to be a citizen. and it's given to those who want to become citizens, to the naturalization process. there have been efforts to institute this as a kind of mandate in states. i don't know that we have to do that. but i think that all americans, if you just google it and take the test, you'd see that it's a worthwhile exercise. it's trying to anchor you on the things that really matter. now, it's important to know those facts and figures, but we also have to know why. and that's something that the naturalization test does not get into. as much as we'd like great civics, great history, learning

goes to those deep questions of inquiry. and it also points to that kind of point counterpoint where you're you're the kind of verbal back and forth, the intellectual tool, disputation that doesn't have to be disagreeable. so it's a good start. but i think we can do do a lot better for for for all americans. with with the kind of critical thinking that we see from a lifelong commitment to civics. before we get to the callers and maybe this is a difficult question for you, but of the amendments in the of rights, which one is the most fascinating to you? you i think it's hard not to be fascinated by the ninth and 10th amendments. they don't get as much attention. maybe today. but taken together, they're they're kind of the the taproot of what we might see as popular sovereignty. the idea that the people rule in this country. think of what humility it took. so you you have drafting of the constitution and then you send it out to the people. that's not been what typically happens in other countries. a lot of countries, it's the elites who rule and we never see

a change from that. so what the founders were trying do is say, could we get away from that? that kind of system in which accident and force rules the day. could we be ruled by reflection and choice? and also in the ninth and 10th amendment, say that the people retain rights. so let me just read them quickly. so the ninth amendment says the enumeration in the constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people. and then the 10th amendment says the powers not delegated to the united states by the nor prohibited by it tthe states are reserved to the states respectively or to the people. if you take the ninth amendment, one of the big debates over the bill of rights, well, wait, what if we start writing them down? if we miss one or don't write down everything, will people think that they don't have those rights? that was some of the objections

and that was a reasonable objection. if you look to history, even the soviet union had a beautiful bill of rights. many of the tyrannies that exist around the globe today do just writing down rights doesn't make them put into practice, though people have to actually believe them. and so we don't have a written confirmation of our right. say, for example, get in your car and i can today drive into maryland and pennsylvania and keep going. but i do have that right. so what's is to think about the declarations promise that because we're human beings, they inhere in us as human beings. that's what the ninth amendment is saying. the 10th amendment is a is a restriction, as are many of these. we think of them as giving away. but in fact, it's restricting and saying to the federal government, you can't interfere. you can't involve yourself in the affairs of human beings because the founders saw i think it's been confirmed by that too strong a government, too

invasive government is going to be a bad thing right. when they were colonists, what happened with the british is that they could search their property for any reason at all, and that's a pretty invasive sense of what power means. so the ninth and 10th amendments are restrictions, power and governmental power, but they're a boon to the power of individual. and you made reference to basically what's in the fourth amendment right. that's right. this one says the right of the people to be secure in their persons houses papers and effects against searches and. seizures shall not be violated and no warrants shall issue. but upon probable cause supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched and, the persons or things to be seized. let's go ahead and get to your calls. i'm sure people lots of questions here. we'll start with okie and crab orchard west, virginia, on our line for independence. good morning, okie. good morning.

what i wanted to say is that your guest and just about everyone always speaks of the inalienable right that are mentioned in our declaration nation. but that's an incomplete sentence. it's almost as if it's out of context. the entire statement says that those rights are gifts endowed by our creator, or that may be the most part of the statement. and that's all i to bring up is people don't remember that our rights are gifts from god. thank you. thank you. okie. that's a that's a great observation. and you're absolutely the declaration itself has four reference is to god. and i think they tell an interesting story. two of them were included by jefferson and two were added by the continental congress. that first reference to creator is the one that i think is probably the most pivotal.

you're right that we're endowed by our creator with certain unalienable rights. they can't be taken away from us. right. they can't be stripped from you by a government. their life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. that has a sense of the executive. also the the legislative kind component of god's nature was the laws of nature. that was the second reference. there's also the supreme judge of the of the universe. that's the third reference, i think, of it. the executive branch, the legislative, the judicial branch. and the declarations argument is pretty simple. in one respect. it's saying that this king george, the third, has become a tyrant. why he's become a tyrant because he takes the executive, legislative and judicial function and pulls it into his own orbit and supposes that he can operate in that way. i what the declaration is saying is without getting specific to any one religion. it's saying if there is a

superintending god or if there's if there's a supreme being, it would be only being that would be able to handle all of this power. no one human being, no one human committee could take executive, legislative and judicial powers. all right. now, let's hear from gary in winter haven, florida on our line for democrats. good morning. good morning. i wanted to talk about. the second amendment. one thing a lot of people don't remember is earlier this year, there was a school shooting iowa and. donald trump's response was, you just have to get it. and then recently there was a shooting of a united health care ceo and you could hear the meltdown on the right over that. and it came me. and i realized the first time a boardroom gets shot up like it's a grade classroom, we're going to see a ban on assault weapons and i'm just curious about the second amendment and how that

would play out. and, you know the other thing is people don't think republicans will introduce that legislation. and california's restrictive gun laws were introduced in the sixties by republican governor ronald reagan when the black panthers were stockpiling weapons. so it's not unprecedented republicans to implement in when they get freaked out enough. all right. well, let's look quickly at the language of the second amendment, which says, oh, militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of a of the people, keep and bear arms, shall be infringed. so one of the great concerns that people at the time this was adopted is we going to have a standing army or and many of those who were anti that is they were opposed to the ratification of the constitution, especially without a bill of rights. we're worried about a standing army. this was adopted and it was not

until very recently in a couple of cases, including that of heller, that the supreme court weighed in to say that the right to keep and bear arms was an individual right. so for most of our history, there was not much litigation and not many cases that went all the way to the supreme court. what we do with the bill of rights institute, with the second amendment, for example, is bring this into the classroom so that teachers and students can learn the history. they can study the primary source documents. they can engage in the kind of debates that help sharpen understanding of this thing. that's the essence of what good history and civic education requires. as an organization, we're not taking a stance on how the second amendment should be interpreted, but we think it's very important that young people and teachers should be equipped with the tools to be able to look at the document. and that goes to just what you did. kimberly, which is reading the text and trying to understand the text and have a conversation

around those those topics. tom is in rochester on our line for independence. good morning, tom. yes, mine is mostly on the education of the bill of rights and the constitution and my daughter is a schoolteacher and we live here in western washington, which is a very liberal area. and she's not allowed teach in. this goes back all the way till civil war when the democrats the war and formed the kkk and they formed an agenda to actually and felt not but to indoctrinate the children through, the school systems and not teach that and this has been proven by the stats that's been stated on this program this morning on people not even able to label them. and you can ask for six year college graduates who we fought in the civil war, not the civil war, the revolution area war,

and they can't even name it. they think it's germany things like. and that's all because the schools have been and dr. denied it and they don't want history because it shows that all through history that when the democrat party was first formed, they fought all against civil rights all the way through history. but it's been kind of in schools to teach. cs not teach christianity or other religions and all that. and i think that be taught in school. that's that a personal thing. but people need to remember history and understand that that i think it was 1909 when the first agenda of the democratic party included indoctrination of school and to not teach stuff because it what they don't want and it's let's give david a chance to respond to some of

these points. okay. the overwhelming number of americans today believe that civics history will lead to critical thinkers and informed citizenship. and i think it's on that agreement. we about polarization and disagreement that we need to seize on and say, how can we more space so that teachers are supported by parents? what does this support mean? you know, a lot of times, if a teacher is using, let's say you want to teach the second amendment or you talk about things that are happening in the news that are controversial, you need to be able to say on one hand, this is a position and on the other hand, here is a different position. it's called viewpoint diversity teacher. the language of educators. we build that into our curriculum because it's from that kind of iron sharpens iron mentality that we think we get the kind of citizens that open to other people's ideas. how do do that? we need more time in schools. we need more trust when we as parents can trust our teachers

and say, if you're committed to viewpoint diversity, we your back, we need to talk to our principals and say carve out more time in the school day for these kind of conversations. building activities in which young people can build the skills that allow these principles to be put into practice. because ultimately what we're looking for civics is a change in the of heart and mind. we young people who are committed to the promise of the declaration of independence. you know, john lewis in his speech in the march on washington in 1968, said that our task is to complete the revolution of 1776. and i think there's something really powerful in that. and there's something that unite us around that effort if we take it seriously. pat is in keyport, new jersey on our line for republicans. good morning, pat. hello. i was speaking about how 10th amendment is really a protect ocean against the growth of the

federal government. but i have seen it all pretty much been eviscerated by supreme court decisions such as mcculloch v maryland, which said congress, an enumerated powers they could do whatever they wanted, regard lots of what the constitution said. thank you. well, i think the stark record actually shows that there there the enumerated powers of article one, section eight still very much are in play. i think that there there have been think and this is, again, one of those debates that if the bill of rights institute we teach a back and forth over many, many generations about just how broad scope are you going to give, what is the right delineation of power between the federal government, the national government and the states? of course, much of the relationship was changed when the civil rights were adopted and before that the amendments, the civil war. so this certainly a hotly

contested thing. the important thing, though, i think, is that in each era and through to today, there is still this amendment in effect, and it's the will of the people and the the the kind of the will of the electorate that's ultimately going to say, how seriously are we going to take this? i'll say just one other thing about this, related to the education. what's great with young people and this is the kind of thing that i think we need to bring out more for them, put a question to them, what is the right relationship between the national government and states? and one of the ways that i think young people can really to understand that best is actually if they get involved at the local level, because then they start to see, okay, it's really difficult to say start something like a farmers market. why is that difficult? why is it difficult to solve of the problems like homelessness or pick any one of the things that are really important to people of any age in this country, but especially to young people? we have a contest of the bill of

rights institute called impact challenge, and it students through three things the charitable sector business and then also constitutionally limited government. so raising these questions around the size and scope of government but it asks them then to get involved in community at the local level to by looking at a problem, a challenge and if they can solve it using founding principles and civic virtues and what we find under 500 some projects is that young people are really committed to trying to figure this thing out. they don't want and i don't think the american people as a whole believe that all of our problems are going to be solved by washington, d.c. all right. let's hear from stan in louisville, kentucky, on our line, four democrats. good morning, stan yes, a caller from west virginia, a few ago called in and misquote in the declaration of independence. and then you also misquoted. it does not say by our creator

it says endowed by their creator, which is a big difference. did you have a question as well? no, just like. all right, let me up the exact language of the declaration of independence from the national archives. and let's see, where's the part with the. and second paragraph. second paragraph. let's see. well, i'll just read it. why not? we hold these truths to be self-evident that all are created equal. that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. so you're right about our versus. there. i think the distinction, though, is one without a difference. i, i think the the affirmation is that there is and this was jefferson's language ratified by the continental congress that

there is a superintending being there's lots of controversy about just what the relationship of god is to human beings but they're saying we're not god. i think that's the essence of it and not the author of our own rights. it's saying that these rights are not positive, they're not given to you just by government, but there's a natural basis and you can actually know them through the natural law. that's the key point. i think. robert in waldorf, maryland, on our line for independence. good morning, robert. merry christmas. and this is a great subject very informative. my question is, if of the two of you can answer this one anywhere in bill of rights? does it authorize or grant the right to abortion? does it authorize right to free health care anywhere in the bill of rights authorize the right of

a living wage. can any of you show me that in the bill of rights? now, i know that can't. but maybe, like you say, we should educate these young kids that nowhere in the bill of right is an abortion ought. is it a right nowhere? the bill of rights is actually health care a right nowhere. the bill of rights is a living a right. and i think you are a dead on the money serve and educating the public. thank you and have a great, great christmas. well, i appreciate the caller's passion around this and i know that the solicitor lot of strong opinions. i'll tell how we approach it again in an educational context. the bill of rights institute each, one of those topics that you raised is one that young people and people of all ages in this country are going to continue to debate. we're a nation of 330 million plus people. we have the task of managing disagreement, not it. so, for example, you go to the

bill of rights institute youtube page. you can a video about roe v wade, the new york times, when they needed rely on a video, their coverage of, the doctor's decision pulled this video because it's telling you what that case said. our job is not to weigh on each of these disputes, but rather to go into the place where teachers especially can equipped to go to primary source documents. we should these documents from the founding era and from each era of our carefully. we equip young people to be civically literate so that they can engage the kind of conversations and debate, recognizing that first and foremost, we see this in the first amendment. we have a guarantee of free speech. i think guarantee of free speech has to go hand in hand with the responsibility, civil discourse and what we want to do, i think, in our civic learning, in

classrooms and out classrooms, is to equip all americans to be able to have conversations. but able to do so with a recognition. we are going to disagree about certain things. the question in my mind is can we agree about core things? can we agree about fact that our rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are critical? we're going to have policy disagreements for sure. but the question is, what are we united around? and i think that's the central challenge of our day to point young people and people of all ages in this country back to those core big. stephen is in georgia on our line for independence. good morning, stefan. excuse me, stefan. good morning. hi. hi. good morning. thank you for taking my i listen every day, so i'm a little nervous the first time i've ever called in. i really think it's a show, and i appreciate the guest points. but one thing i want to point out is the declaration of

independence. important, a document as it is historically, and it is. it is not the law and it is codified into law. and one of the reasons i think that's important is that in relationship to the constitution is that when people do, let's say, try to religion or establishment or religion into society. they will refer to the declaration of independ, which uses the word creator. the constitution does. if the founding fathers really wanted that word to be in the constitu ation, they would have put it in the constitution. but they didn't. so that was my that was my comment. i would like to hear the opinion. thank you again very much, stefan. thank you so much. your question, the declaration of independence does not have the same standing. does the constitution of the united states right? the constitution is the supreme law of the land. the declaration is part, however, of the organic organic laws. so the northwest ordinance, the declaration constitution, the bill of rights are part of the

organic of the united states. abraham lincoln, i think, gave us an interesting guide to thinking about how the declaration and constitution are related. he said, quoting from proverbs, the apple gold. the declaration of independence was made with a frame of silver. it. i think that's an evocative image. what he was trying to say is you set up the goal. the big picture, the vision, if you will, is that human beings have rights and that the government's job is to protect those rights, it has to be powerful role in protecting those rights. so you can't forget the promise of the declaration. that's why i've been anchoring on that so much today. it's not so much to say that we should have. and i certainly don't think that we should have an established religion that, in fact, is one of the great things that the constitution and the bill of rights did notice, for example, the king of england still to this day is the head of a church. one thing that we did in this

country through the first amendment and through the structure of constitution was say that our president has no to quote here, public is no particle of spiritual jurisdiction. that means that the realm of religion is one of an individual, a collectivist within civil society. government's job is not to dictate that that does not mean, however, that religion and politics can have nothing to do with one another. in fact we are given wide license in this country to bring religious perspectives and those that are born of non-religious sentiments into public square. that's a very important. i know this is a complicated i appreciate the nuance of your question but i think it's really important to understand that the declaration of independence is a big part of the that we have about who we are as an american people. and for that reason, we put it at the core of what civics and history education means. since we reference, the first amendment, will pull up the

language for that as well. congress shall make no law respecting an established amount of religion or prohibiting free ercise thereof or the freedom of speech or of the press or the right, the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. rick is in woodville woodville, virginia. on our line for independence. good morning, rick. and my question is about the interplay between the commerce clause and the ninth and 10th amendments. it seems like congress and the court, particularly the warren administration, use the commerce clause to meddle in areas that the framers perhaps didn't intend congress to have jurisdiction. i'm wondering what feeling is about the limits to the commerce clause and whether or not there's some primacy of it, because it's in the constitution, it takes precedence over the bill of rights. can you please comment on that? so bill of rights is part of the

constitution right the an additional 17 amendments were added. so we have 27 amendments to the constitution, even though they're all included at the. it's of of a piece. they really have to be interpreted together as a whole. you can't have a disharmony between the bill of rights and the text of the constitution. that was something really worried those that were involved in that initial debate over the ratification of the bill of rights. are we going to create a kind of disharmony between the things that we put at the end and the text of the constitution. since the caller you're asking rick, about the interstate commerce clause, and this was used really as a as a as a bedrock for for for a long time to say that the congress will not be able to to interfere in the affairs of of commercial activity. there's a lot of different cases

record versus filburn is one of them that we could look at. but that in the 20th century there there's been a movement to allow swing legislation to be deemed constitutional for questions that in the past really were were were not allowed. so cut to the. i think the caller's point, we have a big debate today over how much congress can actually interfere or be involved in questions of interstate commerce. and this is one of those things, again, that of the bill of rights institute. we take up that debate, put it to students and let them dip into these different documents and try to figure out what truth of the matter is. our point is an institute is not to come to a conclusion in a public policy way about whether this interpretation has been done correctly, incorrectly. patricia is in virginia on our line for independence. good morning, patricia. what's your question? my question was standing on the

bill of. i really didn't learn anything about my heritage of native americans and why isn't my native american history free or based upon everything on like the whole constitution and everything. why is it native american history being taught on our side versus, you know, like the civil war and all that? why isn't any of that being taught? because i didn't know anything about how my people died and why there is that many of us left except for when i was 50 years old. i saw a piece on on i think it was nat geo. nasa i found out out. now, patricia did want to know

more about sort of how the bill of rights shapes what we learn in terms of different types of history. yeah. yeah. because it was entirely school. patricia, i'm sorry that you didn't have that opportunity and it's of the things that we hear a lot about if the bill rights institute you know, you can go to our website. my broad and you'll find a 500 year history of the united that touches on many issues and parts of the native american journey in this country. i think one of the key things that that that i'll say is that it's it's vital that each person in this country recognize that these apply to them. our journey in this country has been one that is not a straight line to the the kind of realization of the promise of the declaration. one of the key things that i've learned the years is in reading the writings of the founders is,

that they were aware of how rare what they were trying to do was. and many of them lamented, the fact that they were not extend to enslaved peoples, to native peoples, to the same rights. in some cases they lamented that they didn't do more. and i think it's for us to recognize that that lament was true. we wish that there had been more. take the perspective of somebody like chief joseph or frederick douglass leaders that themselves knew the tyrannical force government when it did not protect their rights that did not eliminate the fact that these individuals said these rights still exist. and that goes back to our core thing today, which is that the rights exist before government grants them to you. human beings have rights and it's government's job to protect them. and when government fails in that task, it's up to all of us to call government to account.

and i think what civic education does well and what it should do well is let people know that we have to teach the whole of our history and we have to recognize we've failed where we've lived up to this promise and also to challenge everybody, this country, to hold our government to account that these rights are extended to each individual, regardless of where they live in this country. and i'll point that on your website. you've got several lessons related to native american history. this one, a deep stain on the american character, john marshall, and justice for native americans as. one of the lesson plans of is available there on the bill of rights institute website. last caller for today hear from horace and philadelphia on our line for democrats. good morning horace. good morning, my dear. are you doing well? thank you. to the young man and the student

who's talking about all these bill of rights in a civics and all these other stuff. i'm a 79 new black man. when i was born legally, blacks wasn't even allowed so long in the state, let alone burning cigarets and still the grass. was allowed to. people were about to for them because something. so narrow these rights to this man was about to words. he was born in the rights stand. so it's easy for us to say all these terrible things about. rights and stuff. unless ernest, you was born without any, he would appreciate you. you know, john quincy.

understand education. you understand. he's a good teacher. we a man that was to the wants to just destroy the department of education. you understand that? so it's mixed up. it's crazy. so i don't understand what. you're saying you understand of course. i appreciate what you're saying. and i think i understand your perspective all. i'll say that one of the things that we take very seriously at the bill of rights institute is to bring to bear the fact that, as you just pointed out these rights have not been extended to people. they have not been extended to people equally. you are 79 years old. and i appreciate the perspective that you just offered. i mentioned frederick douglass a few minutes ago. one of the key things that we anchor is something that douglass said in the speech july

1852, the first half of the speech is about how wrong the united states of america had been allow the extension of the institution of slavery. it was a speech in which douglass could not really say of his fellow citizens that they were his fellow citizens. he felt estranged. he felt estranged from the country and. yet in the second half of the speech, what he what attempts to do is to say yet still have hope. and that hope is based on the idea that there are certain principles that are there from get go freedom and for all. do those principles not apply to all? that was his argument, he said. if we can look to them as saving principles. they can save him from his plight as an individual who, for the first 20 years of his life was enslaved. and they can save the country from the awful of slavery. and i think what we've seen in the story of america is that by repairing to those principles in

a herky jerky, jagged line, a crooked line that has solved lots of false starts. we, more than any other, have been able extend those rights to people and be a beacon of hope for others around the country. that doesn't mean that we're perfect. it doesn't mean that we've have it all figured out. but it does point i think to the centrality as. i believe you indicated to educational imperative here. we need young people to understand our history and our future based on this promise of freedom and equality for all. that's the promise of civic education. thank you so much, david. bob is the president of the bill of rights institute. i appreciate your time this morning. thank you, kimberly. c-span's washington journal. i rely forum involving you to discuss latest issues in government politics and public policy. from washington and across the country. coming up monday morning, notice politics reporter gorman discusses the latest

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