. >> sophia rosenfeld, what is the definition of common sense and politics? been a good question to start up with. the one thing we never talk about, but refers to all the time. common sense is supposed to be, at least, the kind of thing you don't have talk about. it's the wisdom everybody has. it the obvious, the self-evident and it's something politicians refer to the. if you ever notice that democrats or republicans love to have a commonsense solution to health care or a commonsense solution to problems in the environment, but nobody ever actually says what is common sense, what would it be. every day, ordinary list i'm kind of reasoning about everyday ordinary matters were supposed to basically agree upon without discussion. >> when did it enter -- that turned into political discourse? >> welcome at the very old term that goes back to aristotle in different forms. the faculty come a brain that starting in the early 18 century, it starts to become a political term and starts to suggest a kind of politics everyone can participate and potentially, a sense th

. >> sophia rosenfeld, what's the definition of commonsense in politics? >> good question to start off with. the one thing is that we never talk about commonsense. we refer to it all the time. but it's not something that gets defined very often. commonsense is supposed to be at least the kind of thing you don't have to talk about. it's the wisdom everybody has. it's the obvious. the self-evident. and it's something politicians refer to a lot. if you ever notice that democrats or republicans -- they love to talk about a commonsense solution to health care, a commonsense solution to problems of the environment. but nobody ever actually asks what is commonsense? what would it be? but it's every day -- every day, ordinary wisdom, reasoning about every day ordinary matters that we're supposed to agree upon without discussion. >> when did it enter that term enter the political discourse? >> well, it's a very old term. the term goes all the way back to aristotle in different forms but it's not a political term for a long time. it's something -- it's the faculty,

. >> sophia rosenfeld, professor at the university of regina and author of "common sense" joining us on booktv. >> up next, joshua kendall, author of "the forgotten founding father" reports on mr. webster's political career, and 10 years at "american minerva." this is a little under an hour. >> it is my pleasure to welcome you here. we are very happy to have this jointly sponsored program by the connecticut historical society and i know western house historical society with the book for this evening's program. i'm very pleased to introduce the dirt to introduce our speaker today. >> thank you all for coming out tonight. what a pleasure to have treated for it here and be able to collaborate with the connecticut historical society. before he say anything else, i'd like to think the greater arts council, which is allowing us to use this collaboration tonight. we appreciate their purport. josh i first met while he was researching no webster and later i was doing a similar discussion at night on a totally different language character. the book, the man who made the list, which is a fabulo