Lincoln, Democracy, and the American Experiment

We the People

National Constitution Center

History, News Commentary, News

4.6 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 11 April 2024

⏱️ 61 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this episode of We the People, Jeffrey Rosen has a special one-on-one conversation with the historian Allen Guelzo on his new book Our Ancient Faith: Lincoln, Democracy, and the American Experiment. They discuss Lincoln’s powerful vision of democracy, revisit his approach to tackling slavery and preserving the Union, and explain how Lincoln remains relevant as a political thinker today. Resources Allen Guelzo, Our Ancient Faith: Lincoln, Democracy, and the American Experiment (2024) “Lincoln’s Speeches and the Refounding of America,” NCC America’s Town Hall program (Nov. 2021) William H. Herndon, Herndon on Lincoln: Letters (2016) Abraham Lincoln, “Speech to the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield,” (1838) Questions or comments about the show? Email us at [email protected].  Continue today’s conversation on social media @ConstitutionCtr and #WeThePeoplePodcast. Sign up to receive Constitution Weekly, our email roundup of constitutional news and debate, at bit.ly/constitutionweekly.  You can find transcripts for each episode on the podcast pages in our Media Library.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello friends. I'm Jeffrey Rosen, president and CEO of the National
0:06.1	Constitution Center and welcome to We The People, the Weekly Show of
0:09.4	Constitutional Debate. The National Constitution Center is a nonpartisan nonprofit charted by Congress
0:15.0	to increase awareness and understanding of the Constitution among the American
0:18.8	people. In this episode of We The People, I'm delighted to share a special conversation with the historian
0:24.0	Alan Gellzo about his new book, Our Ancient Faith, Lincoln Democracy, and the American Experiment.
0:30.3	Professor Gellzo explores Lincoln's powerful commitment to democracy,
0:33.7	assesses his record on civil liberties and racial equality,
0:36.9	and emphasizes Lincoln's relevance as a political thinker today.
0:40.3	Alan Gellzo's director of the James Madison Program Initiative on Politics and Statesmanship and Senior
0:46.0	Research Scholar in the Council of the Humanities at Princeton University.
0:49.8	He's the author of many books on the Civil War and early 19th century American history and is among
0:54.8	America's leading scholars on Lincoln.
0:57.3	Alan, it is wonderful to welcome you to We the People.
1:00.3	Jeffrey, it's a pleasure to be able to talk to you and also to the audience of the National Constitution Center.
1:07.0	Your book is so clear and illuminating about the basic principles of democracy and how Lincoln embraced them.
1:17.3	You begin by saying that liberalism was based on three tenants when it came to democracy. The first was consent. The second
1:27.7	is majority rule and the third is that liberal democracies must submit to law independent of both.
1:34.0	Tell us about those three basic tenets of liberal democracy.
1:38.0	Lincoln is a figure that bulks very large in any thinking that we have about democracy and especially
1:47.7	in times that we live in now, times of anxiety, times of
1:53.0	anxiety,
	...

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