Meditations: Vol. 1, Issue 5
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In this issue:
- Podcast #4: Dr. Gary Gregg on "Philosopher Kings & Responsibilities of Leadership" in Plato's Republic
- SBS Student Project: Alfonso Castillo, SBS 2018, on "The Constitutional Creation of a New Branch of the Military"
- Book Recommendation: Bernard Bailyn's The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution recommended by Dr. Aaron N. (Nathan) Coleman
- Video of the Month: Dr. Gary Gregg (McConnell Center) on "Patriot Sage: Why We Need George Washington Today"
- Next Reading Assignment: Target 5 (due March 15)
Well, we finally made it into Plato’s cave, but will we make it out?
In this podcast, we look at Plato’s allegory of the ship and the sailors to discuss contemporary politics. Does his story of the sailors trying to dupe the ship owner and take over the captaining of the ship remind you of contemporary politics in America? Or, is Plato too cynical about politics and politicians?
Then we enter Plato’s cave, probably the most well-known part of all Plato’s corpus and maybe the most important as we think of education and society (and maybe everything else). Who is projecting the images on your walls? After you wrestle in the cave, I bet you start seeing it everywhere you look–in movies, books, art, life. At the end of the podcast, I bring in a special guest to try to unravel one of the most difficult aspects of this section of the Republic.
Elsewhere in this edition of Meditations, you will find Alfonso Castillo’s (SBS2018) paper on the constitutionality of creating a new space force and the talk I gave last fall at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (for which I recently won the George Washington Medal for Public Communication by the Freedoms Foundation at Valley Forge). Our editor thought it might be relevant to post again around Presidents' Day.
I hope this edition of Meditations meets you where you need it, and I hope it encourages you on your path ahead.
Dr. Gary L. Gregg
McConnell Center Director
P.S. - Here's the piece on Platonic imagery in Mumford & Sons I mentioned in this month's podcast.
{PODCAST: Target 4}
In this episode, Dr. Gary Gregg outlines Plato’s views on political leadership and uses this framework to consider today’s institutions and public figures. He walks us through the Allegory of the Ship and the famous Allegory of the Cave. Lastly, Connor Tracy joins Dr. Gregg to discuss Plato’s concept of the “Divided Line.”
Please note: We are no longer hosting our podcasts on Soundcloud.
{SBS Student Research Project}
Alfonso Castillo (SBS 2018) on "The Constitutional Creation of a New Branch of the Military"
Even though President Donald J. Trump directed the Department of Defense to establish a space force as the sixth branch of the armed forces, the president can only propose such a new institution–Congress establishes it into law... In this paper, I present the rationale for acquiring a Space Force, address core constitutional questions raised in the creation of a new branch of the armed forces, and consider options available in creating a new force to deal with the challenges of warfare in space in the 21st century. {Read more}
{Bookshelf Recommendation}
The Enduring Battle Between Power & Liberty
Bernard Bailyn’s The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution just celebrated its 50th year of continuous publication. No work has ever done a better job of explaining the reasons behind the American Revolution and the effects those reasons had on American political and constitutional thought.
Bailyn’s work asks the question of why mid 18th-century Americans revolted from Great Britain. His answer points to an entire set of political thought, known commonly as whig ideology. This whig ideology, ironically enough, originated in 17th- and early 18th-century England and is best associated with political thinkers such as James Harrington, Algernon Sydney, John Locke, Robert Molesworth, Viscount Bolingbroke, John Trenchard and James Gordon (among many others). These last two especially, writing a series of letters under the pseudonym of “Cato,” were among the most widely read work in America in the decades prior to the Revolution.
As a set of beliefs, Whig Ideology possessed a decidedly libertarian (small l) bent. It taught the Americans several critical ideas. By far the most important of these teachings held that history was a perpetual struggle between the polar forces of liberty and power. In nearly every case, from the Greek city-states and the Roman republic to modern Europe, power emerged victorious and the people fell under the shadow of tyranny. Thus, Whig Ideology taught that liberty was soft, fragile, declinate and difficult to maintain. Power, however, proved self-aggrandizing and lustful, always seeking more of itself. For a people lucky enough to possess liberty, constant vigilance against governmental power was essential. The more powerful government became, the less liberty people had.
Bailyn’s elegant work traces the tenants of whig ideology from the American resistance against England to the ratification of the Constitution. While the core elements of the ideology remained firmly intact throughout the era, the Revolution, he insists, changed much of its emphasis, unleashing a “contagion of liberty.” Core ideas of what a constitution was, the nature of equality and the role of the people in government all transformed as a result of the Revolution. Many of those ideas, Bailyn concludes, persist to this day.
{Next Reading Assignment}
Target 5: Due March 15
(Book VIII, pp. 221-249)
{Worth the Watch}
On Feb. 3, 2019, Dr. Gary Gregg received the "George Washington Medal for Public Communications" for the 2018 Constitutional Day speech he delivered at the University of Chattanooga. Watch Gregg's award-winning lecture.
