Theoretical Justice: Waiting in the Jury Pool

The small village courtroom, with "Village of Washingtonville, est. 1731" painted proudly behind the judge's counter, and the sound of traffic from just outside the door, is crowded with plumbers, students, an anxious defendant, and housewives like me. The counter holds a box of Kleenex and a plaque with the judge's name, and is the same counter at which other mothers and I elbowed each other last winter to sign our children up for the over-subscribed Toddling Toddlers program.

I feel sorry for the defendant already, and wonder what he's here for. A village court will hear cases only of minor driving misdemeanors and the like, but still he looks nervous. He's been sitting at his table for over an hour, shifting in a suit he's possibly unaccustomed to, and skating quick glances at the prospective jury pool as we enter from the front of the room with coffee, books, and Sudoku in hand.

The woman next to me has exhausted her entertainment, having filled out a popular culture crossword in the local paper. As time wears on she begins swearing quietly under her breath and snapping her chewing gum. I peer at what everyone else is reading, a very nosy and unshakable habit: Frank McCourt's Teacher Man, Black Justice in a White World, Anita Shreve's Lovely Bones, and my own Brother Cadfael mystery novel. I find the 12-century Benedictine monk's fictional life as good an investigation of true humanitarian justice as philosopher John Rawls's Theory of Justice, with Cadfael playing Rawls's own "impartial observer."

It's hard to tell what people are thinking in these situations, brought together for the purposes of dispensing justice. So many of them look bored, or annoyed, or resigned. A few, perhaps, grateful like me to have a few quiet minutes to read a book. It's such a rare thing, undisturbed time. And even I am distracted into annoyance by the juror form, on which it would not be acceptable to mark 'yes' to 'employed?' because 'mother' is not considered a profession -- it doesn't qualify me for Social Security, so it must not count, a perennial grievance of my own.

The choosing finally begins, the first round of possible jurors chosen from slips of paper in a plastic bucket. The judge points laughingly to the seven chairs against the wall as our "jury box, such as it is," but it's better than the proper jury stand in Boston, where I served several years ago. At least here we can see everyone. There, a huge pillar blocked the witness box and half the judge from sight.

Jet-lagged, exhausted, thinking of my son with his molars coming in and the vacation we returned from only at midnight, I half hope to go home soon, so of course my name is the third one called. Someone somewhere either likes me or hates me: the timing of this duty is unfortunate -- I could use about six more hours of sleep -- but the truth is I love jury duty. If I could choose it as a profession, I would be a juror for the rest of my life. The pull and play of evidence and justice, lawyers' desires to win and the jury's frustration with their incompetence and lack of information -- it can be addictive, not to mention the microcosm of human prejudices, frustrations, potentials, grievances, and faith in the system that erupt when you throw several strangers in a room together and tell them they can't go home until they come to mutual agreement on some aspect of a complete stranger's life.

I try not to glance at this stranger, the defendant, don't want to form pre-judgments, but I can't help it. He looks tired and harrassed, bleary-eyed and skittish, easily pegged as "alcoholic," but maybe he's had a sleepless night of panic. I want to study his face to see: Will I believe what he says? Will I trust him? But I resist.

This is a DWI case, they tell us, and the potentially lethal image of cars combined with drunkeness hangs before my eyes, with the quick indrawn breath as my mother's heart squeezes in panic. It's an instinctive reaction to imagining our children in danger.

One woman is excused to care for a very ill child, another makes it clear she views drinking and driving a sin that manifests itself mostly in the irritation caused by people speeding by her Main Street house late at night. She's taken out of the pool, too.

The judge covers challenges and moves on to "reasonable doubt" until we're sick of it. But he seems intelligent, and patient, and reminds me of a good doctor I used to have. The defense lawyer is red-faced, looking sweaty and less competent next to the Assistant District Attorney in her heels and friendly smile. He, the defense counsel, looks a lot like the prosecution in my last jury trial -- an unfortunate initial impression of used car salesman, except his eyes are wide and brown and honest and innocent, as if he should have been a toy maker.

They all think their questions to us will ensure justice, or as close to it as you can get and still be human. They nix the NYPD police sergeant and the woman who admits to having a previous DWI conviction, but keep the man who was once hit by a drunk driver, and another whose friend died while driving drunk.

"Will you let that affect your judgment?" the Assistant DA asks him. "Can you hear this case fairly?"

"Sure, yes," he says. All sorts of questions like this, with the same reassurances from us. But I wonder if these lawyers have ever been in a jury room. Once that door closes, the personal stories come out. That man's pain and conflicted feelings over his deceased friend will spill over into this present case, and we will hear repeated details about the destroyed soccer career of the one who was hit by a drunk driver.

Neither of them can help it. We all draw on our personal experiences as if they're ingredients in baking a cake, all those big events and trivialities combining to help us form judgments.

The defendant looks a bit like Jude Law from the side, but straight on more closely resembles a former neighbor of mine, a pharmaceutical salesman with three boys and, coincidentally, an alcoholic wife. Already I am battling the conflicting prejudices within me: if he's a nice guy who made a mistake, I want to let him off, rebuked but relieved; if he's a jerk, I want to judge against him because maybe he's the kind who will never stop drinking and driving without fear drilled into him.

All these impulses rise without any conscious thought, as does the instant dislike when his lawyer mentions while questioning us that his client drives a black Ford Explorer. There were several questions regarding our attitudes toward alcohol and drinking, but nobody thinks to ask whether I'll feel unkindly to someone for driving a gas-guzzling SUV. For that, I'll happily take his license and tell myself I'm saving the planet.

Defendants wonder, I've heard, why the prospective jurors don't look at them, won't meet their eyes. It's because we feel guilty. A smile, even quick and tight, might deliver too much hope. A blank stare might discourage them. If jurors feel at all -- and most of us do, those who are not simply bored or annoyed at being there -- we have already judged ourselves as guilty for presuming to pass judgment on others.

Finally, there are six of us and an alternate, gazing obediently toward the bench and not meeting the eyes of the lawyers or the defendant. A graphic designer, a saleswoman for a hotel chain, the owner of a pizza parlor, a male nurse, a nineteen-year-old student, a stay-at-home mom, and me, the mother/writer/traveler/humanist. Six of us have to agree at the end of today, or perhaps tomorrow, on what we've heard and seen and how we understand it, an effort made possible only by the flawed laws that guide us.

In this little village, one man will see his mistakes cast up against him, and we will hear his own efforts at vengeance or regret. It will never make even the most minor news headline, but for this man -- overworked father, partying ex-frat boy, emotionally scarred fireman, he could be any or none of these, I have no idea -- our decision, shaped by our opinions and prejudices, no matter how we try to ignore them, will headline the next arc of his life.

We are here. We will never be ready. Let the trial begin.

Federalist Paper 2: Concerning Dangers from Foreign Force and Influence

"Nothing is more certain than the indispensable necessity of government; and it is equally undeniable that whenever and however it is instituted, the people must cede to it some of their natural rights, in order to vest it with requisite powers."

It is important to remember that in these Federalist Papers the writers are setting forth arguments for their form of government -- one weighted towards federal (that is, national) power rather than distributed more heavily among individual states -- during the formation of the United States. So John Jay isn't debating the purpose of government here, but what system best achieves certain assumed goals.

In this paper he is laying the ground for his case that the physical security of Americans can best be achieved by a cohesive Union, a United States rather than several separate confederacies and commonwealths, as many favored at the time.

He's probably right, to a point. I'm no security expert. But I find the language of this letter intriguing, because it drums on the heart of a belief that underlies much of modern America's isolationism, pride, independence, and yes, racism, arrogance, and xenophobia.

"It has often given me pleasure to observe that independent America was not composed of detached and distant territories, but that one connected, fertile, wide-spreading country was the portion of our western sons of liberty. ... A succession of navigable waters forms a kind of chain round its borders, as if to bind it together ... With equal pleasure I have as often taken notice that Providence has been pleased to give this one connected country to one united people -- a people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion, attached to the same principles of government, very similar in their manners and customs. ... This country and this people seem to have been made for each other." (Emphasis mine.)

Sidestepping the issues of slavery and what amounted to a policy of genocide toward Native Americans (since it's impossible to reach back through time, grasp 18th-century America by the throat and say, "You should know better"), the concept that the Christian God has somehow blessed both this country and this people is a refrain that recurs again and again throughout American history. Its tiresome voice harped again in the last three elections, coming largely from those of the Christian Right who believe that America is meant to be a beacon of godly light to the rest of the heathen world (talking to you, Europe!), a "shining city on the hill."

I would contend that it is this belief that has prompted American leaders to perform, and its citizens to condone, some of the most egregious and appalling acts in our recent history. When horrified and exasperated American voices asked again and again how the US government could sanction torture -- torture -- of any human being, there was one simple answer hidden among the manufactured legal gibberish: a quiet voice whispering that America is blessed, America is special, America must survive as a beacon, either of democracy or Christian values, for the rest of the world. America, in other words, must protect its physical security at the cost of all else: its liberty, its justice, its humanity.

John Jay and his contemporaries are not to blame for the evils of Dick Cheney and the rest of the Bush administration. But if modern Americans are to argue the case of justice and true liberty, we must learn to understand, and more importantly, to speak, the language of those who believe the US's actions are always justified, simply by our existence. We must go back to where it all started.

Solutions for a Green World

Green America has been working pretty tirelessly to promote some of the values Julia and I adhere to and extol on this blog: local and/or organic food, and sustainable living. The organization was promoting these things even before the US had a sympathetic government (that is, one without their anti-reason heads in the sand).

Now that the Obama administration is finally turning the US ship slowly back toward progressive policies (before, we hope, that ship turns into the Titanic), Green America's most recent newsletter looks at the simple, sensible changes and "7 Fixes from the Green Economy" that all societies need to focus on in order to move "from greed to green," as the writer says.

Simple doesn't mean easy. I've just finished reading The Long Emergency, by James Kunstler, all about the end of cheap fossil fuel energy, climate change, economic meltdowns, and people's woeful inability to cope rationally with crises; and let me tell you the future looks scary here. And challenging. Our only hopes, it seems, lie in rebuilding both the physical and social structures of our communities immediately, and in, frankly, maintaining hope and optimism. If we couldn't hope that the future can become better, we wouldn't become mothers.

Being a mother, I can't throw up my hands in despair. I'm pushing for significant energy changes in our home, have been supporting local farmers for years (still waiting for a source of dairy, goat or cow, I don't care ...), and am turning my time and talents more and more to build strength into the institutions that make my community breathe. For an introvert, that isn't an easy choice, or always a pleasant one. But for a mother whose child will face energy shortages and climate change, it's the only option.

Knowledge is Power: How Monsanto is trying to keep us in ignorance about genetically "enchanced" dairy cows

Do consumers have a right to know what goes into their food? Do people have a right to know what they’re eating? Most importantly, do parents have a right to determine exactly what they’re feeding their kids?

The answer would seem to be an obvious yes. As Americans with busy lives, we’re used to scanning nutrition and ingredients labels to make educated decisions about what we do or don’t want to eat. But someone is waging a battle against this information, directed by massive corporations with cash and political clout, and it’s aimed directly at the local grocery store.

In a thinly veiled grass-roots campaign, Monsanto, the producer of genetically modified foods including Bovine growth hormone (known as rGHB or rbST), has led several states to pass or seriously deliberate laws that would make it illegal for farmers of hormone-free milk to label it as such. Using incomprehensible political power and access, the company has brainwashed legislators into believing it is bad for consumers to know what goes into their food. Why? Because a simple label stating that a jug of milk is “produced from cows free of growth hormones” might cause us to choose that milk over a label-free container. Monsanto spokesman Michael Doane says the hormone-free label “implies to consumers, who may or may not be informed on these issues, that there’s a health-and-safety difference between these two milks, that there’s ‘good’ milk and ‘bad’ milk, and we know that’s not the case.”

Do they? Do they know it absolutely? Enough to risk our children’s health? Considering that Monsanto has pressed genetically modified foods from corn to tomatoes on the American consumer and then insisted that we had no right to know what was modified and what wasn’t, I have a hard time trusting their claims of the milk’s safety.

There are two issues here. The first is Monsanto’s assertion that non-hormone-free milk is in no way worse for human consumption than the regular stuff. If the genetically modified hormone is perfectly safe, why is it banned by Canada, Australia, Japan, and every European country? I have little faith in the Food and Drug Administration’s impartiality in declaring the product healthy when so many other countries have banned it. And since growth hormones were only approved for U.S. dairy cows in 1994, I, as a consumer, have absolutely no faith that enough time has passed to see the long-term effects of these hormones on adults, much less on children.

The second issue is a far more basic right. No matter what the hormone-free label implies, consumers and parents still have a right to know what’s in their food. Does a “suitable for vegetarians” label imply that a vegetarian diet is better for you than a meat-eating one? Hardly.

I refuse to buy milk without a hormone-free label. That’s my right, as a consumer and as a mother. The further Monsanto pushes this issue in any state, the closer they drive me to buying milk from a farmer down the road, someone I can look in the face and trust. Because it seems I can’t trust my legislators to make the right decisions for my children’s health.

Pennsylvania was one of the first states to adopt a law against hormone-free labeling. A consumer outcry forced the state to reverse the ban. As mothers, our most basic duty to our children is to ensure the food they eat is safe as well as nutritious. If your legislators quietly try to strip you of the right to know your milk, fight back.

Stolen future: does religious freedom harm children's rights?

Some time ago a friend lent me a book called Unchosen: The Hidden Lives of Hasidic Rebels (written by Hella Winston), and reading it led me to question some firmly held beliefs about freedom of religion.

Having been raised in a democracy and school-nursed on the American concept that the Bill of Rights and Constitution are sacrosanct and untouchable, I never really delved into the concept of religious freedom. Unchosen forced me to go there.

Freedom of religion as applies simply to independent adults is easy enough to grasp. We should all be free to practice whatever religion suits our fancy, as long as it doesn't actively hurt anyone else. That means that my mother can waft her way into shamanism, my neighbor can practice his run-of-the-mill Presbyterianism, my friends can howl at the moon every month, and I can remain an atheist. Despite the rise of megachurches and hard-core right-wing evangelists in the US, we've all rubbed along together fairly well.

But what's pulled me up is the question of children. American custom, at least, has always held to the belief that parents should be allowed to bring up their children in the religion--or lack thereof--of the parents' choice, as long as it doesn't involve harming said children. The cults in which prepubescent girls are forced to marry older male leaders being a case of unacceptable.

When it comes to mental hurt or injury, outside of brainwashing, things get a little murkier. That's the road this reading has sent me down.

Unchosen is the first in-depth book I've ever read of a notoriously closed religion, Hasidic Judaism. (Despite the fact that my father's parents were raised in Ukrainian Jewish ghettoes, I know next to zilch about Orthodox practices and beliefs. He, after all, was raised atheist, which tells you something about how much his parents loved their upbringing.) It chronicles the lives of several young adults in the Hasidic community of Brooklyn, a burb of New York City. Raised in strict traditional fashion, a young man studies religious texts and becomes a tutor of the same, and a young woman shaves off all her hair when entering marriage.

A few years down the road, at the time the author met these people, they have individually been nudging the edges of the outside world for some time, having realized, in their mid-twenties, that there's a whole lot more out there than they can find on their neighborhood streets. More people, more ways of thinking, more ways of living.

The problem is, none of these people are equipped with the social, economic, or educational tools needed to survive in that outside world. The women the author meets have only a 4th-grade education. The men have what run-of-the-mill secular Westerners might deem a warped view of sex and sexuality. Many of the men and women barely speak English. Not a one of them is trained in any useful trade or skill beyond reading Hebrew, caring for children, or basic carpentry, this in the center of one of the world's great metropolises of opportunity.

After finishing the book, I was left with the feeling that, by giving adults the freedom to raise their children in their own religion, and by allowing them to keep their children from contact with the outside world, we have, by societal assent, stolen these people's freedom to choose almost anything once they become adults.

Western societies have for some time agreed that every child must have a minimal education. In America the idea is that the education gives them a chance to craft a future on par with their peers. When did we allow freedom of religious upbringing to trump children's chances to craft their own futures? What kind of future can a child have when their parents and immediate surrounding culture prevent them from learning the language of the country they're living in, much less its customs, mores, and skills required to make a living?

This look at Hasidic Judaism led me to think about other even more pleasant-looking cultures, such as the Amish or Hutterite communities. How many adults are simmering away under religious restriction, chafing at the traditions they were raised in but lacking the skills and knowledge to make other choices?

There's a flip side to this, too. As an atheist, I have no particular interest in taking my child to church down the road. As a secular humanist, though, I am conscious of wanting him to make his own choices, and certainly of the need to be educated in the religious cultures and beliefs of the society we live in, as well as others. At some point he'll probably attend Sunday School and we'll delve into knotty Bible questions ("Yes, some people do believe that God created the whole world in 7 days." Pause. "No, mummy doesn't believe in that." Pause. "Well, I don't think that really makes mummy wicked. That's probably not what they meant." Fear crawls over child's face. "No, mummy doesn't believe she's going to hell, either." Oh, shit. "Honey, don't cry, mummy's not going anywhere where she'll get burnt. Neither are you." Hugs, sobs, days of disbelief and worry on child's part follow. "I think we'll try a different church this time. Isn't there a book of Bible stories that doesn't scare the crap off kids?"). How many other atheists out there, though, will give their children that freedom?

Children might be dependent on their parents, but one day they will become adults. Are the rights of parents eternally shortchanging the rights of future generations? Where do we draw the line between religion freedom and individual freedom?

Do Human Rights Require an Imagination?

I believe in the power of narrative to change the world. Or at least it is my way of changing the world. We know that words themselves are mightier than the sword, and I admire many a persuasive speaker, but to me it is the ability to enter people’s imaginations, not just ignite their passions, that sets poetry and prose apart from other media.

In her article “Sentimental Education,” (Harper’s, May 2007), Joanna Bourke reviewed Lynn Hunt’s book Inventing Human Rights: A History. The review unfolded both Hunt’s and Bourke’s arguments that the downfall of slavery, the emancipation of women, and even the pursuit of animal rights, can be traced back not to the simple statements that these truths and rights are inalienable and self-evident, but to the moment in history when the masses began devouring popular novels. By entering the minds, and more importantly, the emotions, of well-drawn characters, normal people began developing empathy for their fellow person. It was only when another’s heartache, distress, unhappiness, and desires entered our imagination—not just our intellect—that humanity began to believe that all people are truly created equal.

Obviously, we still have a long way to go. It’s easy to feel powerless in a world full of inequalities; it’s easy to fret at the iniquities perceived on all sides and one’s inability to right them. Injustices large and small burn my heart. I want to feed the world, to soothe all neglected children, to house every head, to protect every abused animal, to shield beauty and wilderness from environmental devastation, to make motherhood the most revered (and well-paid) job in existence.

As I write this, my son is asleep in the other room. Some days he drives me mad and I’d like to give him away to a passing band of gypsies. Other days I look at him and think there’s no more delightful creature on the planet. On all days, though, when I’m nursing him or just watching him play, my thoughts turn to the other mothers of the world: a mother holding her babies close in Mosul as her house is bombed, a mother looking for her son who’s been stolen and is learning to be a child soldier in Uganda, the mother across town who doesn’t know how to extricate herself and her children from an abusive husband and father. No mother, I think, should ever have to watch her children starve, or be beaten, or should need to protect her baby from a bomb.

It is imagination that gives me empathy and makes my heart ache for the mothers of the world, and it is only through entering others’ imaginations that I can change a world that allows these situations to exist. Writing helps people from different cultures understand one another. It makes previously ignorant readers aware of the beauties of untouched wilderness, and our need to protect it; it turns the hard edges of political rhetoric into something malleable and soft, something closer to real life. Writing that touches people's imaginations will, I hope, help regenerate the power of women, of the Amazon warrior and the mother in all of us.

Writing is the place where I feel I can make a difference. I hang on to the final words of Bourke’s essay: “Although words by themselves cannot eliminate suffering, they can extend the boundaries of our moral imagination. … The words we use to describe others represent contrasting meditations on what it means to be human. Our future depends on which of these meditations we adopt.”

One Rotten Apple...

The Dictatorship of Healthy Living

I have been living in a bubble ever since my daughter was born almost two years ago. I do not have time to read the paper or watch the news and a lot of days pass without me even starting up my computer. I admit that I live my life in a state of ignorance-is-bliss, but so far I do not miss much.

Some weeks ago I made the mistake of checking on the state of the world and went online. The headlines that greeted me were horrifying: Tibet was burning, Belgrade was burning and the stock markets were collapsing. It took me about thirty seconds until I had seen enough. My computer shut down and I decided that as long as I did not know about these disasters they simply did not exist.

I am bad about denying and ignoring, and I certainly do know that the world can be a rotten place. Of course I blame politicians and big industries for it. Governments are unpredictable and unreliable. They see threats in every neighboring and far away country and in every foreigner crossing the border for whatever reason. They pass laws that restrict citizens' rights and freedoms under the pretense that it is best for their safety.

If political reforms are tackled they usually sound good when they are first presented but by the time the bill is passed the original idea is barely recognizable because of lively horse-trading behind closed doors, also referred to as compromising. Not that compromising is a bad thing. No relationship will stand without mutual compromise. The difference, however, is that in a relationship the parties involved are not under the influence of big industries or political strategies.

Governments also support any questionable form of science as long as it puts their country up one place in global rankings and as long as it promises to make products better and cheaper. This is why we can never be sure how much toxic and genetically modified food we have in our fridge. In the US, nowadays, about 80% of all grain is GM, a German farmer recently told me. It is hard to check and confirm this figure but even if it is only 50% it is too much. Especially as we do not know yet about the effects GM food might have on us and on our children, nor do we know the effects it will have on the environment. One hint is that the honeybees are already dying. Of course, pro-GM-food lobbyists claim they die from anything but GM plants. Apiarists, however, are convinced the cause lies in the new crops and demand immediate removal of GM plants.

I consider our little family a miniature state built on grassroots democracy. We discuss big decisions and act according to the final vote but in some departments everyone gets to make his or her own choice because not everyone can be a specialist in every field. As I am taking care of our daughter full time I get to decide on most issues concerning her.

I have never been a greenie except for a short excursion into vegetarianism and self-knit sweaters when I was sixteen. This phase wore off soon enough because my self-made clothes looked hideous and I also could not resist my grandma's roast beef. Where the food came from never really mattered to me as long as it was tasty and on my plate when I was hungry.
However, ever since our little daughter started to join us for meals, I have taken very good care that I put as much organic food on the table as possible. You might say that organic products are unnecessarily overpriced and that I am a victim of some clever marketing strategy of the organic food industry. You might further argue that organic food producers are just as profit oriented as everybody else and that their means of cultivation are not any better for the environment than the traditional ones. You may be right and I do not claim that organic food is the panacea for a better future. But I am convinced that even the slightest decrease in pesticides, hormones, antibiotics and whatever else farmers use to make their products more resistant, less fatty and faster growing is an asset for our and my daughter’s future. Buying organic food is a compromise I am more than willing to make. And the best thing is, it is a decision I make on my own, like any other dictator of the home who cares about the well-being of her people. Moreover, as I do it for my daughter it also makes me feel good and it improves the spirit in our little, happy world without wars and terror.

Federalist Paper 1: General Introduction

I've just put my son (2 weeks short of a year old) down for a nap, after changing the nastiest smelling diaper I think he's ever produced. Was it the avocado he didn't like last night? The garlic in the roast chicken? The peaches? What could produce a stench that bad and of that consistency? Maybe it's the super-drool from his teething. It was all mushy and got everywhere and almost required a bath. I use cloth diapers, which means the cover usually catches any excess (good), but that I then have to rinse said cover and throw it in the wash (bad).

I bet Alexander Hamilton never faced a smelly diaper. Bet he never tried to switch gears from helping a baby knock down stacks of blocks for 3 hours to bending his mind to the momentous questions that faced the educated, gentlemanly creators of a brand-new country. You need undivided attention, which meant, I'm sure, that his wife Elizabeth bore the brunt of running their household and caring for their 8 children.

It says a lot about the great men of past ages that they could, in all seriousness, write something like the following when searching for a cook, helpmeet, mother of their children, and showpiece for their drawing room--that is, a wife:

"She must be young—handsome (I lay most stress upon a good shape) Sensible (a little learning will do) —well bred... chaste and tender (I am an enthusiast in my notions of fidelity and fondness); of some good nature—a great deal of generosity (she must neither love money nor scolding, for I dislike equally a termagent and an economist)—In politics, I am indifferent what side she may be of—I think I have arguments that will safely convert her to mine—As to religion a moderate stock will satisfy me—She must believe in God and hate a saint. But as to fortune, the larger stock of that the better."

That's Alexander Hamilton (quote from Wikipedia) in1779, giving instructions to a friend who is meant to procure him a spouse from South Carolina. Hardly needs mentioning that this "enthusiast in notions of fidelity" later had an affair.

Still, that doesn't change the fact that his language in the Federalist Papers was cogent, persuasive, and intelligent, and to this day thrills both with its idealism and the weight of his argument.

His first Federalist Paper, the General Introduction, breathes the essential yin-and-yang of a democracy:

"[I]t has been reserved to the people of this country ... to decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitution on accident and force."

One could argue that recent events prove this question has failed: America has definitively decided that force guided by those wise old guys in the White House is the only way to preserve the country.

This first Paper lays out Publius's notions of moral and ethical rightness in political choices, and hints at the practical aspects of governance that the new country's Constitution had no choice but to consider if it were to succeed. But I am attracted less by Hamilton's introduction to future arguments here than in his philosophical statements as to the movement of human nature and the nature of human governance. So much of his observation can be transported directly to issues confronting governments around the world today, now, over 200 years after they were penned. And it's not that I agree with all of them. But they open up the mind and force one to question one's own ideological assumptions.

"We are not always sure that those who advocate the truth are influenced by purer principles than their antagonists. Ambition, avarice, personal animosity, party opposition, and many other motives not more laudable than these, are apt to operate as well upon those who support as those who oppose the right side of a question. ... [N]othing could be more ill-judged than that intolerant spirit which has at all times characterized political parties."

How searingly true.

But what do you think of this:

"[T]he vigor of government is essential to the security of liberty; that, in the contemplation of a sound and well-formed judgment, their interests can never be separated; and that a dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people than under the forbidding appearance of zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government. History will teach us that the former has been found a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than the latter, and that of those men who have overturned the liberties of republic, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people, commencing demagogues and ending tyrants."

The danger in this beautifully written paragraph is that Hamilton doesn't seem to have envisioned power-hungry oil barons-come Bible-thumping neoconservative authoritarians. It is so easy for the Cheney-ites of the world to bite off the first section of the paragraph and throw it to the masses who, arguably, seem eager to give up their rights in favor of a specious "security."

I bet Hamilton never had to leave his masterpieces because his kid woke up screaming from a nap, either. That's why this is called Mothers with Brains--we do all the work, from the contemplation to the cuddling.

Reading The Federalist Papers: Finding the Roots of the American Democratic Ideal

It's no news to any person with half a brain (even a sleep-deprived Mommy Brain) that American democracy is in the tank -- whether it's been that way for decades or simply since George Bush took office is a matter for debate, and not one I'm particularly interested in.

The point is, it's gone. Our laws are written and passed mostly by lobbyists, who pay vast amounts of money to the right people in Congress to advance or halt legislation to the benefit of their company or industry. (The EU recently got a taste of what American citizens take for granted: the constant presence of these lobbyists pressing for entrance to the office of people writing the new chemical safety standards for the EU.) Politicians' relationship with citizens and voters is a depressing, constant rehash of nonsense sound bites and "us vs. them" pandering. The corruption behind our voting system is so bare that practically everyone accepts it as given -- what's worse, nobody thinks they can do anything about it.

It's hard to remember these days that there was a point to America, when the creation of its democracy was something new and revolutionary and almost idealistic. Not perfect by a long shot, but striving to be something better than what had come before.

I'd like to get back in touch with these ideals, to taste again the intellectual and hopeful basis behind the (now failed) American democratic experiment. So this year I started reading The Federalist Papers, and I'm using this site to mull over thoughts and responses to the ideas set forth in these documents. Please feel free to join the conversation.

A little background: Most of the Western world knows of the US Constitution, and even some of its Bill of Rights and Amendments. The document is used, supposedly, as the factual and philosophical/theoretical basis of every American law. But at the time it was passed, the Constitution did not have universal popular support. Its tenets were fiercely debated, by those who believed it gave too many rights to the federal government rather than the states (for those who weren't aware, the United States is run under a system called "federalism," whereby certain powers are delegated to the states and others to the national central government -- a balance that has shifted to the national level consistently since the country's formation), and by those who believed that a stronger central government was needed for the country to function properly.

The Federalist Papers are a collection of letters written in the late 1700s under the pseudonym Publius by pro-Constitution advocates Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay. In the letters these three men laid out the philosophical, political, practical, and moral reasons why the country should adopt the Constitution.

Over the centuries, the US government turned repeatedly to these letters to further understand the founders' intent behind the words and laws of the Constitution. The Supreme Court has used the papers extensively to interpret laws and pass judgment.

So, despairing over the current state of American democracy, I'm going to live in the past for a while, to get back in touch with the bedrock shoring up the often illusory idea that this democracy has striven for something wonderful, even if it failed to reach it.

There are 85 of these letters. I hope to read and respond to one a week, followed by a reading of the Anti-Federalist Papers, written by those who at the time supported, instead of the Constitution, a weaker central government under the Articles of Confederation.