America's History with Moving Past Divisions

**Kousha Navadar** (0:10)
It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. I'm Kousha Navadar. I'm filling in for Brian today.
So just a few weeks ago, the United States hit a big milestone birthday. But instead of celebrating the last 250 years, a lot of us spent the day worrying, and maybe some of us asked one question in particular. How much longer can this last?
Our next guest says longer than you think. His new book tells eight stories from the 1790s through the 1890s. And I'll give you a teaser of some of these historical stories. Hyperpartisan newspapers run by the founders themselves, a senator beaten nearly to death on the Senate floor, and a New York newspaper war that gave us the phrase, fake news. That's just a few stories to name. He also teaches at Utah Valley University, where Charlie Kirk was assassinated last September, while this book was still being written. Joining us now is Greg Jackson, creator, host, and head writer of the popular US History podcast, History That Doesn't Suck, professor in constitutional studies and national security studies at Utah Valley University and the author of the new book, Been There, Done That, How Our History Shows What We Can Overcome. Professor Jackson, welcome to WNYC.

**Greg Jackson** (1:26)
Thank you so much, Kusha. Happy to be with you.

**Kousha Navadar** (1:28)
Happy to have you. So, you say that you hear it everywhere you go. It's never been worse.
I'm wondering why are so many of us convinced that right now is the nadir of our democracy?

**Greg Jackson** (1:41)
Well, first, I'll say that that's a theme I noticed doing my research is that we have a tendency to catastrophize the present. And I don't say that to dismiss the very real issues that we're facing, but this is a part of our human nature. The blank page ahead of us is terrifying. Whereas when we read history, we can even take something like the Battle of Antietam, literally the bloodiest day in American history, over 20,000 casualties during the Civil War.
And yet when we read that, no one's really wondering does the nation survive. You know what comes on the next page. That kind of numbs us in a way to really empathizing with our predecessors and recognizing, holy crap, that had to be the most terrifying day pretty much ever.

**Kousha Navadar** (2:29)
So you're saying it's the blank page that really frightens us because we don't know what's going to happen next.

**Greg Jackson** (2:33)
Yep. That's what's scary.

**Kousha Navadar** (2:35)
Your book makes the case that hard times have happened before, we can survive hard times now. It makes that case with eight stories and they all come from before 1900 You say that history should be a source of strength for us.
How badly did Americans behave back then and why does that make you optimistic about our present day?

**Greg Jackson** (2:58)
It makes me optimistic because I see that Americans behaved as badly then as they do today.
So if you think of this almost like data, we've got 250 years of data. Now, the Constitution didn't kick in 250 years ago, but let's embrace the date, run with it. 250 years of the American experiment and we have had violence. We have had absolute games played with our institutions, with the electoral process.
And yet we've not only managed to survive these moments, we've so overcome them that we aren't remembering them. I'm having to dig these stories up that have become forgotten. Some stories that shock me with the level of violence and corruption that just don't make the highlight reels today. And so if we can overcome those moments, I feel that not only does that say, okay, our institutions are strong enough to endure the worst of us, and let's keep in mind that the founders were thinking of that. Federalist 51, whether it's James Madison say, if all men are angels, we wouldn't really need government, right, to paraphrase them. Or as I like to say, people suck. They understood that and they built institutions designed to take that beating. So all that to say, if we've been able to endure the past, I believe we can endure the present and more than that, that these past instances that do rhyme with our present, give us lessons on how we overcome these moments.

**Kousha Navadar** (4:27)
It's so interesting to think of the Federalist Papers and Madison just writing at the top. People suck, so let's make them as small and separate as possible.

**Greg Jackson** (4:36)
It's important to translate what feels like lost jargon into present day parlance.

**Kousha Navadar** (4:41)
For sure, I'm right there with you. Listeners, what makes you feel like right now is the worst it's ever been in American politics? Tell us the specific thing. Maybe it's something you saw in the news this week. Maybe it's an argument at your own dinner table. Maybe it's something you're afraid of for your kids in the future, like we were talking about that blank page. Our guest is a historian who has spent years telling people that Americans have been here before. So bring him your worry and let him take a swing at it. If you think that's a little too easy, that our problems really are new and a history lesson lets us off the hook, we want to hear from you too. Give us a call, send us a text. We're at 212-433-WNYC.