We have a lot of reasons to be afraid these days. No, not because of “death panels” not because president Obama wants to pull the plug on Grandman, not even because we might not get reformed healthcare. No. The real reason to be afraid is that this entire debate is just a small proxy for the battle over the spirit of American Democracy. When millions of American’s can bully the overwhelming majority of individuals who want healthcare reform, when Republicans can get away with lying (I mean that in the vilest of terms), and when people on the only “honest media” can get away with making the same lies day in and day out, there is but only one conclusion to make: American Democracy is in grave danger. What follows is the single most important event in American history, forged not by shouting, not by demonizing the opponent, not by bastardizing the faintest of the straw man argument and obliterating the argument with hate and fear, but by negotiating from principled positions with a genuine attempt to incorporate both sides of the debate.

By now you know I’m a law student, i’ve studied a lot about constitutional law and a whole lot more about the founding of this country. At the constitutional convention of 1787, groups of our founding fathers, federalists and anti-federalists alike came together, in a crowded, hot, and fly infested hall in Philadelphia, to discuss the future of the country. Madison, Hamilton, Morris, Yates, and others from both sides argued day in and day out for months about the direction of the country. The Articles of Confederation, the prior governing document, had failed the federal government after local insurrection in Massachusetts, starting off the need to amend the Articles.

What resulted at the end of the convention was not ardent screaming over one another, it wasn’t steadfast adherence to every principle, despite the fact that the comprise that created the Constitution is the same compromise that led to the continued slavery of my ancestors. The hallmark of the Constitution was its political comprise, the Connecticut Compromise, the Benjamin Franklin suggested committee to iron out the soul and direction of the country between federalists and anti-federalists. (Later reforged after the Civil War)

After the convention the Constitution was drafted and sent to every newly minted state and nine of them had to agree to form the United States as we know it today. The debates at these conventions were intense, but the discourse was the very embodiment of American spirit. From Yates, the anti-federalists, never were more clever and intelligent words were printed about the extent of congressional power:

How far the clause in the 8th section of the 1st article may operate to do away all idea of confederated states, and to effect an entire consolidation of the whole into one general government, it is impossible to say. The powers given by this article are very general and comprehensive, and it may receive a construction to justify the passing almost any law. A power to make all laws, which shall be necessary and proper, for carrying into execution, all powers vested by the constitution in the government of the United States, or any department or officer thereof, is a power very comprehensive and definite [indefinite?], and may, for ought I know, be exercised in a such manner as entirely to abolish the state legislatures. Suppose the legislature of a state should pass a law to raise money to support their government and pay the state debt, may the Congress repeal this law, because it may prevent the collection of a tax which they may think proper and necessary to lay, to provide for the general welfare of the United States? For all laws made, in pursuance of this constitution, are the supreme lay of the land, and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, any thing in the constitution or laws of the different states to the contrary notwithstanding. –Robert Yates as Brutus

In response Hamilton, Jay, and Madison responded in kind with the Federalist Papers, articles written and printed each week, sometimes faster, and sent across the seaboard to persuade future Americans that the Constitution and broad federal power was necessary:

The next most palpable defect of the subsisting Confederation, is the total want of a SANCTION to its laws. The United States, as now composed, have no powers to exact obedience, or punish disobedience to their resolutions, either by pecuniary mulcts, by a suspension or divestiture of privileges, or by any other constitutional mode. There is no express delegation of authority to them to use force against delinquent members; and if such a right should be ascribed to the federal head, as resulting from the nature of the social compact between the States, it must be by inference and construction, in the face of that part of the second article, by which it is declared, “that each State shall retain every power, jurisdiction, and right, not expressly delegated to the United States in Congress assembled.” There is, doubtless, a striking absurdity in supposing that a right of this kind does not exist, but we are reduced to the dilemma either of embracing that supposition, preposterous as it may seem, or of contravening or explaining away a provision, which has been of late a repeated theme of the eulogies of those who oppose the new Constitution; and the want of which, in that plan, has been the subject of much plausible animadversion, and severe criticism. If we are unwilling to impair the force of this applauded provision, we shall be obliged to conclude, that the United States afford the extraordinary spectacle of a government destitute even of the shadow of constitutional power to enforce the execution of its own laws. It will appear, from the specimens which have been cited, that the American Confederacy, in this particular, stands discriminated from every other institution of a similar kind, and exhibits a new and unexampled phenomenon in the political world. — Alexander Hamilton as Publius

These two argued and let every reading person know their position. Not by demonizing their opponents, but by arguing the benefits and concerns regarding our Constitution. Let it be further noted, that when the anti-federalists lost and the Constitution was ratified, it was the anti-federalists who helped create the first most critical amendments to our new nation; the Bill of Rights.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is our heritage, our oratorical root, our founding and guiding divine providence that has gotten us to this point so far. However, we are losing ground to our tradition, our past, and our ability to persuade the minds of individuals. Evidence is in the birther movement, the moonlanding conspiracy, the JFK conspiracy, and the cess pools of internet and media legion that feed these theories and absurdities. It has become far to easy for us, as an entire society, to demonize our political opponents by calling them the politically expedient Nazi, be it President Bush or Obama, rather than wrestle with the intellectual knots that have been wrapped around the political questions of our day.

And so, we are here, today, with people who are not willing to listen to one another. Not willing to simply put fear aside and rationally discuss healthcare with one another. Instead we have many conservatives shilling against non-existent provisions of the Democrat’s healthcare proposals, with no clear alternative of their own; hey, its easier just to say no like Republicans said no to Medicare back in the 60s.

I am not saying that if you disagree with me that you are inherently wrong. In fact, there are numerous principled reasons for arguing that expanded government control of private health insurance is a bad thing. Even though I ardently disagree with the notion that private business always gets the job done right(something this current market shutdown should make evidently clear) it is reasonable to argue for less government intrusion on healthcare. But that hasn’t been the discussion here. Instead posters and critics, on this blog and elsewhere, have reduced the argument to simply calling the other side stupid, or in la-la land, or naive, or any number of simplified attacks, so that the namecaller does not have to actually prove a specific claim with a warrant proving the claim valid. People say the bill raises taxes, what provision says so? People say that the bill will harm medicare, what proof bears that statement out? these questions are never answered by a political entity, it just simply “is the fact” no warrant, no argument from history, just a claim, made often enough, to niggle the brain into thinking that perhaps someone isn’t playing with straight dice and therefore government can’t be trusted.

America has lost its way and its time we take the country as I REMEMBER IT BACK. And this isn’t the scared, fearful, leave it to Beaver trip from back in the 60’s. We need to fight for the America where arguments like the ones excerpted above can flourish and grow the seeds of statecraft. We have to get back to our roots, and start holding ourselves to the standard our founding fathers set for us over two hundred years ago. If we continue to fail, then this experiment called American Democracy shall fail with it, and that, my friends, is something to really be afraid of.