{"id":5850,"date":"2017-02-20T14:49:11","date_gmt":"2017-02-20T19:49:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/?p=5850"},"modified":"2017-02-20T14:59:19","modified_gmt":"2017-02-20T19:59:19","slug":"civics-lessons-for-presidents-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/2017\/02\/civics-lessons-for-presidents-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Civics Lessons for Presidents&#8217; Day"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/2017\/02\/civics-lessons-for-presidents-day\/constitution-3-2\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5856\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-5856\" src=\"http:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/files\/2017\/02\/constitution-3-609x400.jpeg\" alt=\"constitution 3\" width=\"540\" height=\"355\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/files\/2017\/02\/constitution-3-609x400.jpeg 609w, https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/files\/2017\/02\/constitution-3-198x130.jpeg 198w, https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/files\/2017\/02\/constitution-3-305x200.jpeg 305w, https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/files\/2017\/02\/constitution-3.jpeg 670w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 540px) 100vw, 540px\" \/><\/a>Happy Presidents&#8217; Day!\u00a0 With a new president of the United States in town, this 2017 Presidents&#8217; Day (aka Washington&#8217;s Birthday) seems like a great time to review some concepts in American civics.<\/p>\n<p>Most readers of this blog may not know that my first job after law school was teaching and supervising in a Georgetown Law Center clinic called <a href=\"http:\/\/streetlaw.org\/en\/home\">Street Law<\/a>, which today is a global citizenship education program created by Georgetown law professors in 1972.\u00a0 I started my Street Law career as a second year law student teaching about government and law to high school students at Coolidge Senior High School in DC.\u00a0 Those students at Coolidge sparked my lifelong passion for teaching everyday citizens about law and government, something I try to do even today through writing and speeches.<\/p>\n<p>Since the 2016 presidential election, a lot of Americans have found cause to revisit their high school and college civics and political science courses, and the debates we are having as citizens of the greatest free country on earth are important and healthy.<\/p>\n<p>I have also found myself thinking about how important it is for people who work in government to revisit those fundamental lessons about how our system of government is organized, what the rights and freedoms of people are in this country, and how public officials must discharge their oaths of office and fundamental responsibilities.\u00a0\u00a0 If I were to teach a version of Street Law for elected and appointed officials of government today, here are some of the major topics I would include in the syllabus:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>We, the People:<\/strong>\u00a0 WE are the government.\u00a0 We must never forget that.\u00a0 We elect officials to represent our interests but the ultimate power in the United States resides in the citizens of this nation.<\/li>\n<li><strong>The Bill of Rights:<\/strong> Perhaps the greatest statement about a free society ever crafted, the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.billofrightsinstitute.org\/founding-documents\/bill-of-rights\/\">Bill of Rights<\/a> to the Constitution of the United States is essential for every public official to know and to respect.\u00a0 The First Amendment is pre-eminent: without Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Religion, Freedom of the Press, Freedom of Assembly we would hardly have any of our other rights and freedoms today.\u00a0 This is an entire course unto itself, hard to address in this short blog space.<\/li>\n<li><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.usconstitution.net\/consttop_sepp.html\">Separation<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/wwnorton.com\/college\/polisci\/american-government12\/brief\/ch\/03\/outline.aspx\">Balance<\/a> of Powers:<\/strong>\u00a0 this Constitutional principle is essential for our government to work effectively.\u00a0 No branch is superior to the other, all three &#8212; legislative, executive, judicial &#8212; operate as a system of checks and balances on each other.\u00a0 If one branch denigrates or tries to overpower the other, gridlock and resistance ensues.\u00a0 The Framers of the Constitution deliberately created this system to prevent the tyranny of the majority in legislation, and to restrain executive power.\u00a0 Of course, over the two centuries since Madison, Jefferson, Adams and Hamilton crafted this solution, the United States government has had some rip-roaring debates and conflicts over the structure &#8212; all to the good since the structure ultimately ensured balance and fairness for all.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Role of the <a href=\"http:\/\/law2.umkc.edu\/faculty\/projects\/ftrials\/conlaw\/prespowers.html\">President<\/a> and Executive Branch:<\/strong>\u00a0 in the United States, the president is not a central ruler, but rather, the person responsible to carry out law and legislation, and also the Commander-in-Chief of the military.\u00a0 The president may recommend legislation, and may veto legislation, but the president does not enact laws unilaterally.\u00a0 This issue has become more controversial in recent years as presidents have used executive orders and regulatory authority to by-pass legislative processes they believe are unresponsive or ineffective.\u00a0 A key civics and legal question is whether the increasingly expansive use of executive orders and regulatory authority undermines Constitutional principles.\n<ul>\n<li>Executive regulatory authority is a particularly controversial issue as changes in parties in power demonstrates the political weight of regulation.\u00a0 Rules that the Obama Administration created &#8212; e.g., regulations affecting financial advisors, regulations concerning teacher education &#8212; were among the first rules eliminated by the Trump administration.\u00a0 Obama issued the DACA order (Deferred Action for Childhood Access) giving some protection to undocumented young people but the Trump administration is talking about eliminating that order along with more severe actions on immigration.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Role of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ushistory.org\/gov\/6a.asp\">Congress<\/a> and the Legislative Branch:<\/strong>\u00a0 Congress is supposed to make the laws, but in recent years partisan gridlock (different parties controlling different houses of Congress) made enacting legislation difficult.\u00a0 With both houses of Congress and the president now of the same party, more legislation is likely, but two large questions loom:\u00a0 whether partisan acrimony will abate or continue to haunt legislative processes, and whether and how the rights of the minority will be protected.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Role of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.law.cornell.edu\/constitution\/articleiii\">Judiciary<\/a>:<\/strong>\u00a0 Courts are responsible to ensure that the laws of the nation and states are enforced, correctly interpreted and fairly applied.\u00a0 Courts do not make the law, but over the course of history some politicians have accused courts of doing just that through the power of judicial interpretation and review of existing laws according to Constitutional principles.\u00a0 The famous case of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.oyez.org\/cases\/1789-1850\/5us137\">Marbury v. Madison<\/a> in 1803 established the principle of judicial review.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As the leader of the nation, the president of the United States needs to understand and respect the fundamental principles of the form of organization, roles and responsibilities of each branch of government.\u00a0 That does not mean the president is always happy with how the branches function.\u00a0 Almost every president has had occasion to complain about Congress.\u00a0 President Franklin D. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.npr.org\/templates\/story\/story.php?storyId=125789097\">Roosevelt<\/a> was so unhappy with the Supreme Court that he tried to change its composition, failing spectacularly.\u00a0 President Richard <a href=\"https:\/\/verdict.justia.com\/2014\/07\/25\/nixons-uses-abuses-muses-supreme-court\">Nixon<\/a> saw his presidency really begin to unravel when the Supreme Court, whose members he tried to influence, ruled against his claim of executive privilege in the release of secret recordings that became known as the Watergate tapes.<\/p>\n<p>President Trump is also speaking out against the judiciary, railing against the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals for staying his <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2017\/02\/09\/us\/trump-travel-ban-ninth-circuit-ruling.html?_r=0\">immigration order<\/a>, and denouncing Seattle Judge James <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rawstory.com\/2017\/02\/washington-judge-blocks-trump-immigration-order-with-injunction\/\">Robart<\/a> as a &#8220;so-called judge&#8221; when he issued the first stay of the order.\u00a0 If I were teaching a Street Law civics course at the White House, I would caution the president on his language &#8212; the only way to start your oral argument before a judge is with the time-honored words, &#8220;May it please the court..&#8221;\u00a0 Calling the judge names is just not a way to win the case.\u00a0 Street Law 101.<\/p>\n<p>So many other topics in civics and citizenship education come to mind &#8212; as a nation we should probably make a widespread national commitment to regenerate teaching civics at all levels of education as a powerful way to guide our current dialogues and debates about the role of government and future of our society.<\/p>\n<p>Here at Trinity, I welcome ideas from students, faculty and staff about these issues.\u00a0 Please offer comments below or write to me at <a href=\"mailto:president@trinitydc.edu\">president@trinitydc.edu<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We need to regenerate the whole idea of robust civics and citizenship education for everyone!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[509,136,14,822,554],"tags":[1773,1772,1775,1774],"class_list":["post-5850","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-civil-human-rights","category-dc-public-schools","category-education","category-higher-education-2","category-holidays-2","tag-citizenship-education","tag-civics","tag-presidents-day","tag-street-law"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5850"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5850\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trinitydc.edu\/president\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}