If you've been thinking about US politics and trying to make sense of it for the last year or so, you might have hit on something like the following three propositions: one, US partisanship has never been so bad before; two, for the first time, it's geographically spatialized -- we're divided between the coasts, which want to look outwards, and the center of the country, which wants to look inwards; and third, there's nothing we can do about it.
在过去一年左右, 如果你一直在思考美国的政治 并试图理解它, 你可能会碰到以下三个命题: 一,美国的党派关系 从未如此糟糕; 二, 首次, 这种关系是地理空间化的 我们分裂为两部分, 一边是想要向外看的海岸地区, 另一边是想要向内看的内陆; 第三, 我们对此无能为力。
I'm here to today to say that all three of these propositions, all of which sound reasonable, are not true. In fact, our US partisanship goes all the way back to the very beginning of the republic. It was geographically spatialized in almost eerily the same way that it is today, and it often has been throughout US history. And last, and by far most importantly, we actually have an extraordinary mechanism that's designed to help us manage factional disagreement and partisanship. That technology is the Constitution. And this is an evolving, subtly, supplely designed entity that has the specific purpose of teaching us how to manage factional disagreement where it's possible to do that, and giving us techniques for overcoming that disagreement when that's possible.
我今天来这里说 所有这三个命题, 所有这些听起来虽然很合理, 它们是错误的。 事实上, 我们美国的党派关系可追溯到 到共和国的开始。 在地理上的空间化 几乎和今天是同样的, 这种情况贯穿了美国历史。 最后, 最重要的是, 我们实际上有一个非凡的机制 旨在帮助我们管理 党派分歧和党派关系。 这种技术是宪法。 这是一个不断变化的,微妙的, 设计精良的实体 它的具体目的 就是去教我们如何尽可能管理好 派别分歧, 并给我们技巧方法去 尽可能克服 这种分歧。
Now, in order to tell you the story, I want to go back to a pivotal moment in US history, and that is the moment when factional disagreement and partisanship was born. There actually was a birth moment -- a moment in US history when partisanship snapped into place. The person who's at the core of that story is James Madison. And at the moment that this began, James Madison was riding high. He himself was the Einstein of not only the US Constitution, but of constitutional thought more globally, and, to give him his due, he knew it. In a period of time of just three years, from 1785 to 1788, he had conceived, theorized, designed, passed and gotten ratified the US Constitution.
为了告诉你们这个故事, 我想回到美国历史中的关键时刻, 那就是 派别的分歧和多党派诞生的时候。 在一个诞生的时刻, 美国的党派关系腾空出现。 故事核心人物 是詹姆斯·麦迪逊。 那时, 詹姆斯·麦迪逊正享受成功。 他不仅仅是美国宪法的创建者, 更是全球宪法思想之父, 公正地来说 他知道。 在短短三年的时间里, 从1785年到1788年, 他设想,理论化, 设计,通过并得到批准 美国宪法。
And just to give you some sense of the enormity of what that accomplishment actually was, although Madison couldn't have known it at the time, today that same constitutional technology that he invented is still in use not only in the US, but, 230 years later, in places like Canada, India, South Africa, Brazil. So in an extraordinary range of contexts all over the world, this technology is still the dominant, most used, most effective technology to manage governance.
让你们认识一下 这个成就的巨大规模, 虽然麦迪逊当时不知道, 如今,他设计的宪法技术仍被使用, 不仅在美国, 230年后, 在加拿大, 印度, 南非, 巴西。 所以在世界各地,这个非凡的范围中 这项技术依然占主导地位, 是最常用,最有效的政府管理技术。
In that moment, Madison believed that, having solved this problem, the country would run smoothly, and that he had designed a technology that would minimize the results of factions so there would be no political parties. Remarkably, he thought he had designed a constitution that was against political parties and would make them unnecessary.
在那一刻, 麦迪逊认为, 宪法问题解决了后, 国家会运行顺利, 他设计的宪法技术 将使派系斗争的结果最小化, 所以不会产生多政党。 值得注意的是,他觉得 他设计的宪法 是反对政党化的, 会让多党派变得没有必要。
He had gotten an enormous degree of help in the final marketing phase of his constitutional project from a man you may have heard of, called Alexander Hamilton. Now, Hamilton was everything Madison was not. He was passionate, where Madison was restrained. He was pansexual, where Madison didn't speak to a woman except for once until he was 42 years old, and then married Dolley and lived happily ever after for 40 years.
他得到了很大的帮助 在他的宪法项目的最后营销阶段 从一个你可能听说过的男人, 叫亚历山大·汉密尔顿。 汉密尔顿和麦迪逊 是相反两极。 汉密尔顿充满激情, 麦迪逊却更加保守。 汉密尔顿是泛性恋, 而麦迪逊在42岁之前 只和一个女人说过话, 之后,他与多丽结婚 40多年来一直幸福生活。
(Laughter)
(笑声)
To put it bluntly, Hamilton's the kind of person about whom you would write a hip-hop musical --
直言不讳, 汉密尔顿是那种人 你会为他创作一部嘻哈音乐剧,
(Laughter)
(笑声)
and Madison is the kind of person about whom you would not write a hip-hop musical.
而麦迪逊 身上毫无“嘻哈“元素,
(Laughter)
(笑声)
Or indeed, a musical of any kind at all.
你甚至都无法为他创作 一部正经的音乐剧。
But together, they had become a rather unlikely pairing, and they had produced the Federalist Papers, which offered a justification and, as I mentioned, a marketing plan for the Constitution, which had been wildly effective and wildly successful.
但是在一起, 他们成为一个不太可能的配对, 他们共同写了《联邦主义论》, 它为 宪法的营销计划, 正如我所说, 给出了理由。 这是非常有效的 并大获成功。
Once the new government was in place, Hamilton became Secretary of the Treasury, and he had a very specific idea in mind. And that was to do for financial institutions and infrastructure exactly what Madison had done for constitutions. Again, his contemporaries all knew it. One of them told Madison, who can't have liked it very much, that Hamilton was the Newton of infrastructure. The idea was pretty straightforward. Hamilton would give the United States a national bank, a permanent national debt -- he said it would be "immortal," his phrase -- and a manufacturing policy that would enable trade and manufacturing rather than agriculture, which was where the country's primary wealth had historically been.
新政府到位, 汉密尔顿成为财政部长, 他有一个非常具体的想法。 那就是 创立金融机构和基础设施 正如麦迪逊为了宪法所做的一样。 他的同时代人也都知道。 其中一人告诉麦迪逊, 他可能不愿意看到 汉密尔顿作为美国基础设施的创立者。 这个想法很简单。 汉密尔顿会为美国 创立一个国家银行, 一笔永久国债 他说那将会是 “永恒不变的”, 并会制定生产政策, 这将使贸易和制造业 超越农业, 成为美国的首要财务来源。
Madison went utterly ballistic. And in this pivotal, critical decision, instead of just telling the world that his old friend Hamilton was wrong and was adopting the wrong policies, he actually began to argue that Hamilton's ideas were unconstitutional -- that they violated the very nature of the Constitution that the two of them had drafted together. Hamilton responded the way you would expect. He declared Madison to be his "personal and political enemy" -- these are his words.
麦迪逊极力反驳。 在这个至关重要的决定中, 麦迪逊并没有告诉大家 他的老朋友汉密尔顿错了, 采取了错误的政策, 他反而开始争论 汉密尔顿的想法 违反了宪法, 违反了他俩一起 起草的宪法本质。 汉密尔顿的回答 正如我们可以预料得到的。 他宣称麦迪逊是 他的“个人和政治敌人” 这些是他的原话。
So these two founders who had been such close friends and such close allies and such partners, then began to produce enmity. And they did it in the good, old-fashioned way. First, they founded political parties. Madison created a party originally called the Democratic Republican Party -- "Republican" for short -- and Hamilton created a party called the Federalist Party. Those two parties adopted positions on national politics that were extreme and exaggerated. To give you a clear example: Madison, who had always believed that the country would have some manufacturing and some trade and some agriculture, began attacking Hamilton as a kind of tool of the financial markets whom Hamilton himself intended to put in charge of the country. That was an overstatement, but it was something Madison came to believe.
两位国父曾经是 亲密的朋友、盟友 和合作伙伴, 现在开始产生敌意。 他们的做法非常老派。 首先,他们各建政党。 麦迪逊创造了 “民主共和党 ” 简称“共和党”, 汉密尔顿建立了 联邦党。 这两方的政治立场 非常极端和夸张。 给你一个明确的例子: 麦迪逊一直相信 国家应有 一些制造业和一些贸易 和一些农业, 开始攻击汉密尔顿 说他是金融市场的工具 一切都是汉密尔顿用来控制 整个国家的伎俩。 听起来是很夸张, 但麦迪逊的确这样想。
He also attacked city life, and he said that the coasts were corrupt, and what people needed to do was to look inwards to the center of the country, to farmers, who were the essence of Republican virtue, and they should go back to the values that had made American great, specifically the values of the Revolution, and those were the values of low taxes, agriculture and less trade. Hamilton responded to this by saying that Madison was naïve, that he was childish, and that his goal was to turn the United States into a primitive autarchy, self-reliant and completely ineffectual on the global scale.
他还攻击城市生活方式, 他说,海岸城市是腐败的, 人们需要向内陆看齐 回到国家的中心, 尊重农民,他们是 共和党的美德, 人民应该回归 使美国伟大的价值观 特别是革命 和低税收的价值观, 增强农业 并减少贸易。 汉密尔顿回应说 麦迪逊太天真的, 太幼稚, 他称麦迪逊的目标会将美国 变为一个原始的独裁国家 只能自力更生, 在全球范围内完全不起作用。
(Laughter)
(笑声)
They both meant it, and there was some truth to each of their claims, because each side was grossly exaggerating the views of the other in order to fight their war. They founded newspapers, and so for the first time in US history, the news that people received came entirely through the lens of either the Republican or the Federalist party.
他们都是认真的, 他们的主张中有些属实, 因为每一方都是极力夸张 对方的意见 为了打赢这场战争。 他们各自创立报纸, 所以在美国历史上第一次, 人们的新闻来源 不是来自共和党 就是来自于联邦党。
How does this end? Well, as it turned out, the Constitution did its work. But it did its work in surprising ways that Madison himself had not fully anticipated. First, there was a series of elections. And the first two times out of the box, the Federalists destroyed the Republicans. Madison was astonished. Of course, he blamed the press.
一切是怎么结束的? 事实证明, 宪法起了作用。 但它起作用的方式 令人惊讶, 麦迪逊自己 也没有充分预料到。 首先,有一系列的选举。 而前两次开箱, 联邦党摧毁了共和党。 麦迪逊很惊讶 他当然指责新闻界。
(Laughter)
(笑声)
And in a rather innovative view -- Madison never failed to innovate when he thought about anything -- he said the reason that the press was so pro-Federalist is that the advertisers were all Federalists, because they were traders on the coasts who got their capital from Britain, which Federalism was in bed with. That was his initial explanation. But despite the fact that the Federalists, once in power, actually enacted laws that criminalized criticism of the government -- that happened in the United States -- nevertheless, the Republicans fought back, and Madison began to emphasize the freedom of speech, which he had built into the Bill of Rights, and the capacity of civil society to organize. And sure enough, nationally, small local groups -- they were called Democratic-Republican Societies -- began to form and protest against Federalist-dominated hegemony. Eventually, the Republicans managed to win a national election -- that was in 1800. Madison became the Secretary of State, his friend and mentor Jefferson became president, and they actually, over time, managed to put the Federalists completely out of business. That was their goal.
他提出了一个十分创新的观点—— 麦迪逊不管发生什么 都会提出创新的想法 —— 他说 新闻界偏心于联邦党的原因是 广告商都是联邦党人, 因为联邦党徒是海岸线城市的贸易商 从大英帝国拿钱 和英国关系混乱不清。 那是他的初步解释。 但是,联邦党人 掌权之后, 颁布了法律 治罪于那些批评政府的人, 这些在美国都发生过, 尽管如此, 共和党人开始反击, 麦迪逊开始强调 言论自由, 他早已把这写入《人权法案》, 和允许成立民间组织的自由。 当然,在全国, 被称为“民主共和团”的地方团体 开始联合抗议联邦党强势的霸权。 最终共和党赢得全国大选, 那是在1800年。 麦迪逊成为国务卿, 他的朋友和导师杰斐逊 成为总统, 而实际上,随着时间的推移, 他们设法使联邦党 完全失去业务。 这就是他们的目标。
Now, why did that happen? It happened because in the structure of the Constitution were several features that actually managed faction the way there were supposed to do in the first place. What were those? One -- most important of all -- the freedom of speech. This was an innovative idea at the time. Namely, that if you were out of power, you could still say that the government was terrible.
为什么会这样呢? 这是因为宪法的结构 有几个功能 可以管理党派分歧, 这本是首先应该做的事。 那些是什么? 第一,最重要的一点就是 言论自由。 在当时,这是一个创新的想法。 也就是说,如果你失去了政权 你还可以说 政府是可怕的
Two, civil society organization. The capacity to put together private groups, individuals, political parties and others who would organize to try to bring about fundamental change. Perhaps most significantly was the separation of powers -- an extraordinary component of the Constitution. The thing about the separation of powers is that it did then and it does now, drive governance to the center. You can get elected to office in the United States with help from the periphery, right or left. It turns out, you actually can't govern unless you bring on board the center. There are midterm elections that come incredibly fast after a presidency begins. Those drive presidents towards the center.
第二, 民间社会组织。 组织私人团体,个人, 政党等 会带来根本的变化。 也许最重要的一条 是分权原则, 它是宪法最非凡的部分。 分权原则 不管是在当时还是现在 将治理推向中心。 在美国,你可以当选, 通过外围的力量 不管是左派还是右派。 事实证明, 除非你着重中心, 你无法治理。 中期选举会在 总统职位开始没多久后 马上举行。 这些都会促使总统 注重中间派。
There's a structure in which the president, in fact, does not rule or even govern, but can only propose laws which other people have to agree with -- another feature that tends to drive presidents who actually want to get things done to the center. And a glance at the newspapers today will reveal to you that these principles are still completely in operation. No matter how a president gets elected, the president cannot get anything done unless the president first of all follows the rules of the Constitution, because if not, the courts will stand up, as indeed has sometimes occurred, not only recently, but in the past, in US history. And furthermore, the president needs people, elected officials who know they need to win election from centrist voters, also to back his or her policies in order to pass laws. Without it, nothing much happens.
其中存在一个结构, 其实总统并不统治 也并不能管理, 他们只能提案, 而这些提案必须经过他人的同意。 这就是宪法结构的一个特点 促使总统 着力于最中心。 今日的报纸会透露出 这些原则依然在运行。 无论总统如何当选, 总统不能做任何事情 除非总统首先 遵循《宪法》的规定, 若是没有遵循, 法院将采取措施, 确实有时会发生, 不仅最近, 但在过去,在美国历史上。 此外, 总统需要人民, 民选官员知道 他们需要 从中间派选民中 赢得选举。 也要支持他或她的政策 以通过法规。 没有它, 没什么事情可以发生。
The takeaway of this brief excursus into the history of partisanship, then, is the following: partisanship is real; it's profound; it's extraordinarily powerful, and it's terribly upsetting. But the design of the Constitution is greater than partisanship. It enables us to manage partisanship when that's possible, and it enables us actually to overcome partisan division and produce compromise, when and only when that is possible. A technology like that is a technology that worked for the founders, it worked for their grandchildren, it didn't work at the moment of the Civil War, but then it started working again. And it worked for our grandparents, our parents, and it's going to work for us.
这个简短的美国党派历史的 关键点在于 党派是真实的 它是深刻的 它非常强大, 也会令人十分沮丧。 但宪法的设计 大于党派。 它使我们能够管理党派 在可能的时候, 它实际上使我们能够克服党派分裂 并产生妥协, 只有当可能的时候。 这样的技术 是一种有效的技术 对于国父来说, 它为他们的孙辈服务 它在内战时没有起作用, 但后来又开始有用了。 它为我们的祖父母服务, 服务我们的父母, 它也将为我们起效。
(Applause)
(掌声)
So what you should do is really simple. Stand up for what you believe in, support the organizations that you care about, speak out on the issues that matter to you, get involved, make change, express you opinion, and do it with respect and knowledge and confidence that it's only by working together that the constitutional technology can do the job that it is designed to do.
所以你应该做的很简单。 支持你所相信的, 支持你所关注的组织, 说出对你很重要的问题, 参与其中, 改变, 表达你的观点, 并且用尊重, 知识和信心去做, 只有人们共同合作, 宪法技术才会发挥 它设计好的作用。
Stand up for what you believe, but take a deep breath while you do it. It's going to be OK.
捍卫你所相信的, 但是在你做的时候要深吸一口气。 一切都会没有事。
Thanks.
谢谢。
(Applause)
(掌声)