What Kinds of Freedoms Do You Have in a Crisis? | BRIght & Early, BRI’s Student Web Series

0:03 hello young people of the internet and welcome to another episode bright and early the webseries from the Bill of Rights Institute where we talk about all of today’s news and how it relates to history and what you can do to kind of process it all and in order to start I am always here with my colleague Gary and Kirk hi guys

0:24 hello how are you good thanks for asking um the news cycle has been really heavy I think as we’re like moving into kind of tensions between different groups different you know different states are

0:46 coming together and different different you know in parts of states are are in conflict with other parts of states and it’s just it’s been a little intense I think for me how’s it been for you guys yeah I would agree it’s interesting I take a look at sort of how it has developed over time it wasn’t super long

1:08 ago that we were all at work or out doing things and them little by little things changed and that gradual change seems to be going through a new phase now I’m feeling with just the concept of what at what point will things develop at what point will we come together and

1:29 start moving into different ways of doing things and it’s it’s a tough question that no one person has an answer to and it’s interesting seeing how groups of people you know who’ve just seen things at different ways are making decisions about it yeah I think I think that’s that’s right Gary and it’s it’s funny last week and every week we’ve been talking about watching this crisis sort of unfold and I think all of

1:51 us are used to fast paced things and this has been a crisis that’s just been evolving in unfolding over days and weeks which is out of step I think for a lot of the other things we’ve experienced and you know I think at one point either here or on another webinar we were talking about you know people’s experience with with September 11th and

2:13 how that was a big moment then within the next weeks we were still dealing with that big moment but life was getting back to a semblance of what reality’s gonna look like I feel like this has been weeks of that crisis moment and we’re still not knowing kind of where we are and it’s it’s it’s a strange challenging thing to

2:33 deal with so there’s a there’s a concept in chemistry and physics called Delta which is change over timing it’s the symbol it’s the Greek symbol Delta which is the triangle but it means change over time and I think that when when we’re in periods they’re periods of your life that has like a greater Delta there’s

2:54 more change over time like the year from age five to six not super Delta right the year from age 15 to 16 maybe super Delta II right like you’re a very different person when you were 14 than you were when you’re 15 you’re a very different person when you’re 17 than you

3:15 are when you’re 16 you’re not as different a person from 7 to 8 right and so I think one of the things we’re all working with is this idea that there’s so much change happening so quickly it’s overwhelming and a lot of those changes are not small right they’re not they’re not like little things oh you know my you know I can’t they’re out of stop at

3:38 this one thing or I you know are my like things that used to bother me like they cancelled that performance that I was really looking forward to right it’s not single things it’s like lots of things I mean and some of the things are really interesting like the Supreme Court starting to livestream stuff that’s really

3:59 interesting some of the things are a little scarier like what kinds of freedoms do you have in a crisis and that’s kind of what we’re gonna talk about today our topic today our theme of the day is civil liberties in a crisis

4:19 and so one of the things that we’ve seen a lot of over the past couple of weeks has been these various protests happening across the world and specifically in the u.s. there have been protests about different kinds of things done in different ways in different states of different scales and how people are reacting to those protests and what what they’re saying

4:40 about the protests and to start us off the the the quote that kinda gets bandied around a lot the most is this this book is often attributed to Benjamin Franklin it’s me it’s miss attributed it’s not quoted exactly the way that it it was written where he said

5:03 so it was and Kirk can give us more context here but it was January 1775 he was part of the American delegation to Britain and at the end of their their their discussion he went he wrote a letter where he said something that became very famous which is they who can

5:24 give up Essential Liberty to obtain a temporary a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety and so I don’t bring this up to say that the things that are happening right now are are inappropriate or not what we should be doing but it’s our responsibility as

5:45 citizens and as people who care about liberty and civil liberties to start thinking about what the implications are and and what it means that our right to assemble has been restricted what it means that our right to certain kinds of privacy may be restricted in the future and how all of that again it’s our duty

6:07 that’s that’s the responsibility as part of being in a democratic republic as part of being someone who cares about individual freedom and the freedom of the of their neighbors and so we’re gonna start talking about that I think the place we always like to start with all of our episodes is with Kirk and giving us a little bit of historical context so I’m gonna hand it over to you

6:28 Kirk to kind of start walking us through some some ways we can frame this within the history of civil liberties in the u.s. sure and you know I think I think what you said is you know really important Rachel didya that vigilance and being you know paying attention to these these different things isn’t is it being

6:50 critical of them it’s just simply being oh man things are going very quickly here let me see if I can get this to share appropriately there we go so it’s it’s not about being it’s about it’s about paying attention to what’s going on and just making sure that we’re not blindly going forward with whatever may

7:13 be happening and I think it’s up to each one of us to be able to look at the information as we were talking about last week being critical consumers of information trying to parse out what we think on issues and in understanding that different people in a democracy are going to have different views in its the expression of those views on that and the healthy expression of those views

7:33 and the healthy voicing of different opinions that allows us as a society function appropriately and well and so I just wanted to take a couple minutes to talk about a few other crises in American history where these kinds of questions have come up one of the most famous is in 1860 on Abraham Lincoln is elected president and he comes into a

7:54 situation where because of his election in you know his views on slavery and there’s suddenly a rupture in state secede and you have a situation now where the country is fractured and we’re on the eve of civil war and Abraham Lincoln is trying to cobble together what he can and maintain some grip on

8:15 the nation and so he does some things on that people find extra-constitutional he suspends the Maryland legislature from operating I mean he arrests individuals particularly in Maryland it suspends their writ of habeas corpus habeas corpus means is Latin is bringing forth the body it means that you have the

8:36 right to be brought to trial and that evidence brought before you that evidentiary necessity is onerous on the government especially when they’re conducting a ward so Abraham Lincoln says we’re gonna suspend the writ of habeas corpus and we’re gonna arrest these people because Maryland was making moves to prevent Union troops from coming to Washington DC rightly or wrongly that’s the action

9:01 he took in the Constitution it’s stipulated that the writ of habeas corpus cannot be suspended accepting cases of rebellion he saw it as a case of rebellion it’s so suspended it one of the gentlemen Merryman who was arrested for this thought otherwise petitioned the Supreme Court for a written habeas corpus meaning he has to have evidence brought against him and

9:22 Roger B Tony was the Chief Justice said yes that needs to happen Abraham Lincoln said I’m not going to enforce that and use his simulation as commuter and chief not to enforce it and anyway kid was stalemate but this is still a hotly debated case over whether or not what took place here was right legal or just I mean I encourage you if you want to look more into it it’s a really

9:42 interesting one but the point here is that even within the suspension of the writ that discussion that takes place I think is really interesting and rich another famous one and this has actually been banned about a little bit I mean in the news lately is a case called Youngstown Sheet and tube company versus Sawyer from 1952 I’m here Harry Truman was concerned that there’s gonna be a

10:04 strike at steel mills and that that strike would put in danger the war effort that America was engaged in in Korea so he made a move to take over control and operate those steel mills as the federal government and there were serious concerns about whether or not the president had to be able to do that so the 6-3 decision hugo black waiting

10:27 for the majority said no the president cannot do that without congress stipulating that he’s allowed to do that so essentially it means that the legislature had to approve for the president to have those powers and then in that case ostensibly he would then be able to make that kind of a move in the case of emergency so highly both of these again to say these are both

10:47 moments in time where there was something outside of the ordinary taking place there are emergency situations and so the executive whose authority it is whose responsibility is to be the most in the words of our founders energetic and by that we mean effective and fast-acting part of our governmental

11:08 structure acts quickly to try to mitigate what they see as problems for sort of the the greater common good but you immediately see people questioning whether or not that’s appropriate whether or not these actions are appropriate I think the same things are happening now so I say that to say this protest movement that we’re seeing isn’t new and is a part of what happens

11:30 in our country because we are a country that is rooted on democracy deliberation we’re very protective of civil liberties as sort of an instinctive kind of a thing whether or not in these cases things have been appropriate or not I think we’ll get talked about for a long time to come I think we have many years of discussing whether or not these things that are that are unfolding and

11:50 happening in the steps of the government’s take it more appropriate but right now in the case of emergency executive authorities are doing what they think needs to be done in order to stem the control of this terrible pandemic that we’re experiencing and so we’ll leave it up to to time to be able to find out what that looks like but the interesting thing and the rich thing I

12:11 think about our sole discourse now is seeing these things unfold and watching the interplay between government and the people and how it is that each one works to try and check in and relate to to the other and I think that that’s that’s a great kind of call to action Kirk and

12:32 that’s that we we have we’re living this incredible Civic moment right that that and I talked about this with our teacher colleagues but also with my my friends who are young people that I’m Gary you maybe you have some context because you you have lived through some kind of civic crises you know being from New York and 9/11 but there’s there’s a

12:54 moment happening right now we’re kind of federalism you know civic instantly the right to civic institutions a sense of our rights to our civil liberties is much more present then I think it generally is and so that vigilance that we all have that

13:14 that we are responsible for is do as as citizens within a Democratic Republic is is heightened in a way I mean we’re just all a tune kind of to what’s going on and I think that that feeds into kind of what Bri is trying to do with the young people so I’m gonna turn it over to Gary

13:34 who it manages not only all of our teacher problems but all of our student programs as well including one of my favorite products that Bri yes so Gary go ahead sure no and you’re exactly right it’s weird to think of there being a normal course of business in our nation right I mean we’ve got millions and hundreds of millions of people and our day to day lives but

13:56 you’re right every once in a while there is an event or a development that highlights that normal course of business right and and what things and decisions were all making that are connections to each other I mean we’ve all lived through some some major things right if you’re of a certain age there there been huge events that have focused

14:17 everybody at one point to asking about these things and and I’m thinking a lot about how you Rachel were we’re talking about these ideas of safety and the ideas of liberty and and what Kirk was saying in terms of I mean even the phrase habeas corpus right this idea doing something in person well we value

14:39 each of these things individual and that’s something at Bri we talk about a lot and and when you’re learning about it sometimes it’s easy to think of values independently and just say yes I absolutely support these but then you’re right sometimes there are events that put values in either real or perceived

15:00 odds with each other and so we call these crises right a crisis truly is something that is affecting large amounts of people and that multiple sides each have incredible value so how do we decide to move forward and you’re right one of the ways that that we like to tackle this is to encourage students

15:22 to get involved with the discussion about other and say how do you weigh these decisions the the way that we do this online that everybody can jump in on something called think the vote let me say think the vote it very much says let’s take a look at what’s happening and see these important

15:42 values and if they are in conflict there there are the perception of more or less two sides but it’s far more complex than that so I’m backtracking to the main site here because this is an ongoing thing for students it’s for you the students it’s just think the vote.com pretty easy to remember and we update

16:04 this frequently every other week but I want to call your attention to and I have to lean over here because I can’t so the question that we have right now I is a really interesting one to me because it asks you to think about two conflicting values on the one side

16:24 public health public safety for that matter and in this particular case it does involve having people come together being closer than six feet apart or or or being in businesses or religious functions or whatever in terms of having people together on the other side is is

16:45 liberties your civil liberties and again an interesting and important thing about the situation we’re in is there’s individual rights and then group rights right and I individually might very much want something but society it’s really depending on a lot of people so this

17:05 question that that we’re posing to you is to say how do you explore these different things and to agree whether or not one supersedes or is is more important than or should be more adhered to than the other and we’re not saying one or the other is and that’s why it’s

17:26 it’s a question for you I mean on the one side there’s the the idea that coming together physically can be dangerous right now I don’t know I’m not a doctor but right now some of the policies are saying you know through through cleanliness through through being together through knowing who or it does or does not have exposure that’s a

17:47 very real concern but on the flip side there’s also the the fact that assemblies are are a value right so I mean even even the the right to assemble itself is something that is is a core value of ours and something really important and and first a function is a society coming together is

18:07 very very important but what happens when the coming together is the problem and the problem is not allowing to come together it gets very sort of muddled and but we don’t give up at that point right we say all right let’s see if we can sort through what do you think and what do others think and what are you

18:28 basing these on so normally I like to talk about observing what’s around you in journaling well in this case I really encourage you think think about the policies that are out there what is good now what is good for the future maybe maybe what’s important now is that gonna change how what would be the best advice

18:49 or recommendations you would give and the same thing for personal liberties or the liberties the freedoms that come together who gets to decide these things I mean when this was all starting a few weeks ago a few months ago who knows you know these decisions how are they being made and what will happen in the future

19:10 will they reverse eventually you know those decisions were an individual business how do you know when it’s okay to open how do you know when it’s okay to come back together um again you as you as a young person they you know what we know and you have the ability to research to find out more

19:30 so we really encourage that to happen and it’s just a really it’s just great to ask that question and to and to really consider values in relationship to each other absolutely and I think that that called action to do your research is is it’s for all of us no matter your age right I mean it’s it’s

19:51 that we have a lot to think about and and querque I’m sure you have many opinions on this but the kind of messiness that we’re seeing right now the kind of difficulty and kind of having clarity of what policies should be or can be is a feature of a Democratic Republic it’s so

20:11 that it can respond to the citizenry in a meaningful way but what that means is that we have to hold each other accountable we have to figure out ways to to to coordinate our different interests we have to do the research and make sure that we are we are knowing

20:33 what our responsibility is so we can hold other accountable to their responsibilities and luckily we live in the danger the age of the Internet where there are lots of resources for you to kind of poke around the internet and find help in parsing through some of this so I really like this article on

20:53 box box great articles but their journalism can be really strong and I found this article to be really helpful and again kind of showcases that it’s there’s a messiness unprecedented times mean unprecedented we don’t it’s never been the case that we’ve had this

21:14 coordinated response to a perceived material threat now that wasn’t external but then you also have interesting questions about how different technologies are impacting our protest ability our rights as defined in the

21:35 Constitution there was a lot of talk during these protests about whether or not States could censor the speech of the protesters by asking Facebook to remove the events and what Facebook’s responsibility was there that lots of

21:56 questions about what Facebook’s ourselves really is when it comes at a publishing platform is it is a journalism so there are lots of questions there but then there’s also you know this is not just happening here in the US right many Americans are willing to trade some civil liberties to combat the corona with come back around a virus you have a couple of really

22:17 Podcast that you can listen to you think about this isn’t only happening in the u.s. you can you can think globally about different responses just keep it perspective that different responses are different because the legal institutions are different in different countries you know Sweden and Germany have very different legal institutions than the US

22:38 do also population one of the things when we think about and Gary you taught world history so I’m sure this is something if you want to chime in on but what are the things we have to think about when comparing the u.s. to other countries responses what would you say some things to think about our yeah I mean exactly it’s a lot of it is context

22:58 difference this is a very unusual event because it’s not just happening to one country and so things to consider are exactly the the the knowledge of within a country of ways is dealt with problems before the decision-making is going to be very different in very different countries some are very centralized some

23:19 are very decentralized some have multiple parties some have different ways for for citizens to to vocalize or to have ideas some of different economic systems and so there are different things to consider and yet there’s a commonality among them so so you’re actually right context in the same way for those who watched earlier versions

23:40 of our shows different states have different contexts um you know it’s a little more extreme because imagine if each state had a completely different governmental structure right exactly so it’s going to be different so so the the transference of knowledge and such making is something you have to consider

24:01 when you’re looking at different things but same time we’re also all human so exactly and this was I thought this was a fascinating resource so this is the International Centre for nonprofit law they have a civic freedom global tracker that they’re updating which shows you if you’re curious about what what not only is the response in terms of civil

24:21 liberties within a particular country but what the underlying institutions are this is a really interesting place to just kind of explore and then and kind of what are the institutions that allow different countries to respond in different ways so I’m sure you’ve all seen images of the the protests here in the US well the

24:42 rolls which approaches other where other parts of the world where different institutions exist like lining up clearly according to social distance rules even though you’re in a protest so we are giving you a lot to think about in this very brief episode right early

25:02 again we are very interested in hearing from you what is it that you are thinking about doing seeing observing interested in let us know and we will incorporate it into one of our episodes we love hearing from the young people that are watching we know some classes are watching we know teachers are asking

25:24 students to think about some of the things that we’re talking about so we’d love to hear from you so please comment on our youtube channel or send us a tweet or Instagram posts or Instagram I am or post comments on your posts and we’ll we’re gonna continue doing this Kirk Gary does you have any kind of final thoughts thinking about this very complex issue of civil liberties no I

25:45 think go ahead go ahead Kirk I think I think complexity is the right it’s complex right neither these there’s a lot of things going on and that doesn’t mean you know as we’ve said on other things complex it doesn’t mean bad it just means there are a lot of ways to think about it there’s a lot of ways to approach it and that’s why it’s it’s important to be thoughtful and at the

26:07 core to really honor how does it other people’s perspectives are you know on the given situation what other people are thinking about what other people’s opinions are because in doing that that really creates an atmosphere in which we have really healthy honest conversation and deliberation which long-term I think helps get us all through crises just like this yeah and if I may add almost

26:31 every sort of big decision like this while complex is also there’s always a choice in there right there’s always your interaction with it so it even case what you choose to do whether that is to stay home that is a very important choice so there’s no such thing as not

26:52 doing something this is not a theoretical thing this is a very real day-to-day decision that you have to make because you are part of it and so it’s a really interesting to think why are you making decisions that you’re making end why are you advocating for or against things that you are advocating for McGann so it’s a really interesting non-academic sort of complexity right

27:15 it’s a it’s a real life day-to-day decision this Civic moment is for all of us we are all citizens of this experience and we’re all citizens of our communities going through this in a variety of ways it doesn’t matter our age and so we all have the responsibility to be aware and informed

27:36 and thoughtful about how we’re interacting and responding and reacting and so that’s that’s a big job but that’s that’s one of the that’s one of the I mean it’s an honor to have that opportunity to be an agent in our own experience right to be able to make decisions and take action and do our own

27:57 research there’s a lot of countries where that’s not the case so on that note go out there do the things that you think are best and and just make sure you’re really well informed person doing that so we’ll see you next time on bright and early thank you so much for joining us and we’ll talk to you soon bye-bye