In his new book, “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution,” Professor Turley examines the meaning and future of democracy on the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution.
The first part looks back at the unique confluence of people and events that led to the founding of the American republic.
The second part looks forward, examining whether the American Republic can survive in the 21st century due to changes ranging from artificial intelligence to robotics to global governance systems.
Turley believes that the American republic is uniquely suited to meet those challenges, but it will require a restoration, not a rejection, of the fundamental values that defined the American Revolution.
Like Saturn, the Revolution eats its children. Those words of journalist Jacques Mallet du Pan during the French Revolution referred to the Roman god Saturn, Kronos in Greek. Kronos tried to disprove his mother’s prophecy that one of her children would be overthrown by pride at their birth. When his son Zeus was born, Kronos’ friend, Rhea, decided to trick him by wrapping a stone in a blanket and giving it to him to eat. Then he hid Zeus in Crete. When he grew up, Zeus returned and, fulfilling the prophecy, defeated his father.
The story of Kronos had obvious meaning for Mallet du Pan, who watched in horror as the French Revolution devoured first its noble enemies and then its supporters. It is a story played out over and over in history as ambition turns to activism, activism to extremism, and extremism to tyranny. Call it the Saturn gene. We are all children of Saturn with an innate impulse that resides within each of us: the power of all mortals to become monsters.
Saturn’s lesson will be raised in the American Revolution by none other than Thomas Paine. Long before Jefferson put pen to paper on the Declaration of Independence, it was Paine who would speak of natural and indisputable rights as the foundation of the American Revolution. It was Paine, in his pamphlet “Common Sense,” who made the case for “independence.” It was Paine who also saw firsthand, the ability of revolution to consume itself.
Paine would play a key role in two revolutions that took markedly different paths in America and France. Among the best-known figures of the American Revolution, only the Marquis de Lafayette can make the same claim.
Paine learned the dangers of uncontrolled government the hard way. It nearly killed him in France. He would learn that what had been lost in Paris was exactly what he had left behind in Philadelphia – a system that could channel enormous political and economic pressures into a stable republic.
We are also living in revolutionary times. They are not just old-fashioned protests where governments are overthrown but rather protests that can change countries from within. We refer to the Industrial Revolution and the Information Revolution to reflect the revolutionary changes they brought to society. Often those new realities cause political changes that oppose the government. The 21st century has seen the acceleration of new technologies such as artificial intelligence reshaping all aspects of human life.
These changes will not only redefine the workplace but also the place of citizens in society as a whole. The question is whether American democracy can survive in the 21st century or collapse under the same forces of democratic oppression that destroyed the people of that time. It is the unfinished story of the American Revolution.
Thomas Paine saw this near Paris at the height of the French Revolution. He had been among those early voices among the French Jacobins who welcomed the abolition of constitutional protections in favor of the “general will.” Saturn’s endless desire seized the liberators.
For Paine, the final collapse of his ideals came in December 1793. He had just been stripped of his position in the French National Convention by a vote of no confidence. As he watched the carnage in Paris, Paine cried to his friend, “Well, France, you have spoiled the state of the revolution which was well begun, and destroyed those who produced it.”
The long-awaited knock on his bedroom door came on December 28. There were five police officers and two representatives of the dreaded General Security Committee. When they were asked about the case, they backed down. Such details now meant nothing in France.
It will not be democratic intentions but poor ventilation that can save Paine from joining his decapitated comrades in Paris. After opening the door to let more air into the cell, the guards missed a chalk mark that explained that he and his accomplice had been killed. Paine will soon leave the Palais du Luxembourg as the Terror ends with the death of Robespierre.
Paine was an imperfect man, a man who often seemed intent on finding his end under a log or a bottle. It’s a miracle that the crown or cirrhosis didn’t end his life earlier. But few could show his courage and strength in pursuing “his principles unto death.” He is still today, as he was then, a person who is easy to admire from afar.
If American democracy is to survive the 21st century, it must, once again, break the cycle of Saturn. The country – and the world – is facing profound economic and social changes. The causes may be different in the form of robots or AI, but the challenge remains the same in maintaining political stability in an era of economic turmoil and class divisions, living wages and social divisions. The answers can be found in what happened 250 years ago and how dynamic pressure evolved from Madison’s system. We are witnessing a convergence of dynamic and adverse economic conditions developing in this century due to changes in technology and the workplace.
In the United States, political divisions have deepened and violence has increased. At the same time, the country is facing what could be the most significant economic changes since the Industrial Revolution with the expansion of robotics, AI, increased undocumented immigration and increased wealth inequality. After the last industrial revolution, social unrest and migration were followed by political instability. However, the great increase in production and wealth eventually brought prosperity to this and other nations. It is not clear that new economic and technological developments will produce the same economic benefits for the middle class, let alone the lower class. We are already seeing signs of political disillusionment as influential people join the call for radical changes to the constitution and institutions of the United States.
The thought that the Constitution can, once again, survive this time of chaos and uncertainty is a dangerous conceit. The coming storm will further test a system that has lost important political and academic allies.
In the last 10 years, we have seen radical voices on the left and right destroy the traditions and protections of democracy in order to achieve rapid change. It seems that if “democracy is in danger,” even democratic norms can be sacrificed to save it. There are growing calls among academics to radically reform our constitutional and political systems. In a New York Times column titled “The Constitution Is Broken and Shouldn’t Be Restored,” Harvard law professor Ryan D. Doerfler and Yale law professor Samuel Moyn called for the Constitution to be “dramatically changed” to “return America to constitutional rule.” Georgetown University law professor Rosa Brooks warned the public not to become “slaves” to the Constitution if they stand in the way of real change. Berkeley Dean Erwin Chemerinsky is the author of a book titled “No Democracy Lasts Forever: How the Constitution Threatens the United States.”
In May 2024, I was working on this book when I suddenly felt drawn to the pages of my research. The crowd outside was shouting, “Guillotine! Guillotine! Guillotine!” Those words were not recited on the Place de la Concorde in Paris but on the quad of George Washington University in Washington, DC. I was literally working on a story from the French Revolution when it seemed like the French Revolution had come to me. The students held a mock trial against the university president, prosecutor, board of directors and others for their refusal to comply with their demands in the anti-Israel protest. As they camped for weeks in the yard near my law school office, the students chanted, “Get off their heads” and “Go to mother’s stake.” No one really expected the drums to roll down Pennsylvania Avenue. The students were venting and teasing the management. But the mock trial created a “what if” moment, considering we might ever resort to such madness. It came at a time when the protests became more intense and sometimes violent. There was also noise in the protest of Jan. 6 in Congress when the crowd broke into the Capitol. On that fateful day, someone else impaled Vice President Mike Pence. After Trump was reelected, left-wing protesters brought guillotines to Capitol Hill during the inauguration and during recent protests. This is not the first time that carvings or display poles have been used to express anger in our history. We have survived all times because of the constitutional system that was not created for good times but for bad times that come with democracy. However, even though we have the most successful and stable constitutional system in history, there is still that time. The passing doubt of whether the routine can survive the morning, survive the times we live in, weighs us down.
Most of the voices today are just old-fashioned, calling for a direct democratic revolution and attacking the limits of the constitution by “common will.” They are the rising class of American Jacobins, emerging capitalist revolutionaries who stand out against the status quo and constitutional values. A mob cannot be controlled by a politician if it can be on his opponents. The problem is crowd control where today’s rebels are tomorrow’s answers. They are part of an anti-constitutional movement that includes academics and politicians. Most of these figures are not calling for violence but are fueling anger and demanding fundamental change in our system of government. It is the same dangerous game, as shown by the French Jacobins who found themselves hunted by the very mob they empowered and encouraged.
We will continue to allow violence, greed and insanity when circumstances produce anger instead of reason. Some of those conditions are growing in the 21st century. But the true story of democracy is one of hope. It is a shared hope that binds many of the figures in this book to humanity’s promise to become something greater as people than we are as individuals. For Paine and French, it was the fulfillment of the “common will.” For Madison and the inventors, it was freedom that would usher in a golden age. It is the hope of all immigrants who come to these seas in search of a future of their own making. We are not bound by generations in the country but the kind of ideas that were established in freedom.
We are bound by the belief that we have the potential to be something great. So we ask the same question of the 18th century Frenchman, “What then is an American?” The answer is found at the time of creation, when people are defined by “certain inalienable rights, including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” It is seen in imperfect people an insatiable curiosity, a bottle opener who refuses to be stopped by new opportunities. We are bound by the revolutionary idea that government exists to allow every citizen to pursue their own foreseeable future. As Paine pointed out, we are our greatest creatures. What was true in 1776 is true today: These are revolutionary times, but we are still a revolutionary people.
