As America prepares to mark its 250th anniversary on Saturday, historian Andrew Shankman says the moment offers a chance to revisit the country’s founding principles and how they apply to today’s democracy.
Shankman, the History Department chairman at Rutgers University’s Camden campus and president-elect of the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic, is helping lead the Civics Exchange, an initiative that connects scholars with libraries, schools, museums and civic groups across the country.
The project is designed to help people better understand the Constitution, the rule of law, separation of powers and the basic functions of government at a time of deep political polarization and public cynicism.
“Awareness of this growing sense of cynicism is one of the things that sparked us to try to create this initiative,” Shankman said in an interview with NJ Spotlight News.
One key idea behind the U.S. founding was “a government of laws and not of men.” That means government should be shaped not by the interests of particular people, but by shared principles that apply to everyone.
The Civic Exchange’s goal is not merely to lecture, but also to create conversations about how American institutions were formed and why they matter.
“One of the things that we’re trying to do is suggest that there are ways to, in fact, become more engaged and thoughtfully informed about the big questions that people are arguing about right now,” he said.
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