Status Updates From The Greatest Sentence Ever ...

A Note on Type

This book is set in Adobe Caslon type, which is known for its elegance, dignity, and legibility. It is based on a type face created in 1722 by the preeminent, London punch-cutter and type-maker William Caslon. Benjamin Franklin imported Caslon‘s type for his print shop in Philadelphia and chose it for the first printing of the Declaration of Independence.

To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
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He has combined with other others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign into our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; given his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
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For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our Governments:

The Declaration of Independence
In Congress, July 4, 1776

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security…and is such now the necessity which constraints them to alter their former Systems of Government.

From the Virginia Declaration of Rights, June 1776

That no free government, or the blessings of liberty, can be preserved to any people, but by a firm adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, frugality, and virtue, and by frequent recurrence to fundamental principles.

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From Rousseau’s “The Social Contract”, 1762

Filtering out the essentials, the social compact comes down to this: Each of us puts his person and all his power in common under the supreme direction of the general will, and, in our corporate capacity, we receive each member as an indivisible part of the whole.

From Rousseau’s “The Social Contract”, 1762

Since no man has a natural authority over his fellow, and force creates no right, we are left with agreements as the basis for all legitimate authority among men.

That’s the ideal of common ground and the American Dream that our founders fought for 250 years ago. And that’s what we must continue to fight for today so that we can preserve, for ourselves and our posterity, the rights and aspirations that we all share, including to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

He bequeathed a revolving loan fund for young people to start enterprises. He donated to the building funds of each and every church in Philadelphia, and he helped lead the fundraising for a new hall that would provide a pulpit to visiting preachers of any belief….So when he died, 20,000 mourners watched his funeral procession, which was led by all the clergymen of every faith…walking arm-in-arm.
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In short, we can try to be more like Franklin. He not only helped craft the sentence that defines our common ground. He lived it. He organized police, fire, and street sweeping corps; a public library, hospital, and school; a widows’ pension fund and a mutual insurance cooperative. He ran a newspaper that was dedicated to publishing a wide variety of opinions and following no party line.
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And when it comes to our media and our daily discourse, how can we create news outlets, social media platforms, civil discussions, personal conversations, algorithms, and chatbots that seek to connect us to our common ground rather than inflaming resentments, engaging us through enraging us, and harvesting clicks through sensationalism?
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In an era without universal military service, what institutions can instill a sense of shared patriotic service across class lines? What policies can help give every kid an equal opportunity?

One way is by reflecting on our fundamental principles, the ones proclaimed in the Declaration’s great sentence. Take any issue: healthcare, housing, schools, zoning, or whatever else is being debated around the dinner table or at City Hall or in Congress. What policies and attitudes can we adopt, what balances can we strike, that will strengthen our common ground and the American Dream?

Going Forward
As Franklin pointed out, our life-or-death challenge as a nation, whether it be 1776 or 2026, is this: When there are so many forces dedicated to dividing us, how can we best hang together?

A good, stable society where individuals can be free and flourish and live together in harmony. That requires nurturing the sense that we share common rights, common grounds, common truths, and common aspirations. Democracy depends on this.
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Given the resentment and polarization that afflict us today, Franklin‘s wisdom should lead us to ask a basic question: What is the purpose of an economy? To increase wealth? Yes, that’s good. Growth? Yes, also good. But the purpose of an economy is also something deeper. Its purpose is to also create a good society.
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[Benjamin] Franklin correctly saw the danger of creating a meritocratic aristocracy... He aimed at what he called “true merit“, which he defined as “an inclination joined with an ability to serve mankind, one’s country, friends and family, which… should indeed be the great aim and end of all learning.“
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Eighty percent of kids born in 1950 would go on to earn more, in inflation adjusted dollars, then their parents had. But for kids born in the 1980s, there was less than a fifty percent chance of achieving the same financial success as their parents. Less than fifty percent. No wonder there was resentment and populist backlash.
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Most problematic, it led to an economy, where people could no longer believe that their kids would be better off than they were. It used to be easy for Americans to climb the economic ladder.
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It created an economy where people could buy a flatscreen television,very cheaply at Walmart on a Sunday night. But on Monday morning, they were no longer able to take the bus to a job at a local factory. Their grandparents, on a single income, could have a house, a car, and two or three kids. But they can’t even afford a house.
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The approach of raking an elite from the rubbish and dismissing the residue did not turn out well. The entrenchment of a meritocratic elite came at the expense of community and the American Dream. The globalized economic system increased wealth, especially for the elite, but it reduced opportunities for those who used to have secure working-class jobs.
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Jefferson would have understood the trend toward a meritocratic elite. He favored creating what he called a “natural aristocracy“… a school system in which “the best geniuses [would be] selected, and continued six years, and the residue dismissed. By this means twenty of the best geniuses will be raked from the rubbish annually and instructed at the public expense.”
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These policies also led to the rise of the meritocratic elite in America based on educational credentials. The economy and its rewards were geared to those who went to college; the 62% who never finished college ended up feeling resentful, or were made to feel it was their own fault that they were left behind.
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For the past 40 years, we pursued economic policies based on a consensus belief in free trade, free markets, free movement of capital, and free movement of people. These policies were, for the most part, intended to fuel economic growth, and in that regard they succeeded. They led to a fast-growing globalized economy that produced more overall wealth and consumer goods.
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The same has happened with media and information and ideas. We go to our different cul-de-sac online, dive down different rabbit holes on the Internet, listen to different ends of the talk radio dial, and let algorithms turn your social media feeds into echo chambers. The technology that promised to connect us, found a better business model and dividing us.
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In America these days, we have a lot of goods and services that we put in the commons, including libraries and national defense, police and fire departments, road…schools... But there has also been a process of enclosure that has been eroding our common ground. The philosopher, Michael Sandel calls this the “skyboxification” of America, whereby places and practices that used to be in commons are now roped off.

Most of our political debates these days are over which goods … should be provided for, at least to some extent, in commons. It requires balance.

Franklin and Jefferson understood balance. …. Their goal on contentious issues was not to triumph but to find the right balance, an art that has been lost today. Compromisers may not make great heroes, Franklin liked to say, but they do make great democracies.
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The same principal holds today in a free market system that allows the accumulation of great wealth. In making sure there remains, as Locke said, enough in the commons, we not only show our moral compassion to others less fortunate, we also nurture the social bonds that temper resentments, political, polarization, and populist backlash.
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But in doing so, we should keep in mind the moral and practical value of the commons. Back in feudal times, the existence of common grounds, those things to which everyone had the same rights, helped stabilize a society with disparities of wealth by giving people a stake in the social order.
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