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Progress comes from supporting community-based, multiracial democracy
Jul 24, 2024
Nowlin, who served on the board of the Surdna Foundation, advises family foundations as the principal of KDN Philanthropy Consulting. Riley is the executive director and secretary of the board of trustees of the Rx Foundation.
Many of us have spent our philanthropic careers devoted to making tangible change on issues — health care, climate, economic security and more — but have seen limited progress or even years of work rolled back as democracy slips. A collective commitment to supporting a community-based, multiracial democratic practice is needed to sustain it. In light of this, the grant-making community faces a big and admittedly daunting task.
Democracy is the system that creates pathways for people to act collectively, to hold leaders and institutions accountable and to fight for the change they want to see in the world. We need to think beyond tactics that yield only short-term wins, to our role in supporting communities so that they can set their own priorities, innovate on strategy and deliver on a long-term vision for change on the issues that affect their daily lives.
Fortunately, the essential work of shifting philanthropic practice toward supporting democratic systems is already well underway. A re-energized focus on community organizing is disrupting the status quo and creating the conditions for an inclusive multiracial democracy that can withstand the significant challenges of our time. The foundation of this theory is as old as humankind: the importance of relationships.
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It’s the connections that people make with each other that build a sense of agency in individuals, create a feeling of collective power, and enable people to wield their power together to make life better and bring about the kind of world they want to live in.
We are part of a learning and funding collective, the Democracy & Power Innovation Fund, that is in its fifth year of learning directly alongside and from frontline community leaders and organizers. The lessons learned collaboratively from this work can help to guide philanthropy's role in bolstering the understanding, theory and practice of community power-building. In this work together, we are guided by four core beliefs:
1. Support locally led groups in building their ability to organize and wield power.
Independent, state-based groups, many with young Black or Latino leadership, are showing that change is possible through democratic practice. For example, it took more than a decade, but LUCHA in Arizona proved it can turn new and infrequent voters into long-term participants in the democratic process. Together, they have stopped anti-immigrant legislation and passed ballot initiatives to increase the minimum wage and provide sick leave, end predatory collection practices on medical debt, and provide in-state college tuition for undocumented students — wins that are making a huge difference in the lives of everyday people.
What keeps LUCHA grounded is the listening sessions the group did with 1,700 of its members. The members were not simply polled and then dismissed. They were invited to meetings at other members’ homes for food and conversation and to share stories that became LUCHA’s People First Economy agenda. Then, LUCHA invited people to actually lead the campaign work that was necessary to advance that agenda as volunteer leaders.
2. Support experimentation and learning to improve strategy and practice. Funders need to expand our understanding and use of metrics, moving away from what is easiest to count and toward co-defining what is meaningful for impact.
In evaluating civic engagement programs, some in philanthropy have borrowed the metrics of the political industry — that is, numbers of door knocks, digital impressions, headcounts at rallies and so forth. While numbers are important, a focus solely on numbers leads funders to overlook other measures that are defined and leveraged by frontline groups.
The experience of the Ohio Organizing Collaborative is a case in point. In 2016 and 2018, this independent power-building organization registered more people to vote than the state political parties. Despite this stunning accomplishment, OCC’s co-executive directors felt they were not winning actual material change for everyday Ohioans, including their young and Black constituents. They studied how organizers were spending their time and decided to redirect their energy toward bringing in more volunteers, developing the leadership of those volunteers, and deepening the relationships and the commitments members made with each other.
This experimentation allowed OOC to build the power of its membership. In the years that followed, they helped win significant victories on police reform, school funding, maternal health, child care and democracy reforms. The group continues to punch above its weight — and continues to achieve impressive numbers in reaching new and infrequent voters across the state. Relationships and friends-and-family organizing are the key: In the month leading up to the 2022 elections, one family in Cincinnati recruited more than 1,000 volunteers who made sure that more than 20,000 people were registered and voted.
3. Support unrestricted, multi-year funding that spans off-election years. Democratic systems and practices must be nurtured every year, whether a major election is coming up or not.
Many in philanthropy support civic engagement, voting rights and get-out-the-vote efforts in election years, then cease this funding in non-election years. Art Reyes III of We the People in Michigan calls this approach “building sandcastles.” He states: “Boom-and-bust funding creates transient campaigns that are not sturdy. They're not ours. And they're very easily washed away after election day.”
One example of this core belief in practice is Voces de la Frontera in Wisconsin, which builds the leadership of Latino and immigrant workers in rural areas year-round, including dairy workers, meat packing workers and other essential workers. Among other things, Voces provides worker safety trainings, citizenship and ESL classes, and trains super volunteers, known as voceros, who advocate for workers and help people who are eligible to register and vote.
By offering services and mutual aid, voceros build trust and relationships, which make it possible for folks in this community to have each other’s backs when it comes time for collective action and fighting for change. These efforts require resources year-round, particularly in off-election years when grassroots groups can place more focus on capacity-building, relational strategies, as well as rest, replenishment and well-being.
4. Be curious about the diversity of needs, values and worldviews within Black, Latino, Asian American, Pacific Islander and Native communities.
For decades, the civic engagement industry has been endlessly curious about white voters (e.g., suburban soccer moms, NASCAR dads) and their worldviews. But very little research has been done to understand people of color and the values and mindsets that drive their political engagement. Black, Latino, AAPI and Native people have been targeted to benefit the political industry for someone else’s power, rather than agents who need to be understood and engaged to support their perspectives and collective power.
Right now, state-based power-building groups are working with national researchers, including Katrina Gamble of Sojourn Strategies and Terrance Woodbury of HIT Strategies, to conduct first-of-its-kind research that is allowing them to understand Black voters and the diversity of their values and political motivations. These learnings will enable frontline groups to build data-informed programs to reach different segments or values clusters of Black voters through relational, year-round organizing, and innovations in door-to-door canvassing that include urban and rural settings.
Earlier phases of this research found a direct correlation between a Black person’s feelings of power and their level of civic engagement, including voting. As the researchers explained, “When Black people feel powerful, they vote. When they feel powerless, they don’t.” Similar values research is necessary across all communities of color, if we are serious about prioritizing multiracial democratic practice.
No sector can meet the moment our country faces alone, but no sector can shrink from its responsibility. Philanthropy has an important role to play in promoting, supporting and realizing the goal of a community-based, multiracial democratic practice. If member- and relationship-based community organizations have the resources to build and sustain a multiracial democracy, more progress can be made on the issues at the center of our philanthropic missions.
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We can’t amend 'We the People' but 'we' do need a constitutional reboot
Jul 24, 2024
LaRue writes at Structure Matters. He is former deputy director of the Eisenhower Institute and of the American Society of International Law.
The following article was accepted for publication prior to the attempted assassination attempt of Donald Trump. Both the author and the editors determined no changes were necessary.
The roots of many contemporary political problems can be found in the Constitution. Its institutions are creaky, and rights that are new or threatened need anchors.
But the roots of these problems also extend to the people and principles beneath the structures and rights secured by the Constitution. Sure, changing term lengths across all three branches of government or advancing voting rights are worthy amendment topics. It is critical, however, that we re-embrace the fundamental role we citizens have.
This is why “We the People” — the heart of the Constitution — matter most. We are still the ones who elect our representatives, senators (after the 17th Amendment in 1913) and the president (sort of, via the Electoral College).
The framers weren’t flawless, but they deserve credit for creating a government that confronts how bad humans can be. The separation of powers, checks and balances, and federalism may be frustrating, but they prevent power from being consolidated and more easily abused, a risk the framers knew would be perpetual.
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Paradoxically, they also understood that our public officials must be good — virtuous, as they asserted repeatedly — if our democracy is to work as intended. Yet we citizens remain the only ones who can put malignant or malicious perpetrators into office. Can we reduce this complementary risk? Yes, with these four steps:
First, vote. But don’t stop there. A constitutional democracy asks more of us, particularly in the 21st century, when performative partisanship, misinformation and disinformation prevail. Foreign policy expert Richard Haass called our deteriorating civic life the greatest security threat facing the nation. In “The Bill of Obligations,” he described 10 “habits of good citizens” that each of us can do to strengthen America, including staying informed, getting involved, valuing norms and supporting civics education. Our “[c]ollective identity” he said, “is a matter of teaching, not biology.”
Second, dial back the animosity toward those with whom we disagree.It’s an old saw, and easier said than done, but disagreeing agreeably is as necessary as it is laudable. We need to remind our representatives to rediscover this lost art, too. That means changing their incentives from appealing to a narrow, primary electoral base while restoring their constitutional role of bargaining, negotiation and compromise. Yuval Levin clarifies in his latest book, “American Covenant,” how a diverse nation must use this fundamental, Madisonian approach to govern itself. He also emphasizes that national unity is less about what we think and more about what we do.
Third, refresh our appreciation for the full range of principles expressed in our constitutional structure, which might best be accomplished by reading “The Pursuit of Happiness” by the National Constitution Center’s president, Jeffrey Rosen. The philosophies and values beneath the service, citizenship and representation that shaped the founders’ thinking when they crafted the Constitution are considered classical for a reason; in Rosen’s hands, they come alive. He vibrantly shows how the founders tapped the work of great thinkers, from Cicero and Epictetus to Hume and Locke, to conceive the nation’s constitutional design. Their perspectives on restraint, moderation, humility and other traits are surprisingly resonant for re-anchoring our public morals today.
Lastly, recognize that we are all reformers, whether active or passive. As the artist Georgia O’Keeffe said in 1981, reflecting on moving to and living in northwestern New Mexico, “When you start making a home, it is difficult to stop changing it, imagining it different.”
It may be trite to equate our government or nation with a residence, and odder still to do so by citing an introverted artist. But few analogies work better. We are individually and collectively building and living in a home called America. We may disagree about small matters, say a paint color, or large matters, perhaps a renovation. But we need to agree about the largest matters, such as fixing leaky roofs, broken door hinges and cracked foundations.
And then there is how we treat those residing in the other rooms. Suggesting that “We the People” need a civic reboot is not a slur against any or all of us; it simply places us where we belong — at the center of our country, our government, our home — and evokes our responsibility of “imagining it different.” The cyclical waves or spirals that bring change don’t happen unless we use our imagination.
So keep at it, America. O’Keeffe captured the essence of human striving to better our world. Perhaps more than her artwork, her civic wisdom can inspire us all.
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The Supreme Court and the rule of law
Jul 24, 2024
Rikleen is executive director ofLawyers Defending American Democracy and the editor of “Her Honor – Stories of Challenge and Triumph from Women Judges.”
Events are now occurring at a breathtaking pace that leaves us in a perpetual cycle of breaking news and ramped-up emotions. Yet, within this maelstrom, our north star must be the rule of law — and protecting it when endangered.
The rule of law is endangered when a presidential candidate is nearly assassinated at his own rally by a 20-year-old armed with a semi-automatic rifle, whose accuracy killed a father shielding his family. It is further endangered by those who use this tragedy for political advantage, casting blame in the absence of a known motive as to why an unstable young man with access to a gun wreaked havoc on the country.
Each time the rule of law is weakened, our country becomes further at risk.
The very foundation of the rule of law rests on the public’s trust and confidence in our justice system. In the past two weeks, that confidence and trust has been shaken to its core. After another term featuring a series of sweeping decisions demonstrating broad judicial overreach, the Supreme Court has now demonstrated that the public can no longer place its trust and confidence in this court’s decisions.
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In its most recent departure from the norms and principles that have guided the court historically, the radical Roberts majority decided that a president is essentially immune from prosecution. In a decision that went much further than it needed to go, but not far enough to provide any guidance for the lower courts, the majority abandoned a fundamental principle that courts must decide the facts that are before it, not the facts that judges and justices want.
Instead, Chief Justice John Roberts crafted a decision to match the majority’s ideology, which is extreme.
It is a misnomer to refer to the Roberts majority as conservative, as commentators often do. This country has lived through courts that expressed both traditionally liberal and traditionally conservative ideologies for decades. Rather, the Roberts majority represents an extreme viewpoint that violates centuries of constitutional principles in its decisions.
The court’s decisions have also done a disservice to the vast majority of lower federal court judges who daily seek to uphold the ideals of our justice system in a reasoned framework, based on precedent and the facts before them.
And that leads to the decision by one lower court judge who has embraced the openings that the Supreme Court created to issue rulings — or otherwise fail to do so – when it suited an agenda. After slow-walking the classified documents criminal case against former President Donald Trump for more than a year, Judge Aileen Cannon has now dismissed it entirely.
In doing so, Cannon has finally succeeded in what has seemed to have been her goal from the outset: Delay the case and deny any effort to seek justice. Of particular significance in her written ruling, Cannon cites several times Justice Clarence Thomas’ concurrence in the presidential immunity case in which he mused that special counsel Jack Smith’s appointment violated the law — an invitation for future litigation that even the radical majority did not include in its decision.
In effect, Thomas set forth a dispiriting call to which Cannon eagerly responded, leaving the rule of law in tatters.
Cannon has now earned her reputation as a radical who, like the Roberts majority, has continually demonstrated adherence to an ideological agenda that is at odds with principles of the rule of law.
None of us, however, can take time for lamenting. We cannot be a bystander to the dismantling of the rule of law and our democratic institutions.
Instead, we must ensure that our justice system survives these difficult times. There are organizations that need your talents, community forums that need your ideas, and myriad ways to serve as a convener and participant in civil discourse that can help reverse the current threats.
We have no other choice but to join together and save the rule of law. The risk is too real for us to think someone else will do the job.
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Project 2025: A C-SPAN interview
Jul 24, 2024
Beau Breslin, a regular contributor to The Fulcrum, was recently interviewed on C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal” about Project 2025.
Breslin is the Joseph C. Palamountain Jr. Chair of Political Science at Skidmore College and author of “A Constitution for the Living: Imagining How Five Generations of Americans Would Rewrite the Nation’s Fundamental Law.” He writes “A Republic, if we can keep it,” a Fulcrum series to assist American citizens on the bumpy road ahead this election year. By highlighting components, principles and stories of the Constitution, Breslin hopes to remind us that the American political experiment remains, in the words of Alexander Hamilton, the “most interesting in the world.”
Most recently Breslin has also contributed to The Fulcrum’s 30-part series offering a nonpartisan counter to Project 2025, a conservative guideline to reforming government and policymaking during a second Trump administration. The Fulcrum's cross-partisan analysis of Project 2025 relies on unbiased critical thinking, reexamines outdated assumptions, and uses reason, scientific evidence, and data in analyzing and critiquing Project 2025.
While an in-depth analysis of what works and doesn't work in our democracy is a laudable and much-needed task, unfortunately Project 2025 is a biased political report designed to build a case for conservative solutions. The Fulcrum believes that a version of Project 2025 approached from a cross-partisan perspective, void of pre-determined left or right solutions, would serve as a guide for citizens and our elected representatives to ensure the healthy democratic republic we all desire.
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Breslin’s interview on C SPAN offered an in-depth overview of the 990-page Project 2025 report and is a much-needed scholarly analysis of the Heritage Foundation’s comprehensive, far-reaching proposal.
In the interview, Breslin discusses the many controversial components of Project 2025, including its neo-isolationist and Christian nationalist temperament. He also discusses what Project 2025 would mean for America and how it promotes a degree of social, racial and religious intolerance. Callers to the show examined topics ranging from foreign aid to DEI policies, the proposed closing of the Department of Education and the reasons former President Donald rump might want to distance himself from the project. Consistent with the mission of The Fulcrum, Breslin tries to find common ground in a polarized and difficult political environment.
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Singer/songwriter Candace Asher
Presenting 'This Country Tis of Thee'
Jul 23, 2024
As we approach another presidential election, less than 120 days away, uncivil, dysfunctional behaviors continue to divide the nation. Each side blaming the other is never going to unite us.
As the rancor and divide between Americans increases, we need to stop focusing on our differences. The Fulcrum underscores the imperative that we find the common bonds of our humanity — those can, do and must bind us together.
There are many examples in the American Songbook that brought folks together in previous times of great strife and discord, including “Imagine,” “Heal the World,” “Love Can Build a Bridge,” “The Great Divide” and, of course, “We Are the World.”
Presently, as political rhetoric and divisiveness grow worse than ever, The Fulcrum is offering a series featuring songs that we hope will unite us as a nation and remind us that our country stands on the founding premise that “We the People” can rise above divisiveness and gamesmanship. We will be featuring new songs that can inspire each of us to do our part and move our great nation forward, standing united.
The success of democracy rests on our abilities to harness the tensions of the day as we approach our differences as opportunities to learn and discover how to work together. This is the only way Americans will be able to fulfill our Constitution’s promise — namely the inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. For all.
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To kick off the series, we’re featuring a new song in support of democracy by New York/Nashville recording artist/songwriter Candace Asher. It’s called “This Country Tis of Thee.” Asher is internationally and critically acclaimed for several top five hits and airplay in 12 countries during the early 2000s. Then, in 2021, she charted from home mid-pandemic with an independent No. 1 song called “Don’t Lose Heart.”
In support of her self-titled debut CD on Germany’s Taxim Records, Asher’s soulful Americana-pop-country blend took her all across Europe. Now, The Fulcrum is excited to support her artistry here in the United States. We hope you’ll enjoy “This Country Tis of Thee.” David L. Nevins, co-publisher of The Fulcrum, co-wrote the song’s lyrics. Mark Schaffel produced all the tracks and, together with Asher and Nevins, produced the video headed to Youtube.
A consummate survivor, Asher always encourages friends and fans to keep pushing onward through life’s tough times. She describes life as a healing journey. She believes people not only deserve to work hard to make it in life, but that they also deserve to love what they do so they can enjoy their life journey. Not easy.
Nevins was taken by Asher’s voice, lyrics and music in her racial-justice song “Don’t Judge a Heart by its Color,” written about a knifepoint rape that she survived. Before long, Asher and Nevins began co-writing “This Country Tis of Thee” late 2023. Says Asher: “Working on this tune with David meant the world to me. We both wanted to capture the importance of this profound American moment — one that we all must responsibly seize. It’s arguably the presidential election that’ll define this nation’s future.”
Morris Effron and Brian Clancy, co-founders of Citizen Connect (which, like The Fulcrum is a project of the Bridge Alliance), listened to the song. Their reaction:
“‘This Country Tis of Thee’ calls out to every American to express their patriotism through positive action. Don’t sit on the sidelines: Don’t wait to get started. Find what a better American means to you and help make it a reality. This song’s call to action is the reason Citizen Connect exists.”
America has always been an exceptional country — for many reasons. From the outset its citizens saw themselves as participants in an experiment that would have implications for all of humankind. The journey that is the United States of America began 248 years ago with the motto e pluribus unum; out of many, we are one. In order for this motto to remain America’s foundational premise, “We the People” must become actively involved.
The lyrics to “This Country Tis of Thee” are Asher and Nevins’ call to action:
We are a nation trying to heal herself
We’re a nation who is we.
We’re a nation who has to make tough choices now
To remain the land of the free
We all hear the call from sea to signing sea
But leave it up to someone else to lead the way
When in fact it is up to each and one of us.
That’s the real American way
So what will you do? - What will you say ?
What stand will you take -- get started today
In each one of our dreams there is something we are trying to reach.
We must save this Democracy cause this country tis of thee.
Please listen to “This Country Tis of Thee” and let us know your thoughts.
This Country Tis of Theewww.youtube.com
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