Over at
NRO, I think about how to combine a unifying civic space with individual diversity:
One of the central (and persistent) themes of American public life
has been the reconciliation of diversity into a broader, unified
republic. Attempting to balance the interests of diverse states along
with the claims of a national union, the political doctrine of
federalism responds to the challenge of that reconciliation. The federal
Constitution (along with the various state constitutions) seeks to
maintain individual autonomy within a republic of laws that apply to all
through the combination of legislative energies and the recognition of
rights.
This enterprise of reconciliation also casts light on the
idea of equality in American society. Much of the American social
experiment can be understood as an exploration of the concept of equal
but not identical, a notion that balances between the assertion of
individual distinction and a sense of similarity across all
distinctions. We might rephrase “equal but not identical” as the belief
in some essential legal, civic, and natural equality in the face of
various particular inequalities. There are countless inequalities in
American society: Some pay more in taxes, some reap greater economic
benefits from the current social order than others, some receive certain
subsidies, some benefit from a strong family structure, some resent
their parents’ influences, and so on and so forth. But, in complement to
those inequalities, there remain certain common and equalizing
tendencies: Each citizen receives one vote, or the principle that each
person should have equal access to the legal system (and therefore the
protection of his or her rights), for example.
Read the rest
here.
