Ben Rhodes

And so I chose 15 speeches.

This is not an anthology, though.

This is meant to understand the thread of the arguments we've been having back since our founding.

J.D.

Vance has one answer.

We kind of begin the prologue with J.D.

Vance's answer.

I was just going to joke.

I don't do a J.D.

Vance speech, but he says—

he made this speech where he said, America is not a nation founded on a creed.

Oh, right, yes.

The Declaration of Independence is not the right way of thinking about what it means to be American.

And he basically gives the blood and soil argument, which is a kind of Christian nationalist argument.

We are defined by...

a certain kind of people that founded this country, white Christians, and were defined kind of by our use of power and American exceptionalism, right?

And counter to that is obviously the story of multiracial democracy and a nation that protects rights and a nation that is enriched by welcoming people from other parts of the world.

And those two stories, I kind of want to trace the argument between them throughout our history.

I begin at the founding.

Benjamin Franklin gave this extraordinary speech at the Constitutional Convention that was about compromises.