Repeating decimal as infinite geometric series

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.590 --> 00:00:05.360
Let's say we have the
repeating decimal 0.4008,

00:00:05.360 --> 00:00:08.475
where the digits 4008
keep on repeating.

00:00:08.475 --> 00:00:09.850
So if we were to
write it out, it

00:00:09.850 --> 00:00:11.141
would look something like this.

00:00:11.141 --> 00:00:19.790
0.400840084008, and it
keeps on going forever.

00:00:19.790 --> 00:00:22.070
What I want you to do right
now is pause the video

00:00:22.070 --> 00:00:23.778
and think about whether
you can represent

00:00:23.778 --> 00:00:26.250
this repeating decimal
as an infinite sum,

00:00:26.250 --> 00:00:27.880
as an infinite series.

00:00:27.880 --> 00:00:30.770
And then think about
whether that infinite series

00:00:30.770 --> 00:00:33.554
is a geometric series.

00:00:33.554 --> 00:00:35.220
So I'm assuming you've
given a go at it.

00:00:35.220 --> 00:00:36.840
So let's think about it.

00:00:36.840 --> 00:00:39.500
So for each term of
my infinite series,

00:00:39.500 --> 00:00:42.310
I'm going to represent one
of these repeating patterns

00:00:42.310 --> 00:00:44.210
of 4008.

00:00:44.210 --> 00:00:50.570
So, for example, I will make
this 4008 my first term.

00:00:50.570 --> 00:00:52.460
So this could be viewed as 0.

00:00:52.460 --> 00:00:58.060
And this 4008 represents 0.4008.

00:00:58.060 --> 00:01:01.860
Then I could make this
4008 my next term,

00:01:01.860 --> 00:01:06.760
or my next term will
represent this 4008.

00:01:06.760 --> 00:01:15.130
And this 4008 is the
same thing as 0.00004008.

00:01:15.130 --> 00:01:19.140
And then this next
4008, well, that

00:01:19.140 --> 00:01:22.200
represents 0 point-- and
we have eight zeroes--

00:01:22.200 --> 00:01:30.380
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6,
7, 8, 4008, 4008.

00:01:30.380 --> 00:01:33.259
And then we would just keep
on going like that forever.

00:01:33.259 --> 00:01:35.550
So we're just going to keep
on going like that forever.

00:01:35.550 --> 00:01:38.490
So hopefully there's
a pattern here.

00:01:38.490 --> 00:01:41.560
We're essentially throwing
four zeroes before the decimal

00:01:41.560 --> 00:01:42.880
every time.

00:01:42.880 --> 00:01:45.026
And we can just keep on
going like that forever.

00:01:45.026 --> 00:01:46.150
So this is an infinite sum.

00:01:46.150 --> 00:01:47.750
It's an infinite series.

00:01:47.750 --> 00:01:51.770
The next question is, is
this a geometric series?

00:01:51.770 --> 00:01:53.750
Well, in order for it to
be a geometric series,

00:01:53.750 --> 00:01:55.290
to go from one term
to the next, you

00:01:55.290 --> 00:01:57.450
must be multiplying
by the same value,

00:01:57.450 --> 00:01:59.810
by the same common ratio.

00:01:59.810 --> 00:02:04.420
So what are we multiplying when
we go from 0.4008 to this one

00:02:04.420 --> 00:02:08.120
right over here, where we add
four zeros before the 4008?

00:02:08.120 --> 00:02:09.960
What are we multiplying?

00:02:09.960 --> 00:02:12.490
Well, we moved the decimal
four spots to the left.

00:02:12.490 --> 00:02:15.230
So we're multiplying by
10 to the negative fourth.

00:02:15.230 --> 00:02:16.980
Or you could view it
as we're multiplying

00:02:16.980 --> 00:02:24.581
by 0.0001, 10 to the
negative 1, 2, 3, 4.

00:02:24.581 --> 00:02:26.330
To go from here to
here, well, same thing.

00:02:26.330 --> 00:02:28.820
Move the decimal four
places to the left.

00:02:28.820 --> 00:02:34.331
So once again, we're
multiplying by 0.0001.

00:02:34.331 --> 00:02:35.830
And so it looks
pretty clear that we

00:02:35.830 --> 00:02:39.540
have a common ratio of 10 to
the negative fourth power.

00:02:39.540 --> 00:02:42.750
So we can rewrite
all of this business

00:02:42.750 --> 00:02:51.180
as 0.4008 times our common
ratio for this first term

00:02:51.180 --> 00:02:54.980
times our common ratio of
10 to the negative fourth

00:02:54.980 --> 00:02:57.310
to the 0-th power--
so that gives us

00:02:57.310 --> 00:03:05.040
that right over there--
plus 0.4008 times 10

00:03:05.040 --> 00:03:07.840
to the negative fourth
to the first power.

00:03:07.840 --> 00:03:10.560
And that gives us that
value right over there.

00:03:10.560 --> 00:03:19.900
Plus 0.4008 times 10 to the
negative 4 to the second power.

00:03:19.900 --> 00:03:20.885
And we keep on going.

00:03:20.885 --> 00:03:23.010
And so in this form, it
looks a little bit clearer,

00:03:23.010 --> 00:03:26.400
like a geometric series, an
infinite geometric series.

00:03:26.400 --> 00:03:29.150
And if we wanted to write
that out with sigma notation,

00:03:29.150 --> 00:03:33.510
we could write this
as the sum from k

00:03:33.510 --> 00:03:37.825
equals 0 to infinity
of, well, what's

00:03:37.825 --> 00:03:38.950
our first term going to be?

00:03:38.950 --> 00:03:49.981
It's going to be 0.4008
times our common ratio, which

00:03:49.981 --> 00:03:52.230
we could write out as either
10 to the negative fourth

00:03:52.230 --> 00:03:54.290
or 0.0001.

00:03:54.290 --> 00:03:56.450
I'll just write it as 10
to the negative fourth.

00:03:56.450 --> 00:04:02.120
10 to the negative fourth to the
k-th power, to the k-th power.

00:04:02.120 --> 00:04:03.910
So the next
interesting question--

00:04:03.910 --> 00:04:07.980
this clearly can be represented
as a geometric series--

00:04:07.980 --> 00:04:09.064
is, well, what is the sum?

00:04:09.064 --> 00:04:10.646
You might say, well,
that's just going

00:04:10.646 --> 00:04:12.280
to be 4008 repeating
over and over.

00:04:12.280 --> 00:04:14.220
But I want to express
it as a fraction.

00:04:14.220 --> 00:04:15.936
And so I want you
to pause the video.

00:04:15.936 --> 00:04:17.810
Use what would you
already know about finding

00:04:17.810 --> 00:04:20.269
the sum of an infinite
geometric series

00:04:20.269 --> 00:04:24.390
to try to express this thing
right over here as a fraction.

00:04:24.390 --> 00:04:26.960
So I'm assuming
you've had a go at it.

00:04:26.960 --> 00:04:28.480
So let's think about it.

00:04:28.480 --> 00:04:29.930
We've already
seen, we've already

00:04:29.930 --> 00:04:32.140
derived in previous
videos, that the sum

00:04:32.140 --> 00:04:34.240
of an infinite
geometric series--

00:04:34.240 --> 00:04:35.880
let me do this in
a neutral color.

00:04:35.880 --> 00:04:41.620
If I have a series like this,
k equals 0 to infinity of ar

00:04:41.620 --> 00:04:47.500
to the k power, that this sum
is going to be equal to a over 1

00:04:47.500 --> 00:04:48.720
minus r.

00:04:48.720 --> 00:04:51.360
We've derived this actually
in several other videos.

00:04:51.360 --> 00:04:54.040
So in this case, this
is going to be-- well,

00:04:54.040 --> 00:04:59.480
our a here is 0.4008.

00:04:59.480 --> 00:05:06.590
And it's going to be that over 1
minus our common ratio, minus--

00:05:06.590 --> 00:05:14.500
and I'll write it like this--
0.0001, 1 ten thousandth.

00:05:14.500 --> 00:05:16.040
So what's this going to be?

00:05:16.040 --> 00:05:21.240
Well, this is going to be
the same thing as 0.4008.

00:05:21.240 --> 00:05:24.250
If you take 1 minus
1 ten thousandths,

00:05:24.250 --> 00:05:27.545
or you could do this as
10,000 ten thousandths minus 1

00:05:27.545 --> 00:05:42.177
ten thousandth, you're going
to have 9,999 ten thousandths.

00:05:42.177 --> 00:05:44.260
Once again, you could
view-- let me write this out

00:05:44.260 --> 00:05:45.790
just so this doesn't
look confusing.

00:05:45.790 --> 00:05:50.770
1 is the same thing
as 10,000/10,000.

00:05:50.770 --> 00:05:55.150
And you're subtracting 1/10,000.

00:05:55.150 --> 00:06:00.520
And so you're going
to get 9,999/10,000.

00:06:00.520 --> 00:06:03.760
And so this is going
to be the same thing

00:06:03.760 --> 00:06:09.690
as 0.4008 times 10,000.

00:06:09.690 --> 00:06:17.880
So times 10,000 over 9,999.

00:06:17.880 --> 00:06:20.460
Well, what's this top
number times 10,000?

00:06:20.460 --> 00:06:23.870
Well that's just going
to give us 4,008.

00:06:23.870 --> 00:06:31.500
4,008 over 9,999.

00:06:31.500 --> 00:06:33.600
And we've just expressed
that repeating decimal

00:06:33.600 --> 00:06:34.860
as a fraction.

00:06:34.860 --> 00:06:35.740
So we have succeeded.

00:06:35.740 --> 00:06:38.400
And you might say, well, maybe
we can simplify this thing.

00:06:38.400 --> 00:06:39.907
And so let's see.

00:06:39.907 --> 00:06:41.740
This is already a
fraction, so we've already

00:06:41.740 --> 00:06:42.640
kind of achieved it.

00:06:42.640 --> 00:06:44.500
But if we want to get
a little bit simpler.

00:06:44.500 --> 00:06:46.930
Let's see, if we add the
digits up here, 4 plus 8 is 12

00:06:46.930 --> 00:06:48.170
and 1 plus 2 is 3.

00:06:48.170 --> 00:06:50.360
So this up here
is divisible by 3.

00:06:50.360 --> 00:06:53.150
And this down here is
clearly divisible by 3.

00:06:53.150 --> 00:06:55.090
So let's divide
both of them by 3.

00:06:55.090 --> 00:06:58.860
So 3 goes into
4,008-- let's see.

00:06:58.860 --> 00:07:03.780
It goes into 4 one time,
subtract, you get a 10.

00:07:03.780 --> 00:07:06.000
3 times 3 is 9.

00:07:06.000 --> 00:07:08.720
Subtract, you get another 10.

00:07:08.720 --> 00:07:09.980
Goes into 3 times.

00:07:09.980 --> 00:07:11.480
3 times 3 is 9.

00:07:11.480 --> 00:07:12.550
Subtract.

00:07:12.550 --> 00:07:13.740
Bring down an 8.

00:07:13.740 --> 00:07:16.550
3 into 18 exactly six times.

00:07:16.550 --> 00:07:20.760
So our numerator is 1,336.

00:07:20.760 --> 00:07:22.770
This is no longer
divisible by 3.

00:07:22.770 --> 00:07:25.270
The sum of the digits
is not divisible by 3,

00:07:25.270 --> 00:07:27.090
it's not a multiple of 3.

00:07:27.090 --> 00:07:34.760
And if you divide this bottom
number by 3, you get 3,333.

00:07:34.760 --> 00:07:37.180
And I think we
have simplified it.

00:07:37.180 --> 00:07:41.150
I think we can simplified
it about as well as we can.

00:07:41.150 --> 00:07:42.470
Well, we could check more.

00:07:42.470 --> 00:07:43.600
Let me know if I didn't.

00:07:43.600 --> 00:07:46.290
But either way, we
have now written this.

00:07:46.290 --> 00:07:47.240
This was pretty neat.

00:07:47.240 --> 00:07:48.924
We saw that a
repeating decimal can

00:07:48.924 --> 00:07:50.840
be represented not just
as an infinite series,

00:07:50.840 --> 00:07:53.040
but as an infinite
geometric series.

00:07:53.040 --> 00:07:55.440
And then we were able to use
the formula that we derived

00:07:55.440 --> 00:07:57.650
for the sum of an
infinite geometric series

00:07:57.650 --> 00:08:00.840
to actually express
it as a fraction.


Sum of an infinite geometric series

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.740 --> 00:00:03.010
In a previous video,
we derived the formula

00:00:03.010 --> 00:00:06.160
for the sum of a
finite geometric series

00:00:06.160 --> 00:00:10.510
where a is the first term
and r is our common ratio.

00:00:10.510 --> 00:00:12.220
What I want to do
in this video is now

00:00:12.220 --> 00:00:16.030
think about the sum of an
infinite geometric series.

00:00:16.030 --> 00:00:19.900
And I've always found this
mildly mind blowing because,

00:00:19.900 --> 00:00:22.660
or actually more than mildly
mind blowing, because you're

00:00:22.660 --> 00:00:25.160
taking the sum of an infinite
things but as we see,

00:00:25.160 --> 00:00:27.550
you can actually
get a finite value

00:00:27.550 --> 00:00:30.580
depending on what
your common ratio is.

00:00:30.580 --> 00:00:32.980
So there's a couple of
ways to think about it.

00:00:32.980 --> 00:00:35.170
One is, you could
say that the sum

00:00:35.170 --> 00:00:37.350
of an infinite
geometric series is just

00:00:37.350 --> 00:00:41.230
a limit of this as n
approaches infinity.

00:00:41.230 --> 00:00:45.950
So we could say,
what is the limit

00:00:45.950 --> 00:00:53.690
as n approaches infinity of
this business, of the sum from k

00:00:53.690 --> 00:01:04.069
equals zero to n of
a times r to the k.

00:01:04.069 --> 00:01:06.110
Which would be the same
thing as taking the limit

00:01:06.110 --> 00:01:08.560
as n approaches infinity
right over here.

00:01:08.560 --> 00:01:12.410
So that would be the
same thing as the limit

00:01:12.410 --> 00:01:16.440
as n approaches infinity
of all of this business.

00:01:16.440 --> 00:01:17.940
Let me just copy
and paste that so I

00:01:17.940 --> 00:01:20.070
don't have to keep
switching colors.

00:01:20.070 --> 00:01:23.430
So copy and then paste.

00:01:23.430 --> 00:01:26.141
So what's the limit as n
approaches infinity here?

00:01:26.141 --> 00:01:27.640
Let's think about
that for a second.

00:01:27.640 --> 00:01:28.820
I encourage you to
pause the video,

00:01:28.820 --> 00:01:30.220
and I'll give you one hint.

00:01:30.220 --> 00:01:33.000
Think about it for r
is greater than one,

00:01:33.000 --> 00:01:35.244
for r is equal to
one, and actually

00:01:35.244 --> 00:01:36.660
let me make it
clear-- let's think

00:01:36.660 --> 00:01:39.900
about it for the absolute
values of r is greater than one,

00:01:39.900 --> 00:01:42.450
the absolute values
of r equal to one,

00:01:42.450 --> 00:01:47.180
and then the absolute
value of r less than one.

00:01:47.180 --> 00:01:49.250
Well, I'm assuming
you've given a go at it.

00:01:49.250 --> 00:01:55.210
So if the absolute value
of r is greater than one,

00:01:55.210 --> 00:01:59.660
as this exponent explodes,
as it approaches infinity,

00:01:59.660 --> 00:02:02.040
this number is just going
to become massively,

00:02:02.040 --> 00:02:03.560
massively huge.

00:02:03.560 --> 00:02:05.570
And so the whole thing
is just going to become,

00:02:05.570 --> 00:02:07.240
or at least you could
think of the absolute value

00:02:07.240 --> 00:02:08.615
of the whole thing,
is just going

00:02:08.615 --> 00:02:10.690
to become a very, very,
very large number.

00:02:10.690 --> 00:02:14.350
If r was equal to one,
then the denominator

00:02:14.350 --> 00:02:16.190
is going to become zero.

00:02:16.190 --> 00:02:18.480
And we're going to be
dividing by that denominator,

00:02:18.480 --> 00:02:20.930
and this formula
just breaks down.

00:02:20.930 --> 00:02:22.680
But where this formula
can be helpful,

00:02:22.680 --> 00:02:25.700
and where we can get
this to actually give us

00:02:25.700 --> 00:02:29.390
a sensical result, is when
the absolute value of r

00:02:29.390 --> 00:02:31.811
is between zero and one.

00:02:31.811 --> 00:02:33.560
We've already talked
about, we're not even

00:02:33.560 --> 00:02:35.309
dealing with the
geometric, we're not even

00:02:35.309 --> 00:02:38.570
talking about a geometric
series if r is equal to zero.

00:02:38.570 --> 00:02:43.400
So let's think about the case
where the absolute value of r

00:02:43.400 --> 00:02:47.260
is greater than zero,
and it is less than one.

00:02:47.260 --> 00:02:49.410
What's going to
happen in that case?

00:02:49.410 --> 00:02:52.820
Well, the denominator is going
to make sense, right over here.

00:02:52.820 --> 00:02:55.960
And then up here,
what's going to happen?

00:02:55.960 --> 00:02:58.640
Well, if you take something
with an absolute value

00:02:58.640 --> 00:03:02.960
less than one, and you take it
to higher and higher and higher

00:03:02.960 --> 00:03:05.650
exponents, every time you
multiply it by itself,

00:03:05.650 --> 00:03:09.410
you're going to get a number
with a smaller absolute value.

00:03:09.410 --> 00:03:12.210
So this term right over
here, this entire term,

00:03:12.210 --> 00:03:15.860
is going to go to zero
as n approaches infinity.

00:03:15.860 --> 00:03:16.970
Imagine if r was 1/2.

00:03:16.970 --> 00:03:18.970
You're talking about 1/2
to the hundredth power,

00:03:18.970 --> 00:03:21.420
1/2 to the thousandth power,
1/2 to the millionth power,

00:03:21.420 --> 00:03:22.880
1/2 to the billionth power.

00:03:22.880 --> 00:03:25.300
That quickly approaches zero.

00:03:25.300 --> 00:03:28.340
So this goes to zero if
the absolute value of r

00:03:28.340 --> 00:03:30.390
is less than one.

00:03:30.390 --> 00:03:38.370
So this, we could argue, would
be equal to a over one minus r.

00:03:42.900 --> 00:03:46.450
So for example, if I had
the geometric series,

00:03:46.450 --> 00:03:49.070
if I had the infinite
geometric series--

00:03:49.070 --> 00:03:50.400
let's just have a simple one.

00:03:50.400 --> 00:03:52.470
Let's say that my
first term is one,

00:03:52.470 --> 00:03:57.150
and then each successive term
I'm going to multiply by 1/3.

00:03:57.150 --> 00:04:07.680
So it's one plus 1/3
plus 1/3 squared plus 1/3

00:04:07.680 --> 00:04:12.620
to the third plus, and I were
to just keep on going forever.

00:04:12.620 --> 00:04:15.292
This is telling us that that
sum, this infinite sum--

00:04:15.292 --> 00:04:17.000
I have an infinite
number of terms here--

00:04:17.000 --> 00:04:19.779
this is a pretty
fascinating concept here--

00:04:19.779 --> 00:04:21.054
will come out to this.

00:04:21.054 --> 00:04:27.020
It's going to be my
first term, one, over one

00:04:27.020 --> 00:04:29.560
minus my common ratio.

00:04:29.560 --> 00:04:32.160
My common ratio in
this case is 1/3.

00:04:32.160 --> 00:04:37.260
One minus 1/3, which is the
same thing as one over 2/3,

00:04:37.260 --> 00:04:41.630
which is equal to 3/2, or you
could view it as one and 1/2.

00:04:41.630 --> 00:04:44.733
That's a mildly amazing thing.


Vertical distance of bouncing ball

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.830 --> 00:00:03.060
Let's say that we have
a ball that we dropped

00:00:03.060 --> 00:00:06.780
from a height of 10
meters, and every time it

00:00:06.780 --> 00:00:11.380
bounces it goes half as
high as the previous bounce.

00:00:11.380 --> 00:00:14.100
So for example, you
drop it from 10 meters.

00:00:14.100 --> 00:00:18.010
The next time its peak height
is going to be at 5 meters.

00:00:18.010 --> 00:00:21.050
So the next time around,
on the next bounce,

00:00:21.050 --> 00:00:23.220
let me draw in that
same orange color.

00:00:23.220 --> 00:00:27.700
And the next bounce the ball
is going to go 5 meters.

00:00:27.700 --> 00:00:32.720
This distance right over
here is going to be 5 meters.

00:00:32.720 --> 00:00:35.450
And then the bounce after that
is going to be half as high.

00:00:35.450 --> 00:00:39.500
So it's going to go
2 and 1/2 meters.

00:00:39.500 --> 00:00:43.120
And it's just going
to keep doing that.

00:00:43.120 --> 00:00:46.440
So it's going to go 2 and
1/2 meters right over here.

00:00:46.440 --> 00:00:48.740
And what I want to think
about in this video

00:00:48.740 --> 00:00:53.660
is what is the total vertical
distance that the ball travels?

00:00:53.660 --> 00:00:55.600
So let's think about
that a little bit.

00:00:55.600 --> 00:01:00.630
So it's first going to travel
10 meters straight down.

00:01:00.630 --> 00:01:04.530
So it's going to travel
10 meters just like that,

00:01:04.530 --> 00:01:07.990
and then it's going to travel
half of 10 meters twice.

00:01:07.990 --> 00:01:12.970
It's going to go up 5
meters, up half of 10 meters,

00:01:12.970 --> 00:01:15.140
and then down half of 10 meters.

00:01:20.230 --> 00:01:22.630
Let me put it this way.

00:01:22.630 --> 00:01:26.872
So each of these is
going to be 10 meters.

00:01:26.872 --> 00:01:28.830
Actually, I don't have
to write the units here.

00:01:28.830 --> 00:01:30.603
Let me take the
units out of the way.

00:01:30.603 --> 00:01:33.890
Let me write that clear.

00:01:33.890 --> 00:01:35.960
So the first bounce,
once again, it

00:01:35.960 --> 00:01:37.910
goes straight down 10 meters.

00:01:37.910 --> 00:01:45.150
Then on the next bounce it's
going to go up 10 times 1/2.

00:01:45.150 --> 00:01:49.451
And then it's going to
go down 10 times 1/2.

00:01:49.451 --> 00:01:51.700
Notice we just care about
the total vertical distance.

00:01:51.700 --> 00:01:53.310
We don't care about
the direction.

00:01:53.310 --> 00:01:56.760
So it's going to go up 10
times 1/2, up 5 meters,

00:01:56.760 --> 00:01:58.540
and then it's going
to go down 5 meters.

00:01:58.540 --> 00:02:02.260
So it's going to travel a total
vertical distance of 10 meters,

00:02:02.260 --> 00:02:04.200
5 up and 5 down.

00:02:04.200 --> 00:02:08.340
Now what about on this jump, or
on this bounce, I should say.

00:02:08.340 --> 00:02:11.230
Well here it's going to go
half as far as it went there.

00:02:11.230 --> 00:02:19.750
So it's going to go 10 times 1/2
squared up, and then 10 times

00:02:19.750 --> 00:02:24.710
1/2 squared down.

00:02:24.710 --> 00:02:27.210
And I think you
see a pattern here.

00:02:27.210 --> 00:02:29.870
This looks an awful lot
like a geometric series,

00:02:29.870 --> 00:02:31.150
an infinite geometric series.

00:02:31.150 --> 00:02:35.030
It's going to just keep on going
like that forever and ever.

00:02:35.030 --> 00:02:38.220
So let's try to clean this
up a little bit so it looks

00:02:38.220 --> 00:02:42.030
a little bit more like a
traditional geometric series.

00:02:42.030 --> 00:02:43.930
So if we were to simplify
this a little bit

00:02:43.930 --> 00:02:49.635
we could rewrite
this as 10 plus 20.

00:02:52.770 --> 00:03:00.340
20 times 1/2 to the first power,
plus 10 1/2 times 1/2 squared

00:03:00.340 --> 00:03:06.590
plus 10 times 1/2 squared
is going to be 20 times 1/2

00:03:06.590 --> 00:03:09.550
squared, and we'll just
keep on going on and on.

00:03:09.550 --> 00:03:11.820
So this would be a
little bit clearer

00:03:11.820 --> 00:03:14.100
if this were a 20
right over here.

00:03:14.100 --> 00:03:15.350
But we could do that.

00:03:18.300 --> 00:03:23.610
We could write 10 as
negative 10 plus 20,

00:03:23.610 --> 00:03:27.820
and then we have plus all of
this stuff right over here.

00:03:27.820 --> 00:03:31.590
Let me just copy and paste that.

00:03:31.590 --> 00:03:35.570
So plus all of this
right over here.

00:03:35.570 --> 00:03:37.420
And we can even
write this first.

00:03:37.420 --> 00:03:40.170
We can even write this 20
right over here is 20 times

00:03:40.170 --> 00:03:47.840
1/2 to the 0 power
plus all of this.

00:03:47.840 --> 00:03:49.690
So now it very
clearly looks like

00:03:49.690 --> 00:03:51.480
an infinite geometric series.

00:03:51.480 --> 00:03:53.850
We can write our entire
sum, and maybe I'll

00:03:53.850 --> 00:03:56.410
write it up here since I don't
want to lose the diagram.

00:03:56.410 --> 00:03:58.970
We could write it
as negative 10.

00:03:58.970 --> 00:04:01.590
That's that negative
10 right over here.

00:04:01.590 --> 00:04:06.790
Plus the sum from
k is equal to 0

00:04:06.790 --> 00:04:18.959
to infinity of 20 times our
common ratio to the k-th power.

00:04:18.959 --> 00:04:21.029
So what's this going to be?

00:04:21.029 --> 00:04:23.120
What's this going
to turn out to be?

00:04:23.120 --> 00:04:25.380
Well we've already
derived in multiple videos

00:04:25.380 --> 00:04:29.480
already here that the sum of an
infinite geometric series, so

00:04:29.480 --> 00:04:33.780
the sum from k equals 0
to infinity of a times

00:04:33.780 --> 00:04:38.050
r to the k is equal
to a over 1 minus r.

00:04:38.050 --> 00:04:39.887
So we just apply
that right over here.

00:04:39.887 --> 00:04:41.470
This business right
over here is going

00:04:41.470 --> 00:04:46.570
to be equal to 20
over 1 minus 1/2,

00:04:46.570 --> 00:04:50.300
which is the same
thing as 20 over 1/2,

00:04:50.300 --> 00:04:54.440
which is the same thing
as 20 times 2, or 40.

00:04:54.440 --> 00:04:58.580
So what's the total vertical
distance that our ball travels?

00:04:58.580 --> 00:05:02.410
It's going to be negative
10 plus 40, which

00:05:02.410 --> 00:05:05.450
is equal to 30 meters.

00:05:05.450 --> 00:05:10.000
Our total vertical distance that
the ball travels is 30 meters.


Birth of the US Constitution

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.553 --> 00:00:04.336
Male 1: The whole period
of the American Revolution

00:00:04.336 --> 00:00:06.534
and the establishment of the
country, of the government,

00:00:06.534 --> 00:00:09.532
can get very muddled in people's minds.

00:00:09.532 --> 00:00:11.280
What I was hoping we
could cover in this video

00:00:11.280 --> 00:00:14.335
is unmuddle that, separate out the events

00:00:14.335 --> 00:00:16.135
and see how they all fit together.

00:00:16.135 --> 00:00:18.537
Male 2: Let's start in 1775 because that's

00:00:18.537 --> 00:00:20.866
when the rebellion really
begins. That's when

00:00:20.866 --> 00:00:23.412
you have the Battles of
Lexington and Concord

00:00:23.412 --> 00:00:25.869
and Paul Revere riding
to say that the British

00:00:25.869 --> 00:00:28.808
are coming. They started to rebel against

00:00:28.808 --> 00:00:31.783
the taxes that Parliament
has but on us. They're

00:00:31.783 --> 00:00:34.467
not quite clear what the
rebellion is all about,

00:00:34.467 --> 00:00:36.190
especially those people
who aren't up there in

00:00:36.190 --> 00:00:38.138
Massachusetts where the
rebels are happening.

00:00:38.138 --> 00:00:41.952
By 1776, that's when they
write the Declaration

00:00:41.952 --> 00:00:43.773
that says here's what we're doing.

00:00:43.773 --> 00:00:45.020
We're fighting a war of independence

00:00:45.020 --> 00:00:48.203
and "let facts be submitted
to a candid world,"

00:00:48.203 --> 00:00:50.948
here's why we're doing it.

00:00:50.948 --> 00:00:54.685
Then you get, you're fighting
the war, it's really not

00:00:54.685 --> 00:01:00.069
until 1781 that we win the
war. Around that period,

00:01:00.069 --> 00:01:04.599
between 1776 and 1781,
they've drafted this thing

00:01:04.599 --> 00:01:08.727
called the Articles of
Confederation. It's sort of

00:01:08.727 --> 00:01:12.396
rules by which the States
are going to get together

00:01:12.396 --> 00:01:16.013
and govern themselves. But
it doesn't really create

00:01:16.013 --> 00:01:19.663
a new nation. It's
really just a federation

00:01:19.663 --> 00:01:20.661
of the separate states.

00:01:20.661 --> 00:01:22.264
Male 1: This is really around this idea

00:01:22.264 --> 00:01:25.359
the Declaration of
Independence is really, look,

00:01:25.359 --> 00:01:28.264
we're already essentially
at war. This is why.

00:01:28.264 --> 00:01:29.925
This is articulating why we're at war,

00:01:29.925 --> 00:01:33.139
what we actually believe in,
but that didn't establish

00:01:33.139 --> 00:01:35.061
a government, it didn't
actually talk about

00:01:35.061 --> 00:01:36.813
what kind of government it would be,

00:01:36.813 --> 00:01:38.522
how it would govern
itself, so the Articles

00:01:38.522 --> 00:01:40.935
were really this first
attempt at saying, well,

00:01:40.935 --> 00:01:42.549
assuming that we're able to win this war

00:01:42.549 --> 00:01:45.230
of independence, how do we set up?

00:01:45.230 --> 00:01:47.659
Male 2: Right. What they were during this

00:01:47.659 --> 00:01:51.416
war of independence
were 13 separate states.

00:01:51.416 --> 00:01:54.583
They didn't really think
of themselves as one

00:01:54.583 --> 00:01:56.454
new nation. Some people did. Ben Franklin

00:01:56.454 --> 00:01:59.922
and others thought we
should really be a union

00:01:59.922 --> 00:02:02.919
of one nation, but when
they get together to do

00:02:02.919 --> 00:02:05.257
the Articles of
Confederation, really starting

00:02:05.257 --> 00:02:08.515
right after the Declaration
is signed in 1776,

00:02:08.515 --> 00:02:13.255
they finish writing it
in 1777, they write a

00:02:13.255 --> 00:02:16.585
pretty uninspiring document that just says

00:02:16.585 --> 00:02:18.917
we're from a whole lot of separate states

00:02:18.917 --> 00:02:22.516
and we're going to get
together a bit and be a union

00:02:22.516 --> 00:02:24.193
of theses States, but
we're not going to give

00:02:24.193 --> 00:02:26.333
ourselves many powers as one government.

00:02:26.333 --> 00:02:27.988
Male 1: Yeah, we have
it right here. Actually,

00:02:27.988 --> 00:02:29.888
I'd never seen it before
this conversation.

00:02:29.888 --> 00:02:31.194
I've obviously read about it when I was in

00:02:31.194 --> 00:02:35.101
history class, but "To
all to whom these presents

00:02:35.101 --> 00:02:37.523
"shall come, we the
undersigned Delegates of the

00:02:37.523 --> 00:02:40.249
"States affix to our names send greeting."

00:02:40.249 --> 00:02:41.719
Male 2: Oh, I mean it's like something

00:02:41.719 --> 00:02:44.039
written by a bad template.

00:02:44.039 --> 00:02:45.989
Male 1: To whom it may concern! (laughs)

00:02:45.989 --> 00:02:48.392
Male 2: It's not an inspiring document

00:02:48.392 --> 00:02:51.124
and it gives no power
to a central government.

00:02:51.124 --> 00:02:54.034
As you say, it's the
Delegates of the States.

00:02:54.034 --> 00:02:56.199
They "affix our names"
to this and it's the

00:02:56.199 --> 00:02:58.459
Articles of Confederation
and Perpetual Union

00:02:58.459 --> 00:03:01.734
between these States.
One of the main things

00:03:01.734 --> 00:03:06.326
they fail to do is give
the central government any

00:03:06.326 --> 00:03:10.517
taxation power. So really
it's up to the States

00:03:10.517 --> 00:03:14.053
to tax, and then this
Congress that's meeting,

00:03:14.053 --> 00:03:16.477
based on the Articles
of Confederation, tries

00:03:16.477 --> 00:03:19.390
to beg each one of the
States, hey, requisition

00:03:19.390 --> 00:03:21.475
us a little bit of
money so we can continue

00:03:21.475 --> 00:03:22.588
our business.

00:03:22.588 --> 00:03:24.564
Male 1: The Federal,
the central government,

00:03:24.564 --> 00:03:26.473
does not directly, there's
no Federal income tax,

00:03:26.473 --> 00:03:28.901
or not any tax of any
kind, not even any kind of

00:03:28.901 --> 00:03:31.105
tax. The States can tax
in whatever way they

00:03:31.105 --> 00:03:33.989
see fit and then they
have to give something.

00:03:33.989 --> 00:03:36.641
Male 2: What's kind of
amusing is we win the

00:03:36.641 --> 00:03:40.392
Revolution in the Battle of
Yorktown. That's in 1781.

00:03:40.392 --> 00:03:43.472
A messenger comes riding
into New York where

00:03:43.472 --> 00:03:46.395
this Congress has been
meeting, it sort of floats

00:03:46.395 --> 00:03:49.788
from city to city, and
gives them all the details

00:03:49.788 --> 00:03:51.988
and they don't even
have enough money to pay

00:03:51.988 --> 00:03:53.658
the messenger. They have to reach in their

00:03:53.658 --> 00:03:56.183
pockets to do it. So you
have this sort of poorly

00:03:56.183 --> 00:03:59.389
written document called the
Articles of Confederation,

00:03:59.389 --> 00:04:03.257
that seems to make a
confederation of States,

00:04:03.257 --> 00:04:05.151
meaning we're going to
gather together but we're

00:04:05.151 --> 00:04:07.322
going to have our own
separate powers and doesn't

00:04:07.322 --> 00:04:10.477
given any taxation
powers. You have a kind of

00:04:10.477 --> 00:04:12.190
messy governance structure.

00:04:12.190 --> 00:04:14.325
Male 1: It's obviously
not a perfect analogy,

00:04:14.325 --> 00:04:16.481
but if we take analogy
to present-day, it's

00:04:16.481 --> 00:04:18.665
kind of what's happening
in Europe where there's

00:04:18.665 --> 00:04:21.229
these separate nations,
separate States, that

00:04:21.229 --> 00:04:23.561
are trying to form some
type of union, not clear

00:04:23.561 --> 00:04:25.723
who has what power. The
Central European Union

00:04:25.723 --> 00:04:29.792
is not directly taxing.

00:04:29.792 --> 00:04:33.873
Male 2: Precisely. That's
a very good analogy

00:04:33.873 --> 00:04:35.973
to what was happening
because they weren't quite

00:04:35.973 --> 00:04:38.480
clear whether they had a
central currency or not

00:04:38.480 --> 00:04:41.392
back then. They weren't
quite sure what are the

00:04:41.392 --> 00:04:44.121
powers of each of the
States versus the central

00:04:44.121 --> 00:04:46.588
government, and that's
been something throughout

00:04:46.588 --> 00:04:49.450
history. Even starting
with the Greek city-states

00:04:49.450 --> 00:04:51.988
where you can have confederations and it's

00:04:51.988 --> 00:04:54.535
unclear how much power
you're going to put in the

00:04:54.535 --> 00:04:56.476
central government versus how much power

00:04:56.476 --> 00:04:57.987
you're going to leave at the States.

00:04:57.987 --> 00:05:00.479
Male 1: Considering that this is not the

00:05:00.479 --> 00:05:01.987
governing document for us now, something

00:05:01.987 --> 00:05:04.657
must have broken to want to replace it.

00:05:04.657 --> 00:05:07.736
Male 2: Well, yes. By
the time you're getting

00:05:07.736 --> 00:05:12.391
into 1786, it is totally clear that this

00:05:12.391 --> 00:05:15.396
document isn't working. You have all sorts

00:05:15.396 --> 00:05:17.874
of disputes. Like
Maryland and Virginia are

00:05:17.874 --> 00:05:20.797
having this horrible
dispute over navigation

00:05:20.797 --> 00:05:24.262
and border rights. They
call an Annapolis Convention

00:05:24.262 --> 00:05:28.559
to try to fix that up and they try to get

00:05:28.559 --> 00:05:30.815
the States to come.
Only five of them come.

00:05:30.815 --> 00:05:33.056
You have something up
in Massachusetts called

00:05:33.056 --> 00:05:35.789
Shays' Rebellion where there was this

00:05:35.789 --> 00:05:39.273
rebellion of the poor farmers
in western Massachusetts

00:05:39.273 --> 00:05:42.147
under a former Revolutionary War officer

00:05:42.147 --> 00:05:44.851
named Daniel Shays. It's
sort of unclear what ...

00:05:44.851 --> 00:05:46.227
Male 1: His name was Shays?

00:05:46.227 --> 00:05:47.725
Male 2: Yeah. S-H-A-Y-S.

00:05:47.725 --> 00:05:50.320
Male 1: So it's Shays,
the apostrophe's after ...

00:05:50.320 --> 00:05:52.068
Male: The apostrophe's
after, yeah. Daniel Shays

00:05:52.068 --> 00:05:55.870
was his name. He leads
a rebellion and there's

00:05:55.870 --> 00:06:00.143
no central government to
send a force to stop them.

00:06:00.143 --> 00:06:02.473
Washington's army has been disbanded.

00:06:02.473 --> 00:06:05.068
So the poor people of
Massachusetts have to try

00:06:05.068 --> 00:06:07.576
to raise a militia to try
to stop Shays' Rebellion,

00:06:07.576 --> 00:06:09.669
but they can't get the
Federal government to

00:06:09.669 --> 00:06:13.605
step in. It was just one
of many, many symptoms

00:06:13.605 --> 00:06:17.004
that we were all disintegrating
and falling apart.

00:06:17.004 --> 00:06:20.141
There was no rule of law that governed all

00:06:20.141 --> 00:06:22.940
the colonies, and now all the States.

00:06:23.701 --> 00:06:28.013
What happens is people
like Hamilton, Madison,

00:06:28.013 --> 00:06:31.132
others get together
and say, you know what?

00:06:31.132 --> 00:06:33.170
Congress is meeting, I
think they were meeting

00:06:33.170 --> 00:06:35.541
in New York by then.
We ought to go back to

00:06:35.541 --> 00:06:40.344
Philadelphia where this all began in 1776

00:06:40.344 --> 00:06:42.312
with the Declaration of
Independence and we should

00:06:42.312 --> 00:06:46.136
have a Constitutional
Convention. We should

00:06:46.136 --> 00:06:51.900
write a whole new constitution
to govern centrally

00:06:51.900 --> 00:06:57.002
this new nation. Most of
the States agreed to come.

00:06:57.002 --> 00:06:59.500
Some of them worried
about the fact that we

00:06:59.500 --> 00:07:02.227
were writing a whole new
constitution, so they

00:07:02.227 --> 00:07:04.667
did not give their delegates
authority to get rid of

00:07:04.667 --> 00:07:06.986
the Articles of
Confederation. So when they

00:07:06.986 --> 00:07:10.284
began in that very hot summer of 1787,

00:07:10.284 --> 00:07:12.614
it was kind of unclear whether they were

00:07:12.614 --> 00:07:14.668
going to be able to
write a new constitution

00:07:14.668 --> 00:07:18.199
or just try to amend the old
Articles of Confederation.

00:07:18.199 --> 00:07:20.005
Male 1: This makes it
clear that even after

00:07:20.005 --> 00:07:22.569
Shays' Rebellion, even after these border

00:07:22.569 --> 00:07:25.900
disputes between Maryland
and Virginia, it still

00:07:25.900 --> 00:07:27.591
wasn't a done deal. A
lot of States still liked

00:07:27.591 --> 00:07:29.145
their autonomy, liked their independence.

00:07:29.145 --> 00:07:30.936
So even going into this,
it wasn't like everyone

00:07:30.936 --> 00:07:32.473
was unanimously saying
hey, we need to give the

00:07:32.473 --> 00:07:33.671
federal government more power.

00:07:33.671 --> 00:07:35.554
Male 2: And by the way,
what does that sound like?

00:07:35.554 --> 00:07:37.285
It sounds like the debates
we're having today.

00:07:37.285 --> 00:07:38.365
Male 1: Exactly! (chuckles)

00:07:38.365 --> 00:07:40.593
Male 2: We still, as a
nation, have always had

00:07:40.593 --> 00:07:42.554
these debates of how much
power should be given

00:07:42.554 --> 00:07:44.827
to the central government,
how much power should

00:07:44.827 --> 00:07:47.146
retain with the States, whether it's on

00:07:47.146 --> 00:07:50.375
healthcare or our laws or our taxation.

00:07:50.375 --> 00:07:53.183
It's a useful tension to have.

00:07:53.183 --> 00:07:55.900
Male 1: Absolutely. Then they are able

00:07:55.900 --> 00:07:59.939
to come up with a solution.

00:07:59.939 --> 00:08:03.252
Male 2: It's a very
difficult problem of the

00:08:03.252 --> 00:08:06.676
big States wanting
there to be proportional

00:08:06.676 --> 00:08:09.521
representation in a
new Congress, the small

00:08:09.521 --> 00:08:11.999
States wanting equal votes per State.

00:08:11.999 --> 00:08:14.141
You finally have Ben
Franklin again, once again

00:08:14.141 --> 00:08:16.815
being the person who
works out the compromise

00:08:16.815 --> 00:08:19.667
to have both a House and
a Senate, equal votes

00:08:19.667 --> 00:08:21.527
per State in the Senate, proportional

00:08:21.527 --> 00:08:23.744
representation in the House. They finally

00:08:23.744 --> 00:08:28.196
come together and they
all agree to line up

00:08:28.196 --> 00:08:31.508
and sign this new
Constitution that will give

00:08:31.508 --> 00:08:34.254
taxation authority to
the Federal government,

00:08:34.254 --> 00:08:36.608
or to Congress, a new
Congress, a Federal taxation

00:08:36.608 --> 00:08:39.244
authority and, by the
way, that has a Preamble

00:08:39.244 --> 00:08:42.168
that's a whole lot more inspiring than

00:08:42.168 --> 00:08:45.072
that Articles of Confederatin
thing-y that said,

00:08:45.072 --> 00:08:48.327
"To all to whom these
presents shall come."

00:08:48.327 --> 00:08:49.910
Male 1: (laughing)To whom it may concern!

00:08:49.910 --> 00:08:53.536
Male 2: Let's look at the
Preamble to the constitution.

00:08:53.536 --> 00:08:56.533
Male 1: "We the people
of the United States."

00:08:56.533 --> 00:08:59.297
That's as opposed to "To
whom it may concern."

00:08:59.297 --> 00:09:01.604
Male 2: Just look at
those first three words.

00:09:01.604 --> 00:09:04.508
I mean those first three words are totally

00:09:04.508 --> 00:09:07.151
an inspiring thing. It's
never been done before,

00:09:07.151 --> 00:09:11.093
which is "We the people"
are getting to create

00:09:11.093 --> 00:09:13.863
this Constitution. It's not
the States getting together

00:09:13.863 --> 00:09:16.404
to do it. It's not the
king devolving authority.

00:09:16.404 --> 00:09:17.945
It's not a Parliament doing it.

00:09:17.945 --> 00:09:21.994
It's "We the people"
gathered together here.

00:09:21.994 --> 00:09:25.064
We are the ones that are going to ordain,

00:09:25.064 --> 00:09:28.218
a nice religious word
down there, "ordain."

00:09:28.218 --> 00:09:32.024
"Do ordain and establish."
It's almost like

00:09:32.024 --> 00:09:35.262
we have the power. It's
not coming from the

00:09:35.262 --> 00:09:38.341
divine right of kings
or God, we the people

00:09:38.341 --> 00:09:42.679
get to ordain and establish
this constitution.

00:09:42.679 --> 00:09:44.268
Male 1: We've made previous videos about

00:09:44.268 --> 00:09:45.662
the Declaration of Independence.

00:09:45.662 --> 00:09:47.950
The Articles of Confederation in no way

00:09:47.950 --> 00:09:51.074
share any of the spirit or the poetry of

00:09:51.074 --> 00:09:55.578
the Declaration, while this Preamble does.

00:09:55.578 --> 00:09:56.823
It seems almost a continuation of it.

00:09:56.823 --> 00:09:58.689
Male 2: Yeah, let's
read it. "We the people

00:09:58.689 --> 00:10:01.423
"of the United States,
in order to form a more

00:10:01.423 --> 00:10:04.224
"perfect union." That's
a very transcendent

00:10:04.224 --> 00:10:06.341
phrase, but it also means, hey,

00:10:06.341 --> 00:10:08.480
the Articles of Confederation,
we weren't really

00:10:08.480 --> 00:10:11.827
unified. We have to
create a united States.

00:10:11.827 --> 00:10:13.239
We have to create a union.

00:10:13.239 --> 00:10:15.784
Male 1: And the "more perfect," is that a

00:10:15.784 --> 00:10:17.601
direct reference to the
Articles that that was

00:10:17.601 --> 00:10:20.113
a less perfect, or is this something else?

00:10:20.113 --> 00:10:21.532
Male 2: It's not a very
good piece of grammar.

00:10:21.532 --> 00:10:24.419
As you know, things are
either perfect or they're not.

00:10:24.419 --> 00:10:27.269
The notion of creating
a more perfect union,

00:10:27.269 --> 00:10:30.509
yes, they are making
a nod to the fact that

00:10:30.509 --> 00:10:32.945
we have been confederated under

00:10:32.945 --> 00:10:36.322
the Articles of Confederation, but now we

00:10:36.322 --> 00:10:38.739
have to create a more perfect union.

00:10:38.739 --> 00:10:40.693
We have to really hold together.

00:10:40.693 --> 00:10:43.465
Then they decide what's the purpose of

00:10:43.465 --> 00:10:48.469
this Constitution? First
of all, establish justice.

00:10:48.469 --> 00:10:51.604
That means there'll be
one common set of laws.

00:10:51.604 --> 00:10:55.338
Ensure domestic tranquility.
This is Shay's Rebellion.

00:10:55.338 --> 00:10:57.106
It's still going on when
they start writing this

00:10:57.106 --> 00:11:00.672
Preamble. Domestic tranquility means that

00:11:00.672 --> 00:11:04.081
the federal, the central
government, has a right

00:11:04.081 --> 00:11:08.546
to raise an army and that
in the end, the police

00:11:08.546 --> 00:11:12.462
and defense powers don't
reside with just the

00:11:12.462 --> 00:11:14.977
individual States.
There's going to be a more

00:11:14.977 --> 00:11:18.918
perfect union that helps
ensure domestic tranquility

00:11:18.918 --> 00:11:22.777
and provide for the common
defense. What you've

00:11:22.777 --> 00:11:24.721
had is the Continental
Army under Washington

00:11:24.721 --> 00:11:27.347
has been disbanded.
There's no way to raise

00:11:27.347 --> 00:11:30.126
taxes for a central army. Now we're saying

00:11:30.126 --> 00:11:33.072
that the union of States,
the United States,

00:11:33.072 --> 00:11:36.012
the federal government,
they're going to raise

00:11:36.012 --> 00:11:38.060
the money and provide
for the common defense.

00:11:38.060 --> 00:11:40.965
There's another phrase,
"promote the general welfare."

00:11:40.965 --> 00:11:43.258
When people argue about Contitutionalism

00:11:43.258 --> 00:11:44.880
and what gives the Federal government the

00:11:44.880 --> 00:11:47.861
right to do things,
one of those phrases is

00:11:47.861 --> 00:11:50.355
every now and then we have to use the

00:11:50.355 --> 00:11:52.797
"general welfare" phrase
and say whether it's

00:11:52.797 --> 00:11:55.539
healthcare or anything
else, maybe there are

00:11:55.539 --> 00:11:58.196
things the central
government does that promote

00:11:58.196 --> 00:12:01.250
the "general welfare." Then we get to the

00:12:01.250 --> 00:12:04.228
inspiring lines, the poetry as opposed to

00:12:04.228 --> 00:12:07.481
"To all whom these presents shall come."

00:12:07.481 --> 00:12:11.311
That's "secure the blessings of liberty to

00:12:11.311 --> 00:12:14.721
"ourselves and our posterity, we do ordain

00:12:14.721 --> 00:12:17.255
"and establish this Constitution of the

00:12:17.255 --> 00:12:20.061
"United States of America." We've been

00:12:20.061 --> 00:12:21.799
calling ourselves that ever since the

00:12:21.799 --> 00:12:24.133
Declaration of Independence,
but now it's in

00:12:24.133 --> 00:12:27.548
all caps and it's
signifying we're one nation,

00:12:27.548 --> 00:12:29.624
not just 13 different States.

00:12:29.624 --> 00:12:31.695
Male 1: Previously I think
the "U" wasn't capitalized.

00:12:31.695 --> 00:12:33.659
Man 2: Yeah, in some of
the earlier documents

00:12:33.659 --> 00:12:35.976
it wasn't and we
certainly were not united.

00:12:35.976 --> 00:12:39.591
It's only under this Constitution
do we become, really,

00:12:39.591 --> 00:12:42.133
the United States of America.


First draft of the Declaration of Independence

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.314 --> 00:00:04.006
Male 1: In the last few videos
we looked at the final version,

00:00:04.006 --> 00:00:07.744
the Declaration of Independence
as it was approved of.

00:00:07.744 --> 00:00:10.738
Here it seems like we
have a very not final

00:00:10.738 --> 00:00:12.245
version of the Declaration.

00:00:12.245 --> 00:00:14.303
Male 2: What's really
amazing is they go through

00:00:14.303 --> 00:00:16.556
five drafts at least of the Declaration.

00:00:16.556 --> 00:00:19.408
It's wonderful to watch
how each of the drafts

00:00:19.408 --> 00:00:23.200
changes. You have this
committee of real people.

00:00:23.200 --> 00:00:25.944
Jefferson and Adams and Franklin are all

00:00:25.944 --> 00:00:28.930
part of that committee. Jefferson is using

00:00:28.930 --> 00:00:31.998
a lap desk, one of those
little things he invented,

00:00:31.998 --> 00:00:33.533
so he could stand up or sit down

00:00:33.533 --> 00:00:36.245
and write this in a little
room on Market Street.

00:00:36.245 --> 00:00:38.608
Then he shows it to Adams
and he shows it to Franklin,

00:00:38.608 --> 00:00:41.082
very deferential, he
said, "With your broadened

00:00:41.082 --> 00:00:42.823
view of the world, Dr. Franklin, perhaps

00:00:42.823 --> 00:00:44.404
you can make some suggestions."

00:00:44.404 --> 00:00:46.413
Male 1: Franklin and
Adams could be his father.

00:00:46.413 --> 00:00:48.778
Male 2: Right, right. Jefferson's only 33.

00:00:48.778 --> 00:00:52.411
Really, really young.
You have Franklin and

00:00:52.411 --> 00:00:56.247
Adams, Franklin's hitting
70s then, and very

00:00:56.247 --> 00:00:59.246
much of a father figure. But you see real

00:00:59.246 --> 00:01:02.412
people working together in these rooms on

00:01:02.412 --> 00:01:03.939
Market Street in Philadelphia,

00:01:03.939 --> 00:01:06.003
trying to craft this document.

00:01:06.003 --> 00:01:07.231
Male 1: Yeah, yeah, and you see it here.

00:01:07.231 --> 00:01:09.271
This looks like someone editing a paper.

00:01:09.271 --> 00:01:11.740
Male 2: Which shows you how
important it is to edit,

00:01:11.740 --> 00:01:15.552
in a way. Those of us who
are writers and editors,

00:01:15.552 --> 00:01:19.880
we like the fact that
you should really quibble

00:01:19.880 --> 00:01:24.003
over each word. These
are words that matter.

00:01:24.003 --> 00:01:26.200
For example, you can
see they put in a little

00:01:26.200 --> 00:01:29.336
phrase right here, "separate
and equal station."

00:01:29.336 --> 00:01:31.413
In other words, America's
going to become a

00:01:31.413 --> 00:01:33.742
separate nation and an equal nation.

00:01:33.742 --> 00:01:36.417
That word "separate and
equal" actually goes

00:01:36.417 --> 00:01:38.606
down in American history
with some resonance

00:01:38.606 --> 00:01:41.411
because it's used for a
while to defend segregation.

00:01:41.411 --> 00:01:46.802
Even when they get the
words almost perfect,

00:01:46.802 --> 00:01:49.581
they have a resonance that
they have to be careful about.

00:01:49.581 --> 00:01:51.873
Male 1: Do you think they realized when

00:01:51.873 --> 00:01:53.535
they were writing it how important this

00:01:53.535 --> 00:01:54.606
document was going to be?

00:01:54.606 --> 00:01:56.945
Male 2: One of the
amusing things is this was

00:01:56.945 --> 00:01:58.746
not considered the most
important committee

00:01:58.746 --> 00:02:02.913
to be on in June and July of 1776.

00:02:02.913 --> 00:02:04.996
In fact, John Adams thinks
he's already written

00:02:04.996 --> 00:02:07.747
the great document of American Revolution,

00:02:07.747 --> 00:02:10.499
which is a document
written in May asking the

00:02:10.499 --> 00:02:13.336
various colonies to get rid of their Royal

00:02:13.336 --> 00:02:16.473
governors because we
were going to break away.

00:02:16.473 --> 00:02:18.876
So Adams is quite willing
to let Jefferson write

00:02:18.876 --> 00:02:22.336
this draft because he
thinks that this is not

00:02:22.336 --> 00:02:24.236
the most important of all the documents.

00:02:24.236 --> 00:02:27.824
Male 1: And on some level,
to defend Adams a little bit,

00:02:27.824 --> 00:02:29.493
that does seem like a
big deal. This was in

00:02:29.493 --> 00:02:32.411
May of 1776 he writes once
you're getting rid of your

00:02:32.411 --> 00:02:34.335
Royal governors you really
are separating yourself.

00:02:34.335 --> 00:02:39.211
Male 2: And they've already
had a vote to be independent.

00:02:39.211 --> 00:02:41.339
So this is just a document,

00:02:41.339 --> 00:02:43.875
"let Facts be submitted
to a candid world,"

00:02:43.875 --> 00:02:47.827
"the opinions of mankind ...
they should declare the causes."

00:02:47.827 --> 00:02:50.871
This is really just their
public relations document.

00:02:50.871 --> 00:02:54.806
But, the reason it turns
out to be so important

00:02:54.806 --> 00:02:57.828
is it's so beautifully written, it becomes

00:02:57.828 --> 00:03:01.247
the American creed. When
they get together in

00:03:01.247 --> 00:03:04.536
these rooms and edit
it, suddenly they say,

00:03:04.536 --> 00:03:08.075
"All men are created equal."
This becomes not just

00:03:08.075 --> 00:03:11.466
a propaganda document,
but a mission statement

00:03:11.466 --> 00:03:12.751
for who we are as a people.

00:03:12.751 --> 00:03:16.543
Male 1: And to some degree
the power of poetry.

00:03:16.543 --> 00:03:18.336
They could have said
these exact same things

00:03:18.336 --> 00:03:20.206
in very terse and ...

00:03:20.206 --> 00:03:22.003
Male 2: This is why it
was so good Jefferson

00:03:22.003 --> 00:03:24.938
wrote it because Franklin
is a very good writer,

00:03:24.938 --> 00:03:27.500
but he's a very simple, plain writer.

00:03:27.500 --> 00:03:28.944
He writes Poor Richard's Almanac,

00:03:28.944 --> 00:03:30.663
"A penny saved is a penny earned."

00:03:30.663 --> 00:03:33.412
He's one of the first
Americans not to write

00:03:33.412 --> 00:03:36.493
in a very flowery way. John Adams' letters

00:03:36.493 --> 00:03:38.948
are very beautiful, but
they're kind of pompous

00:03:38.948 --> 00:03:41.050
and orotund and self important.

00:03:41.050 --> 00:03:44.936
You have a beautiful poet in Jefferson,

00:03:44.936 --> 00:03:47.997
but as we're looking at
this document on the screen,

00:03:47.997 --> 00:03:51.196
even he benefits from some good edits.

00:03:51.196 --> 00:03:52.748
Male 1: This is literally Jefferson's

00:03:52.748 --> 00:03:54.074
handwriting we see here.

00:03:54.074 --> 00:03:55.746
Male 2: This is Jefferson's
handwriting on the

00:03:55.746 --> 00:03:57.603
first draft. It's in
the Library of Congress

00:03:57.603 --> 00:04:00.133
if you want to go see
it. The final document

00:04:00.133 --> 00:04:03.161
is in the National Archives,
about eight blocks away.

00:04:03.161 --> 00:04:05.666
It's really wonderful
to look at all of these

00:04:05.666 --> 00:04:08.269
documents, especially,
I mean what do you see

00:04:08.269 --> 00:04:11.881
here where they edit the
great second paragraph?

00:04:11.881 --> 00:04:15.542
Male 1: "We hold these
truths to be self evident."

00:04:15.542 --> 00:04:17.936
You mentioned earlier that before it was

00:04:17.936 --> 00:04:19.210
written, what, "sacred and ...

00:04:19.210 --> 00:04:22.830
Male 2: Undeniable. Yeah.
They're using the word

00:04:22.830 --> 00:04:26.604
"sacred" for the truths
when Jefferson writes the

00:04:26.604 --> 00:04:31.007
first draft. To me, if you
look at the backslashes,

00:04:31.007 --> 00:04:33.919
the dark backslashes there, those are

00:04:33.919 --> 00:04:37.416
Benjamin Franklin's
backslashes I'm pretty sure

00:04:37.416 --> 00:04:39.738
because he used a
printer's pen and he was a

00:04:39.738 --> 00:04:43.750
publisher, so he used that
sort of backslashes to

00:04:43.750 --> 00:04:47.676
cross things out. He writes
the words "self evident."

00:04:47.676 --> 00:04:50.338
One of the things is we
historians never fully

00:04:50.338 --> 00:04:53.143
know. Carl Becker, who
was a great historian

00:04:53.143 --> 00:04:55.339
of the Declaration, he's
the one who said that

00:04:55.339 --> 00:04:58.537
that was probably Franklin's
edit. For me, I've spent

00:04:58.537 --> 00:05:01.417
a lot of time in Ben
Franklin's papers, which

00:05:01.417 --> 00:05:04.342
were at Yale University
Library. To me, it really

00:05:04.342 --> 00:05:07.833
feels like his handwriting.
So we assume that it's

00:05:07.833 --> 00:05:10.874
Ben Franklin who takes
out "sacred" because he

00:05:10.874 --> 00:05:15.190
doesn't want "these truths"
to be based on religion.

00:05:15.190 --> 00:05:17.333
He wants "these truths" to be based on

00:05:17.333 --> 00:05:19.951
rationality and reason.

00:05:19.951 --> 00:05:22.006
Male 1: So once again
it's not only the style

00:05:22.006 --> 00:05:24.419
of the crossing out, this is in line with

00:05:24.419 --> 00:05:26.082
Franklin's personality and beliefs.

00:05:26.082 --> 00:05:28.827
Male 2: Franklin was somebody who had read

00:05:28.827 --> 00:05:31.888
the great thinkers of
the British and Scottish

00:05:31.888 --> 00:05:35.826
Enlightenment. That means
John Locke, David Hume.

00:05:35.826 --> 00:05:38.069
David Hume was a person
who came up with the

00:05:38.069 --> 00:05:40.688
concept of "self evident
truths." A self evident

00:05:40.688 --> 00:05:44.251
truth would be that all
bachelors aren't married,

00:05:44.251 --> 00:05:49.332
as opposed to a more contingent truth like

00:05:49.332 --> 00:05:51.320
Philadelphia is smaller than London.

00:05:51.320 --> 00:05:52.947
Male 1: Kind of in math an axiom.

00:05:52.947 --> 00:05:55.323
Male 2: An axiom,
exactly. The fact that two

00:05:55.323 --> 00:06:00.249
plus three is five,
that's not something that

00:06:00.249 --> 00:06:02.869
has to be further proved.
These are somewhat

00:06:02.869 --> 00:06:06.080
"self evident." That's what Hume does and

00:06:06.080 --> 00:06:10.339
Franklin loves that. Franklin
loves Isaac Newton, too,

00:06:10.339 --> 00:06:13.939
because Franklin is a
scientist. He believes that

00:06:13.939 --> 00:06:16.865
there are laws of nature, of nature's God,

00:06:16.865 --> 00:06:19.687
and that there are certain
self evident truths,

00:06:19.687 --> 00:06:21.940
so he doesn't want the
word "sacred" in there

00:06:21.940 --> 00:06:24.199
because that kind of
seems like divine right

00:06:24.199 --> 00:06:26.466
of kings. God's the one
who made these truths.

00:06:26.466 --> 00:06:30.011
He's saying, "no." As
we've discussed that whole

00:06:30.011 --> 00:06:33.269
paragraph, it's about
rationality and reason

00:06:33.269 --> 00:06:35.160
getting us to those truths.

00:06:35.160 --> 00:06:36.836
Male 1: Right, but they
also do talk about,

00:06:36.836 --> 00:06:38.412
as we talked about previously,

00:06:38.412 --> 00:06:39.605
there's a balance here because

00:06:39.605 --> 00:06:40.866
they do talk about "created equal."

00:06:40.866 --> 00:06:42.829
Male 2: Well, let's look.
Tell us, what do you

00:06:42.829 --> 00:06:47.937
see there? This edit,
it says that they were

00:06:47.937 --> 00:06:52.484
had certain inherent and
inalienable rights. You see

00:06:52.484 --> 00:06:54.974
John Adams, and we're pretty sure that's

00:06:54.974 --> 00:06:57.080
John Adams' writing,
not just because of his

00:06:57.080 --> 00:06:59.394
writing, but because of the concept.

00:06:59.394 --> 00:07:00.938
He was a little bit
more religious than the

00:07:00.938 --> 00:07:03.840
others on the committee. He says,

00:07:03.840 --> 00:07:07.481
"They're endowed by their
Creator." He puts in that phrase

00:07:07.481 --> 00:07:12.021
"by their Creator" with
certain inalienable rights.

00:07:12.021 --> 00:07:14.525
It's a balance. It's a balance between

00:07:14.525 --> 00:07:17.527
rationality and reason,
which is self evident,

00:07:17.527 --> 00:07:22.454
and divine providence,
this notion that we're all

00:07:22.454 --> 00:07:25.998
children of the same Creator
and therefore we're all

00:07:25.998 --> 00:07:29.261
endowed with certain inalienable rights.

00:07:29.261 --> 00:07:32.012
Male 1: Yeah, this is
really amazing. Just to

00:07:32.012 --> 00:07:33.258
realize that they were human beings

00:07:33.258 --> 00:07:34.930
kind of forging through this.

00:07:34.930 --> 00:07:36.152
Male 2: Yeah, they're real
human beings who were probably

00:07:36.152 --> 00:07:39.203
arguing just like you.
Jefferson gets really upset

00:07:39.203 --> 00:07:41.534
at someone; not at Franklin
and Adams, but other

00:07:41.534 --> 00:07:43.691
people start editing
it. Franklin tells them

00:07:43.691 --> 00:07:45.777
this wonderful story
about when he was a young

00:07:45.777 --> 00:07:47.934
tradesman in Philadelphia
and somebody had a sign

00:07:47.934 --> 00:07:50.223
about selling hats and
everybody tried to edit

00:07:50.223 --> 00:07:52.561
the sign for them. Franklin
said, "That's why I've

00:07:52.561 --> 00:07:56.176
never been on a committee
that's going to have

00:07:56.176 --> 00:07:59.203
a lot of people editing what I write."

00:07:59.203 --> 00:08:02.543
But, those of us who are
editors, we kind of think

00:08:02.543 --> 00:08:04.539
those edits actually improve the document.

00:08:04.539 --> 00:08:05.607
Male 1: Yeah, it seemed like it turned out

00:08:05.607 --> 00:08:06.236
a pretty good result.

00:08:06.236 --> 00:08:07.739
Male 2: You know, you
don't get much better than

00:08:07.739 --> 00:08:10.000
"We hold these truths to be self evident."


Tyranny and despotism

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.646 --> 00:00:01.561
Man 1: We've been discussing

00:00:01.561 --> 00:00:03.481
this amazing second paragraph of the

00:00:03.481 --> 00:00:04.670
Declaration of Independence.

00:00:04.670 --> 00:00:06.146
We've gotten through what passes

00:00:06.146 --> 00:00:07.479
for the first two sentences.

00:00:07.479 --> 00:00:09.897
They use all sorts of
weird punctuation here.

00:00:09.897 --> 00:00:12.895
Now they're going on to
say, "That whenever any form

00:00:12.895 --> 00:00:15.738
"of government becomes
destructive of these ends,

00:00:15.738 --> 00:00:19.802
"it's the right of the
people to alter or abolish it

00:00:19.802 --> 00:00:22.671
"and to institute new
government, laying its foundation

00:00:22.671 --> 00:00:25.477
"on such principles as
organizing its powers

00:00:25.477 --> 00:00:29.809
"in such forms as to them
shall seem most likely

00:00:29.809 --> 00:00:33.669
"to affect their safety and happiness."

00:00:33.669 --> 00:00:35.870
Man 2: Just to make sure
I, because they're writing

00:00:35.870 --> 00:00:37.560
in a very -

00:00:37.560 --> 00:00:39.931
Man 1: They get a bit
ornate in this (crosstalk)

00:00:39.931 --> 00:00:41.802
They edit that first sentence a whole lot,

00:00:41.802 --> 00:00:44.804
so it's very clear, but this
sentence is a little bit ornate.

00:00:44.804 --> 00:00:46.346
Man 2: When they write,
"That whenever any form

00:00:46.346 --> 00:00:48.733
"of government becomes
destructive of these ends,"

00:00:48.733 --> 00:00:51.346
they're talking again of the
life, liberty, and the pursuit

00:00:51.346 --> 00:00:52.011
of happiness.

00:00:52.011 --> 00:00:53.850
Man 1: Right. (crosstalk)

00:00:53.850 --> 00:00:56.183
In other words, if you have
a king who's taken away

00:00:56.183 --> 00:00:59.367
people's life, liberty, and
the pursuit of happiness.

00:00:59.764 --> 00:01:01.792
This is, they're talking
about the English government,

00:01:01.792 --> 00:01:04.817
not just the Parliament,
but the king now has become

00:01:04.817 --> 00:01:08.324
destructive of these unalienable rights

00:01:08.324 --> 00:01:09.794
that we're supposed to protect.

00:01:09.794 --> 00:01:11.658
Man 2: Yeah and that we
then form a new government

00:01:11.658 --> 00:01:14.733
to affect their safety and happiness.

00:01:14.733 --> 00:01:16.983
Man 1: Right, but most
importantly, it's the right

00:01:16.983 --> 00:01:19.992
of the people to alter or abolish it.

00:01:19.992 --> 00:01:21.399
In other words, they're saying something

00:01:21.399 --> 00:01:26.057
that has not yet been
quite accepted by history,

00:01:26.057 --> 00:01:27.986
which is if you're a
people and you don't like

00:01:27.986 --> 00:01:30.856
your government, you can overthrow it.

00:01:30.856 --> 00:01:32.922
We hadn't had that many revolutions

00:01:32.922 --> 00:01:36.322
in the past 200 years leading up to that

00:01:36.322 --> 00:01:39.272
and this is the beginning
of an age of revolution,

00:01:39.272 --> 00:01:41.790
where people say, "Oh
yeah, we have the right

00:01:41.790 --> 00:01:43.454
"to abolish our government."

00:01:43.454 --> 00:01:44.523
Woah, that's a holy cow.

00:01:44.523 --> 00:01:46.721
Man 2: It's the people
doing it, not another king,

00:01:46.721 --> 00:01:47.787
not another ruler.

00:01:47.787 --> 00:01:50.319
That's most of history, is other kings.

00:01:50.319 --> 00:01:53.423
Man 1: Exactly, most of
history, for the 100 years

00:01:53.423 --> 00:01:55.786
leading up to this
document, France and England

00:01:55.786 --> 00:01:56.851
have been fighting each other.

00:01:56.851 --> 00:01:58.518
The kings of England have
been trying to supplant

00:01:58.518 --> 00:02:02.119
the kings of France and
there's been a 100 Years War,

00:02:02.119 --> 00:02:03.318
it's been ...

00:02:03.318 --> 00:02:05.652
The American Revolution's
sort of a part of that,

00:02:05.652 --> 00:02:07.720
but something different happens here.

00:02:07.720 --> 00:02:10.320
It's not one king trying
to overthrow another king,

00:02:10.320 --> 00:02:14.819
it's the right of the people
to abolish and institute

00:02:14.819 --> 00:02:18.819
a new government to
protect their own safety

00:02:18.819 --> 00:02:20.819
and happiness.

00:02:20.937 --> 00:02:24.353
The next sentence, "Prudence,
indeed, will dictate

00:02:24.353 --> 00:02:26.865
"that governments long
established should not

00:02:26.865 --> 00:02:31.202
"be changed for light
and transient causes."

00:02:31.202 --> 00:02:33.770
That, basically, is saying
you shouldn't go around doing

00:02:33.770 --> 00:02:35.069
this all the time.

00:02:35.069 --> 00:02:37.686
You have to have a really,
really good reason,

00:02:37.686 --> 00:02:40.271
because it's not as if
just because you're kind of

00:02:40.271 --> 00:02:43.270
annoyed at your government
you should overthrow it.

00:02:43.270 --> 00:02:45.603
This is why they have a
pretty long document ahead

00:02:45.603 --> 00:02:46.352
of them.

00:02:46.352 --> 00:02:47.852
This is just the first two paragraphs.

00:02:47.852 --> 00:02:48.866
Man 2: This is important.

00:02:48.866 --> 00:02:49.544
I guess, from my (unintelligible)

00:02:49.544 --> 00:02:50.653
of what this whole document is for.

00:02:50.653 --> 00:02:52.212
This is to communicate
with the rest of the world

00:02:52.212 --> 00:02:55.461
and as you mentioned,
also France, that look,

00:02:55.461 --> 00:02:57.053
we're not crazy folks here.

00:02:57.053 --> 00:02:58.986
We recognize this is a
serious thing we're doing.

00:02:58.986 --> 00:03:00.294
We don't take this lightly.

00:03:00.294 --> 00:03:02.184
Man 1: That's what this
sentence says exactly,

00:03:02.184 --> 00:03:03.919
which is you shouldn't
do it just for light

00:03:03.919 --> 00:03:05.877
and transient causes.

00:03:05.877 --> 00:03:08.652
We're going to have to
show you that we've got

00:03:08.652 --> 00:03:12.961
some real good reasons to do it.

00:03:12.961 --> 00:03:15.453
That's what it goes on to say.

00:03:15.453 --> 00:03:18.124
Especially like, "while
evils are sufferable

00:03:18.124 --> 00:03:21.319
"than to right themselves
by abolishing the forms

00:03:21.319 --> 00:03:23.255
"to which they are accustomed."

00:03:23.255 --> 00:03:26.918
In other words, these
are powerful words saying

00:03:26.918 --> 00:03:30.053
that these are the type
of things you really have

00:03:30.053 --> 00:03:32.210
to raise up arms against.

00:03:32.210 --> 00:03:33.519
Then, let's go to this sentence.

00:03:33.519 --> 00:03:34.735
Oh sorry.

00:03:34.735 --> 00:03:36.069
Man 2: I find this one really interesting.

00:03:36.069 --> 00:03:38.841
It's kind of a less famous
part of it, but it says,

00:03:38.841 --> 00:03:40.521
"and accordingly all experience hath shown

00:03:40.521 --> 00:03:42.853
"that mankind are more disposed to suffer,

00:03:42.853 --> 00:03:45.921
"while evils are sufferable
than to right themselves

00:03:45.921 --> 00:03:48.008
"by abolishing the forms to
which they are accustomed."

00:03:48.008 --> 00:03:50.932
It's really saying that, normally, men,

00:03:50.932 --> 00:03:53.789
even when their rights start
to get imposed, they just -

00:03:53.789 --> 00:03:54.520
Man 1: Go along with it.

00:03:54.520 --> 00:03:56.090
Man 2: It's kind of like
a frog in boiling water.

00:03:56.090 --> 00:04:01.053
They just live with it, but
when it gets too bad ...

00:04:01.053 --> 00:04:03.388
Man 1: Yeah, that's when
you have to take up arms.

00:04:03.388 --> 00:04:05.855
You're right, the whole point of that is

00:04:05.855 --> 00:04:08.122
that experience has shown
we kind of just go along

00:04:08.122 --> 00:04:11.886
with bad kings, just like
we go along with good kings.

00:04:11.886 --> 00:04:14.086
This is special, this is
different, what they're saying

00:04:14.086 --> 00:04:15.604
and that's why they
start the next sentence

00:04:15.604 --> 00:04:17.455
with the word "But".

00:04:17.455 --> 00:04:20.322
It's sort of the, "but this
is different," sentence.

00:04:20.322 --> 00:04:21.389
Why is it different?

00:04:21.389 --> 00:04:24.990
"But when a long train of
abuses and usurpation ..."

00:04:24.990 --> 00:04:28.722
Usurpation means they're
taking away our powers.

00:04:28.722 --> 00:04:32.722
"... Pursuing invariably the
same object evinces a desire

00:04:32.722 --> 00:04:36.746
"to reduce them under absolute despotism."

00:04:36.746 --> 00:04:39.854
In other words, what's
happened is the king

00:04:39.854 --> 00:04:43.257
and his parliament have
decided to reduce it

00:04:43.257 --> 00:04:46.590
so that they have all the powers.

00:04:46.590 --> 00:04:48.996
They're taxing without our consent,

00:04:48.996 --> 00:04:50.328
they're doing all sorts of things.

00:04:50.328 --> 00:04:52.790
They're quartering troops in our homes.

00:04:52.790 --> 00:04:56.589
That's when it goes on to
say, "it is their right."

00:04:56.589 --> 00:04:58.856
In other words, the right of our people.

00:04:58.856 --> 00:05:02.523
"... it is their duty to
throw off such government

00:05:02.523 --> 00:05:07.247
"and to provide new guards
for their future security."

00:05:07.247 --> 00:05:08.189
Think about that.

00:05:08.189 --> 00:05:11.163
How often had that been happening before?

00:05:11.163 --> 00:05:13.855
Man 2: Yeah, especially
for the people to do it.

00:05:13.855 --> 00:05:14.855
Man 1: Right.

00:05:14.855 --> 00:05:18.995
We very rarely have had
a people-led rebellion

00:05:18.995 --> 00:05:21.190
to say you've usurped.

00:05:21.190 --> 00:05:22.666
There's usurpation.

00:05:22.666 --> 00:05:24.255
You've usurped our rights.

00:05:24.255 --> 00:05:26.997
There's been a long train
of abuses and you've reduced

00:05:26.997 --> 00:05:29.808
us to absolute despotism.

00:05:29.808 --> 00:05:32.079
Actually, Jefferson, when
he writes that phrase,

00:05:32.079 --> 00:05:35.388
has an even grander
phrases (unintelligible)

00:05:35.388 --> 00:05:37.080
everything else and Franklin says,

00:05:37.080 --> 00:05:38.919
"I think we're going a bit overboard here.

00:05:38.919 --> 00:05:42.522
"Let's just 'say reduce them
under absolute despotism',"

00:05:42.522 --> 00:05:44.888
which means you've taken
away all our rights.

00:05:44.888 --> 00:05:46.323
You've become a despot.

00:05:46.323 --> 00:05:47.655
Man 2: Yeah.

00:05:47.655 --> 00:05:51.557
Man 1: Then it goes on
to say, "Such has been

00:05:51.557 --> 00:05:54.557
"the patient sufferance
of these colonies."

00:05:54.557 --> 00:05:56.390
In other words, we've been
pretty patient up until now.

00:05:56.390 --> 00:05:58.989
You put on a tea tax,
you put on a paper tax,

00:05:58.989 --> 00:06:03.989
you put on a stamp act,
taxation without representation.

00:06:03.989 --> 00:06:06.323
You haven't allowed us to
be part of the Parliament,

00:06:06.323 --> 00:06:08.140
voting on our own taxes.

00:06:08.140 --> 00:06:10.975
We've been pretty patient of these things

00:06:10.975 --> 00:06:15.256
"and such is now the necessity
which constrains them,"

00:06:15.256 --> 00:06:17.474
meaning constrains us, the
people of the United States,

00:06:17.474 --> 00:06:21.140
"to alter their former
systems of government,"

00:06:21.140 --> 00:06:24.056
and now is when they set up
what is going to be the rest

00:06:24.056 --> 00:06:25.474
of the document.

00:06:25.474 --> 00:06:27.321
They attack the king.

00:06:27.321 --> 00:06:29.922
The history of the present
king of Great Britain.

00:06:29.922 --> 00:06:33.138
We have him up there,
George III, there he is.

00:06:33.138 --> 00:06:39.722
Looking kind of nice, like (crosstalk)

00:06:39.722 --> 00:06:42.790
He looks definitely like a
royal person, but the history

00:06:42.790 --> 00:06:45.321
of this present king of
Great Britain is a history

00:06:45.321 --> 00:06:49.722
of repeated injuries and usurpations.

00:06:49.722 --> 00:06:53.854
" ... all having in direct
object the establishment

00:06:53.854 --> 00:06:58.251
"of an absolute tyranny
over these states."

00:06:58.251 --> 00:06:59.417
You know what?

00:06:59.417 --> 00:07:01.454
I think they were overstating it a bit.

00:07:01.454 --> 00:07:05.145
I'm not trying to be
kind to King George here,

00:07:05.145 --> 00:07:08.686
but what they did is they tax
the tea, they tax the stamp,

00:07:08.686 --> 00:07:10.936
they were using the tax
revenues to help support

00:07:10.936 --> 00:07:12.120
the colonies.

00:07:12.120 --> 00:07:15.654
I think Parliament felt that
you could argue a little bit

00:07:15.654 --> 00:07:18.186
that we're taxing without
getting your consent,

00:07:18.186 --> 00:07:22.436
but I think they would say,
"Hey, wait, absolute tyranny?

00:07:22.436 --> 00:07:24.998
"Repeated injuries and usurpation?"

00:07:24.998 --> 00:07:28.330
They're going too far and
there was a lot of people,

00:07:28.330 --> 00:07:30.411
at least half the people in the colonies,

00:07:30.411 --> 00:07:32.460
that kind of agreed with the English.

00:07:32.460 --> 00:07:34.162
They were still loyal.

00:07:34.162 --> 00:07:38.260
So, what they do, Jefferson,
Franklin, and Adams,

00:07:38.260 --> 00:07:40.193
and the people writing this, is they say,

00:07:40.193 --> 00:07:42.060
"We're going to have to
show you why we're using

00:07:42.060 --> 00:07:43.193
"this strong language."

00:07:43.193 --> 00:07:45.278
It's a wonderful sentence to me.

00:07:45.278 --> 00:07:49.944
"To prove this, let facts be
submitted to a candid world."

00:07:49.944 --> 00:07:52.130
That's what this declaration is.

00:07:52.130 --> 00:07:54.797
We're going to give you all
the facts and try to prove

00:07:54.797 --> 00:07:58.003
it's been absolute tyranny
that we've been suffering

00:07:58.003 --> 00:08:00.254
and they worked themselves
up into convincing

00:08:00.254 --> 00:08:03.088
themselves and probably
the rest of history.

00:08:03.088 --> 00:08:06.004
Man 2: And to be fair to
them, probably in 1774,

00:08:06.004 --> 00:08:11.748
or even March of 1775, they
might have felt like that,

00:08:11.748 --> 00:08:14.749
but there was bloodshed now.

00:08:14.749 --> 00:08:16.335
People have been killed
and now, of course,

00:08:16.335 --> 00:08:18.399
people are going to be
much more passionate

00:08:18.399 --> 00:08:22.189
about the situation.

00:08:22.189 --> 00:08:24.592
Man 1: I guess you could
sense it in your own sense

00:08:24.592 --> 00:08:25.722
of history.

00:08:25.722 --> 00:08:28.123
Once people start fighting,
they get themselves a bit

00:08:28.123 --> 00:08:29.995
worked up.

00:08:29.995 --> 00:08:32.494
Man 2: Absolutely and it's British troops

00:08:32.494 --> 00:08:33.723
on American soil.

00:08:33.723 --> 00:08:38.311
It's American families,
American fathers who are dying.

00:08:38.311 --> 00:08:39.647
That's how I can imagine they would start

00:08:39.647 --> 00:08:40.897
to see these things.

00:08:40.897 --> 00:08:41.394
Man 1: Right.

00:08:41.394 --> 00:08:44.726
It starts to get out of hand
without their intention.

00:08:44.726 --> 00:08:46.728
The continental congress
didn't declare war

00:08:46.728 --> 00:08:48.394
back in 1775.

00:08:48.394 --> 00:08:50.660
You have a bunch of
militia people in Lexington

00:08:50.660 --> 00:08:53.659
and Concord getting all
riled up by Paul Revere,

00:08:53.659 --> 00:08:55.440
because the British
are coming to take some

00:08:55.440 --> 00:08:59.868
of the munitions out of
the arsenals in Lexington

00:08:59.868 --> 00:09:01.017
and Concord.

00:09:01.017 --> 00:09:03.130
He's riding and saying
the British are coming

00:09:03.130 --> 00:09:06.351
and then the militiamen
come out and suddenly,

00:09:06.351 --> 00:09:10.129
up in Massachusetts, this
revolution that even most

00:09:10.129 --> 00:09:11.997
of the people in the
continental congress weren't

00:09:11.997 --> 00:09:16.018
quite ready for, has
begun to happen and ...

00:09:16.018 --> 00:09:19.268
(crosstalk)

00:09:19.268 --> 00:09:22.397
Man 2: After this, they go on and list.

00:09:22.397 --> 00:09:24.434
Man 1: That's the rest of the document.

00:09:24.434 --> 00:09:28.197
The rest of the Declaration
is just line after line

00:09:28.197 --> 00:09:31.064
of the king has done this,
the king has done that,

00:09:31.064 --> 00:09:33.527
and most importantly, as you see in this,

00:09:33.527 --> 00:09:36.160
the history of the present
king of Great Britain,

00:09:36.160 --> 00:09:38.826
they're revolting now against the king,

00:09:38.826 --> 00:09:42.156
not just the Parliament
that has voted these taxes,

00:09:42.156 --> 00:09:44.409
but they're saying it's the king himself

00:09:44.409 --> 00:09:47.259
that we're rebelling against
and that's what made it

00:09:47.259 --> 00:09:49.823
a true revolution, rather
than just trying to get rid

00:09:49.823 --> 00:09:52.490
of the Parliament, which is temporary.

00:09:52.490 --> 00:09:53.500
Man 2: Fascinating.


Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.669 --> 00:00:03.008
Man 1: "We hold these
truths to be self-evident,

00:00:03.008 --> 00:00:05.147
"that all men are created equal,

00:00:05.147 --> 00:00:06.813
"that they are endowed by their Creator

00:00:06.813 --> 00:00:09.607
"with certain unalienable
Rights, that among these are

00:00:09.607 --> 00:00:12.480
"Life, Liberty, and the
pursuit of Happiness."

00:00:12.480 --> 00:00:14.337
It's this amazing second sentence

00:00:14.337 --> 00:00:17.072
of the Declaration of
Independence that Jefferson

00:00:17.072 --> 00:00:20.900
and Adams and Franklin
wrote as part of a committee

00:00:20.900 --> 00:00:22.981
and we were looking at that sentence.

00:00:22.981 --> 00:00:26.896
Let's go on to look at that
phrase, "they are endowed

00:00:26.896 --> 00:00:29.071
"by their Creator."

00:00:29.071 --> 00:00:33.146
It's interesting, they don't
really mention Jesus Christ

00:00:33.146 --> 00:00:34.271
and not even God.

00:00:34.271 --> 00:00:37.897
They talk about the laws of
nature and of nature's god

00:00:37.897 --> 00:00:39.145
and a creator.

00:00:39.145 --> 00:00:43.003
These are deists, people
who believe in the notion

00:00:43.003 --> 00:00:45.603
that there's some grand
creator of the universe,

00:00:45.603 --> 00:00:49.202
but they don't get into the
specifics of any particular

00:00:49.202 --> 00:00:51.311
religious dogma.

00:00:51.311 --> 00:00:54.545
The other thing is they're
balancing where do our rights

00:00:54.545 --> 00:00:55.667
come from?

00:00:55.667 --> 00:00:58.211
In an earlier draft, and
we'll talk about how they edit

00:00:58.211 --> 00:01:02.404
the earlier drafts in a later
video, but in an earlier draft

00:01:02.404 --> 00:01:04.212
it just says they're endowed

00:01:04.212 --> 00:01:06.736
with certain unalienable
rights and you see

00:01:06.736 --> 00:01:08.963
that John Adams, probably,
is the one who wants

00:01:08.963 --> 00:01:12.734
to insert the phrase "their
Creator" and that was

00:01:12.734 --> 00:01:14.669
because they started the sentence

00:01:14.669 --> 00:01:16.467
with "We hold these truths to be sacred,"

00:01:16.467 --> 00:01:18.533
but they changed that to "self-evident."

00:01:18.533 --> 00:01:21.796
They're trying to say to
what extent is it rationality

00:01:21.796 --> 00:01:23.932
that gives us these rights, to what extent

00:01:23.932 --> 00:01:26.932
are these rights endowed by God

00:01:26.932 --> 00:01:29.431
and I think what they
finally come down to is

00:01:29.431 --> 00:01:35.264
that we all had a creator
and that creator made us all.

00:01:35.264 --> 00:01:38.535
So, to a certain sync,
we're created equal.

00:01:38.535 --> 00:01:41.850
Our creator must love us
all, we are all created

00:01:41.850 --> 00:01:45.799
by the same creator, therefore
there's a certain equality

00:01:45.799 --> 00:01:49.800
that we have and in
creating us, he gave us

00:01:49.800 --> 00:01:52.599
certain unalienable rights.

00:01:52.599 --> 00:01:55.682
Man 2: Unalienable just
means can't be taken away.

00:01:55.682 --> 00:01:57.266
It can't be separated.

00:01:57.266 --> 00:01:58.932
Man 1: It can't be separated.

00:01:58.932 --> 00:02:00.850
You can't take these rights away.

00:02:00.850 --> 00:02:03.431
The king can't take these rights away.

00:02:03.431 --> 00:02:06.266
In other words, it's not
as if we could give up

00:02:06.266 --> 00:02:09.849
these rights and in
particular, they are talking

00:02:09.849 --> 00:02:13.535
about this theory of
government that John Locke had,

00:02:13.535 --> 00:02:16.068
who was one of the
philosophers that they read,

00:02:16.068 --> 00:02:18.538
an English philosopher of that period,

00:02:18.538 --> 00:02:20.599
who said that when you created government

00:02:20.599 --> 00:02:22.801
or there is a government, you give up some

00:02:22.801 --> 00:02:23.766
of your rights.

00:02:23.766 --> 00:02:25.597
For example, if we all
agree that we're part

00:02:25.597 --> 00:02:28.514
of a government, we may give up our right

00:02:28.514 --> 00:02:33.847
to take somebody else's
property or whatever it may be.

00:02:33.847 --> 00:02:35.719
These are rights you can give up,

00:02:35.719 --> 00:02:38.784
but there are certain
rights that are unalienable,

00:02:38.784 --> 00:02:44.390
that you just can't give up or
the king can't take it away.

00:02:44.390 --> 00:02:46.519
Once again, you've got to
look at Thomas Jefferson,

00:02:46.519 --> 00:02:49.765
who actually owned slaves at this point

00:02:49.765 --> 00:02:52.514
and he's saying among
those unalienable rights

00:02:52.514 --> 00:02:55.590
are life, liberty, and
the pursuit of happiness.

00:02:55.590 --> 00:02:59.847
There's this inherent conflict
still, between rights,

00:02:59.847 --> 00:03:03.014
such as liberty, that you
can't take away from a person

00:03:03.014 --> 00:03:05.597
and yet, Jefferson's writing this phrase

00:03:05.597 --> 00:03:08.618
when he owns slaves.

00:03:08.652 --> 00:03:11.847
The phrase "Life, Liberty,
and the pursuit of Happiness"

00:03:11.847 --> 00:03:14.597
is also something that
derives from John Locke

00:03:14.597 --> 00:03:17.097
and these philosophers
of the Enlightenment

00:03:17.097 --> 00:03:18.784
that were writing in England.

00:03:18.784 --> 00:03:22.184
At one point, John Locke uses
the phrase "Life, Liberty,

00:03:22.184 --> 00:03:26.852
"and the pursuit of property,"
because Locke believed

00:03:26.852 --> 00:03:31.719
that owning property was
an important right you had

00:03:31.719 --> 00:03:32.931
and the government couldn't just take

00:03:32.931 --> 00:03:35.346
your property away.

00:03:35.346 --> 00:03:37.785
However, you can see that they change it

00:03:37.785 --> 00:03:42.847
to a more elevated phrase
(laughter) that we each get

00:03:42.847 --> 00:03:45.847
to pursue our own notion
of what we want to do

00:03:45.847 --> 00:03:48.428
in our lives, our happiness.

00:03:48.428 --> 00:03:51.118
I don't think they just
mean happiness like joy

00:03:51.118 --> 00:03:52.430
and frivolity.

00:03:52.430 --> 00:03:55.186
I think they mean pursuit
of meaning in life,

00:03:55.186 --> 00:03:56.784
what gives our life meaning

00:03:56.784 --> 00:04:00.719
and these are the unalienable rights.

00:04:00.719 --> 00:04:02.775
Then they go on and this gets

00:04:02.775 --> 00:04:05.792
to what's called the contract
notion of government,

00:04:05.792 --> 00:04:09.025
is that why do we have governments?

00:04:09.025 --> 00:04:11.691
Whether it's John Locke
or the other philosophers

00:04:11.691 --> 00:04:14.282
we've talked about, they say the reason

00:04:14.282 --> 00:04:18.538
we have government is that
we all had these rights,

00:04:18.538 --> 00:04:21.616
but we decided to get together.

00:04:21.616 --> 00:04:23.924
We instituted governments.

00:04:23.924 --> 00:04:27.124
Governments are instituted and the reason

00:04:27.124 --> 00:04:29.701
those governments have
their power is because

00:04:29.701 --> 00:04:31.656
of the consent of the governed.

00:04:31.656 --> 00:04:34.616
It's like if you and I
and 20 people got together

00:04:34.616 --> 00:04:38.283
and formed a group and we
said, "We're going to form

00:04:38.283 --> 00:04:40.533
"a group, we'll give
up some of our rights,

00:04:40.533 --> 00:04:43.457
"because the group itself
will have certain powers,

00:04:43.457 --> 00:04:45.392
"but we're consenting to do that."

00:04:45.392 --> 00:04:47.993
It's not because of the
divine right of kings.

00:04:47.993 --> 00:04:50.458
It's the consent of the governed.

00:04:50.458 --> 00:04:53.616
The consent of the people
says we will institute

00:04:53.616 --> 00:04:56.389
a government amongst ourselves

00:04:56.389 --> 00:04:59.125
and that's not to take away our rights,

00:04:59.125 --> 00:05:01.391
that's to secure our rights.

00:05:01.391 --> 00:05:02.057
Man 2: Right.

00:05:02.057 --> 00:05:02.950
I might ...

00:05:02.950 --> 00:05:08.865
The 20 of us might give up
our right to enforce things,

00:05:08.865 --> 00:05:11.116
police each other, to the government,

00:05:11.116 --> 00:05:12.923
so that we could have our life, liberty,

00:05:12.923 --> 00:05:13.723
and pursuit of happiness.

00:05:13.723 --> 00:05:15.723
We're more likely to have it secured.

00:05:15.723 --> 00:05:18.700
Man 1: Once you get to that
theory, you have to say,

00:05:18.700 --> 00:05:21.965
"What are the type of
rights we would give up?"

00:05:21.965 --> 00:05:24.594
Such as, maybe, the right
to decide the traffic laws

00:05:24.594 --> 00:05:28.058
or the policing of the thing,
or how property contracts

00:05:28.058 --> 00:05:30.206
are made, but there are
certain things that,

00:05:30.206 --> 00:05:33.057
no matter what you did,
if you were instituting

00:05:33.057 --> 00:05:35.994
a government among men,
you would not give up

00:05:35.994 --> 00:05:38.873
the right to life, you
would not give up the right

00:05:38.873 --> 00:05:41.790
to liberty, and you would not
say, "I'm going to give up

00:05:41.790 --> 00:05:45.788
"my right to pursue my own life ends,

00:05:45.788 --> 00:05:47.123
"my own happiness."

00:05:47.123 --> 00:05:49.871
You would say, "We want
to secure those rights.

00:05:49.871 --> 00:05:53.023
"We're not going to give
those up to government."


All men are created equal

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.865 --> 00:00:03.339
Man 1: The second paragraph
of the declaration

00:00:03.339 --> 00:00:08.686
is one of the most amazing
set of phrases ever written.

00:00:08.686 --> 00:00:12.686
It is the creed of what
makes America and now,

00:00:12.686 --> 00:00:14.537
what makes the aspirations of many people

00:00:14.537 --> 00:00:15.736
around the world.

00:00:15.736 --> 00:00:17.404
Let's just read that first sentence

00:00:17.404 --> 00:00:20.768
of the second paragraph,
which is just awesome.

00:00:20.768 --> 00:00:23.805
It's, "We hold these
truths to be self-evident

00:00:23.805 --> 00:00:26.601
"that all men are created
equal, that they are endowed

00:00:26.601 --> 00:00:30.471
"by their Creator with
certain unalienable Rights,

00:00:30.471 --> 00:00:34.349
"that among these are Life,
Liberty, and the pursuit

00:00:34.349 --> 00:00:36.267
"of Happiness."

00:00:36.267 --> 00:00:38.805
Man 2: "All men are created
equal, that they are endowed

00:00:38.805 --> 00:00:42.603
"by their Creator with
certain unalienable Rights,

00:00:42.603 --> 00:00:45.685
that among these are Life,
Liberty, and the pursuit

00:00:45.685 --> 00:00:46.870
"of Happiness."

00:00:46.870 --> 00:00:48.601
Let's start even with the word "we".

00:00:48.601 --> 00:00:49.518
Who's "we"?

00:00:49.518 --> 00:00:55.736
"We", it says, is the American
colonies, now gathering

00:00:55.736 --> 00:00:59.405
as the United States of
America, but they're basically

00:00:59.405 --> 00:01:01.473
white males.

00:01:01.473 --> 00:01:04.268
Everybody at that
convention is a white male,

00:01:04.268 --> 00:01:06.337
most of them landowners.

00:01:06.337 --> 00:01:09.603
So, what the arc of American history shows

00:01:09.603 --> 00:01:14.245
is that word "we" begins,
over the course of decades

00:01:14.245 --> 00:01:17.869
and then centuries, to
include more and more people.

00:01:17.869 --> 00:01:20.162
Eventually, it includes freed slaves,

00:01:20.162 --> 00:01:23.337
eventually it includes
women, but that's a narrative

00:01:23.337 --> 00:01:26.936
of American history, is who are we

00:01:26.936 --> 00:01:28.805
that have these truths as self-evident,

00:01:28.805 --> 00:01:30.605
that we're all equal?

00:01:30.605 --> 00:01:34.670
Now, it's also interesting,
the phrase "self-evident".

00:01:34.670 --> 00:01:41.203
This is something that
comes from the rationality

00:01:41.203 --> 00:01:43.746
of the scientific era we were in.

00:01:43.746 --> 00:01:47.273
This is an age right after
Isaac Newton has made

00:01:47.273 --> 00:01:49.495
everything in the universe rational

00:01:49.495 --> 00:01:52.871
through scientific laws
and it also comes from some

00:01:52.871 --> 00:01:55.605
of the philosophers,
especially David Hume,

00:01:55.605 --> 00:01:59.002
that there are just certain
things that are self-evident.

00:01:59.002 --> 00:02:01.671
That's an important concept,
that they're not appealing

00:02:01.671 --> 00:02:05.081
to anybody else to say,
"What are these truths?"

00:02:05.081 --> 00:02:08.001
They're saying, "This is
just our rationality tells us

00:02:08.001 --> 00:02:11.495
"this is true," but then they say,

00:02:11.495 --> 00:02:14.745
"all men are created equal."

00:02:14.745 --> 00:02:16.244
Now, they say men.

00:02:16.244 --> 00:02:19.579
Back then, men was supposed to be a phrase

00:02:19.579 --> 00:02:21.736
that was more inclusive than just males.

00:02:21.736 --> 00:02:22.870
Man 2: For man.

00:02:22.870 --> 00:02:26.271
Man 1: Right, it's like
mankind, to some extent,

00:02:26.271 --> 00:02:31.880
but then again, at least
Jefferson, he owned slaves.

00:02:32.335 --> 00:02:36.744
Women, they weren't necessarily
given the right to vote.

00:02:36.744 --> 00:02:40.163
Even though they mean
"man" sort of like mankind,

00:02:40.163 --> 00:02:43.829
they also really generally
mean men, at this point.

00:02:43.829 --> 00:02:47.745
Once again, this is where the
American narrative starts.

00:02:47.745 --> 00:02:50.900
Fortunately, that phrase
gets expanded over time

00:02:50.900 --> 00:02:52.318
as to what they mean.

00:02:52.318 --> 00:02:53.900
Man 2: Right.

00:02:53.900 --> 00:02:55.984
Man 1: Look at the phrase "created equal".

00:02:55.984 --> 00:02:57.818
What does that really mean?

00:02:57.818 --> 00:03:00.849
First of all, it doesn't mean
that people are always equal.

00:03:00.849 --> 00:03:03.715
At a certain point in life,
Jefferson owns a whole lot

00:03:03.715 --> 00:03:06.819
of property and Franklin
is quite rich as a printer

00:03:06.819 --> 00:03:11.319
and different people have
different statuses in life,

00:03:11.319 --> 00:03:16.382
but they're saying that in a
fundamental, political way,

00:03:16.382 --> 00:03:19.850
we all start off created equal.

00:03:19.850 --> 00:03:22.052
We have certain rights that
you just can't take away

00:03:22.052 --> 00:03:24.901
from us whether we're
rich or poor or whatever.

00:03:24.901 --> 00:03:26.651
Those unalienable rights
are Life, Liberty,

00:03:26.651 --> 00:03:29.286
and the pursuit of Happiness.

00:03:29.286 --> 00:03:31.130
Man 2: I'm guessing it's
also a ding at the King,

00:03:31.130 --> 00:03:34.366
because royalty ...

00:03:34.662 --> 00:03:36.932
One underlying assumption
is that it's inherited

00:03:36.932 --> 00:03:40.532
and that you are created better off.

00:03:40.532 --> 00:03:42.865
Man 1: Right and Thomas Paine,

00:03:42.865 --> 00:03:47.916
who is a pamphleteer, has
just written this document

00:03:47.916 --> 00:03:51.579
Common Sense and that's
helped inspire everybody.

00:03:51.579 --> 00:03:54.803
At the heart of the document Common Sense

00:03:54.803 --> 00:03:57.731
is that there's no divine right of kings.

00:03:57.731 --> 00:03:59.745
Divine right of kings
was a British concept,

00:03:59.745 --> 00:04:02.933
which meant God made
certain people more equal

00:04:02.933 --> 00:04:08.493
or better than others, and
the king, by divine right,

00:04:08.493 --> 00:04:12.662
had these powers and we're
saying, "No, the kings don't

00:04:12.662 --> 00:04:13.830
"have any more powers."

00:04:13.830 --> 00:04:15.799
Ben Franklin was very much of that way,

00:04:15.799 --> 00:04:18.598
which was he hated the
notion of aristocracy,

00:04:18.598 --> 00:04:20.661
that some people were
born noble and some people

00:04:20.661 --> 00:04:23.662
were born aristocratic and
some people were born royal

00:04:23.662 --> 00:04:27.077
and whatever, but think
about it for a moment.

00:04:27.077 --> 00:04:29.870
What was Thomas Jefferson thinking?

00:04:29.870 --> 00:04:32.831
A guy who owns a lot of
slaves, what was he thinking

00:04:32.831 --> 00:04:35.197
when he writes this amazing phrase,

00:04:35.197 --> 00:04:37.898
"all men are created equal"?

00:04:38.267 --> 00:04:40.161
I think he was very conflicted.

00:04:40.161 --> 00:04:43.267
Here's a guy who did
not end up even freeing

00:04:43.267 --> 00:04:48.162
most of his slaves in his
lifetime and yet, he could write

00:04:48.162 --> 00:04:50.131
these inspiring words.

00:04:50.131 --> 00:04:53.661
If you read about
Jefferson, you know that was

00:04:53.661 --> 00:04:57.245
the fundamental conflict
and it's a conflict that we,

00:04:57.245 --> 00:05:00.386
as a nation, have been wrestling with.

00:05:00.386 --> 00:05:03.386
Man 2: As a slaveowner, he
also knew them very well.

00:05:03.386 --> 00:05:05.186
He knew them as human beings, perhaps.

00:05:05.186 --> 00:05:07.316
Man 1: Right, well he fathered children

00:05:07.316 --> 00:05:09.018
with one of the slaves.

00:05:09.018 --> 00:05:12.102
Ben Franklin is interesting,
because early on in life,

00:05:12.102 --> 00:05:14.451
he had two household slaves,
who he didn't really treat

00:05:14.451 --> 00:05:17.119
as slaves, but they were
his household servants

00:05:17.119 --> 00:05:20.352
and he had allowed the
advertising of slavery

00:05:20.352 --> 00:05:22.652
in the Pennsylvania Gazette, the newspaper

00:05:22.652 --> 00:05:27.268
that he published, but he
realized, after he writes

00:05:27.268 --> 00:05:30.922
these words, "created equal",
he realizes how abhorrent

00:05:30.922 --> 00:05:33.383
that is, to his own notions,

00:05:33.383 --> 00:05:34.987
that people are created equal.

00:05:34.987 --> 00:05:37.453
Of course, he's by then, freed his slaves,

00:05:37.453 --> 00:05:40.936
but becomes a president of
the Society for the Abolition

00:05:40.936 --> 00:05:43.936
of Slavery in Pennsylvania,
as a way of trying

00:05:43.936 --> 00:05:47.453
to make up for the fact that he'd erred,

00:05:47.453 --> 00:05:51.319
he had been wrong when he was young,

00:05:51.319 --> 00:05:55.321
to tolerate the institution
of slavery and he becomes

00:05:55.321 --> 00:05:56.436
an abolitionist.

00:05:56.436 --> 00:05:59.186
Of course, John Adams,
from the very beginning,

00:05:59.186 --> 00:06:00.385
was an abolitionist.

00:06:00.385 --> 00:06:02.119
Man 2: This is important
for people to realize.

00:06:02.119 --> 00:06:04.453
When you take an American history class,

00:06:04.453 --> 00:06:07.250
it seems like obviously
everything comes to a head

00:06:07.250 --> 00:06:10.417
leading up the Civil War,
but this was already starting

00:06:10.417 --> 00:06:11.988
to become an issue, a moral issue,

00:06:11.988 --> 00:06:13.921
a philosophical issue,
even at the founding

00:06:13.921 --> 00:06:14.787
of the country.

00:06:14.787 --> 00:06:16.083
Man 1: And a political issue, as well,

00:06:16.083 --> 00:06:19.255
because if you want Jefferson
and you want Virginia in,

00:06:19.255 --> 00:06:21.415
the reason John Adams ...

00:06:21.415 --> 00:06:23.522
He was a great abolitionist,
but there were no plantations.

00:06:23.522 --> 00:06:26.162
There was no cotton being
grown in Massachusetts,

00:06:26.162 --> 00:06:31.121
but if you were a cotton
farmer or a plantation owner

00:06:31.121 --> 00:06:35.003
in Virginia, you tended to
own slaves and it becomes

00:06:35.003 --> 00:06:39.076
a great political issue
where the slaveholding states

00:06:39.076 --> 00:06:41.186
have to be brought into this union.

00:06:41.186 --> 00:06:45.433
We see that conflict when
the constitution is written

00:06:47.460 --> 00:06:49.596
11 years later.

00:06:49.596 --> 00:06:51.931
They're still having this
conflict on what do we do

00:06:51.931 --> 00:06:52.938
about slavery?

00:06:52.938 --> 00:06:54.069
Man 2: Yeah and it will continue

00:06:54.069 --> 00:06:57.146
for another 70-something years.

00:06:57.146 --> 00:06:58.005
Man 1: Yeah, if you want to say

00:06:58.005 --> 00:07:00.231
that it was totally
resolved by the Civil War

00:07:00.231 --> 00:07:02.404
and there will be some who will say that

00:07:02.404 --> 00:07:04.938
that was the original stain on

00:07:04.938 --> 00:07:07.562
this unbelievably beautiful phrase,

00:07:07.562 --> 00:07:10.403
which is that "all men are created equal."

00:07:10.403 --> 00:07:12.862
Man 2: Yeah, very cool.