The following is adapted from a talk delivered at Hillsdale College on September 20, 2021, during a Center for Constructive Alternatives conference on “Critical American Elections.” Sixteen years ago, in 2005, the Carter-Baker Commission on Federal Election Reform issued a report that proposed a uniform system of requiring a photo ID in order to vote […]
The following is adapted from a lecture delivered at Hillsdale College on September 20, 2021, during a Center for Constructive Alternatives conference on “Critical American Elections.” Notwithstanding all the hysterical rhetoric surrounding the events of January 6, 2021, two critical things stand out. The first is that what happened was much more hoax than insurrection. […]
The following is adapted from a speech delivered on April 27, 2021, in Franklin, Tennessee, at a Hillsdale College National Leadership Seminar. In 2007, America had one pediatric gender clinic; today there are hundreds. Testosterone is readily available to adolescents from places like Planned Parenthood and Kaiser, often on a first visit—without even a therapist’s […]
The following is adapted from a lecture delivered at Hillsdale College on March 30, 2021. Critical race theory is fast becoming America’s new institutional orthodoxy. Yet most Americans have never heard of it—and of those who have, many don’t understand it. It’s time for this to change. We need to know what it is so […]
The following is adapted from a speech delivered on February 18, 2021, at a Hillsdale College National Leadership Seminar in Phoenix, Arizona. The COVID pandemic has been a tragedy, no doubt. But it has exposed profound issues in America that threaten the principles of freedom and order that we Americans often take for granted. First, […]
The following is adapted from a speech delivered at a Hillsdale College reception in Rogers, Arkansas, on November 17, 2020. On September 17, Constitution Day, I chaired a panel organized by the White House. It was an extraordinary thing. The panel’s purpose was to identify what has gone wrong in the teaching of American history […]
The following is adapted from a Hillsdale College online lecture delivered in Nashville, Tennessee, on August 19, 2020. Nearly 30 years ago, in a 1993 Nike commercial, professional basketball legend Charles Barkley fired the first shot at the “role model” concept popularized by Columbia University sociologist Robert K. Merton in the aftermath of the 1960s […]
The following is adapted from a Hillsdale College online lecture delivered in Nashville, Tennessee, on August 19, 2020. Nearly 30 years ago, in a 1993 Nike commercial, professional basketball legend Charles Barkley fired the first shot at the “role model” concept popularized by Columbia University sociologist Robert K. Merton in the aftermath of the 1960s […]
The following is adapted from a lecture delivered on June 18, 2020, for a Hillsdale College online symposium, “The Coronavirus and Public Policy.” Over the last four months, Americans have lived through what is arguably the most consequential period of government malfeasance in U.S. history. Public officials’ overreaction to the novel coronavirus put American cities […]
Hillsdale College held a dedication ceremony for its new Christ Chapel on October 3, 2019, during a two-day gala to celebrate the College’s 175th anniversary. The following are excerpts from the dedication address. A video of the dedication ceremony may be viewed online at fourpillars.hillsdale.edu. This is a very special occasion—the 175th anniversary of Hillsdale and […]
The following is adapted from a speech delivered on January 15, 2019, at Hillsdale College’s Allan P. Kirby, Jr. Center for Constitutional Studies and Citizenship in Washington, D.C. Seventy miles northwest of New York City is a hospital that looks like a prison, its drab brick buildings wrapped in layers of fencing and barbed wire. […]
Trent England Director, Save Our States Trent England is executive vice president and the David and Ann Brown Distinguished Fellow at the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs, where he also directs the Save Our States project. He earned his B.A. in government from Claremont McKenna College and his J.D. from the George Mason University School of […]
Alex BerensonAuthor, Tell Your Children: The Truth About Marijuana, Mental Illness, and Violence Alex Berenson is a graduate of Yale University with degrees in history and economics. He began his career in journalism in 1994 as a business reporter for the Denver Post, joined the financial news website TheStreet.com in 1996, and worked as an investigative reporter for The […]
The following is adapted from a panel presentation on October 12, 2018, in Kansas City, Missouri, at a Hillsdale College Free Market Forum, sponsored by the College’s Center for the Study of Monetary Systems and Free Enterprise. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the invention of the automobile liberated individuals from the yoke of […]
Charles R. Kesler Editor, Claremont Review of Books Charles R. Kesler is the Dengler-Dykema Distinguished Professor of Government at Claremont McKenna College and editor of the Claremont Review of Books. He earned his bachelor’s degree in social studies and his A.M. and Ph.D. in government from Harvard University. A senior fellow at the Claremont Institute for the Study […]