The New Gospel

Our democracy is not so much a house to be built, but a conversation to be had [slightly paraphrased] ... What the Constitution can do is organize the way by which we argue about our future.  All its elaborate machinery—Its separation of powers and checks and balances and federalist principles and Bill of Rights—are designed to force us into a conversation, a “deliberative democracy” in which all citizens are required to engage in a process of testing their ideas against an external reality, persuading others of their point of view, and building alliances of consent.