Founding fathers would be appalled by how powerful the President and Supreme Court are: A.J. Jacobs

Join us right now with the hat on AJ Jacobs, one of the great authors. The book is called The Year of Living Constitutionally, one man's humble quest to follow the Constitution's original meeting. And I've been reading you for so many, many years, I can't even believe it was in like 20 years, actually, maybe more. Not quite since 1780, but for a long time, but close. So. So here you are walking around New York City with a quill pen and more, doing all sorts of things to try to live the way you think the founders lived. What were you trying to do? Well, first of all, good Morrow, I didn't say that. Secondly, I did this because as you've seen, as you just mentioned, the Constitution has a huge impact on our lives. And I realized a couple of years ago, I never even read it, not from start to finish. So I thought as a writer, I need to understand this 240 year old document and the way I like to understand things, dive in, live them. So I said I'm going to understand it using the tools and mindset of our founding fathers. That meant a musket on the streets of New York, writing with a quill pen, quartering soldiers. And it was an actor, a method writer. I am a method writer. That's an excellent description. And I it was absurd at times, as you can see, but it was a serious point. How do we interpret this document was the big lesson. Oh, many big lessons. One is the founders were much more flexible in their thinking than we are. We are so intransigent, so tribal nowadays. Ben Franklin said that the older he gets, the less certain he is of his opinion. So it's patriotic to change your mind. Wow, that would actually be a big one, I know, for this planet. Can you imagine that they didn't see the two party system coming? So what do you think they would think of this now? Oh, they would be, I mean, some parts they would love Ben Franklin, I think would love, I don't know the Internet, but but so much of America, they would be shocked to become an originalist for, for the, the Constitution. Or do you think it it needs to be interpreted in, in view of the way things are today? I think a bit of a of both. You need to look at the original meaning, but you also need to weigh in. OK, we don't have quills, but we we walk around with pens. People in New York, certain areas in New York, it may not be a musket, but there's certainly a lot of people walking around with firearms right in New York. So it's not maybe that different. They just don't have the funny hat, but they have other funny hats. They do have other funny. Well, I would argue that the past really was a different place. It was a different country and and you brought up guns. I had a musket and I went and fired the musket. That is a very different machine. It takes 15 steps to allow you got to put in the the gunpowder and it's like building a desk from IKEA. It takes a long time. So it is not the guns and you can forget the the ball and then that's where the expression below your wad comes from because the only thing that goes out is the cotton or whatever it is in there. Right. Exactly. And flash in the pan also from muskets flash in the pan. OK, so now that you know that and we talk about guns and all sorts of issues that that, do you have a new view on that or a different view? Well, I believe that I do think there is a a right to bear arms, but we've got to take into account how different the technology is. So in the book I talk, I give an example. If there was a law from the 1800s that said wheeled vehicles are fine on this little country lane and that meant carts, bicycles, then someone invents an 18 wheel Mack truck, that's a different machine. So we have to keep in mind that. What do you think the founding fathers would think of what the of the way the Supreme Court ruled yesterday, trying to be originalists, if you will, on this issue around the president? Do you have any, any sense of that now? I have a lot of thoughts. I have a lot of thought. They would be shocked both by the Supreme Court and by the president how powerful they are. They were not, neither was supposed to be this powerful. It was Congress. Congress was first in the Constitution. And the fact that even before the ruling yesterday on immunity, the president, they would be appalled by how powerful the president has become. And they in the originally, George Washington made 8 executive orders. Obama and Trump both made over 200.