Jon Stewart welcomed Harvard Prof. Steven Levitsky to Comedy Central and Monday’s edition of The Daily Show to promote his new book, Tyranny of the Minority, where he wondered if the Constitution is to blame for the “mess” the country finds itself in.
Stewart began, “The Constitution is really our, you know, touchstone. Is that the document that actually got us into this mess?”
By “mess,” the duo meant that Donald Trump won in 2016 and may win again, as Levitsky explained, “The Constitution, as you say, is a brilliant document... It is the world's oldest written constitution. It’s done us a lot of good, but it is also part of the problem today. We, a majority of Americans, support democracy. A majority of Americans support the really interesting experiment with multiracial democracy that we are evolving into in the 21st century. A majority of Americans every day since Donald Trump came down the golden escalator have opposed Trump.”
Levitsky added that “we have a Constitution that protects, that enables, and that empowers an authoritarian minority party, and that’s a problem.”
Stewart followed up with a discussion of the nature of the Constitution, “But isn't that the very nature of the Constitution, it was a balance between that ideal and the practicalities of, well, how do we let the southern states, who have less population, not to be steamrolled by a pure democracy?”
The reference to southern states is a subtle attempt by Stewart to portray various aspects of the Constitution as being created for the defense of slavery and racism, but, at the time, Virginia was a large state and the namesake behind a more purely democratic proposal.
For his part, Levitsky declared that “First of all, it was a document created by people who feared democracy, who feared majority rule. Because majority rule didn't exist in the world in the 18th century.”
Stewart then wondered, “What did they think, if it wasn't kings, what did they think it was going to be?”
Shifting to the Electoral College, Levitsky replied, “They didn't know. They were in completely new terrain. They had never been in a republic like this before. We had never had an elected leader before. The Electoral College was a third choice. They were scrambling, right? They couldn't reach a majority and they didn't know how to elect a president. So the Electoral College was an improvisation, an experiment.”
Still stuck on the idea that every part of the Constitution was designed to appease the South, Stewart asked, “Was it an improvisation to bring a compromise to the southern states? Is that—”
As Stewart was pondering the Electoral College, Levitsky jumped in, “Southern states and smaller states.”
During the segment, neither Stewart nor Levitsky ever offered any reassurances that in their attempts to solve the alleged problem of the tyranny of the minority, they would not simply replace it with the tyranny of the majority, which the Electoral College currently provides some defense against.
Here is a transcript for the March 11 show:
Comedy Central The Daily Show
3/11/2024
11:21 PM ET
JON STEWART: So how-- when you-- tell me about how we got into the mess. The Constitution is really our, you know, touchstone. Is that the document that actually got us into this mess?
STEVEN LEVITSKY: The Constitution, as you say, is a brilliant document, is the world’s oldest—
STEWART: Don't hedge, sir.
LEVITSKY: It is the world's oldest written Constitution. It’s done us a lot of good.
STEWART: Yes.
LEVITSKY: But it is also part of the problem today. We, a majority of Americans, support democracy. A majority of Americans support the really interesting experiment with multiracial democracy that we are evolving into in the 21st century. A majority of Americans every day since Donald Trump came down the golden escalator have opposed Trump.
But we have a Constitution that protects, that enables, and that empowers an authoritarian minority party, and that’s a problem.
STEWART: But isn't that the very nature of the Constitution, it was a balance between that ideal and the practicalities of, well, how do we let the southern states, who have less population, not to be steamrolled by a pure democracy?
LEVITSKY: Right. It was a couple things. First of all, it was a document created by people who feared democracy, who feared majority rule. Because majority rule didn't exist in the world in the 18th century.
STEWART: What did they think, if it wasn't kings, what did they think it was going to be?
LEVITSKY: They didn't know. They were in completely new terrain. They had never been in a republic like this before. We had never had an elected leader before. The Electoral College was a third choice. They were scrambling, right? They couldn't reach a majority and they didn't know how to elect a president. So the Electoral College was an improvisation, an experiment.
STEWART: Was it an improvisation to bring a compromise to the southern states? Is that—
LEVITSKY: Southern states and smaller states.
STEWART: -- Because the north was more industrialized than the south. And the smaller states.
