Questions of Civic Proportions delivers questions, ideas, and good work from a political life worth sharing.Â
It’s a power-up for the civic-minded.
 Each newsletter is a small act of thinking together, delivered twice a month, that transforms the endless scroll of headlines into questions aligned to American political thought and constitutional thinking.
We believe public dialogue is a civic duty but you need good questions. It’s not talking politics. It’s sharing what we can learn about political life.
With our Questions of Civic Proportions Newsletter, you’ll always have good questions.
Questions of Civic Proportions are questions that deserve your time. Let’s make it easier to start thinking together.
Join a community that believes in the power of thinking together.
We designed our Questions of Civic Proportions Newsletter to help you tune your attention to the questions, ideas, and good work of a political life worth sharing. Subscribe to get a copy and let us know what you think.
We will never share your address or any other information without your permission.
"Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers."
—VoltaireOur Latest Questions
Questions of Civic Proportions: What difference does one book make?
I thought I had unlocked my superpower. When I learned to read, I participated in a program that required knocking on my neighbor’s doors. I read to them from my stapled packet of worksheets. I learned to love to read, but part of the superpower of this memory is how reading worked to connect to my community.
The efforts to ban books today are about limiting this power. They are a threat we have to take seriously.
Questions of Civic Proportions: What’s the Remedy for a Disconnected Democratic Life?
As our third legislative session wraps up in Texas, I have spent too much time with the never-ending scroll that goes along with staying up-to-date. We’ve now seen that Facebook has the evidence that our social media habits aren’t helpful for our mental health. I think it’s working against our civic health too.
Even if we set aside what we know about misinformation and extremism online, our online news consumption is corrupting our ideas of how change works.
Questions of Civic Proportions: Can we fight loss with love?
In an instant, the right song has the power to transport across time and space to some past moment. On this day, there’s a song that transports me to a moment that we share.
At some point in the day, every April 4th, I think “A shot rang out in the Memphis sky.”
This is the shot that killed Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1968. A shot that marks the end of so much, a final chapter in the Civil Rights Movement.
Questions of Civic Proportions: What is missing from the stories we already know?
I grew up watching Wonder Woman fly across the country in her invisible jet. My grandmother loved Linda Carter in this show. I was very young, and she wanted me to feel empowered by this female superhero.
Questions of Civic Proportions: What if we have to get angry to change the world?
I recently discovered one of my favorite Harriet Tubman quotes. The words describe her. They are not her own but they still speak to why it’s important to hear voices like hers.
Questions of Civic Proportions: Can failure help us think in complete pictures?
It would be absurd to send a normal newsletter this week. Luckily, my family only suffered inconveniences during this winter storm in Texas. These inconveniences, however, are still best understood as the failure of government.
Questions of Civic Proportions: What will we do with our “Two Americas” story this time?
“Two Americas†has been a theme in our political discussion for decades. Headlines in January warned that a “clash of Two Americas†was real and could get worse.” That’s a tale of Republicans vs. Democrats. It reads like a rhetorical device, something that amps up the drama.
It has roots in our past. We can’t let it slip through our collective memory and become just another strategy to get more clicks.
Questions of Civic Proportions: What did you see on Inauguration Day?
My Fellow Citizens,A lot of magic happens on a successful Inauguration Day. This 59th rotationthrough the ceremonies and traditions came with a shared sense of relief after everything had seemed so dangerously compromised. While there is logistical wizardry at every...
Top Issues from 2019
Did You See the Magic at your Thanksgiving Gathering? It’s the Cure for Loneliness.
When a big holiday meal goes well, we all start to see the magic in a hundred small things.
Perhaps your holiday crew avoided political confrontations this year. Or you palyed board games without someone getting their feelings hurt…
Read more
Is Democracy a Call-to-Arms or Something Else?
Leoanrd Cohen kept coming at me this week. I’m not his biggest fan, but I’ve figured out that he has something to teach us, something that’s important to hear right now.
Read more
What Can We Learn from Thinking in Time, Even for Just a Minute?
I haven’t been able to get my bearings on events in northern Syria this week. There’s a book I keep within reach for moments like these. One of the most pragmatic skills of all lies in the study of history and politics.
Read more
Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
Robert Putnam blamed television and urban sprawl. When we spend our time commuting or binge-watching, we don’t have time to talk to our neighbors. While most of us know some of our neighbors, few of us interact with them in any meaningful way.
Read more
What can we learn from those questions that keep calling us back to them?
We mark a new school year in countless ways…Â In some of those distant places, we remember a question or an assignment that opened up our mind to discovering something new. The best questions make a lasting impression.
Read more
Time to start telling the truth about the hardest work of democratic life
When you step into the arena, you risk everything. No one can tell you what happens next. The work of leading a cause requires a resilience that doesn’t get much air time.