The Case for America

Fox News anchor and presidential biographer Bret Baier writes on the occasion of America's 250th anniversary, framing the book as a courtroom argument delivered to a jury of fellow citizens. He identifies two distorted views: one that dwells only on America's darker chapters, another that offers sanitized history with no room for self-reflection. Baier charts a middle course, organizing his case into an Opening Argument, Testimony, Closing Argument, and Verdict.

The Opening Argument centers on the Declaration of Independence as America's origin story. Baier reconstructs the deliberations of the Second Continental Congress, the assembly of delegates from the thirteen colonies, in Philadelphia during the summer of 1776. John Adams, a delegate from Massachusetts, pushed for independence while loyalists warned that challenging Britain would be suicidal. Baier argues that the core issue was not economics but imperial control without colonial consent, crystallized by the Stamp Act of 1765. Thomas Paine's pamphlet Common Sense rallied public opinion, and Virginia delegate Richard Henry Lee formally proposed independence on June 7. Congress tasked Thomas Jefferson, a Virginia delegate and gifted writer, with drafting the text; Jefferson aimed for language that would be "an expression of the American mind" (12). Fellow committee member Benjamin Franklin and Adams revised the draft, which was organized into a Preamble asserting unalienable rights, Grievances against King George III, and the formal Declaration. Baier calls it a turning point in world history, written before the war was won or the Constitution existed.

Baier establishes three framing principles for assessing America at 250. Democracy is inherently messy, designed to accommodate fierce disagreement. The nation is genuinely diverse: Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice recalls her swearing-in beneath a portrait of Franklin, a Black woman from the segregated South taking an oath to a Constitution that once counted her ancestors as three-fifths of a person. And America is young, only 250 years old. Historian Douglas Brinkley cautions against "presentism," the tendency to view current difficulties as uniquely dysfunctional.

The Testimony section develops five thematic arguments. The first holds that America chooses unity despite dissent. Baier opens with Abraham Lincoln's second inauguration in March 1865, where Lincoln called for "malice toward none, with charity for all" (33) even as the Civil War raged. He profiles bipartisan partnerships, including Republican Senator Orrin Hatch and Democratic Senator Ted Kennedy on the Americans with Disabilities Act, and President Ronald Reagan and House Speaker Tip O'Neill on tax and immigration reform. GovTrack data found that two-thirds of bills passed by Congress in 2024 had bipartisan support. Tim Shriver, a member of the Kennedy family and founder of UNITE, reports that 100 million Americans have severed family relationships over politics. Shriver promotes a Dignity Index that measures how people treat one another when they disagree. Baier recounts how Robert F. Kennedy, JFK's brother, delivered an extemporaneous 1968 speech calling for compassion after Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination. Utah Governor Spencer Cox's Disagree Better initiative, developed through the National Governors Association, urges Americans to model respectful disagreement.

The second testimony argues that America is a beacon of freedom. Baier opens with D-Day on June 6, 1944, highlighting Dwight Eisenhower's private note accepting sole blame in case of failure. He examines Franklin Roosevelt's 1941 "Four Freedoms" speech and Virginia patriot Patrick Henry's 1775 cry of "give me liberty or give me death!" (79). Reagan's Cold War vigilance is featured, including his 1988 address to students at Moscow State University, and Rice argues that American international leadership is indispensable because great powers inevitably shape the global order. Baier reflects on how his youthful objection to reporters questioning Reagan evolved into a deep appreciation for press freedom as foundational to democracy. The chapter closes with the Liberty Bell, invoked by Martin Luther King Jr. in his "I Have a Dream" speech, as a symbol of freedom's endurance.

The third testimony examines America's resilience. Baier describes President George W. Bush at Ground Zero after September 11 shouting, "I can hear you! The rest of the world hears you!" (105), and profiles the Greatest Generation, who endured the Great Depression and fought World War II. The Space Shuttle Challenger disaster of 1986 tested national resolve, and Reagan's televised address comforted schoolchildren who had watched the launch. Baier recounts how Adams and Jefferson, bitter rivals after the 1800 election, reconciled through years of correspondence before both died on July 4, 1826, the Declaration's fiftieth anniversary. The contested 2000 election, with its Florida recount and "hanging chads" (ballot holes not fully punched through), is recounted alongside Vice President Al Gore's concession prioritizing the public good. The January 6, 2021 Capitol breach is briefly addressed, with Baier noting a parallel to the 1876 crisis, when competing electoral slates were resolved through a deal ending Reconstruction, the post-Civil War rebuilding era. He shares his son Paul Baier's story: Born with a congenital heart defect, Paul endured four open-heart surgeries and launched a podcast, One Step at a Time, about overcoming adversity. The chapter identifies optimism, patriotism, and growth through adversity as threads of American resilience.

The fourth testimony presents America as the land of opportunity. Harvard professor and author Arthur Brooks traces the Declaration's "pursuit of happiness" to George Mason's Virginia Declaration of Rights, a 1776 charter of individual liberties. Brooks argues that the Declaration guarantees the opportunity to pursue happiness, not happiness itself. Ken Langone, a founding investor of The Home Depot and grandson of Italian immigrants, recounts learning generosity from a working-class upbringing. Rice advocates for parental school choice, and Steve Case, cofounder of America Online, describes his Rise of the Rest initiative investing in start-ups nationwide to counter the coastal concentration of venture capital.

The fifth testimony argues that America strives for a civic ideal. Baier traces the founders' conception of civic virtue to Aristotle and Cicero and highlights Theodore Roosevelt's "Man in the Arena" speech. He profiles the late commentator Charles Krauthammer, the son of immigrants who was paralyzed in a diving accident yet became a leading conservative voice, viewing the Constitution's survival as a near-miracle. Constitutional law teacher and commentator Hugh Hewitt recommends returning civics to seventh- and eighth-grade curricula, and former Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy calls for civics education beginning in the fourth grade.

In the Closing Argument, Baier revisits the American Dream. He traces the term to James Truslow Adams's 1931 book The Epic of America, which defined the dream not as material wealth but as a social order where every person can reach their fullest potential. He examines immigration as intrinsic to the American story, noting that up to two-thirds of Silicon Valley tech workers are foreign born and listing iconic companies founded by immigrants or their children. The chapter concludes by citing Reagan's description of America as "a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans" (203).

In the Verdict, Baier declares the case for America strong. There has never been a nation like it. America's energy is renewed by innovation, yet it possesses the stability of the world's oldest written constitution. Americans possess boldness and the courage to change when necessary. Freedom gives Americans a vigilance that ensures democratic participation. Baier closes with Reagan's declaration that as long as the American Dream lives, America has a future and all mankind has a reason to hope.