The Center for Citizenship & Constitutional Government is pleased to announce the winners of the third annual Publius Prize for Undergraduate Writing on Public Affairs.
In the prize's third iteration, students were encouraged to submit pieces published in the past year, so long as their article or essay fit the prize description of “refine[ing] and enlarg[ing] the public views” (The Federalist, 10). Essays were submitted by students across the campus community, covering topics as wide ranging as civic dialogue, immigration policy, feminism, and numerous contemporary films. We received submissions from authors across multiple grade levels and majors, and we are grateful to all who submitted their writing for review.
After a difficult selection process, the CCCG is proud to announce the two winners.
In the national publication category, the winner is W. Joseph DeReuil ’24 for his article “American Atlantis,” published in American Postliberal on July 21, 2023. Mr. DeReuil critiques the modern tendency of assuming the elongation of life to be the highest good and challenges the reader to consider the cost that such a prioritization has on human flourishing. As Publius did, DeReuil addresses a contemporary political issue by raising fundamental questions about human nature.
In the on-campus publication category, the winner is Elizabeth Hale ’25 for her article “Wonder and Rapture,” published in The Irish Rover on November 15, 2023. Through elegantly crafted prose, Hale reflects on the modern university’s shift towards career-oriented credentialism and argues that the prioritization of prestige and skill development undermines the university’s duty to “promote wonder in the pursuit of wisdom.”
“Wisdom must be the integrating principle of the university. Wisdom indeed incorporates the technical knowledge of the chemist, the factual comprehension of the historian, and the didactic reasoning of the logician. These skills are understandably prized in the workplace. Yet wisdom transcends these.” -Elizabeth Hale
Each author will receive a $250 prize, and their essays are copied below.
We also are proud to announce the runners-up in both categories, deserving honorable mention.
National Publication Category: “A Drag Show at Notre Dame” by Merlot Fogarty, published in First Things on November 9, 2023, offers a compelling argument that academic freedom at Notre Dame must be shaped by its Catholic identity and mission.
On-campus Publication Category: "Confused American Identity, Patriotism, and Immigration" by Catalina Scheider Galiñaes, published in the Notre Dame Journal of Political Science on April 15, 2024, presents a nuanced and well-researched case for America to define its “ideological and geographical borders.”
The call for next year's Publius Prize will commence in the Spring of 2024.
American Atlantis
A society that is never willing to die will inevitably become a strangled scientocracy, unable to truly live.
JUL 21, 2023
19
“We have a water which we call Water of Paradise, being, by that we do to it, made very sovereign for health, and prolongation of life,” writes Francis Bacon in his 1626 unfinished work New Atlantis. The short novella describes a utopian civilization in which both want and illness have been cured, and the citizens, devoid of physical need, flourish. Health and longevity of life is the first priority of the ruling class, and in the long course of human suffering, they have once and for all been achieved.
We are undoubtedly progressing towards the world of Bacon—modern priorities, and the premises upon which society operates, are the same utopian ones that inform Bacon’s liberalism.
In a recent article by Timothy Cardinal Dolan, the American cardinal claims that health and life, while goods in themselves, must be ordered to something higher—a goal that was especially easy to forget during the throes of COVID. Dolan questions, “Did we do enough? Did we raise the point that spiritual consolation given to patients was as essential as the bodily care?”
Health is a good, but when considered the essential good, neither Christianity nor civil society can flourish. Yet the moral justification for nearly every policy proposal assumes life as the highest good—“Abortion bans put millions of women and girls at risk,” says the United Nations; “Air pollution from burning fossil fuels causes over 50,000 U.S. deaths” annually, claims a study by Yale Climate Connections; “The Science Is Clear: Gun Control Saves Lives,” reads one headline in The Scientific American. Indeed, every moral issue is tied back to saving life in the abstract, instead of promoting its flourishing. The same is true for Bacon, who was looking for eternal life in all the wrong places.
Bacon was among the first to propose a health-centric society—a “scientocracy.” And the world has progressed towards this world since his articulation. Reshaping policy questions in terms more robust than preservation of life is a precondition to forming a good society. For granting life as the highest good (as seen through COVID restrictions limiting access to the sacraments) will eventually pit more robust moral goods against the will of society, and religion will not stand a chance.
New Atlantis was written in response to an earlier utopian work, in which the term was coined, by St. Thomas More. More’s Utopia provides a succinct explanation of the Christian goal that was subverted by Bacon. Rather than Bacon’s goal of extension of life and assurance of health, More’s fictional society seeks “freedom and culture of the mind,” so as to lead its citizens towards true happiness. More spends time contrasting this utopian society with contemporary Europe’s political scene. Unlike Utopia and New Atlantis, each of which have a clear and unique orienting principle around which the society functions, practice does not align with principle in the real world. More describes sixteenth century Europe as a place where the Christian faithful strive for a substantive vision of justice, but where the rulers pursue only power and wealth: the elites abuse the lower class for their own gain. Both authors seek to provide an alternative vision of governance to this predicament.
More’s solution is to paint the picture of an ideal pagan society. In this, he shows the theoretical functioning of a society that perfectly abides by imperfect principles. This society lacks Christianity, but it functions better than contemporary “Christian” Europe. In doing so, he provides an example for Europe to follow in their amending and perfecting the laws among Christian people.
More’s arrangement is seen most clearly through the conversation towards the beginning of Utopia between Raphael Hythloday, the fictional discoverer of Utopia, and a cardinal who is a British state official. “Most princes apply themselves to the arts of war … instead of the arts of peace,” laments Raphael. He then critiques the British punishment for theft, revealing the structural flaws of the regime: it harshly punishes the criminals it systemically creates. The lords’ greed creates the decision between theft and starvation for a whole class of individuals, yet thieves are punished with death: “This way of punishing thieves goes beyond the call of justice and is not, in any case, for the public good.” The cardinal’s courtiers mock Raphael’s propositions, except when they believe they can gain favor with the cardinal through praising them.
Yet through this discussion, More reveals the hypocritical Christian practice of the time. The courtiers justify their misdeed through selective scriptural citation. They practice Christianity privately, but it does not influence policy. The governance of Utopia corrects many of the vices of Europe, acting as a means of self-evaluation.
Raphael first contrasts Utopia and Europe through his description of the Utopians’ punishment. Their punishment’s aim “is to destroy vices and to save men,” as opposed to the cruelty of the British regime. This society also emphasizes the dignity of workers—no one is treated like a “beast of burden.” Health is not disregarded, but life is a means towards achieving higher goods, both for the individual and society.
This context clarifies the modern perversion of Christianity first expressed by Bacon. For Bacon, knowledge is the “greatest jewel.” The individuals in Solomon’s House—the society of elite scientists who manage the affairs of the nation—choose upon whom to bestow it. The society functions because certain keepers and developers of knowledge eradicate the burdens and scarcity of goods in life. This eliminates the need for conflict and allows man to flourish. Many of the inventions in Solomon’s House are undeniably beneficial to mankind. They mainly pertain to health and life. For instance, drinking the “Water of Paradise” mitigates the greatest evil in their society: death. The Father of Solomon’s House says, “We also have fair and large baths, of several mixtures, for the cure of diseases.”
In many ways, the society tries to undo the effects of the Fall. Death, hard work, and limited knowledge were imposed upon mankind through sin. The society of Bensalem addresses sin by uprooting its effects—they discover the goods that allow man to return to his prelapsarian state and instruct the people how to make use of them. Indeed, the effects of sin are dispelled through human invention—those inventions in Solomon’s House. This circle of men set an ideal, and society strives to attain it. The work of men saves men. Politics is the sole means of man’s salvation, for the effects of sin are dispelled by the arrangements of men: The people are made happy by the scientific working of the elites and the removal of suffering.
Creating a flourishing political community should be upheld as a noble end of politics. The goal of the modern “scientocratic” man is attractive, but men must be careful in embracing it, for it leaves aside the most important aspect of man’s nature. Believing that man can leave behind his own nature in the pursuit of worldly perfection creates a false happiness for mankind, striving towards which will not form man according to his telos. A properly ordered ideal does not remain purely material. Nor does it flee to the opposite extreme, ignoring man’s need to improve material conditions.
Perhaps surprisingly, More’s articulation of the proper use of political ideals is not foreign to the American political context. A nearly identical formulation was expounded by the nineteenth century American Orestes Brownson. Brownson writes in his 1842 essay “Parker’s Discourse”: “The sensible does not stand opposed to the Ideal, nor the spiritual. Sensibility is as truly a medium through which we rise to God, as through which we attain to nature.” He then clarifies the middle ground that More takes—recognizing both lived reality and a robust notion of human flourishing— “Let no one, then, try to abstract the Ideal from the contingent existence which represents it, and think to make it, thus abstracted, an object of knowledge”; and he continues, “And let no one try to confine himself to mere contingent existence; for unless he recognizes its Ideal, he cannot recognize even it.”
The scientific utopians of today, unconsciously taking their inspiration from Francis Bacon, do not aim too high, but they aim too low. They take an ideal towards which to strive—that of everlasting life on earth—not realizing that there is a better end for man. Shaping policy with physical death as the primary evil and life as the highest good forms citizens according to a false religion. It deforms consciences and wreaks havoc on human flourishing.
Many learned along with Cardinal Dolan during the COVID regime that even if lockdowns and masks increased your chance of living by some small percentage point, they were not always worth adhering to. This knowledge must not leave the public consciousness. The only way to rebuild society in harmony with human nature is a renewed knowledge of the things worth the price of death. A society that is never willing to die will inevitably become a strangled scientocracy, unable to truly live.
Wonder and Rapture
November 15, 2023
“What does the lovely flush in a beauty’s cheek mean to a doctor but a ‘break’ that ripples above some deadly disease? And doesn’t he sometimes wonder whether he has gained most or lost most by learning his trade?” — Mark Twain, Life on the Mississippi
Wonder and a sincere love for learning are essential to the university’s mission as an institution of higher education. Yet these bulwarks are too often undermined by another of the university’s goals—a career-oriented credentialism that constrains the academic enterprise to a mere acquisition of those skills necessary for ‘professional success.’ In promoting this purely functional approach to education, the university undermines one of its core tenets, which is to promote wonder in the pursuit of wisdom.
At least on the face of things, Notre Dame attempts to reconcile the tension between these two aspects of education: fostering wonder and helping students acquire practical (and employable) skills. On a university website page titled “Why ND,” the university suggests that prospective students should consider attending Notre Dame in order to “Seek Wisdom.” But what is this wisdom?
At least from its promotional material, it seems Notre Dame does not have a clear idea. The entirety of this “Why ND” page is dedicated to the ways in which the university has “created an academic culture that has earned us a place among the nation’s top 25 institutions of higher learning, according to surveys from U.S. News & World Report, Princeton Review, Time, Kiplinger’s Report, and others.”
It boasts that 89% of undergraduates are engaged in research or complete an internship before they graduate. The page concludes, “So a Notre Dame education goes beyond simply gaining intellect. It’s a path to wisdom.”
As important as prestige may be, none of the metrics mentioned on the page have anything to do with wisdom itself. Wisdom does indeed require skills, yet it cannot be reduced to them nor can it be measured by polls that appear in popular news publications.
The university excessively emphasizes its commitment to highly quantitative measures of success. Undoubtedly, popular prestige is important for any university with aspirations to greatness. Nevertheless, this prestige is a mere façade if the underlying academic edifice is bereft of the very substance of the intellectual life: wisdom.
Rising rankings ought to be a reflection of institutions’ improving capabilities to educate their students. If universities seek to attract the best and brightest researchers, professors, and students by fashioning themselves as mere white-collar trade schools, they have abandoned both their privileged place and their duty as the formative institutions of our society.
Wisdom must be the integrating principle of the university. Wisdom indeed incorporates the technical knowledge of the chemist, the factual comprehension of the historian, and the didactic reasoning of the logician. These skills are understandably prized in the workplace. Yet wisdom transcends these.
Beyond skills like “critical thinking,” “practical problem solving,” and “understanding of complex human realities,” true wisdom requires contemplation of the very source of knowledge. This lofty task, when earnestly attempted, is always accompanied by a profound sense of wonder.
In his 1883 book Life on the Mississippi, Mark Twain details his mastering of the Mississippi River. As a young apprentice, Twain experienced the river with a sense of wonder and rapture. In mastering his craft, though, Twain narrowed his view of the river, considering each of its elements only in light of its prospective usefulness. He was able to read the river, and he began to understand every “trifling feature that bordered the great river as familiarly as [he] knew the letters of the alphabet.”
In reducing the river to a workplace, Twain lost the capacity to contemplate its beauty—the Mississippi could no longer enrapture him. Sunsets signaled weather conditions, ripples in the water showed changing currents. Absolutizing its utility, Twain squandered his ability to wonder at the river.
This is the risk one runs when undertaking any sort of serious study. As a place of higher education, it is Notre Dame’s duty to cultivate wonder and to allow students the freedom to pursue their passion for a particular subject in a measured and meaningful way. However, the university undermines this duty when it seeks to fulfill its other—albeit lesser—task, which is to produce economically profitable members of society.
Through the emphasis on using one’s time as a student to do something constructive, the opportunity to simply and truly wonder is taken away.
In this hyperfocus on career-oriented credentialism, we, as students, begin to look at our studies the way that Mark Twain looked at the river. We cease to wonder at it. Our time in college becomes purely utilitarian. Though we may never lose our curiosity—our ability to ask “What is that?”—we will have forfeited this privileged time that is set aside for wonder—the pondering of the question “How can that be?”
Elizabeth Hale is a junior studying political science. She is really just trying to make the case for less homework. Anyone who wishes to join her in this endeavor can email her at ehale@nd.edu.