As part of Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life’s 2026 event programming, professors from the history and political science departments gathered for a panel on Feb. 26 to answer one question: Given your area of expertise, what is on your mind as the United States approaches the milestone of 250 years?
Panelists included history professors David Ekbladh and Paul Polgar; political science professors Eitan Hersh, Meredith McLain, Pearl Robinson and Deborah Schildkraut; and Peter Levine, a Lincoln Filene professor of Citizenship & Public Affairs.
Organized in part by Tisch College, the Department of Political Science, the International Relations Program, the Center for Expanding Viewpoints in Higher Education and the Department of History, the event was spearheaded by Schildkraut, the John Richard Skuse professor of political science. With an area of study focused largely on American public opinion and politics, Schildkraut said she was inclined to organize an event where students could learn from various perspectives at a turning point in American history, as she has done in the past with post-election discussions. She noted her approach in crafting the panel, with the goal of emphasizing student questions rather than solely faculty input and representing a diverse array of perspectives.
“[The balance between student engagement and faculty input] becomes a challenge in the event because we have an embarrassment of riches in terms of wonderful faculty doing interesting and important research,” Schildkraut said. “There [are] so many people I want to ask and so many important topics to cover, and there are lots of important topics that we didn’t get to cover at all on our panel.”
The panelists were each given five minutes to share their perspectives, with each offering unique insight into topics like presidential and congressional power, identity and belonging, voting and revolutionary history. Students were later given the opportunity to ask questions, both regarding what was stated by professors and about concerns of their own.
Drawing on his expertise in U.S. history, Ekbladh reflected on the American Revolution and how its modern interpretation shapes civic nationalism.
“There’s a whole school [of thought] that the [American] Revolution [was] the first real modern revolution. It sets a template with that declaration. Anybody petitioning for independence has to make a case, and that carries down into the present,” Ekbladh said. “But I also think that we’re still trying to tell ourselves and tell the world what it meant.”
Ekbladh also encouraged students to question the more heroic underdog narrative surrounding the birth of the United States.
“The actual past sometimes doesn’t actually reflect what we want it to be in the present,” Ekbladh said. “We should ask ourselves why we’re always contorting this very complicated thing, sometimes for very simple narratives in the present.”
There were contrasting views on the panel as well, most notably between Hersh and Levine. Hersh emphasized a more positive outlook on what he referred to as America’s “golden age of electoral democracy,” noting increased voter turnout and accessibility as evidence of America’s strong civic engagement, despite conspiracies from both right and left that question and delegitimize this process.
“Things are going really well, but a lot of people don’t think it is, and that’s the thing that’s making us fragile right now. Because of how our media is and because of how polarized we are, we’re not able to hold the center and figure out how things are actually going,” Hersh said.
In contrast, Levine regarded the 250th anniversary as the creation of the U.S. Constitution, yet a constitution that is in active danger of collapse. He noted the problematic nuances of the presidential system, the element of a ‘fourth’ branch of government, administrative agencies as well as the fact that there has been much less legislative progress through Congress, along with an absence of lasting policies.
It is evident that scholars and Americans alike are considering governmental structures as a defining moment for the nation at 250 years old. McLain, who specializes in this area, expressed similar concerns about the problematic nature of the current branches and their shares of power.
Reflecting on America’s institutional progress over the years, she noted that presidential power as the most changed, with five times as many cabinet departments since the first convention, as well as the shifting power dynamic between Congress and the presidency.
“Now we see a lot more gridlock than we previously did, and often that’s not necessarily the result of the president taking power, but Congress giving power,” McLain said, speaking on Levine’s points about increased difficulty in passing laws.
McLain offered the example of tariffs and mentioned that even when Congress has tried to reclaim power, like with the War Powers Act of 1973, the effort has failed to be effective. Addressing these concerns, she turned to the audience and asked what Americans, as active participants in democracy, want presidential power to look like over the next 250 years.
Returning to the historical perspective were Polgar and Robinson. Polgar revisited the revolution, explaining how it created space for the abolitionist movement through its theme of liberation while also witnessing the pseudoscience of race evolving to justify slavery. He noted that over time, schools of thought from classrooms to museums have embraced the multi-faceted nature of the revolution in both its glory and its failures. He critiqued movements toward a ‘simpler’ unidimensional and nationalist interpretation.
“It’s really important that, in forums like this and beyond, that we really assert the richness of the revolution because those tensions, those ambiguities, those contradictions, didn’t just happen in 1775 or [1776]. We’re living with those today,” Polgar said.
Moving beyond the revolutionary era, Robinson touched on her defining moments as an American, particularly growing up as a young Black woman in racially segregated New Orleans, La. at the end of World War II. She noted her experiences facing inequality and racism as part of the nation’s past 250 years, yet she chooses to see the anniversary as a new beginning. Robinson also emphasized the importance of panels like this and expressed the need to get the conversation into popular culture, especially among young people.
Wrapping up the conversation was organizer Schildkraut, who posed the timely question of “who belongs.” Her work focuses largely on how Americans’ state identities are connected to who they are and how they fit into the larger country. She acknowledged that she resonated with each of the panelists’ perspectives, but also expressed her own questions about how the structure has changed, and to what extent they are similar to past episodes or genuinely different.
“Something that I think about a lot these days [is] that democracy is always fragile,” Schildkraut said. “I wonder if political life today is mainly a continuation of that reality, or [if] what we’re experiencing now [is] more intractable.”
As the United States embraces this turning point, professors encouraged students to think about the world around them as it changes, accepting the ambiguity that comes with the country’s contested narratives. Reflecting on the panel later, Ekbladh expressed appreciation for the turnout and engagement.
“As a professor, you’ve got your own life and other things going on, and you can’t always be plugged into campus, but it’s really nice [that] outside of class, … [you] can have an intellectual discussion with … students who are very smart and incisive,” he said.
