Recharging the American Experiment: Principled Pluralism for Genuine Civic Community

by James W. Skillen
Baker Books and Center for Public Justice (1994)
Out of print and no longer available here

This report on the health of the foundational American institutions presents a broad agenda for recharging the power cells of society. James Skillen, president of the Center for Public Justice, calls for united political and social action on the part of Christian and secular conservatives.

The time is ripe for such action. Political and legal systems are in a state of chaos, but the American experiment can be recharged through three reconstructing reforms:

1. Full religious freedom can be restored in public life.
2. True educational pluralism can allow coexisting public and private education to flourish.
3. The electoral system can become truly reprsentative.

The recharging goal of these reforms is "principled pluralism"--a view of life that clarifies contemporary political and legal issues.

The author, a widely published writer on judicial and social issues, interacts with leading commentators, including George Will, W. Lance Bennett, Arthur Schlesinger Jr., Shelby Steele, Robert Bellah, Mary Ann Glendon, Alan Wolfe, and James Davison Hunter.