The Daily Signal - During Patriot Week, We Remember America’s Founding. Here’s How to Join the Celebration

Episode Date: September 13, 2021

Judge Michael Warren felt conviction after his daughter asked him why there wasn't a specific time each year dedicated to remembering American history and celebrating the nation's founding.  "We need to start a new celebration for America," Leah, only 10 at the time, told her father. Warren, a judge on the 6th Circuit Court in Oakland County, Michigan, says he determined that he couldn't complain about that lack and then not do anything about it. "So we decided to be audacious and to do a week," he recalls. In 2012, father and daughter formally co-founded Patriot Week. Every Sept. 11-17, they invite all Americans to join them in remembering the patriots who founded our country, the documents that established our government, and the history we must never forget.  Warren joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to share the history of Patriot Week and the resources offered by their website for families, schools, and communities to take part in the celebration.  Also on today’s show, we read your letters to the editor and share a good news story about a police officer who saved nine lives during her first year of service.  Enjoy the show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Signal podcast for Monday, September 13th. I'm Rob Bluey. And I'm Virginia Allen. September 11th through September 17th is Patriot Week, a week dedicated to honoring and remembering America's history. Judge Michael Warren started Patriot Week more than a decade ago with his daughter. He joins the Daily Signal podcast today to share the history of the week and how you can take part in this celebration. We also read your letters to the editor and share a good news story about a police. officer who saved nine lives during her first year of service. Before we get to today's show, Rob and I want to tell you about our favorite way to get the news every morning. It's called the morning bell, and each weekday, the Daily Signal delivers

the top news and commentary directly to your inbox for free. You will be able to read about the policy debate shaping the agenda, analysis from Heritage Foundation experts, and commentary from leading conservatives like Ben Shapiro, Dennis Prager, and Cal Thomas. It's easy to sign up. Just visit dailysignal.com and click on the connect button in the top right corner of the page. We'll start sending you the morning bell tomorrow. Now stay tuned for today's show coming up next. I am so pleased to welcome back to the show Michael Warren, a judge and the co-creator of Patriot Week, a week dedicated to honoring and remembering America's history.

Judge Warren, thank you for being here. Well, as you know, I am a daily listener to the Daily Signal, so it is really my pleasure to come back. Thank you so much. Oh, it's a joy to have you back. You were with us about a year ago, actually almost exactly a year ago, and you told us about Patriot Week and what you all do about its founding. And the week, it runs every year from September 11th, obviously an incredibly significant day through September 17th, which is Constitution Day. So if you would, just refresh our memory. What is really the mission of Patriot? at week, and why did you decide to found it? Well, our slogan is renewing the American spirit.

And I think in today's day and age, our listeners will agree that our country is in a real crisis. We are in a struggle for the soul of America. Originally, when it started, it was more because of commercialization and ignorance and just kind of complacency about our founding first principles and our history. And now we're really under assault. There are so many people that in our country and outside of our country that really are challenging the underlying fundamental principles of who we are as Americans. Not only do we have, and we course, we've always had the terrorists, and that was part of the reason we picked 9-11 as our beginning date, but it seems like America is truly under assault across the globe and within.

There are these movements that are condemning America's foundations, challenging our fundamental principles, condemning everybody in our origins as racist, ignoring the great strides that we have made. It seems like the more strides that we make, the less satisfied people are. at least some segments of our society. And so the point is to remind everyone about why America really is the greatest nation in world history. What made us that and what we need to do to be able to preserve our freedom and liberty in the future. Oh, that's certainly so needed, as you say, right now at this moment in history. Now, you actually co-founded Patriot Week with your daughter.

Tell us a little bit about her, how old she is now, and how you as a dad inspire her and have inspired her to care about American history and our founding documents. Well, first, I want to remind our listeners that they can find out all about our story at patriotweek.org. And the story begins when she was just 10 years old. My daughter and I were sitting at a lunch table. And to really understand this, so you have to learn a little bit more about. me, I am an adult convert to Catholicism. When I was raised as a young child, my father and mother really were not religious. My father is at the time, he's changed a little now, thank goodness, but at the time he was an atheist, a disaffected Jew, and my mother was a disaffected Catholic,

and I was raised as a nothing. And they used to say to me, Mike, you can believe anything you want, just remember it's all baloney, but they used a stronger term. And so I started as an atheist. and then became an agnostic, and then in law school, of all places, the Holy Spirit came and found me, and I converted basically overnight, much to the surprise of all my friends and family. Still remember calling up my grandma from Ann Arbor and saying, Grandma, you're going to take me to church this weekend. And she said, Michael? I go, yep. She goes, is this a joke?

I go, no, Grandma, really, you're going to take me to church this weekend. And I quickly converted to Catholic as much to her joy. and, like I said, confusion to the rest of my family and friends. And I tell you that because as an adult, I had to learn about the liturgical calendar. I knew a little bit about it before, but we have a series of religious holidays like Ash Wednesday, Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Pentecost, Advent, Christmas, Easter. And we have those days to stop on the hustle-bustle of our life and to renew our faith. and all the great religions have this idea of a liturgical calendar. Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, they all have this idea.

And America, you know, I'm a history, I kind of a, not just a history nerd, but I do deep dives in the history. I realize that America used to have a civic calendar. We had Washington's birthday, Lincoln's birthday, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Thanksgiving, for the same exact reason, to stop on the hustle bus over our days and to renew our faith in America. and in fact this was something that was understood by the founding fathers right out of the box. When we declared independence, John Adams wrote to his wife Abigail that the anniversary of that day should be forever commemorated and celebrated with bells and bonfires and games and celebrations and illuminations in the sky from one down in the continent to the other now and forevermore.

And he was right. We still have Fourth of July celebrations. But he also said it should be a solemn day of devotion for the blessings of liberty. it ought to be solemnized. Now, I don't know about you, but last time I had a hot dog of July 4th party was not a particularly solemn occasion. So I was explaining this to my then 10-year-old daughter, Leah. We were at a lunch table. She got very upset, pounded on that table and said,

Dad, that's wrong. We need to do something. We need to start a new celebration for America. And I went, uh-oh. I can't complain and then not do anything about it. So we decided to be audacious and to do a little. week kind of following the Kwanza model and some other models of longer celebrations. Then we looked for anchor dates and we decided 9-11, which at the time a lot of people still do.

We're struggling with what to do with that date. And then 9-17 is the anniversary of the signing of the Constitution. That's called Constitution Day. So we have those anchor dates. And every day we celebrate a founding first principle from a Declaration of Independence, key documents and speeches that embody them, founding fathers and other great patriots that made those come alive in America. And then my daughter said, Dad, we need to get the kids excited. Let's have fireworks. And I said, Leah, we do need to get the kids excited. But, you know, fireworks, you got to go outside. It's kind of expensive. It's kind of taken.

She goes, oh, yeah, you're right, Dad. Let's have flags. Kids love flags. And we have all these really cool flags from American history that we don't know what to do with. we don't really have a reason to learn about it, and now we do for Patriot Week. It's been recognized by the U.S. Senate unanimously a couple years in a row now, hopefully going to be recognized again this year. We have about 17 state legislatures and governors who have recognized it. We have all kinds, it's very grassroots, so we have all kinds of different activities. We've had parades, paluzas, picnics, panel discussions, debates, a gubernatorial debate that I presided over looking at those founding first principles.

Just a lot of classroom activities, community organizations that have been involved. So a wide range of activities. And again, you can go to pagewit.org to learn about those. And then we also have on our website, we've launched a podcast. We have lesson plans. We have all kinds of information about those founding first principles and all the other other features that we celebrate. And it's really become, the heart of it's in Michigan, but it is becoming a national

phenomenon. And so to answer your original question, she's now 22. Leah is 22. And she's in medical school at Wayne State, wants to be an emergency physician, but she's still involved. She's on our board of directors. We have a 501C3 nonprofit and contribute significantly. And so it's been a great pairing for my.

daughter and I very, very special that we're able to share that. Yeah, what a special thing indeed to get to start something like this with your daughter. And for so many years now, for more than a decade to see it continue. And individuals learn about America's founding and our founding documents that's so, so critical. And I love the framing of that, that in this backdrop of, okay, we have all these holidays and we have specific weeks where we celebrate certain things, it only makes sense that, yes, We have a specific week every year to remind ourselves of our nation's history and of those documents that, you know, maybe you read in school. But as an adult, gosh, it's certainly easy to go a year, a decade without ever looking at the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence.

And what a special time to get to remind ourselves of those principles. So if you would talk a little bit more about just the practicals of Patriot Week. I mean, are you all giving lectures on your website? Are there interactive assignments people can do? And is this really geared more towards students or adults or both? It is definitely geared towards everyone from five-year-olds to 99-year-olds. And I don't want to diss the centurion to the oldest that you can be. Yes, we do have a lot of material online.

One thing that we have is what we call daily rituals or celebrations. So if you're by yourself, you know, you're at a rural area. You don't have a lot of folks that you can get together with. You can go and we have a set of activities that you can do by yourself or with your family or with your friends. Something very simple could be a five-minute activity to something that could take up to an hour. So we have like three different levels. We have the podcast has 48-ish episodes doing our 49th on 9-11. are very deep dives on a variety of topics, including the Declaration of Independence. We literally

went through each word of the Declaration of Independence. As far as I can tell, nobody's really done it this way. Heritage has done a great job with the Constitution, so we can't compete there, but with regard to the Declaration, we're going to have something that's very unique. And so people can learn there. We have over 150 TV shows, and you can see Lee and I are co-host, so you can see her grow up over the years. So that's really cool. Lesson plans that people can download and do with their students or do for themselves to remind themselves of the Constitution

and the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr. You know, we have a variety of topics. So every day we celebrate a first principle. And I just want to spend a minute on that. we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they're endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, that when any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it and to establish new government, laying its foundation of such principles and organized its power of such forms as to them so seem most likely to affect. their safety and happiness. Those words from the Declaration of Independence were revolutionary in 1776. They remain revolutionary today, and they are under assault by ignorance. People don't care,

as well as by people that actually don't believe in equality. They want to divide us up. They don't want to treat everybody the same. They don't believe in the rule of law. They want to take to the streets and force people to do what they want to do. Every one of those principles is under assault now. We have to remind Americans about why those principles made us such a wonderful country unique in the whole course of human history. And if we can remember those principles, the people that brought them to life. And again, it's not just the founding fathers, goes all the way to Martin Luther King Jr. Susan B. Anthony. We've had a long march of freedom and liberty in our country and equality.

We need to recognize that. Recognize her flaws, but also recognize all the wonderful things. America can be and fulfill its first principles. So we celebrate the principles, the people that brought them to life, the documents and the flags that embody that. And there's a slew of ways to get involved and encourage people to, if they have new ideas, to do them on their own. You know, we don't, you know, do you have Mother's Day? You celebrate any way you want. You don't have to go to some foundation to figure out how to do it. But I would encourage people to reach out to me directly at M as in Michael, Warren, W-A-R-R-E-N at Patriotweek.org, if they're interested in

getting engaged, because this is very grassroots, and if they have ideas about how to take this even further. And Judge Warren, as we have just marked as well, the 20th anniversary of 9-11, what do you think is really some of those key principles that we need to be teaching? the younger generation. What is it that we need to be instilling in them, you know, for those that maybe weren't even born yet on 9-11 or that we're so young that they don't remember, you know, as we look back, as a nation, and as we look towards our future and how we can move forward as a stronger country and push back against division and actually become more

United, how do we get young people to be excited, to be passionate about our founding, about our history, and to be patriotic citizens? That is a great challenge, great question. So first off, I would say that I'm a former member of the State Board of Education. I've still been very involved in education ever since I've left the State Board. I've been on the bench over 18 years, but who's counting? and what I've realized is that we don't do a good job at all about teaching American history and civics. We have a system that's set up to fail.

It's not because we don't have good teachers. We have a lot of great teachers, but it's just not a priority in the school system. So one thing that we really need to do is lift up American history and civics to the fundamental forefront of education. You know, we have public schools because there were really. two reasons. The first was people needed to be able to read so they could read the Bible and be saved. And the second reason was we needed to understand the foundations of our country so we could maintain our free republic. Those are the two main things. Now obviously we don't teach the Bible anymore in schools, or at least not in the way that those that started public education had in

mind and we have really relegated civics and history to the back burner. So we need to change that completely to have civics in American history be up front and center of education. Secondly, we need to be honest. There's been a lot of criticism about our history in the past, and there is a lot to be critical of, but we also need to recognize all the great things that America's had, so a balanced view. specifically on 9-11, and this is the 20th anniversary, I've gone into schools and talked to students about 9-11 and asked them what happened, and they say,

well, the Twin Towers fell. And I go, okay, but why? And then you might get a couple kids say, well, you know, planes. And I said, okay, but why? And they go, well, you know, they were terrorists. I said, okay. And, you know, less kids even understand that. And say, okay, what were the terrorists trying to do?

And then you get silence. So, you know, they hated America. They wanted to destroy us. They wanted to have an extremist Islamic state take over the entire world. That's apparently not being taught in our schools. We need to do a much better job. And then to understand the heroes of United 93 and the first responders and how they gave their lives running up a tower that was burning.

They're very, very powerful stories. and to get your question to, you know, how do we get kids excited? You know, America is a story. It's an amazing story of freedom and liberty of people willing to put themselves on the line, to give up their blood and treasure, to put it all there so that we could be free. And instead, we have these caricatures, you know, of our founders, of being racist, uncaring, just trying to be. protect their property. There was nothing further from the truth. Some of them were racist, but nothing

further from the truth that they didn't put themselves in line. Many of the people that signed the Declaration of Independence were thrown in jails. They were stuck on prison ships. They got very ill. Some of their homes were utterly destroyed. They had a flee from oncoming British troops. Sam Adams and others were targeted for arrest and execution. they really put everything on the line. And if you learn about those stories, you would have a greater appreciation of how unique the blessings of liberty are

and that America was at the forefront of that. But we don't teach that stuff. We teach these caricatures and criticisms without understanding the broader truth. And so we really need to do a much better job in our system to tell the real story of America. We're not perfect, we never will be, but we're striving to be.

and that's what makes all the difference. Yeah. That idea of story is foundational to history because facts and figures and like you say we're hearing so much negativity about our founding, about our history, but any piece of history is this very complex story

full of humans who have gifts and talents and abilities and flaws and we have to tell the whole story. That is critical. So as you have done that, as you through Patriots Week and through speaking at schools, as you have told young people, that whole story of America's history, you've educated them on the founding documents. If you would, just maybe share one or two stories of young people who you have found be particularly impacted or families who have really benefited from the resources that you all at Patriots Week offer. Well, there is a real hunger for this, and that is very encouraging. And I've had many students, I'll give you one example. This was kind of silly, but I went into a school that my daughter was attending, and I gave a Patriot Week speech, and we talked about the suffragettes and how the suffragettes worked so hard. They, you know, from the 1840s all the way to the 1920s, worked for, women's suffrage, the right to vote, how the 19th Amendment was adopted, how women had to,

they were the first people to protest during wartime, during World War I. They sat outside of the White House and said, you know, give us our rights. They went on hunger strikes. They were abused. And then finally we got the right to vote for women. And students don't know that story. They just think, well, of course women always had the right to vote. Or, or, yeah, there was this amendment, but they don't really understand how hard it was for women to achieve women's suffrage. And then many of the students said, you know, I thought women's suffrage was about women's suffering, that, you know, they were hurting, not that it meant that they could vote. And it's like, wow, we've gone so far afield that they don't even know the basic

terminology. I've, so, you know, we've had a lot of people that have come up to us and and really have appreciated our message, have been inspired by it. We've had contests and other activities where students have been able to display their patriotism. One time I went into a school for Patriot Week, and the whole school was red, white, and blue. Up and down the corridors, you went into the French class, and they were learning the Pledge of Allegiance in French. you went to the music class and they were doing patriotic songs. And what I heard from the educators was they never, you know, they love this stuff, but they never had a reason to do it.

And so now they did. And that was very important. Another example was we had a 9-11 commemoration and firefighters came in and they were talking about 9-11 and what happened there. And then they got a call where they had to go to a fire. And so they ran out. and the teacher and the students were like, wow, we just saw in action the bravery and courage of our first responders and what they have to go through every day. So there's a lot of stories and it's unquestionably making a difference on a person by person basis.

Thank you so much for sharing that. That's excellent. Well, and for all of our listeners, if you want to get involved and jump into Patriot Week and start pulling on these resources, whether it be, you know, in your own family, if you're a teacher in your classroom, if you have a community group, a rotary club, you can get your community involved. You can visit patriotweek.org. All of the information is there. And Judge Warren, I also want to mention your book. You've written an excellent book called America's Survival Guide, How to Stop America's Impending Suicide by Reclaiming Our First Principles and History. You can get that book on Amazon at your

local books, so it's very, very excellent. And Judge Warren, thank you so much for the work that you're doing at Patriot Week for taking action when your daughter pounded her fist on the table and said, what are we going to do about this? We really appreciate the work that you all have been doing for so long, and especially that you're doing this week during Patriot Week. Well, thank you very much. It's my pleasure. I love you guys. It's great program, and it's so, you know, we're working on the same issues in different ways, and it's so important that everything that you folks do at Heritage. And God bless you and God bless America. Thank you so much, Judge Warren. We really appreciate your time. Virginia Allen here, I want to tell you about the most popular

resource on the Heritage Foundation website, The Guide to the Constitution. More than 100 scholars have contributed to create a unique line-by-line analysis of our Constitution. The guide is intended to provide a brief and accurate explanation of each clause of the Constitution as envisioned by the framers and has applied in contemporary law. There has never been a more important time to have an understanding of our founding document. So if you want to learn more about the Constitution, go ahead and visit heritage.org slash constitution or simply search for Heritage Guide to the Constitution. Thanks for sending us your letters to the editor.

Each Monday we feature our favorites on this show. Virginia, who's up first? In response to Rob's recent interview with Debbie Gate, we received. this letter from Janice Taylor of Colorado Springs, Colorado. She writes, thank you for Rob Louis' lovely podcast interview and the related video on the Philanthropy Roundtable's true diversity campaign. It was nicely expressed recently in my church as the priest reminded us that we each have free will and every individual is special. And in response to Fred Lucas's article, 15 million votes in 2020 election not accounted for, report fines.

Joseph Piscucci writes, Mail-in voting is an invitation to cheat, period. It was not necessary to institute mail-in voting in 2020 in the first place except to facilitate cheating and fraud. People were free to use absentee balance systems if they did not want to vote in person because of COVID-19. Absentee ballot requests provide signature comparison data which mail-in votes do not.

Yet, I fully agree with the necessity to maintain voter eligibility lists and the Public Interest Legal Foundation is certainly doing the proper thing in trying to ensure that federal voter registration laws are enforced. But it matters just as much whether mail-in voting nonsense is being practiced by a state. Failure to maintain accurate voting registration lists makes it easy to cheat, whether voting in person or by absentee ballot, just as much as for mail-in voting. Your letter could be featured on next week's show, so send us an email at letters at daily signal.com. The Heritage Foundation has a new website to combat critical race theory. CRT, as it's known, makes race the centerpiece of all aspects of American life.

It categorizes individuals into groups of oppressors and victims. The idea is infiltrating everything from our politics and education to the workplace and even our military. Heritage has pulled together the resources that you need to identify CRT in your community and the ways to fight it. We also have a legislation tracker so you can see what's happening in your state. visit heritage.org slash CRT to learn more. Virginia, you have a good news story to share with us today. Over to you. Thanks so much, Rob. The 20th anniversary of 9-11 is a reminder to us all of just how important our first responders really are. Every moment counts after someone has been critically injured.

Washington, D.C. police officer Taylor Brandt has taken that truth to heart. She used her medical training to save nine lives over the past year, which was her first year on the job. Commander Ralph Ennis at the Metropolitan Police Department Academy told ABC News 7 that Brant exemplifies what it means to serve as an officer. She embodies what we want from our police officers, and she truly understands that policing is about helping people. Brandt uses a specific kind of training known as tactical emergency casual. to care. This emergency medical care has allowed her to save nine lives so far, because as she says,

police officers are often the first ones to arrive on the scene of a tragedy. We're the first on scene to provide medical care, and our first goal is to preserve life, which often results in us trying to prevent blood loss. Officer Brandt first used her emergency medical training just two and a half weeks after being sworn in as a D.C. police officer last summer. She and her training officer came upon a man who was lying in the road by his car. They got out to help him and discovered he was badly wounded. Brant relayed the event in a D.C. police video and explained that she put tourniquets on both his legs before an ambulance arrived.

He was transported by D.C. Femmes to a local hospital, and he ultimately survived his injuries. So in my year on the street, I've used seven tourniquets and two chest seals on various scenes, ranging from gunshot wounds to suicide attempts. And it's incredibly important that officers have access to this equipment because, quite frankly, minutes matter when it comes to saving lives and providing medical care to injured citizens. We're so thankful for officers like Brandt who patrol our communities and are literally saving lives every day. We sure are, Virginia, and it's so good that you're celebrating the success and the work that they're doing because I think too often in so many media contexts, they're not being recognized for the good work that they're doing. So thank you for bringing us that good news story today.

Absolutely. It's a pleasure, Rob. But we're going to leave it there today for the Daily Signal podcast. You can find us on the Rurccea Audio Network, and all of our shows are available at daily signal.com slash podcasts. You can also subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, or your favorite podcast app. And be sure to listen every weekday by adding the Daily Signal podcast as part of your Alexa Flash Briefing. If you like what you heard on today's show, please head over and leave us a review and a five-star

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