Inazu on "Guidelines for Living in a Pluralist Society"

From Christianity Today.  A bit:

Almost all Americans agree about the background practicalities we need to live as a society. Most of us agree that we need public roads, national defense, fire departments, and the like. We also agree today on many basic features of a democratic society: the right to vote, the right to due process of law, the right to free speech. We disagree—sometimes sharply—about the contours of these rights, but we usually have enough of a baseline to recognize the nature of our disagreement. And importantly, we agree about many basic laws, like those protecting life and property, the payment of taxes, and the operation of courts and prisons.

But all of this common ground tells us surprisingly little about who we are as a people, what our goals should be, or what counts as progress. On these deeper questions, Americans remain a deeply divided and pluralistic people. . . .

I think, as a friendly amendment to Inazu, it is important to keep in mind that "pluralism" is not only "the state of things in which many reasonable people disagree reasonably with others in the political community."  It is also "the state of things in which non-state societies are real and do have and exercise authority, authority that is properly seen as constraining and marking the limits of the political authority."