I never heard of this institute, but I like what I read so far. From the Alturas Institute web site...
David Gray Adler is President of The Alturas Institute, a non-profit organization created to promote the Constitution, gender equality, and civic education. A recipient of teaching, writing and civic awards, Adler has lectured nationally and internationally, and published widely, on the Constitution, presidential power and the Bill of Rights. He is the author of six books, including, most recently, The War Power in an Age of Terrorism, as well as more than 100 scholarly articles in the leading journals of his field. He is currently writing a book on the landmark Supreme Court decision in Reed v. Reed, which had its origins in Idaho and transformed the law for American women....and...Adler’s scholarly writings have been quoted by the U.S. Supreme Court, lower federal courts, the U.S. Attorney General, the White House Counsel, the Legal Adviser to the State Department, by Republicans and Democrats in both houses of Congress, as well as political scientists, historians and law professors. He has consulted with members of Congress from both parties on a variety of constitutional issues, including impeachment, the war power and the termination of treaties. He has delivered more than 700 public lectures throughout Idaho, and writes Op-Ed pieces that run regularly in six newspapers across our state, and in papers across the country.
Adler has taught courses on the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Supreme Court at all three universities in Idaho. He has held the Andrus Professorship at Boise State University, where he served as Director of The Andrus Center for Public Policy, and the McClure Professorship at the University of Idaho, where he was Director of the James and Louise McClure Center for Public Policy Research, and held a joint appointment in the College of Law and the Department of Political Science. Previously, he was Professor of Political Science and Director of the Center for Constitutional Studies at Idaho State University. He remains a Lecturer at the University of Idaho College of Law. In 2010, he was the recipient of the Idaho Humanities Council’s Distinguished Humanities Award.
A frequent commentator on state and national events, Adler’s lectures have aired on C-Span, and he has done interviews with reporters from the New York Times, Washington Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Newsweek, National Review, The Nation Magazine, Mother Jones, Fox News, NPR, NBC, CNN and the BBC. Adler has served as a member of the Board of Directors of various academic, corporate and civic organizations, and is a founding member of the City Club of Idaho Falls. He earned a B.A. from Michigan State University and a Ph.D. from the University of Utah.
Promoting Constitutional Education (excerpt)By David Adler
My goal as an educator, writer and constitutional scholar has been a simple one: to find a place for the Constitution in the minds and hearts of the citizenry. Without a broader public understanding of the Constitution and deeper appreciation for the virtues and values of American Constitutionalism, there is little reason to believe that the nation’s founding document will long endure. Of the many challenges that our nation faces, two have central importance to the work and goals of The Alturas Institute: widespread civic illiteracy and general indifference to governmental disregard of constitutional principles.
The alarmingly high level of civic illiteracy in the United States represents a national security crisis. A national survey revealed that one in three native-born citizens fails the civic literacy test that immigrants are required to pass. Of the immigrants who take the test, 97.5 percent pass it. Only 25 percent of the American people can name the three branches of government. Seventy percent do not know that the Constitution is the supreme law of the land. Nearly 60 percent of the citizenry cannot name a single Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court and 12 percent believe that the Bill of Rights guarantees the right to own a pet. Few can explain how the Constitution allocates power, defines the responsibilities of the three branches of government, protects the rights and liberties of the citizenry and, at all events, why constitutional government matters.
Civic illiteracy casts a dark and foreboding shadow over the future of our Democracy. A stalwart defender of the Constitution, the late Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV), justly observed: “People revere the Constitution, yet know so little about it—and that goes for some of my fellow Senators.”
Civic illiteracy threatens our freedoms and renders us vulnerable to the abuse of power. An untutored public, lacking an understanding of the First Amendment cannot, for example, determine whether governmental acts have unconstitutionally infringed on protected speech or religious practices. An unwitting electorate, moreover, may not recognize presidential usurpation of the war power, if it does not know that Congress, alone, possesses the constitutional authority to initiate war and lesser military hostilities on behalf of the American people.
Alturas Institute Board of Directors
