AUTHOR’S NOTE: On June 7, 2003 I gave the commencement address at Hillsdale Academy in Hillsdale, Michigan. Below are my remarks largely as prepared. Readers of my column will recognize some themes.

I’m kind of disappointed they didn’t ask me to wear one of those robes, I was looking forward to the slimming effect. I want to thank Dr. Calvert, President Arnn, Provost Blackstock, the board of trustees, faculty, and parents for this great honor to be here today.

But most of all I want to thank the Hillsdale senior class of 2003.

All six of you.

When I heard that only six students were graduating this year, my first thought was, “Man, this school is hard. How many kids got left back?”

#ad3Then, when I found out that six was it — that there were only six kids in the class, period, I was a bit disheartened. You see, I was told that I was the first choice for commencement speaker of nearly a full third of the senior class.

That’s, by my math, a mere three people.

Actually, I have some experience with this sort of math. You see, I went to a small liberal-arts college in Maryland. My freshman year was the first year it went coed. We had some funny numbers too. Roughly ten percent of the male student body was from my high school, and almost eight percent was Korean-American and named Derrick. I once calculated how many Korean-American Derricks the University of Michigan would have if they had a similar share. They’d have enough to film Ben Hur — including the crowd scenes — solely with Korean-American Derricks.

I’m sorry if I seem a little nervous. This is my first commencement address. The good news is that no matter what happens, this will definitely be my best graduation speech ever.

The possible downside is that that might be like saying “the finest Oktoberfest in Orlando.”

I’ve thought long and hard about what makes a good commencement address. Some things are obvious:

1. Keep the nudity tasteful and integral to the plot.

2. Be brief. After all, I’m here to talk and you are here to listen. The hope is that we’ll both stop around the same time.

3. Be funny. Don’t try to be funny. Humor, as with war, is something you shouldn’t try to do unless you’re sure you can win. Failure is worse than not trying at all. As Yoda said, “There is no try.”

Humor is a tough requirement. I often get billed as a “humorist” or “conservative humorist.” I’m not one. Once, during the Florida recount, an interviewer simply asked me “So, Jonah: What’s funny?” This is a terrible question to ask someone. In fact, the only thing I could think of was, “That blouse makes you look like a hooker.” I’m glad I didn’t say it.

Anyway, some attributes of a good commencement speech are less obvious. For example: Competition.

I hear that Princeton moral and legal political philosopher Robert P. George spoke at the Hillsdale College graduation. That’s great. Dr. George is a brilliant man.

He taught me a great deal when we were in prison together. He taught me:

  • How to chill pruno in the toilet bowl.
  • How to make, and conceal, a shiv.
  • He was even the one who taught me that if you let another man steal the apple brown betty off your cafeteria lunch tray it means you’re engaged.

That’s a very important lesson.

I mention Dr. George because I thought it might be fun to beat Mr. Philosopher Man at his own game and hence make the college kids green with envy. So, I do hereby solemnly swear to make more off-color prison jokes than he did in his address.

But let me get back to what I think makes for a good commencement address — more than anything else, I think — honesty.

So many graduation speeches are full of so much bunk. Sure, I could tell you that you are about to commence on a thrilling and joyous adventure, about how you’ll all become wonderful successes. Sure, I could come up here and read Dr. Seuss’s Oh, the Places You’ll Go!

But come on. Many people live dreary, miserable, lives of quiet desperation, shattered dreams, and bitter regrets.

Surely some of them graduated from high school.

In other words, just because this is a happy day doesn’t mean that you are guaranteed to have happy lives.

And, before I came here, I was perfectly willing to tell you that.

I figured there’d be 300 or so of you and — statistically speaking — I’d be right that a significant number of you would turn out miserable.

But then I met many of these kids and several recent graduates from Hillsdale academy. And I thought: Maybe I’m wrong.

This isn’t simply a variant on why it’s a bad idea to name the lobsters in the tank before you eat them. More than mere shattered anonymity changed my mind.

The kids I met are smart, decent, joyful, and curious: four excellent shelters against the storms of misery. They’re not afraid of hard work.

And, a full third of them think I’m great — a sign of great judgment.

What was it Oscar Levant said? “The world needs more humble geniuses, there are so few of us left.”

Anyway, these are kids who are obviously well-educated for their age. (That, by the way, is the best you can say about anyone, they are well-educated for their age. Education never really ends.)

No offense. [Gesture toward faculty and administration] I know these guys want to take full credit for that.

But this is as much a testament to their parents as it is to this school.

This is an important point because these young men and women are not only graduating from high school, but from the most important classroom humans can ever know: The family.

We know this from the Bible, from the Greeks, from social science, and from Charles Schultz who said: “A good education is the next best thing to a pushy mother.”

Sure Mom and Dad are available for distance learning — and fund transfers — but when you leave high school you become more of your own person than someone else’s. Maybe not in your parents’ eyes, but certainly in your own.

In my remaining time, let me give you some small advice about how to be your own person.

As some of you may know, I’m a conservative and proud of it. I spend quite a bit of time encouraging young people like you to become conservative or to be true to their conservative principles. But since you went to school in the shadow of what many liberals consider to be a leading madrassa of the Vast-Right-Wing Conspiracy, maybe it would be better to put ideology aside.

Instead I’d like to give you some advice I think might be useful for anybody going to college.

First, don’t ever date anybody in your dorm for at least the first semester. It won’t work out and it will make your life really complicated.

Second, don’t buy a mini-fridge until you’re sure your roommate hasn’t got one.

More important: Understand the difference between clichés and wisdom. Kids today, for good or ill, are pretty well-trained when it comes to finding the deficiencies of ideology. But clichés are not only accepted without question on campuses today, they are far too often deemed to be a substitute for actual thinking.

We’ve all heard something along the lines of “better ten guilty men go free than one innocent man be punished.” This sort of thing is spouted on campuses across this country as if it is an argument, as if it’s a self-evident argument. It’s not. Maybe it’s a sentiment. Or an expression of principle or even a priority. But more often it’s a copout for kids — and professors — who wish to sound intelligent rather than be intelligent.

Why is it better that ten guilty men go free? Ten career criminals will do far more damage to society out of prison than the price society will suffer with one innocent man in jail. By the way, we call them “career criminals” for the same reason we refer to “career accountants” — they make a living out of being criminals. A strict utilitarian might say, better to punish the one innocent man for the sake of the larger society. On the other hand, a civil libertarian may ask “Why ten men? Why not 100? Or 1,000? Why not let them all go?” After all, we can say with pretty high confidence that somebody in jail today is innocent. We just don’t who he is. So why not let them all go in order to make sure the innocent aren’t punished? In other words, if you want to say that you’d prefer to err on the side of protecting the rights of the innocent, fine. But that’s easy to say, and more important, it’s not an argument.

Or take the expression: “I don’t agree with what you have to say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” I can’t tell you how many college kids believe they are being brave for making this declaration for all the world to hear. In fact, other students actually applaud when they hear it. Well, thanks for defending my right to say what I have to say. But, uh, so what? What do you think of my argument?

Or take the slippery slope. Conservatives just as much as liberals invoke the slippery slope as if it were an immutable law of history as irresistible and unchanging as any found in Marxism. It is a matter of theology for some on the Right that we are less free today than we were 100 years ago. That may be true, probably is true for some. But it is blatantly less true for others. Blacks and women are more free today that they were a century ago.

Worse, many conservatives, especially the younger ones, believe that a freedom lost can never be regained. Such determinism has no place in a free society.

And, it’s not true. During the debate over the war on terrorism, we constantly heard that we don’t want to get on a slippery slope; we don’t want to return to the days of the internment of the Japanese or the Palmer Raids. Well, these things contradict each other. If the slippery slope existed we would never have passed laws to make the Palmer raids or the internment of the Japanese more difficult. We would never have had the Church committee reforms.

People in a free society learn from their mistakes. And they make changes based upon what they learn. There are no slippery slopes. We control our own destinies.

As I walked into this school this morning I saw a plaque with the words of Edmund Burke: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

A petition is nothing more than a list of people who refused to say no when it was required of them.

The second distinction I think all college kids should understand is the one between emotion and reason, feelings and facts.

It often seems as if we’ve changed “I think therefore I am” to “You hurt my feelings, therefore you’re wrong.”

Hillary Clinton ran her campaign for the Senate by telling voters that the only relevant issue was which candidate was the most “concerned” with the issues that “concern” New Yorkers. Concern’s great, but what about “Who’s right?” “Who’s qualified?”

I would be very concerned about how to remove your pancreas correctly. But wouldn’t you prefer a relatively blasé surgeon who knows how to remove your pancreas?

Today there is an obsession with “mean-spiritedness” in American politics If I say something mean, it must also not be true. If I’m unconcerned about something, I can’t be right.

Let me say a few words about the liberal arts. The “liberal” in liberal arts doesn’t refer to the Michael Dukaki or George Stephanopouli of the world. It refers to a free society. The liberal arts were intended to provide young people the skills, knowledge, and mental discipline necessary for them to become citizens in a free society. With this knowledge, with this ability to think critically and to understand the lessons of the past, these citizens are supposed to be the bulwark against slippery slopes.

And this brings us back to why honesty is so important for a commencement address. Simply because this is a great and happy day doesn’t mean you will also succeed and be happy and productive citizens. And, even if you think I’m being mean-spirited for saying so that doesn’t change the fact that I’m right.

Success of any kind in life requires will and reason and the proper ordering of priorities. The priorities of family, friends, work, and citizenship and the wisdom to appreciate them. You are not on the slippery slope to happiness just because you are happy today. Anymore than the society is on a slippery slope to good or bad. There are no slippery slopes for you, or for any of us. Our destinies are our own. You will make mistakes and if you are lucky, you will learn the right lessons from them. You will not hit a bad patch and confuse it for a greasy slide into misery. A life without mistakes is a boring life. Just remember, there are no slippery slopes. You make your own destiny. As Chevy Chase said in Caddyshack: “See your future, be your future … ma, make, make it. Make your future.”

And in conclusion. My goal here today was to be able to say, “and in conclusion” without hearing a wave of applause or sighs of relief. Having set my goals low, I’m delighted to see I have succeeded. Thank you again for this great honor and good luck to you all.