American Seances

Episode five of Flock takes you through the surprisingly rich history of the U.S. Post Office, from Ben Franklin and the Constitution to the 1878 Ex Parte Jackson decision that said a sealed letter stays private even while the government delivers it.
We’ll talk about how a trusted mail system became a tempting surveillance tool, why the envelope’s outside isn’t the whole story, and what that old rule teaches us about today’s cameras and databases. It’s like a conversation over coffee—come listen in.

We went back to Madison and the founders to figure out what happens when the government can record everywhere you go just because it can. This is about more than finding a stolen car; it’s about whether collecting everyone’s movements is something the state needs to justify in advance.
We talk general warrants, Carpenter and Jones, and why the Fourth Amendment’s demand for particularity still matters when technology makes mass tracking cheap and easy.

Picture 1963: the Warren Court is grappling with whether organizations like the NAACP can protect members and use money to speak, and those rulings start to blur the line between association and corporate political power.
This episode walks through NAACP v. Alabama and Button, shows how justices wrestled with money, speech, and association, and explains why those tensions would later explode into the Citizens United debate — leaving the big question open: where does speech end and corporate power begin?

This episode walks you through the tense shift from the New Deal era to 1948, when powerful unions, new campaign limits, and an emboldened First Amendment collided. Think Taft‑Hartley, the CIO newspaper case, and a Supreme Court that sidesteps a crisis but asks a bigger question: when organizations speak, whose rights are they exercising?
It’s a short, smart look at how collective speech, money, and democracy got tangled — and why the next episode, with the NAACP, matters even more.

We dig into Grosjean v. American Press, where Huey Long's ad tax tried to choke out critical newspapers—and the Court responded by giving corporations a path to claim press protections. It's the surprising legal pivot that helps explain how Citizens United later became possible.Come along as we resurrect dead justices, tussle with old precedents, and ask who really gets to speak in our democracy—individuals, corporations, or both?

Imagine taking Citizens United back to 1907, when the Fuller Court, Lochner-era thinking, and the new Tillman Act were all colliding over corporate clout. With Holmes skeptical of judicial interference and Congress already banning corporate contributions, the odds tip against letting corporations bankroll elections from their treasuries.
It’s a neat reminder that timing and legal context change everything — the same case can end very differently depending on the era.

Come along as we drop Citizens United into 1886 and see how a Gilded Age Supreme Court would handle corporations, cash, and political speech.
Think railroads, booming fortunes, and justices who accept corporations as "persons" for some rights — but would they let corporate treasuries steer elections? It’s a twisty, surprising ride through legal history.

Curious about the thinker who wanted to keep your house but tax the dirt beneath it? This episode unpacks Henry George's simple, bold question—why does progress bring more poverty?—and his famous 'single tax' answer that turned headlines and stirred crowds.Come along for the ride: from booming cities and crushing inequality to a wild mayoral campaign that proved his ideas could move people. It’s sharp, surprisingly human, and you’ll probably find yourself cheering and squirming at the same time.

This episode pulls a wild thread from early America: Thomas Skidmore in 1829 actually proposed wiping out the existing property map and giving every adult an equal share. It’s one of those stories that makes you realize radicals didn’t just arrive on some foreign ship — they grew right here.
We walk through the Working Men’s Party, the fight over inheritance, and why debates about “socialism” keep coming back. It’s short, surprising, and oddly personal — like history leaning in to whisper, "You thought this was new?"

Imagine we dragged Marx into the 21st century and showed him the “cloud”—not fluffy skies but huge, noisy data centers humming with servers, pipes, and power lines. He’d smile: AI isn’t weightless magic, it’s heavy, physical, and made by people.
So the next time you type into a clean little chat box, remember the miners, electricians, technicians, and owners behind that blinking cursor. The real question isn’t what the machine can do, it’s who owns it and who gets what it produces.