Declaring Independence From Partisanship

“Democrats Line Up Their Own Billionaire Firepower” (Nov. 30) speaks of my “liberal television shows” and has me “corralling Hollywood into a $27-million effort to get out the youth vote.” But it left out a very significant fact, one that makes an enormous difference in this final year of our “get out the youth vote” effort: The fact is that the Declaration of Independence Road Trip and its Declare Yourself voter campaign are 100% nonpartisan.

Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter are honorary co-chairs of this project, which began with my purchase of an original copy of the Declaration of Independence. And the $27 million was raised not in Hollywood but from major corporations and foundations to which our nonpartisanship has been key and essential.

I am a known progressive. But the DOI Road Trip project, which I founded, has been strongly supported throughout the country by governors, mayors, secretaries of state, businesses, educators, civic leaders and citizens from across the entire political spectrum. That fact speaks to the values and principles of the single-page document, our nation’s birth certificate, that undergirds the democratic republic we cherish.

Norman Lear

Beverly Hills