This panel explores the ways Californians contributed to the shape and foundations of our current political system, showing how the path to liberty and freedom did not move unilaterally from East to West, with Los Angeles a 20th century trailblazer in the pursuit of freedom.

A conversation with Michael Woo (former Los Angeles City Councilmember and President of 1871 Memorial Project) and Zev Yaroslavsky (former Los Angeles County Supervisor and Director of Los Angeles Initiative, UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs).

LA2026 is presented by the USC-Huntington Early Modern Studies Institute. It brings together members of the public and humanities scholars for eighteen conversations about museum and cultural exhibitions at six partnering institutions in the Los Angeles region, including the Autry Museum of the American West, The Huntington, LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes / El El Pueblo de Los Angeles Historical Monument, Mission San Gabriel Arcángel, the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, and USC Libraries. Each exhibition frames conversations about the anniversary of 1776 from the perspective of California and the West. Each discussion will focus on specific items from one of the partner exhibitions, encouraging public discussions about national identities, relationships between regional and national narratives, participating in democracy, and human relationships to the land.

The EMSI LA2026 Project has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.