The American Upgrade

Twelve Titles, about sixty Acts and two hundred provisions: a complete working draft of what federal action could look like, written at the level where policy is actually made. It is a draft on purpose. It is our country. Read it, argue with it, and tell us what you would change.

Read it (free PDF, 365 pages, 22 MB) Propose an amendment →

"The constituencies for substantive reform exist. They are documented. They are durable. They are cross-partisan."
From the foreword, by E. Lawrence Anderson

The twelve Titles

Each Title stands on its own. Start with the one you care about.

• Title I

  The Economic Foundation

  Tax policy, energy sovereignty, food independence, the American Stewardship Act, monetary infrastructure, and the revenue that funds every other Title.

• Title II

  Health, Body, and Personal Security

  Eaglecare, a public insurance system covering every American; drug pricing; mental health; the Indian Health Service and the VA as specialized provider networks.

• Title III

  Home, Family, and the Cost of Living

  Housing, childcare, and the cost of living for working families.

• Title IV

  The Ladder

  K-12 reform, portable postsecondary credentials, and a Department of Workforce and Services.

• Title V

  The Market and the Maker

  Small business, SBA expansion, antitrust, and the consolidation of local markets into private-equity chains.

• Title VI

  The Integrity of Governance

  The longest Title: civil service protection, campaign finance, ending gerrymandering, congressional term limits, ethics enforcement, and judicial reform.

• Title VII

  Justice, Reform, and the Back Half of the System

  The criminal justice system that the governance reforms depend on.

• Title VIII

  The Promise Kept

  Social Security and Medicare, on terms true to their original purpose and the decades ahead.

• Title IX

  The Civic Commonwealth

  Loneliness, local journalism, the arts and humanities, and veterans' mental health.

• Title X

  The Shield

  Alliances, deterrence, cyber sovereignty, China strategy, and reform of the VA.

• Title XI

  The First Nations Compact

  Treaty obligations, economic development, Indian Health Service parity, Native education and languages, and the Missing and Murdered Indigenous People crisis.

• Title XII

  The Environmental Compact

  Public lands, the clean energy transition, water security, climate resilience, and oceans and coasts.

How to amend it

1. Pick a spot. Name the Title, and the Act or provision if you can.
2. Say what you would change. Add, cut, rewrite, or replace. Specific beats general: "change the phase-in from five years to three" is more useful than "make it faster."
3. Say why. What problem does your change fix, and for whom?
4. Keep it civil. Argue with the ideas, not with people.

Every proposal is read. Nothing you send is published unless it is accepted. Accepted amendments go into the log below, with your name if you want credit, and into the next version of the document. Declined proposals are not posted.

Amendment log

Accepted amendments, newest first. The document changes in public, the same way our corrections do.

Version 2.0, May 2026. Independent research; all documents freely reproducible. It is a citizen's draft, not a party platform.