Before Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, and even AT&T, there was America.
America’s seven principal founders — Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Franklin, Hamilton, Madison, and Jay — did much more than frame and write the U.S. Constitution. They created a new country and led it through its rough infancy to the foundation of the richest, most powerful nation in history.
But America’s founders didn’t create our country out of thin air. There were already 13 colonies, each of which had their own founders. And those colonies were created by uniting earlier colonies.
Jamestown, the first permanent English colony in America, was founded in 1607 by Captain Newport and Edward Wingfield, with Captain John Smith of Pocahontas fame as a founding councilman and the colony’s third president. Jamestown became capital of the larger colony of Virginia, which in 1619 established the first American representative government.
Like I wrote in my book Positive Politics, politics is the oldest game:
“Long before there was technology, industry, business, or even agriculture, Neanderthals organized themselves into tribes and selected leaders not by strength but by social skill. That’s politics. And the first time a leader was challenged by their tribe was the first social movement. Modern politics is the result of many centuries of social and economic evolution. The history of these social movements gives us a playbook full of ideas on how to create the future of our politics.”
The first modern university in Western history, The Academy, was founded by Plato just outside Athens, Greece in 387 BC to train future leaders in a wide range of fields. Aristotle and other Academy students learned how and why philosopher kings tend to overperform and outlast tyrants.
Aristotle tutored prince Alexander III of Macedon from the age of 13 before he became Alexander the Great. Aristotle had previously spent most of his adult life studying at The Academy. The principles that Plato and Aristotle taught were simple — wisdom, courage, temperance, and justice, and the idea that philosopher kings prioritize the common good over personal desire.
We need a modern Academy. An accelerator that trains future leaders how to get into politics and do good. The simplest version of this idea would be a working retreat in Washington DC to help ambitious optimists sprint from political idea to direct action in days, not decades.
We’re doing this retreat for real this July 20-24 in DC! ~10 founders sprinting from political ideas on Monday to direct action on Friday, with a Hill day on Wednesday and a Demo Day at the end.
The vision for this accelerator is to be the Y Combinator for Politics. Some YC founders join with a new idea, but most (like me) joined years into our work and used YC as a true accelerator. Either way, everyone in the class will take direct action in this first week and build plans to win these campaigns once we get home.
You don’t ever have to run for something, but you will learn how to pass bills and ballot proposals as well as anyone in the game. Don’t just vote. Don’t just debate. Don’t just donate. Lead from the front and run your own campaigns. Change laws. Change constitutions. Let’s bring that founding energy back to politics!
At the Positive Politics Accelerator, we call our people “founders” too. Because that’s what we’re building. The next generation of political founders, ready, willing, and able to change politics for good.
The Sunrise Movement was founded in 2017 by college students, and the largest climate bill in US history passed five years later. The Federalist Society was founded in 1982 by law students, and its disciples now control the Supreme Court. Don’t like these examples? Create your own!
Anyone can become a political founder from anywhere. When Indian Chief Justice Surya Kant called unemployed youth in his country “cockroaches”, 30-year-old Abhijeet Dipke founded the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP, “Cockroach People’s Party”), a satirical movement to protest the ruling Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP, the conservative “Indian People’s Party”) and demand resignations from corrupt and incompetent political leaders.
Too often we assume that politics is set in stone, passed down from generation to generation unchanged. But everything that we call politics is constantly being shaped and reshaped by founders of all kinds, from political movements to activism organizations to social and civic nonprofits.
As Steve Jobs said:
“Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact, and that is everything around you that you call ‘life’ was made up by people that were no smarter than you… You can change it, you can mold it…the most important thing…is to shake off this erroneous notion that life is there and you’re just going to live in it, versus embrace it, change it, improve it, make your mark upon it… Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.”
The people running politics now are no smarter than you. They’ve just been in the game longer. With the same knowledge and better motives, you’ll make a bigger impact and positively change the world!
Ready to positively change the world through politics?
Apply to the Positive Politics Accelerator! Our Summer 2026 class starts July 20-24 in DC. The application deadline is June 20. Own your power and join our first class now!