Incivility threatens our inheritance
American democracy is a fragile and valuable inheritance passed down to us from our parents and grandparents, left in our hands to preserve and protect as a legacy for our children and grandchildren.
This precious inheritance was paid for by the blood of our ancestors, spilled on the beaches of Normandy, the fields of Appomattox and Bunker Hill, and on a bridge in Selma, Ala. It was built by the hard work, sweat and tears of millions of regular men and women toiling through the Industrial Revolution, the Dust Bowl and depressions to make a better life for themselves and their children.
Our democracy is a fragile inheritance that belongs equally to each one of us who calls America home. No more or no less based on how long we’ve been here or how we got here, our surname or color, our gender or religion or creed.
This inheritance belongs to all of us, but not to any one of us, and certainly not to a privileged few. Its value is not in any one man or woman or party or point of view. Its value is in the systems, structures, norms and values that hold it together. These must be respected, understood and protected, because American democracy is both strong and fragile.
Each of us, in equal measure, has the privilege and the responsibility to preserve it and to protect it, as was done for us. That requires work: staying informed, seeking out truth (not simply like-minded opinions), wrestling with difficult issues
and differing opinions, a willingness to compromise for the good of all and the preservation of our union. It requires serving, not being served. It is a legacy not to be toyed with, not to be taken for granted or to be used up for personal gain.
It was bequeathed to us to preserve, if possible to improve, and to pass on — not to spend wildly while the sun shines. Ultimately it is an ongoing experiment in implementing a radical vision of equality, justice, love and goodwill — of all men and women being made in the image of God — that goes far back before the name America, back to a radical revolutionary who showed us what it means to love, serve and sacrifice for the sake of others.
What we saw Wednesday breaks my heart. We see what can happen when we treat our precious inheritance badly, when we take it for granted, abuse it, or fail to do the hard work of protecting it — when we fail to be informed or engaged
or to stand up for the truth. May it be a wake-up call that this inheritance is indeed fragile and that it is our turn to preserve it.
May we be convicted and guided by, as President Abraham Lincoln put it, the “better angels of our nature” to put down hatred and division and to seek reconciliation. May that be the legacy that we pass on to the next generation.
“We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection,” Lincoln said at his first inaugural address in 1861. “The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”