Forum Editorial:
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We live in the greatest country on Earth, one whose founding message of freedom and equality has given hope to people across the globe.
Our nation was also built on an imperfect foundation, a truth that echoes through the centuries to the present and shapes many of the challenges of our future.
But over the past two-and-a-half centuries, we have — slowly, and not always linearly — narrowed the gap between who we are and the lofty founding promise that we will become a nation where all are free and equal.
It’s important to keep that in mind this week as we look forward to the celebration of Independence Day, and also to acknowledge that we still have far to go before that promise is fulfilled for all Americans.
It would be foolish to say that this Fourth of July will be a day of pride and joy for all Americans. For many, it will be difficult to watch fireworks in the sky and feel as though they are a part of our national celebration.
We are a nation riven with deep division, separated by instant communication that has amplified the most polarized voices and helped to keep us in echo chambers of our own making. Huddled in our tribes, we are a stressed and fearful people: in a survey conducted earlier this year by USA Today and Suffolk University, more than 80 percent of registered voters said they were very or somewhat worried about the future of democracy in the United States.
A CNN poll last month found that 86 percent of Americans were either “concerned” or “scared” about the way things are going in our country.
It’s not surprising our political discourse is filled and fueled by fear when we spend so much of our time loudly agreeing with those who share our initial views, or adjusting our views to the ones held by those we spend our time loudly agreeing with.
The one thing that seems to cut across partisan dividing lines is that we are afraid of each other.
Well, not the only thing. A Gallup poll last year showed another thing we have in common: seven in 10 Americans said they were “extremely” or “very proud” to be an American.
We are, rightfully, proud of our national ideals, even if we know we aren’t always meeting them.
But being an American is not a passive state. It’s an active one. Since 1776, the uniquely American dream has become possible for more and more people as we have expanded our understanding of what the phrase “all men are created equal” should mean, and have, however slightly, continued to come closer to fulfilling its original promise.
It hasn’t happened on accident. It has required the active participation of Americans, working in good faith, to understand each other and work toward our shared ideal.
“It is not ‘can any of us imagine better?’ but, ‘can we all do better?’” Abraham Lincoln, a man who knew a thing or two about a divided nation, said in a message to Congress in 1862. “The dogmas of the quiet past, are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise — with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.”
To navigate our own stormy present, we must take Lincoln’s advice to heart and disenthrall ourselves, not just from old ways of thinking, but from those who would do our thinking for us.
And if we aim to heal our divisions, it must start on a personal, practical level — the only way we can each make progress in understanding and empathizing with our fellow Americans across the arbitrary dividing lines that otherwise foster only fear.
This Independence Day, watch fireworks, eat hot dogs, watch “Schoolhouse Rock: America Rock” and enjoy what promises to be a sunny, warm summer day.
But also make an effort to understand why someone disagrees with you. Respond to vitriol with good-faith curiosity, and attempt to turn an argument into a conversation.
“Let us at all times remember that all American citizens are brothers of a common country, and should dwell together in the bonds of fraternal feeling,” Lincoln said shortly after being elected president for the first time.
On July Fourth, there is nothing more patriotic we can do than to listen to our brothers and sisters, to hear what makes them proud to be an American, what they fear, what they hope for, in what ways they believe we have yet to fulfill our founding promise and most importantly, to truly take to heart their views — especially those that seem furthest from our own.
