We begin with our love for our country.

And then the words that brought us into existence, words betrayed for so long, still unfulfilled, yet still our birthright, those self-evident truths: All are created equal, with inalienable rights. Government has no power without the consent of the governed.

We find each other, across the streets and down the blocks of our towns and cities; out along the rural roads and local trails; in the places we pray; in our public libraries and union halls; at the coffeehouses and bookstores and open-mic nights; and yes, here too, on Substack and the other spaces in this online world that still hold out the promise of community.

We find each other, because we will need each other.

Few fair-minded people in this country can continue to deny that Donald Trump is exercising power in ways no previous president ever has, and that he has made his contempt for any check on his authority plain for all to see. He is changing our democracy, degrading and debasing it in ways that will benefit him, his cronies, and the movement he leads.

Every day seems to bring a new stunning break with the past. Rene Good is shot and killed by an ICE agent—and there’s not even a cursory federal investigation. Nothing. That sends a message about force and impunity in law enforcement under Donald Trump.

Jerome Powell, the Chair of the Federal Reserve, refuses to do Trump’s bidding and lower interest rates to 1 percent—and an infuriated Trump sics his pliant Department of Justice on Powell, who is now the target of a criminal investigation. And just like that, we live in a very different American economy—dominated by the crackpot notions of Donald Trump, who went bankrupt six times.

Governor Tim Walz of Minnesota and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey get the same treatment Powell did—a criminal investigation—for standing up to the invasion of the Twin Cities by a rogue force of federal agents. So do Senator Mark Kelly and four other Democratic lawmakers ,who simply reminded US troops they can and should refuse to obey unlawful orders. Dissent can and will be punished under this administration.

Trump is mad to gain ownership of Greenland—because he feels that ownership is “psychologically important” to him—and when our closest allies defy him, he slaps tariffs on them. There goes NATO, just like Trump (and Putin) have long wanted.

If Trump succeeds in his effort to transform the United States into a MAGA-dominated, crony-capitalist autocracy, there will be no coming back. Elections may take place, but they won’t matter. Protests will be restricted. Civic life will shrivel.

As a journalist, I’ve reported in countries that go this way. Russia—I first went there in May, 1998, before Putin took over, and in a dozen or more trips since, I’ve seen the shadow of despotism descend on the land. Turkey, Poland, Hungary—variations on the same theme. “Illiberal democracy,” under the leadership of nationalist strongmen, is the most powerful political movement of the 21st Century.

I once asked a Polish friend and colleague what it was like to live in Warsaw as an ordinary, liberal-minded person under the authoritarian rule of the Law and Justice Party there. I’ll never forget what he said.

“Your life gets smaller.”

So this is it. This year, I believe, will decide the issue Trump and his movement have raised. Will we continue to live in the democracy we grew up in? Or will our lives get smaller?

That’s why those first principles from our Declaration of Independence feel so real, so alive and urgent, to us today. They have become, in a civic sense, our rod and staff. But it will take more than those ringing words, more than our real patriotism, more even than our solidarity with each other, to defend this democracy. It will take grit.

And here we turn to our grandparents, to all our ancestors and forebears. Think of them. Remember their grit. You’ve got it, too.

I remain hopeful about our country because of this legacy. People in Minneapolis are discovering strength in themselves they may not have realized they had. You can tell in their interviews and social media posts, you can hear it in their voices. They may be new to defending democracy, but they’ve hurled themselves into the task with courage, conviction—and grit.

Decent Americans—including some who voted for Donald Trump—are not going to let this country go down. And while they are by their nature slow to action, you don’t want to be in their way when they move.

Two American classics came to me today as I thought about these things, one in prose, one in poetry.

First, a stunning piece of American prose that captures the indomitable grit of ordinary Americans. It’s the last paragraph of the opening chapter of The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck. He describes here the way Oklahoma farmers confronted the catastrophe of the Dust Bowl, as the terrible storms abated.

The people came out of their houses and smelled the hot stinging air and covered their noses from it. And the children came out of the houses, but they did not run or shout as they would have done after a rain. Men stood by their fences and looked at the ruined corn, drying fast now, only a little green showing through the film of dust. The men were silent and they did not move often. And the women came out of the houses to stand beside their men - to feel whether this time the men would break. The women studied the men's faces secretly, for the corn could go, as long as something else remained. The children stood nearby drawing figures in the dust with bare toes, and the children sent exploring senses out to see whether men and women would break. The children peeked at the faces of the men and women, and then drew careful lines in the dust with their toes. Horses came to the watering troughs and nuzzled the water to clear the surface dust. After a while the faces of the watching men lost their bemused perplexity and became hard and angry and resistant. Then the women knew that they were safe and that there was no break. Then they asked, Whta'll we do? And the men replied, I don't know. But, it was all right. The women knew it was all right, and the watching children knew it was all right. Women and children knew deep in themselves that no misfortune was too great to bear if their men were whole. The women went into the houses to their work, and the children began to play, but cautiously at first. As the day went forward the sun became less red. It flared down on the dust-blanketed land. The men sat in the doorways of their houses; their hands were busy with sticks and little rocks. The men sat still - thinking - figuring.

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Our poem is by Langston Hughes, great Black American writer, intellectual, and activist whose keen clear-sightedness about our country did not dim his hope for it. His work is an abiding gift to the nation. This poem speaks for itself, unforgettably.

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Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedLet America be America again.Let it be the dream it used to be.Let it be the pioneer on the plainSeeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—Let it be that great strong land of loveWhere never kings connive nor tyrants schemeThat any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where LibertyIs crowned with no false patriotic wreath,But opportunity is real, and life is free,Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There’s never been equality for me,Nor freedom in this “homeland of the free.”)

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,I am the Negro bearing slavery’s scars.I am the red man driven from the land,I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—And finding only the same old stupid planOf dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the young man, full of strength and hope,Tangled in that ancient endless chainOf profit, power, gain, of grab the land!Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!Of work the men! Of take the pay!Of owning everything for one’s own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.I am the worker sold to the machine.I am the Negro, servant to you all.I am the people, humble, hungry, mean—Hungry yet today despite the dream.Beaten yet today—O, Pioneers!I am the man who never got ahead,The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I’m the one who dreamt our basic dreamIn the Old World while still a serf of kings,Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,That even yet its mighty daring singsIn every brick and stone, in every furrow turnedThat’s made America the land it has become.O, I’m the man who sailed those early seasIn search of what I meant to be my home—For I’m the one who left dark Ireland’s shore,And Poland’s plain, and England’s grassy lea,And torn from Black Africa’s strand I cameTo build a “homeland of the free.”

The free?

Who said the free? Not me?Surely not me? The millions on relief today?The millions shot down when we strike?The millions who have nothing for our pay?For all the dreams we’ve dreamedAnd all the songs we’ve sungAnd all the hopes we’ve heldAnd all the flags we’ve hung,The millions who have nothing for our pay—Except the dream that’s almost dead today.

O, let America be America again—The land that never has been yet—And yet must be—the land whereeveryman is free.The land that’s mine—the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME—Who made America,Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose—The steel of freedom does not stain.From those who live like leeches on the people’s lives,We must take back our land again,America!

O, yes,I say it plain,America never was America to me,And yet I swear this oath—America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,We, the people, must redeemThe land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.The mountains and the endless plain--All, all the stretch of these great green states-And make America again!

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—Terry