On a September afternoon in Orem, Utah, a single rifle shot rang out over a college campus and changed American history. Conservative firebrand Charlie Kirk, 31 years old and full of combative bravado just moments prior, crumpled to the ground with a fatal wound to the neck. Panic erupted among the 3,000 attendees of his speaking event. Students screamed and dove for cover; security agents scanned rooftops for a sniper none had really anticipated. In that instant, the American public square — the sacred space of discussion and dissent — was violently shattered. For those of us who vehemently opposed Kirk’s ideas, the news of his assassination was not an occasion for grim satisfaction but for profound dread. A line had been crossed that even the fiercest ideological battles in America should never breach.

I admit, I never liked Charlie Kirk’s brand of politics. As the co-founder of Turning Point USA, he built a reputation stoking campus culture wars, railing against “leftist indoctrination,” and trafficking in a style of confrontational rhetoric I often found corrosive. In another life I might have welcomed his exit from the stage of public debate. Yet as I watched the cellphone footage of Kirk slumping from his chair amid the chaos of that Utah rally, I felt no triumph, only a cold wave of nausea. The bullet that killed Charlie Kirk tore through more than one man’s carotid artery. It pierced the very heart of democratic participation in America. When bullets replace ballots, and assassination supplants argument, something vital dies in the nation’s civic soul.

Democracy at Gunpoint

In the hours and days following Kirk’s murder, Americans across the political spectrum have been grappling with the enormity of what happened. Officials quickly deemed it a “political assassination,” underscoring that this was not some random campus shooting but a targeted killing with an unmistakably political message. The message, however, remains muddled and ominous. No suspect was immediately apprehended; no manifesto delivered to authorities. Authorities do not yet know who pulled the trigger or why. But perhaps, in a sense, Americans do know. The “who” is every zealot who ever decided that an opponent’s voice must be silenced by force. The “why” is the culmination of years of escalating vitriol, tribalism, and despair about peaceful change. Charlie Kirk’s assassination did not occur in a vacuum; it exploded from a powder keg of political rage that has been building for some time.

Look around: American civic life has been bleeding out from a thousand smaller wounds. In recent years, elected officials and public figures have been stalked, threatened, even attacked at an alarming rate. Members of Congress routinely receive death threats. A man invaded the home of the Speaker of the House and bludgeoned her husband with a hammer. A riotous mob stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, leaving a trail of broken glass and broken bones in the very halls where the nation’s laws are made. A Michigan militia plotted to kidnap a sitting governor in 2020. Democratic participation has not officially ended, but more Americans are behaving as if debate, elections, and compromise were futile — as if violence were the shortcut to “saving” the country from their rivals.

Charlie Kirk’s slaying is the latest, most visceral symbol of this malignant trend. Here was a man who lived by the sword of rhetoric and provocation — by his own admission a “culture warrior” for conservative America — yet even he did not expect to die by an actual sword (or rather, a sniper’s bullet). His final moments on stage carry a haunting irony: seconds before the shot, an audience member had asked Kirk about gun violence in America. “Do you know how many mass shooters there have been in the last ten years?” came the question. Kirk was in the midst of a glib reply — “Counting or not counting gang violence?” he said — when a crack of gunfire silenced him forever. It appears that even as he spoke, a real-life exemplar of that very problem lay hidden in a rooftop perch, finger on the trigger. The debate he was leading about violence was cut short by the very thing being debated. There could be no more poignant illustration that the national conversation has collapsed into a scream and a shot.

To be clear, Kirk was a deeply polarizing figure. He relished verbal combat and was no stranger to demonizing his adversaries. But in a democracy, the remedy for speech Americans detest has always been more speech, not a muzzle — and certainly not a murder. By all accounts, Kirk’s “American Comeback Tour” event at Utah Valley University was intended to be contentious but civil: a showcase of free expression where even hostile questioners were invited to spar with him openly. That was the theory. In practice, one unknown assailant decided to short-circuit the entire premise of democratic discourse. With one violent act, this person proclaimed: I do not care to argue. I do not trust the process. I will simply eliminate the other side. Such a mentality is the antithesis of everything the American Founders hoped for in American politics.

In the immediate aftermath, political leaders issued the customary condemnations. There were prayers and press conferences, lowered flags and bipartisan statements of shock. But even in those first responses, one could detect the brittle, fractured nature of the union. A moment that should have united all Americans in unequivocal denunciation of political violence instead became one more rhetorical battleground. In Congress, a planned moment of silence for Charlie Kirk devolved into shouting and finger-pointing. One party’s members demanded solemn recognition for a fallen comrade, while some members of the other balked: Why, they asked, hadn’t other victims of political violence received the same attention? Accusations flew of politicizing the tragedy, of double standards and ulterior motives. A congressman’s voice echoed through the chamber, “Pass a gun law!”, a raw, angry retort to the perfunctory silence. Partisan division, it seemed, could not pause for even a single minute of mourning. The very institution meant to represent We the People could not unite to simply say killing is wrong, without inserting barbs about how to say it or whom to blame.

And blame did come, quickly and ferociously. Prominent voices on the right instantly cast Kirk’s death as proof of an imagined left-wing “war” on conservatives. Social media lit up with incendiary fury: “The left is the party of murder,” pronounced one tech billionaire provocateur from his digital pulpit, painting tens of millions of Americans as complicit in a killing none had endorsed. A far-right activist demanded the government “crack down on the Left” in sweeping retribution, as if every progressive were a latent terrorist. On the left, most political figures responded with sorrow and restraint, condemning violence in general terms, but a few could not resist pointing fingers back at the inflammatory rhetoric of Donald Trump and his allies (Kirk among them) for creating a climate where extremism festers. Across the ideological spectrum, calls for unity against violence were undercut by the nagging urge to score points. Even in the shared horror, people remained miles apart.

Watching all this, I felt the urgent sense that Charlie Kirk’s assassination is not just one more news cycle of partisan jousting. It is something more profound: a symbolic funeral for American democratic engagement itself. When a nation reaches a point that leaders are gunned down or brutalized and the public immediately retreats to its corners, that nation is in deep trouble. Americans have lost not only the ability to talk to each other, but even the ability to grieve together. The public square is no longer a common space; it is a minefield. How did the United States get here? To understand, Americans must take a hard look at their history and at themselves.

Echoes from a Dying Republic

History offers both warning and wisdom about the path now being trod. This is not the first republic to see its democratic norms collapse under the weight of internal strife. As I reflect on the tragedy in Utah, my mind drifts back two millennia to another republic that died by violence: ancient Rome. The Founding Fathers were well-versed in Roman history and drew countless lessons from it when designing the American system. Sadly, America may now be replaying some of Rome’s darkest chapters.

Consider the late Roman Republic, a period when the norms of civility and the rule of law steadily unraveled. For centuries, Rome prided itself on mos maiorum, the customs of the ancestors, which strictly forbade political bloodshed within the civic arena. Romans boasted that their Republic, unlike the monarchies of old, settled disputes through debate in the Senate and votes in the assemblies, not through the assassin’s blade. But that norm did not last. In 133 B.C., a reformist tribune named Tiberius Gracchus dared to bypass the Senate to push through land reforms benefiting the common people. The threatened elites responded not with counterarguments, but with a gang of senators’ thugs who clubbed Gracchus to death on the Capitoline Hill. It was a shocking breach of the peace — the first political murder in Rome in generations — and it cracked open the floodgates. A decade later, Gracchus’s brother met a similar fate amid street violence. Soon Roman politics fell into a vicious cycle: every act of violence bred retaliation. Rival politicians began raising private militias; elections were decided by intimidation and the sword. By the time Julius Caesar was famously assassinated in 44 B.C. on the Senate floor (stabbed 23 times by conspirators claiming to act in the name of liberty), the Republic was already on life support. Caesar’s murder, far from saving the republic, plunged Rome into a final spasm of civil wars. The aftermath was not a restored democracy, but the dictatorship of the emperors. The lesson? Once a republic abandons words for weapons, its days are numbered.

Americans have long seen themselves as inheritors of Rome’s legacy — both its republican virtues and its cautionary tales. The Founders spoke of Cincinnatus and Cicero, well aware that the Roman experiment ultimately imploded. John Adams once worried that “democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” That quote may be pessimistic, but Adams was pointing to the historical reality that republics can perish from internal decay. Violence is often the suicide weapon of a democracy. Think of it as a slow poison: each violent act erodes trust, invites repression or revenge, and teaches citizens that force, not persuasion, is how politics works. Over time, people either cower into silence or arm themselves for battle. In either case, the civic bonds that hold a democracy together fray and eventually snap.

American history, too, provides a stark example of this dynamic: the lead-up to its own Civil War. In the 1850s, as the United States was torn apart over slavery, political discourse grew increasingly toxic and violent incidents began to multiply. Perhaps the most infamous was the Caning of Senator Charles Sumner in 1856. Sumner, an abolitionist from Massachusetts, delivered a fiery anti-slavery speech in the Senate. Two days later, he was approached at his desk by Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina, who took a heavy gold-tipped cane and beat Sumner almost to death right there on the Senate floor. Fellow lawmakers watched in horror as blows rained down, unable to stop the assault. Sumner survived, but suffered injuries that took years to heal. The nation, too, never fully healed from that episode; instead it was a harbinger of worse to come. The brutal attack on a U.S. Senator inside the halls of Congress sent a jolt through the country: was reasoned debate now impossible? Could the union survive when representatives resorted to brute force? We know the answer history gave. Within five years, the disagreements that could not be resolved with words erupted into the bloodiest war America has ever experienced. Over 600,000 died in the Civil War — a sobering price paid in blood for the breakdown of the political system.

It is often said that history doesn’t repeat, but it rhymes. As I contemplate the murder of Charlie Kirk, I hear distinctly the rhyme of those earlier ages. The particulars differ — a high-powered rifle instead of a Roman sword or a Southern cane — but the theme is the same: a republic’s norms and institutions under assault from within. Weimar Germany in the 1920s is another verse of this tragic ballad. In the wake of World War I, Germany’s fledgling democracy was assailed by extremists on the right and left who no longer believed parliamentary politics could deliver change. Armed militias brawled in the streets of Berlin. Political assassinations became dismayingly common. In 1922, Foreign Minister Walther Rathenau, a moderate liberal voice, was gunned down by right-wing militants; other officials met similar fates. Rather than unite Germans against extremism, these killings only deepened resentments. Each faction glorified their martyrs and vilified their enemies. Ultimately, the republic collapsed into the hands of a dictator who promised law and order but delivered tyranny.

Or take Spain in the 1930s: a bitterly polarized society where one assassination sparked a chain reaction. In July 1936, a prominent conservative Spanish politician was murdered by leftist gunmen. In retaliation, nationalist officers led by Francisco Franco launched a coup against the Republic. The result was the Spanish Civil War, a brutal conflict that killed hundreds of thousands and ushered in decades of authoritarian rule. One bullet, one body, and a democracy was snuffed out, replaced by the jackboots of fascism.

The United States in 2025 is not Germany in 1933, nor Rome in its death throes. The institutions, for all their current strain, are older and in some ways sturdier. Yet Americans would be arrogant to assume that they are immune to the lessons of history. America has its own litany of political violence, past and present. Four U.S. Presidents have been assassinated in American history (from Lincoln to Kennedy), and each time the nation was convulsed with grief, questioning its identity. But those were singular events, spaced out over a century. What America faces now feels different: a creeping normalization of violence as a feature of politics. It’s as if the social guardrails that kept partisan passions in check have broken, and the country is sliding toward a cliff. Charlie Kirk’s assassination is a wake-up call ringing at full volume — a warning flare in the night sky of the republic. Will Americans heed it, or will it be just another milestone on the road to democratic suicide?

The Founders’ Worst Nightmare

It’s worth recalling, at this perilous juncture, what the Founding Fathers believed about political conflict and the health of the republic. These were men who had risked being hanged for treason by fighting the Revolution; they understood violence as a tool against tyranny. Yet once independence was won, the Founders became perhaps the greatest champions of peaceful politics the world had seen. They designed a Constitution to channel clashing interests into elections, debates, votes, and lawful processes — specifically so that guns and guillotines would not rule the day. James Madison in Federalist No. 10 acknowledges that faction and disagreement are inevitable in a free society; the key, he argued, is to have structures that compel factions to negotiate and compromise through institutional processes. The entire American experiment rests on the proposition that you do not shoot your opponents; you argue with them. You try to persuade, and if you cannot, you abide by the outcome of votes, and live to fight another day at the ballot box or the courthouse or the town hall meeting.

George Washington, in his Farewell Address, warned about “the fury of party spirit” and the danger that extreme partisanship could pose to the unity of the nation. He urged Americans to remember that whatever the differences, citizens share common ground as a national family. “We are all Republicans, we are all Federalists,” Thomas Jefferson proclaimed in his inaugural address, trying to soothe the divisions of a bitter election by reminding citizens that a difference of opinion was “not a difference of principle.” The principle he referred to was the republican ideal itself — the shared commitment to resolving differences through reasoned debate and constitutional mechanisms, rather than through repression or bloodshed. When Jefferson said “every man must be contented to yield the government to those whom the people have chosen,” he was articulating a fundamental democratic norm: you don’t take up arms simply because your side lost an election or because a speaker angers you. You respect the process, even if you hate the outcome. Without that fidelity to process, no constitution or law can save a nation from chaos.

The Founders also spoke often of civic virtue, the idea that a republic could only survive if its citizens cultivated certain qualities: tolerance, moderation, a willingness to sacrifice personal interest for the common good, and a sense of personal responsibility for the health of the community. John Adams wrote in 1798, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” By “moral,” Adams wasn’t referring to personal piety so much as the virtues necessary for self-government. He and his contemporaries believed that liberty and order are kept in balance not just by laws, but by habits of the heart. If citizens lose those habits — if they stop listening to each other, stop caring about truth, start seeing opponents as mortal enemies — then the finest constitutional structure will buckle under the strain.

What would those giants of 1776 say if they could see America today? I suspect they would be heartbroken, but perhaps not entirely surprised. They knew the dangers that forever lurk in any popular government. Alexander Hamilton, in the very first of the Federalist Papers, warned of demagogues who rise by “lighting the flames of faction” and presenting themselves as the saviors against some internal enemy. The Founders knew that if citizens grew apathetic or angry enough to abandon debate for violence, the republic would be lost. Benjamin Franklin, upon exiting the Constitutional Convention of 1787, was famously asked what kind of government the delegates had created. “A republic,” he replied, “if you can keep it.” That “if” has always been the most important word in that sentence. A republic is not an automatic, self-perpetuating machine; it is an ongoing act of faith and effort by its people. It must be kept, guarded, tended, renewed, or else it withers.

Today, America is failing Franklin’s challenge. The country has allowed the rot of hatred and mistrust to hollow out the timber of its institutions. Americans have stood by (and at times cheered) as political leaders hurled demonizing rhetoric at opponents, as if words carry no consequences. When President Trump calls his adversaries “evil” or “enemies of the state,” when activists label their opponents “terrorists” or “traitors,” it plants a dangerous seed in the public mind. It suggests that normal politics has already ended, that the other side is beyond reasoning with, that perhaps eliminating them is a necessary service to the nation. This is exactly the mindset that motivated some of history’s darkest deeds. It’s the mindset of John Wilkes Booth whispering “sic semper tyrannis” as he pulled the trigger on Lincoln, convinced he was saving America from a “tyrant.” It’s the psychology of every extremist who has ever rationalized murder in the name of a higher good.

Let’s be absolutely clear: political violence is an attack on democracy itself. It does not matter if the victim is a controversial right-wing pundit, a liberal congresswoman, a judge, a journalist, or a protester in the street. To shoot someone for their political stance is to stab at the heart of the social contract that binds a free people. In a healthy democracy, no one is a legitimate target for violence over speech or beliefs. Citizens settle those disputes in the court of public opinion, not at gunpoint. The moment Americans accept any justification for such violence — even subtly, even by silence — they permit the idea that might makes right. And once that idea takes root, it spreads like wildfire. No side will hold a monopoly on “justified” violence for long. If it’s acceptable to kill “tyrants” or “traitors,” each faction will define the other as such. The result is predictable: a war of all against all, and the death of the republic.

When the Public Square Shatters

American democracy has always depended on the existence of a “public square” — not a literal plaza necessarily, but any arena where citizens of differing views come together to share information, argue, persuade, and ultimately shape the direction of the community. In colonial days, it was the town meeting and the pamphlet press. In the 20th century, it was newspapers, radio, television, and civic organizations where neighbors hashed out issues face to face. The public square is where democratic participation lives. It’s where you can speak your mind, hear your neighbor’s perspective, maybe change a few minds or have yours changed.

What happens when that square becomes a shooting gallery? People understandably withdraw. Fear replaces engagement. After Representative Gabby Giffords was shot in 2011 while meeting constituents in Arizona, a chill fell over the tradition of open town halls. Elected officials began to curtail in-person forums or ramp up security dramatically. When mobs threaten local school board members or public health officers with violence (something Americans have sadly seen in recent years), ordinary citizens think twice about volunteering for public service. Who wants to put their family at risk to serve on city council or Congress if the price might be a pipe bomb or an AR-15 attack? When candidates and activists start wearing bulletproof vests to rallies (as some do now), it’s a sign that the public square is literally under fire. The inevitable result: voices grow muffled, democratic participation withers, and the extremists holding the guns gain an outsized influence through sheer intimidation.

Charlie Kirk’s assassination sends a loud and terrifying message to anyone who engages in politics: You could be next. If a prominent figure speaking in broad daylight at a university can be sniped like this, what about everyone else? One imagines some people — perhaps a progressive speaker, or a conservative lawmaker, or any outspoken citizen — deciding it’s simply not worth it to put themselves out there anymore. Better to retreat into the private realm, keep your head down, and avoid becoming a target. But democracy cannot survive if too many good people choose to check out of the public arena out of fear or cynicism. Self-government is not a spectator sport. Yet here stands America, a spectator to its own national unraveling, its citizens too frightened or numbed to step forward and stop it.

Another casualty of this violent climate is truth and dialogue. When every contentious issue is met with threats, how can Americans possibly have honest conversations? Take, for example, the issue Kirk was discussing at the moment of his death — gun violence. How bitterly ironic that a forum on that topic ended in a fatal shooting. It’s as if the very possibility of dialogue on some of the hardest problems is being foreclosed by the literal manifestation of those problems. Americans know the country has a severe crisis of mass shootings and political violence. Americans ought to come together to talk about it — rationally, earnestly, and across partisan lines. But instead, the nation gets more violence, which leads to more polarization, which in turn makes constructive dialogue even less likely. It is a vicious spiral: violence polarizes; polarization breeds more extremism, which yields more violence. How to break out?

One necessary step is to refuse to be cowed into silence. This might sound paradoxical — surely keeping heads down is safer? But if everybody hides, the public square dies. And if the public square dies, then democracy dies with it. Consider how many historical figures Americans admire precisely because they had the courage to stand in the public square despite threats. From Martin Luther King Jr. marching in Selma under constant death threats to suffragists picketing the White House at risk of arrest and assault, positive change has always required civic courage — the willingness to speak and participate even when it’s dangerous or difficult. Americans must summon that kind of courage now. If anything, Americans owe it to Charlie Kirk, ironically enough, to ensure that his murder does not achieve its apparent goal of terrorizing citizens into disengagement. I may have disagreed with virtually every position Kirk took, but I respected his energy in mobilizing young voters and his insistence on showing up at campuses to argue his case. He believed (perhaps naively) that he could win hearts and minds through debate. The sniper believed otherwise. In honor of democratic ideals, Americans must side with the belief in debate over the belief in bullets.

Restoring Civic Courage

So what is to be done? In this atmosphere of anger and sorrow, the temptation is to answer violence with more aggression, to double down on blaming the “other side,” to impose harsh crackdowns or indulge fantasies of retaliation. But that road leads only to darker tyranny and endless conflict. For Americans, the harder task is to renew the habits of democracy, one citizen at a time. It requires a conscious effort to rebuild the public square that has been splintered, and for individuals to assume responsibility for the health of the republic.

First, citizens must utterly reject political violence and intimidation, no matter who it comes from or who it targets. That sounds obvious, but it requires soul-searching. It means no more wink-and-nod tolerance of the radicals on their own side when they talk about armed revolution or getting rid of opponents “by any means necessary.” It means calling out the violent rhetoric at dinner tables, in Facebook groups, in political rallies — even when it’s coming from allies. If you’re a conservative, denounce the crazies who glorify attacks on leftists or talk about military coups; if you’re a progressive, denounce anyone who cheers when a right-wing figure is harmed or who justifies punching and shooting as acceptable political tactics. There can be no double standards. If it’s wrong for one side, it’s wrong for the other. This is a moral bright line on which the vast majority of Americans actually agree. (Polls consistently show that well over 90% of Americans reject violence as a political tool.) But voices condemning it have been too passive. America has let the 6% of extremists dominate the conversation. No more. It’s time for the 94% — the sane, non-violent majority — to reclaim the microphone and say, “Enough. This is not how we solve our problems in America.”

Second, citizens need to demand accountability and courage from leaders. Words matter, especially from the mouths of presidents, governors, members of Congress, media personalities, and movement figures. Citizens should insist they tone down the demonization and model the civility required in a pluralistic society. That doesn’t mean abandoning strong beliefs or vigorous debate. It means disagreeing without dehumanizing. Leaders who indulge in stochastic terrorism — who constantly paint their opponents as monsters and then act shocked when someone takes it literally and acts on it — must be held politically and socially accountable. At the same time, leaders who bravely reach across the aisle or speak out against violence in their own ranks deserve support, even if many dislike some of their other policies. For instance, in the wake of Kirk’s killing, one retiring Republican senator bluntly stated that “everyone who encourages aggressive responses instead of civil discourse bears some responsibility for this death.” He’s right. Those who have been stoking the flames must reckon with their part in creating this climate. And all citizens, as voters and media consumers, need to reward those who choose the path of de-escalation over the easy path of incendiary rhetoric.

Third, citizens must reinvigorate civic education and engagement at the community level. Part of the reason the public square has degraded is that America has lost the spaces and norms that used to bring people together as neighbors and compatriots. Rebuilding trust won’t happen overnight, but it can start in local communities. Why not organize community forums where folks of different backgrounds actually talk to each other rather than about each other? It could be as simple as a public library hosting a monthly “civic dialogue night,” or local schools requiring service projects and debates that mix students from different political households. Citizens have to relearn the art of listening and the skill of disagreeing without hatred. Programs like deliberate dialogue circles, bipartisan civics workshops, even casual meet-your-neighbor potlucks can gradually humanize the “other side.” It’s hard to caricature or kill someone you’ve shared coffee with.

Crucially, citizens must restore faith that the system can respond to people’s needs without violence. A breeding ground of extremism is the belief that normal politics is broken beyond repair. Some of that despair is fueled by very real frustrations — decades of political gridlock, economic inequality, social change that leaves people feeling unmoored or unheard. If large swaths of Americans conclude that “the system” only works for elites or that elections are routinely stolen (a lie that unfortunately has gained traction), the allure of violent “self-help” by vigilantes or revolutionaries grows. Combating that cynicism requires actual reform and responsive governance. It’s not enough to preach nonviolence; people need to see that engaging peacefully in politics leads to results, however incremental. That places a burden on institutions to perform better, and on citizens to participate in good faith (e.g., voting, volunteering, compromising) rather than retreating into apathy or conspiracies.

As Americans confront the aftermath of Charlie Kirk’s assassination, the stakes cannot be overstated. This is a make-or-break moment for American democracy. America now stands at a crossroads not unlike those faced by Rome before Caesar’s fall, or America in the 1850s, or Europe between the wars. In one direction lies an abyss of further hatred, crackdown, rebellion, and possibly the end of the American experiment as it is known. In the other direction lies a difficult road of reconciliation and recommitment to the founding principles. The road of reconciliation does not mean everyone suddenly agrees or that deep issues evaporate. It means Americans agree on the rules of engagement: No matter how much they disagree, they will not kill each other over politics. It means rediscovering a baseline of mutual legitimacy, seeing even their fiercest opponents as fellow Americans, not as poison to be purged.

A Republic, If We Can Save It

America has come to a perilous point, but the country is not past the point of no return. Citizens still have choices. The same social media platforms that spread hate can also spread understanding and organize peace. The same Congress that splinters over a moment of silence can, if it chooses, unite to pass measures protecting officials or countering domestic terrorism. The same public that seems hopelessly divided can still surprise the cynics — recall how Americans of all stripes pulled together briefly after 9/11, or how voters from both parties have, at times, rejected extremist candidates in favor of steadier hands. There is latent strength in American democratic culture that Americans can draw upon. It is evident in the everyday acts of kindness and cooperation that don’t make headlines. It is evident in the vast majority who, despite their political leanings, would never dream of picking up a weapon to settle an argument. That majority needs to become the backbone of a democratic revival.

In his time, Abraham Lincoln implored Americans to remember the “better angels of our nature.” He spoke those words in 1861, when civil war was only a whisper on the wind, in the hope that bloodshed might yet be averted. Americans know that hope was dashed; the angels lost to the demons of division for a time. But Lincoln never gave up on the dream of an American union healed and redeemed. Neither should Americans. Indeed, they might recall another famous Lincoln maxim — one especially apt today: “The ballot is stronger than the bullet.” In their grief and anger, Americans should not forget that fundamental truth. It was strong ballots, not bullets, that have driven progress in this country. Votes ended Jim Crow; court rulings and laws expanded women’s rights; protests and speeches (nonviolent tools of persuasion) won labor reforms and environmental protections. The most enduring changes in America have come through arguments won, not enemies eliminated.

Charlie Kirk’s death is a tragedy and an outrage. But if anything positive can come from it, perhaps it can serve as a national gut check — a moment when citizens pause and recognize that this is not who they want to be. Americans do not want to live in a country where political rallies require armored checkpoints, where every ideological dispute is a potential gunfight, where children grow up seeing public life as a gladiatorial arena soaked in blood. Everyone owes it to the next generation to reverse this course.

Each American can start by making a simple pledge: I will engage, not enrage. I will persuade, not threaten. I will vote, not shoot. This is the civic creed that keeps a republic alive. It is the creed that the Founders effectively enshrined, that generations of Americans, at their best moments, have upheld. It is time to revive it.

The public square need not remain a crime scene. Picture instead a public square reborn — parks and forums bustling with citizens passionately debating, protesting peacefully, listening earnestly. Picture a country where a conservative speaker and a liberal protester can walk away from a confrontation not as mortal enemies, but as fellow citizens who both care about the nation’s future, however differently they see it. This vision need not be naive; it is the basic model of civic life citizens have achieved before and can achieve again. But it will take work, humility, and yes, courage. Civic courage is not just for heroes of history; it’s for everyone now. It’s the courage to defy the cynicism that says citizen voices don’t matter. It’s the courage to reach out to that neighbor with the opposing yard sign and say, “Hey, let’s talk,” instead of avoiding eye contact. It’s the courage to stand up within your own tribe and say, “No, that’s going too far,” when someone advocates harm.

In the end, saving American democracy will come down to countless individual decisions to act with conviction and compassion rather than contempt. It will depend on whether Americans remember that the phrase We the People is not just a historic flourish but a call to action. The people of the United States — together, whether they like each other or not — still hold the fate of their republic in their hands. If fear and hatred are allowed to turn citizens fully against one another, then the American idea dies. But if enough Americans find it within themselves to reclaim the public square — to make it once again a stage for words instead of a killing field — then this dark chapter can remain only that: a chapter, not the final act.

Standing in the dim glow of that candlelight vigil, I felt both despair and a strange glimmer of hope. Despair at how far America has fallen, but hope in the very act of those strangers coming out at night to stand together. In their silence, I sensed not surrender but a yearning — a yearning for an America that lives up to its promise of liberty and justice for all without needing a single life to be taken in the process. Americans can honor Charlie Kirk, even those who opposed him, by striving to be a nation where passionate disagreement is met with vigorous debate and civic action, never with assassination. Americans can commit themselves to proving that self-government still runs in their civic blood, stronger than any impulse to shed one another’s.

The road forward will not be easy. But then again, it never has been. Every generation is tested. This is the test of America’s time. Will Americans let democracy die on their watch, or will they have the courage to revive it? The candles at the vigil eventually guttered out, but the light they symbolized — the light of the public square, of citizens engaging one another — must not. It is up to Americans to carry it forward. The republic will be what citizens make of it. In this somber moment, may Americans make it anew, with hearts that are broken but resolve that is unbreakable.

America, the time for outrage is over; the time for civic responsibility is now. In the name of all that citizens hold dear — and in the name of a future where American children can argue freely without fear — citizens of the United States must rededicate themselves to the proposition that this nation, conceived in liberty, can indeed long endure. The public square can live again. Democratic participation can be reborn. But only if Americans choose to keep the republic — only if they choose courage over violence, and hope over fear.

History is watching. The world is watching. Most of all, America’s own conscience is watching. The death of Charlie Kirk is a warning. The revitalization of American democracy must be the answer. Americans should answer loudly — not with bullets or bitter words, but with a million voices speaking, a million minds reasoning, and a million hearts steadfast in the conviction that this government of the people shall not perish from the earth.