For almost 12 years, I served as the founding CEO of the National 9/11 Memorial & Museum, a role that invited countless strangers to share their stories from that terrible day.
asserted
that → serve → day
On planes, at gas stations, in meetings or on street corners, the mere mention of my work unlocked solemn reminiscing, and I always felt honored to listen.
asserted
I → unlock → reminiscing
Over time, I have noticed a pattern.
asserted
I → notice → pattern
The stories typically begin on 9/11, but rarely end there.
asserted
stories → begin → 9/11
They drift into the weeks and months that followed: people who tossed duffel bags into their cars and drove hundreds of miles to volunteer at Ground Zero; sons and daughters compelled to enlist to fight in the names of the innocent victims; strangers who welcomed stranded travelers into their homes.
asserted
who → drift → homes
Americans channeled grief and fear into acts of service and unity of purpose.
asserted
Americans → channel → purpose
I’ve always found it telling that even years after the attacks, these are the memories people chose to share with me.
asserted
people → find → me
Tempting though it is to recall pre-9/11 America through sunny filters, America seethed with partisan animus even then.
asserted
America → recall → animus
Nine months before the attacks, the Supreme Court had decided Bush v. Gore; three years earlier, the Clinton impeachment had rocked the country.
asserted
impeachment → decide → country
But in the wake of 9/11, the chasms we once shouted across became neighborhoods again.
asserted
we → shout → 9/11
It’s not that Americans suddenly agreed on all that divided them.
asserted
that → ’ → them
And to be sure, we must continue to address the hate that some wrongly embraced in the aftermath of that tragic day.
asserted
some → continue → day
But 9/11 largely clarified an essential truth: beneath our disagreements lay common cause.
asserted
cause → clarify → disagreements
The 2,977 people murdered that day hailed from 92 nations.
asserted
people → murder → nations
They were rich and poor, religious and secular, native-born, and immigrant.
asserted
They → bear → ?
They practiced different faiths, subscribed to different political views, and lived very different lives from even those seated right next to them on that fateful day.
asserted
They → practice → day
But in those differences, they represented the American experiment itself, and in putting aside our conflicts, Americans tacitly acknowledged that it was worth protecting.
asserted
it → represent → conflicts
Twenty-five years later, I am alarmed not by the solidarity we’ve lost, but by the erosion of consensus about the terms under which we disagree.
asserted
we → lose → which
Democracy itself has become debatable, especially among young people.
asserted
Democracy → become → people
Only 66% of Americans now say democratically elected government is “extremely” or “very important” to the nation’s identity, down from 80% in 2021.
asserted
government → say → 2021
Another recent survey found roughly one in five Americans endorse harassment, doxxing, or even violence against their political adversaries.
asserted
Americans → find → adversaries
Those figures belie a disturbing trend in our political discourse: moral absolutism.
asserted
figures → belie → discourse
A healthy democracy makes space even for fierce dissent.
asserted
democracy → make → dissent
The danger comes when political clashes become crusades, and the self-declared righteousness of the cause becomes license to abandon democratic restraints.
asserted
righteousness → come → restraints
Almost nothing went uncontested while we built the 9/11 Memorial & Museum.
asserted
we → go → Memorial
We fought over how to arrange the names of the dead, how and whether to represent the hijackers, and what would we delve into about America’s response.
asserted
we → fight → response
They were real conflicts waged by people of all backgrounds, laden with grief and anger, bound by deeply held personal, emotional, and political convictions and competing ideas about what America owed the dead and the living.
asserted
America → wag → dead
Yet we still had to build on sacred ground.
asserted
we → have → ground
The experience taught me that pluralism doesn’t require agreement.
asserted
pluralism → teach → agreement
It requires something harder: accepting that sometimes you will lose the argument, but you stay at the table anyway.
asserted
you → require → table
Our job wasn’t to make disagreements disappear.
asserted
disagreements → make → ?
There was no universe where that was possible.
asserted
that → be → ?
Instead, my job was to help determine which differences the institution had an obligation to accommodate and where it had an obligation to draw a line.
asserted
it → help → line
We could tell the truth about American failures without concluding that America itself was a failure.
uncertain
America → tell → failures
We could explain why the terrorists hated this country without adopting their indictment of it.
uncertain
terrorists → explain → it
A democracy depends on the same distinctions.
asserted
democracy → depend → distinctions
The rule of law, free expression, and equal citizenship are not partisan preferences to be renegotiated after every election.
asserted
rule → renegotiate → election
Protecting someone’s right to reject the American experiment is different from treating that rejection as simply another interpretation of it.
asserted
Protecting → protect → it
A pluralistic society can tolerate almost limitless disagreement precisely because there are some principles it cannot and should not surrender.
asserted
it → tolerate → disagreement
Now, this 25th anniversary demands more from us.
asserted
anniversary → demand → us
…and 2 more, not listed.
