Aaron Copland’s “Lincoln Portrait” is one of my favorite pieces of American propaganda. The orchestration starts quietly, tentatively, and gradually grows to a triumphant finale. A narrator accompanies the orchestra with descriptions of Abraham Lincoln and quotes from some of his famous speeches. The piece ends with the famous conclusion to the Gettysburg Address: “government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth,” but to my ear the weightiest line is from a note Lincoln wrote to himself: “As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master.” Such a clear and beautiful line; a succinct statement that Lincoln’s moral circle extends beyond himself, and he does not annoint himself with a privileged position at the center of the moral universe.

The 2024 US Presidential election¹ has come and gone, and soon we return to that most un-Lincoln-like of Presidents. I predict and fear the consequences will be with us for years. Leyla and I are highly likely to be fine; we’re blessed with approximately every tool modern society can provide for weathering uncertain times. Instead, this is a tragedy we collectively inflict especially on those far away from us in space and time: Ukranians no longer supported as they fight to defend their homes; future generations living in a hotter and more violent world where international borders are mere inconveniences to autocrats with guns; even the comparatively moderate stakes of neighbors denied healthcare and our own children coming of age in a United States with dirtier air and hollowed state capacity.

While the consequences of this election are unlikely to include the return of widespread literal slavery in the United States, Lincoln’s words echo in my mind alongside a 19th century abolitionist poem I first encountered via the novel Unsong – “The Present Crisis” by James Russell Lowell:

We see dimly in the Present what is small and what is great,
Slow of faith how weak an arm may turn the iron helm of fate,
But the soul is still oracular; amid the market's din,
List the ominous stern whisper from the Delphic cave within,—
"They enslave their children's children who make compromise with sin."

We have made our collective compromise for the feeble hope of short term gain and vengeance upon perceived enemies, children’s children be damned. That compromise is a vicious, ugly thing, and here a quote from – of all things – a beloved fantasy series has lodged itself in my mind: “But men often mistake killing and revenge for justice. They seldom have the stomach for justice.”²

My Judaism is thoroughly cultural and my Jewish knowledge shallow enough that I mostly just know the hits. But the hits are hits for a reason! At this uncertain moment I’m inspired by an absolute classic: “tzedek, tzedek tirdof” – “justice, justice you shall pursue.”³ I hope in time the better angels of our nature will again prevail, and in the words of Lincoln via Copland, we will “disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.”