Trump’s Reckless Assault on Remembrance

Americans will encounter the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence in 2026 through four distinct but intertwined forms of remembrance: commemoration, celebration, memory, and history. The four perspectives constantly shift and interconnect, often in surprising ways.

Celebration recalls the highest ideals and greatest accomplishments of the nation’s story, finding patriotism in common purpose and high ideals. It offers the appeal of parades and fireworks, festivals, and flags. Commemoration, on the other hand, is often solemn, asking for acknowledgment of what has been lost as well as gained, of sacrifice and theft, of forgetfulness and neglect. Memory, for its part, reflects on the ways personal lives interweave with the public events of the past, finding joy and sadness, pride and anger in family, place, and faith. History is dispassionate, built on careful investigation and documentation, on open-mindedness and skepticism.

The four kinds of remembrance evoke conflicting emotions. Celebrants can find the sober tones of commemoration out of place, while displays of patriotic celebration can seem hollow and hypocritical to those who seek commemoration. People who identify with valued ancestors can find the clinical analysis of history an affront, while those who value documented history can find in memory a form of wishful thinking.

Despite the intrinsic and unavoidable tensions among these different forms of remembering, Americans need each form of engagement with the past. No single approach can provide an understanding of the national past that is both affirming and honest. A vast and diverse democratic nation, with a history of both centuries of enslavement and triumph over global dictators, both the dispossession of a continent and bold struggles for rights by the oppressed, is held together by ideals that must transcend personal identity and yet make personal connection. A democracy must seek both cohesion and truth in its past. That is no simple task. We must expect, and even welcome, a perpetual debate over remembrance.

The last half-century has seen the United States navigating this complicated landscape of memory in fraught ways. Scenes of conflict come to mind: football players kneeling during the national anthem, rioters invading the Capitol under flags of professed patriotism, Confederate names removed (and then restored) from military bases, protests in all 50 states in opposition to a president denounced as a would-be king.