We are ceaselessly reminded of the high stakes of the pending election. Pundits and candidates warn of stark consequences for energy policy, taxation, defense budgets, immigration, and reproductive rights. No one speaks of the highest stake and greatest threat of this election:  the fate of the social compact that binds our nation.

When most people speak of social structure, they nearly always refer to the laws and official institutions which determine how the government relates to you and me -- but for the most part they don’t determine how you and I relate to one another. Our daily lives are primarily defined by norms of behavior based on truth, virtue and mutual respect for persons and property, more integral to our society than the voluminous codes our government has imposed on us.

These social norms are inextricably linked to America’s exceptional nature; indeed, they define it. Many years working globally have taught me that while we share certain values with other western countries, there is something very special about the character of America and Americans. It is too complex to capture with one simple label, but it has much to do with honesty, morality, industriousness, gratitude, and cheerful self-reliance. Our exceptional nature was not a gift from a political party nor the product of government, except to the extent that government stayed out of the way and let it flourish.

Our norms were never codified -- at least not since the Ten Commandments -- but the Founders gave us what might be considered a negative template. More than a few of them, including James Madison at first, thought it unnecessary to delineate inalienable social norms in the document that was focused on federal government structure, but fortunately, Madison shifted his perspective, and the country was blessed with the  Bill of Rights, The Bill of Rights in this sense can be seen as a manifesto of individual liberty, underscoring the need to assure the government did not interfere with our social compact.  Because it states legal constraints, they are phrased negatively, but they reflect the fundamental rights between citizens the government must not limit and the profound social significance of those rights. The prohibition on restraining freedom of speech, for example, was an acknowledgment of the vital importance of free speech among its citizens. The ultimate distillation of these rights, taught to earlier generations, was “your rights end at the tip of my nose,” meaning you may enjoy your rights as long as you don’t interfere with mine. No one ever argued with this expression of our social compact, which seemed perfectly obvious because of our shared values. Everyone also knew that a key element of the Constitution was its separation of powers within government; just as important to our lives was a more fundamental separation, the separation of government from our private lives

But we have been yielding these values to leftist leaders, elected and otherwise, whose interests are served by ignoring both separations, who conflate legal rules and social norms and pretend we have no rights except those they bestow on us. We have accepted the steady erosion of our social compact because it is too arduous to reason with the unreasonable, too frustrating to speak calmly with those who shout, and too uncomfortable to speak over the screams of the nihilist tribes. We have stood by in silence as the fabric of our society unravels, tacitly engaged in a dangerous appeasement with the left. In the last century, the appeasement of tyrants led to the eventual loss of millions of lives and the disintegration of entire nations. The cultural appeasement we have been enduring could likewise lead to catastrophe.

Evidence of this threat abounds. The public has not only lost trust in the government but also in journalists, the judiciary, universities, and medical institutions. We can’t rely on legacy media to report the truth. Religion is mocked. Morality has been replaced by shallow, narcissistic virtue signaling and fake empathy. Patriotism is too often seen as a partisan issue. “I see you are flying a flag,” quips a neighbor. “I didn’t know you were Republican.” Parents are blocked from knowing what transpires in their children’s classrooms. Many universities seem to offer only three majors: grievance, arrogance, and ignorance. Officials take our money and spend it to serve their personal ideology without asking our approval. Words like truth and faith have been hollowed out. Preferred pronouns become more important than national security. Gratitude is replaced with resentment. Good faith dissent is stomped into silence. DEI has banished meritocracy in the military and many other organizations. Skepticism against authority -- vital to a healthy democracy -- is rebuffed with cancellation. Is this the country we want to live in?

Free speech is “a block” to implementing enlightened policies, a Democratic elite recently declared. Those words weren’t a complaint; they were a call to fellow officials to implement censorship, a call to control not just what we do but what we think. They reflect the Left’s Faustian bargain: let us control your lives, and we will give you handouts. They represent a government that, if left in power, will overwhelm our social compact, asking us to trade in our hopes and freedom for loan forgiveness and free meals.

While the essential qualities of American exceptionalism can’t be distilled into a word or two, for generations, there has been a simple litmus test: we shared a belief in the goodness of our fellow Americans. Now that confidence is shaken, and that belief is being beaten out of our children by an educational system that has been hijacked by the America-hating Left. If our children are not allowed to experience and absorb the American spirit, our country will be lost -- and if it is, it will not be because the majority of Americans wish it so

Many around the world think America is great because of its Constitution. But America is great because of its people. It was not by some quirk of wordsmithing that the Constitution opens with “We the people…” We the people still hold the power in this republic. This is more than an election, it is a referendum on ourselves and the country we want to live in. It is time to declare that the age of grievance and appeasement is over.

Eliot Pattison’s nineteen novels include the award-winning Skull Mantra series, casting a poignant spotlight on human rights abuses in China, and the Bone Rattler series, examining the complex people and events leading to the founding of the United States.

Image: Robert Huffstutter