There are an awful lot of people who despise government precisely because it opened the door for common citizenship for people of all races and all natures in the United States.

There are an awful lot of people who despise government precisely because it opened the door for common citizenship for people of all races and all natures in the United States.

There's a natural tendency to sanitize and polish any historical icon whether it be George Washington chopping down the cherry tree or Martin Luther King saying, "I have a dream."

Where race is involved, there is a pronounced and proven tendency in the United States for the majority culture to willfully misremember the history and turn it upside down.

History is the key to citizenship.

And to me, that's why the civil rights era is about the future, not about the past, because it's great lessons of how citizens can organize to call on the patriotic heritage of the country to tackle some of our most intractable problems and we need to do that again.

The history of American patriotism is figuring out ways that we can work together to move forward and knit together the common government.