Today, some demand in the name of empathy that we look past what earlier generations — of citizens and immigrants alike — refused to tolerate. Illegal immigration and welfare fraud must be intolerable. Empathy is no excuse. Restore standards, restore trust, follow the law, and our proud tradition as an immigrant nation may continue.

During oral arguments in Slaughter, Justice Katanji Brown Jackson gave voice to that very idea, saying that such expert independence from presidential authority is “for the good of the people.” There could hardly be a better example of condescending moral superiority than a Supreme Court justice implying that what’s good for the people is to have unelected experts ignoring their electoral will.

While presidents Obama and Biden were dividers-in-chief in their own wrongheaded ways, President Trump’s need to raise the divisiveness bar by wallowing in the gutter smears us all.

When teachers prize inquiry over ideology, they train not just students, but citizens. By demanding civility, balance, and intellectual honesty from our educators, perhaps our politics will follow. The reverse has failed us too often to ignore the lesson any longer

For our system of government to function — and for a civil society overall — we need people in our lives who think and believe differently than we do. We must allow our views to be challenged and to learn how to challenge others without assuming ill motive.