“The Preamble” by Thaddeus Rutkowski

Part of our series of pieces inspired by the Democratic Party’s 2024 platform.

From the Democratic platform’s Preamble: “Americans believe that diversity is our greatest strength. That protest is among the highest forms of patriotism. That our fates and fortunes are bound to rise and fall together. That even when we fall short of our highest ideals, we never stop trying to build a more perfect union.”

✶

Many years after her arrival in the United States from China, my mother began to spread the word about the Constitution’s Preamble, which she’d memorized.

“Can you recite the Preamble?” she would ask anyone who would listen.

“Can you?” she asked me.

“I can’t,” I said.

“Even the person who delivers my Meals on Wheels knows the Preamble.”

I pictured a young man with a box of food trays, reciting for my mother as he put the package on a counter.

“I’m giving a thousand dollars to the local elementary school, so all of the students can recite the Preamble,” she said. “The one who does it best wins.”

A thousand dollars seemed like a lot of money, especially in light of where it was going—to a school where my mother knew no one. “Do you think that’s a good idea?” I asked.

“I already gave the money,” she said. “The principal told me I can visit the schooI anytime.”

“How will you get there?”

My mother didn’t own a car, and she walked with small steps. It would take her hours to hike to the school.

“I’ll call for the free van,” she said. “I’ll give the driver a copy of the Preamble, and we’ll recite it on the way.”

“Take this,” she said, handing me a photocopy. “Repeat after me: ‘We the People of the United States . . . ’”

“‘We the people of the United States . . . ’”

“‘In order to form a more perfect union . . . ’”

“‘In order to form a more perfect union . . . ’”

“‘Establish tranquility . . . ’”

“Mom!” I said. “I’m not going to be in a Preamble contest!”

“Doesn’t matter. Just practice the rest of it. This is the Chinese way.”

I could imagine children climbing onto the stage in the school auditorium, standing behind a podium, and speaking into a microphone about justice, tranquility, defense, welfare, liberty, and posterity. I folded the photocopy and put it in my pocket for later use.

“We’ll put up a sign with the name of our candidate for president,” my mother said. “But we’ll have to add a new name with a Sharpie.”

“The Democrats have a Preamble, too,” she added. “It’s in their platform. It goes: ‘We never stop trying to form a perfect union.’ ”

Just putting up the sign was a form of protest. My mother was from another country. She wasn’t supposed to vote but had earned the right by becoming a citizen. She believed in her candidate and was going to tell people. I hoped that the sign would stay where it was planted, that it would not be uprooted by vandals who favored the bigot. My mother was living in rural Pennsylvania.

We stood next to the sign and looked across the unpainted road that ran in front of my mother’s house. We could see a dairy farm surrounded by pastures, and beyond that the side of a mountain, covered with trees.

“We can recite the Preamble here,” my mother said.

“Who would hear us?” I asked.

“We can say it to the sky.”