hese are the times that try men’s souls,” Thomas Paine famously claimed in The American Crisis, his pamphlet published only days before George Washington’s crossing of the Delaware on Christmas 1776. Paine could have been just as easily writing about the past two weeks or the past year. But Inauguration Day, whether held on January 20 (since 1937) or March 4 (from 1789 to 1933), has always been a day of renewal for our country. It represents one of the most important moments in our shared civic and political life. Every inauguration is the culmination of a democratic selection process spanning months. And some three dozen of these inaugurations have been transitions of power from one president to another. Nearly all have been peaceful. >"The Bulwark is a news network launched in 2018 dedicated to providing political analysis and reporting free from the constraints of partisan loyalties or tribal prejudices."