I didn’t go to first grade in the United States; I was overseas on one of my academic father’s endless sabbaticals. I got home in time for the new school year, and I learned that in my absence, my cohort had been charged with a new obligation: saying the Pledge of Allegiance each morning. Nobody took me aside to tell me what it meant (Allegiance? Indivisible?); I just stood up with everyone else and picked it up.

We took it seriously. When the morning bell rang, we’d climb the wide stone steps that led from the playgrounds to the school buildings, hang up our jackets and store our lunch boxes in the cloakroom (why cloak? Had that, too, been explained in first grade?), and then hustle over to our desks for duty. Each week there was a different Pledge of Allegiance monitor, and that person walked importantly to the front of the room and stand beneath the flag. The monitor’s hand was placed (more or less) over the monitor’s heart, a signal for all of us to look alive. A single clap rang out as 22 small hands clapped (more or less) over 22 hearts. The monitor started and we all joined in.

We looked at the flag and said the Pledge, and it was similar to saying prayers you’ve learned by heart. Any single day might not have an effect, but day after day, the words soaked into me. They taught me that I was an American; that America was a good place; and that the flag—our flag—was to be respected.

This wasn’t taking place in some deep red state; this was Berkeley, California, in 1968. All around us, in the city and the country, adults were losing their minds, but up there at Cragmont School, the children were holding it down.

Welcome to Things Worth Remembering, our weekly column in which writers share a literary treasure that all of us should commit to heart. This week, as we celebrate America’s 250th birthday, former presidential candidate and U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley looks back to Calvin Coolidge’s speech on the 150th. His words, she writes, give voice to the same enduring principles her Indian immigrant parents instilled in her—and that too many Americans today are in danger of forgetting.

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No surprise, my mom wanted to go out with a bang.

She passed away exactly one year ago—on July 4, 2025. She loved this country. So did my dad, who died a year before her. They almost lived to see America reach 250 years. No one would have celebrated harder.

My parents weren’t born here. They grew up in India, where they led lives of privilege: Mom lived in a large house, in a respected family, where everything was taken care of, while Dad came from a similar background and was well educated, a rarity back then. But they lacked something far more important: freedom. As a woman, Mom was able to earn a law degree, but she was prohibited from fulfilling her dream of becoming a judge. That was a level too high for women in India at the time.

So, in 1964, three years after their wedding, they moved to Canada, where my father accepted a doctoral scholarship at the University of British Columbia. Five years later, they relocated to the only country where they could truly realize their dreams.

My parents made their home in rural South Carolina, started a family, and worked hard to make a new life for themselves. Mom was a social studies teacher, and Dad was a college professor—but as the only Indian family in town, we faced adversity and discrimination. When my parents tried to find a home, no one would rent to them—and when they were finally able to buy a place, there were strings attached: They weren’t allowed to have alcohol; they couldn’t host black people; and they had to give the previous owner the right to buy the house back if they ever sold it.

Rod Dreher spent four years living in Budapest. In his piece for us last week, Rod reckoned with what he learned in Europe. On the eve of America’s 250th birthday, he picks up the story after coming home to Alabama, to sticker shock at the grocery store, and to a South he’d almost forgotten how much he missed. Ahead of Fourth of July weekend, we thought it was worth hearing from Rod on what it’s like to see your own country again with fresh eyes, and why, for all its chaos, dysfunction, and expensive groceries, there’s no place he’d rather be. —The Editors

As the genial repairman at my apartment complex in suburban Birmingham, Alabama, was fiddling with the wonky dial on my washing machine, I couldn’t help complaining.

“I just got back from Publix,” I whined. “Came out of there with three little bags. Not even any meat! Cost me $114. Can you believe that?”

He stood and smiled. “Welcome home.”

After four years living in Europe—in Hungary, the cheaper side of the continent—the cost of living in America has been the most shocking thing. Everybody talks about it, and I mean everybody. The Iran war? Mass migration? No, man, it’s all about the grinding cost of daily life.

As I was packing my bags in Budapest, I imagined that after landing in America, I would lease a European sedan, as befits my middle-aged writerly dignity. Ha! After two days of hearing my buddies gripe about spending over a hundred bucks every time they fill up their Tahoes or F-150s, I bought a Honda Civic hybrid. It gets 46 miles per gallon—a generous compensation for my aesthetic loss, I tell you what.

The second thing I did: motored over to Costco and got a membership. Since the World Cup games started, my X feed has been filled with European tourists marveling at everyday life in the consumer’s paradise we call home. Taste this barbecue—mein Gott! Can you believe this Walmart?! And so forth.

Welcome back to Great Americans, our series celebrating the people whose contributions to government, culture, and American life have made this country exceptional. Today’s edition is a special one: The picks come from you. We sourced these nominations from The Free Press Forum, our new space for debate, discussion, and discovery, open exclusively to paid subscribers. Become one today, and next time, the nomination could be yours. —The Editors

Abigail,

What’s so hard about marriage?

I’ve lived with my husband for three years now, but we’ve been married for only one. We’ve been together, and very enmeshed in each other’s lives, for about six years.

I know this sounds flippant and arrogant, but I am way happier with my husband than I ever expected to be with anyone. It’s crazy to me how much he loves me. Somehow I married this guy. How can I avoid ruining this? I am a child of divorce and I fear that somehow, without my knowing, the other shoe will drop.

I was always someone who did her homework ahead of schedule. So maybe that’s what drives my urge to understand why everyone says marriage is so hard, and to try to get ahead of it. I know if we are so lucky to have kids we will be sleep-deprived and unhappy, which makes sense, but I feel like the general cultural narrative about marriage being hard extends beyond those early childbearing years. Is it that the damage done in that phase is permanent, so you hate your husband forever?

What can I do to keep this? Should we get preventative couple’s therapy? Or is it time, now that I’m an adult, to realize that I can’t do my homework in advance? Can you future-proof your marriage?

—Grace, 29

Grace,

It’s hard to be wealthy—so much property to keep track of! Organizations and acquaintances with their hands out. Complex decisions about your estate. The nagging fear that abundance will ruin the kids.

It’s hard to live near family—always someone getting on your nerves. Asking how you’re doing, even when you wish they wouldn’t. Inviting you to their kids’ birthday parties and school plays and soccer games.

It’s hard to be beautiful—so much kinetic attention it invites. The work to maintain it, the expectation that you will. Everyone commenting on how you look, paying extra notice on the days your beauty falters. Managing the envy of friends and frenemies.

Being an American? That’s hard too. Laboring under the expectations of the world. No one looks to Portugal to stand up to China or to Belgium to guarantee open sea lanes. But Americans are forever called upon to remain strong, decent, self-correcting, and free.

In a desperate effort to defend a key stronghold from advancing British troops, the Continental Army dug in at Philadelphia’s Fort Mifflin in September 1777. What followed was among the most brutal sieges of the Revolutionary War. The patriots’ meager defenses couldn’t withstand the constant British barrage, and one patriot after another was “cut in two.” A survivor, Joseph Plumb Martin, later described the ordeal: “In the cold month of November,” he fought “without provisions, without clothing,” without even “a scrap of either shoes or stockings.” As the battle neared its end, Martin surveyed lines of dead comrades, observing later that “if ever destruction was complete, it was here.” He was just 16 years old.

Many defeats and relentless hardships followed over the long years of the revolution. Often, soldiers survived on whatever they could find: bark from trees, dog and horse flesh, strips of leather boiled down to bitter soup. Martin recalled regularly marching “24 or 48 hours . . . night and day without rest or sleep.” At times, he fell asleep on his feet, only to be jolted awake by the man next to him. Soldiers slept and fought without adequate clothing, blankets, or, like Martin, shoes. “You might have tracked the army . . . by the blood of their feet,” George Washington said about the long winter march to Valley Forge in Pennsylvania. Those who escaped death from starvation, exposure, or enemy fire often succumbed to disease. And for all this, the small wages the men were promised often went unpaid or arrived in currency so devalued as to be nearly worthless.

Soldiers were not alone in their sacrifice. Across the colonies, ordinary people contributed in countless ways. Women organized boycotts of British goods, joined resistance groups like the Daughters of Liberty, and tended to soldiers as nurses and cooks. Farmers left their fields to join local militias and fight alongside the Continental Army. Children kept households and managed businesses in their parents’ absence. Many, like Martin, volunteered to serve. Emily Geiger was 18 years old when she rode through enemy lines to deliver an important message to a patriot general. Richard Lord Jones was 10 when he became an army fifer; after his discharge three years later, he walked 150 miles home. And when the British caught the 21-year-old spy Nathan Hale, he met death with resolve: “I only regret that I have but one life to give for my country.”

This year marks the 250th anniversary of our nation’s independence. We are celebrating with fireworks, barbecues, and parades. But we might also pause to reflect on the courage and sacrifice of the founding generation and ask: What moved so many ordinary people to do so many extraordinary things?

It’s Thursday, July 2. This is The Front Page, your daily window into the world of The Free Press—and our take on the world at large. Today: Ruy Teixeira on why Kamala 2028 is deadly serious, and Kat Rosenfield on why “Supergirl” haters are not misogynists. Plus: Why the Declaration of Independence had no truer friend than Frederick Douglass. And more.

But first: Is the president taking us for fools?

What has been the most striking thing about Trump’s year and a half back in office? The force of his immigration crackdown? The repeated showdowns between the president and the Supreme Court? His hyperactivity on the world stage—from the Liberation Day tariffs to the Maduro raid and the strikes on Iran?

It’s a crowded field, but one answer arrived in financial disclosures published this week: how much money Donald Trump has made since he returned to the White House. It may not be the most consequential thing about Trump’s second term, but it may be the most extraordinary.

President Trump earned a staggering $2.2 billion in his first year back in office. More than $1.4 billion of that came from crypto ventures.

As we have reported before, and as we lay out in our editorial today, there is more than a whiff of corruption to these schemes.

There’s also a stench surrounding the Boeing 747 donated by the Qatari government for use as Air Force One. Trump flew on it for the first time yesterday. When he leaves office, ownership of the $400 million aircraft will transfer to the Trump Presidential Library.

Read our editorial to understand exactly what’s so wrong with these deals—and why Trump is at the center of what might just be the biggest grift in American history.

And if you see the amount Donald Trump has made in office and are asking yourself “How is this allowed?” Mene Ukueberuwa has the piece for you.

—The Editors

David A. Price says the Declaration of Independence, now a couple of days shy of 250 years old, had “no truer friend” than Frederick Douglass, the abolitionist orator who shook a nation to its moral core, pointing out the blatant hypocrisy in permitting chattel slavery while declaring “all men are created equal.” It’s only fitting that one of the final installments of our Great Americans series is Douglass, a man whose moral conviction still echoes throughout the pages of American history today. Read Price on the great man and his much misunderstood July 4 speech.

Who do you think deserves to be considered a Great American? Let us know your pick(s) in The Free Press Forum now!

• The United States refused to extend its United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, a senior administration official told reporters. U.S. trade with its neighbors totals $1.9 trillion worth of goods and services each year, meaning Canada and Mexico have supplanted China to become America’s top two trading partners. President Donald Trump signed the deal in 2018 but has since soured on it.

• The president embarked on the maiden flight of the new Air Force One—the Qatari-gifted $400 million retrofitted Boeing 747—as he traveled to North Dakota to visit the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library ahead of its official opening. The plane eschewed the traditional light blue hull for dark navy with red and gold accents, while its interior includes cream-colored leather seats.

• A U.S. Navy helicopter crashed into the Arabian Sea on Wednesday as part of an “emergency water landing,” U.S. Naval Central Command said. Three of the four crew members were rescued and are in stable condition aboard the USS George H.W. Bush aircraft carrier, while the search continues for the fourth. The military said there was “no indication” the helicopter was shot down.

• Two people climbed to the top of the Empire State Building Wednesday, apparently got engaged, and proceeded to fly a banner from the top of the skyscraper about the “power of love.” The New Jersey couple is now in custody, according to law enforcement.

• Victor Willis, the lead singer of the disco group Village People, has died. The Village People’s hit song, “Y.M.C.A.,” has been a staple for President Trump at rallies and official events. Willis left the band in 1980, but returned in 2017. He was 74.

• Bobby Bonilla, the former professional baseball outfielder, celebrated the start of July with his 16th $1.2 million check from his former team, the New York Mets. Bonilla hasn’t played for the club since 1999, but he’s set to receive the same payout from the franchise every July through 2035 as a result of a uniquely structured deferred contract.

“Trump’s Moneymaking Run: Unrivaled in Presidential History.”

So read the headline in Wednesday’s New York Times, after the release of President Donald Trump’s financial disclosure report showing that he had reaped at least $2.2 billion in gains since returning to the White House, largely due to the cryptocurrency businesses set up by his sons Eric and Donald Jr.

But it’s not just the moneymaking that’s unrivaled. It’s also the flagrant appearance of corruption that those billions represent.

You do not need to think Trump is the end of American democracy, or that everything he does is evil, to see this for what it is: the biggest grift in American history. For all the condemnation of the so-called “Biden Crime Family” by Republicans—and Burisma and Hunter Biden were not high moments—it pales in comparison to what is happening in this presidency.

It’s true that Trump is far from the first president to profit from the office in our country’s now 250-year history. But most of them waited until they left office, and stuck to cushy board seats and speaking gigs. Bill Clinton reportedly earned more than $75 million on the speaking circuit in his first decade out of office. George W. Bush’s net worth increased by some $50 million after leaving office.

But there is no modern parallel for the scale and shamelessness with which Trump has enriched himself while in power. Most Americans should understand what is happening: a transfer of wealth from them—and perhaps foreigners—to the president.

Americans already knew that President Donald Trump is getting richer than ever. After all, he often tells us himself. “We’re all profiting,” he told reporters on Wednesday, citing the rising stock market. “I’m profiting because I have a lot of money and a lot of cash.”

Yet Trump’s financial disclosure released the same morning shows something very different about the state of his estate. Rather than stocks or even real estate, nearly two-thirds of his income last year—a staggering $1.4 billion—came from a pair of cryptocurrency ventures that he created before his reelection and which surged around the time he took office.

Trump’s shyness about discussing his crypto windfall suggests that he knows the ethics don’t look good, as my colleagues discuss in our latest editorial. At the same time, we can infer something important from his painstaking approach to reporting the details, in the form of a 927-page disclosure. That is, he’s pretty sure it’s all legal.

It’s an amazing proposition, given how brazen the arrangement appears. It’s rare enough that Trump isn’t known to have divested from any significant non-diversified holdings for the sake of avoiding a conflict of interest, as both Presidents Bush did before they took office. Trump put his assets in a trust and turned over management to his sons. But he still knows what he owns, and there’s nothing stopping him from making policy choices meant to boost it.

According to officials at Harvard University, its antisemitism problem is under control. Reports of antisemitic incidents on campus are down after the numbers exploded in the wake of October 7, 2023. Today, 170 Jewish and non-Jewish Harvard faculty members will publish a letter stating that there is more to the story, and that while there’s less overt antisemitism at the university this past year, a more insidious form of Jew-hate has emerged. Jewish students are hiding their Star of David necklaces and scrubbing their CVs of references to Israel to self-protect. Two signatories to the letter explain what’s still not working—and what the school should do about it. —The Editors

When hate turns quiet on campus, it can mean one of two things: First, that the hate has been eliminated from the university, or second, that it has morphed into more insidious forms. What we, as Jewish and Israeli faculty, staff, and students at Harvard University have witnessed over the past year, appears to be the latter.

While incidents of overt antisemitism and anti-Israeli bias have diminished throughout this academic year at Harvard, Jewish students still report feeling uncomfortable and isolated. These students, with whom we have been in direct contact, said they feel compelled to hide their full identities on campus in order to avoid ostracization and bias. Unsurprisingly, they report these choices and circumstances while insisting on anonymity for fear of retribution.

This alarming trend persists despite the emergence of now thriving and welcoming Jewish and Israeli safe spaces such as Harvard Hillel, Chabad, and Harvard Faculty for Israel. Some students and faculty have told us that outside of these trusted Jewish spaces, they are afraid to express their full identities; reveal details of, or even mention, connectivity to and work in Israel; include experiences on their CVs that indicate that they are Jewish; wear their kippah; or uncover their Star of David. A number of these students say it is a matter of self-protection and the only way to get through their educational experience at Harvard.