Lost amid the hullabaloo surrounding Donald J. Trump’s second Inauguration as President of the United States—the last-minute, cold-driven venue changes, the galas and balls, the $170 million raised from donors both big-name and anonymous—is the point of the whole extravaganza. In the summer of 1787, the delegates to the federal convention in Philadelphia included in the document they were drafting a requirement that before taking office, the President should recite the following oath: “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
Not everyone thought it was a good idea. Several delegates believed that oaths were pointless, almost superstitious. It’s the only verbatim pledge in the U.S. Constitution, and in retrospect it speaks to the document’s fragility, a sense that the men struggling in secret in Philadelphia were worried their hard-won agreement was so tenuous that it required a promise from future leaders to respect their work. Yet every president from George Washington on has recited the 35 words as a commitment to the rule of law in the face of unpredictable forces of change.
Trump, of course, is himself an unpredictable force for change. Whatever one thinks of him, he has altered America in ways unimaginable a decade ago. Back then, the so-called Washington consensus among Republicans and Democrats held that free trade was a near-absolute good. Presidents respected prosecutorial independence as a way of protecting citizens from an elected leader’s trying to use the power of law enforcement for personal interests. For 75 years, Commanders in Chief upheld the U.S. pledge of mutual defense with its NATO allies. Trump has cast these norms aside, and the consequences are rippling around the world. He is arguably the most influential change agent to occupy the White House since Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
Yet the 47th President is as much a product of global change as a driver of it. The challenges his agenda attempts to address accumulated over decades, and are now greater than can be mastered by any one leader, or even one country. Transnational forces, from migration to organized crime to pandemics, have resisted both collaborative and unilateral responses since before 9/11. Today’s world is in many ways unrecognizable from what it was when America won the Cold War. In China, the U.S. faces a potential economic and military competitor unlike any before.
Trump has pledged to solve these challenges through a suite of aggressive moves. He promises everything from mass deportations to suppression of the free media through prosecution to the annexation of Greenland, the Panama Canal, and Canada—though he may be joking about that last bit. Supporters say his norm breaking will be worth it if it succeeds where others have failed, and they credit him for promising to tackle big, difficult problems: cutting government waste and reversing massive deficits, ending wars in the Middle East and Ukraine, fixing the long-broken immigration system. Trump will take office in as strong a political position as ever before, buoyed by a decisive election victory and near record-high public support, a Republican Congress unified behind him, and broader backing in the business community, most notably among tech elites, who have committed this time to working with him. To many, Trump’s ascension carries the possibility of positive change for institutions that have grown stagnant or worse.
His opponents, meanwhile, are in the process of figuring out which parts of his agenda to accept. Over time, Democrats have adopted some of the Trump prescriptions they once denounced. President Biden kept many of Trump’s China tariffs. Vice President Kamala Harris embraced his “no tax on tips” pledge during her campaign. Forty-eight House Democrats voted for the Laken Riley Act, which requires federal detention for anyone in the country illegally who is arrested for shoplifting or theft; an even greater proportion of their Senate colleagues support the bill. At the same time, Democrats are preparing to battle over many of Trump’s policies, as they have for the past 10 years.
The key moments of Trump’s second term will come when the forces of political resistance, his own advisers, the legal system, or his fellow world leaders oppose the President’s moves. Trump has threatened to deploy the military against American protesters. Will he abide by judicial rulings if an aide tells him the courts can’t force him to? It is unclear what use Trump intends to make of the partial immunity from criminal prosecution the Supreme Court granted Presidents last year.
Trump told TIME last fall, “I’ll only do what the law allows, but I will go up to the maximum level of what the law allows.” His most anxious critics point out that he is not exactly a man of his word. He changes positions and discards allies at the drop of a hat—he’s already named and replaced his White House counsel before even taking office. The 47th President is the first to enter office as a felon, convicted less than a year ago by a jury of his peers of 34 counts of falsifying business records. Reciting a simple oath doesn’t seem like much assurance that he will abide by the Constitution.
But the hard-won agreement for governing the U.S. has shown itself a survivor. It has endured the Civil War, the rise of fascism, pandemics, and extralegal affronts. It emerged from the disruptions and disgraces of Trump’s first presidency, too, including the events culminating in the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021. As he takes office for the second time, the pledge at the center of his Inauguration spectacle now seems less an expression of insecurity by the framers than one of wisdom. And those anxious about what is coming can be glad that on Aug. 27, 1787, the convention delegates decided to broaden their original version of the President’s oath from a simple promise to “faithfully execute the duties” of the office to a further commitment to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” It is on Trump, and America, to ensure that oath is kept.
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