We are living through the most dangerous challenge to free government in the U.S. anyone of us alive has encountered. Like a house with crumbling foundations, American democracy is suffering from decades of deferred maintenance. The challenge of repairing and updating our institutions would be difficult enough, but we obviously do not live in “normal times.” The pace of change is faster, threats bigger, risks global, and the time to forestall the worst is very short. David Orr, one of the nation’s most lucid and influential thought leaders, draws from his forthcoming book, Democracy Unchained: Politics as if All People Matter, to consider what we must do to return to the better angels of our collective nature and turn the ship around. What happens next is up to us.