“Do not waver in the work, even when the arrows are sharp and the swords are strong”
Tonight Governor of Maryland Wes Moore gave the following keynote address upon receiving a 2025 Legacy Award at an annual dinner held in New York City by the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law. The governor was introduced by Ray McGuire.
First of all, I need to have a word with whoever asked me to follow Ray McGuire. I hate following Ray McGuire, but I will follow that man anywhere. Ray is – you know, I remember the first time that I had the honor of meeting Ray McGuire. And I went in being introduced to somebody who I was hoping would give me a job. I didn’t realize that I was about to be introduced to somebody who was going to change my life, and was going to change my life in such a beautiful way because I realized that in Ray I didn’t just find someone who made me a better businessman; he made me a better man. He made me a better person. He helped me to understand not just what questions to ask, but what answers to seek out. And I know there is so much about who I am that has not just been informed by Ray, but from that first moment that I had a chance to meet him I did not realize that I would have someone who would have fingerprints on everything that I have done since and everything that I will do from here on out. Ray, I love you, and I’m grateful for you, buddy. Thank you.
And it is so nice being back here with y’all at the Brennan Center. Michael, your leadership just continues to inspire us, man. And the work that you and this Center continues to do to fight for justice unapologetically, to fight for justice with a full chest and held – and a head held high. And I can tell you, it matters as much now as ever before because this organization truly is a shrine to American patriotism.
And it’s American patriotism in, actually, the real sense of that word – a patriotism that is real and that is a work in progress. It’s a patriotism that reflects and understands the fact that loving your country does not mean lying about its history, nor does understanding your country’s history make it feel irredeemable; that each and every one of us do have a place and we have a role to be able to perfect this nation.
And the Brennan Center is an organization that I was proud to stand with before when we were at Robin Hood. It’s an organization that I’m proud to stand with now as a governor. It’s an organization that has continued to make direct impacts on people’s lives because there are certain basic rights that are unalienable and there are certain basic rights that we will protect against anybody or anything that tries to push back against the thing that makes this country so great in the first place.
And so, to everybody here – to all of our board members; and Kimberley Harris and Christine Varney, our co-chairs – thank you. Thank you so much. And it’s wonderful seeing you.
To all the people here who are our attorneys, to the scholars, to the writers, to the community activists, to the people in media, to the people in the business world, to the elected officials, everybody who stands up and knows that justice is worth standing for, I want to say thank you because you continue to make sure that our Constitution is defended, our Constitution is protected, our Constitution is honored every single day. And not just when it is easy, but you are here to make sure it is protected when it’s hard as well. When we – and when we know those basic values need protecting.
So the truth is, is that I did not fully start thinking about the Constitution until I was late in my teenage years. I didn’t study it. I didn’t understand it. I didn’t really understand its importance to why it really was the fabric of everything that I was as a person. And honestly, the first time I honestly – (laughs) – started really studying the Constitution was when I did decide to join the Army, because I had to take an oath to it. And so I was like, if I got to take an oath to it, I should probably understand what I’m actually taking an oath to.
But I remember I was 17 years old when I took an oath to that document. In fact, I was – you know, I was so young that I couldn’t sign the paperwork myself; my mother had to sign the paperwork for me. And as – I’m looking as I see my dear friend Rodrick (sp) and Tom and Andy (sp). They’ll tell you that, you know, after my teenage years my mother would sign whatever paperwork the Army put in front of her. They’re like, is this all you need? But when I was 17 years old, I took an oath, and I raised my right hand, and I swore to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic. I was 17 years old. And the document that I swore to support and defend was 208 years old. And while I knew there was a significant age gap between mine and the age of that document that I was pledging allegiance to, there was one thing that both of us had in common, is that we were both incomplete – I as a person, and that document was as well, that our nation’s founding documents aren’t perfect.
And our Founding Fathers actually knew that, that the same law that claimed to secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our prosperity was also the same document that codified African Americans as three-fifths of a person; that the same law that established our system of democratic governance did not extend that franchise to women or people of color. But our founders knew they weren’t perfect, and their goal was not perfection but their goal was to aspire to create a more perfect union. That is our heirloom.
And I don’t use the word “heirloom” lightly, because I think about what an heirloom actually is. An heirloom is something that we didn’t create. We didn’t found it. It’s something that we inherited. It’s something that’s given to us from generations before with very simple instructions: Take care of it. Protect it. And make sure you are passing something off just as beautiful, if not more beautiful, than the way you found it. For those documents are our greatest heirloom.
So when we are now seemingly on a daily basis getting very unneeded reminders about just how fragile our democracy is; at a time when we see a new federal administration that is using the Constitution like it’s a suggestion box, picking and choosing which laws they choose to follow and which laws they’re choosing not to; at a time when the term “coequal branches of government” is being used like it’s a punchline, we have to remember that document. And we have to remember those documents that not only helped to build us, but those documents that helped to bound us in the first place, and know that our pledge and our vows and our oath is to them, not to people who want to challenge their importance or in some cases challenge their existence in the first place – that this does become our opportunity that we have to reaffirm our shared belief that the Constitution is not a suggestion; it is a foundation. That we are a nation of people and not kings – and that is not a suggestion; that is a foundation. That we– that we are a nation of free and fair elections – that is not a suggestion; that is a foundation. And that we have the right to organize, we have the right to protest, we have the right to speak up, we have the right to call out injustice no matter its source – that is not a suggestion; that is our foundation.
Now, I know it is easy to feel pretty helpless right now. I know sometimes it’s pretty easy to turn on the television, and when you watch someone who is spending their time shredding and ripping down something that for so many of us in this room we have devoted our life to protect, I know how challenging that feels and how in many ways we feel like these are really dark days. But the thing that I ask is this, is that we cannot let that fear stop us, just like those before us did not – did not let their fear stop them; that we’ve seen tough times before. We’ve seen difficult times before, but we have seen how people were willing to step up and say: Still I rise. That we know the challenges and the histories that we have seen as a people and a culture, and as a country, and there were people who were willing to step up and say: Still I rise. That the power in this moment is knowing that we are not in this moment alone, that we are being supported by ancestors who are looking at us and hoping that we understand the assignment. That Dr. King wrote freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.
And that is exactly what is being required in this moment, and nobody understands that more than the team here at the Brennan Center. Because when our nation’s fiber– when our nation’s fiber has been tested, it is this organization that has honored its enduring spirit of freedom. And that is actually at the heart of this organization’s founding. This organization has blazed a trail to ensure that we have automatic voter registration, and knowing that is a right and is not a privilege. That this organization stood guard against partisan gerrymandering so that leaders truly represent the constituents that they are supposed to be representing. That this organization helped to confront the myth that every sentence needs to be a life sentence, and sounded the alarm against mass incarceration in this country that is not only not good for the people who are being dealt, but also not good for the communities and the families that we’re hoping that they can serve in the long term as well. This is an extraordinary organization. And when our nation’s history is written, your fingerprints are going to be all over the page. And it will be said that the Brennan Center understood the assignment.
I am very proud to represent a state that continues and will always set a standard for free and fair and safe and secure elections. And I will continue to honor the oath that I took both as a soldier and the oath that I took when I was sworn in as the 63rd governor of the state of Maryland. But my call to the people in the room tonight is this: Do not forget our power. Do not forget where we came from. Do not forget the trials that those who came before us had to endure. Do not forget our strength.
Now, I had the – briefly, I had the honor of speaking at the graduation of Lincoln University yesterday. It’s an HBCU in Pennsylvania. And I told the story of a 1946 graduate, a man who was born in South Carolina, and when he was just a toddler it was the Ku Klux Klan that ran him and his family not out of South Carolina, but ran them out of this country. And they fled to Jamaica, where the vast majority of that family said they will never return to this country, and the vast majority of that family did not. But this one gentleman who I talked about, this 1946 graduate, always said in his humility: This country will be incomplete without him. So he applied to Lincoln University. He was accepted. He eventually graduated. He eventually, after he graduated, became a minister just like his father was a minister. And the same threats that were coming to his father, when they – when the Ku Klux Klan forced them out of the country, started coming to him. And he stuck. And he stayed, and he devoted his life to his God and to his family and to his community and to this country. That man’s name was James Joshua Thomas. And I was honored yesterday to give a speech at the alma mater of my grandfather.
And I think about James Joshua Thomas – or, as I called him, Papa Jim – and this is a man who transitioned on at 87 years old when I was actually in Afghanistan. And he had a deep Jamaican accent his entire life, and was maybe the most patriotic American I’ve ever met, someone who loved this country, who believed in this country, who fought for this country, and who defended his country. And not because he did not know its history. Some of his earliest memories was watching this country reject him. And he turned from American exile to an American patriot, someone who understood that this country was not perfect but the beautiful thing about this American experiment is that it strives towards perfection every day – that we know the history of this country is uneven, but we know this country’s worth fighting for.
At a time when we know that those basic fabrics that we all believe in are being tested, I simply ask this: Do not waver in the work. Even when the arrows are sharp, even when the swords are strong, do not stray from the values that we share even when those values are under direct attack from our federal government.
In the military, I learned that when you are attacked you do not just sit there and take it. You’d be foolish to. You mobilize. And this becomes our moment to mobilize. This becomes our moment – to stand for the things that we hold dear, because we will mobilize our institutions in this moment. We will mobilize our people in this moment. We will mobilize our democracy in this moment. And we will stand in defense of our greatest heirloom, something that we did not create. But we will pass something off to the next generation even more beautiful than the way we found it. That is our job. That is our responsibility, to move fearlessly and to understand that justice is on our side. And in this moment, we will pass something off even more beautiful to the next generation than the way we found it, and we will create a society that those who came before us hoped for and created a – and create a society that those who come after us, that they deserve; that this becomes our moment to do the work. And when we do, people will know that we understood the assignment.
I thank God for this organization. I thank God for this organization because you continue to stand on the side of justice, not when it’s easy but particularly when it’s hard. Because that is the true mettle of patriotism. So God bless you guys, thank you for this award, and thank you for your continued work on making our country better. Thank you so much, everybody.
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