By THE REV. ANDREA AYVAZIAN

We have all heard the anxious warnings: Vote as if your life depended on it! Vote in what is the most important election of your lifetime! Vote because our democracy itself is on the ballot!

OK. Got it. Now let me tell you about my book group. This will make sense in a moment.

My book group, led by local journalist Bill Scher, meets monthly in the Calvin Coolidge Presidential Library and Museum at Forbes Library. We are reading one book every month on each successive president of the United States, from Washington to Biden. Forty-six presidents, 46 books, over a four-year period.

We began in January and we have read nine books so far — from Washington to Tyler. These are hefty volumes, so we have read thousands of pages. And, after reading nine books about the earliest presidents, this is what I have learned:

The early presidents (all white, land-owning men) were, on the whole, brave, visionary, inspiring and ambitious. Most of them were a mess: enslavers, duplicitous, involved sexually with those they enslaved (at least some of them), vindictive, anti-Black, anti-Native American, and sexist.

The early presidents were remarkable — and they were a mess.

But here’s the thing: Reading these thousands of pages has taught me a great deal about these famous, flawed men. In the process, I have learned so much about our democracy. And what I understand now at age 73 that I did not understand at age 13 or 33 or 53 is that our democracy is very fragile.

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Growing up, I used to think that our democracy was a given. Permanent. Unshakable. A fixture in this country that we did not have to worry about. I was so wrong.

In its early years, our democracy was delicate, vulnerable and unstable. Our democracy almost unraveled back then, and can unravel today.

Let me recount some historical examples that tell the story of when our nation was young and our democracy almost broke down and our country nearly fell apart:

In 1788, when the Constitution was ratified, the Founders did not envision political parties. But the public was deeply divided between Thomas Jefferson’s Republican Party and Alexander Hamilton’s Federalists. The Republicans thought the Federalists wanted to establish a monarchy; the Federalists thought the Republicans wanted to undermine the power of the federal government and would unleash mob rule. Each thought the other would subvert the Constitution and destroy the country.

Then, in May 1798, the prospect of war with France further divided the parties, as the Republicans cheered the French Revolution and the Federalists were horrified by its excesses. President John Adams sought to unify the country by proclaiming a national day of “Fasting and Prayer,” but the Republicans scoffed.

Near Adams’ house, a large Republican mob formed, and soon they were confronted by a large Federalist mob. Violence broke out, and the state militia was called in to break up the fighting. The Federalists were terrified at the prospect of future violence. So they pushed through legislation known as the Sedition Act of 1798, which made it a crime to defame the government. Despite this dangerous weakening of the First Amendment, Jefferson and the Republicans were able to win the next presidential election and repeal the Sedition law.

Fourteen years later, the Republican-led government of James Madison declared war on England. Many Federalists strongly opposed the war, and again the parties turned on each other. In June 1812, a Republican mob in Baltimore destroyed the offices of a Federalist newspaper; when the paper reconstituted, so did the mob violence, resulting in deaths on both sides.

In December 1814, with the war dragging on, New England Federalists gathered at their Hartford convention and formally demanded an end to the war— or else, they said, they would reconvene in Boston in June 1815, a threat widely interpreted to imply secession from the United States. Thankfully, the war ended in January, and the possibility of secession subsided.

Lastly, in 1832, Andrew Jackson faced a nearly fatal threat to our democracy when South Carolinians declared they were not obligated to adhere to any federal laws with which they disagreed. The conflict was supposedly about federal tariffs, but it was really about the future of slavery.

Although Jackson was a slaveholder, he saw state nullification of federal laws as a direct threat to the Union. Jackson announced that he would use military force to prevent South Carolina from destroying the Constitution, and he successfully prompted Congress to pass a law giving him such power. Civil war was averted, for a time, when a tariff compromise was passed.

I could offer many other examples of pivotal moments when our democracy almost unraveled, but I will stop here and simply say: Today, in 2024, our democracy is threatened again, as it has been in the past. Our democracy is being attacked and is vulnerable. We could lose our democracy and creep, slip, or even plunge into an undemocratic, authoritarian, tyrannical, and repressive society. You can see and hear the threats daily on the evening news.

So do not take our democracy for granted. Do not assume that our democracy is safe or stable. Make sure that you and everyone you know votes in November. Badger members of your family, congregants in your house of worship, friends in the PTO, members of your book group, and all your neighbors until you are sure they will vote. And support nonpartisan election officials who are doing all they can to ensure a safe and impeccable vote count.

Understand that our democratic system is profoundly fragile, historically and today. Living in a democracy means that we must organize, push, demand, teach, work, write, knock on doors, and vote.

Recognize that our democracy may be on life support. Our democracy needs an energy transfusion, and we are the donors. So do whatever you can to get out the vote on Nov. 5.

The future of our democracy hangs in the balance.

The Rev. Andrea Ayvazian, Ministerial Team, Alden Baptist Church, Springfield, is also founder and director of the Sojourner Truth School for Social Change Leadership.