10/18/2026
Yesterday, Cynthia and I visited the Michener Art Museum in Doylestown and saw a wonderful exhibit, The Crossing: Picturing the American Revolution. It featured a fascinating collection of artwork inspired by George Washington's famous Christmas night crossing of the Delaware River in 1776. The pieces were beautiful, thought-provoking, and offered different perspectives on an event that helped change the course of American history.
The exhibit got me thinking about the many winter mornings I've spent photographing different places along the Delaware River. Sometimes after a snowfall, sometimes with temperatures in the single digits, and sometimes when much of the river is covered in ice. Standing there in the bitter cold, with my hands growing numb, I've often tried to imagine what Washington and his soldiers experienced that extraordinary night nearly 250 years ago: the darkness, the freezing temperatures, the ice-choked river, and the enormous uncertainty of what lay ahead.
And I find myself wondering what Washington and the other Founding Fathers would think if they could see our country today. I suspect they would have grave concerns about a leader who undermines the rule of law, delegitimizes our elections, uses the Justice Department to target political opponents, attacks judicial independence, weakens congressional oversight and independent government watchdogs, demands personal loyalty over loyalty to the Constitution, scapegoats minorities and vulnerable populations, uses the presidency to enrich himself and his family, raising serious concerns about corruption and conflicts of interest, attacks a free press, and undermines relationships with democratic allies while making concessions to authoritarian adversaries.
These aren't simply "normal" disagreements over political policies. They strike at the very principles the founders fought to establish: representative government, individual liberty, separation of powers, checks and balances, and the fundamental belief that no one, including the president, is above the law.
