It was only when I watched the excellent PBS Frontline documentary on “Biden’s Decision” that I learned how profoundly the president had been influenced as a youngster by John Kennedy’s declaration at his inauguration that “the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans.”

Joe Biden was only 18 when Kennedy made that speech, but it seems likely that he set his sights at that moment on the presidency.  He did so with enough determination that, barely a decade later, against nearly impossible odds, he was elected to the U.S. Senate.  He was just 29 when he was elected to a position that the Constitution limits to those over 30, but he would reach that age before his swearing-in.

Sixteen years later, in 1988, he made his first failed bid for the presidency, followed in 20 years by another.  After serving for eight years as Barack Obama’s vice president, he planned to make a third bid for the presidency in 2016, but withdrew when it became clear that the party insiders, including Obama, were lining up behind Hillary Rodham Clinton.  Finally, in 2020, his path opened and Biden, now in his late 70’s, succeeded in ousting Donald Trump from the White House.

By then, his age had clearly begun catching up with him.  By his 81st birthday in November, 2023, most Democrats were saying that they did not want him to run again, citing his age as the principal reason.  When he insisted, the party had little choice but to acquiesce, but the resulting loss of enthusiasm became evident in steadily worsening poll numbers.

For those who had never wanted Biden to seek a second term, the disastrous debate performance on June 27 seemed to present one last chance to avert the looming defeat.  After 25 agonizing days Biden finally relented.  When he explained his decision on national TV a few days later, he echoed Kennedy’s words about passing the torch to a new generation.

By the time Biden uttered those words, the torch had already been enlivened by a remarkable uprush of energy and enthusiasm all across the Democratic Party, but especially among its youngest voters.  The strength of this wind swept my memory back to my own youthful political passions.

I turned 15 between Kennedy’s election and his inauguration, and while I was too young to vote for him, I was old enough to catch the hopeful enthusiasm of his “passing the torch” speech.  At the leading edge of the Baby Boom generation, my classmates and I would graduate from college in June of 1968, on the heels of the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert Kennedy.  Earlier that spring, we had been shocked by Lyndon Johnson’s announcement that “I shall not seek and I will not accept the nomination of my party for another term as your president.”

The baby boom generation would go on from the 60s to dominate American culture and politics for several decades — until now, when we are the ones hearing the ineluctable call to pass the torch.  Many of us hear it against the background sounds of our grandchildren’s lives, and we wonder what kind of politics they will be looking back on when they are our age.

What will have come, by then, of our 2024 concerns about the fate of democracy?  Such questions shouldn’t lessen the sense of urgency about this election, but they can remind us that passing the torch is not the same as walking off the field.  Boomers still have work to do – work in this election, certainly, but perhaps more importantly, work focused beyond whatever this election may bring our way.

Above all, I believe that this generation is responsible for keeping the long game in play and in focus.  Some of my age-mates are attending to that already, through initiatives like The Third Act, “a community of Americans over sixty determined to change the world for the better.  Third Act harnesses an unparalleled generational power to safeguard our climate and democracy.”

I’m convinced that one of the best moves we torch-passers can make is to ask our children’s generation how we can be most helpful in preparing their children for the challenges they will be facing as self-governing citizens.

When I put some version of that question to Katie Vaughan at the University of Montana’s Mansfield Center, she drew my attention to the Center’s work in public schools.  As the Missoulian reported in a recent article, “While the political world roils through the most abrupt U.S. presidential campaign in American history this summer, a team at the University of Montana Mansfield Center has its focus on something more intrinsic to the fabric of American society: Repairing our sense of civics. “We’re playing the long game here,” explains Katie Vaughan, the recently hired director of the Mansfield Center’s Project on American Democracy and Citizenship. “That makes this work much deeper than just one election cycle.” The Missoulian article went  on to describe how Vaughan’s project “has started reaching out to social science classrooms, bringing both teachers and students together for workshops fostering better ways to talk about politics and understand diverging perspectives.”

Torch-passers everywhere should be alert to this kind of long game activity, and looking for ways to support and advance it.  Such opportunities abound.  Just to mention one more Montana example: the Democracy Project is “a teen-led, non-partisan initiative supported by local libraries, community partners, and Humanities Montana. This program gives teens the resources to meet community needs while learning their role in an evolving democracy. Through direct civic engagement, teens work for six months on projects they feel are vital to their community, ending with a public showcase.”

In the midst of a highly charged election season, with so much at stake and so many demands on our attention and resources, it might seem superfluous to be asked to think about, let alone contribute to, civics programs in the schools.  But if we torch-passers think generationally, we might ask whether we can afford not to make such long-term investments.

Daniel Kemmis has seven grandchildren. He is the author of Citizens Uniting to Restore Our Democracy.