As Washington spirals, we should ask ourselves: What would Lincoln do?

Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural address, delivered mere weeks before his assassination at Ford’s Theater and just as the Union was prevailing in the Civil War, echoes as perhaps the greatest single illustration of soaring American rhetoric. Even those with only the vaguest sense of how heavy that moment was will feel the potency of his final admonition: “With malice toward none with charity for all … let us strive … to bind up the nation’s wounds.” Coming on the heels of untold horror, his determination to steer the country away from the spirit of retribution is a testament to his courage and honor as the nation’s selfless leader.

What few tend to remember about that moment in history is that Lincoln wasn’t just talking the talk from the West Front of the half-built Capitol Building. He was also doing the work. Sworn in just ahead of Lincoln, a Republican, was his vice president, Andrew Johnson, a Democrat. Lincoln selected Johnson because the president believed that crafting a ticket that centered on both geographic and political diversity would catalyze a country trying to mend its fissures. Even though Lincoln knew it would upset his fellow Republicans, the president chose to withstand their irritation in service to the greater good.

For Honest Abe, the choice could not have been an easy one. Johnson was, for a host of reasons, an awkward running mate. While he had refused to abandon the Union when Tennessee seceded, he had nevertheless embraced the institution of slavery in the years preceding the war. Having served in the Senate, he was not a popular figure personally among other national leaders. And perhaps most worrisome, he was thought by many to be a drunk—his inaugural address, delivered right before Lincoln’s masterpiece, was a rambling mess that simply trailed off in the end.

But Lincoln had selected Johnson for a reason that, by the president’s calculations, outweighed any combined concerns: The Lincoln-Johnson ticket would represent a break from the vitriol and conflict of the past. Four years earlier, Lincoln had run with Hannibal Hamlin, a Maine Republican whose world view was much more representative of the sentiments expressed by those who had fought to keep the nation united. To Lincoln, re-nominating him would mark a missed opportunity for leadership.

Lincoln’s decision sent an indelible message not only to the South, but to his allies in the North as well: Amid the impulse to punish the South for seceding and embracing the noxious institution of slavery, it was more important in 1864 to rebuild the ties that bound the country together than to drive a partisan agenda. Lincoln’s pitch to the electorate during the campaign, a period in which he described what would become the GOP as the “National Union Party,” was that a divided society needed to bury its disagreements in the past. And he would lead the way.

2024 will not be anything like 1864, and the political dynamics which prevail today, ugly as they may be, have yet to reach the critical point that prompted a war between the states. But as anyone who has lived through recent history knows, our politics remains steeply on the wrong trajectory. Faith in government is in the gutter. Hope for the future is spiraling across the political spectrum. And the divide between the electorate and Washington—a chasm separating ordinary people who want the parties to collaborate and leaders who seem determined never to reach across the aisle—seems only to be getting worse.

It may well be time for Americans to consider whether Abraham Lincoln’s wisdom is once again applicable to present circumstances. Some will point out that, after the president’s assassination, Johnson’s tenure in the White House was utterly disastrous. If Lincoln would have found a way to integrate the confederate states back into the union in an orderly way, Johnson appeared too dismissive of their treason, putting him at odds with the Republicans in control of Congress. That political dispute eventually led the House to impeach Johnson, though he was ultimately acquitted.

Today, however, we should consider whether the circumstances have changed—whether what the country would glean from substance and symbolism of unity finally outweighs the political and ideological reasons nominees have chosen not to reach across the aisle. The central challenge of our time is how to slice through a constellation of incentives that drives the parties apart. The one salve we have may well be drawn from the legacy of Abraham Lincoln—a presidential ticket that combines an honorable figure from each major party.

Nancy Jacobson is CEO and founder of No Labels.