Government can be good.

In our democracy, the kind of government that is good is the kind that Abraham Lincoln described as he consecrated the battlefield at Gettysburg — where the bloodiest battle of our Civil War had been fought, a turning point for the Union — “government of the people, by the people, for the people.”

I thought of this as I was driving with a friend recently to a car dealership in New Jersey.

My friend had sent me an email, saying: “New York state’s goal is for 850,000 EVs on the road by 2025. It currently has 271,000!” He copied a graph from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, tallying the electric vehicles New Yorkers had purchased since 2010.

I felt discouraged that, with the mindset of the Trump administration leading our nation, the state goal would never be met.

My friend, however, had a different reaction. He decided to do something himself to make a better world.

The car dealership in New Jersey offered $4,000 — compliments of the federal government — off the price of an electric car. With this incentive, my friend had calculated his monthly car payments would be slightly less than what he paid for gas to commute to and from work every day.

This sort of spirit — pulling together for the common good, each person doing his part — reminded me of the late Cindy Pollard talking about her girlhood as she grew up in the midst of World War II.

She remembered the Victory Gardens and the limits on everything from sugar to gasoline, how housewives saved fat to be recycled for bombs. She described a community spirit, which she recreated at her Home Front Café in Altamont, where old soldiers told their stories to schoolchildren.

A democratic government that works to serve the people — not just the interests of a wealthy few — can help people reach essential goals. It needn’t take winning a war to galvanize us as a nation.

The threat we face from the use of fossil fuels should be obvious to all of us by now. That $4,000 government incentive allowed my friend to buy his electric vehicle. It also helped the car dealership where the staff, who spoke among themselves in Armenian, proudly displayed framed news articles commending their success.

Further, those funds support car manufacturers in the United States, providing jobs. And, most importantly, if enough people use the incentive to buy EVs, we could save not just our own citizens but the other humans and creatures with which we share the planet from the destruction caused by climate change.

Similarly, the Guilderland school district’s proposal this month to obtain five electric school buses at no cost to local taxpayers is a wise one while the government subsidies hold.

Since my drive to New Jersey, I’ve thought about the many government programs that have changed my life for the better. It started before I was even born with the G.I. Bill.

Actually named the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act, it was passed in 1944 by both parties in Congress in an effort led by the American Legion to reward World War II veterans. By 1956, close to 8 million veterans had used the G.I. Bill’s education benefits.

My father was one of them. After he came home from the Philippines, the G.I. Bill allowed him to go to Dartmouth College, to marry his childhood sweetheart, and to raise his family. He was the first in his family to graduate from college — each of his children followed his lead.

My father had left high school to enlist and fight in the war — not because he expected any benefits but because he wanted to serve his country.

Suzanne Mettler, a Cornell University professor, has written in “Soldiers to Citizens: The G.I. Bill and the Making of the Greatest Generation” about how the G.I. Bill built the middle class in the United States and enhanced democracy. Some 2.2 million veterans attended college or graduate school on the G.I. bill, she writes, and 5.6 million prepared for vocations in fields such as auto mechanics, electrical wiring, and construction.

Four out of five men born in the United States during the 1920s served in the military, and about half of them used the G.I. Bill for education and training, Mettler writes. Prior to 1940, colleges were mostly for the privileged, but the G.I. Bill opened doors to many who were Catholic and Jewish, including rural people, first-generation immigrant offspring, and veterans from working- and middle-class backgrounds.

University education itself changed because of the G.I. Bill, evolving from a curriculum focused solely on the liberal arts to one encompassing a range of career paths, including science, business, and engineering. 

An economic boom followed as ​​returning veterans earned college degrees or trained for vocations, and government-subsidized mortgages — unfairly discriminating against Black veterans — allowed veterans to purchase homes, farms, and businesses.

Significantly, beneficiaries also become more engaged citizens. Compared to veterans who did not use education and training benefits, recipients reported involvements in 50 percent more civic associations and became significantly more politically active, Mettler found. Some joined the Civil Rights movement to expand citizenship for future generations.

“The G.I. Bill helped make U.S. democracy more vibrant in the middle of the twentieth century,” she writes.

Mettler concludes, “To revitalize U.S. democracy for the twenty-first century, we need to create that same sense of reciprocal obligation between citizens and government. All citizens should be called to do their civic duty — and in return they should enjoy visible, dignified benefits that expand opportunity and enable active citizenship.”

With the current federal administration, we are not expecting any nationwide help to expand opportunity. Rather, public servants are being painted as superfluous or worse, and government agencies are being gutted, although the federal workforce is smaller than a half-century ago while the population of the nation has burgeoned.

But we note with appreciation both state and local government efforts that are expanding opportunity and working to ensure a healthier future. 

Earlier this month, we were pleased to report on a county initiative to bring down the cost residents pay for prescription drugs. The County Executives of America Rx Card, which can be used at any retail drugstore, is now available, for free, to any Albany County resident. You can print it out by going online to cea.myrxvalet.com.

Also locally, we’ve been pleased to report in the last month on the state’s recent adoption of regulations that will increase the protection of wetlands, on New Scotland’s plan to protect its open spaces and natural resources, and on Guilderland’s ongoing commitment to preserve parkland and inspire residents to plant native trees.

We also reported on the state’s goal of planting 25 million trees by 2033 as a Tree Tracker and webpage were launched so New Yorkers can record the trees they have planted.

Hosted by the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation, the webpage and Tree Tracker allow state agencies, organizations, private entities, and individuals to report the location and number of trees planted into the tracking tool, measuring progress in the statewide effort.

We urge our readers to adopt the spirit embodied in the Victory Gardens during World War II or in my friend’s decision to buy an EV. In the midst of the Great Depression, under Franklin D. Roosevelt’s leadership as governor, New York state led the way in reforestation.

We can do it again as an emblem of individuals working for the common good. We’ve written several times on this page in this era of climate change about why trees are essential. Trees absorb the excess carbon dioxide we have spewed into our atmosphere by the use of fossil fuels. Trees store the carbon while releasing oxygen back into the air. 

Trees absorb odors and other polluting gases, too, like ammonia, nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, and ozone. They filter particulates from the air, trapping them on their bark and leaves.

About one-third of the United States is forested. Much of that is managed timberland, planted and replanted every decade or two to make products like wood pulp that produced this paper.

But as more land is developed, the planting of trees is often neglected. Here and there across America, communities are realizing the importance of trees. A nationwide effort, led by our federal government, would be most effective. In these splintered times, we have on this page supported efforts for municipal forests but now we stress the importance of individual action as guided by our state’s goal.

Los Angeles, which is emblematic of a car-driven, sprawling city, has an active not-for-profit group started by a teenager nearly 50 years ago, TreePeople, that works with volunteer leaders using a citizen-forester model, which has involved three million people in planting and caring for more than three million trees.

“We’ve over-paved paradise,” the L.A. group writes in its literature. “On hot days, scorching surfaces bake in the heat, endangering people’s health.”

TreePeople lists 22 benefits of trees, among them:

— Cooling the city, since average temperatures in Los Angeles have risen 6 degrees in the last half-century as tree coverage declined and asphalt increased. Trees shade streets and homes and release water vapor into the air through their leaves;

— Conserving energy, since trees planted wisely can cut a home’s air-conditioning needs by half. During cold Northeastern winters, trees planted as a windbreak can reduce heating costs. And deciduous trees conveniently drop their leaves in the fall, allowing sun in the winter to warm the houses that trees shade in the summer;

— Saving water since shade trees slow water evaporation from thirsty lawns;

— Stopping water pollution as trees reduce runoff by breaking rainfall, allowing water to flow down and run into the earth below. This prevents stormwater from carrying pollutants to water sources. When mulched, trees act like sponges that filter water naturally and use it to recharge groundwater supplies;

— Preventing erosion as trees slow runoff and hold soil in place on hillsides;

— Shielding children from ultraviolet rays as trees reduce exposure to harmful ultraviolet rays by about half. Skin cancer is the most common form of cancer in the United States and planting trees on playgrounds or school campuses reduces the risk;

— Providing food since an apple tree, for example, planted in a suburban yard can yield 15 bushels of fruit and trees can also provide food for birds and other wildlife;

— Healing, as studies have shown patients with views of trees heal faster and children with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, for example, show fewer symptoms with access to nature;

— Reducing violence since barren neighborhoods have a greater incidence of violence; and

— Creating economic opportunities since fruit harvested from community orchards can be sold. Small-business opportunities in green-waste management arise when municipalities value mulching and its water-saving qualities.

Trees can serve as landmarks and engender community pride. As the TreePeople have found, planting trees as a shared effort can bring together people of different ages, genders, and cultures for the common good.

“We need all New Yorkers to lend a hand – or shovel! – to reach our goal of planting 25 million trees by 2033,” says the state’s Tree Tracker website, urging residents to record the trees they have planted.

Yes, it is a government-led effort but, as we said at the start, government can be good.

It is easy to feel helpless in times when problems like climate change are so enormous. But planting a tree is something any of us can do. Think of it as a start to digging in for the common good.

Perhaps we can revitalize democracy, as Mettler called for, so that citizens do their civic duty and in return enjoy benefits that expand opportunity.

In Gettysburg where fifty-thousand soldiers had died, Abraham Lincoln called for “increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion” so that “government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Do not let it perish on our watch.

— Melissa Hale-Spencer, editor