Well, one day in the basement of the Hart Senate office building, my life changed. After I filled out

an address in Social Security number form for my first real job. And just when I thought I was

finished with everything I needed to do in that otherwise forgettable moment in a forgettable

looking office space, I was suddenly, and very much, to my surprise,

told to raise my right hand. I was then asked to repeat words that I had never heard before

and have never forgotten. I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of

the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, that I will bear true faith and

allegiance to the same, that I take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or

purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully discharge

the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me by God. Defend the Constitution

of the United States. The weight of those words changed me as I spoke them. I had no idea that everyone working in the Senate

from the receptionist to the senators themselves take the same oath of office, word for word.

And in that instant, the job that I thought was going to be at most a temporary detour in my work life that I was probably

ill-suited for was by far suddenly the most important job that I would ever have. I knew that

day in that moment with my hand raised that the importance of my work was going to peak right there in the

United States Senate in my 30s because I knew that for the rest of my life I could not possibly

have a job as important as defending the Constitution of the United States. I knew I would never have another job that required me to take an oath of office.

I worked in the Senate for several years and was promoted to other jobs within the Senate.

But that first oath held throughout my career on the staff of the United States Senate.

For the more committed Senate staffers, that oath holds for 30 years and sometimes longer, no matter how many

times they changed jobs within the Senate. And years later, in a TV drama that I created for NBC

called Mr. Sterling, I gave those words to Josh Brolin for his oath of office scene as a new

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