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We live in a nation where the freedom to express ideas is foundational to our society, to our democracy and to our American soul.

We do not know the motive of Kirk’s assassin, but it is reasonable to believe that the killer wanted to silence his voice, to shut out his ideas and to end his long debate, not with different ideas but with violence.

It was shocking and disgusting, if hardly surprising, to see how quickly some were to place blame for Kirk’s killing at his own feet.

Political analyst Matthew Dowd took to MSNBC to say that Kirk’s hateful words had led to hateful actions. That logic twists in on itself as a justification for political violence against anyone whose expressions one might deem harmful or hateful to one’s own cause.

The internet was filled, as it always is, with such tripe.

Charlie Kirk said many things we took great issue with. He was a promoter of conspiracies who used his powerful platform in ways that too often advanced division.

But the line between speech and violence is clear. The assassin who took Kirk’s life Wednesday has placed our nation in far greater danger than Kirk ever did.

Kirk’s worst ideas always had an antidote: the speech and ideas of those who oppose them.

Many of his ideas, meanwhile, resonated with audiences who support traditional understandings of marriage and family. Did the killer ever think to ask why so many people were listening?

Kirk was a provocateur, no doubt. Some of his ideas were terrible. Some were worth considering. Many were half-baked at best and designed for clicks, comments and likes — the insistent demand of the internet age.

Now he’s dead, the victim of an evil violence that threatens to spill over in yet more violence. A palpable fear got a strong grip with news of his death. Will there be violence in return? Who will get hurt next?

These are the kinds of terrible questions assassins always raise. They solve nothing. They only sow pain and chaos that threaten to metastasize.

Justice in the law is the only answer now. The nation needs an arrest, an exposure of the motive and a unified voice that this is never, ever acceptable.

In the meantime, the most appropriate feeling is sadness for a dead man’s widow and children and for a nation gripped in terrible division.