A deeply alarmed Christie Whitman has tried a variety of ways to stem the rising tide of Trumpism.

The former New Jersey governor made headlines (and videos) calling Trump "unfit" for office and urged him to resign. Whitman, a lifelong Republican, endorsed Democrat Hillary Clinton for president. And Whitman compared the president — an ex-casino mogul she once clashed with during her tenure as governor in the 1990s — to some of the "worst dictators in history."

Her one-woman resistance hasn't worked.

Now, Whitman has ditched the frontal assault and has embraced a long-range, grass-roots approach. Whitman has been named advisory board co-chairwoman of the National Institute for Civil Discourse, an eight-year-old advocacy and training group that seeks to reverse the deepening polarization of the body politic.

NJ millionaires tax:Here are the arguments for and against the controversial tax hike

Money:Gas prices keep rising in New Jersey, will continue to climb

2020 election:For Indian Americans, coming election is opportunity to demonstrate growing political power

Whitman replaces former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who announced her retirement from public life last October. The group's other co-chairman is former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D.

The institute has a fairly simple overarching plan. It wants political foes to begin treating each other with respect. And with respect comes a tendency to listen, and maybe negotiate along a common ground — a tradition that eroded under the Tea Party fury a decade ago and has all but vanished in Trump era

"You've got to have the conversation and you've got to start listening,'' Whitman said in a recent interview.

The institute was created shortly after the shooting in Tucson, Arizona, that killed six people and wounded 13 others, including former U.S. Rep. Gabby Giffords. Ironically, days before the shooting, Giffords began discussions about creating a center to advance civil conversation, according to the NICD's website.

The group's mission of restoring civility at the grass-roots level of politics was spawned by an across-the-aisle concern that echo-chamber partisanship is destroying the art of compromise, and hence the very underpinnings of Democracy. Partisan voters took their cues from the loudest demagogues, who drown out the demands of the nation's vast middle of independents and moderates.

Attacks on lawmakers — the Giffords shooting, the shooting of House Republican leader Steve Scalise, the 2001 anthrax mailings to political figures, including Daschle — also stirred worries that a breakdown in civil discourse was giving way to extremism.

Trump's election, fueled largely by a mobilized right-wing base, has brought all of those worries to a boil.

Unlike other newly elected presidents, Trump refused to broaden his agenda and his appeal beyond his hard-line, white nationalist supporters, who view compromise as weakness, even betrayal.

And for Whitman, Trump's personalized attacks plunged sharp-edged political dialogue to a crude new low. She singled out Trump's mocking of a New York Times reporter with disabilities during the 2016 campaign.

"This isn’t who we are,'' Whitman lamented.

Keith Allred, the institute's executive director, said Trump's style helped crystallize the long-brewing concerns about polarization and decline in civility.

"There are deeper, systemic things that are going on that will be with us long after Trump,'' he said in an interview. "But he has put such a kind of extreme and vivid face on the problem that I think he has gotten people to wake up to it and focus on it."

The institute doesn't simply broadcast a clarion call for civility through its network of prominent political and media figures — the NICD's board ranges from former President Bill Clinton and former Secretaries of State Colin Powell and Madeleine Albright to NPR host Scott Simon and Yahoo News anchor Katie Couric.

The organization conducts a series of workshops in schools, community groups and, perhaps most importantly, legislatures, which have traditionally served as the de facto training ground for future members of Congress. Half of New Jersey's House delegation, for example, are former state legislators.

The group's “Building Trust through Civil Discourse” workshop has been held in 16 states, is a half-day attempt to prod officials to reconsider each other on common ground. Participants are prodded to craft "rules of engagement" for the discussion, which effectively serves as a manifesto of civility — no talking past each other, a ban on disparaging each other, and a commitment to "listen first."

They are asked to explain, "not in a canned campaign speech,'' about what brought them into politics, Allred said. They then explain why they love their home state. From there they break out in groups and make recommendations.

In Maine, lawmakers agreed to alternate legislative seating between Democrats and Republicans rather than have the parties segregated, as is commonly done. The effort has led to more bipartisan legislation, increased dialogue across the aisle, significant procedural changes, and legislators holding civil conversations with their constituents, the NICD contends.

"They start seeing fellow legislators as human beings,'' he said. More than 850 lawmakers have participated in the workshops.

With the power of party bosses and county chairmen in New Jersey's politics, high-minded workshops might seem like a waste of time. This is also a state that produced Chris Christie, a smash-mouth politician known for his name-calling skills, and who happens to be Trump's chief defender in New Jersey.

Just last week, the former governor broke his vow of silence and unleashed a Trumpian attack on his successor, Democrat Phil Murphy, at a hunters' event last Sunday, mocking his manner of speech and asserting that Murphy is "not from here,'' a reference to Murphy's Massachusetts upbringing.

Yet New Jersey has a long tradition of transactional politics, which has led lawmakers to abandon their partisan loyalties in pursuit of a good deal. And that "deal" often includes a hefty price tag.

For Whitman and the NICD, the campaign is less about the outbursts of the moment and more about the conduct of the future. Allred noted confidently that the nation has gone through deep, seemingly unbridgeable divides in the nation's history, only to rebound when the public realizes that things have reached a crisis stage.

Ironically, Trump's conduct has helped the group make its case.

"You've got to start somewhere,'' Whitman said.