The President’s Speech & My Random Observations

Vice President Biden, Mr. Chief Justice, Members of the United States Congress, distinguished guests, and fellow citizens:

Each time we gather to inaugurate a president, we bear witness to the enduring strength of our Constitution. We affirm the promise of our democracy. We recall that what binds this nation together is not the colors of our skin or the tenets of our faith or the origins of our names. What makes us exceptional - what makes us American - is our allegiance to an idea, articulated in a declaration made more than two centuries ago:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Today we continue a never-ending journey, to bridge the meaning of those words with the realities of our time. For history tells us that while these truths may be self-evident, they have never been self-executing; that while freedom is a gift from God, it must be secured by His people here on Earth. The patriots of 1776 did not fight to replace the tyranny of a king with the privileges of a few or the rule of a mob. They gave to us a Republic, a government of, and by, and for the people, entrusting each generation to keep safe our founding creed.

For more than two hundred years, we have.

Imagine killing with or being killed by a Civil War Sword

Through blood drawn by lash and blood drawn by sword, we learned that no union founded on the principles of liberty and equality could survive half-slave and half-free. We made ourselves anew, and vowed to move forward together.

Together, we determined that a modern economy requires railroads and highways to speed travel and commerce; schools and colleges to train our workers.

Together, we discovered that a free market only thrives when there are rules to ensure competition and fair play.

Together, we resolved that a great nation must care for the vulnerable, and protect its people from life’s worst hazards and misfortune.

Through it all, we have never relinquished our skepticism of central authority, nor have we succumbed to the fiction that all society’s ills can be cured through government alone. Our celebration of initiative and enterprise; our insistence on hard work and personal responsibility, are constants in our character.

But we have always understood that when times change, so must we; that fidelity to our founding principles requires new responses to new challenges; that preserving our individual freedoms ultimately requires collective action. For the American people can no more meet the demands of today’s world by acting alone than American soldiers could have met the forces of fascism or communism with muskets and militias. No single person can train all the math and science teachers we’ll need to equip our children for the future, or build the roads and networks and research labs that will bring new jobs and businesses to our shores. Now, more than ever, we must do these things together, as one nation, and one people.

This generation of Americans has been tested by crises that steeled our resolve and proved our resilience. A decade of war is now ending. An economic recovery has begun. America’s possibilities are limitless, for we possess all the qualities that this world without boundaries demands: youth and drive; diversity and openness; an endless capacity for risk and a gift for reinvention. My fellow Americans, we are made for this moment, and we will seize it - so long as we seize it together.

For we, the people, understand that our country cannot succeed when a shrinking few do very well and a growing many barely make it. We believe that America’s prosperity must rest upon the broad shoulders of a rising middle class. We know that America thrives when every person can find independence and pride in their work; when the wages of honest labor liberate families from the brink of hardship. We are true to our creed when a little girl born into the bleakest poverty knows that she has the same chance to succeed as anybody else, because she is an American, she is free, and she is equal, not just in the eyes of God but also in our own.

We understand that outworn programs are inadequate to the needs of our time. We must harness new ideas and technology to remake our government, revamp our tax code, reform our schools, and empower our citizens with the skills they need to work harder, learn more, and reach higher. But while the means will change, our purpose endures: a nation that rewards the effort and determination of every single American. That is what this moment requires. That is what will give real meaning to our creed.

We, the people, still believe that every citizen deserves a basic measure of security and dignity. We must make the hard choices to reduce the cost of health care and the size of our deficit. But we reject the belief that America must choose between caring for the generation that built this country and investing in the generation that will build its future. For we remember the lessons of our past, when twilight years were spent in poverty, and parents of a child with a disability had nowhere to turn. We do not believe that in this country, freedom is reserved for the lucky, or happiness for the few. We recognize that no matter how responsibly we live our lives, any one of us, at any time, may face a job loss, or a sudden illness, or a home swept away in a terrible storm. The commitments we make to each other - through Medicare, and Medicaid, and Social Security - these things do not sap our initiative; they strengthen us. They do not make us a nation of takers; they free us to take the risks that make this country great.

We, the people, still believe that our obligations as Americans are not just to ourselves, but to all posterity. We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations. Some may still deny the overwhelming judgment of science, but none can avoid the devastating impact of raging fires, and crippling drought, and more powerful storms.

The path towards sustainable energy sources will be long and sometimes difficult. But America cannot resist this transition; we must lead it. We cannot cede to other nations the technology that will power new jobs and new industries - we must claim its promise. That is how we will maintain our economic vitality and our national treasure - our forests and waterways; our croplands and snowcapped peaks. That is how we will preserve our planet, commanded to our care by God. That’s what will lend meaning to the creed our fathers once declared.

We, the people, still believe that enduring security and lasting peace do not require perpetual war. Our brave men and women in uniform, tempered by the flames of battle, are unmatched in skill and courage. Our citizens, seared by the memory of those we have lost, know too well the price that is paid for liberty. The knowledge of their sacrifice will keep us forever vigilant against those who would do us harm. But we are also heirs to those who won the peace and not just the war, who turned sworn enemies into the surest of friends, and we must carry those lessons into this time as well.

We will defend our people and uphold our values through strength of arms and rule of law. We will show the courage to try and resolve our differences with other nations peacefully - not because we are naïve about the dangers we face, but because engagement can more durably lift suspicion and fear. America will remain the anchor of strong alliances in every corner of the globe; and we will renew those institutions that extend our capacity to manage crisis abroad, for no one has a greater stake in a peaceful world than its most powerful nation. We will support democracy from Asia to Africa; from the Americas to the Middle East, because our interests and our conscience compel us to act on behalf of those who long for freedom. And we must be a source of hope to the poor, the sick, the marginalized, the victims of prejudice - not out of mere charity, but because peace in our time requires the constant advance of those principles that our common creed describes: tolerance and opportunity; human dignity and justice.

We, the people, declare today that the most evident of truths - that all of us are created equal - is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall; just as it guided all those men and women, sung and unsung, who left footprints along this great Mall, to hear a preacher say that we cannot walk alone; to hear a King proclaim that our individual freedom is inextricably bound to the freedom of every soul on Earth.

It is now our generation’s task to carry on what those pioneers began. For our journey is not complete until our wives, our mothers, and daughters can earn a living equal to their efforts. Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law - for if we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as well. Our journey is not complete until no citizen is forced to wait for hours to exercise the right to vote. Our journey is not complete until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity; until bright young students and engineers are enlisted in our workforce rather than expelled from our country. Our journey is not complete until all our children, from the streets of Detroit to the hills of Appalachia to the quiet lanes of Newtown, know that they are cared for, and cherished, and always safe from harm.

That is our generation’s task - to make these words, these rights, these values - of Life, and Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness - real for every American. Being true to our founding documents does not require us to agree on every contour of life; it does not mean we will all define liberty in exactly the same way, or follow the same precise path to happiness. Progress does not compel us to settle centuries-long debates about the role of government for all time - but it does require us to act in our time.

For now decisions are upon us, and we cannot afford delay. We cannot mistake absolutism for principle, or substitute spectacle for politics, or treat name-calling as reasoned debate. We must act, knowing that our work will be imperfect. We must act, knowing that today’s victories will be only partial, and that it will be up to those who stand here in four years, and forty years, and four hundred years hence to advance the timeless spirit once conferred to us in a spare Philadelphia hall.

They are the words of citizens, and they represent our greatest hope.

You and I, as citizens, have the power to set this country’s course.

You and I, as citizens, have the obligation to shape the debates of our time - not only with the votes we cast, but with the voices we lift in defense of our most ancient values and enduring ideals.

Let each of us now embrace, with solemn duty and awesome joy, what is our lasting birthright. With common effort and common purpose, with passion and dedication, let us answer the call of history, and carry into an uncertain future that precious light of freedom.

Thank you, God Bless you, and may He forever bless these United States of America.

****************

“Words may show a man’s wit, actions his meaning.”-Benjamin Franklin.

…blood drawn by sword… This phrase of the President gives me pause and reminds me of Phil Ochs (who I think was some kind of distant cousin), who sang in “I ain’t a marchin’ anymore,”

Oh I marched to the battle of New Orleans

At the end of the early British war

The young land started growing

The young blood started flowing

But I ain’t marchin’ anymore

For I’ve killed my share of Indians

In a thousand different fights

I was there at the Little Big Horn

I heard many men lying I saw many more dying

But I ain’t marchin’ anymore

chorus)

It’s always the old to lead us to the war

It’s always the young to fall

Now look at all we’ve won with the saber and the gun

Tell me is it worth it all

For I stole California from the Mexican land

Fought in the bloody Civil War

Yes I even killed my brothers

And so many others But I ain’t marchin’ anymore

For I marched to the battles of the German trench

In a war that was bound to end all wars

Oh I must have killed a million men

And now they want me back again

But I ain’t marchin’ anymore

(chorus)

For I flew the final mission in the Japanese sky

Set off the mighty mushroom roar

When I saw the cities burning I knew that I was learning

That I ain’t marchin’ anymore

Now the labor leader’s screamin’

when they close the missile plants,

United Fruit screams at the Cuban shore,

Call it “Peace” or call it “Treason,”

Call it “Love” or call it “Reason,”

But I ain’t marchin’ any more,

No I ain’t marchin’ any more

It is however, just as true, that some words are actions in and of themselves because they can change peoples’ minds and make them take action. Take the President’s statement that “preserving our individual freedoms ultimately requires collective action.” There is nothing new about that statement, yet it remains profound and elevated coming from the mouth of an incumbent President. The use of the term “collective action” is loaded with history. It is as profound as the endorsement of collective action inherent in President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s statement that “If I were a worker in a factory, the first thing I would do would be to join a union.” It is reminiscent of the sentiments of the National Labor Relations Act (the “Wagner Act”) and of Section 923 of the California Labor Code which states this state’s public policy on the right of workers to engage in collective action:

Negotiation of terms and conditions of labor should result from voluntary agreement between employer and employees. Governmental authority has permitted and encouraged employers to organize in the corporate and other forms of capital control. In dealing with such employers, the individual unorganized worker is helpless to exercise actual liberty of contract and to protect his freedom of labor, and thereby to obtain acceptable terms and conditions of employment. Therefore it is necessary that the individual workman have full freedom of association, self-organization, and designation of representatives of his own choosing, to negotiate the terms and conditions of his employment, and that he shall be free from the interference, restraint, or coercion of employers of labor, or their agents, in the designation of such representatives or in self-organization or in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection.

Ben Spock of the Peace & Freedom Party, more committed to the next generation than to the next election

Dr. Ben Spock was one of the most open minded people of great intellect that I have ever known. He did not resist legitimate opposition to his ideas, he welcomed the criticism and very often, he was motivated by it to change. Having come under attack for the sexism of his former works on baby and child care and rearing, he took the critique to heart and he changed and helped to change America in the process.

Ben had a monthly column in Redbook. Recognizing the basic truth that most babies are girls, he thereafter never referred to a baby as “he” but as “she.” He helped change the sexist language that people of my age grew up with and helped to change the mental images that sexist language places in our minds. So, fast forward to the President’s speech:

We are true to our creed when a little girl born into the bleakest poverty knows that she has the same chance to succeed as anybody else, because she is an American, she is free, and she is equal…

That language continues the work of Ben Spock to change our perceptions in the spirit of his 1972 Presidential campaign slogan, “More committed to the next generation than to the next election” (later ripped off by Ronald Reagan).

As quoted above, John Fitzgerald Kennedy and Richard Milhous Nixon had two different and yet not mutually exclusive concepts of the people’s role in the United States of America. President Obama has posed a challenge for the people as:

We, the people, still believe that our obligations as Americans are not just to ourselves, but to all posterity….

That challenge, whether by doing for one’s country as Kennedy put it, or by doing for yourself as Nixon would have it, is still very much about our posterity, our offspring, the generations to follow us. Will we leave them peace and prosperity, or war, want and environmental degradation?

“….just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall…” Put yourself in the place of a Gay boy or a Lesbian girl growing up in America or anywhere in the world. The President of the United States has just endorsed and commemorated self-defense against unjust authority, an act of outright rebellion against the police forces of a nation who at that time, in 1969, were used to criminalize people because of the sexual orientation that they were born with. That is a very profound concept.

Our journey is not complete until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity; until bright young students and engineers are enlisted in our workforce rather than expelled from our country.

This is where it comes full circle. On immigration and every other issue, what will the President do now. How will his actions show his meaning. Will he continue to deport more people than anytime since the 1930s or will he do something reasonable and positive to insure that America remains true to the words of Emma Lazarus on the Statue of Liberty:

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame,

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she

With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

by Emma Lazarus, “The New Collossus,” New York City, 1883

If I had my druthers, we would implement the sentiments of Emma Lazarus’s poem, with the heartfelt sympathy to immigrants expressed by Buffie Sainte-Marie:

I am proud, I am proud, I am proud of my forefathers
And I sing about their courage,
For they spoke a foreign language and they labored with their hands
The same way you do, my friends.

So welcome, welcome, emigrante, to my country, welcome home.
Welcome, welcome, emigrante, to the country that I love.

Tweet