« THE RAINBOW COALITION »

Prononcé à la Convention Démocrate Américaine le 18 juillet 1984.

Tonight we come together bound by our faith in a mighty God, with genuine respect and love for our country, and inheriting the legacy of a great party, the Democratic Party, which is the best hope for redirecting our nation on a more humane, just and peaceful course.

This is not a perfect party. We are not a perfect people. Yet, we are called to a perfect mission: our mission to feed the hungry; to clothe the naked; to house the homeless; to teach the illiterate; to provide jobs for the jobless; and to choose the human race over the nuclear race. (Applause)

We are gathered here this week to nominate a candidate and adopt a platform which will expand, unify, direct and inspire our Party and the Nation to fulfill this mission.

My constituency is the desperate, the damned, the disinherited, the disrespected, and the despised. They are restless and seek relief. They’ve voted in record numbers. They have invested faith, hope and trust that they have in us. The Democratic Party must send them a signal that we care. I pledge my best to not let them down.

There is the call of conscience, redemption, expansion, healing and unity. Leadership must heed the call of conscience, redemption, expansion, healing and unity, for they are the key to achieving our mission. Time is neutral and does not change things. With courage and initiative, leaders can change things.

No generation can choose the age or circumstance in which it is born, but through leadership it can choose to make the age in which it is born, an age of enlightenment, an age of jobs and peace and justice. (Applause)

Only leadership – that intangible combination of gifts, the discipline, information, circumstance, courage, timing, will and divine inspiration – can lead us out of the crisis in which we find ourselves. The leadership can mitigate the misery of our nation. Leadership can part the waters and lead our nation in the direction of the Promised Land. Leadership can lift the boats stuck at the bottom.

I’ve had the rare opportunity to watch seven men, and then two, pour out their souls, offer their service and heal – and heed the call of duty to direct the course of our Nation. There is a proper season for everything. There is a time to sow, a time to reap. There is a time to compete, and a time to cooperate.

I ask for your vote on the first ballot as a vote for a new direction for this Party and this Nation. (Applause) A vote of conviction, a vote of conscience. (Applause)

But I will be proud to support the nominee of this convention for the Presidency of the United States of America. (Applause) Thank you.

I have watched the leadership of our party develop and grow. My respect for both Mr. Mondale and Mr. Hart is great. I have watched them struggle with the crosswinds and crossfires of being public servants, and I believe they will both continue to try to serve us faithfully.

I am elated by the knowledge that for the first time in our history a woman, Geraldine Ferraro, will be recommended to share our ticket. (Applause)

Throughout this campaign, I’ve tried to offer leadership to the Democratic Party and the Nation. If in my high moments, I have done some good, offered some service, shed some light, healed some wounds, rekindled some hope, or stirred someone from apathy and indifference, or in any way along the way helped somebody, then this campaign has not been in vain. (Applause)

For friends who loved and cared for me, and for a God who spared me, and for a family who understood, I am eternally grateful.

If, in my low moments, in word, deed or attitude, through some error of temper, taste or tone, I have caused anyone discomfort, created pain or revived someone’s fears, that was not my truest self. If there were occasions when my grape turned into a raisin and my joy bell lost its resonance, please forgive me. Charge it to my head and not to my heart. My head – so limited in its finitude; my heart, which is boundless in its love for the human family. I am not a perfect servant. I am a public servant doing my best against the odds. As I develop and serve, be patient. God is not finished with me yet.

This campaign has taught me much; that leaders must be tough enough to fight, tender enough to cry, human enough to make mistakes, humble enough to admit them, strong enough to absorb the pain and resilient enough to bounce back and keep on moving. (Applause)

For leaders, the pain is often intense. But you must smile through your tears and keep moving with the faith that there is a brighter side somewhere.

I went to see Hubert Humphrey three days before he died. He had just called Richard Nixon from his dying bed, and many people wondered why. I asked him. He said, « Jesse, from this vantage point, with the sun setting in my life, all of the speeches, the political conventions, the crowds and the great fights are behind me now. At a time like this you are forced to deal with your irreducible essence, forced to grapple with that which is really important to you. And what I have concluded about life, » Huber Humphrey said, « When all is said and done, we must forgive each other, and redeem each other, and move on. »

Our party is emerging from one of its most hard fought battles for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination in our history. But our healthy competition should make us better, not bitter. (Applause)

We must use the insight, wisdom, and experience of the late Hubert Humphrey as a balm for the wounds in our Party, this Nation and the world. We must forgive each other, redeem each other, regroup and move one.

Our flag is red, white and blue, but our nation is a rainbow – red, yellow, brown, black and white – and we’re all precious in God’s sight.

America is not like a blanket – one piece of unbroken cloth, the same color, the same texture, the same size. America is more like a quilt – many patches, many pieces, many colors, many sizes, all woven and held together by a common thread. The white, the Hispanic, the black, the Arab, the Jew, the woman, the native American, the small farmer, the businessperson, the environmentalist, the peace activist, the young, the old, the lesbian, the gay and the disabled make up the American quilt. (Applause)

Even in our fractured state, all of us count and all of us fit somewhere. We have proven that we can survive without each other. But we have not proven that we can win and progress without each other. We must come together. (Applause)

From Fannie Lou Hamer in Atlantic City in 1964 to the Rainbow Coalition in San Francisco today; from the Atlantic to the Pacific, we have experienced pain but progress as we ended American apartheid laws, we got public accommodation, we secured voting rights, we obtained open housing, as young people got the right to vote. We lost Malcolm, Martin, Medgar, Bobby, John and Viola. The team that got us here must be expanded, not abandoned. (Applause)

Twenty years ago, tears welled up in our eyes as the bodies of Schwerner, Goodman and Chaney were dredged from the depths of a river in Mississippi. Twenty years later, our communities, black and Jewish, are in anguish, anger and pain. Feelings have been hurt on both sides.

There is a crisis in communications. Confusion is in the air. But we cannot afford to lose our way. We may agree to agree; or agree to disagree on issues; we must bring back civility to these tensions.

We are co-partners in a long and rich religious history – the Judeo-Christian traditions. Many blacks and Jews have a shared passion for social justice at home and peace abroad. We must seek a revival of the spirit, inspired by a new vision and new possibilities. We must return to higher ground. (Applause)

We are bound by Moses and Jesus, but also connected with Islam and Mohammed. These three great religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, were all born in the revered and holy city of Jerusalem.

We are bound by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rabbi Abraham Heschel, crying out from their graves for us to reach common ground. We are bound by shared blood and shared sacrifices. We are much too intelligent; much too bound by our Judeo-Christian heritage; much too victimized by racism, sexism, militarism and anti-Semitism; much too threatened as historical scapegoats to go on divided one from another. We must turn from finger pointing to clasped hands. We must share our burdens and our joys with each other once again. We must turn to each other and not on each other and choose higher ground. (Applause)

Twenty years later, we cannot be satisfied by just restoring the old coalition. Old wine skins must make room for new wine. We must heal and expand. The Rainbow Coalition is making room for Arab Americans. They, too, know the pain and hurt of racial and religious rejection. They must not continue to be made pariahs. The Rainbow Coalition is making room for Hispanic Americans who this very night are living under the threat of the Simpson-Mazzoli bill. (Applause) And farm workers from Ohio who are fighting the Campbell Soup Company with a boycott to achieve legitimate workers’ rights. (Applause)

The Rainbow is making room for the Native American, the most exploited people of all, a people with the greatest moral claim amongst us. We support them as they seek the restoration of their ancient land and claim amongst us. We support them as they seek the restoration of land and water rights, as they seek to preserve their ancestral homelands and the beauty of a land that was once all theirs. They can never receive a fair share for all they have given us. They must finally have a fair chance to develop their great resources and to preserve their people and their culture.

The Rainbow Coalition includes Asian Americans, now being killed in our streets, scapegoats for the failures of corporate, industrial and economic policies.

The Rainbow is making room for the young Americans. Twenty years ago, our young people were dying in a war for which they could not even vote. Twenty years later, young America has the power to stop a war in Central America and the responsibility to vote in great numbers. (Applause) Young America must be politically active in 1984. The choice is war or peace. We must make room for young America.

The Rainbow includes disabled veterans. The color scheme fits in the Rainbow. The disabled have their handicap revealed and their genius concealed; while the able-bodied have their genius revealed and their disability concealed. But ultimately, we must judge people by their values and their contribution. Don’t leave anybody out. I would rather have Roosevelt in a wheelchair than Reagan on a horse. (Applause)

The Rainbow includes for small farmers. They have suffered tremendously under the Reagan regime. They will either receive 90 percent parity or 100 percent charity. We must address their concerns and make room for them.

The Rainbow includes lesbians and gays. No American citizen ought to be denied equal protection from the law.

We must be unusually committed and caring as we expand our family to include new members. All of us must be tolerant and understanding as the fears and anxieties of the rejected and of the party leadership express themselves in so many different ways. Too often what we call hate – as if it were some deeply rooted in philosophy or strategy – it is simply ignorance, anxiety, paranoia, fear and insecurity. (Applause)

To be strong leaders, we must be long-suffering as we seek to right the wrongs of our Party and our Nation. We must expand our Party, heal our Party and unify our Party. That is our mission in 1984. (Applause)

We are often reminded that we live in a great nation – and we do. But it can be greater still. The Rainbow is mandating a new definition of greatness. We must not measure greatness from the mansion down, but from the manger up.

Jesus said that we should not be judged by the bark we wear but by the fruit that we bear. Jesus said that we must measure greatness by how we treat the least of these.

President Reagan says the nation is in recovery. Those 90,000 corporations that made a profit last year but paid no Federal taxes are recovering. The 37,000 military contractors who have benefited from Reagan’s more than doubling of the military budget in peacetime surely they are recovering.

The big corporations and rich individuals who received the bulk of a three-year, multibillion tax cut from Mr. Reagan are recovering. But no such recovery is under way for the least of these. Rising tides don’t lift all boats, particularly those stuck at the bottom.

For the boats stuck at the bottom there’s a misery index. This Administration has made life more miserable for the poor. Its attitude has been contemptuous. Its policies and programs have been cruel and unfair to working people. They must be held accountable in November for increasing infant mortality among the poor. In Detroit (Applause) – in Detroit, one of the great cities in the western world, babies are dying at the same rate as Honduras, the most underdeveloped Nation in out hemisphere. This Administration must be held accountable for policies that have contributed to the growing poverty in America. There are now 34 million people in poverty, 15 percent of our Nation. Twenty-three million are White, 11 million Black, Hispanic, Asian and others. By the end of this year, there will be 41 million people in poverty. We cannot stand idly by. We must fight for change now. (Applause)

Under this regime, we look at Social Security. The 1981 budget cuts included nine permanent Social Security benefit cuts totaling $20 billion over five years.

Small businesses have suffered on the Reagan tax cuts. Only 18 percent of total business tax cuts went to them, 82 percent to big businesses.

Health care under Mr. Reagan has already been sharply cut. Education under Mr. Reagan has been cut 25 percent. Under Mr. Reagan there are now 9.7 million female head families. They represent 16 percent of all families. Half of all of them are poor. Seventy percent of all poor children live in a house headed by a woman, where there is no man.

Under Mr. Reagan, the Administration has cleaned up only six of 546 priority toxic waste dumps.

Farmers’ real net income was only about half its level in 1979. Many say that the race in November will be decided in the South. President Reagan is depending on the conservative South to return him to office. But the South, I tell you, is unnaturally conservative. The South is the poorest region in our nation and, therefore, the least to conserve. In his appeal to the South, Mr. Reagan is trying to substitute flags and prayer cloths for food, and clothing, and education, health care and housing. (Applause)

Mr. Reagan will ask us to pray, and I believe in prayer. I have come to this way by power of prayer. But then, we must watch false prophecy. He cuts energy assistance to the poor, cuts breakfast programs from children, cuts lunch programs from children, cuts job training from children, and then says to an empty table, « Let us pray. » (Applause) Apparently he is not familiar with the structure of prayer. You thank the Lord for the food that you are about to receive, not the food that just left. (Laughter and applause) I think that we should pray, but don’t pray for the food that left. Pray for the man that took the food – to leave.

We need a change. We need a change in November. (Applause)

Under Mr. Reagan, the misery index has risen for the poor. The danger index has risen for everybody. Under this administration, we have lost the lives of our boys in Central America and Honduras, in Grenada, in Lebanon, in a nuclear standoff in Europe. Under this Administration, one-third of our children believe they will die in a nuclear war. The danger index is increasing in this world.

All the talk about the defense against Russia; the Russian submarines are closer, and their missiles more accurate. We live in a world tonight more miserable and a world more dangerous. While Reaganomics and Reaganism is talked about often, so often we miss the real meaning. Reaganism is a spirit, and Reaganomics represents the real economic facts of life.

In 1980, Mr. George Bush, a man with reasonable access to Mr. Reagan, did an analysis of Mr. Reagan’s economic plan. Mr. George Bush concluded that Reagan’s plan was  »voodoo economics. » He was right. (Applause)

Third- party candidate John Anderson said « a combination of military spending, tax cuts and a balanced budget by 1984 would be accomplished with blue smoke and mirrors. » They were both right.

Mr. Reagan talks about a dynamic recovery. There’s some measure of recovery. Three and a half yearslater, unemployment has inched just below where it was when he took office in 1981. There are still 8.1 million people officially unemployed, 11 million working only part- time. Inflation has come down, but let’s analyze for a moment who has paid the price for this superficial economic recovery.

Mr. Reagan curbed inflation by cutting consumer demand. He cut consumer demand with conscious and callous fiscal and monetary policies. He used the Federal budget to deliberately induce unemployment and curb social spending. He then weighed and supported tight monetary policies of the Federal Reserve Board to deliberately drive up interest rates, again to curb consumer demand created through borrowing. Unemployment reached 10.7 percent. We experienced skyrocketing interest rates. Our dollar inflated abroad. There were record bank failures; record farm foreclosures; record business bankruptcies; record budget deficits; record trade deficits.

Mr. Reagan brought inflation down by destabilizing our economy and disrupting family life. He promised – he promised in 1980 a balanced budget. But instead we now have a record toward a billion dollar budget deficit. Under Mr. Reagan, the cumulative budget deficit for his four years is more than the sum total of deficits from George Washington through Jimmy Carter combined. I tell you, we need a change. (Applause)

How is he paying for these short-term jobs? Reagan’s economic recovery is being financed by deficit spending – $200 billion a year. Military spending, a major cause of this deficit, is projected, over the next five years, to be nearly $2 trillion, and will cost about $40,000 for every taxpaying family.

When the Government borrows $200 billion annually to finance the deficit, this encourages the private sector to make its money off of interest rates as opposed to development and economic growth.

Even money abroad, we don’t have enough money domestically to finance the debt, so we are now borrowing money abroad, from foreign banks, governments and financial institutions: $40 billion in 1983; $70-80 billion in 1984 (40 percent of our total); and over $100 billion (50 percent of our total) in 1985. By 1989, it is projected that 50 percent of all individual income taxes will be going just to pay for interest on the debt.

The United States used to be the largest exporter of capital, but under Mr. Reagan we will quite likely become the largest debtor nation.

About two weeks ago, on July 4th, we celebrated our Declaration of Independence, yet every day supply-side economics is making our Nation more economically dependent and less economically free. Five to six percent of our Gross National Product is now being eaten up with President Reagan’s budget deficits. To depend on foreign military powers to protect our national security would be foolish, making us dependent and less secure, yet Reaganomics has us increasingly dependent on foreign economic sources.

This consumer-led but deficit-financed recovery is unbalanced and artificial. We have a challenge as Democrats to point a way out. Democracy guarantees opportunity, not success. Democracy guarantees the right to participate, not a license for either a majority to dominate. The victory for the Rainbow Coalition in the Platform debates today was not whether we won or lost, but that we raised the right issues.

We could afford to lose the vote; issues are non-negotiable. We could not afford to avoid raising the right questions. Our self-respect and our moral integrity were at stake. Our heads are perhaps bloody, but not bowed. Our back is straight. We can go home and face our people. Our vision is clear. (Applause)

When we think, on this journey from slaveship to championship, that we have gone from the planks of the Boardwalk in Atlantic City in 1964 to fighting to help write the planks in the platform in San Francisco in 1984 there is a deep and abiding sense of joy in our souls in spite of the tears in our eyes. Though there are missing planks, there is a solid foundation upon which to build. Our party can win, but we must provide hope, which will inspire people to struggle and achieve; provide a plan that shows a way out of our dilemma and then lead the way.

In 1984, my heart is made to feel glad because I know there is a way out – justice. The requirement for rebuilding America is justice. The linchpin of progressive politics in our nation will not come from the North, they in fact will come from the South.

That is why I argue over and over again. We look from Virginia around to Texas, there’s only one black Congressperson out of 115. Nineteen years later, we’re locked out the Congress, the Senate and the Governor’s mansion.

What does this large black vote mean? Why do I fight to win second primaries and fight gerrymandering and annexation and at-large elections? Why do we fight over that? Because I tell you, you cannot hold someone in the ditch unless you linger there with them . (Applause) Unless you linger there. (Applause)

If you want a change in this nation, you enforce that voting rights act. We’ll get 12 to 20 Black, Hispanics, female and progressive congresspersons from the South. We can save the cotton, but we have got to fight the boll weevils. We have got to make a judgment. We have got to make a judgment.

It is not enough to hope that ERA will pass. How can we pass ERA? If Blacks vote in great numbers, progressive Whites win. It is the only way progressive Whites win. If Blacks vote in great numbers, Hispanics win. When Blacks, Hispanics and progressive Whites vote, women win. When women win, children win. When women and children win, workers win. We must all come together. We must come together. (Spontaneous demonstration) Thank you.

I tell you, in all our joy and excitement, we must not save the world and lose our souls. We should never short-circuit enforcing the Voting Rights Act at every level. When one of us rises, all of us will rise. Justice is the way out. Peace is the way out. We should not act as if nuclear weaponry is negotiable and debatable.

In this world in which we live, we dropped the bomb on Japan and felt guilty, but in 1984 other folks have also got bombs. This time, if we drop the bomb, six minutes later we, too, will be destroyed. It is not about dropping the bomb on somebody. It is about dropping the bomb on everybody. We must choose to develop minds over guided missiles, and then think it out and not fight it out. It is time for a change. (Applause)

Our foreign policy must be characterized by mutual respect, not by gunboat diplomacy, big stick diplomacy and threats. Our Nation at its best feeds the hungry. Our Nation at its worst, at its worst, will mine the harbors of Nicaragua; at its worst will try to overthrow their government, at its worst will cut aid to American education and increase the aid to El Salvador; at its worst, our Nation will have partnership with South Africa. That is a moral disgrace. It is a moral disgrace. It is a moral disgrace. (Applause)

We look at Africa. We cannot just focus on Apartheid in Southern Africa. We must fight for trade with Africa, and not just aid to Africa. We cannot stand idly by and say we will not relate to Nicaragua unless they have elections there, and then embrace military regimes in Africa overthrowing democratic governments in Nigeria and Liberia and Ghana. We must fight for democracy all around the world, and play the game by one set of rules.

Peace in this world. Our present formula for peace in the Middle East is inadequate. It will not work. There are 22 nations in the Middle East. Our nation must be able to talk and act and influence all of them. We must build upon Camp David, and measure human rights by one yard stick. In that region we have too many interests and too few friends.

There is one way out, jobs. Put America back to work. When I was a child growing up in Greenville, South Carolina, the Reverend Sample used to preach ever so often a sermon relating to Jesus and he said, « If I be lifted up, I will draw all men unto me. » I didn’t quite understand what he meant as a child growing up, but I understand a little better now. If you raise up truth, it is magnetic. It has a way of drawing people.

With all this confusion in this Convention, the bright lights and parties and big fun, we must raise up the single proposition: If we lift up a program to feed the hungry, they will come running; if we lift up a program to start a war no more, our youth will come running; if we lift up a program to put America back to work, and an alternative to welfare and despair, they will come running.

If we cut that military budget without cutting our defense, and use that money to rebuild bridges and put steel workers back to work, and use that money and provide jobs for our cities, and use that money to build schools and pay teachers and educate our children, and build hospitals, and train doctors and train nurses, the whole nation will come running to us.

As I leave you now, we vote in this convention and get ready to go back across this nation in a couple of days, in this campaign I tried to be faithful to my promise. I lived in old barrios, ghettos and in reservations and housing projects.

I have a message for our youth. I challenge them to put hope in their brains and not dope in their veins. (Applause) I told them that like Jesus, I, too, was born in the slum, and just because you’re born in a slum does not mean the slum is born in you and you can rise above it if your mind is made up. (Applause) I told them in every slum there are two sides. When I see a broken window that’s the slummy side. Train some youth to become a glazier; that is the sunny side. When I see a missing brick, that is the slummy side. Let that child in a union and become a brick mason and build; that is the sunny side. When I see a missing door, that is the slummy side. Train some youth to become a carpenter, that is the sunny side. When I see the vulgar words and hieroglyphics of destitution on the walls, that is the slummy side. Train some youth to be a painter and artist, that is the sunny side.

We leave this place looking for the sunny side because there’s a brighter side somewhere. I am more convinced than ever that we can win. We will vault up the rough side of the mountain. We can win. I just want young America to do me one favor, just one favor.

Exercise the right to dream. You must face reality, that which is. But then dream of a reality that ought to be, that must be. Live beyond the pain of reality with the dream of a bright tomorrow. Use hope and imagination as weapons of survival and progress. Use love to motivate you and obligate you to serve the human family.

Young America, dream. Choose the human race over the nuclear race. Bury the weapons and don’t burn the people. Dream – dream of a new value system. Teachers who teach for life and not just for a living; teach because they can’t help it. Dream of lawyers more concerned about justice than a judgeship. Dream of doctors more concerned about public health than personal wealth. (Applause) Dream of preachers and priests who will prophesy and not just profiteer. Preach and dream! Our time has come. Our time has come.

Suffering breeds character. Character breeds faith, and in the end faith will not disappoint. Our time has come. Our faith, hope and dreams have prevailed. Our time has come. Weeping has endured for nights but that joy cometh in the morning.

Our time has come. No grave can hold our body down. Our time has come. No lie can live forever. Our time has come. We must leave the racial battle ground and come to the economic common ground and moral higher ground. America, our time has come.

We come from disgrace to amazing grace. Our time has come. Give me your tired, give me your poor, your huddled masses who yearn to breathe free and come November, there will be a change because our time has come.

Thank you and God bless you.

« COMMON GROUND AND COMMON SENSE »

Discours prononcé le 19 juillet 1988 durant la Democratic National Convention à l’Omni Coliseum d’Atlanta, GA.

Tonight, we pause and give praise and honor to God for being good enough to allow us to be at this place at this time. When I look out at this convention, I see the face of America: Red, Yellow, Brown, Black and White. We’re all precious in God’s sight — the real rainbow coalition.

All of us — All of us who are here think that we are seated. But we’re really standing on someone’s shoulders. Ladies and gentlemen, Mrs. Rosa Parks — the mother of the civil rights movement.

[Mrs. Rosa Parks is brought to the podium.]

I want to express my deep love and appreciation for the support my family has given me over these past months. They have endured pain, anxiety, threat, and fear. But they have been strengthened and made secure by our faith in God, in America, and in you. Your love has

protected us and made us strong. To my wife Jackie, the foundation of our family; to our five children whom you met tonight; to my mother, Mrs. Helen Jackson, who is present tonight; and to our grandmother, Mrs. Matilda Burns; to my brother Chuck and his family; to my mother-in-law, Mrs. Gertrude Brown, who just last month at age 61 graduated from Hampton Institute — a marvelous achievement.

I offer my appreciation to Mayor Andrew Young who has provided such gracious hospitality to all of us this week.

And a special salute to President Jimmy Carter. President Carter restored honor to the White House after Watergate. He gave many of us a special opportunity to grow. For his kind words, for his unwavering commitment to peace in the world, and for the voters that came from his family, every member of his family, led by Billy and Amy, I offer my special thanks to the Carter family.

My right and my privilege to stand here before you has been won, won in my lifetime, by the blood and the sweat of the innocent.

Twenty-four years ago, the late Fannie Lou Hamer and Aaron Henry — who sits here tonight from Mississippi — were locked out onto the streets in Atlantic City; the head of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party.

But tonight, a Black and White delegation from Mississippi is headed by Ed Cole, a Black man from Mississippi; twenty-four years later.

Many were lost in the struggle for the right to vote: Jimmy Lee Jackson, a young student, gave his life; Viola Liuzzo, a White mother from Detroit, called « nigger lover, » and brains blown out at point blank range; [Michael] Schwerner, [Andrew] Goodman and [James] Chaney — two Jews and a Black — found in a common grave, bodies riddled with bullets in Mississippi; the four darling little girls in a church in Birmingham, Alabama. They died that we might have a right to live.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. lies only a few miles from us tonight. Tonight he must feel good as he looks down upon us. We sit here together, a rainbow, a coalition — the sons and daughters of slavemasters and the sons and daughters of slaves, sitting together around a common table, to decide the direction of our party and our country. His heart would be full tonight.

As a testament to the struggles of those who have gone before; as a legacy for those who will come after; as a tribute to the endurance, the patience, the courage of our forefathers and mothers; as an assurance that their prayers are being answered, that their work has not been in vain, and, that hope is eternal, tomorrow night my name will go into nomination for the Presidency of the United States of America.

We meet tonight at the crossroads, a point of decision. Shall we expand, be inclusive, find unity and power; or suffer division and impotence?

We’ve come to Atlanta, the cradle of the Old South, the crucible of the New South. Tonight, there is a sense of celebration, because we are moved, fundamentally moved from racial battlegrounds by law, to economic common ground. Tomorrow we’ll challenge to move to higher ground.

Common ground. Think of Jerusalem, the intersection where many trails met. A small village that became the birthplace for three great religions — Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Why was this village so blessed? Because it provided a crossroads where different people met, different cultures, different civilizations could meet and find common ground. When people come together, flowers always flourish — the air is rich with the aroma of a new spring.

Take New York, the dynamic metropolis. What makes New York so special? It’s the invitation at the Statue of Liberty, « Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses who yearn to breathe free. » Not restricted to English only. Many people, many cultures, many languages with one thing in common: They yearn to breathe free. Common ground.

Tonight in Atlanta, for the first time in this century, we convene in the South; a state where Governors once stood in school house doors; where Julian Bond was denied a seat in the State Legislature because of his conscientious objection to the Vietnam War; a city that, through its five Black Universities, has graduated more black students than any city in the world. Atlanta, now a modern intersection of the New South.

Common ground. That’s the challenge of our party tonight — left wing, right wing.

Progress will not come through boundless liberalism nor static conservatism, but at the critical mass of mutual survival — not at boundless liberalism nor static conservatism, but at the critical mass of mutual survival. It takes two wings to fly. Whether you’re a hawk or a dove, you’re just a bird living in the same environment, in the same world.

The Bible teaches that when lions and lambs lie down together, none will be afraid, and there will be peace in the valley. It sounds impossible. Lions eat lambs. Lambs sensibly flee from lions. Yet even lions and lambs find common ground. Why? Because neither lions nor lambs want the forest to catch on fire. Neither lions nor lambs want acid rain to fall. Neither lions nor lambs can survive nuclear war. If lions and lambs can find common ground, surely we can as well — as civilized people.

The only time that we win is when we come together. In 1960, John Kennedy, the late John Kennedy, beat Richard Nixon by only 112,000 votes — less than one vote per precinct. He won by the margin of our hope. He brought us together. He reached out. He had the courage to defy his advisors and inquire about Dr. King’s jailing in Albany, Georgia. We won by the margin of our hope, inspired by courageous leadership. In 1964, Lyndon Johnson brought both wings together — the thesis, the antithesis, and the creative synthesis — and together we won. In 1976, Jimmy Carter unified us again, and we won. When do we not come together, we never win. In 1968, the division and despair in July led to our defeat in November. In 1980, rancor in the spring and the summer led to Reagan in the fall. When we divide, we cannot win. We must find common ground as the basis for survival and development and change and growth.

Today when we debated, differed, deliberated, agreed to agree, agreed to disagree, when we had the good judgment to argue a case and then not self-destruct, George Bush was just a little further away from the White House and a little closer to private life.

Tonight, I salute Governor Michael Dukakis. He has run — He has run a well-managed and a dignified campaign. No matter how tired or how tried, he always resisted the temptation to stoop to demagoguery.

I’ve watched a good mind fast at work, with steel nerves, guiding his campaign out of the crowded field without appeal to the worst in us. I’ve watched his perspective grow as his environment has expanded. I’ve seen his toughness and tenacity close up. I know his commitment to public service. Mike Dukakis’ parents were a doctor and a teacher; my parents a maid, a beautician, and a janitor. There’s a great gap between Brookline, Massachusetts and Haney Street in the Fieldcrest Village housing projects in Greenville, South Carolina.

He studied law; I studied theology. There are differences of religion, region, and race; differences in experiences and perspectives. But the genius of America is that out of the many we become one.

Providence has enabled our paths to intersect. His foreparents came to America on immigrant ships; my foreparents came to America on slave ships. But whatever the original ships, we’re in the same boat tonight.

Our ships could pass in the night — if we have a false sense of independence — or they could collide and crash. We would lose our passengers. We can seek a high reality and a greater good. Apart, we can drift on the broken pieces of Reagonomics, satisfy our baser instincts, and exploit the fears of our people. At our highest, we can call upon noble instincts and navigate this vessel to safety. The greater good is the common good.

As Jesus said, « Not My will, but Thine be done. » It was his way of saying there’s a higher good beyond personal comfort or position.

The good of our Nation is at stake. It’s commitment to working men and women, to the poor and the vulnerable, to the many in the world.

With so many guided missiles, and so much misguided leadership, the stakes are exceedingly high. Our choice? Full participation in a democratic government, or more abandonment and neglect. And so this night, we choose not a false sense of independence, not our capacity to survive and endure. Tonight we choose interdependency, and our capacity to act and unite for the greater good.

Common good is finding commitment to new priorities to expansion and inclusion. A commitment to expanded participation in the Democratic Party at every level. A commitment to a shared national campaign strategy and involvement at every level.

A commitment to new priorities that insure that hope will be kept alive. A common ground commitment to a legislative agenda for empowerment, for the John Conyers bill — universal, on-site, same-day registration everywhere. A commitment to D.C. statehood and empowerment — D.C. deserves statehood. A commitment to economic set-asides, commitment to the Dellums bill for comprehensive sanctions against South Africa. A shared commitment to a common direction.

Common ground.

Easier said than done. Where do you find common ground? At the point of challenge. This campaign has shown that politics need not be marketed by politicians, packaged by pollsters and pundits. Politics can be a moral arena where people come together to find common ground.

We find common ground at the plant gate that closes on workers without notice. We find common ground at the farm auction, where a good farmer loses his or her land to bad loans or diminishing markets. Common ground at the school yard where teachers cannot get adequate pay, and students cannot get a scholarship, and can’t make a loan. Common ground at the hospital admitting room, where somebody tonight is dying because they cannot afford to go upstairs to a bed that’s empty waiting for someone with insurance to get sick. We are a better nation than that. We must do better.

Common ground. What is leadership if not present help in a time of crisis? And so I met you at the point of challenge. In Jay, Maine, where paper workers were striking for fair wages; in Greenville, Iowa, where family farmers struggle for a fair price; in Cleveland, Ohio, where working women seek comparable worth; in McFarland, California, where the children of Hispanic farm workers may be dying from poisoned land, dying in clusters with cancer; in an AIDS hospice in Houston, Texas, where the sick support one another, too often rejected by their own parents and friends.

Common ground. America is not a blanket woven from one thread, one color, one cloth. When I was a child growing up in Greenville, South Carolina and grandmamma could not afford a blanket, she didn’t complain and we did not freeze. Instead she took pieces of old cloth — patches, wool, silk, gabardine, crockersack — only patches, barely good enough to wipe off your shoes with. But they didn’t stay that way very long. With sturdy hands and a strong cord, she sewed them together into a quilt, a thing of beauty and power and culture. Now, Democrats, we must build such a quilt.

Farmers, you seek fair prices and you are right — but you cannot stand alone. Your patch is not big enough.

Workers, you fight for fair wages, you are right — but your patch labor is not big enough.

Women, you seek comparable worth and pay equity, you are right — but your patch is not big enough.

Women, mothers, who seek Head Start, and day care and prenatal care on the front side of life, relevant jail care and welfare on the back side of life, you are right — but your patch is not big enough.

Students, you seek scholarships, you are right — but your patch is not big enough.

Blacks and Hispanics, when we fight for civil rights, we are right — but our patch is not big enough.

Gays and lesbians, when you fight against discrimination and a cure for AIDS, you are right — but your patch is not big enough.

Conservatives and progressives, when you fight for what you believe, right wing, left wing, hawk, dove, you are right from your point of view, but your point of view is not enough.

But don’t despair. Be as wise as my grandmamma. Pull the patches and the pieces together, bound by a common thread. When we form a great quilt of unity and common ground, we’ll have the power to bring about health care and housing and jobs and education and hope to our Nation.

We, the people, can win.

We stand at the end of a long dark night of reaction. We stand tonight united in the commitment to a new direction. For almost eight years we’ve been led by those who view social good coming from private interest, who view public life as a means to increase private wealth. They have been prepared to sacrifice the common good of the many to satisfy the private interests and the wealth of a few.

We believe in a government that’s a tool of our democracy in service to the public, not an instrument of the aristocracy in search of private wealth. We believe in government with the consent of the governed, « of, for and by the people. » We must now emerge into a new day with a new direction.

Reaganomics: Based on the belief that the rich had too much money [sic] — too little money and the poor had too much. That’s classic Reaganomics. They believe that the poor had too much money and the rich had too little money,- so they engaged in reverse Robin Hood – took from the poor, gave to the rich, paid for by the middle class. We cannot stand four more years of Reaganomics in any version, in any disguise.

How do I document that case? Seven years later, the richest 1 percent of our society pays 20 percent less in taxes. The poorest 10 percent pay 20 percent more: Reaganomics.

Reagan gave the rich and the powerful a multibillion-dollar party. Now the party is over. He expects the people to pay for the damage. I take this principal position, convention, let us not raise taxes on the poor and the middle-class, but those who had the party, the rich and the powerful, must pay for the party.

I just want to take common sense to high places. We’re spending one hundred and fifty billion dollars a year defending Europe and Japan 43 years after the war is over. We have more troops in Europe tonight than we had seven years ago. Yet the threat of war is ever more remote.

Germany and Japan are now creditor nations; that means they’ve got a surplus. We are a debtor nation — means we are in debt. Let them share more of the burden of their own defense. Use some of that money to build decent housing. Use some of that money to educate our children. Use some of that money for long-term health care. Use some of that money to wipe out these slums and put America back to work!

I just want to take common sense to high places. If we can bail out Europe and Japan; if we can bail out Continental Bank and Chrysler — and Mr. Iacocca, make [sic] 8,000 dollars an hour — we can bail out the family farmer.

I just want to make common sense. It does not make sense to close down six hundred and fifty thousand family farms in this country while importing food from abroad subsidized by the U.S. Government. Let’s make sense.

It does not make sense to be escorting all our tankers up and down the Persian Gulf paying $2.50 for every one dollar worth of oil we bring out, while oil wells are capped in Texas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana. I just want to make sense.

Leadership must meet the moral challenge of its day. What’s the moral challenge of our day?

We have public accommodations. We have the right to vote. We have open housing. What’s the fundamental challenge of our day? It is to end economic violence. Plant closings without notice — economic violence. Even the greedy do not profit long from greed — economic violence.

Most poor people are not lazy. They are not black. They are not brown. They are mostly White and female and young. But whether White, Black or Brown, a hungry baby’s belly turned inside out is the same color — color it pain; color it hurt; color it agony.

Most poor people are not on welfare. Some of them are illiterate and can’t read the want-ad sections. And when they can, they can’t find a job that matches the address. They work hard everyday.

I know. I live amongst them. I’m one of them. I know they work. I’m a witness. They catch the early bus. They work every day.

They raise other people’s children. They work everyday.

They clean the streets. They work everyday. They drive dangerous cabs. They work everyday. They change the beds you slept in in these hotels last night and can’t get a union contract. They work everyday.

No, no, they are not lazy! Someone must defend them because it’s right, and they cannot speak for themselves. They work in hospitals. I know they do. They wipe the bodies of those who are sick with fever and pain. They empty their bedpans. They clean out their commodes. No job is beneath them, and yet when they get sick they cannot lie in the bed they made up every day. America, that is not right. We are a better Nation than that. We are a better Nation than that.

We need a real war on drugs. You can’t « just say no. » It’s deeper than that. You can’t just get a palm reader or an astrologer. It’s more profound than that.

We are spending a hundred and fifty billion dollars on drugs a year. We’ve gone from ignoring it to focusing on the children. Children cannot buy a hundred and fifty billion dollars worth of drugs a year; a few high-profile athletes — athletes are not laundering a hundred and fifty billion dollars a year — bankers are.

I met the children in Watts, who, unfortunately, in their despair, their grapes of hope have become raisins of despair, and they’re turning on each other and they’re self-destructing. But I stayed with them all night long. I wanted to hear their case.

They said, « Jesse Jackson, as you challenge us to say no to drugs, you’re right; and to not sell them, you’re right; and not use these guns, you’re right. » (And by the way, the promise of CETA [Comprehensive Employment and Training Act]; they displaced CETA — they did not replace CETA.)

« We have neither jobs nor houses nor services nor training — no way out. Some of us take drugs as anesthesia for our pain. Some take drugs as a way of pleasure, good short-term pleasure and long-term pain. Some sell drugs to make money. It’s wrong, we know, but you need to know that we know. We can go and buy the drugs by the boxes at the port. If we can buy the drugs at the port, don’t you believe the Federal government can stop it if they want to? »

They say, « We don’t have Saturday night specials anymore. » They say, « We buy AK47’s and Uzi’s, the latest make of weapons. We buy them across the along these boulevards. »

You cannot fight a war on drugs unless and until you’re going to challenge the bankers and the gun sellers and those who grow them. Don’t just focus on the children; let’s stop drugs at the level of supply and demand. We must end the scourge on the American Culture.

Leadership. What difference will we make? Leadership. Cannot just go along to get along. We must do more than change Presidents. We must change direction.

Leadership must face the moral challenge of our day. The nuclear war build-up is irrational. Strong leadership cannot desire to look tough and let that stand in the way of the pursuit of peace. Leadership must reverse the arms race. At least we should pledge no first use. Why? Because first use begets first retaliation. And that’s mutual annihilation. That’s not a rational way out.

No use at all. Let’s think it out and not fight it our because it’s an unwinnable fight. Why hold a card that you can never drop? Let’s give peace a chance.

Leadership. We now have this marvelous opportunity to have a breakthrough with the Soviets. Last year 200,000 Americans visited the Soviet Union. There’s a chance for joint ventures into space — not Star Wars and war arms escalation but a space defense initiative. Let’s build in the space together and demilitarize the heavens. There’s a way out.

America, let us expand. When Mr. Reagan and Mr. Gorbachev met there was a big meeting. They represented together one-eighth of the human race. Seven-eighths of the human race was locked out of that room. Most people in the world tonight — half are Asian, one-half of them are Chinese. There are 22 nations in the Middle East. There’s Europe; 40 million Latin Americans next door to us; the Caribbean; Africa — a half-billion people.

Most people in the world today are Yellow or Brown or Black, non-Christian, poor, female, young and don’t speak English in the real world.

This generation must offer leadership to the real world. We’re losing ground in Latin America, Middle East, South Africa because we’re not focusing on the real world. That’s the real world. We must use basic principles — support international law. We stand the most to gain from it. Support human rights — we believe in that. Support self-determination — we’re built on that. Support economic development — you know it’s right. Be consistent and gain our moral authority in the world. I challenge you tonight, my friends, let’s be bigger and better as a Nation and as a Party.

We have basic challenges — freedom in South Africa. We’ve already agreed as Democrats to declare South Africa to be a terrorist state. But don’t just stop there. Get South Africa out of Angola; free Namibia; support the front line states. We must have a new humane human rights consistent policy in Africa.

I’m often asked, « Jesse, why do you take on these tough issues? They’re not very political. We can’t win that way. »

If an issue is morally right, it will eventually be political. It may be political and never be right. Fannie Lou Hamer didn’t have the most votes in Atlantic City, but her principles have outlasted every delegate who voted to lock her out. Rosa Parks did not have the most votes, but she was morally right. Dr. King didn’t have the most votes about the Vietnam War, but he was morally right. If we are principled first, our politics will fall in place.

« Jesse, why do you take these big bold initiatives? » A poem by an unknown author went something like this: « We mastered the air, we conquered the sea, annihilated distance and prolonged life, but we’re not wise enough to live on this earth without war and without hate. »

As for Jesse Jackson: « I’m tired of sailing my little boat, far inside the harbor bar. I want to go out where the big ships float, out on the deep where the great ones are. And should my frail craft prove too slight for waves that sweep those billows o’er, I’d rather go down in the stirring fight than drowse to death at the sheltered shore. »

We’ve got to go out, my friends, where the big boats are.

And then for our children. Young America, hold your head high now. We can win. We must not lose you to drugs and violence, premature pregnancy, suicide, cynicism, pessimism and despair. We can win. Wherever you are tonight, I challenge you to hope and to dream. Don’t submerge your dreams. Exercise above all else, even on drugs, dream of the day you are drug free. Even in the gutter, dream of the day that you will be up on your feet again.

You must never stop dreaming. Face reality, yes, but don’t stop with the way things are. Dream of things as they ought to be. Dream. Face pain, but love, hope, faith and dreams will help you rise above the pain. Use hope and imagination as weapons of survival and progress, but you keep on dreaming, young America. Dream of peace. Peace is rational and reasonable. War is irrationable [sic] in this age, and unwinnable.

Dream of teachers who teach for life and not for a living. Dream of doctors who are concerned more about public health than private wealth. Dream of lawyers more concerned about justice than a judgeship. Dream of preachers who are concerned more about prophecy than profiteering. Dream on the high road with sound values.

And then America, as we go forth to September, October, November and then beyond, America must never surrender to a high moral challenge.

Do not surrender to drugs. The best drug policy is a « no first use. » Don’t surrender with needles and cynicism. Let’s have « no first use » on the one hand, or clinics on the other. Never surrender, young America. Go forward.

America must never surrender to malnutrition. We can feed the hungry and clothe the naked. We must never surrender. We must go forward.

We must never surrender to illiteracy. Invest in our children. Never surrender; and go forward. We must never surrender to inequality. Women cannot compromise ERA or comparable worth. Women are making 60 cents on the dollar to what a man makes. Women cannot buy meat cheaper. Women cannot buy bread cheaper. Women cannot buy milk cheaper. Women deserve to get paid for the work that you do. It’s right! And it’s fair.

Don’t surrender, my friends. Those who have AIDS tonight, you deserve our compassion.

Even with AIDS you must not surrender.

In your wheelchairs. I see you sitting here tonight in those wheelchairs. I’ve stayed with you. I’ve reached out to you across our Nation. And don’t you give up. I know it’s tough sometimes. People look down on you. It took you a little more effort to get here tonight. And no one should look down on you, but sometimes mean people do. The only justification we have for looking down on someone is that we’re going to stop and pick them up.

But even in your wheelchairs, don’t you give up. We cannot forget 50 years ago when our backs were against the wall, Roosevelt was in a wheelchair. I would rather have Roosevelt in a wheelchair than Reagan and Bush on a horse. Don’t you surrender and don’t you give up. Don’t surrender and don’t give up!

Why I cannot challenge you this way? « Jesse Jackson, you don’t understand my situation. You be on television. You don’t understand. I see you with the big people. You don’t understand my situation. »

I understand. You see me on TV, but you don’t know the me that makes me, me. They wonder, « Why does Jesse run? » because they see me running for the White House. They don’t see the house I’m running from.

I have a story. I wasn’t always on television. Writers were not always outside my door. When I was born late one afternoon, October 8th, in Greenville, South Carolina, no writers asked my mother her name. Nobody chose to write down our address. My mama was not supposed to make it, and I was not supposed to make it. You see, I was born of a teen-age mother, who was born of a teen-age mother.

I understand. I know abandonment, and people being mean to you, and saying you’re nothing and nobody and can never be anything.

I understand. Jesse Jackson is my third name. I’m adopted. When I had no name, my grandmother gave me her name. My name was Jesse Burns ’til I was 12. So I wouldn’t have a blank space, she gave me a name to hold me over. I understand when nobody knows your name. I understand when you have no name.

I understand. I wasn’t born in the hospital. Mama didn’t have insurance. I was born in the bed at [the] house. I really do understand. Born in a three-room house, bathroom in the backyard, slop jar by the bed, no hot and cold running water. I understand. Wallpaper used for decoration? No. For a windbreaker. I understand. I’m a working person’s person. That’s why I understand you whether you’re Black or White. I understand work. I was not born with a silver spoon in my mouth. I had a shovel programmed for my hand.

My mother, a working woman. So many of the days she went to work early, with runs in her stockings. She knew better, but she wore runs in her stockings so that my brother and I could have matching socks and not be laughed at at school. I understand.

At 3 o’clock on Thanksgiving Day, we couldn’t eat turkey because momma was preparing somebody else’s turkey at 3 o’clock. We had to play football to entertain ourselves. And then around 6 o’clock she would get off the Alta Vista bus and we would bring up the leftovers and eat our turkey — leftovers, the carcass, the cranberries — around 8 o’clock at night. I really do understand.

Every one of these funny labels they put on you, those of you who are watching this broadcast tonight in the projects, on the corners, I understand. Call you outcast, low down, you can’t make it, you’re nothing, you’re from nobody, subclass, underclass; when you see Jesse Jackson, when my name goes in nomination, your name goes in nomination.

I was born in the slum, but the slum was not born in me. And it wasn’t born in you, and you can make it.

Wherever you are tonight, you can make it. Hold your head high; stick your chest out. You can make it. It gets dark sometimes, but the morning comes. Don’t you surrender!

Suffering breeds character, character breeds faith. In the end faith will not disappoint.

You must not surrender! You may or may not get there but just know that you’re qualified! And you hold on, and hold out! We must never surrender!! America will get better and better.

Keep hope alive. Keep hope alive! Keep hope alive! On tomorrow night and beyond, keep hope alive!

I love you very much. I love you very much.

 

Sans titre

Prononcé à la Democratic National Convention le 17 août 2000 à Los Angeles.

The long arm of justice reaches neither for the political left nor the political right, but for the moral center. Vanity asks the question, Is it popular? Politics asks the question, Will it work? Can I win? Morality and conscience ask the question, Is it right? In the end, if it is morally right, politics and popularity has to adjust to the unyielding power of the moral center.

There was a left and right in slavery but no moral center, a left and a right in denying women the right to vote but no moral center.

Tonight we gather here in Los Angeles, home to dream makers who entice the world, but also home of the janitors and sanitary workers who clean up your world. Los Angeles, home of a handful of America’s richest people and hundreds of America’s poorest workers.

This Democratic convention is set in that great divide between Beverly Hills and South Central, between the dream makers and dream breakers. And we commit ourselves today to make America better, to stand with the janitors who had to strike to get a dollar more an hour, to stand with the hotel workers who work every day but don’t get health care. We are on your side.

Two weeks ago, in Philadelphia, the nation was treated to a staged show—smoke, mirrors, hired acts the Republicans called inclusion. That was the inclusion illusion.

In Philadelphia… diversity ended on that stage. They could not mention the words “Africa,” “Appalachia” or “AIDS” once.

So it’s good to be in Los Angeles, to look over this great assembly and see the real deal, the quilt with many patches that is America. There are 1,000 union workers here… a thousand African Americans, 1,000 Latinos and Asian Americans. As many women as men…

America’s working families are here, headed by a Southern Baptist and an Orthodox Jew. This is America’s dream team, the Democratic Party.

In this diversity is our strength. Mr. Bush stood with Jefferson Davis and the Confederate flag in South Carolina and Abe Lincoln and the American flag in Baltimore, but Mr. Gore and Lieberman can say: One America, one flag.

Last week, when Al Gore chose Joe Lieberman as his running mate, he stood up for justice. He appealed to the best in America. In selecting Joe Lieberman, Al Gore has brought the sons and daughters of slaves and slave master together with the sons and daughters of Holocaust survivors, women fighting for self-determination, workers fighting for wage security and dignity.

Al Gore has raised the moral chin bar. When a barrier falls to one of the locked out, it opens doors for all.

I’ve devoted much of my life striving to bring light to dark places. Four decades ago, on July 17, 1960, I was jailed with several of my classmates, trying to use a library in Greenville, South Carolina. On July 17, 1984, I addressed you in San Francisco1.

We’ve come a long way. We are making America better.

I know something about the tides of change. I moved with it when the tide was coming in, and labored against it when it was flowing out. I’ve seen enough and done enough to know when the moment is right for history to be made again. My fellow Americans, we face such a moment today. This is a moment pregnant with possibility, a moment that we have waited for more than a generation to come our way.

Remember the dream of Dr. King, the dream of genuine economic opportunity for all. It has been deferred for too long, deferred by the assassination of Dr. King, by the Vietnam War, by the Cold War, by stagnant (ph) deficits (ph). Our imaginations have been shackled.

Now, America has no global military rival, deficits that become surpluses, promises to keep. This economy has enjoyed record growth, but America’s working families are still struggling to get by. Jobs are plentiful, but less secure. Wages are up but haven’t made up ground lost over the last 25 years.

Forty-five million Americans have no health insurance. They’re one illness away from bankruptcy. We cannot rest until every American is covered with health insurance.

In the midst of great wealth, one in five children still grow up in poverty. It’s a moral disgrace we cannot accept. A coal miner dies every six hours from black lung disease.

In Mud Creek (ph), Kentucky; in Hazzard (ph), in Nelsonville, Ohio, in Big Stone Gap, children live in trailers and go to school in trailers.

Think of Appalachia and remember most poor people are not on welfare, they work every day. They do their heavy lifting. They take the early bus. They work the late shift. Most poor people are neither brown nor black. They’re white. They’re female. They’re young. They’re invisible. But they’re all God’s children.

Let’s have a one big tent America.

On this November, there’ll be two teams on the field, two plans and two directions. On the right side, the Republican team is trying to change its uniform colors to blur the differences. But don’t be fooled. Just look at the team.

It’s not just Bush and Cheney, but the grizzled old veterans such as Jesse Helms, and Dick Armey, and Tom DeLay, and Bob Barr, and Strom Thurmond, and Trent Lott, and Pat Robertson, and Ralph Reed. This grizzly old team wants to take the surplus and give it away in tax breaks to benefit those who already are wealthy just to pay for their party.

But then, there’s another team, the team of Gore and Lieberman …and Gephardt, and Bonior, and Daschle, and Wellstone, and Jackson, Jr. and Charlie Rendell, and John Lewis, and Jim Clyburn, Luis Gutierrez, Velasquez, Sanchez, Wu. This is the all-American team.

They want to use the surplus to bolster Medicare, their prescription drug benefit. The question is clear. What shall we do with the surplus?

How shall we make America better? Bush and Cheney says give it to those who are already doing just fine. The Gore-Lieberman team says that money should make America stronger. That’s our choice. George W. says, tell us, we should look into his heart. But whatever is in his heart, the question is what is in his budget.

He says, “Leave no one behind.” But this contest is not about race or religion, it’s about resource distribution and budget priorities.

It’s about the airport security workers who have no health insurance. It’s about cooks at schools. It’s about farm workers. It’s about chicken plant workers who get carpal syndrome bending their wrists. It’s about cab drivers, hotel maids. It’s about janitors. This land is our land. It’s our land.

George Bush says, don’t mess with Texas. That’s fair. I just left Houston where I visited a children’s hospital. In Texas, 1.5 million children live in poverty. Ten percent of the nation’s poor, 500,000, are eligible for the Children’s Health Insurance Program but can’t get it because of bureaucracy. Six hundred thousand eligible for Medicare but they can’t get it. Don’t mess with Texas. Last in children’s health care, last in environmental protection, third worst state to raise a child, the fourth worst drop-out rate, and 38th in teacher’s salary. Don’t mess with Texas any more. Don’t mess with New York and California. Don’t mess with Illinois.

Don’t mess with America. Let us go forward.

What (inaudible) it is is, a one big tent and there are struggles within our party. We cannot duck the challenge of making the global economy work for working people, or fair trade, protecting labor rights and the environment so we lift wages at home and abroad, not just drive them down at home.

We affirm protest. We must make room for protesters and turn their idealism and creative energy into progress; build on their tradition. In 1960, public accommodations was a protest; in ’64 it was a law. In ’64, the right to vote was a protest; in ’65 it was a law. In ’88, affirming PLO and Israel talking was a protest; today it is law. Free Mandela was a protest; today it is law.

We must fight for protest and progress to make America better.

We must fight to include all Americans. We can not keep fighting a failed war on drugs; it must be a war against drug addiction. We can’t keep spending more on prisons than on colleges.

When Governor Ryan of Illinois can — says because those who are dying are mostly black, brown, poor, don’t have a lawyer, mistaken identity or wrongful convictions, we must not risk killing innocent people. There must be a moratorium on the death penalty until there is fairness for everybody.

As I close my friends, one thing I’m convince of, within our party we can fight for the right to do what’s right. We can change. We can challenge. We can agree to disagree. We can agree to be agreeable. But we’re a family.

When I look at these two teams and these two choices, Papa Bush gave us Clarence Thomas.

Baby Bush gave us an end to affirmative action and women’s right for self-determination in Florida. George W. will not stand against — for hate crime legislation. I say, America, stay out the Bushes. Stay out the Bushes.

My brothers and my sisters, your vote counts. And you count, and you matter. In 1960,

Kennedy beat Nixon by 112,000 votes, less than one vote per precinct. Every vote counts.

In 1960, we won by the margin of our hope. In ’68, Dr. King was killed, Robert Kennedy killed, explosion in Chicago, we were in despair, we lost to Nixon by 500,000 votes. We lost by despair. In ’76, again, we came together. Carter beat Ford by 1.7 million. Every vote counts, and everybody counts.

One vote decided that America would speak English rather than German in 1776. One vote kept Aaron Burr, later charged with treason, from becoming our president. One vote made Texas part of the United States of America in 1845. One vote changed France from a monarchy to a republic. One vote has the power to change our course.

And so tonight, I say, America, if we don’t have a prosperity deficit disorder, there’s more with Gore, more health care with Gore, more education with Gore, more health with Gore, more wages with Gore, more freedom with Gore, more strength with Gore, more security with Gore, more prosperity with Gore, it’s more and Gore.

It’s more and Gore. Keep hope alive. Keep hope alive. Keep hope alive. Louder.

 

Sans titre

Apparition surprise à la Democratic National Convention le 5 septembre 2012 en Caroline du Nord.

Forward, by hope, not backwards, by fear.

Today there is a new North Carolina, a new South and a new America. We could not have had this conference in North Carolina 40 years ago.

The cotton curtain is down. We couldn’t have had Bank of America behind the cotton curtain. Could not have had all this development from Winston-Salem, to Greensboro, to Raleigh- Durham down to Atlanta behind the cotton curtain.

We pulled that curtain down and opened up the south.

We’ve been asked over and over again, are we better off four years later. Those who have health care coverage who didn’t have it, they’re better off. Those who get health coverage with pre-existing conditions, they’re better off. Students who stay on their parents insurance plans until they’re 26, they are better off.

Keep hope alive, North Carolina is a winner.

 

Sans titre

Discours de Jesse Jackson Jr. à la Demotratic National Convention le 25 août à Denver.

I’m sure Dr. King is looking down on us here in Denver, noting that this is the first political convention in history to take place within sight of his mountaintop.

On the day President Johnson submitted the Voting Rights Act to Congress, he said, « At times, history and fate meet at a single time in a single place to shape a turning point in man’s unending search for freedom. »

So it was at Lexington and Concord. So it was at Appomattox. So it was in Selma, Alabama. Tonight, I would like to add: and so it shall be in Denver, Colorado, with the nomination of Barack Obama to be President of the United States.

What a remarkable thing it is that the man who came to this convention four years ago as the keynote speaker is returning this year as our party’s nominee. But for those of us who’ve known Barack over his decade in public office in Illinois the yearning for change, the hunger for unity that he’s tapped into across the country has a familiar ring.

I remember when Barack first decided to run for the United States Senate. He’d had a remarkable career in the state Senate, reaching across the aisle to put a tax cut into the pockets of working families, to expand health care for more children and parents and to take on the lobbyists who had so much influence in Springfield.

But despite this record, most in Springfield didn’t take his candidacy all that seriously. The party establishment was skeptical of this young leader from the South Side. They didn’t know what to make of a man like Barack, with a father from Kenya, a mother from Kansas and a funny name that few could pronounce. They didn’t see how this former community organizer could possibly defeat candidates with more money, more name recognition and more backing from « all the right people. »

But here’s the thing: that race wasn’t going to be decided in the halls of power in Springfield or the high rises on the lakefront. It was not going to be decided by the power brokers or opinion shapers. It was going to be decided by the people of Illinois. Illinois is America. It’s great cities and small towns, it’s old factories and new industries, it’s timeless Midwestern values of faith, family and hard work. And it’s black and white and Latino all living together, as one Illinois family, as one America. And the people of Illinois were hungry for change. From the old factory towns of our industrial north to the farms of our agrarian south, families had been struggling to meet the challenges of our global economy. And more often than not, they’d been harmed, rather than helped, by economic policies that failed to them get ahead and reach for their dreams.

But what they heard from Barack as he traveled across the state was a message of hope. Whether he was upstate or downstate; whether he was talking with folks who’d been laid off and seen their jobs shipped overseas or families struggling to keep up with rising costs; whether he was talking with recent immigrants who wanted to know that America had a place for them too, or African Americans who were falling further and further behind, Barack spoke of the same powerful idea. The idea that’s at the heart of who Barack is. The idea that’s at the heart of who we are as Americans. And the idea that’s at the heart of this campaign. That we all have a stake in each other; that the well-being of the « we » depends on the well-being of the « he » and « she »; and that in this country we rise and fall together as one people, as one nation.

And what I saw in that campaign is what I’m seeing today: ordinary men and women of all races, all religions, all walks of life coming together to demand a government in Washington that’s as honest and decent, as purposeful and responsible as the American people.

Fellow Democrats, this is an historic moment. I know. I grew up with the lessons of another generation, my father’s generation. I know his stories of struggle and sacrifice, of fear and division. I know America is still a place where dreams are too often deferred and opportunities too often denied.

But here’s what I also know. I know that while America may not be perfect, our union can always be perfected. I know what we can achieve when good people with strong convictions come together around a common purpose. And I know what a great leader can do to help us find common ground. America, we need such a leader today, a leader who can heal the wounds of the last eight years, a leader who knows that what unites us is greater than what divides us and that America is at its strongest when hard work is rewarded and all of our dreams are within reach.

I know Barack Obama. I’ve seen his leadership at work. I’ve seen the difference he’s made in the lives of people across Illinois. And that is why I know that for the sake of our children, our families, and the future we hold in common, he is the leader America needs right now. Forty-five years to the day after a young preacher called out, « Let freedom ring, » let history show in this fourth week of August in this Mile-High City, freedom in America has never rung from a higher mountaintop than it does here today.