Barack Obama: “This is your generation’s world to shape”, Virtual Commencement speech - 2020

17 May 2020

Hi, everybody. Aniyah, thank you for that beautiful introduction. I could not be prouder of everything you’ve done in your time with the Obama Foundation.

And of course, I couldn’t be prouder of all of you in the graduating Class of 2020 — as well as the teachers, and the coaches, and most of all, parents and family who guided have you along the way.

Now graduating is a big achievement under any circumstances. Some of you have had to overcome serious obstacles along the way, whether it was an illness, or a parent losing a job, or living in a neighborhood where people too often count you out. Along with the usual challenges of growing up, all of you have had to deal with the added pressures of social media, reports of school shootings, and the specter of climate change. And then, just as you’re about to celebrate having made it through, just as you’ve been looking forward to proms and senior nights, graduation ceremonies — and, let’s face it, a whole bunch of parties — the world is turned upside down by a global pandemic. And as much as I’m sure you love your parents, I’ll bet that being stuck at home with them and playing board games or watching Tiger King on TV is not exactly how you envisioned the last few months of your senior year.

Now I’ll be honest with you — the disappointments of missing a live graduation — those will pass pretty quick. I don’t remember much from my own high school graduation. I know that not having to sit there and listen to a commencement speaker isn’t all that bad — mine usually go on way too long. Also, not that many people look great in those caps, especially if you have big ears like me. And you’ll have plenty of time to catch up with your friends once the immediate public health crisis is over.

But what remains true is that your graduation marks your passage into adulthood — the time when you begin to take charge of your own life. It’s when you get to decide what’s important to you: the kind of career you want to pursue. Who you want to build a family with. The values you want to live by. And given the current state of the world, that may be kind of scary.

If you’d planned on going away for college, getting dropped off at campus in the fall — that’s no longer a given. If you were planning to work while going to school, finding that first job is going to be tougher. Even families that are relatively well-off are dealing with massive uncertainty. Those who were struggling before — they’re hanging on by a thread.

All of which means that you’re going to have to grow up faster than some generations. This pandemic has shaken up the status quo and laid bare a lot of our country’s deep-seated problems — from massive economic inequality to ongoing racial disparities to a lack of basic health care for people who need it. It’s woken a lot of young people up to the fact that the old ways of doing things just don’t work; that it doesn’t matter how much money you make if everyone around you is hungry and sick; and that our society and our democracy only work when we think not just about ourselves, but about each other.

It’s also pulled the curtain back on another hard truth, something that we all have to eventually accept once our childhood comes to an end. All those adults that you used to think were in charge and knew what they were doing? Turns out that they don’t have all the answers. A lot of them aren’t even asking the right questions. So, if the world’s going to get better, it going to be up to you.

That realization may be kind of intimidating. But I hope it’s also inspiring. With all the challenges this country faces right now, nobody can tell you “no, you’re too young to understand” or “this is how it’s always been done.” Because with so much uncertainty, with everything suddenly up for grabs, this is your generation’s world to shape.

Since I’m one of the old guys, I won’t tell you what to do with this power that rests in your hands. But I’ll leave you with three quick pieces of advice.

First, don’t be afraid. America’s gone through tough times before — slavery, civil war, famine, disease, the Great Depression and 9/11. And each time we came out stronger, usually because a new generation, young people like you, learned from past mistakes and figured out how to make things better.

Second, do what you think is right. Doing what feels good, what’s convenient, what’s easy — that’s how little kids think. Unfortunately, a lot of so-called grown-ups, including some with fancy titles and important jobs, still think that way — which is why things are so screwed up.

I hope that instead, you decide to ground yourself in values that last, like honesty, hard work, responsibility, fairness, generosity, respect for others. You won’t get it right every time, you’ll make mistakes like we all do. But if you listen to the truth that’s inside yourself, even when it’s hard, even when its inconvenient, people will notice. They’ll gravitate towards you. And you’ll be part of the solution instead of part of the problem.

And finally, build a community. No one does big things by themselves. Right now, when people are scared, it’s easy to be cynical and say let me just look out for myself, or my family, or people who look or think or pray like me. But if we’re going to get through these difficult times; if we’re going to create a world where everybody has the opportunity to find a job, and afford college; if we’re going to save the environment and defeat future pandemics, then we’re going to have to do it together. So be alive to one another’s struggles. Stand up for one another’s rights. Leave behind all the old ways of thinking that divide us — sexism, racial prejudice, status, greed — and set the world on a different path.

When you need help, Michelle and I have made it the mission of our Foundation to give young people like you the skills and support to lead in your own communities, and to connect you with other young leaders around the country and around the globe.

But the truth is that you don’t need us to tell you what to do.

Because in so many ways, you’ve already started to lead.

Congratulations, Class of 2020. Keep making us proud.

Larissa Martinez: 'America can be great again without the construction of a wall built on hatred and prejudice', McKinney Boyd High School - 2016

8 June 2016, McKinney, Texas, USA

Good afternoon. My name is Larissa Martinez and I am delighted to be standing here as the valedictorian of the class of 2016. In all, it's been a great year so far. As we are graduating today, the leader of the free world, Beyonce, dropped a new album Lemonade, and the greatest entertainer in our generation is leaving the White House. First and foremost, I would like to thank all of the parents and family members who are always there to make sure we would make it all the way to today. I would also like to thank all of the faculty and staff at McKinney Boyd because this school wouldn't be the same without them. Now I know some of you may be prepared to call me out, like Damian from Mean Girls, but I assure you that I do in fact go here.

Even though two fifths of you don't know of my existence. To each and every single one of you I saw thank you. You taught me that it's OK to be different and to overlook those differences, and accept you for being yourself. You also taught me that it is OK to push people to the side while rushing to class. I would also like to give special thanks to the people that have changed my life in one way or another and have stuck with my for the last few years. I know I am not always the easiest person to deal, so thank you for being there when I needed you the most. I would also like to thank my sister Andrew for giving me one more reason to keep going when it all seemed pointless. Finally the person I am most thankful for is my mother. You've been there with me through thick and thin. You are my best friend. While most mothers move move mountains for their children, you literally moved countries. Every sacrifice you have made, you have made for us. You are my number one fan and you never lost faith in me, even when I lost faith in myself. For that and many other things I will be eternally grateful.

Let me be frank. I am not going to stand up here and give you the Hallmark version of the valedictorian speech. Instead I would like to offer you a different kind of speech. One that discusses expectations versus reality. Many of you see may see me standing up here and must think "Her life is pretty great." Her parents must be very proud. I decided to stand before you today, and reveal these unexpected realities because this might be the only chance I get to convey the truth to all of you, that undocumented immigrants are people too. Those are only half truths. They are the expectations.

My reality is slightly different. On July 11 it will be exactly six years since I moved to McKinney from Mexico City, where I was born and raised. When people see me standing up here, they see a girl who is Yale-bound and has her life figured out. But that is far from the whole truth. So now I would like to convey my fair share of realities.

Reality number one: At the age of 11 I was nothing more than a girl with an abusive and alcoholic father who had to depend on her mother's strength. I was a girl with a dream that one day I would become an American and a girl that thought moving countries would solve all of the problems in her life.

Unexpected reality number two: At the age of 12 I was faced with the task of having to adapt and embrace a new culture. Often my intelligence was questioned due to my background. I was also faced with giving up part of my childhood so I could look after my little sister Andrea while my mom worked from morning until late at night. School became my safe haven because, despite not having internet, a washing machine, or even my own bed. I always had knowledge at my fingertips thanks to my school. And I realized that my be the only way I could help my family. Although we do not all share the same struggles or the same obstacles throughout life, we do share some of the sentiments. I know what it is like to be put down, to have your achievements put down, to not be acknowledged to be powerless. So at this time I would like to commend each and every single one of you here for preserving through your own challenges and being the resilient human beings you wanted to be. And from not letting any obstacles getting in the way of you today. We all have struggles. Struggles we want to face behind closed doors because others discovered them, it would be at our must vulnerable state and we would never be looked at the same way. Well, after all of these years, I have finally mustered up the courage to stand before and share a struggle I have to deal with each and every day.

Unexpected reality number three: I am one of the 11million undocumented immigrants living in the shadow of the United States. I decided to stand before you today, and reveal these unexpected realities because this might be the only chance I get to convey the truth to all of you, that undocumented immigrants are people too. I was hesitant to speak about this today, because of the great divide in opinions concerning the topic of immigration in America. But I feel like I owe it to you to be honest, and I owe it to myself. The most important part of the debate, and the part most overlooked, is the fact that immigrants, undocumented or otherwise, are people too. People with dreams, aspirations, hopes and loved ones. People like me. People who have become a part of the American society and way of life and who yearn to help make America great again - without the construction of a wall based on hatred and prejudice. We are here without official documentation, because the US immigration system is broken. And it has forced many families to live in fear. I myself have even been waiting seven years for my application to be processed. So I hope that all of you leave here today knowing that we are trying to do it the right way, but we don't know how.

I ask for all of you to try and look beyond the way the media portrays us and the dehumanizing accusations some politicians have made. I ask for you to please keep your hearts open and try to find the love and understanding that makes us human. Because after all we are people, just like you. While I can't predict the future, and tell you how successful you are all going to be. But by sharing my story today, I hope I can convince all of you that if I can break every stereotype based on what I am classified as - Mexican, female, undocumented - so can you. We do not have to let expectations become our reality. I am no expert in this journey we call life. But I am living proof that beating the system is possible. We do not have to conform to the limitations that others put on us. There will always be people that judge us, and set expectations based on their preconceived ideas of who they think we are and who they think we should be. However we have the ability to prove them wrong. In those moments when you need a reason to continue moving forward, close your eyes and picture yourself in the future setting. They told me I couldn't so I did. Thank you

Hillary Clinton: 'Don't be afraid of your ambition, of your dreams, or even your anger', Wellesley College - 2017

26 May 2017, Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts, USA

Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you very much for that warm welcome. I am so grateful to be here back at Wellesley, especially for President [Paula] Johnson's very first commencement, and would like to thank her, the trustees, families and friends, faculty, staff and guests for understanding and perpetuating the importance of this college: what it stands for, what it has meant and what it will do in the years ahead. And most importantly, it's wonderful to be here with another green class to say, congratulations to the class of 2017!

Now I have some of my dear friends here from my class, a green class of 1969. And I assume, or at least you can tell me later, unlike us, you actually have a class cheer. 1969 Wellesley. Yet another year with no class cheer. But it is such an honor to join with the college and all who have come to celebrate this day with you, and to recognize the amazing futures that await you.

You know, four years ago, maybe a little more or a little less for some of you — I told the trustees I was sitting with, after hearing Tala's speech, I didn't think I could get through it. So we'll blame allergy instead of emotion. But you know, you arrived at this campus. You arrived from all over. You joined students from 49 states and 58 countries. Now maybe you felt like you belonged right away. I doubt it. But maybe some of you did and you never wavered.

But maybe you changed your major three times and your hairstyle twice that many. Or maybe, after your first month of classes, you made a frantic collect call (ask your parents what that was) back to Illinois to tell your mother and father you weren't smart enough to be here. My father said, "Okay, come home." My mother said, "You have to stick it out." That's what happened to me.

But whatever your path, you dreamed big. You probably, in true Wellesley fashion, planned your academic and extracurricular schedule right down to the minute. So this day that you've been waiting for — and maybe dreading a little — is finally here.

As President Johnson said, I spoke at my commencement 48 years ago. I came back 25 years ago to speak at another commencement. I couldn't think of any place I'd rather be this year than right here.

Now, you may have heard that things didn't exactly go the way I planned. But you know what? I'm doing okay. I've gotten to spend time with my family, especially my amazing grandchildren. I was going to give the entire commencement speech about them but was talked out of it. Long walks in the woods, organizing my closets, right? I won't lie. Chardonnay helped a little, too.

But here's what helped most of all: remembering who I am, where I come from, and what I believe. And that is what Wellesley means to me. This college gave me so much. It launched me on a life of service and provided friends that I still treasure. So wherever your life takes you, I hope that Wellesley serves as that kind of touchstone for you.

Now if any of you are nervous about what you'll be walking into when you leave the campus, I know that feeling. I do remember my commencement. I'd been asked by my classmates to speak. I stayed up all night with my friends, the third floor of Davis, writing and editing my speech. By the time we gathered in the Academic Quad, I was exhausted. My hair was a wreck. The mortarboard made it worse. But I was pretty oblivious to all of that, because what my friends had asked me to do was to talk about our worries, and about our ability and responsibility to do something about them.

We didn't trust government, authority figures, or really anyone over 30, in large part thanks to years of heavy casualties and dishonest official statements about Vietnam, and deep differences over civil rights and poverty here at home. We were asking urgent questions about whether women, people of color, religious minorities, immigrants, would ever be treated with dignity and respect.

And by the way, we were furious about the past presidential election of a man whose presidency would eventually end in disgrace with his impeachment for obstruction of justice after firing the person running the investigation into him at the Department of Justice.

But here's what I want you to know. We got through that tumultuous time, and once again began to thrive as our society changed laws and opened the circle of opportunity and rights wider and wider for more Americans. We revved up the engines of innovation and imagination. We turned back a tide of intolerance and embraced inclusion. The "we" who did those things were more than those in power who wanted to change course. It was millions of ordinary citizens, especially young people, who voted, marched and organized.

Now, of course today has some important differences. The advance of technology, the impact of the internet, our fragmented media landscape, make it easier than ever to splinter ourselves into echo chambers. We can shut out contrary voices, avoid ever questioning our basic assumptions. Extreme views are given powerful microphones. Leaders willing to exploit fear and skepticism have tools at their disposal that were unimaginable when I graduated.

And here's what that means to you, the Class of 2017. You are graduating at a time when there is a full-fledged assault on truth and reason. Just log on to social media for 10 seconds. It will hit you right in the face. People denying science, concocting elaborate, hurtful conspiracy theories about child-abuse rings operating out of pizza parlors, drumming up rampant fear about undocumented immigrants, Muslims, minorities, the poor, turning neighbor against neighbor and sowing division at a time when we desperately need unity. Some are even denying things we see with our own eyes, like the size of crowds, and then defending themselves by talking about quote-unquote "alternative facts."

But this is serious business. Look at the budget that was just proposed in Washington. It is an attack of unimaginable cruelty on the most vulnerable among us, the youngest, the oldest, the poorest and hard-working people who need a little help to gain or hang on to a decent middle class life. It grossly under-funds public education, mental health and efforts even to combat the opioid epidemic. And in reversing our commitment to fight climate change, it puts the future of our nation and our world at risk. And to top it off, it is shrouded in a trillion-dollar mathematical lie. Let's call it what it is. It's a con. They don't even try to hide it.

Why does all this matter? It matters because if our leaders lie about the problems we face, we'll never solve them. It matters because it undermines confidence in government as a whole, which in turn breeds more cynicism and anger. But it also matters because our country, like this College, was founded on the principles of the Enlightenment — in particular, the belief that people, you and I, possess the capacity for reason and critical thinking, and that free and open debate is the lifeblood of a democracy. Not only Wellesley, but the entire American university system — the envy of the world — was founded on those fundamental ideals. We should not abandon them; we should revere them. We should aspire to them every single day, in everything we do.

And there's something else. As the history majors among you here today know all too well, when people in power invent their own facts, and attack those who question them, it can mark the beginning of the end of a free society. That is not hyperbole. It is what authoritarian regimes throughout history have done. They attempt to control reality — not just our laws and rights and our budgets, but our thoughts and beliefs.

Right now, some of you might wonder, well why am I telling you all this? You don't own a cable news network. You don't control the Facebook algorithm. You aren't a member of Congress —yet. Because I believe with all my heart that the future of America — indeed, the future of the world — depends on brave, thoughtful people like you insisting on truth and integrity, right now, every day. You didn't create these circumstances, but you have the power to change them.

Vaclav Havel, the dissident playwright, first President of the Czech Republic, wrote an essay called "The Power of the Powerless." And in it, he said: "The moment someone breaks through in one place, when one person cries out, 'The emperor is naked!' — when a single person breaks the rules of the game, thus exposing it as a game — everything suddenly appears in another light."

What he's telling us is if you feel powerless, don't. Don't let anyone tell you your voice doesn't matter. In the years to come, there will be trolls galore — online and in person — eager to tell you that you don't have anything worthwhile to say or anything meaningful to contribute. They may even call you a Nasty Woman. Some may take a slightly more sophisticated approach and say your elite education means you are out of touch with real people. In other words, "sit down and shut up." Now, in my experience, that's the last thing you should ever tell a Wellesley graduate.

And here's the good news. What you've learned these four years is precisely what you need to face the challenges of this moment. First, you learned critical thinking. I can still remember the professors who challenged me to make decisions with good information, rigorous reasoning, real deliberation. I know we didn't have much of that in this past election, but we have to get back to it. After all, in the words of my predecessor in the Senate, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, "Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts."

And your education gives you more than knowledge. It gives you the power to keep learning and apply what you know to improve your life and the lives of others. Because you are beginning your careers with one of the best educations in the world, I think you do have a special responsibility to give others the chance to learn and think for themselves, and to learn from them, so that we can have the kind of open, fact-based debate necessary for our democracy to survive and flourish. And along the way, you may be convinced to change your mind from time to time. You know what? That's okay. Take it from me, the former president of the Wellesley College Young Republicans.

Second, you learned the value of an open mind and an open society. At their best, our colleges and universities are free market places of ideas, embracing a diversity of perspectives and backgrounds. That's our country at our best, too. An open, inclusive, diverse society is the opposite of and antidote to a closed society, where there is only one right way to think, believe, and act. Here at Wellesley, you've worked hard to turn this ideal into a reality. You've spoken out against racism and sexism and xenophobia and discrimination of all kinds. And you've shared your own stories. And at times that's taken courage. But the only way our society will ever become a place where everyone truly belongs is if all of us speak openly and honestly about who we are, what we're going through. So keep doing that.

And let me add that your learning, listening, and serving should include people who don't agree with you politically. A lot of our fellow Americans have lost faith in the existing economic, social, political, and cultural conditions of our country.

Many feel left behind, left out, looked down on. Their anger and alienation has proved a fertile ground for false promises and false information. Their economic problems and cultural anxiety must be addressed, or they will continue to sign up to be foot-soldiers in the ongoing conflict between "us" and "them."

The opportunity is here. Millions of people will be hurt by the policies, including this budget that is being considered. And many of these same people don't want DREAMers deported their health care taken away. Many don't want to retreat on civil rights, women's rights, and LGBT rights. So if your outreach is rebuffed, keep trying. Do the right thing anyway. We're going to share this future. Better to do so with open hearts and outstretched hands than closed minds and clenched fists.

And third, here at Wellesley, you learned the power of service. Because while free and fierce conversations in classrooms, dorm rooms, dining halls are vital, they only get us so far. You have to turn those ideas and those values into action. This College has always understood that. The motto which you've heard twice already, "Not to be ministered unto, but to minister" is as true today as it ever was. If you think about it, it's kind of an old-fashioned rendering of President Kennedy's great statement, "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country."

Not long ago, I got a note from a group of Wellesley alums and students who had supported me in the campaign. They worked their hearts out. And, like a lot of people, they're wondering: What do we do now?

Well I think there's only one answer, to keep going. Don't be afraid of your ambition, of your dreams, or even your anger – those are powerful forces. But harness them to make a difference in the world. Stand up for truth and reason. Do it in private – in conversations with your family, your friends, your workplace, your neighborhoods. And do it in public—in Medium posts, on social media, or grab a sign and head to a protest. Make defending truth and a free society a core value of your life every single day.

So wherever you wind up next, the minute you get there, register to vote, and while you're at it, encourage others to do so. And then vote in every election, not just the presidential ones. Bring others to vote. Fight every effort to restrict the right of law-abiding citizens to be able to vote as well. Get involved in a cause that matters to you. Pick one, start somewhere. You don't have to do everything, but don't sit on the sidelines. And you know what? Get to know your elected officials. If you disagree with them, ask questions. Challenge them. Better yet, run for office yourself some day. Now that's not for everybody, I know. And it's certainly not for the faint of heart. But it's worth it. As they say in one of my favorite movies, A League of Their Own, "It's supposed to be hard. The hard is what makes it great."

As Tala said, the day after the election, I did want to speak particularly to women and girls everywhere, especially young women, because you are valuable and powerful and deserving of every chance and opportunity in the world. Not just your future, but our future depends on you believing that. We need your smarts, of course, but we also need your compassion, your curiosity, your stubbornness. And remember, you are even more powerful because you have so many people supporting you, cheering you on, standing with you through good times and bad.

Our culture often celebrates people who appear to go it alone. But the truth is, that's not how life works. Anything worth doing takes a village. And you build that village by investing love and time into your relationships. And in those moments for whatever reason when it might feel bleak, think back to this place where women have the freedom to take risks, make mistakes, even fail in front of each other. Channel the strength of your Wellesley classmates and experiences. I guarantee you it'll help you stand up a little straighter, feel a little braver, knowing that the things you joked about and even took for granted can be your secret weapons for your future.

One of the things that gave me the most hope and joy after the election, when I really needed it, was meeting so many young people who told me that my defeat had not defeated them. And I'm going to devote a lot of my future to helping you make your mark in the world. I created a new organization called Onward Together to help recruit and train future leaders, and organize for real and lasting change. The work never ends.

When I graduated and made that speech, I did say, and some of you might have pictures from that day with this on it, "The challenge now is to practice politics as the art of making what appears to be impossible, possible." That was true then. It's truer today. I never could have imagined where I would have been 48 years later — certainly never that I would have run for the Presidency of the United States or seen progress for women in all walks of life over the course of my lifetime. And yes, put millions of more cracks in that highest and hardest glass ceiling.

Because just in those years, doors that once seemed sealed to women are now opened. They're ready for you to walk through or charge through, to advance the struggle for equality, justice, and freedom.

So whatever your dreams are today, dream even bigger. Wherever you have set your sights, raise them even higher. And above all, keep going. Don't do it because I asked you so. Do it for yourselves. Do it for truth and reason. Do it because the history of Wellesley and this country tells us it's often during the darkest times when you can do the most good. Double down on your passions. Be bold. Try, fail, try again, and lean on each other. Hold on to your values. Never give up on those dreams.

I'm very optimistic about the future, because I think, after we've tried a lot of other things, we get back to the business of America. I believe in you. With all my heart, I want you to believe in yourselves. So go forth, be great. But first, graduate.

Congratulations!

Ken Burns: "You must do everything you can to defeat the retrograde forces that have invaded our democratic process", Stanford University - 2016

12 June 2016, Stanford University, Stanford, California, USA

President Hennessy, members of the Board of Trustees, distinguished faculty and staff, proud and relieved parents, calm and serene grandparents, distracted but secretly pleased siblings, ladies and gentlemen, graduating students of the Class of 2016, good morning. I am deeply honored and privileged that you have asked me here to say a few words at so momentous an occasion, that you might find what I have to say worthy of your attention on so important a day, especially one with such historical significance. One hundred and twenty-five years. Wow.

Thank you, too, for that generous introduction, President Hennessy. I always feel compelled, though, to inoculate myself against such praise by remembering that I have on my refrigerator at home an old and now faded cartoon, which shows two men standing in hell, the flames licking up around them. One guy says to the other, “Apparently my over 200 screen credits didn’t mean a damn thing.” They don’t, of course; there is much more meaning in your accomplishments, which we memorialize today.

I am in the business of memorializing – of history. It is not always a popular subject on college campuses today, particularly when, at times, it may seem to some an anachronistic and irrelevant pursuit, particularly with the ferocious urgency this moment seems to exert on us. It is my job, however, to remind people – with story, memory, anecdote and feeling – of the power our past also exerts, to help us better understand what’s going on now. It is my job to try to discern patterns and themes from history to enable us to interpret our dizzying, and sometimes dismaying, present. For nearly 40 years now, I have diligently practiced and rigorously maintained a conscious neutrality in my work, avoiding the advocacy of many of my colleagues, trying to speak to all of my fellow citizens.

Over those decades of historical documentary filmmaking, I have also come to the realization that history is not a fixed thing, a collection of precise dates, facts and events that add up to a quantifiable, certain, confidently known truth. History is a mysterious and malleable thing, constantly changing, not just as new information emerges, but as our own interests, emotions and inclinations change. Each generation rediscovers and reexamines that part of its past that gives its present new meaning, new possibility and new power. The question becomes for us now – for you especially – what will we choose as our inspiration? Which distant events and long dead figures will provide us with the greatest help, the most coherent context and the wisdom to go forward?

This is in part an existential question. None of us gets out of here alive. An exception will not be made in your case and you’ll live forever. You can’t actually design your life. (If you want to make God laugh, the saying goes, tell her your plans.) The hard times and vicissitudes of life will ultimately visit everyone. You will also come to realize that you are less defined by the good things that happen to you, your moments of happiness and apparent control, than you are by those misfortunes and unexpected challenges that, in fact, shape you more definitively, and help to solidify your true character – the measure of any human value. You, especially, know that the conversation that comes out of tragedy and injustice needs to be encouraged, emphasis on courage. It is through those conversations that we make progress.

A mentor of mine, the journalist Tom Brokaw, recently said to me, “What we learn is more important than what we set out to do.” It’s tough out there, but so beautiful, too. And history – memory – can prepare you.

I have a searing memory of the summer of 1962, when I was almost 9, joining our family dinner on a hot, sweltering day in a tract house in a development in Newark, Delaware, and seeing my mother crying. She had just learned, and my brother and I had just been told, that she would be dead of cancer within six months. But that’s not what was causing her tears. Our inadequate health insurance had practically bankrupted us, and our neighbors – equally struggling working people – had taken up a collection and presented my parents with six crisp $20 bills – $120 in total – enough to keep us solvent for more than a month. In that moment, I understood something about community and courage, about constant struggle and little victories. That hot June evening was a victory. And I have spent my entire professional life trying to resurrect small moments within the larger sweep of American history, trying to find our better angels in the most difficult of circumstances, trying to wake the dead, to hear their stories.

But how do we keep that realization of our own inevitable mortality from paralyzing us with fear? And how do we also keep our usual denial of this fact from depriving our lives and our actions of real meaning, of real purpose? This is our great human challenge, your challenge. This is where history can help. The past often offers an illuminating and clear-headed perspective from which to observe and reconcile the passions of the present moment, just when they threaten to overwhelm us. The history we know, the stories we tell ourselves, relieve that existential anxiety, allow us to live beyond our fleeting lifespans, and permit us to value and love and distinguish what is important. And the practice of history, both personal and professional, becomes a kind of conscience for us.

As a filmmaker, as a historian, as an American, I have been drawn continually to the life and example and words of Abraham Lincoln. He seems to get us better than we get ourselves. One hundred and fifty-eight years ago, in mid-June of 1858, Abraham Lincoln, running in what would be a failed bid for the United States Senate, at a time of bitter partisanship in our national politics, almost entirely over the issue of slavery, spoke to the Republican State Convention in the Illinois Statehouse in Springfield. His political party was brand new, born barely four years before with one single purpose in mind: to end the intolerable hypocrisy of chattel slavery that still existed in a country promoting certain unalienable rights to itself and the world.

He said, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”

Four and half years later, he was president, presiding over a country in the midst of the worst crisis in American history, our Civil War, giving his Annual Message to Congress, what we now call the State of the Union. The state of the Union was not good. His house was divided. But he also saw the larger picture. “The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise – with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.”

And then he went on: “Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history. … The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation. We say we are for Union. The world will not forget that we say this. We know how to save the Union. … In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free – honorable alike in what we give, and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth.”

You are the latest generation he was metaphorically speaking about, and you are, whether you are yet aware of it or not, charged with saving our Union. The stakes are slightly different than the ones Lincoln faced – there is not yet armed rebellion – but they are just as high. And before you go out and try to live and shape the rest of your life, you are required now to rise, as Lincoln implored us, with the occasion.

You know, it is terribly fashionable these days to criticize the United States government, the institution Lincoln was trying to save, to blame it for all the ills known to humankind, and, my goodness, ladies and gentlemen, it has made more than its fair share of catastrophic mistakes. But you would be hard pressed to find – in all of human history – a greater force for good. From our Declaration of Independence to our Constitution and Bill of Rights; from Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, Fifteenth and Nineteenth Amendments to the Land Grant College and Homestead Acts; from the transcontinental railroad and our national parks to child labor laws, Social Security and the National Labor Relations Act; from the GI Bill and the interstate highway system to putting a man on the moon and the Affordable Care Act, the United States government has been the author of many of the best aspects of our public and personal lives. But if you tune in to politics, if you listen to the rhetoric of this election cycle, you are made painfully aware that everything is going to hell in a handbasket and the chief culprit is our evil government.

Part of the reason this kind of criticism sticks is because we live in an age of social media where we are constantly assured that we are all independent free agents. But that free agency is essentially unconnected to real community, divorced from civic engagement, duped into believing in our own lonely primacy by a sophisticated media culture that requires you – no, desperately needs you – to live in an all-consuming disposable present, wearing the right blue jeans, driving the right car, carrying the right handbag, eating at all the right places, blissfully unaware of the historical tides that have brought us to this moment, blissfully uninterested in where those tides might take us.

Our spurious sovereignty is reinforced and perpetually underscored to our obvious and great comfort, but this kind of existence actually ingrains in us a stultifying sameness that rewards conformity (not courage), ignorance and anti-intellectualism (not critical thinking). This wouldn’t be so bad if we were just wasting our own lives, but this year our political future depends on it. And there comes a time when I – and you – can no longer remain neutral, silent. We must speak up – and speak out.

For 216 years, our elections, though bitterly contested, have featured the philosophies and character of candidates who were clearly qualified. That is not the case this year. One is glaringly not qualified. So before you do anything with your well-earned degree, you must do everything you can to defeat the retrograde forces that have invaded our democratic process, divided our house, to fight against, no matter your political persuasion, the dictatorial tendencies of the candidate with zero experience in the much maligned but subtle art of governance; who is against lots of things, but doesn’t seem to be for anything, offering only bombastic and contradictory promises, and terrifying Orwellian statements; a person who easily lies, creating an environment where the truth doesn’t seem to matter; who has never demonstrated any interest in anyone or anything but himself and his own enrichment; who insults veterans, threatens a free press, mocks the handicapped, denigrates women, immigrants and all Muslims; a man who took more than a day to remember to disavow a supporter who advocates white supremacy and the Ku Klux Klan; an infantile, bullying man who, depending on his mood, is willing to discard old and established alliances, treaties and long-standing relationships. I feel genuine sorrow for the understandably scared and – they feel – powerless people who have flocked to his campaign in the mistaken belief that – as often happens on TV – a wand can be waved and every complicated problem can be solved with the simplest of solutions. They can’t. It is a political Ponzi scheme. And asking this man to assume the highest office in the land would be like asking a newly minted car driver to fly a 747.

As a student of history, I recognize this type. He emerges everywhere and in all eras. We see nurtured in his campaign an incipient proto-fascism, a nativist anti-immigrant Know Nothing-ism, a disrespect for the judiciary, the prospect of women losing authority over their own bodies, African Americans again asked to go to the back of the line, voter suppression gleefully promoted, jingoistic saber rattling, a total lack of historical awareness, a political paranoia that, predictably, points fingers, always making the other wrong. These are all virulent strains that have at times infected us in the past. But they now loom in front of us again – all happening at once. We know from our history books that these are the diseases of ancient and now fallen empires. The sense of commonwealth, of shared sacrifice, of trust, so much a part of American life, is eroding fast, spurred along and amplified by an amoral Internet that permits a lie to circle the globe three times before the truth can get started.

We no longer have the luxury of neutrality or “balance,” or even of bemused disdain. Many of our media institutions have largely failed to expose this charlatan, torn between a nagging responsibility to good journalism and the big ratings a media circus always delivers. In fact, they have given him the abundant airtime he so desperately craves, so much so that it has actually worn down our natural human revulsion to this kind of behavior. Hey, he’s rich; he must be doing something right. He is not. Edward R. Murrow would have exposed this naked emperor months ago. He is an insult to our history. Do not be deceived by his momentary “good behavior.” It is only a spoiled, misbehaving child hoping somehow to still have dessert.

And do not think that the tragedy in Orlando underscores his points. It does not. We must “disenthrall ourselves,” as Abraham Lincoln said, from the culture of violence and guns. And then “we shall save our country.”

This is not a liberal or conservative issue, a red state, blue state divide. This is an American issue. Many honorable people, including the last two Republican presidents, members of the party of Abraham Lincoln, have declined to support him. And I implore those “Vichy Republicans” who have endorsed him to please, please reconsider. We must remain committed to the kindness and community that are the hallmarks of civilization and reject the troubling, unfiltered Tourette’s of his tribalism.

The next few months of your “commencement,” that is to say, your future, will be critical to the survival of our Republic. “The occasion is piled high with difficulty.” Let us pledge here today that we will not let this happen to the exquisite, yet deeply flawed, land we all love and cherish – and hope to leave intact to our posterity. Let us “nobly save,” not “meanly lose, the last best hope of earth.”

Let me speak directly to the graduating class. Watch out. Here comes the advice.

Look. I am the father of four daughters. If someone tells you they’ve been sexually assaulted, take it effing seriously. And listen to them! Maybe, some day, we will make the survivor’s eloquent statement as important as Dr. King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail.

Try not to make the other wrong, as I just did with that “presumptive” nominee. Be for something.

Be curious, not cool. Feed your soul, too. Every day.

Remember, insecurity makes liars of us all. Not just presidential candidates.

Don’t confuse success with excellence. The poet Robert Penn Warren once told me that “careerism is death.”

Do not descend too deeply into specialism either. Educate all of your parts. You will be healthier.

Free yourselves from the limitations of the binary world. It is just a tool. A means, not an end.

Seek out – and have – mentors. Listen to them. The late theatrical director Tyrone Guthrie once said, “We are looking for ideas large enough to be afraid of again.” Embrace those new ideas. Bite off more than you can chew.

Travel. Do not get stuck in one place. Visit our national parks. Their sheer majesty may remind you of your own “atomic insignificance,” as one observer noted, but in the inscrutable ways of Nature, you will feel larger, inspirited, just as the egotist in our midst is diminished by his or her self-regard.

Insist on heroes. And be one.

Read. The book is still the greatest manmade machine of all – not the car, not the TV, not the smartphone.

Make babies. One of the greatest things that will happen to you is that you will have to worry – I mean really worry – about someone other than yourself. It is liberating and exhilarating. I promise. Ask your parents.

Do not lose your enthusiasm. In its Greek etymology, the word enthusiasm means simply, “God in us.”

Serve your country. Insist that we fight the right wars. Convince your government, as Lincoln knew, that the real threat always and still comes from within this favored land. Governments always forget that.

Insist that we support science and the arts, especially the arts. They have nothing to do with the actual defense of our country – they just make our country worth defending.

Believe, as Arthur Miller told me in an interview for my very first film on the Brooklyn Bridge, “believe, that maybe you too could add something that would last and be beautiful.”

And vote. You indelibly underscore your citizenship – and our connection with each other – when you do.

Good luck. And Godspeed.

Jack Aiello: 'What we need is a cinnamon roll revolution!', Thomas Middle School - 2016

9 June 2016, Thomas Middle School, Illinois, USA

Hello everyone. I’ve decided that since we’re in the middle of an election year, I would do my graduation speech in the style of some of the 2016 presidential candidates, along with President Obama.

Let’s begin with Donald Trump

[As Trump]

Hello and congratulations you are now getting to hear a speech from the magnificent Donald Trump. And let me just tell you that Thomas has been such a great school, I mean, quite frankly, it’s been fantastic, I mean we have had so many great experiences here. You know one of those would have to be starting foreign language.

We’re learning languages from Spain, from France, from Germany, and China. And you know, people say I don’t like China,  I love China. I mean I have so many terrific friends in China. But I took Spanish, and let me tell you by the way, that it was fantastico. Moy fantastico.

And y’know, Foreign languages was one great thing, another one would have to be the showdown between the teachers themselves. We won in sixth grade, we won in seventh grade, but then we lost in eighth grade, but that’s okay, teachers, we’ll forgive you.

And let me just tell you by the way, if we have an entire team of Mr Craigs, who is fantastic by the way, he’s terrific. If we have an entire team of Mr Craigs,  we will win, and we will win, and believe me, we will win.

Infact quite frankly we will win so much you’ll be sick of winning.

And again, this is such a terrific crowd, and I know you’re all loving this speech, but I have to hand it off to Senator Ted Cruz.

[as Cruz]

Thank you Donald, Let me start by saying this. God bless the great school of Thomas. You know some of the greatest memories here at TMS were in the creative arts classes. Like in family and consumer science, baking the whacky chocolate cake, or sewing our very own miniature pellets. I had a Lamborghini on it, and I can assure you that that Lambhorgini is still a throw pillow on my bed, each and every day.

Or in music class, experimenting with the different tones of the boomwhackers. Or jamming on the ukuleles, creative arts unquestionably part of the great TMS memories.

And I know that President Obama shares some of the great feelings that I have about Thomas. Isn’t that right Mr President?

[As Obama]

You know, that right Ted. I’d like to start off by thanking our excellent Principal Mr Cate, he’s done a terrific job preparing us for high school. But back to the memories. Some of the greatest memories we had were gym class and PE. We diod all the regular sports you’d expect liek basketball and soccer, but we also did some unique ones too.

Like on rainy days we’d go into the small gym and do yoga.

And I am proud to say that I have completely mastered the downward dog.

You know we also did a unit entirely on dance. Dances like the Bavarian Shoe $. And we also did some Hawaiian dancing too. In fact I remember how one of the Hawaiian songs goes, it goes a little bit like this.

I wanna go back to my little grass hut,

Where all the old Hawaiians are singing [Hawaiian]

Aloha to that.

Anyway, TMS has given us some terrific memories, and now I’d like to pass it on to Secretary Clinton.

[As Hillary Clinton]

Thank you President Obama. I’d like to start off by thanking the great hardworking teachers of Thomas Middle School. They’ve been our champions. They’ve given us the skills we need to get through sixth grade and through seventh grade and eighth grade, and now we’re going to take those skills and apply them to high school.

And thanks to our teachers we have all the skills we need to succeed in this next chapter of our lives.

And they all deserve a big round of applause.

And I know that Senator Sanders agrees with me.

[As Bernie Sanders]

Yes I do agree with the Secretary.

And hello. Thank you for allowing me to speak to you today.

Let me start with the lunches they are delicious. Things like pizzas and tacos and chips, you name it! And some of the best cinnamon rolls I’ve ever tasted!

I do have one improvement for them though. We need to make them free!

Why should students have to pay for their own cinnamon rolls, doesn’t make any sense!

What we need is a cinnamon roll revolution!

You know another great experience would have to be going to Taft. Who can forget activities such as nightlight and cross country orienteering. Or indulging ourselves into some truly delicious meals like pot roast with noodles!

And finally to conclude this entire graduation speech. I would just like to say that the bottom line is this. As far as schools go, TMS is in the top one half of one half of one percent of schools, in the entire country!

Thank you all and congratulations to the class of 2016.

Barack Obama: 'Each of us believes that we will always be the winner in life's lottery, that we will be Donald Trump', Knox College - 2005

4 June 2005, Knox College, Illonois, USA

Good morning President Taylor, Board of Trustees, faculty, parents, family, friends, the community of Galesburg, the class of 1955 -- which I understand was out partying last night, and yet still showed up here on time -- and most of all, the Class of 2005. Congratulations on your graduation, and thank you -- thank you for the honor of allowing me to be a part of it. Thank you also, Mr. President, for this honorary degree. It was only a couple of years ago that I stopped paying my student loans in law school. Had I known it was this easy, I would have ran [sic] for the United States Senate earlier.

You know, it has been about six months now since you sent me to Washington as your United States Senator. I recognize that not all of you voted for me, so for those of you muttering under your breath "I didn’t send you anywhere," that's ok too. Maybe we’ll hold -- What do you call it? -- a little Pumphandle after the ceremony. Change your mind for the next time.

It has been a fascinating journey thus far. Each time I walk onto the Senate floor, I'm reminded of the history, for good and for ill, that has been made there. But there have been a few surreal moments. For example, I remember the day before I was sworn in, myself and my staff, we decided to hold a press conference in our office. Now, keep in mind that I am ranked 99th in seniority. I was proud that I wasn’t ranked dead last until I found out that it’s just because Illinois is bigger than Colorado. So I’m 99th in seniority, and all the reporters are crammed into the tiny transition office that I have, which is right next to the janitor’s closet in the basement of the Dirksen Office Building. It’s my first day in the building, I have not taken a single vote, I have not introduced one bill, had not even sat down in my desk, and this very earnest reporter raises his hand and says:

“Senator Obama, what is your place in history?”

I did what you just did, which is laugh out loud. I said, "place in history?" I thought he was kidding. At that point, I wasn’t even sure the other Senators would save a place for me at the cool kids’ table.

But as I was thinking about the words to share with this class, about what’s next, about what’s possible, and what opportunities lay ahead, I actually think it’s not a bad question for you, the class of 2005, to ask yourselves: What will be your place in history?

In other eras, across distant lands, this question could be answered with relative ease and certainty. As a servant in Rome, you knew you’d spend your life forced to build somebody else’s Empire. As a peasant in 11th Century China, you knew that no matter how hard you worked, the local warlord might come and take everything you had -- and you also knew that famine might come knocking at the door. As a subject of King George, you knew that your freedom of worship and your freedom to speak and to build your own life would be ultimately limited by the throne.

And then America happened.

A place where destiny was not a destination, but a journey to be shared and shaped and remade by people who had the gall, the temerity to believe that, against all odds, they could form “a more perfect union” on this new frontier.

And as people around the world began to hear the tale of the lowly colonists who overthrew an empire for the sake of an idea, they started to come. Across oceans and the ages, they settled in Boston and Charleston, Chicago and St. Louis, Kalamazoo and Galesburg, to try and build their own American Dream. This collective dream moved forward imperfectly -- it was scarred by our treatment of native peoples, betrayed by slavery, clouded by the subjugation of women, shaken by war and depression. And yet, brick by brick, rail by rail, calloused hand by calloused hand, people kept dreaming, and building, and working, and marching, and petitioning their government, until they made America a land where the question of our place in history is not answered for us. It’s answered by us.

Have we failed at times? Absolutely. Will you occasionally fail when you embark on your own American journey? You surely will. But the test is not perfection.
The true test of the American ideal is whether we’re able to recognize our failings and then rise together to meet the challenges of our time. Whether we allow ourselves to be shaped by events and history, or whether we act to shape them. Whether chance of birth or circumstance decides life’s big winners and losers, or whether we build a community where, at the very least, everyone has a chance to work hard, get ahead, and reach their dreams.

We have faced this choice before.

At the end of the Civil War, when farmers and their families began moving into the cities to work in the big factories that were sprouting up all across America, we had to decide:  Do we do nothing and allow captains of industry and robber barons to run roughshod over the economy and workers by competing to see who can pay the lowest wages at the worst working conditions? Or do we try to make the system work by setting up basic rules for the market, instituting the first public schools, busting up monopolies, letting workers organize into unions?

We chose to act, and we rose together.

When the irrational exuberance of the Roaring Twenties came crashing down with the stock market, we had to decide: do we follow the call of leaders who would do nothing, or the call of a leader who, perhaps because of his physical paralysis, refused to accept political paralysis?

We chose to act -- regulating the market, putting people back to work, expanding bargaining rights to include health care and a secure retirement -- and together we rose.

When World War II required the most massive home front mobilization in history and we needed every single American to lend a hand, we had to decide: Do we listen to skeptics who told us it wasn’t possible to produce that many tanks and planes? Or, did we build Roosevelt’s Arsenal for Democracy and grow our economy even further by providing our returning heroes with a chance to go to college and own their own home?

Again, we chose to act, and again, we rose together.

Today, at the beginning of this young century, we have to decide again. But this time, it is your turn to choose.

Here in Galesburg, you know what this new challenge is. You’ve seen it. All of you, your first year in college saw what happened at 9/11. It’s already been noted, the degree to which your lives will be intertwined with the war on terrorism that currently is taking place. But what you’ve also seen, perhaps not as spectacularly, is the fact that when you drive by the old Maytag plant around lunchtime, no one walks out anymore. I saw it during the campaign when I met union guys who worked at the plant for 20, 30 years and now wonder what they’re gonna do at the age of 55 without a pension or health care; when I met the man who’s son needed a new liver but because he’d been laid off, didn’t know if he could afford to provide his child the care that he needed.

It’s as if someone changed the rules in the middle of the game and no wonder -- no one bothered to tell these folks. And, in reality, the rules have changed.

It started with technology and automation that rendered entire occupations obsolete. When was the last time anybody here stood in line for the bank teller instead of going to the ATM, or talked to a switchboard operator? Then it continued when companies like Maytag were able to pick up and move their factories to some under developed country where workers were a lot cheaper than they are in the United States.

As Tom Friedman points out in his new book, The World Is Flat, over the last decade or so, these forces -- technology and globalization -- have combined like never before. So that while most of us have been paying attention to how much easier technology has made our own lives -- sending e-mails back and forth on our blackberries, surfing the Web on our cell phones, instant messaging with friends across the world -- a quiet revolution has been breaking down barriers and connecting the world’s economies. Now business not only has the ability to move jobs wherever there’s a factory, but wherever there’s an internet connection.

Countries like India and China realized this. They understand that they no longer need to be just a source of cheap labor or cheap exports. They can compete with us on a global scale. The one resource they needed were skilled, educated workers. So they started schooling their kids earlier, longer, with a greater emphasis on math and science and technology, until their most talented students realized they don’t have to come to America to have a decent life -- they can stay right where they are.

The result? China is graduating four times the number of engineers that the United States is graduating. Not only are those Maytag employees competing with Chinese and Indian and Indonesian and Mexican workers, you are too. Today, accounting firms are e-mailing your tax returns to workers in India who will figure them out and send them back to you as fast as any worker in Illinois or Indiana could.

When you lose your luggage in Boston at an airport, tracking it down may involve a call to an agent in Bangalore, who will find it by making a phone call to Baltimore. Even the Associated Press has outsourced some of their jobs to writers all over the world who can send in a story at a click of a mouse.

As Prime Minister Tony Blair has said, in this new economy, "Talent is the 21st century wealth."  If you've got the skills, you've got the education, and you have the opportunity to upgrade and improve both, you’ll be able to compete and win anywhere. If not, the fall will be further and harder than it ever was before.

So what do we do about this? How does America find its way in this new, global economy? What will our place in history be?

Like so much of the American story, once again, we face a choice. Once again, there are those who believe that there isn’t much we can do about this as a nation. That the best idea is to give everyone one big refund on their government -- divvy it up by individual portions, in the form of tax breaks, hand it out, and encourage everyone to use their share to go buy their own health care, their own retirement plan, their own child care, their own education, and so on.

In Washington, they call this the Ownership Society. But in our past there has been another term for it -- Social Darwinism -- every man or woman for him or herself. It’s a tempting idea, because it doesn’t require much thought or ingenuity. It allows us to say that those whose health care or tuition may rise faster than they can afford -- tough luck. It allows us to say to the Maytag workers who have lost their job -- life isn’t fair. It let’s us say to the child who was born into poverty -- pull yourself up by your bootstraps. And it is especially tempting because each of us believes we will always be the winner in life’s lottery, that we’re the one who will be the next Donald Trump, or at least we won’t be the chump who Donald Trump says: “You’re fired!”

But there is a problem. It won’t work. It ignores our history. It ignores the fact that it’s been government research and investment that made the railways possible and the internet possible. It’s been the creation of a massive middle class, through decent wages and benefits and public schools that allowed us all to prosper. Our economic dependence depended on individual initiative. It depended on a belief in the free market; but it has also depended on our sense of mutual regard for each other, the idea that everybody has a stake in the country, that we’re all in it together and everybody’s got a shot at opportunity. That’s what’s produced our unrivaled political stability.

And so if we do nothing in the face of globalization, more people will continue to lose their health care. Fewer kids will be able to afford the diploma you’re about to receive.

More companies like United Airlines won’t be able to provide pensions for their employees. And those Maytag workers will be joined in the unemployment line by any worker whose skills can be bought and sold on the global market.

So today I’m here to tell you what most of you already know. This is not us -- the option that I just mentioned. Doing nothing. It’s not how our story ends -- not in this country. America is a land of big dreamers and big hopes.

It is this hope that has sustained us through revolution and civil war, depression and world war, a struggle for civil and social rights and the brink of nuclear crisis. And it is because our dreamers dreamed that we have emerged from each challenge more united, more prosperous, and more admired than before.

So let’s dream. Instead of doing nothing or simply defending 20th century solutions, let’s imagine together what we could do to give every American a fighting chance in the 21st century.

What if we prepared every child in America with the education and skills they need to compete in the new economy?  If we made sure that college was affordable for everyone who wanted to go? If we walked up to those Maytag workers and we said “Your old job is not coming back, but a new job will be there because we’re going to seriously retrain you and there’s life-long education that’s waiting for you -- the sorts of opportunities that Knox has created with the Strong Futures scholarship program.

What if no matter where you worked or how many times you switched jobs, you had health care and a pension that stayed with you always, so you all had the flexibility to move to a better job or start a new business? What if instead of cutting budgets for research and development and science, we fueled the genius and the innovation that will lead to the new jobs and new industries of the future?

Right now, all across America, there are amazing discoveries being made. If we supported these discoveries on a national level, if we committed ourselves to investing in these possibilities, just imagine what it could do for a town like Galesburg. Ten or twenty years down the road, that old Maytag plant could re-open its doors as an Ethanol refinery that turned corn into fuel. Down the street, a biotechnology research lab could open up on the cusp of discovering a cure for cancer. And across the way, a new auto company could be busy churning out electric cars. The new jobs created would be filled by American workers trained with new skills and a world-class education.

All of that is possible but none of it will come easy. Every one of us is going to have to work more, read more, train more, think more. We will have to slough off some bad habits -- like driving gas guzzlers that weaken our economy and feed our enemies abroad. Our children will have to turn off the TV set once in a while and put away the video games and start hitting the books. We’ll have to reform institutions, like our public schools, that were designed for an earlier time. Republicans will have to recognize our collective responsibilities, even as Democrats recognize that we have to do more than just defend old programs.

It won’t be easy, but it can be done. It can be our future. We have the talent and the resources and brainpower. But now we need the political will. We need a national commitment.

And we need each of you.

Now, no one can force you to meet these challenges. If you want, it will be pretty easy for you to leave here today and not give another thought to towns like Galesburg and the challenges they face. There is no community service requirement in the real world; no one is forcing you to care. You can take your diploma, walk off this stage, and go chasing after the big house, and the nice suits, and all the other things that our money culture says that you should want, that you should aspire to, that you can buy.

But I hope you don’t walk away from the challenge. Focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a certain poverty of ambition. It asks too little of yourself. You need to take up the challenges that we face as a nation and make them your own. Not because you have a debt to those who helped you get here, although you do have that debt. Not because you have an obligation to those who are less fortunate than you, although I do think you do have that obligation. It’s primarily because you have an obligation to yourself. Because individual salvation has always depended on collective salvation. Because it’s only when you hitch your wagon to something larger than yourself that you realize your true potential.

And I know that all of you are wondering how you’ll do this, the challenges seem so big. They seem so difficult for one person to make a difference.

But we know it can be done. Because where you’re sitting, in this very place, in this town, it’s happened before.

Nearly two centuries ago, before civil rights, before voting rights, before Abraham Lincoln, before the Civil War, before all of that, America was stained by the sin of slavery. In the sweltering heat of southern plantations, men and women who looked like me could not escape the life of pain and servitude in which they were sold. And yet, year after year, as this moral cancer ate away at the American ideals of liberty and equality, the nation was silent.

But its people didn’t stay silent for long.

One by one, abolitionists emerged to tell their fellow Americans that this would not be our place in history -- that this was not the America that had captured the imagination of the world.

This resistance that they met was fierce, and some paid with their lives. But they would not be deterred, and they soon spread out across the country to fight for their cause. One man from New York went west, all the way to the prairies of Illinois to start a colony.

And here in Galesburg, freedom found a home.

Here in Galesburg, the main depot for the Underground Railroad in Illinois, escaped slaves could roam freely on the streets and take shelter in people’s homes. And when their masters or the police would come for them, the people of this town would help them escape north, some literally carrying them in their arms to freedom.

Think about the risks that involved. If they were caught abetting a fugitive, you could’ve been jailed or lynched. It would have been simple for these townspeople to turn the other way; to go live their lives in a private peace.

And yet, they didn’t do that. Why?

Because they knew that we were all Americans; that we were all brothers and sisters; the same reason that a century later, young men and women your age would take Freedom Rides down south, to work for the Civil Rights movement. The same reason that black women would walk instead of ride a bus after a long day of doing somebody else’s laundry and cleaning somebody else’s kitchen. Because they were marching for freedom.

Today, on this day of possibility, we stand in the shadow of a lanky, raw-boned man with little formal education who once took the stage at Old Main and told the nation that if anyone did not believe the American principles of freedom and equality, that those principles were timeless and all-inclusive, they should go rip that page out of the Declaration of Independence.

My hope for all of you is that as you leave here today, you decide to keep these principles alive in your own life and in the life of this country. You will be tested. You won’t always succeed. But know that you have it within your power to try. That generations who have come before you faced these same fears and uncertainties in their own time. And that through our collective labor, and through God’s providence, and our willingness to shoulder each other’s burdens, America will continue on its precious journey towards that distant horizon, and a better day.

Thank you so much class of 2005, and congratulations on your graduation. Thank you.