Add Context
They understand why they are in front of an audience and offer context using historical references. President Obama opened his speech today with these words:
“Each time we gather to inaugurate a president, we bear witness to the enduring strength of our Constitution. We affirm the promise of our democracy. We recall that what binds this nation together is not the colors of our skin or the tenets of our faith or the origins of our names. What makes us exceptional – what makes us American – is our allegiance to an idea, articulated in a declaration made more than two centuries ago.”
Martin Luther King, Jr. began his I Have a Dream speech this way:
“Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of captivity.”
Understand the Challenge
King: “One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination…So we have come here today to dramatize an appalling condition. “
Obama: “Today we continue a never-ending journey, to bridge the meaning of those words with the realities of our time. For history tells us that while these truths may be self-evident, they have never been self-executing…”
Share Your Values
King: “In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline.”
Obama: “Our celebration of initiative and enterprise; our insistence on hard work and personal responsibility, these are constants in our character…And we must be a source of hope to the poor, the sick, the marginalized, the victims of prejudice – not out of mere charity, but because peace in our time requires the constant advance of those principles that our common creed describes: tolerance and opportunity; human dignity and justice.”
Offer Hope
King: “But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation… Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning.”
Obama: “We are true to our creed when a little girl born into the bleakest poverty knows that she has the same chance to succeed as anybody else, because she is an American, she is free, and she is equal, not just in the eyes of God but also in our own.”
Make it Personal
King: “I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”
Obama: “But the words I spoke today are not so different from the oath that is taken each time a soldier signs up for duty, or an immigrant realizes her dream. My oath is not so different from the pledge we all make to the flag that waves above and that fills our hearts with pride.”
Call For Action
King: “It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment and to underestimate the determination of the Negro…And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall march ahead. We cannot turn back.”
Obama: “My fellow Americans, we are made for this moment, and we will seize it – so long as we seize it together… We must act; we must act knowing that our work will be imperfect. We must act, knowing that today’s victories will be only partial…”
End on a Positive Note
Martin Luther King, Jr. ended his I Have a Dream speech this way:
“This will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with a new meaning, ‘My country, ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.’”
President Obama ended his second Inaugural speech with these words:
“Let each of us now embrace, with solemn duty and awesome joy, what is our lasting birthright. With common effort and common purpose, with passion and dedication, let us answer the call of history, and carry into an uncertain future that precious light of freedom.”
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