Life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness… Today we continue a never-ending journey to
bridge the meaning of those words with the realities of our time. For history
tells us that while these truths may be self-evident, they’ve never been
self-executing.
We, the people, still believe that every citizen deserves a basic measure of security and dignity. We must make the hard choices to reduce the cost of health care and the size of our deficit. But we reject the belief that America must choose between caring for the generation that built this country and investing in the generation that will build its future.
We
do not believe that freedom is reserved for the lucky or happiness for the few.
We recognize that no matter how responsibly we live our lives, any one of us at
any time may face a job loss or a sudden illness or a home swept away in a
terrible storm.
The
commitments we make to each other through Medicare and Medicaid and Social
Security, do not sap our initiative. They strengthen us. They do not make us a
nation of takers. They free us to take the risks that make this country great.
We,
the people, still believe that enduring security and lasting peace do not
require perpetual war. We are also heirs to those who won the peace, and not
just the war. Who turned sworn enemies into the surest of friends. And we must
carry those lessons into this time as well.
Being
true to our founding documents does not require us to agree on every contour of
life. Progress does not compel us to settle century’s long debates about the
role of government for all time, but it does require us to act in our time.
We
cannot mistake absolutism for principle or substitute spectacle for politics,
or treat name-calling as reasoned debate.
We must act knowing that our work
will be imperfect. We must act knowing that today’s victories will be only
partial, and that it will be up to those who stand here in four years and 40
years and 400 years hence to advance the timeless spirit once conferred to us
in a spare Philadelphia hall.
The
oath I have sworn before you today, like the one recited by others who serve in
this Capitol, was an oath to God and country, not party or faction.
You
and I, as citizens, have the power to set this country’s course. You and I, as
citizens, have the obligation to shape the debates of our time, not only with
the votes we cast, but the voices we lift in defense of our most ancient values
and enduring ideas.
