The Content of the President’s Character…
1/21/2009
From the Lincoln Memorial Dr. King looks 50 years into the future
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”
~Dr. Martin Luther King (August 28, 1963)
Yesterday it struck me that less than 50 years separate Dr. Martin Luther King Junior’s Dream Speech and the inauguration of Barack Obama. Imagine that these two men face each other across the National Mall with King speaking from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and Obama speaking from the opposite side separated only by about 50 years.
That is what makes the United States of America great. It isn’t that we are perfect or that racism doesn’t exist anymore. We screw things up all the time and the last 8 years is a good example of that, but we have the capacity to change our mistakes. The certain knowledge of our faults and the need for constant change is written into the fabric of our government and by recognizing our many imperfections, we are a stronger nation.
We’ve had a seemingly non-stop progression of old white guys running our country. Some of them have been great and some of them have been terrible, but the truth is that when given a chance to vote for a candidate that was outside of the majority’s ethnicity, most of the people judged the candidate not by the color of his skin, but by by the content of his character.
Democrat. Republican. It doesn’t really matter. It is something to be happy about and I think we can thank Dr. King and all the other great Americans for yesterday and tomorrow.
- The Oath
With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
~Dr. Martin Luther King (August 28, 1963)
~P