My Fellow Americans.
Sixteen months ago, when I announced my candidacy for the Presidency of the United States, I said this campaign would be a marathon. Tonight, with the wind at our backs, with friends by our side, with courage in our hearts, the race to the finish line begins.
And we’re going to win this race.
We’re going to win because we are the party that believes in the American dream.
A dream so powerful that no distance of ground, no expanse of ocean, no barrier of language, no distinction of race or creed or color can weaken its hold on the human heart.
I know, because I am a product of that dream.
A dream that brought my father to this country 76 years ago, that brought my mother and her family here one year later—poor, unable to speak English, but with a burning desire to succeed in their new land of opportunity.
And tonight in the presence of that marvelous woman who is my mother and who came here 75 years ago; with the memory in my heart of the young man who arrived at Ellis Island with only $25 in his pocket, but with a deep and abiding faith in the promise of America; tonight, as a son of immigrants with a wonderful wife and four terrific children is a proud public servant who has cherished every minute of the last 16 months on the campaign trail, I accept your nomination for the Presidency of the United States.
My friends, the dream that carried me to this platform is alive tonight in every part of this country—and it’s what the Democratic Party is all about.
Henry Cisneros of Texas, Bob Matsui of California, Barbara Mikulski of Maryland, Mario Cuomo of New York, Claude Pepper of Florida and Jesse Louis Jackson.
A man who has lifted so many hearts with the dignity and the hope of his message throughout this campaign; a man whose very candidacy says to every child—aim high to every citien—you count; to every voter—you can make a difference; to every American—you are a full shareholder in our dream.
My friends, if anyone tells you that the American dream belongs to the privileged few and not to all of us, you tell them that the Reagan era is over and a new era is about to begin.
Because it’s time to raise our sights—to look beyond the cramped ideals and limited ambitions of the past eight years—to recapture the spirit of energy and of confidence and of idealism that John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson inspired a generation ago.
It’s time to meet the challenge of the next American Frontier—the challenge of building an economic future for America that will create good jobs at good wages for every citizen in this land, no matter who they are or where they come from or what the color of their skin.
It’s time to rekindle the American spirit of invention and daring, to exchange voodoo economics for can-do economics, to build the best America by bringing out the best in every American.
It’s time to wake up to the new challenges that face the American family. Time to see that young families in this country are never again forced to choose between the jobs they need and the children they love; time to be sure that parents are never again told no matter how long they work or how hard their child tries, a college education is a right they can’t afford.
It’s time to ask why it is that we have run up more debt in this country in the last eight years than we did in the previous 200; and to make sure it never happens again.
It’s time to understand that the greatest threat to our national security in this hemisphere is not the Sandinistas—it’s the avalanche of drugs that is pouring into this country and poisoning our children.
I don’t think I have to tell any of you how much we Americans expect of ourselves or how much we have a right to expect from those we elect to public office.
Because this election isn’t about ideology. It’s about competence. It’s not about overthrowing governments in Central America. It’s about creating good jobs in middle America.
It’s not about insider trading on Wall Street; it’s about creating opportunity on Main Street.
It’s not about meaningless labels. It’s about American values. Old-fashioned values like accountability and responsibility and respect for the truth. And just as we Democrats believe that there are no limits to what each citizen can do, so we believe there are no limits to what America can do.
Yes, I know, this fall, we’re going to hear a lot of Republican talk about how well some neighborhoods and some regions of this country are doing; about how easy it is for some families to buy a home or to find child care or to pay their doctor’s bills or to send their children to college.
But maintaining the status quo—running in place—standing still—isn’t good enough for America. Opportunity for some isn’t good enough for America.
My friends, we’re going to forge a new era of greatness for America.
We’re going to take America’s genius out of cold storage and challenge our youngsters; we’re going to make our schools and universities and laboratories the finest in the world and we’re going to make teaching a valued and honored profession once again.
We’re going to fight fires of innovation and enterprise from coast to coast; and we’re going to give those on welfare the chance to lift themselves out of poverty; to get the child care and the training they need; the chance to step out into the bright sunshine of opportunity and of hope and of dignity.
We’re going to invest in our urban neighborhoods; and we’re going to work to revitalize small town and rural America. We’re going to give our farm families a price they can live on, and farm communities a future they can count on.
And we’re going to build the kind of America that Senator Lloyd Bentsen of Texas has been fighting for 40 years; the kind of America where hard work is rewarded; where American goods and American workmanship are the best in the world and where our workers have at least 60 days notice when their plants or factories shut down.
Now, I know I have a reputation for being a frugal man. In nine years, I’ve balanced nine more budgets than this Administration has and I’ve just balanced a tenth. And I’ve worked with the citizens of my state—worked hard to create hundreds of new jobs—and I mean good jobs, jobs you can raise a family on, jobs you can build a future on, jobs you can count on.
I’m proud of our progress, but I’m even prouder of the way we’ve made that progress—by working together; by excluding no one and including everyone: business and labor; educators and community leaders and just plain citizens—sharing responsibility; exchanging ideas; building confidence about the future.
And what we have done reflects a simple but very profound idea—an idea as powerful as any in human history.
It is the idea of community.
It is the idea that we are in this together; that regardless of who we are or where we come from or how much money we have—each of us counts. And that by working together to create opportunity and a good life for all—all of us are enriched—not just in economic terms, but as citizens and as human beings.
It is an idea that was planted in the New World by the first Governor of Massachusetts.
"We must," said John Winthrop, "love one another with a pure heart fervently. We must delight in each other, make each other’s condition our own, rejoice together, mourn together, and suffer together. We must knit together as one."
John Winthrop wasn’t talking about material success. He was talking about a country where each of us asks not only what’s in it for us, but what’s good and what’s right for all of us.
When a young mother named Dawn Lawson leaves seven years of welfare to become a personnel specialist in a Fortune 500 company in Worcester, Massachusetts—we are all enriched and ennobled.
When a Catholic priest named Bill Kraus helps homeless families in Denver not just by giving them shelter, but by helping them to find the jobs they need to get back on their feet, we are all enriched and ennobled.
When a high school principal named George McKenna and a dedicated staff of teachers and counselors create a real environment for learning at the George Washington Preparatory High School in Los Angeles: a high school that is 90 percent black and 10 percent Hispanic and has 80 percent of its graduates admitted to college; we are all enriched an ennobled.
When a dedicated new management team and a fine union in Milwaukee work together to turn Harley-Davidson around and help it come back to life, we are all enriched and when a man named Willie Velasquez y cuando un Willie Velasquez can register tens of thousands of his fellow citizens as voters, puede inscribir decena de miles de sus conciudadanos para votar and bring new energy and new ideas and new people brindando asi nuevas energias, nueves ideas, nuevas personas into courthouses and city halls and state capitals all across the Southwest a los gobiernos municipales y estatales a del suroeste—we are all enriched and ennobled todos no enriquecem os y enoblecemos.
As President, I’m going to be setting goals for our country; not goals for our government working alone; I mean goals for our people working together. I want businesses to be wise enough and innovative enough to retrain their workers, to re-tool their factories, and to help rebuild their communities.
I want students and office workers and retired teachers to share with a neighbor the precious gift of literacy.
I want bricklayers and carpenters and developers and community action agencies to help create decent and affordable housing for every family, and to end the shame of homelessness in America.
I want our young scientists to dedicate their great gifts not to the destruction of life, but to its preservation; to wage war on hunger and pollution and infant mortality; and to win the war against AIDS, the greatest public health emergency of our lifetime, and a disease that must be conquered.
I want a new Attorney General to work with me and with law enforcement officials all over America to reclaim our streets and neighborhoods from those who commit violent crime.
And I want the members of Congress to work with me so that, at long last, we can make good on Harry Truman’s commitment to basic health insurance for every family in America.
My friends, the dream that began in Plymouth 360 years ago: the spirit that survived that terrible winter at Valley Forge and triumphed on the beach at Normandy, the courage that looked Khrushchev in the eye during the Cuban Missile Crisis—is as strong and as vibrant today as it has ever been.
We must—we are—and we will be—militarily strong.
But we must back that military strength with economic strength; we must give the men and women of our armed forces weapons that work; we must have a Secretary of Defense who will manage—and not be managed by—the Pentagon; and we must have a foreign policy that reflects the decency and the principles and the values of the American people.
President Reagan has set the stage for deep cuts in nuclear arms—and I salute him for that.
He has said that we should judge the Soviet Union not by what it says, but by what it does—and I agree with that.
But we can do a lot more to stop the spread of nuclear and chemical arms; we can do a lot more to bring peace to Central America and to the Middle East; and we can and we will do a lot more to end apartheid in South Africa.
John Kennedy once said that America "leads the … world, not just because we are powerful, but because we exert that leadership for the cause of freedom around the globe … and … because we are moving on the road to peace."
We must always be prepared to defend our freedom.
But we must always remember that our greatest strength comes not from what we possess, but from what we believe; not from what we have, but from who we are.
I’ve been asked many times over the past 16 months if I have one very special goal for these next four years—something that reflects everything I stand for and believe in as an American.
The answer to that is yes, I do.
Because four years from now, when our citizens walk along Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C., or when they see a picture of the White House on television, I want them to be proud of their government; proud of a government that sets high standards not just for the American people, but high standards for itself.
We’re going to have a Justice Department that isn’t he laughing stock of the nation—we’re going to have a Justice Department that understands what the word "justice" means.
We’re going to have an Environmental Protection Agency that’s more interested in stopping pollution than in protecting the polluters.
We’re going to have a real war—not a phony war—against drugs, and we won’t be doing business with drug-running Panamanian dictators.
We’re going to have a Vice President who won’t sit silently by when somebody at the National Security Council comes up with the cockamamie idea that we should trade arms to the Ayatollah for hostages; we’re going to have a Vice President named Lloyd Bentsen who will walk into the Oval Office and say, "Mister President, this is nuts."
And in the Dukakis White House, as in the Dukakis State house: if you accept the privilege of public service, you had better understand the responsibilities of public service. If you violate that trust, you’ll be fired; if you violate the law, you’ll be prosecuted; and if you sell arms to the Ayatollah, don’t expect a pardon from the President of the United States.
Tuesday night, along with millions of other Americans, I was inspired by the powerful words of Jesse Jackson. And Monday night, I laughed and was moved by the wit and wisdom of Ann Richards.
But what stirred me most on Monday was a grandmother talking about her "nearly perfect" granddaughter; and what stirred me most on Tuesday were those fine handsome and proud and articulate Jackson children talking about their hopes and the future of this country.
You know, young Jacqueline Jackson goes to school in Massachusetts. And last month, she visited with me at the State House in Boston. She’s a remarkable young woman, and I know her parents are very proud of her.
My thoughts tonight—and my dreams for America—are about Ann Richards’s granddaughter Lily; about Jackie Jackson; and about the baby that’s going to be born to our son, John, and his wife, Lisa, in January.
God willing, our first grandchild will reach the age that Jackie Jackson is now at the beginning of a new century. And we pray that he or she will reach that age with eyes as filled with the sparkle of life and pride and optimism as that young woman we watched together two nights ago.
Yes, my friends, it’s time for wonderful new beginnings.
A little baby.
A new Administration.
A new era of greatness for America.
And when we leave here tonight, we will leave to build the future together.
To build the future so that when our children and grandchildren look back in their time on what we did in our time, they will say that we had the wisdom to carry on the dreams of those who came before us; the courage to make our own dreams come true, the foresight to blaze a trail for generations yet to come.
And as I accept your nomination tonight, I can’t help recalling that the first marathon was run in ancient Greece, and that on important occasions like this one, the citizens of Athens would complete their ceremonies by taking a pledge.
That pledge—that covenant—is as eloquent and timely today as it was 2000 years ago.
"We will never bring disgrace to this, our country, by any act of dishonesty or cowardice. We will fight for the ideals of this, our country. We will revere and obey the laws. We will strive to quicken our sense of civic duty. Thus, in all these ways, we will transmit this country greater, better, stronger, prouder and more beautiful than it was transmitted to us."
That is my pledge to you, my fellow Democrats.
And that is my pledge to you, my fellow Americans.