By Barack
Hussein Obama
Monday, January 21, 2013.
OBAMA: Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you so much. Vice President Biden, Mr. Chief Justice,
members of the United States Congress, distinguished guests, and fellow
citizens, 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 America is our allegiance to an idea articulated in
a declaration made more than two centuries ago. We hold these truths to
be self-evident, that all men are created equal.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: That they are endowed by their creator with
certain unalienable rights, and among these are 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. That while freedom is a gift from God, it must be secured
by his people here on earth.
The patriots of 1776 did not fight to replace the
tyranny of a king with the privileges of a few, or the rule of a mob.
They gave to us a republic, a government of, and by, and for the people.
Entrusting each generation to keep safe our founding creed. And for more
than 200 years we have. Through blood drawn by lash, and blood drawn by
sword, we noted that no union founded on the principles of liberty and equality
could survive half slave, and half free.
OBAMA: We made ourselves anew, and vowed to
move forward together. Together we determined that a modern economy requires
railroads and highways to speed travel and commerce, schools and colleges to
train our workers. Together we discovered that a free market only thrives
when there are rules to ensure competition and fair play. Together we resolve
that a great nation must care for the vulnerable and protect its people from
life's worst hazards and misfortune. Through it all, we have never relinquished
our skepticism of central authority, nor have we succumbed to the fiction that
all societies ills can be cured through government alone. Our celebration
of initiative and enterprise, our insistence on hard work and personal
responsibility, these are constants in our character. For we have always
understood that when times change, so must we, that fidelity to our founding
principles requires new responses to new challenges, that preserving our
individual freedoms ultimately requires collective action. For the American
people can no more meet the demands of today's world be acting alone than
American soldiers could have met the forces of fascism or communism with
muskets and militias. No single person can train all the math and science
teachers we'll need to equip our children for the future. Or build the
roads and networks and research labs that will bring new jobs and businesses to
our shores.
OBAMA: Now, more than ever, we must do these
things together, as one nation, and one people.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: This generation of Americans has been tested
by crises that steeled our resolve and proved our resilience. A decade of
war is now ending.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: And economic recovery has begun.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: America's possibilities are limitless, for
we possess all the qualities that this world without boundaries demands:
youth and drive, diversity and openness, of endless capacity for risk and a
gift for reinvention. My fellow Americans, we are made for this moment and we
will seize it, so long as we seize it together.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: For we, the people, understand that our
country cannot succeed when a shrinking few do very well and a growing many
barely make it.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: We believe that America's prosperity must
rest upon the broad shoulders of a rising middle class. We know that
America thrives when every person can find independence and pride in their
work, when the wages of honest labor will liberate families from the brink of
hardship.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.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: We understand that outworn programs are
inadequate to the needs of our time. So we must harness new ideas and
technology to remake our government, revamp our tax code, reform our schools,
and empower our citizens with the skills they need to work hard or learn more,
reach higher. But while the means will change, our purpose endures. A
nation that rewards the effort and determination of every single American, that
is what this moment requires. That is what will give real meaning to our
creed. 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.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: 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.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: For we remember the lessons of our
past, when twilight years were spent in poverty and parents of a child with a
disability had nowhere to turn. We do not believe that in this country
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, these things do not sap our initiative.They
strengthen us.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: They do not make us a nation of
takers. They free us to take the risks that make this country great.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: We, the people, still believe that our
obligations as Americans are not just to ourselves, but to all posterity.
We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do
so would betray our children and future generations.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: Some may still deny the overwhelming
judgment of science, but none can avoid the devastating impact of raging fires,
and crippling drought, and more powerful storms. The path towards
sustainable energy sources will be long and sometimes difficult. But American
cannot resist this transition. We must lead it.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: We cannot cede to other nations the
technology that will power new jobs and new industries. We must claim its
promise. That's how we will maintain our economic vitality and our national
treasure, our forests and waterways, our crop lands and snow capped
peaks. That is how we will preserve our planet, commanded to our care by
God. That's what will lend meaning to the creed our fathers once
declared.
OBAMA: We, the people, still believe that
enduring security and lasting peace do not require perpetual war.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: Our brave men and women in uniform tempered
by the flames of battle are unmatched in skill and courage.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: Our citizens seared by the memory of those
we have lost, know too well the price that is paid for liberty. The
knowledge of their sacrifice will keep us forever vigilant against those who
would do us harm. But we are also heirs to those who won the peace, and
not just the war. Who turn sworn enemies into the surest of
friends. And we must carry those lessons into this time as well. We
will defend our people, and uphold our values through strength of arms, and the
rule of law. We will show the courage to try and resolve our differences with
other nations peacefully. Not because we are naive about the dangers we
face, but because engagement can more durably lift suspicion and fear.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: America will remain the anchor of
strong alliances in every corner of the globe. And we will renew those
institutions that extend our capacity to manage crisis abroad. For no one has a
greater stake in a peaceful world than its most powerful nation. We will
support democracy from Asia to Africa, from the Americas to the Middle East,
because our interests and our conscience compel us to act on behalf of those
who long for freedom. And we must be a source of hope to the poor, the
sick, the marginalized, the victims of prejudice.
OBAMA: 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. We the people declare today that the most evident of truth that
all of us are created equal -- is the star that guides us still; just as it
guided our forebears through Seneca Falls and Selma and Stonewall; just as it
guided all those men and women, sung and unsung, who left footprints along this
great mall, to hear a preacher say that we cannot walk alone; to hear
a King proclaim that our individual freedom is inextricably bound to the
freedom of every soul on Earth.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: It is now our generation's task to carry on
what those pioneers began, for our journey is not complete until our wives, our
mothers and daughters can earn a living equal to their
efforts.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: Our journey is not complete until our gay
brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law, for if we are
truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one
another must be equal, as well.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: Our journey is not complete until no citizen
is forced to wait for hours to exercise the right to vote.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: Our journey is not complete until we find a
better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as
a land of opportunity, until bright young students and
engineers are enlisted in our workforce rather than expelled from our country.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: Our journey is not complete until all
our children, from the streets of Detroit to the hills of Appalachia to the
quiet lanes of Newtown, know that they are cared for and cherished and always
safe from harm.That is our generation's task, to make these works, these
rights, these values of life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness real for
every American. Being true to our founding documents does not require us to agree
on every contour of life. It does not mean we all define liberty in
exactly the same way or follow the same precise path to happiness 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.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: For now, decisions are upon us and we cannot
afford delay. We cannot mistake absolutism for principle or substitute
spectacle for politics, or treat name-calling as reasoned
debate.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA: 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, 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. My fellow Americans, 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. And
we must faithfully execute that pledge during the duration of our service.
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. They are the words of
citizens, and they represent our greatest hope. 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.
(APPLAUSE)
OBAMA:
Let us 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.
Thank you. God bless you. And may He forever bless
these United States of America.