The Obamas Give the 250th America’s Birthday Speeches You Probably Will Not Hear from the Current White House Residents

Look at those crowds in Chicago today.

In two speeches in front of a large crowd celebrating the official opening of the Obama Presidential Center, former First Lady and President Michelle and Barack Obama gave riveting addresses celebrating the dynanmism of the American Ideal and the power of the American Indivdual’s spirit.

Frankly, the American People are probably not going to hear any of these themes from the current residents of the White House on July 4, their names not mentioned but clearly invoked in both of Obama’s speeches, telling the American People and the next generation of leaders what not to do.

During her first remarks, former First Lady Michelle Obama praised her husband’s temperament and achievements while in the Oval Office, taking not-so-subtle digs at the current White House occupant, who was not named, saying:

“Eight years in the crucible, and not once did you melt from the heat. Not once did you let it harden you. Instead, you used it to reveal your truest essence, your stubborn optimism and unflinching courage, your dazzling brilliance and unpretentious decency, your ferocious work ethic, and absolutely unshakable moral fiber.

And to do it all as a first, and the higher standard that comes with all that, the claims that a U.S. senator and constitutional law expert wasn’t qualified for the job, the lies about your birthright, your faith, your patriotism, the outrage when you stated the biological fact that if you’d had a son, that he, too, would be black. Yet, you were unflappable at every turn, always focused, always calm, always looking at the long view. How absurd it is to even imagine that you might have buckled under the pressure even once, lashed out in frustration, lost your temper.

How absurd it is to imagine that you might have done anything but make our family and this entire country proud. No, you were too busy, not done, so much to say. You were doing the people’s work, rescuing our economy, expanding health care, ending a war, ordering the bin Laden raid, saving an auto industry, winning a Peace Prize, keeping us safe from Ebola, regulating the banks, standing up for marriage equality, listening to science, and comforting an entire nation in the face of unspeakable tragedies.

And you did it all with such grace and class and cool that you made the hardest job in the world look like a walk in this beautiful park.”

On the creation of the Obama Presidential Center as a House of Hope, Mrs. Obama said:

“The Obama Presidential Center was created as a beacon of hope, a monument to our unshakable values, the ones my husband has exemplified his entire life. Equality. Empathy. Honesty. Inclusion. Fairness. And especially during these anxious and divisive times, it is so important that we remember that those values are not unique to my husband. They are the same ones that your husbands and wives, your parents and children, your friends and neighbors exhibit and pass on.”

The former First Lady then paid tribute to the American People and their spirit, saying:

“Every single day, millions of people in this country wake up doing their very best to live decent and purposeful lives. Yet we’re all tested in one way or another. And there are plenty of times we all fall short.

But deep down in our hearts and souls, we all know right from wrong. We know selflessness from greed, righteousness from injustice. We understand that we all rise and fall together, that every last one of us is an invaluable contributor to the greatness of America…”

“…That’s where the truth of this country lies, not in grabbing as much as we can get for ourselves or knocking folks down to prop ourselves up. But in the overwhelming goodness, the relentless striving, the quiet dignity that is inside all of us, our greatest hope is that this center can reflect back just a fraction of that life. That it can capture the beauty of who we all are, no matter what we look like or where we come from or how much money we earn or how we pray or vote or speak or love.

It’s why during our administration, we threw open the White House doors to all sorts of folks who don’t usually get to meet the President or First Lady. The families pinching pennies to send their first child to college. The teenagers who know that a hot afternoon means the bullets start flying.

The military spouses and children serving and sacrificing just like their loved ones in uniform. The Native kids showing us that resilience and pride can never be stolen. The 4-H’ers and FFA members with calluses on their hands from feeding livestock.

The immigrants proving what it truly means to be a dreamer. These folks aren’t Americans, too. They are America.

They are the beating heart of this country. They are us, and we are them. And to ignore this simple truth, to refuse to respect the contributions and experiences of people who aren’t exactly like us, y’all, puts us all at risk.

Failing to see the humanity in all people puts us all on a slippery slope. And once that slide starts, there’s no telling where it stops. A dangerous precedent that flies in the very face of our faith and of the founding promise of this democracy that all of us, all of us, are created equal.

That each of us is a child of God with inerrant value. And no one, and I mean no one, has the right to sit in judgment of who’s American enough. And that’s why, folks, we simply don’t have the luxury or time to be cynical or complacent, to wring our hands in despair, to wait for someone else to fix the problem.

Y’all, hope is all we have. Because hope is the essential spark that lights the fire of change. But hope is a choice.

Whether or not we use our voices to speak up is a choice. Voting is a choice. Being a decent human being is a choice. Believing that we still hold the power to build a country that reflects us all is a choice. The Obama Presidential Center is a living testament to the power of choice, y’all.”

Former President Obama had to follow that hard act and started with saying that it was always his public service belief that:

“I was possessed with this abiding faith that if we could give people more of a say in the forces that govern their lives. If we could bridge some of the differences that drove us apart. Then we could build an America where everyone counts. And everyone has a fair shot. And everyone belongs. Even a mixed-race kid with a weird backstory and a name nobody could pronounce.”

Former President Obama then remincsed about the trials and tribulations of his Administration, saying:

‘Now, of course, we did not accomplish everything we set out to do. No administration does. Some of the exhibits reflect unfinished business.

In some cases, my own shortcomings and mistakes. In some cases, because, as a sign I kept on the Resolute Desk Red, hard things are hard. And that’s especially true in a big, raucous, diverse, argumentative democracy like the United States of America.

Everybody’s got an opinion. And that means getting stuff done involves reconciling the demands of a couple of hundred million people. Democracy can be frustrating.

It can be slow. It can be inefficient. And yet, more than anything, I hope this center will serve as an affirmation of just how special, how precious our Democracy truly is and remind us what we can achieve when we embrace our shared responsibilities as citizens.”

Obama then followed those passages up with several that the American People will probably not hear from Mr. Trump, stating:

“…Since we’re a few weeks away from America’s 250th birthday, it is worth remembering just how radical the whole idea of self-government really was back in 1776. To that point, human history was a tale of conquest and caste and rigid hierarchies, a world where the strong dominated the weak, where power and wealth and status flowed through lineage, and the many were ruled by the few. But out of the fire and steel of a revolution, a different story took flight.

On this continent, a declaration that we are all created equal, endowed by our creator with certain unalienable rights, and that in the newly independent United States there will be no kings or lords, no serfs or subjects, but only citizens, each of us free to pursue our own version of happiness and able to determine our collective fate through an elected representative government. It had not been done. And because it hadn’t been done before, the success of this experiment was never a given.

In forming our union, the founders fell terribly short of the Declaration’s promise, leaving slavery intact, allowing states to restrict the franchise to white men who owned property. But in drafting a Constitution and a Bill of Rights, they did have the foresight, the genius, to provide us with a framework that allows each generation to make our union more perfect. And over more than two centuries, through petitions and protests, marches and strikes, moral appeals from the pulpit and conversations at the family dinner table, men and women from all walks of life, of every color, every faith, every region, took up the cause of democracy and made it their own until we, the people, came to include not just some of us, but all of us.

And that’s why the story we tell in this building begins not with Michelle’s origins or my origins, but with our nation’s, with the founding of our print of the Declaration of Independence and a pen and ink stand used by Frederick Douglass. Lincoln’s Bible and a pamphlet by Ida B. Wells. Suffragist buttons and a hard hat worn by FDR’s Labor Secretary, Francis Perkins.

And it’s why the exhibits here focus not just on policies, but on the shared values that make democracy possible. A belief in the intrinsic dignity and worth of all people and that no one is above the law or beneath its protection. A belief in checks and balances in our government and an accountability that comes with an independent judiciary and a robust free press.

A belief that our military and law enforcement owe allegiance not to any president or political party, but to the people and our Constitution. A belief in the peaceful transfer of power after the people have spoken in fair and free elections, recognizing that in a large, complicated society like ours, no group or faction gets its way 100% of the time. And a belief that qualities of character, honesty, integrity, kindness, compassion, a sense of duty and honor, those things matter in our public dealings, just as they do in our private lives.

These are not… -… … These are the values and traditions I believe in. And they are not Republican or Democratic values. They’re American values we can all share, regardless of party.

Values every president here today, as different as we are, has tried our best to uphold. Values that John McCain and Mitt Romney believed in no less than I did. It is our greatest inheritance, the story of America at its best, because it reflects a basic faith in the decency of our fellow citizens and the possibility that despite all of our differences, we can see each other and understand one another and make common cause together.”

Obama then told prospective visitors to his Presidential Center that if they are in a time crunch to skip over the wings that showcase his speeches and achievements and instead visit the portions of the complex that salute everyday Americans who helped build a better nation during the Obama/Biden Administration, conveying:

“In favor of the stories of those ordinary citizens who helped make that change happen. The cancer survivor who feared rising premiums would force her out of her home and was brave enough to speak out about it. She’s why we pushed so hard for healthcare reform.

The small business owner trying to keep the lights on. The teenage girl who told me she was worried her dad might lose his job in the auto crisis. They’re why we focused so relentlessly on pulling our economy back from the Great Recession.

The wounded warrior overcoming debilitating injuries. The gay Air Force major serving her country even when forced to hide who she was. They’re why we worked to end Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell and care for those who’ve worn our country’s uniform and do right by our military families.

It’s their voices that led to our successes. And while going through the exhibits, I’d also ask you listen to the voices of people around the world who’ve been inspired by American ideas.”

Later, he called on Americans to stay optimistic and faithful to the American Experiment that started 250 years ago, offerering:

“I am not immune to anger or doubt, but I do know this. When we lose faith in each other, when we stop believing that voting matters, that citizenship matters, that our collective voices matter, that how we treat each other no longer matters, then we give away our power to decide our own futures.

We open the door to the most ruthless or the most careless or the most fearful among us who see some groups and some people as more equal than others and see government as nothing more than a way to divvy up the spoils and punish enemies and keep those who are different in their place. I do not believe that is the story of America that prevails in the end. I don’t believe it because for us to give up, for us to give in now, after all this country’s been through, to cynicism and division would be a betrayal of our founding ideas, a betrayal of our faith.

And I remain convinced that the overwhelming majority of Americans feel the same way, that as unsettled as we are, people aren’t looking for perpetual anger and division. They are looking for fairness and common sense and mutual respect that deep in our gut, we want to find a way to turn towards each other again, not further away. I believe this because I’ve seen all across our country and cities that have worked together to reclaim their streets from crime and rural communities that have rebuilt their economy and businesses that are finding new ways to make housing affordable and those ordinary people in the Twin Cities who brave frigid temperatures, risk their own safety, standing shoulder to shoulder to look out for their neighbors and sometimes look out for strangers because they knew that was the right thing to do.”

The former President finished his address by invoking the determination of the abolitionists and his faith that the American Ideal would endure past 2028, saying:

“…The abolitionist cause seemed lost. The Compromise of 1850 had made harboring fugitive slaves a crime under federal law, even in those states that had abolished slavery. And in a case that garnered national attention, a young fugitive in Boston had been seized and tried and marched to the wharf by hundreds of armed officers where he was summarily put on a ship bound for the south where he would remain in shackles and chains.

It was a moment of profound uncertainty and despair. A moment the minister called darker than any New England had witnessed. We do not see, Reverend Theodore Parker observed, that justice is always done on earth.

Many a knave is rich, sleek, and honored, while the just man is poor, hated, and in torment. I do not pretend, the preacher said, to understand the moral universe. The arc is a long one.

My eye reaches but little ways. I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight. I can divine it by conscience.

But from what I see, I am sure it bends towards justice. The good reverend was under no illusions about the perils and obstacles facing the abolitionist cause. His words offered no easy answers, no comforting assurances that he or his congregation would live to see the progress they so desperately sought.

Rather, his was a declaration of faith, a defiant call, not to abandon hope or give way to fear, but to stay true to our better selves and true to one another, and to keep fighting to fulfill the promise of this nation, even in the face of cruelty and bitter disappointment, even in the face of impossible odds. It is that spirit that we open this center today. The same spirit that so many of you showed all those years ago.

The same spirit that inspired generations of Americans to meet the challenges of their time. The same spirit that is alive and well here on the South Side of Chicago. The same spirit that will see America and the world through its present trials. There is a new generation out there, ready to write the next chapter of our story. We intend to help them do it, and we ask that you join us.”