Jesse Jackson is one of the finest preachers and public speakers alive today. This excerpt is from his address to the Democratic National Convention in 1988. A candidate for the Democratic nomination for president that year, he won seven primaries (five of them Southern states) and five caucuses. You can read or listen to the entire speech here.
You must never stop dreaming. Face reality, yes, but
don't stop with the way things are. Dream of things as they ought to be. Dream.
Face pain, but love, hope, faith and dreams will help you rise above the pain.
Use hope and imagination as weapons of survival and progress, but you keep on
dreaming, young America. Dream of peace. Peace is rational and reasonable. War
is irrational in this age, and unwinnable.
Dream of teachers who teach for life and not for a
living. Dream of doctors who are concerned more about public health than
private wealth. Dream of lawyers more concerned about justice than a judgeship.
Dream of preachers who are concerned more about prophecy than profiteering.
Dream on the high road with sound values.
And then America, as we go forth to September, October,
November and then beyond, America must never surrender to a high moral
challenge.
Do not surrender to drugs. The best drug policy is a
"no first use." Don't surrender with needles and cynicism. Let's have
"no first use" on the one hand, or clinics on the other. Never
surrender, young America. Go forward.
America must never surrender to malnutrition. We can feed
the hungry and clothe the naked. We must never surrender. We must go forward.
We must never surrender to illiteracy. Invest in our
children. Never surrender; and go forward. We must never surrender to
inequality. Women cannot compromise ERA or comparable worth. Women are making
60 cents on the dollar to what a man makes. Women cannot buy meat cheaper.
Women cannot buy bread cheaper. Women cannot buy milk cheaper. Women deserve to
get paid for the work that you do. It's right! And it's fair.
Don't surrender, my friends. Those who have AIDS tonight,
you deserve our compassion. Even with AIDS you must not surrender.
In your wheelchairs. I see you sitting here tonight in
those wheelchairs. I've stayed with you. I've reached out to you across our
Nation. And don't you give up. I know it's tough sometimes. People look down on
you. It took you a little more effort to get here tonight. And no one should
look down on you, but sometimes mean people do. The only justification we have
for looking down on someone is that we're going to stop and pick them up.
But even in your wheelchairs, don't you give up. We
cannot forget 50 years ago when our backs were against the wall, Roosevelt was
in a wheelchair. I would rather have Roosevelt in a wheelchair than Reagan and
Bush on a horse. Don't you surrender and don't you give up. Don't surrender and
don't give up!
Why I cannot challenge you this way? "Jesse Jackson,
you don't understand my situation. You be on television. You don't understand.
I see you with the big people. You don't understand my situation."
I understand. You see me on TV, but you don't know the me
that makes me, me. They wonder, "Why does Jesse run?" because they
see me running for the White House. They don't see the house I'm running from.
I have a story. I wasn't always on television. Writers
were not always outside my door. When I was born late one afternoon, October
8th, in Greenville, South Carolina, no writers asked my mother her name. Nobody
chose to write down our address. My mama was not supposed to make it, and I was
not supposed to make it. You see, I was born of a teen-age mother, who was born
of a teen-age mother.
I understand. I know abandonment, and people being mean
to you, and saying you're nothing and nobody and can never be anything.
I understand. Jesse Jackson is my third name. I'm
adopted. When I had no name, my grandmother gave me her name. My name was Jesse
Burns 'til I was 12. So I wouldn't have a blank space, she gave me a name to
hold me over. I understand when nobody knows your name. I understand when you
have no name.
I understand. I wasn't born in the hospital. Mama didn't
have insurance. I was born in the bed at [the] house. I really do understand.
Born in a three-room house, bathroom in the backyard, slop jar by the bed, no
hot and cold running water. I understand. Wallpaper used for decoration? No.
For a windbreaker. I understand. I'm a working person's person. That's why I
understand you whether you're Black or White. I understand work. I was not born
with a silver spoon in my mouth. I had a shovel programmed for my hand.
My mother, a working woman. So many of the days she went
to work early, with runs in her stockings. She knew better, but she wore runs
in her stockings so that my brother and I could have matching socks and not be
laughed at at school. I understand.
At 3 o'clock on Thanksgiving Day, we couldn't eat turkey
because momma was preparing somebody else's turkey at 3 o'clock. We had to play
football to entertain ourselves. And then around 6 o'clock she would get off
the Alta Vista bus and we would bring up the leftovers and eat our turkey --
leftovers, the carcass, the cranberries -- around 8 o'clock at night. I really
do understand.
Every one of these funny labels they put on you, those of
you who are watching this broadcast tonight in the projects, on the corners, I
understand. Call you outcast, low down, you can't make it, you're nothing,
you're from nobody, subclass, underclass; when you see Jesse Jackson, when my
name goes in nomination, your name goes in nomination.
I was born in the slum, but the slum was not born in me.
And it wasn't born in you, and you can make it.
Wherever you are tonight, you can make it. Hold your head
high; stick your chest out. You can make it. It gets dark sometimes, but the
morning comes. Don't you surrender!
Suffering breeds character, character breeds faith. In
the end faith will not disappoint.
You must not surrender! You may or may not get there but
just know that you're qualified! And you hold on, and hold out! We must never
surrender!! America will get better and better.
Keep hope alive. Keep hope alive! Keep hope alive! On
tomorrow night and beyond, keep hope alive!
I love you very much. I love you very much.
