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“America’s
Unity Call”
Alan
Keyes
McKay
Events
Center, Orem, Utah
September 22, 2000
Alan Keyes: Thank you. Praise God. Thank you very much.
I'm going to do something this evening that I don't usually do. It is my
habit when I speak, most of the time, to kinda plunge in, because I think the
substance ought to speak for itself. And so, generally, I don't take
excursions when I start my speeches. But tonight I feel impelled to do so
because I have a word on my heart that I have to share with you, and it's not
very often I get an opportunity. Matter of fact, I don't know that I've ever
had the opportunity before in quite the same way.
Over the course of the last year or year and a bit, I was obviously out on
the hustings during the Presidential primaries, and
there along with me, as you know, was your own wonderful Senator Orrin Hatch.
Some of you might be under the misimpression, however, that our acquaintance
somehow springs from that occasion when we were out there together meeting up
at different Republican events, and so forth and so on. And that's not true.
I am glad to count Senator Hatch amongst those folks who, for many years, has
been both an admired figure for me--first when I was a younger
person. I can use that term now. As some of you probably know, since my staff
insisted on spreading it all over the universe, I did celebrate my fiftieth
birthday recently. I would just as soon . . . [applause] . . . no, no, why
are you applauding? Me? I would have just as soon have let it slip by
quietly, myself. I was planning to do that.
And so, when I think back on just how long ago it was that I first had
occasion to meet and have dealings with Senator Hatch--it was
quite a while ago, Senator--and actually, one of my first
contacts through an individual named Ron Doxey. (Remember Ron? He used to
work with you.) And a I've gotta say, over the years, he has been for me one
of those models in American politics--because sometimes we think
that in order to be in politics you have to lose integrity, and lose dignity,
and lose heart, and lose kindness, and lose the kind of characteristics that
actually make human beings both respectable and lovable. And that is not
true. And I think one of the people who demonstrates that and can be a model
for us of decency and integrity in politics (not just in the way of what you
do with your votes and all this, but in the way that you maintain the core of
your soul and your spirit and your humanity), one of those people that I look
up to is your own Senator Hatch. And I'd like to tell him from my heart this
evening, thank you for the example he has set for me, because I love him for
it. [applause]
He's also been one of those folks who, in the midst of all the difficulties
in Washington, with everybody tempted to go this way and that and the other,
has managed at the same time that he can make a network of friendships that
run across party lines, and ideological lines, to maintain his stance as a
voice of conservative conviction for which we can have respect and on which
we can rely. And that is a hard thing to do.
And I have to tell you. I have watched that as many folks I have known over
the years have gone to Washington and lost it completely. And by the time
they are done, they don't have anything to do with the person they were when
they first stood up to run. But I believe deeply with all my heart you can
look at Senator Hatch today and you know he is the same senator you sent
there in the first place--and he still comes home. I cannot say
that about every senator, and I do not believe it about a lot of them. And I
think people in this state ought to be happy and proud to have a man that you
can be sure, when it's said and done--the other great test of
whether or not you still have a senator who represents you: when he wins, you
send him to Washington. When he decides that his career is over, he will come
back to Utah and it will still be his home. And I have seen too many of whom
that is not the truth. [applause]
I want to talk this evening about the importance of this election. It may
seem sometimes that we are simply going through the usual routine motions in
America. We have these things. They come around every couple of years. A few
of us go to the polls--less and less of us, it seems sometimes.
And then it's over, and we can do it all again in a few years and take it all
for granted. The only way I believe anybody could really think that's what's
happening this year is if they have not, in fact, lived in America for the
last eight years, and have not, in fact, been witness to the truth.
I don't care if the economy is good right now. I know all these politicians
are standing up, "This economy is good because we did this, and we did
that, and we did the other thing." The Democrats want to claim credit,
the Republicans, the folks in the White House, and the--meaning
no offense, Senator--the folks in the Congress, too. And I'll
tell them all: this great economy we've got is not due to what any of
these politicians have done. Some of them are good, like Senator Hatch, and
some of them are bad--but none of them are responsible.
The American people have made this miracle, and they are still making it
happen. [applause]
But what I hope is that the American people will not allow the work of their
hands, and their heart, and their creativity, and their risk-taking, and
their enterprise--will not allow the fruit of it to distract
them from the crisis that is also looming over us in the midst of these good
times. And that crisis is unmistakable. It pains my heart a little bit that I
seem to be the only person left in America willing to say it outright. But I
will have to say it outright. I don't care. You can summarize the moral
crisis of this country, not in fifty words, not in a hundred, not in ten
thousand. You don't have to write a tome. You don't have to have to write a
book. You don't even have to write a long newspaper article. You can
summarize the moral crisis of this country in two words: Bill Clinton!
[applause]
You can see it writ large. And the folks who are in our opposition today,
they can pretend that this is not the case. But we have seen, over the course
of the last several weeks, the most clear and blatant confession we could see
that Bill Clinton has utterly damaged, if not undermined and destroyed, the
integrity of the high office he holds, and in the process assaulted the
national character of our people.
And you know who has given us the greatest witness to that truth? I'll tell
you who. His own faithful shadow, Al Gore. That's right. And you know how he
did it? I'll tell you how he did it--and the media's out there
and they laud him and they say it was such a wonderful thing. Do you know how
he did it? He confessed that the major vulnerability, the major failing, of
all these years of the Clinton-Gore leadership has been the assault on our
moral character when he chose Senator Lieberman as his vice-president.
Why did he do it? Why did he do it? I'll tell you why he did it. He did it
because Lieberman's probably the only major Democrat public figure in this
country who has even a fig leaf of credibility left when it comes to
being some kind of moral spokesman! That's why he did it. [applause]
And he knows that, if they are not able to deal with the moral revulsion of
the American people, they are going to lose big time, because we have watched
the spectacle of Bill Clinton and what the polls say and everything.
Look at the times we're in, y'all. I keep wondering when, as Republicans,
we're gonna wake up. When are we gonna wake up? And people run around now
with a lot of gloomy faces, some of them, and they're trying to say,
"Why isn't this going on?" "Why isn't that going on?"
"Why is so-and-so behind?" "Why isn't he ahead in the
polls?" Consider what I've been trying to tell people for months. And
nobody, at least in the leadership, has been willing to listen. They've been hypin' junk. And I've told people repeatedly--I
said it when I was here at the rally we had at the end of my own campaign--look
at the facts. We are in the midst of one of the most prosperous economic
periods in the history of our country. In the course of the twentieth
century, the American people have never taken the White House from one
party and given it to another in prosperous economic times. It has never
happened.
That being the case, why on earth did we think this was going to be an easy
fight? It was never going to be easy. But it also has never been impossible.
Because, even though the material times are good, the American people know
that the moral performance has been dismal; that this administration
and these Democrats have assaulted something more precious than money--something
that, once it is gone, we cannot recover with all our dollar bills. You take
away the character of this nation, and you have taken away the foundation of
everything that makes our freedom possible. [applause] And that is what has been
at risk. That is what has been at risk in these years of Clinton-Gore
leadership.
So what do we do about it? Well, first I think we have to recognize the real
importance of it. And I'm afraid, some people, even despite the fact that it
is so clear and so obvious, they lose sight of it.
What is the distinguishing public good of American life? In the course of
human history, there have been many empires and many nations. They've been
noted for many different things. There have been empires noted for their
military prowess, and their pursuit of glory, and their pursuit of gold, and
their conquest of colonies and this and that. What is it that we as a people
are known for? Do you know what it is? That most precious and important thing
that we have realized beyond the imaginings of previous generations: it is
the liberty of the people. It is the dignity of ordinary men and women to
hold the fate and destiny of their nation and their communities in their
hands and shape it responsibly, so that they could look upon it with pride
and satisfaction.
That is who we are: a people who have realized a dream of freedom; who have
taken it from an abstract hope and turned it into a living reality. But what
made it possible? I think it's pretty clear what made it possible. We had a
founding generation that understood the essential principles of liberty, and
they knew from the very beginning what had to be the foundation-stone of our
discipline. And what was it? Well, simply put, it's right there in the
Declaration, when they penned the great words, "We hold these truths to
be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by
their Creator with certain unalienable rights." Do I speak of the
rights? No, they're very important. No: that principle that, above all,
involves us in the recognition that the basis for human justice, and dignity,
and rights is the will and authority of our Creator, God. [applause]
The importance of that principle we have to look at, because that principle
allows us to understand that, since we claim our rights by virtue of the
authority of God, we must exercise our rights with respect for the authority
of God. That becomes a sound foundation for discipline in our use of our
freedoms. It becomes a bulwark against the abuse of our powers. It becomes
also a sound foundation for our confidence that, when we claim those rights
and when we exercise them, we do not have to fear the consequences, because
we are a people who exercise our rights in the fear of God.
And with that confidence you move forward. You don't have to give in to those
who are trying to convince you that you don't have the capacity, the ability,
the character to take care of your own family, to deal with your own
children, to run your own schools, to run your our communities and states, to
take care of the things that need to be done for your nation and its people.
I have watched, over the course of my lifetime, as time and again, the
liberals--in particular, of course, those who dominate the
Democrat party, I'm afraid--have come forward and they are
always speaking in terms, some of which actually don't sound all that bad.
Because, when they stand up and tell us that we need to care about each
other, and we don't want to leave anybody out, and we want to make sure that
we have opened up the avenues of opportunity, and held out a helping hand to
those in need--I don't think there's a single decent conscience
in America that doesn't believe that those things are true.
Where we part company with the liberals is very simple. They seem to think
that all the virtue, and all the decency, and all the will, and the goodness,
and all the motivation in America to do what's right, has suddenly
concentrated itself in the hands of the federal government. But I believe
it's still in the hearts of the American people. [applause]
But if we are to act on that kind of faith, we have to be pretty sure that
our heart's in the right place, you know. Because, at the end of the day, if
we are people--parents who aren't going to take care of our
children, children who aren't going to respect the needs of their parents,
neighbors who aren't going to heed the cry of their neighbors in need, people
who aren't going to worry about the things that are going on in their
community; if that's the kind of people we are, then we are going to
need a government that will step in a take over from us, because we're
incompetent to take care of ourselves.
I've often said to people that that's the real significance of those who
claim that everybody in America is somehow like Bill Clinton. They want it
that way. Liberals want us to think that everybody in the country is like
Bill Clinton--that, even if we were President of the United
States, if the whole fate of the republic, and indeed of the world, was on
our shoulders, we wouldn't be able to control and discipline our lustful
passions for even for one second. That's what they want us to believe.
And if we believe that that's true--if it is true that we have
lost our will, lost our discipline, as a people to that extent--then
we are as unfit to be free as that man is unfit to be President of the United
States. [applause]
But you see, I don't believe it. I don't believe it, and yet some of the
signs are all around us. When folks stand forward and say that we've gotta
have more government spending and we can't cut taxes because then the babies
will starve, they're telling us that we have to rely on a welfare system
because the families of America won't work anymore. When they tell us we
can't afford to have school choice, because if we do, the schools are all
going to deteriorate and there'll be quack education, there won't be
standards, and so forth, they're telling us that decent parents will no
longer have a sense of discipline and responsibility when they care for their
children.
I don't know, by the way, why anybody in America today would give them an
ear, though, because over the course of the last several decades, we've seen
the emergence in America of one of those movements that everybody ought to
look at because they remind us of who we are.
I want to say a word here in that context, of course--about who?--about
those folks who, looking on what happened in the government system, decided
that they had to step up once again and assert the truth that parents indeed
have the full and whole responsibility for the education of their children.
And some of them have stepped forward to such a degree that they have kept
those children home, and educated them themselves. And today they're coming
forward and they're taking the SAT tests and applying to colleges and they
are doing as well or better than any of the products that come out of the
government schools! [applause]
I don't praise them because they have rejected the government education. I
praise them because they have proven again the right principle of all
education: parental leadership, parental responsibility, respect for the
authority, and the need to have responsibility in the parents themselves.
That's where education should be based. [applause]
But if we're going to see all these things, if we're going to go down the
road that we want to go down--we talk about taxes, for instance:
lowering taxes, changing the tax system, moving to a tax system that leaves
more control of income in the hands of the American people. Sounds good. And
I deeply believe in it. But when the liberals come along and tell us that if
we're left in control of our money, we're gonna see disasters for welfare,
disasters for the poor, disasters for unemployment, disasters for the elderly,
that's a comment about us. That's a way of saying we won't meet our
responsibilities. We won't care. We won't respond. We won't do what we're
supposed to do for one another.
Do we have the kind of sense of responsibility anymore that can indeed take
on the responsibilities of freedom, be trusted with the control of our own
resources? I'm not sure, you see. And that might surprise some folks:
"Alan's not sure we can govern ourselves?" No, I'm not. You know
why I'm not? I am not sure we can govern ourselves because there's a big
question mark today behind the capacity in principle of our people to take on
this task.
After all, why shouldn't someone believe that we will ignore the cries of the
poor, that we will harden our hearts against the needs of our neighbors, that
we will not care for the requirements of our aging parents and friends, since
we are so willing callously to disregard the voiceless cries of our helpless
future in the womb? It boils down to that in the end. Some people always say,
"Why does he always get back to that?" I'll tell you why I always
get back to abortion: because we can't have it both ways. Either our rights
come from God, or they come from a human choice. Either our rights are here
by the will of God, or they're here by our mother's choice. Either we must
respect the integrity of God's choice in every human being, in every human
life, because it is God's word and God's will before we have anything to do
with it, or not a single one of us are safe in our claim to rights and freedoms.
[applause]
Deny it to the innocents in the womb, and we have denied it to ourselves.
Harden our hearts to the innocents in the womb, and we have hardened our
hearts to the need for compassion, and mercy, and fellow-feeling, and
charity, and decency in this world. People who don't care about those
children should stop pretending that we will care about each other. It is not
so.
It is one of the reasons why, when folks try to tell me that Senator
Lieberman is such a great spokesman for the moral viewpoint, I have to look
at them with a certain amount of pity, actually. No, really. And it's not
disrespect for any individual, here. I'm not making a personal comment at
all. I'm making a logical comment. Don't come and tell me that you're some
big spokesman for "moral principle" and then turn around and vote
for partial birth abortion, which kills infants as they're coming out
of the womb! What's moral about that? What kind of conscience does that
show?! [applause]
If we are going to remove the question mark behind our capacity for
self-government, then we must first restore the respect for moral principles
that guarantee us against the abuse of rights--the first
principle being, our rights come from God, not from any human choice. Then we
must stand up and reclaim those responsibilities and rights that allow us to
govern our families, and govern our schools, and govern our communities in
such a way that we can stand forward and claim the responsibility, as well as
take the pride in the results that are shaped by our actions. By restoring
our moral foundations, by reclaiming our rightful sovereignty and discipline
as a people, we can put this republic back on the right path of
self-government.
But all that said, it's not enough. It's not enough. Because, I have to say
something here right now--it's difficult at the moment, because
it's a little bit humbling for me, but it's something that we must, none of
us, forget. It's all well and good to stand up and make speeches, however
nice they may be. It's all well and good to affirm our belief in principles,
and it's all well and good to stand forward and talk about how we need to get
back to this and promote that, and save that, and safeguard that. But when
push comes to shove, our Founders left us with instruments that allow us to
do this job. And that means, when the time comes to choose the people who are
going to wield those instruments, if we don't get into the political arena
and get the job done, then all our speeches, and all our words, and all our
expressions of patriotic commitment don't mean a thing! [applause]
I know--maybe a little better than some, because I look at it
and maybe a little more often. I know that it's hard. You get into office. It
can be going to Washington or it can be Governor Leavitt stepping into the
governor's chair. You come in with great hopes and everybody's behind you and
they want you to do this and to do that, and you're working everyday to get
something done, and maybe in the first little while, in the flush of
enthusiasm, you'll get 60% of it done, and then maybe it goes down a little
bit, and then it goes up a little bit. I don't know anybody, Ronald Reagan
included, who's ever stepped into office and been able to fulfill all the
promises and get the whole agenda done.
After all, Ronald Reagan said he was going to abolish the Department of
Education--and the last time I looked, it's still there.
[laughter] That doesn't mean he wasn't a great President, and that doesn't
mean that he wasn't a great conservative. What it means is that you get in
and you do what you can, and then you have to rely on the great people of
this country to get others in to do what they can. [applause]
And that's the question that's before us in this election year. It's before
us at the national level. It's before us at the state level. It's before us
at every level. It may very well be the case, and I have been real clear
about it sometimes, as Senator Hatch knows. I have been one of those voices
willing to express my unhappiness from time to time with things that have
been going on in the Congress--and, "Why didn't the
Republicans do this and why didn't we fight harder for that?" But I'll
tell you something, my friends. When we go into the voting booth, when we're
out there fighting as we must this November to try to decide whether
America's going to be going down the road of tyranny or staying on the road
of freedom, I hope to wake up on the day after that election able to know
that I will be once again brow-beating a Republican majority in the Congress,
because that's the only thing that's going to offer this country any
hope! [applause]
I say that with the deepest conviction. It's all well and good. We have to,
in fact--and I'll say it from the word go, and I hope nobody
minds. It's the responsibility of citizens. And I think Gov. Leavitt
understands it, and I think Senator Hatch understands it. I think everybody
understands it. It's the responsibility of citizens to hold your feet to the
fire. That's what we're here for! It's our job. Some of us will do it a
little more vocally, a little more loudly than others. [laughter]
But you gotta know that you want to keep sending back to office people who
are going to feel your heat, because at the end of the day, they share the
fire that burns in your heart for liberty.
And that's not true of a lot of folks on the other side. I gotta tell ya. They don't care anymore. I learned this little story
from New Jersey recently where the New Jersey legislature was trying to pass
a bill, and all they wanted to do was establish it that in the schools the
children would stand up every day and they would recite, at the beginning of
the day, the great words from the Declaration of Independence: "We hold
these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they
are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among
these are life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness," etc. And they wanted
them to say those great words and then observe a moment of silence, and sit
down and start their day.
I can't take any credit for the legislative initiative, though several years
ago, I did go to New Jersey and in a speech suggest that that would be a
perfect way to resolve the controversy over school prayer. I mean, it is a
prayer of sorts, isn't it? You are acknowledging the existence and authority
of the Creator with respect to the most important public good that we share
as a community, and then you're sitting down to get on with your business.
And you're doing it all based on the great common document of our nation's
heritage--not somebody's religious sectarian document, but the
great document of the American creed.
Now you and I would think, I'm pretty sure, that somebody puts that proposal
on the table, who's gonna object? Are we gonna say our children can't read
the Declaration anymore in our schools? That's kinda hard to believe, isn't
it? Well, I think all of us would find it hard to believe. I think we'd all
find it kind of absurd to believe that anybody's gonna stand up and make an objection.
Do you realize that not only was objection made, but there were objections
made long and vociferously and loudly by Democrats and liberals in the New
Jersey legislature who were perfectly willing to take the Declaration
principles and throw them right on the ash heap of history?
Those are people who do not share our heart. Those are people who do not
share the fire that burns in the American breast for the preservation of our
liberty, and it's time we saw the truth. We cannot hope to preserve the possibility
of victory and sustenance for that freedom if we don't send into office and
back into office those who are willing to feel the same heat that we feel for
the liberty of this country. [applause]
And I am here today to tell ya, there are times when
I'll agree and times when I'll disagree with some of the folks who sit on
this stage, but I know that each and every one of them are moved in their
hearts by the same love of freedom and same desire to preserve it that I am--and
that they will stand with us and fight with us and work with us to make sure
that this republic survives in liberty. And that is the crisis we are in.
Vote wrongly now, fail to step forward and work now, and the time is already
here when we shall lose it forever.
This is not a joke--and I say this, my friends, with absolute
seriousness. We are in the midst of the crisis of this republic, and we
cannot afford to shirk our responsibilities. Nor can we afford to believe
that if we can't have it all today, we should opt out and wait for something
else to happen. Because it doesn't work that way.
So I sincerely hope that we will look on the hearts and we will look on the
records and even though we may not be 100% happy with everything we see, we
will understand the challenge that is before us. The first challenge being,
yes, to articulate the principles and stand for the truths and move forward
to fight for the restoration of our constitutional liberties and our
sovereignty and moral discipline as a people; and the second priority being
to get behind those who are willing to stand with us and fight with us and
work with us in order to make it happen--because if we don't get
out there and make those election victories happen, every word will be hollow
and every hope will be lost.
It's a hard word to hear, but it's one we had best take to heart, because the
crunch is already upon us. If you haven't noticed that in the last several
years, I don't know what I can do for you. I know that there are some people
who believe that worse is better, because somehow or another we're gonna pull
back from the brink. I don't believe it. I look back on the history of the
last eight years, and I know for a fact that we are far worse off in terms of
the moral future of America because people chose Bill Clinton over Bob Dole;
Bill Clinton over George Bush. I wasn't 100% happy with either of those
individuals, but I'll tell ya. None of them, none
of them, would have dragged the White House, would have dragged the moral
heart of this country, through the stinking muck the way Bill Clinton has.
[applause]
I want--and I shall certainly fight on--to make
sure that as we move on into the future we are able to pursue an agenda that
does not compromise on the fundamental principles, that restores control of
the schools, and the money, and the sovereignty of this country to its
people. I believe in it deeply. But I also believe, at the end of the day, we
must fight to make sure that we don't give added opportunities to those who
deeply, in my opinion, are intent on destroying the moral heart and betraying
the institutions of our people. If we are to fight in order to do good with
them and to make them a better reflection of the real Constitutionalism that
this nation needs to see reborn, then we must keep them out of the hands of
individuals who will destroy them altogether.
I hope that folks will reflect seriously on what I say tonight, because I
came here with a certain sense of responsibility--knowing that I
couldn't afford this evening to just give a little rah-rah speech and go
away, making everybody feel some superficial good about what we need to do. I
know better. Sometimes I have been noted for saying to people things they
don't want to hear. That's why, whenever people tell me that an audience
doesn't want to hear about abortion, that's the first thing I talk about.
[laughter] And seeing that a lot of audiences don't want to hear about it, I
talk about it a lot. [laughter, applause]
But at the same time, there are times we don't want to hear about the need to
temper our best hopes in order to achieve our most vital security. But we
still need to do it. Before we can triumph, we must survive. Before liberty
can prevail, the possibility of liberty must be preserved. And I believe that
that is the choice that's before us right now. Shall we hand off the future
of America once again to those who have already tried to strike death blows
against its heart, against its conscience, against its national security, or
shall we work hard to make sure that that opportunity for destruction is
taken out of their hands? [applause]
I hope that we will resolve upon the latter course--not because
it is the perfect result, but because it is the result that will give us all
the opportunities to strive for what is better. And this is, in the end, I
believe, as much as we can hope for.
I suspect that I, and everybody who's on this stage--Governor
Leavitt and Orrin Hatch--we're all gonna go on striving to do
what we can to make this nation better, to make its Constitution stronger, to
make its people more the sovereign center of its life that they should be.
But I don't think any of us fool ourselves into believing that what we do in
our day and in our lifetime is gonna do more than contribute to that result.
The time approaches for each and every one of us, nearer for some than
others, when we shall hand the torch on to new faces and new generations. The
best we can ever hope to do is to know that we have acted with some integrity
in the time we had. That we have taken those opportunities to do some good
and made them better. That we have avoided the worst evils, safeguarded the
nation from the worst dangers, and passed on intact a respect for those
principles that help us to understand where lies the direction of our
liberty. If we can do that, then we have to understand that beyond that, the
fate of our country is in the hands of God.
And unlike some people, I don't say that as if it doesn't mean anything. I
think that when you think it through, that's the truth everywhere and always.
Whatever we do, whatever we strive for, whatever we think we're going to
achieve, the battle is not with us; it is with the Lord. The victory is not
for us; it will be for Him.
If we can act in that kind of faith, then we don't need to see the perfect ending
in our time, because we have faith that the perfect power will produce the
ending in His time. If we act in that faith, then I believe that we will be
willing to give all that we can give to preserve the better possibilities of
our moment, so that our future and our children will have their opportunities
to strive to make things even better than we could.
This is all, in the end, that is asked of us. But it is asked of us now.
The economy might distract us, the good times might turn our minds away from
it, but the shadow of the destruction of our freedom hangs heavy over this
republic. And I believe that all of you who have come here tonight--in
your heart, in your wills, in your willingness to go out and do what you can
to assure that evil will be held in abeyance and the potential for a
restoration of our true sense of values and principles and discipline will be
promoted--it's in your hands.
When these folks sit up here tonight--and every time we have an
election, the beauty of it is that our candidates have to confess that, at
some point, it's no longer up to them. There have been days, Governor
Leavitt, when the decision was yours and when things were depending on you,
but you sit before these people knowing this evening that the future depends on
what they do. And I hope you all understand this. That is the truth of
government of the people, by the people, for the people.
Our success or failure is not in the hands of our leaders. It is in our
hands. I pray God every day that the sovereign temporal power in this land
will be guided by His will, will be humble before His authority. But that
sovereign power is not the government, and it's not the politicians; it is
the heart and conscience of the people. Your heart. Your conscience. Let them
be guided by a true love of your country to stand forward and do as much as
we can of the good that we can do today--for that is all our God
expects of us. And if we do that, then we can safely leave the rest to Him.
God bless you. [applause]
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