I AM THE NATION

I was born on July 4, 1776, and the Declaration of Independence is my birth certificate. The bloodlines of the world run in my veins, because I offered freedom to the oppressed. I am the nation!

I am [300 million] living souls and the ghosts of those who have
lived and fought and died for me.

I am Nathan Hale. I stood at Lexington and fired the shot heard around the world.

I am Washington, Jefferson, and Patrick Henry.

Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace-- but there is no peace. What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!

I am John Paul Jones, the Green Mountain Boys and Davy Crockett.

I am Lee, Grant, Abe Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, Pershing, Eisenhower, MacArthur, Patton, and Colin Powell.

But just as they did in Philadelphia when they were writing the constitution, sooner or later, you've got to compromise. You've got to start making the compromises that arrive at a consensus and move the country forward.

I remember the Alamo, the Maine, Pearl Harbor and September 11, 2001. When freedom called, I answered and stayed until it was over, over there.

I left my heroic dead in Flanders Fields, the rock of Corregidor, on the bleak slopes of Korea, in the steaming jungle of Vietnam and the desert sands of Kuwait.

I am the Statue of Liberty; the wheat fields of Kansas, the granite hills of Vermont, and Tennessee the Volunteer State.

I am the coalfields of the Virginias and Pennsylvania, the fertile lands of the west, the Golden Gate, Brooklyn Bridge and the Grand Canyon.

I am Independence Hall, the Monitor, the Merrimac and the Challenger.

I am the Liberty Bell that first rang for freedom.

Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof.

I sprawl from the Atlantic to the Pacific - three million square miles of land throbbing with industry. I am forest, field, mountain and desert.

I am quiet villages and cities that never sleep. You can look at me and see Ben Franklin walking down the streets of Philadelphia with his bread loaf under his arm.

All who think cannot but see there is a sanction like that of religion which binds us in partnership in the serious work of the world.

You can see the lights of Christmas and hear the strains of "Auld Lang Syne" as the calendar turns.

I am Babe Ruth and the World Series.

The way a team plays as a whole determines its success. You may have the greatest bunch of individual stars in the world, but if they don't play together, the club won't be worth a dime.

I am more than 170,000 schools and colleges and more than 300,000 churches where my people worship God as they choose.

I am a ballot dropped into a box, the roar of a crowd in a stadium, the voice of a choir in a cathedral.

I am an editorial in a newspaper and a letter to Congress.

I am John Glenn and Neil Armstrong and their fellow astronauts who whirl above my head. I am Eli Whitney and Stephen Foster, Tom Edison, Albert Einstein and Billy Graham.

The framers of our Constitution meant we were to have freedom of religion, not freedom from religion.

I am Horace Greeley, Will Rogers and the Wright brothers.

The desire to fly is an idea handed down to us by our ancestors who... looked enviously on the birds soaring freely through space... on the infinite highway of the air.

I am George Washington Carver, Jonas Salk and Martin Luther King Jr.

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I am Longfellow, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Walt Whitman and Thomas Paine.

I love the man that can smile in trouble that can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. 'Tis the business of little minds to shrink, but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death.

Yes, I am the nation and these are the things I am.

I was conceived in freedom and God willing; in freedom I shall spend the rest of my days.

May I always possess the integrity, the courage and the strength to keep myself unshackled, to remain a citadel of freedom and a beacon of hope to the world.