中文譯文全文：
兩百二十一年以前，在一個如今仍屹立在對街的大廳中，一群人匯聚一堂，而以這些簡單文字，推啟了美國這機會渺茫的民主實驗。跨海逃離暴政與迫害的農夫及學者、政治家及愛國人士們，終於在那持續了整個1787年春季的費城會議中，實現了他們的獨立宣言。
他們所提出的文件，後來雖經簽字通過，但最終仍未完成。它被這國家奴隸制度的原罪所玷污，一個使各殖民地間彼此分歧且讓整個會議陷入僵局的疑點。直到開國元老們選擇容許奴隸貿易繼續運作至少二十年，而將任何最終解決方案留給將來的世代。
當然，對奴隸制度疑問的答案早已埋藏在我們的憲法之中。一部將依法享有平等公民權這理想置於最核心之憲法，一部承諾人民自由、正義、以及一個可能且應當隨時間獲得進一步完善的聯邦之憲法。
然而區區羊皮紙上的文字，並不足以助奴隸脫離桎梏；或是提供每種膚色及信仰的男男女女，身為美國公民的完整權利及義務。所需要的，是世世代代願意盡一己之力的美國人，透過抗爭與奮鬥、在街頭與法庭上、透過內戰及公民不服從並且始終冒著極大風險，以縮小理想的承諾與當代的現實間之差距。
這是我們在這次競選一開始時所提出的任務之一。為了接續前人的漫長旅途，一個追求更正義、更平等、更自由、更具關懷且更繁榮的美國之旅途。我選擇在歷史上的此時此刻參選總統，因為我深深相信除非我們共同努力，否則無法解決我們此刻面臨的各項挑戰。除非我們為建立一個更完善的聯邦而瞭解到：我們雖懷著不同的故事，但擁有相同的期待；我們可能外表不同且來自不同的地方，但我們都嚮往朝同一方向邁進，朝向一個讓我們子子孫孫更美好的未來。
這份信念，來自於我對美國人民的善良與慷慨不變的堅信。但這也來自於我的美國故事。
我是來自肯亞的黑人父親與來自坎薩斯州的白人母親的兒子。扶養我長大的，是曾經歷過大蕭條而在二次大戰時巴頓將軍旗下服役的白人祖父、以及當祖父身在海外時，在利文沃司堡一家轟炸機生產線上工作的白人祖母。我曾就讀於某些美國最好的學校，也曾在全世界最窮的國家之一生活過。我所娶的是一位在血脈中流有奴隸與奴隸主血液的美國黑人。而我也將這份血脈傳承到我兩個寶貴的女兒身上。在三個大陸上，散佈著我屬於每一個種族及每一種膚色的兄弟、姊妹、外甥、外甥女、叔伯與表親。在有生之年，我將永不忘記，我的故事在地球上任何一個其他國家中，都沒有一丁點可能會發生。
這個故事並未使我成為最符合傳統的候選人。但這故事在我基因深處烙印著這理念：這個國家不只是部分的總和，而真正是合眾為一。
在這次競選的第一年中，出乎所有預料之外，我們看到了美國人民對於團結和諧的渴望。無視於單純以種族眼光來看我的參選之誘惑，我們在全國最高白人比例的州裡贏得了明確的勝利。在內戰南方聯盟旗仍舊飄揚的南卡羅來納州，我們建立了非洲裔美國人與白人之間的強力聯盟。
這並不代表種族在這次競選中並不成為一個問題。在這次競選的各個階段，有些評論者曾經認為我要麼「太黑」或是「不夠黑」。我們看到種族緊張關係在南卡羅來那州初選前一週浮出表面。媒體搜遍了每一個出口民調，來找尋支持種族兩極化論點的最新證據。並不僅止於黑白之間，更包含黑色與棕色人種之間。
然而，一直到最近幾週，這次競選中對種族的討論，才轉入了更引起歧見的彎路。
在光譜的一端，我們聽到了一些說法，認為我的參選，只是在執行補助少數族裔的贊許行動；認為我的參選，單純是墊基於不切實際的自由派人士們想要便宜買下種族諒解。在另一個極端，我們聽到了我先前的牧師，傑瑞米亞‧萊特教士，使用了煽動性的語言以表達一些看法。這些看法不只可能擴大種族鴻溝，而且貶抑了我們國家的偉大與善良。這些言論理所當然地，引起白人及黑人雙方的不悅。
我已經用無可爭議的明確言辭，嚴正批評了萊特牧師造成如此爭議的不當言論。對某些人而言，仍有些疑問隱隱殘留未解。我是否知道，他有時是個尖銳批評美國內政及外交政策的評論者？當然。我是否曾經在坐在教堂內時，聽過他做出些可能被認為有爭議性的言論？是的。我是否曾經強烈不同意他的很多政治觀點？絕對如此。正如我確信，你們之中很多人也曾自你的牧師、神父或猶太祭司口中聽過你所強烈不同意的言論。
但是造成最近風暴的言論，並不只是具爭議性而已。它們並不單是宗教領袖在試圖對感受到的不公義發聲。相反地，它們表達出對這國家嚴重扭曲之觀點。這觀點將白種人種族主義視為根深蒂固的，且將美國不好的地方強調到高過於所有我們知道美國作的好的地方。這觀點將中東衝突視為主要根源於如以色列等忠實盟友的行為，而非來自扭曲而充滿仇恨的伊斯蘭極端教義派之意識型態。
由此，萊特牧師的評論並不僅僅錯誤，而且挑起分歧。在一個我們需要合作如一的時候挑起分歧；在一個我們需要聯合一起以解決一串巨大問題的時候加強種族緊張。兩場戰爭、一系列恐怖威脅、一個衰敗的經濟、一個持續已久的健保危機及具有潛在毀滅性的氣候變遷。這些問題並不單是黑人、白人、拉丁裔或亞裔的問題，而是我們全民所共同面對的難題。
以我的背景、我的政治走向、和我所公開表示的價值和理想，毫無疑問地，對有些人而言，我批評萊特牧師的言論仍不足夠。為什麼在一開始時要跟萊特牧師打交道？為什麼不加入另一個教會？而我承認，若我對萊特牧師的所知，僅止於在電視和youtube上無限循環的宣道片段，又或是三一聯合基督教會真的符合於某些評論者譏諷的形象，我毫無疑問會以相同的方式回應。
但實際的情況是，那並不是我對這個人所瞭解的全部。我在二十年前遇見的，是一位協助引領我信仰基督的人、是一位對我闡述以愛照護我們同胞的義務的人、告訴我要關懷病者而拉拔窮人的人。他是個曾經在海軍陸戰隊報效國家的男子漢，他也曾在國內最優秀的大學及神學院就讀及講課，他也曾在超過三十年的時光中，帶領教會在世間做上帝的善行，如提供無家可歸者棲身之處、照料有急難需求的人、提供日間托兒服務、贊助獎學金、到監獄佈道、且向身受愛滋病所苦的病患伸出援助之手。
在我的第一本書《我父之夢》裡，我曾描述過我在三一教會第一次參加的佈道會之經驗：
「人們開始呼喊，從座中立起，擊掌而高聲大叫。一陣強烈的風將牧師的聲音帶到屋脊之上…而在那齊一的音符中 – 希望! – 我聽到了更多；在那十字架腳邊，在城市裡上千座教堂中，我想見了尋常黑人的故事和大衛與巨人哥利亞、摩西與法老、以西結的白骨回生這些聖經故事融合為一。這些生存、自由與希望的故事，成為了我們的故事，我的故事。故事中所流的血，成為我們的血、那滴下的淚，化做我們的淚；直到這黑人教會，在這明亮的白日，好似再次成為了承載著眾人故事的船隻，向廣闊未來世界中的世世代代而去。我們的試煉與勝利既獨一無二而又普及於萬眾，屬於黑人，而不只屬於黑人。在記錄我們的旅途中，這些故事、歌謠使我們有方法能取回我們所不需感到羞愧的記憶…讓所有人能夠學習且珍惜的記憶、讓所有人能開始重建的記憶。」
那才是我在三一教會的經驗。像全美國各地任何其他黑人為主的教堂一樣，三一教會包含了黑人族群的所有層面。醫師與靠福利救助生活的母親、模範學生與前幫派份子。如同其他黑人教會一般，三一教會的講道充滿了喧鬧的笑聲及時而俗氣下流的幽默。它們充滿了對不熟悉的人而言可能刺耳的舞蹈、擊掌、尖叫與高呼。這教會中完整包容了善良與殘酷、熾烈的才智與驚人的無知、掙扎與成功、愛心與，是的，苦澀及偏見，這些組成美國黑人生活的全部經驗。
而這，也許，能幫助解釋我與萊特牧師的關係。即使他如此地不完美，他對於我還是如同親人一般。他堅定了我的信仰、主持我的婚禮、並領洗我的孩子。我一次都未曾在與他談話時，聽到他對其他族裔說出貶抑之詞；或是對待任何他所接觸的白人時，有任何禮貌與尊重之外的舉止。他在他一人之中包含了，無論好壞，他如此多年來勤奮服務的族群的特質。
我不能與他斷絕關係，正如同我不能與黑人族群斷絕關係。我不能與他斷絕關係，正如同我不能與我的白人祖母斷絕關係。我的白人祖母協助養育我、一次又一次地為我做出犧牲，而且愛我如同她愛這世上任何事物。但她也曾經承認他對路過黑人男子的恐懼，而她也曾不止一次說出讓我揪心蜷縮的種族刻板印象字句。
這些人都是我的一部份。而且他們也是美國的一部份，這個我所摯愛的國家。
有些人會把這視為一個將單純不可原諒的文字合理化或找藉口的嘗試。我可以向你保證，這不是。我想，政治上安全的作法應該是讓這事件過去，然後希望它消失在叢林之中。我們可以將萊特牧師當作怪人或煽動者來打發掉，如同有些人在她最近發表言論之後，以隱藏著深層的種族偏見為由打發了潔拉汀‧費拉洛一樣。(註1)
但是種族議題，是我相信這國家不能在此時忽略的議題。若如此做，則我們將會犯了如同萊特牧師那些令人反感的講道一樣的錯 -- 將刻板印象簡化而放大負面觀點，直到扭曲了事實。
事實是，最近這幾週所出現的評論及浮現的議題，反映了在這個國家中，種族這複雜議題其實從來沒有得到真正解決。這是我們聯邦仍須改善以求更完美的一部份。如果我們現在遠離這個議題，如果我們僅僅撤退回各自的角落，我們永遠不會聚在一起，一同解決如醫療體系、教育、或為每個人找份好工作的真正挑戰。
要瞭解這個現實，得先瞭解我們是如何到達這個局面的。如同威廉‧佛克納所說「過去還沒有蓋棺論定。說實在的，過去根本還沒有過去。」我們並不需要在這裡重述這國家中種族不正義的歷史。但我們確實需要提醒我們自己，今日在非裔美人族群中所存在的許多分歧，可以直接追溯到從上一代遺留下來的不平等待遇、在奴隸制度與吉姆‧克羅種族分離法案之下受苦的殘酷遺產。(註2)
種族分離的學校曾經是，而且仍然是，較差的學校。我們在布朗vs教育董事會一案判決之後五十年，仍然還沒有解決這個問題。(註3)而他們所提供的較差教育，無論當時及現在，協助解釋今日白人與黑人學生之間普遍的成就差距。
訂於法令中的歧視，當黑人被透過暴力禁止擁有財產、或是不提供借款給非裔美人的小生意老闆、或是黑人購屋者不能夠獲得聯邦住屋局的貸款、或是將黑人排除於公會、警察、消防隊之外等等，這代表者黑人家庭不能夠累積任何有意義的財富，來遺留給下一代。這個歷史協助解釋了黑白之間的收入及財富差距，以及在今日這麼多城市及鄉村社區中，密集的貧困區域。
在黑人男性中經濟機會的缺乏，以及不能供養家庭所產生的羞愧與挫折，導致了黑人家庭的侵蝕。這個問題可能還受多年以來的福利政策影響，而變的更差。而且許多都市黑人社區中缺乏基本服務，如孩子們能遊戲的公園、按規巡邏的警察、正規化的垃圾收集服務以及建築法規執法等，全都協助創造了一直困擾我們的一個暴力、荒蕪及漠視的循環。
這是萊特牧師以及他那一代的許多非裔美人成長過程所面對的現實。他們在五十年代末期及六十年代初時成年，一個種族隔離仍屬於法律規定而機會遭受到系統化限制的時代。值得評論的不是在歧視之下有多少人失敗了。而是有多少男男女女克服了困境，在無路之處篳路藍縷，為我這一輩後來的人開出條路來。
但在所有努力奮鬥扒出一條路來獲得美國夢一角的人之外，還有許多人沒能成功。這些在各種原因之下，因遭受歧視而終究敗下陣來的人。這些失敗的遺留效應，也被傳遞到新生的下一代，那些在街角呆站或在監獄裡消沈的少男，以及逐漸增加的少女，對將來沒有一丁點希望或期待。即使是那些取得成功的黑人，種族問題和種族歧視依然以根本地定義著他們的世界觀。對於萊特牧師那一代的男男女女，羞辱、懷疑與恐懼的記憶並沒有離開。那些年來的憤怒與苦澀也依然留下。那些憤怒也許不會在公開場合中，在白人朋友或同事面前表示出來。但是這些仍然會在理髮店或餐桌旁發聲。有時候，那些憤怒受到政治人物的利用，沿著種族界線來獲取選票、或是用來掩蓋政治人物自己的不足。
偶爾，這些憤怒也在週日上午的教堂中發出聲音來。在講道台上、在聽眾席中。有這麼多人對於聽到萊特牧師講道中的憤怒感到驚訝這個事實，正提醒我們那句老話：在美國人的生活中，種族隔離最嚴重的時間是在星期日上午大家上教堂的時候。那份怒氣並不總是有幫助的。事實上，在太多時候他分散了該用來解決真正議題的注意力。這使我們不能正面面對我們自己在這處境中所應負起的責任，也阻止了非裔美人族群來組成促進真正改變所需要的聯盟。但是這份怒氣是真實的，強烈的。而單純許願希望它消失，批評它而不去瞭解它的根源，只能讓種族之間誤解的隙縫更加拉寬。
事實上，在白人族群中的一些區塊，也存在著相類似的憤怒。大部分勞工階級與中產階級的美國白人，並不覺得他們因自身種族而得到了什麼特權。他們的經驗是外來移民的經驗。就他們所知，從來沒有什麼人給過他們什麼，他們從零開始建立了一切。他們一生努力工作，但很多時候卻看到職位被轉移到海外，或是退休金在奮鬥一輩子後化為烏有。他們對於他們的未來感到焦慮，也感受到夢想正在從手中溜走。在一個工資漲幅停頓與全球競爭的時代，機會被視為一個零合遊戲，也就是你的夢想是從我手中奪走的。所以當有人告訴他們要送他們的小孩坐公車到城市另一端，只為了學校族裔人口要求、當他們聽到非裔美人在爭取好工作或大學入學名額時，因為他們自己從未犯下的過錯而有保障名額優勢、當有人告訴他們在心中對市區犯罪的恐懼只不過是個偏見，埋怨便隨時間逐漸累積。
正如黑人族群中的憤怒一般，這些埋怨並不總會在禮貌場合表達出來。但是它們協助了塑造至少一整個世代的政治地貌。對福利措施及保障入學政策的憤怒協助促成了雷根的聯盟。政治人物屢次利用對犯罪的恐懼來達到自己的政治目的。脫口秀主持人和保守派評論員們靠著指出不存在的種族歧視事件建立了整個事業；而對真實種族不義及不公按理應該有的討論，卻被當作政治正確或是逆向種族歧視給打發掉了。
就如同黑人的憤怒常常實際上產生反效果，這些白人的積怨也將注意力從對中產階級遭受擠壓的真正罪魁禍首身上分散開來。充滿了內線交易的公司文化、可疑的會計操作、以及短視的貪婪；受到說客及利益團體掌控的華盛頓政府、優惠少數而非多數的經濟政策等。但，單純希望白人的積怨憑空消失，或是將他們貼上被誤導或種族主義的標籤而不能理解他們有真實合理的背景，這也加寬了種族之間的分歧，且阻擋了通往真正諒解的道路。
這，就是我們現在的情況。這是個我們已經受困其中多年的種族僵持局面。與某些批評我的人所說相反，無論是黑人白人，我從未天真到相信我們可以在一次選舉週期中，甚或是一任總統任期中，超越我們的種族歧見。尤其是如我一般不完美的競選人。
但我確立了一個堅定的信念，一個來自於我對上帝的信心及我對美國人民的信念。當一起合作時，我們可以跨過一些陳年的種族傷痕，而且我們如果要繼續踏上「更完美的聯邦」之路，別無選擇。
對於非裔美人族群，這條路代表著擁抱我們過去的負擔，但不成為過去的受害者。這代表著繼續堅持在美國生活中每一個層面的完整公義。但這也代表了將我們的特定不滿之處，如更好的醫療體系、更好的學校、更好的工作等，與所有美國人更廣大的期望結合在一起。如那正努力衝破玻璃天花板的白種女人、被裁員的白種男人、試圖餵飽一家人的移民。這也代表著對我們的生活負起完全的責任，透過對於我們的父親要求更多的關愛、花更多時間陪伴我們的孩子們、對他們閱讀、教導他們即使他們可能會在他們生命中遇到些挑戰與歧視，他們永遠不能臣服於絕望或譏諷之下、他們必須要永遠相信，他們能寫下自己的命運。
諷刺地，這個典型的美國的 -- 是的，保守主義的 -- 天助自助的想法，在萊特牧師的講道中時常出現。但是我的前牧師經常未能瞭解的，是踏上自我協助的計畫，也需要這社會能夠改變的信念。
萊特牧師講道內容最大的錯誤，並不是他談到了社會上種族主義的話題。而是他說話時，把這社會當作是靜止不變的；當作沒有發生任何進展；當作這個國家 – 這個讓他信眾的一份子能夠競選這片土地上最高的職位，建立一個跨越黑白、拉丁裔與亞裔、富人與窮人、年輕人與老人的聯盟的國家 – 仍舊無可救藥地束縛於一個悲劇性的過往。但我們知道，我們已看到的，是美國能夠改變。這才是這個國家的真正天才所在。我們所已經達成的成果，給予了我們希望 - 敢於希望的無畏 – 來達成我們能夠而且必須在明天達成的一切。
在白人族群中，通往更完美聯邦的路代表著認知到困擾著非裔美人族群的問題，並不只存在於黑人的想像中；種族歧視的遺跡以及今日的歧視案例 -- 雖然已比過去不明顯-- 是真實存在的，而且需要解決。並不只是用言語，而是以行動。透過在我們的學校與社區中投資、透過執行我們的人權法律及保證犯罪正義系統中的公平、透過提供這一代人前幾代人所沒有機會階梯。這需要所有美國人來瞭解到，你的夢想並不一定要來自於我的夢想的損失；瞭解到對黑人、白人、棕色人種的孩子們的健康、福利及教育投資改善，最終會幫助整個美國繁榮。
那麼，最後，所要求的並不多過、也不少於所有世界上的偉大宗教所要求的：要人如何對待你，便如何對待別人。讓我們成為我們兄弟的守護者，如聖經經文所說。讓我們找尋彼此之間的共同之處，而讓我們的政策反應它。
因為我們對這國家有個選擇。我們可以接受產生分裂、紛爭與譏諷的政治。我們可以對種族問題只當作作秀來看，如同我們在O.J Simpson辛普森殺妻案中一般、或是只在悲劇發生之後才注意到，如我們在Katrina颱風之後、或是夜間新聞的消費品。我們可以在每個電視頻道、每一天播放萊特牧師的講道，一直到大選當天，然後把我是否相信或同情他最引人厭惡的言論，當作這次競選的唯一話題。我們可以對希拉蕊支持者的幾句失言窮追猛打，當作她在打種族牌的證據；或是我們可以猜測白人男性會不會毫不考慮共和黨候選人約翰‧馬坎的政策，而在大選中全數支持他。
我們可以那樣做。
但如果我們這樣做了，我可以告訴你在下一次競選時，我們會繼續討論其他的干擾議題。然後下一個。然後再下一個。然後什麼都不會改變。
那是一個選項。或是，在此時此刻，在這次大選，我們可以凝聚在一起而說：「這次不會」。這次我們要談談正在崩壞的學校，它們偷取了黑人孩子、白人孩子、亞裔孩子、西班牙裔孩子、美國原住民孩子的未來。這次我們要拒絕告訴我們「這些孩子學不了」的諷刺犬儒主義；拒絕把看來不像我們的孩子當作是別人的問題。美國的孩子不是「那些孩子」，他們是我們的孩子。我們不會讓它們在二十一世紀的經濟中落後。這次不會。
這次我們要談談排在急診室中的長龍，是如何排滿了沒有醫療保險的白人、黑人與西班牙裔；這些光靠自身無力抵抗華盛頓的特殊利益份子，但是若我們一同努力可以抵抗它們的老百姓。
這次我們要談談曾經提供給每個族裔的男男女女美好生活，卻拉下了鐵門的工廠；曾經屬於每一個宗教、每一個地區、每一個行業的美國人的，如今卻高掛著「售屋」牌的住家。這一次我們要談談真正的問題，而這並不是長相與你不同的人會搶你的工作，是所你服務的公司會把你的職位移往海外，只為了賺取一點利潤。
這一次我們要談談每一種膚色、每一種信念的男男女女。他們在那同一面光榮的旗幟之下一同服役、一同作戰、一同流血。我們要談談該如何從一個從來不應許可也從不應發動的戰爭之中，帶他們回家。而且我們要談談我們要如何透過照顧他們及他們的家人，以及給予他們應得的福利，來展現我們的愛國心。
我如果不是全心全意地相信，這些是絕大部分的美國人對這國家的期望，我不會來參選總統。這個聯邦也許永遠不能完美，但是一代又一代已經顯示了，它永遠可以更為完美。於是今天，當我發現自己對這個可能性感到懷疑或嘲諷時，給我最大力量的就是下一代 -- 已經以他們的態度、信念及對改變的開放心胸在這次選舉中創造了歷史的年輕人。
今天有一個故事，想要在這裡留給大家。一個我曾有榮幸在馬丁‧路德‧金博士生日時，在他生前的教堂，亞特蘭大的艾伯那澤浸信會中述說的故事。
有一位年輕，二十三歲的白人女子，名叫艾希莉‧白雅。她在南卡羅來那州的佛羅倫斯鎮，組織我們的競選團隊。她從競選一開始，便在一個多數為非裔美人的社區中組織競選。有一天，她在一個圓桌討論會上，每個人都要說出他們的故事，以及他們為什麼在這裡參與競選。
而艾希莉說，當她還只是九歲大的時候，她母親得了癌症，必須很多天不能上班。於是她被解聘，而且失去了健保。他們被迫申請破產，就在那時，艾希莉決定，她該要做些什麼。
她知道食物是他們最昂貴的支出之一，所以艾希莉說服了她母親，他真正想吃而且比什麼東西都更愛吃的，是芥菜和醬菜三明治。因為那是吃東西最便宜的辦法。
她這樣子吃了一年，直到她媽媽病情好轉。而她告訴圓桌邊的每個人，她加入我們競選團隊的原因，是因為這樣子她就可以幫助這國家中，以百萬計的其他需要協助他們父母的孩子。
艾希莉也可能做出不同的選擇。也許有人在半途上告訴她，她母親遭受問題的根源是靠福利救濟而太懶不願工作的黑人；或是非法進入這個國家的西班牙裔移民。但是她並沒有。她在這對抗不公的抗爭中，尋求可以合作的同伴。
無論如何，艾希莉結束了她的故事。然後她繞著房間走，尋問每個人他為何要支持我們這次的競選。他們都有不同的故事和理由。很多人有特定的議題。最後，他們終於來到了這一位年長的黑人男子，他在這裡全程默默地坐著。然後艾希莉問他，他為何在這裡。他並沒有提出特定的議題。他並沒有提到醫療體系或是經濟。他並沒有提到教育或是戰爭。他並沒有說他是為了巴拉克‧歐巴馬而來。他簡單地對房間裡的每一個人說，「我是為了艾希莉來的」。
「我是為了艾希莉來的」。僅此本身，那一個年輕白人女孩與年長黑人男子互相認識瞭解的瞬間，還不夠。這還不足以對病人提供醫療服務、對失業者提供工作、或是對我們的孩子提供教育。
但這正是我們的起點。我們的聯邦就是從此茁壯。而正如這麼多世世代代的人們，自一小群愛國者於兩百二十一年前，在費城簽署那份文件後所瞭解到的，那就是追求更完美的起點。
註 1：潔拉汀‧費拉洛 Geraldine Ferarro民主黨女性眾議員，曾在1984年做為副總統候選人，與Walter Mondale搭檔參選總統。後敗於雷根。參與希拉蕊的競選團隊，於2008年3月7日在加州每日微風報上發表評論：「如果歐巴馬是白人，他不會在這個位置；如果他是個女人，他也不會在這個位置。」這段話引起很大的爭議，及歐巴馬陣營的抗議。在3月12日，她退出競選團隊，表示不希望給希拉蕊帶來進一步傷害，但自始至終沒有收回此言論。
註2:Jim Crow 是白人對黑人的輕蔑稱呼，代指許多種族隔離法案的總稱。在許多南方州裡，曾有黑白必須就讀不同學校，搭乘不同公車，使用不同廁所等等的歧視法案。
註3: Brown vs. Board of Education. 美國最高法院於1954年5月17日發下的判例，推翻之前黑白各自設立學校的各州法案。視為種族平等進程的一大突破。
A More Perfect Union 英文原文：
Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America's improbable experiment in democracy. Farmers and scholars; statesmen and patriots who had traveled across an ocean to escape tyranny and persecution finally made real their declaration of independence at a Philadelphia convention that lasted through the spring of 1787.
The document they produced was eventually signed but ultimately unfinished. It was stained by this nation's original sin of slavery, a question that divided the colonies and brought the convention to a stalemate until the founders chose to allow the slave trade to continue for at least twenty more years, and to leave any final resolution to future generations.
Of course, the answer to the slavery question was already embedded within our Constitution - a Constitution that had at is very core the ideal of equal citizenship under the law; a Constitution that promised its people liberty, and justice, and a union that could be and should be perfected over time.
And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part - through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk - to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time.
This was one of the tasks we set forth at the beginning of this campaign - to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America. I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for of children and our grandchildren.
This belief comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people. But it also comes from my own American story.
I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton's Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I've gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world's poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners - an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.
It's a story that hasn't made me the most conventional candidate. But it is a story that has seared into my genetic makeup the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts - that out of many, we are truly one.
Throughout the first year of this campaign, against all predictions to the contrary, we saw how hungry the American people were for this message of unity. Despite the temptation to view my candidacy through a purely racial lens, we won commanding victories in states with some of the whitest populations in the country. In South Carolina, where the Confederate Flag still flies, we built a powerful coalition of African Americans and white Americans.
This is not to say that race has not been an issue in the campaign. At various stages in the campaign, some commentators have deemed me either "too black" or "not black enough." We saw racial tensions bubble to the surface during the week before the South Carolina primary. The press has scoured every exit poll for the latest evidence of racial polarization, not just in terms of white and black, but black and brown as well.
And yet, it has only been in the last couple of weeks that the discussion of race in this campaign has taken a particularly divisive turn.
On one end of the spectrum, we've heard the implication that my candidacy is somehow an exercise in affirmative action; that it's based solely on the desire of wide-eyed liberals to purchase racial reconciliation on the cheap. On the other end, we've heard my former pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, use incendiary language to express views that have the potential not only to widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation; that rightly offend white and black alike.
I have already condemned, in unequivocal terms, the statements of Reverend Wright that have caused such controversy. For some, nagging questions remain. Did I know him to be an occasionally fierce critic of American domestic and foreign policy? Of course. Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes. Did I strongly disagree with many of his political views? Absolutely - just as I'm sure many of you have heard remarks from your pastors, priests, or rabbis with which you strongly disagreed.
But the remarks that have caused this recent firestorm weren't simply controversial. They weren't simply a religious leader's effort to speak out against perceived injustice. Instead, they expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country - a view that sees white racism as endemic, and that elevates what is wrong with America above all that we know is right with America; a view that sees the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam.
As such, Reverend Wright's comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems - two wars, a terrorist threat, a falling economy, a chronic health care crisis and potentially devastating climate change; problems that are neither black or white or Latino or Asian, but rather problems that confront us all.
Given my background, my politics, and my professed values and ideals, there will no doubt be those for whom my statements of condemnation are not enough. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church? And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way
But the truth is, that isn't all that I know of the man. The man I met more than twenty years ago is a man who helped introduce me to my Christian faith, a man who spoke to me about our obligations to love one another; to care for the sick and lift up the poor. He is a man who served his country as a U.S. Marine; who has studied and lectured at some of the finest universities and seminaries in the country, and who for over thirty years led a church that serves the community by doing God's work here on Earth - by housing the homeless, ministering to the needy, providing day care services and scholarships and prison ministries, and reaching out to those suffering from HIV/AIDS.
In my first book, Dreams From My Father, I described the experience of my first service at Trinity:
"People began to shout, to rise from their seats and clap and cry out, a forceful wind carrying the reverend's voice up into the rafters....And in that single note - hope! - I heard something else; at the foot of that cross, inside the thousands of churches across the city, I imagined the stories of ordinary black people merging with the stories of David and Goliath, Moses and Pharaoh, the Christians in the lion's den, Ezekiel's field of dry bones. Those stories - of survival, and freedom, and hope - became our story, my story; the blood that had spilled was our blood, the tears our tears; until this black church, on this bright day, seemed once more a vessel carrying the story of a people into future generations and into a larger world. Our trials and triumphs became at once unique and universal, black and more than black; in chronicling our journey, the stories and songs gave us a means to reclaim memories that we didn't need to feel shame about...memories that all people might study and cherish - and with which we could start to rebuild."
That has been my experience at Trinity. Like other predominantly black churches across the country, Trinity embodies the black community in its entirety - the doctor and the welfare mom, the model student and the former gang-banger. Like other black churches, Trinity's services are full of raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing, clapping, screaming and shouting that may seem jarring to the untrained ear. The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and yes, the bitterness and bias that make up the black experience in America.
And this helps explain, perhaps, my relationship with Reverend Wright. As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions - the good and the bad - of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.
I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother - a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.
These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.
Some will see this as an attempt to justify or excuse comments that are simply inexcusable. I can assure you it is not. I suppose the politically safe thing would be to move on from this episode and just hope that it fades into the woodwork. We can dismiss Reverend Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated racial bias.
But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America - to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.
The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we've never really worked through - a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.
Understanding this reality requires a reminder of how we arrived at this point. As William Faulkner once wrote, "The past isn't dead and buried. In fact, it isn't even past." We do not need to recite here the history of racial injustice in this country. But we do need to remind ourselves that so many of the disparities that exist in the African-American community today can be directly traced to inequalities passed on from an earlier generation that suffered under the brutal legacy of slavery and Jim Crow.
Segregated schools were, and are, inferior schools; we still haven't fixed them, fifty years after Brown v. Board of Education, and the inferior education they provided, then and now, helps explain the pervasive achievement gap between today's black and white students.
Legalized discrimination - where blacks were prevented, often through violence, from owning property, or loans were not granted to African-American business owners, or black homeowners could not access FHA mortgages, or blacks were excluded from unions, or the police force, or fire departments - meant that black families could not amass any meaningful wealth to bequeath to future generations. That history helps explain the wealth and income gap between black and white, and the concentrated pockets of poverty that persists in so many of today's urban and rural communities.
A lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one's family, contributed to the erosion of black families - a problem that welfare policies for many years may have worsened. And the lack of basic services in so many urban black neighborhoods - parks for kids to play in, police walking the beat, regular garbage pick-up and building code enforcement - all helped create a cycle of violence, blight and neglect that continue to haunt us.
This is the reality in which Reverend Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up. They came of age in the late fifties and early sixties, a time when segregation was still the law of the land and opportunity was systematically constricted. What's remarkable is not how many failed in the face of discrimination, but rather how many men and women overcame the odds; how many were able to make a way out of no way for those like me who would come after them.
But for all those who scratched and clawed their way to get a piece of the American Dream, there were many who didn't make it - those who were ultimately defeated, in one way or another, by discrimination. That legacy of defeat was passed on to future generations - those young men and increasingly young women who we see standing on street corners or languishing in our prisons, without hope or prospects for the future. Even for those blacks who did make it, questions of race, and racism, continue to define their worldview in fundamental ways. For the men and women of Reverend Wright's generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician's own failings.
And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright's sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning. That anger is not always productive; indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems; it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity in our condition, and prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.
In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don't feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience - as far as they're concerned, no one's handed them anything, they've built it from scratch. They've worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they're told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.
Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren't always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.
Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze - a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns - this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.
This is where we are right now. It's a racial stalemate we've been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy - particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.
But I have asserted a firm conviction - a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people - that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.
For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances - for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans -- the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives - by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.
Ironically, this quintessentially American - and yes, conservative - notion of self-help found frequent expression in Reverend Wright's sermons. But what my former pastor too often failed to understand is that embarking on a program of self-help also requires a belief that society can change.
The profound mistake of Reverend Wright's sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It's that he spoke as if our society was static; as if no progress has been made; as if this country - a country that has made it possible for one of his own members to run for the highest office in the land and build a coalition of white and black; Latino and Asian, rich and poor, young and old -- is still irrevocably bound to a tragic past. But what we know -- what we have seen - is that America can change. That is true genius of this nation. What we have already achieved gives us hope - the audacity to hope - for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.
In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination - and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past - are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds - by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations. It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.
In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world's great religions demand - that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother's keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister's keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.
For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle - as we did in the OJ trial - or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright's sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she's playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.
We can do that.
But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we'll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.
That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, "Not this time." This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can't learn; that those kids who don't look like us are somebody else's problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.
This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don't have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.
This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn't look like you might take your job; it's that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.
This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should've been authorized and never should've been waged, and we want to talk about how we'll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.
I would not be running for President if I didn't believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation - the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.
There is one story in particularly that I'd like to leave you with today - a story I told when I had the great honor of speaking on Dr. King's birthday at his home church, Ebenezer Baptist, in Atlanta.
There is a young, twenty-three year old white woman named Ashley Baia who organized for our campaign in Florence, South Carolina. She had been working to organize a mostly African-American community since the beginning of this campaign, and one day she was at a roundtable discussion where everyone went around telling their story and why they were there.
And Ashley said that when she was nine years old, her mother got cancer. And because she had to miss days of work, she was let go and lost her health care. They had to file for bankruptcy, and that's when Ashley decided that she had to do something to help her mom.
She knew that food was one of their most expensive costs, and so Ashley convinced her mother that what she really liked and really wanted to eat more than anything else was mustard and relish sandwiches. Because that was the cheapest way to eat.
She did this for a year until her mom got better, and she told everyone at the roundtable that the reason she joined our campaign was so that she could help the millions of other children in the country who want and need to help their parents too.
Now Ashley might have made a different choice. Perhaps somebody told her along the way that the source of her mother's problems were blacks who were on welfare and too lazy to work, or Hispanics who were coming into the country illegally. But she didn't. She sought out allies in her fight against injustice.
Anyway, Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they're supporting the campaign. They all have different stories and reasons. Many bring up a specific issue. And finally they come to this elderly black man who's been sitting there quietly the entire time. And Ashley asks him why he's there. And he does not bring up a specific issue. He does not say health care or the economy. He does not say education or the war. He does not say that he was there because of Barack Obama. He simply says to everyone in the room, "I am here because of Ashley."
"I'm here because of Ashley." By itself, that single moment of recognition between that young white girl and that old black man is not enough. It is not enough to give health care to the sick, or jobs to the jobless, or education to our children.
But it is where we start. It is where our union grows stronger. And as so many generations have come to realize over the course of the two-hundred and twenty one years since a band of patriots signed that document in Philadelphia, that is where the perfection begins.
"We the people, in order to form a more perfect union."
Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America's improbable experiment in democracy. Farmers and scholars; statesmen and patriots who had traveled across an ocean to escape tyranny and persecution finally made real their declaration of independence at a Philadelphia convention that lasted through the spring of 1787.
The document they produced was eventually signed but ultimately unfinished. It was stained by this nation's original sin of slavery, a question that divided the colonies and brought the convention to a stalemate until the founders chose to allow the slave trade to continue for at least twenty more years, and to leave any final resolution to future generations.
Of course, the answer to the slavery question was already embedded within our Constitution - a Constitution that had at is very core the ideal of equal citizenship under the law; a Constitution that promised its people liberty, and justice, and a union that could be and should be perfected over time.
And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part - through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk - to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time.
This was one of the tasks we set forth at the beginning of this campaign - to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America. I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for of children and our grandchildren.
This belief comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people. But it also comes from my own American story.
I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton's Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I've gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world's poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners - an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.
It's a story that hasn't made me the most conventional candidate. But it is a story that has seared into my genetic makeup the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts - that out of many, we are truly one.
Throughout the first year of this campaign, against all predictions to the contrary, we saw how hungry the American people were for this message of unity. Despite the temptation to view my candidacy through a purely racial lens, we won commanding victories in states with some of the whitest populations in the country. In South Carolina, where the Confederate Flag still flies, we built a powerful coalition of African Americans and white Americans.
This is not to say that race has not been an issue in the campaign. At various stages in the campaign, some commentators have deemed me either "too black" or "not black enough." We saw racial tensions bubble to the surface during the week before the South Carolina primary. The press has scoured every exit poll for the latest evidence of racial polarization, not just in terms of white and black, but black and brown as well.
And yet, it has only been in the last couple of weeks that the discussion of race in this campaign has taken a particularly divisive turn.
On one end of the spectrum, we've heard the implication that my candidacy is somehow an exercise in affirmative action; that it's based solely on the desire of wide-eyed liberals to purchase racial reconciliation on the cheap. On the other end, we've heard my former pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, use incendiary language to express views that have the potential not only to widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation; that rightly offend white and black alike.
I have already condemned, in unequivocal terms, the statements of Reverend Wright that have caused such controversy. For some, nagging questions remain. Did I know him to be an occasionally fierce critic of American domestic and foreign policy? Of course. Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes. Did I strongly disagree with many of his political views? Absolutely - just as I'm sure many of you have heard remarks from your pastors, priests, or rabbis with which you strongly disagreed.
But the remarks that have caused this recent firestorm weren't simply controversial. They weren't simply a religious leader's effort to speak out against perceived injustice. Instead, they expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country - a view that sees white racism as endemic, and that elevates what is wrong with America above all that we know is right with America; a view that sees the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam.
As such, Reverend Wright's comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems - two wars, a terrorist threat, a falling economy, a chronic health care crisis and potentially devastating climate change; problems that are neither black or white or Latino or Asian, but rather problems that confront us all.
Given my background, my politics, and my professed values and ideals, there will no doubt be those for whom my statements of condemnation are not enough. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church? And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way
But the truth is, that isn't all that I know of the man. The man I met more than twenty years ago is a man who helped introduce me to my Christian faith, a man who spoke to me about our obligations to love one another; to care for the sick and lift up the poor. He is a man who served his country as a U.S. Marine; who has studied and lectured at some of the finest universities and seminaries in the country, and who for over thirty years led a church that serves the community by doing God's work here on Earth - by housing the homeless, ministering to the needy, providing day care services and scholarships and prison ministries, and reaching out to those suffering from HIV/AIDS.
In my first book, Dreams From My Father, I described the experience of my first service at Trinity:
"People began to shout, to rise from their seats and clap and cry out, a forceful wind carrying the reverend's voice up into the rafters....And in that single note - hope! - I heard something else; at the foot of that cross, inside the thousands of churches across the city, I imagined the stories of ordinary black people merging with the stories of David and Goliath, Moses and Pharaoh, the Christians in the lion's den, Ezekiel's field of dry bones. Those stories - of survival, and freedom, and hope - became our story, my story; the blood that had spilled was our blood, the tears our tears; until this black church, on this bright day, seemed once more a vessel carrying the story of a people into future generations and into a larger world. Our trials and triumphs became at once unique and universal, black and more than black; in chronicling our journey, the stories and songs gave us a means to reclaim memories that we didn't need to feel shame about...memories that all people might study and cherish - and with which we could start to rebuild."
That has been my experience at Trinity. Like other predominantly black churches across the country, Trinity embodies the black community in its entirety - the doctor and the welfare mom, the model student and the former gang-banger. Like other black churches, Trinity's services are full of raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing, clapping, screaming and shouting that may seem jarring to the untrained ear. The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and yes, the bitterness and bias that make up the black experience in America.
And this helps explain, perhaps, my relationship with Reverend Wright. As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions - the good and the bad - of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.
I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother - a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.
These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.
Some will see this as an attempt to justify or excuse comments that are simply inexcusable. I can assure you it is not. I suppose the politically safe thing would be to move on from this episode and just hope that it fades into the woodwork. We can dismiss Reverend Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated racial bias.
But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America - to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.
The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we've never really worked through - a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.
Understanding this reality requires a reminder of how we arrived at this point. As William Faulkner once wrote, "The past isn't dead and buried. In fact, it isn't even past." We do not need to recite here the history of racial injustice in this country. But we do need to remind ourselves that so many of the disparities that exist in the African-American community today can be directly traced to inequalities passed on from an earlier generation that suffered under the brutal legacy of slavery and Jim Crow.
Segregated schools were, and are, inferior schools; we still haven't fixed them, fifty years after Brown v. Board of Education, and the inferior education they provided, then and now, helps explain the pervasive achievement gap between today's black and white students.
Legalized discrimination - where blacks were prevented, often through violence, from owning property, or loans were not granted to African-American business owners, or black homeowners could not access FHA mortgages, or blacks were excluded from unions, or the police force, or fire departments - meant that black families could not amass any meaningful wealth to bequeath to future generations. That history helps explain the wealth and income gap between black and white, and the concentrated pockets of poverty that persists in so many of today's urban and rural communities.
A lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one's family, contributed to the erosion of black families - a problem that welfare policies for many years may have worsened. And the lack of basic services in so many urban black neighborhoods - parks for kids to play in, police walking the beat, regular garbage pick-up and building code enforcement - all helped create a cycle of violence, blight and neglect that continue to haunt us.
This is the reality in which Reverend Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up. They came of age in the late fifties and early sixties, a time when segregation was still the law of the land and opportunity was systematically constricted. What's remarkable is not how many failed in the face of discrimination, but rather how many men and women overcame the odds; how many were able to make a way out of no way for those like me who would come after them.
But for all those who scratched and clawed their way to get a piece of the American Dream, there were many who didn't make it - those who were ultimately defeated, in one way or another, by discrimination. That legacy of defeat was passed on to future generations - those young men and increasingly young women who we see standing on street corners or languishing in our prisons, without hope or prospects for the future. Even for those blacks who did make it, questions of race, and racism, continue to define their worldview in fundamental ways. For the men and women of Reverend Wright's generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician's own failings.
And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright's sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning. That anger is not always productive; indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems; it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity in our condition, and prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.
In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don't feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience - as far as they're concerned, no one's handed them anything, they've built it from scratch. They've worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they're told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.
Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren't always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.
Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze - a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns - this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.
This is where we are right now. It's a racial stalemate we've been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy - particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.
But I have asserted a firm conviction - a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people - that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.
For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances - for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans -- the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives - by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.
Ironically, this quintessentially American - and yes, conservative - notion of self-help found frequent expression in Reverend Wright's sermons. But what my former pastor too often failed to understand is that embarking on a program of self-help also requires a belief that society can change.
The profound mistake of Reverend Wright's sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It's that he spoke as if our society was static; as if no progress has been made; as if this country - a country that has made it possible for one of his own members to run for the highest office in the land and build a coalition of white and black; Latino and Asian, rich and poor, young and old -- is still irrevocably bound to a tragic past. But what we know -- what we have seen - is that America can change. That is true genius of this nation. What we have already achieved gives us hope - the audacity to hope - for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.
In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination - and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past - are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds - by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations. It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.
In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world's great religions demand - that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother's keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister's keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.
For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle - as we did in the OJ trial - or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright's sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she's playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.
We can do that.
But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we'll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.
That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, "Not this time." This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can't learn; that those kids who don't look like us are somebody else's problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.
This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don't have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.
This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn't look like you might take your job; it's that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.
This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should've been authorized and never should've been waged, and we want to talk about how we'll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.
I would not be running for President if I didn't believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation - the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.
There is one story in particularly that I'd like to leave you with today - a story I told when I had the great honor of speaking on Dr. King's birthday at his home church, Ebenezer Baptist, in Atlanta.
There is a young, twenty-three year old white woman named Ashley Baia who organized for our campaign in Florence, South Carolina. She had been working to organize a mostly African-American community since the beginning of this campaign, and one day she was at a roundtable discussion where everyone went around telling their story and why they were there.
And Ashley said that when she was nine years old, her mother got cancer. And because she had to miss days of work, she was let go and lost her health care. They had to file for bankruptcy, and that's when Ashley decided that she had to do something to help her mom.
She knew that food was one of their most expensive costs, and so Ashley convinced her mother that what she really liked and really wanted to eat more than anything else was mustard and relish sandwiches. Because that was the cheapest way to eat.
She did this for a year until her mom got better, and she told everyone at the roundtable that the reason she joined our campaign was so that she could help the millions of other children in the country who want and need to help their parents too.
Now Ashley might have made a different choice. Perhaps somebody told her along the way that the source of her mother's problems were blacks who were on welfare and too lazy to work, or Hispanics who were coming into the country illegally. But she didn't. She sought out allies in her fight against injustice.
Anyway, Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they're supporting the campaign. They all have different stories and reasons. Many bring up a specific issue. And finally they come to this elderly black man who's been sitting there quietly the entire time. And Ashley asks him why he's there. And he does not bring up a specific issue. He does not say health care or the economy. He does not say education or the war. He does not say that he was there because of Barack Obama. He simply says to everyone in the room, "I am here because of Ashley."
"I'm here because of Ashley." By itself, that single moment of recognition between that young white girl and that old black man is not enough. It is not enough to give health care to the sick, or jobs to the jobless, or education to our children.
But it is where we start. It is where our union grows stronger. And as so many generations have come to realize over the course of the two-hundred and twenty one years since a band of patriots signed that document in Philadelphia, that is where the perfection begins.
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