Thinking About It
February 13, 2007
Senator Barack Obama, in his impressive announcement speech for the Democratic nomination for president, in Springfield, Illinois on February 10th spoke “in the shadow of the Old State Capitol, where Lincoln once called on a divided house to stand together”. The latest candidate in the race for the Democratic nomination for president spent a good part of his speech discussing Abraham Lincoln, one of our most famous and most successful presidents and, of course, a former congressman and senate candidate from Illinois. One cannot go wrong in quoting Lincoln, Jefferson or Washington in their speeches but it does seem somewhat ironic that Senator Obama was discussing a Republican president while announcing his candidacy to capture the Democratic nomination for president. It may be petty on my part to bring this up but it would seem the Illinois senator might have also spoken about a prominent Democratic politician or quoted a Democratic party leader in his speech. He didn’t mention Lincoln’s Democratic opponent for president in 1860 the Illinois senator Stephen A. Douglas nicknamed the “Little Giant”. And, Obama didn’t mention the other two candidates for president in 1860 John Bell of the Constitutional Union party or John Breckenridge of the Southern Democratic party. He didn’t mention that Lincoln only won 39.8% of the vote in the hotly contested 1860 presidential race. Hopefully, the 2007 presidential race won’t have as many problems as the one in 1860 with four major candidates and the threat of a civil war hanging over the contest. Setting himself up as a new type of Democrat who says in his announcement speech that “It’s time to turn the page” the Harvard Law graduate might have talked about President John F. Kennedy’s New Frontier. He could have presented some quotes from Kennedy about passing the torch to a new generation. Or, if he wanted to be more current the former community organizer in Chicago could have invoked the name of President Bill Clinton and discussed his views of being a man of the people. Also, lacking from the speech from the senator was any standard discussion of Franklin Roosevelt or Thomas Jefferson, two other fairly well-known Democratic party standard bearers. And, if he wanted to quote or mention the best known Democrat in his state’s history he could have discussed the former legendary mayor of Chicago Richard Daley. Daley was a Democrat who definitely understood politics and would be useful to mention in Illinois. The former state senator speaks of his “improbable quest” of running for the presidency in his announcement speech which reminds one of Don Quixote. But, Senator Obama is neither an Abraham Lincoln or a Don Quixote. He appears to be the genuine article who can fire up a crowd with his considerable charisma and stirring rhetoric. He can get thousands of people to stand in ten degree weather to listen to him speak. Obama has taken on quite a challenge, as he says, “to transform a nation” and move beyond a polarized political climate in Washington and in the country. We can all wish him well on his journey which may or may not take him to the White House. We can all hope he presents his views and position papers so we can know where he actually stands on the issues of the day. My only small disagreement with his announcement speech for the Democratic presidential nomination is the fact that he didn’t mention or quote any of his fellow Democrats from today or from the past. It seems as if the could have found one or two worth mentioning. And, if the best selling author of two books, is looking for a Democrat from Illinois who became a Republican president, he might have mentioned or quoted Ronald Reagan who was also from the land of Lincoln.
Robert J. Guttman
Founder and Director, CPFR
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