PLANK JANUARY 21, 2013
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Presidents use their inaugural addresses as an opportunity to talk about the future. But when they take the oath of office for a second time, they also use it to talk about the past.
Franklin Roosevelt used his second inaugural address, which many consider his best, to define the New Deal—not as a one-time reaction to a national economic crisis, but as a “new chapter in our book of self-government.” He proclaimed a “new order of things” in which “the test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.” Ronald Reagan used his second address, effectively, to declare Roosevelt’s era over. Reagan framed his first term as an antidote to the era when “we asked things of government that government was not equipped to give” and proof that “freedom and incentives unleash the drive and entrepreneurial genius that are the core of human progress.”
Perhaps President Obama had those speeches in mind today, because he too used the occasion to define his first term—in ways, perhaps, that will last long beyond his presidency. If his first inaugural address was a vision of a better politics, then this address was a vision of a better society—a progressive vision in which government acts boldly to protect the weak, to promote economic growth, and to solve the problems we cannot solve on our own.
The contrast to 2009 was striking. That workmanlike speech was, above all, a call for less partisan fighting. “The time has come to set aside childish things,” Obama said in 2009, making a plea for national unity. It was an honorable effort and, ultimately, a futile one. As Obama would soon learn, his political critics were already strategizing to oppose him at every turn.
But despite this resistance, Obama accomplished a great deal, more than even many of his supporters realized at the time. He stopped the country from falling into depression, laying the groundwork for future economic prosperity; he brought new regulation to Wall Street and made the tax code more progressive; he saved the auto industry and the communities that depend upon it; and he put in a place a program to make health insurance available to all. Even allowing for all of the missteps and missed opportunities, that's an impressive list.
With this speech, Obama made clear that these efforts were more than haphazard responses to crises. They were, Obama said, reaffirmation of the idea that we need energetic, activist government. He started by quoting the Declaration of Independence and the need to guarantee “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” for all Americans. But unlike Reagan, who saw government as an impediment to liberty, Obama said he believed that government was liberty's protector. “We have always understood that when times change, so must we,” Obama said, “that fidelity to our founding principles requires new responses to new challenges; that preserving our individual freedoms ultimately requires collective action.”
From there, Obama’s rejection of economic conservatism—the impulse to do less, rather than more—became more explicit:
Together, we determined that a modern economy requires railroads and highways to speed travel and commerce; schools and colleges to train our workers. …Together, we discovered that a free market only thrives when there are rules to ensure competition and fair play. … Together, we resolved that a great nation must care for the vulnerable, and protect its people from life’s worst hazards and misfortune.”
Lest anybody mistake him for a socialist, Obama stated that “Our celebration of initiative and enterprise; our insistence on hard work and personal responsibility, are constants in our character.” But after that acknowledgement, he reaffirmed the commitments to the welfare state, by reminding Americans of what they truly have in common—a vulnerability to misfortune. And he issued a sharp, explicit rejection of the idea that government help breeds dependency.
We recognize that no matter how responsibly we live our lives, any one of us, at any time, may face a job loss, or a sudden illness, or a home swept away in a terrible storm. The commitments we make to each other – through Medicare, and Medicaid, and Social Security – these things do not sap our initiative; they strengthen us. They do not make us a nation of takers; they free us to take the risks that make this country great.
Stated that way, these ideas may seem relatively uncontroversial—who doesn’t think government should protect the weak? Who doesn't think government can do things to foster prosperity? But in the last four years Republicans and their allies have revealed they believe those things. They have voted to end guarantees of economic security for the poor, elderly, and infirmed—and they have, most recently, even questioned help for natural disaster victims. Today Obama made clear that he believes those critics are wrong and that he interprets his reelection as proof the American people agree with him.
Obama also described how he hopes to apply this vision in the next four years, most explicitly with a new effort to address climate change, which represents not just unfinished business from the first term but perhaps humanity’s greatest challenge for the future. Obama warned supporters not to expect too much of the next four years: “We must act, knowing that our work will be imperfect. We must act, knowing that today’s victories will be only partial.”
But this was a speech for future generations, as much as for today’s. Something tells me they will hear it.
16 comments
The first half of the speech was certainly as Jonathan describes -- Obama wove the idea of "we the people" into the need for collective, federal, action to solve problems. But then the speech disintegrated. There was an incoherent mixture of strength and peace (even using the phrase that should forever be off limits to political discourse, "peace in our time"), nods to women/gays/Latinos that were ritual rather than thematically supportive, an unrealistic return to the very first-term romantic idiocy about surmounting political disagreements, and winding up in pathetic acknowledgements that we won't always disagree. I was really enthusiastic about the first part, and dismayed by the latter part.
- TARFON
January 21, 2013 at 3:21pm
As literary criticism, you are surely correct, tarfon. But, on the whole, I still think it was a moving speech and a clear public declaration of his intentions as opposed to the vain hopes he expressed the last time. I hope he follows through.
- roidubouloi
January 21, 2013 at 3:28pm
I agree with both TAR and Roi. I would very much like to be proved wrong on my oft-expressed concerns that BHO doesn't follow through. We should know by Labor Day.
- drofnats1
January 21, 2013 at 4:05pm
Here's hoping - I was so glad to hear this speech. The 47% remarks, makers vs takers, that stuff - it was so damaging. A powerful assertion of our inherent value as human beings, and also of the need to protect the environment - a reiteration of the need for people to care for one another and not simply benefit the wealthy few - hooray. I understand Paul Ryan got booed by the crowd. Good.
- Sophia
January 21, 2013 at 5:53pm
Ooof, Jonathan, you've been watching too many episodes of the West Wing. Words that were not used in the speech: "jobs," "employment," "unemployment," "underemployment," "debt," "growth," "Iran," "North Korea," "trade," "nuclear," "terrorism," "defense," "missile defense." We'll see whether this speech is equal to the times. History might look back at that speech as being a little silly.
- bob1239
January 21, 2013 at 9:01pm
Silly? You thought this speech was silly? Seriously?
- Sophia
January 21, 2013 at 11:34pm
Here's the thing: some of you guys simply cannot help yourselves. We are personally killing ourselves off. Tens of thousands of people die every year from guns courtesy of our fellow citizens and we are causing a mass extinction, countless species are dying, the planet is under duress, and you gotta play the North Korea card. Can't help yourselves huh. Gotta have a good war, set things right. Gimme a break.
- Sophia
January 21, 2013 at 11:36pm
bob, the inaugural address isn't the State of the Union. It doesn't have to cover every policy option we're going to be struggling over for the next four years. But it does mean something imo that the president made a very sensible and undeniable case for the value of government in our everyday lives and pushed back against the myopic Republican mantra that appropriate support and protection is somehow against enterprise and creates dependency.
- ironyroad
January 22, 2013 at 12:01am
Obama did two things that matter deeply in his inaugural: He declared openly and firmly that government is not "the problem" but rather the means by which we take collective action to secure peace and prosperity today and a future we can bequeath to our followers without embarrassment tomorrow, and he made clear that "We the people ..." includes all Americans - that the march of inclusion and "from Seneca Falls to Selma to Stonewall" is not a debasement of the vision of the nation, but a fulfillment of that vision, and one to which we must remain committed and the future of which requires eternal vigilance and defense. This is enough for one speech. Here's hoping and expecting that he will use the State of the Union Address to put all this in concrete terms of jobs, resonsible entitlement reform, voter protection, immigration reform, climate change policy, ....
- IowaBeauty
January 22, 2013 at 8:03am
Hey Bob - bitter partisan, Not Over It, Line One. You've been watching too many Glenn Beck episodes, mainlined too much Krauthammer and his fevered ilk. You have no idea what an inaugural address even is. Besides, Obama doesn't need to preen on any of these points for you or anyone else, he's kicked the right wing's ass on each and every point you brought up. I'll take you up in detail on any of them - you pick. I'll wait.
- WandreyCer
January 22, 2013 at 9:20am
Lol! I'm a pretty moderate guy. I voted for the President in '08 and, while I've disagree with many (ok, most) of his policies, I've never said to myself "golly, I wish John McCain" was President. I don't watch any late night cable -- people yelling at each other annoy me and, honestly, most are less informed than I am (20 years ago I did some policy work on the Hill-- it stuck). Yes, I think Paul Krugman has digressed to a left wing hack, but that's a pretty mainstream thought. He's about as silly as those on the right who think the income tax can and should be replaced with a single rate consumption tax. Guys, you all seem nice enough, but I gotta tell you .... if you're a typical married person in the 30-50 age range with kids, mortgage, worries about employment, health care premiums which are now going up dramatically and annoyed that the payroll tax holiday is over, you're saying as you listen to this speech "WTH is the President talking about?" or, even worse, "I voted for this?" This is a little like Bush taking his 51% victory and using it to try to create private accounts in SS. The President will talk and his popularity will go down and, in about a year, the public will just tune him out and move on. And I say that as a guy who thought that shifting resources from Medicare to Medicaid made som sense and who does not think that every upper income tax hike is the end of Western civilization. Just keeping it real.
- bob1239
January 22, 2013 at 10:37am
Bob says: "if you're a typical married person in the 30-50 age range with kids, mortgage, worries about employment, health care premiums which are now going up dramatically and annoyed that the payroll tax holiday is over" If you are that person, then 1) you're a minority in this country; join the club of people who need fairness and balance and collective action in our policies because it's the only way you'll get a slice - yours is not a minority with inherent power to game the system to their own benefit (as are say, the very rich minority); and 2) your kids are reason enough to care about climate change, and "Seneca Falls to Selma to Stonewall" and all that implies. For my part, I welcome any responsible leader with the guts to stand up and say, in effect, "we'd better hang together, or we shall assuredly hang alone."
- IowaBeauty
January 22, 2013 at 11:37am
"if you're a typical married person in the 30-50 age range with kids, mortgage, worries about employment, health care premiums which are now going up dramatically and annoyed that the payroll tax holiday is over," Bob: I guess we will find out in a year's time whether you are correct. Remember, the State of the Union address is coming up, and as Irony noted, policy prescriptions belong there, rather than in the inauguration speech. You said voted for Obama in '08; that suggests you voted for Romney in '12. Romney would have gutted the ACA - and done nothing whatever to restrain health care premiums; Romney would likely have shifted more of the tax burden onto the middle class, by cutting taxes for the rich and perhaps moving to a flat tax structure; and Romney said nothing that suggests he understood or cared about mortgage or, for that matter, employment (remember his 47% speech? He thought that by merely being elected, unemployment would vanish). So you were not impressed by Obama's failure to mention policy prescriptions, but everything you are worried about would have got worse under Romney. Does not compute.
- icarus-r
January 22, 2013 at 11:39am
Or maybe you stayed at home in 2012, bob -- which is an option, fair enough. But if so, then it does seem to me that you're looking at the state of affairs through a very narrow lens. The inaugural is certainly not the place for Obama to start going into policy choices on Iran and North Korea (just to take two things you mentioned), which are likely to get more complex and dangerous over the next few years.
- ironyroad
January 22, 2013 at 12:16pm
hey Bob, do you want to hear something interesting, none of those words were used in FDR's second inagural speech either: "jobs," "employment," "unemployment," "underemployment," "debt," "growth" Nope, not a one (not to mention neither were any words mentioned about Hitler, Mussolini, Fascism, Stalin, military, etc.) Yet reading his second and reading Obama's second the similiarities are striking. Here are two excerpts: we have come far from the days of stagnation and despair. Vitality has been preserved. Courage and confidence have been restored. Mental and moral horizons have been extended. But our present gains were won under the pressure of more than ordinary circumstance. Advance became imperative under the goad of fear and suffering. The times were on the side of progress. To hold to progress today, however, is more difficult. Dulled conscience, irresponsibility, and ruthless self-interest already reappear. Such symptoms of prosperity may become portents of disaster! Prosperity already tests the persistence of our progressive purpose. Today we reconsecrate our country to long-cherished ideals in a suddenly changed civilization. In every land there are always at work forces that drive men apart and forces that draw men together. In our personal ambitions we are individualists. But in our seeking for economic and political progress as a nation, we all go up, or else we all go down, as one people. To maintain a democracy of effort requires a vast amount of patience in dealing with differing methods, a vast amount of humility. But out of the confusion of many voices rises an understanding of dominant public need. Then political leadership can voice common ideals, and aid in their realization. Honest to God, Obama could have written the exact same thing.
- blackton
January 22, 2013 at 12:27pm
"if you're a typical married person in the 30-50 age range with kids, mortgage, worries about employment, health care premiums which are now going up dramatically and annoyed that the payroll tax holiday is over, you're saying as you listen to this speech "WTH is the President talking about?" or, even worse, "I voted for this?"" Well that describes me almost to a 'T' except for the last three items - payroll tax holiday expiration, WHT? and I voted for this. I worry about employment but that's because I'm in an industry that goes through high and low cycles every 5-10 years not because BHO didn't mention jobs or failed to send me a personal note that he's 'liked' me on my LinkedIn profile. My health care premiums have gone up over the last 20+ years, much like gasoline prices, food prices, dental care. Although the cost of craft beer has remained relatively level for a 6pk. Actually when I read the speech, it reminds me why I'm a progressive - even a centrist one a that. That the collective body we call the United States of America requires that we not only are a nation of 'boot strappin', gun packin' individuals' but that we're also citizens of the USA meaning that we also have moral and ethical obligations to the communities and civilized society we belong too and were born into. We're not an accidental nation of islands but a purposeful republic of individual citizens engaged in the building and perpetuation of our country. I could go on why, right now, the US is poised to regain its place in the world - not through military campaigning - but leading through actions that actually make the world a better place for a majority and not the privileged few.
- singlspeed
January 22, 2013 at 2:53pm