We have the will, as we did 43 years ago. We have the majorities in Congress, as we did then. We have available to us the opportunity to cast the debate in moral terms, in moral imperatives. We even have, courtesy of another young and charismatic President, the words that will call a nation to action to guaranty to all Americans a fundamental right. All we need now is for President Obama to take to the airwaves in prime time to address the nation and say it, just as John F. Kennedy did on June 11, 1963: "We are confronted primarily with a moral issue..."
Good evening, my fellow citizens:
This afternoon, in every State in our Union, decisions regarding the health and even the lives of thousands of Americans are being made not in hospitals and not by doctors, but in the offices of our state and local governments, and the offices of private health insurance companies. These decisions are being made not on the basis of whether a medical procedure is medically necessary or advisable, but whether the expense of providing life-saving healthcare has already exceeded an arbitrary dollar limitation in their health insurance policy, or whether the income, or marital status, or place of residence of the patient qualifies or disqualifies them for public assistance in obtaining much needed healthcare.
At this very moment, even as I am addressing you tonight, an American is dying not because their illness is untreatable, or because doctors and medical resources are not available, but because they are unable to pay for much needed healthcare, or their insurance company is unwilling to pay, or because - like most of you listening tonight - their insurance policy contains a dollar limit on coverage, and the expense of treating their illness has exceeded that limit.
I hope that every American, regardless of where he lives, will stop and examine his conscience about this and other similar incidents of denial of healthcare to Americans who are ill and need critical healthcare. This Nation was founded by people of many nations and backgrounds. It was founded on the principle that all people are created equal, and that the rights of every person are diminished when the rights of one are threatened.
It ought to to be possible for Americans of any economic status to receive equal service in places of healthcare, such as hospitals and clinics and doctor's offices. It ought to be possible for American citizens of any economic status to change jobs without fear of loss of healthcare benefits. It ought to to be possible, in short, for every American to enjoy the privileges of being American without fear that available and much needed healthcare is denied them because of the limitations in their health insurance policy. In short, every American ought to have the right to be treated as he would wish to be treated, as one would wish his children to be treated. But this is not the case.
We are confronted primarily with a moral issue. It is as old as the Scriptures and as clear as the Declaration of Independence: the question is whether all Americans are to be afforded the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, whether we are going to treat our fellow Americans as we want to be treated. If an American, because he has lost his job and therefore his health insurance, cannot obtain needed healthcare, if he cannot obtain healthcare for his children because expenses associated with treating his child's illness have exceeded an arbitrary cap on coverage in his health insurance policy, if, in short, he cannot enjoy the healthcare necessary in order for him and his family to live the full and free life that all of us want, then who among us would be content to stand in his place?
Who among us would then be content with the counsels of patience and delay? Who among us would then be content with half-measures that, while expanding coverage and increasing public health insurance to the poor and the young, still tolerates the denial of healthcare to the ill because the expense of treating their illness has now exceeded their policy's cap, or because they lost their job and income and therefore their health insurance benefits, or because their insurance company denies coverage for a procedure deemed necessary by their doctor?
Sixty years of delay have passed since President Truman called for universal healthcare for every American, and yet millions of Americans are still without coverage and without needed healthcare. They are not yet freed from the threat that illness may cost them their life savings and bankrupt them. They are not yet freed from the fear that their illness may go untreated because their insurance company has mistakenly and unfairly rescinded their policy, an injustice that remains a daily occurrence in our country. They are not yet freed from the fear that though they purchased health insurance, they are not covered because a tumor or a mutation in their blood chemistry was already growing, undetected, at the moment they signed their signature to an application for a health insurance policy, and is therefore a "pre-existing condition" that entitles their insurer to deny coverage.
We preach human and civil rights around the world, and we mean it, and we cherish our rights here at home, but are we to say to the world, and much more importantly, to each other, that this is the land of civil and human rights except for the uninsured; that we have no second-class citizens except those with capped coverage in their private insurance policies; that we have no class or caste system, except with respect to those who are ill and have had their insurance coverage rescinded?
We face, therefore, a moral crisis as a country and a people. It cannot be met by half-measures . It cannot be left to increased demands by phone, letter or e-mail, or demonstrations in the streets. It cannot be quieted by token moves or talk. It is a time to act in the Congress, in your State and local legislative body and, above all, in all of our daily lives. It is not enough to pin the blame on others, to say this a problem of one segment of our citizenry or another, or deplore the facts that we face. A great change is at hand, and our task, our obligation, is to make that change fair and constructive for all. Those who do nothing are inviting shame. Those who act boldly are recognizing right, as well as reality.
Next week I shall ask the Congress of the United States to act, to make a commitment it has not fully made in this country to the proposition that arbitrary denial of healthcare has no place in American life or law. The Executive Branch has adopted that proposition in the conduct of its affairs, including the healthcare of Federal personnel. Congress, too, has adopted that proposition by extending governmentally provided healthcare coverage to every Senator and Representative, and every person who works on their staff or the staff of Congressional committees, each of whom is insured and has equal access to healthcare.
I am, therefore, asking the Congress to enact legislation giving all Americans the right to be treated at our healthcare facilities -- hospitals, clinics, doctors offices and similar establishments - simply by virtue of being an American and therefore qualifying for publicly provided health insurance. This seems to me to be an elementary right. Its denial is an arbitrary indignity that no American in 2009 should have to endure, but many do.
This is one country. It has become one country because all of us and all the people who came here had an equal right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We cannot say to the nearly 18 percent of the population without health insurance that you can't have that right; we cannot say to those who have insurance but have been denied coverage because of arbitrary limitations on coverage in their policy that they are not entitled to live-saving healthcare. I think we owe them and we owe ourselves a better country than that.
Therefore, I'm asking for your help in making it easier for us to move ahead and to provide the kind of equality of healthcare treatment that we would want ourselves; to guaranty to every American - young and old, rich and poor, employed and unemployed, healthy and ill - the opportunity to receive critical healthcare treatment when needed.
This is what we're talking about and this is a matter which concerns this country and what it stands for, and in meeting it I ask the support of all our citizens.
Thank you very much.
We need the President to do this, to shift the grounds of the debate from CBO cost estimates to moral imperatives. We need this speech to put people in the streets, to bring the ill and uninsured to Washington to ask Max Baucus TO HIS FACE whether he will vote to perpetuate a private healthcare system that denies them life-saving healthcare. We need Obama to make this about something bigger than budget issues or healthcare policy wonkery. We need Obama to define this is a moral issue.
And then the rest will be up to us.