As we enter next year and beyond, we must remember the roots of American Exceptionalism - the middle class, born out of the basic idea that everyone should contribute to their fullest and be given the tools and opportunity to do so. If we want to rebuild America, we must return to these roots of providing more rungs and more ladders for more opportunity.
Watch my keynote address at the Washington State Democrats' 8th Annual Warren Magnuson Dinner:
Read the prepared speech below:
American Exceptionalism
By Joe Sestak
Speech delivered on October 22, 2011 in Seattle, Washington at the Washington State Democrats 8th Annual Warren Magnuson Dinner
In 1788, nine of the 13 States ratified the Constitution, and it became the law of our land. It laid out who could qualify to govern the United States as Representatives, Senators and President. The only limitations to serve were age, citizenship and residence. There was no mention of wealth, property, education or social class. This was truly extraordinary for the 18th Century…and it marked the beginning of our American Exceptionalism.
This revolutionary idea – that “We the people” were to govern ourselves, without the prerequisites of class, legacy or wealth -- became the core of what drove our nation… while giving natural birth to another concept that was also uniquely American…the creation of a middle class….a concept born out of the basic idea that everyone should have a fair opportunity, but they should also contribute to their fullest…and be given the tools to do so. As our nation evolved from the 18th to the 21st century, we fortified the essential tenets of the middle class, the essence of our American Exceptionalism.
We created the tool of publicly-funded elementary and secondary education on a national scope. Through education for all, an equitable opportunity was established. And by requiring that our entire population become educated, everyone could contribute to the growth of our nation.
We continued on this course across our history as public universities followed elementary and secondary schools; as we developed our waterways, railways, and highways; and created our communications, energy, and healthcare infrastructure.
Together we assembled and enhanced these areas of collective excellence….with a rising income for our middle and working class households… as America led our international counterparts in every one of these measures of competitiveness.
Over our history, we created a superior national environment for individual opportunity … from our collective resources. If you achieved your Dream in America, you did it with us…not by yourself.
The best of America’s character – what makes us exceptional as a nation – is that our country is driven by an alliance between rugged individualism and the common enterprise; by people striving for their own individual achievement, but never measuring it apart from the greater effort.
27 years old, the new female pilot I launched with seven male veterans as our carrier battle group arrived off Afghanistan, proved to be the one who disobeyed my orders that night not to dive below 20,000 feet until we had ensured no endangering anti-aircraft missiles were present. Ambushed, surrounded, with four dead, the remaining four special force soldiers requested that someone strafe the advancing Taliban immediately so our men could get away. Believing she could not wait precious seconds by requesting permission, she dove…and the soldiers got out, carrying their dead.
Women were not on aircraft carriers, never mind flying F-18s, when I joined during the Vietnam era. But because she – like so many individual Americans – was finally given an opportunity to be all she could be, our common mission – our common enterprise -- succeeded that night, and four men came home.
Ours is the first nation founded on principle, not power, and our long struggle to embody the vision set by our founders, is the history of our nation’s progressive movement – freedom, suffrage, civil rights, equality….ideals that are not attained until they extend to all.
It is why an important part of America’s character has been that we measure the wealth of our society by its poor, the health by its sick, and the justice by its wronged.
And it is why this particular time in our history is so important…and so vital to whom we have been… and what we are to be…and why those who care about America must tie their souls to this fight for its character. Our national mantra is that we as a nation have invested and maintained a foundation so strong that anyone amongst us has an equal opportunity to achieve our dreams through our individual hard work. We have seen our nation prosper because of it, and lived its evidence!
This simple idea of the middle class has been the engine of our economy, the source of our innovation, and now, all over the world, it is taken for granted that shared opportunity is shared prosperity, and common wealth is common strength.
Yet -- because of the broad challenges we face today -- there are those who would deny our American experience of the past centuries…of how we achieved our Exceptionalism…. Rather than remove the barriers to continuing our American Exceptionalism, they would prevent the actions needed to do so.
We have data points for the broad challenges we confront, such as faltering education as our students’ performance has fallen in international rankings, particularly in math and science. We see other nations eclipsing us in mass transit, energy grids and renewable energy, infrastructure, wireless communications…and infant mortality rates higher than other developed nations.
…and we have borrowed a cumulative debt equivalent to nearly 100% of our annual Gross Domestic Product.
But I think everyone here really knows what most concerns Americans. When I travelled the 67 counties of Pennsylvania, I drove into rural Potter County past a sign that said, “God’s Country.” Intent upon determining if I should run for Senate against the wishes of my party’s establishment, I asked a farmer, “How is the recession.” He answered, with a slow smile, “Not too bad, I was already hurting.”
People feel that the American Dream – the idea that our children, based on their efforts, will have the opportunity to do even better than we have done – is broken. In fact, we know it’s broken.
The collaboration of a group of researchers from across the political spectrum demonstrated that, for the first time in our history, Americans that are in their late 30s are earning less than their parents did at that age a generation before. And this study was conducted a year before the recession that cost nearly 10 million American jobs, and wiped out $14 trillion in household wealth. The common sense of a farmer could have told us that. It’s the dream my father emigrated from Czechoslovakia to live here in America…that’s at stake. It’s our dream.
The American people see major challenges on every front and are afraid no one really has a plan to deal with any of them. They can see the impediments to achieving their aspirations…such as the increasingly difficult task of being able to afford a college degree for their children… eroding the pillars of American Exceptionalism as this begins to limit the opportunities of those that are not wealthy… shrinking the middle class. We become less equal—and less prosperous -- when fewer of us can climb the ladders of opportunity … simply because there are fewer ladders with fewer rungs.
If you believe in American Exceptionalism, then you believe in providing more ladders with more rungs…as we must in order to remain the exception to other cultures that failed to educate, promote equality, defend a shared prosperity, avoid crushing debts and promote participation…and therefore imploded permanently.
We owe our children a country that offers them the opportunity we inherited as individuals…and as a nation: one with a shared set of resources wherein every citizen contributes, and we all benefit. That unique American Exceptionalism codified by our forefathers over the centuries is what we need to fight for – not let be destroyed. But it will take something absent today…and Americans know it.
With two days to go in the election for Senate, I hurried down a Philadelphia street to the next event. A passing trash truck honked its horn, and the African American man driving called out, “Hey, Joe, we got your back!” I’ve never forgotten the wave of that man…and how I let him down…because I didn’t make sure I had his, by winning.
If we are to do this, we need leaders who trust us … “we the people”…so that we might trust them.
When the election was over, I returned to our 67 counties, again. In conservative Elks County I went into a bar that was advertising barbeque late one night, having just finished thanking my supporters in the county. As a sailor, it was a comfortable kind of place for me. Every truck outside had its NRA sticker, and the recent college graduate I was with said, “Congressman, if I wasn’t hanging with you, I probably wouldn’t have come into a place like this.” I said, “Ben, these are my sailors; if my party cannot speak with them…perhaps not earn their vote, but rather their respect, we don’t deserve the mantle of leadership for America.”
Obviously, my perspective is shaped by my experience of having run for the U.S. Senate against the desires of my party’s establishment…from having been part of today’s revolutionary fervor. I often said as I was running from the outside in the primary, I wasn’t really alone…I had the Tea Party with me…at least what was causing them --and me—to be outsiders!
When the nation’s political institutions seem to be incapable of positive change, there is a lot of justified outrage on the part of Americans concerned for our future. They have a deep uneasiness that the ‘politics of survival’ of political leaders is now threatening the survival of their own way of life. It has provided the impetus for outside forces – from the tea party to “occupy Wall Streeters” – to be the agents for today’s achievements -- not the parties’, or other institutional, leadership.
One is reminded of Senator Olin Johnston, who once signed off on a press release condemning communism….and its godless and evil ways. But then he reached out for the aide as he walked away, and asked, “Wait…how many them Communists you reckon we have voting back home?” But, today, it isn’t communism’s way of life that our people are worried about; it’s ours.
This understandable lack of faith in our government, and trust in its leaders, is ravaging not only our democratic process, but ultimately, our sense of national unity. Which is so fixable. We simply need leaders like the 27 year old female pilot, who was willing to risk her individual career for the common mission that night over Afghanistan by doing what she knew was right despite my—the “institution’s—rule not to dive on her own. We need leaders who have the courage to stand for what American Exceptionalism really is…and who will align government policy with it…instead of the will of legal tender. Now is the time to behave exceptionally, to pool our resources for all of us to contribute; to reinforce education…not to abandon it; to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure…not to let it disintegrate; to rescue the poor…not to ignore them; to chart the payment of our debt…while reversing the decline of the middle class that will ultimately sustain our Republic.
This is also a personal experience for me. As my then-four year old daughter – now ten (and seemingly going on 22) … was being treated with chemotherapy after her operations -- safeguarded by the healthcare plan you provided my family in the military -- we could not help but overhear social workers speaking with her hospital roommate’s parents, trying to see if their two year old son might stay and be treated for his leukemia….for they did not have coverage. My daughter will be all she can be….and this nation enriched by her individual contribution … thanks to our nation’s collective resources. Her roommate….stayed, but America almost lost him, and his similar future support of us.
I entered politics because of that experience…to pay back for the collective resources my family benefited from so my daughter has an opportunity. Think about it: we don’t provide healthcare in the military because we are socialist or liberal---anything but! We do it because of the dividend our nation gets from healthy, productive warriors. I hope the Attorney General here in the state of Washington also would think about that as he pursues the repeal of the health care law—making it impossible for my daughter and her roommate to get coverage later….and to be able to contribute to our nation. I know Jay has.
Ultimately, this is about accountability to our children for the character of America, one that has evolved over the centuries since the ratification of our unique Constitution.
We need to be Americans now, before we are partisan, in our accountability for our nation…like the 19 year old sailor who taught me. On an aircraft carrier, the average age of its 5,000 sailors is just over 19, one of whom – after the pilot of an aircraft turns on its engines – latches the plane to the catapult that will fling the aircraft and pilot into the night. However, sometimes, the pilot must shut down the plane just before launch due to some compelling reason. But no pilot turns off their engines until they are assured the plane has first been disconnected from the catapult…for if the aircraft were to be accidently launched without its engines turning, the plane – the pilot – would be lost.
So a young 19 year old sailor goes under the plane, where the pilot cannot see, and disconnects the catapult from it. Then, he or she, stands in front of that plane until the pilot is safely on deck. And that young sailor has said it all: “Go ahead, trust me, I did my responsibility. But I am also willing to be held accountable for my responsibility. So if something wrong does occur, and you – the pilot – start heading overboard to your certain death, you are going to go right through me, and I am also going to mine, with you.”
We each—together—must be willing to trust our people, and stand in front of that plane…for them…for America’s character, and be accountable for our nation’s, for our children’s, future. Thank you very much!
Joe Sestak was an Admiral in the U.S. Navy, and a Congressman (PA-07) from 2007-2010, when he ran for the U.S. Senate.
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