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Headmaster Marcus D. Hurlbut Reflects on the Historic Presidential Election
Reflections offered during Upper School Chapel Service - November 6, 2008Throughout my life I have often thought about those special and memorable moments in history when we look outside ourselves and realize that we are part of something very important and very memorable. This phenomenon is often couched in questions like, where were you when?
For me these questions have led back to mostly tragic and traumatic times - the assassination of President Kennedy, the explosion of the Challenger, and of course, September 11, 2001.
Two days ago, we were all part of the one of those historic moments that looks decidedly but fortunately different from those other punctuation marks in history. It is entirely possible that years from now we will look back at November 4, 2008 as no big deal, but today what took place in this country 48 hours ago is a very big and important deal.
This morning we are celebrating All Saints Day and the connection of this day to the 2008 Presidential Election is powerful and moving. We are all where we are today because others have gone before us, charted new waters and paved the way for us to follow. Some of us were born into families of prominence and privilege. Others of us were not as fortunate. Regardless, our lives have been shaped for better or for worse by those who have gone before. What we will leave for those who will follow depends on what we will do with our lives.
The people who preceded Barack Obama had a very tough and challenging row to hoe. Despite his mixed racial heritage, a white mother from Kansas and a black father from Kenya, Barack Obama is considered African American or black in this country. Today he stands as our next President in large part because he stood on the shoulders of those who had gone before.
The list is long and the stories are painful. Most of you know them. The most obvious and celebrated is The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who spoke of a dream of equality and integration and ultimately gave his life to the cause. There were of course many others. Their stories represent some of the darkest and most courageous moments in the history of the United States. From Dred Scott, to Homer Plessy, to Linda Brown and Rosa Parks, to the Little Rock Nine and James Meredith and the Freedom Riders and Medgar Evers, the road is long and painful.
Our forefathers spoke of all men being created equal, but as in George Orwell's Animal Farm, some men have been more equal than others. It has been a long struggle for equality and opportunity in our country. Less than 90 years ago, women couldn't vote at all and yet two days ago, women represented more than 53% of all voters. More recently, inter-racial marriage, the kind that produced our next president, was illegal in 17 states in 1966, and less than 50 years ago citizens of the United States who happened to be African American were denied equal access to schools, colleges, restaurants, hotels and other public places in many states across our nation.
Regardless of your political persuasion, the election of 2008 represents the very best of what we stand for as a country. The process was long -- very, very long, but in the end, this was victory for the United States. We demonstrated to ourselves and the world that we can argue long and hard about governmental regulation, taxes, the war in Iraq, health care, the environment, qualifications and experience, blue states and red states, but in the end, as it says in the preamble to our Constitution, "we the people of the United States in order to form a more perfect Union," went to the polls, cast our votes (133 million this year) and decided who will be our next leader. It is an amazing process - orderly, peaceful and powerful.
This year we did what has never been done before in our country. We elected a black man president of the United States and the face of America was literally and figuratively changed forever. We have delivered on the promise of opportunity and equality. We have risen above our prejudices and biases and put aside for the moment the bitter feelings and painful experiences that have been so imbedded in the history of our country. We have stood on the shoulders of those who have gone before, learned from their successes and their failures and ushered in a new day for this country. And in the true spirit of healthy and honorable competition, despite the long, challenging and at times deeply personal campaign, Mr. McCain was gracious and eloquent in his concession speech late Tuesday evening when he said "Senator Obama has achieved a great thing for himself and for his country. I applaud him for it. I urge all Americans who supported me to join in not just congratulating him, but offering our next president our good will and earnest effort to find ways to come together, to find the necessary compromises, to bridge our differences, and help restore our prosperity, defend our security in a dangerous world, and leave our children and grandchildren a stronger, better country than we inherited." As I watched this amazing process unfold, I was very proud to be an American.
Earlier this year during an Upper School convocation, Ms. Jamie Bunch gave another eloquent and memorable speech in which she shared with us some thoughts about the year, the future and our lives together.
"Here you are," she said. "This is your life. You are living it right now and this moment 'shall never be seen again. Still, standing here in front of you, I can't help but think of the future, too, of the vast potential each of you represents. You make me think, every day, that perhaps humanity will make it after all, that perhaps it will be 'glory' instead of 'gloom,' stars instead of bombs. You are our hope, and, as American poet Emily Dickinson writes, "Hope is a thing with feathers - / that perches in the soul - / and sings the tune without the words - / and never stops - at all."
In 1959, two years before Mr. Obama was born in Honolulu, The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. addressed the Hawaii Legislature and declared that the civil rights movement aimed not just to free blacks but "to free the soul of America." He ended his Hawaii speech by quoting a prayer from a preacher who had once been a slave, "Lord, we ain't what we want to be; we ain't what we ought to be; we ain't what we gonna be, but, thank God, we ain't what we was."
This week we took a huge step away from what we were and toward what we might be, and a thing called hope perched in the soul of America,
and we were there!
Contact:
Anne Mack
949.661.0108 x252
949.400.2055 (mobile)
anne.mack@smes.org