American speeches

Introduction

Acknowledgements - Part 1: Poltical oratory from the Revolution to the Civil War

Argument against Writs of Assistance (Boston, February 24, 1761) / James Otis

Oration on the Boston Massacre (Boston, March 5, 1774) / John Hancock

Speech in the Virginia Convention (Richmond, March 23, 1775) / Patrick Henry

Speech to officers of the Continental Army (Newbergh, N.Y., March 15, 1783 / George Washington

Speech at the conclusion of the Constitutional Convention (Philadelphia, September 17, 1787)

Speech in Virginia ratifying convention (Richmond, June 4, 1788)

First inaugural address ( New York City, April 30, 1789) / George Washington

Reply to the President (Philadelphia, March 31, 1792) / Red Jacket

Eulogy on George Washington (Philadelphia, December 26, 1799) / Henry Lee

First inaugural address (Washington, D.C., March 4, 1801) / Thomas Jefferson

Remarks on the repeal of the judiciary act (New York City, February 11, 1802) / Alexander Hamilton

Speech in Congress against non-importation (Washington, D.C., March 5, 1806) / John Randolph

Speech in Congress on the War of 1812 (January 8-9,1813) / Henry Clay

Address at the laying of the cornerstone of the Bunker Hill Monument (Boston, June 17, 1825) / Daniel Webster

Eulogy on John Adams and Thomas Jefferson (Washington, D.C., October 19, 1826) / William Wirt

Fourth of July address (New Harmony, Indiana, July 4, 1828) / Frances Wright

First inaugural address (Washington, D.C.,March 4, 1829) / Andrew Jackson

Second reply to Hayne (Washington D.C., January 26-27, 1830) / Daniel Webster

Second inaugural address (Washington, D.C., March 4, 1833) / Andrew Jackson

Adresss tot he general trades' union (New York City, December 2,1833) / Ely Moore

Speech in the Senate on expunging the censure of President Jackson (Washington D.C., January 12, 1837) / Thoams Hart Benton

Speech in the Senate on antislavery petitions (Washington D.C., February 6, 1837) / John C. Calhoun

The murder of Lovejoy (Boston, December 8, 1837) / Wendell Phillips

Antislavery speech at Pennsylvania Hall (Philadelphia, May 16,1838) / Angelina Grimke Weld

Address to the slaves of the United States of America (Buffalo, NY, August 21, 1843) / Henry Highland Garnet

Speech in Congress on the War with Mexico (Washington, DC, January 12, 1848) / Abraham Lincoln

Address to woman's rights convention (Seneca Falls, NY, July 19, 1848) / Elizabeth Cady Stanton

The political destination of America and the signs of the times (1848) / Theodore Parker

Speech on the Senate on compromisr resolutions (Washington, D.c., February 5-6, 1850) / Henry Clay

Speech tot he Senate on compormise resolutions (Washington D.C., March 7, 1850) / Daniel Webster

Speech to woman's Rights Convention (Akron, OH, May 29, 1851) / Sojourner Truth

What to the slave is the fourth of July? (Rochester, NY,July 5, 1852) / Frederick Douglass

The crime against Kansas (Washington DC, May 19-20, 1856) / Charles Sumner

House divided speech (Springfield, IL, June 16, 1858) / Abraham Lincoln

The irrepressible conflict (Rochester, NY, October 25, 1858) / William Seward

True Americanism ( Boston, April 18, 1859) / Carl Schurz

Speech to the court (Charlestown, Virginia, November 2, 1859) / John Brown

Address at Cooper Institute (New York City, February 27, 1860) / Abraham Lincoln

Farewell address in the Senate (Washington, DC, January 21, 1861) / Jefferson Davis

Speech at Independence Hall (Philadelphia, February 22, 1861) / Abraham Lincoln

First inaugural address ( Washington DC, March 4, 1861) / Abraham Lincoln

Cornerstone speech (Savannah, Georgia, March 21, 1861) / Alexander Stephens

Address at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania (November 19, 1863) / Abraham Lincoln

Second inaugural address (Washington D.C., March 4, 1865) / Abraham Lincoln

Biographical notes

Note on the texts

Notes

Index.

Part 2: Political oratory from Abraham Lincoln to Bill Clinton

The doctrine of the strenuous life (1899) / Theodore Roosevelt - Methods of Barbarism (1901) / Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman - Socialism (1901) / Keir Hardie

I believe in a British Empire and I do not believe in a Little England' (1903) / Joseph Chamberlain

I warn the Government' (1906) / F.E. Smith - The men with the muck rakes (1906) / Theodore Roosevelt - The plight of women (1908) / Emmeline Pankhurst - The people's budget (1909) / David Lloyd George

We are in for rough weather' (1909) / David Lloyd George - The new nationalism (1910) / Theodore Roosevelt - Freedom or death ( 1913) / Emmeline Pankhurst - Ulster is asking to be let alone (1914) / Edward Carson - The great pinnacle of sacrifice ( 1914) / David Lloyd George - Ireland unfree shall never be at peace (1915) / Patrick Pearse - There is no salvation for India (1916) / Mahatma Gandhi - Ireland summons her children to the flag ( 1916) / Proclamation of the Irish Republic - In Ireland alone in this twentieth century, is loyalty held to be a crime ( 1916) / Roger Casement - The world must be made safe for democracy ( 1917) / Woodrow Wilson - A new phase in the history of Russia begins ( 1917) / V.I. Lenin - The dustbin of history ( 1917) / Leon Trotsky - We need an army ( 1918) / Leon Trotsky - While there is a lower class, I am in it (1918) / Eugene V. Debs - A fit country for heroes to live in ( 1918) / David Lloyd George - American, I was born ( 1919) / Henry Cabot Lodge - Man will see the truth ( 1919) / Woodrow Wilson - A man as low and mean as I can picture ( 1919) / Alfred E. Smith - The eyes of the whole Empire are on Ireland today ( 1921) / George V - Non-violence is the first article of my faith (1922) / Mahatma Gandhi - A message to every land where the Jewish race is scattered (1922) / A. J. Balfour - The sounds of England ( 1924) / Stanley Baldwin - The life of the Negro race has been a life of tragedy ( 1926) / Clarence Darrow - I am never be guilty, never (1927) / Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti - Rugged individualism (1928) / Herbert Hoover - The nation has to be mobilized (1930) / Oswald Mosley - We are not on trial ( 1930) / Ramsay MacDonald - Either we do it or they crush us ( 1931) / Joseph Stalin - Bolshevism run mad (1931) / Philip Snowden - An indominable aggressive spirit (1932) / Adolf Hitler - The bomber will always get through (1932) / Stanley Baldwin - The only thing we have to fear is fear itself (1933) / Franklin Delano Roosevelt - The supreme justiciar of the German people ( 1934) / Adolf Hitler - England again dares to be great ( 1935) / Oswald Mosley - They shall not pass (1936) / La Pasionaria (Dolores Ibarruri) - The forces of selfishness and of lust for power met their match (1936) / Franklin Delano Roosevelt - The locust years ( 1936) / Winston Churchill - I shall always trust the instincts of our democratic people ( 1936) / Stanley Baldwin - The Jews carry Palestine in their hearts (1936) / Chaim Weizmann - I have determined to renounce the throne (1936) / Edward VIII - I stake my life (1937) / Leon Trotsky - My patience is now at an end (1938) / Adolf Hitler - The oppression is growing ( 1917) / Martin Niemoller - Peace for our time (1938) / Neville Chamberlain

My head erect (1938) / Duff Cooper - A total and unmitigated defeat (1938) / Winston Churchill - Is this an attempt to dominate the world by force (1939) / Neville Chamberlain - This country is at war with Germany (1939) / Neville Chamberlain - In the name of God, go (1940) / Leo Amery - Sacrifice the seals of office (1940) / David Lloyd George - I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat (1940) / Winston Churchill - Be ye men of valour (1940) / Winston Churchill - This was their finest hour (1940) / Winston Churchill - The flame of French resistance (1940) / Charles de Gaulle - This little steamer ( 1940) / J.B. Priestley - The arsenal of democracy (1940) / Franklin Delano Roosevelt - The four freedoms (1941) / Franklin Delano Roosevelt - A grave danger hangs over our country (1941) / Joseph Stalin - A dae which will live in infamy ( 1941) / Franklin Delano Roosevelt - The final solution ( 1942) / Reinhard Heydrich - We will stand and fight here ( 1942) / General Bernard Montgomery - Give me your children (1942) / Chaim Rumkowski - The vision of such an Ireland (1943) / Eamon de Valera - That son of a bitch Patton again ( 1943-4) / General George Patton - Obliteration is not a justifiable act of war (1944) Bishop George Bell - Our deep moral dependence (1945) / J. Robert Oppenheimer - The iron curtain ( 1946) / Winston Churchill - A choice between the quick and the dead (1946) / Bernard Baruch - The noble mansion of free India ( 1947) / Jawaharlal Nehru - The light has gone out of our lives ( 1948) / Jawaharlal Nehru - I have in my hand (1950) / Joseph McCarthy - The agony and the sweat (1950) / William Faulkner - There is only one hope for mankind (1951) / Aneurin Bevan - Let's talk sense to the American people ( 1952) / Adlai Stevenson - The motion of destine (1953)

Kwame Nkrumah - History will absolve me (1953) / Fidel Castro - Shall we choose death (1954) / Bertrand Russell - There comes a time when people get tired (1955) / Martin Luther King - WE must abolish the cult of the individual (1956) / Nikita Khrushchev - We have to act up to different standards (1956) / Aneurin - Naked into the conference chamber (1957) / Aneurin Bevan - Hola Camp (1959) / Enoch Powell - An Ugly society, a meretricious society (1959) / Aneurin Bevan - The wind of change (1960) / Harold MacMillan - Do not reject this man (1960) / Eugene McCarthy - A new frontier (1960) / John F. Kennedy - The torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans ( 1961) / John F. Kennedy - That man was Eichmann (1961) / Gideon Hausner - We will fight fight and fight again (1961) / Hugh Gaitskell - The brotherhood of man (1961) / Iain MacLeod - Duty, honor, country (1962) / Douglas MacArthur - The end of a thousand years of history (1962) / Hugh Gaitskell - Ich bin ein Berliner (1963) / John F. Kennedy - Never glad confident morning again (1963) / Nigel Birch - I have a dream (1963) / Martin Luther King - The white heat of technology (1963) / Harold Wilson - Let us continue (1963) / Lyndon B. Johnson - An ideal for which I am prepared to die (1964) / Nelson Mandela - The great society (1964) / Lyndon B. Johnson - Extremism in defense of liberty is not vice (1964) / Barry Goldwater - A time for choosing (1964) / Ronald Reagan - More African than American (1965) / Malcolm X - We shall overcome (1965) / Lyndon B. Johnson - This is the goal (1966) / Roy Jenkins - A tiny ripple of hope (1966) / Robert Kennedy - The decent opinion of mankind (1967) / Eugene McCarthy - We will be free (1968) / Melina Mercouri - I shall not seek nor will I accept nomination as your president (1968) / Lyndon B. Johnson - I seem to see the River Tiber foaming with much blood (1968) / Enoch Powell - The time has come for an honest government (1968) / Richard Nixon - A woman's civil right (1969) / Betty Friedan - Millions will rejoice (1971) / Edward Heath - Au revoir (1974) / Richard Nixon - Our human stock is threatened (1974) / Sir Keith Joseph - Let me give you my vision (1975) / Margaret Thatcher - Hate, ignorance and evil ( 1975) / Chaim Herzog - The red flame of Socialist courage (1976) / Michael Foot - What is the joy about? (1978) / Alexander Solzhenitsyn - Home thoughts from abroad (1979) / Roy Jenkins - The dream shall never die (1980) / Edward Kennedy - We are reaping the whirlwind of all our yesterdays (1981) / Michael Heseltine - The Falklands factor (1982) / Margaret Thatcher - Our neighbours are indeed like us (1982) / Robert Runcie - I warn you (1983) / Neil Kinnock - We do not want a Poland which costs us nothing (1983) / Pope John Paul II - The great she-elephant, she who must be obeyed (1984) / Denis Healey - A monstrous carbuncle (1984) / Prince Charles - Let us make a vow to the dead (1984) / Ronald Reagan - You can't play politics with people's jobs (1985) / Neil Kinnock - The future doesn't belong to the fainthearted (1986) / Ronald Reagan - Why am I the first Kinnock in a thousand generations to be able to go to a university (1987) / Neil Kinnock - Now is the time (1988) / Edward Kennedy - Keep hope alive (1988) / Jesse Jackson - The frontiers of the state (1988) / Margaret Thatcher - A contaminated moral environment (1990) / Vaclav Havel - Our march to freedom is irreversible (1990) / Nelson Mandela - A conflict of loyalty (1990) / Sir Geoffrey Howe - I cannot hand away powers lent to me (1991) / Tony Benn - What is my single life worth? (1991) / Salman Rushdie - Annus Horribilis (1992) / Queen Elizabeth II - If Martin Luther King were to reappear (1993) / Bill Clinton - Let freedom reign (1994) / Nelson Mandela - A modern constitution (1994) / Tony Blair - Listen to the silent screams (1995) / Elie Wiesel - The most hunted person of the modern age (1997) / Earl Spencer - A beacon to the world (1997) / Tony Blair - The causes of defeat (1997) / Michael Portillo - May they rest in oeace (1998) / Boris Yeltsin - This has hurt too many innocent people (1996) / Bill Cliinton.