he Honorable Kweisi Mfume's Speech Before the Democratic National Convention Thursday, July 29, 2004 /EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE UPON DELIVERY OF SPEECH, SCHEDULED FOR 6:36 P.M. EDT TODAY, JULY 29/ BOSTON, July 29 /PRNewswire/ -- The following is a transcript of a speech by the Honorable Kweisi Mfume at the Democratic National Convention on Thursday, July 29, 2004: I am honored to greet you on behalf of the NAACP, our nation's oldest and largest civil rights organization. As a former Member of Congress and as a believer in the best about America I am again honored to stand with you in the democratic tradition of fighting for equality and equal opportunity for all. Like four years ago the NAACP asked to address the Republican convention and like four years ago it appears that our request will again be denied. Over the last four years too many hard working Americans have seen our nation go in the wrong direction. Too many have seen their pension plans devastated, their 401k plans collapse, and their benefit packages shrink. We are not economists but we understand economies of scale. We know that nothing from nothing still leaves nothing. The tragic irony is that while the president proclaims the goal of building a democracy in Iraq-democratically eligible voters in America are still illegally being purged from voting rolls and stripped of their constitutional rights. Before we say anything else about protecting democracy in Baghdad, let's make sure we protect democracy at home. And so we support (without apology) an increase in the minimum wage, but, more importantly, we believe in a livable wage for working men and working women, we believe in equal pay for equal work based on performance, not gender. We believe in affordable health care coverage for all Americans. On the matter of choice, one of the most personal decisions that a woman has to make-we believe that a woman must make that decision with her god and not have it made for her by her government. We know what it really means to be pro-family and pro values. We know why it's really important to save Social Security and we know why smaller classrooms for students and day care for working parents must be more than a song or a dance or a 20 second sound bite on the six o'clock news. Wouldn't it be great if we could make the right to clean air and clean water, an American birthright not an American option? Wouldn't it be great if the constitution did not belong to any one party? And wouldn't it be great if we paid homage to the men and women of our armed services for a job well done by promising never again to send them into harm's way without first telling them the truth about why? We will speak out forcefully for these and other ideals. The truth is our's is the belief in tomorrow. We mean it when we say that racism, sexism, and anti-semitism are wrong. We know that black bigotry is just as cruel and as evil as white bigotry. We understand that gay bashing and immigrant bashing and union bashing deplete us as a nation, in an era of smaller vision, rampant apathy and celebrated mediocrity. We so desperately need a president who will stand up for that which is right and speak out against that which is wrong. And so we can't quit now. Like John Kerry and John Edwards, I have not given up on the American idea or on the American possibility and I ask you not to give up either. I am convinced that our nation still stands before the world as perhaps the last expression of a possibility of mankind devising a social order, where justice is the supreme ruler and law is but its instrument. Where freedom is the dominant creed and order is but its principle, where equity is the common practice and fraternity the true human condition. We can't quit now! So, when future generations peer through the telescope of time and history, let them say of us: that we did not waiver that we did not flinch, and that we did not shirk our responsibilities to face the issues of race, poverty, and equal opportunity head on. During this time of new challenges and new hope, building a more perfect union does yet require more perfect believers. We can't quit now! So we join John Kerry, John Edwards and fair minded Americans everywhere in reaching out today, to others, different in race, different in religion and different in heritage, to join together as a new coalition of Americans seeking to bring full meaning to our birthright, by bringing hope, strength and equal opportunity to all. Source: Democratic National Convention Committee CONTACT: Peggy Wilhide of the Democratic National Convention Committee, +1-617-366-3100 Web site: http://www.dems2004.org/