, is our lifetime achievement award. a lifetime of service award. augustine thomas is a woman i have yet to meet, but have heard a lot about. she was actually a classmate of dr. king. she -- it is very fitting that she would be getting this award. she knew him before he was the dr. king that we have all come to know and love. she was reelected as the national vice president for women and fair practices in 2000 nine. as the national vice president her mission is to expand the training program. in 1956 she first joined a sge. she was someone who set in at

the greensboro lunch counter. i am sure that we will hear more about her. a perfect fit for the king day awards, because of her lifelong service and commitment to justice and equal opportunity. we were delighted to present her with the award. unfortunately, she could not join us, but we do have someone who knows her well to accept the award on her behalf. here we have david cox president of the national also see asian of employees. [applause] >> well, good morning, brothers and sisters. you know that this is a wonderful morning. let's just stop to think about

it. barack obama is president of the united states. that is an achievement. now, i just heard from the secretary of housing and urban development and i am telling you, you know, that is an achievement, too. look, dr. king's dream is alive. we also heard from the secretary of health and human services -- a woman, yes, dr. kings -- king's dream is alive. miss augustine was born in 1922. do the math right fast. she had to have a little medical procedure. she is not here because she is elderly and working her but off in the senate in louisville, kentucky, just a few weeks ago. she will be back on her feet and

joining us in a few more weeks marching again as she has been marching all of her life. i am so very honored and privileged to receive this award for someone that i admire and someone who has mentored me my entire life, miss augustine thomas. now, i asked her what do you want me to talk about this morning? what would you say on accepting this award? she has many, many stories. the one she wanted me to share with you this morning, all of her life she has stood up for workers, for union members, for winning fair wages and dignity him the job, as well as equal opportunity. in 1960 she was living in louisville kentucky and had six

children. the lord was eventually going to bless her with nine. had six children. they needed help at the greensboro lunch counter. she was outraged with what was going on. thank god, today augustine thomas -- augustine thomas made north carolina better state with her work and actions. she said that these young men need help and has spent her life helping others. so, she went to her husband and said -- i told him, i was going

to go to greensboro and you all this was 1960. this was before women had arrived in this country. he looked at her and said your father and i will discuss this situation. well, they came back and told her it was too dangerous. you are a mother, you know, you are a wife, you could get hurt and go to jail. you could even be killed. she said -- i understand all of that, but i am going. well, they talked for a few minutes and said -- ok, we are going to agree to let you go. she said no, stop right there. i told you that i made this decision, i'm going. i don't need my husband and my father telling me whether i can go or not. yes, she was a fighter for women's rights in this country also.

so, she went on to greensboro. she sat there, day after day. people spat on her. they hit her. they kicked her. they knocked her off the stool. she kept getting back up. she was arrested twice in the process. as she tells the stories, as she tells it to me, miss augustine is very light-skinned. she said that they were more vicious, more evil, and more wicked to her because they thought she was white and that she was being a traitor to her race. but you know, miss augustine is not a traitor to any race. augusta thomas is a person that fights for every individual in this country. she told me to end the story today, that she believes in helping anybody who cannot help themselves at the time.

and it does not matter whether a person is male or female, black or white, gay or straight, even a democrat or a republican. she said -- if they need help, we should help them we should stand by them. when i think of all of the things that augustine thomas has done in her life, i will tell you, brothers and sisters join with augustine thomas, the dream of martin luther king. encourage someone to get an education, that needs to get a chance in this life. help us child. get the arts back in the school. first of all, go out and get someone to vote today and register them to vote and live the dream forever, for dr. king and for augusta thomas.

thank you also much. miss augusta, thank you from the bottom of our hearts for this award. [applause] >> now you see not only why we honored miss augustine a, but also by president cox be the one to accept the award. he has to collect every year now. i want to draw your attention back to the idiot screen. king day is something that we all look forward to. it became a law in 1983. all 50 states did not observe it until 2000.

at this point i want to knowledge that the president created a video and he will tell you more on what you need to do, but he is part of the dream that dr. king talked about. so, at this time i think the video is ready and we can turn our attention to the screen. >> hi, everybody. today we pay tribute to dr. martin luther king jr.. we reflect on the lessons of his life and the extraordinary change that begins when ordinary men and women are willing to stand up for the progress they seek. we draw strength from his unbending moral force and belief in nonviolence. just as we celebrate what he achieved we recommit ourselves to our unfinished work

defending the dignity and equality of all people. that is why today we come together in a national they of service. as dr. king once said, life's most persistent and urgent question is -- what are you doing for others? cleaning up parks visiting hospitals, working at food banks, reading to children. they are doing their part to honor dr. king by heating his call to serve. to everyone out there volunteering today, thank you. to everyone who wants to join in , it is not too late. just go to www. mlk day.com to find a project happening right now near you. dr. king is an inspiration to millions around the world including me. we feel his legacy all around us. in our schools, communities,

halls of government, and most importantly in our hearts and in how we treat each other, with kindness and respect, binding us together. that one day all americans would treat each other as brothers and sisters. let's do our part to make that dream real. not just today, but every day. [applause] >> is everyone having a good time? i told you we would have a good time today. you all having a good time? we are closing in on the end of the program, but we have two very special presentations that we want to have right now. one that really focuses on education. as we all know in this room, education is key. knowledge is power. we also know that that is one of the main reasons that people of our color were shut out of the educational system.

once you learn, you are able to grow. whether it was the little rock nine or frederick douglas, they had to have an education. the national education network is pleased to bring up dr. mark is right, the executive director of the education for a better america. the mission of the corporation is to build ridges between policymakers and the classroom by supporting innovation in the delivery of education and creating a dialogue between policymakers, community leaders educators, parents students, disseminating information positively to impact our schools . if we are ever going to get out of the hole that we are in it will come through education and be led by individuals like dr. -- like dr. mark is right -- marcus wright. let's bring him to the stage now. >> i do bring greetings from

education for a better america. we are only two years old but we have been able to partner with universities and school districts to conduct a myriad of programs for parents and students across the country. for example, this fall we conducted a higher education awareness tour in miami-dade county. that district went on to bust thousands of those students to the polls to vote early october 27 and october 28, 2000 or election. dr. king, the man that we celebrate today, once posed the question -- what good does it do a man to have access to an integrated lunch counter if you cannot afford to buy his wife's dinner? he was calling for what so many have been working for this room, access and equity.

we want equitable ways to be able to raise our families. [laughter] [applause] david johns is here with his teach the babies movement, which has been a critical call for action. for early childhood education of a high-quality nature. we can assist in that movement by making sure that those programs are implemented in an equitable fashion and encouraging parents to teach their babies to read, talk, and sing for 30 minutes per day. to cultivate bring development. ultimately, civil rights activism like that must be complemented. and from collaboration from service providers, with all of us working together

accomplishing more than the best of us working alone. as we seek to move from demonstration the legislation, we cannot forget separation. after the doors of opportunity are opened for access, we must make sure that we have the skills to walk through it. unfortunately, many of very -- many of our young people are not prepared and that is on us. as we renew access to equity, it equals a better america. access plus equity equals a more perfect union. we can truly be a nation with liberty and justice for all. thank you. [applause] >> thank you. thank you so much.

my favorite part of the program, this is the part where we talk about what next. as we look out at the fights that have taken place, it was always the younger people who helped to leave -- lead the fight in the future. they led the fights in the past. it should be no different today. when you take the young people and ask the question? what is wrong with the youth of today? just look at what is right with the youth of today. you saw the video. who was on the front lines behind reverend sharpton and side-by-side with him? who was there with president obama needed those people to get the word out about the campaign in 2008? who was the one out there that made sure that the word got out? it was those young people, tweeting twitting, we didn't

even know what they were doing on those things but they turned the people out. to talk about what the use is doing, please bring up rihanna patterson, who will tell us what the youth have in store next. [applause] >> good morning, everyone. my name is rihanna patterson and i am the northeast regional director for the national northeast action network. i am so happy to be here this morning to bring you remarks from the perspective of the millennial generation. first i would like to say congratulations to all of our honorees this morning and your dedication to be like king and continue to be like came. i would like to thank reverend sharpton for his -- and his staff -- for hosting this annual event. to honor those who are doing the work and making sure that we are

trying and striving to be more like king. i also want to thank reverend sharpton for giving myself and other millennial generation leaders the platform his mentorship, and his shoulders to stand on. after seeing the film, "soma," last year, i realize that dr. king understood the importance of bridging the gap between old and the new. then a young john lewis understood the need for strategic planning. the two of them were the links that bridged both generations together. seeing that dr. king and reverend sharpton were both known when they started, i feel that my message to young people is to all americans, we have to study his character and his implementation in order to reach

greater heights. we have to understand that in order to make the movement progress, we must come together and get out of the mentality that we can do it alone. dr. king knew that it would take more than just that to make this movement progress. i also want to leave you with this note -- we are going to have to come together in order to make the world a better place. so, i leave you with this scripture that has played a role in my life and, i am sure, everyone knows it -- a house divided it -- divided against itself cannot stand, let's come together in peace and equality. thank you. [applause] >> i am very proud of her. you did a great job. [applause]

at this time we would like to thank our sponsors for helping us to put on this event year. we are honored to have lots of sponsors who give us their support. the first is the american federation of government employees. next is comcast. city lily. sci you 1199. walmart. next we have ge and luke capital. 32 bj. i am not sure -- i hear one over there. b et networks. aetna. jackson lewis. pepsico. and mtc. i would also like to knowledge that we have the honorable judge and a black worm rigsby here with us.

thank you for joining us. i know you have had such a wonderful time. yes, he will do it. but we will say that for next year. i wanted to thank the d.c. bureau staff for putting on this event. it has been a long week, but there is lots more to come. we have a long road ahead. thank you for joining us this morning. we know that it was early and we look forward to seeing you again at some of our future events. please check out our website for more information, as well as our annual convention, taking place in new york city, we hope that you join us for that. have a great morning. remember, today is a day on, not a day off. [applause] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015]

>> if you missed any of his national action network day mlk broadcast, we will be airing it again later tonight. also today, jeh johnson participated in a wreathlaying ceremony honoring dr. king at the mlk memorial in washington d.c.. here are parts of the ceremony. >> someone help, come on. come on.

>> mr. johnson? >> in the front. >> may we have a moment of silence? a moment of silence? this is the moment of silence. we give thanks. for the memory of the challenge of what lies before us. amen. >> amen. >> thank you all for coming out. we appreciate you going through

your day of service and keeping in mind those less fortunate than us. god bless. [indiscernible] >> look here, folks. right here, guys.

>> this is the mayor and the secretary. >> the politics of impact, please? the politics of impact. board members. please.

[indiscernible] [laughter] >> here. here. [indiscernible] all right.

>> theory go. here we go. right up here. look up here. look up here. here we go. look up here, everybody. >> thank you. [indiscernible] >> we will be showing the full ceremony from earlier today including remarks from secretary johnson, tonight at 7:00 eastern . our cameras have been down there all day today, between the lincoln memorial at the far west end of the mall and the jefferson memorial across the

tidal basin. this included the stone of hope sculpture. that is mlk standing there, with two large stones depicting the mountain of despair behind him. this is the image of his i have a dream speech. just 4.5 years later he was assassinated in memphis, tennessee. lining the memorial here, 14 quotes from him along the inscription wall. it was president george h.w. bush who set them off -- the holiday on the third monday of each year but it was not until 2000 that it was officially observed on the same day and all 50 states. people gather from all over to pay honor in tribute to reverend martin luther king jr.. him

him

>> members of congress, tweeting about mlk event that they are attending today. patty murray tweets -- great to be in tacoma to honor his legacy and discuss next steps to make sure that all are treated equally. bernie sanders says that he spent part of the day with striking fairpoint workers in south burlington. jason smith tweeted that it was an honor to give remarks at the event in palmer bluffs this

afternoon. share your thoughts with us at twitter.com/c-span. >> president obama delivers his state of the union on tuesday night. live coverage begins at 8 p.m. eastern, including the president's speech, the gop response from joni ernst, and your reaction through open phones, live on c-span. c-span2, watch the president's speech and congressional reaction from statuary hall in the u.s. capitol. the state of the union, live on c-span, c-span2, c-span radio and c-span.org. >> tonight, a discussion on racism in america from cleveland, ohio, where the police force has come under scrutiny after the killing of two unarmed african americans in november. here is a part of the discussion. >> i would say that we need to spend more time walking in each

other's shoes. this issue of schools, before i started doing the work that i do now i used to work in schools. i often found it fascinating that we were able to find money for metal detectors, but not toilet paper and so when the bathroom. [applause] again, it gets to the issue of priorities and how we message to young people about the value of their worth. when you don't allow young people to have access to toilet paper or soap and cannot figure out a way to do that, you are telling them that you are not worthy. you do not deserve it. so, when we treat people like less than human from the time that they are children we condition them to walk through metal detectors before they can get their education. we are really conditioning young

people for prison. by the time that they get there they have lost the ownership of their mind and body's >> you can watch the entire forum tonight at 8:00 eastern, right here on c-span. next, remarks by jim jordan and three new members of the 114th congress on how conservatives can better position their party for the next election. the panel is part of a two-day summit hosted by the heritage foundation and runs about one hour and 10 minutes. >> not need a long introduction. you know him well. he has been a reliable friend on capitol hill. let me say this about jim, then i will introduce and get him on here. besides the fact that he is great on policy and courageous and all of that kind of stuff he is a friend. a friend and a trustworthy person. when he says he is going to go to the mat for you on an issue he goes to the mat for you on an

issue. we have asked him to come in and talk about 2015 a little bit. he is going to speak for 10 to 15 minutes and then we will hear from freshman panelists. please join me in welcoming jim jordan to the panel. [applause] >> don't clap, you have not heard me say anything yet. it is good to be with you. i had a coach in college, one of those coaches that always wanted to challenges student athletes with motivational statements. he always talks about commitment. commitment to excellence. he had one line that he liked -- commitment, by definition, is total and complete. if compromised, it is not commitment. the thing that i admire so much about heritage, the whole crew here, all of you who support it

they are committed, totally and completely to the defense of freedom in the free market. they are uncompromising in their effort to make sure that liberty is defended. and that is important. think about where we are at today in america. there are serious attacks on fundamental liberty and freedom. actually, i think that they take two forms. there is the straight on direct assault that we see. think about obamacare and its attack on your first amendment religious liberty rights. think about the internal revenue service. the irs is directly attacking your most fundamental right you're right to speak in a political nature against the policies of your government without being systematically targeted over a sustained. of time. think about the third example

maybe more recent, the president's executive amnesty issue back in november relative to people who came here illegally and the fundamental assault that that is on the constitution and separation of powers. all of you as a part of heritage are supporting defending liberty from the direct assault that we see. but there is also the more indirect and more subtle ways. that is what this conference is about. this idea that your government can take your money and play favorites with it. that is wrong as well. it is an attack on freedom and liberty as well. it could be cronyism, corporate welfare, handouts to the industry of the month. it is just as wrong as the direct attack. but we do talk about this, commitment.

the two can accomplish big things. the idea is to set small goals you're not likely to college big things. like ronald reagan did. you have a chance, and it may not happen, but you have the opportunity and of chance to accomplish big things and old things. i told some folks earlier today that there is a big football game tonight and ohio is playing. my guess is that they have the goal of being international -- of being national champions. the idea is that if you set a big goal, then i have a chance to make it a reality today. if you set small goals, you will not get there. our goal is just to win one game

. we are going to beat michigan this year. heck, everyone will beat michigan. if that is your only goal? i think we are at one of those points where it is important for the party that i belong to in this congress after the election in november to be big and bold. think about it. can you imagine -- what if the republican party said that they were going to stop the cronyism stop the favoritism, put an end to the export import -- the about this, something that has been around for 80 years billions in your tax money given to some of the most powerful, large, powerful corporations in the world, we say that we are going to stop it? everyone knows the tax code. taxco benefits, big firms here in d.c., big firms here in bc.

what about regular, middle-class families? what if we said instead of all of that, we will represent regular middle-class families? think for a few minutes about two people i am going to describe. my guess is that these two people are two people all across these -- this country. they went through a same or similar experience several times over the last six years. two people i want you to think about. the first is a guy who, this afternoon, walked out to get in his truck because he works second shift at the local auto plant. second shift, that means he is going to miss some of those soccer games after school. some of the little league games. he cannot always make a school play. but he is working hard, second

shift at the local auto factory. as he goes to get in his truck to drive to work he sees his neighbor couple of houses down sitting on the front porch drinking a cup of coffee. he knows that his neighbor can work, but he is not, and he is getting some kind of benefit from the taxpayer. food stamps, some kind of compensation from the taxpayer. he sees his neighbor, knowing he can work and he is not and is getting some bad of social welfare benefit. he turns on the radio and the newscast reporter comes on and says the federal government has a $17 trillion national debt and they started a program that gives money to corporations because they are favored industry of the group -- of the government and one of them got millions in taxpayer money and then went bankrupt. he hears all of this as he drives to work, second shift at the local factory. guess what? he is ticked off. he has every right to be, right?

the same time he is driving to work there is a lady driving home from the elementary school who taught second grade. she cares about her students. she was busting her tail teaching those kids to read. she views it as her mission education, teaching young people to read and write multiplication, it is her mission to help those students that she has helped to educate. she has her radio on and here's the same newscast, where the news reporter says -- the federal government has a $17 trillion national debt. there is some program where they give her hard-earned tax dollars to big favored corporations and one of those went bankrupt and lost tens of millions of dollars.

that guy is on his front porch drinking a cup of coffee getting her tax money in some sort of social welfare benefit. she is ticked off and has every right to be. those two people, and millions around the country, those are who we are supposed to represent. we are about respecting freedom and free markets for people like the second grade teacher and second shift worker. that is who we are supposed to represent. i think we are in one of those rare moments where our party needs to understand what is at stake. do you know what those people did this november? i think a bunch of them said -- i am not even going to vote. i am going to stay home.

like the second shift worker that i just described, they would say -- i am going to go. when they went to the polls they said this -- we know that the democrats have forgotten us. they don't represent us. they are for big government and top-down structure. special interest in group politics. we know that they have abandoned us. we know that they don't remember us and are not standing up for us. but we think maybe, just maybe that other party might. we suspect that they don't. we suspect that with the tax cuts for the rich and big corporations on wall street that that is where they are at. but we think that maybe, just maybe, republicans might remember who i am. i would argue that that is our charge as we start this congress

. if the first thing that our republican party does, the majority in the house and senate's trade promotional authority, repeal the medical device tax and corporate tax reform if that is the first thing we do, frankly if it is the only thing that we do, what is that second grade teacher and second shift worker going to say? i knew i was right. i knew that no one represented me. look, i am for those things. those are good policies. but they should not be the first or only thing that we should do. we have been talking about those policies for the entire conference. labor union reform that empowers the individual. school choice. throwing out the tax code. saying to half the population that you will not participate in the main tax?

that's broken. they will be paying the highest corporate tax rate in the road -- in the world? that's stupid. you might want to throw it out and start over, right? why not do that. the second grade teacher and worker understand that the tax code is for special interests. imagine if we did that as a party. embraced old ideas and big ideas . it would be so positive. finally, to last things and i will take your questions. in this story we cannot forget the other person, the guy sitting on the front porch and dragging the coffee. one of the things that we need to do, and i think i talked about this at this podium one year ago, we need to require work for people who get a benefit from the taxpayer. it helps that individual get to

a better life. think about the very first job that you had. was it delivering papers? babysitting her cousin? was it waitress? waiter? we lived in the country and we would mow lawns every week. think about the skill set that values the principles you learned in that job making less than minimum wage, helping you to get to the position you are at today. we had an old truck, trailer with a riding mower on the back. we were driving down the road. we look like the beverly hillbillies.

he said that he would help us get started, but then we would have to maintain the equipment pay for everything, patent for it with what we make. you learn to handle things. you learn to manage a schedule. we had 20 yards to get them all in a week. i will always remember this, we had certain customers that wanted the lawn mowed on thursday because they wanted it looking nice for the weekend and we figured out that they would pay more if you did it on thursday. guess what, we did it on thursday. we were not stupid right? you learn those important people skills that help you move on through life. two ladies, never married, the steinberger sisters, nice ladies, typically when you pull into a place you pull in get

out, start unloading, you have a lot to do. with them we learned of that it was worth your time before you started to go up to the door and say hello and say that you're going to met -- going to mow the lawn. as sure as you did that, by the time that you finished up and turned around in the house, you could smell the chocolate chip cookies that they were making. people skills. the point is, that guy on the front porch getting something for nothing, we are depriving him of what we all learned in those very first occupations. it is something that our party has to talk about in a productive way. the taxpayers that pay for the benefits the -- deserve that and the guy receiving it deserves it as well because we want to help him or her get to a better position in life. lastly, the coach talked about commitment and about setting appropriate goals.

he said to me -- jim, you know there are moments in the life of everyone that have special significance. moments of real meaning, moments that you never forget. he called it moments of magnitude, moments of significant meaning. think about it. think about your own life. 100 degrees in the methodist church in ohio. that's where i was married. i remember the david each of my kids was born. i will remember this -- my son-in-law called us to tell us that our first grandchild's name was elizabeth. there are moments as an individual where you realize your kid has certain goals they want to achieve and you will remember them forever. sometimes those moments of magnitude and real meaning are

bigger and broader in context and they apply not just to an individual or family, they can apply to an entire political party. i would argue that we are at one of those now. are we going to be this party that sort of plays this game for free markets and individual liberty but we also want to have the special deals for corporations and favoritism? or are we going to be a party that remembers we are supposed to fight for that second grade teacher and local auto plant worker? if we do the right thing, we will get off on the right foot in this congress and set the right framework. i mean it, this time. second timothy, he says he has fought the good fight and kept the faith.

it is a verse that i think always applies to america. it is a verse that we as a party need to adopt. we need to fight for the middle class workers that think that no one represents them. we need to finish the job and keep the faith with the principles of reagan. if we do that we will have a good congress and a good election. thank you all. [applause] >> thank you very much. we are going to speed through and skip the q&a we have another panel right now and are a little bit behind and i would like you all to be able to do q&a during that time.

if for whatever reason you want to stick around, jim, you always can, but i think you have a 5:30? let me introduce this panel. jim just quoted scripture, i will quote gk chesterton and we will say -- we will see how it goes. this is a quote from his book, "orthodoxy." "yes when one is young, one has these ideas in the abstract but in the middle age they break up like clouds and one comes down to a belief in practical politics, using the machinery at hand to get on with the world as it is, thus men used to talk to me when i was a boy. since then i have grown up and

discovered that these philanthropic old men were telling lies. what is really happening is the opposite of what they said should happen. that i should believe in the message of practical politicians. i have not lost my ideals in the least. my faith in fundamentalist are exactly what they always were. the vision is the reality that is often the fraud. it was a rosy type of innocence in which i believe the liberals. he is saying not to lose your ideals. that they are the true north. all of the stuff thrown at you while you are in washington, it changes every day with every different circumstance. i love this freshman class because it has talked about ideals and true north. it has a sense and purpose amongst it that is important

saying that we will not play the game as usual in washington. there are two modes of thought here. one, the election means that it is time to govern and time to show people that we can get stuff done. the real thing that we know that the selection is about, we know that they want politicians who will stand up for them and will never lose sight of the ideal. i would invite the panelists to come up. we have dave, from virginia, ken from colorado, barry loudermilk from georgia, and john radcliffe from texas. [applause] thank you all. come on up actually, ken had to cancel at the last minute, i will take his spot right there.

i believe that he is presiding on the floor. but i will ask each member to give three or four minutes of remarks on the important portions of 2014. we will start with congressman palmer to be back here with the heritage foundation, talking a little bit about what i think my campaign was about to begin with. and i do not blame liberals for the predicament of the country. if there were murmurs or smalltalk in the crowd, that always stopped everyone. i don't. i blame us. if you look at poll after poll we outnumber liberals to do one. they have been more willing to

sacrifice, more dedicated, more willing to get involved i think that people are looking for honesty. when i started the campaign trail, i said that this is what you need to know -- we will not go negative, no matter what they say. we will run a campaign on ideas. we are going to run the kind of campaign that when it is over the next day we will look in the mirror and see things that we still like. and the other thing is that i said we have got to stop talking about how bad everything is.

i'm not sure that another speech is going to make a lot of difference. i try to smile at the beginning, to get that out of the way. laura ingram told me that if i smiled, i would be elected to congress. [laughter] there is a way to give the country back on the right track. you have to be honest. it is not high in the sky we are going to start the march toward freedom again. it may take 20 to 25 years to get our car out of the ditch and get an approach -- presents

solutions beyond us on the timeline. the other thing is that we need to inspire people. game, blaming pelosi and reid and obama, and there is plenty to blame them for, is not a winning formula. this idea that congress is broken and they wanted bipartisanship and stuff that on a winning message. what they want our solutions they want honesty but they also want to know that if they get involved it is worth it. it is hard to get people to charge a hill or hit a beach if they don't think the objective is worth it. i often let people know that our country has seen extraordinarily difficult circumstances before. and we have prevailed. there are some of you in this

room that have no clue about this, some of you that do. i would tell people about 1979. i know john remembers 1979. i would say this is not the worst it has been. in 1979 we had double-digit unemployment, double-digit inflation, consumer interest rates were on their way to 21% we had a new index called the misery index, the unemployment rate plus the inflation rate. honest conservatives and liberals both thought that the soviets were likely going to win the cold war. by the end of the year, they were in afghanistan. we had 52 americans being held hostage in tehran. jimmy carter introduced a new word into the political lexicon

malaise. people had thought that the u.s. had seen her best days. i tell people that was not all that was happening in 1979. there was a guy named reagan running for president, turns out successfully so. margaret thatcher was elected prime minister. in june of 1979, pope john went to his native land of poland. prior to his arrival, my understanding is the kgb initially thought about having him assassinated. there have been one attempt already, but they changed their minds and pumped atheism into the school systems, tried to limit the polish people there. when he arrived and took his motorcade, more than a million people had gathered and they were chanting, we want god. light will always pierce the darkness. we need to remind people of that.

on june 10, he held a mass outside of the pretty -- city of kraków. about 2 million people appeared. he told us before you must be strong with a strength that faith gives. you must be strong with love. therefore, there is no reason to fear death. at the end of his homily he said, so i beg you, never lose your trust. do not be defeated, do not be discouraged. peggy noonan wrote a wonderful article, to eulogize pope john paul ii, after his death, and said at that point, many believed that fall of the soviet union was inevitable. but that's not the rest of the story. almost eight years to the day later on june 12, 1987, ronald reagan stood outside the brandenburg gate and said, mr. gorbachev, tear down this wall.

17 month later it down. if i, or any of my colleagues, or any of you living at that time had gone anywhere in the u.s. and said we will be in the middle of the greatest economic expansion in 10 years and the iron curtain will be done, people would've thought we were crazy. but the whole world was changing. i believe it's changing again. this is what i try to tell people. the whole world is changing. you can either be a part of it or you can miss it. i will end with this. i believe his mast -- last major speech that reagan made to the republican convention. he quoted a man named james allen who had written in his diary that most people believed that america had seen its best days. he wrote that in july, 1775. the world was changing in front of him and he missed it. what i would encourage you to share with your friends is that

faith is something that you need to be strong with. don't be discouraged, don't be defeated, don't give up. this country is worth it, we can overcome these opticals again. thank you. [applause] >> thank you, congressman palmer. congressman ratcliffe, we will go right down the line. >> thank you, depreciated invitation to be here. let me echo what gary said. it's a tremendous privilege and honor to be able to serve with a bunch of folks that quickly we have gotten to know, our freshman conservative colleagues. in my case, i ran against a republican incumbent.

834-year incumbent who was frankly, well-liked. the reason that i have the opportunity now to serve in congress, as tim said, notwithstanding all of that what i learned on the campaign trail is that people are very much discontent with the status quo. there is a feeling out there and i hope to represent that feeling i know that gary and dave would tell you the same thing. the feeling out there is that washington is filled with a bunch of career politicians that have come up here, stayed too long, promised too much, and ultimately become part of the problems they were sent here to fix. people are looking for a different type of representative. i think that is something that we all are striving to be and see as a tremendous opportunity.

there is tremendous frustration. i caught the tail end of congressman jordan's comments, and i found the same thing to be true in the district of texas i am privileged to represent. i don't have this opportunity because people have fallen back in love with republicans. in my district, people feel like the republican party has been focused too much on the top 1%, that there has been too much or for cronyism, corporate welfare, and corporate bailouts. but they are also convinced that the democrats are focused too much on the bottom 3%, folks getting by on entitlements that do not really need them. what they really feel like in the middle-class, middle-income district like mine come is that no one is fighting for the 96% in between. they see $18 trillion in debt,

porous borders, too much taxation regulation, and a lawless president that repeatedly tramples our constitution, and they want to know will somebody finally stand up for us? i campaigned on those issues about being that type of representative. i think we are off to a great start. we have some great legislation coming forward that really does provide conservative solutions attack some of the problems that people had to endure for the past six years. the next two years is an audition for the republican party, for my party. we have to convince middle america that we can do a better job and that we deserve to have a republican president and if we do have a republican president with a republican house and republican senate, we can get back to the principles of reagan

and the conservative believes that we all believe in. >> thank you, congressman. [applause] >> i served in a state house and state senate in georgia. for about nine years. i had no intention of running for congress. it was something i never thought of and then a congressman who was serving in this district decided to run for the senate. i met my family, who are all politically engaged, and we were trying to find the right candidate. one of the most conservative districts in the nation. we were talking about it and the more we talked about it, the more my kid said you need to do this. of course, that is when all the excuses started coming. i had a small business that was struggling. we had a nonprofit where we teach the values and the foundations of american history. i kept going through the reasons why i could not run and i

finally said after years of struggling with our business we are starting to get comfortable again. that is when my daughter looked at me and said, god called you to be comfortable? as we talked about it, she expressed what a lot of people were feeling. this nation that you have taught me to love, we are losing. unless we have the right people willing to fight the fight, we will lose it. after a lot of consideration and prayer, we decided this was the right direction to go. as i sat with the campaign team, i said a lot of things that others were saying without coordinating with all these new republican candidates. i started to see her -- to hear the same thing. we have to quit defining ourselves by what we are against. we have been defined by what we don't like. let's be defined by what we are for and come up with solutions. we don't have to convince

americans that their nation is off course. they know it. obamacare is the reality. what we have to do is reinstall hope that we can make a difference and that is what we started focusing on. we can make change. one of the things that i also realized, that we have been talking about since the real -- the election, as conservatives come a we have no strategy and we use poor tactics. if you want to use military terms. what is our strategy? you can boil that down to a lack of vision. the scriptures tell us if you have a lack of vision, you will perish. we talk about what we want america to look like. not tomorrow or next week, not two years, not for years, but in the year 2030. what do we want america to look like? there are a lot of people in america who still remember what america used to be. what it could be.

it can be again. i tell the story of my dad. when i was in high school, he worked with a building contractor. he said, i wanted to tell you, i started my own construction business. i remember asking, how did you do that? he said, i got a business license and i got the insurance, and i'm in business. the founder of home depot recently said he could not start home depot in today's regulatory environment. i remember talking to my dad and i said that is all you need to do to start a business? he said that is what is so great about this country. he was a world war ii veteran. he said what is so great about this nation is you have written to do whatever you want and government is sadly there to protect your rights. in your pursuit of happiness you don't violate your neighbors pursuit of happiness. so i wrote number thinking

america is so great, you can do whatever you want, except a few things that government is protecting you from violating. but the mentality of the next generation following us is what will the government let me do? we started realizing that not only do we have to define what america can be, we have to define it in a way that the generation following us mama that never experienced that america, that they would understand. i was invited a couple months ago to speak to one of the colleges in our district, to their political science class and it was a joint meet occasions class. about 75 students in the room. the majority of them were minority. after speaking to the class, it turns out, the majority of them were not associated as conservatives or in the republican party, at least at the beginning of the program. but as we were there, i realized

something we talked about in the campaign, a lot of times conservatives operate in this sphere of the mind. but most voters operate in the sphere of the heart. we have to connect those two. the topic they asked me to speak about was the bill of rights. instead of going down the bill of rights, i decided to talk about the vision of what the founding fathers were. what was the character what was it that they wanted, what was behind their pursuit of having a bill of rights instead of going down through each? i wrote down on the white board i can put in one word the whole idea behind the founding fathers and the bill of rights, and i wrote the word liberty. then we started talking about what liberal meant. then i told a story about my father starting his business. then i said, let me ask you a question. what did the founding fathers believed was the greatest enemy to liberty?

when around the room. british army. there were other suggestions. i went back up to the board and next to liberty i wrote government. our founding fathers said the very thing they were creating was the very enemy to what they wanted to achieve and that is why it had to be limited. i realized i was starting to connect. so i finally asked the group how many of you in this room believe you can achieve the american dream? the traditional dream of owning a home? only three or four of the students raise their hands. they said we cannot afford it. we do not believe we will ever have enough to buy a home. i said, if i told you that tomorrow we could reduce the price of a home by 50%, how many of you would believe you can achieve the american dream? they all raise their hands. i said, let me tell you what this enemy to liberty can do by regulating. i was just in a meeting with a

homebuilders association who told me that 60% of the cost of a new home is because of government regulation. it started to hit home with them. we went down a few other scenarios. by the time we got done, a young african-american girl came up to me and said, i have grown up in a household of staunch democrats. i am a democrat. you just made a conservative out of me. she did not say republican. i said, no, ma'am. i just let you realize what you already were. because we changed our messaging and we built a strategy. that is what we need to do as conservatives. we have to convince the generation behind us. it took us a long time to sell our liberties away. it will take a long time to get it back. we have to be patient. one of the problems we have had in the past was, if we were

a football team, we would throw a hail mary pass and if they did not score, we would assassinate the team as they walked off the field. you win a football game by moving the ball down the field a little at a time. we have to be patient. we have to change our mood. we have to change our vision. we have to be working together. if you look at the liberal side of politics, they don't agree on everything. there is a lot of disagreement, but they have learned to unify behind those things that they want to accomplish. that is how they have achieved that. we have to do the same thing. i still believe in american exceptionalism. we have to define what america needs to be by 2030. the most dangerous thing we are facing is an $18 trillion debt. people tell me that we can never pay off that debt. i said i still believe in american exceptionalism.

americans can accomplish anything if they put their mind to it. they have a vision and they plot a path to get there. if we were back in 1960 and i gave you this choice, which would be the most possible? to pay off an enormous debt or put a man on the moon? everyone one of you would have said to pay off the debt. but if i recall, there is only one nations lag on the face of the moon, the united states of america, because we set our mind on a goal, we built an agency to manage -- if you think about it it was the private sector i got us to the moon. nasa managed the contractors. they did not stop until they got it done. i still believe american exceptionalism is still there. we have to spark that in this generation and the new generation and we can restore america so our kids can have a country that is free, save, and full of opportunity. [applause] >> thank you, congressman.

>> thank you. they saved the professor for last. ready for my hours of talking points? i will try to keep it brief. it is a pleasure to be here at heritage. anyone opens with chester's 10 -- chesterton i'm a fan of. it has been great so far. we are going to do great things for the reasons you heard. heritage framed a nice session here as to what the american people want. you have heard from all of us. what they want is people with ideals that sick to principles. i will give you my opening stump speech. then i will close. whenever i give my stump speech i give my background. i went to princeton seminary, i went to american for my phd in economics. i would always open up saying i

am running to put in and ethics together. people laugh at it as a joke. how can you put them together, but not only that, but our founding fathers knew that. they held those principles. i said not only will i do that you can predict all of my future votes pretty simply. take adam smith free market economics and put it together with james madison, who is from my district. i have some friends here who are going to hold me true for here. if you put them together, adam smith and james madison, who authored the constitution, you can predict my vote. i actually mean that. we intend to act out on those principles. if you do that, the people back home will say they are sticking

to their principles, they are announcing what they are doing and either they will buy it or not. if we stick to our principles, it is harder for the other side to not be done with sign-ups -- knock you down with soundbites. those are the utopian principles we are trying to hang two. i ran on three issues that concern the young people in the room. the debt is 18 trillion. they you have the unfunded liabilities, $127 trillion. our budget is about a third discretionary, two thirds nondiscretionary. entitlements are in that two thirds. you cannot change that until you change the law. just to give you a sense of what 127 trillion means, those four programs will take up the entire budget by 2030. the other side will run negative ads against us and say you are threatening the systems. false. those systems are insolvent by

2030. they are broke. our budget is gone. education and military is being cramped because those programs are intruding on the discretionary piece. that is a huge piece that i have always taught students. who is the only group of peer who does not have a lobbyist doing the job? your generation. madison intended this to be a government of competing factions, and that is a good thing. free-market capitalism relies on a large number of competing factions. some of you can make a lot of money doing it. represent your generation, get up here and get a working coalition together on that issue. you have to get some talking points to start out with. then i ran on obamacare a year ago. now the bill is in the mailbox. it is not theoretical. who watched "60 minutes" last night?

google it. everyone is seeing it right now. it is one thing to sell it in theory. this one guy helped us out by pointing to the arrogance of the top-down economic philosophy on the other side, the fatal conceit to think you will run 20% of this economy as a command economy without using prices and the price system is the fatal conceit. unfortunately, we bought into that and we will all pay the price, because that will take a while to turn around. i think you've heard good news on this panel. finally, iran on illegal immigration and amnesty. it's tarted up with a cheap labor argument that morphed into kids coming across the border, 100,000 kids, and then it

morphed into an even worse case of national security concerns. now it is all the above. i could not believe someone could be on the other side of this. there is just too much common sense. then it morphed into the president doing an illegal run around. he said it was unconstitutional over and over. i always go back to my free-market principles and my seminary background on that issue, because the left tries to get us all confused on whatever on that issue as if we don't like people or something like that. they could not be further from the truth. when it comes to immigration in this town, it all starts with data and talking points. no one ever backs it up. why does everyone want to come to this country in the first place? that's the question. because we are rich. how did we get rich? because we have the chesterton

-judeo-christian tradition. uniquely individual rights. free markets emerged even more uniquely in that context in only a subset of countries. if you want to help people, we are doing at the margin about one million people, small ball -- if you want to help 8 billion people on this planet who are all children of god, and i believe that, what should you do? promote the rule of law and free markets in home countries. that is what we did with our archenemies after world war ii. it worked. now they are our friends. seems like pretty good evidence. and to let the other side cast us as not caring is false. we have all the data on our side. we are the richest country on earth. all the countries that follow our principles are doing well. i'm optimistic as well.

we can do it we have done it but we better stay true to those fundamental principles that got us here. heritage has been fighting the fight for a long time. a lot of people have done the legwork, grassroots people out there that have helped me in my campaign. i say to the young people in my campaign don't yell at them just ask them if we are going in the right direction or not. that is all you have to do. heritage hit it out of the park on having this session. how do we win, what do we run on. we did run on the principles and ideals that made this country great. they are not in dispute, as far as i know, but it takes courage to say that. thank you all for having us here. i think we are happy to take a few questions. [applause] >> thank you, congressman. questions?

>> i would like to ask congressman brat, you are one of the few economics professors in congress, you have watched congress for a long time. what basic economics 101 principles do they either not know or have completely forgotten, or just abandoned? >> i get that, and that open up with free-market economics and ethics him and i don't think it is a lack of knowledge. when you people that are full of knowledge here. we had army and billy graham and lots of people before us. it hasn't do more with the political courage. when it comes to the unfunded liability and the debt, we all know the problem. there is no mystery on economics. we heard jim jordan and my colleagues here say it takes courage to stand up to special interest. when you are running a race and you want to win, it easier to go to the few big purses that a lot

of small ones. for me it is not so much the economic knowledge but the political courage to stand up and state the truth in public. that is the economic education of everybody. k12 kids cannot tell you what a business is. that is an issue. it doesn't not have the kids back home cannot tell you what a business is. that's a problem for workforce skills etc. >> anyone else? ok, right here. >> congressman, i want to congratulate you. thank you for being a congressman. i just got back from southern california, real quick, and i voted for prop 8, which got turned over, as you know, by an unjust judge. and i could go on and talk about the illegal immigration problem for hours. they've closed eight of the

hospitals. 34% of -- i know a man who hired some undocumented. he said i found out that one of them's grandmother was coming up from guadalajara getting a check once a month. multiply that by tens of thousands of times. i met a lady from the philippines, and her husband had been a veteran fought in world war ii, and they were waiting eleven years for an immigration and naturalization number. i could get each and every one of you a new i.d. if you pass immigration reform, i just -- it will really -- i just don't see this country recovering. i mean, you know, i just -- i hope you don't. i pray to god that you don't. and you realize -- i mean, i'm an immigrant. i mean, i'm a grandson. i'm jewish and i'm a minority. more mexican fought in the

mexican-america war against america. this isn't about race. it's about right and wrong. i believe the republic and congress should stand for right and wrong and law and order. >> great. thank you. immigration reform. >> well, you bring up a great point. but one of the other things we have to change in the way we operate as conservatives is we've got to take back the language. they have taken the immigration reform. and the truth is, we need reform. we just have to define what it is. we need to seal the border. when you look right now, legal immigrants take 12 to 15 years and sometimes up to 15,000 in legal fees to emigrate to this nation, that's a problem. it needs to be reformed. we have utilized migrant workers in this nation sense the revolutionary war. we brought the french over here to help us win and many of them stayed. we had a visa program that worked. i've been to south georgia

farmers. i've been to their farms. i've met with them to see. many of these migrant workers that would come to this nation, through government policy, is where we've driven ourselves to where we're so reliant on migrant workers. but most of them prior to the last couple of decades would come here. they would work. most of it is piecemeal. they're making a decent wage. it's hard work. as soon as it's done, they go back, because what they make here they live in upper middle class when they go back to their country. so what we've done is we've tried to fix something that was working relatively well. and we've created a situation. now what we want is, through government policy, poor policy, we've created a situation where many of those migrant workers are afraid, if they go back home, they're not going to come back so they stay here. now we want to give them amnesty. i sat with a gentleman from ecuador recently, who is an

engineer here. he's a legal immigrant. it took him 12 years to legally come to this country. he said, i have supported you, but if you let the folks that came here illegally stay, after what i had to go through, i'll never support you again. and so you're exactly right. but we have to be very careful in the way we message this because we are going to be seeking immigration reform but it's not the reform that they're talking about. it's the rule of law. it's getting back. it's simplifying it. it's taking the red tape out of it. it's making it work the way it was intended to work in the nation. and so -- but you're right. giving am amnesty is a slap in the face to those who have done it properly. we need to make the legal immigration work. we have to seal the borders. it always amazes me, when i was in the state legislature we're so reactive. we always want to start a new law instead of enforcing the laws with ehave on the books.

so -- instead of enforcing the laws we have on the books. so let's secure the border enforce the laws we have on the books. let's will streamline the legal immigration system and have a work visa program that allows those that do need to come into the nation to work we know where they are, we can track them and we know when they're supposed to go back. if we do that, then we can take a step back and look at what else needs to be done. >> yes. right here. >> brad harris with the religious society of friends. with the budget control act with the budget caps on the defense spending, this is sort of split a wedge amongst some conservativives. the defense hawks would spend more on defense. some of the budget hawks fear that defense spending has government more government spending. i wonder if you -- each or any of you could talk a little bit on where you stand on the defense spending caps. thank you.

[laughter] >> sure. i'll take it. so... i think this goes to, you know -- i always talk about the fact that i believe in a limited government. but an energetic government. and, you know, this sort of ties into a little bit about what barry was talking about. you know the-year-old government has -- the federal government has one legitimate role. it's to provide for the common defense. and so, you know we talk about border security before. we spend $3.5 trillion a year on a whole bunch of things that the federal government doesn't have constitutional authority or edicts to do, and yet we don't do the one thing well that the constitution says that we're supposed to do. so when you talk about being a hawk, i'm a national security hawk. i'm a former united states attorney. i'm a former terrorism prosecutor. i know that when you talk about

border security, for instance, everyone wants to talk about immigration. but given my background, i'll tell you it's about national security. it's about our first line of defense for stopping drug traffickers. it's our first line of defense for human trafficking. and it's about immigration. so, you know, from my perspective, we always have to keep in mind that that is the one legitimate role of the federal government. now, having said that, within that role, within defense spending, there is absolutely no denying that there is waste fraud and abuse within the defense sector and other sectors. so that's one of the things that, as i look at making those decisions, is making sure that it's money that's really going to be allocated for the legitimate purpose of our federal government, but not more than that. >> go ahead. >> the problem we have today is

our military the strategy should dictate the budget. but we're letting the budget dictate strategy. and that's a problem. as you said, this is one of the -- one of the legitimate or constitutional roles of our federal government. the problem with sequestration is the way it is done. the best illustration is if -- my personal income, if i took a hit, if my business did, back in 2008 to 2012, i had to reduce my income, which meant i had to go look at my personal budget. if i would have used the scres traition model i -- sequestration model, i would have cut maybe 10% out of my entertainment budget 10% out of my travel budget, 10% out of my home payment and 10% out of my car payment. that's great, except for i would be homeless and wouldn't have a car. there's no flexibility in sequestration and that's one of the problems with it. there are reforms, as we've recognized here. we need procurement proform.

there's a lot of waste in the procurement process. most of the defense contractors are begging, let's streamline it. it's a shame that when we have a new technology, a new fighter aircraft comes off the assembly line or it's approved for production. it's 13 years before the first one is flying, and the chinese have already developed and put one out in a year and a half. these are the types of things we have to fix. but we have to let those who are on the frontline of the battle, the generals who have the strategy view, dick take what the -- dictate what the budget of the military is. >> i think we have time for one more. yes, ma'am. >> hi. thank you. i am just so proud to be here and proud to be a heritage sentinel. thank you for the work that you guys have done here. it's really made an impact in virginia. i'm a native virginian. so -- and yes, that's my guy. ha ha!

so my question is, though, with the mandate, november 4 from the american people and the reaction to cromnibus in regards to john boehner, we've had a lot of great ideas and a lot of great action that all of our speakers have talked about today. how are we going to get the other side of congress to get it? are we going to unit them to -- unite them to get what we get and what we want? and, of course, we'd like to see their scores higher. >> you're referring to the senate, i assume, or are you referring to the democrats? or are you referring to -- where? >> well, with the group cromnibus, with cromnibus being just passed. and the outrage from the american people with john boehner. they feel that they were kind of let down with the november election and they want to see what we're talking about here today. we want to see a real change.

and we want to see our speaker lead that and unite our congress against president obama's agenda. >> yes. >> so i'd like to know how our plan of attack -- because we have great ideas on the table but how are we going to implement them if we don't have a united congress with our speaker? >> let me offer a thought and then turn it over to our guests. that is one of the reasons we're holding this conference. i think that one of the things that is really important about this conference is when you start talking about these ideas when you talk about the acts like we talked about todd earlier or when we talk about school choice like we're going to talk about tomorrow, when we talk about the energy reforms, tax reforms, all of these ideas it becomes very hard for even the more establishment types within the republican party to opensoppose us, because the ideas are right. you have the moral high ground.

it becomes very hard for them to say, i'm not sure i want to put that on the floor this year. i'm not sure it's a good idea to vote for school choice on the floor of the house of represents this year. all of a sudden, the guys on this panel have the moral high ground. i'm not saying it's a magic bullet. it's going to be hard. we've got a lot of work to do to convince our leadership to adopt most of our agenda. but i do think they are open to it. i think that when you start to talk about the issues and you start to say this is what we're actually going to focus on this year i think, at the end of the day, they're putting a place with they need to really consider putting that on the floor. i don't know. what do you all think? >> well, i hope you're going to see a different congress. one of the things to keep in mind president james garfield was asked a similar question. how do we change things? and he responded basically saying politics is downstream from culture. people -- we would tell you this

on the campaign trail. i want you to go up there and fix washington. well, i can't do it. i, as one, can't do it. what president garfield said is if congress is reckless, ignore ignorant and corrupt it's because people accept that. what they're getting at is it isn't just a one-sided battle. there's multiple battle fronts. part of that is within your neighborhoods, at your home, bringing more people in this. because what is going to change washington is a demand from the people to change. but patience with that too realizing you don't turn a battleship around on a dime. it takes -- it is going to be a slow and frustrating process. and not assassinate those that you send in to fight the battle if they don't win on the first shot. the other thing, we have to choose our battlefields wisely and start moving the ball down the field a little bit. in 1774, jefferson was appointed to a committee to look at the top 15 issues facing the colony of virginia, the most dangerous

things facing virginia. ironically, the top 15 then are the same today. the committee met in the house of burgess and came out with their recommendation which was the biggest danger to the liberties of the american people is a lethargic people. we have to awaken the people. that's why i'm saying, the culture has as much of a battle on this as we do. >> i'll just add, i mean, i think there's good news. people do listen to the people. you all know that. the sentinel program out here is very good. so i ran on principals. i put them on paper a head of time. that's roughly what ethics is putting the rules down on paper then trying to follow them. i don't think enough solutions up here have been in the trillion dollar ball game. the problems are in the trillion dollar ballpark and the solutions don't match. i think the solutions -- i think

they got the message. and i think our leadership is doing some good stuff on this immigration bill we got going forward right now, that came out of conference, looks like the right elements are in there. for a start. nothing is ever going to be perfect. but we can keep working on it. so i just applied the people that -- applaud the people that keep us paying attention to the issues you want us to focus on. i think we're getting the memo up here. it's coming over. >> well, before we break, just one more note for tomorrow. we have a schedule change. senator rand pall was scheduled to -- rand paul was scheduled to speak in the afternoon. he's going to speak at 11:30 tomorrow. we have a great agenda for tomorrow. we'll have members talking about education, defense reform. we'll have rand paul, mike lee lots of folks on the agenda. please join me in thanking our panelists for their time.

and thank you all for being here! [applause] >> congress returns tomorrow at 2 o'clock eastern time. the house considering a resolution condemning the recent terror attacks in paris. no votes are scheduled since members will be attending president obama's state of the union address before a joint gathering. on c-span 2, the senate returns at 10 a.m. eastern to continue debate on the keystone xl pipeline bill. votes on amendments will likely take place liter in the afternoon -- later in the afternoon. >> mr. speaker, the president of the united states! [applause] >> despite our hardships, our union is strong. we do not give up. we do not quit. if because of our -- it's because of our people that our future is hopeful. our journey goes forward. and the state of our union is getting stronger.

we've come too far to turn back now. we have cleared away the rubble of crisis. and we can say with renewed confidence that the state of our union is stronger. it is you our citizens, who make the state of our union strong. [applause] >> and the movie "american sniper" has been nominated for an academy award. at 5:15, book t.v. will show an interview with u.s. navy seal sniper chris kyle, who is movie is based on. back in to 2012, he talked about his career. you can watch the interview at 5 eastern over on c-span 2.

and pope francis has added new york and washington, d.c. to his previously announced itineraries to visit the u.s., including a stop in philadelphia in september. the pontiff told reporters he wishes he could enter the u.s. through the mexican border, as a sign of brotherhood and help to immigrants but he will probably wind up flying directly across the east coast. possible appearances at the white house, united nations and a possible mass at madison square garden. and a look across the potomac tidal basin on this martin luther king jr. day. c-span's cameras have been capturing the sights and sounds around the district and around the district of columbia at the m.l.k. memorial. that's built right between the lincoln memorial at the far end of the national mall and the jefferson memorial there across the basin. the m.l.k. memorial including the stone of hope sculpture of

m.l.k. as well as two large stones that depict the mountain of despair. it's an image from king's "i have a dream" speech delivered in august 1963. four and a half years later, he was assassinated in memphis tennessee. lining this memorial with the stone of hope and the mountain of despair in the background, 14 quotes from dr. king on the inscription wall. in 1971, cities and states around the u.s. began individually establishing annual holidays to honor m.l.k. it was president reagan who signed a bill in 1983, creating a federal holiday. it was observed for the first time on january 20, 1986.

>> a look at the sights and sounds at the m.l.k. memorial today. earlier, we hosted a conversation about the state of

race relations in the u.s. and the 50th anniversary of the voting rights act on "washington journal." this is about 50 minutes. >> and on this martin luther king jr. day, we're joined by retired neurosurgeon, dr. ben carson. dr. carson, a few years ago, you wrote that if dr. king were able to see america today you think he'd be disappointed by some of the things that he would see in the black community today. >> yes. >> do you still feel that way? >> yes, i do. i think what he was advocating for was not people being sustained but for people to be empowered. and what we've seen is really quite the opposite. if you look at the trajectory of the black community in america, from the time of emancipation, it was almost straight up until the mid- to late 60's.

since that time, it's been going down. and you have to ask yourself you know, what happened? and a lot of what happened is that a lot of people who considered themselves great and wonderful do-gooders started patting people on the head and saying, there, there, you poor little thing. you've been through so much. i'm going to take care of all your needs. and it's created a cycle of expectation and dependency. i don't think that's what dr. king wanted. i think what he wanted was a situation where people had a fair and equal chance to develop their god-given talents and to excel and to be contributors rather than need to be taken care of. >> well, on this m.l.k. day, let me ask you this question. we've been asking our viewers this this morning. who best embodies m.l.k.'s legacy today? >> i think there are people across the nation, in every home. they don't have to be famous people. but you look at all the people

who have gone out there and decided to turn their attention to the opportunities and to the talents that they have and have worked with those things to create opportunities for themselves and for their families, as opposed to those who say i'm going to concentrate on all the injustice. i gotta tell you something. there was injustice yesterday there was injustice today and there will be injustice tomorrow. there will be injustice as long as there are human beings around. you can spend all your time concentrating on that, or you can concentrate on something else. if you are welcomed into an auditorium full of bigoted people, they're all going to wonder if you're going to sit next to them, or you can sit wherever you want. if they have these problems, let them stew in it. i've got important things to do. that's what i think dr. king

would be saying if he were alive today. i think he would be saying to the black community, there are $1 trillion worth of assets in the black community. learn to turn your dollar over in your own community two or three times before you send it out. that's how you create westminster. that's how jews created westminster,wealth,how koreaned created wealth, just about everybody. we need to learn how to do those things as well. >> you said you have important things to do. does one of those things involve running for the presidency? >> that's something i'm certainly considering. it wasn't on my bucket list when i decided to retire, to be honest with you, but sometimes you find yourself in a situation. i thought all the clamoring would just die down. but instead, it continues to build. so sometimes you have to do things that you're obligated to do rather than what you want to do, because i frankly, when i retired, i bought a nice home in florida on a golf course.

i was going to relax and do all the things i never had a chance to do. somehow, that doesn't seem to be in the cards. >> a quote from an appearance that you made this weekend, the south carolina tea party coalition convention, our founders wanted to make sure there was no such thing as a political class in this country, a select, small group of people out of which we consistently pull our leaders. that hasn't worked so well for us. who did you mean? >> i mean, no particular individual but i want people to understand that the way our system was put together, it was put together with the people in mind, the common people. and anybody was supposed to be able to be a representative, not just a select group of people. and that's what i was really referring to. >> we're talking with dr. ben carson. he joins us for about the next 40 minutes or so here on the

washington. if you have questions, you can join us. we'll start on our line for republicans. keith calling in from savannah, tennessee. keith, you on with dr. carson. >> thank you. dr. carson, i would like to say you're one of the most brilliant men that has ever been seen on t.v. you've got the right attitude. you know what dr. king would have wanted. he wants everyone to do the best they can do in their own environment and take care of the resources that are there for them, not to go out and destroy them and cry wolf every time something is said they don't like. they stand up for themselves, get on education use the education and use the talents god gave us all. everyone was given talents to

develop, use and share, not to go out and cry "i don't have." be thankful for what i do have and enjoy it and share it with others that don't see the light of god. >> absolutely. and, you know, the fact of the matter is, we the american people need to understand something that's very important. and that is we're not each other's enemies. enemies are the people who are always trying to divide us. they want to divide us, race. they want to divide you by income, by age, on religion, on just about anything that you can imagine. that's not why we're called the united states of america. and we the people are going to have to rise above all of the division and begin to look at the good things that exist within us and within our society. >> speaking of race relations in this country tonight on this

martin luther king jr. day, you're going to be holding a town hall event with attorney benjamin crump, the attorney for the michael brown family, on how to move forward with race relations in this country. what are going to be your suggestions? >> well, it is obviously so important that we begin to discuss things rather than get into corners and shoot hand grenades at each other. that never accomplishes anything. one of the things i think is incredibly important in terms of the relationships between the police in the community is that they get to know each other. i was talking to ed mullens, the president of the sergeant's association in nypd last week and he's working with community leaders like a. r. bernard. they're trying to put together a league throughout the neighborhoods, an athletic league, and they can compete against each other, police and the community, involved in each of the teams. so they get to know each other.

and, you know, it's an interesting thing. but when you get to know people, all of a sudden the horns disappear. ha ha! the fangs go away. you say, oh wow. sometimes you don't even think about what collar color they are. >> arewe are going to be talking to ronald davis, coming up at about 8:30. let's go to michael, detroit, michigan line for democrats. michael, good morning. >> good morning. first of all, this is what i'd like to say. for you to be a black man and just say what you just said that didn't make no sense to me! and did you know that the party that you represent represents the k.k.k.? thank you! >> okay. well, first of all i wonder if this gentleman knows that the republican party was formed as an abolition party that the

republican party was the one who fought for the right of freed men to have guns so that when the k.k.k. came in, which were democrats, which by the way, and tried to destroy them, they would at least have the opportunity to protect themselves, that it was the republican party that actually fought for the civil rights legislation and for the voting rights legislation, that the republican party was the party of abraham lincoln of martin luther king sr., of george washington korver of frederick douglas, of booker t. washington. and i could go on. but what is important, here is the important thing. not democrats, not republicans. the important thing is how do we in the black community empower ourselves? how do we reach a point where we

don't have to be dependent upon anybody else, where we use the talents that god has given don't allow ourselves to be manipulated by those who want to create division, because that's how they keep you under control. host: we're talking with dr. ben carson, the story of the cover of "the weekly standard." fred barnes writes most interesting longshot. how do like that title? guest: my whole life has been composed of long shots. people saying what couldn't be done and what hasn't been done. using the talent god has given you, faith and hard work, i do not believe those things. host: geri is up next.