this campaign is about more than issue differences on health care, tax cuts, national security, jobs, the environment and our economy. it is about something as important as our children. it's about who we are as americans. here are the words of john winthrop: "we shall be as one. we must delight in each other, make other's conditions our own; rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always living before our eyes our commission and community in our work." it is that ideal, the ideal of the american community, that we seek to restore. an america where it is not

enough for me to want health care for my family but the obligation, and responsibility of every one of us as american citizens to insure that each one of us has health care for our families. an america where it is not enough for me to want good public schools and a better life for my children but an obligation, and a responsibility as citizens to insure that every child in america may go to a good public school and have the opportunity of a better life. an america where it is not enough to protect my rights under the law but where it is a duty and an obligation for each of us as americans to make sure every american is equal under the law.

if september 11, 2001 taught america anything, it is that we are stronger when we are holding to each other as a national community and weaker when we act as individuals. that tragedy gave us an enormous opportunity to focus not only on our common peril, but also on our common dreams. the peril remains, but the dreams must be resurrected -- and they will be in a new american century. president kennedy challenged us to "pass the torch to a new generation of americans." and so, we must issue that challenge again. so too must we restore the deepest belief of our people that each generation has a responsibility to pass to our children a nation and a world that is better and stronger than the one that was passed to us.

as we experience the crisis of community at home, we are witnessing the effort to repudiate 225 years of american consensus on what our nation's place should be in the world. since the time of thomas paine and john adams, our founders implored that we were not to be the new rome. we are not to conquer and suppress other nations to submit to our will. we were to inspire them. the idea of america using its power solely for its own ends is not consistent with the idealistic moral force the world has known for over two centuries. we must rejoin the world community. america is far stronger as the

moral and military leader of the world than we will ever be by relying solely on military power. we destroyed repressive communist regimes without firing a shot, not simply by having a strong military, but because we had a better ideal to show the world. every american president must and will take up arms in the defense of our nation. it is a solemn oath that cannot -- and will not -- be compromised. but there is a fundamental difference between the defense of our nation and the doctrine of preemptive war espoused by this administration.

the president's group of narrow-minded ideological advisors are undermining our nation's greatness in the world. they have embraced a form of unilateralism that is even more dangerous than isolationism. this administration has shown disdain for allies, treaties and international organizations alike. in doing so they would throw aside our nation's role as the inspirational leader of the world the beacon of hope and justice in the interests of humankind. and instead, they would present our face to the world as a dominant power prepared to push aside any nation with which we do not agree. our foreign and military policies must be about america leading the world, not america

against the world. so how did we come to this point? how is it that our leaders have abandoned our communities and repudiated our idealism and principles? when confronted with a dedicated band of right wing ideologues, too many americans have stopped participating, stopped voting, and stopped believing that they can change america. and we in politics have not given our people a reason to vote or a reason to participate. we have slavishly spewed sound bites, copying each other while saying little. we raise millions of dollars and

each year make lofty promises, while every year the struggles of ordinary americans increase and fewer americans vote. our politicians, many of them good people, have been paralyzed by their fear of losing office. our leaders have developed a vocabulary which has become meaningless to the american people. there is no greater example of this than a self-described conservative republican president who creates the greatest deficits in history of america. or a president who boasts of a clear skies initiative which allows far more pollution into our air. or a president who co-opts from an advocacy organization the phrase "no child left behind,"

while paying for irresponsible tax cuts by cutting children's health care. martin luther king, jr. said, "our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." the history of our nation is clear: at every turn when there has been an imbalance of power the truth questioned, or our beliefs and values distorted the change required to restore our nation has always come from the bottom up from our people. and so, while the president

raises $4 million more tonight to maintain his agenda, we will not be silent. he calls his biggest fundraisers rangers and pioneers. but today, we stand together with thousands in burlington vermont and tens of thousands

more, standing with us right now in every state in this nation. and we call ourselves, simply, americans. and we stand today in common purpose to take our country back.

i am a doctor and i was proud to be governor of vermont: where we balanced our budgets where we made sure that nearly every child in our state had health care coverage where we are stewards of our land and natural resources where, on the first tuesday of march every year, vermonters gather to make decisions on matters vital to our communities where we hold these truths to be self evident: that all are created equal and are endowed with the inalienable

rights of life, liberty and pursuit of happiness and, where we, like all americans, love our country and want to see her flag stand for freedom and justice for all. that flag is not the property of the either party, it belongs to all of us. it is from this place that the rest of the journey of this campaign continues. we will ask the american people to participate again in our common future.

we are go from mouse pads, shoe leather, and like moveon.org, we seek to build a community of millions and strengthen the voice of our people and like the founders of the republic, we see change. i ask all americans regardless of party to meet with me across the nation to come together in common cause to forge a new american century. help us in the quest to return to greatness and return high moral purpose to the united states of america. the great lie spoken by politicians on platforms like this is the cry of "elect me and i will solve all your problems."

the truth is the future of our nation rests in your hands, and not in mine. abraham lincoln said that government of the people, by the people and for the people shall not perish from this earth. you have the power to reclaim our nation's destiny. you have the power to rid washington of the politics of money. you have the power to make right as important as might. you have the power to give americans a reason to vote again. you have the power to restore our nation to fiscal sanity and bring jobs back to our people. you have the power to fulfill harry truman's dream and bring health insurance to every american. you have the power to give us a

foreign policy consistent with american values again. you have the power to take back the democratic party. you have the power to take our country back. and we have the power to take the white house back in 2004. that is exactly what we are going to be doing. you have the power. you have the power. you have the power to take this country back. you have the power. thank you very much. we are going to take our country back. thank you very much. you have the power. thank you very much. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

>> our special program on presidential campaign announcement with senator barack obama addressing a large crowd in front of the illinois old state capitol building in springfield. the event marked the start of the close conference -- contest between the junior senator and hillary clinton, who conceded a nomination in june. this announcement is about 20 minutes. >> let me begin by saying thanks to all you who've traveled, from far and wide, to brave the cold today. i know it is a little chilly. but i'm fired up.

we all made this journey for a reason. it's humbling, but in my heart i know you didn't come here just for me, you came here because you believe in what this country can be. in the face of war, you believe there can be peace. in the face of despair, you believe there can be hope. in the face of a politics that's shut you out, that's told you to settle, that's divided us for too long, you believe we can be one people, reaching for what's possible, building that more perfect union.

that's the journey we're on today. but let me tell you how i came to be here. as most of you know, i am not a native of this great state. i moved to illinois over two decades ago. i was a young man then, just a year out of college; i knew no one in chicago, was without money or family connections. but a group of churches had offered me a job as a community organizer for $13,000 a year. and i accepted the job, sight unseen, motivated then by a single, simple, powerful idea that i might play a small part in building a better america. my work took me to some of chicago's poorest neighborhoods. i joined with pastors and lay-people to deal with

communities that had been ravaged by plant closings. i saw that the problems people faced weren't simply local in nature that the decision to close a steel mill was made by distant executives; that the lack of textbooks and computers in schools could be traced to the skewed priorities of politicians a thousand miles away; and that when a child turns to violence there's a hole in his heart no government could ever fill. it was in these neighborhoods that i received the best education i ever had, and where i learned the true meaning of my christian faith. after three years of this work i went to law school, because i wanted to understand how the law should work for those in need. i became a civil rights lawyer and taught constitutional law, and after a time, i came to understand that our cherished rights of liberty and equality depend on the active

participation of an awakened electorate. it was with these ideas in mind that i arrived in this capital city as a state senator. it was here, in springfield, where i saw all that is america converge farmers and teachers businessmen and laborers, all of them with a story to tell, all of them seeking a seat at the table, all of them clamoring to be heard. i made lasting friendships here friends that i see in the audience today. it was here we learned to disagree without being disagreeable that it's possible to compromise so long as you know those principles that can never be compromised; and that so long as we're willing to listen to each other, we can assume the best in people instead of the worst. that's why we were able to reform a death penalty system that was broken.

that's why we were able to give health insurance to children in need. that's why we made the tax system more fair and just for working families, and that's why we passed ethics reforms that the cynics said could never, ever be passed. it was here, in springfield, where north, south, east and west come together that i was reminded of the essential decency of the american people where i came to believe that through this decency, we can build a more hopeful america. and that is why, in the shadow of the old state capitol, where lincoln once called on a divided house to stand together, where common hopes and common dreams still, i stand before you today to announce my candidacy for president of the united states.

thank you. i recognize there is a certain presumptuousness , a certain audacity to this announcement. i know i haven't spent a lot of time learning the ways of washington.