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Inaugural Address of President George Bush
Friday, January 20, 1989
Mr. Chief Justice, Mr. President, Vice President Quayle, Senator Mitchell,
Speaker Wright, Senator Dole, Congressman Michel, and fellow citizens,
neighbors, and friends:
There is a man here who has earned a lasting place in our hearts and in
our history. President Reagan, on behalf of our Nation, I thank you for the
wonderful things that you have done for America.
I have just repeated word for word the oath taken by George Washington 200
years ago, and the Bible on which I placed my hand is the Bible on which he
placed his. It is right that the memory of Washington be with us today, not
only because this is our Bicentennial Inauguration, but because Washington
remains the Father of our Country. And he would, I think, be gladdened by
this day; for today is the concrete expression of a stunning fact: our
continuity these 200 years since our government began.
We meet on democracy's front porch, a good place to talk as neighbors and
as friends. For this is a day when our nation is made whole, when our
differences, for a moment, are suspended.
And my first act as President is a prayer. I ask you to bow your heads:
Heavenly Father, we bow our heads and thank You for Your love. Accept our
thanks for the peace that yields this day and the shared faith that makes
its continuance likely. Make us strong to do Your work, willing to heed and
hear Your will, and write on our hearts these words: "Use power to help
people." For we are given power not to advance our own purposes, nor to make
a great show in the world, nor a name. There is but one just use of power,
and it is to serve people. Help us to remember it, Lord. Amen.
I come before you and assume the Presidency at a moment rich with promise.
We live in a peaceful, prosperous time, but we can make it better. For a new
breeze is blowing, and a world refreshed by freedom seems reborn; for in
man's heart, if not in fact, the day of the dictator is over. The totalitarian era is passing, its old ideas blown away like leaves from an ancient, lifeless tree. A new breeze is blowing, and a nation refreshed by freedom stands ready to push on. There is new ground to be broken, and new action to be taken. There are times when the future seems thick as a fog; you sit and wait, hoping the mists will lift and reveal the right path. But this is a time when the future seems a door you can walk right through into a room called tomorrow.
Great nations of the world are moving toward democracy through the door to
freedom. Men and women of the world move toward free markets through the
door to prosperity. The people of the world agitate for free expression and
free thought through the door to the moral and intellectual satisfactions
that only liberty allows.
We know what works: Freedom works. We know what's right: Freedom is right.
We know how to secure a more just and prosperous life for man on Earth:
through free markets, free speech, free elections, and the exercise of free
will unhampered by the state.
For the first time in this century, for the first time in perhaps all
history, man does not have to invent a system by which to live. We don't
have to talk late into the night about which form of government is better.
We don't have to wrest justice from the kings. We only have to summon it
from within ourselves. We must act on what we know. I take as my guide the
hope of a saint: In crucial things, unity; in important things, diversity;
in all things, generosity.
America today is a proud, free nation, decent and civil, a place we cannot
help but love. We know in our hearts, not loudly and proudly, but as a
simple fact, that this country has meaning beyond what we see, and that our
strength is a force for good. But have we changed as a nation even in our
time? Are we enthralled with material things, less appreciative of the
nobility of work and sacrifice?
My friends, we are not the sum of our possessions. They are not the
measure of our lives. In our hearts we know what matters. We cannot hope
only to leave our children a bigger car, a bigger bank account. We must hope
to give them a sense of what it means to be a loyal friend, a loving parent,
a citizen who leaves his home, his neighborhood and town better than he
found it. What do we want the men and women who work with us to say when we are no longer there? That we were more driven to succeed than anyone around us? Or that we stopped to ask if a sick child had gotten better, and stayed
a moment there to trade a word of friendship?
No President, no government, can teach us to remember what is best in what
we are. But if the man you have chosen to lead this government can help make
a difference; if he can celebrate the quieter, deeper successes that are
made not of gold and silk, but of better hearts and finer souls; if he can
do these things, then he must.
America is never wholly herself unless she is engaged in high moral
principle. We as a people have such a purpose today. It is to make kinder
the face of the Nation and gentler the face of the world. My friends, we
have work to do. There are the homeless, lost and roaming. There are the
children who have nothing, no love, no normalcy. There are those who cannot
free themselves of enslavement to whatever addictiondrugs, welfare, the
demoralization that rules the slums. There is crime to be conquered, the
rough crime of the streets. There are young women to be helped who are about
to become mothers of children they can't care for and might not love. They
need our care, our guidance, and our education, though we bless them for
choosing life.
The old solution, the old way, was to think that public money alone could
end these problems. But we have learned that is not so. And in any case, our
funds are low. We have a deficit to bring down. We have more will than
wallet; but will is what we need. We will make the hard choices, looking at
what we have and perhaps allocating it differently, making our decisions
based on honest need and prudent safety. And then we will do the wisest
thing of all: We will turn to the only resource we have that in times of
need always growsthe goodness and the courage of the American people.
I am speaking of a new engagement in the lives of others, a new activism,
hands-on and involved, that gets the job done. We must bring in the
generations, harnessing the unused talent of the elderly and the unfocused
energy of the young. For not only leadership is passed from generation to
generation, but so is stewardship. And the generation born after the Second
World War has come of age.
I have spoken of a thousand points of light, of all the community
organizations that are spread like stars throughout the Nation, doing good.
We will work hand in hand, encouraging, sometimes leading, sometimes being
led, rewarding. We will work on this in the White House, in the Cabinet
agencies. I will go to the people and the programs that are the brighter
points of light, and I will ask every member of my government to become
involved. The old ideas are new again because they are not old, they are
timeless: duty, sacrifice, commitment, and a patriotism that finds its
expression in taking part and pitching in.
We need a new engagement, too, between the Executive and the Congress. The
challenges before us will be thrashed out with the House and the Senate. We
must bring the Federal budget into balance. And we must ensure that America
stands before the world united, strong, at peace, and fiscally sound. But,
of course, things may be difficult. We need compromise; we have had
dissension. We need harmony; we have had a chorus of discordant voices.
For Congress, too, has changed in our time. There has grown a certain
divisiveness. We have seen the hard looks and heard the statements in which
not each other's ideas are challenged, but each other's motives. And our
great parties have too often been far apart and untrusting of each other. It
has been this way since Vietnam. That war cleaves us still. But, friends,
that war began in earnest a quarter of a century ago; and surely the statute
of limitations has been reached. This is a fact: The final lesson of Vietnam
is that no great nation can long afford to be sundered by a memory. A new
breeze is blowing, and the old bipartisanship must be made new again.
To my friendsand yes, I do mean friendsin the loyal oppositionand yes,
I mean loyal: I put out my hand. I am putting out my hand to you, Mr.
Speaker. I am putting out my hand to you, Mr. Majority Leader. For this is
the thing: This is the age of the offered hand. We can't turn back clocks,
and I don't want to. But when our fathers were young, Mr. Speaker, our
differences ended at the water's edge. And we don't wish to turn back time,
but when our mothers were young, Mr. Majority Leader, the Congress and the
Executive were capable of working together to produce a budget on which this
nation could live. Let us negotiate soon and hard. But in the end, let us
produce. The American people await action. They didn't send us here to
bicker. They ask us to rise above the merely partisan. "In crucial things,
unity"and this, my friends, is crucial.
To the world, too, we offer new engagement and a renewed vow: We will stay
strong to protect the peace. The "offered hand" is a reluctant fist; but
once made, strong, and can be used with great effect. There are today
Americans who are held against their will in foreign lands, and Americans
who are unaccounted for. Assistance can be shown here, and will be long
remembered. Good will begets good will. Good faith can be a spiral that
endlessly moves on.
Great nations like great men must keep their word. When America says
something, America means it, whether a treaty or an agreement or a vow made
on marble steps. We will always try to speak clearly, for candor is a
compliment, but subtlety, too, is good and has its place. While keeping our
alliances and friendships around the world strong, ever strong, we will
continue the new closeness with the Soviet Union, consistent both with our
security and with progress. One might say that our new relationship in part
reflects the triumph of hope and strength over experience. But hope is good,
and so are strength and vigilance.
Here today are tens of thousands of our citizens who feel the
understandable satisfaction of those who have taken part in democracy and
seen their hopes fulfilled. But my thoughts have been turning the past few
days to those who would be watching at home, to an older fellow who will
throw a salute by himself when the flag goes by, and the women who will tell
her sons the words of the battle hymns. I don't mean this to be sentimental.
I mean that on days like this, we remember that we are all part of a
continuum, inescapably connected by the ties that bind.
Our children are watching in schools throughout our great land. And to
them I say, thank you for watching democracy's big day. For democracy
belongs to us all, and freedom is like a beautiful kite that can go higher
and higher with the breeze. And to all I say: No matter what your
circumstances or where you are, you are part of this day, you are part of
the life of our great nation.
A President is neither prince nor pope, and I don't seek a window on men's
souls. In fact, I yearn for a greater tolerance, an easygoingness about
each other's attitudes and way of life.
There are few clear areas in which we as a society must rise up united and
express our intolerance. The most obvious now is drugs. And when that first
cocaine was smuggled in on a ship, it may as well have been a deadly
bacteria, so much has it hurt the body, the soul of our country. And there
is much to be done and to be said, but take my word for it: This scourge will stop.
And so, there is much to do; and tomorrow the work begins. I do not
mistrust the future; I do not fear what is ahead. For our problems are
large, but our heart is larger. Our challenges are great, but our will is
greater. And if our flaws are endless, God's love is truly boundless.
Some see leadership as high drama, and the sound of trumpets calling, and
sometimes it is that. But I see history as a book with many pages, and each
day we fill a page with acts of hopefulness and meaning. The new breeze
blows, a page turns, the story unfolds. And so today a chapter begins, a
small and stately story of unity, diversity, and generosityshared, and
written, together.
Thank you. God bless you and God bless the United States of America.
Visit Mr. Bush's Website
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The U. S. Constitution
