No one imagined
That we'd have accomplished what we did here tonight
No one could have imagined.
We always knew our climb would be steep
But in record numbers you came out
and you spoke up for change.
And we've been told that we're not ready,
or that we shouldn't try,
or that we can't!
The reason that we began this improbable journey
Because it's not just about what I will do as president
It is also about what you; the people who love this country;
The citizens of the United States of America
can do to change it.
I know you didn't do this for me.
You did this– you did this because you believed so deeply
in the most American of ideas.
That in the face of impossible odds
people who love this country can change it.
It was a creed written into the founding documents
that declared the testament of a nation.
Yes we did.
It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists
and blazed a trail towards freedom through the darkest of nights. Yes we can.
It was sung by immigrants
as they struck out for distant shores
and pioneers went westward
against an unforgiving wilderness.
Yes we can.
It was the call of workers who organized,
women who reached for the ballot,
a president who chose the moon as our new frontier.
And a king who took us to the mountaintops
and pointed the way into the promised land.
Yes we can to justice and equality.
Yes we can to opportunity and prosperity.
Yes we can heal this nation.
Yes we can repair this world.
Yes we can.
As we learn that the struggles of the textile workers in Sparkburg are not so different
than the plight of the dish washer in Las Vegas.
That the hopes of the little girl who goes to
the public school in Billings
are the same as the dreams of the boy who learns
on the streets of LA.
We will remember that there is something happening in America. That we are not as divided
as our politics suggest.
We are one people.
We are one nation.
And together we will begin the next great chapter
in the American story with three words
that will ring from coast to coast;
from sea, to shining sea;
YES WE CAN.
We came together as Democrats, Republicans
and Independants to stand up and say
that we are one nation;
we are one people;
and our time for change has come.
Together, ordinary people can do extraordinary things.
The belief that our destiny will not be written for us
but by us; by all those men and women
who are not content to settle for the world as it is
who have the courage to remake the world as it should be.
When Malia and Sasha and your children
inherit a planet that's a little cleaner, and safer.
Years from now, you'll look back and you'll say
that this was the moment
where America remembered what it means to hope.
(chanting) Obama! Obama! Obama!
Thank you!