The "Crisis of Confidence" Speech

One of the English teachers asked me if I could find a part of a good speech for the students to memorize, so they could have the experience of tackling some really meaningful English, hopefully getting a little bit of history in the process. I was happy to oblige. First, I read the entire text of Martin Luther King's famous speech, and I was blown away by it. I don't know how, but I've never read the whole thing until now. I had no idea it was so long or so beautiful. I recommend it to everyone.

The other speech I looked up was Jimmy Carter's "Crisis of Confidence" speech from 1979. I had heard an excerpt from this in the opening montage of "Miracle," and the little bit I heard struck me as eloquent, serious, and relevant for these times. Here is the entire text if you care to read it.

He delivered this televised speech on July 15, 1979.

Good evening. This is a special night for me. Exactly three years ago,
on July 15, 1976, I accepted the nomination of my party to run for
president of the United States.

I promised you a president who is not isolated from the people, who
feels your pain, and who shares your dreams and who draws his strength and his wisdom from you.

During the past three years I've spoken to you on many occasions about national concerns, the energy crisis, reorganizing the government, our nation's economy, and issues of war and especially peace. But over those years the subjects of the speeches, the talks, and the press
conferences have become increasingly narrow, focused more and more on what the isolated world of Washington thinks is important. Gradually, you've heard more and more about what the government thinks or what the government should be doing and less and less about our nation's hopes, our dreams, and our vision of the future.

Ten days ago I had planned to speak to you again about a very
important subject -- energy. For the fifth time I would have described
the urgency of the problem and laid out a series of legislative
recommendations to the Congress. But as I was preparing to speak, I
began to ask myself the same question that I now know has been
troubling many of you. Why have we not been able to get together as a
nation to resolve our serious energy problem?

It's clear that the true problems of our Nation are much deeper --
deeper than gasoline lines or energy shortages, deeper even than
inflation or recession. And I realize more than ever that as president
I need your help. So I decided to reach out and listen to the voices
of America.

I invited to Camp David people from almost every segment of our
society -- business and labor, teachers and preachers, governors,
mayors, and private citizens. And then I left Camp David to listen to
other Americans, men and women like you.

It has been an extraordinary ten days, and I want to share with you
what I've heard. First of all, I got a lot of personal advice. Let me
quote a few of the typical comments that I wrote down.

This from a southern governor: "Mr. President, you are not leading
this nation -- you're just managing the government."

"You don't see the people enough any more."

"Some of your Cabinet members don't seem loyal. There is not enough
discipline among your disciples."

"Don't talk to us about politics or the mechanics of government, but
about an understanding of our common good."

"Mr. President, we're in trouble. Talk to us about blood and sweat and tears."

"If you lead, Mr. President, we will follow."

Many people talked about themselves and about the condition of our nation.

This from a young woman in Pennsylvania: "I feel so far from
government. I feel like ordinary people are excluded from political
power."

And this from a young Chicano: "Some of us have suffered from
recession all our lives."

"Some people have wasted energy, but others haven't had anything to waste."

And this from a religious leader: "No material shortage can touch the
important things like God's love for us or our love for one another."

And I like this one particularly from a black woman who happens to be
the mayor of a small Mississippi town: "The big-shots are not the only
ones who are important. Remember, you can't sell anything on Wall
Street unless someone digs it up somewhere else first."

This kind of summarized a lot of other statements: "Mr. President, we
are confronted with a moral and a spiritual crisis."

Several of our discussions were on energy, and I have a notebook full
of comments and advice. I'll read just a few.

"We can't go on consuming 40 percent more energy than we produce. When
we import oil we are also importing inflation plus unemployment."

"We've got to use what we have. The Middle East has only five percent
of the world's energy, but the United States has 24 percent."

And this is one of the most vivid statements: "Our neck is stretched
over the fence and OPEC has a knife."

"There will be other cartels and other shortages. American wisdom and
courage right now can set a path to follow in the future."

This was a good one: "Be bold, Mr. President. We may make mistakes,
but we are ready to experiment."

And this one from a labor leader got to the heart of it: "The real
issue is freedom. We must deal with the energy problem on a war
footing."

And the last that I'll read: "When we enter the moral equivalent of
war, Mr. President, don't issue us BB guns."

These ten days confirmed my belief in the decency and the strength and
the wisdom of the American people, but it also bore out some of my
long-standing concerns about our nation's underlying problems.

I know, of course, being president, that government actions and
legislation can be very important. That's why I've worked hard to put
my campaign promises into law -- and I have to admit, with just mixed
success. But after listening to the American people I have been
reminded again that all the legislation in the world can't fix what's
wrong with America. So, I want to speak to you first tonight about a
subject even more serious than energy or inflation. I want to talk to
you right now about a fundamental threat to American democracy.

I do not mean our political and civil liberties. They will endure. And
I do not refer to the outward strength of America, a nation that is at
peace tonight everywhere in the world, with unmatched economic power
and military might.

The threat is nearly invisible in ordinary ways. It is a crisis of
confidence. It is a crisis that strikes at the very heart and soul and
spirit of our national will. We can see this crisis in the growing
doubt about the meaning of our own lives and in the loss of a unity of
purpose for our nation.

The erosion of our confidence in the future is threatening to destroy
the social and the political fabric of America.

The confidence that we have always had as a people is not simply some
romantic dream or a proverb in a dusty book that we read just on the
Fourth of July.

It is the idea which founded our nation and has guided our development
as a people. Confidence in the future has supported everything else --
public institutions and private enterprise, our own families, and the
very Constitution of the United States. Confidence has defined our
course and has served as a link between generations. We've always
believed in something called progress. We've always had a faith that
the days of our children would be better than our own.

Our people are losing that faith, not only in government itself but in
the ability as citizens to serve as the ultimate rulers and shapers of
our democracy. As a people we know our past and we are proud of it.
Our progress has been part of the living history of America, even the
world. We always believed that we were part of a great movement of
humanity itself called democracy, involved in the search for freedom,
and that belief has always strengthened us in our purpose. But just as
we are losing our confidence in the future, we are also beginning to
close the door on our past.

In a nation that was proud of hard work, strong families, close-knit
communities, and our faith in God, too many of us now tend to worship
self-indulgence and consumption. Human identity is no longer defined
by what one does, but by what one owns. But we've discovered that
owning things and consuming things does not satisfy our longing for
meaning. We've learned that piling up material goods cannot fill the
emptiness of lives which have no confidence or purpose.

The symptoms of this crisis of the American spirit are all around us.
For the first time in the history of our country a majority of our
people believe that the next five years will be worse than the past
five years. Two-thirds of our people do not even vote. The
productivity of American workers is actually dropping, and the
willingness of Americans to save for the future has fallen below that
of all other people in the Western world.

As you know, there is a growing disrespect for government and for
churches and for schools, the news media, and other institutions. This
is not a message of happiness or reassurance, but it is the truth and
it is a warning.

These changes did not happen overnight. They've come upon us gradually
over the last generation, years that were filled with shocks and
tragedy.

We were sure that ours was a nation of the ballot, not the bullet,
until the murders of John Kennedy and Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther
King Jr. We were taught that our armies were always invincible and our
causes were always just, only to suffer the agony of Vietnam. We
respected the presidency as a place of honor until the shock of
Watergate.

We remember when the phrase "sound as a dollar" was an expression of
absolute dependability, until ten years of inflation began to shrink
our dollar and our savings. We believed that our nation's resources
were limitless until 1973, when we had to face a growing dependence on
foreign oil.

These wounds are still very deep. They have never been healed. Looking
for a way out of this crisis, our people have turned to the Federal
government and found it isolated from the mainstream of our nation's
life. Washington, D.C., has become an island. The gap between our
citizens and our government has never been so wide. The people are
looking for honest answers, not easy answers; clear leadership, not
false claims and evasiveness and politics as usual.

What you see too often in Washington and elsewhere around the country
is a system of government that seems incapable of action. You see a
Congress twisted and pulled in every direction by hundreds of
well-financed and powerful special interests. You see every extreme
position defended to the last vote, almost to the last breath by one
unyielding group or another. You often see a balanced and a fair
approach that demands sacrifice, a little sacrifice from everyone,
abandoned like an orphan without support and without friends.

Often you see paralysis and stagnation and drift. You don't like it,
and neither do I. What can we do?

First of all, we must face the truth, and then we can change our
course. We simply must have faith in each other, faith in our ability
to govern ourselves, and faith in the future of this nation. Restoring
that faith and that confidence to America is now the most important
task we face. It is a true challenge of this generation of Americans.

One of the visitors to Camp David last week put it this way: "We've
got to stop crying and start sweating, stop talking and start walking,
stop cursing and start praying. The strength we need will not come
from the White House, but from every house in America."

We know the strength of America. We are strong. We can regain our
unity. We can regain our confidence. We are the heirs of generations
who survived threats much more powerful and awesome than those that
challenge us now. Our fathers and mothers were strong men and women
who shaped a new society during the Great Depression, who fought world
wars, and who carved out a new charter of peace for the world.

We ourselves are the same Americans who just ten years ago put a man
on the Moon. We are the generation that dedicated our society to the
pursuit of human rights and equality. And we are the generation that
will win the war on the energy problem and in that process rebuild the
unity and confidence of America.

We are at a turning point in our history. There are two paths to
choose. One is a path I've warned about tonight, the path that leads
to fragmentation and self-interest. Down that road lies a mistaken
idea of freedom, the right to grasp for ourselves some advantage over
others. That path would be one of constant conflict between narrow
interests ending in chaos and immobility. It is a certain route to
failure.

All the traditions of our past, all the lessons of our heritage, all
the promises of our future point to another path, the path of common
purpose and the restoration of American values. That path leads to
true freedom for our nation and ourselves. We can take the first steps
down that path as we begin to solve our energy problem.

Energy will be the immediate test of our ability to unite this nation,
and it can also be the standard around which we rally. On the
battlefield of energy we can win for our nation a new confidence, and
we can seize control again of our common destiny.

In little more than two decades we've gone from a position of energy
independence to one in which almost half the oil we use comes from
foreign countries, at prices that are going through the roof. Our
excessive dependence on OPEC has already taken a tremendous toll on
our economy and our people. This is the direct cause of the long lines
which have made millions of you spend aggravating hours waiting for
gasoline. It's a cause of the increased inflation and unemployment
that we now face. This intolerable dependence on foreign oil threatens
our economic independence and the very security of our nation. The
energy crisis is real. It is worldwide. It is a clear and present
danger to our nation. These are facts and we simply must face them.

What I have to say to you now about energy is simple and vitally important.

Point one: I am tonight setting a clear goal for the energy policy of
the United States. Beginning this moment, this nation will never use
more foreign oil than we did in 1977 -- never. From now on, every new
addition to our demand for energy will be met from our own production
and our own conservation. The generation-long growth in our dependence
on foreign oil will be stopped dead in its tracks right now and then
reversed as we move through the 1980s, for I am tonight setting the
further goal of cutting our dependence on foreign oil by one-half by
the end of the next decade -- a saving of over 4-1/2 million barrels
of imported oil per day.

Point two: To ensure that we meet these targets, I will use my
presidential authority to set import quotas. I'm announcing tonight
that for 1979 and 1980, I will forbid the entry into this country of
one drop of foreign oil more than these goals allow. These quotas will
ensure a reduction in imports even below the ambitious levels we set
at the recent Tokyo summit.

Point three: To give us energy security, I am asking for the most
massive peacetime commitment of funds and resources in our nation's
history to develop America's own alternative sources of fuel -- from
coal, from oil shale, from plant products for gasohol, from
unconventional gas, from the sun.

I propose the creation of an energy security corporation to lead this
effort to replace 2-1/2 million barrels of imported oil per day by
1990. The corporation I will issue up to $5 billion in energy bonds,
and I especially want them to be in small denominations so that
average Americans can invest directly in America's energy security.

Just as a similar synthetic rubber corporation helped us win World War
II, so will we mobilize American determination and ability to win the
energy war. Moreover, I will soon submit legislation to Congress
calling for the creation of this nation's first solar bank, which will
help us achieve the crucial goal of 20 percent of our energy coming
from solar power by the year 2000.

These efforts will cost money, a lot of money, and that is why
Congress must enact the windfall profits tax without delay. It will be
money well spent. Unlike the billions of dollars that we ship to
foreign countries to pay for foreign oil, these funds will be paid by
Americans to Americans. These funds will go to fight, not to increase,
inflation and unemployment.

Point four: I'm asking Congress to mandate, to require as a matter of
law, that our nation's utility companies cut their massive use of oil
by 50 percent within the next decade and switch to other fuels,
especially coal, our most abundant energy source.

Point five: To make absolutely certain that nothing stands in the way
of achieving these goals, I will urge Congress to create an energy
mobilization board which, like the War Production Board in World War
II, will have the responsibility and authority to cut through the red
tape, the delays, and the endless roadblocks to completing key energy
projects.

We will protect our environment. But when this nation critically needs
a refinery or a pipeline, we will build it.

Point six: I'm proposing a bold conservation program to involve every
state, county, and city and every average American in our energy
battle. This effort will permit you to build conservation into your
homes and your lives at a cost you can afford.

I ask Congress to give me authority for mandatory conservation and for
standby gasoline rationing. To further conserve energy, I'm proposing
tonight an extra $10 billion over the next decade to strengthen our
public transportation systems. And I'm asking you for your good and
for your nation's security to take no unnecessary trips, to use
carpools or public transportation whenever you can, to park your car
one extra day per week, to obey the speed limit, and to set your
thermostats to save fuel. Every act of energy conservation like this
is more than just common sense -- I tell you it is an act of
patriotism.

Our nation must be fair to the poorest among us, so we will increase
aid to needy Americans to cope with rising energy prices. We often
think of conservation only in terms of sacrifice. In fact, it is the
most painless and immediate way of rebuilding our nation's strength.
Every gallon of oil each one of us saves is a new form of production.
It gives us more freedom, more confidence, that much more control over
our own lives.

So, the solution of our energy crisis can also help us to conquer the
crisis of the spirit in our country. It can rekindle our sense of
unity, our confidence in the future, and give our nation and all of us
individually a new sense of purpose.

You know we can do it. We have the natural resources. We have more oil
in our shale alone than several Saudi Arabias. We have more coal than
any nation on Earth. We have the world's highest level of technology.
We have the most skilled work force, with innovative genius, and I
firmly believe that we have the national will to win this war.

I do not promise you that this struggle for freedom will be easy. I do
not promise a quick way out of our nation's problems, when the truth
is that the only way out is an all-out effort. What I do promise you
is that I will lead our fight, and I will enforce fairness in our
struggle, and I will ensure honesty. And above all, I will act. We can
manage the short-term shortages more effectively and we will, but
there are no short-term solutions to our long-range problems. There is
simply no way to avoid sacrifice.

Twelve hours from now I will speak again in Kansas City, to expand and
to explain further our energy program. Just as the search for
solutions to our energy shortages has now led us to a new awareness of
our Nation's deeper problems, so our willingness to work for those
solutions in energy can strengthen us to attack those deeper problems.

I will continue to travel this country, to hear the people of America.
You can help me to develop a national agenda for the 1980s. I will
listen and I will act. We will act together. These were the promises I
made three years ago, and I intend to keep them.

Little by little we can and we must rebuild our confidence. We can
spend until we empty our treasuries, and we may summon all the wonders
of science. But we can succeed only if we tap our greatest resources
-- America's people, America's values, and America's confidence.

I have seen the strength of America in the inexhaustible resources of
our people. In the days to come, let us renew that strength in the
struggle for an energy secure nation.

In closing, let me say this: I will do my best, but I will not do it
alone. Let your voice be heard. Whenever you have a chance, say
something good about our country. With God's help and for the sake of
our nation, it is time for us to join hands in America. Let us commit
ourselves together to a rebirth of the American spirit. Working
together with our common faith we cannot fail.

Thank you and good night.