Words of Courage and Comfort

Commencement speakers assess a world of uncertainties

Addressing the 1,378,400 members of this year's college graduating class, the largest in U.S. history, speakers across the land have warned of the dangers of nuclear war, reaffirmed the need to maintain high standards in life and pondered the challenges of adjusting to a high-tech tomorrow. Bucknell University President Dennis O'Brien was among those who offered comforting words for young people entering a world of increasing complexity. He told the graduates at Wilkes College in Wilkes-Barre, Pa., "You go forth now into careers, into a world of performance, of doing tasks, of keeping up with computers, but don't worry that your humanity will ever be made obsolete. Humanity's value is that it not only performs, it enjoys knowledge of the world."

Excerpts from some other notable commencement speeches:

Chrysler Chairman Lee lacocca at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor: "Our free-enterprise economic system is still the best there is. America still has the people and the resources to be a worldbeater. The only thing we seem to be missing is the determination that once pushed America to great heights. That's where you folks come in. I want you to get mad about the current state of affairs. I want you to get so mad that you kick your elders in their figurative posteriors and move America off dead center. Our nation was born when 56 patriots got mad enough to sign the Declaration of Independence. We put a man on the moon because Sputnik made us mad at being No. 2 in space. Getting mad in a constructive way is good for the soul--and the country."

Former Ambassador Sol Linowitz at Haverford College in Haverford, Pa.: "There is no security for anyone in a world in which more than half the people live in want or in fear of want. The people of this earth know that there is more to living than disease, hunger, indignity and prejudice, and whether it be in our cities or in other countries, they mean to have their fair share of the earth's bounties. We must create conditions in which people can fulfill their destiny as human beings and can stand erect and with dignity as children of God--starting with our own fellow citizens here at home."

Duke University President Terry Sanford at Emory University in Atlanta: "Our President publicly proclaims that the Soviet Union is the 'evil empire,' and snarls at its leaders. The Soviet leaders respond in kind. That is why most of the people of the world see the United States and the Soviet Union as the two superpowers to be feared. The end mission of the people of the United States is not to build an armed camp to face the other armed camps of the world. And yet that is what we are doing. We can do better than that. We should not be slamming doors in the faces of the Soviet Union and China. We should be promoting massive programs of cultural, commercial and education exchange, as well as commerce and tourism."

New York Governor Mario Cuomo at Barnard College in New York City: "The liberation of women from the stereotypes and narrow possibilities that have bound their lives is one of the great movements of this century or of any other, an expansion of the concept of our human dignity and of our worth. One-half of the human race is waking to claim its birthright. The full participation of women in our national life--in our courts, capitols, boardrooms, precinct houses, theaters and universities--will flood this country with new energy and imagination and genius."

Author Ann Beattie at American University in Washington, D.C.: "I graduated from American University 14 years ago. We were all concerned about the atrocity of Viet Nam, and the men I went to college with had to face the fact that they would have to go and then possibly be blown away. The threat of a nuclear holocaust actually allows us only to be passive: there is no exact and sure terrain. That there is not even a way to estimate how much of the world might be scorched acts as a refrain to whatever we do. Viet Nam was 'over there.' This is 'everywhere.' My guess is that now the fear quotient is greater and that in response to a horror we can find no limits to, people appear passive, and that this passivity is mistaken for conservatism."

Secretary of the Navy John Lehman at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md.: "We have had a true sea change of historic proportions in our nation. In a few short years the self-doubt, the post-Viet Nam syndrome of negativism, of antimilitarism, of loss of faith, have been transformed. Traditional American values are no longer held up to ridicule. But more important, America has turned once again to its military to set standards of integrity and excellence and to restore American security and confidence in a very threatening world."

Historian David McCullough, author of The Great Bridge, at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, N.Y.: "If you could pick the Brooklyn Bridge up and turn it over, you'd see stamped there MADE IN THE U.S.A. It was built by people who had a profound self-regard, which they expressed through their work. Two great points were made by John A. Roebling, the designer of the bridge. The first was 'that this greatest of bridges will not only be the greatest engineering work of the continent and of the age, it will be a work of art.' And secondly, 'It will last forever, as a testament to the community which builds it.' It is an expression of ourselves, he is saying, and we mean it to last."

Secretary of Transportation Elizabeth Dole at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va.: "I could hardly leave today without issuing my own invitation to each of you to become involved in the joy of public service. The panoply of American democracy, contentious and colorful as it is, remains the best way to make life better and thus, to me, by far the best way to make a living. So I ask you to become partisans for democracy and to embrace change with all its uncertainty and all its potential for abuse. I ask you to manage it well and to make it fit within unchanging values and lasting truths."

TV Anchorwoman Jessica Savitch at Columbia College in Columbia, S.C.: "I very often receive letters from young women wanting a job in broadcasting. The job that they want is mine. Many of the young women who write want to make a million dollars. These women don't want to be broadcast journalists; these women want to be rich. As a reporter, I have had a chance to observe people at the top of just about every field. And it makes no difference if they are male or female, black or white, old or young, the people I observed succeeding are those who have been taught or who teach themselves to strive for excellence. The pleasure comes from knowing you have done a job the best way you know how. It seems to me, however, in our modern society that there is very little done these days in pursuit of excellence. But whatever there is, it stands out for its rarity."

Historian John Hope Franklin at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte: "I am certain that you have followed with interest the activities of our country in Poland and Central America, as it set out to protect the rights of the peoples of those countries. But I hope that you have also reserved some of your energies and resources to do something about the denials and violations of human rights in your own communities. One suspects that the most effective way to do battle for human rights in Poland, Central America or wherever, is to do battle for them here."

Joseph Cardinal Bernardin, Archbishop of Chicago, at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Ind.: "I urge Notre Dame to be in the forefront of peacemaking studies. What better way would there be to take seriously Jesus' mandate: Blessed are the peacemakers! Addressing the contemporary questions of peace and war in a scholarly fashion and in the context of our Christian teaching and tradition would be a great service both to the Catholic community and the wider society. Another important agent in this task of shaping a community of conscience is you. I urge you to lend your own voice to the discussion. You do this, of course, more by example than by word. The church's witness is really your witness because the church's witness is tied to the integrity and the quality of life of its members. So how you live your lives, the priority you give to the values of the Gospel, will speak loudly and make a tremendous difference in the future."

Historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. at San Diego State University: "We cannot acquiesce in the drift toward Armageddon. For the stake is supreme: it is the fate of humanity itself. Let me say at once that the answer to the arms race is not unilateral nuclear disarmament. The renunciation of nuclear weapons by the West would place the democratic world at the mercy of Soviet Communism. History has proven beyond all argument that mercy is not a salient characteristic of any Communist regime. Neither the arms race nor unilateral disarmament holds out hope. What we must do rather is to revive the art of diplomacy."

Gilbert Grosvenor, president, National Geographic Society, at George Washington University's Graduate School of Arts and Sciences: "I think of J.R.R. Tolkien. The year is 1926. He sits in his study at Oxford correcting a student's thesis. The student had, for some reason, left a page blank. When Tolkien came to it, he picked up his pen and wrote on the blank page: 'In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.' Thus launched one of the great literary careers of our century. He was asked why he had done that, and he replied: 'It popped into my head.' No machine, no electronic wizardry, can replace the single act of creation, the inspired moment that arrives in its own time, at its own speed, and from its own, unknown source. It is what drives all the rest. Regardless of how technology increases the speed, the volume and the nature of communication, the value of the content--the very essence--will begin and end with the creative personality."

Vice President George Bush at Furman University in Greenville, S.C.: "The guerrillas [in El Salvador] hope that if they can keep this horrible war going on long enough, well-meaning but misguided people will call for negotiations to bring out what is euphemistically known as power sharing. Well, we've tried that in the past. When the Sandinistas first came to power in Nicaragua, this country was extremely generous in its support. We hoped that the revolutionary government would live up to its promise to institute democracy and pluralism. But they failed to keep every promise they made. So we know what happens when you try to share power with Communists. How can we in good conscience force the same arrangement on the Salvadorans?"

Poet Maya Angelou at Spelman College in Atlanta: "Congratulations to you. You are phenomenal. The reason you are phenomenal is because you come from a phenomenal people. When you get into the marketplace, whether it is the academic world or the industrial, or business, corporate or the arts, it is wise to remember where you come from. And then you can use your past as the mirror so that you can see yourself. You have come well from a very healthy, a lusty people, a people loving life and loving love. When you need to see yourself, you must see who you bring onto the stage with you. Take everybody on the stage with you all the time. Everyone who has ever loved you, take them with you."

Lech Walesa, founder of Poland's Solidarity movement, turned down Harvard University's invitation to address its graduates out of fear that the Warsaw government would not allow him to return home. President Derek Bok read portions of Walesa's speech, which had been delivered to the U.S. embassy in Warsaw and sent on to Harvard. "Almost daily I receive letters from unknown friends in your country, cards with wishes and expressions of good cheer. I have pondered what could link people living in such different political and social systems and so far from each other. What could link workers of the Gdansk shipyard and the scholarly community of Harvard University? I believe that this emotional closeness is based on a system of shared fundamental values. Their source is not hard to find; it is contained in every copy of the Bible. The workers starting the strike and the process of transformation did not refer to the classics of Marxism-Leninism. They referred to the simplest natural rights due man upon his very birth. I believe that it is precisely such ideals which unite us, the people in America and Poland." This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.