Alan Keyes
August 19, 2004
DuPage County, Illinois

People ask me sometimes how it is that after many years, and sometimes you're up and sometimes you're down, and many times it doesn't seem as if anybody is watching, and as if anything is going to be accomplished--they ask me, "How do you keep going?" And I'll tell you how I keep going. I remember the perseverance and the example and the inspiration of political leaders like Henry Hyde, and I hope someday I will be able to live up to them.

I guess God knows what He's doing, because there are many ways in which I have been with Henry on various platforms, but I do have to tell you, it hadn't occurred to me until about a week and half ago that one of them would be as the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in Illinois. But here we are!

It's only been now a bit over a week. It does seem like longer than that to me. But I think all of you have probably noticed what has been going on for the last weeks, and have realized, if it seems like more than a week to me, it seems like an awful lot more than a week to my opponent!

In fact, as far as I can tell--and I am enjoined by my faith to always show compassion, even for those who stand in opposition to me at any given moment. So I have spent a moment or two feeling some compassion for Barack Obama. The Lord will forgive me--it was only a moment or two. But I realized at some point that, given what I have learned a little bit about it, it's possible that I have done him a great disservice. This morning I was on a radio program, and the host ended our discussion by asking me to speak a word of praise for my opponent. He had asked Barack Obama to do the same thing when he came on the show, and so he was asking me, in a spirit of good American goodwill, that even though we are opponents, maybe we can say something nice about each other.

And I thought for a moment, and I told him that, from what I've learned about Barack Obama's book about his life, I would have to say that he was a master of fiction.

Now, later, at the State Fair, I visited the Democrat's tent that was there. It is my wont, I guess, when I'm involved in campaigns, to show up in the Democrat tent, just to say "hi," and see how people react.

And the lady there introduced herself as the secretary of the [Illinois Democratic] Party [inaudible]. She said, of course, she was supporting Barack Obama. But she had heard me in the morning, and she took me to task. She said that she didn't understand why I had been so rude, instead of complimenting him, and so forth. And I said, well, no, I wasn't rude at all. I was just speaking the truth.

You have heard about his book, after all. It's a book that has apparently three characters in it who are real, and the rest of them are kind of composites that he put together from various folks he met along the way. The dialogue in the book is apparently of the same kind; it's really what might have been said, or could have been said, or would have been said, or should have been said. But it's not as if it actually happened. So it's a strange mélange of fact and fantasy.

And I found that when I learned that this was the nature of the book, I understood something about Barack Obama's campaign for the United States Senate. Because if I look at the convention speech that he gave at the Democratic National Convention, and I compare it to his record, we are definitely looking at fact and fantasy.

And in the midst of all of this, there he was, in that place between sleep and waking, peacefully dreaming the dream of power. And who should show up on the state but Alan Keyes.

And I'm sure at some point in the midst of it all, he said, "Get out of here! I don't want you in my dream! You don't belong here." And he's been trying to get me out ever since.

And I noticed that the first reaction that he had, too, when I came into the state, was not only that he noted that I was from somewhere else, but he heartily wished that I was somewhere else, I think.

And that's why, less than 24 hours after I entered the race, he held a press conference. Now this is the fellow who had, when Jack Ryan was the candidate, he'd written up a letter--you've probably heard about it--in which he had said that he thought that the people of Illinois needed six statesmanlike, Lincoln-Douglas debates. And he took the number six, he said, because that's what it would take to make sure that all the people of the state got a firsthand look at the candidates, that they would see firsthand what their views were in comparison to one another. And in statesmanlike language, he allowed as how this was something that the candidates owed to the people, so that they could make an informed choice. And by means of this letter, I was introduced to him. And I thought to myself, when I first came in and my staff handed it to me, and I looked it over, and they said, "Well, what do you want to do?" And I said "Well, this is perfect! This sounds like my sentiments, exactly! I think that this would serve well. No negotiation, no problem, we'll just move forward."

Well, of course, it was less than 24 hours after I got into the race that this wonderful proposal was withdrawn, and he stood before the press to say he only wanted two debates. So he goes from six debates to two, immediately after I get into the race. So here we are: when Jack Ryan was in, he was Abraham Lincoln, he was Stephen Douglas. He was standing not only on the stage of Illinois politics, he was standing not only on the stage of national attention--he was standing on the stage of American history, shoulder to shoulder with the greatest statesmen that America has produced. When the chair was empty, and the Illinois Republican Party was trying to come to a decision in the best interests of the people of Illinois, he stood forward and he said, "I'll debate anybody the Republicans nominate." No talk then of changing this statesmanlike position.

But 24 hours, less than 24 hours after I entered the race, he goes from six to two. And I guess he can't believe that people in this state have the intelligence to figure out why.

It seems like ever since I entered the ring, he's been doing his level best to back out of it.

I would suggest that, all things considered, if he's that lacking in self-confidence, maybe he ought to just back out of it all the way, and give the Democrats a chance to choose somebody who has the confidence to face this test. But I don't know.

There is another question that occurs to me, of course. And that is the question of the standard that is involved. I mean, he set in that letter a standard. It was a high and correct standard of service to the people of this state. Since he has now backed away from that standard, I think questions are in order.

The first question would be, since he has gone from six to two, and six debates, he said, were needed in order to make sure that everyone in the state would get what they needed, the first question we need to ask is, who is he leaving out? I mean, obviously, according to his own standard, two debates won't accomplish the purpose. Now everybody in the state WON'T get a first-hand look. Who is he leaving out?

Since we look at the landscape of Illinois politics, and we see it dominated by a little clique of Democrat politicians from one small area of one place in the state, maybe we know who he intends to leave out! He intends to leave out the people they have always left out--all the other people of Illinois!

But there's more than that. Because elections are not only about issues. They are not only about the platforms of this party and that. They are about people, and the character and integrity that they bring to the people that they intend to serve.

And I know we've all gotten used to it--a certain degree of cynicism in American politics, a certain sense that, well, they all do it; they come up; they promise this; they promise that; they promise the other thing; and then when they get into office they just do what they please. I've heard it from many people.

But there is one salient difference between even that cynical image of the politician and Barack Obama. At least most politicians wait until AFTER they've been elected before they start BREAKING their PROMISES to the people of Illinois!

If he can't keep his word about debates before he gets into office, what makes you think he'll keep his word about anything else after he gets into office? This is a serious question.

And there's more. Because when all is said and done, that high standard of service to the people of Illinois WAS the right standard. It came from a viewpoint that purported to suggest that maybe politicians don't exist in order to grab for power at any cost. Maybe we're not here in order to serve our own selfish ambition. Maybe we're not here simply in order to make sure that we and our little cliques and cronies can get the power that we crave. Maybe we're here to try to understand and serve the best interests of our people. That was the standard he set.

But the other day a reporter said to me, "Well, maybe the reason he goes from six to two is that he's gotten all this hype and attention, and so forth and so on, and he doesn't want to risk it to the exposure of open debate." And he went through the whole cynical thing about how this would be what his campaign consultants would tell him. And, you know, I didn't disagree with him. He was a savvy guy, and I said "Yes, that's probably right. That's exactly the calculation he's making."

But tell me something, y'all. Do you really think it says something good about this whole situation when Barack Obama sets a standard of service to the people of Illinois, and then tosses it aside in order to serve his own ambition? It seems to me that somebody who wanted to present himself as apart from the usual pattern of that politics which has so characterized his party, somebody who claimed he had come forward in order to challenge the bossism that represented the subservience of the interests of the people to the interests of those who are supposed to serve them--maybe at the end of the day, he's just like the machine he comes out of. He puts the people below the interests of power that he serves. That's what it seems to me.

So right from the very beginning, I step into the ring and all of a sudden the masquerade is over. All of a sudden the true Barack Obama stands forward--not the Barack Obama of the scripted Democrat National Convention, but the Barack Obama of the State Senate, where he cast that vote that above all drew me into this race, that vote on a bill that would have ended the heinous practice of live birth abortion.

You know what that is, right? That's when a baby, in the course of an abortion, comes out of the womb, and somebody notices that that baby is alive. And then, you have a choice. You can work to respect the life of that child, or you can just set it aside to die.

Now in order to set a standard for ourselves, we should realize that a bill with respect to this procedure came up in the United States Senate. The vote against it was 98-0. It included even some of the more hard-core, pro-abortion, so-called liberal Senators, like Barbara Mikulski and Teddy Kennedy. Even they understood that once that human life has emerged into the world, even they could not dare to claim that it did not deserve our respect, even as we who stand in this world, each and every one of us, deserve respect for our right to life.

But though all his would-be colleagues in the United States Senate understand the true decency of conscience, Barack Obama does NOT, and he voted to allow that heinous procedure to continue.

You didn't get a hint of that in his speech at the Democrat National Convention.

No. The mask was on. But now it's off. And we can see that this strange mix of fact and fantasy has at its heart not a moderate servant of the people, but a self-serving extremist, an ideologue who believes, consistently, that it is not people we serve, not people who in the end are to govern themselves in America, but government power that is to be the instrument through which politicians achieve their ambitions.

I think that's the wrong understanding of our political life. And I will join with all of you to represent to the people of Illinois a different alternative. It will be the alternative that the Republican Party has, I believe, stood for since it was founded--founded, as you will recall, as a party not of politics and power, but of principle; a party that pushed aside those who were willing to be indifferent to the heinous evil of slavery; a party that pushed aside the indifference of someone like a Stephen Douglas, who said he didn't care whether slavery was voted up or voted down, so long as it was done by popular sovereignty; pushed aside that "pro-choice" position with respect to the great moral principles of our founding, that say that we are all created equal, and endowed--not by popular sovereignty, not by Constitutional provision, not by judges' decisions, not by legislative choice, and not by our mother's choice, but by the Creator God with our unalienable rights.

When I say this, there are people who try to act as if, "Well, Alan, that's your opinion." And I try to point out to them, "No, indeed." That is the great creed, that is the great ideal, that is the great expression of truth that lies at the very heart, that is the very foundation of all our liberty, of all our freedom, of all our dignity as a people. Surrender that, and we have surrendered all.

And that, you see, is what is at stake in this choice between Alan Keyes and Barack Obama. It is, of course, a choice between, as they say, a conservative and a radical socialist, a Democrat and a Republican. But it's also a choice between somebody who has studied and meditated upon, and embraced as best he could, the prudent wisdom and statesmanship of the greatest statesman to emerge in our country, who came from the heart of the people of Illinois, Abraham Lincoln--a statesman who understood the importance of those principles so much that he was even willing to accept the terrible crisis of the Civil War rather than to see our Union abandon them.

Barack Obama rejects his statesmanship, he rejects that principle which distinguishes this nation above all from all the nations that have existed in the history of the world. He pushes them aside, and embraces instead the view that, no, we are not all of us created equal; but some of us, having the power, the force, the intelligence, the strength, can trample out, can snuff out, can ignore the dignity and life of the most helpless, and voiceless, and dependent among us.

It is not the American way. It is not the American conscience. It is not the American heart. And from its founding, the Republican Party has stood for something better. And we shall preserve it now.

I don't think that, either, this election occurs at an accidental time. I apparently have won the attention of some of the folks in the media, because they've been going back over some of the speeches I've given in the course of years. For this I would have to say that I am grateful, already, to the people of Illinois, because you have to realize that for some of these people in the media, it's the first time since I've been alive that they've paid any attention to a single word I've said. So we've accomplished something already!

So they go back, and they discover that in some of my speeches I have actually had the audacity to mention God, and to think about good and evil. And in the course of it I have pointed out to my audience something that I believe is deeply true, and that in this time of our crisis we need to meditate upon.

As we have been reminded already from this stage, right now we are engaged in a great conflict, an insidious war against the evil of terrorism. It struck us on September the eleventh, 2001. It took the lives of thousands of our people. It left families broken and in grief. It left great symbols of our power and economic strength in a cloud of dark gloom, broken and destroyed. It was the beginning of what will prove to be, I fear, a long and righteous war against a great scourge of human conscience--that terrorism which uses force for political objective against the lives of innocent human beings.

Think about that. At the heart of terrorism is this evil: a willingness to use force against the lives of innocent human beings. And they take me to task now, because I dare to point out that at the heart of abortion lies this very same evil: a willingness--maybe in sterile abortuaries, maybe not on the battlefield, maybe not in the fall of great buildings, but in the silent fall of that infinite worth which is just one human life--a willingness to use force and violence against the life of the most helpless, innocent human beings imaginable.

I am glad to be taken to task for this, and I think we need to see it. In terrorism we see the truth that that evil principle overshadows not just our hopes, but the hopes of the world. And as we struggle with that principle in the world, so we must struggle against it in our hearts. And that struggle begins here. That line is drawn here. And it will be drawn with bright and clear clarity in this election--for Barack Obama rejects the principle that protects innocent life, and I shall stand forward with every breath that is in me, with every bit of my heart, with every hope of my conscience, I shall fight him on this for the sake of the truth, and the people of Illinois will decide.

And why is it important? It is important because our moral character is the foundation of our family strength; our moral character is the foundation of our economic strength; our moral character is the foundation of our capacity to sustain that self-government which is the hallmark of our liberty. Sacrifice the principles of our conscience, and we have sacrificed that which is the core of our entire way of life.

We should not let someone stand and take the seat that represents the land of Lincoln, while in his heart, and in his votes, and in his policy, he rejects the principle that Lincoln fought for, that thousands died for, and that has been the foundation of all our strength and all our triumphs as a free people. This is what this election represents.

And I know, sometimes, in the midst of the festivities and the hoopla, we can act as if our elections are some kind of game. But I think we ought to remember the men and women who stand now on the front lines of the battle against terrorism in Iraq. We ought to remember the victims of that terror on September eleventh. We ought to remember all of those innocent young lives that, by the millions, have been struck into oblivion by our forgetting of the principle that would respect their innocent lives, and remember--as we walk from door to door, as we pass out information, as we leaflet, as we talk to our friends and neighbors--we decide by words and ballots what has, in the course of human history, been decided by bullets and by blood. But at the heart of it, the issue is the same. It is life and death. It is right and wrong. It is dignity or degradation. It is greatness or decline.

And we stand, now, at the crossroads of our nation's life, of our civilization's life. And as we decide in this generation, so it shall be decided for all generations. The crisis is upon us.

And that is why I would say to you here: we have been through many elections, we have fought many battles, we have stood many times as a party of principle--calling our brethren in this state not just to a coalition of selfish interests, but to join once again in a great community of American principle.

We must rediscover our spirit. We must rediscover our energy. We must lift ourselves, once again, unto the wall--one last time. And this time, it counts for generations. For this is the crisis that will decide whether against terror we shall prevail in the world, and whether against the brutal slaughter of our innocents we shall prevail in the soul of America.

Right now, as if the soul of America depended on what you do, speak now and act now and give now and work now for all those candidates who stand with us on this common ground of Republican principle, as if the whole destiny of America's hopes for mankind was in your hand. For, my friends, it is in your hands. We are now that line of last defense that will determine, in this age of confusion and corruption, whether the bright ideals of American hope will still survive.

And I say to you that if we can act now with courage and determination, if we can put it all on the line, everything that we have held dear, let us put it forth now, we shall not just see a recovery of our strength as a party here in Illinois. But our spirit and our example, watched as it will be in this race by our nation as a whole, will ignite the heart of hope in Republicans and Americans of decent conscience everywhere along the line.

In every city, in every county, in every state of this land, they shall know what they have known before in history--that in this great heartland of America, there still beats true the heart of our conscience, the heart of our freedom, the heart of our leadership of hope for humankind. And that heart is still in the people, and in the great State of Illinois.

Let us move forward to prove it again, and in doing so bring our party to a new time of leadership, and bring our state to fulfill its heritage and its destiny of leadership for America.

God bless you.