Ann Richards’ Solution for Forgotten American Families
Since the first Democratic National Convention in 1832, three women have taken the stage as keynote speakers.
Representative Barbara Jordan of Texas spoke first in 1976 and again in 1992 — but both times, she had to share the billing of “keynote speaker” with men. Decades later, Senator Elizabeth Warren took the stage solo, a fitting opening act for Democrats’ celebration of the Party’s first female presidential nominee.
The third woman held a rather unusual title for a DNC keynoter: State Treasurer. She had an accent as big as the Atlanta convention hall and what columnist Molly Ivins once called “Republican hair.”
Ann Richards of Texas took the stage in 1988 with that perfectly coiffed ’do, a dress as deep-blue as her politics, and the remarkable ability to land a line. It was so remarkable, in fact, that her speech is often remembered for its quick-witted quips.
On the legacy of female speakers at the DNC:
Twelve years ago, Barbara Jordan, another Texas woman… made the keynote address to this convention. And two women in 160 years is about par for the course.
On the capabilities of women:
If you give us a chance, we can perform. After all, Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred Astaire did. She just did it backwards and in high heels.
On the Republican nominee, outgoing Vice President George H.W. Bush:
Poor George, he can’t help it — he was born with a silver foot in his mouth.
They are iconic lines in an iconic address. And as the video of her remarks proves, they helped her win over the audience.
But Richards’ keynote offered more than soundbites. It offered solutions. The soon-to-be Governor of Texas promised that the Democratic Party was the solution for forgotten American families — and it’s a promise Democrats are still trying to fulfill.
Richards introduced herself by telling her audience what it was like to grow up just outside Waco, Texas during the Great Depression:
It was back then that I came to understand the small truths and the hardships that bind neighbors together. Those were real people with real problems. And they had real dreams about getting out of the Depression.
Then, she read a letter from another real person with real problems, who dreamed of making life better for her children. The letter was from a young mother in Lorena, Texas living paycheck to paycheck, worrying whether she could afford both her grocery bill and her car insurance payment in the same month. The woman described what she and her family did have, and made a point to say how grateful they were for it. And yet, in the final line that Richards read, the young mother said, “I believe that people like us are forgotten in America.”
Richards’ response was simple. “Well,” she said, looking up from the letter, “of course you believe you’re forgotten, because you have been.”
That was the crux of her message: Republicans had forgotten American families. But Democrats hadn’t — and they wouldn’t. Richards laid out the values Democrats held dear, recounted how the Party had already made life better for American families, and identified the ways in which they would continue to do so if they were elected in November.
Toward the end of her address, she reminded the audience of families like hers and like “the one in Lorena, Texas,” saying, “Our strength lies in the men and women who go to work every day, who struggle to balance their family and their jobs, and who should never, ever be forgotten.”
The beauty — and, frankly, the tragedy — of Richards’ 1988 keynote address is not just that her jokes can still make you laugh in 2020. It’s that her message still resonates. (And not only because three women in 188 years is still par for the course.)
Far too many Americans are still being forgotten: the 135,991 people — the majority of them Latino, Black, and Native — who, at the time of this writing, have lost their lives to a virus that has been managed far better by nearly every other national government on the planet. The millions of Americans who have filed for unemployment during the subsequent economic crisis. The 598 Americans — the majority of them Black — who have been killed by police violence thus far in 2020.
It would be easy to blame it all on the particular set of challenges we currently face — and even easier to blame this particular Administration. But these failures are not just failures of this moment, or this government. They are failures of systems and of policies — from healthcare to housing, from education to pay inequities, from Republican leaders and Democratic ones — that leave far too many real people behind, especially if those people are Black, or transgender, or marginalized in any way.
Thirty-two years ago, Richards told us not to forget American families. She called on us to make life easier for them. We have yet to live up to her call.
If Democrats want to try, they have to acknowledge and atone for their mistakes. They have to lay out specific plans to correct them and chart a clear path toward a more equitable, more just future. They have to deliver on “the promise that echoes in homes all across America” — that, according to Richards, “we can do better.”
In “Orations Worth Ovations,” professional speechwriters analyze great speeches (real or fictional, historic or personal) and explain what makes them so good.
Read then-Treasurer Ann Richards’ 1988 Democratic National Convention address here.
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