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Yes, America must do the right thing, but to provide moral leadership, America must do it in the right way, too.
Half a century ago, the amazing courage of Rosa Parks, the visionary leadership of Martin Luther King, and the inspirational actions of the civil rights movement led politicians to write equality into the law and make real the promise of America for all her citizens.
After the Berlin Wall came down I visited that city and I will never forget it. The abandoned checkpoints. The sense of excitement about the future. The knowledge that a great continent was coming together. Healing those wounds of our history is the central story of the European Union.
The biggest danger to the European Union comes not from those who advocate change, but from those who denounce new thinking as heresy. In its long history Europe has experience of heretics who turned out to have a point.
From Caesar’s legions to the Napoleonic wars. From the Reformation, the Enlightenment and the industrial revolution to the defeat of nazism. We have helped to write European history, and Europe has helped write ours.
I think it true that, you know, sometimes things start to change even before a government changes and, actually, I think you can begin to see even the Labour machine beginning to understand that it has become over-reliant on targets and processes, that local governments have been over-bossed and bullied.
For me, and I suspect for lots of other people too, bad things actually sometimes make you think more about faith and the fact that you’re not facing these things on your own.
Because with courage and conviction I believe we can deliver a more flexible, adaptable and open European Union in which the interests and ambitions of all its members can be met.
We have the character of an island nation: independent, forthright, passionate in defence of our sovereignty. We can no more change this British sensibility than we can drain the English Channel. And because of this sensibility, we come to the European Union with a frame of mind that is more practical than emotional.
There’s another way we are getting behind business – by sorting out the banks. Taxpayers bailed you out. Now it’s time for you to repay the favour and start lending to Britain’s small businesses.