LOS ANGELES - Following are excerpts of remarks by Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, the Democratic vice presidential candidate, at the Democratic National Convention.
My dad lived in an orphanage when he was a child. He went on to work on a bakery truck and then owned a package store in Stamford, Connecticut. He taught my sisters and me the importance of work and responsibility. With my mother by his side, he saw me become the first person in my family to graduate from college.''
I've also tried to see America through the eyes of people I've been privileged to know. In the early 1960s, when I was a college student, I walked with Martin Luther King in the march on Washington for jobs and freedom.
That was my honor. That was my opportunity.
And later that fall, I went to Mississippi where we worked to register African-Americans to vote.
The people I met never forgot that in America every time a barrier is broken, the doors of ... opportunity go wider for every single one of us. And I know that in a very personal way tonight.''
You know when we see the world through the other - through the eyes of other people, you understand that the smallest changes can make the biggest differences in all of our lives. That's something I'm really sorry to say I don't think our Republican friends really understand.''
We may be near Hollywood tonight, but not since Tom Hanks won an Oscar has there been that much acting in Philadelphia.''
And I think it's a good thing that our opponent talks about education. Schools need to be held to the highest standards of performance and accountability. But I'm sad to say their plan does not provide the resources our schools need to meet those high standards. You know, sometimes it seems to me like their idea of school modernization means buying a new calendar for every school building.''
My friends, it is this simple. We Democrats will expand the prosperity. They will squander it.''
My friends, I have known Al - I've known Al for 15 years now. I know his record and I know his heart.
I know him as a public servant, and I know what it's like to sit with him around the dining room table. We have discussed - often debated policy issues. And we've also shared private moments of prayer.''
It was 40 years ago, when we came to this city, and together crossed a New Frontier, with a leader who inspired me and so many others in my generation into public service.
Today we return to this same great city, with prosperity at home and freedom throughout the world that John F. Kennedy could only have dreamed about.
We may wonder tonight where the next frontier really is. Tonight, I believe the next frontier isn't just in front of us, but inside of us: to overcome the differences that are still between us, to break down the barriers that remain and to help every American claim the possibilities of their own God-given lives.''
