This article is from the source 'nytimes' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.

You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/14/us/politics/hillary-clinton-race-speech.html

The article has changed 6 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.

Version 2 Version 3
Hillary Clinton Speaks on Unity at Site of Lincoln’s ‘House Divided’ Speech Hillary Clinton, at Site of Lincoln Speech, Laments G.O.P.’s Turn to Donald Trump
(35 minutes later)
In the chamber where Abraham Lincoln denounced slavery and declared “a house divided against itself cannot stand,” Hillary Clinton called on Wednesday for racial tolerance after a series of shootings of black men by white police officers and the killing of five officers in Dallas last week. SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — On the grounds of the Old State Capitol where, nearly 160 years ago, Abraham Lincoln held forth on “a house divided,” Hillary Clinton on Wednesday lamented the Party of Lincoln’s transition to the Party of Trump, casting the present moment as an indelible stain on Republican history.
In a chamber of the Old State Capitol in Springfield, Ill., where Lincoln gave his June 16, 1858, address, Mrs. Clinton expanded on her remarks calling on white people to express more empathy with blacks who fear for their lives in encounters with the police. Yet even as she savaged Donald J. Trump as an existential threat to American democracy, a week before Republicans plan to nominate him for president in Cleveland, Mrs. Clinton sought a delicate balancing act of her own.
And she reiterated her call for understanding about the difficult job police officers do, “kissing their kids and spouses goodbye every day and heading off to a dangerous job,” as she said in a speech at an African Methodist Episcopal Church convention in Philadelphia last week. She waded with care into the thickets of national reckonings over both police violence and violence against the police, hoping to position herself as an unlikely agent of national harmony.
In that address, the basis of which she expanded on in her speech on Wednesday, Mrs. Clinton called for “ending the systemic racism that plagues our country — and rebuilding our communities where the police and citizens all see themselves as being on the same side.” And in an uncommon admission from a candidate who has long inspired intense partisan passions, Mrs. Clinton assumed responsibility for at least a small measure of the fractiousness.
“White Americans,” she added to a crowd of black clergy members, “need to do a better job of listening when African-Americans talk — talk about the seen and unseen barriers you face every day.” “I cannot stand here and claim that my words and actions haven’t sometimes fueled the partisanship that often stands in the way of our progress,” she told a small audience that crowded beneath a grand ceiling here. “So I recognize I have to do better, too.”
The message of unity came a day after Mrs. Clinton sought to achieve unity in the Democratic Party, appearing on stage in Portsmouth, N.H., with Senator Bernie Sanders, where both candidates called for an overhaul of the criminal justice system. The Old State Capitol is also where Barack Obama declared his candidacy for president in 2007. (Mrs. Clinton attracted criticism last year for saying during a Democratic debate that Republicans were perhaps the “enemy” she was most proud to have made.)
Mrs. Clinton’s event on Wednesday also served as an indirect rebuttal of Donald J. Trump’s response to the shooting in Dallas and the deaths of the two black men, Alton B. Sterling in Baton Rouge, La., and Philando Castile in Falcon Heights, Minn. Though Mrs. Clinton has for weeks stressed unity as the binding theme of her campaign — making speeches in front of “Stronger Together” signs — the staging on Wednesday was particularly unsubtle.
Mr. Trump said the Dallas shootings were “an attack on our country.” She immediately invoked President Lincoln, quoting from his speech on June 16, 1858.
But Mrs. Clinton tried to use the imagery of a president from Mr. Trump’s party. Lincoln delivered his “House Divided” speech upon accepting the Republican Party’s nomination for president. She spoke slowly and sternly, as if narrating a documentary, railing against a litany of national hardships: gun violence, economic inequality, an overreliance on the police to remedy societal ills.
She suggested reassuringly that America had overcome much more than its recent pain and political fury.
“The challenges we face today do not approach those of Lincoln’s time. Not even close,” she said. “But recent events have left people across America asking hard questions about whether we are still a house divided.”
For a candidate not known for soaring oratory, and often not especially comfortable pursuing it, the venue was something of a risky choice, inviting comparisons to some of the most stirring speakers in American history. Nearly 150 years after Lincoln condemned slavery here, Senator Barack Obama stood before the capitol in February 2007 to announce his bid for president.
Mrs. Clinton’s aides had billed this speech as a major address, hoping to build on remarks last week before black clergy members in Philadelphia, when she urged white Americans to “do a better job of listening when African-Americans talk.”
She did touch on the deaths of black men in Louisiana and Minnesota, and the deaths of five police officers in Dallas, reciting all of their names. She also cited the deaths of five Latinos in lesser-known police-involved incidents last week.
But in the back end of her half-hour remarks, Mrs. Clinton trained her attention largely on Mr. Trump, whose campaign she called “as divisive as any we’ve seen in our lifetimes.”
In perhaps her most zealous flourish, she noted that Mr. Trump had suggested Tuesday night that he could relate to systemic bias against black Americans because “even against me, the system is rigged.”
“Even this, the killing of black people by police, is somehow about him,” Mrs. Clinton said.
Indeed, as the Republican Party prepares to nominate Mr. Trump next week, Mrs. Clinton seemed inclined to highlight the consequences of that choice at every opportunity.
She mocked Mr. Trump’s reference last week to “Article 12” of the Constitution, which does not exist, and wondered aloud about giving him access to the levers of power.
“Imagine if he had not just Twitter and cable news to go after his critics and opponents, but also the I.R.S. – or for that matter, our entire military,” she said.
As she moves to portray Mr. Trump as an avatar of national chaos, Mrs. Clinton is also seeking to bridge a divide within her own party. Her campaign is hopeful that the long-sought endorsement from Senator Bernie Sanders on Tuesday will help bring Democrats together in earnest before the party’s convention in Philadelphia in two weeks.
Concluding her remarks, Mrs. Clinton strayed from her prepared text to describe a song from the musical “Hamilton,” which she saw for the third time on Tuesday, telling the crowd that history had its eyes on how Americans respond to this moment.
Then she quoted President Lincoln once more.
“If we do the work, we will ‘cease to be divided,’ ” she said. “We, in fact, will be indivisible – with liberty and justice for all. And we will remain – in President Lincoln’s words – the last, best hope of earth.”