JFK Berlin Wall (1963)
I am proud to come to this city as the
guest of your distinguished Mayor, who has symbolized
throughout the world the fighting spirit of West Berlin.
And I am proud to visit the Federal Republic with
your distinguished Chancellor, who for so many years
has committed Germany to democracy and freedom and
progress, and to come here in the company of my fellow
American, General Clay, who has been in this city
during its great moments of crisis and will come again
if ever needed.
Two thousand years ago the proudest
boast was "civis Romanus sum." Today, in
the world of freedom, the proudest boast is "Ich
bin ein Berliner."
I appreciate my interpreter translating
my German!
There are many people in the world who
really don't understand, or say they don't, what is
the great issue between the Free World and the Communist
world. Let them come to Berlin. There are some who
say that communism is the wave of the future. Let
them come to Berlin. And there are some who say in
Europe and elsewhere we can work with the Communists.
Let them come to Berlin. And there are even a few
who say that it's true that communism is an evil system,
but it permits us to make economic progress. "Laßt
sie nach Berlin kommen." Let them come to Berlin!
Freedom has many difficulties and democracy is not
perfect, but we have never had to put a wall up to
keep our people in, to prevent them from leaving us.
I want to say, on behalf of my countrymen, who live
many miles away on the other side of the Atlantic,
who are far distant from you, that they take the greatest
pride that they have been able to share with you,
even from a distance, the story of the last eighteen
years. I know of no town, no city, that has been besieged
for eighteen years that still lives with the vitality
and the force and the hope and the determination of
the city of West Berlin.
While the wall is the most obvious and
vivid demonstration of the failures of the Communist
system, for all the world to see, we take no satisfaction
in it. For it is, as your Mayor has said, an offense
not only against history but an offense against humanity,
separating families, dividing husbands and wives and
brothers and sisters, and dividing a people who wish
to be joined together.
What is true of this city is true of
Germany--real, lasting peace in Europe can never be
assured as long as one German out of four is denied
the elementary right of free men, and that is to make
a free choice. In eighteen years of peace and good
faith, this generation of Germans has earned the right
to be free, including the right to unite their families
and their nation in lasting peace, with goodwill to
all people. You live in a defended island of freedom,
but your life is part of the main. So let me ask you,
as I close, to lift your eyes beyond the dangers of
today to the hopes of tomorrow, beyond the freedom
merely of this city of Berlin, or your country of
Germany, to the advance of freedom everywhere, beyond
the wall to the day of peace with justice, beyond
yourselves and ourselves to all mankind.
Freedom is indivisible, and when one
man is enslaved, all are not free. When all are free,
then we can look forward to that day when this city
will be joined as one, and this country, and this
great Continent of Europe, in a peaceful and hopeful
globe. When that day finally comes, as it will, the
people of West Berlin can take sober satisfaction
in the fact that they were in the front lines for
almost two decades.
All free men, wherever they may live,
are citizens of Berlin, and, therefore, as a free
man, I take pride in the words "Ich bin ein Berliner."
Original hand written excerpt: "Ich
bin ein Berliner." "Civis Romanus sum."
