Sen. Joseph Lieberman's Speech Text

Aug. 16 -- Sen. Joseph Lieberman accepted his party’s nomination for vice president at the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles. Read a full transcript of his prepared remarks here.

Sen. Joseph Lieberman:

Is America a great country, or what?

Ten days ago, with courage and friendship, Al Gore asked me to be his running mate.

This has been an extraordinary week for my family and me.

There’s an old saying that behind every successful man … there is a surprised mother-in-law.

I am here tonight to tell you: … it’s true.

I want to thank the daughter of my mother-in-law, the woman who just introduced me.

Hadassah — even before Al Gore made me his running mate, you made me the luckiest guy in the world.

I am fortunate to have you by my side on this journey and I thank you sweetheart.

That miraculous journey begins here and now. Tonight, I am so proud to stand as your candidate for Vice President of the United States. Only in America.

I am humbled by this nomination and so grateful to Al Gore for choosing me.

And I want you to know … I will work my heart out to make sure Al Gore is the next President of the United States.

We have become the America that so many of our parents dreamed for us.

But the great question this year, is what will we dream for our country … and how will we make it come true?

We who gather here tonight believe, as Al Gore has said, that it’s not just the size of our national feast that is important … but the number of people we can fit around the table. There must be room for everybody.

As every faith teaches us — and as Presidents from Lincoln to Roosevelt to Reagan to Clinton have reminded us — we must as Americans, try to see our nation not just through our own eyes … but through the eyes of others.

In my life, I have seen the goodness of this country through many sets of eyes.

I have seen it through the eyes of my grandmother.

She was raised in Central Europe, in a village where she was often harassed because of the way she worshiped God.

Then, she immigrated to America.

On Saturdays, she used to walk to synagogue, and often, her Christian neighbors would pass her and say, “Good Sabbath, Mrs. Manger.”

It was a source of endless delight and gratitude for her that here in this country, she was accepted for who she was. I have seen America through the eyes of my parents, Henry and Marcia Lieberman.

My father lived in an orphanage when he was a child.

He went on to drive a bakery truck and own 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.

My mom is here tonight.

She’s 85 years old, and never felt younger than she does today.

Mom — thank you, I love you — and you and I know how proud dad would be tonight.

And I have tried to see America through the eyes of people I have 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.

Later that fall, I went to Mississippi, where we worked to register African-Americans to vote.