Barack Obama 2008 presidential election victory speech

Following his victory in the 2008 United States presidential election, then-President-elect Barack Obama, who was 47 years old at the time, gave his victory speech at Grant Park in his home city of Chicago, on November 4, 2008, before an estimated crowd of 240,000. Viewed on television and the Internet by millions of people around the globe, Obama's speech focused on the major issues facing the United States and the world, all echoed through his campaign slogan of change. He also mentioned his maternal grandmother Madelyn Dunham, who had died just two nights earlier.

References in the speech

The speech heavily referenced the inaugural addresses of former presidents John F. Kennedy and Abraham Lincoln, and also referred to speeches of Martin Luther King Jr.

Echoing Martin Luther King's "I've Been to the Mountaintop" address, he declared, "But tonight, because of what we did on this day, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to America" and "The road ahead will be long, our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year, or even in one term—but America, I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there." At another point in the speech he again referenced King when referring to the "arc of history", a phrase King used regularly, most notably after the Selma to Montgomery marches, saying "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice".

Obama directly quoted Abraham Lincoln's first inaugural address, by saying "As Lincoln said to a nation far more divided than ours, we are not enemies but friends. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection."

Obama also referred to Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address by saying "... that more than two centuries later a government of the people, by the people, and for the people has not perished from the Earth".

Obama proclaimed, "It's been a long time coming, but ...