Immigrant families have integrated themselves into our communities, establishing deep roots. Whenever they have settled, they have made lasting contributions to the economic vitality and diversity of our communities and our nation. Our economy depends on these hard-working, taxpaying workers. They have assisted America in its economic boom.
We know the future will outlast all of us, but I believe that all of us will live on in the future we made.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the notion that our actions and choices today will impact the future, allowing us to continue living through the legacies we leave behind.
Edward Kennedy's quote reflects a profound understanding of the relationship between the present and the future. It suggests that while individual lives are finite, the contributions we make and the world we shape will endure beyond our existence. The future serves as a canvas painted by our decisions, highlighting the importance of living with intention and purpose, as our collective efforts contribute to a legacy that outlives us.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a graduation speech to inspire students to make impactful choices.
More from Edward Kennedy
All quotes βWith Barack Obama, we will turn the page on the old politics of misrepresentation and distortion. With Barack Obama we will close the book on the old politics of race against race.
What we have in the United States is not so much a health-care system as a disease-care system.
Regulation has gone astray. . . . Either because they have become captives of regulated industries or captains of outmoded administrative agencies, regulators all too often encourage or approve unreasonably high prices, inadequate service, and anticompetitive behavior. The cost of this regulation is always passed on to the consumer. And that cost is astronomical.
We want to support our troops because they didn't make the decision to go there... but I don't think it should be open-ended. We ought to have a benchmark where the administration has to come back and give us a report.
Individual faults and frailties are no excuse to give in - and no exemption from the common obligation to give of ourselves.
Similar quotes
We can ignore even pleasure. But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world....No doubt pain as God's megaphone is a terrible instrument; it may lead to final and unrepented rebellion. But it gives the only opportunity the bad man can have for amendment. it removes the veil; it plants the flag of truth within the fortress of the rebel soul.
I love the old way best, the simple way of poison, where we too are strong as men.
Whatever is received is received according to the nature of the recipient.
The great and rare mystics of the past . . . were, in fact, ahead of their time, and are still ahead of ours. In other words, they most definitely are not figures of the past. They are figures of the future.
People shouldn't call for demons unless they really mean what they say.
If, in the name of combating terrorism, we so restrict our own freedom, have we not thereby lost part of the very battle we seek to win?