Folsom: The media today
likes to focus on that which divides us as a nation,
especially on the issue of race.
Black and white, they say, have opposing interests.
The truth is that black and white
have always had common interests.
In fact, many of the greatest,
most spectacular achievements in the United States
have occurred when black and white got together
and worked together to achieve something
absolutely pathbreaking in this country's history.
It starts for example, with our nation's capital.
That surveying of the 10 square miles of Washington, D.C.
was accomplished by Andrew Ellicott, a white,
and Benjamin Banneker, a black.
Both were experts at surveying
and did work to try to set out what should be
the land that was our nation's capital.
But Benjamin Banneker was also an expert astronomer,
he was a master clockmaker,
and with his surveying skills,
he was backed by George Washington, Thomas Jefferson
and black and white worked together
to create the national capital.
A more modern example is that in the integration of sports.
Jackie Robinson, a black man, integrated baseball in 1947,
but he had the Brooklyn Dodgers' general manager,
a white man, Branch Rickey working with him.
The two men worked together,
and together they integrated American sports.
They were both Christians.
They worked well together.
Branch Rickey warned Jackie Robinson
all the things he might face, how to overcome them.
Because they were both Christians,
they could deal with each other in an area of trust,
and Branch Rickey said,
there are going to be times when
you're going to have to put up
with a lot of stuff you don't want to,
but you can do this and it will make a difference.
The nation will be better for it.
And the nation was better for it.
Jackie Robinson, further,
because he knew that not all blacks
can play professional sports,
but all blacks can have careers,
wanted to be an example for blacks with careers.
Jackie Robinson, after playing baseball,
went into the food industry,
he set up a bank to make loans for black businessmen.
He became a millionaire himself,
becoming a role model for other black businessmen,
and black career people to follow.
Today we have 1,500,000 black millionaires
in the United States,
about two-thirds of all the black millionaires
are in the United States.
So what we have is black and white working together
dramatically changing American history for the better.
Even slavery, a terrible institution,
the cure for slavery, which is freedom,
was accomplished in part
by black and white working together.
Harriet Tubman on the underground railroad,
the underground railroad was a way for blacks
to escape to freedom.
Whites would put them up in their houses
and help them get to the next spot,
moving them house by house northward
until they could get to freedom.
The black would be taking tremendous risks,
but so would the white because if he could be caught,
although you couldn't be killed like the black,
he could have his property taken from him.
So, we have black and white, Harriet Tubman
working with Thomas Garrett in Wilmington, Delaware,
the last stop on the underground railroad
in the Maryland, Delaware, Philadelphia area.
Those two worked together to help other slaves
achieve their freedom.
Harriet Tubman went back, brought in other slaves.
Thomas Garrett would hide them,
and help them get to freedom in the north into Philadelphia.
They even worked together somewhat after the Civil War
to establish the 14th and 15th Amendments,
which gave freedom and voting rights to black Americans.
So we can either focus on the few things
that divide us, black and white,
or we can focus on the many things that we have in common,
and the great history we have when black and white
work together to achieve something spectacular.