Well, on behalf of Michelle and myself, welcome to the White House. This is one of my favorite

events every year, especially special this year, as I look at this extraordinary group

of individuals and our opportunity to honor them with our nation's highest civilian honor

-- the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

And this year, it's just a little more special because this marks the 50th anniversary of

President Kennedy establishing this award. We're honored, by the way, today to have with

us one of my favorite people -- Ethel Kennedy -- and a pretty good basketball player, President

Kennedy's grandson, Jack. (Applause.)

This medal has been bestowed on more than 500 deserving people. Tonight, I'm looking

forward to joining some of these honorees, as well as members of the Kennedy family,

as we pay tribute to these 50 years of excellence. And this morning, we're honored to add 16

new names to this distinguished list.

Today, we salute fierce competitors who became true champions. In the sweltering heat of

a Chicago summer, Ernie Banks walked into the Cubs locker room and didn't like what

he saw. "Everybody was sitting around, heads down, depressed," he recalled. So Ernie piped

up and said, "Boy, what a great day! Let's play two!" (Laughter.) That's "Mr. Cub" -- a

man who came up through the Negro Leagues, making $7 a day, and became the first black

player to suit up for the Cubs and one of the greatest hitters of all time. And in the

process, Ernie became known as much for his 512 home runs as for his cheer and his optimism

and his eternal faith that someday the Cubs would go all the way. (Laughter.)

And that's serious belief. (Laughter.) That is something that even a White Sox fan like

me can respect. (Laughter.) But he is just a wonderful man and a great icon of my hometown.

Speaking of sports, Dean Smith is one of the winningest coaches in college basketball history,

but his successes go far beyond Xs and Os. Even as he won 78 percent of his games, he

graduated 96 percent of his players. The first coach to use multiple defenses in a game,

he was the pioneer who popularized the idea of "pointing to the passer" -- after a basket,

players should point to the teammate who passed them the ball. And with his first national

title on the line, he did have the good sense to give the ball to a 19-year-old kid named

Michael Jordan. (Laughter.) Although they used to joke that the only person who ever

held Michael under 20 was Dean Smith. (Laughter.)

While Coach Smith couldn't join us today due to an illness that he's facing with extraordinary

courage, we also honor his courage in helping to change our country -- he recruited the

first black scholarship athlete to North Carolina and helped to integrate a restaurant and a

neighborhood in Chapel Hill. That's the kind of character that he represented on and off

the court.

We salute innovators who pushed the limits of science, changing how we see the world

-- and ourselves. And growing up, Sally Ride read about the space program in the newspaper

almost every day, and she thought this was "the coolest thing around." When she was a

PhD candidate at Stanford she saw an ad for astronauts in the student newspaper and she

seized the opportunity. As the first American woman in space, Sally didn't just break the

stratospheric glass ceiling, she blasted through it. And when she came back to Earth, she devoted

her life to helping girls excel in fields like math, science and engineering. "Young

girls need to see role models," she said, "you can't be what you can't see." Today,

our daughters -- including Malia and Sasha -- can set their sights a little bit higher

because Sally Ride showed them the way.

Now, all of us have moments when we look back and wonder, "What the heck was I thinking?"

I have that -- (laughter) -- quite a bit. Psychologist Daniel Kahneman has made that

simple question his life's work. In a storied career in Israel and America, he basically

invented the study of human decision-making. He's helped us to understand everything from

behavioral economics to "Does living in California make people happy?" It's an interesting question.

He's also been called an expert on irrational behavior -- so I'm sure that he could shed

some light on Washington. (Laughter.)

But what truly sets Daniel apart is his curiosity. Guided by his belief that people are "endlessly

complicated and interesting," at 79 he's still discovering new insights into how we think

and learn, not just so we understand each other, but so we can work and live together

more effectively.

Dr. Mario Molina's love of science started as a young boy in Mexico City, in a homemade

laboratory in a bathroom at home. And that passion for discovery led Mario to become

one of the most respected chemists of his era. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize

-- or the Nobel Prize, rather, not only for his path-breaking research, but also for his

insistence that when we ignore dangerous carbon emissions we risk destroying the ozone layer

and endangering our planet. And thanks to Mario's work, the world came together to address

a common threat, and today, inspired by his example, we're working to leave our planet

safer and cleaner for future generations.

We also have to salute musicians, who bring such joy to our lives. Loretta Lynn was 19

the first time she won the big -- she won big at the local fair. Her canned vegetables

brought home 17 blue ribbons -- (laughter) -- and made her "Canner of the Year." (Laughter.)

Now, that's impressive. (Laughter.)

For a girl from Butcher Hollow, Kentucky, that was fame. Fortunately for all of us,

she decided to try her hand at things other than canning. Her first guitar cost $17, and

with it this coal miner's daughter gave voice to a generation, singing what no one wanted

to talk about and saying what no one wanted to think about. And now, over 50 years after

she cut her first record -- and canned her first vegetables -- (laughter) -- Loretta

Lynn still reigns as the rule-breaking, record-setting queen of country music.

As a young man in Cuba, Arturo Sandoval loved jazz so much it landed him in jail. It was

the Cold War, and the only radio station where he could hear jazz was the Voice of America,

which was dangerous to listen to. But Arturo listened anyway. Later, he defected to the

United States knowing he might never see his parents or beloved homeland again. "Without

freedom," he said, "there is no life." And today, Arturo is an American citizen and one

of the most celebrated trumpet players in the world. "There isn't any place on Earth

where the people don't know about jazz," he says, and that's true in part because musicians

like him have sacrificed so much to play it.

We salute pioneers who pushed our nation towards greater justice and equality. A Baptist minister,

C.T. Vivian was one of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s closest advisors. "Martin taught us,"

he says, "that it's in the action that we find out who we really are." And time and

again, Reverend Vivian was among the first to be in the action: In 1947, joining a sit-in

to integrate an Illinois restaurant; one of the first Freedom Riders; in Selma, on the

courthouse steps to register blacks to vote, for which he was beaten, bloodied and jailed.

Rosa Parks said of him, "Even after things had supposedly been taken care of and we had

our rights, he was still out there, inspiring the next generation, including me," helping

kids go to college with a program that would become Upward Bound. And at 89 years old,

Reverend Vivian is still out there, still in the action, pushing us closer to our founding

ideals.

Now, early in the morning the day of the March on Washington, the National Mall was far from

full and some in the press were beginning to wonder if the event would be a failure.

But the march's chief organizer, Bayard Rustin, didn't panic. As the story goes, he looked

down at a piece of paper, looked back up, and reassured reporters that everything was

right on schedule. The only thing those reporters didn't know was that the paper he was holding

was blank. (Laughter.) He didn't know how it was going to work out, but Bayard had an

unshakable optimism, nerves of steel, and, most importantly, a faith that if the cause

is just and people are organized, nothing can stand in our way.

So, for decades, this great leader, often at Dr. King's side, was denied his rightful

place in history because he was openly gay. No medal can change that, but today, we honor

Bayard Rustin's memory by taking our place in his march towards true equality, no matter

who we are or who we love. (Applause.)

Speaking of game-changers, disrupters, there was a young girl names Gloria Steinem who

arrived in New York to make her mark as a journalist, and magazines only wanted to write

articles like "How to Cook without Really Cooking for Men." (Laughter.) Gloria noticed

things like that. (Laughter.) She's been called a "champion noticer." She's alert to all the

ways, large and small, that women had been and, in some cases, continue to be treated

unfairly just because they're women.

As a writer, a speaker, an activist, she awakened a vast and often skeptical public to problems

like domestic violence, the lack of affordable child care, unfair hiring practices. And because

of her work, across America and around the world, more women are afforded the respect

and opportunities that they deserve. But she also changed how women thought about themselves.

And Gloria continues to pour her heart into teaching and mentoring. Her one piece of advice

to young girls is -- I love this -- "Do not listen to my advice. Listen to the voice inside

you and follow that."

When Patricia Wald's law firm asked if she'd come back after having her first child, she

said she'd like some time off to focus on her family -- devoted almost 10 years to raising

five children. But Patricia never lost the itch to practice law. So while her husband

watched the kids at home, she'd hit the library on weekends. At the age 40, she went back

to the courtroom to show the "young kids" a thing or two. As the first female judge

on the D.C. Circuit, Patricia was a top candidate for Attorney General. After leaving the bench,

her idea of retirement was to go to The Hague to preside over the trials of war criminals.

Patricia says she hopes enough women will become judges that "it's not worth celebrating"

anymore. But today, we celebrate her. And along with Gloria, she shows there are all

kinds of paths listening to your own voice. We salute communicators who shined a light

on stories no one else was telling. A veteran of World War II and more than a dozen Pacific

battles, Ben Bradlee brought the same intensity and dedication to journalism. Since joining

The Washington Post 65 years ago, he transformed that newspaper into one of the finest in the

world. With Ben in charge, the Post published the Pentagon Papers, revealing the true history

of America's involvement in Vietnam; exposed Watergate; unleashed a new era of investigative

journalism, holding America's leaders accountable and reminding us that our freedom as a nation

rests on our freedom of the press. When Ben retired, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan put

the admiration of many into a poem: "O rare Ben Bradlee/His reign has ceased/But his nation

stands/Its strength increased."

And I also indicated to Ben he can pull off those shirts and I can't. (Laughter.) He always

looks so cool in them. (Laughter.) Early in Oprah Winfrey's career, her bosses

told her she should change her name to Susie. (Laughter.) I have to pause here to say I

got the same advice. (Laughter and applause.) They didn't say I should be named "Susie,"

but they suggested I should change my name. (Laughter.) People can relate to Susie, that's

what they said. It turned out, surprisingly, that people could relate to Oprah just fine.

In more than 4,500 episodes of her show, her message was always, "You can." "You can do

and you can be and you can grow and it can be better." And she was living proof, rising

from a childhood of poverty and abuse to the pinnacle of the entertainment universe. But

even with 40 Emmys, the distinction of being the first black female billionaire, Oprah's

greatest strength has always been her ability to help us discover the best in ourselves.

Michelle and I count ourselves among her many devoted fans and friends. As one of those

fans wrote, "I didn't know I had a light in me until Oprah told me it was there." What

a great gift. And, finally, we salute public servants who've

strengthened our nation. Daniel Inouye was a humble man and didn't wear his Medal of

Honor very often. Instead, he liked to wear a pin representing the Good Conduct Medal

he earned as a teenage private. "To behave yourself takes special effort," he said, "and

I did not want to dishonor my family." Danny always honored his family and his country,

even when his country didn't always honor him.