John Edwards Addresses DNC Meeting

It doesn't have to be that way.

We are here today because somewhere in America a housekeeper who works in a hotel is a walking the picket line in front of that hotel with her union brothers and sisters...

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EDWARDS: ... to try to get decent health care, decent benefits, to try to have a better life, to be able to send her child to college so that her child can have a better life than she's been able to have.

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And somewhere today, somewhere in America, a young man will have an envelope in his hand, a college acceptance letter. And he'll fold the letter. He'll put it back in the envelope and he'll put that envelope back in the desk drawer because he knows that even with his part-time job and even with his mom working three jobs he still can't afford to go to college.

It doesn't have to be that way.

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Today somewhere in America -- somewhere in America a mother will be working in the kitchen. She'll be folding her dish towel, putting it on the cabinet and she'll hear a knock at the door. And she'll go and she'll open the door and at the door will be a chaplain and an officer with the name of her precious son on their lips, her son who volunteered, enlisted after September the 11th because he loved his country.

It doesn't have to be that way.

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It doesn't have to be that way.