【正文】 nd againsta dictator until they are defeated. You see it in the democracy activist who goes to jail tryingto ensure an election is free and transparent. You see it in the civil rights lawyer who suffersscorn and isolation for standing against bigotry, racism, and intolerance.
　　I am literally in awe of the courage that ordinary, anonymous people demonstrate in themost difficult circumstances imaginable – in a dank African jail, a North Korean gulag, aprison in Syria or Central Asia, facing the cruelest persecution and lonely isolation.
　　Many of these people just quietly disappear. They lose their lives. They never bee aninternational cause or a global hero. Courage is not a strong enough word for what they doevery day, and all of us need to think about that.
　　What all these people have in mon – and what I hope they have in mon with you – isthat they refuse to be placent and indifferent to what is going on around them or towhat should be going on around them.
　　And that’s the most important lesson I hope you will take with you when you leave Yale. Thefact is that for those of you who have loans are not the only burden you graduate with have had the privilege of a Yale education. No matter where you e from, no matterwhere you’re going next, the four years that you’ve spent here are an introduction toresponsibility. And your education requires something more of you than serving yourself. It callson you to give back, in whatever way you can. It requires you to serve the world around youand, yes, to make a difference. That is what has always set America apart: our generosity, ourhumanity, our idealism.
　　Last year I walked through the devastation of the typhoon that hit the Philippines. The and USAID and regular volunteers got there before countries that lived a lot closer. Wewent there without being asked and without asking for anything in return. And today Americansare helping to bring that munity back to life.
　　In Nigeria, when Boko Haram kidnapped hundreds of girls, the government didn’t turn to otherpowerful countries for help – and by the way, they’re not offering.
　　As Josh and Nia mentioned, it was my privilege to stand here 48 years ago at Class ing here, I did reread that speech. A lot of it was about Vietnam, but one linejumped out at me. In 1966 I suggested, “an excess of isolation had led to an excess ofinterventionism.” Today we hear a different tune from some in Congress and even on somecampuses and we face the opposite concern. We cannot allow a hangover from the excessiveinterventionism of the last decade to lead now to an excess of isolationism in this decade.
　　I can tell you for certain, most of the rest of the world doesn’t lie awake at night worryingabout America’s presence – they worry about what would happen in our absence.
　　Without arrogance, without chauvinism, never forget that what makes America different fromother nations is not a mon bloodline or a mon religion or a mon ideology or amon heritage – what makes us different is that we are united by an unmon idea: thatwe’re all created equal and all endowed with unalienable rights. America is not just a countrylike other countries. America is an idea and we – all of us, you – get to fill it out over time.
　　Tomorrow, when President Salovey grants you those diplomas, listen to what he says. He won’tsay what is said at most schools – that your degree admits you to all its “rights and privileges.”At Yale, we say your degree admits you to all its “rights and responsibilities.” It means we needto renew that responsibility over and over again every day. It’s not a onetime is the best antidote to pessimism and ultimately cynicism.
　　So I ask you today on a celebratory afternoon as you think about the future: Remember whathappened when the Founding Fathers had finished their hard work at the ConstitutionalConvention in Philadelphia and Ben Franklin, tired, end of day, walked down at night, down thesteps of the hall. A woman called to him. She said, “Tell us Dr. Franklin: What do we have, amonarchy or a republic?” And he answered: “A republic, if you can keep it.”
　　Class of 2020: We know what you have – a worldclass education – if you will use it.
　　Congratulations to you, good luck, and God bless. (Cheers and applause.)