[00:00:02] Save Your Freedom - 英语演讲
[00:00:05] by Helping Others Find It
[00:00:07] U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy’s Commencement Address
[00:00:12] at Stanford University
[00:00:15] President Hennessey, graduating students,
[00:00:19] and my fellow citizens in a world
[00:00:22] that must seek to come ever closer
[00:00:25] to the idea and reality of freedom under law.
[00:00:28] Thank you for inviting me to your Commencement.
[00:00:31] There is now clear evidence that,
[00:00:34] with President Hennessey,
[00:00:36] I have become a willing accomplice
[00:00:38] in the wacky walk.
[00:00:41] Each of you graduates has your own story
[00:00:46] of the years at Stanford.
[00:00:48] Your story is bound up with your parents,
[00:00:50] your family and the loved ones
[00:00:53] who sustained you here.
[00:00:55] You-indeed all of us and the entire Nation-
[00:00:59] owe them warmest thanks.
[00:01:01] Freedom must remain a central part of your story.
[00:01:06] From the beginning of our Republic,
[00:01:09] Americans have defined freedom by a moral principle.
[00:01:13] It is this: With our own freedom
[00:01:16] comes the duty to secure it for others.
[00:01:19] Freedom is the birthright of all.
[00:01:22] When we help others find freedom,
[00:01:24] we save our own.
[00:01:26] Now, two people or two million people
[00:01:31] or two billion people cannot
[00:01:34] enjoy freedom without rules.
[00:01:36] So freedom goes hand in hand with law.
[00:01:40] This is just high school civics stuff.
[00:01:44] No surprise here. But the principles
[00:01:47] are so fundamental that it seems appropriate
[00:01:50] to discuss them at your commencement,
[00:01:51] as you consider how best to
[00:01:54] shape your life and your work.
[00:01:56] Americans have the responsibility to
[00:02:00] try to advance law and freedom in other places.
[00:02:04] The task is daunting.
[00:02:06] For the stark truth is this:
[00:02:09] more than half the world lacks
[00:02:11] either the will or the power to embrace law
[00:02:14] and freedom as we know it.
[00:02:16] In the long run our last,
[00:02:18] best security is in the realm of ideas.
[00:02:22] It is urgent for our Nation
[00:02:25] and for you as young people to strive to
[00:02:28] make the case for the idea of law and freedom.
[00:02:31] We must make that case to a doubting world.
[00:02:35] On this question, the world must
[00:02:38] not be in search of two different destinies.
[00:02:41] When lawyers make their case to a jury,
[00:02:47] they sometimes have a few hours.
[00:02:50] Attorneys in our Court have thirty minutes a side.
[00:02:53] Today, in order not to trespass upon
[00:02:56] your patience or delay your celebration,
[00:02:59] I shall take but eleven minutes more to
[00:03:02] make the case about your duties
[00:03:04] as the newest trustees of freedom.
[00:03:07] You must prepare to take some risks
[00:03:12] to make the case. You may enter a realm of ideas
[00:03:16] or a real world place where freedom
[00:03:19] is not just in doubt but opposed.
[00:03:21] You must find inventive,
[00:03:24] new ways to make the case for freedom.
[00:03:27] And to be prepared for this role,
[00:03:29] to be prepared to confront the reality
[00:03:32] of half a world without law and freedom,
[00:03:35] you must know what is at stake.
[00:03:38] You must know that in Sri Lanka over
[00:03:43] a thousand people a year go to jail for
[00:03:46] three hundred sixty-five days for
[00:03:49] want of a one dollar fine.
[00:03:51] You must know that there is an African country
[00:03:57] where a woman who is raped must
[00:03:59] pay five dollars to file a complaint with the police.
[00:04:03] You must know that each year eight hundred thousand people -
[00:04:10] mostly women and children -
[00:04:11] are the subject of capture and trafficking
[00:04:15] for slavery and sexual exploitation.
[00:04:17] Human trafficking is one of
[00:04:20] the world’s most profitable businesses.
[00:04:23] All of these failings come from
[00:04:27] the absence of the rule of law.
[00:04:29] You would think this would be clear to everyone
[00:04:32] . It is surprising, though,
[00:04:35] that the concept escapes so many.
[00:04:37] In 1978, Alexander Solzhenitsyn gave a commencement speech.
[00:04:45] It was puzzling at first that,
[00:04:47] in a speech moving in so many other ways,
[00:04:50] he attacked the West for being too devoted to the law.
[00:04:54] After a few days I reached this conclusion:
[00:04:58] his understanding of law was simply different from our own.
[00:05:03] For him the concept, the history,
[00:05:06] the meaning of law made it a diktat,
[00:05:10] a ukase, a cold threat, a decree.
[00:05:14] We believe otherwise.
[00:05:16] For us the law is not an obstacle
[00:05:19] but the instrument of progress;
[00:05:21] not a command to be feared but a hope to be embraced;
[00:05:26] not a threat but a promise.
[00:05:29] The chance to build and own a small business
[00:05:33] is an essential part of any economy
[00:05:36] that seeks to establish law and freedom.
[00:05:39] That is why we want many of you to
[00:05:42] have economic success.
[00:05:43] A certain economic self sufficiency is necessary
[00:05:48] if we are to have some voice
[00:05:50] in planning our own destiny.
[00:05:52] This is essential in a world where governments
[00:05:56] are always waiting in the wings,
[00:05:58] all too eager to plan our destiny for us.
[00:06:02] And, the legal infrastructure in over half
[00:06:06] the world cannot or will not allow
[00:06:10] the dream or the hope of owning a small business.
[00:06:12] And in those same parts of the world neither
[00:06:18] can the legal infrastructure support basic
[00:06:20] improvements that engineers and builders otherwise
[00:06:23] could construct in short order.
[00:06:26] But you cannot build, say,
[00:06:29] a modern water system if there is
[00:06:32] no honest legal system to maintain it.
[00:06:34] Consider the water crisis in the sub-Sahara.
[00:06:41] You have seen pictures of a stately,
[00:06:44] dignified woman in a flowing gown with
[00:06:47] a water jug on her head. That jug weighs more
[00:06:50] than the luggage allowance at the airport.
[00:06:53] The hours, the human hours, the toilsome hours,
[00:06:57] the heart-wrenching, backbreaking hours a woman
[00:07:00] spends just trying to bring water
[00:07:03] to the family are staggering.
[00:07:06] By cautious estimates, on the African continent
[00:07:12] alone it takes over sixteen billion hours
[00:07:15] each year to bring water to the family.
[00:07:18] That is sixteen billion with a B.
[00:07:23] But new water systems cannot be built
[00:07:26] and maintained where corruption holds sway.
[00:07:30] This is not just because of the lack of money;
[00:07:33] it is because of the lack of law and property rights.
[00:07:37] There are some who say your generation has
[00:07:42] less power than previous ones
[00:07:45] because a more interdependent world
[00:07:47] reduces our power to make unilateral policy choices.
[00:07:51] In my view this understates your capacity and potential.
[00:07:56] You are among a new generation of university graduates
[00:08:00] who see an interconnectedness in our world
[00:08:04] and its universe that far surpasses
[00:08:07] what previous generations could understand.
[00:08:11] An interconnected universe is manifested
[00:08:14] in all fields of learning and endeavors.
[00:08:17] The earth sciences teach this in a concrete,
[00:08:21] formal way. Science, and in particular quantum physics
[00:08:26] and astrophysics, may soon yield stunning explanations
[00:08:30] of dark matter and of our common link to the universe.
[00:08:34] As is evident in the new communications technology,
[00:08:38] this more interconnected world touches
[00:08:41] all of our work and culture, over the whole range
[00:08:45] of the sciences, law and business,
[00:08:47] and the arts and letters. Legally blonde
[00:08:52] in a law school a half a world away.
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