Barack Obama

“ King's birthday a time to celebrate service, to reflect and study on how we had helped to perfect our union, but that it should be a day in which each of us individually also try to stretch out of our comfort zones and try to do something for others and to reach out and learn about things that maybe we've shied away from — because part of what the civil rights movement was all about was changing people's hearts and minds and breaking out of old customs and old habits. ”

“ And I want to wish everybody around the country a day in which they reflect on the extraordinary contributions that ordinary people can make each and every day to make America the most hopeful country in the world. ”

“ That's, I think, an important lesson for all of us on this day — are the things that we can try to do that might have seemed impossible but we know are worth doing, and can we apply those principles that we know to be true in our own lives and our society. ”