施密特登台时，主题是“What is an American？”（美国人是什么？）。他开场直击林肯的《葛底斯堡演说》：“四分之一个世纪前，我们的祖先在这个大陆上孕育了一个新国家，基于自由理念，并致力于人人平等的命题。”
Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Abraham Lincoln's words at Gettysburg are etched into our national memory. But Lincoln was wrong.
The white Europeans who settled America and conquered the West believed they were forging a nation—a homeland for themselves and their descendants. They fought, they bled, they struggled, they died for us. They built this country for us.
It belongs to us. It’s our birthright, our heritage, our destiny. If America is everything and everyone, then it is nothing and no one at all. But we know that’s not true. America is not a “universal nation.”