President\'s State of the Union Address

¶ … Union

Each year in January, the President of the United States typically gives a speech to the joint session of the United States Congress entitled "The State of the Union." The speech fulfills Article 2, Section 3 of the Constitution, which requires that the President give congress an update on the measures necessary to continue governing and the overall "state of the union." In the 1800s and early 1900s, the President usually submitted a written letter to Congress, but after the advent of radio and television, the address is usually broadcast live on most networks with a large amount of commentary afterwards. In a more practical venue, the speech allows the President a captive audience to tout major accomplishments and push for his agenda for the coming year (Peters, 2014). The speech is certainly governed by tradition, but in the modern age it is also seen as one of the few times that all branches of government are under one roof, including the Judicial Branch, the Military represented by the Joint Chiefs, and foreign governments from the Dean of the Diplomatic Corps. Typically, particularly in the last several television decades, the address is used to honor certain Americans, who sit with the First Lady (Peters).

The State of the Union 2014 was given by President Barack Obama on January 28, 2014. The 2014 speech focused on a theme of improving the American economy, first by raising the minimum wage to $10.10 for all federal contractors and to work with all state and local governments to also raise the minimum wage as a pretense for supporting the economy and improving the quality of life for millions. Obama then focused on six other major themes: 1) continuing to improve American Healthcare and the initial successes of the new healthcare initiatives; 2) greater focus on education that would empower American students within a global economy; 3) rethinking of America's approach to national security; 4) asking Congress to give more power to the diplomatic corps, particularly in Iran; 5) enacting immigration reform management; and 6) moving the nation off a "war" paradigm into "strong and principled diplomacy" (Obama, 2014).

Ironically, there was not a united front in rebutting the President's speech by Republicans. The official GOP response was made by Cathy Rodgers, the House's highest-ranking woman. Rodgers noted that the President's policies, while seeming to focus on making the lives of Americans better, were actually making them harder. She focused on healthcare decisions that should be individualized, not mandated by the government. Further, the GOP response noted that there is still a primary gap of "opportunity equality" in the American system that the Republicans wish to narrow. However, she gave no specifics other than to plan to improve the educational and economic systems so that more people could benefit from governmental policies, not governmental control (Rodgers, 2014).

Senator Mike Lee gave the Tea Party response to the President's speech, concentrating on the widening wealth gap and a lack of true measures to correct too much government and too wide an inequality gap that leaves many Americans worse off than they were prior to Obama's election. "American's know in their hearts that something is wrong. Much of what is wrong relates to the sense that the 'American Dream' is falling out of reach for far too many of us (Lee, 2014).