"There is a temptation to see these times as unprecedented, to see our current challenges as insurmountable. As a history teacher, I found it instructive to look back at past inaugural speeches to see how incoming governors portrayed the situations facing them. In 1955, Governor Orville Freeman painted a picture of a society in intense crisis, besieged by the struggle between freedom and totalitarianism raging around the world. In 1971, Governor Wendy Anderson spoke about how health care cost too much—or wasn’t even available. He described a housing shortage in which the average young couple in Minnesota could not dream of buying a home. In 1979, Governor Al Quie expressed concern about discrimination in our state. He urged the legislature to take action to eliminate discrimination in all forms, and to open opportunities for women, people of color, the poor, those with disabilities, and the elderly. In 2011, Governor Mark Dayton described how our education system was failing our students, thus failing our future. It strengthens my resolve to know those who came before me, on whose shoulders I stand, faced difficult challenges, many similar to those we face today."