Vol. 06 · Misquoted ·Speech ·321 of 348
"We choose to go to the Moon."
They never said that.
What people say
"We choose to go to the Moon."
What was actually said
"We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard." John F. Kennedy — Rice University speech, 12 September 1962
Why it stuck
The first clause is the poster; the second clause is the argument. Without "because they are hard," the sentence is a tourism statement instead of a political philosophy.
Ted Sorensen drafted the speech. The "because they are hard" phrasing was Sorensen's — Kennedy made it his own.
Know another line by heart?
Play the duel and see how many you can spot. Or browse the whole shelf.