The Speechwriter in Chief

Ever wonder who helps President-elect Barack Obama sound so uplifting, so eloquent? North Reading's Jon Favreau, all of 27, tops the list.

One day at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston, the people putting together the various speeches hit something of a snag. There was a certain turn of phrase that Senator John Kerry wanted to use in his speech accepting the convention's nomination. As Jon Favreau, then a 23-year-old Kerry speechwriter, recalls, it was the line: There are no red states or blue states, there are only the United States of America, all of us pledging allegiance to the red, white, and blue. The problem was that the phrase was also included in the text of the convention's eagerly awaited keynote address, which was to be delivered by a well-regarded senatorial candidate from Illinois.

The Kerry people dispatched Favreau, fresh out of Holy Cross and, before that, out of North Reading High School, to explain to Barack Obama that he would not be using that particular turn of phrase on this evening. "So, I walked in where Senator Obama was practicing his speech," Favreau recalls, "and I said that I had to talk to the senator and get this line out. So he comes up to me and says, 'Are you telling me I have to cut this line out?' " Obama's staff defused the situation quickly. Kerry got the line, got the nomination, and got something of a beating in November. Obama gave his speech -- minus the line -- became a star, and, this year, got himself elected president of the United States. And Favreau helped write several of the speeches that were vital to Obama's campaign.

These included Obama's pivotal address to the Jefferson-Jackson Day Dinner in Iowa prior to his stunning victory in the caucuses there: This party, the party of Jefferson and Jackson, of Roosevelt and Kennedy, has always made the biggest difference in the lives of American people, when we led, not by polls, but by principle; not by calculation, but by conviction. Also, his acceptance speech at the Democratic convention in Denver, and his election-night victory address in Chicago: If there is anyone out there. . .

By this point, Favreau, now 27, can fairly well channel not only Obama's style, but his substance as well, even though Obama himself is that rarest of politicians -- one who thinks he can write and actually can. But even he needs speechwriters, which is why, not long after the Kerry campaign ended, Favreau was invited to breakfast with Obama in the Senate Dining Room. "It was one of the most easygoing interviews I ever had," Favreau says. "He asked me why I went into politics, what issues I cared about."

In fact, Favreau had sounded similar themes in his valedictory address to the class of 2003 at Holy Cross. He told his classmates: Here's some of what we need. Soccer coaches, den mothers, PTA members, neighbors who help you move in and promise to keep in touch when they move you out, friends who come early and stay late, shoulders to cry on, big brothers and sisters, family comedians, T-ball umpires, letter-to-the-editor authors, voters who care about any issue from traffic lights and tax reform to potholes and peace on earth, organizers and activists, critics and supporters, voices for those who are having trouble getting theirs heard, summertime porch-sitters with special degrees in talking about everything and nothing until the mosquitoes bite, mentors, philanthropists, signature collectors, boo-boo fixers, grocers to the hungry, roofers to the homeless, and believers -- especially believers.

Shortly before Thanksgiving, Favreau was named director of speechwriting for the Obama administration, and (despite a Facebook faux pas) he is now working on the speechwriter's Super Bowl -- the inaugural address. It's the biggest historical field he can play on, a place where better angels pass torches and don't fear anything, not even fear itself. If nothing else, Favreau is confident he can write for this particular president on that particular day. "On a lot of issues, I'm so closely aligned with what Barack believes anyway, that it's much easier," he explains. "I've been doing it so long that if I were to go write for someone else, I wonder if I would write like I do now. If I wrote for myself, what would my voice sound like? You kind of forget."

E-mail Charles P. Pierce at cpierce@globe.com.