DeclareYourself

Declare Yourself is a national nonpartisan, nonprofit campaign to empower and encourage every eligible 18-year-old in America to register and vote in the presidential primaries and 2008 presidential election. Using the power of strategic media partnerships, celebrity spokespeople, the sports arena, and most importantly, mobile and Internet technology, Declare Yourself's campaign blankets the landscape of popular culture, as well as universities and high schools, with a simple, clear message: REGISTER and VOTE!

Declare Yourself registered over one million young people in the 2004 and 2006 elections at www.DeclareYourself.com. Declare Yourself, founded by television producer and philanthropist Norman Lear, was launched in 2003 as the culmination of the Declaration of Independence Road Trip, a nationwide multimedia exhibit and tour of an original copy of the Declaration of Independence.

For the 2008 primary season and general election, Declare Yourself is enlisting an unprecedented array of partners including Cricket Wireless, Yahoo!, MySPace, Google, Evite, UWIRE, Good Magazine, Clear Channel, Comedy Central, American Eagle Outfitters, Harper Collins, Starbucks, and Voto Latino.

How It Began:
In 2004, Declare Yourself challenged every American between the ages of 18 and 29, especially first-time voters, to find their reasons to register and to vote.  Declare Yourself registered well over 1.2 million people in the 2004 and 2006 elections at www.DeclareYourself.com.

The 2004 Declare Yourself campaign included:

Unique alliances with technology, media, and retail partners, including Yahoo!, Friendster, Clear Channel, Comedy Central, Time Inc., Borders, Urban Outfitters, Evite, Hugo Boss, EB Games, E!, Rolling Stone, and US Weekly magazine.
A major launch event, featuring Drew Barrymore and 150+ college students in Washington DC on November 13, 2003.
A star-studded "Young Hollywood Celebrates Democracy" event in Los Angeles on March 2, 2004, co-hosted by Leonardo DiCaprio, Reese Witherspoon, Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, & other young actors, and emceed by Andre 3000 of OutKast.
A live spoken word and music tour of 18 college campuses, featuring an original copy of the Declaration of Independence.
An unprecedented nationwide voter education initiative for high school seniors, in partnership with Newspapers in Education  and a youth voter education partnership with the National Association of Secretaries of State
Two unique public service announcement campaigns.  The first campaign, "Only You Can Silence Yourself," was directed by David LaChapelle and featured Andre 3000, Christina Aguilera and others.  The second, produced in partnership with Comedy Central, was directed by Kevin Smith and featured a number of young actors and comedians, including Ben Affleck, Zach Braff, Sarah Silverman and more.
Limited edition t-shirts designed by Todd Oldham, Richard Tyler and Isaac Mizrahi sold exclusively at www.DeclareYourself.com.
Declare Yourself, founded by Norman Lear, was launched in 2003 as the culmination of the Declaration of Independence (DOI) Road Trip, a nationwide multi-media exhibit and tour of an original copy of the Declaration of Independence.  

In 2000, Lyn and Norman Lear purchased a rare, original copy of the Declaration of Independence with the goal of bringing "the people's document" directly to the American people.  Launched on July 4, 2001, the DOI Road Trip was founded to tour the nation's birth certificate and a multimedia exhibit across the United States, to engage and energize all Americans, particularly young people, to participate in civic activism and to vote.

The DOI Road Trip traveled to 51 cities and towns in 31 states, the 2002 Winter Olympic Games in Salt Lake City, the Super Bowl in New Orleans, the Daytona 400 NASCAR race, Mount Rushmore, and the Oklahoma City National Memorial.  It has been to six Presidential libraries.  

More than 115,000 students visited the exhibit and millions used the DOI curriculum in schools nationwide.

"When I first looked at the Declaration of Independence, my eyes welled up. I thought - this is our nation's birth certificate, the people's document, and it should visit Americans, rather than sit somewhere on a wall waiting for Americans to come to it, as a reminder of the freedoms we all cherish."

— Norman Lear