The second day of the Democratic National Convention officially kicked off, with New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson calling the day to order.

• Ted Kennedy, longtime senator from Massachusetts, hailed John Kerry, the state's junior senator, and urged "the patriots of this new century ... [to] choose a leader worthy of our country." If America's ideas are not reached today, he said "it's not because our ideals need replacing, it's because our president needs replacing."
• Other speakers in the hour included Sen. Tom Daschle and some former rivals of John Kerry's for the Democratic presidential nod: Rep. Richard Gephardt and former Sen. Carol Mosley Braun.

"I'm Howard Dean and I'm voting for John Kerry," the former Vermont governor -- and one-time rival of Kerry for the Democratic presidential nod -- announced at the podium during Tuesday's event. He also pointed at jobs and health care improvements the Democratic party can make while in the White House.

Rising Democratic Party star Barack Obama, who is running for the U.S. Senate in Illinois, used his own story in a call for America to "reclaim its promise" as a place of opportunity and "the audacity of hope." In his keynote speech, Obama told the convention, "There's not a liberal America and a conservative America -- there's the United States of America. ... There's not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America -- there's the United States of America."

Ron Reagan, son of the former president who died last month after a decade-long battle with Alzheimer's disease, called for expanding stem-cell research. "[The] theology of a few" shouldn't be allowed to "forestall the health and well-being of the many," Reagan said.

Introduced by her son Chris Heinz, Teresa Heinz Kerry wrapped up the night with a speech that described her husband as "a fighter" and said John Kerry would lead the nation by "showing the face, not of our fears, but of our hopes." She also outlined plans on core issues: "We can and we will create good, competitive and sustainable jobs while still protecting the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the health of our children, because good environmental policy is good economics."