Secretary Bell and ladies and gentlemen, I am delighted to be here today to join you in honoring some of the finest secondary schools in America. And I want to extend a special greeting to the students in the audience. May I also extend a warm welcome to the principals who are here today, including Mrs. Vera White, who was kind enough to show me through Jefferson Junior High School this morning. both of us have to keep a lot of people happy. You have the PTA; I have the voters. When a Congress leaves town, it is no accident we call it a recess. But I am pleased to help honor the 262 middle, junior, and senior high schools that are receiving awards today for outstanding educational performance. Today we honor you for doing a superb job of educating students and for setting an example that all our schools can follow. We must remember, though, that American schools have not always performed as well as those represented here today. From the early sixties to 1980, combined SAT scores declined steadily, dropping by 90 points. Science achievement scores of 17-year-olds showed a steady drop. And, most shocking, our National Commission on Excellence in Education reported that in 1980 more than one-tenth of America's 17-year olds could be considered functionally illiterate. The dropout rate increased so much that by 1982, 27 percent of our students failed to complete high school, and dropout rates among minority students were higher than 40 percent. Now, this erosion in academic achievement took place during the very period, overall, when spending was up by over 600 percent. The crisis in our schools was symptomatic of a much larger crisis in our country. We were living under a tired philosophy of government knows best. It was out of touch with the reality of a changing world. And while spending was going up, that tired philosophy was dragging America down. Big taxing and spending had led to soaring interest rates and inflation, and all over the world our once-proud nation was no longer known for strength and resolve but for vacillation and self-doubt. And since the whole aim of our schools is to prepare our children for the future, it was only natural that when leaders lost faith in our future, many of our principals, teachers, and students felt robbed of their sense of purpose and self-esteem. Well, the American people decided to put a stop to that long decline, and in the past few years our country has seen a rebirth of vitality and freedom a great national renewal.

Remarks at a Ceremony Honoring the 1983-1984 Winners in the Secondary School Recognition Program


We have knocked inflation down, and all across our land a powerful economic expansion is providing new products and new work for millions. Once again, the United States is respected throughout the world as a force for peace and freedom. This is a springtime of hope for America. When we came to Washington, we knew that the problems in education had not developed overnight and could not be cured overnight. We knew the key to educational improvement was not proposing still more Federal involvement and control, but helping to chart a new course that challenges State and local governments, teachers, administrators, students, and parents to meet the goals of an agenda for excellence. That is why one of our first actions was to appoint a National Commission on Excellence in Education. And today from Maine to California parents, teachers, school administrators, and principals have begun the crucial work to carry out the Commission's recommendations by improving fundamentals of basic teaching and learning. Since the Commission's report, we have been witnessing a great reawakening of learning, reflecting a culmination of concern over the quality of American education at all levels. On the State level, progress has been significant. When our administration took office only a handful of States had task forces on education. Today they all do, and many have begun to work on pay incentives for teachers. They know that to promote good teaching we must reward good teachers. On the local level, parents, teachers, and administrators are making dramatic strides. The PTA reported last year that after a 20-year decline in its membership, 100,000 new members joined the organization. As with so many challenges throughout our history, the American people are showing again that it can be done. Although we are doing much to make our schools more like the temples of learning we all want them to be, I do not believe there is an educator in this room, or in America, who would not agree that we have barely begun. Our challenge is to sustain and build on the progress that we are now making. We cannot reach for the future without a firm grasp of basic educational tools and the importance of traditional values. Learning cannot take place without discipline. Today, in schools across our land, many teachers cannot teach because they lack the authority to make students take tests and turn in homework. School disorder destroys the learning atmosphere, drives good teachers out of teaching, and hurts minority and low-income students who are concentrated in urban schools where the problem is most severe.


To keep learning in our schools, we must get crime, drugs, and violence out. We cannot expect to raise a new generation of responsible leaders in a lawless environment. We cannot expect young Americans to master the complexities of computers if they are high on drugs and alcohol. We must teach our sons and daughters a proper respect for academic standards, for codes of civilized behavior, and for knowledge itself. As the National Commission forcefully argued, we must also get our students back to the proper study of basic subjects. Today too many students are allowed to abandon vocational and college prep courses, so when they graduate, they are prepared for neither higher education, nor work, nor the training they may later need to keep up with technological advances. In 1980, 35 States required only 1 year of math for a high school diploma; 36 required only 1 year of science. We must insist that all our students master math, science, history, reading, and writing, the fundamentals of our civilization. Earlier this month, I signed into law the Education for Economic Security Act. It authorizes more scholarships for science and math teachers to help raise the level of instruction in those crucial basics. If we fail to instruct our children in justice, religion, and liberty, we will be condemning them to a world without virtue, a life in the twilight of a civilization where the great truths have been forgotten. In many schools, students are being taught the dangers of nuclear weapons and the burdens of national defense. Well, let us make certain they understand not only the price of defending America but the price of failing to. The students from St. George's University School of Medicine learned in Grenada that freedom is worth sticking up for. And while it makes sense that our children learn of our nation's problems, I hope they are also learning that Americans are good and decent people who face up to those problems with courage and conviction. Yes, we are human, we have our faults. But by any objective measure, we live in the freest, most prosperous nation in the history of the world, and our children need to know that. Jeane Kirkpatrick, Ambassador to the United Nations, said, ... we must learn to bear the truth about our society, no matter how pleasant it may be. So, we have identified long-neglected problems. We are beginning to turn them around.


We are remembering the all-important foundation of basic educational tools, values, and discipline all good and important steps of progress, but still not good enough. If the world of learning is to meet the needs of America's future, then we must clearly see where America is headed. You know, during my own lifetime I have seen this country change so much. Cars had been invented, but very few people had one. In the winter, people got around by horse and sleigh. A huge number of Americans were farmers, and the oneroom schoolhouse was common. Those dirt roads gave way to sleek interstate highways. The commercial development of the airplane, then the creation of the jet engine, revolutionized our transportation. In agriculture, innovations in farm equipment and techniques made it possible for more and more workers to leave the fields to pursue other jobs. As they did so, our great industries grew became the mainstay of our economy. Today we are well into a new revolution driven by technologies that offer virtually unlimited opportunities for satisfying jobs and personal fulfillment. This revolution is based in large part on an American breakthrough development of the microchip. Through a vast burst of creativity in the use of microchips, the human race has projected its computational technology beyond all time and size into new galaxies of inner space, where distances are measured in billionths of a meter, time is measured in trillionths of a second, and costs drop to thousandths of a penny. I, just a few years ago, received a great shock when I was told about a satellite of ours and a communications thing in which the entire Encyclopaedia Britannica could be transmitted in a matter of something like 3 or 4 seconds. Today our children learn to tell time on digital watches. They mix traditional games like baseball with the latest video craze. And they grow up with constant exposure to the mass media, watching television some 25 hours a week. Today's children can expect to live longer, have more leisure, enjoy better health, change jobs more often, and move to more new locations then ever before. We have heard it said that our nation's most important recess 1 is the mind of a child, and that is truer than ever. Not long ago we were asking how America could bring the world of learning into better harmony with the world of work. Well, those worlds must not only come together, but also strengthen and enrich each other.


Our vision of education must be as forward-looking as our vision of the rest of American life. This will mean a school system that teaches our children how to enrich their lives by using telecommunications as educational tools, that shows them how to educate themselves so they will be able to keep their skills current in an everchanging job market, and that gives them an appreciation of the arts and humanities so that they may broaden their vision and deepen their understanding of the values that give life meaning. One way of helping American schools better serve and shape our future is to keep bringing technology into more classrooms. Now, when I was a boy, an apple was some- thing you brought the teacher. Today you learn on an Apple or a MacIntosh or an IBM. Already our schools and universities have begun to make extensive use of the technological revolution. Young children can use computers to teach themselves colors and basic concepts like up and down or fast and slow. Others, older students, can use computers to sharpen their grasp of virtually any subject from math to history. Computers can tie in with vast libraries and, in effect, put those libraries in every classroom. One dramatic advantage of the new technology is that, as we put it to use in our schools, it can case the burden on our teachers. In any given classroom, some students are able to work quietly with computers while their teacher spends time with others perhaps with students who require more personal attention. At the same time, technology can produce new opportunities for learning in the workplace and the home. Audiovisual courses can teach workers how to use new techniques and equipment, and computers can help them prepare for new fields. In the home, personal computers can put all the world's great art, literature, and drama at a family's fingertips. Two-way cable television stations can bring classroom instruction into the living room, and new techniques of viewer participation can enable people in the home to take tests and practice skills. If we apply technology to education with thoughtful skill, good education will be available to all. Education and technology will enable all to participate fully in the wonders and benefits of American life. It is long been a goal of our space shuttle, the program, to some day carry citizen passengers into space. But today I am directing NASA to begin a search in all of our elementary and secondary schools and to choose as the first citizen passenger in the history of our space program one of America's finest a teacher.


Now, I promise you there will be a little bit of voluntarism in that, also. But when that shuttle lifts off, all of America will be reminded of the crucial role that teachers and education play in the life of our nation. I cannot think of a better lesson for our children and our country. So, now we know that there is reason for hope. We can see an exciting future, but we also know what the current problems are. We have defined them, studied them, quantified them. We have made some progress in combating them, but not enough. Now is the time to set ourselves some additional challenges. We have slowed the downward trend in SAT scores in the past few years. We may even have ended that trend. We have to challenge ourselves further, and we must challenge ourselves as individuals. The state cannot do it for us. This town and the Federal Government cannot do it for us. We have to challenge ourselves to get moving again. I propose that, like an Olympic athlete, we set ourselves some goals four specific challenges and go for it. Before this decade is out, scholastic aptitude test scores should regain at least half the losses of the last 20 years a big challenge. States should reduce their high school dropout rates to less than 10 percent. But from the teachers and principals and administrators that I have met over the past 3 1/2 years, believe me, they have or should I say, you? are up to the challenge. Violence in the schools is, in some ways, the toughest of our problems. But, again, I know we are up to it. A Gallup Poll now shows that the number of parents with children in public schools who cite violence as their major concern is down from 29 percent last year to 23 percent this year. Before this decade is out, every school in the Nation should have adopted clear discipline codes, and the percentage of parents who cite school safety as a major concern should be half of what it is now. You know, our country is perfectly poised to meet these challenges and reach these heights. So many things have begun righting themselves the past few years, or, I should say, you have helped right them. It is a time of good feeling about the future. It is a time of progress. And we are showing ourselves again that effort and dedication and tenacity really make a difference. As a young fellow said recently, America's on top again.


I just thought we ought to come out here in the brisk morning sunshine and wake up together. I want to thank the representatives here from all parts of the communications industry, from the foundation world, from various civil rights and other civic groups for being here, and coming in and giving me a chance to make this statement, because I had intended to go to Secretary Daley's conference today on bridging the digital divide, and because I am going to Worcester, I could not do that. So they came in this morning, and we had a visit. I want to thank them for being here and for their commitment and for all those who are not here but who are at the conference. This conference is about closing the digital divide. And we have worked hard on that for the last several years in very specific contexts. Under the Vice President's leadership, we have worked to make sure that eventually a digital divide will not deprive business of the technology-savvy workers they need and will not hurt our educational systems today. We started with the first NetDay in California, back in 1994, when only 3 percent of our classrooms were wired and only 14 percent of our schools were. Now we know that, through the public-private partnerships that have been established all over America, through the Telecommunications Act and the E-rate, which the FCC set to make sure our poorest schools could afford to be connected, we are now up over 50 percent of the schools, from 3 percent, and over 80 percent of the classrooms, from 14 percent, since 1994. I am very pleased by that, and we are on our way to meeting our goal sometime next year of having all of our schools wired and, soon after that, all of our classrooms wired. I want to thank the Vice President and all the people in various industries who have supported us and helped us in this regard. But as Secretary Daley's most recent Falling Through the Net report shows, there is still a lot more to do. We must connect all of our citizens to the Internet not just in schools and libraries but in homes, small businesses, and community centers. And we must help all Americans gain the skills they need to make the most of the connection. So this morning, as they go back to their meeting, I want to announce a series of new plans and partnerships that will expand on both these efforts to use the combined forces of public, private, and nonprofit sectors, finally to slam shut the digital divide.

Remarks on the Digital Divide and an Exchange With Reporters


First, I have decided to lead a prominent delegation, including top CEO's, on a new markets tour this spring to focus specifically on the digital divide out in America. As we have done on our previous tours, we will visit communities that have not fully participated in our Nation's economic growth. And yet, in the communities we will also see how partnerships between the public and private sectors can unleash the power of the Internet to link children and adults to a lifetime of learning, to provide access to distant medical care, to empower parents, to assist job seekers, to enhance safety, and foster economic development. Second, I am signing an executive memorandum to ensure that closing the digital divide will be a vital goal not just for Secretary Daley and for us here in the White House but throughout the Federal Government. For example, I am directing Secretary Daley to work with the private sector to develop a national strategy for connecting all Americans to the Internet and directing Secretaries Daley, Riley, Herman, Cuomo, and Shalala to expand our growing network of community technology centers. I just ask you all to think about this one thing. What do you believe the economic impact would be if Internet access and usage were as dense in America as telephone access and usage? I think it is clear that we need to keep working until we achieve this goal. Third, with the help of many other groups, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights is launching an initiative to empower the entire civil rights community through an expanding civilrights.org website, through leadership forums and even modern-day freedom riders who will bring high-tech training to the doorsteps of nonprofit organizations. As the Congress of National Black Churches has said, the digital divide is a key civil rights issue of the 21st century. That is why our civil rights organizations must be ready, wired, and able to lead the change. Fourth, the Benton Foundation is bringing together companies from across the computing, telecommunications, software, and Internet industries, as well as the Urban League and several other large private foundations, to create the Digital Divide Network, an enormous clearinghouse of information for information on public and private efforts to bring technology to underserved communities. For the first time, we will have one-stop shop for tracking our progress in every community and for learning exactly what is worked and what has not .


Each year we set aside a special day to pay special tribute to our men and women in uniform. Today is Armed Forces Day and, on behalf of a grateful nation, I would like to offer them our thanks and appreciation. Their job is unusually difficult not only because it involves hardship and danger, or because it requires long periods away from families and loved ones, or even because it may demand the giving of one's life in defense of our nation. The difficulty of the military profession grows out of all of these, plus the fact that our service men and women are always faced with several of the most fundamental questions we ask as individuals and as a nation the questions of war and peace and the use of force in the world. Americans have asked these questions again and again for more than 200 years. They are still debating them today. The answers lie in seeming paradoxes, underlying truths that may appear contradictory on the surface. The most fundamental paradox is that if we are never to use force, we must be prepared to use it and to use it successfully. We Americans do not want war and we do not start fights. We do not maintain a strong military force to conquer or coerce others. We want to prevent war by deterring others from the aggression that causes war. If our efforts are successful, we will have peace and never be forced into battle. That is the paradox of deterrence. The men and women in our Armed Forces also live with a second paradox. They spend their entire time in service training to fight and preparing for a war which we and they pray will never come. As individuals, these men and women want peace as much as we do as a nation. In fact, they want it even more, because they understand that war is not the romantic heroism we read about in novels or see in the movies, but the stark truth of suffering and sacrifice and the slain promise of youth. Our service men and women know firsthand the horrors of war and the blessings of peace, but they also know that just wanting peace is not enough to guarantee that peace will be sustained. As George Washington said, To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual ways of preserving peace. Today, Americans are again asking important questions about war and peace. How could we prevent nuclear war, and how could we reduce American and Soviet nuclear arsenals? The answers to these questions are not found in simple slogans, but again, in paradoxes. To prevent nuclear war, we must have the capability to deter nuclear war.

Radio Address to the Nation on the Observance of Armed Forces Day


This means we must keep our strategic forces strong enough to balance those of the Soviet Union. It must be absolutely clear to the Soviets that they would have no conceivable advantage in threatening or starting a nuclear war. In seeking to reduce American and Soviet nuclear arsenals, we must convince the Soviet Union that it is in our mutual interest to agree to significant, mutual arms reductions. And to do that, we cannot allow the current nuclear imbalance to continue. We must show the Soviets that we are determined to spend what it takes to deter war. Once they understand that, we have a real chance of successfully reaching arms reduction agreements. Last month I sent to the Congress a proposal to modernize our intercontinental ballistic missile force. By building the MX Peacekeeper and small, single warhead missiles, we will not only preserve our ability to protect the peace, we will also demonstrate that any Soviet quest for nuclear superiority will not work, that it is in everyone's interest to end the arms race and to agree to mutual arms reductions. The MX and other modernization measures will help us to achieve our fundamental goal, and that is to strengthen the peace by seeking arms reduction agreements that make for more security and stability by reducing overall force levels while permitting the modernization of our forces needed for a credible deterrent. I know that the paradox of peace through a credible military posture may be difficult for some people to accept. Some even argue that if we really wanted to reduce nuclear weapons we should simply stop building them ourselves. That argument makes about as much sense as saying that the way to prevent fires is to close down the fire department. It ignores one of the most basic lessons of history, a lesson that was learned by bitter experience and passed down to us by previous generations. Tyrants are tempted by weakness, and peace and freedom can only be preserved by strength. So, let us resolve today, as we honor the brave men and women who serve in our Armed Forces, to give them the support they need to protect our cherished liberties and preserve the peace for ourselves and our children. Till next week, thanks for listening, and God bless you.


And I want all of you to know that it is good to be back in Indiana, and it is good to once again speak to the National Association of Counties. To tell you the truth, though, I figure that in addressing some 4,000 fellow public officials I have got to be on my toes. And it has to do with a fellow that was the only living survivor or left alive years later of the Johnstown flood. And he made quite a thing out of public speaking. He was in great demand at luncheon clubs and so forth to tell of the experiences of having gone through that terrible thing, the Johnstown flood. Well, his time came, and there he was facing St. Peter. And as he entered heaven, St. Peter said, You know, if you have got anything special that you'd like to talk about from down on Earth, people up here like to hear things from back there. I have been speaking for a long time. And he told him what he'd been doing. So, he led him into an auditorium, and here it was packed and jammed. And St. Peter told them a newcomer from Earth was there and had an interesting story to tell them. And then as he introduced him and turned away and whispered when he went past him and said, That fellow with the beard on the aisle in the front row his name is Noah. But I come to you today with immense respect and respect for the hundreds and hundreds of, well, people that are here and I was told how many were here, 4,000, so I'd better say that instead of the hundreds. But I come before you today with immense respect and respect for the offices you hold so close to the people themselves respect for your service to our nation at the most basic levels of our democracy. You know many of your constituents by face and by name. And you preside at commission and board meetings, where they voice their concerns. You know what it is to be stopped on the street to explain a decision. In recent years, you have worked imaginatively to increase private economic development in your communities the best way to ensure economic growth. And day in and day out, you know what it is to be held responsible for government actions. You know what it is, in short, to do the will of the people. This is why I want to enlist you in the campaign that I began on the 3d of July on the steps of the Jefferson Memorial.

Remarks at the Annual Convention of the National Association of Counties in Indianapolis, Indiana


There I called on all Americans to complete the work of the authors of the Declaration of Independence with an Economic Bill of Rights, a bill that will restore to us the freedoms that our Founding Fathers believed we should always have, a bill of rights that will protect us and future generations from the needless and wrongful encroachment of government upon our lives. For make no mistake, the danger is grave. And many in Congress are intent upon returning to the days of unrestrained and irresponsible government present company, I might add, is excepted. I know which side Governor Myers or Congressman Myers is on. Delay after delay, missed deadline after missed deadline the entire budget process looks like intentionally staged chaos, chaos to provide a cover for those in Congress whose aim is to shift resources from the people's interest to the special interests. Indeed, a recent article in the Washington Post described how one member of the House Public Works and Transportation Committee circulated a bill asking well, it was to fill in the blanks, and the form was asking other members to sign up for their favorite pork-barrel project. And according to the Post, few could resist grabbing-quote a piece of the action. Now, I have spoken before about this congressional urge to grab a piece of the action, but this is so important for you and all the American people to understand that I'd like to give you examples. To begin with, there is the highway bill with its massive demonstration projects that give more of the funds to a few, hand-picked areas. This approach deprives you of the necessary resources to return Federal dollars to places where they are really needed. I vetoed that bill earlier this year. By one vote, Congress managed to override my veto. Well, in part, so that Congress could allow a certain major city to add an extension to its mass transit system. The system will be so expensive, and for so few people, that it would be cheaper to buy each rider a new car every 5 years for the next half a century. Also part of the highway bill, Congress chose to spend $870 million for the continued construction of a subway system in a major city on the west coast. The city is in sound economic condition, could have financed the construction independently, but perhaps the really remarkable part of it all is that the route of the subway is still undetermined. Eight hundred and seventy million in a hole in the ground, and where it comes out, nobody knows.


There is the Federal program that will spend millions to build luxury hotels, restaurants, and condominiums-that is right, fancy condominiums. I barely had time to figure out what yuppies were before Congress started to subsidize them. There are the farm programs that provide little or nothing for the many family farms, but that gave one wealthy farmer more than $13 million and that gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to a Texas landowner who is neither American nor in need of public assistance. He is the Crown Prince of Liechtenstein. But there is one program Congress recently voted on that pretty much says it all. This year the Congress of the United States, in its deep and unfathomable wisdom, voted 8 million of your tax dollars to establish get ready a center for the study of weeds. Now, I do not know whether I want to know any more about weeds. But you know, there are some days sitting in that Oval Office, with these bills coming across my desk, when I do not know whether to laugh or cry. Now, I have been accused in recent days of campaigning for our Economic Bill of Rights in order to distract attention from other events in Washington. Well, it so happens that I have been campaigning for economic rights for more than three decades, and I intend to go on doing so for years to come. putting an end to unrestrained spending. Stop the spending, and no more taxes. And while I am getting a few things off my chest, something else has been bothering me lately. Critics have claimed that in opposing our administration on the issues, they are at some kind of an unfair disadvantage, that this Presidency is somehow based more on personality than on policy. Well, the truth is, no President can remain popular unless he retains the fundamental support of the American people on the issues. So, I invite my critics I welcome my critics to go after me on the issues just as hard as they please. It all reminds me about Senator Gore of Oklahoma a story told back in the early 1900's. And one day an opponent of his in the Senate, stung by Gore's criticism, took to his feet and shouted, If you were not blind, I'd beat you to within an inch of your life. And Senator Gore simply responded, Blindfold the so-and-so, and point him in my direction. Tax hikes, budget-busting spending bills, job-destroying protectionism, a new round of soaring inflation the momentum in Washington is building.


As I have said since the beginning of this campaign, today virtually all that stands between us and a return to the malaise economy of the 1970's is the Presidential veto. And to make this point so clear that Congress cannot possibly understand me, permit me once again to repeat my commitment. As far as I am concerned, our tax reform for the American people is, to borrow the title of the current hit movie, untouchable. And if any tax hike ever comes across my desk, my handling of the veto pen will make the way Elliott Ness went after Al Capone look like child's play. But important as the Presidential veto power may be, we dare not rely upon it alone. No, we need more to protect the hard-won achievements of these past 6 years. And it is for this reason to protect our prosperity and our jobs, to promote more growth and opportunity that I have proposed our Economic Bill of Rights. The people are entitled to the fruits of their labor and shall not be burdened by excessive taxation. What does this mean? It means that more than a mere majority of the Congress should be required to raise taxes not just 50 percent plus one, maybe 60 percent, maybe two-thirds. I know when I was Governor of California it took twothirds of the legislature to pass the budget, and it took 60 percent of the voters to pass a bond issue. They have cried out in fright in Washington as if I have suggested something unconstitutional with regard to raising taxes. The future of succeeding generations shall not be mortgaged to the national debt through deficit spending. The Congress shall be required to balance the budget each and every year. Special interest legislation shall not be hidden from the people. The President shall have the right to veto individual appropriations. The President shall have the line-item veto. I used it 943 times when I was a Governor, and I miss it in Washington. The people are entitled to pursue their own livelihood, free from excessive regulation and tax-subsidized competition. I will appoint a Presidential commission to spearhead efforts to privatize public-owned enterprises. Educational development, creativity, and initiative will be fostered by diversity in our educational system. Welfare programs must not harm the structure of family and community. Through the use of incentives, the Congress will seek to lift the least fortunate to independence and full participation in American life and economy.


The Congress shall pass no measure that slows growth, shrinks markets, or destroys jobs by erecting high tariffs or other trade barriers. The Government shall take seriously the 5th and 14th amendment guarantees to life, liberty, and property. Whenever government expropriates the use or value of private property, whether outright or through government regulations, owners will be justly compensated. The burden of government shall not be hidden from view. The Congress shall require that a financial impact statement accompany each bill, specifying the economic growth, employment or the effect on economic growth and employment, and competition overseas. These last two points, truth in Federal spending and the requirement for a financial impact statement, bear directly upon your work as county officials. For in recent years, Congress has not been satisfied with just spending hundreds of billions of Federal funds. Congress has wanted to spend still more money, including the funds of State and local governments. The Federal Government appropriates millions for this or that program, then mandates that you participate in the program by spending millions of your own dollars or by complying with certain national standards to avoid the loss of Federal funds. In all this, mandates is just a fancy word for big government in Washington pushing around the levels of government that are closest to the people. Under our proposals, whenever Congress considered legislation that would impose costs on State and local governments, a statement of those costs would appear in the legislation itself, not buried in some obscure committee report. Still more significant, Congress would be required to state what they expect the impact to be on State and local governments and where the funds would come from, not leave it to local officials like you to explain to your constituents why you are forced to raise taxes because of something that happened in Washington. take federalism seriously and treat State and local governments with respect. Now, all that sounds good to me, but you are the one whose opinions count. Is not it high time Washington put its own house in order and stopped pushing you around? Socialist countries seem to experience some economic malaise precisely to the extent that they are Socialist. And in the Communist world, we see economic stagnation, material backwardness of every kind. Yes, in concentrating on it all but exclusively, the Soviet Union has been able to build its military into a formidable force. When was the last time you bought a car or there are some other things there even a good cheese or a videocassette recorder and the label read, Made in the U.S.S.R. ?


In our own nation, too, we have recent examples that prove how important it is for government to respect economic rights. No property is more private, no property is more personal, even intimate, than an individual's income. It directly represents the labor, day-in and day-out, of one's mind and hands. It is used for the necessities of life itself, to provide for one's family, to make possible the adventure of building a better life. Yet during the 1970's, the Federal Government showed a high-handed disregard for this most fundamental form of property, taxing it at higher and higher levels, permitting inflation to raise effective tax rates again and again. Well, our administration changed all that. We cut tax rates, indexed tax brackets, then simplified the entire tax system with our historic tax reform. The connection between effort and reward was reestablished, giving virtually every participant in our economy new incentives for achievement. Today unemployment stands at the lowest rate in almost 8 years. Government revenues at the Federal level and for most State and local governments have actually gone up. The stock and bond markets have risen to record highs. And come this Thanksgiving, this tax cut-led expansion if it is still going on on Thanksgiving Day will go into the books as the longest peacetime expansion ever to take place in this nation. And perhaps most important, we have seen the creation of more than 13 million new jobs. Yet all that we have achieved our hard-won victory over inflation, the millions of new jobs all these are in danger. It is our duty to protect them, to secure for ourselves and our children the economic rights that will enable our nation, now and into the 21st century, to become a still greater land, a land of ever-increasing prosperity and ever-widening opportunity. In this bicentennial year of our Constitution, I submit to you that we see in the vision of the Founding Fathers and in the Constitution itself the promise of a government that is good, because it respects its citizens' rights, both political and economic, and that has chosen once and for all to live within its own means. And now I ask you to join me; join me, my friends, in making that promise come true. I cannot conclude without telling another little story here. I have got a new hobby.


Boy, he was hot to-Thank you, Chairman Wilhelm, for your outnight, was not he? And thank you, Senator Bradley, for being here with us tonight and for your work on this event and for your steadfast effort to get a health care bill out of the Senate Finance Committee that actually protects the American people's health care. And I want to ask all of you here to help him be reelected to the Senate in New Jersey this year. We need him back there. In addition to all the dignitaries from New York, I understand that we have two Democratic congressional candidates from New Jersey, and maybe you could raise your hands. Shine a light on that man; he is running for office. There you are, Lou, it is good to see you. Ladies and gentlemen, when I was nominated for President by Governor Cuomo, I thought he gave one of the best speeches I ever heard. And about halfway through it, I looked at Hillary and I said, Who is he talking about anyway? By the time he got through that speech, I felt like a real President. And tonight I am also in his debt for his wonderful words, for his profound way of telling the truth, for his leadership in New York, and for his love for New York. People ask me sometimes kind of cynics, who do not know what it is like to really love where you are from how Mario Cuomo could be doing this again. And I said, I may be the only person in America that understands this, but if I had not been just absolutely obsessed with the direction the country was taking in 1992 and convinced it was wrong, I'd still be Governor of my State. It is the best job in the world if you are lucky enough to be in a place where you love. And he loves this State. He loves you, and you ought to keep him doing what he is doing. I also want to say, I am glad to see all the musicians here with all their talent. I hope I get to hear a little music before I have to go tonight. But there is really nothing for me to say; Mario said it all. Ditto, I could say. Let me say the stakes this year are very high because they will determine the extent to which and the shape of our continued forward progress. When I was elected President, we'd had 12 years of exploding deficits.

Remarks at a Democratic National Committee Reception in New York City


And I knew we had to bring the deficit down, we had to bring interest rates down, we had to get investment up in our people, we had to put the American people first again. And we came up with a plan, with the help of a lot of people from New York, including my National Economic Adviser, Bob Rubin, that would do those things. And when I say well, maybe it sounds good but it is not human sometimes to say, we had the biggest deficit reduction in history; we are going to have 3 years of deficit reduction in a row for the first time since Harry Truman was President of the United States; we have had two budgets passed on time for the first time in 17 years; last year we had the first year without a Presidential veto in 60 years. And you say, well, what does all that mean? 3.4 million of your fellow Americans have jobs that they did not have. That is what it means. Sixteen million American taxpayers with children, who work for a living, are going to get an income tax cut out of our economic plan, so they will be encouraged to stay working and not go on welfare 16 million of them. Twenty million students are eligible, 20 million students are eligible for low-interest-rate loans and better repayment terms under the student loan program because we changed that, so no one will ever have an excuse that The cost is too much, and I cannot go to college again. Ninety percent of the small businesses in this country, under that economic program, were eligible for a tax cut. All they had to do was invest more money in their business, hire more people, and make this economy grow. Five and a half million Americans refinanced their homes because the interest rates went down. I just came back from St. Louis; in the previous 4 years they lost 2,000 jobs. In the first year of our administration, they gained 28,000 as automobiles in America came back. That is what it means. How many million people, we will never know, under the Family and Medical Leave Act, are now able to take a little time off when their baby's born or when their parents are sick? We know that thousands of lives will be saved because of the Brady bill. We know that; we have evidence of that.


We know that because of that assault weapons ban, police will be able to go out on the street with a little more confidence that they will not be outgunned by the people they are supposed to protect the rest of us from. We know that. These are real things that affect the real lives of real people. It is not easy to break habits of gridlock that, frankly, are the province not just of the other party, which says no a lot of the time, but of the cumbersome procedures which grip Washington. But we have been working on it. The world trade agreement, GATT, hung around for 7 years. We are going to ratify it this year. The family leave law hung around for 7 years and got vetoed twice . The Brady bill took 7 years, but it passed. The assault weapons ban to give you an idea of how difficult change is, we had for the assault weapons ban, all the living former Presidents, every police organization in the United States of America, and this President working as hard as he could, and we beat the NRA by two votes. But we are doing it. We are breaking gridlock. We are making changes. It is affecting people's lives in ways that are profound and important. And a lot of it involves not just the Government doing something for somebody but empowering people to do something for themselves. Governor Cuomo's son, Andrew, now a leader and Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, has been a leader in empowering people, starting with the homeless to the people in public housing, to live safe, constructive lives. We are trying to change the rules. No more Government handouts but Government handups, real partnerships, real community building, really trying to help people take control of their own lives. These things matter to real people. And the American people are beginning to sense this. And the more they sense it, the more we will be able to cut through the fog and let the clear sky show and the more we will be able to run on what we have done for the American people to help them help themselves. It is going to make a real difference in the life of this country. Americans have a well-known cynicism for Government. My senior Senator back home used to say that half the American people are convinced the Government would mess up a one-car parade. But you know something? We do some things pretty well. The Republicans talked about bringing down the deficit. We did it.


They talked about generating economic growth. We contributed to that. They talked about having less Government. You know, they always complained about that. But when our budgets are implemented, we will reduce over 5 years the National Government by a quarter of a million people, not by firing people but by attrition. We will use all the savings to pay for that crime bill to put another 100,000 police officers on the streets of New York and the other cities of this country. We will have the smallest Federal Government since John Kennedy was President. It will be producing more work, and the American people will be safer on their streets. That is the kind of thing that we ought to do. We can make Government work for ordinary people in ways that make sense and change lives. But let me say, everything I have tried to do to empower people to get the economy going, to make Government work for ordinary people again, all of those things are embodied in this struggle to provide health care to all Americans. People have been trying to do it for 60 years. Roosevelt wanted to do it; Truman wanted to do it. President Nixon President Nixon proposed requiring employers and employees to buy health insurance. President Carter tried to do it. We have worked for months and months and months. We worked for 9 months and involved thousands and thousands of people to put together a proposal. It will not be right for everybody. Surely, there is some things that can be improved about it. I went out and listened to the American people. They said, do a little more for small business and make sure you are going to protect small business, and make it a little less regulatory. And trust the American people to take more voluntary actions at work, but make sure you cover everybody. So we made some changes, and we did that. And there are now bills on the floor of the House and the Senate for the first time ever in the whole history of the Republic that would cover all Americans with health care. But the forces of opposition are very strong. We were talking at dinner how the great Italian political theorist, Machiavelli, said 500 years ago there was nothing so difficult in all of human affairs than to change the established order of things. Because the people that lose know it, and they fight you like crazy. And the people that are going to win are never quite sure you can deliver the goods. And so they are often not there in the trenches.


Today we had over 100 distinguished doctors and medical personnel from all over America, including many from New York City, representing the academic health centers of America. And a brilliant doctor stood up and said, you know, people say they wish to protect what is best about American health care and fix what is wrong, but they are afraid they will mess it up if they try to fix it. Unless we finally join the ranks of all other advanced countries and provide health care to everybody, we are not going to be able to afford to keep our finest medical centers going, training the finest doctors and nurses and medical professionals. He said they run ads against the President's program, saying that if you cover everybody you will ration health care. Tell that to the 39 million Americans that do not have any health care. I say that to make this point. breaking gridlock, defeating special interests, arguing for a future, and asking people to work toward that future and making Government work for ordinary people, not to give them anything but to permit them to access a system that will enable people to take care of themselves and their families. I spend a lot of time talking to laboring groups of people, saying, I am trying to make change your friend and not your enemy; support my trade policies. Yes, it'll change the economy more and you will have to change jobs more often, but we will be more prosperous and we will provide lifetime training policies for you. And here are all these things I am trying to do to change our education and training policies to make change your friend. But I just want to tell you folks, I met two kids today when I came to New York. Whenever I go to a city, I try to let the Make-A-Wish Foundation or some other group bring some children to see me who are sick and who have health problems. And one of these children had a condition that may be fatal, but it is been in remission for a couple years 12-year-old boy, just graduated at the top of his class in elementary school here in New York City. He may have a good, long, healthy life, but I am telling you, if his parents lost their jobs, what would he do for health care? And if they tried to get another job, could they get health coverage for a child like that?


I met a 17-year-old boy Mayor Dinkins, you can be proud of this who was wheelchair-bound, has been all his life, has a severe muscular disorder from childhood very bright young man, computer expert, wanted to write me on the White House E-mail, and I told him I was too dumb to use it, but I'd read it if he sent it. And he gave me a letter he prepared about obstacles for handicapped children and what his life was going to be like. And he said, You know, this wheelchair of mine cost, I think he said, $15,000. And he said his parents were immigrants, both of them were immigrants. And he said, Because my mother works for the city of New York, our family has been able to maintain a middle class lifestyle because our health policy pays for 80 percent of my bills. But it is been hard even for us. I had expensive surgery. I have this expensive wheelchair; I will have to replace it soon. But he said, So many of my young friends are almost destitute who are physically handicapped because of the conditions that exist. And if we were getting a good deal, the rest of us, that would be fine, but your country's spending 40 percent more on health care than any other country in the world. And it is only because we have refused to discipline ourselves to provide health care to everybody, like all our competitors do, that these stories are out there. We have to fight those who say we cannot do it. We can turn this economy around. If we can bring this deficit down, when nobody thought we could do it, if we can break gridlock, we can do this too. I ran for this job because I wanted to do what I could with the power vested by the framers of our Constitution in the Presidency to change the lives of ordinary Americans for the better. And anything, anything that diverts, divides, distracts, or destroys the spirit and the purpose of the American people, when we have so much on our plate here at home and around the world, is not good. And anything that unifies and makes us believe in ourselves and makes us better and gives our children a chance to have a better future is good. That is what we represent.


Woodrow Wilson once said that the Office of President requires the constitution of an athlete, the patience of a mother, and the endurance of an early Christian. Personally, I think he may have overstated the requirements of the Presidency. But from very long and close observation of 34 years, it seems to me that President Wilson may have been describing the requirements for congressional page. So, whether your experience on the Hill has been long or brief, each of you in this page class this morning has been through a very rigorous and a very demanding test. And I want you to know--each of you to know--that I am extremely proud of you. From this point on you will turn upward along many different paths. All of you are exceptional young men with exceptional training. I am sure that in your choices of professions or other pursuits many of you will achieve exceptional success. Whatever your pursuit, however, I hope that the experience you have had at the heart of our representative democratic system will always be a part of your life. Even if you do not choose a career of public service, I hope as private citizens you will live your lives with a high and an active sense of public duty and responsibility. This is a time of change in America. All of us are awakening to the fact that America today is far different from the land into which my generation or your generation was born. The answers, the attitudes, and the approaches of 30 years ago, or 20 years ago, or even 5 years ago, are not now adequate to meet the new obligations or the new opportunities of the 1960's. As one who shares with you a very abiding respect and affection for the Congress, I am especially gratified and pleased by the response that Congress itself has made last year and this year toward meeting the change of our changing times. Congress has done much to silence the critics and the cynics who have belabored it and who have attempted to downgrade it. You can all be proud that you served during a season when the Congress of the United States was strengthened and revitalized as a functioning, responsive, and conscientiously responsible branch of our system of government. And I am pleased that at their own direction they are now engaging in a considerable amount of introspection and study on how they can make the Congress stronger and better and more effective. As this is a changing land, so America stands as a part of the changing world.

Remarks at the Graduation Ceremony of the School for Capitol Page Boys.


There are some who would have mankind believe that the only choices of these times are choices between political philosophies. In a real sense, the choice facing men in every nation today, old or young, large and small, is a choice between moving into the modern world with all of its unlimited potential or turning back toward the restrictive world that is dominated by the dogma and the doctrine of the 19th century. So, in your lifetimes, and in the lifetimes of a majority of the nations on earth, the total of human knowledge has doubled twice. The growth of human knowledge has made obsolete many of the causes of friction and contention and division among nations. Certainly the advance of human knowledge has made war itself obsolete and impossible as a means of resolving differences between large or small nations. Above all, the growth of human knowledge has rendered obsolete and archaic the doctrine on which the dogma of communism was constructed. Man today has in his capacity the potential of ending human misery or ending human life. We can really, for the first time, see the promise and the prospect of eliminating hunger and poverty, illness, bias, and prejudice in our own land and, we would hope, all around the world. So, this is the work that we want to do. And this is the work which your generation will do. And that is why I have said over, and over, and over again that we of the United States invite all peoples--East and West--to pull back their curtains, and to tear down their walls, and to come out of the darkness of dogma and walk all together in the bright light of human knowledge and human freedom toward the peace that mankind must make together, and must keep together, on this earth. I have seen many classes of Capitol pages graduate throughout the years. I would say that the class of which you are members faces the brightest and the most thrilling and the most hopeful prospects of any. For never before have young men like yourselves had so sure and so strong a prospect of being a part of the constructive building of a sane and a sensible and a rational world. Whatever profession you choose as your own, I hope you will never forget that the ultimate success of our system rests upon the contributions that every citizen makes to public service. What did I do today to make my country better, to make it stronger, to make my Government more efficient and more useful?


And whether as the elected or the elector you will have a great opportunity to be leaders of your times in fostering the responsible and the responsive politics that is needed at every level--local and State, as well as national and international ? You have been privileged to know some of the great leaders of these times in the legislative halls. And I hope that when your time comes you will keep faith by being leaders then in the cause of peace and freedom for the world, and for progress for all of humankind. I went to sleep last night after reading a letter from a mother who was the mother of only one child, and that boy was now 20 years of age. And she had just gotten a letter from him and he said in 20 days he would be on his way to Viet-Nam. And she said, Mr. , I hesitate to take your time to write this letter, but I did not want to see my boy go away unless and until I could have your assurance that our Government and our country needs that boy and needs him where he is going. He had lost his father. It was a difficult letter to dictate an answer to, but I had to write it this morning. And I told her that our liberty and our freedom was so precious, and liberty and freedom was in danger. And we had to call upon those who were capable and equipped to help us protect it. And all of us in our own way were doing the very best we could to preserve freedom, and that I did think it was necessary. The mother had said in her letter that if t felt that, that she would not , under any circumstances, object, although she did have to admit that while she did not want him out of the service, and she did not want him not to face up to his duty, she had to admit that she did not look with any favor to his going to that place at this time. So, those of you who in a short time will be in the service of your country in one capacity or another, know how blessed you are to live in a system that was inherited by you as the result of the sacrifice of many thousands of young men like yourselves. I believe that as you leave your present work that you will have gained from the halls of the Congress a sense of duty and a sense of responsibility that will always make the job of serving your country a pleasant one for you.


I first apologize for the fact that we have kept you waiting. But as we came through the city the crowds were so large that we were unable to keep on our schedule. that the people of Berlin are free and that despite a wall this is one city and one people and one nation. I saw many signs as we came through the streets of the city some were in English, most were in German. The ones in German, of course, I could not understand. But there was one sign that was a combination that made me feel very much at home. I first came to this city 22 years ago. At that time most of those that I see here, or many of those, were not yet born. And to many who came here then, Berlin seemed to be a city without hope and without a future. But the pessimists at that period, over 20 years ago, did not know the people of Berlin. And it is you who have done it. It is you who have rebuilt this great city; it is you who have stood the shock of crises; it is you who have kept the faith in yourselves and in your allies. Berlin may look lonely on the map -but it is a vital part of the world that believes in the capacity of man to govern himself with responsibility and to shape his destiny in dignity. If this is an age of symbols, one of the great symbols of the age is this city. And what you do here is done for free men everywhere throughout the world. You stand for a cause much bigger than yourselves and this is the greatest destiny that a man or a woman can have. Because your will to remain free strengthens the will to freedom of all men; your courage in the face of deliberate and constant challenge fortifies the courage of all those who love liberty. The presence of an American President in Berlin, following a recent visit by a British Prime Minister, is another kind of symbol. It is a way of demonstrating unmistakably our long-standing commitment to the people of West Berlin. No unilateral move, no illegal act, no form of pressure from any source will shake the resolve of the Western nations to defend their rightful status as protectors of the people of free Berlin. All the world admires bravery. Bravery in a crisis is expected of those who love freedom; what is much more difficult, much more rare, is bravery day-by-day the steady fortitude that resists remorseless pressure and refuses to permit the slow erosion of liberties.

Remarks at the Siemens Factory, West Berlin.


That is the remarkable bravery of the Berliner, and it stands as a shining example to people everywhere throughout the world. The partnership between our two peoples was forged back in the dark days of the blockade when men like Lucius Clay and Ernst Reuter1 personified our determination to survive as free men. It is appropriate, 20 years after the end of that blockade, that we pay tribute to all who suffered for the ideal of freedom in those days of physical privation and spiritual triumph. As I viewed the progress of this vital city today, I knew that that sacrifice was not in vain. You have justified the support and the commitment of your friends and, as a result, no city in the world has more friends, or more devoted friends, than has the city of Berlin. The American responsibility here is derived from the most solemn international agreements. But what we have gone through together in those 24 years has given those agreements a special meaning. Berlin must remain free. I do not say this in any spirit of bravado or belligerence. I am simply stating an irrevocable fact of international life. Our commitment to the freedom of Berlin has never been more steady, never more firm than it is today. that Berlin shall be free and that Berlin shall live. For its part, Berlin has remained steadfast. No one should doubt the determination of the United States to live up to its obligations. The question before the world is not whether we shall rise to the challenge of defending Berlin we have already demonstrated that we shall. The question now is how best to end the challenge and clear the way for a peaceful solution to the problem of a divided Germany. When we say that we reject any unilateral alteration of the status quo in Berlin, we do not mean that we consider the status quo to be satisfactory. Nobody benefits from a stalemate, least of all the people of Berlin. Let us set behind us the stereotype of Berlin as a provocation. Let us, all of us, view the situation in Berlin as an invocation, a call to end the tension of the past age here and everywhere. Without haste, but without rest. That is how, step by step, we shall strive together to construct a durable peace. There were times in the past when Berlin had to stand its ground in defiance of powerful forces that threatened to overwhelm it. Your determination in those times of danger demonstrated beyond the shadow of a doubt that threats and coercion could never succeed.


I am indeed proud to join that company of men which has been awarded this medal during these years since Mr. Hoover first accepted it. And that reminds me that 30 years is just too long a time to elapse between Republican Presidents. And that is a sentiment which I think Mr. Hoover would share. Ladies and gentlemen, as I listened to the statistics with which I was overwhelmed by General--and we called him Slam Marshall--I had the feeling it was a rather good thing he did not know all those figures, and give them to me somewhere along about December of 1944. I would have been so impressed that I think my mind would have been taken off the war. And certainly it is enlightening, even at this late date, to find out exactly what such devoted and professionally competent people achieved. And indeed it was the confidence of military men that our technical and professional people could do this. That was at the bottom of the plan that came later to be known as Operation Overlord. This plan came finally to a preliminary state of completion in about April of 1942. It was placed before General Marshall and all of the possibilities were explained to him, and he approved and later got the approval, of course, of the President and the British counterparts. But they also had the great faith that the American engineering profession could provide us the equipment and the materiel that would be needed, finally, for victory. There are one or two incidents that General Marshall did not mention. I am not going to go too deeply into statistics, but there is a story--a true one--that I thought always was interesting. The American engineers equipped with the kind of mechanisms such as he mentioned , went over to Malta; and there was a British air officer, General Park, a very competent and gallant man, who knew that the Americans needed a new fighter field fight close by. The only spot that was possible to use was an island and I think it was named Gozo, but if I am wrong General Gruenther will tell me after we leave this meeting. But anyway it was nothing but a mountain. And the British having long ago given up with their hand tools on building this field, said to the engineer colonel visiting for the evening, How long would it take you to get this field ready? And the British thought, at least, that anything under a year, if you could do it at all, would be all right. And this man took a look and said, Oh, 12 to 14 days.

Remarks Upon Receiving the Hoover Medal Award


And the British officer was so astonished, and really so insulted in a sense, he said, When can you start? .... Well, he said, let us see what headquarters will give me. And he cabled back to Africa--he was over in Sicily--and it happened that all this equipment was in a harbor in Philippeville and ready to go, so it went right over. From the time the equipment reached there, 13 days later, our first fighter flew on and off the field. And General Park made a special flight to me and said, I take back everything about American bragging; it is all true. And then, many months later, we were about to go across the Rhine, and we made finally, down near Wesel, what we called a power crossing. It was way down toward the mouth--it was flooded rivers and it looked pretty bad--all the bridges of course were blown, as the general said. But we wanted a railroad bridge just to the north of the river, and so the supply people, showing their confidence in themselves, invited me-and I think it was 12 days later--to ride on the first train that was to go across the Rhine on their bridge. They had not yet gotten all the piles and equipment on the side. Well, the amazing thing is that 11 days I went up and they were ready to go, and I did not have time to stay, but they cut off a piece of rail and gave it to me as a trinket to show that they had done it. That was another of those great accomplishments that people called impossible and therefore took a little time to do. But finally there was one little incident that impressed me almost more than any other. We had in Normandy what is called the bocage country, and it is a country that is very closely bounded and broken up with hedges, fields the size of this room are not uncommon, and these hedges are so old that they have banks of earth formed up around them. And so you have these big hedges--enormous--sometimes 20 feet high--15 feet and that kind, growing out of these big banks of earth. Every time our tanks would try to go across, of course, they would belly up, and even a machine gun would go through them, and we were losing tanks and pretty helpless. His name was Culin, and he had an idea.


And his idea was that we could fasten knives, great big steel knives in front of these tanks, and as they came along they would cut off these banks right at the ground level--they would go through on the level keel--would carry with themselves a little bit of camouflage for awhile. And this idea was brought to the captain, to the major and to the colonel, and it got high enough that somebody did something about it-and that was General Bradley--and he did it very quickly. Because this seemed like a crazy idea, they did not even go to the engineers very fast, because they were afraid of the technical advice, but then someone did have a big question, Where are you going to get the steel for all this thing? Well now, happily, the Germans tried to keep us from going on the beaches with great steel chevaux de frise --big crosses, they were all big bars of steel down on the beach where the Germans left it. And he got it--got these things sharpened up--and it worked fine. The biggest and happiest group I suppose in all the Allied Armies that night were those that knew that this thing worked. Now Sergeant Culin later had a leg shot off, but he is still strong and healthy--in New York the last time I saw him--a salesman. And he is one of those humble Americans who had an idea, who had the courage to bring it up to someone who could do something about it. And unquestionably he saved--the idea, properly implemented, of course, by technical and professional men--saved thousands of lives. So that I submit that sometimes your engineering profession can profit by a little bit of lay imagination and wit. By no means, my friends, did I mean to supplement General Marshall's history with these little accounts, but I could not help having my mind jumping around to the theatre of those years, and exciting years. I cannot tell you how proud I am for the award I have been given, how complimented I am by General' Marshall's brilliant remarks this evening, and how happy indeed that I have met so many of you this evening. see you again one day, when I am not quite so busy as today.


I am very proud and very delighted to be here on this particular occasion. I was saying, for the one real Westerner up here at the head table, he sure is duded up. You know, I was very worried--and we were just talking about it--we were worried, Did they really mean that? So you can imagine my relief when I met Pete out there at the airport and saw, yep, they did, because I had a picture of myself standing up here this way in front of a bunch of people dressed like the lawyer from the East. But I can only tell you, after a year and a half in Washington, somebody says casual western to me, that is what they are going to get. The Senate has been called the most exclusive club in the world. The hundred men and women there represent the 50 States. And you know, sometimes we forget or sometimes we are young enough that we just did not know or were not aware that that is exactly what the Senators do represent-that not too many years ago it was changed to popular election?and that Senators were actually chosen by State governments. They are there to represent the interests in this federation of sovereign States of their particular sovereign State as well as the national interests of the federation. In about 10 weeks, Californians are going to choose which of two men is best able to represent the State. One of them has held the highest elective office in this State, that of Governor. He took office 8 years ago, in the middle of the fiscal year, with a $500 million surplus in the State cash box. Previous to that, the State of California had returned the last surplus before that $500 million-we could not return it because the administration had to leave in the middle of the fiscal year?but the one previous to that we turned back $850 million in the form of a rebate. And I have often thought nothing ever delineated so clearly the difference between the two parties as the statement of a Senator in the opposing party who stormed into my office one day when we were giving back that $850 million and said he considered that giving that money back was a misuse of public funds. Well, the new Governor did not give back the $500 million. And now he seeks to move on to greener fields, leaving the State a few million dollars in the hole, which is against the constitution of the State of California.

Remarks at a Fund-raising Dinner in Los Angeles, California, for United States Senate Candidate Pete Wilson


And it is a little frightening when you stop to think that if he were in Washington, he would not be dealing in millions, he'd be dealing in billions. Now, as an alternative, we can choose a man who was a part of the California State Legislature when California was climbing out of that fiscal swamp, turning back to the people surpluses every time we got one as rebates to the people. He then became mayor of one of our great cities. And that city is recognized nationwide as one of the best run communities in the United States. Will we make our choice based on campaign slogans or spot ads? Or will we, the people of California, do as Al Smith admonished once and look at the record? Is there any relationship between what the Governor says he will do and what the Governor has done? I understand, though, that a Senator from Massachusetts is going to come out here and campaign in his behalf. That same Senator from Massachusetts came out and campaigned for a relative of the present Governor 16 years ago when I was running. And he made a great point up and down the State that the people should watch out, because I had never held public office before. Well, you know, he had never held public office before he became a Senator. As a matter of fact, he'd never held a job. But let me try and tell you how important it is that we hold this slim lead that we have, that slim majority in the United States Senate. It is the first time that we have had a majority in one of the Houses of Congress in decades. And without that, we could not achieve what has been achieved in the last year and a half. Well, I think one of the most historic changes in government?a 180-degree turn from the historic pattern over the last decades of tax and tax and spend and spend, and do not worry about the public debt, we owe it to ourselves. When we took office, it was at the end of 2, years of double-digit inflation?12.4 percent was the rate when we arrived; the interest rate, 21 1/2 percent, prime rate. The rate of increase in government spending had touched 18 percent, and 2, million workers, in that last campaign year of 1980, had lost their jobs. We were not quite to the middle of the fiscal year when we took office so the '81 budget was in place, and there was not much we could do about that.


But we had to proceed immediately with the fiscal budget for '82, which would go into effect on October of 1981. That budget was you know, under the pattern in Washington budgets are proposed for a few years in advance. The unemployment kept on increasing, the recession of 1980 became the recession of 1981. But I remember campaigning in which I stood in communities and areas in which the unemployment rate at that time had reached as high as 20 percent, and I called it a depression. And I was immediately corrected by the incumbent, who said it was a recession. I do not know whether you will recall, but I told him that a recession was when your neighbor lost his job; a depression was when you'd lost yours-- --and relief would be when he lost his. But we proposed an economic recovery program almost the instant that we were there, and it was a long and hard struggle, if you will remember. And then just about this time of year a year ago, we passed and I signed here in California our economic recovery program which reduced proposed government spending over the next 3 years by $130 billion and contained also the greatest tax cut?single tax cut in the history of the United States. Now, the program did not go into effect until October of last year, but by September the critics were already calling it a failure. It had not started yet, so to make it easier to identify they renamed it Reaganomics. Now, I do not think they were trying to honor me? ?with that, but if they were, I just want them to know that I had already received a distinguished honor that they could in no way equal. In the tiny village of Ballyporeen in County Tipperary in Ireland, where my great-grandfather left from to come to America, they have named a pub after me. You see, if you are for free enterprise, the word gets around. It continues to be phased in over a 3-year period. The second part of that, the second phase was the tax cut that you all received on the first of July. The 12.4-percent inflation rate has been running at less than 6 percent for the last 6 months. And after a decade of decline, after a time when incomes went up some 120-odd percent but the actual real earnings of the American people kept going down and the standard of living kept going down, personal income for July -- that single month, up 1 percent.


And if you wanted to annualize that instead of keep on doing that every month, that is a 12-percent increase. Disposable personal income after payment of income tax went up 2.1 percent in July. The savings rate?and in this country of ours, for the last several years personal savings, the very essential to having a capital pool for investment that industry can borrow from -- that savings has been less than that of our counterparts in the other industrial nations in the world. But in June, before the tax cut, it had gone up to 7.3 percent. It had been 6.9 percent in May. It has been steadily down for the months and a long time before, as I have said. You do not get the figures as early on that one, so we will wait a few weeks before we know what it is for July. Housing starts were up 34 percent in July. The permits for new housing were up 174,000 over June. Ninety-day Treasury notes upon which we were paying 15 1/2-percent interest?the government was paying just a couple of weeks ago--are now down to less than 8 percent. Fraud and waste--and we have a task force that is been in that and reporting to me every 6 months, and the last report on their 6 months they had saved $5.8 billion for us?thousand of audits, thousands of indictments, and hundreds and hundreds of convictions. And last year's tax cut, which as I say was to be phased in over a 3-year period, is still the largest tax cut in history in spite of what happened last week, because over the 3 years, the coming 3 years, even with the bill that has just been passed, the American people will get a tax cut in these 3 years of $335 billion. And accompanying that will be spending outlay reductions of $280 billion. federalism. There is a program that we have been working with Governors-well, some Governors.


We have been working with mayors, we have been working with city council members, county officials, State legislatures, to work out a return to the tenth amendment; to give back to the States and the cities and the counties of this country the programs, the powers, the authority that were unjustly seized by the Federal Government in denial of the tenth amendment of the Constitution; to put government, as much as possible, those functions that are proper, back in those levels of government that are closest to the people. Now, who would you like to have in California helping administer that switch back to that kind of federalism? Someone whose first great battle of history-making proportions was against the medfly? Or someone who has served in the State legislature for years, someone who has now served as the mayor of one of our major cities for years, who knows the local problems and knows what the Federal Government should do if we are to have the kind of honest government, efficient government that we should have for all of us throughout the Nation? If ever there was a watchword that was appropriate, it is in this election. And that is, with Pete Wilson's opponent, with regard to him, that we should say, Pay attention to what he does, not what he says. Let me just give you a little example. It was not too long ago that he stepped up to the 155-millimeter microphones and fired a salvo at Jim Watt. And it was all about--he single-handedly, the Governor of California, was going to protect the coastline of California from the threat of oil. And this summer alone, the present Governor of California has approved drilling permits for 20 more wells on the very edge of the Santa Barbara sanctuary. Well, when we were in Sacramento, as Pete knows, we'd laid out some of the great scenic areas of California and drew lines out to the 3-mile limit and said, No matter what, there will be no drilling inside these beautiful scenic areas. And a Republican administration in Washington continued the line on out beyond the 3-mile limit and said, We will observe your sanctuaries. They may not be in the sanctuary, but you can throw a rock from any one of them into the sanctuary from where they are going to be drilled. So, as I say, he talked a great war; he has not exactly been fighting that war. This?I cannot tell you?and This is the first time I have ever been a before-dinner speaker.


But nothing of what we have achieved, nothing of what we have accomplished could have been done if we did not, for one of these rare moments in history, have that majority in the United States Senate. I'd like to have a majority in the other House, but in off-year elections history says that you do not usually gain in that off-year election. But I can tell you this. The Senator who is coming out to campaign for Pete's opponent is a member of a very exclusive little group of a half a dozen Senators who have set an all-time record in the history of the Senate for spending; in fact, more spending than any other Senators that have ever been there. We know some of the things advocated by Pete's opponent and what he would stand for. I have not touched on another area, but one of which I am very proud. When we took office, the supposed voluntary military was a failure. People were talking that we could not exist or have a good defense without the draft. Now, even though we have a registration?and I am convinced that that is worth keeping?I am opposed to a peacetime draft and I am even more so now, because we do not need it. We found that half our airplanes could not fly on any given day for lack of spare parts. We found that on any given day there were Navy vessels that could not leave port either because they did not have enough crew or they did not have enough parts. And we set out to do something about that. Now, we have been accused of spending too much on military and cutting social reform programs too much, and I know which side Pete's opponent would come down on on that, and I know where Pete would come down from his experience as a legislator. I think it should be recognized that when John F. Kennedy was President, only 27 percent of his budget went for the social reforms to help the needy and the helpless in this country, and 46 percent went for defense. In our budget for 1983, about 53 percent of our budget is going for the needy and the helpless, and only 29 percent is going for defense. And yet, the morale, the esprit de corps, the reenlistments of men in the service?men and women in the service today, the level, the educational level of the people going into the service making it a career, is something we have not seen in a great many years.


And I just have to tell you one of my favorite little stories about that. Our Ambassador to Luxembourg wrote me a letter, and he said that he had been up on the East German border, visiting the Second Armored Cavalry Regiment. And he told me how great they looked. And then he said that one of these fellows, a 19-yearold trooper, followed him over to his helicopter and asked him if he could get a message to me. And the kid said, Well, will you tell the President that we are proud to be here, and we ain't scared o' nothin'. I just thought you'd like to know about the attitude of those who are guarding our shores, because they are the real freedom fighters. It is by doing their job and doing it right that they can be a deterrent to war. And you have never gone into a war because you were too strong; you go into them when the other fellow thinks you are not strong. So, you have, really, a clear-cut choice here. The more strength we have in the Senate, the more we can gain allies over there in the House. You send Pete Wilson. San Diego will find a way to get along without him. You send Pete Wilson to Washington. And just?if you cannot send him, do not send anybody. And, as I say, I know I am preaching to the choir, because you would not be here if you did not -- --feel that way. But God bless you all. And we are going to keep it up in Washington. And we are going to keep the country turned around on this new course until we have reduced the percentage of gross national product that is being taken by the Government and being spent by the Government until once again Government is back spending within its means. And then my dream is that day we make the first payment, I do not care what size it is, on the national debt to prove to our kids that we are not going to dump it all on them. Let me just say, deep, if you will, in your hearts?! said, I think, the last time I was out here and, maybe, to many of you, I do not know all the national anthems in the world, but I do know this. I do not know of any other that ends with a question. Does that star spangled banner yet wave o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?


You have done me a very great honor. Perhaps you can imagine what a feeling it is for a citizen of one of the newest of the great nations to be made a citizen of this ancient city. It is a distinction which I am sure you are conferring upon me as the representative of the great people for whom I speak. One who has been a student of history can not accept an honor of this sort without having his memory run back to the extraordinary series of events which have centered in this place. But as I have thought to-day, I have been impressed by the contrast between the temporary and the permanent things. Many political changes have centered about Rome, from the time when from a little city she grew to be the mistress of an empire, and change after change has swept away many things, altering the very form of her affairs, but the thing that has remained permanent has been the spirit of Rome and of the Italian people. That spirit seems to have caught with each age the characteristic purpose of the age. This imperial people now gladly represents the freedom of nations. This people which at one time seemed to conceive the purpose of governing the world now takes part in the liberal enterprise of offering the world its own government. I have been reflecting in these recent days about a colossal blunder that has just been made-the blunder of force by the Central Empires. If Germany had waited a single generation, she would have had a commercial empire of the world. She was not willing to conquer by skill, by enterprise, by commercial success. She must needs attempt to conquer by arms, and the world will always acclaim the fact that it is impossible to conquer it by arms; that the only thing that conquers it is the sort of service which can be rendered in trade, in intercourse, in friendship, and that there is no conquering power which can suppress the freedom of the human spirit. I have rejoiced personally in the partnership of the Italian and the American people, because it was a new partnership in an old enterprise, an enterprise predestined to succeed wherever it is undertaken-the enterprise that has always borne that handsome name which we call Liberty. Men have pursued it sometimes like a mirage that seemed to elude them, that seemed to run before them as they advanced, but never have they flagged in their purpose to achieve it, and I believe that I am not deceived in supposing that in this age of ours they are nearer to it than they ever were before.

Remarks at the Capitol in Rome, Italy


You got a lot of people standing outside trying to get in. Would anybody like to give up their slot? I want to just pay my respects. CPAC is really, what a job they have done, and I am thrilled to be back in the heart of Texas with the proud conservative patriots, who are courageously leading the battle to frankly save our country. That is what it is about. For a year before election, the fake news media said Texas was in play. It is in play. You know what in play means? And they were right, except it was totally in play for me. No, it was in play for me. They said, The polls have closed in Texas. ENTITY has won Texas. But how long did we listen to it? It was in play. it will never be in play if we have the right candidate. This state is never going to be in play. this is a very, very special place, and we are going to keep it the way it is, and we are going to bring back your energy. I told you this was going to happen. I told you. Actually, Texas believed us. With the help of everyone here today, we will defeat the radical left, the socialists, Marxists, and the critical race theorists. Whoever thought would be even using that term. We will secure our borders. We will stop left wing cancel culture. We will restore free speech and fair elections, and we will make America great again. From the very beginning, the people in this room have been some of the staunchest and fiercest supporters of our incredible movement, the greatest political movement in the history of our country. And I can say that, and nobody ever even challenges me. They do not challenge us. I want to personally thank each and every one of you for your incredible support, and your support of CPAC. You never stopped fighting for me, and I will never, ever stop fighting for you. I especially want to thank two wonderful and really extraordinary people who make this incredible event possible. You know them almost as well as I do. You have taken it to a whole new level. I appreciate it. Everybody appreciates it. Also with us is a true Texas conservative, and a real leader. He is fast on the draw. We love Ken. He is going back home to mom. His mom is a big supporter of ours, by the way. He is going to have a rough night.

Donald Trump CPAC 2021 Speech Transcript Dallas, TX


We are grateful to be joined as well by a wonderful, wonderful, not only political person, but a wonderful person, Governor Kristi Noem. And we have many, many members of Congress here. Could I ask our great Congress men and women to stand up please, right now? And countless other conservative leaders and politicians and people that we love and we respect, and we are fighting with and we are fighting for. For generations, the American conservative union has helped lead the charge to defend our values, protect our country, and preserve our glorious American heritage. You see they are taking our heritage away. But today that heritage is under threat like never before. He is mild by comparison. In a matter of mere months, Joe Biden has brought our country to the brink of ruin. Right here in Texas we are the epicenter of a border and migration crisis unlike anything anyone has ever seen before in the history of our country. At the same time, they have totally obliterated your energy industry. I told you. Under my administration, we achieved a historic reduction in illegal immigration. We ended the horrible catch and release, where we catch a criminal and release him into our country. We actually said, Nope, it is called stay in Mexico. And it worked very well, and we had the support of Mexico. Who else could do that? And you have a great president of Mexico, a friend of mine. He is done a great job. We are on opposite sides of the spectrum, but we got along great, and he is been terrific, and I appreciate it. We stopped asylum fraud, and we struck critical agreements with other countries to stop illegal immigration. We called it, in fact, remain in Mexico. Get released, and you never see these people again. They say, Come back in three years for a court case. We reduced drugs pouring across our border by the highest percentage ever. We shut down the migrant caravans. You have not seen those caravans. In those caravans, you have some deadly people. We dealt a crippling blow to MS-13. We deported criminal aliens by the thousands and thousands and thousands, and we built almost 500 miles of border wall, the exact wall that the border patrol wanted. I thought we could use nice concrete plank. They said, Sir, we want steel, concrete, and rebar. So we can all the drones the Democrat Remember they wanted drones? I said, Drones are not going to stop people.


Do you remember the statement during the campaign? Everything's obsolete like two days after they come up with it nowadays. They got a better one. In a thousand years, you will say, Wheels and walls. She has a nice wall around her house. Now the Biden administration has turned the border into the single greatest disaster in American history, and perhaps in world history. Nobody's ever seen a border like this. Other countries do not have a border like this. Illegal border crossings are up over 1,000% from last year. For the last three months in a row, more illegal alien minors have arrived than any other month in United States states history. This is the major pipeline for MS-13. These are the worst gang members, they say, anywhere in the world. They bring recruits to every state in our country. they run it like a business. What a job he is done. Think of that, and they are being resettled in cities and towns all across the United States at tax payers' expense. And the people in those cities and towns have no idea that they are coming. The tax payers will also be forced to pay for relatives to be flown from Central America to join them. Did you ever hear of chain migration? You come in illegally, and we will also bring your mother, your father, your grandparents, your brothers, your sisters, your aunts, your uncles. We had on the West Side Highway. He was driving rapidly down the West Side Highway at a very excessive speed. A big group of people, and he decided to make a right turn, and he killed many, and he maimed many. People go out because they want to put themselves in shape, and they end up going back home missing a leg, missing a couple of arms, or dead. And he had the right to bring people in with him. And he had many that he brought in, but we took very good care of him. But this administration does not do that. Many of these children, for the first time ever, it is a terrible thing that is happening to them, are on suicide watch. They end up in a place that they have no idea where it is. Meanwhile, ICE removals are at the lowest level ever, and they are great people. All of America's now one giant sanctuary city. We were fighting sanctuary cities, and doing very well. They are meant for criminal aliens. That is what they are meant for.


Under our administration, we sent a very different message to the coyotes, human traffickers, child smugglers, vicious criminal cartels, and savage MS-13 gang members. When I was president, illegal alien criminals knew that if they trespassed across our border, they would be caught, they would be detained, and they would be sent to jail, or we would send them the hell back to where they came from. We created the most secure border in all of American history by far. Biden's border crisis is also helping drive an unprecedented crime wave, and you see the crime wave. Even without this you see all in Democrat run cities. The bloodshed and violence in these cities is reaching epidemic proportions. Homicides are up 42% in Los Angeles, 37% in Philadelphia, 68% in Atlanta, and over 500% in Portland over this time last year. What they did to Portland, and nothing happens to Antifa, and nothing happens to BLM. But to people that are patriots or conservatives or Republicans, they stay in jails for extended periods of time, and they destroy their lives. We are not going to take it anymore. In New York City, crime is out of control. It is at record levels with nobody being prosecuted except of course innocent Republicans are being prosecuted. The Democrats know their policies on crime are so unpopular, so radical, so crazy, they are now trying to pretend they never led the defund the police movement in the first place. We never said defund the police. You know who did it? The Republicans did it. That is what they do. ENTITY had to do with Russia. He loves Russia. He loves Putin. He loves everybody. After two years, they figured, gee. And after awhile, people actually believed this stuff. But now they are saying, Defund the police. We did not say it. You have to be wise to it. If you support defunding the police, vote for the radical left Democrats, and you see what is happening to the cities where they defunded the police. If you want more police and more cops on the streets, vote for America first Republicans or let us put it very simply, vote for MAGA. The same far left Democrats who are defunding police are also leading an all out crusade to strip you, the law abiding citizens of America, of your God given Second Amendment rights. I told you again. I told you. I told you.