Press Release, Speech of President Harry S. Truman, Tolono, Indiana

IMMEDIATE RELEASE IMMEDIATE RELEASE REAR PLATFORM REMARKS OF THE PRESIDENT "NATIONAL AT TOLONO, ILLINOIS, October 12, 1948 ARCHIVES RECORDS AND 2:10 P.M., C.S.T. SERVICE" ROVERN WENT Thank you very much. I appreciate that introduction very much, and I hope that Mrs. Goldman will be the next Congresswoman from this District, too. I am always agreeably surprised at the wonderful receptions along the w y . I have been from one end of the United States O the other and now I am going across, north and south. Having been east and west from one end to the other, I am going north and south from one side to the other. I have been in the Middle Atlantic States. I have been in the Middle Western States. I have been on the West Coast. I have been down South. And everybody seems to bei highly interested in the issues in this campsign. The reception I am getting today in Illinois means victory for Poul Douglas, your next United States Senator, and for Olive Remington Goldman, your next Congr sswoman, and for Addai Stevenson, your next Governor -- and for the straight Democratic ticket. I am told it was just 87 years ago that Abraham Lincoln came through Tolono on his way to Washington. This was his last stop in Illinois before he went on to become President. And this is what I am told he said: "I am leaving you on an errand of national importance attended, as you are well aware, with considerable difficulties. Let us believe, 8.S some point is expressed, behind the clouds the sun is still shining. I bid you affectionate farewell. You don't know how well he spoke when he said he was going to 8 place of considerable difficulty. I can speak from three years' experience that he knew exactly what he was talking about. The American people today want peace and prosperity. That's why Lincoln was going to Washington -- to try to got peace and prosperity. I am trying to help them get peace and the prosperity they deserve. I want to see everybody in the country get a fair break, and I have been fighting to see that vital legislation -- such S.S the farm price support program -- doesn't get thrown out of the window by the Renublicans. After World War I the farmers in this country began- a series of bed years that didn't end until the Democratic Party's farm program went into effect in the 1930's I know the difficult times the farmers had because I was living E Missouri farm then, and I could see the troubles the farmers were having. I was trying my best to make E 600-acre farm in Jackson County pay its way, and in those days it WES a most difficult job, as you all remember. The Democratic Administrations of the last 16 years have been building a firm foundation for farm prospority. We conceived and wrote the farm price support bill into a program of law. We placed a floor under the farmers' income so they wouldn't be wiped out in drought years or low-priced out of existence when a bumper crop hit the market. The prosperity and well-being of the American farmers showed that the Democratic programs have worked. Farmers tell me they want them continued. Even the Republicans talk out of one side of their mouth about continuing them. But what do the Republicans do about the farm program when they are back in Washington? Well, they cut the farm price support program to pieces. They cut funds from the Rural Electrification program, the soil conservation program, and the school lunch program. They refused to provide funds for rural housing or better schools. (OVER)