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Speeches - Miscellaneous (including scripts), 1964-1974 [May 1969-February 1970]
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Speeches - Miscellaneous (including scripts), 1964-1974 [May 1969-February 1970]
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Ronald Reagan's Governor's Papers of the Press Unit
Governor Ronald Reagan's Speeches
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Ronald Reagan Presidential Library
Digital Library Collections
This is a PDF of a folder from our textual collections.
Collection: Reagan, Ronald: Gubernatorial Papers,
1966-74: Press Unit
Folder Title: Speeches - Miscellaneous (including scripts),
1964-1974 [May 1969-February 1970]
Box: P20
To see more digitized collections visit:
https://reaganlibrary.gov/archives/digital-library
To see all Ronald Reagan Presidential Library inventories visit:
https://reaganlibrary.gov/document-collection
Contact a reference archivist at: [email protected]
Citation Guidelines: https://reaganlibrary.gov/citing
National Archives Catalogue: https://catalog.archives.gov/
-
5/4/69
CBS NEWS
2020 M Street, N. W.
Washington, D. C. 20036
All Purposes permission of of transcript and be for the Inc.
FACE THE NATION
as broadcast over the
CBS Television Network
and the
CBS Radio Network
Sunday, May 4, 1969 - 12:30-1:00 PM EDT
GUEST: RONALD REAGAN
Governor of California
REPORTERS:
George Herman, CBS News
David Broder, The Washington Post
Mike Wallace, CBS News
PRODUCERS:, Sylvia Westerman and Prentiss Childs
NOTE TO EDITORS: This broadcast originated at WHAS-TV, in Louisville,
Kentucky.
Please credit CBS' 1 "Face the Nation."
1
1
MR. HERMAN: Governor Reagan, you indicated that you would like
Phone (Arce 202) 628-4266
2
to see the Republican Governors Conference approve a resolution
3
favoring the antiballistic missile, and they didn't. What
4
happened?
5
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, in the previous session, in which the
6
Vice President was talking to us about the cooperation that he
7
hoped to achieve between state governments and the federal
8
administration and this is his assignment - he outlined a
9
number of things where he thought, if the governors were so
10
inclined, resolutions could be helpful in establishing this, in
11
making our own positions plain. And I was not clear whether
12
that particular subject, which had also been a part of his
WARD & PAUL
13
discussion, was one in which he had suggested we do this, and
14
in the press conference I said the following morning we would
15
discuss it. It developed, as we then later on discussed this,
16
that this was one in which the administration felt they would
17
rather not have any hint of partisanship involved; and ours
18
being a Republican Governors Conference, it was specifically
19
mentioned that they would hope that we would not, so we
20
acceded to their demands.
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
ANNOUNCER: From Louisville, Kentucky, in color, FACE THE NATION
22
a spontaneous and unrehearsed news interview with the Chairman
23
of the Republican Governors Association, Governor Ronald
24
Reagan, of California. Governor Reagan will be questioned by
25
CBS News Correspondent Mike Wallace, David Broder, National
2
1
Political Reporter of The Washington Post, and CBS News
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
Correspondent George Herman. We shall resume the interview
3
with Governor Reagain in just a moment.
4
5
MR. HERMAN: Governor Reagan, do you presently subscribe to what
6
you say is the administration's position, that a group of
7
Republican -- I suppose, for that matter, Democratic --
8
governors should not state their minds and pass a resolution on
9
some matter of grave national policy?
10
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, if he was fearful in this issue, which
11
is admittedly controversial, that it might take on a flavor of
12
partisanship to the point of there being party positions on it,
WARD & PAUL
13
this could endanger in Congress, perhaps, his getting the
14
bipartisan support he would like to have and that he would need
15
for this, and so, having been governor and having been in the
16
same position with regard to measures that require the opposi-
17
tion to support you in the legislature, I would have to say
18
yes. He knows better what his problem is.
19
MR. BRODER: Governor, you were very scornful of President
20
Johnson's efforts to sort of manipulate the Democratic governors
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
to produce statements of support or hold off statements of
22
support. Are the Republican governors going to speak only
23
when requested to speak by the administration?
24
GOVERNOR REAGAN: No, and I think, if you look at the resolutions
25
passed, there were some in which We certainly did make our
3
1
position known on the domestic scene. If you are recalling he
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
one, I'm sure, that had to do with the Vietnam war and the
3
conduct of the war back at the time of the general governors
4
conference, there I did think we were being asked to do some-
5
thing political, because an endorsement of the position that the
6
President wanted them was not just an endorsement, let's say, or
7
the hawk side versus dove, because there has been no question
8
that I am a hawk, but the endorsement also would have been one
9
of the manner in which the war was being conducted. And, at
10
the same time that I confess to being a hawk -- in fact, I
11
won't even call it a confession, I am very affirmative about
12
that - I have been and was quite critical of the lack of
WARD & PAUL
13
solid effort toward victory that was being put forth at that
14
particular time. So I thought that we were being asked to do
15
something that we could not specify our position. It would
16
have been a blanket endorsement of the policy.
17
MR. WALLACE: Your own characterization of yourself, Governor
18
Reagon, now again is that you're a hawk. You made some fairly
19
war-like statements from time to time about Vietnam. At one
20
time you were going to pave North Vietnam, and a year ago, it
21
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
seems to me,' there was talk about the possibility - keep the
22
threat of the invasion of North Vietnam by South Vietnam open.
23
Lately, though, you seem to be less win-oriented. What show
24
the United States do with respect to Vietnam?
25
GOVERNOR REAGAN: No, I'm not less win-oriented than I ever was,
4
1
but I say that a new administration that has taken over and in-
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
herited that war, and inherited also the peace negotiations that
3
finally got under way under the last administration, certainly
4
should have an opportunity themselves to catch up with and
5
learn all the factors, all the options open, the reason for the
6
past decisions, information which they had not been privy to
7
until it was taking office; and three months I think is hardly
8
time to expect someone to make all of this decision, and I
9
think you have to wait until you discover whether something is
10
going forward to bring this tragic war to an an end, and so
11
it is no less determination on my part. For example, the line
12
you quoted about paving over Vietram, I used that -- and it has
WARD & PAUL
13
been quoted many times out of context since, and it was over
14
three years ago, almost four years ago -- that in a discussion
15
and questions regarding the relative strength of whether we
16
could or could not win, as of four years ago, I used some
17
figures pointing out the relative strength of the two countries,
18
and then perhaps I shouldn't have said it, but in trying to
19
illustrate it I said, on the basis of comparative strength, we
20
could pave the country over, put Disneyland in the middle and
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
paint parking stripes. I never advocated doing that.
22
MR. BRODER: Governor, as a hawk, what do you think of the talk
23
coming out of the administration about unilateral American
24
troop withdrawals at a point when we apparently have no agree-
25
ment that would safeguard the South Vietnamese independerce and
5
1
freedom?
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, Dave, at this point I have to be gu
3
a little bit by the frank statement of the President at the
4
press conference recently, when he said there were things going
5
forward, there were things going on, but that he couldn't
6
mention them or discuss them because, in the nature of so-called
7
secretive diplomacy, if he did they would no longer be secret.
8
And the inference was that if they were not secret some people
9
who finally have begun to talk might back away if they were
10
exposed as talking. This is a little similar to Dr. Hadkawa Hiskawa-at
11
San Francisco State, when some members of the BSU left their
12
militancy and came in and wanted to arrive at a peaceful
WARD & PAUL
13
settlement, and when it was exposed in the press that they W
1
14
meeting, that was the last they ever heard of them again. Their
15
colleagues evidently made sure that they did not come in and
16
talk to the President of the college again.
Hyskawa
17
MR. HERMAN: Governor, like Dr. Hiakawa, I am sort of a student
18
of words. In answering Mike's question about whether you were
19
still as hawkish or whatever, you mentioned the -- you used the
20
phrase "to bring this tragic war to a halt." You didn't say,
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
as we might expect a hawk, "to win this war." Now, is there
22
some change in your position --
23
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Oh, no.
24
MR. HERMAN: -- when you talk about bringing this tragic war
25
a ha It?
6
1
GOVERNOR REAGAN: No, no. Any halt, I think, would have to be
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
with the assurance that the South Vietnamese could continue on
3
their way with their own free choice, that there would be no
4
gain whatsoever or advantage for the aggressors. In other
5
words, this must be brought to a halt in such a way that we
6
will have taken a stride toward making it evident that aggres-
7
sion will not pay, and that the aggressor will get nothing for
8
his effort, and that the South Vietnamese are guaranteed their
9
safety. Now, whatever it takes to do this should be done. My
10
criticism over all these years, from the time when the then
11
President, John Kennedy, sent the first combat division in, the
12
time when it was then escalated up to the half a million or
WARD & PAUL
13
more men that we have, is that some place along the line this
14
country seemed to have departed from a policy or a formula that
15
had guided us for a couple of hundred years, that our great
16
regard for the sanctity of the individual, for human life, was
17
such that we didn't risk human life, we didn't ask a man to die
18
for his country unless the cause was so worthwhile for us, so
19
meaningful for this country that we put the full resources of
20
this Nation at the man's disposal to win a victory and come home
21
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
as quickly as possible. And it has seemed for several years as
22
if we are now adopting a custom that was formerly used and has
23
been used back through history by too many older nations in the
24
world of declaring human beings expendable and using them in
25
political maneuvering.
7
1
MR. WALLACE: Well, have we, in effect, as some people suggest,
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
lost the Vietnam war and, under those circumstances, isn't
3
possible we should get out as gracefully as We can?
4
GOVERNOR REAGAN: No, I don't think we have lost it. And I
5
think that to get out gracefully, leaving the other side with,
6
whether in name, in fact a victory of sorts, proving that
7
aggression does pay, I think we will have just bought more. It
8
Winston Churchill gave the greatest description of this kind
9
of appeasement when he said, that if you will not win when your
10
vicoty will be sure and not too costly, if you will not win
11
when you can without bloodshed, you may come to the moment when
12
you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a
WARD & PAUL
13
precarious chance of survival.
14
MR. BRODER: Governor, the word "appeasement" reminds me, I
15
want to ask your reaction to one other foreign policy decision
16
of the Nixon administration. You said at the time that our
17
surveillanceplane was shot down by the North Koreans that there
18
had been an appeasement, this kind of thing was happening
19
because we had appeased them too often in the past on this kind
20
of incident. And you said, out in Sacramento, I believe, that
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
you felt that we should take the decisive action to let them
22
know we weren't going to put up with that, and you hoped the
23
administration would do that. Does Mr. Nixon's action measure
24
up to your concept of decisive action?
25
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, not knowing all the options open to him,
8
l
I would have to say that the mobilizing of forces, both sea and
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
air, the announcement now of military escort for anyone in such
3
a position, whether in the air or on the sea, was a decisive
4
action, and the announcement to the enemy that we were now
5
prepared for any further adventure on their part of that kind
6
-- yes, I do think it was. There is a great difference between
7
this and the Pueblo. The Pueblo was a situation where 82 young
8
men of ours were kidnapped and held by the enemy. And I didn't
9
think we were taking all the proper action we should to get
10
them back. Now we've had a case of some men murdered by the
11
enemy. Well, ours is a system in which you may go for an eye
12
for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, but it is a little difficult
WARD & PAUL
13
for people like ourselves to go kill thirty-one people who were
14
innocent of the original crime simply to match numbers. This
15
is a little different than saying we should take an action to
16
get our men back.
17
MR. HERMAN: Governor, in the long run all these questions of
18
policy are settled by what, I suppose, you could call under the
19
envelope of politics, by the desire and the will of the
20
American people. Now We see campus demonstrations, we see
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
students, we see nonstudents talking about peace in Vietnam.
22
Is there a will in the country to pursue this war in Vietnam to
23
the extent to which you think it should be pursued?
24
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, of course, I could quote the British --
25
MR. HERMAN: I would rather have you quote Rona Id Reagan.
9
1
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Pardon?
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
MR. HERMAN: I would rather have you quote Rona ld Reagan.
3
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, they made a statement that We had
4
abandoned the number one position of power in the world, and
5
then they questioned in their survey whether there was the
6
desire in this country to hold that position of power that we
7
had.
8
MR. HERMAN: Do you question it?
9
GOVERNOR REAGAN: I think we have been softened up. I think w.
10
have had, very frankly, under the previous administrations, I
11
think we have followed policies of softness. and it has cloude
12
a great many people's thinking as to the eventual result of
WARD & PAUL
13
this. There are some times you have to stand on principle, yo
14
have to make decisions on the basis of right or wrong and not
15
on expediency.
16
MR. HERMAN: I didn't want to interrupt you, but you did say W
17
had been softened up, which implies by somebody. I wondered
18
whether you were including the students as a deliberate attemp
19
to soften us up?
20
GOVERNOR REAGAN: No, perhaps they are the victims of this, al
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
though I would think that there are some student leaders who
22
made it pretty plain that they have an interest not so much in
23
peace as an interest in the other, in the enemy.
24
MR. WALLACE: On the business. of the students, you were we
25
ahead of a good many state administrators on this whole subjec
10
1
and college administrators. I understand that, in your absence
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
from California, Governor, your Lieutenant Governor, Ed Reinecks
3
has proposed that a student be placed on the Board of Regents
4
of the University of California, and a student on the Board of
5
Trustees of the State College System.
6
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, I don't think that this would denote
7
any great difference between us, although I would take issue
8
with Ed on some things. This has been considered and talked
9
about.
10
MR. WALLACE: Do you think it is a good idea?
11
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, let me tell you the problem. Now, here
12
in the state from which this broadcast is emanating, Kentucky,
WARD & PAUL
13
they have done this. But there is a difference in putting a
14
student from a campus on a board of trustees or a board of
15
regents of that particular institution. In California we have
16
nine campuses at the university, with one board of regents
17
governing them. We have eighteen state colleges with one board
18
of trustees governing them. Now, how do you select that student
19
from which one of the eighteen campuses? How do you insure that
20
he is representative of the students? I also note that the
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
student here in Kentucky is an ex officio member with no vote.
22
As I say, these are things we' ve discussed and we ve brought up
23
the various difficulties. And Ed would not be alone. There is
24
no solid body of opinion yet, either way, in the trustees or
25
regents about this, and you would probably be surprised to see
11
1
the difference of opinion and how it crossed lines of people
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
normally associated.
3
MR. WALLACE: Which side are you on?
4
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Frankly, at the moment, I am opposed, not
5
because of any lack of confidence in the students but, as I
6
say, number one, I have been unable to figure out how this
7
selection would be made on nine campuses scattered over a state
8
700 miles long, or eighteen campuses over the same area.
9
MR. WALLACE: It does seem a strange time for him to make a
10
suggestions, while he is Acting Governor in your absence.
11
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, I imagine that he was probably question-
12
ed, the same as I am questioned on a variety of subjects, just
WARD & PAUL
13
as here. Look, I have just been talking about Vietnam, and
14
California doesn't have any foreign policy. I was expressing
15
personal opinions. But I do know Ed Reinecke's feeling about
16
the situation on the campuses, what we' been confronted with,
17
and I know there is no basic difference of opinion between us.
18
MR. BRODER: Governor, why didn't your association have anything
19
to say formally on this subject of student disorders? The
20
administration didn't warn you off of that topic, did they?
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
GOVERNOR REAGAN: No, and We had quite a discussion on this. I
22
think since the resolution I asked for in Washington, at the
23
time when some of the governors hadn't had the experience yet,
24
really there was such a unanimity of opinion on this, and it
25
has moved so far and SO fast, and we have now had statements by
12
l
the Department Justice indicating their interest in this, and
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
they are looking into things. You will recall --
3
MR. HERMAN: I wish you would explain, this was your resolution
4
to have a complete investigation of the campus riots.
5
GOVERNOR REAGAN: That's right. And the President has now made
6
a statement, and the Vice President has made a statement, and
7
most of the governors have now had their own troubles. I think
8
the situation just moved to the point that no resolution was
9
necessary.
10
MR. WALLACE: I think the President has taken the issue of
11
pornography away from you, too, Governor Reagan. How big an
12
issue is pornography, obscenity, sex education in the schools
WARD & PAUL
13
going to be next year in the California campaign?
14
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, pornography has been a California issue
15
for some time, and properly so, because -- we're number one in
16
a lot of things in California, of which I am very proud, but I
17
am not proud of this, that we have become virtually the capita 1
18
For example, there isn't a week that goes by that I don't get a
19
number of letters from all over the country from parents who
20
have intercepted the advertising material for pornography that
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
has been sent to their children, and it a Iways has a California
22
return address. And the display that we could make shows that
23
we've gone beyond anything that any of us had ever known or
24
experienced in this. Now, those who want that and those who
25
want to close the door and indulge themselves in looking at
13
1
this kind of material, let them. I'm not interfering or adve
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
cating that kind of censorship. But there is another kiml of
3
freedom, too. There is the freedom of a parent to be able to
4
determine what his children are going to see, to be able to
5
send his child to a store on an errand without having them walk
6
past a magazine rack and subjected to this kind of material.
7
And I think there is an answer, and we have legislation that I
8
believe is within the spirit of the Supreme Court decisions so
9
that it avoids unnecessary censorship and that will give us the
10
tools. The police themselves have asked for better weapons.
11
They say they are virtually helpless in the face of this. In
12
sex education, which is an issue, I don't know in how many other
WARD & PAUL
13
states, but in California, because it was put forth in
14
California -- I have read the legitimate complaints of parents
15
that indicate that some of the teachers, there is a wide
16
variation in the approach to this subject on the part of
17
individual teachers, SO evidently it was a hasty move. But I
18
am also inclined to think that one of the things wrong with it,
19
might we move in to teach admittedly physiological function
20
that perhaps does need much more light shed on it, but first,
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
following a Supreme Court decision regarding prayer, we have
22
gone back to a point where we won't even discuss moral rules
23
or morality at all in the schools. How do you discuss sex in
24
the schools with children if you cannot do it within a framework
25
of moral rules and morality? How do you treat it as a purely
14
].
biological function without going far beyond what parents want
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
their children exposed to?
3
MR. HERMAN: And what is the state's role?
4
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, the State Board of Education, of course,
5
which sets certain standards for education, has now been deal-
6
ing with --
7
MR. HERMAN: I mean what is the state's role in teaching
8
morality?
9
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, I myself would be one who would like to
10
see us get off this ridiculous completely secular kick and
11
recognize the fact that this is a nation under God, that these
12
words appear in our most historic documents. I thought that it
WARD & PAUL
13
was -- they talk about extremism on the other side, I thought
14
it was a little ridiculous at the time of the death of
15
President Eisenhower, when a school in California named the
16
Eisenhower School called the children all out in the playground
17
to lower the flag to half-mast, and the principal then asked
18
them all to bow their heads and meditate for the family of
19
President Wisenhower. He was afraid to even use the word
20
"prayer."
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
MR. BRODER: Governor, could I come back to this question of
22
student disorders for a moment. You told us over in Levington
23
the other day, and I was intrigued, that if we read the
24
Congressional Record We would find out that the whole plan for
25
these student disorders had been laid out at a meeting at the
15
1
Edgewater Beach Hotel in Chicago, I believe you said nine years
Phone (Aree 202) 628-4266
2
ago.
3
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Yes.
4
MR. BRODER: Now, I have been spending more time down here with
5
the racing form than with the Congressional Record. Maybe you
6
could just tell us what happened there, because I don't know
7
the story.
8
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, this was a report by the Federal Bureau
9
of Investigation to a committee of Congress, and therefore was
10
in the Congressional Record. I have the exact statement back in
11
my office and have been aware of it for those years. And this
12
was a group of campus leaders at that time associated with
WARD & PAUL
13
various Communist organizations who met in the Edgewater Bea
14
and they laid out a plan --
15
MR. BRODER: These are the same people whose names we know now?
16
I mean are these the SDS leaders?
17
GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, you've got it nine years later, you
18
have a newer, younger crop now. I am not familiar enough with
19
the names that were mentioned there to see whether in any way
20
they are connected, like some of the older individuals like
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
21
Dellinger, for example, with his anti-Vietnam mobilization group
22
whether they. were present there or not, or whether they have
23
continued now above college level or age organizations. But
24
the plan laid out was for a plan of fomenting dissent on the
25
campus, and they were to start out and move by taking advantage
16
1
of legitimate complaints, that even if it was just a complaint
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
2
about the food in the cafeteria or they wanted a change in the
3
hours in the dormitory, whatever it was, that they were to get
4
in and foment this to bring about and bring it up to more and
5
more points of demands and the use of violence eventually, but
6
not to begin with, but to bring this up to a demand where they
7
could eventually, in the pattern of the Latin American educa-
8
tional system, which is probably one of the world's worst,
9
because they have made the campuses sanctuaries where the stu-
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dents run the show, that they were to aim at this kind of
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control of higher education in this country.
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MR. WALLACE: Down at Lexington you talked about a plot. You
WARD & PAUL
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said straight out that there was a plot afoot, and that these
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various student leaders were moving from state to state, from
15
campus to campus to foment disturbances, to create riots. if
16
possible. Well, the Attorney General has the right, has the
17
power, under the Civil Rights Act of 1968, to move against them
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Why doesn't he?
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GOVERNOR REAGAN: Well, I would gather from the statement he
20
made the other day that now, a new Attorney General, again
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
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someone who has only been there three months, he is looking int
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this to see what position the Justice Department can take. The
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only federal law here that would probably be involved, the
24
most likely would be the tracking down of these individuals
25
and to establish that they did indeed cross state lines to
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foment riot. Now this is not the easiest thing to take int 0
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
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court. It is not the easiest thing to prove, that the ri
3
occurred as the result of a speech by a Jerry Rubin or someone
4
was it his intent -- this would be the defense -- did he inter
5
with that speech to start a riot or was it just natural
6
combustion. But, anyway, I would gather from his statement
7
that they are investigating in that area.
8
MR. HERMAN: Excuse me, I didn't mean to interrupt you. The
9
pattern that you cited was a comparison with the Latin America
10
universities. The more frequent one that we've heard from
11
historians is comparison with the Nazi Germany universities,
12
before the Nazi takeover in Germany. There is a lot of talk
WARD & PAUL
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about the threat of a right-wing wave of reaction, extremi
14
right-wing, bully boys fighting the campus demonstrators. Do
15
you see any threat of an extremist right-wing reaction, as is
16
so frequently talked of?
17
GOVERNOR REAGAN: I think if you look at the record you have t
18
see that the --
19
MR. HERMAN: This is a talk about the future.
20
GOVERNOR REAGAN: -- that the great silent ma jority, the bulk
25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
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the legitimate student body -- and let me make one thing plain
22
they have legitimate complaints on a great many campuses; I'm
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talking of the legitimate students now, the great silent
24
majority -- they have a legitimate complaint about a number
25
things, inability to be recognized as individuals, teachers
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turning over their duties to teaching assistants while they go
Phone (Area 202) 628-4266
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into research and so forth. But they, I think, have shown
3
remarkable control in not physically striking back. No, if
4
there is any comparison with the Nazi bully boys of Adolf
5
Hitler, it is the students that are now conducting the riots.
6
They are following exactly the same tactics as the Hitler
7
Youth Movement, the brown shirts.
8
MR. HERMAN: In the very few seconds we have left, do you see
9
any kind of a rebellion among taxpayers who want to clamp down
10
on universities and on liberalism generally in a right-wing
11
fashion?
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GOVERNOR REAGAN: I don't know of any issue - - and it wouldn't
WARD & PAUL
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be in a right-wing fashion -- I don't know of any issue that
14
has the people so incensed, so determined, and to me it is as
15
simple as this, and they are justified in this, the people,
16
whether it is with a private institution or whether it is with
17
a university --
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MR. HERMAN: I'm sorry, Governor, we are just about off the
19
clock at this point. Thank you very much for being with us
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here to FACE THE NATION. And we will have a word on next
25 K Street, N.E., Weshington, D.C. 20002
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week's guest in a moment.
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ANNOUNCER: Today, on FACE THE NATION, Governor Ronald Reagan,
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Chairman of the Republican Governors Association, was interviewe
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by CBS News Correspondent Mike Wallace, David Broder, National
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Political Reporter of The Washingtn Post, and CBS News
Phone (Ares 202) 628-4266
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Correspondent George Herman. Next week, Michael Klonsky, are
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National Secretary of Students for a Democratic Society, will
4
FACE THE NATION. FACE THE NATION originated, in color, from
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WHAS-TV, Louisville, Kentucky.
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WARD & PAUL
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25 K Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
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X
5/23/69
69
NO GREATER
Chapman College
INVESTMENT IN
Claremont Graduate School
Claremont Men's College
FREEDOM
Immaculate Heart College
La Verne College
Loyola University of Los Angeles
Mount St. Mary's College
Occidental College
Hon. RONALD REAGAN
Governor of California
Pepperdine College
Pitzer College
Scripps College
University of Redlands
Westmont College
Whittier College
INDEPENDENT
COLLEGES
OF
SOUTHERN
CALIFORNIA
INDEPENDENT COLLEGES OF
CROCKER-CITIZENS PLAZA -- LOS ANGELES 90017
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
(213) 627-7091
NO GREATER INVESTMENT
IN FREEDOM
Governor Reagan addressed a luncheon at the Los
Angeles Music Center, May 23, 1969, sponsored by
HON. RONALD REAGAN
Independent Colleges of Southern California, Inc.
Governor of California
and attended by 300 leaders of the business com-
munity.
HIGHLIGHTS
It is absolutely essential to the total education
system of this nation that we have independent
You have done me a very great honor to
colleges. They serve as an educational whetstone,
allow me the privilege of being here with you.
helping to hone the educational process, helping
I don't know of anything that would make
to add to the public system, keeping them com-
me feel more grateful unless it might be re-
petitive in the endeavor for excellence. Indeed,
by way of competition, they help preserve the
ceiving an honorary degree at Berkeley.
public institutions from political influence, and
I'm SO old that I can remember when folks
they guarantee a measure of academic freedom
used to brag about living "a stone's throw"
that the public university or college could not
from the campus. Now they board up the win-
attain without these schools that are represented
dows. I am quite cognizant of the image that
here.
some have tried to give me of having an anti-
The independent colleges and universities edu-
intellectual posture. But it just ain't true that
cate about 25 per cent of all the graduates and
I don't set no store by book learnin'. As a mat-
four-year undergraduate students in California.
ter of fact, I am so interested in the intellectual
The small colleges produce leadership for
pursuits of higher education that in my capac-
America that is out of all proportion to their size.
ity as Governor I am willing to engage in a
I commend all of you who are here as friends
student exchange program with anyone.
of independent colleges. The private sector and
On the other hand, I have that same repug-
the business community can make no greater in-
nance that all of you have for the pseudo-
vestment in freedom than their contributions to
independent colleges and schools in this country.
intellectual, the phony who wants to use a
little bit of learning to make a false impression.
If we are to win the battle which is being fought
Mark Twain wrote of an experience of that
today at so many of our public institutions within
kind. He was on a cruise and someone was
this state, I pray that you keep alive this very
seeking to impress him at the table with his
viable force-an independent college and univer-
own intellectual ability. Finally he had another
sity system-that will be competitive and that will
excuse when Mark asked him to pass the
ensure true academic freedom and the true pres-
sugar. As he did so that man couldn't resist
ervation of our culture and our heritage.
saying, "Mr. Twain, have you ever noticed in
our language there are only two words in
which the s-u sound has the sound of Shu-
Sugar and Sumac." Twain said, "Are you
sure?"
1
Role of the Independent Colleges
They set an amount, a theoretical amount,
at seriously, I say that it is absolutely
that could be a limit of the amount of the
essential to the total education system of this
contribuiton, but said this would be up to the
nation that we have independent colleges.
government, that their figures could be
They serve as an educational whetstone, help-
wrong, and that such a contribution within
ing to hone the educational process, helping
this limit should be a tax credit and would
to add to the public system, keeping them
constitute federal aid with no risk to Church
competitive in the drive for excellence. In-
and State separation. The individual would
deed, by that very competition, they have
choose the school that would receive the gift.
helped preserve the public institution from
They argued and argued, and over and over
political interference and they guarantee it a
again in their arguments they kept asking,
measure of academic freedom that the public
"What is wrong with this? Why won't this
university or college could not attain without
work?" And finally the Commissioner of Edu-
schools such as those that are represented
cation rebuffed them and repudiated their
here. The independent colleges and univer-
suggestion with these words, "You don't un-
sities educate about 25% of all the graduate
derstand. Under such a plan we couldn't
and four-year undergraduate students in
achieve our social objectives." And you
California.
wonder.
I doubt if anyone would interpret his refusal
Tax Credits
as anything but a declaration that the gov-
Small colleges produce leadership for Amer-
ernment's precise intention was to use those
ica that is out of all proportion to their size.
Federal grants to influence the course of
It is for this reason that I believe the Federal
higher education in this country. And that is
government should grant tax credit, not de-
an intolerable political interference with aca-
ductions, but tax credit for at least a portion
demic freedom.
he tuition fees that are paid by parents as
they send their sons and daughters to college.
Business' Investment in Freedom
I think we should seriously explore the pos-
I commend all of you who are here as friends
sibility of extending Federal aid, not through
of the independent colleges. The private
more bureaucracy at the risk of violating our
sector and the business community can make
traditional separation of Church and State,
no greater investment in freedom than their
but, again in the spirit of competition, by
creating tax credits for contributions to schools
contributions to independent colleges and
and colleges within a prescribed limit as to
schools in this country. They might be able
the over-all amount.
to curb the growth and expansion of some
This was suggested some years ago by a
of the public institutions at a much lower cost
group of college presidents who were alarmed
to themselves as taxpayers. Right today, if
by the possible threat to academic freedom
the State had to assume the responsibility and
inherent in the beginning of large grants from
burden of the independent colleges it would
the government to higher education. And SO
cost the taxpayers in California an additional
they took their concern to Washington and
$200 million a year just in operating expenses,
they spoke to the Commissioner of Education.
and the plant facilities - the capital outlay -
2
3
would take more than $11/2 billion. Indeed,
of time there were vast increases in the num-
if the independent colleges and universities of
bers of idle rich and idle poor in Rome with
this country had the funds, they could accom-
the latter being put on a permanent dole, a
modate today between a quarter and a half
kind of welfare system. As time went on they
a million more students without adding so
organized into a political bloc with sizable
much as a chair to their present physical facil-
political power so that would-be emperors
ities. The real winner would be our way of life.
catered to them as a cheering section outside
the Senate and as a voting bloc. The govern-
Parallels to Ancient Rome
ment continually rewarded them with extra
I know it is kind of square and is a cliche
benefits and with ever increasing frequency.
subject, particularly in academic circles, to
They weren't hesitant about making their de-
draw a parallel between the rise and fall of
mands known.
Rome and some of the threats that some of
us see to our own nation and our civilization
Middle Class
at this present time. And yet as it has been
The great solid middle class of Rome,
pointed out, to ignore history is to repeat it.
Rome's strength, was taxed more and more
Dr. Robert Straus-Hauppe has recently pub-
to support the bureaucracy that kept growing
lished a series of articles. He collected obser-
larger and more powerful as they took care of
vations from such historians as Spengler, De
this idle bloc. Surtaxes were imposed on in-
Riencourt, Ferraro, and Gibbons. And all of
comes to meet emergency situations. The gov-
them, as he put them together in a series of
ernment engaged in deficit spending and the
articles, confirmed the great similarity be-
denarius, a silver coin which was similar to
tween the history and the background of the
our half dollar, basically the most valuable
course followed by Rome and the course fol-
currency in the then known world, began to
lowed by this nation for two centuries. Indeed
lose its silvery hue and it took on a kind of cop-
the parallel is so accurate that it is frightening.
pery glow as the government increased the
It is so eerie.
copper content and reduced the silver. The
The history of Rome is better documented
real silver coins went into hiding and soon
than any history of any civilization that had
disappeared entirely.
ever preceded them or many since. We know
Military service was an obligation that had
more about it than the great civilizations of
been highly honored by the Romans. Indeed,
the past. We know that it started with a kind
a foreigner could obtain citizenship in Rome
of pioneer heritage similar to our own begin-
simply by voluntarily serving with Rome's
nings. Then it entered into its two centuries of
legions. But with increasing affluence the
greatness, reaching its height in the second
young men of Rome began avoiding military
of those two centuries and it then went into
service. They found excuses to remain in the
its decline and collapse in the third century.
soft and sordid life of the city. They took to
But the signs of decay as we look back in his-
the use of cosmetics, the wearing of feminine-
tory were becoming apparent in that second
like hairdo and garments until it became diffi-
century.
cult to tell men from women. Among the
Our nation is today in the latter years of its
teachers and the scholars there was a group
second century. It is said that in that period
called the Cynics who let their hair and their
4
5
beards grow and wore ragged and old cloth-
their votes to obtain instant satisfaction. Then
ing. They professed indifference to worldly
equal opportunity at the starting line becomes
gods and heaped scorn on what they called
an extended guarantee of a tie at the end of
culture of middle class values. (Now, I'm
the race. Under the euphemism "the greatest
still talking about Rome.)
good for the greatest number" we move to-
The morals declined. It became unsafe to
ward the managed economy and away from
walk in the countryside or on the city streets.
freedom and we mortgage the future earnings
Rioting was commonplace and sometimes
of generations yet unborn.
whole sections of towns and cities were
We've known rioting in our streets. We
burned. And all the time waiting to deliver
know that streets are unsafe for an evening
the death blow were the twin diseases of con-
stroll in almost every city. While we are gath-
fiscatory taxation and creeping inflation. They
ered here just in this brief period this noon,
finally overcame the energy and ambition and
several people will have been murdered in
the efforts of the middle class of Rome.
America. Scores of robberies, muggings, as-
saults and thefts will have occurred. At this
Decay in America
And now we come to the end of our second
very moment as I am saying this, some place
someone in the United States is being the vic-
century, jingling our copper coins in what we
tim of a crime of violence. Half of this runaway
are told is a time of affluence, while each year
crime in our land is committed by youngsters
the number of people on welfare increases out
under the age of 18 and a fourth of it by those
of all proportion to our growth, and taxes and
under 15, and more than half of the crime in
inflation more than eat up our ability to in-
this country is committed by narcotic addicts
crease our earnings.
in an attempt to finance their habit.
Last year in California we created 207,000
new jobs. We reduced the number of un-
Youth Crime
employed, reducing unemployment to a low
French journalist Suzanne Laban writes of a
ce 1957, and we reduced the number of
Saturday night she spent here in Los Angeles
people at the beginning of the year on wel-
in one of our police stations, watching the
fare by putting them to work and then totaled
weekend round-up, particularly those who
up at the end of the year and found that we
were brought in from the Sunset Strip. She
had added 108,000 new people to welfare.
was amazed and horrified as she saw some of
Last year the average personal income of
them, mere children, boys and girls, and so
workers in California increased 4.9% Increases
many of them brought in possessing narcotics.
in taxes and inflation increased to take 5.1%,
Then she talked to a young man through the
and the workers were worse off than before
bars of a cell. He was almost in tears at the
the year began.
thought that he might have to spend the night
It has been pointed out that the days of
in jail. He told her he was just someone from
democracy are numbered once the belly takes
a good family who had left home to wander
command of the head. When the less affluent
around and see what was going on. Then the
feel the urge to break a commandment and
police brought in the personal possessions they
begin to covet that which their more affluent
had taken from him at the time of arrest in-
neighbors possess, they are tempted to use
cluding his notebook. In the notebook were
6
7
the pages and pages of the list of his custom-
challenges are worthy. So by all means let's
ers, and the pages of the list of his new pros-
get on with the business of hearing the com-
pects and the list of the wholesalers and the
plaints and implementing answers to the
price list for LSD and marijuana and metha-
causes of those complaints. Let's try to find a
drine. Also was a personal notation in the book
way to get at the real problem of students who
that he was going to have $75 less in profit
today are complaining because of a lack of
this particular month because he had eaten
personal contact on the campus with those
up some of the profit himself. He had taken
above them and with their teachers. There is
15 LSD trips on his own stock in a four week
a lack of communication through the clogged
period. And the police led him away. He was
channels of the universities that have grown
15 years of age.
all too fast.
The jungle is closing in again on this tiny
Leaders of Violence
plot we have been civilizing for 6,000 years.
But at the same time, let's not be naive. Let's
Those of you in higher education know that
squarely look at those others who hide be-
Dr. Spock's babies have grown up. I'll confess
hind the legitimate dissent while they plan
I liked the Doctor better when he was talking
riots and orgies of destruction. Who are they?
about pablum and potty training..
What is their purpose? Well, there is one
We see parades held in the name of peace
called Peter Camayo. He has been involved in
but the banners they carry are the flags of
every large scale demonstration for the last
nations that are now killing and have killed
four years. He is 29 years old. He is the leader
35,000 of our young men. We have campus
of the Socialist Workers' Party, a non-student
demonstrations to force the college to divorce
listed by the police as a Trotskyite Commun-
itself from any partcipation in the defense of
ist professional agitator. He does most of his
the country. Organized sabotage teams make
virulent writing calling for revolution in this
open boast of their purpose. Anti-war coffee
country when he is a guest out of the country
houses are opened adjacent to our military
in Castro's Cuba.
bases. The purpose: spreading mutiny among
Tom Haydn is another. He is founder of
the other young men who are serving this
the Students for a Democratic Society. He is
country. In their convention at Michigan State
a visitor to Moscow, Peking, and Havana. He
a little over a year ago, the SDS urged its mem-
was involved in riots at Columbia University,
bers to continue to persuade other young
the violence last summer in Chicago, the riots
people to avoid the draft but that they them-
at the University of Wisconsin, which caused
selves should accept military service so they
the governor to call out the National Guard.
could subvert the military from within.
We are very well acquainted with him at San
Encourage Legitimate Dissent
Francisco State and at Berkeley. Yet with all
Now let us recognize and agree that legiti-
of this record, we are acquainted with him at
mate dissent and ferment, some of it natural
Berkeley because in this present school year
and often beneficial, is the yeast of change
he has been on the campus as a guest lecturer
and improvement. It exists among our youth
being paid out of Associated Students funds.
not only on the campus but in general. And
Mike Myerson on a visit to Hanoi in 1967
many of their complaints and many of their
was proclaimed an honorary nephew of Ho
8
9
Chi Minh. Perhaps while he was there he re-
ganizing sedition." SDS publications say, "We
wed that pledge that some of his cohorts
are working toward a guerrilla force in an
had made about sending blood to the Viet
urban environment."
Cong. You know that is a humanitarian under-
On the San Francisco State campus during
taking and I never really objected to it pro-
the riots before Dr. Hayakawa came there,
vided they would send the blood in the orig-
instructions were issued on how to make bet-
inal containers.
ter Molotov cocktails and one leaflet was spe-
There is Terry Cannon, a young man who
cifically entitled "The Need to Fight the
was in the forefront of the Stop the Draft
Cops." One day, as a trustee of the State Col-
Week out in Oakland. Subsequently he at-
lege System, I sat with the other trustees, and
tended meetings of the Viet Cong and the
we heard a tape. A tape that had been taken
National Liberation Front in Budapest right
in a so-called students meeting on the campus
after the Chicago riots. He boasts that when
discussing their further plans for disruption.
this country goes down it will be through some
In the tape we heard explicit instructions
massive combination of leaflets, sit-down
given on the use of fire bombs on the campus
strikes, and fighting in the streets.
and subsequently there were 50 fires in cam-
Then there is George Murray, a teacher at
pus buildings in one day. And as we continued
San Francisco State College, who urged
listening to the tape of a student meeting we
students to carry guns on the campus and
heard a voice say, "If in this process it becomes
called the American flag a piece of toilet paper
necessary to kill, you will kill." One is gripped
to be flushed down the drain.
by an overwhelming sense of unreality-un-
The list goes on. Mortimer Scheer-reported
reality that it is happening at all, but even
to be a member of the New York State Com-
more frightening, that we have almost come
munist Party, later founded the Progressive
to the point that we accept this as a kind of
bor Movement and the west coast chapter
normal way.
in San Francisco. They talk about a genera-
We have our barbarians waiting for the
tion gap-well, he's part of it. I doubt he will
right stage of inner decay to render us help-
ever see 50 again.
less. Beloc said, "In the easy times of peace we
are amused by the antics of the barbarian and
Riot Training
we laugh. But while we laugh we are watched
These individuals are tied together in organ-
by large and awful faces from beyond. And on
izations popping up whenever there is trouble,
those faces there is no smile."
infiltrating any group that really has a legiti-
mate grievance. Their stock in trade: fires and
Personal Moral Code
bombings, the breakdown of authority, dis-
What do we do? How do we enforce the
paragement of the police. And then the cycle
law? Perhaps we should go back beyond the
begins again a half a nation away on another
easily dramatized man with the mask and the
campus, on another street corner outside a mili-
gun of the student rebels I have just described
tary base and we inch one step closer to total
with their torch and club and their storm troop
anarchy. There should be no doubt as to their
type tactics and ask ourselves, "Could any of
objective. Craig Calvert, National Secretary
them have come about if there hadn't been
of SDS, openly boasted, "We actively are or-
over recent years a gradual and quiet erosion
10
11
of our own moral code without which society
talents and buildings and equipment are used
cannot function?" Some time during each day
for purposes that are not consonant with its
each one of us has an opportunity to do some-
proper function, which is teaching and learn-
thing dishonest, to lie, to cheat, to steal, or
ing. Those are easy words to say, but they are
even to do bodily harm. No government at any
difficult to achieve. If a school is to transmit
level could afford the police that would be
the intellectual and cultural heritage and de-
necessary to assure our safety and freedom
velop in students a proper sense of morality
unless the overwhelming majority of us were
it must be done by teaching them to think,
guided by an inner personal code of morality.
not necessarily what to think, but how to
Today too many, yes too many, in the aca-
think. Yet conversely it must give them a cul-
demic community are challenging all the time-
tural and moral framework in which much of
tested standards. They are telling our young
their intellectual capacities may be exercised.
people to make their own rules, that jets and
Subversives on the campuses will probably
nuclear energy and electronics have scrapped
be much easier to handle if that great so-called
all that man has learned in his journey from
silent majority has inner convictions and be-
the swamp to the stars, that we swept aside the
liefs and a confidence in our society.
dead hand of the past with its constricting and
confining tradition and morality. Discipline
Youth and Society
of the past no longer binds us.
A young man, one of our own young Cali-
Education a Search for Meaning
fornians on a campus, has said, "Our most
retching problem is finding a place for our-
To discuss freely all sides of all questions
without values is to insure the creation of a
selves in society. By all indices we should have
no anxiety about the future. We are told we
generation of uninformed and talkative minds,
a living demonstration of the decline of the
are the best prepared, the best educated, the
most talented crop of students ever produced
intellect. I'm glad the Pope didn't do away
with St. Thomas Aquinas. He warned the
in the country. What we fear is not that society
teachers that they must never dig a ditch in
will reject us. We fear that we cannot accept
front of a student that they failed to fill in.
society."
St. Thomas knew that cleverly to raise doubts
Well now I admit his view is not completely
and to ever seek and never find was, when car-
balanced. Citizen contributions to good works
ried to the extremity, an enemy of education,
total about 250,000,000 work hours a week.
intellect, and progress. The challenge is to
Seventy percent of the people of our country
search for meaning in a troubled world. Our
in a public opinion poll a few weeks ago said
obligation is to help our young people find
they were willing to work a minimum of 4
truth and purpose, to find identity and a goal.
hours a week in good works if someone would
And yet today's system of higher education
only show them how or tell them where they
is expected to be all things to all people. Gov-
could go. But that decline of morality still has
ernment subsidizes it to solve social problems,
gone on. Last year the banks and financial
sometimes industry pays it to conduct re-
institutions of this country lost $117 million,
search. It spreads itself too thin and more and
not to robbers but to their own employees in
more of the university's time and money and
just a kind of small time pilfering. Retail estab-
12
13
lishments it is estimated lost $4 billion not to
to make a decision on the basis of political ex-
rieves but to employees who had a kind of
pediency, or do you want him to be guided
self-declared fringe benefit.
by the same kind of inner moral conviction
Now, I'll venture to say that most of these
that made him approach the referee and tell
people were basically good people who didn't
the truth? Where does it start, how does it
really in their own minds consider what they
start? Well I think it starts with each one of
were doing was stealing. So we look at our-
us. Inside each one of us.
selves. What do we say? What do you say to
Plea for Guidelines
that young fellow in your house if he comes
There is a ferment and rebellion on the
home from the practice field and tells how he
campus. But is that ferment and rebellion
learned that day how to hold on a block with-
really an inarticulate and anguished plea for
out getting caught by the referee? How many
guidelines? Are perhaps our young people
times, with the kids in the car, do we look over
pushing and pushing as they once did when
our shoulders to see if there is a policeman
they were only so high, asking some adult to
around and fudge on the light? As the country
tell them where are the limits and how far
parson said, the fellow who left the gate open
they can go?
is only slightly more guilty than the one who
I have a friend who was a school teacher.
saw it open and didn't close it.
Marriage interrupted that but she still kept her
Each One of Us
interest in young people and she contacts
How many of you know about a football
young teen agers and tries to help them out.
game that was played several years ago down
She wrote me the other day and told me of
in Texas between one of Bud Wilkinson's
one who was on dope. She asked him what his
great football teams, a national championship
parents thought about the way he had chosen
eam, and TCU? TCU had had a pretty medi-
to live. He said, "They don't give a damn and
Cre season but they rose to the heights as a
neither do I." He said, "Not once has my old
team will and in this final game of the season,
man and my old lady said they would break
in the closing minutes, a fellow dived into the
my neck if they caught me smoking pot. They
end zone and caught a shoestring pass for
have never said to me what they think of my
what could have been the winning touch-
friends, that they think they are creeps al-
down over the national champions. And with
though it is written all over their faces. I've
the stadium going wild he got up and walked
never heard my old man say 'Son, this is what
over to the official and said, "No sir, it touched
I expect you to be like, or this is how I expect
the ground before I caught it." Now what was
you to act.' If he really cared, really loved me,
your first reaction. Did you say, "Wait a min-
he'd help me."
ute. That is carrying things a little too far. He
Hunger for Leadership
should have kept his mouth shut." Should he?
Well, in our own state here, there are
Someday he may represent you in Congress,
250,000 people under the age of 25 that, they
or in the White House, or even the State
tell me, are so hooked on drugs now that they
House. He might even be on the Supreme
will probably never be salvaged. Isn't this a
Court. What then? Do you want him then to
time for a resurgence of an old fashioned mor-
keep his mouth shut? Do you want him then
ality, and shouldn't it begin with us? The
14
15
world is hungry for it. It is searching, crying
framework will have to get their education
for leadership and integrity. And the cry the
some place else. It is time to say to the revolu-
most poignant, because it isn't heard or under-
tionaries, "one dose of Hitlerian storm troop-
stood, comes from our own children.
ery is more than enough for this century."
Have they lost faith in our old standards or
Independent College System
have they lost faith in us? Do they doubt our
Institutions like those represented here to-
willingness to practice what we preach?
day are very much needed. I doubt if God is
Where were we when God was expelled from
dead on your campus. And because of this, I
the classroom?
think more and more of us will be leaning
In this state there are two young people
more and more on you in the troubled days to
lying on their beds of pain with mangled
come.
hands and sightless eyes. It was inevitable that
On the deck of the tiny Arabella off the
this would happen. The only question was
coast of Massachusetts in 1630, John Winthrop
time and place and who. For one it was a 20
gathered the little band of pilgrims together
year old girl, picking up the mail delivery in
off that hostile shore and said, "We shall be
a college administration building when the
as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all the people
bomb went off. The other was a 19 year old
are upon us, so that if we shall deal falsely with
boy in the dark of the early morning hours as
our God in this work we have undertaken and
he tried to plant a bomb, a symbol of his rage
SO cause Him to withdraw His present help
and his hate. How and when did this double
from us we shall be made a story and a by-
tragedy start to happen? It started the first
word through all the world."
time someone old enough to know better de-
clared that it was no crime to break the law
To you gentlemen from the business com-
in the name of social protest. It started with
munity here, who are considering what you
those who proclaimed in the name of aca-
can do in support of these institutions, I tell
demic freedom that the campus was a kind of
you without colleges of the kind represented
sanctuary immune to the laws and the rules
here, that shining dream of John Winthrop's
of behavior that govern the rest of us.
may well become the taste of ashes in our
mouths. Many nations have exchanged their
Framework for Education
God for other gods, but no nation in the
Personally, I am sick and tired of those who
history of mankind has ever exchanged its
on our behalf would assume the collective
God for no god at all and survived to write
guilt of man's inhumanity to man since the
any additional pages in history. So for what-
beginning of time. The breasts they are beat-
ever value my words could have, I say to you,
ing are not theirs, they're ours. It is time to
if we are to win the battle where it is being
say to all of our students, "Yes, we'll hear your
fought today in so many of our public insti-
suggestions, your complaints. If they are justi-
tutions within this state, I pray that you keep
fied, we'll heed them, but in offering you an
alive this very viable force, an independent
education we reserve the right to establish a
college and university system that will be
framework of rules and regulations within
competitive and that will ensure true aca-
which that education will be given, and those
demic freedom and the true preservation of
who find it impossible to live within that
our culture and our heritage.
16
17
6/11/69
ROBERT TAYLOR EULOGY
June 11, 1969
How to say farewell to a friend named Bob. He'd probably say, "Don't
make any fuss. I wouldn't want to cause any trouble."
How to speak of Robert Taylor--one of the truly great and most endur-
ing stars in the golden era of Hollywood. What can we say about a
boy named--well, a boy from Nebraska with an un-Nebraska-like name of
Spangler Arlington Bough.
Perhaps that's as good a starting point as any. A young man, son of
a Nebraska doctor, coming to California--to Pomona--for his last
years in college, and from there the story reads like a script from
one of those early musicals. And it happens to the last person in
the world who would have thought that great fame was in store for him.
There was the college play, the talent scout, and most improbable of
all, the coincidence of timing that found him in an MGM casting office
on the day that had been picked for the testing of a prospective
actress. Who can we get to do the scene with her? What about that
kid in the outer office? When the test was over, they didn't hire
her, they hired him. And I suppose that would be first-act curtain.
And the second act followed the same pattern--was almost a repeat. A
newly signed contract player getting a minor role in a picture. No
one remembers who had the principal roles--most have forgotten even
the title of the picture. But when it was previewed, everyone wanted
to know who was Robert Taylor--a young man with the name that sounded
like one the studio would think up and become instead Robert Taylor,
a name with a kind of honest midwest sound.
MGM was a giant and the home of giants. It had the greatest stars
in an era when Hollywood was a Mount Olympus peopled with god-like
stars--Gable Tracy, Grant, Montgomery, Coleman, Cooper, the Barrymores.
And there were goddesses to match--Garbo, Shearer, Crawford, Irene
Dunne. Bob Taylor became one of the all-time greats of motion
picture stardom. Twenty-four years at that one studio, MGM, alone.
Thirty-five years before the public. His face, instantly recognizable
-1-
in every corner of the world. His name, a new one--a household word.
And all of this came to be in one sudden dazzling burst. To simply
appear in public caused a traffic jam. There has never been anything
like it before or since--possibly the only thing that can compare to
it--Rudolph Valentino, and why not? Because on all of Mount Olympus,
he was the most handsome.
Now there were those in our midst who worked very hard to bring him
down with the label, "Pretty Boy". And, of course, there's that
standard Hollywood rule that true talent must never be admitted as
playing a part in success if the individual is too handsome or too
beautiful.
It's only in the recent years of our friendship that I've been able
to understand how painful all of this must have been to him--to a
truly modest man--because he was modest to the point of being painfully
shy. In all of the years of stardom, he never got quite over being
genuinely embarrassed at the furor that his appearance created. He
went a long way to avoid putting himself in a position where he could
become the center of attention.
And in these later years I have learned--and not by any complaints from
him--complaining wasn't a part of him--but I have learned of something
else that must have been hard for him to bear: that idea that just
a handsome face was responsible for his success--that he wasn't truly
an actor. Because Bob had one intolerance--he had no patience with
those who came into the business with the idea that they could short-
cut hard work and substitute gimmicks for craftsmanship.
He respected his profession and he was a superb master of it. He
took a quiet pride in, his work. He was a pro, and the "pretty boy"
tag couldn't begin to survive roles like Magnificent Obsession, Camille,
Waterloo Bridge, Johnny Eager, Quo Vadis.
It takes a rare and unique actor to be believable, as he was
believable, in costume epics like Ivanhoe, Knights of the Round Table,
and, also, at the same time as a fighter in The Crowd Roars and the
almost psychopathic Billy the Kid. Some of his pictures live on as
-2-
true classics, and, generally, the standard is so high that in
retrospect it would appear his modesty caused this industry to under-
rate the calibre of this man who was truly a star among stars.
And yet, none of this is what brought us together here today.
Perhaps each one of us has his own different memory, but I'll bet
that somehow they all add up to "nice man". Mervyn Leroy, who
directed so many of his great pictures, speaks of his always showing
consideration for everyone who worked with him. Artie Deutsch said
he never worked in a company where he wasn't well-loved well-liked,
even beloved, by cast and crew.
His quiet and disciplined manner had a steadying effect on every
company he was ever in, and at the same time, throughout this country,
there are hundreds of men who remember him because he taught them to
fly. He sought combat duty in World War II as a Navy flier and he
wound up teaching others--and I'll bet he taught 'em good. There
was no caste system in his love of humanity.
Today I am sure there is sorrow among the rugged men in the northwest
who run the swift water of the Rogue River and who knew him as one
of them. There are cowpokes up in a valley in Wyoming who remember
him and mourn--mourn a man who rode and hunted with them. And
millions and millions of people who only knew him by way of the silver
screen, and they remember with gratitude that in the darkened theater
he never embarrassed them in front of their children.
I know that some night on the late, late show I'm going to see him
resplendent in white tie and tails dining at Delmonico's, and I am
sure I'll smile--smile at Robert Spangler Arlington Bough Taylor,
because I'll remember how a fellow named Bob really preferred blue
jeans and boots. And I'll see him squinting through the smoke of a
barbecue as I have seen him a hundred times.
He loved his home and everything that it meant. Above all, he loved
his family and his beautiful Ursula-+lovely Manuela, all grown up;
little Tessa; Terry, his son, a young man in whom he had such great
pride.
-3-
In a little while the hurt will be gone. Time will do that for you.
Then you will find you can bring out your memories. You can look at
them--take comfort from their warmth. As the years go by you will
be very proud. Not SO much of the things that we have talked about
here--you are going to be proud of simple things. Things not so
stylish in certain circles today, but that just makes them a little
more rare and of greater value. Simple things he had like honor and
honesty, responsibility to those he worked for and who worked for him,
standing up for what he believed, and, yes, even a simple old-fashioned
love for his country, and above all, an inner humility.
I think, too, that he'd want me to tell you how very much he loved
your mother. What happiness she brought him and how wonderful she
is. The papers say he was in the hospital seven times; actually he
was out of the hospital seven times. He needed the strength that he
could only get from being in that home so filled with her presence.
He spoke to me of this just a few days ago. It was uppermost in his
mind, and I am sure he meant for me to tell you something that he
wanted above all else. Ursula, there is just one last thing that
only you can do for him--be happy. This was his last thought to me.
I don't pretend to know God's plan for each one of us, but I have
faith in his infinite mercy. Bob had great success in the work he
loved, and he returned each day from that work with the knowledge
there were those who waited affectionately for the sound of his
footsteps.
-4-
to
the
6/13/69
Commonwealth Club
Q&A
6-13-69
MR. TODD: Thank you, Governor. If you will return to the rostrum. at
we just have an immense number of questions, and I'm sure that you people
will realize that we can ask just very few of them, relatively speaking.
I've tried to select representative questions, and the Governor
has indicated to me that he would like to have questions asked on all
subjects in relation to the state. Many of the questions have been
answered by his address.
First question, Governor, is this:
Q: In a Commonwealth speech in 1965 former Berkeley Chancellor,
Edward Strong, warned of the dangers of politicizing the campus. Do
you think former restrictions barring outside political speakers should
be re-established?
A: Oh, I have a feeling that- I think perhaps we could use a
little more common sense than we've used in some communication with the
students, but I think this would be secondary to what I said in my
remarks about meeting and finding out these real grievances- things that
have created so much unrest among the students. I would think that
right now a rule like, that would be taken by that majority as, again,
just evidence of tactics that were forced upon them by the violent
dissidents and that still no one was aware of their discontent. I'd
hesitate on that.
Q: The next question, Governor, concerns the policy of the regents
on hiring Communists. What is your current regents' policy in this
regard, and what is your feeling about it?
A: Well, of course the regents don't hire professors- that's been
made very plain, and I, myself, have gone on record as saying that
someone's political beliefs should not properly be a judge of educational
qualifications. I don't think the issue is GO much that. I think this
is already happened--chat political considerations have been taken into
account by some department heads in hiring, and that there has been a
-1-
kind of a move over toward one way, I think what should be looked at
is: Does the individual lack the capacity for teaching to the extent
that he injects his own views and his philosophy into a kind of
indoctrination in the classroom?
The answer is not so much to check in the future on the political
qualifications of teachers as it is to rectify what I think is the
problem on the campus because someone--or some several ones--on the
campus have been hiring deliberately those who resort to indoctrination
and make their political feelings known to the students in that way.
Q: Governor, a question on Congressional Acts: How do you
feel about Congressman Green's proposed legislation to place tough
sanctions on campuses that get out of hand? Wouldn't it tend to work
against attempts being made by Lieutenant Governor Reinecke to moderate
and solve California's campus problems?
A: Well, Lieutenant Governor and I are on the same side with
this in much the theme of my closing remarks here of: Let's balance up
and start spending some more time trying to solve those other problems.
I don't know in detail just what it is that Edith Green has prop
ed
but I can understand her impatience. What she's talking about was the
congressional intent that was written into some of the aid-to-student
laws that said that a student receiving a federal grant to go to school,
was expected to obey the rules, regulations and decisions of the chief
administrative officer of the campus, and iT he didn't, the grant would
be taken away from him.
Now, I think that the government has a right, if it's subsidizing
someone, to say that they're not subsidizing for the purpose of burning
down the school. But I think that part of her impatience was due to
the fact that some of the SDS officials refused her request that they
appear before her committee in its hearing, and their refusal was
based on this declaration: That to appear--for them to appear--would be
to acknowledge that they recognized the Congress of the United States
as a legitimate part of government. and this they refused to do.
Q: Governor, there are a number of questions on tenure. Can
anything be done to modify our tenure system to permit elimination of
-2-
the incompetent and the undesirable who are now untouchable because
of it? I think this is representative of the questions asked.
A: Well, here I go, and I can see the headlines in the campus
papers now, The regents did do something. The regents had taken back
an authority they had for 97 years and gave up about three years ago
I think mistakenly they gave it up. The regents have taken back the
right to veto individuals who are recommended for tenure, .and I think
this is sound. The regents, in the eyes of the people, by the
constitution of the state--have that responsibility. Now, you can
delegate authority, but you can't delegate your constitutional
responsibility. So, as long as they are being held responsible, the
University took it back.
Now, 1 am not an educator, as you know; and, therefore, it's
always challenging when someone- a layman like myself comments on some
of the customs of education. So, I would rather see and say that with
regard to the whole subject of tenure, I think it is time that those
qualified in the field of higher education should do a study and a
review of the whole subject of tenure. It is one of the only areas in
our competitive society where after a few years you guarantee life
security to an individual, and I think human beings are human beings,
and there is a tendency when you remove the stick from behind and only
leave the carrot out in front, for somebody to slow down when they feel
they' had enough carrots.
Q: Governor, it's quite natural that we would have a large number
of questions on finances and taxes. How can we afford to spend millions
of dollars on new buildings for the Senate and this may be assuming
something not in evidence, I don't know--and the Legislature, when we
don't have sufficient funds for schools and tax refunds for taxpayers?
A: Listen, I was as surprised when I read that story as you were.
I have been claiming for two-and-a-half years that there are no secrets
in Sacramento, and I just discovered one:
I don't have all the facts on that or the figures or the space
requirements upon which they base that grand plan; and I intend to get
them and to look into this because we're embarked in Sacromento on a
-3-
plan right now to reduce the amount of office space required by
government over the next few years by 25 percent. This is by simply
applying to government--welve started already--the floor space require-
ments. How many square feet of floor space do employees require who
are doing similar kinds of work?
This was one of our Task Force recommendations. It had never been
done in government, and by simply applying this private business
standard the same standard employed by banks and financial houses and in-
surance companies and businesses of that kind, we believe that we can make
that much reduction. So, I would like to see how our figures, with what
we're attempting to do, jive with the present supposed shortage of space.
Now, the return of money that the taxpayers--the eventual return of
money to the taxpayers must come by not taking in the first place.
The tax reform cannot reduce taxes. Reduced taxes can only come from
reducing the size and cost of government, and this we are trying, as
hard as we can, to do. In the meantime, without any assurance as to
how well or how effective our economies will be, we have had to resort
to this other thing of when we find a one-time surplus such as the
hundred million dollars that we've projected for this fiscal year, then
I think we do just exactly what a private business concern does when
it can cut up a melon or a bonus--that we cut that up and give it
back to the people, and that's why I have been asking the legislature
and have legislation so far is moving about a snail's pace--but
that next year to give this hundred million dollars back by allowing
the people of the state to simply take an across-the-board 10 percent
reduction in their state income tax for that one year.
I think the people are intelligent enough to know--some over there
don't believe this, some say if you do it one year and you don't do it
the next, everybody will throw rocks at you. I think the people of this
state are intelligent enough to know that if you say to them: This is
one-time bonus, we've got some money left over, we're giving it back.
If next year there isn any money left over, you say there isn't any
money left over. Andguntil the day when enough of these happen that you
can pay now we do know here is the size of government--from here we can
adjust our tax take accordingly to meet the expected demand.
-11-
I -you know the great problem is that the expenditure of public
money it seemingly belongs to no one and there's an overwhelming desire
on the part of some to bestow it on someone,
Q: Governor, your opinion on the voting age. Do you believe that
favorable evidence supports the conclusion that the judgment of youth
on political matters has increased to such a degree that the voting age
should be reduced?
A: Well, as I said in my remarks, I think it's probably the best
informed generation-- knowledgeable, more aware of things that are
going on than any other generation we've ever known. But I'd feel a
lot more confident about them voting at 18 if they, on the campus, would
vote now for their own campus officers.
One of my biggest questions about lowering the voting age doesn't
have to do with the qualifications of the individual. I'm sure there are
many at 18 who are qualified. I'm equally sure there are many every par-
ent knows that all children do not mature equally--I'm sure there are
many who would be very susceptible to someone else's influence; but the
main point is: Can you lower the age without running the risk that no
political party--no candidate--can ever again afford to not go in and
organize the campus? What then does happen to academic freedom? What
about the professor, who in making a point in discussing current events
in a class, wants to take on the government or a government policy or
criticize the president or the governor or the legislature? Wouldn't
he then find that the opposite party would be in there the next day
saying we want equal time in that class? Wouldn't we lose the very thing
we're talking about: The right to free discuss in the campus and then
bring them out?
It's that fear of political--and there's an election of some kind
every year. This isn't a thing that just happens every four years.
There would be people in there for local elections, state elections.
Special elections, everything, all of the time, and I Morry about that.
I can't say that I have my feet in concrete on 11, but they're
getting a little sticky.
Q: Governor, would you explain briefly your stand on the Dos
Rios Dam?
-5
A: You're nasty sometimes. Well. you know that the Dos Rion
High Dam was not a part of the original water project. It was believed
in the beginning when the guarantees and assurances were made of water
to the valley and to the south that it could be obtained without that
high dam. That came along later. and was a brain child of the Corps of
Engineers. There were a number of factors involved in it It's a long
period of time--I'm concerned about the possibilities-- other possibilities
for water, but also aware of the knowledge that water could be provided
without flooding ground out, and I don't mind telling you if it was one
issue alone involved that's bothered me for a long time. I think that
people of fifty or a hundred years ago made promises to the Indians while
holding official title--must have made them in good faith believing that
those who followed and held that same title would honor their word, and I
just figured it's about time somebody started keeping that word that was
made to those indians up there and might as well start with us.
Q: And another rather difficult question, Governor. What is your
opinion of the family-life education courses being placed in the public
school system?
A: Well, I think there is an area there for education. Again, I'm
not an educator-- I speak as a layman. But I'd like to ask you if the
real problem is that the teaching of sex for example, in a school--is
that really the problem or isn't the problem compounded by the fact that
first, a few years ago, as the result of a court decision, we took out
of the schools the right and the ability to discuss things within a moral
framework. and how in the world can you start teaching sex if you cannot
discuss it within the framework of morality or any more rules of conduct?
MR. TODD: Governor Reagan, our time is just about up, and we just
have all kinds of questions that I cannot ask. I'm sorry, but I want to
express the appreciation of the Commonwealth Club of California and
particularly those who are present here today at this special ladies-day
lunchoon in the Grand Ballroom of the Sheraton Palace Hotel in San Fran
cisco.
We all understand the tremendous problems that California has, and
WC are most appreciated for your taking your time to come down here today,
-6-
and discuss these numerous questions and your generosity in meeting
any and all questions on all subjects that were submitted to you, but
there is one more final question, Governor, and I think this possibly
you should answer this with great care--it possibly could be the most
difficult question I've asked you: Why didn't you bring Nancy?
L
-1-
#
OPERATION PATRIOTISM
Remarks of
Governor Ronald Reagan
July 4, 1969
Independence Hall
Knott's Berry Farm
Buena Park
Dr. Teague, Reverend Father, our host, Walter Knott, fellow
citizens:
Having some experience with the timing problems of tele-
vision and knowing this program runs simultaneously with the one
in Philadelphia,* * I shall very carefully budget my words. Since
this is America's Birthday Party, the 193rd, it is fitting that
we look back in memory as we look forward with courage and antici-
pation. Now call it mysticism if you will (I have remarked before
to some of you on this), but it's my belief that there was some
divine plan that placed this nation between the two oceans to be
sought out and found only by those with a special kind of courage
and an overabundant love of freedom.
I have told before a story that is attributed to Thomas Jef-
ferson. I cannot actually vouch by my OWN personal research for
this story, but one historian has told me that Jefferson has written
that on that day of our Nation's birth in that little hall in Phila-
delphia, a replica of which stands here, the debate had raged for
*
The ceremonies were sponsored by the AMERICAN REVIVAL COMMITTEE
and coincided with the annual activities sponsored by the Sons of the
Révolution at Independence Hall, Philadelphia, and by the Sacramento
American Heritage Committee at the Liberty Bell replica in Capitol
Park, Sacramento, California.
-1-
many hours and the issue hung in doubt. The men who gathered there
were honorable men; they were hard-pressed by a king who had flouted
the very laws they were willing and anxious to obey. And even so, to
sign a declaration of independence was such an irretrievable act that
the walls had resounded for hours with the words of "treason"; and the
price for treason, the gallows--the headsman's axe. And as I say, the
issue still remained in the balance.
And then, according to Jefferson, a man arose. Jefferson de-
scribed him as not a young man, but one who had to summon all his
energy for an impassioned plea. He cited the grievances that had
brought them to this moment. And finally--and after speaking at great
length, his voice failing, he said, "They may turn every tree into a
gallows, every home into a grave, and yet the words of that parchment
can never die. To the mechanic in the workshop, they will speak hope;
to the slave in the mines, freedom. If this hall heard the sound in
the next moment of the headsman's axe, if my hand were freezing in
death, I would sign that parchment. Sign
Sign
if the next moment
the noose is around your neck, for that parchment will be the text-
book of freedom, the Bible of the rights of man forever. "
He fell back, exhausted. Fifty-six delegates, swept up by his
eloquence, rushed forward and signed the document destined to be as
immortal as any work of man can ever be.
And then they turned to thank him for his timely oratory and he
was not to be found. Nor could any be found who knew who he was or
how he had come in or gone out through the locked and guarded doors.
Fifty-six men had pledged their lives, their fortunes, and thei
sacred honor. Sixteen gave their lives in the war that followed.
-2-
Most gave their fortunes and all preserved their sacred honor.
What manner of men were they? Not of royal birth; not statesmen.
Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists; eleven were merchants; nine
were farmers. They were soft-spoken men of means and education
They were not an unwashed rabble. They had achieved security and
prestige but they valued freedom more.
Their stories haven't been told individually enough. John Hart
was drawn from the side of his desperately ill wife. For more than
a year he lived in the forest, in caves. He returned to find his
wife dead, his children vanished, his property destroyed. He died
of a broken heart.
Carter Braxton lost all his ships and sold his home to pay his
debts and died in rags. And so it was--Ellery, Clymer, Hall, Walton,
Gwinnett, Rutledge, Morris, Livingston, and Middleton. Nelson per-
sonally urged Washington to fire on his home and destroy it when it
became the headquarters for Cornwallis. Nelson died bankrupt.
This little band of men, so unique we have never seen their
like since, sired a nation that grew from sea to shining sea. Five
million square miles of forest, field, mountain, and desert. Two
hundred million people with a pedigree which includes the blood lines
of all the world. And just as our blood came from every corner of
the world, so has it been spilled in every corner of the world.
As Don read, it's been bled into the field called Flanders, the
sands of Africa on a place called Omaha Beach, splashed on a rock
named Corregidor, on the bleak slopes of Pork Chop Hill, and now in
the rice paddies of the jungles of Vietnam.
With the wisdom gained by hindsight, there have been cynics among
us after each war able to explain how each war, once it was safely past
-3-
had been a fraud, perpetrated on the people by greedy interests and
for selfish ends. And so saying, these cynical few have added to the
burden of doubt -- to the grief of those who mourn for the fallon.
But one thing they cannot do is tarnish or stain the motives of the
men who actually did the fighting and dying. Men who did die, died
to make the world safe for democracy, died to push back the evil
darkness of a Nazi world without God, a world where mar's morality
was measured by the size of the club he could carry : nc. young men
die today because an equally evil force threatens the freedom and
dignity of man in every land. And yet I challenge those who would
call us warlike, who say that war is your own choice and is solely
of our doing, or that war would cease if we would simply will it to
cease. Men who love freedon, who believe that man was created in
God's image, endowed with C. divine spark, know that government's
highest purpose is to preverve, to build the preeminence of the
individual. Such men knew that whenever and wherever in the world
the life and liberty of even the least among us is threatened there
we must all go with our collective might or there can be no freedom
at all.'
Reverend, the Reverend Muhlenbery knew this 193 years ago. He
was a man of God, a man of peace; and on a bright Sunday morning he
was preaching a sermon when he was handed a note. He paused, read
the brief message silently, and then took off his ministerial robes.
His surprised congregation saw him standing there in the uniform of
Washington's army. He said, "My friends, there is a time to preach
and there is a time to fight. This is a time to fight. " Now, if
I've seemed to dwell too much on war, it's only because the birth
pains of our nation were the agony of conflict and several times since
has been the price of freedom. The truth is the greatest fruit of
our founding fathers' dreams is to be found in the harvest of our
peacetime years.
The providing of plenty on a scale unmatched by any people in
all man's history. And the sharing of that plenty on a wider scale
than any society past or present. We're not perfect, but then we're
not tolerant of our imperfections either. We tax ourselves heavily
to care for the less fortunate, we grumble as we do so and complain,
and then we go right out and contribute fourteen billion dollars
voluntarily each year to good causes. We give 250 man hours a week
in volunteer work for good causes.
It is fitting that this meeting should be held here before this
replica of our Nation's birthplace. It's even more fitting that this
replica should have been built in California. Article I, Section 1, of
the Declaration of Rights of the original Constitution of the State of
California says, "All men are by nature free and independent and have
certain inalienable rights, among which are those of enjoying and
defending life and liberty, acquiring, possessing, and protecting
property. Californians are true sons of independence; and it's with
pride and hope that we welcome this beautiful replica of Independence
Hall to our friendly soil. California is and shall remain a strong
branch of the Liberty Tree. The American Eagle doesn't fly on one
wing. Liberty must be balanced with responsibility.
Walter Colton, builder of the Colton Hall where California's
Constitution was drafted and signed, put the choice before us with
these words, "It is for your faith and philantrophy to say what
-5-
California shall be when her swelling population shall burst the
bounds of her domain. You can write her hope in ashes or in stars
that shall never set.
"Every school book and Bible you throw among her hills will be
a source of penetrating and pervading light when the torch of the
caverned miner has gone out."
Well, let us resolve here today that no Californian shall re-
main ignorant of the spirit of this Nation, of its Declaration of
Independence and to the cornerstone of our Republic. In home, in
church, yes, and in the school, let this spirit and let these truths
be taught and known. Those who call themselves radical militants
today don't seem to understand the moral lessons of our history.
Perhaps they haven't been properly taught or perhaps they haven't
sought to learn or to grow and mature in understanding of the re-
sponsibilities that go with individual freedom.
In seven short years we shall mark two centuries of progress
under the rights and freedoms for which the Declaration of Independence
was proclaimed in 1776. How shall we prepare for this third century
of freedom? Shall we greet it as a people divided by animosity and
suspicion? Some would have it that way. They work diligently and
tirelessly to erode the faith, the faith we have in ourselves, hoping
that we 'll forget our heritage and hoping we'll forget how truly
great we are and can be.
If they should succeed, then perhaps some day an epitaph would
be written for our Nation. Frank R. Barnett, president of the
National Strategy Information Center, a Rhodes Scholar, a former
professor at Wabash College, has written his idea of what that epita
for our Nation might be.
-6-
"Here lies the only civilization which perished at the peak of
its power with its power unused. Here lies a decent people who
wanted love--not empire but got neither. Who tried to trade power
for popularity, and lost both.
"Here lies a Nation of advertisers who knew how to change con-
sumer taste in cigarettes but were themselves manipulated on all
issues that really mattered to their salvation and survival.
"Here died a. sort of Lancelot in the court of nations who,
granted all his grievious flaws, was still somehow the noblest
knight of all. Except this Lancelot, crippled with an undeserved
guilt complex, let his weapons and his i ideals fall unused and so
condemned all mankind to a thousand-year night of the Russian Bear
and the Chinese Dragon."
Well, whether or not that epitaph is ever written depends on
us. We can be apathetic, we can listen to those today who would
divide us, and by our lack of caring we can insure the engraving of
that epitaph on our granite mountains. Or we can resolve here that
this replica of our Nation's birthplace would be a symbol that America
today will also be an exact replica of the dream that came into being
193 years ago. That this Lancelot among nations will hold back the
thousand-year night and that on our granite mountains instead will be
erected--not a tomb and not a tombstone--but a shining Camelot, an
inspiration to all mankind.
-7-
7/29/69
RELEASE: 9:00 am
Tuesday
July 29
Opening Remarks by Governor Ronald Reagan
Seminar on Transportation and Public Safety
Western Governors' Conference
Seattle, Washington
July 29, 1969
We are here today to discuss an imperative of our
modern-day society -- Transportation and Public Safety.
At the outset, let me stress that if we are to receive
maximum value from this seminar, it must be an open discussion
with everyone taking part - with State and Federal representa-
tives speaking freely and taking part in the search for solutions
and accelerated efforts. We must also have follow through on
the issues and ideas discussed here.
Permit me, quickly, to outline some of the dimensions of
the problem - and the challenges - which face us. Perhaps they
will serve as "thought starters" for our discussion here today.
First, there are questions regarding our highway systems:
How they may serve our people efficiently in the face of
mounting population pressures - while at the same time balancing
construction and routes to take into consideration the increas-
ing concern about human and environmental problems such as
air pollution, aesthetics and noise control.
Very serious consideration and discussion also must be
given to highway safety and the spiraling death and injury rate
on our streets and freeways.
For example, should the National Highways Safety Bureau
report directly to the Secretary of Transportation? Would this
increase its importance and effectiveness? Would it accelerate
efforts and accomplishments in this area? And how can we
speed up approval of highway safety programs?
Just as we know there will be increased traffic on our
highways - with attendant problems - so we also know there will
be increased traffic in our airways - with equally as complex
problems. It is the purpose of this seminar to seek the answers
to those problems - now before they become unsolvable.
I suppose it is natural that the recent fantastic events
of the Apollo moon flight color our thinking. One message I
get from that tremendous achievement is that it shows what can
be done when, first, a commitment is made, and, second, the
brainpower, the time and the resources are spent to translate
rhetoric and commitment into action into reality.
Transportation - on the ground and in the air - is and
will continue to be one of our major domestic problems. It,
along with its various spin-off effects - both positive and
negative - permeates virtually every aspect of our life.
REAGAN (con't)
(2)
Obviously, the entire question of Mass Rapid Transpor-
tation is one of major importance - in many cases it deals
with nothing less than the survival of our central cities.
Recently, a California Task Force on Transportation
reported after more than a year's study by experts represent-
ing all modes and all disciplines. Recommendation Number
Five in their report stated:
"The State has a legitimate responsibility, and must
accept a key role, in assuring the urban mass trans-
portation needs of the several metropolitan urban
regions in California."
What is the proper role of the Federal government in this?
What responsibilities do the local entities have?
Here in the West, the problem of mass transportation
seems especially difficult - at least it has its peculiar
problems - because of our horizontal cities with their
relatively low population density, but which nevertheless re-
quire some form of mass rapid transportation.
As with highways, mass transportation also has en-
vironmental ramification; too many systems have created
artificial, long-term and injurious social boundaries in too
many cities. We cannot affort to create anymore "wrong
sides of the tracks: or alienate segments of society.
One of the most difficult problems to solve in mass
transportation is the question of financing. How should
mass transportaion be financed? Who should pay for it? At
what level? How can we insure that mass transit systems are
thoughtfully conceived - and designed - to serve practical
market areas rather than political boundaries?
Here in the West, because of our distances and our
mobility, we look into the sky for much of our intercity and
interstate travel We also are both the starting and ending
points for national (and global) flights.
The question of reliable air transportation - and air
safety - is one in which problems of growth must not only be
solved but also anticipated.
What is the proper role of the States in this? How can we
best work with Federal and municipal agencies to insure maximum
safety and minimum congestion? What about the related problems
of ground traffic congestion in and about, and to and from,
airports? And, what of the increasing problem of noise pollution
along the airport approaches and in the vicinity of the landing
fields?
REAGAN (con't)
(3)
At this point, I would like to call upon some of our
Federal friends to start the discussion by commenting and
responding to the questions I have raised, as well as some
of the issues which are outlined in the suggested agenda
which has been distributed to each of you.
the
9/28/69
REMARKS BY GOVERNOR RONALD REAGAN
WELCOMING THE REVEREND BILLY GRAHAM
ANAHEIM, CALIFORNIA
SEPTEMBER 28, 1969
I am sure there will be those who question my participation here
tonight. We have become so conscious of the separation of church and
state that sometimes it seems we have reinterpreted freedom of religion
to be freedom from religion. If that be our course, then indeed we are
in great danger as a nation.
On the deck of the tiny Arbella, off the Massachusetts coast in the
year 1630, John Winthrop spoke to that little band of pilgrims of what
their future could be in this new land; a land they had not yet seen.
He said: "We shall be as a city upon a hill. They eyes of all people
are upon us, so that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work
we have undertaken and so cause him to withdraw his present help from us,
we shall be made a story and a byword throughout the world."
There is no need in our land today greater than the need to
rediscover our spiritual heritage. Many nations in the past centuries
have exchanged their gods for other gods, but no nation has ever
exchanged its god for no god at all and lived to add further pages to
its history.
Our young people cry out for a cause, a belief, in which they can
invest their youthful strength and idealism. And too often the cause
they find is tragically false.
Runaway young people have come to one of our cities in California--
San Francisco. I don't know what exactly they were seeking, but I do
know what they found. In one year alone, 2056 of them were questioned in
narcotics investigations; 1731 were jailed; 4692 were treated in one
hospital alone for narcotics poisoning and bad trips; and 2613 were treated
for venereal disease. A total of 1861 girls mothered fatherless, un-
supported children; 3280 underaged delinquents were arrested for involvement
in muggings, burglaries, shoplifting and so forth; 26 were murdered.
Why is a representative of government here? To welcome with humble
pride a man whose mission in life has been to remind us that in all our
seeking, in all our confusion, the answer to each and every problem is
to be found in- the simple words of Jesus of Nazareth who urged us to love
one another. By word and example, the man we welcome can show even the
most turned off of the turned off world, the most militant with their
placards, their parades and their hatred, where the action really is.
The action is here.
On behalf of my fellow Californians, I am happier than I can say
to welcome to our State the Reverend Billy Graham. We are proud to have
him here--we need to hear his word.
# # #
10/22/69
OFFICE VI THE GOVERNOR
Sacramento, California
Contact:
Paul Beck
445-4571
11-20-69
EXCERPTS OF REMARKS BY GOVERNOR RONALD REAGAN
Eureka College Fundraising Luncheon
Chicago, Illinois
October 22, 1969
You have all done me a very great honor and there is no way to
describe how I feel in this moment. The only thing I can think of---
that might possibly top this moment would be to receive an honorary
degree from Berkeley.
But E am here, not only to more adequately express my thanks, but
also to honor an institution, a college, Eureka College. You can see by
the pennants how long it has been a part of Illinois and this country.
I wouldn't be here had it not been for Eureka College. I don't know just
exactly what course my life would have taken, but I know that this little
institution; which down through the years has known what would have to be
called, in educational circles, a genteel poverty, has still always been
able to reach down and help those who know real poverty to help them
to move up a notch, and help those trying to raise themselves by their
bootstraps. In my case I wasn't sure I had boots.
I am sorry that my brother could not be here with us. He also
will be honored by erection of the building at Eureka which will bear our
name. At the same time though, I can't help but feel a kind of a
vindictive pleasure because I remember when he was a freshman and I was
a sophomore we played in a football game. On the last play, he as a
freshman was put in at end. I had been in the entire 60 minutes. Bud
Cole, who you have met here, called a pass play in the huddle. My
brother was supposed to go to the right and try to suck the secondary
with him. An end, named Heinie Sand, was to go to the left and receive
a pass down the side. Bud, the quarterback, made it very clear that the
pass would be thrown down the left sideline. My brother, with truly
charming originality, thought "what am I doing way over hereto the right
f the ball is going to be thrown over there?" So he joined Heinie.
It so happened that the ball was deflected by an opposing defensive back,
bounced over Heinie's head, dropped in my brother's arms, and he went
65 yards for the winning touchdown. It was so unusual for a college
freshman to be in on one play of a college game, and score the winning
touchdown, that it made all the papers in the United States, regardless
of Eureka's limited size. I remember they spelled my name wrong in the
lineup.
- 1 -
Eureka College speech
There are so many of you friends with us today that it would be
very easy for me to just stand here and reminisce. But, I know that
time moves on, and I must speak some of the thoughts I have about this
occasion, and the reason for it. I am not unaware of e certain amount
of political image-making which portrays me as anti-educational and an
opponent of intellectualism. And it just ain't true that I don't put no
store by book learnin'.
As a matter of fact, as governor of California, I want you to know
that my feelings about higher education are so deep that I am willing to
engage in a student exchange program with anyone.
Seriously, I have been disturbed by a quotation that was
attributed to Dr. James Conant of Harvard a few years ago, He was
supposed to have said: "The greater proportion of our youth who attend
private schools, the greater the threat to our democratic unity." I
hope he was quoted out of context; that he had some other meaning than
the one that seems so obvious from those words. Using "private" to mean
all the independent schools, I say that it is absolutely essential to
the total educational system of this nation that we have the independent
colleges. The small colleges produce a leadership for America that is
far out of proportion to their size.
It is for this reason that I have been supporting and advocating
that the Federal Government grant tax credits not deductions, but
tax
credits
for at least a portion of the tuition fees that are paid
by parents sending their sons and daughters to college. I think that
we should seriously explore the possibility of extending federal aid,
not through additional bureaucracy at the risk of violating the
traditional separation of church and state, but, in a spirit of
competition between the independent and the public schools, by granting
tax credits within a suitable limit, of course, as to amount, but tax
credits for contributions that are made to the independent schools and
colleges.
This was suggested some years ago by a group of college presidents
who were alarmed by the possibility that academic freedom might be
threatened by the large grants that were beginning to come to higher
education from Washington. These college presidents journeyed to
Washington to present their idea. For a matter of days they met with the
Director of Education and the Department of Health, Education and Welfare
- 2 -
speech
But, they were having little success, Over and over they kept asking
the question, rather than presenting arguments: "Why won't such a plan
work?" They had suggested a limit of a hundred dollars for the
contribution that would be a tax credit. They said the government should
feel free, of course, to change that figure if it was unrealistic,
either up or down. But finally, after days of discussion, the director
rejected their suggestion with these words: "You don't understand. Under
such a system the government couldn't achieve its social objectives."
Well, I doubt that anyone can interpret those words as anything other
than a declaration that the government did intend to use those grants
precisely for the purpose of influencing the course of higher education
in this country, and to me that is an intolerable political interference
with academic freedom.
To those of you in the commercial and industrial world who view
undertakings from the standpoint of cost-effectiveness, the independent
colleges are one of the nation's better investments. As is typical in
almost any comparison between tax-supported projects and those in the
private sector, you will find that there is a lower cost ratio per
student in the independent colleges and universities. They also reduce
the need for costly expansion by our public institutions. In my own
state, if the government had to take over the education of those now
being provided an education in California's independent colleges we would
have to increase the state budget by 200 million dollars a year and the
immediate capital outlay required would be one and a half billion dollars.
Right now, the private colleges in this country, if they were provided
with additional funds of a comparably small amount, would be able to take
between a quarter and a half of a million additional students with no
additional capital outlay. That's a good educational buy from the
standpoint of economy alone.
Now I know that it's a kind of cliche, particularly in academic
circles, to draw a parallel between the rise and fall of the Roman Empire
and the course in recent history of our own republic. Yet the parallel
is there in such detail that it's almost frightening, eerie. Dr. Robert
Stráus-Hauppe in a series of articles, in which he collected the
observations of Spengler, Ferrazo, DeReincourt, Gibbons and a number of
other historians, told of how Rome had a few centuries of beginning as
did our OWE country, a kind of pioneer heritage not unlike our own, then
entered into the two centuries of greatness reaching the heights in the
second of those centuries and going into the decline and the collapse in
the third. However, the signs of decay were becoming apparent in the
latter years of that second century.
- 3 winds
Eureka College speech
It is written that there were vast increases in the number of idle
rich and the idle poor and the latter were put on a permanent dole---a
kind of federal welfare system. And, as this system became permanent,
and the recipients of public largess increased in number, they organized
into a political bloc of sizeable power. They weren't hesitant about
making their demands known and their government wasn't hesitant about
meeting those demands with ever-increasing frequency. Would-be empero
catered to them. A great solid middle class Rome's strength then as
ours is today---was taxed more and more to support a bureaucracy that
kept growing larger and more powerful. And oh how those of us in govern-
ment know how bureaucracy can grow! You start out hiring a rat catcher
and the first thing you know he has become a rodent control officer and
he has no intention of getting rid of the rats.
Surtaxes in Rome were imposed on incomes to meet emergencies.
The government engaged in deficit spending and the denarius, a silver
coin widely used throughout the known world and similar to our half
dollar in size and value, began to lose its silvery hue, to take on a
kind of copper glow as the government reduced the silver content.
Gresham's law was at work even before Gresham had propounded it. The
real silver coins went into hiding and soon disappeared entirely.
Military service was highly honored by the Romans. A foreigner
could attain Roman citizenship simply by serving for a term in the Roman
legions. But with the increasing affluence and oppulence, young men of
Rome began avoiding military service. They found excuses to remain in
the soft and sordid life of the city. They took to using cosmetics,
wearing feminine-like hairdos and garments until it became difficult to
tell the sexes apart. Among the teachers and scholars was a group called
cynics, who let their hair and beards grow, were slovenly in their dress,
professed an indifference to worldly goods, and heaped scorn on what
they called the middle.class culture.
Now, I'm still talking about Rome.
The morals declined. It became unsafe to walk in the countrysi
or the city streets. Rioting was commonplace. Sometimes whole sections
of cities and towns were burned. And all the time the twin diseases of
confiscatory taxation and creeping inflation were waiting to deliver the
death blow. When they Finally overcame the energy and ambition of
Rome's middle class, Rome fell.
- 4 -
Bureka College speech
Well, we're approaching the end of our second century, jingling
our copper coins in our pockets, knowing fear as WE walk in the country-
side or on our city streets. We've known rioting in those streets and
on our campuses, where demands are made that colleges divorce themselves
from participating in the defense of the nation. In the last eight
years we've seen 45 social welfure programs become 435, expending one of
every three of the tax dollars. In my own state which is one of great
growth, with an influx of westarn migration that is almost constant
in the last two years we've increased our population by 600,000. And in
this great time of affluence and prosperity, in that same two-year period,
to the rolls of those receiving direct cash grants from government we've
added 400,000.
It's been pointed out that the days of democracy are numbered once
the belly takes command of the head, When the less affluent feel the
urge to break a commandment and begin to covet that which their more
affluent neighbors possess, when they attempt to use their votes to attain
instant satisfaction, and when an equal opportunity at the starting line
becomes an extended guarantee of at least a tie at the finish of the
race, under the euphemism of the greatest good for the greatest number,
we destroy the very system which for two centuries has provided exactly
that, the greatest good for the greatest number.
The jungle seems to be closing in on this little plot that we
have been trying to civilize for six thousand years.
Yes, we have campus disturbances. All of us are disturbed at the
virus that has infected the campus and no doubt, we could top each other
with frightening and unbelievable stories. Hardly a day passes without
my mail bringing new evidence. For instance, a leaflet, the other day
entitled, "The Need to Fight the Cops, " was distributed on a college
campus explaining how to make and threw fire bombs. One day we listened
to a tape recording of a so-called student meeting that had been held on
one of our state college campuses. They were discussing the plans for a
campus disruption. Explicit directions were given as to how to start
fires in the buildings and subsequently there were 50 fires started in
the campus buildings in one day. Continuing to listen to the tape as the
outlined while they would march, Where Chiry would parade and picket, we
heard a voice 26% "and At in the process it becomes necessary to kill,
you vill One is guipped with an overwaelming sense of unreality.
Unreality first, that it is happening at all. But even more evightening,
as we sat there listening, was how close we've come to accepting this as
normal. Dr. spock's babies have grown up, which is probably more than
we can say for the doctor. I 11 confess that I thought between of him
when he was concerned with pablum and potty training.
- 5 -
College speech
Last year on our California campuses there was a million dollars
worth of damage done by arson and vandalism. There were three murders
on our university campuses during the year.
Today, there are two young people in my state lying with mangled
hands and sightless eyes. One of them, a 20-year-old girl, was picking
up the mail delivery in a college administration office when a bomb
exploded. The other, a 19-year-old boy in the dark hours of the early
morning was planting a bomb in a campus building as a symbol of his rage
and hatred when it exploded prematurely.
You wonder: how and when did all this begin? I can tell you.
It began the first time that someone old enough to know better declared
that it was no crime to break a law in the name of social protest. It
started
when those who proclaim in the name of academic freedom
declared the campus a sanctuary immune to the laws and the rules that
govern the rest of us. It began when some, who in the name of change and
progress, decided that you can scrap all the time tested wisdom that man
has accumulated in his climb from the swamp to the stars, by simply
calling its constricting tradition and morality the dead hand of the past
and wiping it out as a discipline that is no longer binding upon us.
St. Thomas Aquinas warned teachers they must never dig a ditch
front of a student that they fail to fill in. To cleverly raise doubts
and to ever seek and never find is to develop a generation that is
extremely talkative but does very little thinking and accomplishes nothing
Yet sometimes, with these young people, we have to look beyond
their words to hear what they are actually saying. Read between the lines
and the placards demanding the right to choose their own curriculum, to
not be degraded for more participation in the social turmoil of the off
campus world.
Some decisions must remain with those in charge and those in charge
must have the common sense and the courage to say that this will be so.
Now, I don't question the right of a person to say that he should be
allowed to study and to investigate whatever he prefers. But, at the
same time, there is no question about the educational institution's rigne
to say that this person will not be granted a degree for pursuing such
a course.
- 6 -
Eureka College speech
My alma mater is not ranked with the great universities of the
Ivy League or even with the University of California. But, of course,
it does have one distinction we are gathered here today because
Eureka hopes to build a building, not tear one down. I have been
reminded on certain occasions of the difference between our institutions
by some irate educators with a hint of intellectual arrogance. But, in
the area of common sense, my alma mater ranks with the best. Recently,
when the controversy raging in the country had to do with the problems
of discrimination and bigotry, Eureka President Dr. Langston said:
"The black student is not admitted nor rejected, nor any other student,
on the basis of complexion. Here at Eureka we believed and talked and
practiced integration even before the law required it. The criteria
for admission relates to the college's purposes, which are education.
The college has no purposes and no programs which are to be evaluated
on the basis of the college being a social or revolutionary agency, or
a clinical institution of any kind. This college is an institution of
higher learning. It expects the faculty and the students to examine
and to debate many sides of great issues. It doesn't engage in commercia
or social programs or politics or other such activities. Members of
her faculty and student body are occasionally interested in such matters.
And sometimes intensely interested and active. But the college works
at education and expects to be judged solely as an educational
institution."
I believe the thinking members of our minority communities would
agree that this is exactly the thing that they have been talking about
and hoping for. That they would be there, neither because of, nor in
spite of, any differences in complexion. Now, this may not jibe with
some of the current campus discussions in the land but I think it makes
great good sense the kind of common sense that all too often the
intellectual community tends to forget.
I like the idea of common sense that was expressed by the farmer
when some smart alecks were trying to get his goat and one of them asked
him where he would like to be in the event of a nuclear explosion. The
farmer said someplace where I could say, "What was that?"
Really, I think it is the kind of good sense that our young people
truly want. They really would be happy to put down their placards and
to invest their energy and idealism in causes that they could discuss
freely all sides of all questions within a framework of value judgment.
- 7 -
Eureka College speech
Our obligation is to help our young people find truth and purpose,
to find identity and a goal. I already have talked of those who were in
rebellion with a club and a torch. And admittedly there are only a few.
But there is a ferment involving the great majority of our young men and
women, They do have complaints and their complaints are legitimate.
They are refusing to become numbers in a computer. They want more than
a four-year ride on an assembly line in some kind of giant diploma mill.
They want a reordering of the priorities.
The United States Department of Education recently conducted a
survey on 68 university campuses involving 7500 professors, and a question
was asked, "What is the objective of the university?" 7500 professors
answered: "To protect the academic freedom of the faculty."
Whatever happened to teaching? I think it is time for all of us,
but especially those in charge of our institutions of learning to review
the bidding. Shouldn't the doctrine "publish or perish, or even research
follow in order of importance the need to teach our young people. It is
possible that even the protestors, those who are most radical among our
young people, are in reality crying for help and their cry is all the
more poignant because it has gone unheard and unheeded.
One day I participated in a lecture series in one of our large
midwestern universities in Kansas, The meeting was held in a fieldhouse.
There were 4000 adults on the ground floor because townspeople were
admitted to the Alf Landon Lecture Series. There were 10,000 students
or more in the tiers of seats rising up to the roof of that building.
Then there was a question and answer period. I don't remember the
details, but an adult from the floor asked me a question and in asking
it stated his concern that our young people were turning against and
rebelling against standards of morality- the principles which we, the
adults, had tried to teach them.
In answering him, I said that I wondered whether that was what
they were really rebelling against. Were they really turning away from
those standards or principles, I asked. Or, were they rebelling because
they don't believe that we are living up to those standards and principles
ourselves? There was a second of silence and then 10,000 kids came to
their feet with a roar that 7 shall never forget.
- 8 -
Have they lost faith in the rules, or have they lost faith in us?
Do they doubt our willingness to practice what we preach? Has there been
a quiet drifting away and erosion of our moral commitment? Where were
we when God was expelled from the classroom? How often do they see us
dismiss wrong-doing in public life with an easy tolerande such as:
"Well, that's just politics?"
The halls of government are the very temples of freedom and we
should so consider them. What about us when that youngster comes home
from the practice field, tells us how that afternoon he learned to get
away with holding illegally on a block? What is our response? How many
times have they sat in a car with us and seen us look over our shoulder
and fudge a little at a stop sign if there was no policeman in sight?
As the country parson said, the fellow who left the gate open is only
slightly more guilty than the one who saw it open and didn't close it.
Is it possible that much of what frightens and disturbs us actually
started with us, with a gradual and silent erosion of our own moral code.
No government at any level and for any price can afford the police that
are necessary to assure our safety and our freedom unless the over-
whelming majority of us are guided by an inner personal code of morality--
a code that makes us act when we're alone the same as we do when the
eyes of the crowd are upon us.
There is a wonderfulstory about the potential of these young
people. It was a few years ago when Bud Wilkinson had those great
championship football teams out in Oklahoma. One year at the close of
the season, his national championship team was playing Texas Christian.
TCU had had a mediocre season, but on this day they rose to the heights
as sometimes a team will, and they were giving that Oklahoma team a
battle right down to the closing seconds. Then, in these closing seconds
a receiver dived into the end zone for a shoestring catch of a pass that
meant victory over the national champions. The crowd in the stadium was
going wild. But, the young fellow who caught the pass walked over to
the referee and said, "No, sir, it touched the ground before I caught it.'
Now, what was your first reaction? Should have kept his mouth
shut. The referee didn't see it. Why didn't he just get away with it?
Well, should he have kept his mouth shut?
- 9 -
Eureka College speech
Some day he may be in your State House, or in the Congress of
the United States, or in the White House or on a Supreme Court bench,
and what then? Will you want him to keep his mouth shut then or make
decisions on the basis of political expediency because no one is looking?
Or, on the other hand, do you want him to base his decisions on the same
strong moral conviction that made him walk over to the referee and tell
him the ball had touched the ground before he caught it?
And who will teach them by word and deed this kind of morality
if it isn't us?
On the tiny deck of the Arbella off the coast of Massachusetts in
1630, John Winthrop gathered that little band of pilgrims together. He
spoke to them of the life they would have in this land, which as yet
they had not seen. He said, "We shall be as a city upon a hill. The
eyes of all people are upon us 30 that if we shall deal falsely with our
God in this work that we have undertaken and so cause him to withdraw
his present help from us we shall be made a story and a by-word to all
the world."
To you who are considering, what can I do, may I suggest supportin
Eureka College. Without such schools this shining dream of John Winthrop
may well become as he prophesied, the taste of ashes in our mouth within
our lifetime.
Schools like Eureka College are an educational whetstone serving
to hone the educational process, helping to improve the public tax
supported system and keeping it competitive in the drive for excellence.
By their very competition these private schools help preserve the
public institutions from political interference, guaranteeing a measure
of academic freedom that the public system could never attain by itself.
Institutions such as Eureka College are essential to America.
They provide leadership out of all proportion to their size, as I said
before. America will be needing them more and more in the days ahead.
You ladies and gentlemen who are in the world of industry and
business and the professions, can make no greater investment in freedo
than your contributions to independent schools and colleges in this
country. If we are to win the battle where it is being fought today,
in the hearts and minds of young people, I pray that you will keep
alive the dreams of so many in our pioneer background who left us their
heritage of this kind of institution.
- 10 -
Recently, I was privileged to speak to a group gathered on
Dwight Eisenhower's birthday. Dwight Eisenhower said that we believe
that individual liberty rooted in human dignity is man's greatest
treasure that men given free expression of their will, prefer freedom
and self-dependence to dictatorship and collectivism.
And then he left us these words: "Freedom from fear and injustice
and depression will be ours only in the measure that men who value such
freedom are ready to sustain its possession defended against every
thrust from within and from without."
The poet Belloc said, "In the easy times of peace we look at the
barbarian and we are amused at his antics and we laugh. But while we
laugh we are watched by large and awful faces from beyond. And on those
faces there is no smile."
God is not dead on the campus of Eureka. Many nations have
exchanged their gods for other gods and gone on to write pages of history.
But no nation in all history has ever exchanged its god for no god at all
and continued to leave a mark on the world.
It is a great challenge that faces us to see if we can make
institutions of this kind as a shining city upon a hill.
Again, I want to tell you how proud I am to have been a part of
this and to say that to those who have expressed some thanks for my
being here that thanks is the other way around. This has been just a
half hour or so in which I could at least, in a small measure, pay back
a debt I owe,
##########
(NOTE: Since Governor Reagan speaks from notes, there may be changes
in, or additions to, the above quotes. However, the governor
will stand by the above quotes.)
- 11 -
of
the
and
the and
the
the
the
"IN LESS THAN THREE YEARS
"
Remarks by Governor Ronald Reagan
REPUBLICAN STATE CENTRAL COMMITTEE
Anaheim, California
November 1, 1969
The last time we met under these circumstances, we were preparing
for a campaign and our efforts culminated in the national victory
and the inauguration of Richard Nixon in Washington on January 20th.
Well, thanks to all of you, we also have had some other victories
to celebrate, only we got ours on the installment plan; four
special elections, plus that big win last November. The best way
to thank you, I think, is just to tell you a few of the things
those victories - and the Republican majorities in Sacramento -
have made possible.
FIGHTING CRIME
We passed some of the most significant crime legislation in more
than a decade. Many of the measures passed are the same ones that
we have been trying to pass every year, only to have them buried
in committee or defeated on the floor; thanks to you and that
Republican majority, there have been some changes made in the
committees.
We passed the presumptive limits law. This, of course, is a help
to local law enforcement; we have established a level by which it
can be assumed that a driver is under the influence of alcohol.
Me passed the first anti-pornography laws that have been enacted
in eight years. You know, it is a funny thing: through the years
that Republicans have been trying to get these laws everyone was
in favor of anti-pornography laws if you could get them out of
committee where everyone then has to vote in the light of day.
Well, under the leadership of the former Speaker, it was pretty
difficult -- if not impossible -- to get such laws out of committee.
Once Republicans got a majority in the Assembly, we changed Speakers
and started passing these laws.
Drugs and Narcotics
We sought and supported tougher laws to crack down on the dope
peddler and the narcotics pusher. Working with Republican leader-
ship, Howard May and Bob Monagan, we passed laws increasing the
penalties for the possession and sale of dangerous drugs and
narcotics; laws that permit the school principal to expel or sus-
pend students who are caught selling narcotics on the school
grounds, and laws which prohibit juveniles under 18 from going to
Mexico without the written consent of their parents or guardians.
We established an Interagency Council on Drug Abuse. In a major
creative society program, we organized a public education program
of drug abuse which would have cost us two million dollars, except
that the private sector donated their talent and their money to
prépare the advertisements and publish the pamphlets. Now, radio
-2-
and TV stations and newspapers are running the ads on a public
service basis without charge.
After we managed to gain a one vote Republican majority in both
houses, we were able to pass some laws to curb campus violence.
Laws that make it illegal for anyone disturbing the peace to return
within 72 hours if he has been thrown off a campus. Laws that
withhold state school and other tax financial aid from students
convicted of illegal campus disturbances. Laws that make it first
degree murder to plant a bomb that results in someone's death.
We have tightened the states' statutes against unlawful assembly;
passed laws giving local authorities the power to control topless
and bottomless entertainment and laws to protect those witnesses
who are willing to testify on the activities of organized crime
such as the "Mafia".
We have added 5 to 25 years to the prison sentence if the criminal
was carrying a gun at the time of the commission of the crime. We
have also increased the penalties for rape, robbery and burglary
if the victim suffers bodily harm in the commission of the crime.
And, we passed laws making it illegal for unauthorized persons to
carry a loaded firearm into schools and other public places. (I
hope the Sierra Club will take note that the teachers have now
been added to the list of the protected species.)
The opposition - whose veracity decreases as its volume increases
cites crime statistics and charges that in the 1966 campaign,
we boasted that we would wipe out crime. Well, just for the record,
we said we would do something about crime - instead of wringing
our hands and blaming society for every crime that was committed.
And in less than three years we have passed more effective anti-
crime legislation than they did in all the eight that they were
there. As a matter of fact, the record will show that they made
no real effort to pass such legislation in those eight years; to
the contrary, they devoted their efforts to reducing the penalties
for crime.
Administrative Action
Not all of our efforts in fighting crime have been confined to
passing laws. We have also acted administratively --- and are
working closely with the private sector and local government
agencies. Me established a California Council on Crime, bringing
together for the first time in this nation every element of law
enforcement to develop a master plan for preventing and detecting
and fighting crime. We established the nation's first computer-
to-computer crime information hookup. This is the first time this
has ever been done - linking our state crime computer with the
leading cities in our state and with the Federal crime computer
in Washington. Now, we have one system with an almost instantaneous
exchange of knowledge on criminal activities and criminal records.
Representatives of law enforcement have been assigned to the Adult
Authority to lend their experience and their expertise so they
could help shape the policies and the probation policies with
regard to parole.
-3-
None of this was possible without all of you. All of you who
worked and contributed. Those of you who lived in motels and
walked precincts in strange towns in special elections. You can
be very proud. You made this and more possible.
CUTTING THE COST OF GOVERNMENT
Not too long ago I was on my way into a luncheon to make a speech
and Mike Deaver, of my office, overheard somebody say, "I hope he
isn't going to talk about how much money they saved on typewriter
ribbons". Well, I won't do that, although we did save money on
typewriter ribbons.
The cost of government continues to be the biggest thing on the
peoples' minds. So let me just make a passing reference to the
progress we have made in government economy and you will realize
that we haven't retreated or weakened in our determination to make
government more efficient and as economic as it can possibly be.
You have often heard me say in the past that no government has
ever voluntarily reduced itself in size. Well, we may just be the
first to do it. If we had continued the rate of increase in the
size of government in our state that we found when we took office,
there would now be 15 thousand more employees than when we started.
But, on July 1, the start of this fiscal year, there were just
C57 more employees than when we started 24 years ago. And I
believe that on next July 1 there will be fewer and certainly no
more employees than when we started.
In one of our largest departments, the Department of Public Works,
the workload in 2½ years has increased by 25 percent; the number
of employees has increased just one percent.
In the Department of Motor Vehicles, the workload has gone up 30
percent. At the same time the number of employees has remained
the same and at the same time we have reached a goal that I out-
lined to you some time ago: we are now processing the applications
for drivers licenses in ten days; it used to take 39.
More than $382 million in new highway projects are now being built,
over and above the scheduled construction, with money that has been
saved in Jim Moe's Public Works shop through economies and effi-
ciencies. To have achieved this same result -- to do this much
more highway building without those economies -- would have
required a 2 cent increase in the gasoline tax.
Task Force on Efficiency
The number of citizens task forces recommendations that we have
now implemented has more than doubled what it was the last time
we met. The figure now is 876.
We have reduced the amount of office space the state government
occupies by 22 percent.
-4-
A few weeks ago, the Controller General of the United States govern-
ment told the Congress that California was buying many of the same
supplies the federal government was buying and we were doing it
for from 36 to 42 percent less. The items ranged from $250 less
for an automobile, to $80 less for two-way radios. (You will
notice I didn't even mention typewriter ribbons!)
We have moved from 9th lowest among the states in the cost of
government proportionate to population, to the 5th lowest and we
intend to be the lowest. We do not subscribe to the philosophy of
those who would rate government's quality on the basis of how much
it spends instead of how much it achieves.
In that part of government that we can control administratively,
by way of our own appointees, a total of only 13 percent. But
if you adjust for inflation, and if you compute that in adjusted
dollars, you will find that actually represents a decrease of
3.4 percent.
Let me give you some basis for comparison. The budget for higher
education in the same period has increased 54 percent. If you
adjust that to constant dollars you will find that is a 38 percent
increase.
TAX RELIEF
We were forced to increase taxes, as all of us know to our pain
and sorrow, almost before we unpacked -- simply to pay our pre-
decessors profligacy. Well, let's bring the record up-to-date
in this department. While we are reminded of that tax increase,
little is being said about some steps we have taken in the
direction of tax relief.
In these almost three years, we have provided the taxpayers cash
refunds on property tax (those famous $70 checks), provided a
$750 property tax exemption, a double standard of state income
deduction to provide property tax relief for renters, a special
property tax relief for the low-income senior citizens, reduced
rates in the lowest bracket of the state income tax, abolished
personal property tax on household furnishings and reduced business
inventory tax of 30 percent. And, in April, you will receive an
$87 million tax rebate on your state income tax.
All of this adds up in two years to $633 million in direct tax
relief. If this comes as a surprise, it is because much of this
must appear in the budget as an expense. (Since we collect the
money and give it back, correct bookkeeping requires that we show
it as an outgoing item.)
Now, if you add to the $633 million, another $651 million of
indirect tax relief by way of increased school aid and so forth --
which otherwise would have been added to the local tax burden,
the property tax burden, and the $600 million that we simply
collect on behalf of local government, such as in the sales tax
and cigarette tax and so forth -- you can see that overall budget
is hardly an accurate reflection of the cost of state government.
In this year's budget, for example, $225 million of the $6.2
-5-
billion budget is actually money that is being given back to the
individual taxpayers. If we could have found some way to do this
similar to next April's rebate on the income tax ---- not collect
the money in the first place -- the budget would have been under
$6 billion. Incidentally, even at $6.2 billion, it is less than
the budget for New York City. I said "city", not state. (It is
also less than the state budget of New York, too.)
Incidentally, that tax rebate on your income tax next April which
has a $100 maximum for the individual taxpayer; that is the most
that anyone can get back regardless of the amount of tax they paid.
That ceiling was not our idea. The money was originally taken on
a proportionate basis and frankly, I believe it should have been
given back on the same basis, ten percent across the board. Next
January, I would like to see the legislature amend that bill so
as to remove the $100 ceiling.
New Form for Budget
I have long felt that the people have difficulty understanding a
state budget and thus they are not so well able to show their
displeasure when excessive spending takes place. We are trying
to find some method of breaking up the budget to show the actual
cost of state government. For example, one budgetwould show you
exactly how much it costs to run the shop. How much does it take
for all the legitimate functions of state government? Then, a
second budget would show those funds that we were collecting and
returning to local governments and counties and school districts.
And, when we could do it, a third budget would show the amount of
money we returned directly to the taxpayers. Thus, the taxpayer
could take a look at these three figures: he could be happy if
that first one - the cost of government -- was going down, and,
likewise, he could be happy if he saw that third one -- the rebate
to the taxpayers was going up. In fact, the citizens could
ask some pretty sharp questions when our opponents start offering
those expensive goodies they like to dream up and hold out to the
people as a gift from Sacramento. They could question how much
it might add to that first budget and how much it might reduce
that third budget.
While I am on this subject, you might as well be prepared for
some screams of anguish you are going to hear in the months ahead.
There will be no area of government that will not feel the pain
of the pruning knife. Those costs over which we have so little
control or no control at all -- particularly in the area of social
reform -- continue to rise at such an extent that here and there,
particularly among our opponents, we are beginning to hear some
little murmurs and some talk about additional revenue and the need
to find some new areas to tax. Well, I, for one, refuse to be a
party to that; I intend to go in the opposite direction.
Our new budget procedure, started this year, is designed to make
tax reduction a priority item as soon as possible. In other words,
as soon as we can, we intend to put into the budget a figure for
tax reduction; then we will require every single government pro-
gram to match its priority and its necessity against the desire
-6-
of the people for tax reduction. In this way we shall see whether
some of those programs are not less important indeed than giving
back to the people some of their own money.
TAX REFORM
In January, we intend to introduce a program of tax reform: one
which will once-and-for-all give real and lasting property tax
relief; one which will give the public schools a source of revenue
other than the residential property tax. What we will propose is
a cut in the residential property tax of 50 percent, and we will
replace this -- or suggest replacing it --- with an increase in
the sales tax which will be completely earmarked and go directly
for support of public schools. Thus, schools will have a source
of income that expands with the economy, that grows so that each
year they can count on revenues that come from the economic growth
of our state.
Supporting Education
IS we secure passage of this measure, we will be able to equalize
state support for every school district and provide $500 for
every child in kindergarten and progressively up to $725 for every
student in junior college. And, that would be a force reduction
of the property tax: the only way that the property tax for schools
could be increased would be if the people in the district vote to
increase their own taxes.
The measure to do this will require legislation and they will also
require constitutional amendment. HopeFully, this would be on
the ballot next June -- or, if not in June, then in November -
and it will then be for the people to decide. It is also our
hope that we can construct this program so that even when the
legislation is passed, all of the tax reform programs will be tied
to the constitutional amendments in such a way that, for the first
time, the people of California - by the ballot -- will make the
decision as to whether this tax reform program is to go into
effect or whether we are to look for something else.
COMPASSION IN GOVERNMENT
There are those who are concerned that perhaps our energies and
our diligence have been in one direction only: dollars and cents,
costs and economies. Well, the record would indicate otherwise.
Last year, for example, we moved from 11th to 2nd among the states
in the rehabilitation of the physically handicapped. In that one
year, we trained, rehabilitated and put into self-supporting jobs
14,450 of the physically handicapped. This is an increase of
10,000 over what had been the annual total in this area. (I must
admit that even this has a practical side: in seven years, the
increase in income tax will pay back the entire cost of rehabili-
tation.)
-7-
Mental Hygiene Reforms
Probably the best hatchet job that our opponents have been able
to do on us is in the area of mental hygiene. Even our friends
aren't so sure of us in this department. Now what makes it
unusual is that the truth is completely contrary -- directly the
opposite -- to what the opposition would have you believe. We
are spending more per patient than any other major state, but we
are getting our money's worth because we are number one in achieve-
ment in this field.
We not only are a model for other states but even world-wide --
nations such as Japan, Switzerland, England and others have sent
delegations to California to study OUT system of mental hygiene,
to learn the reasons behind the progress we made.
When we took office, the staffing standards -- the ratio of
patients to staff -- were based on 1952 staffing standards. In
all the years since 1952, the State of California had never even
achieved 100 percent of those staffing standards, even though all
the while medical personnel throughout the nation and throughout
our state were admonishing that those standards had long been
obsolete. In February of 1968, we adopted standards recommended
in 1967 by the medical association. We set out on a five-year
program. Our target: full implementation of those 1967 standards
within five years. We are already at 93 percent of that imple-
mentation in our state hospitals for the mentally ill. And, the
day before yesterday, I was able to announce publicly that next
June we will reach 100 percent of the full 1967 staffing standards
--- four years ahead of schedule!
In the hundred-year-old history of mental hygiene in California,
there has been a basic standard for space allotted per patient
in our hospitals: 55 square feet. That's not very much when
you figure that the bed itself takes up 35 square feet. The
American Hospital Association recommends 70 square feet. As of
right now, that is the allotment in every state hospital for the
mentally ill in California -- 70 square feet per patient. It is
in full effect.
When we took office, the budget for mental hygiene was $213
million; in 1969-70, it rose to $275 million.
We have increased the number of county mental health care centers
from 41 to 53 and increased the state's share in this program 300
percent -- from $15 to $3 million. The state is now paying 90
percent of the costs instead of the 50, and sometimes 75 percent
that was being paid 2½ years ago.
By June, 1970, we will be able to close down the Modesto State
Hospital which has been occupying temporary wooden army barracks
from World Mar II. To ease the economic impact on the Modesto
area, we are turning over to the county all those facilities and
the 258 acres of land for whatever public use they can make that
might help ease the transition as they lose this state function
in their area.
-8-
Our emphasis on local treatment plus faster and more effective
treatment in the hospitals has reduced the patient population
from 22,000 to 14,000. By next June, it will be down to 12,300.
To give you some frame of reference, the next state to us in size
is New York and they had €6,000 hospitalized mentally ill patients.
We have reduced the waiting list on our hospitals for the mentally
retarded from more than 800 in 1967 to a little over 200. Two
weeks ago, at UCLA, we dedicated a medical research center in the
field of mental retardation to see if we can find the answer to
this tragic illness.
Now, this isn't exactly the picture that you have been getting,
is it? It would seem that someone has been very busy hiding our
light under their bushel.
PARKS FOR PEOPLE
Well, again in contrast to what some would have you believe, we
have added 25,000 new acres to our state system. (You will recall
those charges about someone going to Sacramento to sell all the
state parks?) Three offshore areas have been designated to become
underwater marine parks. Ve have reorganized the system and
developed a 20-year plan that will make sure there will be a
state park within easy driving distance of every citizen. We
have already started to contract with the private enterprise
sector for the development of resort facilities and recreational
facilities on state lands - particularly around some of the lakes
that have been created in the water program.
Even the national park system has sent people out to study one of
the things we started two years ago; a park reservation system.
You remember those terrible stories you used to read every summer
weekend about the thousands of people, with their campers and
their trailers, who tried to get into state parks but there was
no more camping space so they spent the weekend roaming around on
the highways? Well, we set up what any citizen should be able to
expect on a vacation: the ability to make reservations in advance
and to know the space would be there. For two years, we have been
taking reservations all through the winter months; a person
receives a ticket that tells him he has "x" number of days at
such-and-such a time in a certain state park.
And, now we have gone a step farther. We have computerized the
system. Shortly you will find computers set up in banks, and
savings and loans, and department stores throughout the state where
you can go in, pay your money, punch the button and take out a
ticket that tells you you have your reservations in a state park
for vhatever date that you have selected.
You know the federal government is not only stealing so much of
our staff, but copying so many of our programs, I wanted to suggest
to the President the other day that he just leave our people here
and contract out with us!
-9-
QUALITY OF ENVIRONMENT
Next to the cost of government, the people are most concerned
about the preservation of our environment and we have been doing
something about that.
Air Pollution Controls
We have created the nation's first statewide Air Pollution Board.
It includes some of the top men in this field in the nation. It
has broad powers to enforce the toughest air pollution regulations
in the country. I know it is hard to think that something is
really happening in this field when you go out and breathe the
air on a bad smoggy day. But a couple of years ago we turned the
corner and, actually, smog is decreasing in California. But you
must remember we have to run just to keep up with the great
increase in population and the number of cars.
Even so, there is much more to be done. You will recall that
Senator George Murphy led the fight in Washington to get us a
waiver -- we had to fight, a year or two ago, to get the federal
government to let California have tougher regulations than the
federal government wanted us to impose. The result has been that
Detroit literally has to manufacture its cars to meet the
regulations and requirements for the State of California.
Periodically, every year or two, we raise those standards and
they get tougher because we are going to clean the air of
California.
Our California Highway Patrol is now experimenting with vehicles
that are powered with steam engines and liquid propane gas; per-
haps the answer lies in another form of propulsion.
California is the first state to set out to control pollution by
jet air craft.
Water Quality Control
In 1967 we signed into law the first complete revision of the
state's water quality control laws in 20 years. The Los Angeles
Times called it "the strongest state water pollution control act
in the United States". It established fines of up to $6,000 a
day for violators and it makes the violators pay for cleaning up
the pollution they cause.
Ecological Values
Within government, we have formed a Joint Transportation-Resources
Agency Commission to protect the aesthetic and ecological values
in the planning of all types of public works --- from highways to
reservoirs. Today, routes for highways and freeways are not
chosen on the basis of the shortest distance between two points.
The joint committee of the Parks and Recreation people and the
Highway Commission sits down and plans so as to preserve and not
destroy any ecological features or beautiful areas.
-10-
We cancelled the bridge that was planned across Emerald Bay at
Lake Tahoe and we cancelled out a highway that was to go through
one of our bird sanctuaries in the North. We created an Environ-
mental Quality Study Council to find ways to protect the natural
environment and we established a bi-state agency to protect Lake
Tahoe.
We were one of the first to call for passage of the bill to extend
protection and preservation of San Francisco Bay (the BCDC). And,
I think we shocked the United States Corps of Army Engineers when
we refused to go along with their Dos Rios Dam which would flood
Round Valley. Let me assure you this does not mean that we are
going to renege our contractural obligations in the state water
system to provide the water that southern California needs. But,
we intend to preserve for our children this way of life we call
California with all its natural wonder and beauty.
Consumer Protection
I could go on listing our positive achievements through a dozen
pieces of legislation passed in the last session for consumer
protection -- protect you if your credit cards are lost or stolen,
to protect you from the flood of nuisance mail that you get and
to reorganize the executive branch, and eliminate dozens of Boards
and Commissions.
We have started a prairie fire. One of the first Governors to
come to me and ask about our citizens' task forces was the Governor
of Maryland, Ted Agnew. Now he has become Vice President.
Let me just tell you something about Ted. He launched a task
force like ours, he got it underway in the State of Maryland
before he became Vice President. He was succeeded by a Democratic
Governor who is now running up and down the state telling every-
body about the wonderful economies they are making under his
administration.
At the last Governors' Conference, in Colorado Springs, two
governors came up to me. They are doing better than we are about
economies, but then they are in two states that don't have our
growth problems. But they came to me on their own, stuck out
their hands and said "We just want to thank you".
One of them is on his way to a 10 percent reduction in the size
of his state's government. The other is half way to a 20 percent
reduction and he said, "All we have done is copy what is going on
in California and we just want to thank you for getting the ball
rolling and tell you what it has meant to us and our states."
The federal government has just announced a plan for a Human
Resources Development Agency. This was an idea started by us;
the Legislature approved it. It was to go into effect next
January but it will start ahead of time on November 1.
-11-
Human Resources Development; this is bringing together finally
all those multitudinous agencies of welfare and job training and
state employment into one department. It is designed to take
people off welfare by the way of job training and to put them into
self-sustaining work.
We are getting a lot of interest in our highway safety program.
It has attracted national attention. The traffic fatalities in
the nation have been going up 5 percent a year; ours have gone
down. We have developed such things as soft hardware, as we call
it; signs, pillars and posts that have to be erected along our
highway. We have made them, as they do in Hollywood, into break-
away fixtures so that when someone hits them, they give way instead
of the driver.
EDUCATION & YOUR MONEY
Now, despite what you may have heard, under this Republican
administration, we are spending more money for education in
California than ever before.
This year in state subventions and other programs, we are spending
almost $1.6 million for local schools -- K through 14. This
includes the increase of $120 million which we voluntarily included
in the budgets we presented to the legislature. This was the
first time a Governor had ever done such a thing. And, it includes
about $80 million which will be added because of unanticipated
revenues and economies made in other state operations. Ours is
an all-time record increase in state support of elementary and
high schools and junior colleges in one year.
Higher Education
And what about higher education -- the taxpayer supported state
university and colleges?
Three years ago the tarpayer's total general fund support for the
University of California campuses and the state colleges was $414
million. Today, it is $638 million.
The current budget includes $329.8 million in general fund sup-
port for the University of California -- an increase of 13 percent
over the previous year for an estimated increase in enrollment
of 6 percent. The budget for the state colleges was increased
$46 million this year - up 24 percent over last year for an
anticipated increase in enrollment of 12 percent. And, the budget
also includes $12.9 million for college scholarships and loans ---
57 percent more than the previous year.
Higher education has received an overall 54 percent increase
budget support during the past three years while all other
state agencies have increased 18 percent. Incidentally, those
agencies administered by my appointees had an increase during
this three year period of 13 percent. And, when these dollars
are adjusted for population and inflation growth, our state opera-
tions have actually decreased by 3.4 percent during this same
period of time.
-12-
Still there are those who claim that we have cut their budgets for
higher education. Well, if your household budget were cut the
same way, you'd be on easy street.
I know what some of you are thinking --- you're asking why we have
increased state support of higher education in face of the problems
on certain campuses. Well, we do just not believe that it would
be fair to penalize the thousands upon thousands of industrious,
sincere, students because of the anarchy and the vandalism of
those few teachers and students -- and non-students --- who seem
intent upon wrecking a system which it has taken the taxpayers
of this state years of sacrifice and billions of dollars to build.
Our record is clear: we will not put up with violence, or
destruction, or anarchy on our campuses; we will protect the
rights and provide the support for those who go to college to
learn, and those who are there to teach.
At the same time, we expect the administrators on those campuses ---
the chancellors and the presidents and their staffs -- to see that
the maximum education is provided for the dollars spent, just as
we expect from every other agency of government. The students
should be their first priority, not their last.
Financing Education
Now let me just conclude with something that has just come to my
attention. I have been informed the teacher and school organi-
zations are seriously considering endorsing a proposed initiative
measure designed to shift 50 percent of the cost of school
financing to the state. This would be presented to the voters
as a massive tax reduction. That would be a fraud. It would
instead be a massive tax increase.
The measure calls for the state to pay more than one-half billion
dollars, in addition to the present $1.5 billion that we are now
subventing to the schools. This would go up at the rate of
about $150 million each year.
Undoubtedly this vill be presented to the people, if this initia-
tive goes on the ballot, as a property tax reduction. Well, this
was how the original sales tax was presented to the people back
in 1933; that if the voters would pass the sales tax, somehow
property tax would decline. But there was no provision to clamp
a lid on the property tax; so, the new tax vas added and the old
property tax kept right on going up.
Let's look again at the tax reform proposal that we are suggesting.
It won't be 50-50; the state will be putting up 80 percent of
school financing and we will actually be cutting the property tax
50 percent not just hoping that it will go down by itself. And
we are putting the power to increase the property tax in the
people's hand. Unless you put such a restriction on future
increases, you're deluding the people. The property tax must be
forced down, and it will not go down simply because you find some
additional money someplace else.
-13-
Nov what this other initiative really will mean, if it is passed,
is an unwarranted and intolerable addition to the crushing burden
the taxpayers are nov carrying. Even worse, it will mean the job
producing industries here or about to come to California will
look to locate elsewhere with disastrous results to our economy.
It is most unfortunate and significant that the California Teachers
Association, which may decide to support this guaranteed tax
increase initiative, will also be considering next week a proposal
that the association condone teacher strikes. The people of
California can hardly be expected to look with favor upon a pro-
posal guaranteeing a massive tax increase in the schools when it
is linked with the open threat of a teachers' strike.
I hope that we can have confidence in the tens of thousands of
dedicated teachers throughout this state who have been doing such
a good job in our schools. I hope that reason will prevail in
their meeting next week.
The Right to Strike?
I spent 25 years, as you know, as an officer in organized labor.
I led my union in the only strike that it ever had. I recognize
the right of a working man to withhold his services by way of a
strike. And yet, I cannot agree that public employees can have
that same right.
If, in each one of your districts, they don't have the proper
machinery to sit down at the table and hear the grievances and
work out with the representatives of education -- or whatever
group of public employees it is
work out a solution to their
problems, that machinery should be set up. That is what we are
trying to set up in the State of California right now. That is
an obligation we have. But there can be no justification for a
strike against the public and it is time for us to think this
through.
First of all, the leadership of our own State Employees Associa-
tion recently voted to rescind the no strike pledge they have
had these many years. We have to face this fact: government
cannot close up shop. It is not like a private business which
can shut the doors until the matter is resolved. It has to keep
on providing the services.
Beyond that, in any strike in the private sector, the idea is
inherent that if the dispute once imposes too unfairly on the
general public, there are higher levels by way of government and
the public that the adversaries in the disagreement can go to for
arbitration.
There is no higher authority than the people. The people are the
source of all authority in this land. And, therefore, when
employees of the people have a grievance, there is no arbitration
board to which government can turn. Government is the representa-
tive of the people and of their authority and if a strike takes
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place, government has no recourse but to replace the strikers and
continue on with the duties.
In connection with that, there is one bright spot. The next time
you see a California Highway Patrolman take a second look -- you
might even give him a friendly wave. Their association has just
notified me that the California Highway Patrol is pledged to
protect the people of California and nothing will prevent them
from Sulfilling that pledge.
I hope that I have been able to give you a few of the things that
make all that you have done worthwhile --- all of your service,
all that you have contributed and sacrificed.
Just one last thing in closing. I told you about some of the
governors coming up to me at the Governors Conference and
ing
about some of the things I mentioned. Well, you will remember
how torn with dissention our party was just a few years ago
here in this State. One of the most frequent questions my fellow
Republican governors ask of me is "How can we get the party in
our state to work together and to be as unified as the Republican
Party seems to be in California?"
You just keep them asking that question because I don't mind
answering that question one bit.
Thank you.
and
to
the
Thursday, November 6th, 1969
SPEECH BY GOVERNOR RONALD REAGAN
to
THE INSTITUTE OF DIRECTORS
"The New Noblesse Oblige"
Your Excellency, My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen, you honor me and that honor is
only increased by the sober realization that today marks the first time an American has
addressed this most prestigious forum. My pleasure is not lessened in the slightest
by the suspicion that your invitation was prompted at least in part by curiosity. It
isn't every day that someone who has been riding off into the sunset for 25 years with
"the end" superimposed on his back, turns up on the State House steps with something he
calls a "Creative Society".
For a number of years I have been speaking out against what has seemed to me to
be an inexorable march by government, an encroachment on, usurpation of, rights
traditionally held to be the proper possession of the people.
Now I am a part of government and I am even more concerned.
Let it be made perfectly clear that I am discussing government as an instutition --
not any particular government -- and as an institution government has never voluntarily
reduced itself in size. A government agency or bureau is the nearest thing to eternal
life we will ever see on this earth. Some who have been in government a long time as
part of the permanent structure seem to develop what Cicero called "the arrogance of
officialdom".
In almost three years in government I have learned at first-hand how savage can be
their resistance to any attempt to reduce the size and power of government. But, as
Sir Winston Churchill once said, "Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at
without result". I have also learned that the size and power of government can be
-2-
reduced -- and the reduction will be hailed by the people, for men want to be free. They
do notwear comfortably the feeling that their voices echo unheard and unheeded in th
vast and multitudinous halls of government.
The prophecies of your Lord Thomas Macaulay 100 years ago have been widely quoted
by countless after-dinner speakers. Less quoted is his excellent advice to governments
everywhere:
"Our rulers will best promote the improvement of the people by confining themselves
to their own legitimate duties, by leaving capital to find its most lucrative course,
commodities their fair price, industry and intelligence their natural reward, idleness
and folly their natural punishment, by diminishing the price of law, by maintaining
peace, by defending property and by observing strict economy in every department of the
state. Let government do this and the people will assuredly do the rest".
History is filled with the stories of men who lusted after power, and yet government
can be most menacing when its purposes are beneficient. Often with the noblest of
intentions the public servant sincerely seeking to better service the citizenry
says, "Oh, how much more I could do for the people if only I had a little more money
and a little more authority to do what I can see needs doing". What he does not com-
prehend is that the price for each pound of blessing he would provide is an ounce of
freedom from each one of us.
In some dim beginning man created government for his own convenience and it has
been doing its best to become an inconvenience ever since.
One of the legal functions of government is to protect us from each other. We
cannot possibly afford the amount of government it would take to protect us from ourselves
For too long a time now, outside of an occasional campaign contribution, business
has held itself aloof from politics. Unfortunately, politics has not held itself
aloof from business. Businessmen work to reduce overhead or speed up production, hoping
to increase the margin of profit by a fraction of a penny. But one adverse decision by
-3-
government, one slight alteration in the tax laws, can wipe out the gains and cause
changes in management policy and practise.
When in spite of this, business prospers, government claims credit for its
handling of the economy and announces success is due to its wise regulations.
Actually the fact that business has been able to survive the harassment and nit-
picking down through the decades is simply proof of the virility of the free enter-
prise system.
But there is a limit. Even the giant Gulliver was rendered helpless, bound not
by chains but by tiny threads until at last the fine threads proved too much for him.
Politics is too important to be left to politicians. Some years ago business in my
country was under attack by the Bureau of Internal Revenue. Specifically the Bureau
was issuing new regulations regarding tax deductibility for such legitimate expenses
as travel, entertainment for business purposes as well as gifts to employees.
Business leaders sat down with government as if at a bargaining table
negotiating a contract. Should an expense account provide for filet mignon or only
the "blue plate special"? Should an employee receive a $25 or $35 gift? Actually
the issue was one of fundamental principle. Government was usurping the privilege
of management while assuming none of the responsibility. In my opinion there should
have been no bargaining. Business should have said to government, "As long as we are
spending the money in the legitimate expectation of making a profit, how much we
spend is none of the government's business".
Ludwig Van Mises, the economist, listening to the directors of several major
corporations argue whether the ceiling on the corporation tax should be 35 or 52% said,
"they were like a group of Frenchmen during the revolution arguing who should be first
at the guillotine".
I have no way of knowing at this moment, or of rapidly computing, the power,
the amount of capital, the number of employees -- or the social and economic impact --
of all the companies represented here in this great hall today. But I do know that
many of your firms bear pround names and produce products which were known in my
country to my father and to his father and they are now known to my son. Your firm
may have the word "Limited" after its name instead of "Incorporated", but that does not
alter the fact that you as businessmen must take an active part in the affairs of
state. To sit back hoping that some day, some way, someone will make things right is
to go on feeding the crocodile hoping he will eat you last - - but eat you he will.
The time has come for a new noblesse oblige. A putting into action and deed is the
philosophy that has caused us to meet here. Do we believe in capital finding its most
lucrative course, commodities their fair price, industry and intelligence their
reward? Do we truly believe that outside of its legitimate functions government can
nothing as well or as efficiently as the private sector? Mark well, I said -- outside
of its legitimate functions -- for government does have legitimate functions which are
its proper province.
But for many years it has been my belief that government could benefit by the
common sense practises of business -- that a society can only be as great as its
people are willing to make it. No government can possibly afford the personnel to
even approach the genius and power of the private sector. If government had men
capable of running your businesses you would hire them away.
It is time for business to recognize its obligation to participate in public
affairs. This means more than just campaign contributions and attendance at
political rallies. It means offering government the expertise and management skill of
the private sector. It means lending your best manpower to government, not your cast-
offs. Government by second rate men will be second rate government.
California has been called a microcosm of our nation, its 20 million population
matching the diversity in ethnic and racial groups as well as the economic variations.
As an economic entity it ranks sixth among the nations of the world.
For eight years prior to our Administration, the government of California had been
-5-
a little brother to big brother in Washington. When Washington sneezed the "Gesundheit"
was heard in Sacramento. The number of government employees had been increasing more
than twice as fast as the increase in population -- which is considerable as the trend
of western migration continues.
The state was spending more than a million dollars a day over and above revenues
and in those first few months after taking office it seemed that each new day brought
new and horrifying discoveries.
Among my campaign promises was one to turn to the people for help instead of
building a government in the time honoured tradition of rewarding party hacks and
political hangers on. There are those opponents today who charge my administration
is business oriented. If they mean that special privilege is granted to some
segment of our society, they are of course wrong. But if they mean we. have turned to
the people and to the business community for help in bringing common sense practises
of business into government, they are absolutely right.
In the weeks preceeding my inauguration I asked the leading citizens in business,
industry and the professions to form a committee -- not to screen applicants for
jobs but to recruit, to find the kind of men who were not seeking government
careers, men who would give a pound out of their lives in public service and who would
not build a civil service empire, men who would be the first to tell us if a government
agency or functions was unnecessary. Indeed that is just what one bright young
executive from the aero-space industry did. He dismantled the commission he had taken
over and in four months resigned. No one has missed the commission or even noticed
its demise.
But I am getting ahead of my story. This committee was knowledgeable, as I
know you are knowledgeable, about where to find talent in the world of commerce.
They twisted employers' arms to obtain release of promising young men even if it was
only for a year or two. In some cases they delivered prematurely retired men who were
-6-
not resigned to going on the shelf. Some took jobs in our administration at salaries
a third or half of their regular incomes.
They approached their jobs much as if they were involved in a merger or take-over
of a newly acquired business -- in this case a nearly bankrupt business.
We put a freeze on hiring replacements for those who left government service or
retired. It is now about three years later and our Department of Public Works is
handling a 25% work-load increase with only a 1% increase in employees. In our
Department of Motor Vehicles, the work-load has gone up 30% with no increase in
workers and drivers licenses are being processed in 10 days instead of the 39 which
had been standard procedure. By the previous growth rate we should now have added
15,000 employees -- we actually have increased only 657, yet our population has
increased more than a million.
In those first few months we invited the leadership of California's business
community to lunch one day -- several hundred of them. We asked them to lend us
their expertise for a period of several months. They volunteered without reservation.
Some 250 men and women, the best in their fields, were organized into task forces based
on their specialities. They went into every department and agency of government to
see where modern business practices could be put to work for government. For example,
the heads of our hotel chains went into our prisons and state institutions -- not to
tell wardens how to run a prison but to see how the kitchens were being run and how
supplies were being purchased.
All in all these citizens gave about six months full time away from their own
areas and finally handed us 1560 specific recommendations. We have implemented 875
and are proceeding with the rest as fast as possible.
One recommendation revealed that government had never applied the common
practise of allocating floor space on a basis of how many square feet are required
per employee for those doing similar kinds of work. We applied this standard to
-7-
state government and discovered we were able to tear up the contracts for a 10-story
$41/2 million building slated for immediate construction. We have now reduced the
total office space required for government by 22%.
The task forces found our employees had a streak of tourist in them, travelling
out of state constantly and at great expense, always on business. We did not
exactly put a freeze on that -- we just told them they would have to come in and tell
us where they were going and why. That reduced the out of state travel budget 78%.
Things that were routine and common sense practises in the business world were
startling and revolutionary to government. In fact just the application of common
sense to government caused traumatic shocks. We sent out notices of automobile
license renewals a month ahead of time. That was not really a discovery of some new
efficiency -- we had learned that Washington was increasing the postage rates and
we saved $100,000 on stamps by mailing early.
Being totally inexperienced, I did not know all the things government could not
do so we went ahead consolidating files, centralizing purchasing functions and
instituting competitive bidding instead of negotiating contracts. A few weeks ago
the Comptroller General of the United States told Congress that California was buying
identical items Washington was buying and California was paying from 36 to 42% less.
These ranged from automobiles to typewriter ribbons. We save $250 on each auto
purchased. Not all of the savings were in the million dollar class. My office was
stacked with stationery bearing the State Seal and my predecessor's name. One day
workmen came in to cart it off for burning. It seemed to me there must be a certain
amount of inter-office correspondence where we could ignore formality and use this
writing paper. So the girls simply started crossing out his name and typing in mine.
You know, I got a certain degree of pleasure out of that.
In our state the heavy population is centered in the southern half which is
largely desert. California's water is in the north in rivers and rushing mountain
torrents. A gigantic water moving project was started some years ago building lakes
-8-
and canals to carry water from north to south. In one area where a canal was to be built
the state was out buying land on which to dump the millions of tons of excavated dirt
In the same area our highway builders were seeking land from which they could take
millions of tons of earth fill for a major highway. It did not take a genius to figure
out that if the highway paralleled the canal and went first it could excavate the
canal and get dirt at the same time. From this came additional benefits -- as
they progressed south they shared repair and storage facilities and even office space
could be shared for a savings to both projects.
The lakes we are creating are multiple purpose and provide recreation as well as
water storage. Not believing the state should be in competition with the resort
business we are contracting the private developers on a lease basis to construct and
run resort hotels, grounds and recreational facilities.
Many of our citizens are given to camping and each summer arrive at our state
parks with tents and trailers anticipating a few days or weeks in the wilderness.
For years the newspapers have carried stories of those who arrive late and spend their
holidays on the highways in a fruitless search for a park that is not packed to
capacity. Two years ago we instituted a system of taking advance reservations
through the winter months. Now this has been computerized and people can go into
department stores or banks and make reservations in a matter of seconds for the park
of their choice. Our highway construction is totally financed by a tax on motor
fuel. Today we are building $382 million worth of highways over and above scheduled
construction, all with money that was formerly spent on administrative overhead.
Task force recommendations, and the skill of our own appointees, did this by cutting
through bureaucracy and red tape.
I could go on enumerating all the areas where modern technology and management
skill have brought savings and efficiencies -- but not in the allotted time. Let me
just say that the task force recommendations alone have reduced the cost of state
government $187 million a year. Another $24 million has been saved in the elimination
-9-
of buildings and facilities we do not have to build. We have not quite reached the
point where we can offer our people a permanent tax reduction, but this year we are
returning $225 million directly to the taxpayers as a one-time rebate -- a kind of
bonus.
There was some opposition to this on the part of spendthrift legislators who
had ideas for using the money. Buttpeople have ideas too. Other than necessary
working capital, government has no right to build or keep a surplus. For too long
a time governments have not taxed to get the money they need, they have always
needed the money they get. In two years, California has moved from ninth lowest
among the states in cost of government in proportion of population to fifth lowest
and our goal is number one. We have started a prairie fire. More than a dozen
states are now calling on citizen task forces and the new administration in Washington
has taken a score of our people for assignments there.
So far I have talked only of saving and economies. Government does have
legitimate functions and in our case these too have benefited from the application
of common sense and business techniques.
You will perhaps recall the catalytic upheaval a few years ago in an areabof Los
Angeles known as Watts, a community marked by poverty and unemployment. A businessman
practising what must be recognized as "noblesse oblige" organised his fellow
industrialists in a programme of jobs and job training. After the election I asked
him to do this on a state-wide basis. There are now over 20,000 employees engaged
in this programme and unemployment in California dropped to its lowest point in
fifteen years.
Last year we went from eleventh among the states to second in the rehabilitation
and employment of the physically handicapped.
In a partnership between government and the private sector we have a state-wide
anti-drug programme financed, incidentally, by voluntary contributions.
-10-
Highway fatalities in the United States are increasing at an annual rate of 5%
in California they are decreasing. We have pioneered in highway design and the
development of "soft hardware" our term for road signs, posts and pillars that give
way on impact. It is easier to replace a post than a driver.
Our state crime information computer has been linked to Washington and to our
principle cities -- the first such hook-up in our nation's history.
In the coming year we will offer to the people a revolutionary overhaul of our
entire state tax system. A reform which will seek to tie taxes to our free
enterprise system so they will expand as our economy expands without having to come
back every other year for a change in rates. Here too we enlisted the aid of our
people because much of what we will propose came from the findings of two separate
citizen task forces.
Many of our young men have returned to their careers in business and the
professions more valuable to themselves and to their employers. They have been
replaced by others, for industry in California has learned the value of this new
noblesse oblige.
Gentlemen, it is as simple as this: If we will not share our best with
government, then government will be staffed by our worst. If we will not energetically
seek to people government with those who believe in the freedom of the market place,
we run the risk of being governed by those lacking both knowledge and confidence in
free institutions. They do not fear government or government power -- they are
government.
We can no longer afford to say to the young men in business do not seek
public office, do not get involved in community affairs. Rather, we must urge them
to do so and assure them they will lose no seniority or opportunity when they
return to the company just as we have said this in the past to those who have fought
on our behalf in our wars.
-11-
It has been said that if we lose this way of ours, this way of freedom, history
will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did
the least to prevent its happening.
There is concern world-wide over the seeming rebellion of youth. They are
irreverent to say the least with regard to our traditions and our values. Yet if
one listens there is a cry for help in their angry protest for they are idealistic.
They want to help build a better world and they look for their reward not just in
a pay check but in terms of self-accomplishment, service and dignity. What a
driving power for free enterprise if we will provide the springboard for the future
they are seeking. If we do not they may one day ask "Where were we when freedom
was lost? What had we found that seemed more important to us than freedom?"
69/01/11
OFFICE OF THE GOVERNOR
RELEASE: NOON, MONDAY
Sacramento, California
November 10, 1969
Contact: Paul Beck
445-4571
EXCERPTS OF REMARKS BY GOVERNOR RONALD REAGAN
BRITISH NATIONAL EXPORT COUNCIL
November 10, 1969, London, England
We welcome the British Trade Drive which starts in California
next year. May I cite some statistics about our state--not in a
(adison venue manner or to sound boastful but because they have a
bearing on the subject that brings us together.
Californians, as an average, have the highest purchasing power
in the world; the market is one of the most dynamic in the United
States. Our people look for the new, the innovative, the stylish
and even the bold.
We are, basically, a consumer-state which should be important
to your trade ambitions; in 1966, import valued at $2.2 billion
came through our California Customs Districts.
As an economic entity California ranks sixth in the world.
Out ranked only by your country, our own, West Germany, France and
Japan. Our export-import trade is greater than that of 118 nations
in the world.
Your British products have had an excellent reception in
California--because our people are appreciative of quality, and
delivery dates, excellence of design and fabrication and lasting
value.
The success of your Trade Drive should be proportionate to the
deep reservoir of goodwill our people hold for you and your nation.
There is no reticence at all in buying products "Made in Britain."
As a matter of fact, there is a desire to buy British goods and in
this regard, you have an advantage over the other nations of the
free world.
We have discussed all of these facets of the 1970 Trade Drive
with Lord Mancroft and his staff and they are fully aware of the
potentials and the requirements for success.
-1-
British National Export Council
Obviously, we in California realize that trade is a two-way
buy
street and that the British can hardly be expected to/ products
made in California unless our people purchase products made in Great
Britain. The value of foreign trade is not to be underestimated in
California; more than 100,000 manufacturing jobs (four percent of
our total labor force) result from our export trade. We are eager
to strengthen--and broaden--that two way street.
A relatively new phenomenon--on the world trade scene is the
international corporation. Many with their home base in California,
have been able to increase productive capacity, provide employment,
and--in some cases--raise the standard of living for the residents
in those countries where they are doing business.
Of course there are those who would picture these international
corporations as tools of imperialism, exploiting the underdeveloped
countries. These are people who can not see a fat man standing
beside a thin one without assuming the fat man got that way by
taking advantage of the thin man. However, they have been foremost
in making more effective use of the world's economic resources and
in meeting the ever increasing demands of the developing countries
for minerals and other raw materials to feed their manufacturing
plants.
In international economics it has been demonstrated that one
nation can raise its own standard of living by helping to raise the
standard of living of the trading partner. This common sense is
often denied, or decried, by those who are not capable of competing
in the world markets, or who have other designs.
In the world of economics, we must distinguish between growth,
and development. Growth without parallel--or even anticipatory--
development can lead' to serious problems, even chaos. A 50 percent
increase in the gross national product of a country is not very
much if the population has more than doubled during the same period.
-2-
British National Export Council
California is a prime example. Since 1945-the end of World
War II--our population has increased from 9,344,000 to 19,782,000
--more than 111 percent. If our gross state product had simply
grown by the same percentage, we would not have had an increase in
our standard of living. As it is, our gross state product increased
from just under $20 billion to $94.6 billion or 376 percent during
the same period. This has been brought about by surging economic
development--new products, new demands, new techniques--many of
which have not only met, but created, new markets and new jobs and
new directions for ever-new jobs and products.
This recognition of, and ability to create, economic develop-
ment through corporate enterprise can play a very constructive role
in the ascendany of industrially backward countries--because of
capital investment, and most importantly because of technical
and managerial expertise. And, the development of those nations
would be of benefit to all concerned--to the emerging nation and
to the rest of the free world community.
Many of the emerging countries fail to realize that the
developed country-whether it is Great Britain or the United
States, whether it is European, American or Asian, once had to
go through the developmental stage. And, what it is offering in
essence, is an economic and social leap through time. This leap
symbiotic in its benefits--is essential if we are to maintain
some semblance of tranquility and progress on the world fronts.
As citizens of an international business community, it is our
task to help our counterparts in the developing nations comprehend
the mutuality of benefits and to create an atmosphere conductive
to economic vitality at the same time that an understandable and
desirable measure of nationalism prevails for each of the parties
concerned.
-3-
British National Export Council
I believe that free enterprise and free trade between nations
of free men is vital to the onward march of the world in which we
believe. Next year you will be involved in the British Trade Drive
in California. We have met with Lord Mancroft, the British Consul
General in San Francisco, as I said a few minutes ago, and we are
delighted with the plans and intend to cooperate in every proper
way.
The basic goodwill which exists in California for the British
and Britain should provide the potential of a successful drive. I
need not tell you that for years California has been one of your best
American markets--although I am surprised that you have not retaliated
for some of the films we have sent your way over the years. But then
I listen to some records our young people play on their phonograph
and it is possible you have gotten even.
But this trade between free men--and the hoped for expansion
of trade both ways in the years to come-will persist only if we
first have free men, in a free world. We hold in common more than
blood lines, more than a language. We hold a mutual belief in the
divine nature of man and we are, as your John Donne once wrote,
involved in mankind--as nations, and as individuals. We have much
in common-not least is our heritage of freedom.
Sir Winston Churchill, he put it well-this bond between us-
"The British Empire and the United States will have to be somewhat
mixed up together in some of their affairs for mutual and general
advantage. For my own part, looking out upon the future, I do not
view the process with any misgivings. I could not stop it if I
wished; no one can stop it. Like the Mississippi it just keeps
rolling along. Let it roll. Let it roll on full flood inexorable,
irresistible, benignant, to broader lands and better days."
-4-
#
92/6/6
Excerpt of Remarks by GOVERNOR RONALD REAGAN
Pepperdine College
Los Angeles, California
February 9, 1970
I have been deeply disturbed by a quotation by Dr. James Conant
of Harvard. He is quoted as saying that the greater the proportion
of our youth who attend private schools, the greater the threat to
our democratic unity. I hope that he was quoted out of context and
that he had some other meaning than the one that seemed so obvious
in these words, using the term "private" to mean all the independent
schools. I say that it is absolutely essential to the total educa-
tion system of this nation that we have the independent colleges:
they serve as an educational whetstone; they help to hone the
educational process; they force the public system to compete in a
drive for excellence. Indeed, by that very competition, they help
preserve the public institution from political interference and
guarantee to it a measure of academic freedom the public university
or college could not attain without a school such as this. The
independent colleges and universities educate about 25 percent of
all the graduate and four-year undergraduate students in California.
The small colleges produce leadership for America out of proportion
to their size.
It is for this reason that I believe the federal government
should grant tax credit, not deductions, but credits, for at least
a portion of the tuition fees that are paid by parents as they send
their sons and daughters to college.
-1-
I think we should seriously explore the possibility of extending
federal aid--not through bureaucracy at the risk of violating our
traditional separation of church and state-but again in the spirit
of competition by granting tax credits for contributions to schools
and colleges within a prescribed limit as to the overall amount.
This was suggested some years ago by a group of college presi-
dents. They were disturbed and alarmed by the threat to academic
freedom inherent in the large federal grants that were beginning to
be doled out so regularly to many of our public schools. They
journeyed to Washington, these sincere men. They presented their
case and for days they argued with the Director of Education and
the Department of Health, Education and Welfare. Over and over again
they asked "Why wouldn't this system work?" And finally, the Director
of Education repudiated their suggestion with these words: "You
don't understand: under such a plan, we couldn't achieve our social
objectives." And, you wonder.
I doubt if anyone would interpret his refusal as anything but
a declaration that the government intended to use those federal
grants precisely to influence the course of higher education in this
country. That is intolerable political interference with academic
freedom.
The private sector and the business community can make no
greater investment in freedom than their contributions to the
independent colleges and schools of this country. They might be
able to curb the growth and expansion of some of the public institu-
tions at much lower cost to themselves as taxpayers.
-2-
Right today, if California had to assume the responsibility
and the burden carried by the independent colleges, it would cost
the taxpayers an additional $200 million a year, just in operating
expenses--over and above the $677 million we spend now. And the
plant facilities--the capital outlay-would take $1.5 billion.
Right today, if given adequate funds, the independent colleges
of this country could take between a quarter and a half million
more students without adding a single classroom or enlarging their
physical facilities by even so much as a chair. The real winner
would be our way of life.
I know it is something of a cliche to draw a parallel between
the rise and fall of Rome and the course of our own Republic.
Certainly this is true in academic circles. And yet, the parallel
is there in such detail that it is frightening almost eerie.
It has been pointed out that the days of a democracy are
numbered once the belly takes command of the head. When the less
affluent feel the urge to break a commandment and begin to covet
that which their more affluent neighbors possess, they are tempted to
use their votes to obtain instant satisfaction. Then equal oppor-
tunity at the starting line becomes an extended guarantee of a tie
at the end of the race and under the euphemism "the greatest good
for the greatest number" we move toward a managed economy and we
mortgage the earnings of generations yet unborn.
Demonstrations to force colleges to divorce themselves from
participating in the defense of the nation take place. We've known
riots in our streets. We no longer walk the countryside or the city
streets without fear.
-3-
The jungle seems to be closing in on this little plot we have
been trying to civilize for 5,000 years and all of us, I know, are
disturbed at the virus that infected the campus during recent years.
No doubt we could all top each other with frightening and
unbelievable stories. One day on one of our campuses, I listened
to a tape recording of a so-called student meeting where they were
planning a campus disruption. Explicit directions were given on how
to start fires in college buildings. Subsequently, there were 50
fires started in those buildings in one day.
Continuing to listen, they outlined where the pickets would go
and how they would parade and what they would do and how they would
take over the college. We actually heard a voice say: "If, in the
process, it becomes necessary to kill, you will kill."
We were gripped with an overwhelming sense of unreality.
Unreality that it is happening at all. But, even more frightening
is how close we have come to accepting it as a normal way of life.
Dr. Spock's babies have grown up, which is probably more than
we can say for the doctor.
Just about one month ago, in my annual State of the State
message to the California Legislature, I noted that our young
people are also critical of what they call "the establishment."
Frankly, here too, I think, they have much to be critical
about. There is a certain validity to many of the points they
raise.
But, in their exuberance and their impatience to build a
better world, they have at times allowed themselves to be misled
into excessive and premature actions by those who have taken
advantage of their concern.
-4-
Now, I believe, they are wiser to the ways of the zealots,
including some of their own teachers, who have used them for
non-constructive, alien purposes.
our
Many of/young people talk about greater participation in our
American democracy. When asked about their plans for the future,
they say they want to serve--to become, as they put it,
"meaningfully involved."
Well, meaningful involvement is the very heart of the Creative
Society. It's exactly what we mean when we say that government
should be of and by as well as for the people; that no government
and no government program can ever do away with the need for
individual participation.
If young people are looking for constructive action
which can give spirit and uplift to the decade of the seventies--
and make it a benchmark in man's search for a better world--they
can find it by working within the system
reforming it, improving
it, making it more responsive to the citizens and the needs of the
future.
Part of this preparation and participation must begin on the
campus and in the mind. Meaningful participation, by its very
nature, must have a modicum of wisdom as well as idealism and
enthusiasm.
Is it possible that even among student radicals, their protests
are in reality a cry for help?
I've told some of you, I'm sure, about an experience I had
participating in a lecture series at a large Midwestern university.
It was held in the fieldhouse with 4,000 adults and 10,000 students
in attendance.
- 5-
Most of the adults expressed concern that our young people
were rebelling against the moral standards and the principles
we have tried to teach them all of their lives.
In my answer, I expressed a belief that they weren't so
much rebelling against the standards and the principles. They
were rebelling because they don't believe that we are living up
to those standards and principles.
There was a second of silence, and then 10,000 young people
came to their feet with a roar I shall never forget.
Have they lost faith in the rules, or have they lost faith in
us?
Where were we when God was expelled from the classroom? If
we believed, why didn't we fight back?
As the country parson once said, "The fellow who left the gate
open is only slightly more guilty than the one who saw it open and
didn't close it."
I suppose what I am really calling for is the old-fashioned
custom of bearing witness. It is so much more powerful than mere
sermonizing. It is time to bear witness not alone as individuals,
but also for our institutions.
The U.S. Department of Education did a survey of 68 campuses
involving 7,500 faculty the question what is the obligation
of the university? the answer to protect academic freedom of
the faculty. What about teaching? Where is our obligation to
our students? In our quest for academic excellence, have we lost
sight of its primary purpose?
-6-
It is time perhaps to reorder our priorities. The doctrine
of publish or perish should give way to prestige based on the
ability to teach.
We should reward qualified young men and women we send out
into the world as the end product of our educational effort. No
one at all and certainly no one in my present position would deny
the great value of our public universities and colleges. But let
no one carelessly dismiss the obligation to independent colleges
and universities which are so much a part of the educational
tapestry of America. Without them, that tapestry would soon
become a fabric of great monotony and little color.
You have done me a gfeat honor. I doubt that you have added
luster to your own scholastic prestige. You may even find your-
selves looking forward to the time when the mantle of old age
will make you more acceptable among your peers. Take heart, one
ages faster in Sacramento.
# # #
-7-
attelle
Price
Excerpts of Remarks by
Governor Ronald Reagan
LINCOLN DAY FUND RAISER
Sacramento, California
February 12, 1970
This being an election year, there are those who will say that
we should play it cozy that things are going along fine and that we
shouldn't do anything to rock the boat
that politics being what it
is, we should go along with the game -- pick up votes where we have
to with pork barrels and gimmicks.
Well, that's not what the Republican effort is all about
it's
not what the people want and, it's not why I ran for office.
We work in the precincts, we work to build our party and our State,
and we work for our ideals and our principles, because we want to
make a difference and to get things done.
With your help, I came to Sacramento to do a job. We ve been
working at the job for just a little over three years. And, just be-
cause this is an election year is no reason for slowing down. There
are too many things that need doing - this is no time for politics
as usual.
Just about one month ago, I addressed a joint session of the
Legislature. I'd like to repeat to you what I think were the most
important words in that talk:
"Now and then people in a particular moment of time are called
on to rise above the norm. Their chosen representatives, elevated
from politics to statesmanship, make land-mark decisions -- and men,
for decades to come, hark back to those decisions and are guided in
their deliberations.
"I believe we are met in such a moment of time -- a moment when
we should be more concerned with the next generation than the next
Lincoln Day speech
-2-
election. "
We are met in such a moment in Sacramento.
Paraphrasing Mr. Lincoln -- the dogmas of the recent past are
inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with
difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion.
"We -- even we here -- hold the power and bear the responsibility
We shall nobly save or meanly lose the last, best hope of earth."
We will not do this by being cozy, or by engaging in politics
as usual.
It would have been a lot more cozy for us not to tackle tax
reform this year. It's a controversial matter and strictly political
observers always say that you never get into tough battles in an
election year; that you wait until just after an election so that
the sound and the fury can die down and there is time to smooth the
ruffled feathers on the goose that lays the taxable eggs.
Well, maybe that is what the politicians would do -- but, we've
all worked hard to keep from being politicians in the past three years,
and
the people of California can't wait on politics. They need
tax reform -- and they need it this year.
The tax reform package we presented last week is a good package.
It will be the first real tax reform this State has had in more than
30 years. And, any individual -- any politician -- who tries to
stymie this reform in an attempt to serve partisan interests or per-
sonal advantage does so at his peril and, I believe, to his eventual
regret. The taxpayer is no longer so inclined to grin and bear such
peccadillos; they expect more from their representatives.
For the vast majority of homeowners, the reform we propose will
mean a cut in their property. taxes of anywhere from 20 to 40 percent.
For many in the lower and lower-middle income groups, it can mean the
difference between keeping or selling their home, buying or not buying
Lincoln Day speech
-3-
a home. For every renter who files a state income tax return, it
will mean a $50 credit. against those taxes. If his state income tax
is less than $50 -- the entire tax will be forgiven.
And, this tax reform program includes a special school equaliza-
tion program which will produce additional funds for about 80 percent
of the school districts. It will take the first $2.05 in the existing
school tax and place it equally behind all the school children in
California. This is a redirection of existing revenues into an equal
educational opportunity program for all of our children
a reform
that has long been called for, a reform that has been a long time in
coming. Now, the opportunity is here to break the chains of the
antiquated and inadequate school financing system which for many years
has been tied to the property taxpayer in such a way that both have
suffered.
The tax reform program will also help the counties get a better
handle on the rising costs of welfare -- and, at the same time, provide
some relief on that part of the property tax used to pay the costs of
those welfare programs.
We are also calling for a permanent reduction to 50 percent of
the business inventory tax which, for years, has been putting California
business at a disadvantage -- and working an especial hardship on the
smaller businessman. At this time, as we phase into a more diversified
and balanced industrial base, it is essential to provide this tax
relief for both the free enterprise private sector and the thousands
upon thousands of men and women who will be looking for a good job.
To pay for these tax cuts, we have proposed some tax shifts which,
we feel, will make our tax system more equitable and more elastic:
- an increase of one cent on the state sales tax,
- a new rate bracket on the personal income tax for those
filing joint returns of $32,000 taxable income,
Lincoln Day speech
-4-
- an equitable adjustment of the capital gains tax,
- an increase of one-half of one percent on the bank
and corporations tax, and
- a minimum income tax to close the loopholes on those,
at the higher income levels, who now pay no income tax at all.
Now, I'm sure you're waiting for me to mention that one other
source of revenue we needed to help finance property tax relief. And,
I'm sure that many of you are unhappy about the decision I made.
Well, turn yourselves inside out -- put yourselves through a
wringer, walk barefoot on hot coals -- and you'll feel almost half as
bad as I do.
That sound you hear is the concrete still breaking away from my
feet and my situation is just about the same as that of General Armstro
Custer at the battle of the Little Big Horn when he uttered those
immortal words, "take no prisoners".
I am still philosophically opposed to withholding -- as I've
always been.
I could say to you that the public opinion polls show that the
majority who last year opposed withholding have become a minority and
that I was bowing to the will of the people; but, to use that as a
justification for my decision would just be rationalizing.
The cold, hard truth is that the financial facts and my fiscal
responsibility to the people of this State forced me to give in.
Very simply, because of California's increasing reliance on the
income tax as a source of revenue, there is a greater and greater
"cash-gap" -- a cash-flow shortage -- during the months of January
and April. During this four-month period the State runs short of
cásh and has to borrow to keep up with the bills. This situation
will become even tighter during the years ahead, and our need to
borrow would be even greater -- greater than the amount of borrowable
Lincoln Day speech
-5-
money from special funds unless we liquidated our permanent investments
As a matter of fact, the way things are, in three years, the cash
flow shortage would exceed our borrowing capacity -- including the
revenue from those liquid investments.
A 10 percent income tax increase, across the board, would give us
the revenue we needed to make up for the reductions in the property
tax -- but, it would do nothing to even out the State's monthly income
and solve the cash flow problem. Withholding will not only help to
fund the cut in property taxes -- it will help solve our cash flow
problem.
I could not, in clear conscience, choose my personal philosophy
over my clear and constitutional obligation to preserve the fiscal
integrity of the State. That is why I made my decision.
If our proposal is approved by the Legislature, there will be a
one-time "windfall" in the year of transition -- of about $450 million.
That entire windfall will be returned to the taxpayers. In April of
1971, each taxpayer would deduct somewhere in the neighborhood of 40
percent of his income tax to receive his share of that windfall.
There are two major, all-important differences between my reluctan
endorsement of withholding -- and the eager calculations of those who
have drooled over the prospects of withholding in past years.
They would have kept the windfall and used it to increase state
spending; this would have been, in fact, a back-door tax increase. We
have committed ourselves to returning that windfall to the taxpayer -
and that, in effect, is a tax rebate.
An essential part of the tax reform proposal is our request for
accompanying legislation to require a two-thirds majority vote in the
legislature for any future tax increase. This would protect us from
any subtle and insidious tax increase once withholding was in effect.
Lincoln Day speech
-6-
Now, it is irresponsible to talk about taxes, and tax reform,
unless we also concern ourselves with ways to reduce government spend-
ing. As I have said, repeatedly, nothing is more important right r.
than cutting the cost of government wherever possible.
In those departments directly administered by my appointees, and
on the basis of per capita costs in constant dollars, we have managed
to reduce expenditures by 4.7 percent since 1967.
This year we have managed to come up with a "hold-the-line" budget
for fiscal 1970-71. It is the tightest California budget in many years
and, it includes $316 million for tax relief
an increase of $75
million over the amount budgeted for this past year.
Overall, the budget is about one percent less than what we expect
to spend this year.
To keep the expenditures within the anticipated revenues we have
had to cut back on some programs and we have had to delay others.
There is no question that in some of those areas we would have pre-
ferred to maintain or expand certain programs. But, we had no choice
there is just so much money and it can only be spent once. It was
either cut spending or increase taxes -- and that's no choice at all.
It is almost humorous to watch the tortures and the torments of
those who -- on the one hand -- complain because the budget is so
high and -- on the other hand -- cry because it does not allocate all
the money they want for their pet programs. They have not yet learned
or refuse to accept --- that government's money is the taxpayer's money
once removed
and that there just ain't no free lunch.
One of the largest items -- and one of the largest cost increases
in the budget is the total amount spent for social welfare and health
care services (Medi-Cal). Together, these two items demand more th
$1 billion of your tax money. And, that does not include your money
which is spent on these programs at the federal and local levels.
Lincoln Day speech
-7-
The cost of welfare to the California state taxpayer has increased
59 percent in the past three years; Medi-Cal has gone up 90 percent.
These costs are rising at three times the increase in annual revenues.
If we had increased taxes to keep up with the increase in these costs,
we would have had to ask you for $466 million more. Instead, we have
managed to pay these increased costs through savings in various areas
and through some increase in revenues due to an expanded and inflated
economy. This year alone we have cut the costs in the administration
of these programs -- those parts of welfare and Medi-Cal over which
the executive branch has control -- by $56 million. But, we cannot
make the cuts and make the progress which must be made here unless and
until the laws -- both federal and state -- are changed.
Here in Sacramento County, the chief administrator has been forced
to halt construction projects, stop hiring, and to fire personnel,
because of an unanticipated rise in welfare costs. He said that
unless the spiralling costs were controlled, the county would be in
the red by next June and he blamed the recent Supreme Court decision
on striking down the one-year residency requirements as one reason
for the increased costs. He emphasized that his actions were taken
only after it became apparent that other departments could not come
up with enough cuts to pay for the increased welfare costs.
If we are to meet the pressing demands in such areas as education,
the attack against air and water pollution, the modernization of our
correctional institutions, the creation of additional parks and
recreational facilities, the fight against crime and narcotics - we
must have a complete reform of our welfare system. Not just a tighten-
ing of administrative procedures, we're doing that; but, a real reform
of the basic approach and basic philosophy involved.
Government has been fighting the war against poverty for years and
years -- and poverty is winning. For years -- decades - government has
been increasing the money and the programs, and increasing the problem.
Some months ago the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors
voted -- five to one -- to stop welfare benefits to five recipients
who were living abroad, in foreign countries. Three in England, one
in Canada, and one in the Philippines. The county welfare director
reported that the monthly welfare checks -- paid for by California
taxpayers -- were being delivered to the recipients through inter-
national social agencies.
The county counsel told the supervisors there was some question
as to whether they could cut off the welfare payments because
United States Supreme Court had held that we cannot withhold welfare
just because the recipient wants to travel.
Recently Representative Edith Green, of Oregon, asked the Library
of Congress to compile a list of the total funds a family could receive
if it took advantage of all the welfare and assistance programs
available.
The Library took two hypothetical cases of mothers receiving
aid to families with dependent children: one with four children and
one with eight children, ranging in age from pre-school to college.
The smaller family -- with the four children -- could receive an
annual tax free income of $11,513. The larger family -- with eight
children -- could receive $21,093, tax free.
There is something wrong when hundreds of thousands of men and
women with families to support toil eight hours a day, five days a
week, 12 months a year, and earn less than $11,000 -- and pay taxes --
while some on welfare can receive the same amount, or more, without
having to work a single day.
Bastiat said: "The State is the great fictitious entity by which
each one is led to believe that he can exist at the expense of some-
one else." It's time to recognize that we are all that "someone els
There comes a time when we have to take a stand and say we're
not going down the wrong road anymore; when we have to face up to the
fact that the whole approach is wrong -- that just because a law has
Lincoln Day speech
-9-
been on the books for years doesn't make it right
and that we will
no longer put up with the mistakes of the past -- regardless of how
well-intentioned they may have been.
During the past three years, we have introduced -- and re-introduce
--- legislation to halt some of the abuses, and legislation to relieve
the taxpayer of some of these burdens. Time and time these bills
have been killed.
It was only after June of last year -- when Bob Wood of Greenfield
was elected in a special election -- that we Republicans finally had
a slim majority in both houses of the Legislature. By then it was
too late to do much in that session about these reforms.
This year we have re-introduced bills that could bring about
reforms in welfare and could mean a reduction of some $130 million.
We expect to see some substantive changes made, now that Republicans
are finally running the show.
(This, of course, will not protect the taxpayer from the court
decisions which, in the past three years, have forced us to spend
another $86 million
over and above the amounts we had budgeted.
Right now there are six cases pending before various courts. If the
courts rule as they did in the first six, still another $316 million
a year will be added to the taxpayer's burden.)
The fact that we call for reforms in welfare does not mean that
we mean to ignore the needy or the indigent. There is every desire to
help the unfortunate, and to care for the aged and the disabled.
The question is not whether the unfortunate should be cared for:
the real proper question is "How can we best care for them? How can
we best help those who can to help themselves? How can we make sure
that those who should get off the welfare rolls and onto payrolls?"
There are great reforms necessary in government today --- those
in welfare and health care services are but an example of what must
Lincoln Day speech
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be done to break through the crust of the bureaucratic status quo
and we have been chipping away at it for just over three years, now
Everything that we have been working for since the Republican
debacle of 1958 is just now coming to be. For the first time this
year we started with a Republican team in control of the executive
and the legislative branches
as slim as the legislative majorities
may be.
All of the work, sweat and volunteers of all those years is now
starting to produce results. And it is up to all of us -- you and
me, all of us working together -- to make sure that this prairie fire
we started in 1966 spread and keeps growing this year, so that we can
continue next year and in the years ahead, the job we started years
ago.
more than ever
This year, and at the start of this decade, the question/rests
with us. For, as Mr. Lincoln pointed out:
"Not with politicians, not with presidents, not with office
holders -- but with us -- rests the question: shall this Republic
and shall its liberties be preserved to this latest generation?"