Ask the Scholar
Document scope · 1 page
Scholar
Ask about this object, its catalog metadata, its source description, or the page inventory.
For page-specific OCR and visual context, open one of the page chats.
Scholar Source Context
Document identity
localId
4526105
label
GOP Fund-Raising Dinner, Las Cruces, NM, March 23, 1968
core
doc
dtoType
document
citationUrl
pageCount
1
Source metadata
id
4526105
sourceUrl
contentType
document
title
GOP Fund-Raising Dinner, Las Cruces, NM, March 23, 1968
citationUrl
collections
Gerald R. Ford Congressional Papers
Speeches
subjects
Civil disobedience
Crime
Inflation (Finance)
Labor disputes
Law enforcement
Minimum wage
Vietnam War, 1961-1975
iiifBase
thumbnailUrl
largeImageUrl
imageCount
1
hasImages
yes
source
import
hasTranscription
no
Source extras
naId
4526105
coverageEndDate
logicalDate
1968-03-31
month
3
year
1968
coverageStartDate
logicalDate
1968-03-01
month
3
year
1968
levelOfDescription
fileUnit
recordType
description
ocrSource
nara-archive
Single page context
seq
1
pageIndex
0
type
document
url
mediaId
a313f0a95022756d
ocrText
The original documents are located in Box D24, folder "GOP Fund-Raising Dinner, Las
Cruces, NM, March 23, 1968" of the Ford Congressional Papers: Press Secretary and
Speech File at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library.
Copyright Notice
The copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code) governs the making of
photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted material. The Council donated to the United
States of America his copyrights in all of his unpublished writings in National Archives collections.
Works prepared by U.S. Government employees as part of their official duties are in the public
domain. The copyrights to materials written by other individuals or organizations are presumed to
remain with them. If you think any of the information displayed in the PDF is subject to a valid
copyright claim, please contact the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library.
DRY CLEANERI NOTES
I suggest your topic be: "The Issues of 1968--a Republican
View."
-
1. Ask two opposing candidates what the issues are you
get two entirely different answers.
2. The people determine the issues, not the candidates.
The issues are always matters of vital concern to the voters.
3. In the broad sense, there are only two issues--the
issue of war and peace both at home and abread, and FORD the issue
of genuine
economic progressx for us all--REAL presperit
II/DRY CLEAN NOTES
4. All of the issues of 1968 fall under these two broad
headings and are inter-relmated.
as I seethem 2
5. The major issuestare riots, crime, inflation and the
value of the dollar, taxes and the general health of the
economy, and the Vietnam War.
war and
6. We talk of peace at home as well as abroad because some
120 of our cities were ripped by riots in 1967-Detroit
suffering the worst.
Digitized from Box D24 of The Ford Congressional Papers: Press Secretary and Speech File at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
III/DRY CLEANER NOTES
7. The President has predicted more of the same in
1968. I don't think it helps to talk as though riots are
inevitable. This may encourage rioting. We should prepare
for the worst but try to promote the best.
8. We must move on a number of fronts to attack the
conditions which breed riots. The chief target should be to
train ghetto youths for good-paying jobs and then provide them
with jobs with dignity. According to the National Advisory
Commission on Civil Disorders, hostility and r acial pride
IV/DRY CLEANERRAWZK NOTES
underlay the riots. This appears to be a valid
analysis. We should, then, seek to treat the Negro with
dignity and place him through tr sining in a job he can be
proud of and thus seek to wipe out at least
some of the hostility between the races.
9. Present government training programs must be supplemented
in massive degree by on-the-job training programs in industry.
This can be triggered through tax credits for party of
and
the training costs through direct subsidy. This is the
V./DRY CLEANER NOTES
kind of action that should have been taken years ago.
If
1s had been, we might never have had the riots which since
1965 have resulted in more than 100 deaths, nearly
2,500 injury 7,985 cases of arson, 28,939 arrests,
5,434 convictions, $210 million in property damage, and
$504 million in estimated economic losses.
10. Smallbusinessmen in areas where riots may break out are
natural ly concerned about economic loss. There is no excuse
for the conditions which breed riots, but neither is there any
excuse for riots or criminal activity associated with them.
VI. DRY CLEANER NOTES
11. We must deal firmly with lawbreakers whether they a re
rioters or professional criminals. To do less is to
encourage widespread lawlessness. We must restore respect
for the law in this country. We must restore the rule of law,
or we will never again enjoy domestic tranquillity.
12. A general atmosphere of disregard for the law has
enveloped this country since 1960. It has never been
true that the 1 end justifies the means, because this
attitude leads to accomplete breakdown of law and order
This is what has happened in this country in the last four
years. A tolerance of civil disobediance has produced a
general disregard for the law. This is one of the factors
in the tremendous upsurge in crime throughout the Nation.
13. The crime rate, according to official FBI figures,
has gone up 83 per cent (not 88) since 1960 while the
resident population has grown by 11 per cent. This means that
faster than
crime has grown
nearly eight times
the population.
ARV
VIII. DRY CLEANER NOTES
14. Crime prevention and law enforcement are primarily a
local function but the federal government can help. Federal
help should have been on the way long ago but the
President has not exhibited the necessary S ense of urgency.
The House of Representatives passed a Law Enforcement
Asspistance Act last year but the President did nothing
to push it through the Senate, perhaps because House
FORD
Republicans amended it in severall major respects.
We
&
improved its by providing that local law enforcement efforts
be coordinated on the basis of approved state plans. The
VX. DRY CLEANER NOTES
President wanted to funnel the money directly to the cities
with the Attorney General deciding who got what and how
much. One of the problems in local law enforcement now is
overlapping of local jurisdictions and lack of
proper coordination. The Republican amendments were designed
to
correct this situation. The President's plani would
have aggravated / these problems.
15. The federal role in law enforcement bears directly
on organized crime and the syndicates. In that connection,
Republicans believe that wiretapping should be permitted under
X. DRY CLEANERNEN NOTES
careful supervision of the courts-- only under court
order--and only in cases involving major crimes, so-called
organized crime. The President would deprive law enforcement
agencies of this important tool. He would restrict its
Republicans
use to national security cases. think this is a mistake,
and we believe the Congress will so decide. Americans should
demand that the Senate pass the House-approved Law Enforcement
Assistance Act and that both House and Senate approve the
use of wire-tapping under court order in cases involving
major federal crimes.
XI. DRY CLEANER NOTES
16. Next to riots and crime, Americans are perhaps most
distrurbed by inflation and the Vietnam War. The upward
push on prices continues, and the debate over a possible
increase in the federal income tax continues. Both
related to the Vietnam Wary but spread far wider.
17. The pres nt inflationary cycle actual ly began in late
1965 when the Federal Reserve $ Board warned the President
that price stability was - endangered by overheating of
the economy. The board wanted spending cuts and a
tax increase.
EII. DRY CLEANER NOTES
18. Republicans in Congress pressed for a holddown in
domestic spending to offset a rise in defense spending for
the Vietnam War.
19. Leading economists early in 1966 joined the Fed.
Res. Board in urging a tax increase.
20. President J. refused either to hold down domestic
spending or to ask for a tax increase. Result: Inflation.
21. When the President talked in January 1967 about FORD the
need for a tax increase, the best time for it had passed. BRA
The economy went into mini-recession early in 1967, and it
XIII. DRY CLEANER NOTES
was not until August 1967 that the President felt safe in
actually placing a tax increase before the Congress.
By that time, the inflation the country was experiencing
had changed in character. In 1966, it was a demand-pull
kind of inflation--excessive demand pulliing prices upward.
Meantime organized labor had won
substantial wage increases in a number of important
industries, and the cost of raw materials also had gone up.
By late 1967 U.S. inflation had turned to the cost-push
variety--increased production costs exerting an up ward push
on prices while profit margins declined dramatically.
XIV. DRY CIEANER NOTES
22. As recently as the end of last year, leading economists
were saying the President should
either scale the tax increase request back to 6 per cent
from 10 or should foraget about it altogether. They foresaw
a soft second half for the economy in 1968 and figured a
tax increase coming about the middle of the year would be
damaging to the economy.
FORD
23. Meantime the dollar has come under attack in Europe.
Europeans have lost confidence in the dollar. They prefer
gold. The goad pool nations as a holding action
XV. DRY CLEANER NOTES
have shut down the London gold market and have adopted a
two-price system for gold. This just buys time for the
United States to get its balance of payments situation
straightened out.
24. But hope of eliminating the balance of payments deficit
condition may be wiped out by rising demands of the Vietnam
War and deterioration of our position there since the
RD
Communist Tet offensive. In other words, any
LIBRARY
balance of payments savings accomplished through special
restrictions on foreign investment and travel may be offset
by
spending of additional billions on Vietnama due to
XVI. DRY CLEANERN NOTES
increased demands for troops.
24. This Nation faces a situation where
sharp belt-tightening is in order on the home front. As a
minimum, federal spending on domestic programs should be
held to the fiscal 1968 level, not sharply accelerated as the
President proposes. The country is faced with the need
for drastic action because more moderate action was not
taken beginning with the inflationary upsurge of late 1965
RAR
and early 1966. We now are paying for that major mistake.
XVII. DRY CLEANER NOTES
25. In view of the present critical situation in Vietnam
and on the international financial scene, I am keeping an
open mind on a tax increase. I have been opposed to a
tax increase to date because the first need is to
hold down domestic spending rather than load more taxes
on
individual Americans and ont
our
busine ssmen. One is tempted to say that it was President J.
and the
wild-spending 89th Congress that got us into
LIBRAR,
this mess; the President and the Democrats in Congress
should get us out of it.
XVIII. DRY CIEANERN NOTES
26. For more than three years Republicans have been calling
for an austerity program in recognition of the fact that
heavy domestic spending coupled with war spending was taking
us down the road to financial disaster as a Nation and a
people. President Johnson ignored our pleas. Now the
President talks of an austerity program. He appears
FORD
suddent] to have gotten religion. But we must wait to
see just how genuine the conversion is. He is proposing
LIBRARY
reductions of $8 or $9 billions in his budget requests, as I
understand it. This may amount to actual spending cuts of
XIX. DRY CLEANER NOTES
only $4 billion or so below spending the level anticipated by the
President for fiscal 1969. The President wants to couple
that with his 10 per cent tax surcharge I would like to
(-6y#86illion?
see spending cut more deeply than that with the
possibility that the income tax increase could be avoided
altogether. But as I said earlier I am keeping an open
mind on the subject of the tax increase.
FORD
27. There is always the possibility that the President
LIBRA
will so escalate the Vietnam War that the present cost of
about $30 billion a year could go to $35 billion or more. We
then would have to view the tax increase in that light.
XX. DRY CLEANER NOTES
lost
28. The President appears to have
hope for a
negotiated settlement in Vietnam. He seems to have adopted
the idea of achieving military victory. I feel we must
regain the initiative in Vietnam because only in that way
can we lay the groundwork for an
honorable conclusion of the war. Ending the
Vietnam War under conditions which wills enable us
ultimately to win the peace should be the first priority
of the American people. At the same time we must restore
this Nation to fiscal sanity if we are to make realt progress
at home. #### (MORE)
DRY CLEANERS .WORK STOPPAGES
The inflation that doomed the bo om of 1965-66 has produced
a highly volatile labor-management relations and pricing
situation. Prices remained relatively stable until
late
1965 when inflationary pressures clearly began to push
prices upward and the President's wage-price guidelines
began coming apart at the seams. The White House
ostensibly had been seeking to maintain price stability by
insisting that wage increases generally conform with
increases in productivity. But the Administration did not
ride herd on labor, and the guidelines were violated repeatedly
beginning in 1965. Currently we see labor costs
XXXXXX
WORK STOPPAGES...2
rising twice as fast as improvement in productivity (source,
Raymond Saulnier). In AN fact, this has been going on for
two years, with no end in sight. Last year was a banner
year for strikes. Maj or union settlements averaged 51/2 per
cent a year over the life of the contracts. Several
prominent settlements lastyear exceeded 6 per c ent a year.
Council Economic Advisers
Says the President in Mis their Economic Report for 1968,
"If new union settlements were to average even
higher
in 1968 than in 1967, a clear acceleration of price increases
would be likely in 1968." (Econ. Rept, p. 125).
WORK STOPPAGES
Council
The President also notes in Economic Report that "some
unions have already taken this figure (6 per cent) as their
target to meet or beat in negotiations during 1968.' The
President's actions in the copper strike
indicate he has no intention of seeking
improvements in federal laws for the handling of major
work stoppages. I believe that if the President had moved to
cool off the overheated economy in early 1966 we would not
now have the distortions we have in labor costs
as
related to productivity. The latest increase in the
MINIMUM WAGE
minimum wage also presents us with a serious problem. The
1967 increase for the most part restored the minimum wage
to a more typical relationship with the average wage level
Economic Report for 1968.
in the e conomy 1 But the 1968 increase was a whopping
14 per cent...from $1.40 to $1.60 an hour. It will
have a great impact. There are two aspects to legislating
a wage floor. One argument is that this is necessary to
ensure the payment of a living wage. Another is that
AR
certain workers may be priced right out of the labor
market if the minimum is raised without regard to production
MINIMUM WAGE
2
costs. I think that is happening right now..and when it
does happen,
raising the minimum wage does
great
harm to our marginal workers, those without
any special skills.
We should instead concentra te on
upgrading
workers so they will actually be worth more
and thus can earn a better living on their own merits.
ORD
It M just makes sense that if the minimum wage is raised
to an artificially high level in relation to other wages and
of productivity people will get hurt.###
a lot
CONGRESSMAN
NEWS
GERALD R. FORD
HOUSE REPUBLICAN LEADER
RELEASE
--FOR RELEASE AT 6:30 P.M. MT. TIME--
March 23, 1968
Excerpts from a Speech by House Republican Leader Gerald R. Ford, R-Mich., at a
GOP Fund-Raising Dinner Saturday evening, March 23, 1968, at Las Cruces, N.M.
Recent events have greatly improved Republican chances for a smashing
victory in November.
The Republican Party will go into the 1968 election campaign more united
than perhaps ever before in its history.
This is a good omen. This is one of the necessary ingredients for a broad-
scale Republican victory. This enlarges the opportunity Republicans have to win
the White House, take control of the U.S. House of Representatives and to make
substantial gains in the U.S. Senate.
Great victories will be ours if we do everything possible to capitalize on
our favorable position.
Our prospects are bright because the American people are becoming convinced
of the fact that the Republican Party is best equipped to end the war and win the
peace both at home and abroad, and to restore genuine prosperity in this Nation.
Our outlook is good because if you flip the coin over you see that the
Democratic Party has failed the American people on almost every one of the basic
promises it made in 1960 and 1964.
The Democratic Party has failed the young men who were promised they would
never be sent to do the job Asian boys should be doing.
The Democratic Party has failed the farmer who was promised his fair share
of the fruits of the American economy.
The Democratic Party has failed the consumer who was promised price stability
The Democratic Party has failed the worker who was promised increased
purchasing power.
In sum, the Democratic Party has failed all of the American people on all
of the counts that add up to peace and real prosperity.
Postmaster General Larry O'Brien, who will be masterminding Lyndon Johnson's
reelection campaign, recently said the President will seek reelection on the basis
of his record. That is wonderful news.
Let's look at that record and tell it like it is--not as the Johnson-Humphrey
Administration would like people to believe.
(more)
-2-
If we tell it like it is we see that the Johnson-Humphrey Administration has
brought us a constant and continuing deterioration of the dollar, some of the
highest interest rates in a hundred years, a spiraling crime rate that has made
streets of fear of our city pavements, a breakdown of law and order which has
made nearly every major American city the seedbed for racial riot and a potential
war between the races, price inflation and cost inflation that make special
victims of the pensioner and the farmer while hurting every American, strikes
that have threatened the Nation's health, education and welfare as Americans
tried to catch up with Johnson-Humphrey inflation, inflation that wipes out the
worker's wage gains, massive and repeated federal deficits that cause other
nations to view the dollar with distrust, a gold outflow that threatens to drain
away our entire gold stock, moves to restrict the freedom of Americans to travel
and to invest abroad, a limited war fought in a way that is pointing toward
unlimited disaster, stalemate in Vietnam, humiliation at the hands of North Korea,
the distrust of both Israelis and Arabs because of our non-policy in the Middle
East, drift in Europe and a sundering of the once-strong ties that bound NATO
together, danger that the Soviet Union will upset the balance of power through-
out the world and surpass us in nuclear capability.
That is a long list and there's more. Kind of leaves you breathless,
doesn't it? It should leave the Administration speechless.
But this Administration, from the President on down, has been doing plenty
of talking in the past four years--and that's on the record, too. That record
is one of serious misjudgments both on the war and the home front, misleading
statements if not deliberate distortions, and direct contradictions.
The farmer has been caught squarely in the middle as the Johnson-Freeman
Administration has tried to put the best possible face on its mistakes.
We all remember when the Johnson-Freeman Administration made the farmer the
scapegoat of inflation in 1966. Republicans know that never before have our
farmers produced so much and been paid so little for it. We know that Johnson-
Freeman Administration policies forced the Nation's farmers to take a $11/2 billio
pay cut this past year while increased profits to the middlemen and the handlers
pushed food prices upward.
The message I bring you tonight is that no country, no matter how rich or
powerful, can follow the Johnson-Freeman-Humphrey path of continuous inflation
without inviting financial disaster. I invite America to follow Republicans
on the road to genuine prosperity and peace.
###
CONGRESSMAN
NEWS
GERALD R. FORD
HOUSE REPUBLICAN LEADER
RELEASE
--FOR RELEASE AT 6:30 P.M. MT. TIME--
March 23, 1968
Excerpts from a Speech by House Republican Leader Gerald R. Ford, R-Mich., at a
GOP Fund-Raising Dinner Saturday evening, March 23, 1968, at Las Cruces, N.M.
Recent events have greatly improved Republican chances for a smashing
victory in November.
The Republican Party will go into the 1968 election campaign more united
than perhaps ever before in its history.
This is a good omen. This is one of the necessary ingredients for a broad-
scale Republican victory. This enlarges the opportunity Republicans have to win
the White House, take control of the U.S. House of Representatives and to make
substantial gains in the U.S. Senate.
Great victories will be ours if we do everything possible to capitalize on
our favorable position.
Our prospects are bright because the American people are becoming convinceu
of the fact that the Republican Party is best equipped to end the war and win the
peace both at home and abroad, and to restore genuine prosperity in this Nation.
Our outlook is good because if you flip the coin over you see that the
Democratic Party has failed the American people on almost every one of the basic
promises it made in 1960 and 1964.
The Democratic Party has failed the young men who were promised they would
never be sent to do the job Asian boys should be doing.
The Democratic Party has failed the farmer who was promised his fair share
of the fruits of the American economy.
The Democratic Party has failed the consumer who was promised price stability
The Democratic Party has failed the worker who was promised increased
purchasing power.
In sum, the Democratic Party has failed all of the American people on all
of the counts that add up to peace and real) prosperity.
Postmaster General Larry O'Brien, who will be masterminding Lyndon Johnson's
reelection campaign, recently said the President will seek reelection on the basis
of his record. That is wonderful news.
Let's look at that record and tell it like it is--not as the Johnson-Humphrey FORD
Administration would like people to believe.
(more)
GERALD
LIBRARY
-2-
If we tell it like it is we see that the Johnson-Humphrey Administration has
brought us a constant and continuing deterioration of the dollar, some of the
highest interest rates in a hundred years, a spiraling crime rate that has made
streets of fear of our city pavements, a breakdown of law and order which has
made nearly every major American city the seedbed for racial riot and a potential
war between the races, price inflation and cost inflation that make special
victims of the pensioner and the farmer while hurting every American, strikes
that have threatened the Nation's health, education and welfare as Americans
tried to catch up with Johnson-Humphrey inflation, inflation that wipes out the
worker's wage gains, massive and repeated federal deficits that cause other
nations to view the dollar with distrust, a gold outflow that threatens to drain
away our entire gold stock, moves to restrict the freedom of Americans to travel
and to invest abroad, a limited war fought in a way that is pointing toward
unlimited disaster, stalemate in Vietnam, humiliation at the hands of North Korea,
the distrust of both Israelis and Arabs because of our non-policy in the Middle
East, drift in Europe and a sundering of the once-strong ties that bound NATO
together, danger that the Soviet Union will upset the balance of power through-
out the world and surpass us in nuclear capability.
That is a long list and there's more. Kind of leaves you breathless,
doesn't it? It should leave the Administration speechless.
But this Administration, from the President on down, has been doing plenty
of talking in the past four years--and that's on the record, too. That record
is one of serious misjudgments both on the war and the home front, misleading
statements if not deliberate distortions, and direct contradictions.
The farmer has been caught squarely in the middle as the Johnson-Freeman
Administration has tried to put the best possible face on its mistakes.
We all remember when the Johnson-Freeman Administration made the farmer the
scapegoat of inflation in 1966. Republicans know that never before have our
farmers produced so much and been paid so little for it. We know that Johnson-
Freeman Administration policies forced the Nation's farmers to take a $11/2 billio
pay cut this past year while increased profits to the middlemen and the handlers
pushed food prices upward.
The message I bring you tonight is that no country, no matter how rich or
powerful, can follow the Johnson-Freeman-Humphrey path of continuous inflation
without inviting financial disaster. I invite America to follow Republicans
on the road to genuine prosperity and peace.
###