Press Release, Speech of President Harry S. Truman, Canon City, Colorado

IMMEDIATE RELEASE TREMIT IMMEDIATE RELEASE "NATIONAL REAR PLATFORM REMARKS OF THE PRESIDENT AT CANON CITY, COLORADO, September 20, 1948, 7:32 p.m., m.s.t. Well:. I guess this is all the rest of Colorado. I can't tell you how very much have appreciated the cordiality of the welcome. I have received in Colorado today. In Denver I never such crowds. And Colorado Springs and Pueble. I think this crowd here in Canon City is bigger than either one of the crowds in Colorado Springs or Pueble. I believe that Colorado in interested in Democrats. Particularly in your Democratic President. As we came down from Denver to Pueblo today, we passed by Pike's Peak, and I understand tonight we are going to pass by Mt. Elbert, which next to Mt. Whitney is the highest mountain in the country. And I was thinking about those high mountains and these high prices under which we live. Prices are higher than Mt. Elbert or Pike's Peak or Mt. Whitney, either one; and that was brought about because we have special interests who want to profit by those prices, and they have prevented a control of those prices to make things fair for the fellow that has to XXXX work for a living. I don't know whether they want to do it. I think 7 or 8 or 9 times I asked for legislation that would improve that price situation, but I didn't get anywhere with it at all. This 80th Republican do-nothing Congress was not interested in your welfare and mine. They were interested in certain special interests in the country who want to control the country as they did in times past. In fact, they would like to put the West back where it was in 1860 as a sort of colony of the East. You remember when we were trying to build the Pacific Railroad across the United States, Daniel Webster made a speech in the Senate of the United States. Daniel Webster was one of the original Republicans, and he made a speech in the Senate of the U. S., and he said he did not want to open up the "est, he never did think this part of the country was any good, he didn't think it ever would be any good. And you remember when he sat down with Lord Ashburton to write a treaty about 54-40, he and Lord Ashburton took a ruler and drew a line across the map and said this will do, the country is no good anyway. I think the Republicans have always thought that. At least this Republican 80th Congress seems to think it, because they are trying to keep you from trying to get your projects built out here. I have asked for funds for Reclamation projects, for power projects, and for those projects in this part of the country that mean so much to you people; and they have turned me down every time. I don't think they want you to prosper. They are afraid of you. I want you to help me keep the Government in the hends of the people. The people west of the Mississippi River can do that if they want to do it, because there are enough people east of the Mississippi River who are in sympathy with what you believe in--conservation, public power, and the implementation of our national resources for the benefit of all the country, not just for a few people who speculate on the stock exchange in Wall Street. (over)