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    "localId": "483031386",
    "label": "Press Release, Speech of President Harry S. Truman, Shawnee, Oklahoma",
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    "title": "Press Release, Speech of President Harry S. Truman, Shawnee, Oklahoma",
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            "logicalDate": "1948-09-29",
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{
    "seq": 2,
    "pageIndex": 0,
    "type": "photo",
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    "ocrText": "IMMEDIATE RELEASE\nIMMEDIATE RELEASE\nNATIONAL\nARCHIVES AND\nRECORDS\nREAR PLATFORM REMARKS OF THE PRESIDENT\nSERVICE\"\nAT SHAWNEE, OKLAHOMA, SEPTEMBER 29,1948,\n7:35 A. M., c.s.t.\nGovernor, and Fellow Democrats of Shawnee: I can't tell you how very much\nI appreciate this wonderful turnout at this time of day - and the train\nfifteen minutes ahead of time. You know, that's the most unusual thing in\nhistory -- for a train to run 15 minutes ahead of time.\nI wonder if the color bearers would let the flags rest on the ground\nuntil I get through speaking, so the people behind can see. Thank you very\nmuch.\nI have been acquainted with Shawnee for a long time. You've got a\nBaptist school here, and I am a Baptist myself. Not only that. In years\npast Shawnee was, and still is, one of the oil capitals of this great oil\nstate of Oklahoma.\nBut Shawnee decided that the fundamentals come out of the top of the\nground, in the form of farm products; and I'minformed that there are more than\n4400 farms and 500,000 acres in cultivation around this great agricultural\ncenter and that you are, from year to year, producing more and more of the\nthings that go to make up the good things in life - which is fiber, grain,\nand things of that sort -- and we have, in this campaign, a very decided and\nclear drawn issue. It is the people against the special interests. And this\nlast Congress made a sincere effort for the special interests to abolish our\nfarm program. I just want to give you some statistics on things that\nhappened in the House of Representatives in this last Congress.\nThe Republican House Appropriations Committee, headed by one of the worst\nold moss-backs in Congress, John Tabor of New York, said, \"To hell with the\nfarmers out west.\" That's an exact quote from him. And they voted to cut the\nfunds of the Department of Agriculture by 37%. The cuts they made put the axe\nto your program of rural electrification, school lunches, and small farm loans\nand soil conservation. Those are among the most important things to the\nfarmer that ever have been on the law books of the country.\nThen my friend Clarence Cannon, a great Democrat and your neighbor over\nhere in Missouri, who used to be Chairman of the Appropriations Committee,\ntried to get those cuts restored; and he was supported by every one of the\nDemocrats on the Committee and every one of the Democrats in the House,\nincluding all the representatives from the great State of Oklahoma. The\nRepublicans ganged up against us and they defeated that attempt to put those\nappropriations back, by 180 to 174. But there happened to be a very good\nbunch of fighting Democrats in the Senate, and they got most of it restored.\nBut it just goes to show you that if these Republicans could get complete\ncontrol of the Government of the United States I don't think the farmer would\nhave a chance. They'd take every gain that the farmers made in the last 16\nyears away from him. I'm just as sure of that as I'm standing here; and I\nstarted out this campaign on this trip at Des Moines, Iowa, and explained to\nthe farmers just exactly where they stoodwith these Republicans. Stassen has\nmade it very plain that they want to revise the Price Support Program down to\nthe point where the farmer won't have a chance in these high markets.\nI hope you weigh these things very carefully and that you'll consider\nyour own interests when you go to the polls on November the second and vote\nfor yourselves. Vote for yourselves as well as vote for the Democratic\nticket, and when you do that you'l be sure that the country is in safe hands.\nNow, I'm particularly interested in these young people who come out to\nthese meetings. These young people are going to be in a position to run the\ncountry the next generation, and I think we are facing the greatest age in\nhistory; and as I said time and again, I wish I was 14 instead of 64 so I\ncould see what was going to happen in the next 50 years, because I think we\nare going to face a situation, when you get all the wonderful inventions and\nthe harnessing of atomic energy, to the point where the world will be the\nhappiest place to live in possible -- if we can just succeed in getting a\nfew contrary people to understand that peace is much more profitable than war.\nAnd I think we're going to get that done before we get through. If you really\nwant to implement these policies, if you really want to do the proper thing\nfor the most people in the United States of Am rica, you'll send Bob Kerr to\nthe Senate and you'll send my good friend Steve, here, to the House of Repre-\nsentatives. And Steve knows his way around Washington. He has been secretary\nto three Congressmen, and if he doesn't know where all the places are it's not\nhis fault. Secretaries, you know, do most of the work for Congressmen.\nXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX"
}