Press Release, Speech of President Harry S. Truman, Geneva, New York

IM EDIATE RELEAS SE IMMEDIATE RELEASE REAR PLATFORM REMARKS OF THE PRESIDENT AT GENEVA. NEW YORK, October 8, 1948 "NATIONAL ARCHIVES AND 4:45 P.M., E.S.T. RECORDS SERVICE" Mr. Chairman, I can't tell you how very much I eppreciate this wonderful turnout here in this great city of Geneva. I have been here many a time, and I like the place. They have some wonderful scenery around here, with some wonderful farms, but you have other things here that are important to the welfare of this great nation. The people around here, at this time, are all apparently very well off, and a lot of them seem not to be interested in the election this year. You know, that is usually the case when people become prosperous -- they think the country will go along ,anyway, without their taking any interest in things. But that is not the case, that is what you did in 1946 -- and look what you got. You got the 80th Republican do-nothing Congress, because you stayed at home and didn't vote. Now, I am on a crusade through this country to wake the people up and make them see what they have at stake in this election. You have everything at stake in this election. _Your own welfare is at stake, and if you let it go by default, there won't be anybody to bleme but yourself, because when you exercise your right to vote you control your Government. That makes you the Government. When you don't exercise your right to vote, a minority controls the Government, and you can expect things that are in the interests of the minority. And that is what happened in 1946. The newspapers and the million dollar propagandists misrepresent the President. They are trying to keep you from knowing the issues in this campaign. They are trying to tell you that I don't know what I am talking about, but I am going to prove to you before I get through with this campaign that I. do know what I am talking about. I think the majority of the people will know it, too, when I get through in spite of all the propaganda they can put out. That is why I have come to see you. That is why I am trying to give you a chance to know the truth. I want you to analyze these issues and then make up your own mind. I am throwing some light on the fog of Republican propoganda. In spite of the bad weather today we have had the finest turnouts that I have ever seen anywhere, and I appreciate it. It shows you are interested, or you wouldn't come out in weather like this to hear anybody at all. You are interested in the welfare of this country or you wouldn't be here today. And that is what pleases me to death, because if you get interest- ed you can't help but do the right thing for your own interests. The Republican leaders like to keep you in the dark. Democratic Administrations believe in bringing light to the people. A good example, take this Rural Electrification Administration. You have electric lines financed by REA in operation right here in your own county. You know that REA means light for farmers, that 93% of the farmers of New York now have electricity. Less than one-third of the farmers had electricity in 1935. who created the Rural Electrification Administration? A Democratic congress acting on he recommendotion of Franklin Roosevelt. Now, who fought the REA, who fought the efforts of the REA cooporatives to give you back those arees that private power companies would not serve? It was the power lobby, and they fought that rural electrification through the Republican Party. OVER