Press Release, Speech of President Harry S. Truman, Fall River, Massachusetts

IMMEDIATE RELEASE IM-EDIATE RELEASE TRUMAN REMARKS OF THE PRESIDENT AT SOUTH PARK, FALL RIVER, "NATIONAL MASSACHUSETTS, OCTOBER 28, 1948, AT 9:55 a. m. ARCHIVES AND RECORDS ANYBELA E. S. T. SERVICE" GOVERNMENT Thank you -- thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, for that most cordial in- introduction. I hope I shall continue to deserve your good opinion and the good opinion of the fine people of Fall River and the great State of Massa- chusetts. I am more than happy this morning to be in Fall River. I sin- cerely wish I could have also gone to New Bedford, but I couldn't go to both places. I went to New Bedford in 1944, and didn't get to Fall River. This time I changed it about. I hope the people of New Bedford will un- derstand that it is necessary for me to be in New York City tonight at five o'clock. It is necessary for me to be there because we are moing to carry the great State of New York as well as Massachusetts. end I have been going all over the United States from one of the country to the other, telling the people what the issues in this campaign are. That is the only way you have been able to find out about them, for the simple reason that the Republican candidate for Fresident will not discuss the issues in this campaign. He is afraid to discuss the issues, because th Republicans are on the wrong side of every issue that affects the people of the United States. There are more people at work under this Democratic administration than ever had jobs before in the history of the world in any one country. 61 million people have jobs and they have jobs at living wages. The pay of textile workers is three and a half times what it was under the last Republican administration. That did not come about by accident. That was the result of legislation which the Democratic administrations put on the books. That was the result of the Walsh-Healy Act, the Wagner Act, and Fair Labor Standards Act. Of course, the first thing the Republicans did when they got in the Congress -- got control of it -- was to try to tear up these things that made labor's rights in this country a -reat deal better. They immediately went to work to repeal the Wagner Act and they passed that Taft-Hartley Act which I think ought to be repealed. Now, I understand that they are trying to do the same thing right here in this great Commonwealth. They are trying to pass a local Taft-Hartley Law, and I hope you won't let them do it. I don't think you will. Last year we had the greatest national income of any country in the history of the world -- 217 billion dollars. This year it is running over 220 billion dollars. That income is fairly distributed to all the people. The farmers get their fair share of the farm income. This year it isthe highest it has ever been in history -- 18 billion dollars for the farmers. The farmers in 1932 had an income of two and a half billion dollàrs. That's the difference. The wages of labor are three times what they were under Republican Administrations. We want to keep them that way. We want to see that the farmers get their fair share of the national income, that labor gets its fair share of the national income, and that business gets its fair share of the national income. But the Republicans don't want it that way. They want special privi- lege to control this country. The legislation which they passed in this Congress -- most of it over my veto -- was for special interests and not in the public interest. Now the Bemocratic Party has a different philosophy. The Democratic Party has always been the party of the people ever since Thomas Jefferson or- ganized it. Thomas Jefferson organized that party way back yonder in 1800, and Andrew Jackson implemented it in 1828 to 1836. Woodrow Wilson reviwed it and gave it new life in the eight years in which he was President of the United States. And Franklin D. Roosevelt and I have carried on those policies for he people and not against them. This fight I have been making, as I told you last night in Boston, is the fight that Al Smith was making, the fight that Franklin D. Roosevelt was making, and now it is my fight, and I want you to help me win that fight - and I am sure you are going to do it. (OVER)