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Copy of Richard Nixon's acceptance speech for Presidential nomination, 27 pgs. [Other Document], 8/8/1968
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Copy of Richard Nixon's acceptance speech for Presidential nomination, 27 pgs. [Other Document], 8/8/1968
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Richard Nixon Presidential Library
White House Special Files Collection
Folder List
Box Number Folder Number Document Date Document Type
Document Description
32
30
08/08/1968
Other Document
Copy of Richard Nixon's acceptance speech
for Presidential nomination, 27 pgs.
Tuesday, August 05, 2008
Page 1 of 1
ON Tour.
RN's Copy
Acceptance Speech
August 8, 1968
Sixteen years ago I stood before this Convention to accept your
nomination as the running mate of one of the greatest Americans
of our time -- or of any time -- Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Eight years ago, I had the highest honor of accepting your nomination
for President.
Tonight, I again proudly accept that nomination.
1. But this time there is a difference.
2. This time we are going to win.
(1) General Eisenhower, as you all know, lies critically
Washington D.e
ill tonight unable even to watch these procedings on
television but I just talked with Mrs. Eisenhower on
the telephone.
1. She tells me that his heart is with us -- that
there is nothing that he lives, more for and there
001
is nothing that would please him more than for us
to win in November.
(1) I say -- Let's win this one for Ike.
- 2 -
We are going to win because this great Convention has demonstrated
to the nation that the Republican Party has the leadership, the platform
and the purpose that America needs.
We are going to win because you have nominated as my running mate
a statesman of the first rank who will be a great campaigner and one
who is fully qualified to undertake the new responsibilities that I shall
give to the next Vice President of the United States.
We are going to win because at a time America cries out for the unity
that this Administration has destroyed, the Republican Party -- after a
spirited contest for its nomination -- stands united before the nation.
1. I congratulate Governor Romney, Governor Rockefeller
and Governor Reagan for the hard fight they have made
for this nomination.
(1) I know that all of you will fight even harder for the
great victory our party is going to win in November.
2. A party that can unite itself will unite America.
Most important -- we are going to win because our cause is right.
1. My fellow Americans, we make history tonight -- not for
ourselves alone but for the ages.
- 3
2. The choice we make in 1968 will determine not only the
future of America but the future of peace and freedom
of the world for the last third of the Twentieth Century.
Can America meet this great challenge?
1. Let us look at America and listen to America to find
our answer.
(1)
We see cities enveloped in smoke and flame.
(2)
We hear sirens in the night. '
(3) We see Americans dying on distant battlefields abroad.
(4) We see Americans hating each other; fighting each other;
killing each other at home.
2. As we see and hear these things, millions of Americans cry.
out in anguish.
(1)
Did we come all this way for this?
(2) Did American boys die in Normandy, Korea and Valley
Forge for this?
Listen to the answer to those questions.
1. It is another voice.
- 4 -
2. It is the voice of the great majority of Americans, the
forgotten Americans -- the non-shouters; the non-demonstrators.
(1) They are not racists or sick; they are not guilty of
the crime that plagues the land.
(2) They are black and they are white -- native born and
foreign born -- young and old.
(3) They work in America's factories.
(4) They run American businesses.
(5) They serve in government.
(6) They provide most of the soldiers who died to
keep us free.
(7) They give drive to the spirit of America.
(8) They give lift to the American Dream.'
(9) They give steel to the backbone of America.
5. They are good people, decent people; they work, they. save,
they pay their taxes, they care.
(1) Like Theodore Roosevelt, they know that this
country will not be a good place for any of us
to live in unless it is a good place for all of us
to live in.
- 5 -
This, I say, is the real voice of America. And in this year 1968, this
is the message it will broadcast to America and to the world.
1. Let's never forget that despite her faults, America
is a great nation.
2. America is great because her people are great.
(1) With Winston Churchill, we say:
"We have not journeyed all this way across the
centuries, across the oceans, across the mountains,
across the prairies because we are made of sugar
candy. "
3. America is in trouble today not because her people have
failed but because her leaders have failed.
4. What America needs are leaders to match the greatness
of her people.
They know that the great question Americans must answer by their votes
in November is this: Whether we shall continue for four more years the
policies of the last five years.
1. This is their answer and this is my answer to that question. ?
- 6 -
(1)
When the strongest nation in the world can be tied
down for four years by a war in Vietnam with no
end in sight;
(2)
When the richest nation in the world can't manage
its own economy;
(3)
When the nation with the greatest tradition of the
rule of law is plagued by unprecedented lawlessness;
(4) When the President of the United States cannot travel
abroad or to any major city at home without fear of a
hostile demonstration -- then it is time for new
leadership for America.
My fellow Americans, I accept the challenge and the commitment to
provide that new leadership for America.
1. I ask you to accept it with me.
2. Let us accept this challenge not as a grim duty but as an
exciting venture in which we are privileged to help a great
nation realize its destiny.
3. Let us begin by committing ourselves to the truth -- to see
it like it is, and tell it like it is -- to find the truth, to speak
the truth, and to live the truth.
- 7 -
(1)
We have had enough of big promises and little action.
(2) The time has come for honest government in America.
I do not promise the millenium in the morning.
1. I do not promise that we can eradicate poverty, end
discrimination, eliminate all danger of war in the space
of four, or even eight years. But, I do promise action --
a new policy for peace abroad; a new policy for peace and
progress and justice at home.
As we look at America abroad, we face the stark truth that we are
worse off in every area of the world than we were when President
Eisenhower left office eight years ago. There is only one answer to
such a record of failure -- it is a complete housecleaning of those
responsible for our failure and a complete re-appraisal of America's
policies in every section of the world.
1. We shall begin with Vietnam.
(1)
We hope there is a chance that current negotiations
may bring an honorable end to the war.
1. We will say nothing during this campaign that
might destroy that chance.
- 8 -
(2) If the war is not ended when the people choose in
November, the choice will be clear.
1. For four years this Administration has had at
its disposal the greatest military and economic
advantage that one nation has had over another
in any war in history.
2. For four years, America's fighting men have set
a record for courage and sacrifice unsurpassed
in our history.
3. For four years, this Administration has had the
support of the Loyal Opposition for the objective
of seeking an honorable end to the struggle.
(3) Never has SO much military, economic and diplomatic
power been used so ineffectively.
(4) If after all of this time and all of this sacrifice and
all of this support there is still no end in sight, then
I say the time has come for the American people to
turn to new leadership - not tied to the policies and
mistakes of the past.
- 9 -
2. The first priority foreign policy objective of our next
Administration will be to bring an honorable end to the
war in Vietnam.
3. We shall not stop there -- we need a policy to prevent
more Vietnams.
(1) All of America's peace-keeping institutions and
all of America's foreign commitments must be
re-appraised.
1. Over the past twenty-five years, America has
provided more than one-hundred-fifty billion
dollars in foreign aid to nations abroad.
(1)
In Korea and again in Vietnam, the United
States furnished most of the money, most
of the arms, and most of the men to help
the people of those countries defend themselves
against aggression.
2. We are a rich nation, a strong nation and a populous
nation. But there are two-hundred-million people in
America and two-billion people in the Free World.
3. The time has come for other nations in the Free World
to bear their fair share of the burden of defending
freedom and keeping the peace.
- 11 -
4. This is not a new isolationism. It is a new
internationalism in which America enlists its
allies and friends around the world in those
struggles in which their interest is as great
as ours.
trute
To the leaders of the Communist world, we say: After an era of
confrontation, the time has come for an era of negotiation.
1.
Where the world's super powers are concerned, there is
no acceptable alternative to peaceful negotiation.
(1)
Because this will be a period of negotiation, we shall
restore the strength of America so that we shall always
negotiate from strength and never from weakness.
2. As we seek peace through negotiation, our goals should be
made clear:
(1)
We do not seek domination over any other country.
(2) We believe deeply in our ideas, but we believe they
should travel on their own power and not on the power
of our arms.
(3) We shall never be belligerent but we shall be as firm
in defending our system as they are in expanding theirs.
- 12 -
(4) We believe this should be an era of peaceful
competition, not only in the productivity of our
factories but in the quality of our ideas.
(5) We extend the hand of friendship to the Russian people,
and to the Chinese people, and to all peoples in the world.
(6)
We shall work toward the goal of an open world -- open
skies, open cities, open hearts, open minds.
The next eight years will be a period in which we will have the-greatest
opportunity for world peace and face the greatest danger of world war.
1. I believe we must have peace. I believe that we can have
peace.
2. I do not underestimate the difficulty of this task.
(1) The art of preserving peace is greater than that of
waging war and more demanding.
3. But I am proud to have served in an Administration which
ended one war and kept the nation out of other wars for
eight years.
(1) It is that kind of experience and that kind of leadership
that America needs today.
- 13 -
As we commit to new policies for America tonight, let us make one
further pledge:
1.
For five years hardly a day has gone by without our
reading or hearing a report of the American flag being
spit on; an embassy being stoned; a library being burned;
or an ambassador being insulted someplace in the world.
Each incident reduced respect for the United States until
the ultimate insult inevitably occurred.
(1)
I say that when respect for the United States has
fallen so low that a fourth rate military power, like
North Korea, will hijack a United States naval vessel
on the high seas it is time for new leadership to
restore respect for the United States of America around
the world.
America is a great nation.
1. It is time we started to act like a great nation.
2. It is ironic to note that when we were a small nation -- weak
militarily and poor economically -- America was respected.
3. The reason was that America stood for something then more
powerful than military strength or economic wealth.
- 14 -
(1)
The American Revolution was a shining example of
freedom in action which caught the imagination of
the world.
(2) Today, too often, America is an example to be avoided
and not followed.
1. A nation that can't keep the peace at home
won't be trusted to keep the peace abroad.
2. A President who isn't treated with respect at
home will not be treated with respect abroad.
3. A nation which can't manage its own economy;
can't tell others how to manage theirs.
If we are to restore prestige and respect for America abroad, the place
to begin is at home.
1. We must recognize that there is no ground more important
than the ground we stand on.
We live in an age of revolution in America and in the world.
1. To find the answers to our problems, let us turn to a
revolution that will never grow old -- the world's greatest
continuing revolution the American Revolution.
- 15 -
The American Revolution was and is dedicated to progress, but our
founders recognized that the first requisite of progress is order.
1. There is no quarrel between progress and order --
neither can exist without the other.
2. Let us have order in America -- not the order that
suppresses dissent and discourages change but the order
which guarantees the right to dissent and provides the basis
for peaceful change.
3. It is time for some honest talk about the problem of order
in the United States.
(1)
Let us always respect our courts and those who serve
on them. But let us also recognize that some of our
courts in their decisions have gone too far in weakening
the peace forces as against the criminal forces and we
must act to restore that balance.
(2)
Let those. who have the responsibility to enforce our
laws and our judges who have the responsibility to
interprèt them be dedicated to the great principles of
civil rights.
1.
Let them also recognize that the first civil right
of every American is to be free from domestic
violence.
- 16 -
(3) If we are to restore order and respect for law
in this country there is one place to begin. We
are going to have a new Attorney General of the
United States.
1.
I pledge to you that our Attorney General
will be directed to launch a war. against
organized crime in this nation.
2.
I pledge to you that the next Attorney General
of the United States will be an active belligerent
against the loan sharks and the numbers racketeers
who rob the urban poor.
3.
I pledge to you that the next Attorney General
will open a new front against the filth peddlers
and the narcotics peddlers who are corrupting
the lives of our children.
3. Let this message come through clear from what I
say tonight -- Time is running out for the merchants
of crime and corruption in American society.
4. The wave of crime is not going to be the wave of
the future in America.
5. We shall re-establish freedom from fear in America
SO that America can take the leadership in establishing
freedom from fear in the world.
- 17 -
To those who say law and order is the code word for racism, this is
our reply:
1. Our goal is justice for every American.
2. If we are to have respect for law in America, we must
have laws that deserve respect.
3. Just as we cannot have progress without order; we
cannot have order without progress.
(1) As we commit to order, let us commit to progress.
This brings us to the clearest choice among the great issues of this
campaign.
1. For the past five years we have been deluged by programs
for the unemployed; programs for the cities; programs for
the poor.
(1) And we have reaped from these programs an ugly
harvest of frustration, violence and failure across
the land.
2. Now our opponents will be offering more of the same --
more billions for government jobs, government housing,
government welfare.
- 18 -
(1) It is time to quit pouring billions of dollars into
programs that have failed.
(2) We are on the wrong road -- it is time to take a
new road. for pager
Again, we turn to the American Revolution for our answer:
1. The war on poverty in America did not begin five years ago.
2. It began when this country began.
3. It has been the most successful war on poverty in the
history of nations.
(1) There is more wealth in America today, more broadly
shared, than in any nation in the world.
4. We are a great nation. We must never forget how we became
great.
(1) America is a great nation not because of what
government did for people -- but because of what
people did for themselves.
It is time to apply the lessons of the American Revolution to our present
problems.
1. Let us increase the wealth of America SO that we can provide
more generously for the aged; for the needy; for all those
who cannot help themselves.
- 19 -
2. But, for those who are able to help themselves -- what
we need are not more millions on welfare rolls -- but more
millions on payrolls.
3. Instead of government jobs, and government housing, and
government welfare, let government use its tax and credit
policies to enlist in this battle the greatest engine of progress
ever developed in the history of man -- American private
enterprise.
(1) Private enterprise, far more effectively than the
government, can provide the jobs, train the unemployed,
build the homes, offer the new opportunities which will
produce progress -- not promises - in solving the
problems of America.
4. Let us enlist in this great cause the millions of Americans
in volunteer organizations who will bring a dedication to this
task that no amount of money could ever buy.
5. Let us build bridges to human dignity across that gulf which
today separates black America from white America.
(1)
Black Americans don't want more government programs
which perpetuate dependency.
(2) They don't want to be a colony in a nation.
- 20 -
(3)
They want the pride, the self-respect and the dignity
that can only come if they have an equal chance to own
their own homes, their own businesses, to be managers
and executives as well as workers, to have a piece of
the action in the exciting ventures of private enterprise.
(4) I pledge that we shall have new programs which will
provide that equal chance.
We make great history tonight.
1. We do not fire a shot heard 'round the world but we shall
light the lamp of hope in millions of homes across this land
in which there has been no hope before.
2. And that great light shining out from America will again
become a beacon of hope for all those in the world who seek
freedom and opportunity.
My fellow Americans, I believe that historians will record that 1968
marked the beginning of the American generation in world history.
1. Just to be alive in America at this time is an experience
unparalleled in history. Here is where the action is.
(1)
Thirty-two years from now most Americans living
today will celebrate a new year that comes once
in a thousand years.
- 21 -
(2) Eight years from now, in the second term of the
next President, we will celebrate the 200th
anniversary of the American Revolution.
(3)
By our decision in this election, we will determine
what kind of nation America will be on its 200th
birthday, and what kind of a world America will
live in in the year 2000.
This is the kind of a day I see for America on that glorious Fourth --
eight years from now.
1. I see a day when Americans are once again proud of their
flag. When once again at home and abroad, it is honored
as the world's greatest symbol of liberty and justice.
2. I see a day when the President of the United States is
respected and his office honored because it is worthy of
respect and honor.
3. I see a day when every child in this land, regardless of
color or background has 2 chance for the best education our
wisdom and schools can provide, and an equal chance to go
as high as his talents will take him.
4. I see a day when life in rural America attracts people to
the country, rather than driving them away.
- 22 -
5. I see a day when we can look back on massive break-
throughs in solving the problems of slums, pollution and
traffic which are choking our cities to death.
6. I see a day when our senior citizens and millions of others
can plan for the future with the assurance that their government
is not going to rob them of their savings by destroying the
value of their dollars.
7. I see a day when we will again have freedom from fear in
America and freedom from fear in the world.
8. I see a day when our nation is at peace and the world is
at peace and everyone on earth -- those who hope, those who
aspire, those who crave liberty -- will look to America as a
living example of hopes realized and dreams achieved.
My fellow Americans, this is the cause I ask you to vote for. This is
the cause I ask you to work for. This is the cause I ask you to commit to.
-- not just for victory in November but beyond into the new Administration.
The time when one man or a few leaders could save America is gone.
1. We need nothing less than the total commitment and the
total mobilization of the American people if we are to
succeed.
-23 -
Government can pass laws. But respect for law can come only from
people who take the law into their hearts and minds -- and not into
their hands.
Government can provide opportunity. But, opportunity means nothing
unless people are prepared to seize it.
A President can ask for reconciliation in the racial conflict that divides
Americans. But, reconciliation will come only from the hearts of
people.
As we make this commitment tonight -- let us look into our hearts and
let us look down into the faces of our children.
1. Is there anything in the world that should stand in their way ?
2. None of the old hatreds mean anything when we look down
into the faces of our children.
3. In their faces is our hope, our love, our courage.
Tonight, I see the face of a child.
1. He lives in a great city. He is black. He is white. He
is Mexican, Italian, Polish. None of this matters. What
does matter is that he is an American child.
- 24 -
2. That child is more important than any politician's promise.
He is America. He is a poet, a scientist, a great teacher,
a proud craftsman. He is everything we have ever hoped to
be and everything we dare to dream to be.
3. He sleeps the sleep of childhood and dreams its dreams.
4. Yet when he awakens he awakens to a living nightmare of
poverty, neglect and despair.
(1) He fails in school.
(2) He ends up on welfare.
(3) For him the American system is one that feeds his
stomach and starves his soul.
1. It breaks his heart.
2. And in the end it may take his life on some
distant battlefield.
5. To millions of children in this rich land, this is their
prospect for the future.
But, this is only part of what I see in America.
1. I see another child.
- 25 -
2. He hears the train go by at night and dreams of far away
places he would like to go.
(1)
It seems like an impossible dream.
3. But he is helped on his journey through life.
(1)
A father who had to go to work before he finished
the sixth grade, sacrificed everything SO that his
sons could go to college.
(2) A gentle, Quaker mother, with a passionate concern
for peace, quietly wept when he went to war but
understood why he had to go.
(3)
A great teacher, a remarkable football coach, an
inspirational minister encouraged him on his way.
(4)
A courageous wife and loyal children stood by him
in victory and defeat.
(5) In his chosen profession of politics, first scores,
then hundreds, then thousands, and finally millions
worked for his success.
(6) Tonight he stands before you - nominated for President
of the United States.
- 26 -
You can see why I believe so deeply in the American Dream.
1. For most of us the American Revolution has been won;
the American Dream has come true.
I ask you to help me make that dream come true for millions to whom
it is an impossible dream today.
This is the cause in which we enlist tonight.
One-hundred-eight years ago, the newly elected President of the United
States, Abraham Lincoln, left Springfield, Illinois, never to return again.
He spoke to his friends gathered at the railroad station. Listen to his
wonds:
"Today I leave you. I go to assume a greater task than
devolved on General Washington. The great God which helped
him must help me. Without that great assistance, I will surely
fail. With it, I cannot fail. "
Abraham Lincoln lost his life but he did not fail.
The next President of the United States will face challenges in some ways
greater than those of Washington or Lincoln. For the first time in our
nation's history, an American President faces not only the problem of
restoring peace abroad but also of restoring peace at home.
1. Without God's help and your help, we will surely fail;
With God's help and your help, we shall surely succeed.
- 27 -
My fellow Americans, the long dark night for America is about to end.
1. The time has come for us to leave the valley of despair
and climb the mountain SO that we may see the glory of
the dawn -- a new day for America, a new dawn for peace
and freedom in the world.
#########