White House Press Release, Remarks of President Harry S. Truman in the Red Room, Fairmont Hotel, San Francisco, California

251 IMMEDIATE RELEASE June 13, 1948 Remarks of the President, in the Red Room, Fairmont Hotel, San Francisco, California, June 13, 1948, 8.40 a.m., c.d.t. Mr. Chairman and ladies and gentlemen of the ILO: Mr. Morse persuaded me to come and have breakfast with you, and I am very happy that I am able to do it. I have a hard and fast rule about speeches on Sunday. You see, I believe that six days in the week are for work, and one is for rest. Of course, I have never caught up with that. But I only consented to say a word or two here because I think maybe this organization can make -- and is making -- a greater contribution to peace in the world than nearly any other organization of its kind in the world. when I say any other kind of organization in the world, I mean parallel organization, because there is only one ILO, and there has only been one ILO. I believe that if a cross-section of every country in the world could sit down at breakfast such as you are having here, and talk to each other SO they can understand each other in a common language, we would never have any trouble in the world. You know; honest men, when the facts are all in sight, never have any difficulty agreeing as to what the decision ought to be. It is my duty, as President of the United States, to make the decisions, because I can't pass the buck to anybody; and if I can get all the NARA facts, I have found that the decisions that I make as a result of the facts are satisfactory to everybody. Now I think this organization is in a position to do more for peace in the world than any other organization of its :fnd in the world, as I said a while ago. I want to pay a tribute to Mr. Phelan, retiring president, or presiding officer, or whatever he is called, because he has built this organization up over the 29 years that he has been in charge of it. He came to the White House and invited me to come to this breakfast, and I told him that I thought I would be so busy I couldn't possibly get here. Well, I have been so busy that I managed to get here, incidentally, because I decided to accept a degree from the University of California yesterday, and it became convenient for me to come over here. And I am certainly happy that I have had that opportunity. This organization is represented from the United States by business and labor, and government. Mr. Morse, and Senator Thomas the great Senator from Utah -- Mr. Morse, the Under Secretary and Acting Secretary of Labor, are representatives of the Government of the United States. Mr. Zellerbach represents the business cross-section of the United States, and Mr. Clinton represents labor in the United States. If we could get Congresses together representing all those organizations -- and I think probably it might be well to add another organization, since this is Sunday morning -- we ought to have a cross-section of religion in the world, a religion founded on a moral code. I, the other day, was instrumental in starting a stamp sale dedicating the death of four Chaplains in this Second World War, and those four Chaplains represented Catholics, Protestants and Jews. And those four Chaplains, when their ship was tinking, handed out all the life preservers that were available in the box, and then took off their own and gave their lives that four young men might be saved. Now you can't witness, or hear about a thing of that kind, without understanding that the heart of the ordinary man is right. And that is what I want to impress upon you this morning, that when your heart is right, and you want to do only what is right, you will have plenty of help and assistance in doing it.