[ ] Mr. Speaker, Mr. Vice President, Members of the Congress: It is a pleasure to return from whence I came. You are among my oldest friends in Washington--and this House is my oldest home. It was here, more than 14 years ago, that I first took the oath of Federal office. It was here, for 14 years, that I gained both knowledge and inspiration from members of both parties in both Houses--from your wise and generous leaders--and from the pronouncements which I can vividly recall, sitting where you now sit--including the programs of two great Presidents, the undimmed eloquence of Churchill, the soaring idealism of Nehru, the steadfast words of General de Gaulle. To speak from this same historic rostrum is a sobering experience. To be back among so many friends is a happy one. I am confident that that friendship will continue. Our Constitution wisely assigns both joint and separate roles to each branch of the government; and a President and a Congress who hold each other in mutual respect will neither permit nor attempt any trespass. For my part, I shall withhold from neither the Congress nor the people any fact or report, past, present, or future, which is necessary for an informed judgment of our conduct and hazards. I shall neither shift the burden of executive decisions to the Congress, nor avoid responsibility for the outcome of those decisions. I speak today in an hour of national peril and national opportunity. Before my term has ended, we shall have to test anew whether a nation organized and governed such as ours can endure. The outcome is by no means certain. The answers are by no means clear. All of us together--this Administration, this Congress, this nation-must forge those answers. But today, were I to offer--after little more than a week in office--detailed legislation to remedy every national ill, the Congress would rightly wonder whether the desire for speed had replaced the duty of responsibility. My remarks, therefore, will be limited. But they will also be candid. To state the facts frankly is not to despair the future nor indict the past. The prudent heir takes careful inventory of his legacies, and gives a faithful accounting to those whom he owes an obligation of trust. And, while the occasion does not call for another recital of our blessings and assets, we do have no greater asset than the willingness of a free and determined people, through its elected officials, to face all problems frankly and meet all dangers free from panic or fear. The present state of our economy is disturbing. We take office in the wake of seven months of recession, three and one-half years of slack, seven years of diminished economic growth, and nine years of falling farm income. Business bankruptcies have reached their highest level since the Great Depression. Since 1951 farm income has been squeezed down by 25 percent. Save for a brief period in 1958, insured unemployment is at the highest peak in our history. Of some five and one-half million Americans who are without jobs, more than one million have been searching for work for more than four months. And during each month some 150,000 workers are exhausting their already meager jobless benefit rights. Nearly, one-eighth of those who are without jobs live almost without hope in nearly one hundred especially depressed and troubled areas. The rest include new school graduates unable to use their talents, farmers forced to give up their part-time jobs which helped balance their family budgets, skilled and unskilled workers laid off in such important industries as metals, machinery, automobiles and apparel. Our recovery from the 1958 recession, moreover, was anemic and incomplete. Our Gross National Product never regained its full potential. Unemployment never returned to normal levels. Maximum use of our national industrial capacity was never restored. In short, the American economy is in trouble. The most resourceful industrialized country on earth ranks among the last in the rate of economic growth. Since last spring our economic growth rate has actually receded. Business investment is in a decline. Profits have fallen below predicted levels. Construction is off. A million unsold automobiles are in inventory. Fewer people are working--and the average work week has shrunk well below 40 hours. Yet prices have continued to rise--so that now too many Americans have less to spend for items that cost more to buy. Economic prophecy is at best an uncertain art--as demonstrated by the prediction one year ago from this same podium that 1960 would be, and I quote, "the most prosperous year in our history." Nevertheless, forecasts of continued slack and only slightly reduced unemployment through 1961 and 1962 have been made with alarming unanimity-and this Administration does not intend to stand helplessly by. We cannot afford to waste idle hours and empty plants while awaiting the end of the recession. We must show the world what a free economy can do--to reduce unemployment, to put unused capacity to work, to spur new productivity, and to foster higher economic growth within a range of sound fiscal policies and relative price stability. I will propose to the Congress within the next 14 days measures to improve unemployment compensation through temporary increases in duration on a self-supporting basis--to provide more food for the families of the unemployed, and to aid their needy children--to redevelop our areas of chronic labor surplus--to expand the services of the U.S. Employment Offices--to stimulate housing and construction--to secure more purchasing power for our lowest paid workers by raising and expanding the minimum wage--to offer tax incentives for sound plant investment--to increase the development of our natural resources--to encourage price stability--and to take other steps aimed at insuring a prompt recovery and paving the way for increased long-range growth. This is not a partisan program concentrating on our weaknesses--it is, I hope, a national program to realize our national strength. II. Efficient expansion at home, stimulating the new plant and technology that can make our goods more competitive, is also the key to the international balance of payments problem. Laying aside all alarmist talk and panicky solutions, let us put that knotty problem in its proper perspective. It is true that, since 1958, the gap between the dollars we spend or invest abroad and the dollars returned to us has substantially widened. This overall deficit in our balance of payments increased by nearly $11 billion in the 3 years--and holders of dollars abroad converted them to gold in such a quantity as to cause a total outflow of nearly $5 billion of gold from our reserve. The 1959 deficit was caused in large part by the failure of our exports to penetrate foreign markets-the result both of restrictions on our goods and our own uncompetitive prices. The 1960 deficit, on the other hand, was more the result of an increase in private capital outflow seeking new opportunity, higher return or speculative advantage abroad. Meanwhile this country has continued to bear more than its share of the West's military and foreign aid obligations. Under existing policies, another deficit of $2 billion is predicted for 1961--and individuals in those countries whose dollar position once depended on these deficits for improvement now wonder aloud whether our gold reserves will remain sufficient to meet our own obligations. All this is cause for concern--but it is not cause for panic. For our monetary and financial position remains exceedingly strong. Including our drawing rights in the International Monetary Fund and the gold reserve held as backing for our currency and Federal Reserve deposits, we have some $22 billion in total gold stocks and other international monetary reserves available-and I now pledge that their full strength stands behind the value of the dollar for use if needed. Moreover, we hold large assets abroad-the total owed this nation far exceeds the claims upon our reserves--and our exports once again substantially exceed our imports. In short, we need not--and we shall not-take any action to increase the dollar price of gold from $35 an ounce--to impose exchange controls--to reduce our anti-recession efforts--to fall back on restrictive trade policies--or to weaken our commitments around the world. This Administration will not distort the value of the dollar in any fashion. And this is a commitment. Prudence and good sense do require, however, that new steps be taken to ease the payments deficit and prevent any gold crisis. Our success in world affairs has long depended in part upon foreign confidence in our ability to pay. A series of executive orders, legislative remedies and cooperative efforts with our allies will get underway immediately--aimed at attracting foreign investment and travel to this country-promoting American exports, at stable prices and with more liberal government guarantees and financing--curbing tax and customs loopholes that encourage undue spending of private dollars abroad--and (through OECD, NATO and otherwise) sharing with our allies all efforts to provide for the common defense of the free world and the hopes for growth of the less developed lands. While the current deficit lasts, ways will be found to ease our dollar outlays abroad without placing the full burden on the families of men whom we have asked to serve our Flag overseas. In short, whatever is required will be done to back up all our efforts abroad, and to make certain that, in the future as in the past, the dollar is as "sound as a dollar." III. But more than our exchange of international payments is out of balance. The current Federal budget for fiscal 1961 is almost certain to show a net deficit. The budget already submitted for fiscal 1962 will remain in balance only if the Congress enacts all the revenue measures requested--and only if an earlier and sharper up-turn in the economy than my economic advisers now think likely produces the tax revenues estimated. Nevertheless, a new Administration must of necessity build on the spending and revenue estimates already submitted. Within that framework, barring the development of urgent national defense needs or a worsening of the economy, it is my current intention to advocate a program of expenditures which, including revenues from a stimulation of the economy, will not of and by themselves unbalance the earlier Budget. However, we will do what must be done. For our national household is cluttered with unfinished and neglected tasks. Our cities are being engulfed in squalor. Twelve long years after Congress declared our goal to be "a decent home and a suitable environment for every American family," we still have 25 million Americans living in substandard homes. A new housing program under a new Housing and Urban Affairs Department will be needed this year. Our classrooms contain 2 million more children than they can properly have room for, taught by 90,000 teachers not properly qualified to teach. One third of our most promising high school graduates are financially unable to continue the development of their talents. The war babies of the 1940's, who overcrowded our schools in the 1950's, are now descending in 1960 upon our colleges-with two college students for every one, ten years from now--and our colleges are ill prepared. We lack the scientists, the engineers and the teachers our world obligations require. We have neglected oceanography, saline water conversion, and the basic research that lies at the root of all progress. Federal grants for both higher and public school education can no longer be delayed. Medical research has achieved new wonders--but these wonders are too often beyond the reach of too many people, owing to a lack of income (particularly among the aged), a lack of hospital beds, a lack of nursing homes and a lack of doctors and dentists. Measures to provide health care for the aged under Social Security, and to increase the supply of both facilities and personnel, must be undertaken this year. Our supply of clean water is dwindling. Organized and juvenile crimes cost the taxpayers millions of dollars each year, making it essential that we have improved enforcement and new legislative safeguards. The denial of constitutional rights to some of our fellow Americans on account of race--at the ballot box and elsewhere--disturbs the national conscience, and subjects us to the charge of world opinion that our democracy is not equal to the high promise of our heritage. Morality in private business has not been sufficiently spurred by morality in public business. A host of problems and projects in all 50 States, though not possible to include in this Message, deserves-and will receive--the attention of both the Congress and the Executive Branch. On most of these matters, Messages will be sent to the Congress within the next two weeks. IV. But all these problems pale when placed beside those which confront us around the world. No man entering upon this office, regardless of his party, regardless of his previous service in Washington, could fail to be staggered upon learning--even in this brief 10 day period--the harsh enormity of the trials through which we must pass in the next four years. Each day the crises multiply. Each day their solution grows more difficult. Each day we draw nearer the hour of maximum danger, as weapons spread and hostile forces grow stronger. I feel I must inform the Congress that our analyses over the last ten days make it clear that--in each of the principal areas of crisis--the tide of events has been running out and time has not been our friend. In Asia, the relentless pressures of the Chinese Communists menace the security of the entire area--from the borders of India and South Viet Nam to the jungles of Laos, struggling to protect its newly-won independence. We seek in Laos what we seek in all Asia, and, indeed, in all of the world-freedom for the people and independence for the government. And this Nation shall persevere in our pursuit of these objectives. In Africa, the Congo has been brutally torn by civil strife, political unrest and public disorder. We shall continue to support the heroic efforts of the United Nations to restore peace and order--efforts which are now endangered by mounting tensions, unsolved problems, and decreasing support from many member states. In Latin America, Communist agents seeking to exploit that region's peaceful revolution of hope have established a base on Cuba, only 90 miles from our shores. Our objection with Cuba is not over the people's drive for a better life. Our objection is to their domination by foreign and domestic tyrannies. Cuban social and economic reform should be encouraged. Questions of economic and trade policy can always be negotiated. But Communist domination in this Hemisphere can never be negotiated. We are pledged to work with our sister republics to free the Americas of all such foreign domination and all tyranny, working toward the goal of a free hemisphere of free governments, extending from Cape Horn to the Arctic Circle. In Europe our alliances are unfulfilled and in some disarray. The unity of NATO has been weakened by economic rivalry and partially eroded by national interest. It has not yet fully mobilized its resources nor fully achieved a common outlook. Yet no Atlantic power can meet on its own the mutual problems now facing us in defense, foreign aid, monetary reserves, and a host of other areas; and our close ties with those whose hopes and interests we share are among this Nation's most powerful assets. Our greatest challenge is still the world that lies beyond the Cold War--but the first great obstacle is still our relations with the Soviet Union and Communist China. We must never be lulled into believing that either power has yielded its ambitions for world domination--ambitions which they forcefully restated only a short time ago. On the contrary, our task is to convince them that aggression and subversion will not be profitable routes to pursue these ends. Open and peaceful competition--for prestige, for markets, for scientific achievement, even for men's minds--is something else again. For if Freedom and Communism were to compete for man's allegiance in a world at peace, I would look to the future with ever increasing confidence. To meet this array of challenges--to fulfill the role we cannot avoid on the world scene--we must reexamine and revise our whole arsenal of tools: military, economic and political. One must not overshadow the other: On the Presidential Coat of Arms, the American eagle holds in his right talon the olive branch, while in his left he holds a bundle of arrows. We intend to give equal attention to both. First, we must strengthen our military tools. We are moving into a period of uncertain risk and great commitment in which both the military and diplomatic possibilities require a Free World force so powerful as to make any aggression clearly futile. Yet in the past, lack of a consistent, coherent military strategy, the absence of basic assumptions about our national requirements and the faulty estimates and duplication arising from inter-service rivalries have all made it difficult to assess accurately how adequate--or inadequate--our defenses really are. I have, therefore, instructed the Secretary of Defense to reappraise our entire defense strategy--our ability to fulfill our commitments-the effectiveness, vulnerability, and dispersal of our strategic bases, forces and warning systems--the efficiency and economy of our operation and organization-the elimination of obsolete bases and installations-and the adequacy, modernization and mobility of our present conventional and nuclear forces and weapons systems in the light of present and future dangers. I have asked for preliminary conclusions by the end of February--and I then shall recommend whatever legislative, budgetary or executive action is needed in the light of these conclusions. In the meantime, I have asked the Defense Secretary to initiate immediately three new steps most clearly needed now: First, l have directed prompt attention to increase our air-lift capacity. Obtaining additional air transport mobility--and obtaining it now--will better assure the ability of our conventional forces to respond, with discrimination and speed, to any problem at any spot on the globe at any moment's notice. In particular it will enable us to meet any deliberate effort to avoid or divert our forces by starting limited wars in widely scattered parts of the globe. (b) I have directed prompt action to step up our Polaris submarine program. Using unobligated ship-building funds now (to let contracts originally scheduled for the next fiscal year) will build and place on station--at least nine months earlier than planned-substantially more units of a crucial deterrent--a fleet that will never attack first, but possess sufficient powers of retaliation, concealed beneath the seas, to discourage any aggressor from launching an attack upon our security. (c) I have directed prompt action to accelerate our entire missile program. Until the Secretary of Defense's reappraisal is completed, the emphasis here will be largely on improved organization and decision making--on cutting down the wasteful duplications and the time-lag that have handicapped our whole family of missiles. If we are to keep the peace, we need an invulnerable missile force powerful enough to deter any aggressor from even threatening an attack that he would know could not destroy enough of our force to prevent his own destruction. For as I said upon taking the oath of office: "Only when our arms are sufficient beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt that they will never be employed." Secondly, we must improve our economic tools. Our role is essential and unavoidable in the construction of a sound and expanding economy for the entire non-communist world, helping other nations build the strength to meet their own problems, to satisfy their own aspirations--to surmount their own dangers. The problems in achieving this goal are towering and unprecedented-the response must be towering and unprecedented as well, much as Lend-Lease and the Marshall Plan were in earlier years, which brought such fruitful results. (a) I intend to ask the Congress for authority to establish a new and more effective program for assisting the economic, educational and social development of other countries and continents. That program must stimulate and take more effectively into account the contributions of our allies, and provide central policy direction for all our own programs that now so often overlap, conflict or diffuse our energies and resources. Such a program, compared to past programs, will require --more flexibility for short run emergencies --more commitment to long term development --new attention to education at all levels --greater emphasis on the recipient nation's role, their effort, their purpose, with greater social justice for their people, broader distribution and participation by their people and more efficient public administration and more efficient tax systems of their own --and orderly planning for national and regional development instead of a piecemeal approach. I hope the Senate will take early action approving the Convention establishing the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. This will be an important instrument in sharing with our allies this development effort--working toward the time when each nation will contribute in proportion to its ability to pay. For, while we are prepared to assume our full share of these huge burdens, we cannot and must not be expected to bear them alone. To our sister republics to the south, we have pledged a new alliance for progress-alianza para progreso. Our goal is a free and prosperous Latin America, realizing for all its states and all its citizens a degree of economic and social progress that matches their historic contributions of culture, intellect and liberty. To start this nation's role at this time in that alliance of neighbors, I am recommending the following: --That the Congress appropriate in full the $500 million fund pledged by the Act of Bogota, to be used not as an instrument of the Cold War, but as a first step in the sound development of the Americas. --That a new Inter-Departmental Task Force be established under the leadership of the Department of State, to coordinate at the highest level all policies and programs of concern to the Americas. --That our delegates to the OAS, working with those of other members, strengthen that body as an instrument to preserve the peace and to prevent foreign domination anywhere in the Hemisphere. --That, in cooperation with other nations, we launch a new hemispheric attack on illiteracy and inadequate educational opportunities to all levels; and, finally, --That a Food-for-Peace mission be sent immediately to Latin America to explore ways in which our vast food abundance can be used to help end hunger and malnutrition in certain areas of suffering in our own hemisphere. This Administration is expanding its Food-for-Peace Program in every possible way. The product of our abundance must be used more effectively to relieve hunger and help economic growth in all corners of the globe. And I have asked the Director of this Program to recommend additional ways in which these surpluses can advance the interests of world peace--including the establishment of world food reserves. An even more valuable national asset is our reservoir of dedicated men and women-not only on our college campuses but in every age group--who have indicated their desire to contribute their skills, their efforts, and a part of their lives to the fight for world order. We can mobilize this talent through the formation of a National Peace Corps, enlisting the services of all those with the desire and capacity to help foreign lands meet their urgent needs for trained personnel. Finally, while our attention is centered on the development of the noncommunist world, we must never forget our hopes for the ultimate freedom and welfare of the Eastern European peoples. In order to be prepared to help re-establish historic ties of friendship, I am asking the Congress for increased discretion to use economic tools in this area whenever this is found to be clearly in the national interest. This will require amendment of the Mutual Defense Assistance Control Act along the lines I proposed as a member of the Senate, and upon which the Senate voted last summer. Meanwhile, I hope to explore with the Polish government the possibility of using our frozen Polish funds on projects of peace that will demonstrate our abiding friendship for and interest in the people of Poland. Third, we must sharpen our political and diplomatic tools the means of cooperation and agreement on which an enforceable world order must ultimately rest. I have already taken steps to coordinate and expand our disarmament effort--to increase our programs of research and study-and to make arms control a central goal of our national policy under my direction. The deadly arms race, and the huge resources it absorbs, have too long overshadowed all else we must do. We must prevent that arms race from spreading to new nations, to new nuclear powers and to the reaches of outer space. We must make certain that our negotiators are better informed and better prepared--to formulate workable proposals of our own and to make sound judgments about the proposals of others. I have asked the other governments concerned to agree to a reasonable delay in the talks on a nuclear test ban--and it is our intention to resume negotiations prepared to reach a final agreement with any nation that is equally willing to agree to an effective and enforceable treaty. We must increase our support of the United Nations as an instrument to end the Cold War instead of an arena in which to fight it. In recognition of its increasing importance and the doubling of its membership --we are enlarging and strengthening our own mission to the U.N. --we shall help insure that it is properly financed. --we shall work to see that the integrity of the office of the Secretary-General is maintained. --And I would address a special plea to the smaller nations of the world--to join with us in strengthening this organization, which is far more essential to their security than it is to ours--the only body in the world where no nation need be powerful to be secure, where every nation has an equal voice, and where any nation can exert influence not according to the strength of its armies but according to the strength of its ideas. It deserves the support of all. Finally, this Administration intends to explore promptly all possible areas of cooperation with the Soviet Union and other nations "to invoke the wonders of science instead of its terrors." Specifically, I now invite all nations--including the Soviet Union--to join with us in developing a weather prediction program, in a new communications satellite program and in preparation for probing the distant planets of Mars and Venus, probes which may someday unlock the deepest secrets of the universe. Today this country is ahead in the science and technology of space, while the Soviet Union is ahead in the capacity to lift large vehicles into orbit. Both nations would help themselves as well as other nations by ten moving these endeavors from the bitter and wasteful competition of the Cold War. The United States would be willing to join with the Soviet Union and the scientists of all nations in a greater effort to make the fruits of this new knowledge available to all-and, beyond that, in an effort to extend farm technology to hungry nations--to wipe out disease--to increase the exchanges of scientists and. their knowledge--and to make our own laboratories available to technicians of other lands who lack the facilities to pursue their own work. Where nature makes natural allies of us all, we can demonstrate that beneficial relations are possible even with those with whom we most deeply disagree-and this must someday be the basis of world peace and world law. V. I have commented on the state of the domestic economy, our balance of payments, our Federal and social budget and the state of the world. I would like to conclude with a few remarks about the state of the Executive branch. We have found it full of honest and useful public servants--but their capacity to act decisively at the exact time action is needed has too often been muffled in the morass of committees, timidities and fictitious theories which have created a growing gap between decision and execution, between planning and reality. In a time of rapidly deteriorating situations at home and abroad, this is bad for the public service and particularly bad for the country; and we mean to make a change. I have pledged myself and my colleagues in the cabinet to a continuous encouragement of initiative, responsibility and energy in serving the public interest. Let every public servant know, whether his post is high or low, that a man's rank and reputation in this Administration will be determined by the size of the job he does, and not by the size of his staff, his office or his budget. Let it be clear that this Administration recognizes the value of dissent and daring--that we greet healthy controversy as the hallmark of healthy change. Let the public service be a proud and lively career. And let every man and woman who works in any area of our national government, in any branch, at any level, be able to say with pride and with honor in future years: "I served the United States government in that hour of our nation's need." For only with complete dedication by us all to the national interest can we bring our country through the troubled years that lie ahead. Our problems are critical. The tide is unfavorable. The news will be worse before it is better. And while hoping and working for the best, we should prepare ourselves now for the worst. We cannot escape our dangers--neither must we let them drive us into panic or narrow isolation. In many areas of the world where the balance of power already rests with our adversaries, the forces of freedom are sharply divided. It is one of the ironies of our time that the techniques of a harsh and repressive system should be able to instill discipline and ardor in its servants--while the blessings of liberty have too often stood for privilege, materialism and a life of ease. But I have a different view of liberty. Life in 1961 will not be easy. Wishing it, predicting it, even asking for it, will not make it so. There will be further setbacks before the tide is turned. But turn it we must. The hopes of all mankind rest upon us--not simply upon those of us in this chamber, but upon the peasant in Laos, the fisherman in Nigeria, the exile from Cuba, the spirit that moves every man and Nation who shares our hopes for freedom and the future. And in the final analysis, they rest most of all upon the pride and perseverance of our fellow citizens of the great Republic. In the words of a great President, whose birthday we honor today, closing his final State of the Union Message sixteen years ago, "We pray that we may be worthy of the unlimited opportunities that God has given us."
[ ] Mr. Speaker, Mr. Vice President, Members of the Congress: It is a pleasure to return from whence I came. You are among my oldest friends in Washington--and this House is my oldest home. It was here, more than 14 years ago, that I first took the oath of Federal office. It was here, for 14 years, that I gained both knowledge and inspiration from members of both parties in both Houses--from your wise and generous leaders--and from the pronouncements which I can vividly recall, sitting where you now sit--including the programs of two great Presidents, the undimmed eloquence of Churchill, the soaring idealism of Nehru, the steadfast words of General de Gaulle. To speak from this same historic rostrum is a sobering experience. To be back among so many friends is a happy one. I am confident that that friendship will continue. Our Constitution wisely assigns both joint and separate roles to each branch of the government; and a President and a Congress who hold each other in mutual respect will neither permit nor attempt any trespass. For my part, I shall withhold from neither the Congress nor the people any fact or report, past, present, or future, which is necessary for an informed judgment of our conduct and hazards. I shall neither shift the burden of executive decisions to the Congress, nor avoid responsibility for the outcome of those decisions. I speak today in an hour of national peril and national opportunity. Before my term has ended, we shall have to test anew whether a nation organized and governed such as ours can endure. The outcome is by no means certain. The answers are by no means clear. All of us together--this Administration, this Congress, this nation-must forge those answers. But today, were I to offer--after little more than a week in office--detailed legislation to remedy every national ill, the Congress would rightly wonder whether the desire for speed had replaced the duty of responsibility. My remarks, therefore, will be limited. But they will also be candid. To state the facts frankly is not to despair the future nor indict the past. The prudent heir takes careful inventory of his legacies, and gives a faithful accounting to those whom he owes an obligation of trust. And, while the occasion does not call for another recital of our blessings and assets, we do have no greater asset than the willingness of a free and determined people, through its elected officials, to face all problems frankly and meet all dangers free from panic or fear. The present state of our economy is disturbing. We take office in the wake of seven months of recession, three and one-half years of slack, seven years of diminished economic growth, and nine years of falling farm income. Business bankruptcies have reached their highest level since the Great Depression. Since 1951 farm income has been squeezed down by 25 percent. Save for a brief period in 1958, insured unemployment is at the highest peak in our history. Of some five and one-half million Americans who are without jobs, more than one million have been searching for work for more than four months. And during each month some 150,000 workers are exhausting their already meager jobless benefit rights. Nearly, one-eighth of those who are without jobs live almost without hope in nearly one hundred especially depressed and troubled areas. The rest include new school graduates unable to use their talents, farmers forced to give up their part-time jobs which helped balance their family budgets, skilled and unskilled workers laid off in such important industries as metals, machinery, automobiles and apparel. Our recovery from the 1958 recession, moreover, was anemic and incomplete. Our Gross National Product never regained its full potential. Unemployment never returned to normal levels. Maximum use of our national industrial capacity was never restored. In short, the American economy is in trouble. The most resourceful industrialized country on earth ranks among the last in the rate of economic growth. Since last spring our economic growth rate has actually receded. Business investment is in a decline. Profits have fallen below predicted levels. Construction is off. A million unsold automobiles are in inventory. Fewer people are working--and the average work week has shrunk well below 40 hours. Yet prices have continued to rise--so that now too many Americans have less to spend for items that cost more to buy. Economic prophecy is at best an uncertain art--as demonstrated by the prediction one year ago from this same podium that 1960 would be, and I quote, "the most prosperous year in our history." Nevertheless, forecasts of continued slack and only slightly reduced unemployment through 1961 and 1962 have been made with alarming unanimity-and this Administration does not intend to stand helplessly by. We cannot afford to waste idle hours and empty plants while awaiting the end of the recession. We must show the world what a free economy can do--to reduce unemployment, to put unused capacity to work, to spur new productivity, and to foster higher economic growth within a range of sound fiscal policies and relative price stability. I will propose to the Congress within the next 14 days measures to improve unemployment compensation through temporary increases in duration on a self-supporting basis--to provide more food for the families of the unemployed, and to aid their needy children--to redevelop our areas of chronic labor surplus--to expand the services of the YOU.S. Employment Offices--to stimulate housing and construction--to secure more purchasing power for our lowest paid workers by raising and expanding the minimum wage--to offer tax incentives for sound plant investment--to increase the development of our natural resources--to encourage price stability--and to take other steps aimed at insuring a prompt recovery and paving the way for increased long-range growth. This is not a partisan program concentrating on our weaknesses--it is, I hope, a national program to realize our national strength. II. Efficient expansion at home, stimulating the new plant and technology that can make our goods more competitive, is also the key to the international balance of payments problem. Laying aside all alarmist talk and panicky solutions, let us put that knotty problem in its proper perspective. It is true that, since 1958, the gap between the dollars we spend or invest abroad and the dollars returned to us has substantially widened. This overall deficit in our balance of payments increased by nearly $11 billion in the 3 years--and holders of dollars abroad converted them to gold in such a quantity as to because a total outflow of nearly $5 billion of gold from our reserve. The 1959 deficit was caused in large part by the failure of our exports to penetrate foreign markets-the result both of restrictions on our goods and our own uncompetitive prices. The 1960 deficit, on the other hand, was more the result of an increase in private capital outflow seeking new opportunity, higher return or speculative advantage abroad. Meanwhile this country has continued to bear more than its share of the West's military and foreign aid obligations. Under existing policies, another deficit of $2 billion is predicted for 1961--and individuals in those countries whose dollar position once depended on these deficits for improvement now wonder aloud whether our gold reserves will remain sufficient to meet our own obligations. All this is because for concern--but it is not because for panic. For our monetary and financial position remains exceedingly strong. Including our drawing rights in the International Monetary Fund and the gold reserve held as backing for our currency and Federal Reserve deposits, we have some $22 billion in total gold stocks and other international monetary reserves available-and I now pledge that their full strength stands behind the value of the dollar for use if needed. Moreover, we hold large assets abroad-the total owed this nation far exceeds the claims upon our reserves--and our exports once again substantially exceed our imports. In short, we need not--and we shall not-take any action to increase the dollar price of gold from $35 an ounce--to impose exchange controls--to reduce our anti-recession efforts--to fall back on restrictive trade policies--or to weaken our commitments around the world. This Administration will not distort the value of the dollar in any fashion. And this is a commitment. Prudence and good sense do require, however, that new steps be taken to ease the payments deficit and prevent any gold crisis. Our success in world affairs has long depended in part upon foreign confidence in our ability to pay. A series of executive orders, legislative remedies and cooperative efforts with our allies will get underway immediately--aimed at attracting foreign investment and travel to this country-promoting American exports, at stable prices and with more liberal government guarantees and financing--curbing tax and customs loopholes that encourage undue spending of private dollars abroad--and (through OECD, NATO and otherwise) sharing with our allies all efforts to provide for the common defense of the free world and the hopes for growth of the less developed lands. While the current deficit lasts, ways will be found to ease our dollar outlays abroad without placing the full burden on the families of men whom we have asked to serve our Flag overseas. In short, whatever is required will be done to back up all our efforts abroad, and to make certain that, in the future as in the past, the dollar is as "sound as a dollar." III. But more than our exchange of international payments is out of balance. The current Federal budget for fiscal 1961 is almost certain to show a net deficit. The budget already submitted for fiscal 1962 will remain in balance only if the Congress enacts all the revenue measures requested--and only if an earlier and sharper up-turn in the economy than my economic advisers now think likely produces the tax revenues estimated. Nevertheless, a new Administration must of necessity build on the spending and revenue estimates already submitted. Within that framework, barring the development of urgent national defense needs or a worsening of the economy, it is my current intention to advocate a program of expenditures which, including revenues from a stimulation of the economy, will not of and by themselves unbalance the earlier Budget. However, we will do what must be done. For our national household is cluttered with unfinished and neglected tasks. Our cities are being engulfed in squalor. Twelve long years after Congress declared our goal to be "a decent home and a suitable environment for every American family," we still have 25 million Americans living in substandard homes. A new housing program under a new Housing and Urban Affairs Department will be needed this year. Our classrooms contain 2 million more children than they can properly have room for, taught by 90,000 teachers not properly qualified to teach. One third of our most promising high school graduates are financially unable to continue the development of their talents. The war babies of the 1940's, who overcrowded our schools in the 1950's, are now descending in 1960 upon our colleges-with two college students for every one, ten years from now--and our colleges are ill prepared. We lack the scientists, the engineers and the teachers our world obligations require. We have neglected oceanography, saline water conversion, and the basic research that lies at the root of all progress. Federal grants for both higher and public school education can no longer be delayed. Medical research has achieved new wonders--but these wonders are too often beyond the reach of too many people, owing to a lack of income (particularly among the aged), a lack of hospital beds, a lack of nursing homes and a lack of doctors and dentists. Measures to provide health care for the aged under Social Security, and to increase the supply of both facilities and personnel, must be undertaken this year. Our supply of clean water is dwindling. Organized and juvenile crimes cost the taxpayers millions of dollars each year, making it essential that we have improved enforcement and new legislative safeguards. The denial of constitutional rights to some of our fellow Americans on account of race--at the ballot box and elsewhere--disturbs the national conscience, and subjects us to the charge of world opinion that our democracy is not equal to the high promise of our heritage. Morality in private business has not been sufficiently spurred by morality in public business. A host of problems and projects in all 50 States, though not possible to include in this Message, deserves-and will receive--the attention of both the Congress and the Executive Branch. On most of these matters, Messages will be sent to the Congress within the next two weeks. IV. But all these problems pale when placed beside those which confront us around the world. No man entering upon this office, regardless of his party, regardless of his previous service in Washington, could fail to be staggered upon learning--even in this brief 10 day period--the harsh enormity of the trials through which we must pass in the next four years. Each day the crises multiply. Each day their solution grows more difficult. Each day we draw nearer the hour of maximum danger, as weapons spread and hostile forces grow stronger. I feel I must inform the Congress that our analyses over the last ten days make it clear that--in each of the principal areas of crisis--the tide of events has been running out and time has not been our friend. In Asia, the relentless pressures of the Chinese Communists menace the security of the entire area--from the borders of India and South Viet Nam to the jungles of Laos, struggling to protect its newly-won independence. We seek in Laos what we seek in all Asia, and, indeed, in all of the world-freedom for the people and independence for the government. And this Nation shall persevere in our pursuit of these objectives. In Africa, the Congo has been brutally torn by civil strife, political unrest and public disorder. We shall continue to support the heroic efforts of the United Nations to restore peace and order--efforts which are now endangered by mounting tensions, unsolved problems, and decreasing support from many member states. In Latin America, Communist agents seeking to exploit that region's peaceful revolution of hope have established a base on Cuba, only 90 miles from our shores. Our objection with Cuba is not over the people's drive for a better life. Our objection is to their domination by foreign and domestic tyrannies. Cuban social and economic reform should be encouraged. Questions of economic and trade policy can always be negotiated. But Communist domination in this Hemisphere can never be negotiated. We are pledged to work with our sister republics to free the Americas of all such foreign domination and all tyranny, working toward the goal of a free hemisphere of free governments, extending from Cape Horn to the Arctic Circle. In Europe our alliances are unfulfilled and in some disarray. The unity of NATO has been weakened by economic rivalry and partially eroded by national interest. It has not yet fully mobilized its resources nor fully achieved a common outlook. Yet no Atlantic power can meet on its own the mutual problems now facing us in defense, foreign aid, monetary reserves, and a host of other areas; and our close ties with those whose hopes and interests we share are among this Nation's most powerful assets. Our greatest challenge is still the world that lies beyond the Cold War--but the first great obstacle is still our relations with the Soviet Union and Communist China. We must never be lulled into believing that either power has yielded its ambitions for world domination--ambitions which they forcefully restated only a short time ago. On the contrary, our task is to convince them that aggression and subversion will not be profitable routes to pursue these ends. Open and peaceful competition--for prestige, for markets, for scientific achievement, even for men's minds--is something else again. For if Freedom and Communism were to compete for man's allegiance in a world at peace, I would look to the future with ever increasing confidence. To meet this array of challenges--to fulfill the role we cannot avoid on the world scene--we must reexamine and revise our whole arsenal of tools: military, economic and political. One must not overshadow the other: On the Presidential Coat of Arms, the American eagle holds in his right talon the olive branch, while in his left he holds a bundle of arrows. We intend to give equal attention to both. First, we must strengthen our military tools. We are moving into a period of uncertain risk and great commitment in which both the military and diplomatic possibilities require a Free World force so powerful as to make any aggression clearly futile. Yet in the past, lack of a consistent, coherent military strategy, the absence of basic assumptions about our national requirements and the faulty estimates and duplication arising from inter-service rivalries have all made it difficult to assess accurately how adequate--or inadequate--our defenses really are. I have, therefore, instructed the Secretary of Defense to reappraise our entire defense strategy--our ability to fulfill our commitments-the effectiveness, vulnerability, and dispersal of our strategic bases, forces and warning systems--the efficiency and economy of our operation and organization-the elimination of obsolete bases and installations-and the adequacy, modernization and mobility of our present conventional and nuclear forces and weapons systems in the light of present and future dangers. I have asked for preliminary conclusions by the end of February--and I then shall recommend whatever legislative, budgetary or executive action is needed in the light of these conclusions. In the meantime, I have asked the Defense Secretary to initiate immediately three new steps most clearly needed now: First, l have directed prompt attention to increase our air-lift capacity. Obtaining additional air transport mobility--and obtaining it now--will better assure the ability of our conventional forces to respond, with discrimination and speed, to any problem at any spot on the globe at any moment's notice. In particular it will enable us to meet any deliberate effort to avoid or divert our forces by starting limited wars in widely scattered parts of the globe. (b) I have directed prompt action to step up our Polaris submarine program. Using unobligated ship-building funds now (to let contracts originally scheduled for the next fiscal year) will build and place on station--at least nine months earlier than planned-substantially more units of a crucial deterrent--a fleet that will never attack first, but possess sufficient powers of retaliation, concealed beneath the seas, to discourage any aggressor from launching an attack upon our security. (c) I have directed prompt action to accelerate our entire missile program. Until the Secretary of Defense's reappraisal is completed, the emphasis here will be largely on improved organization and decision making--on cutting down the wasteful duplications and the time-lag that have handicapped our whole family of missiles. If we are to keep the peace, we need an invulnerable missile force powerful enough to deter any aggressor from even threatening an attack that he would know could not destroy enough of our force to prevent his own destruction. For as I said upon taking the oath of office: "Only when our arms are sufficient beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt that they will never be employed." Secondly, we must improve our economic tools. Our role is essential and unavoidable in the construction of a sound and expanding economy for the entire non-communist world, helping other nations build the strength to meet their own problems, to satisfy their own aspirations--to surmount their own dangers. The problems in achieving this goal are towering and unprecedented-the response must be towering and unprecedented as well, much as Lend-Lease and the Marshall Plan were in earlier years, which brought such fruitful results. (a) I intend to ask the Congress for authority to establish a new and more effective program for assisting the economic, educational and social development of other countries and continents. That program must stimulate and take more effectively into account the contributions of our allies, and provide central policy direction for all our own programs that now so often overlap, conflict or diffuse our energies and resources. Such a program, compared to past programs, will require --more flexibility for short run emergencies --more commitment to long term development --new attention to education at all levels --greater emphasis on the recipient nation's role, their effort, their purpose, with greater social justice for their people, broader distribution and participation by their people and more efficient public administration and more efficient tax systems of their own --and orderly planning for national and regional development instead of a piecemeal approach. I hope the Senate will take early action approving the Convention establishing the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. This will be an important instrument in sharing with our allies this development effort--working toward the time when each nation will contribute in proportion to its ability to pay. For, while we are prepared to assume our full share of these huge burdens, we cannot and must not be expected to bear them alone. To our sister republics to the south, we have pledged a new alliance for progress-alianza para progreso. Our goal is a free and prosperous Latin America, realizing for all its states and all its citizens a degree of economic and social progress that matches their historic contributions of culture, intellect and liberty. To start this nation's role at this time in that alliance of neighbors, I am recommending the following: --That the Congress appropriate in full the $500 million fund pledged by the Act of Bogota, to be used not as an instrument of the Cold War, but as a first step in the sound development of the Americas. --That a new Inter-Departmental Task Force be established under the leadership of the Department of State, to coordinate at the highest level all policies and programs of concern to the Americas. --That our delegates to the OAS, working with those of other members, strengthen that body as an instrument to preserve the peace and to prevent foreign domination anywhere in the Hemisphere. --That, in cooperation with other nations, we launch a new hemispheric attack on illiteracy and inadequate educational opportunities to all levels; and, finally, --That a Food-for-Peace mission be sent immediately to Latin America to explore ways in which our vast food abundance can be used to help end hunger and malnutrition in certain areas of suffering in our own hemisphere. This Administration is expanding its Food-for-Peace Program in every possible way. The product of our abundance must be used more effectively to relieve hunger and help economic growth in all corners of the globe. And I have asked the Director of this Program to recommend additional ways in which these surpluses can advance the interests of world peace--including the establishment of world food reserves. An even more valuable national asset is our reservoir of dedicated men and women-not only on our college campuses but in every age group--who have indicated their desire to contribute their skills, their efforts, and a part of their lives to the fight for world order. We can mobilize this talent through the formation of a National Peace Corps, enlisting the services of all those with the desire and capacity to help foreign lands meet their urgent needs for trained personnel. Finally, while our attention is centered on the development of the noncommunist world, we must never forget our hopes for the ultimate freedom and welfare of the Eastern European peoples. In order to be prepared to help re-establish historic ties of friendship, I am asking the Congress for increased discretion to use economic tools in this area whenever this is found to be clearly in the national interest. This will require amendment of the Mutual Defense Assistance Control Act along the lines I proposed as a member of the Senate, and upon which the Senate voted last summer. Meanwhile, I hope to explore with the Polish government the possibility of using our frozen Polish funds on projects of peace that will demonstrate our abiding friendship for and interest in the people of Poland. Third, we must sharpen our political and diplomatic tools the means of cooperation and agreement on which an enforceable world order must ultimately rest. I have already taken steps to coordinate and expand our disarmament effort--to increase our programs of research and study-and to make arms control a central goal of our national policy under my direction. The deadly arms race, and the huge resources it absorbs, have too long overshadowed all else we must do. We must prevent that arms race from spreading to new nations, to new nuclear powers and to the reaches of outer space. We must make certain that our negotiators are better informed and better prepared--to formulate workable proposals of our own and to make sound judgments about the proposals of others. I have asked the other governments concerned to agree to a reasonable delay in the talks on a nuclear test ban--and it is our intention to resume negotiations prepared to reach a final agreement with any nation that is equally willing to agree to an effective and enforceable treaty. We must increase our support of the United Nations as an instrument to end the Cold War instead of an arena in which to fight it. In recognition of its increasing importance and the doubling of its membership --we are enlarging and strengthening our own mission to the YOU.N. --we shall help insure that it is properly financed. --we shall work to see that the integrity of the office of the Secretary-General is maintained. --And I would address a special plea to the smaller nations of the world--to join with us in strengthening this organization, which is far more essential to their security than it is to ours--the only body in the world where no nation need be powerful to be secure, where every nation has an equal voice, and where any nation can exert influence not according to the strength of its armies but according to the strength of its ideas. It deserves the support of all. Finally, this Administration intends to explore promptly all possible areas of cooperation with the Soviet Union and other nations "to invoke the wonders of science instead of its terrors." Specifically, I now invite all nations--including the Soviet Union--to join with us in developing a weather prediction program, in a new communications satellite program and in preparation for probing the distant planets of Mars and Venus, probes which may someday unlock the deepest secrets of the universe. Today this country is ahead in the science and technology of space, while the Soviet Union is ahead in the capacity to lift large vehicles into orbit. Both nations would help themselves as well as other nations by ten moving these endeavors from the bitter and wasteful competition of the Cold War. The United States would be willing to join with the Soviet Union and the scientists of all nations in a greater effort to make the fruits of this new knowledge available to all-and, beyond that, in an effort to extend farm technology to hungry nations--to wipe out disease--to increase the exchanges of scientists and. their knowledge--and to make our own laboratories available to technicians of other lands who lack the facilities to pursue their own work. Where nature makes natural allies of us all, we can demonstrate that beneficial relations are possible even with those with whom we most deeply disagree-and this must someday be the basis of world peace and world law. V. I have commented on the state of the domestic economy, our balance of payments, our Federal and social budget and the state of the world. I would like to conclude with a few remarks about the state of the Executive branch. We have found it full of honest and useful public servants--but their capacity to act decisively at the exact time action is needed has too often been muffled in the morass of committees, timidities and fictitious theories which have created a growing gap between decision and execution, between planning and reality. In a time of rapidly deteriorating situations at home and abroad, this is bad for the public service and particularly bad for the country; and we mean to make a change. I have pledged myself and my colleagues in the cabinet to a continuous encouragement of initiative, responsibility and energy in serving the public interest. Let every public servant know, whether his post is high or low, that a man's rank and reputation in this Administration will be determined by the size of the job he does, and not by the size of his staff, his office or his budget. Let it be clear that this Administration recognizes the value of dissent and daring--that we greet healthy controversy as the hallmark of healthy change. Let the public service be a proud and lively career. And let every man and woman who works in any area of our national government, in any branch, at any level, be able to say with pride and with honor in future years: "I served the United States government in that hour of our nation's need." For only with complete dedication by us all to the national interest can we bring our country through the troubled years that lie ahead. Our problems are critical. The tide is unfavorable. The news will be worse before it is better. And while hoping and working for the best, we should prepare ourselves now for the worst. We cannot escape our dangers--neither must we let them drive us into panic or narrow isolation. In many areas of the world where the balance of power already rests with our adversaries, the forces of freedom are sharply divided. It is one of the ironies of our time that the techniques of a harsh and repressive system should be able to instill discipline and ardor in its servants--while the blessings of liberty have too often stood for privilege, materialism and a life of ease. But I have a different view of liberty. Life in 1961 will not be easy. Wishing it, predicting it, even asking for it, will not make it so. There will be further setbacks before the tide is turned. But turn it we must. The hopes of all mankind rest upon us--not simply upon those of us in this chamber, but upon the peasant in Laos, the fisherman in Nigeria, the exile from Cuba, the spirit that moves every man and Nation who shares our hopes for freedom and the future. And in the final analysis, they rest most of all upon the pride and perseverance of our fellow citizens of the great Republic. In the words of a great President, whose birthday we honor today, closing his final State of the Union Message sixteen years ago, "We pray that we may be worthy of the unlimited opportunities that God has given us."
speaker vice president members of the congress it is a pleasure to return from whence i came you are among my oldest friends in washington and this house is my oldest home it was here more than 14 years ago that i first took the oath of federal office it was here for 14 years that i gained both knowledge and inspiration from members of both parties in both houses from your wise and generous leaders and from the pronouncements which i can vividly recall sitting where you now sit including the programs of two great presidents the undimmed eloquence of churchill the soaring idealism of nehru the steadfast words of general de gaulle to speak from this same historic rostrum is a sobering experience to be back among so many friends is a happy one i am confident that that friendship will continue our constitution wisely assigns both joint and separate roles to each branch of the government and a president and a congress who hold each other in mutual respect will neither permit nor attempt any trespass for my part i shall withhold from neither the congress nor the people any fact or report past present or future which is necessary for an informed judgment of our conduct and hazards i shall neither shift the burden of executive decisions to the congress nor avoid responsibility for the outcome of those decisions i speak today in an hour of national peril and national opportunity before my term has ended we shall have to test anew whether a nation organized and governed such as ours can endure the outcome is by no means certain the answers are by no means clear all of us together this administration this congress this forge those answers but today were i to offer after little more than a week in office detailed legislation to remedy every national ill the congress would rightly wonder whether the desire for speed had replaced the duty of responsibility my remarks therefore will be limited but they will also be candid to state the facts frankly is not to despair the future nor indict the past the prudent heir takes careful inventory of his legacies and gives a faithful accounting to those whom he owes an obligation of trust and while the occasion does not call for another recital of our blessings and assets we do have no greater asset than the willingness of a free and determined people through its elected officials to face all problems frankly and meet all dangers free from panic or fear the present state of our economy is disturbing we take office in the wake of seven months of recession three and years of slack seven years of diminished economic growth and nine years of falling farm income business bankruptcies have reached their highest level since the great depression since 1951 farm income has been squeezed down by 25 percent save for a brief period in 1958 insured unemployment is at the highest peak in our history of some five and million americans who are without jobs more than one million have been searching for work for more than four months and during each month some workers are exhausting their already meager jobless benefit rights nearly of those who are without jobs live almost without hope in nearly one hundred especially depressed and troubled areas the rest include new school graduates unable to use their talents farmers forced to give up their jobs which helped balance their family budgets skilled and unskilled workers laid off in such important industries as metals machinery automobiles and apparel our recovery from the 1958 recession moreover was anemic and incomplete our gross national product never regained its full potential unemployment never returned to normal levels maximum use of our national industrial capacity was never restored in short the american economy is in trouble the most resourceful industrialized country on earth ranks among the last in the rate of economic growth since last spring our economic growth rate has actually receded business investment is in a decline profits have fallen below predicted levels construction is off a million unsold automobiles are in inventory fewer people are working and the average work week has shrunk well below 40 hours yet prices have continued to rise so that now too many americans have less to spend for items that cost more to buy economic prophecy is at best an uncertain art as demonstrated by the prediction one year ago from this same podium that 1960 would be and i quote the most prosperous year in our history nevertheless forecasts of continued slack and only slightly reduced unemployment through 1961 and 1962 have been made with alarming this administration does not intend to stand helplessly by we can not afford to waste idle hours and empty plants while awaiting the end of the recession we must show the world what a free economy can do to reduce unemployment to put unused capacity to work to spur new productivity and to foster higher economic growth within a range of sound fiscal policies and relative price stability i will propose to the congress within the next 14 days measures to improve unemployment compensation through temporary increases in duration on a basis to provide more food for the families of the unemployed and to aid their needy children to redevelop our areas of chronic labor surplus to expand the services of the employment offices to stimulate housing and construction to secure more purchasing power for our lowest paid workers by raising and expanding the minimum wage to offer tax incentives for sound plant investment to increase the development of our natural resources to encourage price stability and to take other steps aimed at insuring a prompt recovery and paving the way for increased growth this is not a partisan program concentrating on our weaknesses it is i hope a national program to realize our national strength ii efficient expansion at home stimulating the new plant and technology that can make our goods more competitive is also the key to the international balance of payments problem laying aside all alarmist talk and panicky solutions let us put that knotty problem in its proper perspective it is true that since 1958 the gap between the dollars we spend or invest abroad and the dollars returned to us has substantially widened this overall deficit in our balance of payments increased by nearly 11 billion in the 3 years and holders of dollars abroad converted them to gold in such a quantity as to because a total outflow of nearly 5 billion of gold from our reserve the 1959 deficit was caused in large part by the failure of our exports to penetrate foreign result both of restrictions on our goods and our own uncompetitive prices the 1960 deficit on the other hand was more the result of an increase in private capital outflow seeking new opportunity higher return or speculative advantage abroad meanwhile this country has continued to bear more than its share of the west military and foreign aid obligations under existing policies another deficit of 2 billion is predicted for 1961 and individuals in those countries whose dollar position once depended on these deficits for improvement now wonder aloud whether our gold reserves will remain sufficient to meet our own obligations all this is because for concern but it is not because for panic for our monetary and financial position remains exceedingly strong including our drawing rights in the international monetary fund and the gold reserve held as backing for our currency and federal reserve deposits we have some 22 billion in total gold stocks and other international monetary reserves i now pledge that their full strength stands behind the value of the dollar for use if needed moreover we hold large assets total owed this nation far exceeds the claims upon our reserves and our exports once again substantially exceed our imports in short we need not and we shall any action to increase the dollar price of gold from 35 an ounce to impose exchange controls to reduce our efforts to fall back on restrictive trade policies or to weaken our commitments around the world this administration will not distort the value of the dollar in any fashion and this is a commitment prudence and good sense do require however that new steps be taken to ease the payments deficit and prevent any gold crisis our success in world affairs has long depended in part upon foreign confidence in our ability to pay a series of executive orders legislative remedies and cooperative efforts with our allies will get underway immediately aimed at attracting foreign investment and travel to this american exports at stable prices and with more liberal government guarantees and financing curbing tax and customs loopholes that encourage undue spending of private dollars abroad and through oecd nato and otherwise sharing with our allies all efforts to provide for the common defense of the free world and the hopes for growth of the less developed lands while the current deficit lasts ways will be found to ease our dollar outlays abroad without placing the full burden on the families of men whom we have asked to serve our flag overseas in short whatever is required will be done to back up all our efforts abroad and to make certain that in the future as in the past the dollar is as sound as a dollar iii but more than our exchange of international payments is out of balance the current federal budget for fiscal 1961 is almost certain to show a net deficit the budget already submitted for fiscal 1962 will remain in balance only if the congress enacts all the revenue measures requested and only if an earlier and sharper in the economy than my economic advisers now think likely produces the tax revenues estimated nevertheless a new administration must of necessity build on the spending and revenue estimates already submitted within that framework barring the development of urgent national defense needs or a worsening of the economy it is my current intention to advocate a program of expenditures which including revenues from a stimulation of the economy will not of and by themselves unbalance the earlier budget however we will do what must be done for our national household is cluttered with unfinished and neglected tasks our cities are being engulfed in squalor twelve long years after congress declared our goal to be a decent home and a suitable environment for every american family we still have 25 million americans living in substandard homes a new housing program under a new housing and urban affairs department will be needed this year our classrooms contain 2 million more children than they can properly have room for taught by teachers not properly qualified to teach one third of our most promising high school graduates are financially unable to continue the development of their talents the war babies of the 1940 who overcrowded our schools in the 1950 are now descending in 1960 upon our two college students for every one ten years from now and our colleges are ill prepared we lack the scientists the engineers and the teachers our world obligations require we have neglected oceanography saline water conversion and the basic research that lies at the root of all progress federal grants for both higher and public school education can no longer be delayed medical research has achieved new wonders but these wonders are too often beyond the reach of too many people owing to a lack of income particularly among the aged a lack of hospital beds a lack of nursing homes and a lack of doctors and dentists measures to provide health care for the aged under social security and to increase the supply of both facilities and personnel must be undertaken this year our supply of clean water is dwindling organized and juvenile crimes cost the taxpayers millions of dollars each year making it essential that we have improved enforcement and new legislative safeguards the denial of constitutional rights to some of our fellow americans on account of race at the ballot box and elsewhere disturbs the national conscience and subjects us to the charge of world opinion that our democracy is not equal to the high promise of our heritage morality in private business has not been sufficiently spurred by morality in public business a host of problems and projects in all 50 states though not possible to include in this message will receive the attention of both the congress and the executive branch on most of these matters messages will be sent to the congress within the next two weeks iv but all these problems pale when placed beside those which confront us around the world no man entering upon this office regardless of his party regardless of his previous service in washington could fail to be staggered upon learning even in this brief 10 day period the harsh enormity of the trials through which we must pass in the next four years each day the crises multiply each day their solution grows more difficult each day we draw nearer the hour of maximum danger as weapons spread and hostile forces grow stronger i feel i must inform the congress that our analyses over the last ten days make it clear that in each of the principal areas of crisis the tide of events has been running out and time has not been our friend in asia the relentless pressures of the chinese communists menace the security of the entire area from the borders of india and south viet nam to the jungles of laos struggling to protect its independence we seek in laos what we seek in all asia and indeed in all of the for the people and independence for the government and this nation shall persevere in our pursuit of these objectives in africa the congo has been brutally torn by civil strife political unrest and public disorder we shall continue to support the heroic efforts of the united nations to restore peace and order efforts which are now endangered by mounting tensions unsolved problems and decreasing support from many member states in latin america communist agents seeking to exploit that region peaceful revolution of hope have established a base on cuba only 90 miles from our shores our objection with cuba is not over the people drive for a better life our objection is to their domination by foreign and domestic tyrannies cuban social and economic reform should be encouraged questions of economic and trade policy can always be negotiated but communist domination in this hemisphere can never be negotiated we are pledged to work with our sister republics to free the americas of all such foreign domination and all tyranny working toward the goal of a free hemisphere of free governments extending from cape horn to the arctic circle in europe our alliances are unfulfilled and in some disarray the unity of nato has been weakened by economic rivalry and partially eroded by national interest it has not yet fully mobilized its resources nor fully achieved a common outlook yet no atlantic power can meet on its own the mutual problems now facing us in defense foreign aid monetary reserves and a host of other areas and our close ties with those whose hopes and interests we share are among this nation most powerful assets our greatest challenge is still the world that lies beyond the cold war but the first great obstacle is still our relations with the soviet union and communist china we must never be lulled into believing that either power has yielded its ambitions for world domination ambitions which they forcefully restated only a short time ago on the contrary our task is to convince them that aggression and subversion will not be profitable routes to pursue these ends open and peaceful competition for prestige for markets for scientific achievement even for men minds is something else again for if freedom and communism were to compete for man allegiance in a world at peace i would look to the future with ever increasing confidence to meet this array of challenges to fulfill the role we can not avoid on the world scene we must reexamine and revise our whole arsenal of tools military economic and political one must not overshadow the other on the presidential coat of arms the american eagle holds in his right talon the olive branch while in his left he holds a bundle of arrows we intend to give equal attention to both first we must strengthen our military tools we are moving into a period of uncertain risk and great commitment in which both the military and diplomatic possibilities require a free world force so powerful as to make any aggression clearly futile yet in the past lack of a consistent coherent military strategy the absence of basic assumptions about our national requirements and the faulty estimates and duplication arising from rivalries have all made it difficult to assess accurately how adequate or inadequate our defenses really are i have therefore instructed the secretary of defense to reappraise our entire defense strategy our ability to fulfill our effectiveness vulnerability and dispersal of our strategic bases forces and warning systems the efficiency and economy of our operation and elimination of obsolete bases and the adequacy modernization and mobility of our present conventional and nuclear forces and weapons systems in the light of present and future dangers i have asked for preliminary conclusions by the end of february and i then shall recommend whatever legislative budgetary or executive action is needed in the light of these conclusions in the meantime i have asked the defense secretary to initiate immediately three new steps most clearly needed now first l have directed prompt attention to increase our capacity obtaining additional air transport mobility and obtaining it now will better assure the ability of our conventional forces to respond with discrimination and speed to any problem at any spot on the globe at any moment notice in particular it will enable us to meet any deliberate effort to avoid or divert our forces by starting limited wars in widely scattered parts of the globe b i have directed prompt action to step up our polaris submarine program using unobligated funds now to let contracts originally scheduled for the next fiscal year will build and place on station at least nine months earlier than more units of a crucial deterrent a fleet that will never attack first but possess sufficient powers of retaliation concealed beneath the seas to discourage any aggressor from launching an attack upon our security c i have directed prompt action to accelerate our entire missile program until the secretary of defense reappraisal is completed the emphasis here will be largely on improved organization and decision making on cutting down the wasteful duplications and the that have handicapped our whole family of missiles if we are to keep the peace we need an invulnerable missile force powerful enough to deter any aggressor from even threatening an attack that he would know could not destroy enough of our force to prevent his own destruction for as i said upon taking the oath of office only when our arms are sufficient beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt that they will never be employed secondly we must improve our economic tools our role is essential and unavoidable in the construction of a sound and expanding economy for the entire world helping other nations build the strength to meet their own problems to satisfy their own aspirations to surmount their own dangers the problems in achieving this goal are towering and response must be towering and unprecedented as well much as and the marshall plan were in earlier years which brought such fruitful results a i intend to ask the congress for authority to establish a new and more effective program for assisting the economic educational and social development of other countries and continents that program must stimulate and take more effectively into account the contributions of our allies and provide central policy direction for all our own programs that now so often overlap conflict or diffuse our energies and resources such a program compared to past programs will require more flexibility for short run emergencies more commitment to long term development new attention to education at all levels greater emphasis on the recipient nation role their effort their purpose with greater social justice for their people broader distribution and participation by their people and more efficient public administration and more efficient tax systems of their own and orderly planning for national and regional development instead of a piecemeal approach i hope the senate will take early action approving the convention establishing the organization for economic cooperation and development this will be an important instrument in sharing with our allies this development effort working toward the time when each nation will contribute in proportion to its ability to pay for while we are prepared to assume our full share of these huge burdens we can not and must not be expected to bear them alone to our sister republics to the south we have pledged a new alliance for para progreso our goal is a free and prosperous latin america realizing for all its states and all its citizens a degree of economic and social progress that matches their historic contributions of culture intellect and liberty to start this nation role at this time in that alliance of neighbors i am recommending the following that the congress appropriate in full the 500 million fund pledged by the act of bogota to be used not as an instrument of the cold war but as a first step in the sound development of the americas that a new task force be established under the leadership of the department of state to coordinate at the highest level all policies and programs of concern to the americas that our delegates to the oas working with those of other members strengthen that body as an instrument to preserve the peace and to prevent foreign domination anywhere in the hemisphere that in cooperation with other nations we launch a new hemispheric attack on illiteracy and inadequate educational opportunities to all levels and finally that a mission be sent immediately to latin america to explore ways in which our vast food abundance can be used to help end hunger and malnutrition in certain areas of suffering in our own hemisphere this administration is expanding its program in every possible way the product of our abundance must be used more effectively to relieve hunger and help economic growth in all corners of the globe and i have asked the director of this program to recommend additional ways in which these surpluses can advance the interests of world peace including the establishment of world food reserves an even more valuable national asset is our reservoir of dedicated men and only on our college campuses but in every age group who have indicated their desire to contribute their skills their efforts and a part of their lives to the fight for world order we can mobilize this talent through the formation of a national peace corps enlisting the services of all those with the desire and capacity to help foreign lands meet their urgent needs for trained personnel finally while our attention is centered on the development of the noncommunist world we must never forget our hopes for the ultimate freedom and welfare of the eastern european peoples in order to be prepared to help historic ties of friendship i am asking the congress for increased discretion to use economic tools in this area whenever this is found to be clearly in the national interest this will require amendment of the mutual defense assistance control act along the lines i proposed as a member of the senate and upon which the senate voted last summer meanwhile i hope to explore with the polish government the possibility of using our frozen polish funds on projects of peace that will demonstrate our abiding friendship for and interest in the people of poland third we must sharpen our political and diplomatic tools the means of cooperation and agreement on which an enforceable world order must ultimately rest i have already taken steps to coordinate and expand our disarmament effort to increase our programs of research and to make arms control a central goal of our national policy under my direction the deadly arms race and the huge resources it absorbs have too long overshadowed all else we must do we must prevent that arms race from spreading to new nations to new nuclear powers and to the reaches of outer space we must make certain that our negotiators are better informed and better prepared to formulate workable proposals of our own and to make sound judgments about the proposals of others i have asked the other governments concerned to agree to a reasonable delay in the talks on a nuclear test ban and it is our intention to resume negotiations prepared to reach a final agreement with any nation that is equally willing to agree to an effective and enforceable treaty we must increase our support of the united nations as an instrument to end the cold war instead of an arena in which to fight it in recognition of its increasing importance and the doubling of its membership we are enlarging and strengthening our own mission to the we shall help insure that it is properly financed we shall work to see that the integrity of the office of the is maintained and i would address a special plea to the smaller nations of the world to join with us in strengthening this organization which is far more essential to their security than it is to ours the only body in the world where no nation need be powerful to be secure where every nation has an equal voice and where any nation can exert influence not according to the strength of its armies but according to the strength of its ideas it deserves the support of all finally this administration intends to explore promptly all possible areas of cooperation with the soviet union and other nations to invoke the wonders of science instead of its terrors specifically i now invite all nations including the soviet union to join with us in developing a weather prediction program in a new communications satellite program and in preparation for probing the distant planets of mars and venus probes which may someday unlock the deepest secrets of the universe today this country is ahead in the science and technology of space while the soviet union is ahead in the capacity to lift large vehicles into orbit both nations would help themselves as well as other nations by ten moving these endeavors from the bitter and wasteful competition of the cold war the united states would be willing to join with the soviet union and the scientists of all nations in a greater effort to make the fruits of this new knowledge available to beyond that in an effort to extend farm technology to hungry nations to wipe out disease to increase the exchanges of scientists and their knowledge and to make our own laboratories available to technicians of other lands who lack the facilities to pursue their own work where nature makes natural allies of us all we can demonstrate that beneficial relations are possible even with those with whom we most deeply this must someday be the basis of world peace and world law i have commented on the state of the domestic economy our balance of payments our federal and social budget and the state of the world i would like to conclude with a few remarks about the state of the executive branch we have found it full of honest and useful public servants but their capacity to act decisively at the exact time action is needed has too often been muffled in the morass of committees timidities and fictitious theories which have created a growing gap between decision and execution between planning and reality in a time of rapidly deteriorating situations at home and abroad this is bad for the public service and particularly bad for the country and we mean to make a change i have pledged myself and my colleagues in the cabinet to a continuous encouragement of initiative responsibility and energy in serving the public interest let every public servant know whether his post is high or low that a man rank and reputation in this administration will be determined by the size of the job he does and not by the size of his staff his office or his budget let it be clear that this administration recognizes the value of dissent and daring that we greet healthy controversy as the hallmark of healthy change let the public service be a proud and lively career and let every man and woman who works in any area of our national government in any branch at any level be able to say with pride and with honor in future years i served the united states government in that hour of our nation need for only with complete dedication by us all to the national interest can we bring our country through the troubled years that lie ahead our problems are critical the tide is unfavorable the news will be worse before it is better and while hoping and working for the best we should prepare ourselves now for the worst we can not escape our dangers neither must we let them drive us into panic or narrow isolation in many areas of the world where the balance of power already rests with our adversaries the forces of freedom are sharply divided it is one of the ironies of our time that the techniques of a harsh and repressive system should be able to instill discipline and ardor in its servants while the blessings of liberty have too often stood for privilege materialism and a life of ease but i have a different view of liberty life in 1961 will not be easy wishing it predicting it even asking for it will not make it so there will be further setbacks before the tide is turned but turn it we must the hopes of all mankind rest upon us not simply upon those of us in this chamber but upon the peasant in laos the fisherman in nigeria the exile from cuba the spirit that moves every man and nation who shares our hopes for freedom and the future and in the final analysis they rest most of all upon the pride and perseverance of our fellow citizens of the great republic in the words of a great president whose birthday we honor today closing his final state of the union message sixteen years ago we pray that we may be worthy of the unlimited opportunities that god has given us
speaker vice president members congress pleasure return whence came among oldest friends washington house oldest home 14 years ago first took oath federal office 14 years gained knowledge inspiration members parties houses wise generous leaders pronouncements vividly recall sitting sit including programs two great presidents undimmed eloquence churchill soaring idealism nehru steadfast words general de gaulle speak historic rostrum sobering experience back among many friends happy one confident friendship continue constitution wisely assigns joint separate roles branch government president congress hold mutual respect neither permit attempt trespass part shall withhold neither congress people fact report past present future necessary informed judgment conduct hazards shall neither shift burden executive decisions congress avoid responsibility outcome decisions speak today hour national peril national opportunity term ended shall test anew whether nation organized governed endure outcome means certain answers means clear us together administration congress forge answers today offer little week office detailed legislation remedy every national ill congress would rightly wonder whether desire speed replaced duty responsibility remarks therefore limited also candid state facts frankly despair future indict past prudent heir takes careful inventory legacies gives faithful accounting owes obligation trust occasion call another recital blessings assets greater asset willingness free determined people elected officials face problems frankly meet dangers free panic fear present state economy disturbing take office wake seven months recession three years slack seven years diminished economic growth nine years falling farm income business bankruptcies reached highest level since great depression since 1951 farm income squeezed 25 percent save brief period 1958 insured unemployment highest peak history five million americans without jobs one million searching work four months month workers exhausting already meager jobless benefit rights nearly without jobs live almost without hope nearly one hundred especially depressed troubled areas rest include new school graduates unable use talents farmers forced give jobs helped balance family budgets skilled unskilled workers laid important industries metals machinery automobiles apparel recovery 1958 recession moreover anemic incomplete gross national product never regained full potential unemployment never returned normal levels maximum use national industrial capacity never restored short american economy trouble resourceful industrialized country earth ranks among last rate economic growth since last spring economic growth rate actually receded business investment decline profits fallen predicted levels construction million unsold automobiles inventory fewer people working average work week shrunk well 40 hours yet prices continued rise many americans less spend items cost buy economic prophecy best uncertain art demonstrated prediction one year ago podium 1960 would quote prosperous year history nevertheless forecasts continued slack slightly reduced unemployment 1961 1962 made alarming administration intend stand helplessly afford waste idle hours empty plants awaiting end recession must show world free economy reduce unemployment put unused capacity work spur new productivity foster higher economic growth within range sound fiscal policies relative price stability propose congress within next 14 days measures improve unemployment compensation temporary increases duration basis provide food families unemployed aid needy children redevelop areas chronic labor surplus expand services employment offices stimulate housing construction secure purchasing power lowest paid workers raising expanding minimum wage offer tax incentives sound plant investment increase development natural resources encourage price stability take steps aimed insuring prompt recovery paving way increased growth partisan program concentrating weaknesses hope national program realize national strength ii efficient expansion home stimulating new plant technology make goods competitive also key international balance payments problem laying aside alarmist talk panicky solutions let us put knotty problem proper perspective true since 1958 gap dollars spend invest abroad dollars returned us substantially widened overall deficit balance payments increased nearly 11 billion 3 years holders dollars abroad converted gold quantity total outflow nearly 5 billion gold reserve 1959 deficit caused large part failure exports penetrate foreign result restrictions goods uncompetitive prices 1960 deficit hand result increase private capital outflow seeking new opportunity higher return speculative advantage abroad meanwhile country continued bear share west military foreign aid obligations existing policies another deficit 2 billion predicted 1961 individuals countries whose dollar position depended deficits improvement wonder aloud whether gold reserves remain sufficient meet obligations concern panic monetary financial position remains exceedingly strong including drawing rights international monetary fund gold reserve held backing currency federal reserve deposits 22 billion total gold stocks international monetary reserves pledge full strength stands behind value dollar use needed moreover hold large assets total owed nation far exceeds claims upon reserves exports substantially exceed imports short need shall action increase dollar price gold 35 ounce impose exchange controls reduce efforts fall back restrictive trade policies weaken commitments around world administration distort value dollar fashion commitment prudence good sense require however new steps taken ease payments deficit prevent gold crisis success world affairs long depended part upon foreign confidence ability pay series executive orders legislative remedies cooperative efforts allies get underway immediately aimed attracting foreign investment travel american exports stable prices liberal government guarantees financing curbing tax customs loopholes encourage undue spending private dollars abroad oecd nato otherwise sharing allies efforts provide common defense free world hopes growth less developed lands current deficit lasts ways found ease dollar outlays abroad without placing full burden families men asked serve flag overseas short whatever required done back efforts abroad make certain future past dollar sound dollar iii exchange international payments balance current federal budget fiscal 1961 almost certain show net deficit budget already submitted fiscal 1962 remain balance congress enacts revenue measures requested earlier sharper economy economic advisers think likely produces tax revenues estimated nevertheless new administration must necessity build spending revenue estimates already submitted within framework barring development urgent national defense needs worsening economy current intention advocate program expenditures including revenues stimulation economy unbalance earlier budget however must done national household cluttered unfinished neglected tasks cities engulfed squalor twelve long years congress declared goal decent home suitable environment every american family still 25 million americans living substandard homes new housing program new housing urban affairs department needed year classrooms contain 2 million children properly room taught teachers properly qualified teach one third promising high school graduates financially unable continue development talents war babies 1940 overcrowded schools 1950 descending 1960 upon two college students every one ten years colleges ill prepared lack scientists engineers teachers world obligations require neglected oceanography saline water conversion basic research lies root progress federal grants higher public school education longer delayed medical research achieved new wonders wonders often beyond reach many people owing lack income particularly among aged lack hospital beds lack nursing homes lack doctors dentists measures provide health care aged social security increase supply facilities personnel must undertaken year supply clean water dwindling organized juvenile crimes cost taxpayers millions dollars year making essential improved enforcement new legislative safeguards denial constitutional rights fellow americans account race ballot box elsewhere disturbs national conscience subjects us charge world opinion democracy equal high promise heritage morality private business sufficiently spurred morality public business host problems projects 50 states though possible include message receive attention congress executive branch matters messages sent congress within next two weeks iv problems pale placed beside confront us around world man entering upon office regardless party regardless previous service washington could fail staggered upon learning even brief 10 day period harsh enormity trials must pass next four years day crises multiply day solution grows difficult day draw nearer hour maximum danger weapons spread hostile forces grow stronger feel must inform congress analyses last ten days make clear principal areas crisis tide events running time friend asia relentless pressures chinese communists menace security entire area borders india south viet nam jungles laos struggling protect independence seek laos seek asia indeed people independence government nation shall persevere pursuit objectives africa congo brutally torn civil strife political unrest public disorder shall continue support heroic efforts united nations restore peace order efforts endangered mounting tensions unsolved problems decreasing support many member states latin america communist agents seeking exploit region peaceful revolution hope established base cuba 90 miles shores objection cuba people drive better life objection domination foreign domestic tyrannies cuban social economic reform encouraged questions economic trade policy always negotiated communist domination hemisphere never negotiated pledged work sister republics free americas foreign domination tyranny working toward goal free hemisphere free governments extending cape horn arctic circle europe alliances unfulfilled disarray unity nato weakened economic rivalry partially eroded national interest yet fully mobilized resources fully achieved common outlook yet atlantic power meet mutual problems facing us defense foreign aid monetary reserves host areas close ties whose hopes interests share among nation powerful assets greatest challenge still world lies beyond cold war first great obstacle still relations soviet union communist china must never lulled believing either power yielded ambitions world domination ambitions forcefully restated short time ago contrary task convince aggression subversion profitable routes pursue ends open peaceful competition prestige markets scientific achievement even men minds something else freedom communism compete man allegiance world peace would look future ever increasing confidence meet array challenges fulfill role avoid world scene must reexamine revise whole arsenal tools military economic political one must overshadow presidential coat arms american eagle holds right talon olive branch left holds bundle arrows intend give equal attention first must strengthen military tools moving period uncertain risk great commitment military diplomatic possibilities require free world force powerful make aggression clearly futile yet past lack consistent coherent military strategy absence basic assumptions national requirements faulty estimates duplication arising rivalries made difficult assess accurately adequate inadequate defenses really therefore instructed secretary defense reappraise entire defense strategy ability fulfill effectiveness vulnerability dispersal strategic bases forces warning systems efficiency economy operation elimination obsolete bases adequacy modernization mobility present conventional nuclear forces weapons systems light present future dangers asked preliminary conclusions end february shall recommend whatever legislative budgetary executive action needed light conclusions meantime asked defense secretary initiate immediately three new steps clearly needed first l directed prompt attention increase capacity obtaining additional air transport mobility obtaining better assure ability conventional forces respond discrimination speed problem spot globe moment notice particular enable us meet deliberate effort avoid divert forces starting limited wars widely scattered parts globe b directed prompt action step polaris submarine program using unobligated funds let contracts originally scheduled next fiscal year build place station least nine months earlier units crucial deterrent fleet never attack first possess sufficient powers retaliation concealed beneath seas discourage aggressor launching attack upon security c directed prompt action accelerate entire missile program secretary defense reappraisal completed emphasis largely improved organization decision making cutting wasteful duplications handicapped whole family missiles keep peace need invulnerable missile force powerful enough deter aggressor even threatening attack would know could destroy enough force prevent destruction said upon taking oath office arms sufficient beyond doubt certain beyond doubt never employed secondly must improve economic tools role essential unavoidable construction sound expanding economy entire world helping nations build strength meet problems satisfy aspirations surmount dangers problems achieving goal towering response must towering unprecedented well much marshall plan earlier years brought fruitful results intend ask congress authority establish new effective program assisting economic educational social development countries continents program must stimulate take effectively account contributions allies provide central policy direction programs often overlap conflict diffuse energies resources program compared past programs require flexibility short run emergencies commitment long term development new attention education levels greater emphasis recipient nation role effort purpose greater social justice people broader distribution participation people efficient public administration efficient tax systems orderly planning national regional development instead piecemeal approach hope senate take early action approving convention establishing organization economic cooperation development important instrument sharing allies development effort working toward time nation contribute proportion ability pay prepared assume full share huge burdens must expected bear alone sister republics south pledged new alliance para progreso goal free prosperous latin america realizing states citizens degree economic social progress matches historic contributions culture intellect liberty start nation role time alliance neighbors recommending following congress appropriate full 500 million fund pledged act bogota used instrument cold war first step sound development americas new task force established leadership department state coordinate highest level policies programs concern americas delegates oas working members strengthen body instrument preserve peace prevent foreign domination anywhere hemisphere cooperation nations launch new hemispheric attack illiteracy inadequate educational opportunities levels finally mission sent immediately latin america explore ways vast food abundance used help end hunger malnutrition certain areas suffering hemisphere administration expanding program every possible way product abundance must used effectively relieve hunger help economic growth corners globe asked director program recommend additional ways surpluses advance interests world peace including establishment world food reserves even valuable national asset reservoir dedicated men college campuses every age group indicated desire contribute skills efforts part lives fight world order mobilize talent formation national peace corps enlisting services desire capacity help foreign lands meet urgent needs trained personnel finally attention centered development noncommunist world must never forget hopes ultimate freedom welfare eastern european peoples order prepared help historic ties friendship asking congress increased discretion use economic tools area whenever found clearly national interest require amendment mutual defense assistance control act along lines proposed member senate upon senate voted last summer meanwhile hope explore polish government possibility using frozen polish funds projects peace demonstrate abiding friendship interest people poland third must sharpen political diplomatic tools means cooperation agreement enforceable world order must ultimately rest already taken steps coordinate expand disarmament effort increase programs research make arms control central goal national policy direction deadly arms race huge resources absorbs long overshadowed else must must prevent arms race spreading new nations new nuclear powers reaches outer space must make certain negotiators better informed better prepared formulate workable proposals make sound judgments proposals others asked governments concerned agree reasonable delay talks nuclear test ban intention resume negotiations prepared reach final agreement nation equally willing agree effective enforceable treaty must increase support united nations instrument end cold war instead arena fight recognition increasing importance doubling membership enlarging strengthening mission shall help insure properly financed shall work see integrity office maintained would address special plea smaller nations world join us strengthening organization far essential security body world nation need powerful secure every nation equal voice nation exert influence according strength armies according strength ideas deserves support finally administration intends explore promptly possible areas cooperation soviet union nations invoke wonders science instead terrors specifically invite nations including soviet union join us developing weather prediction program new communications satellite program preparation probing distant planets mars venus probes may someday unlock deepest secrets universe today country ahead science technology space soviet union ahead capacity lift large vehicles orbit nations would help well nations ten moving endeavors bitter wasteful competition cold war united states would willing join soviet union scientists nations greater effort make fruits new knowledge available beyond effort extend farm technology hungry nations wipe disease increase exchanges scientists knowledge make laboratories available technicians lands lack facilities pursue work nature makes natural allies us demonstrate beneficial relations possible even deeply must someday basis world peace world law commented state domestic economy balance payments federal social budget state world would like conclude remarks state executive branch found full honest useful public servants capacity act decisively exact time action needed often muffled morass committees timidities fictitious theories created growing gap decision execution planning reality time rapidly deteriorating situations home abroad bad public service particularly bad country mean make change pledged colleagues cabinet continuous encouragement initiative responsibility energy serving public interest let every public servant know whether post high low man rank reputation administration determined size job size staff office budget let clear administration recognizes value dissent daring greet healthy controversy hallmark healthy change let public service proud lively career let every man woman works area national government branch level able say pride honor future years served united states government hour nation need complete dedication us national interest bring country troubled years lie ahead problems critical tide unfavorable news worse better hoping working best prepare worst escape dangers neither must let drive us panic narrow isolation many areas world balance power already rests adversaries forces freedom sharply divided one ironies time techniques harsh repressive system able instill discipline ardor servants blessings liberty often stood privilege materialism life ease different view liberty life 1961 easy wishing predicting even asking make setbacks tide turned turn must hopes mankind rest upon us simply upon us chamber upon peasant laos fisherman nigeria exile cuba spirit moves every man nation shares hopes freedom future final analysis rest upon pride perseverance fellow citizens great republic words great president whose birthday honor today closing final state union message sixteen years ago pray may worthy unlimited opportunities god given us
speaker vice president member congress pleasure return whence come among old friend washington house old home 14 year ago first take oath federal office 14 year gain knowledge inspiration member party house wise generous leader pronouncement vividly recall sit sit include program two great president undimmed eloquence churchill soar idealism nehru steadfast word general de gaulle speak historic rostrum sober experience back among many friend happy one confident friendship continue constitution wisely assigns joint separate role branch government president congress hold mutual respect neither permit attempt trespass part shall withhold neither congress people fact report past present future necessary informed judgment conduct hazard shall neither shift burden executive decision congress avoid responsibility outcome decision speak today hour national peril national opportunity term end shall test anew whether nation organize governed endure outcome mean certain answer mean clear u together administration congress forge answer today offer little week office detailed legislation remedy every national ill congress would rightly wonder whether desire speed replace duty responsibility remark therefore limit also candid state fact frankly despair future indict past prudent heir take careful inventory legacy give faithful accounting owes obligation trust occasion call another recital blessing asset great asset willingness free determine people elect official face problem frankly meet danger free panic fear present state economy disturb take office wake seven month recession three year slack seven year diminished economic growth nine year fall farm income business bankruptcy reach high level since great depression since 1951 farm income squeeze 25 percent save brief period 1958 insured unemployment high peak history five million american without job one million search work four month month worker exhaust already meager jobless benefit right nearly without job live almost without hope nearly one hundred especially depress troubled area rest include new school graduate unable use talent farmer force give job help balance family budget skilled unskilled worker lay important industry metal machinery automobile apparel recovery 1958 recession moreover anemic incomplete gross national product never regain full potential unemployment never return normal level maximum use national industrial capacity never restore short american economy trouble resourceful industrialized country earth rank among last rate economic growth since last spring economic growth rate actually recede business investment decline profit fall predicted level construction million unsold automobile inventory few people work average work week shrunk well 40 hour yet price continue rise many american less spend item cost buy economic prophecy best uncertain art demonstrate prediction one year ago podium 1960 would quote prosperous year history nevertheless forecast continue slack slightly reduce unemployment 1961 1962 make alarm administration intend stand helplessly afford waste idle hour empty plant await end recession must show world free economy reduce unemployment put unused capacity work spur new productivity foster high economic growth within range sound fiscal policy relative price stability propose congress within next 14 day measure improve unemployment compensation temporary increase duration basis provide food family unemployed aid needy child redevelop area chronic labor surplus expand service employment office stimulate housing construction secure purchase power low pay worker raise expand minimum wage offer tax incentive sound plant investment increase development natural resource encourage price stability take step aim insure prompt recovery pave way increase growth partisan program concentrating weakness hope national program realize national strength ii efficient expansion home stimulate new plant technology make good competitive also key international balance payment problem lay aside alarmist talk panicky solution let u put knotty problem proper perspective true since 1958 gap dollar spend invest abroad dollar return u substantially widen overall deficit balance payment increase nearly 11 billion 3 year holder dollar abroad convert gold quantity total outflow nearly 5 billion gold reserve 1959 deficit cause large part failure export penetrate foreign result restriction good uncompetitive price 1960 deficit hand result increase private capital outflow seek new opportunity high return speculative advantage abroad meanwhile country continue bear share west military foreign aid obligation exist policy another deficit 2 billion predicted 1961 individual country whose dollar position depend deficit improvement wonder aloud whether gold reserve remain sufficient meet obligation concern panic monetary financial position remain exceedingly strong include draw right international monetary fund gold reserve hold backing currency federal reserve deposit 22 billion total gold stock international monetary reserve pledge full strength stand behind value dollar use need moreover hold large asset total owe nation far exceed claim upon reserve export substantially exceed import short need shall action increase dollar price gold 35 ounce impose exchange control reduce effort fall back restrictive trade policy weaken commitment around world administration distort value dollar fashion commitment prudence good sense require however new step take ease payment deficit prevent gold crisis success world affair long depend part upon foreign confidence ability pay series executive order legislative remedy cooperative effort ally get underway immediately aim attract foreign investment travel american export stable price liberal government guarantee finance curb tax custom loopholes encourage undue spending private dollar abroad oecd nato otherwise share ally effort provide common defense free world hop growth less developed land current deficit last way find ease dollar outlay abroad without place full burden family men ask serve flag overseas short whatever require do back effort abroad make certain future past dollar sound dollar iii exchange international payment balance current federal budget fiscal 1961 almost certain show net deficit budget already submit fiscal 1962 remain balance congress enacts revenue measure request earlier sharp economy economic adviser think likely produce tax revenue estimate nevertheless new administration must necessity build spending revenue estimate already submit within framework bar development urgent national defense need worsen economy current intention advocate program expenditures include revenue stimulation economy unbalance earlier budget however must do national household clutter unfinished neglected task city engulf squalor twelve long year congress declare goal decent home suitable environment every american family still 25 million american live substandard home new housing program new housing urban affair department need year classroom contain 2 million child properly room taught teacher properly qualify teach one third promise high school graduate financially unable continue development talent war baby 1940 overcrowd school 1950 descend 1960 upon two college student every one ten year colleges ill prepared lack scientist engineer teacher world obligation require neglected oceanography saline water conversion basic research lie root progress federal grant higher public school education longer delay medical research achieve new wonder wonder often beyond reach many people owe lack income particularly among age lack hospital bed lack nurse home lack doctor dentist measure provide health care age social security increase supply facility personnel must undertake year supply clean water dwindle organize juvenile crime cost taxpayer million dollar year make essential improve enforcement new legislative safeguard denial constitutional right fellow american account race ballot box elsewhere disturbs national conscience subject u charge world opinion democracy equal high promise heritage morality private business sufficiently spur morality public business host problem project 50 state though possible include message receive attention congress executive branch matter message send congress within next two week iv problem pale place beside confront u around world man enter upon office regardless party regardless previous service washington could fail stagger upon learn even brief 10 day period harsh enormity trial must pass next four year day crises multiply day solution grows difficult day draw near hour maximum danger weapon spread hostile force grow strong feel must inform congress analysis last ten day make clear principal area crisis tide event run time friend asia relentless pressure chinese communist menace security entire area border india south viet nam jungle laos struggle protect independence seek lao seek asia indeed people independence government nation shall persevere pursuit objective africa congo brutally tear civil strife political unrest public disorder shall continue support heroic effort unite nation restore peace order effort endanger mount tension unsolved problem decrease support many member state latin america communist agent seek exploit region peaceful revolution hope establish base cuba 90 mile shore objection cuba people drive good life objection domination foreign domestic tyranny cuban social economic reform encourage question economic trade policy always negotiate communist domination hemisphere never negotiate pledged work sister republic free americas foreign domination tyranny work toward goal free hemisphere free government extend cape horn arctic circle europe alliance unfulfilled disarray unity nato weaken economic rivalry partially erode national interest yet fully mobilized resource fully achieve common outlook yet atlantic power meet mutual problem face u defense foreign aid monetary reserve host area close tie whose hope interest share among nation powerful asset great challenge still world lie beyond cold war first great obstacle still relation soviet union communist china must never lull believe either power yield ambition world domination ambition forcefully restate short time ago contrary task convince aggression subversion profitable route pursue end open peaceful competition prestige market scientific achievement even men mind something else freedom communism compete man allegiance world peace would look future ever increase confidence meet array challenge fulfill role avoid world scene must reexamine revise whole arsenal tool military economic political one must overshadow presidential coat arm american eagle hold right talon olive branch leave hold bundle arrow intend give equal attention first must strengthen military tool move period uncertain risk great commitment military diplomatic possibility require free world force powerful make aggression clearly futile yet past lack consistent coherent military strategy absence basic assumption national requirement faulty estimate duplication arise rivalry make difficult assess accurately adequate inadequate defense really therefore instructed secretary defense reappraise entire defense strategy ability fulfill effectiveness vulnerability dispersal strategic base force warn system efficiency economy operation elimination obsolete base adequacy modernization mobility present conventional nuclear force weapon system light present future danger ask preliminary conclusion end february shall recommend whatever legislative budgetary executive action need light conclusion meantime ask defense secretary initiate immediately three new step clearly need first l direct prompt attention increase capacity obtain additional air transport mobility obtain good assure ability conventional force respond discrimination speed problem spot globe moment notice particular enable u meet deliberate effort avoid divert force start limited war widely scatter part globe b direct prompt action step polaris submarine program use unobligated fund let contract originally schedule next fiscal year build place station least nine month earlier unit crucial deterrent fleet never attack first possess sufficient power retaliation conceal beneath sea discourage aggressor launch attack upon security c direct prompt action accelerate entire missile program secretary defense reappraisal complete emphasis largely improved organization decision make cut wasteful duplication handicap whole family missile keep peace need invulnerable missile force powerful enough deter aggressor even threaten attack would know could destroy enough force prevent destruction say upon take oath office arm sufficient beyond doubt certain beyond doubt never employ secondly must improve economic tool role essential unavoidable construction sound expand economy entire world help nation build strength meet problem satisfy aspiration surmount danger problem achieve goal tower response must tower unprecedented well much marshall plan earlier year bring fruitful result intend ask congress authority establish new effective program assist economic educational social development country continents program must stimulate take effectively account contribution ally provide central policy direction program often overlap conflict diffuse energy resource program compare past program require flexibility short run emergency commitment long term development new attention education level great emphasis recipient nation role effort purpose great social justice people broader distribution participation people efficient public administration efficient tax system orderly plan national regional development instead piecemeal approach hope senate take early action approve convention establish organization economic cooperation development important instrument share ally development effort work toward time nation contribute proportion ability pay prepare assume full share huge burden must expect bear alone sister republic south pledge new alliance para progreso goal free prosperous latin america realize state citizen degree economic social progress match historic contribution culture intellect liberty start nation role time alliance neighbor recommend follow congress appropriate full 500 million fund pledge act bogota use instrument cold war first step sound development americas new task force establish leadership department state coordinate high level policy program concern americas delegate oas work member strengthen body instrument preserve peace prevent foreign domination anywhere hemisphere cooperation nation launch new hemispheric attack illiteracy inadequate educational opportunity level finally mission send immediately latin america explore way vast food abundance use help end hunger malnutrition certain area suffer hemisphere administration expand program every possible way product abundance must use effectively relieve hunger help economic growth corner globe ask director program recommend additional way surpluses advance interest world peace include establishment world food reserve even valuable national asset reservoir dedicate men college campus every age group indicate desire contribute skill effort part live fight world order mobilize talent formation national peace corp enlist service desire capacity help foreign land meet urgent need trained personnel finally attention center development noncommunist world must never forget hope ultimate freedom welfare eastern european people order prepare help historic tie friendship ask congress increase discretion use economic tool area whenever find clearly national interest require amendment mutual defense assistance control act along line propose member senate upon senate vote last summer meanwhile hope explore polish government possibility use frozen polish fund project peace demonstrate abide friendship interest people poland third must sharpen political diplomatic tool mean cooperation agreement enforceable world order must ultimately rest already take step coordinate expand disarmament effort increase program research make arm control central goal national policy direction deadly arm race huge resource absorb long overshadow else must must prevent arm race spread new nation new nuclear power reach out space must make certain negotiator well inform well prepared formulate workable proposal make sound judgment proposal others ask government concerned agree reasonable delay talk nuclear test ban intention resume negotiation prepare reach final agreement nation equally willing agree effective enforceable treaty must increase support united nation instrument end cold war instead arena fight recognition increase importance double membership enlarge strengthen mission shall help insure properly finance shall work see integrity office maintain would address special plea small nation world join u strengthen organization far essential security body world nation need powerful secure every nation equal voice nation exert influence accord strength army accord strength idea deserve support finally administration intend explore promptly possible area cooperation soviet union nation invoke wonder science instead terror specifically invite nation include soviet union join u develop weather prediction program new communication satellite program preparation probe distant planet mar venus probe may someday unlock deep secret universe today country ahead science technology space soviet union ahead capacity lift large vehicle orbit nation would help well nation ten move endeavor bitter wasteful competition cold war united state would willing join soviet union scientist nation great effort make fruit new knowledge available beyond effort extend farm technology hungry nation wipe disease increase exchange scientist knowledge make laboratory available technician land lack facility pursue work nature make natural ally u demonstrate beneficial relation possible even deeply must someday basis world peace world law comment state domestic economy balance payment federal social budget state world would like conclude remark state executive branch find full honest useful public servant capacity act decisively exact time action need often muffled morass committee timidity fictitious theory create grow gap decision execution planning reality time rapidly deteriorate situation home abroad bad public service particularly bad country mean make change pledge colleague cabinet continuous encouragement initiative responsibility energy serve public interest let every public servant know whether post high low man rank reputation administration determine size job size staff office budget let clear administration recognize value dissent dare greet healthy controversy hallmark healthy change let public service proud lively career let every man woman work area national government branch level able say pride honor future year serve united state government hour nation need complete dedication u national interest bring country trouble year lie ahead problem critical tide unfavorable news bad well hop work best prepare bad escape danger neither must let drive u panic narrow isolation many area world balance power already rest adversary force freedom sharply divide one irony time technique harsh repressive system able instill discipline ardor servant blessing liberty often stand privilege materialism life ease different view liberty life 1961 easy wish predict even ask make setback tide turned turn must hop mankind rest upon u simply upon u chamber upon peasant lao fisherman nigeria exile cuba spirit move every man nation share hop freedom future final analysis rest upon pride perseverance fellow citizen great republic word great president whose birthday honor today close final state union message sixteen year ago pray may worthy unlimited opportunity god give u