September 2, 1952
[1.] CINCINNATI, OHIO (Rear platform, 8:35 a.m.)
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I am very glad to be here in Cincinnati this morning, especially in an election year, when we are starting out on a campaign to elect a new Democratic President of the United States.
Naturally, one of the first things I think about, when I come to Cincinnati at a time like this, is the fact that this is Bob Taft's hometown. I have known Bob for a long time, and while we have disagreed about many things, the personal relationship between Bob and myself has always been friendly.
You know, Bob is intellectually honest, and that is more than you can say for a lot of Republicans. I thought the Republicans were going to nominate him for President this time--and he was my candidate. But the Governor of New York took the nomination away from him again, just like he did in 1948, although this time he did it by proxy.
Now it is not for me to say whom the Republicans ought to nominate, but it does seem to me that they are a little unfair to Bob Taft. Bob Taft certainly represents what the Republican Party stands for. He has had more to do with making the Republican record than anyone else. And the Republican Party, like the Democratic Party, must run on its record. There is no getting around that.
If the American people had a chance to vote for Senator Taft, they would at least know what they are getting. Whether you agree with him or not, you must admit that he is thoroughly familiar with the issues involved in running the Government of this country, and he has taken a stand on them.
However, the Republican Party turned him down. I think that was terrible. He was my candidate--on the Republican ticket.
That looks to me like an effort to run out on their record and disguise what their party really stands for. I don't think this effort at disguise is going to be successful. I don't believe the Republican Party can hide its record behind a new face.
When it comes to taking a stand on the issues, the Republican candidate for President is in an extremely difficult position. If he comes out in favor of social security, or farm price supports, or minimum wage, or fair labor laws, or housing, then he is in the position of saying "me too" to the Democrats. And most Republicans think that is an awful thing to do. They are wrong, of course.
On the other hand, if he comes out against these things, the people won't vote for him, because he is taking a position against their welfare and against the welfare of the country.
I sympathize with him because of the fix he's in. I have watched with interest the turning and twisting he has had to do in an effort to go both ways at the same time, without getting anywhere.
I saw one speech he made awhile back, which said in effect that the things the Democrats have done are good, and everybody now agrees with him, but we ought not to do anything else like it because it would ruin the country. If you can beat that, I'll pay for it. That doesn't seem to me to be a very strong position.
Incidentally, he was wrong when he said that everybody now agrees with these things, as he can find out for himself if he would do a little research on the record of the Republican Party in Congress. I am asking him right now to read all the fine print in the Congressional Record, and he will find out a lot of things he doesn't know now.
I think you will find, as the campaign goes on, that the Republican candidate for President will discover more and more that there is nothing for him to do except to use the typical Republican approach: that is, to stay away from the issues, and spend his time abusing the Democrats, particularly the President of the United States.
The Democratic Party is going into this campaign in a very strong position. We have made a record in the last 20 years that is unequaled in the history of this country or any other country in the history of the world.
We have nominated a man for President who is well-qualified for the job. It will take hard work to win this campaign, just as it does in every campaign, but we are going to work hard, and we are going to Win.
Remember what I told you when I was here in 1948: that we would win. You didn't believe me. But we did win, and this time I won't have to work so hard, because I am going to have a lot of help to win.
I am sure that the Democrats in Ohio are going to do their part. You know, I carried Ohio in 1948, and nobody thought it could be done.
I am sure that you will carry the State for Governor Stevenson, and that you will elect a Democratic Governor, a Democratic Senator; and that you will send more Democratic Congressmen to the House of Representatives.
When you do that, our country will be able to go forward with new vigor in building our national prosperity and securing a lasting world peace.
Now I want you to go home and I want you to talk to your neighbors, and I want you to tell them that the country's safety is wrapped up in what you do on election day, just as it was in 1948.
I don't believe any of you--even the meanest, low-down Republicans in the world-are sorry that I was elected in 1948.
Now, remember that the welfare of this country is wrapped up in what you do on election day. Go to the 'polls and vote the Democratic ticket, and the country will be safe.
[2.] PARKERSBURG, WEST VIRGINIA (Rear platform, 12:45 p.m.)
Thank you very much for coming out to meet me. I am glad to be back in West Virginia and I am going to have a fine afternoon traveling across your State and talking to people on the way.
I went out to Milwaukee last night and gave the people there some hard facts about the Republican Party. I told them the truth--which is that the National Republican Party is a reactionary and irresponsible outfit and no friend to the American people. And I proved that by citing the Republican record in the Congress on domestic issues.
Important as domestic issues are these days, foreign policy overshadows them. The great problem of our foreign policy is Whether we are going to have peace or war. I have been working constantly to overcome a great menace to world peace--the terrible menace of an armed and ruthless Communist imperialism.
This is a long and difficult task--it is one that must be above party.
We have made progress in these last few years in dealing with the threat. Our country has put its strength into a great effort to defend and unite the free world. In this effort, Republicans and Democrats have joined together, without reference to party. This is as it should be, because in this effort, in this task of working for peace, only a united nation can succeed.
In spite of this obvious fact, there has been, all along, a group of Republican obstructionists--men of little minds and mean aspirations-who have put party above country, and have worked for votes instead of peace. They are the same kind of men who wrecked the security of the United States and the hope of peace in the world, back in the 1920's after World War I.
They were almost silenced by the great events of World War II, but today they have begun to crawl out of their hiding places to try to undermine the security of our country once again. As our country has had to make sacrifices in the cause of peace, they have become bolder. Not only have they voted in Congress against the measures needed for world peace, they have tried to stir up the people to believe that these measures are unnecessary.
These men have tried to find votes for themselves in every difficulty we have encountered, every loss we have suffered, every restriction we have had to undergo, every appropriation we have had to make, in the cause of peace.
They have been reckless and unscrupulous. On one day, they have counseled us to cut off all our allies--and on the next, to plunge heedlessly toward a major war. They have been playing with fire, at home and abroad.
So long as these men represented only a small minority of the Republicans in Congress, I was not too much concerned. While Senator Vandenberg lived, they were not a great danger. But after he died, their ranks began to grow. In vote after vote on fundamental issues in Congress, it became clear that the Republicans were backsliding into their old habit of isolationism.
Then these men hoped and planned to take control of the Republican convention, last July. In that they were frustrated, and the Republican nomination fell to a man who had helped vigorously to execute the great foreign policy on which this country is embarked. But this was not the end of the efforts of the Republican "snollygosters?'
The Republican candidate has been told that he can't have their support unless he adopts some of their ideas. He has been threatened with sabotage from within unless he will join in the wild and reckless ranting of men who don't care what happens to world peace if they can get elected.
There have been some masterminds at hand, in the Republican councils, to show him how to be a hypocrite in a few easy lessons.
One of these Republican masterminds is a man who helped in the formulation of our foreign policy. He knows what a precarious situation the world is in. He knows how easy it would be to start a war. But he is perfectly willing to have the Republican Party, and the Republican candidate, say things that increase the risk of war, simply in order to get votes.
Let me give you an example of what these Republican masterminds are doing and saying now. They have started to talk loosely about liberating the enslaved peoples of Eastern Europe.
Now the fate of the people in the Soviet borderlands is one of the greatest and most terrible tragedies of human times. Here are countries which suffered dreadfully from Nazi oppression and the ravages of war. These are peoples to whom the Kremlin promised freedom and independence in the last war-only to break that promise once the Red armies had moved in.
We shall never forget these people. We shall never cease working to help these people gain their rightful chance for freedom.
We must never treat their plight, or their endeavors to relieve it, as matters for partisan debate. Millions upon millions of decent human beings are going through a dreadful agony and it is not for us to play cheap politics with their needs and fears and hopes.
Yet, that is exactly what some of those Republicans have begun to do.
They are telling us we must undertake to liberate these people--and do it right now.
It is hard to tell from their vague statements exactly what these Republicans mean by this. If they mean that they deplore the Soviet seizure of the once free states of Eastern Europe, I am glad to hear it. If they mean that they will not accept the permanent Soviet enslavement of these nations, I am glad to hear this, too. If they mean our country should do all it can to keep alive the culture and the spirit and the hopes of once-free people, I am with them all the way.
If the Republicans mean that they look forward to the time when the growing strength of the free nations makes the Kremlin realize it must honor its promise of 7 years ago, and give these people back their chance for freedom--then those are my sentiments exactly.
If these are the things the Republicans mean, then it is natural that I should welcome them. For they express, precisely, the firm policy of this administration and that of franklin D. Roosevelt.
Remember that in 1941 it was President Roosevelt who refused to recognize the brutal Soviet seizure of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. We have never accepted that aggressive act. Remember, too, that on Navy Day in 1945, and at the opening of Congress in 1946, and many, many times since, I have stated that America will always work for the return of freedom and independence to the people who have been deprived of them by force or by subversion.
Remember that by all means short of war, your Government has helped to save the freedom of the countries which the Soviets have threatened since the war. We have helped to save Greece, Turkey, Iran, South Korea, southern Asia, and all of Western Europe. We have helped to save these vital areas and we are doing everything we can to join their growing strength in the common defense of the free world and to prevent a third world war.
We are working now to help the thousands of brave people who manage to flee west, through the Iron Curtain. Through the Voice of America we are bringing truth and encouragement to those who have to stay behind. We are helping the one nation which has succeeded, up to now, in breaking the Soviet stranglehold. In these and other positive ways, your Government is showing that we have not forgotten the people whom the Soviets have enslaved.
There is no way to do more than this now without using force. To try to liberate these enslaved people at this time might well mean turning these lands into atomic battlefields.
Maybe the Republicans don't realize this, but the people who are on the spot in Europe know very well that talk of liberation under present circumstances is war talk. That is why these Republican statements have caused so much concern among our friends in Europe. After all, our allies there have signed up with us for combined defense of freedom. They have not signed up to join in a crusade for war.
Now, I am perfectly convinced--and I hope our allies will understand--that the Republicans do not intend by what they say to pledge this country to a frightful, atomic war in order to roll back the Iron Curtain by force. Yet, if they don't want war, why do they tell us they have some new and positive proposal to help the people behind the Iron Curtain? If they don't mean war, what is it they do mean? Do they mean insurrection by the satellite peoples?
Nothing could be worse than to raise false hopes of this in Eastern Europe. Nothing could be worse than to incite uprisings that can only end by giving a new crop of victims to the Soviet executioners. All Europeans know quite well that insurrection in the Soviet borderland these days could only be successful with armed support from the outside world.
If the Republicans don't mean to give that armed support--and I am sure they don't-then they are trying to deceive their fellow citizens at home and playing cruel, gutter politics with the lives of countless good men and women behind the Iron Curtain.
If the Republicans don't mean war or insurrection, what do they mean? Well, I'll tell you. They are trying to get votes and they don't care how they get them. They don't care if they frighten our allies. They don't care if they make the masters of the Kremlin trigger-happy. I am afraid they don't care about anything except votes in November.
What they are trying to do is play on the natural desire of all Americans to see justice done. And they are especially concerned to stir up all our citizens who have ties of blood or culture with the people of Eastern Europe. They want to fool these good Americans into thinking the Republicans have some new, cheap, easy, painless way to give the people of the "old country" their freedom once again.
It is not a pleasant thing for me to have to come here and tell you that Republican leaders have stooped so low. It is not an easy thing for me to see their respected candidate-who knows better--being used as spokesman for selfish politicians who will say anything they think will help them to power.
Surely, the Republican candidate must know the Iron Curtain and the Kremlin walls will not come tumbling down from a few blasts on a campaign trumpet.
Now I am sorry I had to talk about such a serious subject on my visit here. But there is one thing that might as well be plain from the outset of this campaign.
If the Republicans insist on dragging foreign policy into partisan politics, I am completely prepared to keep the record straight. We have made some mistakes in foreign policy, of course, but, on the whole, our record is one of great constructive accomplishments.
And while we have been making our record, the Republicans have been making theirs by their votes in Congress. Having studied that record, I can say with some assurance that they are in no position to point a finger of scorn.
So, I say, if they want to make an issue of foreign policy, let them come ahead. We are ready.
But I do hope that from now on, they will debate foreign policy issues in a way that does not jeopardize our defensive alliances, endanger our security, and raise the risk of new world wars.
[3.] CLARKSBURG, WEST VIRGINIA (Rear platform, 3:10 p.m.)
It is a very great pleasure to me today to be back in Clarksburg once more. I have had some very happy times in this town. My Press Secretary is a graduate of VMI, and he claims he didn't go to school when Stonewall Jackson was a professor there. I don't know whether that is true or not.
My Secretary of Defense came from here, too--Louis Johnson, of whom I am very fond--one of the great national commanders of the American Legion. I wish we had somebody like him that we could put in charge of that organization now; it certainly needs somebody like that.
When I was here in 1948, I was trying to get you to elect a Democratic President and a Democratic Congress. Well, I am back here on the same errand now, but I have another candidate for President this time. I hope you will vote for him. I hope all of you listened to Governor Stevenson's speech yesterday. If you will just listen to what he has to say, you will find that he stands foursquare on the Democratic platform, and that when you make him President the forward-looking steps which the Democratic Party has taken in the last 20 years will be continued.
I am out trying to inform you on what the Democratic Party has done to make this country great, and Governor Stevenson is going to tell you what is going to happen in the future when he becomes President. And he will make a great President.
There is one thing I am very anxious for you to do. It doesn't do any good to elect a Democratic President if you elect a Congress that faces the other way. I want you to send this Senator back--Harley Kilgore is my good friend. He and Matt Neely are always on the right side of all the questions when they come before the Congress and the welfare of this country. I served with both of them a long time in the Congress, and I am very fond of both of them. They are both good Senators. And I know very well you are going to send Harley Kilgore back; but that is not all you ought to do, you have got to send a Congressman down there, Cleve Bailey.
[ Voice: That's right]
I see I have complete agreement over here, and I hope everybody feels the same way about it. He is a great Congressman, Cleve Bailey is, and he has been on the right side of all these questions; and if you will just give us a Congress along with the new President, we will continue to go forward.
We can't afford to let the Republicans get control of the Congress. All you need do is to look at the record of the Democrats and the Republicans to come to the conclusion that it would be the most dangerous thing you can possibly do--to let the Republicans get control of the Government of the United States.
The Democrats have a record of which they can be proud. We have improved wages and working conditions in the last 20 years. We have saved farms and homes from mortgage foreclosures. We have insured bank deposits--and I want to say to you that there are more homeowners in the United States now than ever before in the history of the country. That means homes in cities, and it means homes on the farm that are owned by the people that live in them.
We have insured bank deposits--and there hasn't been a bank failure where anybody lost any money in the last 10 years. I am saying that advisedly. We developed the rivers for the benefit of all the people, and not for just a few of the special interests. We have taken steps to conserve the soil and other precious natural resources. We have helped the American people get decent homes to live in--as I said awhile ago--there are more homeowners now than there ever were in the history of the country.
We have provided social security for old people, and for the needy. We have made the United States a better place in which to live, and made it possible for most of our citizens to lead happier lives than ever before.
We have turned away from the paths of isolationism and made our country the respected leader of the world in the cause of freedom and peace.
Every one of you knows that these things are true. I want to point out a few things about the people who want to unseat the Democrats, and why you don't want to let them do it.
In the first place, they are trying to tell you that all the good things I have just repeated to you are not true. Well, you know how you are fixed at home. I wonder how many of you would like to go back to the apple-selling days of 1932? I don't believe you would. I don't think they are going to get very far with their misstatements of facts.
The important thing is that by their votes in Congress, the policy they are following has been one of constant obstruction and reaction.
They were against social security. In fact, when that good-for-nothing 80th Congress got control of the Government, they took a million people off the rolls. They will do it again, too--more than that to you--if you let-them do it.
They were against minimum wages--they voted against the 75-cent minimum wage and they voted against the first minimum wage law. They have constantly tried to weaken the farm programs. You remember what they did to the farmers in 1948. In 1947, when I went out to the farmers and told them what was happening to them, they voted against them. They are going to do it this time, too.
They have been against public power. They have been against low-rent housing. They have tried to sabotage price and rent controls, and they have been against practically everything that is for the welfare of the everyday man and the common people.
I know you wouldn't want to turn this country over to the Republican Party and let them try to take it back to the days of McKinley. They are still thinking in 1896. They haven't come to life yet. We have had enough of that kind of thing when you had the 80th Congress. That is just a sample of what you would get if they get control of the whole Government. You see, I was there to head them off when the 80th Congress was in.
You are going to elect Stevenson, President and John Sparkman, Vice President. You are going to elect a Democratic delegation from West Virginia to the House. You are going to send Harley Kilgore back to the Senate.
I wish I could go back there with him. I had more fun when I was in the Senate than I ever had in my life. I have had more trouble since I have been President than any man alive.
I am also of the opinion that you are going to elect a Democrat to be Governor of West Virginia, as you always have done. From the looks of him, he will make a good one.
I am more than happy to be here with you again. I hope that 4 years from now I can come back and tell you to elect another Democratic President and a Democratic delegation from West Virginia. That is what I am going to try to do, because I think--well, I am only 68, I ought to live to be 98; and in all that time you find out a lot of things. And I will, too.
West Virginia is a most hospitable place. I am always pleased to come to West Virginia. I have been in nearly every town in the State, and I have never been to one where I haven't been cordially treated and asked to come back.
In fact, West Virginia tried to get me to put myself up to run for President again, but I decided that the best thing for the country would be for the Democratic Party to bring out some new faces and keep the country rolling for the next 20 years as it has in the last 20.
Thank you very much.
[4.] GRAFTON, WEST VIRGINIA (Rear platform, 4 p.m.)
Senator Neely, I appreciate that introduction, and I would like very much to deserve it. It's a fine thing, you know, to have people like Senator Neely and Senator Kilgore, with whom I have served in the Senate, believe that the President of the United States is just what he pretends to be: a representative of the people.
I am happy to be here again. I still recall the fine reception you gave me when I stopped here in 1948. I hope very much that you people will vote for Adlai Stevenson and John Sparkman this year, and that you will elect this grand Democrat for Governor, Mr. Marland. And I want you to be sure and send Harley Kilgore back to the Senate, and elect Robert Mollohan to the House of Representatives. I want you to send the whole Democratic delegation from West Virginia to the House of Representatives.
I was here before, talking for another candidate for President, if you remember, and you were kind enough to believe in me and vote for me.
Now I want you to vote for my successor, Adlai Stevenson, just as you would have voted for me if I had been nominated.
When I was here in 1948, I talked to you about how the Republican candidate for Vice President--he is still Governor of California--was speaking here and had refused to mention the candidate for Senator on the Republican ticket. Now I understand that same fellow is running for Senator again against Kilgore, and I know he hasn't got any more chance with Kilgore than he had against Neely. I want you to be sure to give these Congressmen, and the Senator, and the Governor the necessary votes to keep West Virginia in the Democratic column. And I know that is what you are going to do.
The Republicans have a lot of trouble endorsing certain of their people. They are having trouble again this year, not just in West Virginia but in a lot of other States as well. I know the Republican candidate for president must be sadly embarrassed by some of the people who are on the ticket with him this year. He is ashamed to endorse them, but he is not willing to come out against them. In fact, he's in a terrible fix. He is going to be in a worse fix than that before we get through with him.
In 1948 I went out across the country and gave the people the facts on that "do-nothing" Republican 80th Congress. This year I am going to remind the people about some of the facts of the terrible Republican record, and bring the story up to date.
Let me give you an example of what I mean. Surely you would think that everybody would be in favor of soil conservation. Nothing could be more important than saving precious soil on which our very existence depends.
The farmers in West Virginia understand what that means. I saw just the other day that over 99 percent of the farmland in West Virginia is in soil conservation districts. That is a wonderful thing.
Now, what is the Republican attitude about this matter? I found that out shortly after I first came to the Senate. I remember when we passed the Soil Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act in 1936. You should have heard the whooping and hollering about regimentation and socialism that went up from most of the Republicans in that Congress.
There was one of them--the one that would be Speaker of the House if you were foolish enough to elect a Republican House of Representatives--who said that if this act were passed, the farmers would "be dominated and regimented for all time."
I wonder how many of you farmers in West Virginia believe that now?
There was another one--the one who would be chairman of the powerful Appropriations Committee in a Republican House of Representatives--who said this soil conservation act was "an attempt to enslave the farmers."
That has been 16 years now, and I haven't seen any farmers enslaved under the act yet. Indeed, the farmers of America have been enjoying more freedom year by year--freedom from debt, freedom from want, freedom from drudgery, freedom for ha?pier lives for themselves and their families than ever before in the history of the world.
But do you think the Republicans have learned anything? Not a bit of it. Just 3 months ago, 75 percent of the Republican Senators voted for a crippling slash in the soil conservation program. They won't dare brag to you about that when they come to West Virginia, and you be sure to ask them about it when they come over here.
The story of Republican reaction can be illustrated many times over. Take rural electrification. This is one of the best programs the Democrats have developed during these last 20 years. Here in your own State only 3 ½ percent of the farms had powerline service when the Rural Electrification Administration was established. Today it is 82 percent. Isn't that an amazing record? Well, I can assure you it was made in spite of Republican opposition, which continues down to this day.
The Republicans seem to want to live in the past. They approach the present very reluctantly, and they absolutely refuse to move ahead to the future.
My friends, the issue in 1952 is this: Do you want to go backward with the party of reaction, or do you want to go forward with the Democratic Party, which is always looking forward, and looking out for the interests of the people?
It is up to you to get out and work, if you believe that we should continue to march forward. Vote for your own interests. Vote for a great future for your country. In fact, I think we are facing the greatest age in history. We have put this Government and this country in a position that no other republic or no other monarchy or empire has ever been in.
We must keep that forward march going on, and you can't do it if you put a lot of reactionaries in control of the National Government of this great Republic.
Vote the Democratic ticket. Vote for these good Democrats in West Virginia, and we will continue to go forward, and continue to be prosperous.
Thank you very much.
[5.] KEYSER, WEST VIRGINIA (Rear platform, 6:20 p.m.)
I don't know of anybody in the United States that I would rather have introduce me to a Democratic crowd than Harley Kilgore. Harley and I used to serve on a committee in the Senate, and we did some things that got me into a great deal of trouble.
You can see by the type of candidate that you have here for the Senate, for Congress, for Governor, for all the other offices in your great State, that you can't do anything but vote Democratic.
I am most happy to be here this afternoon. I have been wanting to come back to Keyser ever since November 1948 to thank you for the way you voted in that year. You had a good turnout in Mineral County, and you voted the Democratic ticket. That is a fine record, and I hope you will keep it up.
I was out here then, campaigning for a man for President, and you voted for him. I am campaigning for another man for President now, and I hope you will vote for him just like you did for me.
It is important to exercise your right as citizens. It is most important to keep the Government in the hands of the people. The ballot box is the only defense the people have against special privilege and special interest.
As I said earlier today, there are 150 million people who can't afford to keep a lobbyist in Washington, and the only lobbyist they have, who looks after their interests, is the President of the United States. And you must elect a President who believes in the welfare of the people as a whole and in the welfare of the whole country, and not in the welfare of just one or two special interests. I don't care what those special interests are.
You people here in Keyser know from your own experience that the welfare of any one part or group of this country is tied closely to the welfare of everybody else. If the farmers are not prosperous, you people here in Keyser feel it in your pocketbooks. If there is a shutdown in coal or steel, you know it, too; and you know it right away.
I know you here felt this last steel strike. I did everything I could in honesty and fairness to prevent that strike, because of national defense and the welfare of the country as a whole. A lot of people wanted me to act unfairly in that strike, but I wouldn't do it.
When laboring people have just and legitimate demands, and when those demands have been found to be fair by the appropriate Government body, it is not up to the President of the United States to act unfairly or unjustly.
Labor unions are not always in the right, but when they are in the right, they ought not to be penalized just because they are labor unions.
And yet that is what a lot of people want to do. They want to go after the unions and the working people every chance they have.
And this is true of the majority of the Republicans in Congress--and I am sorry to have to say that, but it is true. They have given us a national labor law that bears down on people who belong to unions, whether the unions are right or wrong. That is not a fair approach to this Government of ours.
Some day we will get a labor law that is fair to both sides. That is all we want. That is all you want. That is all laboring men want. That is what the Democratic Party is working for.
The Government has to be fair, not only to labor but to every group in the country. Republican party leaders do not seem to recognize that very simple principle. And that is the main trouble with the Republican Party. You ought to study the record they have made in Congress. If you will study that record, you will be surprised. I was-and I have been there right along. But when I began to look up the record of those birds in the Congress--well, it was horrible. And it surprised me when I saw it all collected together in one place.
The Republican candidate for President said recently that all Americans were in favor of social security by now. That just isn't so. The voting record of the Republicans in Congress shows that whenever it comes to extending social security coverage, or improving the benefits of the common everyday man, they are against it.
That is just an example of what the majority of the Republicans in Congress are against. I expect to spend a good deal of time during this campaign telling the people all about the record of the Republicans in the Congress. That is the only way you can find out how they would act, if they became able to control this Government.
You know, they had a Congress back some years ago called the "do-nothing, good-for-nothing" 80th Congress, but they had a President who didn't believe in what that Congress was trying to do. And that President went out and told the people exactly what that Congress did. And you know what happened in 1948.
You don't want another 80th Congress. It will be the 84th Congress this time, I think. But that Congress ought to be a Congress that will support the new President, and that will work for the welfare and benefit of the people.
Now you have a candidate for Senator here who ought to be in that Congress. know you are going to send him back there. You have Mr. Harley Staggers here for the House of Representatives, and I know you are going to send him back. And if you do that, and elect a Democratic Governor in West Virginia--as I am sure you will--I never met your candidate for Governor until today, but if I were in West Virginia I wouldn't think about voting for anybody else, he looks all right to me.
Now, weigh these things carefully. Find out what the record is of the people who are trying to become the controllers of the Government of the United States. When you find out that record, you can't do but one thing, and that is to send Adlai Stevenson to the White House, John Sparkman to preside over the Senate, and these wonderful men in West Virginia on the Democratic ticket who are running for the Senate and the Congress.
Thank you very much.
[6.] MARTINSBURG, WEST VIRGINIA (Rear platform, 8:15 p.m.)
I am not running for President this time. The last time I went through here, I was running for President, and I didn't stop, and I apologize for that. I wish I had.
The Democratic Party has a wonderful candidate for President this time, the Governor of Illinois, Adlai Stevenson. He has no commitments to anyone, or to any group. He is interested in the welfare of the average citizen, and in leading the way to world peace. He will make a great President, and I hope you will all vote for him in November, just like you did for me last time--in spite of the fact that I didn't stop and talk to you.
I understand that you have been troubled by unemployment here in Martinsburg, and I am sorry that is the case. I hope it will soon be remedied. There are more jobs in the country as a whole, these days, than ever before in its history. In spite of this, there are a few areas where there has been some local unemployment. We in Washington have been trying to correct that condition, by channeling Government orders to the towns that need them most.
We know now that the prosperity of the country is all of one piece, and that if any one group or an area suffers, it is bad for everybody else in the country. That is why we have Government programs that benefit the farmer and the worker and the businessman. There are no favorites played. They are all considered, when the policy of the Government is worked out.
To do this, we must have not only a President who will work for the people, but we must have a Congress that will vote in the interests of all the people.
You all know what happened back in 1947, in 1948, when we had that "good-for-nothing" 80th Congress on our hands. If I hadn't been there, the country would have been in an awful fix, sure enough. They thought they were going to put it in an awful fix, but we fooled the pollsters and 87 percent of the press at that time, because they had a notion that the country boy from Missouri couldn't be elected, but he gave them something to think about.
If we have a Republican Congress, they won't improve. They will be just exactly as that old 80th Congress was. They still nibble and nag at social progress, when they aren't able to stop it completely.
If the Republicans were to win this fall-and God forbid that they should--it would be the 80th Congress all over again, but this time it would be much worse.
It is more necessary than ever to have a good Congress--a Democratic Congress--at a time like this, when national defense and foreign policy are as important as they are today. If we are to have security and peace, the Congress must do a lot of things that are not very popular.
It must proceed to provide the draft laws, and for the huge sums for our armed services, and keep our economy strong at home by authorizing wage and price controls-and taxes must be high enough, and should be high enough, so that we can pay as we go. Nobody likes these things, but we have to have them, or we might lose our freedom.
I have had trouble with the Republicans on all these things. This reminds me of some history concerning the country here around Martinsburg. About 200 years ago this was frontier country. It was exposed to attack from the French and Indians coming down from Pittsburgh--Fort Duquesne at that time; it was not Pittsburgh.
George Washington was a young man then, and he had the job of defending this frontier. He was in desperate need of men and money for this big job, but the legislature of his home State, Virginia, refused to pass a draft law, and it refused to vote enough money to carry on defenses in this part of the world.
Washington did what he could, and got a big fort built at Cumberland, and a series of small blockhouses running down through here to Roanoke, Virginia; but he couldn't defend them properly. Time and again the enemy broke through, killing the settlers and burning the farms.
Finally, the legislature woke up and passed the laws that Washington needed. Then the Indians were held back and the frontier was made safe.
That is what we are faced with today, only it's on a worldwide basis instead of a statewide basis. Everything depends on our national legislature, the Congress. Only today, if the enemy breaks through just once, that may be the last chance we will ever have. So we must have a wise and courageous Congress that will give us the tools we need to defend ourselves and the peace of the world.
If you send Harley Kilgore back to the Senate, and send Harley Staggers back to the House, and elect a Democratic Governor in West Virginia--he is a fine man, I have got acquainted with him today, and you ought to surely elect him--you voters here will be doing your part to make the country
Safe.
I hope the other parts of the country will elect the same sort of liberal progressive Democrats. If they do that, we will be safe for another 4 years.
And I am just as anxious, and intend to work just as hard to win this election, as I did in 1948 for myself.
I think the welfare of the world, the welfare of this great Republic of ours, depends entirely on what you voters do on November the 4th. I hope every single one of you will go to the polls on that day, and that you will see that your neighbors go to the polls on that day, and that you will vote the Democratic ticket from top to bottom--and then the country will be safe for another 4 years.
NOTE: In the course of his remarks on September 2 the president referred to William A. Harlow, Chairman of the Democratic Central Committee of West Virginia; Senator Robert A. Taft of Ohio; Joseph H. Short, Secretary to the President; Louis Johnson, former Secretary of Defense, Senators Harley M. Kilgore and Matthew M. Neely, Representatives Cleveland M. Bailey and Harley O. Staggers, Robert H. Mollohan, Democratic candidate for Representative, and William C. Marland, Democratic candidate for Governor, all of West Virginia; Governor Adlai Stevenson of Illinois, Democratic candidate for President; and Senator John Sparkman of Alabama, Democratic candidate for Vice President.
[1.] CINCINNATI, OHIO (Rear platform, 8:35 a.m.)
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I am very glad to be here in Cincinnati this morning, especially in an election year, when we are starting out on a campaign to elect a new Democratic President of the United States.
Naturally, one of the first things I think about, when I come to Cincinnati at a time like this, is the fact that this is Bob Taft's hometown. I have known Bob for a long time, and while we have disagreed about many things, the personal relationship between Bob and myself has always been friendly.
You know, Bob is intellectually honest, and that is more than you can say for a lot of Republicans. I thought the Republicans were going to nominate him for President this time--and he was my candidate. But the Governor of New York took the nomination away from him again, just like he did in 1948, although this time he did it by proxy.
Now it is not for me to say whom the Republicans ought to nominate, but it does seem to me that they are a little unfair to Bob Taft. Bob Taft certainly represents what the Republican Party stands for. He has had more to do with making the Republican record than anyone else. And the Republican Party, like the Democratic Party, must run on its record. There is no getting around that.
If the American people had a chance to vote for Senator Taft, they would at least know what they are getting. Whether you agree with him or not, you must admit that he is thoroughly familiar with the issues involved in running the Government of this country, and he has taken a stand on them.
However, the Republican Party turned him down. I think that was terrible. He was my candidate--on the Republican ticket.
That looks to me like an effort to run out on their record and disguise what their party really stands for. I don't think this effort at disguise is going to be successful. I don't believe the Republican Party can hide its record behind a new face.
When it comes to taking a stand on the issues, the Republican candidate for President is in an extremely difficult position. If he comes out in favor of social security, or farm price supports, or minimum wage, or fair labor laws, or housing, then he is in the position of saying "me too" to the Democrats. And most Republicans think that is an awful thing to do. They are wrong, of course.
On the other hand, if he comes out against these things, the people won't vote for him, because he is taking a position against their welfare and against the welfare of the country.
I sympathize with him because of the fix he's in. I have watched with interest the turning and twisting he has had to do in an effort to go both ways at the same time, without getting anywhere.
I saw one speech he made awhile back, which said in effect that the things the Democrats have done are good, and everybody now agrees with him, but we ought not to do anything else like it because it would ruin the country. If you can beat that, I'll pay for it. That doesn't seem to me to be a very strong position.
Incidentally, he was wrong when he said that everybody now agrees with these things, as he can find out for himself if he would do a little research on the record of the Republican Party in Congress. I am asking him right now to read all the fine print in the Congressional Record, and he will find out a lot of things he doesn't know now.
I think you will find, as the campaign goes on, that the Republican candidate for President will discover more and more that there is nothing for him to do except to use the typical Republican approach: that is, to stay away from the issues, and spend his time abusing the Democrats, particularly the President of the United States.
The Democratic Party is going into this campaign in a very strong position. We have made a record in the last 20 years that is unequaled in the history of this country or any other country in the history of the world.
We have nominated a man for President who is well-qualified for the job. It will take hard work to win this campaign, just as it does in every campaign, but we are going to work hard, and we are going to Win.
Remember what I told you when I was here in 1948: that we would win. You didn't believe me. But we did win, and this time I won't have to work so hard, because I am going to have a lot of help to win.
I am sure that the Democrats in Ohio are going to do their part. You know, I carried Ohio in 1948, and nobody thought it could be done.
I am sure that you will carry the State for Governor Stevenson, and that you will elect a Democratic Governor, a Democratic Senator; and that you will send more Democratic Congressmen to the House of Representatives.
When you do that, our country will be able to go forward with new vigor in building our national prosperity and securing a lasting world peace.
Now I want you to go home and I want you to talk to your neighbors, and I want you to tell them that the country's safety is wrapped up in what you do on election day, just as it was in 1948.
I don't believe any of you--even the meanest, low-down Republicans in the world-are sorry that I was elected in 1948.
Now, remember that the welfare of this country is wrapped up in what you do on election day. Go to the 'polls and vote the Democratic ticket, and the country will be safe.
[2.] PARKERSBURG, WEST VIRGINIA (Rear platform, 12:45 p.m.)
Thank you very much for coming out to meet me. I am glad to be back in West Virginia and I am going to have a fine afternoon traveling across your State and talking to people on the way.
I went out to Milwaukee last night and gave the people there some hard facts about the Republican Party. I told them the truth--which is that the National Republican Party is a reactionary and irresponsible outfit and no friend to the American people. And I proved that by citing the Republican record in the Congress on domestic issues.
Important as domestic issues are these days, foreign policy overshadows them. The great problem of our foreign policy is Whether we are going to have peace or war. I have been working constantly to overcome a great menace to world peace--the terrible menace of an armed and ruthless Communist imperialism.
This is a long and difficult task--it is one that must be above party.
We have made progress in these last few years in dealing with the threat. Our country has put its strength into a great effort to defend and unite the free world. In this effort, Republicans and Democrats have joined together, without reference to party. This is as it should be, because in this effort, in this task of working for peace, only a united nation can succeed.
In spite of this obvious fact, there has been, all along, a group of Republican obstructionists--men of little minds and mean aspirations-who have put party above country, and have worked for votes instead of peace. They are the same kind of men who wrecked the security of the United States and the hope of peace in the world, back in the 1920's after World War I.
They were almost silenced by the great events of World War II, but today they have begun to crawl out of their hiding places to try to undermine the security of our country once again. As our country has had to make sacrifices in the cause of peace, they have become bolder. Not only have they voted in Congress against the measures needed for world peace, they have tried to stir up the people to believe that these measures are unnecessary.
These men have tried to find votes for themselves in every difficulty we have encountered, every loss we have suffered, every restriction we have had to undergo, every appropriation we have had to make, in the cause of peace.
They have been reckless and unscrupulous. On one day, they have counseled us to cut off all our allies--and on the next, to plunge heedlessly toward a major war. They have been playing with fire, at home and abroad.
So long as these men represented only a small minority of the Republicans in Congress, I was not too much concerned. While Senator Vandenberg lived, they were not a great danger. But after he died, their ranks began to grow. In vote after vote on fundamental issues in Congress, it became clear that the Republicans were backsliding into their old habit of isolationism.
Then these men hoped and planned to take control of the Republican convention, last July. In that they were frustrated, and the Republican nomination fell to a man who had helped vigorously to execute the great foreign policy on which this country is embarked. But this was not the end of the efforts of the Republican "snollygosters?'
The Republican candidate has been told that he can't have their support unless he adopts some of their ideas. He has been threatened with sabotage from within unless he will join in the wild and reckless ranting of men who don't care what happens to world peace if they can get elected.
There have been some masterminds at hand, in the Republican councils, to show him how to be a hypocrite in a few easy lessons.
One of these Republican masterminds is a man who helped in the formulation of our foreign policy. He knows what a precarious situation the world is in. He knows how easy it would be to start a war. But he is perfectly willing to have the Republican Party, and the Republican candidate, say things that increase the risk of war, simply in order to get votes.
Let me give you an example of what these Republican masterminds are doing and saying now. They have started to talk loosely about liberating the enslaved peoples of Eastern Europe.
Now the fate of the people in the Soviet borderlands is one of the greatest and most terrible tragedies of human times. Here are countries which suffered dreadfully from Nazi oppression and the ravages of war. These are peoples to whom the Kremlin promised freedom and independence in the last war-only to break that promise once the Red armies had moved in.
We shall never forget these people. We shall never cease working to help these people gain their rightful chance for freedom.
We must never treat their plight, or their endeavors to relieve it, as matters for partisan debate. Millions upon millions of decent human beings are going through a dreadful agony and it is not for us to play cheap politics with their needs and fears and hopes.
Yet, that is exactly what some of those Republicans have begun to do.
They are telling us we must undertake to liberate these people--and do it right now.
It is hard to tell from their vague statements exactly what these Republicans mean by this. If they mean that they deplore the Soviet seizure of the once free states of Eastern Europe, I am glad to hear it. If they mean that they will not accept the permanent Soviet enslavement of these nations, I am glad to hear this, too. If they mean our country should do all it can to keep alive the culture and the spirit and the hopes of once-free people, I am with them all the way.
If the Republicans mean that they look forward to the time when the growing strength of the free nations makes the Kremlin realize it must honor its promise of 7 years ago, and give these people back their chance for freedom--then those are my sentiments exactly.
If these are the things the Republicans mean, then it is natural that I should welcome them. For they express, precisely, the firm policy of this administration and that of franklin D. Roosevelt.
Remember that in 1941 it was President Roosevelt who refused to recognize the brutal Soviet seizure of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. We have never accepted that aggressive act. Remember, too, that on Navy Day in 1945, and at the opening of Congress in 1946, and many, many times since, I have stated that America will always work for the return of freedom and independence to the people who have been deprived of them by force or by subversion.
Remember that by all means short of war, your Government has helped to save the freedom of the countries which the Soviets have threatened since the war. We have helped to save Greece, Turkey, Iran, South Korea, southern Asia, and all of Western Europe. We have helped to save these vital areas and we are doing everything we can to join their growing strength in the common defense of the free world and to prevent a third world war.
We are working now to help the thousands of brave people who manage to flee west, through the Iron Curtain. Through the Voice of America we are bringing truth and encouragement to those who have to stay behind. We are helping the one nation which has succeeded, up to now, in breaking the Soviet stranglehold. In these and other positive ways, your Government is showing that we have not forgotten the people whom the Soviets have enslaved.
There is no way to do more than this now without using force. To try to liberate these enslaved people at this time might well mean turning these lands into atomic battlefields.
Maybe the Republicans don't realize this, but the people who are on the spot in Europe know very well that talk of liberation under present circumstances is war talk. That is why these Republican statements have caused so much concern among our friends in Europe. After all, our allies there have signed up with us for combined defense of freedom. They have not signed up to join in a crusade for war.
Now, I am perfectly convinced--and I hope our allies will understand--that the Republicans do not intend by what they say to pledge this country to a frightful, atomic war in order to roll back the Iron Curtain by force. Yet, if they don't want war, why do they tell us they have some new and positive proposal to help the people behind the Iron Curtain? If they don't mean war, what is it they do mean? Do they mean insurrection by the satellite peoples?
Nothing could be worse than to raise false hopes of this in Eastern Europe. Nothing could be worse than to incite uprisings that can only end by giving a new crop of victims to the Soviet executioners. All Europeans know quite well that insurrection in the Soviet borderland these days could only be successful with armed support from the outside world.
If the Republicans don't mean to give that armed support--and I am sure they don't-then they are trying to deceive their fellow citizens at home and playing cruel, gutter politics with the lives of countless good men and women behind the Iron Curtain.
If the Republicans don't mean war or insurrection, what do they mean? Well, I'll tell you. They are trying to get votes and they don't care how they get them. They don't care if they frighten our allies. They don't care if they make the masters of the Kremlin trigger-happy. I am afraid they don't care about anything except votes in November.
What they are trying to do is play on the natural desire of all Americans to see justice done. And they are especially concerned to stir up all our citizens who have ties of blood or culture with the people of Eastern Europe. They want to fool these good Americans into thinking the Republicans have some new, cheap, easy, painless way to give the people of the "old country" their freedom once again.
It is not a pleasant thing for me to have to come here and tell you that Republican leaders have stooped so low. It is not an easy thing for me to see their respected candidate-who knows better--being used as spokesman for selfish politicians who will say anything they think will help them to power.
Surely, the Republican candidate must know the Iron Curtain and the Kremlin walls will not come tumbling down from a few blasts on a campaign trumpet.
Now I am sorry I had to talk about such a serious subject on my visit here. But there is one thing that might as well be plain from the outset of this campaign.
If the Republicans insist on dragging foreign policy into partisan politics, I am completely prepared to keep the record straight. We have made some mistakes in foreign policy, of course, but, on the whole, our record is one of great constructive accomplishments.
And while we have been making our record, the Republicans have been making theirs by their votes in Congress. Having studied that record, I can say with some assurance that they are in no position to point a finger of scorn.
So, I say, if they want to make an issue of foreign policy, let them come ahead. We are ready.
But I do hope that from now on, they will debate foreign policy issues in a way that does not jeopardize our defensive alliances, endanger our security, and raise the risk of new world wars.
[3.] CLARKSBURG, WEST VIRGINIA (Rear platform, 3:10 p.m.)
It is a very great pleasure to me today to be back in Clarksburg once more. I have had some very happy times in this town. My Press Secretary is a graduate of VMI, and he claims he didn't go to school when Stonewall Jackson was a professor there. I don't know whether that is true or not.
My Secretary of Defense came from here, too--Louis Johnson, of whom I am very fond--one of the great national commanders of the American Legion. I wish we had somebody like him that we could put in charge of that organization now; it certainly needs somebody like that.
When I was here in 1948, I was trying to get you to elect a Democratic President and a Democratic Congress. Well, I am back here on the same errand now, but I have another candidate for President this time. I hope you will vote for him. I hope all of you listened to Governor Stevenson's speech yesterday. If you will just listen to what he has to say, you will find that he stands foursquare on the Democratic platform, and that when you make him President the forward-looking steps which the Democratic Party has taken in the last 20 years will be continued.
I am out trying to inform you on what the Democratic Party has done to make this country great, and Governor Stevenson is going to tell you what is going to happen in the future when he becomes President. And he will make a great President.
There is one thing I am very anxious for you to do. It doesn't do any good to elect a Democratic President if you elect a Congress that faces the other way. I want you to send this Senator back--Harley Kilgore is my good friend. He and Matt Neely are always on the right side of all the questions when they come before the Congress and the welfare of this country. I served with both of them a long time in the Congress, and I am very fond of both of them. They are both good Senators. And I know very well you are going to send Harley Kilgore back; but that is not all you ought to do, you have got to send a Congressman down there, Cleve Bailey.
[ Voice: That's right]
I see I have complete agreement over here, and I hope everybody feels the same way about it. He is a great Congressman, Cleve Bailey is, and he has been on the right side of all these questions; and if you will just give us a Congress along with the new President, we will continue to go forward.
We can't afford to let the Republicans get control of the Congress. All you need do is to look at the record of the Democrats and the Republicans to come to the conclusion that it would be the most dangerous thing you can possibly do--to let the Republicans get control of the Government of the United States.
The Democrats have a record of which they can be proud. We have improved wages and working conditions in the last 20 years. We have saved farms and homes from mortgage foreclosures. We have insured bank deposits--and I want to say to you that there are more homeowners in the United States now than ever before in the history of the country. That means homes in cities, and it means homes on the farm that are owned by the people that live in them.
We have insured bank deposits--and there hasn't been a bank failure where anybody lost any money in the last 10 years. I am saying that advisedly. We developed the rivers for the benefit of all the people, and not for just a few of the special interests. We have taken steps to conserve the soil and other precious natural resources. We have helped the American people get decent homes to live in--as I said awhile ago--there are more homeowners now than there ever were in the history of the country.
We have provided social security for old people, and for the needy. We have made the United States a better place in which to live, and made it possible for most of our citizens to lead happier lives than ever before.
We have turned away from the paths of isolationism and made our country the respected leader of the world in the cause of freedom and peace.
Every one of you knows that these things are true. I want to point out a few things about the people who want to unseat the Democrats, and why you don't want to let them do it.
In the first place, they are trying to tell you that all the good things I have just repeated to you are not true. Well, you know how you are fixed at home. I wonder how many of you would like to go back to the apple-selling days of 1932? I don't believe you would. I don't think they are going to get very far with their misstatements of facts.
The important thing is that by their votes in Congress, the policy they are following has been one of constant obstruction and reaction.
They were against social security. In fact, when that good-for-nothing 80th Congress got control of the Government, they took a million people off the rolls. They will do it again, too--more than that to you--if you let-them do it.
They were against minimum wages--they voted against the 75-cent minimum wage and they voted against the first minimum wage law. They have constantly tried to weaken the farm programs. You remember what they did to the farmers in 1948. In 1947, when I went out to the farmers and told them what was happening to them, they voted against them. They are going to do it this time, too.
They have been against public power. They have been against low-rent housing. They have tried to sabotage price and rent controls, and they have been against practically everything that is for the welfare of the everyday man and the common people.
I know you wouldn't want to turn this country over to the Republican Party and let them try to take it back to the days of McKinley. They are still thinking in 1896. They haven't come to life yet. We have had enough of that kind of thing when you had the 80th Congress. That is just a sample of what you would get if they get control of the whole Government. You see, I was there to head them off when the 80th Congress was in.
You are going to elect Stevenson, President and John Sparkman, Vice President. You are going to elect a Democratic delegation from West Virginia to the House. You are going to send Harley Kilgore back to the Senate.
I wish I could go back there with him. I had more fun when I was in the Senate than I ever had in my life. I have had more trouble since I have been President than any man alive.
I am also of the opinion that you are going to elect a Democrat to be Governor of West Virginia, as you always have done. From the looks of him, he will make a good one.
I am more than happy to be here with you again. I hope that 4 years from now I can come back and tell you to elect another Democratic President and a Democratic delegation from West Virginia. That is what I am going to try to do, because I think--well, I am only 68, I ought to live to be 98; and in all that time you find out a lot of things. And I will, too.
West Virginia is a most hospitable place. I am always pleased to come to West Virginia. I have been in nearly every town in the State, and I have never been to one where I haven't been cordially treated and asked to come back.
In fact, West Virginia tried to get me to put myself up to run for President again, but I decided that the best thing for the country would be for the Democratic Party to bring out some new faces and keep the country rolling for the next 20 years as it has in the last 20.
Thank you very much.
[4.] GRAFTON, WEST VIRGINIA (Rear platform, 4 p.m.)
Senator Neely, I appreciate that introduction, and I would like very much to deserve it. It's a fine thing, you know, to have people like Senator Neely and Senator Kilgore, with whom I have served in the Senate, believe that the President of the United States is just what he pretends to be: a representative of the people.
I am happy to be here again. I still recall the fine reception you gave me when I stopped here in 1948. I hope very much that you people will vote for Adlai Stevenson and John Sparkman this year, and that you will elect this grand Democrat for Governor, Mr. Marland. And I want you to be sure and send Harley Kilgore back to the Senate, and elect Robert Mollohan to the House of Representatives. I want you to send the whole Democratic delegation from West Virginia to the House of Representatives.
I was here before, talking for another candidate for President, if you remember, and you were kind enough to believe in me and vote for me.
Now I want you to vote for my successor, Adlai Stevenson, just as you would have voted for me if I had been nominated.
When I was here in 1948, I talked to you about how the Republican candidate for Vice President--he is still Governor of California--was speaking here and had refused to mention the candidate for Senator on the Republican ticket. Now I understand that same fellow is running for Senator again against Kilgore, and I know he hasn't got any more chance with Kilgore than he had against Neely. I want you to be sure to give these Congressmen, and the Senator, and the Governor the necessary votes to keep West Virginia in the Democratic column. And I know that is what you are going to do.
The Republicans have a lot of trouble endorsing certain of their people. They are having trouble again this year, not just in West Virginia but in a lot of other States as well. I know the Republican candidate for president must be sadly embarrassed by some of the people who are on the ticket with him this year. He is ashamed to endorse them, but he is not willing to come out against them. In fact, he's in a terrible fix. He is going to be in a worse fix than that before we get through with him.
In 1948 I went out across the country and gave the people the facts on that "do-nothing" Republican 80th Congress. This year I am going to remind the people about some of the facts of the terrible Republican record, and bring the story up to date.
Let me give you an example of what I mean. Surely you would think that everybody would be in favor of soil conservation. Nothing could be more important than saving precious soil on which our very existence depends.
The farmers in West Virginia understand what that means. I saw just the other day that over 99 percent of the farmland in West Virginia is in soil conservation districts. That is a wonderful thing.
Now, what is the Republican attitude about this matter? I found that out shortly after I first came to the Senate. I remember when we passed the Soil Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act in 1936. You should have heard the whooping and hollering about regimentation and socialism that went up from most of the Republicans in that Congress.
There was one of them--the one that would be Speaker of the House if you were foolish enough to elect a Republican House of Representatives--who said that if this act were passed, the farmers would "be dominated and regimented for all time."
I wonder how many of you farmers in West Virginia believe that now?
There was another one--the one who would be chairman of the powerful Appropriations Committee in a Republican House of Representatives--who said this soil conservation act was "an attempt to enslave the farmers."
That has been 16 years now, and I haven't seen any farmers enslaved under the act yet. Indeed, the farmers of America have been enjoying more freedom year by year--freedom from debt, freedom from want, freedom from drudgery, freedom for ha?pier lives for themselves and their families than ever before in the history of the world.
But do you think the Republicans have learned anything? Not a bit of it. Just 3 months ago, 75 percent of the Republican Senators voted for a crippling slash in the soil conservation program. They won't dare brag to you about that when they come to West Virginia, and you be sure to ask them about it when they come over here.
The story of Republican reaction can be illustrated many times over. Take rural electrification. This is one of the best programs the Democrats have developed during these last 20 years. Here in your own State only 3 ½ percent of the farms had powerline service when the Rural Electrification Administration was established. Today it is 82 percent. Isn't that an amazing record? Well, I can assure you it was made in spite of Republican opposition, which continues down to this day.
The Republicans seem to want to live in the past. They approach the present very reluctantly, and they absolutely refuse to move ahead to the future.
My friends, the issue in 1952 is this: Do you want to go backward with the party of reaction, or do you want to go forward with the Democratic Party, which is always looking forward, and looking out for the interests of the people?
It is up to you to get out and work, if you believe that we should continue to march forward. Vote for your own interests. Vote for a great future for your country. In fact, I think we are facing the greatest age in history. We have put this Government and this country in a position that no other republic or no other monarchy or empire has ever been in.
We must keep that forward march going on, and you can't do it if you put a lot of reactionaries in control of the National Government of this great Republic.
Vote the Democratic ticket. Vote for these good Democrats in West Virginia, and we will continue to go forward, and continue to be prosperous.
Thank you very much.
[5.] KEYSER, WEST VIRGINIA (Rear platform, 6:20 p.m.)
I don't know of anybody in the United States that I would rather have introduce me to a Democratic crowd than Harley Kilgore. Harley and I used to serve on a committee in the Senate, and we did some things that got me into a great deal of trouble.
You can see by the type of candidate that you have here for the Senate, for Congress, for Governor, for all the other offices in your great State, that you can't do anything but vote Democratic.
I am most happy to be here this afternoon. I have been wanting to come back to Keyser ever since November 1948 to thank you for the way you voted in that year. You had a good turnout in Mineral County, and you voted the Democratic ticket. That is a fine record, and I hope you will keep it up.
I was out here then, campaigning for a man for President, and you voted for him. I am campaigning for another man for President now, and I hope you will vote for him just like you did for me.
It is important to exercise your right as citizens. It is most important to keep the Government in the hands of the people. The ballot box is the only defense the people have against special privilege and special interest.
As I said earlier today, there are 150 million people who can't afford to keep a lobbyist in Washington, and the only lobbyist they have, who looks after their interests, is the President of the United States. And you must elect a President who believes in the welfare of the people as a whole and in the welfare of the whole country, and not in the welfare of just one or two special interests. I don't care what those special interests are.
You people here in Keyser know from your own experience that the welfare of any one part or group of this country is tied closely to the welfare of everybody else. If the farmers are not prosperous, you people here in Keyser feel it in your pocketbooks. If there is a shutdown in coal or steel, you know it, too; and you know it right away.
I know you here felt this last steel strike. I did everything I could in honesty and fairness to prevent that strike, because of national defense and the welfare of the country as a whole. A lot of people wanted me to act unfairly in that strike, but I wouldn't do it.
When laboring people have just and legitimate demands, and when those demands have been found to be fair by the appropriate Government body, it is not up to the President of the United States to act unfairly or unjustly.
Labor unions are not always in the right, but when they are in the right, they ought not to be penalized just because they are labor unions.
And yet that is what a lot of people want to do. They want to go after the unions and the working people every chance they have.
And this is true of the majority of the Republicans in Congress--and I am sorry to have to say that, but it is true. They have given us a national labor law that bears down on people who belong to unions, whether the unions are right or wrong. That is not a fair approach to this Government of ours.
Some day we will get a labor law that is fair to both sides. That is all we want. That is all you want. That is all laboring men want. That is what the Democratic Party is working for.
The Government has to be fair, not only to labor but to every group in the country. Republican party leaders do not seem to recognize that very simple principle. And that is the main trouble with the Republican Party. You ought to study the record they have made in Congress. If you will study that record, you will be surprised. I was-and I have been there right along. But when I began to look up the record of those birds in the Congress--well, it was horrible. And it surprised me when I saw it all collected together in one place.
The Republican candidate for President said recently that all Americans were in favor of social security by now. That just isn't so. The voting record of the Republicans in Congress shows that whenever it comes to extending social security coverage, or improving the benefits of the common everyday man, they are against it.
That is just an example of what the majority of the Republicans in Congress are against. I expect to spend a good deal of time during this campaign telling the people all about the record of the Republicans in the Congress. That is the only way you can find out how they would act, if they became able to control this Government.
You know, they had a Congress back some years ago called the "do-nothing, good-for-nothing" 80th Congress, but they had a President who didn't believe in what that Congress was trying to do. And that President went out and told the people exactly what that Congress did. And you know what happened in 1948.
You don't want another 80th Congress. It will be the 84th Congress this time, I think. But that Congress ought to be a Congress that will support the new President, and that will work for the welfare and benefit of the people.
Now you have a candidate for Senator here who ought to be in that Congress. know you are going to send him back there. You have Mr. Harley Staggers here for the House of Representatives, and I know you are going to send him back. And if you do that, and elect a Democratic Governor in West Virginia--as I am sure you will--I never met your candidate for Governor until today, but if I were in West Virginia I wouldn't think about voting for anybody else, he looks all right to me.
Now, weigh these things carefully. Find out what the record is of the people who are trying to become the controllers of the Government of the United States. When you find out that record, you can't do but one thing, and that is to send Adlai Stevenson to the White House, John Sparkman to preside over the Senate, and these wonderful men in West Virginia on the Democratic ticket who are running for the Senate and the Congress.
Thank you very much.
[6.] MARTINSBURG, WEST VIRGINIA (Rear platform, 8:15 p.m.)
I am not running for President this time. The last time I went through here, I was running for President, and I didn't stop, and I apologize for that. I wish I had.
The Democratic Party has a wonderful candidate for President this time, the Governor of Illinois, Adlai Stevenson. He has no commitments to anyone, or to any group. He is interested in the welfare of the average citizen, and in leading the way to world peace. He will make a great President, and I hope you will all vote for him in November, just like you did for me last time--in spite of the fact that I didn't stop and talk to you.
I understand that you have been troubled by unemployment here in Martinsburg, and I am sorry that is the case. I hope it will soon be remedied. There are more jobs in the country as a whole, these days, than ever before in its history. In spite of this, there are a few areas where there has been some local unemployment. We in Washington have been trying to correct that condition, by channeling Government orders to the towns that need them most.
We know now that the prosperity of the country is all of one piece, and that if any one group or an area suffers, it is bad for everybody else in the country. That is why we have Government programs that benefit the farmer and the worker and the businessman. There are no favorites played. They are all considered, when the policy of the Government is worked out.
To do this, we must have not only a President who will work for the people, but we must have a Congress that will vote in the interests of all the people.
You all know what happened back in 1947, in 1948, when we had that "good-for-nothing" 80th Congress on our hands. If I hadn't been there, the country would have been in an awful fix, sure enough. They thought they were going to put it in an awful fix, but we fooled the pollsters and 87 percent of the press at that time, because they had a notion that the country boy from Missouri couldn't be elected, but he gave them something to think about.
If we have a Republican Congress, they won't improve. They will be just exactly as that old 80th Congress was. They still nibble and nag at social progress, when they aren't able to stop it completely.
If the Republicans were to win this fall-and God forbid that they should--it would be the 80th Congress all over again, but this time it would be much worse.
It is more necessary than ever to have a good Congress--a Democratic Congress--at a time like this, when national defense and foreign policy are as important as they are today. If we are to have security and peace, the Congress must do a lot of things that are not very popular.
It must proceed to provide the draft laws, and for the huge sums for our armed services, and keep our economy strong at home by authorizing wage and price controls-and taxes must be high enough, and should be high enough, so that we can pay as we go. Nobody likes these things, but we have to have them, or we might lose our freedom.
I have had trouble with the Republicans on all these things. This reminds me of some history concerning the country here around Martinsburg. About 200 years ago this was frontier country. It was exposed to attack from the French and Indians coming down from Pittsburgh--Fort Duquesne at that time; it was not Pittsburgh.
George Washington was a young man then, and he had the job of defending this frontier. He was in desperate need of men and money for this big job, but the legislature of his home State, Virginia, refused to pass a draft law, and it refused to vote enough money to carry on defenses in this part of the world.
Washington did what he could, and got a big fort built at Cumberland, and a series of small blockhouses running down through here to Roanoke, Virginia; but he couldn't defend them properly. Time and again the enemy broke through, killing the settlers and burning the farms.
Finally, the legislature woke up and passed the laws that Washington needed. Then the Indians were held back and the frontier was made safe.
That is what we are faced with today, only it's on a worldwide basis instead of a statewide basis. Everything depends on our national legislature, the Congress. Only today, if the enemy breaks through just once, that may be the last chance we will ever have. So we must have a wise and courageous Congress that will give us the tools we need to defend ourselves and the peace of the world.
If you send Harley Kilgore back to the Senate, and send Harley Staggers back to the House, and elect a Democratic Governor in West Virginia--he is a fine man, I have got acquainted with him today, and you ought to surely elect him--you voters here will be doing your part to make the country
Safe.
I hope the other parts of the country will elect the same sort of liberal progressive Democrats. If they do that, we will be safe for another 4 years.
And I am just as anxious, and intend to work just as hard to win this election, as I did in 1948 for myself.
I think the welfare of the world, the welfare of this great Republic of ours, depends entirely on what you voters do on November the 4th. I hope every single one of you will go to the polls on that day, and that you will see that your neighbors go to the polls on that day, and that you will vote the Democratic ticket from top to bottom--and then the country will be safe for another 4 years.
NOTE: In the course of his remarks on September 2 the president referred to William A. Harlow, Chairman of the Democratic Central Committee of West Virginia; Senator Robert A. Taft of Ohio; Joseph H. Short, Secretary to the President; Louis Johnson, former Secretary of Defense, Senators Harley M. Kilgore and Matthew M. Neely, Representatives Cleveland M. Bailey and Harley O. Staggers, Robert H. Mollohan, Democratic candidate for Representative, and William C. Marland, Democratic candidate for Governor, all of West Virginia; Governor Adlai Stevenson of Illinois, Democratic candidate for President; and Senator John Sparkman of Alabama, Democratic candidate for Vice President.