Rear Platform Remarks in Montana

September 30, 1952

[1.] WOLF POINT, MONTANA (Rear platform, 7 a.m.)

I am more than happy to see that so many people in Montana get up before breakfast. Now back East we have an awful time getting people up in time to eat breakfast, let alone getting up before breakfast.

I was glad to see Mike up in time. I think Mike has learned, as I did, that there are more votes to be gotten as the sun comes up than there are when it goes down, especially in this part of the world.

It has been a pleasure for me to enter Montana last night--had a wonderful crowd of people out here to welcome the train, and I appreciate it most highly; and I am more than happy that all of you turned out this morning to see me off on what I hope will be a successful whistlestop trip across the great State of Montana with my good friend Mike Mansfield here, who is one of the best public servants that I know in Washington. He has done a wonderful job in that position. And if you put him in the Senate, you will have wonderful representation in Washington.

Now, there are some States that don't have such wonderful representation, as told the people last night. Sometimes they take a vote in the Senate press gallery as to who is the best Senator and who is the worst. With Mike Mansfield and Jim Murray there, it will be a contest to see who is the best Senator.

And I hope Montana will do its duty. Vote for your own interests, and vote the Democratic ticket straight on November the 4th.

I hope to see you again sometime when I am not running for office, or working for somebody running for office.

[2.] GLASGOW, MONTANA (Rear platform, 8:15 a.m.)

It is not very often that the President rates two bands in one morning. That was wonderfully done.

I appreciate very much this welcome this early in the morning from the great State of Montana. I came into Wolf Point last night, and there were 500 or 600 people on the platform. When I got up to leave this morning, there were 700 or 800 there to see me off and wish me well. And I certainly appreciate that.

I remember stopping here in 1950. I had just come from seeing fort Peck Dam, the greatest earth dam in the world. I had a good time on that trip, and I am certainly having a good time now. And I am here in one of my five official capacities, as the head of the Democratic Party. I am on a campaign trip to tell you the truth about what the issues in this campaign are, and to bring to light some of the misrepresentations that have been made by the opposition-and I am not wasting any words on it, either.

Now you have a wonderful ticket here in Montana. You have just had them all introduced to you. When you have a ticket like that, you can't help but do the country good when you vote the Democratic ticket.

I have known Mike Mansfield--well, I don't know how many years, as long as he has been in Congress. And he is one of the best that has ever been in that Congress. He has done more for the State of Montana than any other Congressman that has ever come from this State.

And you have Mr. Fraser, who will do the things for Montana just as Mike has done. He impresses me as being a good man.

And I know your Governor very well. He is a great person, and if you don't send him back, why you will lose by it.

Of course, I served in the Senate with Jim Murray. He got in just a few days before I did, and always had precedence over me--had protocol over me; but I cured that. Jim Murray has been a good Senator. He has been for the interests of the people, and he has always been fighting for the welfare of Montana. He told me awhile ago he wanted me to remark that he wanted to run for reelection in 1954; and if he does, I am for him.

But the national ticket is the thing that I am out here to talk to you about. Adlai Stevenson is talking sense to the American people. He has a healthy respect for the people, and he cares about your interests and your future. That certainly is proved by his fine record as Governor of Illinois.

And John Sparkman is the same kind of man--his whole career in Congress has been spent fighting for the things the plain people of this country want and need. Ask Mike Mansfield about John Sparkman, he can tell you just the sort of person he is.

Before I go further, I want to say how sorry I was to hear of all your troubles in the flood last year. But I am told things are pretty well back to normal now. I am glad we were able to give you some emergency help from Washington. And in the next few years I hope we can do a lot more for flood control work and soil conservation, and give you permanent protection. But I am here to tell you if you elect a Republican Congress and a Republican President, you won't get it, and you won't deserve it.

I am always glad to see our Government helping people do things they couldn't get done by themselves. That's what the Government is for. And that is what your Democratic administrations have been doing these 20 years--helping the people of this country to make things better for themselves. That is point 4 working at home.

Take our farm programs. They are a good example. We have worked to build up the land through soil conservation, reclamation, and irrigation projects like the ones you have here. We have worked to bring electric power to the farm, at reasonable rates, through the REA and your fine cooperatives. That is one of the best programs the Government ever started.

And do you know it had to be fought through? It had vicious Republican opposition. We have worked to make sure the farmers could count on fair prices for their crops and really good living on a family-sized farm.

That is what makes Charlie Brannan one of the greatest Secretaries of Agriculture we have ever had. He is for the family-sized farm. That is what he has been working for ever since he has been Secretary of Agriculture.

Now, all these things are doing a lot of good. They are good for the farmers, and farm prosperity is good for everybody. I am sure you know that here in Glasgow. But you will never keep these things if the Republicans grab the White House and the Congress in November. If that happens, this country is in for a bad time. You had better make up your minds to that.

I am not exaggerating. I know it is true, because I am very familiar with the Republican record in Congress. And, my friends, their record is terrible. All you have got to do is to read it. Their record is so bad that it is hard to believe, but if you just look at the facts, as I have done, you can see for yourselves. It's all down in black and white, but it's mostly fine print, and it's hard to read. That's the reason I am bringing it to your attention. You ought to read that fine print in the Congressional Record-then you will know just exactly what these birds will do to you if they get in there.

Now, my Republican friends don't want you to find that out, so they try to distract you by heaping abuse on the Democrats. And just in case that doesn't convince you, they resort to downright untruths and falsehoods about what actually happened in the past. They just rewrite the record to suit themselves. They think you won't read that fine print, but I am urging you to do it. They think if they tell you a false story often enough, you will get confused about what really happened, and come to believe their version of it. Don't you do that. You will be believing something that is absolutely contrary [o your own interests.

I want to tell you about some of these Republican attempts to rewrite the record. First let us take the story on REA appropriations back in that terrible Both Congress which I talked to you about in 1948. The Republicans had control of that Congress. They came out and showed you just exactly what they would do if they had the power. If you hadn't had a man in the White House to head them off, they would have ruined you.

Now, the Republican candidate for President had the nerve to stand up at Omaha, the other day, and say that the Both Congress had gladly appropriated $800 million for REA, and that proved the Republicans just loved rural electrification. But what he didn't say was this: there were four record votes on funds for REA during the life of that Congress, and every single time, the Republicans in both the House and Senate voted overwhelmingly to slash the funds.

The only reason REA got that $800 million was that practically every Democratic Member of Congress voted for it. And there were a handful of friendly Republicans that voted to put it over.

Yet the Republican candidate wants you to believe the Republican Party favored REA 4 years ago. That is what I mean when I tell you to read the record. In addition to that, you know the operation of that $800 million fund had to have an administrative setup; that is, it had to have engineers and clerks and surveyors and things to see that the lines went in as they should go.

What did the Republicans do? That great statesman from New. Hampshire, Mr. Bridges, got an amendment to the appropriations bill which cut $700,000 off the administrative fund of REA, and that meant that whole survey crowd, engineers and everybody else in connection with it, had to be thrown out. I think there were some 2,500 employees of REA taken off the payroll--the men who actually put REA into effect. They fixed it so that one engineer had to look after Minnesota, North Dakota, and South Dakota, and the eastern half of Montana, and he just simply couldn't do it. And so while they say they appropriated $800 million, they fixed it so it couldn't be spent. That's the way they do a lot of things. They make you believe that they have done a lot for you.

Now here's another--the story on that terrible shortage of grain storage back in 1948, when the 80th Congress stopped the Commodity Credit Corporation from providing storage space for farmers. And that amendment to the Commodity Credit Corporation to prevent storage space for farmers was put through by men who are interested in grain storage in private business.

The Republican candidate made a speech at Kasson, Minnesota, and said that the 80th Congress did not prevent the CCC from providing storage space for grain. Furthermore, he said there was no shortage of storage back in 1948. And finally, he said the CCC did not provide storage space, anyway.

Now let me tell you the truth. In the first place, I have on the train here the official report of a committee of the House of Representatives in the Both Congress in 1949. This report concerned a bill to restore to the CCC the powers that the Republican candidate says were never taken away. This was the 81st Congress, not the Both. The 81st--the one after the 80th. And this report says flatly that there had been a bad shortage of storage space in 1948, and it says that the 80th Congress had helped to cause the shortage by stopping the CCC from providing storage space.

Now, why a candidate for President would get up and misrepresent the facts in a manner like that is more than I can tell. He must have been sure that I didn't know the record, and I was there when it was made.

There's the record--and I don't recall that any Republican raised a voice against this report, and didn't deny it on the floor of the House.

Now, one thing more. The Democratic 81st Congress gave the Commodity Credit Corporation its powers back again. And since that time, the CCC has been steadily leasing storage to farmers. Moreover, since 1949 the Government has loaned farmers more than $35 million to build extra storage space for themselves. All that, of course, is storage which the Republican candidate said did not exist and was not needed. And here are two specific cases where Republicans are trying to confuse you on the facts, and I can tell you about a lot of others.

I am sorry to say it's their candidate for President himself who is doing this. He is acting no better than the rest of them. In fact, I think he believes everything that the old-line looking-backward Republicans tell him, and then he gets up on the platform and says it.

Either he doesn't know what has been going on in this country--and in his adopted 'party--or he doesn't care. But regardless of his motives, you must not let him fool you.

Now I like Ike. I see signs all around at some of our meetings "I like Ike." And I like Ike, too, but I like Ike as the commander in chief of the Armed forces in France, but I don't like him for President.

I don't see how you people can afford to take a risk with a man like that--or with a party like that.

You can't put your future in the hands of men who won't tell you the truth. You can't trust a party that has always been against you.

Think of your own interests. Think what will happen if they get control of the Government. Think--just think what would happen to the soil conservation, to flood control, and to all the rest of the things for which the Democratic Party has stood over the last 20 years, and which the Democratic Party has put into effect.

Now they are saying that everything we have done is wrong. My friends, if everything we have done is wrong, the country never was in better shape than it is now, and I am here to tell you if you want to turn the clock back and suffer a little while, you will get it if you turn this Government over to them.

I want you to go to the polls on November the 4th and exercise your right and prerogatives of the Government of the United States, because the people of the United States are the Government. I want you to go there and vote for yourselves and vote for the welfare of this great Nation of ours, and vote for the welfare and the peace of this world by voting the Democratic ticket. Then we will have 4 more years with the country safe and the world at peace.

[3.] MALTA, MONTANA (Rear platform, 10 a.m.)

Thank you very much, Mr. Attorney General, for that introduction. I appreciate it. I am also highly complimented and highly pleased to see this turnout here this morning. You know, coming across North Dakota, and coming into Montana, the people were just as cordial and fine to me as they possibly can be; and from the way they turned out, they seemed to be interested in what I had to say. You would think I was running for election.

It is easy to see that you people here in Malta are on your toes. I am glad to know that you have made a good recovery from the floods which hit here in the spring. That was a terrible disaster. I am glad we were able to give you some emergency help from Washington.

I guess you all are acquainted with the fact as to why I am here. You see, the President has four or five jobs centered in the one man. I am working at one of those jobs now across the State of Montana, as the head of the party which is in control of the Government. The President of the United States is always the head of his party. I am out here this time, frankly, campaigning as the head of the Democratic Party, trying to convince you that the Democratic ticket is the proper one to put in office again.

You have one wonderful man running for Senator in this State, the Honorable Mike Mansfield. I have known Mike ever since I have been in the Congress--or ever since he has been there, and he has been a real public servant. He understands the needs of the people. He not only understands them but he works for them. And if you send him there to join with Jim Murray--who is one of the most able and distinguished Senators in the United States Senate--Montana will be as well represented in the Senate as any other State in the Union. And it is to your interest to be that way.

I have just become acquainted with Willard Fraser, the candidate for Congress in this district, and I hope you will send Mr. Fraser to the Congress to carry on where Mike will have left off in the House of Representatives to go to the Senate.

I am very much pleased to have the Governor of the great State of Montana as my guest this morning on this train, and I know very well you are going to send him back to the capital of Montana to run the State. He has done a good job at it.

Back in 1948, you people stood by me when the big interests were saying the Republicans had the election in the bag. I remember one pollster in that campaign decided that he wouldn't take any more polls after September 9. He said the election was over and there was no use going to the expense--all we need do is inaugurate Mr. Dewey. Well, it didn't come out quite that way, if you remember. You people believed with me that I would be elected. And I appreciate it very much.

We licked the big interests in 1948, and we will lick them if we stand together as we have all the time. 1952 is a key year in the welfare of this country and the welfare of the world. And if you do your duty, the country will be in safe hands for another 4 years. And that duty is to vote the Democratic ticket.

I am glad you are going to stand up and be counted this year for two of the greatest candidates the Democratic Party has ever had: Adlai Stevenson and John Sparkman-both wonderful men. Mr. Stevenson has been one of the great Governors of one of the great States in the Union. He understands administration. He understands how to run the Government. And you will make no mistake if you put him in there.

Here in the area around Malta, you people are getting a lot of benefits from the Milk River irrigation project, so I am told. And you are going to get a lot more from the new improvements that Congress has authorized.

You can thank Mike Mansfield for that, and for a lot of other things which have helped you people and your State.

Just about 3 months ago I signed a bill which Mike sponsored to make it easier for the average farmer to pay for irrigation works on this Milk River project. That bill also provided for nearly a million dollars in Federal help to put the works in first-class shape.

That's what Mike Mansfield and the Democratic Party have been doing all along--helping the average person in this county to get the things he needs that he can't manage by himself. In my opinion, that is what the Government is for.

The Republicans don't believe in helping the people of this country. They don't care about the development and prosperity of Montana. Their record in Congress is certainly proof of that. They are against just about everything you people out here want and need. And that situation is not confined to Montana. The Republicans are against everything that will help the common everyday man. They are for the special interests, and they don't make any bones about it.

They seem to want to turn the clock back to William McKinley and the robber barons. In 1948 you didn't fall for their line, and I know you are not going to fall for it this year, either.

I think the name of your town is a very good symbol of your determination to stand for what is right. I understand that Malta was named for that island in the Mediterranean Sea. I am sure you all know the story of how that island of Malta took some of the heaviest blows from air bombardments during the Second World War. But the people carried on--they weren't scared and they weren't fooled into surrender.

I hope you will resist the Republican blows, and blowhards--particularly the blowhards--and the hot air bombardments in the same way.

The Republicans are out to cut off the common people from their Government, just like the enemy tried to cut off Malta during the war.

Now, it's up to you to keep that from happening. You have got to get out and vote for the party that always works for you--that always works for the people.

I am talking from historical facts. If you read the record you will find that all the good things that have come to your great State have been sponsored and put through during Democratic administrations. You will find the Republicans trying to claim credit for those things, but if you will read the record, you will find that it points exactly the other way. You see, that record comes out in the Congressional Record, as I said awhile ago, and it's mostly fine print and people don't like to read fine print.

I am asking you and praying with you that you will read the fine print and understand just exactly what is needed to keep this country great.

That's the reason I am out here. You don't suppose I would be going up and down the United States from one end to the other and to all the crossways except that the people need convincing on what is in their own interests.
When you vote in November you are voting for yourselves. And if you vote for yourselves, you can't do anything else but send Stevenson and Sparkman to the White House, and elect a Democratic ticket in Montana.

Do that--and the country will be safe for another 4 years.

[4.] CHINOOK, MONTANA (Rear platform, 11:10 a.m.)

Well, I certainly appreciate that welcome. I can't tell you how much I appreciate it. You know, I have got a warm spot in my heart for this town of Chinook. It went for me in 1948 about two to one; of course I can't forget that as long as I live.

I understand that Chinook means "warm wind" to melt the snow and ice in January and February and save the cattle. You know what I wish? I wish we could get a Chinook wind into the Republican Party. You know why I wish that? It would melt the ice around the Republican hearts and get them to show some warmth toward the common people.

I don't think we can expect that very soon because the reactionary Old Guard still calls the tune for the Republican Party. Don't let them tell you anything else, and if you will analyze what they say and what they do, you will see I am telling you the truth; the lies are all on the other side.

Here in Montana, and everywhere in this country, the Democratic Party has a lot of warmth and interest in the farmer, the small businessman, and the plain people. That is why I hope you will elect Willard Fraser to the House of Representatives, reelect Governor John Bonner, and send Mike Mansfield to the Senate.

I want to say a special word about my good friend Mike. When I spoke here in Montana 2 years ago, I said that most Republicans could look and look at an acorn and all they could see were the little old acorns. But people like Mike Mansfield, with vision for the future, can see that acorn as a giant oak tree. So I say as I did 2 years ago, don't vote for the little men with acorn minds, but vote for the people like Mike Mansfield who have the broad vision to carry us forward to peace and prosperity.

When you send Mike to the Senate, you will have two Senators then of which Montana can be exceedingly proud. Montana will then have two of the best Senators in the United States Senate.

I want to thank you for the big majority you gave me here in 1948. As I said awhile ago, this year I am not out campaigning for myself, but I am campaigning for some of the finest candidates the Democratic Party and the country ever had a chance to vote for--Adlai Stevenson for President and John Sparkman for Vice President.

You know, the President has five immense jobs for which he is responsible, any one of which is an all-time chore for any one man, but he has to do all five of them the best he can.

In the first place, he is the Chief Executive of the greatest Nation in the history of the world. In the next place, he is the Commander in Chief of the Armed forces of the greatest Nation in the history of the world, and he is the only head of a state that has a Commander in Chief of the Armed forces, except a few of the republics that have been organized since the United States Government was set up. He is also the head of his party, and that is the job I am working at today, the head of the Democratic Party. The President in the White House is the top man in his party, and he can't help it, he has to take responsibility for the party, he has to try to see that that party does what is right by the people.

And the President makes the foreign policy of the United States. He is responsible for the foreign policy; in fact, he is the foreign service man for the whole country. Therefore, in that capacity he has to know something about what goes on in the world.

Then he has the job as social head of state. He has to entertain all the visiting firemen. When the kings and queens and presidents come to our country, he has to see that they go back with a good feeling about this country and tell their people what a great country this is.

Now with his five jobs and 17 hours a day the President can't get the job done, but I am working specifically at my job this time as head of the Democratic Party. I want you to know just what the Democratic Party stands for, and in this capacity I am going across the country and back; and when I get through you will have the truth, and then you can use your own judgment.

These men I have been talking about stand for prosperity and progress in Montana and everywhere in this country. They also stand for peace in the world, and they know that the way to peace is through careful, steady effort to strengthen the forces of freedom. These men don't believe in talking tough one day, and cutting our Armed forces the next day. That is the Republican way--and I hope we never get stuck with it.

The Democratic Party for 20 years has been working for all the 'people of this country--the farmer, the businessman, the worker, and everyone in the country. We don't play to any special interest. I am just as anxious to be fair to the big bankers and the big man in business as I am to be fair to the man who is not in big business. And I want to say to you that there are lobbies galore in Washington--the power lobby, the real estate lobby--you can't count them on the fingers of both hands. But the only lobby and the only lobbyist that the common everyday man has--the 150 million people who don't have any lobby--is the President of the United States; and when he goes back on you then you are in a bad fix, sure enough.

Now we have achieved the greatest prosperity this country and the world has ever seen. And we have done it by seeing that every interest in the country has a fair and square deal; and we will keep that prosperity and improve on it, if we all keep working together as we have done in the past 20 years.

Now the Republicans have opposed all the great progressive measures that have given us strength and prosperity. They said those things were wrong--bad for the people, too expensive, and socialistic. They especially don't like what we have done out here in the West. And they seem to think that progress just isn't good for you.

You know, when this 49th parallel was laid out, it was in the administration of Millard Fillmore, and there was a great fight on about 54-40. And do you know who was Secretary of State for Millard Fillmore? His name was Daniel Webster. And he and Lord Ashburton got together and decided that this part of the world wasn't any good anyway and they split the difference, and ran the 49th parallel all the way down to the Pacific Ocean.

But there were a lot of people in the country who decided that this part of the world was just as great and can have just as great potentialities as any other section of the country; and I am one of them.

These people especially don't like what we have done for you out here. And their five-star candidate talks the same line as all the rest of them.

The Democratic Party believes that the great rivers of the West should be assets, not liabilities. We believe the rivers should be harnessed to prevent floods, to produce electricity, and irrigate farm land.

You know, you people know about these things. You know you can use your Government to better your own welfare. I think you want to keep that kind of government that understands all these things. And if you do want to keep that kind of government, you want to inform yourselves as to the facts.

If you will do that, I have no fear that on election day you will go down there and vote for yourselves and your interests and for the welfare of this great country, and vote the Democratic ticket, and then the country will be safe for another 4 years.
Thank you very much.

[5.] HAVRE, MONTANA (Rear platform, 11:55 a.m.)

I am certainly enjoying this trip through the northern part of Montana. I don't think I have had such a good time since 1948. I know very well I haven't because then I had to work too hard. This is a vacation for me. I am working at my job as head of the Democratic Party. I am trying to explain to all the people, and when I get through I think they will understand that the Democratic Party is the party of the people, and that is the party you ought to stick to.

It is good to be back in Havre again. The last time I was here you were having a music festival, and I greatly enjoyed those wonderful high school bands.

They tell me at the Weather Bureau that Havre is one of the coldest places in the world, but I want to say this: you have given me one of the warmest welcomes. You also gave me one of the largest majorities--better than two to one, I believe it was--that I received in the 1948 election from the whole State of Montana.

I want to say to you that you have better judgment than some of the newspapers and the pollsters. You went along with the winner. Now I want to thank you for that, and I am going to ask you to do the same thing, or even better, for Adlai Stevenson of Illinois, who will be one of the country's greatest Presidents, I am sure of that.

He has everything that is required for the Presidency. It is just as if he had been trained for the job. He has had government experience in the field of agriculture. He has held important jobs in national defense and foreign affairs. He has been one of the most economical, most honest, and most successful Governors that any of our great States ever had. Personally, he has courage and humility, and he has always been on the side of the people.

I hope you will send Mike Mansfield to the United States Senate to work with Jim Murray. Over in this part of Montana, you haven't had the chance to vote for Mike before, but I want to assure you that he is one of the ablest men in the House of Representatives, and that he has earned your vote for United States Senator. Mike Mansfield is a credit to Montana, and to the whole United States. He has a record to be proud of. I don't know anyone who has worked harder for the welfare of the people of his State than he has.

He is more responsible than any other man for Hungry Horse Dam, which I am going to dedicate tomorrow, and for a lot of other great projects which are going to make Montana more prosperous and an even better State to live in than it is now.

Mike has worked just as hard for projects in this part of the State as he has for projects in his own district. One of the things he has worked the hardest for is the transmission line from Havre to Shelby. You all know how that fight came out. In spite of the Republican 80th Congress, and in spite of all the mossback Republicans in the House of Representatives and in the Senate, we got that line through.

But Mike has done much more than to represent Montana in Washington. He has represented the United States before the whole world. Last year, I appointed him to the United States delegation to the United Nations. I never made a better choice. In the debates in Paris he stood right up to Russia's Vishinsky and slugged it out with him and beat down a Russian attack on the foreign policy of the United States. That debate won respect for Mike Mansfield all over the world. Mike has always known that communism is dangerous and that we have to take measures to stop it. Governor Stevenson has been the same way. Back in 1945 and 1946 Governor Stevenson carried out some important missions for us in Europe. He saw what the Communists were up to, and while he worked mightily for international cooperation, he was one of the first to warn that the Russians were becoming a threat to peace.

I don't remember that the Republican Party had any such wisdom or foresight. If they had, they didn't tell me about it. Neither did the man who is now the Republican candidate for President. After the war, while he was still the commanding general of our forces in Europe, he said that he saw no reason why Russia and the United States would not remain the closest possible friends.

I am going to quote him: "There is no one thing," he said, "that guides the policy of Russia more today than to keep friendship with the United States." Those are the exact quotes he used before a committee of the Congress in November 1945. Now, my friends, his foresight was not nearly so good as his hindsight is.

You know, when I was going to school, we had an old professor who was interested in teaching us how to make up our minds and make decisions. The lesson was on the history of battles of the War Between the States, and discussion was on the Battle of Gettysburg. And some kid in the class got up and said what Lee should have done and what Meade should have done, and this old professor said, "Now, young man, that's all very fine, but any schoolboy's hindsight is worth a great deal more than all General Lee's and General Meade's foresight."

I can say the same thing about Ike. His hindsight may be extra good, but his foresight isn't any better than anybody else's.

Of course, we can all make mistakes, but the Republican candidate was then commanding general in Europe, and he was in close contact with the Russians. His advice carried great weight and it therefore did a great deal of harm. Perhaps if he had given us better advice in 1945, we wouldn't have had so much trouble in waking up the country to the danger of Communist imperialism in 1946, 1947, and 1948.

It is true that we were all trying immediately after the war to find a means for living with the Russians on a peaceful basis. I don't blame the Republican candidate for his part in that. But he ought to be honest enough to admit that he made "blunders" the same as everybody else did, and admit them frankly and freely; and also admit that he was perfectly willing to get on the bandwagon on my policy in trying to meet the situation.

I get very tired of all the Republican speeches and all their propaganda saying that the Republican Party has been out in front against the danger of communism. That just isn't so. If they were out in front, I couldn't see them, and I was right at the head of the army.

The Republican Party was asleep at the switch when the Communists first began to threaten our security in Europe and in Asia. It took all I could do, and all the Democrats could do, with the assistance of Senator Vandenberg and a few intelligent Republicans, to wake the Republican Party up to the necessity of taking sufficient measures against communism. The Old Guard Republicans in Congress were the leaders in the clamor for demobilizing our Armed forces after the close of the war.

Through all of 1946 and 1947 and 1948 they were dragging their feet. They were voting to cut military and economic aid to our foreign allies. And as recently as last summer, they were voting to cut appropriations which we need to make our defenses strong.

The Republican Party is just as backward in foreign policy as it is on domestic policy. And that's saying a lot. It is just as careless about our national security as about our national welfare.

This year, however, they have unlimited supplies of money and they are trying to flood the country with propaganda to make you think the Republican Party stands for national defense and national security--and that the Democratic Party doesn't. It is a complete distortion of the facts. Worse than that, it is a trap, and I want to tell you exactly what I mean by that. I will have to go back a little bit in history.

The basic issue between the Republican Party and the Democratic Party is the same today as it has always been. It is the issue between liberal policies and reactionary policies.

It is the issue between the party which believes the people come first--the Democratic Party--that wants to help the people in their daily lives; and the party that believes that big business comes first--the Republican Party--that wants to help the special privilege groups at the expense of all the people.

That was the issue I explained to you in 1948. The Democratic Party went before the people in 1948 with a liberal program. We explained what we wanted to do for the people. And after we were elected, we went ahead to do those things for the people.

In the 81st Congress we had a good solid Democratic majority and we set out to do the things we had promised. We expanded Social security, and we improved the minimum wage law. We improved health and housing measures, and we went ahead with our progressive farm policies. Most important of all, we stopped this Nation from sliding into a recession in 1949. We kept prosperity. For the first time in history, we did not have a postwar depression.

At the same time, we were fighting against the threat of communism. We were building up the nations of Europe and Asia against the Communist threat. We were working out firm alliances and firm defenses to hold the Communists in check.

All this time, the Republicans were following a policy of obstruction. They were trying to sabotage our great development projects like the ones you have here in Montana. They were trying to weaken our farm price support program. They were trying to keep us from improving social security and protecting the rights of labor. They were trying to block everything the majority of the people voted for in 1948.

In 1950 the Republicans saw their big chance. It was in that year that the Communists launched their brutal invasion of Korea. We moved in to stop it, for the sake of our own national security and to preserve the freedom of the world. We knew we could not wait while the attack spread and dragged the whole world into a war--a war which would be atomic this time, with the bombs falling on America. So we moved in and stopped the Communists in Korea.

This cost us money and effort, and worst of all, the lives of many of our finest young men. But it checked the plans of the Communists and the Kremlin for world conquest, and blocked their conspiracy against this country. The sacrifices of our men in Korea have protected this country against one of the gravest dangers that ever threatened it.

The Republicans decided, however, that regardless of the threat to our country, they could make a lot of votes out of the hardships and the losses of our action in Korea and its cost to us. They went around the country trying to spread alarm and panic, misrepresenting the facts and stirring up resentment. And they succeeded in frightening a lot of timid people.

They elected more Republicans to the 82d Congress in November 1950 than there were in the 81st Congress. They did not obtain control of the 82d Congress but they got enough Republicans in there to block progress. That was what they wanted most. Their increased voting strength in Congress enabled them, with the aid of a few Democrats, to succeed in their obstructionist efforts. They were able to block further progress in such fields as better health and better housing. They tried to undermine the protections we had set up for the average citizen in this time of defense mobilization. They weakened our controls over prices, pushing the cost of living up. They tried to do away with rent control.

They worked to leave big loopholes in the tax laws so the rich could make more money. They tried to put the burden of the defense program on the little fellow, instead of making each man carry his fair share in accordance with his ability to pay.

Now, in this election year, they believe that they have a chance to finish the job. If they can elect a Republican President and a Republican Congress, they will finally have the average citizen at the mercy of the special interests and that's exactly what they want. And they believe that they can win this election by stepping up their campaign of misrepresentation, distrust, fear, and panic that they started in 1950.

So they are going around the country again, and they are wringing their hands and they say our foreign policy is a failure, saying that our defense of Korea is useless, saying that our defenses are either unnecessary or too expensive, saying that your Government is corrupt and incompetent and disloyal. They are engaging in the greatest smear campaign this year that we have ever seen in American politics. And I have been in American politics 40 years and I have been through some tough, rough campaigns; but I have never yet faced a campaign that the other side based on lies and slander. And before I get through, they will wish they hadn't done so.

Now, what is the purpose of all this? Is it to give us better defenses? Certainly not. They have been voting to hold down our defense effort.

Is it to give us stronger allies in the fight against communism? It most certainly is not. They have been voting against measures to make our allies stronger ever since I started to help to make them stronger.

Is it to give us a better and stronger foreign policy? It most certainly is not. They haven't had a single constructive idea about foreign policy since Senator Vandenberg died.

Is it to give us stronger internal defenses against the Communists? No, it certainly is not. We were engaged in crushing the Communist conspiracy in this country long before the Republican orators tried to make votes out of it.

Is it the purpose of the Republican smear campaign to give us a cleaner, more efficient government? Obviously not. They have been voting for tax loopholes, for special favors to big business, and against most of the reorganization plans I have sent to the Congress to make our Government cleaner and better.

I wish you would read the record on that. I have sent more reorganization plans to the Congress than all the rest of the Presidents put together. I have had reorganization plan after reorganization plan knocked out by the Republicans and a few renegade Democrats.

No, my friends, the real reason for this Republican attack, for this campaign of fear and distrust, is that they want to take your Government away from you. They want to scare you and fool you into voting for them, so that they can again control the United States as they did in 1932. They want to get back in power and get their hands into our resources and the development of this country. They want to get back in power so they can make this country the happy hunting ground that it was for the millionaires, so that the farmer and the workingman can be left out in the cold again, like they were back in the twenties and the early thirties.

My friends, that is their objective, and that is what I want to explain to you as I go along on this trip through this great and wonderful country of ours. I want to explain to you, just as I did in 1948, that your interests are in danger. And I want to ask you now, as I did then, to vote for yourselves, to look at the welfare of this Nation as a whole, to look at our position as the greatest leader of the world in the history of the world, to do what is necessary to keep the peace in the world, which I have been fighting for for 7 years.

And if you go to the polls in November and vote the Democratic ticket, you will vote to keep this country safe for another 4 years.

[6.] TIBER DAM, MONTANA (Address at the dam site, 2:20 p.m., see Item 269)

[7.] SHELBY, MONTANA (Rear platform, 4:25 p.m.)

I certainly do appreciate this most cordial reception. I want to say to you that Montana has been exceedingly cordial to me today. In fact, there have been more people out to see me when I am not running for office than were out to see me when I was. I don't know whether that has any significance or not.

I am certainly enjoying this trip through Montana and I am sure you all know why I am here. I am campaigning for the Democratic ticket. That is one of my full-time jobs as President, to act as the leader of his party. I have really enjoyed seeing the good Democrats who are running for election here in Montana. I have had a most pleasant day with your great Governor, John Bonnet, and I hope you will send him back as Governor of Montana, and I am sure you will, because he has done a good job. Your candidate for Congress is a wonderful man. I have become very well acquainted with him on the train here today, and I feel sure that if you send him to Congress for this district, you will have service instead of promises.

Mike Mansfield is one of the ablest men in the Congress, and I am sure you are going to send him to the Senate, and if you do, with Mike Mansfield and Jim Murray as your representatives in the Senate, Montana will be one of the best-represented States in that great body.

I am very anxious to have you vote for Adlai Stevenson for President next November, just like you did for me in 1948. Adlai Stevenson has made a great record as Governor of Illinois, and that is the finest kind of training for the office of President.

We have a fine vice-presidential candidate in John Sparkman. He has one of the greatest progressive records in the Congress. He is a grand man. And with Stevenson and Sparkman in the offices of President and Vice President, you will find that the country will continue on the same good road it has been following for the last 4 years.

There is one thing I want to do on this trip and that is to make sure that you people are not fooled by all the false stories the Republicans are spreading around this country. I have taken up a lot of these phony stories since I have been on this trip, but I want to talk to you about one I haven't mentioned up to now. That is the one about how another depression is inevitable.

I am told the Republicans are trying to make people believe the only thing that holds up our economy is the defense effort. They say we wouldn't have prosperity today if it weren't for military spending. They want you to believe everything is as shaky as can be. They want you to believe that everything is as shaky as the Republican platform, and that's about the most shaky thing I know about.

Now let me tell you something. All this talk about a proposed depression is just plain hooey. It isn't so. The prosperity that we are now enjoying is very sound and very healthy. Right now we have a total national production of over $340 billion-this year.

The defense program is taking less--less than one-sixth of our total output. As a matter of fact, if it weren't for the defense effort, we would be even more prosperous than we are now, and not less prosperous. The defense effort is making us hold back on a lot of things we need--things to make our country even greater than it is now.

Let me give you some examples. We need more power--more water on the land. That calls for a lot more dams like Hungry Horse here in the West--and more transmission lines. We need more and better roads all over the country. We need new schools and homes and hospitals and health centers in almost every town in the Nation. We are going to need more food for our growing population--and more consumers of goods of every kind.

Thousands of businesses have plans to bring their factories up to date and expand them to meet these new demands.

Now I was just here awhile ago and turned the first spade of dirt with a ton of dynamite at this Tiber Dam on the Marias River. It is going to bring in 127,000 acres for production, which is an asset to the Nation. It is not a liability. And there are hundreds of things like that that we could do.

As soon as we can ease off on defense, all this civilian work will be there waiting to be done. Maybe defense spending can be cut some day to a lot less than it is now-I hope so, that is what we are all working for--but there are plenty of civilian needs to more than take its place. That means there need be no depression in this country. And there won't be, if you have a government in Washington that understands these things and will help you to start on new production when the right time comes.

The Democratic Party can give you the right kind of government. That is the reason I want you to vote the Democratic ticket. Now that has been proved. We got you out of the great depression 20 years ago, and we kept you out of a depression after World War II. That is the first time in history this country has kept out of a depression after a war.

And I might remind you, Korea had nothing to do with it. We were already well past the danger period and booming along before June 1950.

But the Republicans are quite right to tell you there could be a depression. Yes, there could be a depression--perhaps there will be--if they get control of this country. And I don't want them to have it, because I don't want you to have a depression.

They just don't believe in doing the things we need to keep this country growing. They got us into the last depression 20 years ago, and there is no sign they wouldn't do it again if they had the chance.

Just a few years ago the Republican Congressmen voted almost two to one against the full Employment Act.

Now I wouldn't count on their candidate for President to make them behave. You see, he is a military man. He has been in the Army ever since he was 18 years old. He has been in the habit of saying, "You do this." And it's done. "You do that." And it's done. He doesn't understand that the office of President of the United States is a public relations office, and the President spends most of his time persuading people to do what they ought to do without being persuaded.

A military man hasn't got that kind of disposition, I can tell you that. He doesn't know a single thing about the economy of the country. He has been living an Army life for 40 years, and all the Army knows-and I spent some time in the Army, and I know what they think--all the Army knows is how much can we get to spend.

And anyway, he has surrendered, lock, stock, and barrel to the Republican reactionaries--Taft and all the rest, and they have got him well under control.

I can't think of a worse combination than an uninformed military man fronting for the big lobbies--which really run the Republican Party. And before I get through with this trip, I will take them one at a time and prove it to you--that they run the Republican Party all the time, from the China lobby to the lobby on oil.

That kind of combination can lead us down the road to ruin--and in all probability would.

My friends, you are not helpless in this situation. You can protect yourself if you want to. And the way to do that is just to keep those Republicans out of office, and you will be all right.

Think of your own interests, and vote for yourselves. You are the Government. The people of the United States are the Government of the United States. The power under the Constitution of the United States rests with the people, and when they exercise their rights and vote as they should, they are safe.

Now, it is your duty as a citizen to go to the polls in November and vote for your own interests and for the welfare of this great Nation. And if you do that, the country will be safe for another 4 years.
Thank you very much.

[8.] CUT BANK, MONTANA (Rear platform, 5:30 p.m.)

Well, thank you very much--thank you very much for that wonderful and enthusiastic welcome. You know, I have heard a great deal about this town. There are a great many stories about it, what a wonderful place it is, but they tell me that it is most famous for that wonderful high school choir over there. We have a choir of the same sort in the first Baptist Church in Washington, and I am sure they can't sing as well as this one. I hope I will get an opportunity to hear you sing.

I have an idea that there is a suspicion afloat around somewhere that I am campaigning for the Democratic ticket. Well, that is my privilege. You see, the President of the United States is the head of his party, and the Democratic Party is in control of the Congress and the White House. So it is my privilege to go around and report to the people of the United States just what the Democratic Party has done during the 7 years that I have been President.

And it is the privilege of the Democratic candidate for President, who is now running for that office, to go around and tell you what he proposes to do to continue that situation.

I have been through North Dakota and Montana yesterday and today, and I have had a most pleasant time. I am here to tell you that I didn't have any such crowds when I was trying to get elected. And I am not running for anything. I have had a very pleasant time today with your Governor, the Honorable John Bonner, who has made a great Governor of this great State, and I have deemed it a privilege to be associated with him on this trip across Montana. I was with him many times before, and from what I have heard, he has made you a great Governor, and you ought to put him back.

I have also had a chance to get acquainted with Mr. Fraser, who is running for the Congress in the eastern district of Montana, which they tell me is the biggest district in area in the whole United States--covers more territory, nearly, than the State of Missouri. And that's saying a lot. I don't admit that anything covers more territory than the State of Missouri, not at the present time, at any rate. But I hope you will send Mr. Fraser to Congress, because I think it will be to your interests to do it. You need a Democratic Congressman here to help you get some things that you ought to have had a long time ago. If you had a Congressman like Mike Mansfield--and they tell me Willard Fraser is the same kind of fellow--you would have had a lot of things that you haven't now, I am sure of that.

Of course you are going to send Mike Mansfield to the Senate, and if you do that, you will have two of the best Senators in the Senate of the United States--Mike Mansfield and Jim Murray. It will be an honorable representation for this great State, and a help to the United States Government.

Now then, to cap that off, you must elect a Democratic President for the next 4 years. Adlai Stevenson and John Sparkman are running for President and Vice President. Mr. Stevenson is the best new leader to come along since franklin Roosevelt back in 1932.

Like Roosevelt, he has been a fine Governor of one of our greatest States--and he has proved himself to be an able, honest, and efficient administrator.

In this campaign, Governor Stevenson is talking sense to the American people. And that's a lot more than you can say for the Republican candidate, I'll tell you.

For 2 days now I have been telling the people some plain facts about the issues involved in this election that affect them very personally. That's what I am going to do here today. I am going to talk about the subject of health--your health--the medical care you need, and the doctors' bills you have to pay.

First, I want to read you something that was said by a woman many of you may know--Mildred K. Stoltz of Sunburst, Montana.

She went to Minneapolis a few weeks ago to testify before the President's Commission on the Health Needs of the Nation, and this is what she said: "Thousands of families pray daily that they may go through life without any of the major calamities of sickness, accidents, and untimely deaths happening to them. They are so vulnerable, they are so unprepared, that a major accident will wipe out the savings they have accumulated over long years of work."

Now this is a copy of that hearing that was held in Minneapolis, an exact transcript of what I have been quoting to you. And it's printed at Minneapolis, Minnesota, on September 2d, 1952, and it's available so you can see that the quotes I am making from it are the exact truth. And they fit the situation, because I am told that this lady knows what she is talking about.

Those words express exactly what the problem is, not only in Montana but in most parts of the country. Now, the question is, what are we going to do about it?

Ever since I took office, the Democratic administration has been trying to get something done about it. And nobody has worked harder in the cause than your own Jim Murray. I want to tell you it has been a battle every step of the way. We have had to fight the pullbacks and the mossbacks, and all the other kinds of "backs," and all the people who are against any kind of progress at all.

But we have made some progress in spite of them. For one thing, we have started a program of Federal aid to help build hospitals. That's how you got your own hospital here in Cut Bank. And I want you to know that I am mighty glad you have it.

And another thing that has been done is to add an Indian wing to the State Tuberculosis Hospital at Galena, Montana. Mike Mansfield got a bill through Congress for that purpose. You know, Mike works hard for the Indians just like he does for all the people of Montana.

Under the Mansfield bill, the Federal Government appropriated $1 ½ million to build that wing on the State hospital. Then Montana, under a Democratic State administration, matched those funds, and this addition to the Galena hospital is now completed and in operation. It is a credit to the great State of Montana.

That just shows you that the Democratic Party is interested in looking after the health and welfare of the American people.

But we could have done a lot more than we have done to improve the health of the people of the United States. Now, who stopped us? Why the Republicans in Congress, of course--the same crowd that is always against every progressive measure that is in the interest of the people.

Let me tell you something about their record. They say in their platform that they are for aid to hospitals and medical research and improved health services, but their voting record proves just the opposite. They talk one way, and they act another.

Now let me give you some examples. In 1947 the Senate Republicans voted better than 4 to 1 to cut down our research on cancer.

In 1950, 58 percent of the Republican Congressmen voted against expanding our hospital program. In 1951 the Republican Senators voted 9 to 1 to block Federal help to train more doctors. And that same year they voted 4 to 1 against badly needed help for State and local public health units.

Then when I asked for an insurance program along the lines of social security, to help you save to pay those doctor bills, the Republicans made a political football out of the whole thing. They put on the biggest smear campaign you ever saw.

Now, do you want to trust your welfare to a crowd with a record like that? I don't think you do.

You had better not expect any help from the Republican candidate for President. He is even worse than the Republicans in Congress. He issued a statement the other day that is supposed to tell where he stands on health matters. And if it means what it says, it's the most reactionary document I ever saw.

In his statement, the Republican general did not seem to know that there was a medical care problem. He did not come out for anything positive except locally administered indigent medical care programs. That means help for charity cases. He didn't say anything about all the other fine things the Government is doing in the field of medicine.

I wonder if the general knows that some of the greatest discoveries in medical history were made by Government doctors, and that millions of lives have been saved as a result? Maybe he never heard of the Public Health Service--or maybe he wants to do away with it. I don't know. Maybe he never heard of the research the Government is doing on cancer and heart disease and mental illness and many others--or maybe he wants to do away with that research.

Maybe he never heard of the Hill-Burton Act that helped you get your hospital here-or maybe he's against hospitals like that. I don't know.

The Republican candidate has a sign on the back of his train that says "Look Ahead Neighbor." But when it comes to meeting the health needs of the people, that sign ought to say "Look Out Neighbor." You can't expect much help from him.

That is true of a lot of other things, too. He is awful free and easy with generalities about the wonderful things he would do, but when it comes to the specific issues, he always follows the line of the special interest lobbies. I know, because I have been fighting those lobbies ever since I went to Washington in 1935.

Now I will tell you another story about this health thing. The American Medical Association had a spasm over it. They collected $25--or tried to from all their members-to go out and make a fight. And they hired a lot of experts in the public relations field to get them a slogan and tell the public what was the matter. And that public outfit decided that maybe "socialized medicine" would be a good slogan, and they got out that socialized medicine thing.

The other day at Philadelphia, before the Hospital Association of the United States, I told the Hospital Association what the facts were and what I was trying to do--which is to help people help themselves. And the American Medical Association folded up its socialized medicine outfit, and the head of it joined the Republican Party to see if he couldn't keep health from being an issue in this campaign.

Well, they can't, for I am going to make it an issue.

My advice to you is, don't take a chance on a fellow who doesn't know any more about the interior workings of the civil government of the United States than does that great General Eisenhower. And I am very fond of him. I like him as a general, but I am sure I am not going to like him for President of the United States.

And I want you to give that matter a great deal of thought--a great deal of thought-because your interests are at stake. It is you. You are the Government, the people of the United States; because the Constitution says the power shall be lodged in the people, and the people have the right to exercise that power in the selection of their public servants, from the county, the State, the Nation. And if you use good judgment you will always have good judgment. But if you don't, you are liable to get something you will be sorry for.

I can tell you something that you can do next November. You can look out for your own interests, you can look out for the welfare of this great Nation, you can look out for the peace of the world, as you go to the polls and vote the Democratic ticket, and then the country will be safe for another 4 years.

You have had experience with this situation. Help yourselves. Help the Nation. Vote the Democratic ticket, and let us have 4 more years of safety and good government.
Thank you very much.

[9.] BELTON, MONTANA (Rear platform, 8:40 p.m.)

I appreciate very much the cordiality of this. welcome tonight. I have had the same sort of welcome all the way across the great State of Montana. I came out this morning-after having been at Wolf Point the night before at 10:30, and I thought everybody in eastern Montana was there at that time--but I got up this morning at 7 to leave town and there were more of them at 7 than there were at 10:30 last night. So you can't help but feel the welcome when a State treats you like that when you come in.

All the way across the State it has been the same way. I told some of them that they were coming out in greater numbers than they did when I was running for office, so I feel highly complimented since I am not running for office.

This is beautiful country. I have enjoyed seeing it very much indeed, and I am only sorry that it gets dark so soon. You should have arranged it so that the sun shines all night in this beautiful country, especially this time of year.

I am sorry that I won't have a chance to see anything of Glacier Park. I believe it is one of the grandest sights in this whole country. And I certainly do enjoy touring around these wonderful parks of ours--and seeing what a good job those rangers do. Maybe I can come out here and go through the park next summer. I'll have a lot more time and leisure, I hope, at that time; and I won't have so many people interested in what I am going to do or what I am going to say.

You see, I am rather a busy person right now, working at one of my five jobs. I am trying to do my share to help the Democratic Party win another election. You see, I have been in the political game for a long, long time--40 years or more. I have been in elective public office for 30 years, and that's a long time. I was elected to county offices and State offices, the United States Senate, and then as Vice President, and as President. And I have always had a hard time getting the office I wanted. I never had it, in fact, but after I got it, I never let anybody take it away from me, unless I wanted to give it up voluntarily.

I have been studying government and politics ever since I was a boy in high school, and I have been interested in it. I have been interested in government for what it means, and I came to the conclusion a long, long time ago that the Government of this great Republic of ours is in the hands of the people, that politics is government. And I came to the conclusion that the most honorable profession in the country is politics--and politics in the sense that it is government is, in my opinion, the most honorable job that there is, the most honorable career that a man can have.

I have been traveling all day through this State with the men and women who are candidates for office in Montana, and I have come to the conclusion that you have a wonderful number of candidates on the Democratic ticket, and if I were a citizen of Montana I wouldn't hesitate a minute about sending Governor Bonner back to the Governor's chair. I wouldn't hesitate a moment about electing Mr. Metcalf for Congressman in this district, because I know he will carry on the precedent which Mike Mansfield has set as one of the greatest Congressmen that the Congress has ever had.

You see, Mike is not only a good Congressman for the great State of Montana, but Mike is a statesman. He has an idea of the greatness of this Republic of ours. He knows the foreign policy of your country. In fact, I appointed him as a delegate to the United Nations which met in Paris, and Mike made a great contribution to that meeting, he told Vishinsky where to get off.

I am proud to be campaigning for these Montana candidates for office, and I hope I help them with this trip today. My only object in getting into this campaign is my sincere desire to see the welfare of this great Nation the first object of the people.

Now you are the Government. It is you that says who shall be President, who shall be Vice President, who shall be Governor of Montana, who shall be Senator from Montana, who shall be Congressman from Montana, and who shall fill the other offices that are vacant in this great State in this election year.

If you don't use your judgment and exercise your privilege and prerogative, if you don't have good government, you have nobody to blame but yourself.

I have been in this game, as I told you, a long time, and the people who do the most quarreling about government and the people in it are those who take the least interest in seeing that they get the right kind of government.

I am going to spend the rest of my life after I get out of this job of mine trying to impress upon the young people of this country the fact that they have the greatest Government in the history of the world, they have the greatest country that has ever been on earth, and it is up to them to continue that great Government in the manner in which it has come down to us.

It is the leader of the free nations of the world. Whether we like it or not we are the most powerful free nation in the history of the world. We are the leader of the free nations of Europe. We are the leader of the free nations of the Asiatic countries.

We must, therefore, accept that responsibility and place ourselves in position of leadership--which we have never had to do before. We sometimes think that it would be fine if we could build a fence around ourselves and not accept this responsibility. We can't do that.

Now, to continue that responsibility, we must have a man for President of the United States who understands just exactly what that means. And that is Adlai Stevenson. He has had the experience. He has been the Governor of one of the great States of the Union. He has been a successful Governor, and he has had experience in foreign policy, he has had experience in government in every phase, and I am sure that he will carry on the policies which have made the country great in the last 20 years.

Now there has been a great deal of talk in opposition to him. We have on the other side of the picture a great general who has been nominated by the Republicans to run for President. I am very fond of that great general, but his whole life has been spent as a military man. He has a military mind, which is a very peculiar one. I had to deal with military minds ever since I went to Washington--that has been 18 years--and I think I understand it pretty well. I ran a committee in the Senate and had some very, very strange experiences with the military mind. And that's no reflection on the great general. He was one of our great leaders in World War II. He did a wonderful job as Commanding General of Allied forces in Europe. But that in no way fits him to be President of the United States.

You know, the President of the United States, whether the public knows it or not, is a public relations man. It is his business to get the various branches of the Government-the legislative, the executive and the various departments--in the frame of mind to cooperate, and he spends most of his time talking to 'people trying to persuade them to do what they ought to do without being persuaded.

That is not the habit of a military man. He says, "You do this," and if it isn't done, the fellow gets court-martialed. "You do that," and if it isn't done, the fellow gets court-martialed. But the President can't court-martial anybody. If he does he will find himself out on a limb, and he can't get reelected or do anything that is worthwhile for his country.

I am hoping that you will take a public relations man, a man who understands our form of government and how to use it, and put him in the White House for the next 4 years.

I am asking you to use your prerogative on election day and go to the polls. Study this situation. Get all the information you can get. That is what you are entitled to have. Then make up your mind in your own best interests, and in the best interests of this great Nation of ours, and in the best interests of the free world.

And you can't do anything else, if you study it well enough, but go to the polls on election day in November and vote the Democratic ticket. And if you do that, the country will be safe for another 4 years.

It has been a very great pleasure for me to be in Montana today, and I appreciate it.

NOTE: In the course of his remarks on September 30 the President referred to Representative Mike Mansfield, Democratic candidate for Senator, Senator James E. Murray, Willard E. Fraser, Democratic candidate for Representative, Arnold H. Olsen, State Attorney General, Governor John W. Bonner, and Associate Justice of the State Supreme Court Lee Metcalf, Democratic candidate for Representative, all of Montana, and Senator Styles Bridges of New Hampshire. He also referred to Charles f. Brannan, Secretary of Agriculture, Andrei Y. Vishinsky, Soviet Minister of foreign Affairs, Governor Adlai Stevenson of Illinois, Democratic candidate for President, and Senator John Sparkman of Alabama, Democratic candidate for Vice President.