Senator KENNEDY. Congressman Udall, my friend
and colleague from the House of Representatives, Congressman-to-be Dick
Harless, with whom I served in the House in the end of the 1940's, and
with whom I will serve again in Washington [applause]. Lee Ackerman, the
next Governor of the State of Arizona [applause], my friend and valued
colleague, a distinguished Senator from this State, and from the Nation,
Senator Hayden, ladies and gentlemen [applause], I come here to Arizona
this morning to ask your support in this campaign. [Applause.] I recognize
that the struggle here is not easy. I know that Barry Goldwater sent a
wire [response from the audience] - sent a wire to Nelson Rockefeller that
it was in the bag in Arizona.
It is in the bag for Arizona like it was in
the bag for the New York Yankees. [Applause.] There is no election in the
United States that is in the bag 2 weeks ahead, and our experience this
year in Arizona, a strong Democratic State, is going to prove that Arizona
and the Nation are going Democratic in 1960. [Applause.] There is
no State in the Union that depends more upon men who look to the future.
I spent a year in Arizona. There is no State in the Union, I repeat, that
is committed more to progress by the inevitable laws of nature. This State
would not be here, there would not be a single person now living in this
community, unless men who went before you looked to the future, made it
possible for you to develop the land and the water. Do you believe a Republican
Party committed to no new starts, committed to the present and the past
- how can they build Arizona? How can they build a nation? [Response
from the audience.]
I want to make it clear that anyone here in
Arizona who is satisfied with things as they are, who looks to the world
around them and sees our prestige as the highest it has ever been, if they
accept that view, who believe that the balance of power in the world is
shifting in our direction, who believe that we are meeting our problems
here at home in full measure, that we are planning our lands and water
with vigor - anyone who feels that, anyone who is that happy and contented,
Mr. Nixon is your man. [Response from the audience.] But anyone who
takes the view that I take, that our prestige is not as high as it must
be, that this powerful country of ours must be more powerful, that this
strong country of ours must be stronger - anyone who takes the view that
freedom is not secure, that this country is not secure unless we are building
a strong and vital society, I want their help. I want them to come with
me. [Applause.]
I represent the only national party in the
United States, a party stretching from Arizona to Massachusetts. I run
with a running mate from the State of Texas. We stand in the tradition
of the oldest political party in the United States. I come to a State which
has a majority of Democrats and ask you, "What have the Republicans done
for Arizona?" [Response from the audience.] What have the Republicans
ever done for the Nation compared to the progress to which we are committed,
the kind of progress which Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt provided
in their time which makes it possible now for Arizona to prosper?
[Response from the audience and applause.]
Barry, this election is not in the bag in
Arizona or in the Nation. Your chances in 1964 may still come because we
are going to retire Mr. Nixon to the beauties of California. [Applause.]
If I am elected President of the United States
November 8, I am committed to progress and to a stronger America, strengthening
this country here at home, to providing a vital society here in the United
States and a society which speaks with vigor around the world. I don't
care how many polls taken of our prestige in the world, which show that
it is dropping, which are hidden by the Government in the State Department,
all of us citizens of this country who read the papers, we know the facts
of life. We know that this country is not doing what it must do. We know
that we no longer hold the position in the world as strong as we once did.
Yesterday the papers carried a poll which
had been taken out by someone and released to the press, which showed that
by 1970 a majority of people in the world thought the Soviet Union would
be stronger than we were. Do you realize 30 years ago or 40 years ago the
Soviet Union was the most backward country in Europe? What is happening
to the United States that people around the world begin to believe that
the way of the future is not freedom, is not us, but is our adversary?
I don't want that. I want Mr. Khrushchev to know that a new generation
of Americans has taken over in the United States, a generation of Americans
committed to strength and progress and vigor, one that will speak for freedom
as well as for America, and I ask your help. [Applause.]
You make a choice not merely between Mr. Nixon
and myself, and not merely between our two parties, but you make a choice
between two philosophies. One that looks to the present and the past, and
wishes to return in some in some cases to that happy past, and one that
believes that in the deadly days of 1960 we must look forward, as a people
individually, as States, and as a nation. This State of Arizona depends
upon the wise development of your natural resources, of the effective use
of water. We have dams all around the United States, built as memorials
to the efforts of Franklin Roosevelt and others. We have three words that
are the memorials to this Republican administration: "No new starts." And
how long will Arizona last with no new starts? [Applause.] How much
water are you using than is going back into the ground? How long can Arizona
live off the resources built up over hundreds of thousands of years? How
long before Arizona comes face to face with the reality of the fact that
we are not doing enough today? This State is going to grow and grow. The
Western united States is going to have four times as many as the United
States as a whole. By the year 2000, we are going to have twice as many
people in this country as we do today. Where are they going to live? We
will have three or four times as many in this State. And yet this administration
in the critical years of the 1950's, carried on a policy which gutted our
hopes for developing the orderly resources of the Western United States.
I come from Massachusetts, but it is a source
of pride to me that the two Americans in this century who did more to develop
the resources of the West both came from New York, Theodore Roosevelt and
Franklin Roosevelt. [Applause.] And it is an interesting fact that an administration
headed by two westerners, one born in Texas, the other in California, did
the least. [Applause.]
Now, Mr. Nixon - we brought him along. He
is making progress. I will agree with that. In the last month he has taken
more progressive, forward-looking stands than he has taken in the last
14 years, and I am glad of that. [Laughter and applause.] But the Bible
tells us, "By their fruits you shall know them." In 1951, Mr. Nixon himself
voted to kill the Southwestern Power Administration, which supplies power
for the REA co-ops. It was Mr. Nixon himself in 1951, before he saw the
bright view of the frontiers of America, who voted to kill the central
Arizona project. It was Nixon himself in 1952 who voted to eliminate funds
for road construction to schools and reservations on the Arizona Indian
reservations. This record is clear, and I don't think anyone in the State
of Arizona can go to the polls on Tuesday, November 8, and come to any
conclusion but that the differences are sharp. The Republican Party and
Mr. Nixon have opposed progress for 25 years. I don't know of a single
project in the last 25 years [passing plane]. Dick? See you later in New
Mexico. [Laughter.]
I don't know of a single project - all the
people are down here, Dick. [Laughter.] We don't want Barry to leave
yet. Stay here, Barry. Fight it out. [Laughter and applause.]
Let me make it clear that the kind of thing,
in conclusion, that I think Arizona has to recognize is that we live in
the most changing time in the life of our country. In the 1952 campaign,
there was no discussion of two issues which have become important in the
fifties. One was outer space, and one was the development of fresh water
from salt water. This administration has failed in both of those areas,
and they may well mean, these two areas, outer space, and the securing
of enough water from the ocean to make our lands green, may well mean more
blessings to our people than anything done in this century.
This is the kind of change that is coming
upon us. Africa, Latin America, Asia - all are changing. The world is changing
around us. n 1952, there were very few independent countries in Africa.
Today, 25 percent of all the countries in the United Nations are African.
There were 16 new nations admitted to the United Nations this summer. Do
you know how many voted with us on the admission of Red China? Zero. Do
you know the Soviet Union has 10 times as many broadcasts in Spanish to
Latin America as we do? Do you know that the United States now is fourth
in radio broadcasts? Russia first, Peiping second - do you know who is
third? Radio Cairo. We are fourth. Do you know we brought more foreign
students to the United States 10 years ago by the Government than we do
today? Do you know in Western Germany in 1957 we had more people stationed
in our embassies than in all of Africa? We live in a changing time. We
cannot sit still. We cannot look back. We cannot just stay as we are. We
have to recognize that we are face to face with a dangerous adversary that
is determined to destroy us and freedom, and unless we are prepared to
move, unless we are prepared to lead, unless we are prepared to build a
strong and vital country here in the United States, then our hopes for
freedom in our generation will begin to fade. The balance of power stands
like this: If India should fall, if Africa should fall, if more Castros
should develop in Latin America, what happens to the United States? What
happens to Arizona? What happens to our security? That is the issue of
our times. Can we demonstrate that a free society can move ahead, that
it can speak with power, that it can develop its resources, that it can
provide individual employment for its people, that it can educate its children,
that it can provide security for its older citizens? These are the things
that we must do, and I believe they can be best done by the Democratic
Party. I ask your help in picking this country up. [Applause.] I ask your
help in picking this country of ours up and moving it into the sixties.
Thank you. [Applause.]