Remarks at a Dinner Honoring William Boyle, New Chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

Mr. Vice President, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Attorney General:

You know, it is a great thing to have the chairman of the National Democratic Committee from the suburb of my hometown. It is a great thing to have the Vice President of the United States interested in the spirit of St. Louis at the other end of the State, and it is a magnificent thing to have the new Attorney General from that great State of Rhode Island, which has produced so many great men.

I am overwhelmed at the way the situation has worked out. I don't think the Democratic Party, in the history of the Nation, has ever been in better condition to carry the battle to the foe.

Our platform at Philadelphia was specific. It was explained by the then National Chairman Howard McGrath, by the Vice President, and by me--and by all the workers in the trenches. It was explained in words of one syllable, written so that everybody understood the things for which we stood.

The Republicans and the opposition press were so thoroughly depressed at what happened to them on November 2d last that they have carried on a continuous filibuster in the House and Senate of the United States, in an effort to defeat the platform that the people wanted carried out.

They will not succeed!

That platform is in the interests of the people. The Democratic Party is the party of the people. The Democratic Party is a national party, and not a sectional party any more. The tail no longer wags the dog. We won the election last November without New York, without the industrial East, and without the solid South. And I am prouder of that than anything that has ever happened to me.

And that doesn't mean that we are not inviting the industrial East, and the solid South, and all the rest of the country to join the party of the people, and help the country go forward. That is exactly what we want, and that is exactly what we are going to accomplish in the next 2 years.

We have brought in a number of able and distinguished young Congressmen, a number of able and distinguished young Senators, and new Senators; and next year we will bring in a large number of new Congressmen and new Senators, and we will carry out that platform, don't think we won't!

I am as happy as I can be, of course, that my lifetime friend--I have known him ever since he was a kid--I knew his mother before him, and she was one of the best Democrats that Missouri ever produced--is the National Chairman of the Democratic Party. He succeeds a great National Chairman. I thought he was a great National Chairman because I made him Attorney General of the United States, the supreme law officer of the land. And I put his predecessor on the greatest court in the world. Tom Clark was an able and distinguished Attorney General, and he will make a great and distinguished justice on the greatest court in the country.

There are many "I's" in this, but I am taking the credit for all these maneuvers. They will help the Democratic Party, and I am not ashamed of a single one of them. And I am here to tell you people, who are the backbone of the Democratic Party, that the National Democratic Party is the nucleus and the organization of the Democratic Party, and we are going forward with this great National Democratic Committee, and this leadership, which we have here today.

I can't tell you how much I appreciate your asking me to come over here tonight. If you hadn't asked me, I would have come anyway. It is a privilege and a pleasure, you know, to meet with your friends, and to discuss with them the things in which they are interested. And when we have a Vice President, such as we have, who is telling the country--all the great cities in the country, including St. Louis--what the Democratic Party stands for, we can't help but go forward.

We are represented here from every section of this great United States, and I invite all those people who are interested in the welfare of this great Republic of ours, who are interested in the peace of the world, for which we are striving, to get into the Democratic Party and help us go forward with it.

Thank you very much.