Remarks Upon Arrival at the Airport, Ohakea, New Zealand

Mr. Prime Minister, Mrs. Holyoake, Mr. Meech, Mr. White, my friends of New Zealand:

This is my second visit to New Zealand, and they recognized both times that I was a rancher from a drought-stricken part of Texas.

Six days ago I paid a running political visit to Staten Island, a borough of New York City. That is almost 10,000 miles from where we are today--which is almost as far from any place as anyone can get.

And yet, our closeness is greater than our distance.

Staten island in New York City was named by Dutch colonizers at a time when New York City was still known as Nieuw Amsterdam. And New Zealand, 324 years ago, was also called "Staten Land" by the explorer Tasman who first sighted the peaks of your green land.

Apparently Captain Tasman's sponsor-the Netherlands East Indies Company-felt that "Staten Land" wasn't quite grand enough a name. So it came to be that your nation, with 223 mountains thrusting 7,500 feet or higher, was then called "Nieuw Zealand," named after a Dutch province that is flatter than a fried herring.

The Dutch experience in both New Zealand and in New York gave way to English settlers. Ever since we have been cultural, if not terrestrial, neighbors. We have shared a common human philosophy that men can grow to their own limits. And we have noted that those human limits are quite vast.

When I first came to New Zealand, it was about a quarter of a century ago, and my country and your country were then allied in a major war at a grim moment in history.

As I came across Auckland Bay in a sputtering PB2Y2, I saw your beautiful land and I wished to myself that I might be able to return at a more tranquil moment.

Tranquility, as I have since learned, is not an easy commodity to come by. Our times today cannot be called tranquil times. Yet, should we compare our common condition this afternoon with our common condition in 1942, I can only conclude that we-and the world--have seen great progress.

We are allied in a grim, if smaller, conflict now. At the deepest roots of that conflict is the threat--the threat to what we hold dearest in the United States and New Zealand: the ability of people to grow in freedom.

New Zealanders have done that. Your accomplishments are great. Yours is one nation to which less developed Asian-Pacific peoples look for inspiration and guidance.

My Nation is anxious to work with you in providing that help.

Our task for the future in New Zealand, in the United States--yes, all over the world--is a difficult but inspiring one. And that is to allow people, and allow nations, to grow to their own vast limits in freedom.

I want to thank you for coming here in this rainy weather, exposing yourselves to the weather, to give us this neighborly welcome.

I have told Mrs. Johnson many, many times of the delightful experience that I had here and the hospitality that your people extended to me.

I remember the first thing I did after I landed in Auckland Bay was to go and buy myself a raincoat.

So I went back before I left the United States and got one that I had worn several years ago--it is a little short now, but I knew I would need it in New Zealand.

If you will be good enough, I hope that you will wish me on my return to have the same kind of rainy reception at my home ranch in Texas as I am getting here today.

Mrs. Johnson has come with me and she will get to see you, to know you, to see your boys and girls, your families. She will be able, in the years to come, to share with me the beauty and, most of all, the kindness and the integrity of the great people that make up New Zealand.

We are so delighted to be in your country today.