Remarks Before Signing Proclamation 3759 "Youth for Natural Beauty and Conservation Year."

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.

Mrs. Johnson and I are very gratified that this representative group of young people could join us here at the ranch and make this report which we think will alert and awaken America. It will be extremely helpful to all of us who want to see not only a better America but a more beautiful land.

One of the great pleasures that we receive out of coming home is to look into our river where we can swim in pure water, where we can see our fish live and thrive free of the pollution of the toxics that are true in so many streams throughout the Nation.

When we met with this group of young people last June, as we frequently meet with young people, we realized that if we were really to succeed in awakening America and getting beautification-conscious, it would be necessary to alert our young people, to get them to put their shoulders to the wheel and get the job moving.

This report indicates that they have done that.

I know what they have pointed up with the mayors, with the Governors, with the other leaders, with the editors of the country, will bear great fruit.

Today I am issuing a proclamation as suggested by them. I will shortly sign it.

I would like to read a very brief part of it so it may be in the record of today's proceedings, and so that these young people can not only see that it is implemented in the various States and carried out, but that the young who come after them may do likewise.

The greatest heritage and tradition our Nation can have is to have had the elders provide for the beauty of their land.

[Reading.] "Last June, young men and women of the National Youth Conference on Natural Beauty and Conservation met in Washington and dedicated themselves:

"--to work toward creating a healthful environment in our cities and towns.

"--to speak out for the appreciation and protection of the beautiful.

"--to clean, to plant, to plan and build for beauty.

"--to plead with others to join them in that effort.

"They made this pledge because their generation will soon inherit an America that threatens to become physically ugly.

"The great industrial progress we have made in this century--resulting in an unparalleled prosperity for most of our people--has not been achieved without waste and blight. That progress grows with each year--and refuse, pollution and decay grow with it.

"It is no part of America's dream that we should erect a house of material well-being in the cheerless atmosphere of physical blight. Our people will be denied their heritage if they must live out their lives among polluted rivers, spoiled fields and forests, and streets where nothing pleases the eye.

"Young people sense this strongly. They have not grown accustomed to ugliness. They have not resigned themselves to living among the litter and neglect of a careless civilization.

"May they never do so.

"But it is not enough to be offended by ugliness. Those who would not live without beauty must join in a tireless effort to bring it into being. They must help to reverse the sorry decline of cities and countryside. They must become a force for restoring order and dignity to the environment that surrounds them. I know that ugliness will yield to such a force, if it is supported by millions of our people, in public and private life.

"And, THEREFORE, I, LYNDON B. JOHNSON, President of the United States of America, do hereby designate the year 1967 to be Youth for Natural Beauty and Conservation Year; and I ask our young people-individually and through clubs, school groups, and other organizations--to observe, to plan, and to act to preserve and protect, salvage and restore, develop and enhance their surroundings.

"I ask the youth organizations which sponsored the National Youth Conference-and all other organizations and individuals working with youth--to expand the natural beauty and conservation activities now under way, and to begin new activities. I expect them to report their accomplishments to me during the year and also their plans for the future.

"I call upon the President's Council on Recreation and Natural Beauty, the Citizens' Advisory Committee on Recreation and Natural Beauty, and all Federal officials and agencies to cooperate, consistent with their authorities and available funds, in providing technical assistance and support to the young people. It is an investment in better environment, and in better citizenship.

"I further call upon all citizens to be alert to the activities and hopes of our young people, to hear their requests, to encourage and assist them, and with them to grow more aware of the beauty of America and the ways in which we can preserve it.

"IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand and cause the Seal of the United States of America to be affixed."