Deputy Attorney General Kleindienst, Director Hoover, Members of the House, Members of the Senate, and our very distinguished guests this morning:
This is a very special ceremony that I am always very honored to participate in, in which we have the privilege of making the awards for bravery and service for young Americans.
These awards were set up by the Congress 20 years ago, and I think that all of you would be interested in knowing how the four that have been selected for the top awards today were chosen.
The Governors of the 50 States, out of each State, selects the young people in his State that he believes should qualify for this award, either for bravery or for service, and then at the very highest level within the Justice Department there are selected the top four, two for bravery and two for service.
When we think of these young people, as the citations will be read by the Deputy Attorney General, we realize how fortunate we are in this Nation to have such outstanding young people in America because they are the leaders of America in the future.
We hear too much these days about the very small minority of young Americans who have lost faith in their country. We hear too little about the great majority of young Americans, young Americans who display courage in their daily lives, who are willing to sacrifice in order to save the lives of others and young Americans who are motivated by idealism, who want to do something to make this Nation, their communities, their States better for themselves, but more important, better for other people.
It is in that tradition that these awards have been made for the past 20 years, and, as you hear the citations, I am sure you will be just as proud as I am of these four fine young Americans who represent the very best in American youth.
Mr. Kleindienst.
[Deputy Attorney General Richard G. Kleindienst read the citations. The President then resumed speaking.]
Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes the ceremony. And I understand that arrangements have been made for you to have a tour of the White House, as well as the other Capital facilities. We want to thank you again for coming and hope you have a very fine visit here, that your plane rides back are just as smooth as the ones coming down.
Thank you.
Note: The President spoke at 10:35 a.m. in the Blue Room at the White House.
J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, was a member of the Young American Medals Committee.
The President presented gold medals for bravery in 1968 to the parents of John N. Caruso, Jr., of John's Island, S.C., who lost his life in saving the life of a 10-year-old boy, and to Thomas Dvorscek, 17, of Oak Lawn, Ill., who rescued a 10-year-old girl who had fallen through ice into a small pond; and gold medals for service to Maxine Susan Lazovick, 20, of Bridgeport, Conn., who assisted in local fund-raising drives and did volunteer work with mentally retarded and crippled children, and to Debra Jean Sweet, 19, of Madison, Wis., who helped organize a 30-mile march by 3,000 high school students to raise funds for the poor and worked to improve race relations in the inner city.
An announcement, released by the White House on the same day, containing information on the awards and summaries of the winners' accomplishments is printed in the Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents (vol. 6, p. 1619).
Richard Nixon, Remarks on Presenting the Young American Medals. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/240618
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