Lyndon B. Johnson photo

Remarks of Welcome at the White House to President Saragat of Italy

September 18, 1967

Mr. President, Mr. Foreign Minister, distinguished ladies and gentlemen:

I am honored to extend America's warm welcome to our friends from Italy.

We know President Saragat as the leader of a very great and venerated nation. We know him also as a patriot who fought for freedom, who knew the bitterness of exile, and who now leads a free people to new prosperity.

As we speak here today on the White House lawn, we are being seen and heard by the good people of Italy, by means of communications satellite and a new station at Fucino.

So I have the chance, Mr. President, not only to address our welcome to you, but also to speak to your people.

I want them to know of our affection and our esteem for Italy. Italy has enriched America beyond measure; and it has earned a debt beyond repayment.

A country is no more than its people, and America has been blessed with millions of families who trace their ancestry back to Italy. They have given color, force, and vitality to our American character.

Our people are united both in blood, and by a love of beauty. The genius of your people has made Italian art and literature, music, science, and architecture a treasure of our Western civilization.

Last year, when the floods came to Florence, it was not only Italy that felt the shock of loss; it was the entire world. It was not only the people of Italy who responded; it was the people of the world. I am very proud that so many Americans played a part in helping to repair and to restore those works of man's spirit.

Because we love Italy, Americans rejoice in your country's unprecedented prosperity, and the well-being it is bringing to your people. The remarkable recovery that has marked your economy in the past few years has established Italy as a strong partner in the European community. It gives convincing evidence of the energy and the skills that are characteristic of the Italian people.

The interest our two peoples have in each other is very real. Last year, 613,000 Americans toured Italy, and nearly 45,000 Italians visited America. I hope thousands more Italians will come to visit us in America. Each visit, by each person, is still another bond between us. Whether we meet as heads of state, or just as vacationing tourists, we have much to learn from each other.

For the past two decades, our nations have been joined in an intimate partnership and alliance. And you, Mr. President, were among the first to recognize the necessity of that partnership. You have always been its advocate and its champion.

You have been, in the words of Dante "... like a firm tower that never sways from the blowing of the winds."

An Italian led the way to the New World. And so has modern Italy led in the rebuilding of the old.

So, Mr. President, it is with great pleasure that Mrs. Johnson, I, and other members of our official family, welcome you here to the White House this afternoon.

We know that our talks will be most pleasant and most rewarding.

Thank you for having come.

Note: The President spoke at 5:06 p.m. on the South Lawn at the White House where President Giuseppe Saragat and Foreign Minister Amintore Fanfani were given a formal welcome with full military honors. President Saragat responded as follows:

Mr. President:

I sincerely thank you for the courteous words with which you have welcomed us, and I am happy to extend to you, and to the great Nation that you guide, the greeting of Italy.

The Italian people look to the United States as a friend and ally, to which they are bound by many common ties of civilization, a long-standing tradition of intense political, cultural, and economic relations, and by an ardent faith in the great ideals of liberty and human dignity.

These ties, this tradition, and this faith constitute the foundations on which the solid edifice of friendship between our two nations has been built, a friendship which, while having its roots in the distant past, has always been renewing itself and which is, today more than ever, alive, vigorous, and rich in benefits for our people, furthering freedom, security, and peace for all and being therefore an element of progress for mankind as a whole.

Great men in the history of our countries--men who have left an important imprint in all fields of human civilization--have taken part and are now taking part in the construction of this edifice of friendship. But foremost in my thoughts is the landing in this free country of millions of Italians who have found here a home and work, bringing with them the contribution of their untiring ingenuity.

They are proud to be citizens of the free American Republic, as they are of their Italian heritage. They constitute a powerful bond of friendship between two peoples who have been brought close together by common ideals, historical events, and technological progress. I have mentioned technological progress also because, as you yourself have recalled, an American satellite and several very modern installations built in Italy are permitting Italians and Americans to see and hear us at this very moment on both sides of the Atlantic.

The invitation that you, Mr. President, have kindly extended to me confirms the friendship which links our two countries, a friendship not only of governments, but also--which is more important--of peoples. In this way we are offered the possibility of having an open and frank exchange of views which will include the problems of common and direct interest as well as the more general problems whose solution is daily becoming more urgent and more necessary if mankind is to enjoy-as we fervidly wish--the benefits of peace, of justice and liberty for which it is striving to the utmost.

Mr. President, I am very grateful to you for having offered me the opportunity to return once again to the hospitable soil of America. I am sure that I shall be able to look again at the gratifying reality of the friendly relations that bind our two countries, and to contribute, with you, to their further strengthening.

Lyndon B. Johnson, Remarks of Welcome at the White House to President Saragat of Italy Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/237677

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