Statement by the President on the Report "Social and Economic Conditions of Negroes in the United States."

THIS SUMMER, I asked two highly respected Government statistical agencies to draw together the latest and most relevant data concerning the social and economic conditions of Negroes in America--the bad with the good; the disappointing with the encouraging-in a simple format that could be easily understood.

That report, prepared by the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Census Bureau, is now ready and I commend it to all Americans for serious study. As the report indicates, no set of statistics can present a complete picture of all aspects of life. We have not yet learned to measure on a yardstick all the elements that contribute to a sense of equality among people. Yet much can be learned from the evidence at hand.

This report, as I view it, backs up neither of the extreme positions that emerged in the wake of the summer disturbances. It does not confirm the diagnosis of bleakness and despair: that there has been no recent progress for Negroes in America and that violence is therefore a logical remedy. It does not confirm the opposite view: that "Negroes have been given too much."

We know those views to be fruitless. This report shows them to be false as well.

Far from showing "no progress," the picture revealed is one of substantial progress. As the Nation rode a great tide of social and economic prosperity over the past 7 years, Negroes in America not only kept up with the general advance, but in important ways moved ahead of it. In education, in occupations, in income, in housing, most Negroes have made gains over the past few years. Today, for the first time, a substantial number of Negroes in America are moving into the middle class.

But that is only one of the meanings in this data, and taken alone it is of only limited value. The second meaning is grim.

The gap between Negro and white levels of living in America is still large despite progress. What is most troubling is that in many of the worst slum areas of America, life is not getting better for Negroes--it is getting worse.

Any set of data is subject to a wide variety of interpretations, and I am sure that this report will not be an exception. I have formed my own judgment about its deeper meaning.

The Negro progress made over the past 6 years was earned by millions of Negro Americans going to school, getting better jobs, making higher wages--motivated by the same drives for a better tomorrow that motivated white Americans during this period of economic expansion. Government helped by opening doors of opportunity. Our civil rights laws have opened doors to jobs, schools, housing, public accommodations, and voter participation that were once closed to Negroes. Manpower training programs have opened doors for skill improvement. Aid to education is providing better schools with better teachers and better facilities. Medicare and Medicaid and other programs are opening the way to better health.

The American system places a premium on individual enterprise and initiative. The data in this report show again that when people have a chance to better themselves-they will better themselves.

The data show that our job is not ended. Millions of Americans--whites as well as Negroes, children as well as adults, in every region of the Nation--remain unreached by the opportunities of the day.

In the urban areas--large cities particularly-as I have pointed out time and time again, the Nation faces a major problem. Successful Negroes are moving out of the worst slum areas, leaving behind communities that are inhabited largely by the deprived, the unskilled, the handicapped, and new immigrants from the rural South. It makes all the more urgent that the Federal programs for reclaiming these slums be adequately funded. We must put our country first by giving top priority to the problems of our cities. This must be without regard to party or politics.

The data in this report show that people do make progress, great progress, when they have the opportunity to do so. Our job in the coming days and the coming years is to continue and to intensify our efforts to offer people a chance.

Let us get on with the job.