Statement Following the Laying of a Wreath on the Tomb of the Unknowns in Arlington National Cemetery.

FIFTY YEARS ago a soldier known to God alone was returned to America from the foreign land where he fell in defense of freedom. He was buried in Arlington National Cemetery on Armistice Day, November 11, 1921, and his memory consecrated for all time to those who have died that this Nation might live.

That first Unknown was selected by an Army sergeant named Edward F. Younger. Three times Younger circled the caskets, on one of which he would lay a single white rose, and suddenly he stopped in front of one of those caskets. As he is reported to have told it later, "A voice seemed to say: 'This is a pal of yours.'" He laid the rose on that coffin.

Today, Americans come here from all over to stand near one of these Unknowns, and in their hearts a voice says: This is a friend of yours--or, here is your brother or your father or your son.

Though only God can know the names of those who sleep here, we all can know what is most important to the soul of this Nation. We know that these were Americans who answered freedom's call and paid freedom's price.

Their skins may be black or white or red or yellow; they may have been young with their lives before them, or they may have had full lives already; their religions we do not know; the homelands from which their ancestors came we cannot know. In the American ideal, none of these things was essential to the quality of life they were able to seek. In death, the ideal is realized--those who lie here are equal in the sacrifice they made, equal in the contribution they made, equal in the honor we bear them.

Thirteen years ago President Eisenhower came to Arlington to bury Unknowns from the Second World War and Korea. By that time, America knew that the idea of a war to end all wars was in vain. It was clear that what we really need is a peace to end all wars. Such a peace would require as much power and as much perseverance and as much patience and as much courage as any war. We have such power and such courage. We hope that we shall have such a peace.

Soon, another Unknown may come to rest on this hallowed hill. We pray he will be the last. But we will be mindful of what St. Augustine is reputed to have said: "I shall work as if everything depended on me. I shall pray as if everything depended on God."

This Nation intends to do both.