Remarks in Columbus at a Birthday Dinner for Governor DiSalle.

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Coleman:

There is no city in the United States in which I get a warmer welcome and less votes than Columbus, Ohio!

Mr. Coleman, Mr. Justice, reverend clergy, my colleagues in the House of Representatives, my two distinguished former colleagues in the Senate of the United States, Senator Young and Senator Lausche, who have served this State and who have also served the United States ladies and gentlemen :

A hundred years ago, Abraham Lincoln stayed up all one night in a telegraphic office, watching the results of an essential gubernatorial contest in this State, in the darkest days of the Civil War. And at the end of the night when the Unionist candidate who supported Lincoln's policies had finally emerged the victor, Lincoln wired, "Glory to God in the highest, Ohio has saved the Nation."

Two years ago yesterday, when Governor DiSalle was kind enough to endorse my candidacy, I had somewhat similar sentiments about Ohio.

Last year I felt that maybe Ohio had lost the Union, but I believe now--1962--in the State of Ohio, that this State is going to elect a Democratic Governor, is going to elect in the person of Senator Lausche a Democratic Senator, and will elect Democratic Congressmen who stand for progress in Ohio and the Nation.

I think that this is a most important occasion. The President of the United States, as Harry Truman has pointed out on many occasions, wears many hats, and one of them is the hat of the leader of his party. A political party is not an end in itself. It is a means to an end. Woodrow Wilson said, after his great victory in 1912, "What good is the success of a political party unless that party is being used by the Nation for a great purpose?"

And it is my conviction that here in this State and in the United States at large, the Democratic Party has been used by the people for a great state and national purpose.

I come here on the birthday of Governor DiSalle. He has rendered singular service-before he became the Governor of this State--to the people of Ohio, in a number of high positions. He has rendered service to the people of the State of Ohio. He is a distinguished Governor, and to every position which he has held, he has brought integrity, a sense of community with the people, and a recognition that no city, no State, and no country can afford to stand still, but must move forward. So I am delighted to come here tonight.

The work that he has done in one field alone, in mental retardation, is indicative of his concern--which must be the concern of us all.

Two months ago, I had two young girls come into my office, two sisters--both of them had suffered from mental retardation. One had been discovered--the second one-because of the advance of science, and by changing her diet that young lady will live a normal, healthful, and useful life. And her sister will be sick from now on. That is what?--a change of 2 years in the advance of science.

People who say that all the things that had to be done were done in the administrations of Harry Truman or Franklin Roosevelt or Woodrow Wilson are wrong. We in our time, in this State and country, face problems entirely different, but equally important. How glad all of us would be if in the next 5 years it is possible for the more than 5 million children who suffered at one time or another in their lives from this affliction to be cured, as we have cured so many other diseases.

These are the things which interest our party. They interest the American people. Their responsibilities are upon us. Governor DiSalle has recognized them, and what he has tried to do in the State of Ohio, we are trying to do in the United States of America.

We have not done everything that we thought should be done in the campaign of. 1960, but we have done many things. In the last 12 months the economy of the United States moved ahead by 10 percent, over $40 billion. Agriculture in this country has had the highest income it has had since Korea. The United States, at last, is making a determined effort in the field of space, where our neglect in other years cost us more in prestige than any failure since 1945.

This country is committed to progress. This administration is committed to progress, and I can assure you that in the Congress of the United States--this year--we are going to add programs which will serve our people. You may say, and some do, that everything should be left alone. I read where the Ohio scholarship fund reported last year that more than 41,000 of the 78,000 high school graduates were academically prepared for college, a record which few other States can duplicate, and yet nearly 4,100 of these young boys and girls were unable to go to college because they could not afford it.

It costs now $1,650 to put a student in college for a year, and yet half the families of the United States have incomes of less than $5,000 a year.

In 1970 there will be twice as many boys and girls trying to get into the colleges and universities of this State, and every other State, as in 1960. Is this something that we should turn our backs on?

I believe that it is essential that we recognize in the State and in the National Government our obligation to make it possible for any young man or woman of talent and motivation to secure an education and advance their life and interest. And we propose to help them do it.

American families worry not only about educating their children, they also worry about how they are going to care for their parents, and that is why we are going to send again to the Congress of the United States--and I believe the Congress of the United States will enact this legislation, which will permit older people to pay for their medical bills under a system of social security.

Medical costs are high enough, but their parents have longer illnesses, they spend two or three times as long in the hospital, they see physicians half again as much as people under 65, and the result is a medical bill twice as high, which falls in many cases on a mother and father who at the same time are attempting to educate their children. The parents cannot pay these bills. Three-fourths of our older people have incomes of less than $2,000 a year. Only one-half of them have any kind of hospital insurance, and I believe that this represents an opportunity to permit them through the Social Security System--which was once opposed in the thirties, but which is now a blessing--to participate in providing for their own security when they are older.

So all those who say that there is nothing left to be done, that we should rest on our oars, that the function of the national administration and Government is to sit and lie at anchor, are wholly wrong. And we do not propose to follow their advice.

We face a difficult and hazardous future, but one which I believe is bright with opportunity. All of the predictions which the Communists made with such assurance years ago, very few of them have come to fruition. They prophesied that the Western World would break asunder, and yet the Western World sees the greatest impetus towards unity of the Atlantic Community that it has had in its history. They prophesied that the Communist world would be a great bloc, and yet in the last 18 months to 2 years, we have seen the beginning of the fragmentation of the Communist empire--and East Germany and Poland and Hungary are kept in it by force--and Albania and Yugoslavia and China and the others begin to move away. So those who see only hazard and do not recognize that on the other side of the coin is opportunity are wrong.

I believe that the future can be bright for us. I believe that this administration has recognized that to the south, to the east, to the west, and above us, there are many things still left undone. From 1945 to 1960 the United States of America gave more assistance to Yugoslavia than it did to all of Latin America combined. This was the forgotten area. It was difficult for public officials of the United States Government to travel with safety in many parts of our own Hemisphere. I believe a change has come about, and I believe the people of this Hemisphere recognize an identity of interest, that freedom is the handmaiden of abundance, and that through working together in the days to come this Hemisphere can set an example to a watching world.

So I come to Ohio a year later, and I come to express my regard for your distinguished Governor and the Members of Congress who have assisted on many occasions in advancing the interests of this State and country.

And I want to commit myself to you, as I did to them, to the progress of this country.

On the back of your program there is a picture of the Seal of the State of Ohio. You will see that there is a sun low on the horizon. It is my judgment that that is not a setting sun but a rising sun, because as the State of Ohio says in its great Seal, "With God all things are possible."

Thank you.