Proclamation 4195—Small Business Week, 1973

In no facet of our national life is the American genius for independence, innovation and self-improvement better displayed than in the small business community.

The instinct to create, sustain and expand an independent enterprise is as old as America herself—an impulse that brought the earliest settlers to our shores and motivated generation after generation of our citizens in their onward, upward march. Nowhere is it more clearly evident today than among our Nation's 8 million small businesses.

In the past year alone, more than 70 thousand new companies were started. Nineteen out of every twenty firms are considered small business, and they provide approximately 35 million jobs, and contribute more than $420 billion to the gross national product.

They also provide a ladder of opportunity to hard working, ambitious Americans of all races and creeds—the chance to harness individual initiative and ability to the mighty potentials of the free enterprise system. As long as America remains true to her heritage, the small businessman will continue as a mainstay of our economy and our society.

Now, Therefore, I, Richard Nixon, President of the United States of America, do hereby designate the week beginning May 13, 1973, as Small Business Week. I ask all Americans to share with me during this week a deep pride in the many accomplishments of our Nation's small businessmen and women, and in the invaluable contribution they have made to our free way of life.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this 12th day of March, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred seventy-three, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred ninety-seventh.

RICHARD NIXON