Rear Platform and Other Informal Remarks in California

[1.] ROSEVILLE, CALIFORNIA (Rear platform, 9:35 a.m.)

Mr. Mayor, this certainly is a cordial welcome, and I appreciate it more than I can tell you. I have been having a beautiful ride through this western country in the last 3 or 4 days, and I think I have had a liberal education on a lot of things. I have been sitting at the window this morning looking at this beautiful valley--the Sacramento Valley--and I am very happy that eventually we are going to get this Central Valley of California fixed so that water won't be such a problem, I hope. And between the Shasta Dam and the Folsom Dam and the improvements that are to be made at the mouth of the Sacramento River outside of San Francisco, sometime or other both the north and the south ends of this valley will be much happier about the water situation than they are now.

You know, back where I live water is not such a problem, only sometimes we get too much of it just like we are getting up in the Columbia River Valley now. The Missouri River goes on a rampage about once in 3 years and causes damage from a $100 to $500 million. We have been trying to get that worked out.

Now my theory is that all these river valleys are interested in just one thing and that is the welfare of the population that inhabits those valleys, but they have a common interest, and that common interest is centered in the Congress of the United States, and if you can get a Congress that understands the problems of the river valleys, as I am egotistical enough to say, as your President understands them, we can get most of these things solved. There isn't any fundamental difference. One river valley may be suffering from too much water. That valley gets flood control. One river valley may be suffering from a lack of water on the adjoining land. That is a reclamation and irrigation project. One river valley may be suffering from the fact that the potential power in that river has not been controlled. That is easy enough to overcome. We have proven that that can be overcome in the Tennessee Valley, which is one of the most successful projects of its kind in the world. The Columbia River can be controlled in the same way, and there isn't any reason in the world why the problems of the Central Valley of California can't be solved in exactly the same way.

But you must have people who understand the situation, and those people control the purse strings, and unless those purse strings are properly controlled, we will never get anything done.

It has been a very great privilege to me to have a chance to personally see as many people as I have seen in the last 2 or 3 days in this part of the world. You know there has been a great deal of conversation about your President, and what he has done and hasn't done, and what he should do and shouldn't do. And I thought maybe it would be a very fine thing if I could come out here and let you know what, in the last 3 years, I have been trying to do, and to let you understand that for 10 years previous to that time I was a Member of the United States Senate from Missouri, and was on the Appropriations Committee of the United States Senate, and I know something about how the Government ought to run.

During the war I was one of the right hands of the President of the United States, Franklin Roosevelt. It was my business to investigate the efficiency of the production program which produced the machines and the ammunition and everything of that sort, so that the men in the field would never be left so they couldn't fight. I used to interview the President at least once a week, and we would outline the things that should be looked into. As a result of those investigations by the committee of which I was a member, I think it has been impossible for this hostile Congress to dig up any scandals that will reflect on President Roosevelt. And that is what I was working for at that time. Don't think they haven't tried their best. They have.

But the issues this fall are going to be clearly drawn. When the time arrives that your President doesn't have to run against the field and have a definite fellow who has a record, then we will see what's what, and it is going to be up to you to decide whether you want the country to go forward or whether you want to go back to 1920.

[2.] SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA (Rear platform, 10:20 a.m.)

Governor Knight and Mayor Cooledge, and citizens of Sacramento:

This certainly is a welcome and a turnout. It looks as if everybody in the Central Valley is here in the capital city tonight--this morning--I am so used to talking at night. The Central Valley, I know, is a most important part of California and the United States, so I judge that people in the Central Valley will be here to talk to the President about the various things that I have been interested in since I have been in the Congress of the United States. I went there in 1935 as a United States Senator from Missouri.

My grandfather, you know, owned the site of the city of Sacramento. You didn't know that, did you? He was a freighter from Westport, which is now part of Kansas City, Mo., to Salt Lake City and San Francisco. They made a deal one time and obtained 27 Spanish leagues of land in the Sacramento Valley on a part of that site that Sacramento City is upon, and if you look at those titles you will find his name in the titles somewhere.

The partner of the old man went south with the assets of the freighting company, and he had to sell that ranch for $75,000 in order to pay his share of the debts. Now think of that! I probably would not have been President of the United States if the old man had kept that valley.

But I have had a most remarkable tour and a most remarkable reception since I left the Capital City of the United States. I have been to Ohio, and Illinois, and Nebraska, Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, Washington, Oregon, and now I am in California.

I was invited to come to California by the President of the University of California to make the graduation address to the graduating class down there today, and at the same time to receive a degree from that university. I am most happy that the president of the university invited me. That gave me an excellent excuse to make a nonpolitical trip across the country and tell the people what I think. And I think you are entitled to see your President and to understand what his policies are and what he is thinking about. It wouldn't make any difference where I went, on what excuse I went or what I did. It's a political matter so far as the Government of the United States is concerned. The President can't cross the street without creating an incident. But this President likes to create incidents.

And I am extremely happy that I have had the opportunity to see as many people as I have on this trip, and to explain to them the policies of the President of the United States, so that when these issues are drawn and when these conventions meet, and when they make their platforms, the record of the President of the United States will be one platform, and the record of the policy committee of the United States Congress will be the other. And then you will have a chance to take your choice and see which one you want. It is perfectly legitimate for me to come out here and talk to you and let you see me, and let you find out for yourselves whether I am just the kind of a bird that these columnists say I am.

I am very much interested in this Sacramento Valley--the Central Valley of California--which includes the whole San Joaquin Valley and the Sacramento Valley, too. I included the improvements for the Sacramento Valley and the San Joaquin Valley in the budget, and I included them in the budget last year. And the Congress decided that it wasn't necessary to spend all that money.

This year they have been a little more liberal. The reason for that, of course, is that this is 1948. Every fourth year those Eastern Republicans who control this Congress decide that maybe something ought to be done for the West. You know, old Daniel Webster said, way back there in 1835, when the Congress was trying to appropriate money for the development of the West, that the East was close enough to the West, he didn't want to get it any closer, there wasn't anything out there anyway.

I will say one thing, you have a Governor here that doesn't believe in that. Your Governor believes in forward-looking. Your Governor believes in getting things done. He has been back to see me time and again on the problems which are located in this Valley, and I am glad to talk to him because he is a man of sense and a man of ability. The facts in the case are he is really a Democrat and doesn't know it.

I sincerely hope that when the lines are drawn and when the facts are before you, that you will examine them carefully. That is your privilege and your right. That is what makes this country great. When I ride up and down the streets in these great cities, people stand on the sidewalk and say, "Hi, Harry." Now there isn't another head of a state in the world to whom that can be done. That means that the people are the Government of the United States. They elect the President, they elect the Vice President, they elect the Congress, and when they don't like what the Congress does, or the President does, when the time comes, they can turn him out and try another one, who may not be quite so good, but at least it's a change. In this instance, I don't think you will want to make a change when the time comes, but we will discuss that when I go on my political tour.

I have had, as I told you, a wonderful time. The welcome that has been given me since I have left Washington has surprised me as much as it has the newspaper columnists. And I appreciate it.

I am going on down to the university now, trying to tell these young men and young women who are graduating from that university that they are living in the greatest age in history, and that I am sorry that I can't start out with them and live through that age.

This country is just beginning its greatness. You know, we have more people at work now than we ever had before in the history of the country. Some 61 million people are at work and they are hunting for more people. The national income has been running over $200 billions, and I always thought that that is only a start.

You know, way back in 1843 some old Commissioner of Patents said that they ought to close the Patent Office because there wasn't anything else to invent. What would have happened if they had done that? All the great inventions under which we live now and which have made this country great have been invented since 1843.

We are on the edge of the same sort of an era, right now. And this is 1948.

I wish I could come back here in 1958 and read about some of these old birds that want to send this country back to 1920. They are not going to be able to do it, because I don't think you people are going to stand for it.

Thank you very much.

[3.] DAVIS, CALIFORNIA (Rear platform, 11:10 a.m.)

You know, I get a surprise every day. I was told that this was only just a pass-through stop, and all I should do is to come out on the back platform and wave to the populace, and look!--I believe half the town is here. Well, maybe the surrounding country is represented, too.

It is a pleasure. I certainly appreciate the cordial welcome which I have received since I have been in California, and since I have been in the whole West. Everybody has been good to me. And I like it. Everybody likes to be received when he goes into another man's home or another man's State. And I am hoping that sometime or other I may be able to come back and talk to you on the issues of the day.

You know, I am on a nonpolitical trip. I am going down here to Berkeley to get me a degree.

I understand that you have a college here. Now you know how to get the President here, don't you? I am giving you a little hint.

I certainly appreciate it, and thank you very much. If this hadn't been just a pass-through stop, there's no telling how big a crowd there would have been here.

[4.] BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA (University of California Luncheon, 1:50 p.m.)

Dr. Sproul, I don't know how to accept the hospitality of the University of California when it is delivered in that graceful manner. You remember some time back that you and Ed Pauley tried to get a reparations agreement out of the Russians. You got a very excellent reparations agreement out of the United States. I hope you will keep on working on the Russians.

I have a little hesitation about addressing this august body, shall I say, everybody with degrees emeritus and all the other $40 words that go with an education. The only degree that I ever earned was at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. My daughter went to school there for 4 years and earned me a degree.

But I am very happy to be here to talk to the graduating class of the University of California on a nonpolitical subject. And I hope that Dr. Sproul, when he goes to Philadelphia on the 21st day of June, will consult me, because I have got a candidate I would like to see nominated there.

I was very much interested in the address of the gentleman from the class of '98, when he said that the future before us for the next 50 years is a brighter, greater future than the 50 years just past. Back in 1843, a Commissioner of Patents appeared before the Appropriations Committee of the United States Senate, and I have seen the transcript of his testimony, in which he said that everything had been invented and there wasn't any sense in the world for the United States Government to go to the expense of maintaining a Patent Office, for there was nothing new to patent. That was in 1843. Consider that a little bit. There are people today who have that same viewpoint.

I haven't it. I wish I were 18 instead of 64. I would like to see the next 50 years because I think the greatest age in the history of the world is in front of us, and that age depends entirely on the proper leadership in the United States of America, because the United States of America is now the greatest Nation in the world and must set the pattern. Twenty years ago God Almighty intended this Nation to set that pattern and we refused to accept the responsibility. We must accept it this time, and it is up to you people-people such as you are--to see that that leadership is what it should be.

I know with what we are faced. I am sure of what we can do. I hope we will assume that responsibility and carry it out.

Thank you.