Mr. President, Your Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen:
It is a very great honor for Mrs. Nixon and me to be received for the first time in Mexico on an official state visit.
Since our meeting at Amistad a year ago, I have been looking forward to the chance to resume our personal acquaintanceship and our discussion of problems of mutual interest.
I think it is significant that this is the first country in Latin America to which I have been able to make a state visit. It is very appropriate that that should be so. We share a 2,000-mile common border, one of the longest in the world. That border we can say today is not a wall that divides us, but a bridge of friendship which unites us.
Mr. President, on this occasion I want to pay tribute, too, to the leadership that you have provided for this country over the past 6 years. You will go down in history as one of Mexico's great Presidents and as one of the great leaders of this hemisphere and of the world.
You can be proud of the unprecedented progress that has occurred during your term of office; progress that is demonstrated by this new airport on which our plane has landed, an airport which I think very appropriately bears your name.
You have demonstrated not only for the people of your country, but for the people of the world, that the way to progress is through the right combination between liberty and stability. We admire and respect you for that kind of leadership that you have provided.
Finally, Mr. President, as I'm sure you know, it is for Mrs. Nixon and me a very special, personal honor to return to this country on a state visit, because of our memories of our first visit to Mexico 30 years ago--on our wedding trip-this summer.
It was then that we became acquainted with Mexico City, Cuernavaca, Toluca, Puebla, Taxco, Guadalajara, and other cities.
Many things have happened, since that time 30 years ago, to Mexico. Many changes have occurred. But one thing has not changed, and that is that there is warm friendship and warm hospitality for all of those who come as visitors to this country. It was true then and we see it today, and we are grateful for this welcome.
Note: The President spoke at approximately 11:55 a.m. at President Gustavo Diaz Ordaz International Airport in response to President Gustavo Diaz Ordaz' welcoming remarks. President Diaz Ordaz spoke in Spanish. A translation of his remarks follows:
His Excellency President Richard Nixon, Nixon, distinguished guests:
The people of Mexico extend to you a heartfelt welcome when you reach the soil of Mexico.
We are glad to have you with us again and it is an opportunity to renew our friendship established in Ciudad Acufia a year ago.
During these conversations we will carry on with frankness, with the loyalty due among friends, and with the respect due to the representatives of two neighboring, friendly countries, and I am sure that the result of these conversations will be most fruitful.
In the name of Mrs. Diaz Ordaz and of myself, I beg you and Mrs. Nixon to excuse Mrs. Diaz Ordaz who was not able to be here as she would have wished because she is still convalescing from an illness.
Mr. President, Mrs. Nixon, in the name of the people of Mexico, in the name of the people of Jalisco, in the name of Mrs. Diaz Ordaz, my daughter, and myself, we wish that your stay here in Mexico will be most pleasant.
Thank you.
Richard Nixon, Remarks on Arrival at Puerto Vallarta, Mexico Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/240348
