Remarks in Asheville, North Carolina

Thank you very much for the very generous introduction. And I want to express my appreciation to this wonderful crowd here in Asheville and in western North Carolina for your welcome.

You know, a President of the United States, when he travels around the country, whether it is in Vermont or Connecticut or Ohio--I was in, for example, Missouri last night, in Tennessee this morning--you get lots of big crowds. But you know the kind of a crowd that impresses you the most, people that will stand in the rain and wait for hours.

Thank you very much.

And I am most grateful that you have. And I particularly want to speak to you very directly as really one of you, because like most people in political life, I have lived in a number of States. I, of course, was born in California and have spent most of my life there. And I lived in New York as a registered voter there for approximately 4 years. But except for California and Washington, D.C., I have spent more time in North Carolina than any other State in the country.

I know that in this great State in which there is great rivalry between the various fine universities, that--I probably shouldn't mention it but you know I am very proud to have been a Duke graduate. But I like Carolina, and North Carolina State, and Wake Forest and Davidsan. And I think that of all the States that I have visited that there probably is not one that has a greater educational tradition than the State of North Carolina.

If I may also come directly to my subject, as you know, I have not been able to spend too much time in this election year making any kind of political appearances. Saturday was the first day and I was out yesterday and I am out today.

I had to limit my appearances pretty much to those States where there were Senate races or gubernatorial races.

The only State in the country there is not a Senate race or a gubernatorial race that I am visiting is the State of North Carolina. There are reasons for that that are personal: one, because of my very great affection for this State, the fact that I went to school here, and the fact, also, that in that critical close election in 1968, North Carolina was in our column.

Thank you very much.

The other reason is that when we think of this election, we must think not only, of course, of the candidates for Governor and the United States Senate, but we must think of the candidates for the House of Representatives.

The House of Representatives, a body in which I was privileged to serve when I first came to the Congress 23 years ago, has been a tower of strength in many areas over these past 20 months that I have served in the Presidency. And among those who have been strongest in giving the President the support that is needed, not as an individual, but for those things that we think are best for America, are the men from North Carolina that I am proud to campaign for.

I refer to Charley Jonas. I refer to Jim Broyhill. I refer to Earl Ruth and Vinegar Bend Mizell, and I would like to have more of them, more like them here.

Luke Atkinson, your own candidate here, is one that would be, along with the others, a very fine addition to that team.

And in speaking of them all, however, rather than talking in individual terms, I would like to come directly and very briefly to those great issues that we as Americans, not as Republicans or Democrats but as Americans, are concerned about this year.

I want you to know what we are trying to do and then you will know how to cast )-our vote. Because, if you believe in what we are trying to do, then remember, a President is very powerful, but he can't do it unless he has got the votes in the House and in the Senate. And we need those votes and that is why we are here.

First, above everything else, we want to bring peace to this world. When I speak of peace to this world, I am not referring simply to that kind of peace which is so easy to get, instant peace, which tomorrow leads to another war. We have had enough of that.

Let's have peace for a generation. That is what we have never had in this century.

In Vietnam, for example, we have been working for that. When I came in, we had 550,000 men in Vietnam. There was no plan to bring any of them home. The casualties were 300 a week. We had no peace plan on the table. And in this past year and 10 months, we have not done as much as I would have liked, but we have moved,

Instead of men going into Vietnam, they have been coming out and they are going to continue to come out, and the South Vietnamese will take their place.

Second, instead of casualties going up, they are going down. They are the lowest in 4 1/2 years. And they are going to continue to go down. Young Americans are not going to be killed in Vietnam in the months ahead.

Third, we have put forward---and some of you may have heard it on television-a peace proposal that is the most far-reaching, the most generous certainly that could possibly be put forward: the offer of a cease-fire without any conditions, the offer of a political settlement, and the offer--even though we have far more prisoners of theirs than they have of ours let's release all the prisoners as a humanitarian gesture and exchange them today. This, we think, is the kind of proposal that can do something.

My friends, I now come to the critical point. And I realize that there are those who are very troubled and they say, "Well, why does it take so long? Why not just bring them home fight now, end the war, get out and then we have got peace?"

Let me tell you something: Look back. Those of you who are older will remember, as I remember. Those of you who are younger have read about it in school. In this century, we have been in four wars in this country. We were in World War I. We ended that. We were in World War II. We ended that war. We were in Korea. We ended that war. And yet, we have not had a full generation of peace.

And I say, let's end this war in a way that we can win the peace. That is what we are trying to do. That is why, if we were to cut and run, if we were to encourage the enemy by the way that we ended the war, it would only mean one thing: It would plant the seeds for another one.

And so I say, if you want real peace, the peace that will last, we need that kind of support, the kind of support we have been getting from your Carolina delegates, Republicans in the House of Representatives.

Now, I want to talk about two or three other issues very briefly. Ones that you are concerned about, and I am going to tick them off. The fact that I can't go into any length is not because they don't deserve more attention, but because I see a lot of people out here who are enthusiastic. I think most of you are going to vote for our candidates. I don't want any of you to get pneumonia. We need every one of those votes that we can get.

One, I am going to talk about your pocketbook for just a moment. When you go out and shop, you are going to find that prices are going up. Right? And second, you are going to be worried about that. Third, you are going to wonder, why did it happen?

I will tell you why it happened. Because before we came to Washington, D.C., the, Government was spending billions more than it was taking in in taxes, even though; those taxes were at a time when we were. at full employment in the economy. And the result is that when the Government in Washington spends billions more than it should, it only has the effect of raising prices and taxes for people at home.

I tried to turn that around. I can't do it alone. I need men in the House. The' President needs men in the House and men in the Senate who will vote with him on this principle.

You know, we always want to spend everything that we can for those things that are needed. We want to help the needy. We want to help the elderly. We want to do the right thing by the schools and health and all the rest.

But remember this: When a spending program is one that might benefit one special group or some of the people and yet raise prices and taxes for all the people, then I say that spending program is one that should not be approved by the Congress.

I come to the great issue of reform. I say this particularly because this is a university community. And I see so many young people in this audience.

I want you to know that we are not satisfied in this administration with just putting a lot of good money into old programs. We think it is time for a change. Whether it is the welfare program, whether it is the environmental program, whether it is education or whether it is health, we need to spend billions of dollars, but my friends, we need to reform the institutions of government and the place to start is right in Washington, D.C.

Let me tell you how. First, we propose to share the revenues of the Federal Government with the States. I want to tell you why. For 190 years--and this was one of the 13 original States--for 190 years, as you know, power has been flowing from the proud, independent States of this Nation to Washington, D.C. Now I say it is time for power to go back to the people, from Washington to the States and to the people. That is why we are sharing the revenues with the States.

That is why in the field of welfare reform, in the environment, and all the others, ours is a program of progress.

When I look at this magnificent country, when I realize that I am standing in a place where on a clear day I understand you can see forever [laughter], that on a clear day--and listen to this for a moment-did you know that you in Asheville on a clear day in these beautiful mountains can see more of America than you can see any place else in the United States?

This is a beautiful country, too. It is particularly beautiful here. But there are parts of America that are not beautiful. Our cities are cluttered up with traffic and terrorized by crime and choking with smog and poisoned by water. And we have got to clean up that environment so that our young people will have the heritage of a decent life in the years ahead. It is that kind of progress that we are for.

I say let's reform the institutions of government, of education, in housing, of health, of welfare, of environment so that the young people of this country can move forward rather than simply putting into the programs of the past money which will be wasted.

And now a couple of issues that particularly apply to you in this part of the country. In fact, it applies to all of the country, because these two areas that I mention are not limited to North Carolina. They are not limited to the South and they are not limited in terms of any area of the country.

First, textiles. We think of textiles primarily of being a Southern problem. You know textiles are produced all over the United States of America. If you don't think so, you should see the Senators and Congressmen that came in with Charley Jonas and these other fellows to talk to me about textiles. They are from all over the United States.

We have the problem of imports, imports from abroad. We have been trying to work out a voluntary agreement with the major country responsible for the excess of imports: Japan. We are still working on it.

Since we have failed, we have asked the Congress for legislation which would provide a quota for textile imports in the event that we couldn't get a voluntary agreement. And now we need that kind of legislation.

But the difficulty is, and the reason that it is hung up, is that in the Congress of the United States there are those who are trying to hang a lot of other things on this bill. And this is a technical matter, but all of you will understand it; they are trying to hang a lot of other products on the bill.

They say, "If you are going to protect quotas, we will protect this and that and the other thing." The result is that it would raise barriers that would reduce our farm markets abroad. That wouldn't be good for North Carolina. It wouldn't be good for our great agriculture in this country.

So what we are fighting for is for the protection of our textiles and our textile markets, but let's do it in a way that we do not destroy our farm exports for abroad. Let's help ,the farmers as well as those who are in the textile area.

Now, the problem of our schools. When I come to the southern part of the United States, I know that ,the question is often asked about what we are going to do with regard to the dual school system. That answer has been given by the courts. This administration carries out whatever orders the courts have handed down.

I must say that in the presence of my good friends in North Carolina--and I can say this as I said it in New Orleans and I have said it in other Southern States--it is to the great credit of the Southern States that where they have had this difficult problem, without violence, with cooperation they have worked out a period of transition in district after district after district in a way that is in the great American tradition.

Many did not like the law. Many disagreed with what was handed down. But they realized that where the law of the land is handed down it must be complied with. And I congratulate the South for what it has done in complying with the law in an orderly way.

I should also point out in that respect, however, that as far as the law is concerned, as I have often mentioned, and this was my position when I spoke in North Carolina in 1968, it has been my position ever since--I stated it again in March of this year in a statement that I issued throughout the country, I have stated it in the North as well as in the South, and I state it here again now--I believe, and I look at these small children here and I see them, I believe that a child--and I don't care whether he is a white child or a black child, what his background is--is better off going to that school closest to home, his neighborhood school. I am for the neighborhood school.

And I do not favor for that reason, I do not favor, and the Congress has so stated and I support this proposition, the use of busing solely for the purpose of achieving racial balance because you have two problems here.

You have education on the one side. You have the problem of integrating the! school system on the other.

I say the important thing for us to remember is: Let us not destroy the quality education of our children. And if we do not bear in mind the fact that if we have these long transportation situations, it is going to have an effect on those children that isn't going to be good for their education.

That is our position. We will continue to hold to that position until or unless there is any other finding by the courts.

And now I come to one final point. It it one that perhaps doesn't need to be touched upon here in this great western part of North Carolina with its patriotic tradition, this all-American city as it is called, a city with a fine record in law enforcement, a fine record in civic cooperation, a fine record is an example to all the other cities of the country.

But it needs to be spoken about, because I want to tell you, my friends, when crime strikes at any part of the country, it hurts all parts of the country. We were concerned that crime went up 150 percent in the 8 years before I came to Washington in January. We are concerned by the fact that as I was in Kansas City this morning, I went to the hospital to call on two policemen who had been injured because a bomb had been thrown into the office in which they were working; and they had received wounds: one had lost the use-partial use--of his hand and permanent use of one of his fingers, and the other had other injuries from the glass and from the wood that got into his system.

Others have been killed, 66 in this year alone. Hundreds have been wounded, perhaps thousands.

It goes beyond that. We see a rising problem of drugs, a rising problem of pornography, a rising problem of crime. When I came into office, I pledged to do something about it. And as these Members of Congress will tell you, the first request I sent to the Congress was in the field of crime. I asked for bills on organized crime. I asked for the power to deal with the problem of drugs. I asked for bills that would stop the flow of pornography and obscenity into the homes of our children in this country.

I asked for other bills. It has taken 18 months to get action on the major ones. The organized crime one finally has been signed. A drug bill may be signed this next week. The obscenity bill is still in a committee, and we still have hopes for it.

But my point is this, my friends: I am simply telling you that as far as this administration is concerned, we believe that it is time to stop the attitude of condoning and, by condoning, encouraging the permissive attitude toward crane and criminal elements in this country. It is time to take a strong stand.

And this means not only passing laws, it means giving the support to our law enforcement officers that they deserve. When I think that law enforcement officers are called pigs in many parts of the country, I say let us be thankful that men will go into this profession. It is underpaid. It is dangerous. We can't perhaps pay them enough, and we can't remove the danger, but let's give them our respect when they go into the police forces.

Then, finally, in that same connection, because this is a university community, I want to bring to you a report from across the Nation on a subject that you see perhaps almost nightly on your television screens. You see the problem of what is called student unrest and disruption. And you see in many instances a bombing. Here, for example, there was one in my home State of California, yesterday, in which they destroyed a science laboratory just 10 miles from my home.

You've seen also indications where not only violence and burnings and bombings, but you also have seen those areas where some students will get out and try to shout a speaker down, won't listen to him. They shout out their obscenities. They will not listen to him. They think that's the way to get their message across.

I want to tell you this: If you saw that television screen and you saw some of the people that are shouting the obscenities and engaging in violence, you'd get the impression that these are a majority of our America's youth and that they may be the leaders of the future.

I want to tell you something. They are not a majority of America's youth, and they are not going to be the leaders of this country in the future. Because I tell you, I have seen our young students.

I have seen them at Kansas State; I have seen them at Ohio State; I have seen them in New Jersey; I have seen them in Missouri; and the great majority of America's young people---oh, yes, they want changes in this country, and we are thankful that they do--they aren't satisfied with things as they are, and all young people should be that way.

They want to build a peaceful world, and we want to build a peaceful world. But also, they disapprove of violence. They disapprove of disorderly conduct, and let's give a hand to the good young people of America that are a majority of the young people of this country.

And I just want to make one pledge to you finally in this State of North Carolina. I remember back. The years were 1934-1937. I drove across the country with four other students. Four of them were divinity students. I was the only law student in the car. I don't know how I ever got across without becoming a preacher. That's probably how I got into politics.

But, nevertheless, we drove across the country and we got to Duke University. I remember the excitement of going to that magnificent campus with its 5,000 acres of North Carolina pines. And I remember the excitement of those 3 years. It was the middle of the depression. It was difficult and hard. But we never thought we were poor. We never considered it that way. We thought it was a great privilege to live in this country and to go to that great school. And I've always looked back upon it with pleasure.

But, I also remember this: I remember, how strongly I felt about the need to build a better country, a peaceful country, a better chance for all of our people, sol that this country could be an example to all the people of the world. I didn't even dream when I was in school then, 30 years ago, that I'd be standing in Asheville, North Carolina--and I had two people in my class who were from Asheville--talking to this great crowd standing in the rain. I didn't dream then that just 2 weeks ago, I would be traveling all over Europe being welcomed by 350, 000 people in Communist Yugoslavia standing in the rain, being welcomed by a million and a, half people in Spain, by thousands in Ireland.

Every place around this world, let me tell you, you hear about what is wrong with America. You hear of people abroad that don't like us. Sure, some of the leaders don't like our policies. But to great numbers of people, hundreds and millions of people abroad, America is still the land with the most freedom, which it has, the most opportunity, which it has, and the greatest progress and prosperity in the world.

We are fortunate to live in this country. Let's be proud of it. Let's make it a better country. Let's work for it. And I pledge to you above everything else we are going to have progress, we are going to have prosperity without war, and to this young generation, we are going to have a generation of peace for you.

Thank you.