Remarks to Representatives of National Voluntary Organizations Concerned With Consumer Interests.

Miss Furness, Congresswoman Sullivan, ladies and gentlemen:

I am sorry I am late. I am very happy that Mrs. Sullivan, who is a champion of our cause, could be here with you this morning.

The people that all of you represent--the American consumers--are very much in our mind and we are concerned with many good things about them, and some problems they also have.

We are happy that we believe in this country our American consumers enjoy the highest standard of living of any people in the world.

And we are very happy that that standard has constantly risen during the last 4 years.

There are more than 7 million more people working today, contributing to that economy instead of draining from it.

In the last 3 months, we have put more than 1.5 million people on new jobs.

Real income has risen about 17 percent for the average American.

The net financial wealth of the American families has risen $150 billion.

These statistics are important only because of the thing I want to say now.

Prosperity and progress are good, but they are not all good. They bring some problems with them. As new materials are created, as new inventions come on the market, as new methods of financing are devised, as new sales pitches are made, we must be constantly on the lookout for the dangers that accompany them.

That is Betty's job and that is your job. That is Mrs. Sullivan's job. That is a matter of great moment and concern to me.

We feel the consumer should have the satisfaction and the security of knowing that he is not being taken unfair advantage of. The slogan "let the buyer beware" has no place in our society.

Our consumers, we think here at the White House, have the right to expect safety in the products that are sold to them.

They have the right to choose between a variety of products and to exercise a choice.

They have a right to be fully informed about the products they buy--and this covers everything from telling them the honest weight of a food product to spelling out precisely how much money they will be paying at an annual percentage rate on a loan.

We feel they have the right to have their views of matters of national importance represented in the highest councils of their country and their government.

We have tried since the days I was Vice President--in this administration and the preceding one. We have made a great and constant effort to try to assure these rights. We have tried to secure for the consumer his rightful place in our economy.

It has not been easy--special interests have usually fought us every step of the way--but I believe we have come a very long way in this consumer field, relatively speaking.

The 89th Congress, which some rightly called the consumers Congress, saw its responsibilities to the consumers of America-meaning all Americans--and they did the following things about them:

The Truth in Packaging Act--which assures that the buyer will know what he is purchasing, how much it weighs, and who made it.

The Traffic and Highway Safety Acts-which have begun our all-out attack on the mounting toll of death and destruction on our highways.

The Child Protection Act--which will safeguard our children from hazardous toys.

And bills providing for increased insurance protection for people who place their savings on deposit.

Now, that is past. We don't want to live in the past. We don't want to spend our time talking about the past, except to provide an example that we can learn from and emulate.

Because of that progress, we have felt encouraged. If we could do this in the 89th Congress, what should we try in the 90th?

So, we have 12 actions that we have urged the Congress to take in behalf of the consumer.

They include the truth-in-lending bill-legislation which Mrs. Sullivan has done such yeoman service on. I want to publicly acknowledge it and congratulate her.

It is legislation to assure that a consumer, shopping for credit, knows exactly what he is paying in interest costs.

We have many others. I will just name a few.

One includes the amendments to the Flammable Fabrics Act. That is legislation to prevent accidents, to make clothing and household items much safer for all of us.

Betty Furness has worked on that legislation, has testified before the Congress for all of us on it.

I can say that our legislative package covers everything from making meat more wholesome to the safe movement of natural gas by pipeline.

We are trying to do everything we can to see that the consumer is protected. We will not achieve that this year. We didn't in the 89th Congress; we won't in the 90th Congress. We will be working on it when they have the 100th Congress. But we are breaking down old barriers.

We are setting new standards. We are creating a consumer ethic that is fair both to the seller as well as to the buyer. We are going to be unrelenting in our efforts. We are going to stay on the job. We are going to pursue it every day. We are going to win.

Betty is our leader in this field. I look to her and her office as my eyes and my ears in the consuming area. What she knows I can have a part of. What reaches her usually reaches me.

I want to ask each of you to talk to her about the information that you think you would like for me to know. I am sure she will relay it to me.

She had barely settled down in this job before she started planning this get-together here today.

I want to express the hope that you will work closely with her and with the Consumer Advisory Council because I believe this lady is bright, dedicated, and determined. 1 believe she is going to make it possible for the consumer's voice to be heard loudly, clearly, and effectively, if you give her support and if I give her support.

We have the President's Committee on Consumer Interests. That is a Cabinet level committee which is solely concerned with the consumers.

I would like you, with Betty, to try to work out ways for us to improve the quality of consumer education in this country. I know this is something that you have been devoting a lot of time to, but we must move on from just getting the catalog, looking at it, and seeing the rating. There are a lot of other jobs to be done.

If we are going to continue to make progress, we are going to have to have more than just one person working at it.

And you, through your groups and the people you speak for, can actively support us and be the difference between success and failure.

What grievances you have, we want to know about them too. Your consumers can tell you and you can tell Betty. She can tell me and I will try to tell your Congressman. That is a part of this job.

Your organizations cover almost every conceivable area of American life. You are in touch with millions of people. That is your job--to work with those specific groups that add up to millions in the long run.

Our job is to adequately protect and properly serve all of those millions.

We don't always live up to their expectations. We don't always discharge our responsibilities as they think we should. But we are aware of them, and we want so much to be equal to them.

I do feel that the country has moved forward in the last few years in consumer education and in consumer legislation. It hasn't gone as far as it needs to go. How far it will go is going to be determined somewhat by the way I do my job and Betty does her job. But it is going to be determined a lot by how well you do your job, taking the grievances, formulating them into reasonable, marketable suggestions, making them appealing, and bringing them in.

Let's try to effect and devise solutions to them.

This is not something we are going to settle this afternoon. It is something we are going to have to work at 30 days a month for 365 days a year.

There will be great rewards and great satisfaction that will come to us if we can take these protective measures and move forward in an enlightened way to not only serve the buyer well in this country, but to be just, reasonable and helpful to the seller.

We just might as well face up to it. The good old days, where a person could make the best mousetrap, have his own way about what it did and the dangers associated with it, all of the prices he charged, the way it was so!d, the interest that was requested-those days are "gone and forgot. The bridge of the railroad now crosses the spot."

We have turned the horses and the carriages out. We are going to try to make this Congress and the next Congress an improvement on the 89th, which I think history will show was more aware of and more concerned with the 200 million consumers of this Nation than any Congress in all of our history.

If we can do that, I think the time that you spent here this morning will be well worthwhile. It will be a great day for every American consumer.

Thank you very much.