Proclamation 4203—Senior Citizens Month, 1973

Today more than 20 million Americans have six and a half decades or more of life behind them, and rich years of promise still before them. This distinguished generation grew up with the twentieth century, and they came to the fullness of their maturity at the same time America did. They have stood in the forefront of this country's rise to unprecedented national well-being and to the world leadership role which is ours today.

Our older citizens have given their best to America. Now they deserve the best from America.

Senior Citizens Month each year is a time for all our people to renew the recognition, the respect, and the active concern which properly belong to older Americans.

The theme of this year's observance is OLDER AMERICANS IN ACTION. It points our attention to the basic fact that most older people are not mere onlookers in our society—nor are they society's wards. They remain vital, versatile, and highly valued contributors to the quality of American life.

Government's actions on behalf of older Americans must never become mere caretaking. Rather they must be designed to free and assist senior citizens so that they can remain active and involved, in ways of their own choosing. This principle has guided us as Federal spending to help older Americans has increased by almost three-fourths during the past four years.

But Senior Citizens Month 1973 must be something more than a time for renewing our commitment to Government efforts concerning older Americans—important as these efforts are. It must also be a time for strengthening those human bonds which will ensure older Americans an active and honored place in our families, our communities, and our Nation.

Now, Therefore, I, Richard Nixon, President of the United States of America, do hereby designate the month of May, 1973, as Senior Citizens Month.

I invite the officials of the Federal, State, and local governments, leaders of voluntary and private organizations, and all Americans everywhere to join in appropriate recognition Of OLDER AMERICANS IN ACTION during this month and throughout the coming year.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-sixth 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