Proclamation 4240—United Nations Day, 1973

Each year the peoples of the world celebrate October 24 as United Nations Day, recalling the date in 1945 when the United Nations Charter came into force. This is an appropriate occasion for people everywhere to renew their adherence to the Charter ideals of peace and human rights, and their determination to promote economic and social progress and a greater measure of justice and freedom for all.

This year the anniversary occurs at a time of dramatic change in world affairs. We sense the promise of a more peaceful world and the opportunity for new strides in international cooperation.

As the world climate improves, the prospects will grow for using the United Nations to alleviate political disputes and for broadening its constructive activity in the social, economic and technological fields.

In some areas, international cooperation is already a longstanding tradition—moving the international mails, regulating international communications and transportation, preventing the worldwide spread of disease, developing international standards of practice in labor, and many others.

More recently, the United Nations and other international agencies have begun to work in other areas—devising safeguards, for example, for the production of nuclear energy and rules concerning man's use of outer space; extending the rule of law over the exploitation of the oceans; protecting the environment; protecting the rights of refugees and prisoners of war; and inhibiting the international traffic in narcotic drugs. Efforts are also underway to cope with the problems of population growth and with the hijacking of aircraft and other forms of international terrorism.

In the years ahead the growing interdependence of nations will inevitably require international institutions to be even more effective in dealing with this new agenda. We need to create new arrangements to control new technologies for the common good. We must bridge the interests of rich and poor countries on matters of trade and aid. We must facilitate the exchange of technical and scientific knowledge and encourage modes of cooperative behavior which will permit nations to live together in concord.

Within this framework I hope all Americans will continue to appreciate and analyze, soberly and realistically, the benefits they and all peoples gain from international cooperation—within the United Nations and other institutions—to meet the challenges of the modern world.

Now, Therefore, I, Richard Nixon, President of the United States of America, do hereby designate Wednesday, October 24, 1973, as United Nations Day. I urge the citizens of this Nation to observe that day with community programs which will promote understanding and support for the United Nations and its affiliated agencies.

I have appointed Donald S. MacNaughton to be United States National Chairman for United Nations Day and, through him, I call upon State and local officials to encourage citizens' groups and agencies of communication—press, radio, television, and motion pictures to engage in appropriate observances of United Nations Day in cooperation with the United Nations Association of the United States of America and other interested organizations.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this fourth day of September, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred seventy-three, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and ninety-eighth.

RICHARD NIXON