Proclamation 5036—National Mental Health Counselors Week

Mental health counselors provide 50 percent of the mental health services delivered in this country. They work with adults and children whose self-doubts or distorted perceptions of the world interfere with their capacities to fulfill their obligations or to enjoy the pleasures that life can offer. They work with the chronically mentally ill, the depressed, the suicidal, the anxious, the phobic, the juvenile delinquent, the abused, and the deprived.

Through utilization of individual and group counseling techniques, mental health counselors help individuals to develop self-understanding, make life decisions, and adjust to the everyday demands of a complex world.

Mental health counselors apply skills gained through years of education and training in a multitude of settings—hospitals, community agencies, clinics, and in the private practice sector. They play an important role in our Nation's health care system.

In recognition of their service in behalf of others to save lives and reduce suffering, the Congress, by Senate Joint Resolution 35, has designated the week beginning March 20, 1983, as National Mental Health Counselors Week, and has requested the President to issue a proclamation in observance of that week.

Now, Therefore, I, Ronald Reagan, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim the week beginning March 20, 1983, as National Mental Health Counselors Week. I call upon health care professionals, educators, the media, individuals, and public and private organizations concerned with mental health to join me in observing this week.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-fifth day of March, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty-three, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and seventh.

RONALD REAGAN