Remarks to a Group of Republican Workers in the Civic Auditorium, Portland, Oregon

Mr. Chairman, Governor McKay, and My Friends:

I have been in a state of confusion ever since I stepped my foot off that plane. They said it was bad weather down here and that there would be no one along the route--and what voice I have had has been left out there, and my eyes are full of confetti and I think my ears and my clothes are.

I have been overwhelmed by your welcome.

Then they said, "Won't you stop at the auditorium just for a few moments because there are a few Republican workers there that we want you to say Hello to."

Now, if this great audience is made up just of Republican workers, I'll tell you: we're in! Oregon will go right once again.

My friends, there are a dozen things I could talk to you about today. As a matter of fact, I have been poring for the last few days over manuscripts of what I am going to say tonight. But, as of now, I think I will just wander around a little bit and tell you a few things that seem important to me. It won't be a speech, but maybe it will give you an idea here and there that will help you in your work as you get Oregon's voters to the polls on November 6th.

First of all, regarding public office, I have had a good many years' experience in selecting people for positions in government--for many years in the military, and since then in civil office. As you do that, you get to pondering in your mind, what is the first thing you want? ' Men and women have different qualifications. Some are brilliant, some are plodders--some are very personable. What is the first quality you look for? I would say, possibly, in military life and civil life it is not exactly the same. But in this political business, my friends, I commend to you one quality: honesty. Just plain, ordinary honesty. Plain, ordinary integrity--intellectual honesty--honesty with the people--honesty in pursuing your pledged word just as hard as you know how to do it.

I remember, many years ago, Carter Glass in his prime was asked to Yale University where he received an honorary degree, and in giving him this very flattering commendation, they read off this long commendation, and through it the word "honesty" was repeated several times. And he got up and said, "I rather despair of the Republic if we are getting to the place where you have to reward a man for being honest."

Now, I don't think honesty is so rare that you have to pin a big medal on him in any walk of life, but I do insist over and over again: put someone in public office upon whose word you can depend.

I therefore bring this name to you in that connection: Douglas McKay.

Of course, I have not known him nearly as long as many of you in this audience, but I saw him under these special conditions, where on a meeting of the minds on a difficult subject, no matter what it was, each one bringing in his opinion, his conviction, on what should be done--and I shall always testify to this--to Douglas McKay, he never pulled his punches on what he believed. What he believed to be right, that was what was done as far as his recommendations were concerned.

Now, I don't know some of your other candidates for office in this State as well as I do Douglas McKay, but I can say this: If they are running on the same team with him, I am about ready to write my name under there and say "I think he'll do. He's a good one."

So then, if we have that as the first quality--we want honesty-we want, then, someone who represents for us--people that send him there--the kind of thinking with respect to government that is at the bottom of our political philosophy.

In general, I think you could define the Republican Party in its management of the domestic affairs of our country, so far as government affects them, along this line:

We believe, first, in fiscal integrity. Consequently we believe in the sound dollar, the dollar that when you come around to start living on your pension or social security will be worth every cent that you are now putting into it. That is the kind of dollar we want.

If we are going to do that, we have to keep income and outgo in the government level; and in order, therefore, to avoid heavily taxing the people, we must keep governmental expenditures as low as it is possible for us to do and to carry on the functions expected of the government. That is the second.

And the third is this; and very important: Keep government as close to the governed as it is humanly possible to do.

By and large, our opponents believe the opposite of these things. They believe in heavier government expenditures; and if it brings about deficits, that is of no moment to them because they believe in what they call the loose credit of the easy dollar. All very well, as long as it doesn't bring about inflation. But inflation is the robber that takes the money out of your pocket, and particularly out of your pensions, your insurance policies and all long-term investments. So we won't have that. And they believe in that, or at least they practice that.

They believe in centralized government. They say, "We are very wise in Washington, we know how to run this country. Now, you just pay your taxes and do as we say, and everything will be nice."

We say: the power of the United States--the strength of America--is developed only when government releases the illimitable qualifications, capacities and initiative of every individual citizen, and merely guides them in the direction where the common good will be served.

All of us want peace. There is no American that I know of who would really like to see any kind of war, big or little.

In foreign affairs the problem of decision resolves itself into this: Do we pursue our objectives from a position of strength, dealing with others on a perfectly fair, equitable basis, always holding out the hand of friendship but saying, if you don't want to be friends, we will be the strongest nation in the world.

Now in this kind of thing, there is nothing truculent, there is nothing antagonistic, we simply speak from bitter experience. Thrice in our lifetime--at least in my lifetime--we have seen our country in war.

Why? Because we were too weak for the circumstances of the time. We shall not be that again. We must not be that again.

So we continue to pursue peace through every honorable avenue open to us through conference, whether it be on the ordinary diplomatic level or at the summit at Geneva, or among the Presidents in Panama.

However it is done, we pursue peace with honor and with justice for all. One thing we know: all nations must travel the road of peace, or none can do so. This means peace must be secured by agreement--and agreements and covenants mean we are not afraid to let you look at us, and you are not afraid to let us look at you. That is all we ask. We reject any thought that we will say--and know we are going to keep our word--we will disarm in any respect and it may be you will do so some day. We will do it in unison.

So I think, my friends, when you come to consider your choices in the foreign field, you have to take this criteria probably: hard sense and experience versus pie in the sky promises and wishful thinking. That is the decision there.

Now I had a lot of things--as I was riding down in the plane-I was going to say to this group, and I haven't said a single one of them yet. As I told you, I left my ideas and everything else I had along that road coming in. It was a joyous road.

But I am going to tell you one story which I have told several times--possibly you have heard it; but it does illustrate the kind of question that a good Republican worker has to be able to answer, or to give an answer to, and very quickly. This is just one of them.

A good Republican worker was walking down the street and he met a man; and he stopped him and said, "My friend, I would like to talk a little politics to you." And he said, "How are you going to vote?"

"Well," he says, "I am going to vote for Stevenson, of course."

Well, that set our Republican friend back on his heels a little bit, but he recovered enough to say, "Would you give me your reasons?"

"Why," he says, "the best in the world. I voted for him four years ago, and everything has been wonderful ever since."

Goodbye.