Remarks at a Luncheon With Members of the National Symphony Orchestra

Mr. President, Mr. Chairman, Mrs. Magnuo son, Mrs. Truman:

I appreciate most highly this scroll which you have given me. I sincerely wish that I deserved the statement that I am the most musical President. My musical knowledge and ability has been greatly overrated, as have some of my faults and foibles. But I am more than happy to have this scroll. I shall have it framed and keep it for the rest of my life.

I am very much interested in music. I am more than interested in the success of this Washington Symphony Orchestra. Washington should have one of the great symphony orchestras of the world, and it is gradually approaching that condition. I want to see that consummated.

Washington should have an auditorium that would seat 40,000 people, with a music hall and an opera house in addition to it.

When I was vice chairman of the Committee on Public Buildings and Grounds in the Senate in 1935, Senator Connally was the chairman of that committee at that time, and we got a bill through the Senate authorizing the construction of an auditorium to seat 35,000 people. In fact, it passed the Senate twice. It was murdered in the House both times by the efforts and the lobbying of the adjoining chambers of commerce of these big cities that are around Washington.

Now they did not appreciate at that time that Washington was to become the capital of the world--the free world, that Washington was to be the most interesting city in the world so far as free government is concerned.

It has been my privilege to go to Mexico City, and to Rio de Janeiro and to Paris, and in each one of those great cities one of the showplaces is their national opera house. They have great symphony orchestras also in those cities. And the London Symphony is also one of the great symphonies of the world.

Now there isn't any reason in the world why Washington shouldn't have a place for the greatest symphony in the world to assemble and play for the benefit of the public. I hope that time will come.

I have always been interested in the welfare of this organization. Mrs. Truman has done the work, and I--I am afraid-have received the credit and the scroll. But maybe I can add a "Mrs." to that scroll and make it work.

Another thing I am sorry for is that I didn't get over here in time to have lunch with you, but this has been one of my busiest days, and it's only half done. Therefore, I am sorry to say, I will have to rush back to-the White House and get myself ready to make a broadcast this afternoon, and one tonight, and a lot of other things that the President does that nobody knows anything about.

I have already received a scroll this morning from the United Nations, of which I will think just as much as I do this one. And I have had the point 4 program people in who have been studying at the University of California. They came from Pakistan and India and Indonesia and Malaya and the Philippines and Central American countries. And they are over here studying our methods of farm management and farm control.

That, my friends, is what eventually will give us peace in the world. Our idea is to help people to help themselves. And if we do that, and if we cultivate the greatest musical center in the history of the world-which we can do--we then will charm these people into a frame of mind that will cause peace to come and last forever.

Thank you very much.