Remarks to Members of the American Nationalities for Nixon-Lodge

Someone told me there are 20 million Americans that are classed as belonging to the Nationality Groups. I asked a few minutes ago why aren't there 180 million that belong to the same groups. We all came from somewhere, that's sure.

I asked, "Why don't I belong to the Germanic, with my name?" Well, I was told I would have to get the permission of, I think it was, my great-great-grandfather.

In any event, what I am saying in this awkward fashion is that I have difficulty in addressing a group when I feel that they are different from other Americans. All of us are Americans. I don't know how to speak to a Jewish group or a Catholic group or a Presbyterian group, or any other. I like to talk to Americans.

So as I welcome you here to our Capital City for your conferences, I would very much like to urge that all of us, in these days which seem now to be unusually troublous--with at least what seems to be troublemakers trying to come to our country--that we all stand behind a strong, firm, national policy that really spells out our determination to be free, and to help others enjoy the same freedom that we in this Nation won so many years ago.

World problems color our domestic problems. Sometimes though our domestic problems seem very severe and urgent--the farm problem or arguments about easy money or inflation or anything else--they are dwarfed when you come to compare them with the age-old struggle of mankind to achieve international order and peace.

You people with your identity to these national groups are more closely related, possibly, than some other citizens. With individuals and with populations from which you or your forebears have more recently come, these national groups enlist your interest, your support, so that we all may achieve this international order. I am convinced that if enough people in the world--whether it's in Africa or Asia or all the Americas, or in Europe--if each of us puts his mind to this one great problem, eventually we shall solve it.

Possibly first we have to solve it by making certain that we cannot be attacked successfully, penetrated successfully, and certainly not subverted successfully. If we can in our hearts and in our minds and by the strength of our economies--and where necessary by our military strength--make ourselves absolutely sure and secure, then in the long run we win.

I must say this does not include any aggressive intent toward any person. The time has come when anyone talking about an aggressive war on a global scale is also talking about suicide. I think at least all of us have got that much sense.

So as you talk about your common problems in these groups--I care not what they are in detail--I do say let's all of us dedicate ourselves anew to unionizing the thinking and the spiritual, economic and material strength of our whole free world in order to make ourselves secure. By being secure and living these principles in which we all are talking about now--the principles of freedom and of human liberty and of dignity-finally we win.

And that's the thing I would like to see the whole world do.

Goodbye. Good luck.