Remarks Upon Arrival in Denver, Colorado

Governor Johnson, Mr. Mayor, Governor Thornton, other distinguished guests, My Friends:

This is by way of a homecoming for Mamie and me. It is not, so far as I am concerned, a political meeting. But I have been on a political trip and so it would be a little out of character if I had not a word to say about the political situation.

The first thing I must say is this: Both Mrs. Eisenhower and I are deeply honored that the Governor should come out to meet us this morning, and I do hope he understands it when I say that he, retiring voluntarily--I want to see him succeeded by Don Brotzman.

Of course, I am very hopeful, and here I couldn't speak with more feeling, that you will be able to send Dan Thornton to the Senate to help us out.

Your Republican delegation in the House, I would like to see all of them come back, and I want to see you add to it. The more the better.

Now, in a way, it's rather a sad thing for Mamie and me to come back here for only a half-hour stay. This is the place that we have so often spent our leaves through our married life, and in late years have even established headquarters in the little White House, which this summer we couldn't do.

This has been a matter of great regret, and had we our own way, we should now stay a week instead of a half-hour. We would like to mingle with old friends, to enjoy your matchless recreation facilities, and to experience again a spell of this wonderful weather which Thornton assures me today is only average.

But, my friends, events rush on us, and there is no time to stay a week today. Things are happening in the world and there is a campaign in progress to decide how this country shall be run the next four years.

So the problem is to go back and to work for what I like to call a people's prosperity, and for the great cause of peace.

The strength of our country must always be our first concern-its spiritual, intellectual, economic, and its military strength. Above all things, it is the concern of each of us living here in the heartland of the United States or its borders, in official life or on a farm--our first concern must be that our country is secure.

But we must remember that that strength is not merely military, it is a many-sided thing, and part of it is the great industrial, productive, economic strength of this great country--a great prosperity widely shared. That has come about and has come on an ascending scale in these last three and a half years, and is one of the things of which we can well be proud, one of the things that we must keep moving in the same direction.

Now, in the work for peace, again, each of us has a job to do, to make certain that our nation stays strong, that we live in the faith of our fathers, that peace can finally be achieved for the world, that we can do our part in right thinking, in working at our daily jobs to convince others in the world that we want none of their property, we don't want to dominate them, we merely want the opportunity for all men who love freedom to have it, to hold it, and to enjoy it.

This is our task, not only for those who are in the Congress and in the State gubernatorial chairs and in the legislatures. All of us--America--must stand together, stand strong and be of one mind if we are, from our position of strength, going to lead really on the road of peace.

One thing on this last trip which is just now ending for me has impressed me mightily. We have been up through the northern country and in Minnesota and into the Northwest and into Portland and Los Angeles and back here; and I am convinced of one thing: America is more prosperous, America is happier, than it was four years ago.

There are those who tell us that we have a false prosperity, that people are fearful. I don't find it. It is true that there are still individuals, there are pockets where prosperity has not reached the heights that it has in the general level, and these must be continuing problems of government and, indeed, of all of us. But over the nation, the prosperity we are sharing today is at a new height, a new level, even for the United States. And out of the confidence that we are progressing slowly, even if tortuously, toward a peace, we see a glow of happiness on people's faces. They are believing something. They are holding a faith.

And I say to you, that kind of faith, and that kind of belief, is the first essential to pushing onward toward peace.

The problems that remain in the world are, of course, staggering. We have only to read our daily newspapers and read the words on Suez where differing opinions between friends of ours bring about a critical situation and require the constant and earnest attention of all statesmen in order that we may be certain of a peaceful solution.

We read about Poland in our papers, we read about these captive peoples that are still keeping alive the burning desire to live in freedom, a freedom that we have come to take almost for granted, but which they have found is the most difficult thing to sustain in the world. Our hearts go out to them, that they at last may have that opportunity to live under governments of their own choosing.

But I say again to you, no matter how difficult these problems, no matter how frequently they arise, if we do keep our own country strong in all of the ways of which I have spoken, if we keep strong our confidence, and above all our faith in ourselves, our country and our God, we will win through.

Thank you very much, my friends.