Remarks Upon Arrival of the "Lady Bird Special" at Union Station in New Orleans

Senator Ellender, Senator Long, Members of the congressional delegation, Governor McKeithen, my beloved friend Hale Boggs, who has spent the last 4 days coming through our Southland carrying the message to our own people:

You have heard from the stars and the sensations of this special train, but I want all of you to know that I think so much of the South that gave me birth that I have given the South the best I had for the last 4 days.

Eleven months ago on that tragic day when I became your President and returned to the White House that night, I said to the people of this country and the people of the world that with God's help and your prayers, I would do my best to be President of all the people.

That was a difficult period of transition. A good and wise and courageous leader had started moving this country again, and he had been President of all the people. And he had given all that he had to give--his life--in the service of it. I promised my Maker and I promised my family if I were spared that as long as I occupied the position that he had left vacant I would carry on for him and for you, in his program and in your program, of peace and prosperity for all the people of all the world.

For 20 years we have had a bipartisan foreign policy and President Truman, with the help of Arthur Vandenberg, met the Communists at Greece and Turkey, and stood up and was counted, and we won. President Eisenhower, with the help of a Democratic Congress, and with the support of the then Democratic leader, Lyndon Johnson, stood up in the Strait of Formosa, and let the world know that freedom was on the march.

John F. Kennedy, with the support of the leaders of both parties, stood up in the Cuban missile crisis, and Mr. Khrushchev packed up his missiles and put them on his boat and took them home. And when they fired upon our destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin, we made prompt, appropriate reply.

Now, I do not think that we can lead the world, as Luci says, I do not think we can unite other peoples, if we are divided ourselves. And I have done everything I know how to do to treat all Americans equally and alike and fair.

I have invited the leaders of both parties to give me their counsel and their wisdom and their support. I have invited all the States of the Union to share in the fruits of our efforts and to contribute everything they could to help us achieve peace in the world.

We are going through a critical time, and there are those who would conquer us by dividing us. But I am proud to say that they were in the minority in America during the first 11 months of my term as President, and they are going to be very much in the minority on November 3d.

We are going to continue to be the strongest nation in the world. We are going to keep our guard up, but our hand out. We are willing to go anywhere, any time, to talk to anyone, to do anything with honor to get peace in the world, and we are going to have prosperity at home. We are going to educate our children. We are going to have jobs for the people who want to work. We are going to improve our countryside. We are going to protect our farmers.

I may cut out the lights of the chandeliers in the White House, but we are not going to turn out REA in Louisiana!

I am going to repeat here in Louisiana what I have said in every State that I have appeared in, and what I said the night that I walked to the White House to take over the awesome responsibilities that were mine: As long as I am your President, I am going to be President of all the people.

We are not going to have any business government, we are not going to have any labor government, we are not going to have any farm government. We are going to have a government of all the people, and your President is going to protect the constitutional rights of every American.

Those that want to be fair and those that want to be just, and those that want to follow the Golden Rule of doing unto others as you would have them do unto you, we invite them to come and join us. Those that have other views are welcome to them, and this is a free country. They can express them as strongly as they want to with such vehemence as they may choose and we will listen, but we will not follow. Because this democratic land of ours is going to be a united land.

In the words of Robert E. Lee, I am going to say tonight, let's try to get our people to forget their old animosities and let us all be Americans.

It is wonderful to be back in New Orleans where I was in 1960. I thank you for your hospitality, for your understanding. I will appreciate your support and your help, and I will try to be worthy of your confidence.

Thank you.