Speech Transcript:

 For the sixth and the last time, I present to the Congress my
assessment of the State of the Union.

I shall speak to you tonight about challenge and opportunity-and
about the commitments that all of us have made together that will, if
we carry them out, give America our best chance to achieve the kind of
great society that we all want.

Every President lives, not only with what is, but with what has been
and what could be.

Most of the great events in his Presidency are part of a larger
sequence extending back through several years and extending back
through several other administrations.

Urban unrest, poverty, pressures on welfare, education of our people,
law enforcement and law and order, the continuing crisis in the Middle
East, the conflict in Vietnam, the dangers of nuclear war, the great
difficulties of dealing with the Communist powers, all have this much
in common: They and their causes-the causes that gave rise to them-all
of these have existed with us for many years. Several Presidents have
already sought to try to deal with them. One or more Presidents will
try to resolve them or try to contain them in the years that are
ahead of us.

But if the Nation's problems are continuing, so are this great
Nation's assets:

    * our economy,
    * the democratic system,
    * our sense of exploration, symbolized most recently by the
wonderful flight of the Apollo 8, in which all Americans took great
pride,
    * the good commonsense and sound judgment of the American people,
and
    * their essential love of justice. 

We must not ignore our problems. But neither should we ignore our
strengths. Those strengths are available to sustain a President of
either party-to support his progressive efforts both at home and
overseas.

Unfortunately, the departure of an administration does not mean the
end of the problems that this administration has faced. The effort to
meet the problems must go on, year after year, if the momentum that we
have all mounted together in these past years is not to be lost.

Although the struggle for progressive change is continuous, there are
times when a watershed is reached-when there is-if not really a break
with the past-at least the fulfillment of many of its oldest hopes,
and a stepping forth into a new environment, to seek new goals.

I think the past 5 years have been such a time.

We have finished a major part of the old agenda.

Some of the laws that we wrote have already, in front of our eyes,
taken on the flesh of achievement.

Medicare that we were unable to pass for so many years is now a part
of American life.

Voting rights and the voting booth that we debated so long back in
the fifties, and the doors to public service, are open at last to all
Americans regardless of their color.

Schools and school children all over America tonight are receiving
Federal assistance to go to good schools.

Preschool education-Head Start-is already here to stay and, I think,
so are the Federal programs that tonight are keeping more than a
million and a half of the cream of our young people in the colleges
and the universities of this country.

Part of the American earth-not only in description on a map, but in
the reality of our shores, our hills, our parks, our forests, and our
mountains-has been permanently set aside for the American public and
for their benefit. And there is more that will be set aside before
this administration ends.

Five million Americans have been trained for jobs in new Federal
programs.

I think it is most important that we all realize tonight that this
Nation is close to full employment--with less unemployment than we
have had at any time in almost 20 years. That is not in theory; that
is in fact. Tonight, the unemployment rate is down to 3.3 percent.
The number of jobs has grown more than 8 1/2 million in the last 5
years. That is more than in all the preceding 12 years.

These achievements completed the full cycle, from idea to enactment
and, finally, to a place in the lives of citizens all across this
country.

I wish it were possible to say that everything that this Congress and
the administration achieved during this period had already completed
that cycle. But a great deal of what we have committed needs
additional funding to become a tangible realization.

Yet the very existence of these commitments- these promises to the
American people, made by this Congress and by the executive branch of
the Government-are achievements in themselves, and failure to carry
through on our commitments would be a tragedy for this Nation.

This much is certain: No one man or group of men made these
commitments alone. Congress and the executive branch, with their
checks and balances, reasoned together and finally wrote them into
the law of the land. They now have all the moral force that the
American political system can summon when it acts as one.

They express America's common determination to achieve goals. They
imply action.

In most cases, you have already begun that action--but it is not
fully completed, of course.

Let me speak for a moment about these commitments. I am going to
speak in the language which the Congress itself spoke when it passed
these measures.

I am going to quote from your words.

In 1966, Congress declared that "improving the quality of urban life
is the most critical domestic problem facing the United States." Two
years later it affirmed the historic goal of "a decent home . . . for
every American family." That is your language.

Now to meet these commitments, we must increase our support for the
model cities program, where blueprints of change are already being
prepared in more than 150 American cities.

To achieve the goals of the Housing Act of 1968 that you have already
passed, we should begin this year more than 500,000 homes for needy
families in the coming fiscal year. Funds are provided in the new
budget to do just this. This is almost 10 times-10 times-the average
rate of the past 10 years.

Our cities and our towns are being pressed for funds to meet the
needs of their growing populations. So I believe an urban development
bank should be created by the Congress. This bank could obtain
resources through the issuance of taxable bonds and it could then
lend these resources at reduced rates to the communities throughout
the land for schools, hospitals, parks, and other public facilities.

Since we enacted the Social Security Act back in 1935, Congress has
recognized the necessity to "make more adequate provision for aged
persons . . . through maternal and child welfare . . . and public
health." Those are the words of the Congress-"more adequate."

The time has come, I think, to make it more adequate. I believe we
should increase social security benefits, and I am so recommending
tonight.

I am suggesting that there should be an overall increase in benefits
of at least 13 percent. Those who receive only the minimum of $55
should get $80 a month.

Our Nation, too, is rightfully proud of our medical advances. But we
should remember that our country ranks 15th among the nations of the
world in its infant mortality rate.

I think we should assure decent medical care for every expectant
mother and for their children during the first year of their life in
the United States of America.

I think we should protect our children and their families from the
costs of catastrophic illness.

As we pass on from medicine, I think nothing is clearer to the
Congress than the commitment that the Congress made to end poverty.
Congress expressed it well, I think, in 1964, when they said: "It is
the policy of the United States to eliminate the paradox of poverty
in the midst of plenty in this nation."

This is the richest nation in the world. The antipoverty program has
had many achievements. It also has some failures. But we must not
cripple it after only 3 years of trying to solve the human problems
that have been with us and have been building up among us for
generations.

I believe the Congress this year will want to improve the
administration of the poverty program by reorganizing portions of it
and transferring them to other agencies. I believe, though, it will
want to continue, until we have broken the back of poverty, the
efforts we are now making throughout this land.

I believe, and I hope the next administration- I believe they
believe-that the key to success in this effort is jobs. It is work
for people who want to work.

In the budget for fiscal 1970, I shall recommend a total of $3.5
billion for our job training program, and that is five times as much
as we spent in 1964 trying to prepare Americans where they can work
to earn their own living.

The Nation's commitment in the field of civil rights began with the
Declaration of Independence. They were extended by the 13th, 14th,
and 15th amendments. They have been powerfully strengthened by the
enactment of three far-reaching civil rights laws within the past 5
years, that this Congress, in its wisdom, passed.

On January 1 of this year, the Fair Housing Act of 1968 covered over
20 million American homes and apartments. The prohibition against
racial discrimination in that act should be remembered and it should
be vigorously enforced throughout this land.

I believe we should also extend the vital provisions of the Voting
Rights Act for another 5 years.

In the Safe Streets Act of 1968, Congress determined "To assist state
and local governments in reducing the incidence of crime."

This year I am proposing that the Congress provide the full $300
million that the Congress last year authorized to do just that.

I hope the Congress will put the money where the authorization is.

I believe this is an essential contribution to justice and to public
order in the United States. I hope these grants can be made to the
States and they can be used effectively to reduce the crime rate in
this country.

But all of this is only a small part of the total effort that must be
made-I think chiefly by the local governments throughout the Nation-if
we expect to reduce the toll of crime that we all detest.

Frankly, as I leave the Office of the Presidency, one of my greatest
disappointments is our failure to secure passage of a licensing and
registration act for firearms. I think if we had passed that act, it
would have reduced the incidence of crime. I believe that the
Congress should adopt such a law, and I hope that it will at a not
too distant date.

In order to meet our longstanding commitment to make government as
efficient as possible, I believe that we should reorganize our postal
system along the lines of the Kappel report.

I hope we can all agree that public service should never impose an
unreasonable financial sacrifice on able men and women who want to
serve their country.

I believe that the recommendations of the Commission on Executive,
Legislative and Judicial Salaries are generally sound. Later this
week, I shall submit a special message which I reviewed with the
leadership this evening containing a proposal that has been reduced
and has modified the Commission's recommendation to some extent on
the congressional salaries.

For Members of Congress, I will recommend the basic compensation not
of the $50,000 unanimously recommended by the Kappel Commission and
the other distinguished Members, but I shall reduce that $50,000 to
$42,500. I will suggest that Congress appropriate a very small
additional allowance for official expenses, so that Members will not
be required to use their salary increase for essential official
business.

I would have submitted the Commission's recommendations, except the
advice that I received from the leadership-and you usually are
consulted about matters that affect the Congress-was that the
Congress would not accept the $50,000 recommendation, and if I
expected my recommendation to be seriously considered, I should make
substantial reductions. That is the only reason I didn't go along
with the Kappel report.

In 1967 I recommended to the Congress a fair and impartial random
selection system for the draft. I submit it again tonight for your
most respectful consideration.

I know that all of us recognize that most of the things we do to meet
all of these commitments I talk about will cost money. If we maintain
the strong rate of growth that we have had in this country for the
past 8 years, I think we shall generate the resources that we need to
meet these commitments.

We have already been able to increase our support for major social
programs-although we have heard a lot about not being able to do
anything on the home front because of Vietnam; but we have been able
in the last 5 years to increase our commitments for such things as
health and education from $30 billion in 1964 to $68 billion in the
coming fiscal year. That is more than double. That is more than it
has ever been increased in the 188 years of this Republic,
notwithstanding Vietnam.

We must continue to budget our resources and budget them responsibly
in a way that will preserve our prosperity and will strengthen our
dollar.

Greater revenues and the reduced Federal spending required by
Congress last year have changed the budgetary picture dramatically
since last January when we made our estimates. At that time, you will
remember that we estimated we would have a deficit of $8 billion.
Well, I am glad to report to you tonight that the fiscal year ending
June 30, 1969, this June, we are going to have not a deficit, but we
are going to have a $2.4 billion surplus.

You will receive the budget tomorrow. The budget for the next fiscal
year, that begins July 1-which you will want to examine very
carefully in the days ahead-will provide a $3.4 billion surplus.

This budget anticipates the extension of the surtax that Congress
enacted last year. I have communicated with the President-elect, Mr.
Nixon, in connection with this policy of continuing the surtax for
the time being.

I want to tell you that both of us want to see it removed just as
soon as circumstances will permit, but the President-elect has told
me that he has concluded that until his administration, and this
Congress, can examine the appropriation bills, and each item in the
budget, and can ascertain that the facts justify permitting the
surtax to expire or to be reduced, he, Mr. Nixon, will support my
recommendation that the surtax be continued.

Americans, I believe, are united in the hope that the Paris talks
will bring an early peace to Vietnam. And if our hopes for an early
settlement of the war are realized, then our military expenditures
can be reduced and very substantial savings can be made to be used
for other desirable purposes, as the Congress may determine.

In any event, I think it is imperative that we do all that we
responsibly can to resist inflation while maintaining our prosperity.
I think all Americans know that our prosperity is broad and it is
deep, and it has brought record profits, the highest in our history,
and record wages.

Our gross national product has grown more in the last 5 years than
any other period in our Nation's history. Our wages have been the
highest. Our profits have been the best. This prosperity has enabled
millions to escape the poverty that they would have otherwise had the
last few years.

I think also you will be very glad to hear that the Secretary of the
Treasury informs me tonight that in 1968 in our balance of payments
we have achieved a surplus. It appears that we have, in fact, done
better this year than we have done in any year in this regard since
the year 1957.

The quest for a durable peace, I think, has absorbed every
administration since the end of World War II. It has required us to
seek a limitation of arms races not only among the superpowers, but
among the smaller nations as well. We have joined in the Test Ban
Treaty of 1963, the outer space treaty of 1967, and the treaty
against the spread of nuclear weapons in 1968.

This latter agreement-the nonproliferation treaty-is now pending in
the Senate and it has been pending there since last July. In my
opinion, delay in ratifying it is not going to be helpful to the
cause of peace. America took the lead in negotiating this treaty and
America should now take steps to have it approved at the earliest
possible date.

Until a way can be found to scale down the level of arms among the
superpowers, mankind cannot view the future without fear and great
apprehension. So, I believe that we should resume the talks with the
Soviet Union about limiting offensive and defensive missile systems.
I think they would already have been resumed except for
Czechoslovakia and our election this year.

It was more than 20 years ago that we embarked on a program of trying
to aid the developing nations. We knew then that we could not live in
good conscience as a rich enclave on an earth that was seething in
misery.

During these years there have been great advances made under our
program, particularly against want and hunger, although we are
disappointed at the appropriations last year. We thought they were
woefully inadequate. This year I am asking for adequate funds for
economic assistance in the hope that we can further peace throughout
the world.

I think we must continue to support efforts in regional cooperation.
Among those efforts, that of Western Europe has a very special place
in America's concern.

The only course that is going to permit Europe to play the great
world role that its resources permit is to go forward to unity. I
think America remains ready to work with a united Europe, to work as
a partner on the basis of equality.

For the future, the quest for peace, I believe, requires:

    * that we maintain the liberal trade policies that have helped us
become the leading nation in world trade,
    * that we strengthen the international monetary system as an
instrument of world prosperity, and
    * that we seek areas of agreement with the Soviet Union where the
interests of both nations and the interests of world peace are
properly served. 

The strained relationship between us and the world's leading
Communist power has not ended-especially in the light of the brutal
invasion of Czechoslovakia. But totalitarianism is no less odious to
us because we are able to reach some accommodation that reduces the
danger of world catastrophe.

What we do, we do in the interest of peace in the world. We earnestly
hope that time will bring a Russia that is less afraid of diversity
and individual freedom.

The quest for peace tonight continues in Vietnam, and in the Paris
talks.

I regret more than any of you know that it has not been possible to
restore peace to South Vietnam.

The prospects, I think, for peace are better today than at any time
since North Vietnam began its invasion with its regular forces more
than 4 years ago.

The free nations of Asia know what they were not sure of at that
time: that America cares about their freedom, and it also cares about
America's own vital interests in Asia and throughout the Pacific.

The North Vietnamese know that they cannot achieve their aggressive
purposes by force. There may be hard fighting before a settlement is
reached; but, I can assure you, it will yield no victory to the
Communist cause.

I cannot speak to you tonight about Vietnam without paying a very
personal tribute to the men who have carried the battle out there for
all of us. I have been honored to be their Commander in Chief. The
Nation owes them its unstinting support while the battle
continues-and its enduring gratitude when their service is done.

Finally, the quest for stable peace in the Middle East goes on in
many capitals tonight. America fully supports the unanimous
resolution of the U.N. Security Council which points the way.

There must be a settlement of the armed hostility that exists in that
region of the world today. It is a threat not only to Israel and to
all the Arab States, but it is a threat to every one of us and to the
entire world as well.

Now, my friends in Congress, I want to conclude with a few very
personal words to you.

I rejected and rejected and then finally accepted the congressional
leadership's invitation to come here to speak this farewell to you in
person tonight.

I did that for two reasons. One was philosophical. I wanted to give
you my judgment, as I saw it, on some of the issues before our
Nation, as I view them, before I leave.

The other was just pure sentimental. Most all of my life as a public
official has been spent here in this building. For 38 years- since I
worked on that gallery as a doorkeeper in the House of
Representatives-I have known these halls, and I have known most of
the men pretty well who walked them.

I know the questions that you face. I know the conflicts that you
endure. I know the ideals that you seek to serve.

I left here first to become Vice President, and then to become, in a
moment of tragedy, the President of the United States.

My term of office has been marked by a series of challenges, both at
home and throughout the world.

In meeting some of these challenges, the Nation has found a new
confidence. In meeting others, it knew turbulence and doubt, and fear
and hate.

Throughout this time, I have been sustained by my faith in
representative democracy- a faith that I had learned here in this
Capitol Building as an employee and as a Congressman and as a
Senator.

I believe deeply in the ultimate purposes of this Nation-described by
the Constitution, tempered by history, embodied in progressive laws,
and given life by men and women that have been elected to serve their
fellow citizens.

Now for 5 most demanding years in the White House, I have been
strengthened by the counsel and the cooperation of two great former
Presidents, Harry S. Truman and Dwight David Eisenhower. I have been
guided by the memory of my pleasant and close association with the
beloved John F. Kennedy, and with our greatest modern legislator,
Speaker Sam Rayburn.

I have been assisted by my friend every step of the way, Vice
President Hubert Humphrey. I am so grateful that I have been
supported daily by the loyalty of Speaker McCormack and Majority
Leader Albert.

I have benefited from the wisdom of Senator Mike Mansfield, and I am
sure that I have avoided many dangerous pitfalls by the good
commonsense counsel of the President Pro Tem of the Senate, Senator
Richard Brevard Russell.

I have received the most generous cooperation from the leaders of the
Republican Party in the Congress of the United States, Senator Dirksen
and Congressman Gerald Ford, the Minority Leader.

No President should ask for more, although I did upon occasions. But
few Presidents have ever been blessed with so much.

President-elect Nixon, in the days ahead, is going to need your
understanding, just as I did. And he is entitled to have it. I hope
every Member will remember that the burdens he will bear as our
President, will be borne for all of us. Each of us should try not to
increase these burdens for the sake of narrow personal or partisan
advantage.

Now, it is time to leave. I hope it may be said, a hundred years from
now, that by working together we helped to make our country more just,
more just for all of its people, as well as to insure and guarantee
the blessings of liberty for all of our posterity.

That is what I hope. But I believe that at least it will be said that
we tried.