[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 68 (Thursday, May 26, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[Congressional Record: May 26, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
{time} 1730
FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARIES
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Fingerhut). Under the Speaker's
announced policy of February 11, 1994, and May 23, 1994, the gentleman
from California [Mr. Dornan] is recognized for 60 minutes as the
designee of the minority leader.
Mr. DORNAN. Mr. Speaker, we are going on a district work break, what
is called the Memorial recess. During the upcoming week, the largest
congressional contingent that I can recall will be commemorating and
honoring an important day in history, that day being June 6, 1944, D-
Day. This large delegation is going to Europe and will visit Utah
Beach, Omaha Beach. Some of America's World War II veterans who saw the
fire of combat during that amazing period of history are going to speak
as are Canadian and British veterans.
I would like to share the following with C-SPAN's audience of 1.5
million.
I would like to use my imagination here for a minute and tell you,
Mr. Speaker pro tempore, what I would have done today were I the
Speaker. I would have set the scene for this Memorial Day recess. Most
of our Members from both sides of the aisle have been invited to
Memorial Day ceremonies at graveyards all over the country,
particularly to beautiful Federal graveyards like Sautelle in west Los
Angeles or Arlington. They have been invited to speak, to pause again
for the men and women who have given the full measure of devotion, to
use Lincoln's beautiful, poetic expression, ``dying for your friends
and your country.'' I would like to tell you what I would have done
were I the Speaker.
I think I would have taken an hour from today's proceedings to
commemorate D-Day. We did this once on Flag Day, led by Congressman
Risenhoover of Oklahoma. We filled this Chamber with potted plants. I
mean potted plants all over the place. Probably the Speaker would not
remember this, but we had June Carter and Johnny Cash, her handsome
husband, come to the well. Full Chamber, we invited all the staff on
the floor and some of the Senate staff came over. We did a tribute to
the American flag. This must have been 1978 or 1979, Jimmy Carter was
President.
I thought, well, this is probably what we are going to do in the '90s
as we go through the 50th anniversaries of all of these great momentous
days that I remember vividly even though I was only 8 to 12 years of
age. I thought we would do it for Pearl Harbor, obviously Victory in
Europe day, Harry Truman's birthday, May 8, that we would do it for
Victory in Japan Day and we would do it on September 2, the signing of
the Japanese unconditional surrender on the deck of the U.S.S.
Missouri. I thought we would go through all these days.
Then we came to the 75th anniversary of World War I's ending, on that
day in 1918 my father, Harry Joseph Dornan, was in the trenches of
France somewhere between Argonne and Chateau Thierry. When the 75th
Anniversary of that 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918
passed here on Capitol Hill in 1993, nothing happened. And of course,
the 75th anniversary is the last one that most veterans celebrate.
Nobody is around for the 100th.
Here we were not memorializing or commemorating in this Chamber any
of the 50th anniversaries of the days of World War II and the 75th
anniversary of World War I. And I though, what are we going to do for
D-Day? Here we are, we have done nothing.
If we had shut this House down, we would not have needed a great
singer like Johnny Cash, we could have had our own heroes here, Tom
Bevill, Sam Gibbons, we could have invited Strom Thurmond from the
other body to commemorate this great day, which will be passing while
we are in recess. We would have done this to remind our pages and every
other young boy or girl, young man or woman across this country why it
is important to remember great historical days. We must remember in
order to pass on that legacy, and that torch off to the next
generation. When we ask young people to dare to do great things--to do
an extra bit of homework, not to sleep with that fellow classmate, not
to drink that can of beer and then smash head-on into some van filled
with a family, not to cheat on that exam--we must have exemples of
greatness for them to follow. We should ask young men and women to make
this a stronger country than we gave to them or that our parents and
grandparents gave to us. We have to be able to talk about uplifting
moments in history when people died for freedom, died for their
country.
Bob Michel was just telling me--he hit the beach on D-Day plus 4--
that it moved him when he read Eisenhower's words. I told him I was
going to reread the order of the day from the supreme headquarters
allied expeditionary force, Eisenhower's stunning words to the invasion
force. Our Republican leader said, ``I just reread them yesterday, Bob,
and it struck me that he used the term `United Nations,' not `the
United Nations,' but `United Nations.''' Even then the term had come
into usage. We had not formally organized the body, which happened at
San Francisco a year and some months later, but the term was in usage.
It was the Axis Powers versus the United Nations of the allies.
I stand here stunned today that we are going to take this break with
no mention of the breakout at Anzio 50 years ago this week, no mention
of the liberation of one of the most beautiful cities ever on the face
of the Earth. It had seen in its ugly pagan days the slaughtering of
Christians and now the headquarters of one of the world's great
Christian faiths, my Catholic faith, Vatican City, Rome. Eternal Rome,
I believe it is the most romantic city on the face of the Earth.
We liberated it from the heel of Mussolini's blackshirt Fascists on
June 4, 50 years ago, 2 days before D-Day. As I have often said, all
the men who died on the road from Salerno and Anzio fighting for the
liberation of Rome, they were eclipsed by the cataclysmic events on D-
Day, June 6. But these two great days in history--the liberation of
Rome and the establishment of a beachhead at Normandy--and not a word
is spoken in this House except a few 1-minutes. I thought maybe I would
be able to organize a special 1 hour when we get back to tell of some
of our experiences, walking--again, to quote Lincoln speaking of the
Gettysburg battlefield--``this hallowed ground.'' There is nothing we
can do to pay it any more respect or devotion than was done by the
blood of the young men that died there.
Maybe we will bring back some hallowed memories of those beaches
along that gorgeous Normandy French area.
I took one of my daughters, Kathleen, to Ste. Mere-Eglise. Kathy
loves history. She says I passed on my wanderlust to her. She wants to
visit every country in the world, which is the dream of anybody who
loves all the diverse countries in the world.
I took her to Ste. Mere-Eglise back in 1982, and we went looking of
course for the church steeple where private 1st class airborne
paratrooper John Steel had come down, his chute caught on the very
spire of the church. He hung there pretending he was dead. The trees
surrounding the church were filled with bodies of young Americans who
were truly dead.
We found a lady, still young, younger than I am now, who had been a
young girl in 1944. Her father owned a butcher's shop, and she was
still in that building. She spoke beautiful English with a wonderful
French accent. She took us out on the street and showed us where the
body of a handsome young paratrooper was lying dead. She begins to cry,
making my daughter cry, making me cry. She said, ``I looked at this
handsome young American boy come to liberate us, dead at the very
doorstep of my father's shop right here.''
{time} 1740
I thought, ``How wonderful, and yet how sad, that Americans have to
come back twice inside of one generation, sons coming back to do what
their father did, die for French freedom.'' Then she showed me where
young men were hanging in the trees.
I saw that great moment when John Wayne is playing Gen. Maxwell
Taylor. Wayne says in that classic style of this, ``Cut 'em down''
meaning all the young paratroopers hanging in the trees. It struck me
then that the first American flags flown over France were the ones
stitched on the shoulders of the field jackets of the paratroopers who
died hanging in those trees.
That was the occasion of the first flying of the American flags,
heroes' bodies turning in that morning breeze of June 6. That was the
beginning of the liberation of France.
There were all sorts of flags from World War I, from the South
Pacific, flags that had come up from the landing at Salerno in Italy
the year before. All sorts of flags, including flags hidden by the
French, burst out all over Normandy during the month of that titanic
struggle.
As I said yesterday, it was Rommel himself, Erwin Rommel, the field
marshal, the Desert Fox, that said this would be the longest day of the
war because the Americans, the British, the small French units, and the
Canadians established a beachhead. That was the end of the war.
That landing, because it was successful, caused the assassination
plot against Hitler; tyrannicide is the way I think to think about it,
the justifiable Judeo-Christian murder of a tyrant to save lives. That
plot, Operation Valkyrie of Klaus van Stoffenberg, was thwarted just 44
days later, on July 20. Five thousand German officers who--too late,
far too late, but still in a just way--tried to take out the tyrant.
They paid for it with their lives, hung by piano wire from butcher
hooks. Hitler has it all photographed, the 16 millimeter film sent up
to Berchtesgaden or to the bunker in Berlin where like a pervert he
would sit for hours and hours and watch over and over the film of these
5,000 German officers and high ranking civilians executed. Some of them
were innocent; they should have been in on the Valkyrie assassination
plot, but they were not.
What an amazing thing that we established that beachhead.
Well, Mr. Speaker, I will come back. I will see if there are some
stories to bring home to motivate the next generations of Americans. To
tell them that the United States of America for all of her faults, is a
superior attempt at culture; that this truly is a nation of immigrants,
a polyglot country of many cultures, every culture from everywhere in
the world. There are even aboriginal people from Australia that have
come to America and became American citizens.
We are a different country than any one that has ever existed. We
have fought in wars around the world with no strings attached, bled our
treasure and the blood of young men. There are also women who have
died, eight died for their country as combat nurses in Vietnam. We have
really done something in this century that no country has ever done
before, die fighting for freedom with no strings attached and nothing
asked of the countries that we liberate or the countries that we
conquered like Japan, Germany, or Italy other than: ``Get your
political scene together in a coherent way, and let your people share
in your process of government.''
So, Mr. Speaker, what I would like to do before I put in the Record
President Ronald Reagan's good-bye speech to this Nation on 11 January
1989, 9 days before the inauguration of his then Vice President, George
Bush, to become the 41st President; our 40th President, Ronald Reagan,
at the end of about an eight-page address to television saying good-bye
paused and said:
``There is something else I'd like to say to my fellow Americans by
way of good-bye,'' and again I paraphrase him badly, but it will be in
the Record. He told his Nation of the importance of remembering our
history, the men and women who came to a frontier and tried to create a
new and a different type of democracy. And, in the main, we have
succeeded amazingly well. He told young children something to the
effect: ``I give you kids permission to get on your parents' case at
the kitchen table and demand of your parents that they make sure you
are educated in the history of this Nation.''
That probably will go down as one of the finest and constructive
good-byes of any American President.
Three weeks ago I had the opportunity as a member of the Committee on
Armed Services and as a fading, aging peacetime fighter pilot to strap
into the back seat of a Navy F-14 Tomcat and fly out to the U.S.S.
Eisenhower, one of our big nuclear supercarriers. We shot five
landings, cable-arrested landings, on the deck. Navy jocks call those
traps. And, when we landed, I thought we were going to go below and
meet the admiral and the skipper of the ship, and I always wanted to
meet some of the women that were assigned. This is going to be the
first man-of-war, the first U.S. Navy line ship, with women on board. I
thought we were going to taxi over, and I could see there was no guard
there, no people to greet us. It was raining, and all of a sudden we
taxied, and then took a left turn, and suddenly we were locked into
catapult No. 4, and they go through that amazing process. It is almost
like a dance of the macabre with all these young Navy people in
different colored uniforms, armorers, fuelers, cat men, catapult men.
By the way, that is the most dangerous industrial or military work
environment in peacetime anywhere on the planet Earth, the deck of a
carrier during recoveries and launches, and suddenly we are lined up,
and this was my first catapult launch in a fighter. I had done it on
board delivery aircraft in the Persian Gulf after visiting with my
nephew, Don Dornan, Jr., Navy officer. But you are sitting backward in
the back of a small transport plane. This is my first time in a cat
launch, facing forward, in the radar intercept officer's position, and
it was one of the better flying experiences of my life, right up there
with flying three times the speed of sound at 84,000 feet in an SR-71
Black Bird. That still maybe is a notch more impressive. But, when we
launched off that cat, I planned to take a picture from the back seat
with my Nikon. I was shoved back so hard, I did not get it, so the next
launch we catapulted--five times in a row, and, when I finally got out
in a pouring rainstorm and went into the island of the big sail, the
island of the carrier, to meet with the admiral and the captain, the
skipper of the ship, I kept thinking to myself, over and over:
``What an honor it is for Nixon's grandkids and Eisenhower's
grandkids to have this big beautiful Navy man of war aircraft carrier
named after Eisenhower.'' I thought, ``What a special President he
was,'' and, ``How lucky our country was to have somebody as the
Commander in Chief during the peacetime years that I flew as a fighter
pilot.''
I think a key reason why I was never called upon to kill some other
mother's child, or be killed and shot down myself is, when you have a
five-star general, and we only have had eight five-star admirals and
generals, sitting in the White House, we have a man of character to
look up to. The whole military establishment says that, ``If this man
gives me orders, if this man talks to me about Somalia, Bosnia, Haiti,
Guadalcanal, the beaches in France, this is a man I'll obey willingly
and lay my life on the line.''
So, thinking about that beautiful carrier, thinking about General and
then-President Eisenhower, this humble man from Abilene, KS, who
graduated in the class of West Point of 1915, I stopped one of our
great chairmen here, Democrat Tom Bevill, and asked him where he was
when Ike read these words. Tom went into the beach a few days after he
was training people, he was an officer training people in England, and
he said, ``Those of us in England didn't hear it read. We saw it in the
paper the next day, Stars and Stripes or British papers.''
{time} 1750
He said, he reminded me it was piped over the PA system of every one
of those 5,000 invasion ships.
Before I do it, Mr. Speaker, let me find that key paragraph in
Reagan's January 11 farewell address to the Nation. Let me read the
opening and then I will go looking for it.
Ronald Reagan.
My Fellow Americans: This is the 34th time I'll speak to
you from the Oval Office and the last. We've been together 8
years now, and soon it will be time for me to go.
Mr. Speaker, in my lifetime there have only been three 8-year
Presidents: President Roosevelt who died into his 13th year by 89 days;
and then Eisenhower's 8 years, and Ronald Reagan, our only other 8-year
President since Woodrow Wilson. He says:
Before I do, I wanted to share some thoughts, some of which
I've been saving for a long time. It's been the honor of my
life to be your President.
He goes on telling about how he and Nancy have been so honored to
receive so many letters. He says:
You know, down the hall and up the stairs from this office
is the part of the White House where the President and his
family live. There are a few favorite windows I have up there
that I like to stand and look out of early in the morning.
The view is over the grounds here to the Washington Monument
and then the Mall and the Jefferson Memorial. But on mornings
when the humidity is low, you can see past Jefferson to the
river, the Potomac, and the Virginia shore. Someone said
that's the view Lincoln had when he saw the smoke rising from
the Battle of Bull Run. I see more prosaic things, the grass
on the banks, the morning traffic as people make their way to
work, and now and then a sailboat on the river.
I've been thinking a bit at that window. I've been
reflecting on what the past 8 years have meant and mean. And
the image that comes to mind like a refrain is a nautical
one. A small story about a big ship and a refugee and a
sailor. It was back in the early 1980's at the height of the
boat people. And a U.S. sailor was hard at work on the
carrier Midway which was patrolling the South China Sea. The
sailor like most American servicemen was young, smart, and
fiercely observant. The crew spied on the horizon a leaky
little boat. And crammed inside were refugees from Indochina
hoping to get to America.
Refugees caused by the Stroke Talbotts, the Sam Browns, the Derrick
Shearers and the Bill Clintons of the world. That is my Bob Dornan
footnote.
The Midway sent a small launch to bring them to the ship
and safety. As the refugees made their way through the choppy
seas, one refugee spied the sailor on deck and stood up and
called out to him. He yelled up, ``Hello, American sailor.
Hello, freedom man.'' A small moment with a big meaning, a
moment the sailor who wrote it in a letter couldn't get out
of his mind. And, when I saw it, neither could I. Because
that's what it was to be an American in the 1980's. We stood
again for freedom. I know we always have. But in the past few
years, the world again and in a way we ourselves rediscovered
it.
He goes on to talk about Grenada, the Washington and the Moscow
summits. This will all be in the record, Mr. Speaker.
And then he comes to this, talks about we the people. We the people
tell the government what to do, it does not tell us--not often. We the
people are the driver, the government is the car.
He goes through a more and more beautiful paragraph talking about
Gorbachev and some of the Reagan regiments that will have to become the
Bush brigades.
He comes down to the end, and here is that part that I want to use as
a prologue to D-Day.
He says, and I'm quoting President Reagan's final address, last
paragraph, the President says:
An informed patriotism is what we want. And are we doing a
good enough job teaching our children what America is and
what she represents in the long history of the world? Those
of us who are over 35 or so years of age grew up in a
different America. We were taught very directly what it means
to be an American. And we absorbed almost in the air a love
of country and an appreciation of its institutions. If you
didn't get these things from your family, you got them from
the neighborhood, from the father down the street who fought
in Korea or the family who lost someone at Anzio. Or you
could get a sense of patriotism from school. And if all else
failed, you could get a sense of patriotism from the popular
culture. The movies celebrated democratic values and
implicitly reinforced the idea that America was special.
Television was like that, too, through the mid-1960's.
But now we're about to enter the 90's and some things have
changed. Younger parents aren't sure that an unambivalent
appreciation of America is the right thing to teach modern
children. And as for those who create the popular culture,
well-grounded patriotism is no longer the style. Our spirit
is back
he is talking now in January 1989
but we haven't reinstitutionalized it. We've got to do a
better job of getting across that American is freedom,
freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of
enterprise, and freedom is special and rare. It is fragile.
It needs protection.
So we have got to teach history, based not on what's in
fashion but what is important. Why the Pilgrims came here.
Who Jimmy Doolittle was and what those 30 seconds over Tokyo
meant.
You know 4 years ago on the 40th anniversary of D-Day
next week's it's a 50
I read a letter from a young woman writing to her late father
who had fought on Omaha Beach.
What a moment that was.
Her name was Lisa Zanatta Henn. And she said: ``We will
always remember. We will never forget what the boys of
Normandy did.'' Well, let's help her keep her word,
President Reagan said to us in his goodbye.
If we forget what we did, we won't know who we are. I'm
warning of an eradication of the American memory that could
result ultimately in an erosion of the American spirit.
Let's start with some basics: More attention to American
history and a greater emphasis on civil ritual. And let me
offer lesson number one about America. All great change in
America begins at the kitchen table. So tomorrow night, in
the kitchen, I hope the talking begins. And, children, if
your parents haven't been teaching you what it means to be an
American, let'em know and nail'em on it. That would be a very
American thing to do.
{time} 1800
That is about all I have to say tonight, except for one
thing: The past few days when I have been at that window
upstairs, I have thought a bit of the shining city on a hill.
That phrase comes from John Winthrop, who by the way, his
statue is right downstairs, first Governor of Massachusetts,
and his son, first Governor of Connecticut. What he imagined
was important, because he was an early pilgrim, an early
freedom man. He journeyed here on what today we would call a
little wooden boat. And like the other pilgrims, he was
looking for a home that would be free.
I have spoken of the shining city all my political life,
but I don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when
I said it. But in my mind it was a tall, proud city, built on
rocks stronger than oceans, wind-swept, God-blessed, and
teeming with people of all kinds, living in harmony and
peace. A city with free ports that hummed with commerce and
creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had
doors, and the doors were open to anyone with the will and
the heart to get here. That is how I saw it and see it still.
And out stands that city on a hill this winter night, more
prosperous, more secure, and happier than it was 8 years ago.
But more than that, after 200 years, two centuries, she still
stands strong and true on the granite ridge, and her glow is
held steady no matter what the storm. And she is still a
beacon, still a magnet, for all who must have freedom. For
all the pilgrims, from all the lost places, who are hurdling
through the darkness toward home. We have done our part. And
as I walk off into the city streets, a final word to the men
and women of the Reagan revolution, the men and women across
America who for 8 years did the work that brought America
back. My friends, we did it. We were not just marking time.
We made a difference. We made the city stronger, freer, and
left it in good hands. All in all, not bad. Not bad at all.
So good-bye, God Bless you, and God bless the United States
of America.
The big event in my life as a kid was dreaming about being in a
Thunderbolt or a Mustang or a Lightning over the decks of Normandy.
Like most kids with an imagination, you wanted it all.
I dreamed about shooting down a Messerschmidt, and then getting shot
down myself, joining the paratroopers on the ground, fighting on the
beach, joining the 4th Division, the 1st, the 29th. Kids wanted it all.
Today girls can have those dreams of glory fighting for freedom, and
having the mayor of a French town bring out a hidden bottle of
champagne, and with the fire still going on over your head. It is
beautifully written in Cornelius Ryan's book, ``The Longest Day. ``This
mayor putting on his medallions of office, those chains with all the
crests of the city, and his champagne bottle, dead cows around him,
Saying: ``Welcome, American, welcome.''
Twenty-two sets of twins now rest in the beautiful cemetary at
Deauville, in the hills overlooking Omaha Beach. One father and son
rest there as well. A father who fought in World War I buried next to
his son who had come back to liberate France again.
Unbelievable, that graveyard.
Let me take the center lectern as I close here, Mr. Speaker, to read
Dwight D. Eisenhower's words on the evening of June 5th, to the men who
were going to draw their last breath the next day.
Ike had what is called the midwestern American, non-accented,
standard American voice, and I can hear it in my head as I read this
from the Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force:
Soldiers, Sailors and Airmen of the Allied Expeditionary
Force: You are about to embark on a great crusade toward
which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the
world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty loving
people everywhere march with you. In company with our brave
allies and brothers in arms on other fronts, you will bring
about the destruction of the German war machine, the
elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of
Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world.
Your task will not be an easy one. Your enemy is well-
trained, well-equipped, and battle-hardened. He will fight
savagely.
But this is the year, 1944. Much has happened since the
Nazi triumphs of 1940-41. The united nations have inflicted
upon the Germans great defeats in open battle, man-to-man.
Our air offensive has seriously reduced their strength in the
air and their capacity to wage war on the ground. Our home
fronts have given us an overwhelming superiority in weapons
and munitions of war and placed at our disposal great
reserves of trained fighting men. The tide has turned. The
free men of the world are marching to victory. I have full
confidence in your courage, devotion to duty, and skill in
battle. We will accept nothing less than full victory.
Good luck. And let us all beseech the blessing of all-
mighty God upon this great and noble undertaking.
And there is his signature.
He then ordered that the ``Our Father'' would be recited by a
chaplain over the public address system of every ship in that 5,000
invasion force. Young men seasick because it was very stormy, throwing
up all night long, weak, exhausted, on the ships hours longer than they
planned. The last words they heard, other than the din of battle and
the screams of fellow soldiers: Over here. I am hit. Medic. The last
words they heard in silent contemplation were: ``Our Father, who are in
heaven, hollowed by thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on
earth as it is in heaven.''
Those words of the ``Our Father,'' and its final line, would be
deemed politically incorrect and insulting to a tiny minority in that
invasion force.
It is too bad that we leave some of this history behind, and that we
didn't have that hour ceremony that I dreamed about on the House floor
today, without my participation, with just my sitting out there,
listening to Republican Strom Thurmond, Democrat Tom Bevill, hero
paratrooper Sam Gibbons, and all the others like Bob Michael that
poured onto that beachhead day after day until we were rolling across
northern France behind George Patton, gallantly letting the French unit
under General LeClerci go into Paris on August 25. What amazing
historical events to follow as an 8, 9, 10, 11-year-old-boy.
{time} 1810
It made me want to come to Congress. It made me want to fly
supersonic fighters in the Air Force. It makes me want to dream about
other, higher office than serving as a Congressman in this great
legislative Chamber.
I wish everybody, every American, could be with us 40 Congressmen and
women and the veterans of this Chamber and the other Chamber that lead
us back to the beautiful beaches and the tough hedge rows of northern
France, the Normandy coastline, and to Anzio, the forgotten struggle in
Italy.
A final word, Mr. Speaker, I wear around my neck a small St.
Christopher given to me by Lt. Walter Krell, a veterinarian from
Northern California who is still a healthy, vigorous man in practice
today. He wore this little medal around his neck on 20 missions in the
South Pacific.
He led President Johnson's aircraft when President Johnson was in the
back, won the Silver Star for merely huddling, as I would have done,
because he was not at a gun station, was not a pilot or crew member,
just observing as a Navy Lieutenant Commander for Sam Rayburn, Speaker
of this Chamber. Walter Krell was at this time in New Guinea.
We were fighting across the northern part of New Guinea at this point
50 years ago. George Bush's carrier, last Monday, 50 years ago, the San
Jacinto, with Wasp and Essex, had hit Marcus Island.
Another task force had shelled Wake Island, where 200 American
prisoners were in the last year of their life. They would be executed,
every one of them shot in the back of the head, civilian construction
workers, because we bypassed Wake Island.
Men were dying in the jungle still in Bougainville, the Solomon
Islands were not secure, the Admiralty Islands, men were dying over the
skies of Rabaul. I don't want to forget what was happening 50 years ago
throughout the whole Pacific.
And our Russian allies, under the cruel dictator Stalin who killed
more people than Hitler, were still fighting magnificently, giving up
three or four lives for every German they captured as they pushed the
Nazi forces back to the six death camps in Poland, where they would
soon find a demonic nightmare of piles of bodies, all the result of
politics, politics gone wrong in Germany and Italy and in Tokyo in the
Diet. And it still continued to go wrong in the Soviet Union, even
after their great victories over another form of tyranny.
These are 50th anniversaries of momentous days, Mr. Speaker, and I am
just sorry that we do not have some time in our legislative schedule to
pause and take President Reagan's advice and contemplate the unique,
special, and noble history of our great country. God bless America.
Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force
Soldiers, Sailors and Airmen of the Allied Expeditionary
Force!
You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward
which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the
world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving
people everywhere march with you. In company with our brave
Allies and brothers-in-arms on other Fronts, you will bring
about the destruction of the German war machine, the
elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of
Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world.
Your task will not be an easy one. Your enemy is well
trained, well equipped and battle-hardened. He will fight
savagely.
But this is the year 1944! Much has happened since the Nazi
triumphs of 1940-41. The United Nations have inflicted upon
the Germans great defeats, in open battle, man-to-man. Our
air offensive has seriously reduced their strength in the air
and their capacity to wage war on the ground. Our Home Fronts
have given us an overwhelming superiority in weapons and
munition of war, and placed at our disposal great reserves of
trained fighting men. The tide has turned! The free men of
the world are marching together to Victory!
I have full confidence in your courage, devotion to duty
and skill in battle. We will accept nothing less than full
Victory!
Good Luck! And let us all beseech the blessing of Almighty
God upon this great and noble undertaking.
Dwight D. Eisenhower.
____
Ronald Reagan's Farewell Address to the Nation
(January 11, 1989)
My Fellow Americans: This is the 34th time I'll speak to
you from the Oval Office and the last. We've been together 8
years now, and soon it'll be time for me to go. But before I
do, I wanted to share some thoughts, some of which I've been
saving for a long time.
It's been the honor of my life to be your President. So
many of you have written the past few weeks to say thanks,
but I could say as much to you. Nancy and I are grateful for
the opportunity you gave us to serve.
One of the things about the Presidency is that you're
always somewhat apart. You spent a lot of time going by too
fast in a car someone else is driving, and seeing the people
through tinted glass--the parents holding up a child, and the
wave you saw too late and couldn't return. And so many times
I wanted to stop and reach out from behind the glass, and
connect. Well, maybe I can do a little of that tonight.
People ask how I feel about leaving. And the fact is,
``parting is such sweet sorrow.'' The sweet part is
California and the ranch and freedom. The sorrow--the
goodbyes, of course, and leaving this beautiful place.
You know, down the hall and up the stairs from this office
is the part of the White House where the President and his
family live. There are a few favorite windows I have up there
that I like to stand and look out of early in the morning.
The view is over the grounds here to the Washington Monument,
and then the Mall and the Jefferson Memorial. But on mornings
when the humidity is low, you can see past the Jefferson to
the river, the Potomac, and the Virginia shore. Someone said
that's the view Lincoln had when he saw the smoke rising from
the Battle of Bull Run. I see more prosaic things: the grass
on the banks, the morning traffic as people make their way to
work, now and then a sailboat on the river.
I've been thinking a bit at that window. I've been
reflecting on what the past 8 years have meant and mean. And
the image that comes to mind like a refrain is a nautical
one--a small story about a big ship, and a refugee, and a
sailor. It was back in the early eighties, at the height of
the boat people. And the sailor was hard at work on the
carrier Midway, which was patrolling the South China Sea. The
sailor, like most American servicemen, was young, smart, and
fiercely observant. The crew spied on the horizon a leaky
little boat. And crammed inside were refugees from
Indochina hoping to get to America. The Midway sent a
small launch to bring them to the ship and safety. As the
refugees made their way through the choppy seas, one spied
the sailor on deck, and stood up, and called out to him.
He yelled, ``Hello, American sailor. Hello, freedom man.''
A small moment with a big meaning, a moment the sailor, who
wrote it in a letter, couldn't get out of his mind. And, when
I saw it, neither could I. Because that's what it was to be
an American in the 1980's. We stood, again, for freedom. I
know we always have, but in the past few years the world
again--and in a way, we ourselves--rediscovered it.
It's been quite a journey this decade, and we held together
through some stormy seas. And at the end, together, we are
reaching our destination.
The fact is, from Grenada to the Washington and Moscow
summits, from the recession of '81 to '82, to the expansion
that began in late '82 and continues to this day, we've made
a difference. The way I see it, there were two great
triumphs, two things that I'm proudest of. One is the
economic recovery, in which the people of America created--
and filled--19 million new jobs. The other is the recovery of
our morale. America is respected again in the world and
looked to for leadership.
Something that happened to me a few years ago reflects some
of this. It was back in 1981, and I was attending my first
big economic summit, which was held that year in Canada. The
meeting place rotates among the member countries. The opening
meeting was a formal dinner for the heads of government of
the seven industrialized nations. Now, I sat there like the
new kid in school and listened, and it was all Francois this
and Helmut that. They dropped titles and spoke to one another
on a first-name basis. Well, at one point I sort of learned
in and said, ``My name's Ron.'' Well, in that same year, we
began the actions we felt would ignite an economic comeback--
cut taxes and regulation, started to cut spending. And soon
the recovery began.
Two years later, another economic summit with pretty much
the same cast. At the big opening meeting we all got
together, and all of sudden, just for a moment, I saw that
everyone was just sitting there looking at me. And then one
of them broke the silence. ``Tell us about the American
miracle,'' he said.
Well, back in 1980, when I was running for President, it
was all so different. Some pundits said our programs would
result in catastrophe. Our views on foreign affairs would
cause war. Our plans for the economy would cause inflation to
soar and bring about economic collapse. I even remember one
highly respected economist saying, back in 1982, that ``The
engines of economic growth have shut down here, and they're
likely to stay that way for years to come.'' Well, he and the
other opinion leaders were wrong. The fact is what they call
``radical'' was really ``right.'' What they called
``dangerous'' was just ``desperately needed.''
And in all of that time I won a nickname, ``The Great
Communicator.'' But I never though it was my style or the
words I used that made a difference: it was the content. I
wasn't a great communicator, but I communicated great things,
and they didn't spring full bloom from my brow, they came
from the heart of a great nation--from our experience, our
wisdom, and our belief in the principles that have guided us
for two centuries. They called it the Reagan revolution.
Well, I'll accept that, but for me it always seemed more like
the great rediscovery, a rediscovery of our values and our
common sense.
Common sense told us that when you put a big tax on
something, the people will produce less of it. So, we cut the
people's tax rates, and the people produced more than ever
before. The economy bloomed like a plant that had been cut
back and could now grow quicker and stronger. Our economic
program brought about the longest peacetime expansion in our
history: real family income up, the poverty rate down,
entrepreneurship booming, and an explosion in research and
new technology. We're exporting more than ever because
American industry because more competitive and at the same
time, we summoned the national will to knock down
protectionist walls abroad instead of erecting them at home.
Common sense also told us that to preserve the peace, we'd
have to become strong again after years of weakness and
confusion. So, we rebuilt our defenses, and this New Year we
toasted the new peacefulness around the globe. Not only have
the superpowers actually begun to reduce their stockpiles of
nuclear weapons--and hope for even more progress is bright--
but the regional conflicts that rack the globe are also
beginning to cease. The Persian Gulf is no longer a war zone.
The Soviets are leaving Afghanistan. The Vietnamese
are preparing to pull out of Cambodia, and an American-
mediated accord will soon send 50,000 Cuban troops home
from Angola.
The lesson of all this was, of course, that because we're a
great nation, our challenges seem complex. It will always be
this way. But as long as we remember our first principles and
believe in ourselves, the future will always be ours. And
something else we learned: Once you begin a great movement,
there's no telling where it will end. We meant to change a
nation, and instead, we changed a world.
Countries across the globe are turning to free markets and
free speech and turning away from the ideologies of the past.
For them, the great rediscovery of the 1980's has been that,
lo and behold, the moral way of government is the practical
way of government: Democracy, the profoundly good, is also
the profoundly productive.
When you've got to the point when you can celebrate the
anniversaries of your 39th birthday you can sit back
sometimes, review your life, and see it flowing before you.
For me there was a fork in the river, and it was right in the
middle of my life. I never meant to go into politics. It
wasn't my intention when I was young. But I was raised to
believe you had to pay your way for the blessings bestowed on
you. I was happy with my career in the entertainment world,
but I ultimately went into politics because I wanted to
protect something precious.
Ours was the first revolution in the history of mankind
that truly reversed the course of government, and with three
little words: ``We the People.'' ``We the People'' tell the
government what to do; it doesn't tell us. ``We the People''
are the driver; the government is the car. And we decide
where it should go, and by what route, and how fast. Almost
all the world's constitutions are documents in which
governments tell the people what their privileges are. Our
Constitution is a document in which ``We the People'' tell
the government what it is allowed to do. ``We the People''
are free. This belief has been the underlying basis for
everything I've tried to do these past 8 years.
But back in the 1960's, when I began, it seemed to me that
we'd begun reversing the order of things--that through
more and more rules and regulations and confiscatory
taxes, the government was taking more of our money, more
of our options, and more of our freedom. I went into
politics in part to put up my hand and say, ``Stop.'' I
was a citizen politician, and it seemed the right thing
for a citizen to do.
I think we have stopped a lot of what needed stopping. And
I hope we have once again reminded people that man is not
free unless government is limited. There's a clear cause and
effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of
physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.
Nothing is less free than pure communism--and yet we have,
the past few years, forged a satisfying new closeness with
the Soviet Union. I've been asked if this isn't a gamble, and
my answer is no because we're basing our actions not on words
but deeds. The detente of the 1970's was based not on actions
but promises. They'd promise to treat their own people and
the people of the world better. But the gulag was still the
gulag, and the state was still expansionist, and they still
waged proxy wars in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
Well, this time, so far, it's different. President
Gorbachev has brought about some internal democratic reforms
and begun the withdrawal from Afghanistan. He has also freed
prisoners whose names I've given him every time we've met.
But life has a way of reminding you of big things through
small incidents. Once, during the heady days of the Moscow
summit, Nancy and I decided to break off from the entourage
one afternoon to visit the shops on Arbat Street--that's a
little street just off Moscow's main shopping area. Even
though our visit was a surprise, every Russian there
immediately recognized us and called out our names and
reached for our hands. We were just about swept away by the
warmth. You could almost feel the possibilities in all that
joy. But within seconds, a KGB detail pushed their way toward
us and began pushing and shoving the people in the crowd. It
was an interesting moment. It reminded me that while the man
on the street in the Soviet Union yearns for peace, the
government is Communist. And those who run it are Communists,
and that means we and they view such issues as freedom and
human rights very differently.
We must keep up our guard, but we must also continue to
work together to lessen and eliminate tension and mistrust.
My view is that President Gorbachev is different from
previous Soviet leaders. I think he knows some of the things
wrong with his society and is trying to fix them. We wish him
well. And we'll continue to work to make sure that the Soviet
Union that eventually emerges from this process is a less
threatening one. What it all boils down to is this: I want
the new closeness to continue. And it will, as long as we
make it clear that we will continue to act in a certain way
as long as they continue to act in a helpful manner. If and
when they don't, at first pull your punches. If they persist,
pull the plug. It's still trust by verify. It's still play,
but cut the cards. It's still watch closely. And don't be
afraid to see what you see.
I've been asked if I have any regrets. Well, I do. The
deficit is one. I've been talking a great deal about that
lately, but tonight isn't for arguments, and I'm going to
hold my tongue. But an observation: I've had my share of
victories in the Congress, but what few people noticed is
that I never won anything you didn't win for me. They never
saw my troops, they never saw Reagan's regiments, the
American people. You won every battle with every call you
made and letter you wrote demanding action. Well, action is
still needed. If we're to finish the job. Reagan's regiments
will have to become the Bush brigades. Soon he'll be the
chief, and he'll need you every bit as much as I did.
Finally, there is a great tradition of warnings in
Presidential farewells, and I've got one that's been on my
mind for some time. But oddly enough it starts with one of
the things I'm proudest of in the past 8 years: the
resurgence of national pride that I called the new
patriotism. This national feeling is good, but it won't count
for much, and it won't last unless it's grounded in
thoughtfulness and knowledge.
An informed patriotism is what we want. And are we doing a
good enough job teaching our children what America is and
what she represents in the long history of the world?
Those of us who are over 35 or so years of age grew up in
a different America. We were taught, very directly, what
it means to be an American. And we absorbed, almost in the
air, a love of country and an appreciation of its
institutions. If you didn't get these things from your
family you got them from the neighborhood, from the father
down the street who fought in Korea or the family who lost
someone at Anzio. Or you could get a sense of patriotism
from school. And if all else failed you could get a sense
of patriotism from the popular culture. The movies
celebrated democratic values and implicitly reinforced the
idea that America was special. TV was like that, too,
through the mid-sixties.
But now, we're about to enter the nineties, and some things
have changed. Younger parents aren't sure that an
unambivalent appreciation of America is the right thing to
teach modern children. And as for those who create the
popular culture, well-grounded patriotism is no longer the
style. Our spirit is back, but we haven't reinstitutionalized
it. We've got to do a better job of getting across that
America is freedom--freedom of speech, freedom of religion,
freedom of enterprise. And freedom is special and rare. It's
fragile; it needs production [protection].
So, we've got to teach history based not on what's in
fashion but what's important--why the Pilgrims came here, who
Jimmy Doolittle was, and what those 30 seconds over Tokyo
meant. You know, 4 years ago on the 40th anniversary of D-
day, I read a letter from a young woman writing to her late
father, who'd fought on Omaha Beach. Her name was Lisa
Zanatta Henn, and she said, ``we will always remember, we
will never forget what the boys of Normandy did.'' Well,
let's help her keep her word. If we forget what we did, we
won't know who we are. I'm warning of an eradication of the
American memory that could result, ultimately, in an erosion
of the American spirit. Let's start with some basics: more
attention to American history and a greater emphasis on civic
ritual.
And let me offer lesson number one about America: All great
change in America begins at the dinner table. So, tomorrow
night in the kitchen I hope the talking begins. And
children, if your parents haven't been teaching you what
it means to be an American, let 'em know and nail 'em on
it. That would be a very American thing to do.
And that's about all I have to say tonight, except for one
thing. The past few days when I've been at that window
upstairs, I've thought a bit of the ``shining city upon a
hill.'' The phrase comes from John Winthrop, who wrote it to
describe the America he imagined. What he imagined was
important because he was an early Pilgrim, an early freedom
man. He journeyed here on what today we'd call a little
wooden boat; and like the other Pilgrims, he was looking for
a home that would be free.
I've spoken of the shining city all my political life, but
I don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I
said it. But in my mind it was a tall, proud city built on
rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and
teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace;
a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and
creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had
doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the
heart to get here. That's how I saw it, and see it still.
And how stands the city on this winter night? More
prosperous, more secure, and happier than it was 8 years ago.
But more than that: After 200 years, two centuries, she still
stands strong and true on the granite ridge, and her glow has
held steady no matter what storm. And she's still a beacon,
still a magnet for all who must have freedom, for all the
pilgrims from all the lost places who are hurtling through
the darkness, toward home.
We've done our part. And as I walk off into the city
streets, a final word to the men and women of the Reagan
revolution, the men and women across America who for 8 years
did the work that brought America back. My friends: We did
it. We weren't just marking time. We made a difference. We
made the city stronger, we made the city freer, and we left
her in good hands. All in all, not bad, not bad at all.
And so, goodbye, God bless you, and God bless the United
States of America.
Note: The President spoke at 9:02 p.m. from the Oval Office
at the White House. The address was broadcast live on
nationwide radio and television.
____________________