[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 22 (Friday, February 11, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E212]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                HONORING PRESIDENT RONALD WILSON REAGAN

                                 ______
                                 

                               speech of

                            HON. MIKE PENCE

                               of indiana

                    in the house of representatives

                      Wednesday, February 9, 2011

  Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, on February 6, 1911, America's fortieth 
president was born in a small midwestern town. A century later, we 
remember Ronald Wilson Reagan as a great man and a great leader who 
personified and advanced the highest ideals of the American people at 
home and abroad. He may have started his life with a humble beginning 
in America's heartland, but at a time when America longed for 
leadership, he answered the call to service.
  After eight years of his presidency, the communism of Soviet Russia 
was collapsing, the American military was rebuilt, the nation's economy 
restored and its moral fabric renewed. As he said himself, President 
Reagan left America ``more prosperous, more secure, and happier than it 
was eight years earlier.''
  Many will remember him as the Great Communicator. But as the 
President said many times, he was not a great communicator; he 
communicated great things. He communicated the traditional American 
values anchored by his profound Christian faith.
  His ideas were simple, straightforward and distinctly American. 
President Reagan believed that freedom depended on limited government. 
He fiercely advanced the principles of less government, less taxes, a 
strong defense and a commitment to traditional moral values.
  Mr. Speaker, like many Americans, President Reagan changed the course 
of my life. I had the honor of meeting him in the summer of 1988 as a 
candidate for Congress. Determined to say something of great meaning to 
him, I looked the President in the eye and thanked him for all he had 
done to inspire my generation to believe in American again. He 
responded with characteristic humility by saying that ``the American 
people decided it was time to right the ship, and I was just the 
captain they put on the bridge when they did it.''
  In the midst of his extraordinary gifts, Ronald Reagan was a deeply 
humble man who believed in God and the American people with an 
unshakable faith. He also was able to find inspiration in his beloved 
Rancho del Cielo. When I had the opportunity to visit the ranch, I 
immediately understood why President Reagan found solace in its beauty. 
He spent many a day working at the ranch, and it is not difficult to 
believe that he contemplated many important decisions while clearing 
brush, fixing fences and breaking new trails in his jeep. The Young 
America's Foundation has since taken responsibility of the ranch, and I 
commend them for preserving this significant part of Ronald Reagan's 
legacy.
  In his Farewell Address to the nation, President Reagan spoke 
poignantly of the distance that high office can place between the 
servant and the served.
  He said, ``One of the things about the presidency is that you're 
always somewhat apart. You spend 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, Mr. Speaker, one hundred years after his birth and two decades 
after he left public service, the American people are still connected 
to President Ronald Reagan's American ideals and values, which endure 
to this day.

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