Essential to the stable economic growth we seek is a system of well-adapted
and efficient financial institutions. I believe the time has come to
conduct a broad national inquiry into the nature, performance and adequacy
of our financial system, both in terms of its direct service to the whole
economy and in terms of its function as the mechanism through which
monetary and credit policy takes effect. I believe the Congress should
authorize the creation of a commission of able and qualified citizens to
undertake this vital inquiry. Out of their findings and recommendations the
Administration would develop and present to the Congress any legislative
proposals that might be indicated for the purpose of improving our
financial machinery.
In this message it seems unnecessary that I should repeat recommendations
involving our domestic affairs that have been urged upon the Congress
during the past four years, but which, in some instances, did not reach the
stage of completely satisfactory legislation.
The Administration will, through future messages either directly from me or
from heads of the departments and agencies, transmit to the Congress
specific recommendations. These will involve our financial and fiscal
affairs, our military and civil defenses; the administration of justice;
our agricultural economy; our domestic and foreign commerce; the urgently
needed increase in our postal rates; the development of our natural
resources; our labor laws, including our labor-management relations
legislation, and vital aspects of the health, education and welfare of our
people. There will be special recommendations dealing with such subjects as
atomic energy, the furthering of public works, the continued efforts to
eliminate government competition with the businesses of tax-paying
citizens.
A number of legislative recommendations will be mentioned specifically in
my forthcoming Budget Message, which will reach you within the week. That
message will also recommend such sums as are needed to implement the
proposed action.
Turning to the international scene:
The existence of a strongly armed imperialistic dictatorship poses a
continuing threat to the free world's and thus to our own Nation's security
and peace. There are certain truths to be remembered here.
First, America alone and isolated cannot assure even its own security. We
must be joined by the capability and resolution of nations that have proved
themselves dependable defenders of freedom. Isolation from them invites
war. Our security is also enhanced by the immeasurable interest that joins
us with all peoples who believe that peace with justice must be preserved,
that wars of aggression are crimes against humanity.
Another truth is that our survival in today's world requires modern,
adequate, dependable military strength. Our Nation has made great strides
in assuring a modern defense, so armed in new weapons, so deployed, so
equipped, that today our security force is the most powerful in our
peacetime history. It can punish heavily any enemy who undertakes to attack
us. It is a major deterrent to war.
By our research and development more efficient weapons-some of amazing
capabilities--are being constantly created. These vital efforts we shall
continue. Yet we must not delude ourselves that safety necessarily
increases as expenditures for military research or forces in being go up.
Indeed, beyond a wise and reasonable level, which is always changing and is
under constant study, money spent on arms may be money wasted on sterile
metal or inflated costs, thereby weakening the very security and strength
we seek.
National security requires far more than military power. Economic and moral
factors play indispensable roles. Any program that endangers our economy
could defeat us. Any weakening of our national will and resolution, any
diminution of the vigor and initiative of our individual citizens, would
strike a blow at the heart of our defenses.
The finest military establishment we can produce must work closely in
cooperation with the forces of our friends. Our system of regional pacts,
developed within the Charter of the United Nations, serves to increase both
our own security and the security of other nations.
This system is still a recent introduction on the world scene. Its problems
are many and difficult, because it insists on equality among its members
and brings into association some nations traditionally divided. Repeatedly
in recent months, the collapse of these regional alliances has been
predicted. The strains upon them have been at times indeed severe. Despite
these strains our regional alliances have proved durable and strong, and
dire predictions of their disintegration have proved completely false.
With other free nations, we should vigorously prosecute measures that will
promote mutual strength, prosperity and welfare within the free world.
Strength is essentially a product of economic health and social well-being.
Consequently, even as we continue our programs of military assistance, we
must emphasize aid to our friends in building more productive economies and
in better satisfying the natural demands of their people for progress.
Thereby we shall move a long way toward a peaceful world.
A sound and safeguarded agreement for open skies, unarmed aerial sentinels,
and reduced armament would provide a valuable contribution toward a durable
peace in the years ahead. And we have been persistent in our effort to
reach such an agreement. We are willing to enter any reliable agreement
which would reverse the trend toward ever more devastating nuclear weapons;
reciprocally provide against the possibility of surprise attack; mutually
control the outer space missile and satellite development; and make
feasible a lower level of armaments and armed forces and an easier burden
of military expenditures. Our continuing negotiations in this field are a
major part of our quest for a confident peace in this atomic age.
This quest requires as well a constructive attitude among all the nations
of the free world toward expansion of trade and investment, that can give
all of us opportunity to work out economic betterment.
An essential step in this field is the provision of an administrative
agency to insure the orderly and proper operation of existing arrangements
trader which multilateral trade is now carried on. To that end I urge
Congressional authorization for United States membership in the proposed
Organization for Trade Cooperation, an action which will speed removal of
discrimination against our export trade.
We welcome the efforts of a number of our European friends to achieve an
integrated community to develop a common market. We likewise welcome their
cooperative effort in the field of atomic energy.
To demonstrate once again our unalterable purpose to make of the atom a
peaceful servant of humanity, I shortly shall ask the Congress to authorize
full United States participation in the International Atomic Energy
Agency.
World events have magnified both the responsibilities and the opportunities
of the United States Information Agency. Just as, in recent months, the
voice of communism has become more shaken and confused, the voice of truth
must be more clearly heard. To enable our Information Agency to cope with
these new responsibilities and opportunities, I am asking the Congress to
increase appreciably the appropriations for this program and for
legislation establishing a career service for the Agency's overseas foreign
service officers.
The recent historic events in Hungary demand that all free nations share to
the extent of their capabilities in the responsibility of granting asylum
to victims of Communist persecution. I request the Congress promptly to
enact legislation to regularize the status in the United States of
Hungarian refugees brought here as parolees. I shall shortly recommend to
the Congress by special message the changes in our immigration laws that I
deem necessary in the light of our world responsibilities.
The cost of peace is something we must face boldly, fearlessly. Beyond
money, it involves changes in attitudes, the renunciation of old
prejudices, even the sacrifice of some seeming self-interest.
Only five days ago I expressed to you the grave concern of your Government
over the threat of Soviet aggression in the Middle East. I asked for
Congressional authorization to help counter this threat. I say again that
this matter is of vital and immediate importance to the Nation's and the
free world's security and peace. By our proposed programs in the Middle
East, we hope to assist in establishing a climate in which constructive and
long-term solutions to basic problems of the area may be sought.
From time to time, there will be presented to the Congress requests for
other legislation in the broad field of international affairs. All requests
will reflect the steadfast purpose of this Administration to pursue peace,
based on justice. Although in some cases details will be new, the
underlying purpose and objectives will remain the same.
All proposals made by the Administration in this field are based on the
free world's unity. This unity may not be immediately obvious unless we
examine link by link the chain of relationships that binds us to every area
and to every nation. In spirit the free world is one because its people
uphold the right of independent existence for all nations. I have already
alluded to their economic interdependence. But their interdependence
extends also into the field of security.
First of all, no reasonable man will question the absolute need for our
American neighbors to be prosperous and secure. Their security and
prosperity are inextricably bound to our own. And we are, of course,
already joined with these neighbors by historic pledges.
Again, no reasonable man will deny that the freedom and prosperity and
security of Western Europe are vital to our own prosperity and security. If
the institutions, the skills, the manpower of its peoples were to fall
under the domination of an aggressive imperialism, the violent change in
the balance of world power and in the pattern of world commerce could not
be fully compensated for by any American measures, military or economic.
But these people, whose economic strength is largely dependent on free and
uninterrupted movement of oil from the Middle East, cannot prosper--indeed,
their economies would be severely impaired--should that area be controlled
by an enemy and the movement of oil be subject to its decisions.
Next, to the Eastward, are Asiatic and Far Eastern peoples, recently
returned to independent control of their own affairs or now emerging into
sovereign statehood. Their potential strength constitutes new assurance for
stability and peace in the world--if they can retain their independence.
Should they lose freedom and be dominated by an aggressor, the world-wide
effects would imperil the security of the free world.
In short, the world has so shrunk that all free nations are our neighbors.
Without cooperative neighbors, the United States cannot maintain its own
security and welfare, because:
First, America's vital interests are world-wide, embracing both hemispheres
and every continent.
Second, we have community of interest with every nation in the free world.
Third, interdependence of interests requires a decent respect for the
rights and the peace of all peoples.
These principles motivate our actions within the United Nations. There,
before all the world, by our loyalty to them, by our practice of them, let
us strive to set a standard to which all who seek justice and who hunger
for peace can rally.
May we at home, here at the Seat of Government, in all the cities and towns
and farmlands of America, support these principles in a personal effort of
dedication. Thereby each of us can help establish a secure world order in
which opportunity for freedom and justice will be more widespread, and in
which the resources now dissipated on the armaments of war can be released
for the life and growth of all humanity.
When our forefathers prepared the immortal document that proclaimed our
independence, they asserted that every individual is endowed by his Creator
with certain inalienable rights. As we gaze back through history to that
date, it is clear that our nation has striven to live up to this
declaration, applying it to nations as well as to individuals.
Today we proudly assert that the government of the United States is still
committed to this concept, both in its activities at home and abroad.
The purpose is Divine; the implementation is human.
Our country and its government have made mistakes--human mistakes. They
have been of the head--not of the heart. And it is still true that the
great concept of the dignity of all men, alike created in the image of the
Almighty, has been the compass by which we have tried and are trying to
steer our course.
So long as we continue by its guidance, there will be true progress in
human affairs, both among ourselves and among those with whom we deal.
To achieve a more perfect fidelity to it, I submit, is a worthy ambition as
we meet together in these first days of this, the first session of the 85th
Congress.
The Address as reported from the floor appears in the Congressional Record
(vol. 103, p. 387).
***
State of the Union Address
Dwight D. Eisenhower
January 9, 1958
Mr. President, Mr. Speaker, Members of the 85th Congress:
It is again my high privilege to extend personal greetings to the members
of the 85th Congress.
All of us realize that, as this new session begins, many Americans are
troubled about recent world developments which they believe may threaten
our nation's safety. Honest men differ in their appraisal of America's
material and intellectual strength, and the dangers that confront us. But
all know these dangers are real.
The purpose of this message is to outline the measures that can give the
American people a confidence--just as real--in their own security.
I am not here to justify the past, gloss over the problems of the present,
or propose easy solutions for the future.
I am here to state what I believe to be right and what I believe to be
wrong; and to propose action for correcting what I think wrong! I.
There are two tasks confronting us that so far outweigh all other that I
shall devote this year's message entirely to them. The first is to ensure
our safety through strength.
As to our strength, I have repeatedly voiced this conviction: We now have a
broadly based and efficient defensive strength, including a great deterrent
power, which is, for the present, our main guarantee against war; but,
unless we act wisely and promptly, we could lose that capacity to deter
attack or defend ourselves.
My profoundest conviction is that the American people will say, as one man:
No matter what the exertions or sacrifices, we shall maintain that
necessary strength!
But we could make no more tragic mistake than merely to concentrate on
military strength.
For if we did only this, the future would hold nothing for the world but an
Age of Terror.
And so our second task is to do the constructive work of building a genuine
peace. We must never become so preoccupied with our desire for military
strength that we neglect those areas of economic development, trade,
diplomacy, education, ideas and principles where the foundations of real
peace must be laid. II.
The threat to our safety, and to the hope of a peaceful world, can be
simply stated. It is communist imperialism.
This threat is not something imagined by critics of the Soviets. Soviet
spokesmen, from the beginning, have publicly and frequently declared their
aim to expand their power, one way or another, throughout the world.
The threat has become increasingly serious as this expansionist aim has
been reinforced by an advancing industrial, military and scientific
establishment.
But what makes the Soviet threat unique in history is its
all--inclusiveness. Every human activity is pressed into service as a
weapon of expansion. Trade, economic development, military power, arts,
science, education, the whole world of ideas--all are harnessed to this
same chariot of expansion.
The Soviets are, in short, waging total cold war.
The only answer to a regime that wages total cold war is to wage total
peace.
This means bringing to bear every asset of our personal and national lives
upon the task of building the conditions in which security and peace can
grow. III.
Among our assets, let us first briefly glance at our military power.
Military power serves the cause of security by making prohibitive the cost
of any aggressive attack.
It serves the cause of peace by holding up a shield behind which the
patient constructive work of peace can go on.
But it can serve neither cause if we make either of two mistakes. The one
would be to overestimate our strength, and thus neglect crucially important
actions in the period just ahead. The other would be to underestimate our
strength. Thereby we might be tempted to become irresolute in our foreign
relations, to dishearten our friends, and to lose our national poise and
perspective in approaching the complex problems ahead.
Any orderly balance-sheet of military strength must be in two parts. The
first is the position as of today. The second is the position in the period
ahead.
As of today: our defensive shield comprehends a vast complex of ground,
sea, and air units, superbly equipped and strategically deployed around the
world. The most powerful deterrent to war in the world today lies in the
retaliatory power of our Strategic Air Command and the aircraft of our
Navy. They present to any potential attacker who would unleash war upon the
world the prospect of virtual annihilation of his own country.
Even if we assume a surprise attack on our bases, with a marked reduction
in our striking power, our bombers would immediately be on their way in
sufficient strength to accomplish this mission of retaliation. Every
informed government knows this. It is no secret.
Since the Korean Armistice, the American people have spent $225 billion in
maintaining and strengthening this overall defensive shield. This is the
position as of today.
Now as to the period ahead: Every part of our military establishment must
and will be equipped to do its defensive job with the most modern weapons
and methods. But it is particularly important to our planning that we make
a candid estimate of the effect of long-range ballistic missiles on the
present deterrent power I have described.
At this moment, the consensus of opinion is that we are probably somewhat
behind the Soviets in some areas of long-range ballistic missile
development. But it is my conviction, based on close study of all relevant
intelligence, that if we make the necessary effort, we will have the
missiles, in the needed quantity and in time, to sustain and strengthen the
deterrent power of our increasingly efficient bombers. One encouraging fact
evidencing this ability is the rate of progress we have achieved since we
began to concentrate on these missiles.
The intermediate ballistic missiles, Thor and Jupiter, have already been
ordered into production. The parallel progress in the intercontinental
ballistic missile effort will be advanced by our plans for acceleration.
The development of the submarine-based Polaris missile system has
progressed so well that its future procurement schedules are being moved
forward markedly.
When it is remembered that our country has concentrated on the development
of ballistic missiles for only about a third as long as the Soviets, these
achievements show a rate of progress that speaks for itself. Only a brief
time back, we were spending at the rate of only about one million dollars a
year on long range ballistic missiles. In 1957 we spent more than one
billion dollars on the Arias, Titan, Thor, Jupiter, and Polaris programs
alone.
But I repeat, gratifying though this rate of progress is, we must still do
more!
Our real problem, then, is not our strength today; it is rather the vital
necessity of action today to ensure our strength tomorrow.
What I have just said applies to our strength as a single country. But we
are not alone. I have returned from the recent NATO meeting with renewed
conviction that, because we are a part of a world-wide community of free
and peaceful nations, our own security is immeasurably increased.
By contrast, the Soviet Union has surrounded itself with captive and sullen
nations. Like a crack in the crust of an uneasily sleeping volcano, the
Hungarian uprising revealed the depth and intensity of the patriotic
longing for liberty that still burns within these countries.
The world thinks of us as a country which is strong, but which will never
start a war. The world also thinks of us as a land which has never enslaved
anyone and which is animated by humane ideals. This friendship, based on
common ideals, is one of our greatest sources of strength.
It cements into a cohesive security arrangement the aggregate of the
spiritual, military and economic strength of all those nations which, with
us, are allied by treaties and agreements.
Up to this point, I have talked solely about our military strength to deter
a possible future war.
I now want to talk about the strength we need to win a different kind of
war--one that has already been launched against us.
It is the massive economic offensive that has been mounted by the communist
imperialists against free nations.
The communist imperialist regimes have for some time been largely
frustrated in their attempts at expansion based directly on force. As a
result, they have begun to concentrate heavily on economic penetration,
particularly of newly-developing countries, as a preliminary to political
domination.
This non-military drive, if underestimated, could defeat the free world
regardless of our military strength. This danger is all the greater
precisely because many of us fail or refuse to recognize it. Thus, some
people may be tempted to finance our extra military effort by cutting
economic assistance. But at the very time when the economic threat is
assuming menacing proportions, to fail to strengthen our own effort would
be nothing less than reckless folly!
Admittedly, most of us did not anticipate the psychological impact upon the
world of the launching of the first earth satellite. Let us not make the
same kind of mistake in another field, by failing to anticipate the much
more serious impact of the Soviet economic offensive.
As with our military potential, our economic assets are more than equal to
the task. Our independent farmers produce an abundance of food and fibre.
Our free workers are versatile, intelligent, and hardworking. Our
businessmen are imaginative and resourceful. The productivity, the
adaptability of the American economy is the solid foundation-stone of our
security structure.
We have just concluded another prosperous year. Our output was once more
the greatest in the nation's history. In the latter part of the year, some
decline in employment and output occurred, following the exceptionally
rapid expansion of recent years. In a free economy, reflecting as it does
the independent judgments of millions of people, growth typically moves
forward unevenly. But the basic forces of growth remain unimpaired. There
are solid grounds for confidence that economic growth will be resumed
without an extended interruption. Moreover, the Federal government,
constantly alert to signs of weakening in any part of our economy, always
stands ready, with its full power, to take any appropriate further action
to promote renewed business expansion.
If our history teaches us anything, it is this lesson: so far as the
economic potential of our nation is concerned, the believers in the future
of America have always been the realists. I count myself as one of this
company.
Our long-range problem, then, is not the stamina of our enormous engine of
production. Our problem is to make sure that we use these vast economic
forces confidently and creatively, not only in direct military defense
efforts, but likewise in our foreign policy, through such activities as
mutual economic aid and foreign trade.
In much the same way, we have tremendous potential resources on other
non-military fronts to help in countering the Soviet threat: education,
science, research, and, not least, the ideas and principles by which we
live. And in all these cases the task ahead is to bring these resources
more sharply to bear upon the new tasks of security and peace in a
swiftly-changing world. IV.
There are many items in the Administration's program, of a kind frequently
included in a State of the Union Message, with which I am not dealing
today. They are important to us and to our prosperity. But I am reserving
them for treatment in separate communications because of my purpose today
of speaking only about matters bearing directly upon our security and
peace.
I now place before you an outline of action designed to focus our resources
upon the two tasks of security and peace.
In this special category I list eight items requiring action. They are not
merely desirable. They are imperative.