This is the eighth such report that, as President, I have been privileged
to present to you and to the country. On previous occasions, it has been my
custom to set forth proposals for legislative action in the coming year.
But that is not my purpose today. The presentation of a legislative program
falls properly to my successor, not to me, and I would not infringe upon
his responsibility to chart the forward course. Instead, I wish to speak of
the course we have been following the past eight years and the position at
which we have arrived.
In just two weeks, General Eisenhower will be inaugurated as President of
the United States and I will resume--most gladly--my place as a private
citizen of this Republic. The Presidency last changed hands eight years ago
this coming April. That was a tragic time: a time of grieving for President
Roosevelt--the great and gallant human being who had been taken from us; a
time of unrelieved anxiety to his successor, thrust so suddenly into the
complexities and burdens of the Presidential office.
Not so this time. This time we see the normal transition under our
democratic system. One President, at the conclusion of his term, steps back
to private life; his successor, chosen by the people, begins his tenure of
the office. And the Presidency of the United States continues to function
without a moment's break.
Since the election, I have done my best to assure that the transfer from
one Administration to another shall be smooth and orderly. From General
Eisenhower and his associates, I have had friendly and understanding
collaboration in this endeavor. I have not sought to thrust upon him--nor
has he sought to take--the responsibility which must be mine until twelve
o'clock noon on January twentieth. But together, I hope and believe we have
found means whereby the incoming President can obtain the full and detailed
information he will need to assume the responsibility the moment he takes
the oath of office.
The President-elect is about to take up the greatest burdens, the most
compelling responsibilities, given to any man. And I, with you and all
Americans, wish for him all possible success in undertaking the tasks that
will so soon be his.
What are these tasks? The President is Chief of State, elected
representative of all the people, national spokesman for them and to them.
He is Commander-in-Chief of our armed forces. He is charged with the
conduct of our foreign relations. He is Chief Executive of the Nation's
largest civilian organization. He must select and nominate all top
officials of the Executive Branch and all Federal judges. And on the
legislative side, he has the obligation and the opportunity to recommend,
and to approve or veto legislation. Besides all this, it is to him that a
great political party turns naturally for leadership, and that, too, he
must provide as President.
This bundle of burdens is unique; there is nothing else like it on the face
of the earth. Each task could be a full-time job. Together, they would be a
tremendous undertaking in the easiest of times.
But our times are not easy; they are hard-as hard and complex, perhaps as
any in our history. Now, the President not only has to carry on these tasks
in such a way that our democracy may grow and flourish and our people
prosper, but he also has to lead the whole free world in overcoming the
communist menace--and all this under the shadow of the atomic bomb.
This is a huge challenge to the human being who occupies the Presidential
office. But it is not a challenge to him alone, for in reality he cannot
meet it alone. The challenge runs not just to him but to his whole
Administration, to the Congress, to the country.
Ultimately, no President can master his responsibilities, save as his
fellow citizens-indeed, the whole people--comprehend the challenge of our
times and move, with him, to meet it.
It has been my privilege to hold the Presidential office for nearly eight
years now, and much has been done in which I take great pride. But this is
not personal pride. It is pride in the people, in the Nation. It is pride
in our political system and our form of government--balky sometimes,
mechanically deficient perhaps, in many ways--but enormously alive and
vigorous; able through these years to keep the Republic on the right
course, rising to the great occasions, accomplishing the essentials,
meeting the basic challenge of our times.
There have been misunderstandings and controversies these past eight years,
but through it all the President of the United States has had that measure
of support and understanding without which no man could sustain the burdens
of the Presidential office, or hope to discharge its responsibilities.
For this I am profoundly grateful--grateful to my associates in the
Executive Branch--most of them non-partisan civil servants;
grateful--despite our disagreements-to the Members of the Congress on both
sides of the aisle; grateful especially to the American people, the
citizens of this Republic, governors of us all.
We are still so close to recent controversies that some of us may find it
hard to understand the accomplishments of these past eight years. But the
accomplishments are real and very great, not as the President's, not as the
Congress', but as the achievements of our country and all the people in
it.
Let me remind you of some of the things we have done since I first assumed
my duties as President of the United States.
I took the oath of office on April 12, 1945. In May of that same year, the
Nazis surrendered. Then, in July, that great white flash of light, man-made
at Alamogordo, heralded swift and final victory in World War II--and opened
the doorway to the atomic age.
Consider some of the great questions that were posed for us by sudden,
total victory in World War II. Consider also, how well we as a Nation have
responded.
Would the American economy collapse, after the war? That was one question.
Would there be another depression here--a repetition of 1921 or 1929? The
free world feared and dreaded it. The communists hoped for it and built
their policies upon that hope.