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To Restore America

To Restore America, Ronald Reagan’s Campaign Address

March 31, 1976

Good evening to all of you from California. Tonight, I’d like to talk to you about issues. Issues which I think are involved—or should be involved in this primary election season. I’m a candidate for the Republican nomination for president. But I hope that you who are Independents and Democrats will let me talk to you also tonight because the problems facing our country are problems that just don’t bear any party label.

In this election season the White House is telling us a solid economic recovery is taking place. It claims a slight drop in unemployment. It says that prices aren’t going up as fast, but they are still going up, and that the stock market has shown some gains. But, in fact, things seem just about as they were back in the 1972 election year. Remember, we were also coming out of a recession then. Inflation had been running at round 6 percent. Unemployment about 7 (percent). Remember, too, the upsurge and the optimism lasted through the election year and into 1973. And then the roof fell in. Once again we had unemployment. Only this time not 7 percent, more than 10. And inflation wasn’t 6 percent, it was 12 percent. Now, in this election year 1976, we’re told we’re coming out of this recession just because inflation and unemployment rates have fallen, to what they were at the worst of the previous recession. If history repeats itself, will we be talking recovery four years from now merely because we’ve reduced inflation from 25 percent to 12 percent?

The fact is, we’ll never build a lasting economic recovery by going deeper into debt at a faster rate than we ever have before. It took this nation 166 years until the middle of World War II to finally accumulate a debt of $95 billion. It took this administration just the last 12 months to add $95 billion to the debt. And this administration has run up almost one-fourth of the total national debt in just these short 19 months.

Inflation is the cause of recession and unemployment. And we’re not going to have real prosperity or recovery until we stop fighting the symptoms and start fighting the disease. There’s only one cause for inflation- government spending more than government takes in. The cure is a balanced budget. Ah, but they tell us, 80 percent of the budget is uncontrollable. It’s fixed by laws passed by Congress. Well, laws passed by Congress can be repealed by Congress. And, if Congress is unwilling to do this, then isn’t it time we elect a Congress that will?

Soon after he took office, Mr. Ford promised he would end inflation. Indeed, he declared war on inflation. And, we all donned those WIN buttons to “Whip Inflation Now.” Unfortunately the war – if it ever really started – was soon over. Mr. Ford without WIN button, appeared on TV, and promised he absolutely would not allow the Federal deficit to exceed $60 billion (which incidentally was $5 billion more than the biggest previous deficit we’d ever had). Later he told us it might be as much as $70 billion. Now we learn it’s 80 billion or more.

Then came a White House proposal for a $28 billion tax cut, to be matched by a $28 billion cut in the proposed spending – not in present spending, but in the proposed spending in the new budget. Well, my question then and my question now is, if there was $28 billion in the new budget that could be cut, what was it doing there in the first place?

Unfortunately, Washington doesn’t feel the same pain from inflation that you and I do. As a matter of fact, government makes a profit on inflation. For instance, last July Congress vaccinated itself against that pain. It very quietly passed legislation (which the president signed into law) which automatically now gives a pay increase to every Congressman every time the cost of living goes up.

It would have been nice if they’d thought of some arrangement like that for the rest of us. They could, for example, correct a great unfairness that now exists in our tax system. Today, when you get a cost of living pay raise – one that just keeps you even with purchasing power – it often moves you up into a higher tax bracket. This means you pay a higher percentage in tax, but you reduce your purchasing power. Last year, because of this inequity, the government took in $7 billion in undeserved profit in the income tax alone, and this year they’ll do even better.

Now isn’t it time that Congress looked after your welfare as well as its own? Those whose spending policies cause inflation to begin with should be made to fee the painful effect just as you and I do.

Repeal of Congress’s automatic pay raise might leave it with more incentive to do something to curb inflation. Now, let’s look at Social Security. Mr. Ford says he wants to “preserve the integrity of Social Security.” Well, I differ with him on one world. I would like to restore the integrity of Social Security. Those who depend on it see a continual reduction in their standard of living. Inflation strips the increase in their benefits. The maximum benefit today buys 80 fewer loaves of bread than it did when that maximum payment was only $85 a month. In the meantime, the Social Security payroll tax has become the most unfair tax any worker pays. Women are discriminated against, particularly working wives. And, people who reach Social Security age and want to continue working, should be allowed to do so without losing their benefits. I believe a presidential commission of experts should be appointed to study and present a plan to strengthen and improve Social Security while there’s still time – so that no person who has contributed to Social Security will ever lose a dime.

Before leaving this subject of our economic problems, let’s talk about unemployment. Ending inflation is the only long range and lasting answer to the problem of unemployment. The Washington Establishment is not the answer. It’s the problem. Is tax policies, its harassing regulation, its confiscation of investment capital to pay for its deficits keeps business and industry from expanding to meet your needs and to provide the jobs we all need.

No one who lived through the Great Depression can ever look upon an unemployed person with anything by compassion. To me, there is no greater tragedy than a breadwinner willing to work, with a job skill but unable to find a market for that job skill. Back in those dark depression days I saw my father on Christmas eve open what he thought was a Christmas greeting from his boss. Instead, it was the blue slip telling him he not longer had a job. The memory of him sitting there holding that slip of paper and then saying in a half whisper, “That’s quite a Christmas present”; it will stay with me as long as I live.

Other problems go unsolved. Take energy. Only a short time ago we were lined up at the gas station – turned our thermostats down as Washington announced “project Independence.” We were going to become self-sufficient, able to provide for our own energy needs. At the time, we were only importing a small percentage of our oil. Yet, the Arab boycott caused half a million Americans to lose their jobs when plants closed down for lack of fuel. Today, it’s almost three years later and “Project Independence” has become “Project Dependence.” Congress has adopted an energy bill so bad we were led to believe Mr. Ford would veto it. Instead, he signed it. And, almost instantly, drilling rigs all over our land started shutting down. Now for the first time in our history we are importing more oil than we produce. How many Americans will be laid off if there’s another boycott? The energy bill is a disaster that never should have been signed.

An effort has been made in this campaign to suggest that there aren’t any real differences between Mr. Ford and myself. Well, I believe there are and these differences are fundamental. One of them has to do with our approach to government. Before Richard Nixon appointed him Vice President, Mr. Ford was a Congressman for 25 years. His concern, of necessity, was the welfare of his congressional district. For most of his adult life he has been a part of the Washington Establishment. Most of my adult life has been spent outside of government. My experience in government was the eight years I served as governor of California. If it were a nation, California would be the 7th-ranking economic power in the world today.

When I became governor, I inherited a state government that was in almost the same situation as New York City. The state payroll had been growing for a dozen years at a rate of from five to seven thousand new employees each year. State government was spending from a million to a million-and-a-half dollars more each day than it was taking in. The State’s great water project was unfinished and under-funded by a half a billion dollars. My predecessor had spent the entire year’s budget for Medicaid in the first six months of the fiscal year. And, we learned that the teacher’s retirement fund was unfunded – a $4 billion liability hanging over every property owner in the state. I didn’t know whether I’d been elected governor or appointed receiver. California was faced with insolvency and on the verge of bankruptcy. We had to increase taxes. Well, this came very hard for me because I felt taxes were already too great a burden. I told the people the increase in my mind was temporary and that, as soon as we could, we’d return their money to them.

I had never in my life thought of seeking or holding public of office and I’m still not quite sure how it all happened. In my own mind, I was a citizen representing my fellow citizens against the institution of government. I turned to the people, not to politicians, for help. Instead of a committee to screen applicants for jobs, I had a citizens’ recruiting committee, and I told this committee I wanted an administration made up of men and women who did not want government careers and who’d be the first to tell me if their government job was unnecessary. And I had that happen. [A] young man from the aerospace industry dissolved his department in four months, handed me the key to this office, and told me we’d never needed the department. And to this day, I not only have never missed it – I don’t know where it was.

There was a reason for my seeking people who didn’t want government careers. Dr. Parkinson summed it all up in his book on bureaucracy. He said, “Government hires a rat-catcher and the first thing you know, he’s become a rodent control officer.” In those entire eight years, most of us never lost that feeling that we were there representing the people against what Cicero once called the “arrogance of officialdom.”  We had a kind of watchword we used on each other. “When we begin thinking of government as we instead of they, we’ve been here too long.” Well, I believe that attitude would be beneficial in Washington.

We didn’t stop just with getting our administration from the ranks of the people. We also asked for help from expert people in a great many fields, and more than 250 of our citizens volunteered to form into task forces. They went into every department and agency of state government to see how modern business practices could make government more efficient, economical and responsive. The gave an average of 117 days apiece full time, away from their own jobs and careers at no cost to the taxpayers. They made eighteen hundred specific recommendations. We implemented more than sixteen hundred of those recommendations.

This was government-by-the-people, proving that it works when the people work at it. When we ended our eight years, we turned over to the incoming administration a balanced budget, a $500 million surplus, and virtually the same number of employees we’d stated with eight years before – even though the increase in population had given some departments a two-thirds increase in work load. The water project was completed with $165 million left over. Our bonds had a triple A rating, the highest credit rating you can get. And the teachers’ retirement program was fully funded on a sound actuarial basis. And, we kept our word to the taxpayers – we returned to them in rebates and tax cuts, $5 billion, $761 million.

I believe that what we did in California can be done in Washington if government will have faith in the people and let them bring their common sense to bear on the problems bureaucracy hasn’t solved. I believe in the people. Now, Mr. Ford places his faith in the Washington Establishment. This has been evident in his appointment of former Congressmen and longtime government workers to positions in his Administration. Well, I don’t believe that those who have been part of the problem are necessarily the best qualified to solve those problems.

The truth is, Washington has taken over functions that don’t truly belong to it. In almost every case it has been a failure. Now, understand, I’m speaking of those programs which logically should be administered at state and local levels. Welfare is a classic example. Voices that are raised now and then urging a federalization of welfare don’t realize that the failure of welfare is due to federal interference. Washington doesn’t even know how many people are on welfare – how many cheaters are getting more than one check. It only knows how many checks it’s sending out. Its own rules keep it from finding out how many are getting more than one check.

Well, California had a welfare problem. Sixteen percent of all welfare recipients in the country were drawing their checks in our state. We were sending welfare checks to families who decided to live abroad. On family was receiving its check in Russia. Our caseload was increasing by 40,000 people a month. Well, after a few years of trying to control this runaway program and being frustrated by bureaucrats here in California and in Washington, we turned again to a citizens’ task force. The result was the most comprehensive welfare reform ever attempted. And in less than three years we reduced the rolls by more than 300,000 people, saved the taxpayers $2 billion, and increased the grants to the truly deserving needy by an average of 43 percent. We also carried out a successful experiment which I believe is an answer to much of the welfare problem in the nation. We put able-bodied welfare recipients to work at useful community projects in return for their welfare grants.

Now, let’s look at housing. Washington has tried to solve this problem for the poor by building low-cost houses. So far it’s torn down three and a half homes for every one it’s built.

Schools – in America we created at the local level and administered at the local level for many years the greatest public school system in the world. Now through something called federal aid to education, we have something called federal interference, and education has been the loser. Quality has declined as federal intervention has increased. Nothing has created more bitterness, for example, than forced busing to achieve racial balance. It was born of a hope that we could increase understanding and reduce prejudice and antagonism. And I’m sure we all approved of that goal. But busing has failed to achieve the goal. Instead, it has increased the bitterness and animosity it was supposed to reduce. California’s Superintendent of Public Instruction, Wilson Riles (himself a Black), says “The concept that Black children can’t learn unless they are sitting with white children is utter and complete nonsense.” Well, I agree. The money now being wasted on this social experiment could be better spent to provide the kind of school facilities every child deserves. Forced busing should be ended by legislation if possible – by constitutional amendment if necessary. And, control of education should be returned to local school districts.

The other day Mr. Ford came out against gun control. But back in Washington, D.C., his Attorney General has proposed a seven-point program that amounts to just that: gun control. I don’t think that making it difficult for law-abiding citizens to obtain guns will lower the crime rate - not when the criminals will always find a way to get them. In California I think we found an answer. We put into law what is practical gun control. Anyone convicted of having a gun in his possession while he committed a crime: add five to fifteen years to the prison sentence.

Sometimes bureaucracy’s excesses are so great that we laugh at them. But they are costly laughs. Twenty-five years ago the Hoover Commission discovered that Washington files a million reports a year just reporting there is nothing to report. Independent business people, shopkeepers and farmers file billions of reports every year required of them by Washington. It amounts to some 10 billion pieces of paper each year, and it adds $50 billion a year to the cost of doing business. Now, Washington has been loud in its promise to do something about this blizzard of paperwork. And they made good. Last year they increased it by 20 percent.

But there is one problem which must be solved or everything else is meaningless. I am speaking of the problem of our national security. Our nation is in danger, and the danger grows greater with each passing day. Like an echo from the past, the voice of Winston Churchill’s grandson was heard recently in Britain’s House of Commons warning that the spread of totalitarianism threatens the world once again the democracies are “wandering without aim.”

“Wandering without aim” describes the United States’ foreign policy. Angola is a case in point. We gave just enough support to one side to encourage it to fight and die, but too little to give them a chance of winning. And while we’re disliked by the winner, distrusted by the loser, and viewed by the world as weak and unsure. If détente were the two-way street it’s supposed to be, we could have told the Soviet Union to stop its trouble-making and leave Angola to the Angolans. But it didn’t work out that way.

Now, we are told Washington is dropping the word “détente,” but keeping the policy. But whatever it’s called, the policy is what’s at fault. What is our policy? Mr. Ford’s new Ambassador to the United Nations attacks our longtime ally, Israel. In Asia, our new relationship with mainland China can have practical benefits for both sides. But that doesn’t mean it should include yielding to demands by them, as the administration has, to reduce our military presence on Taiwan where we have a longtime friend and ally, the Republic of China.

And, it’s also revealed now that we seek to establish friendly relations with Hanoi. To make it more palatable, we’re told that this might help us learn the fate of the men still listed as Missing in Action. Well, there’s no doubt our government has an obligation to end the agony of parents, wives and children who’ve lived so long with uncertainty. But, this should have been one of our first demands of Hanoi’s patron saint, the Soviet Union, if détente had any meaning at all. To present it now as a reason for friendship with those who have already violated their promise to provide such information is hypocrisy.

In the last few days, Mr. Ford and Dr. Kissinger had taken us from hinting at invasion of Cuba, to laughing it off as a ridiculous idea. Except, that it was their ridiculous idea. No one else suggested it. Once again – what is their policy? During this last year, they carried on a campaign to befriend Castro. They persuaded the Organization of American States to lift its trade embargo, lifted some of the U.S. trade restrictions. They engaged in cultural exchanges. And then, on the eve of the Florida primary election, Mr. Ford went to Florida, called Castro an outlaw and said he’d never recognize him. But he hasn’t asked our Latin American neighbors to reimpose a single sanction, nor has he taken any action himself. Meanwhile, Castro continues to export revolution to Puerto Rico, to Angola, and who knows where else?

As I talk to you tonight, negotiations with another dictator go forward – negotiations aimed at giving up our ownership of the Panama Canal Zone. Apparently, everyone knows about this except the rightful owners of the Canal Zone – you, the people of the United States. General Omar Torrijos, the dictator of Panama, seized power eight years ago by ousting the duly-elected government. There have been no elections since. No civil liberties. The press is censored. Torrijos is a friend and ally of Castro and, like him, is pro-Communist. He threatens sabotage and guerrilla attacks on our installations if we don’t yield to his demands. His foreign minister openly claims that we have already agreed in principle to giving up the Canal Zone.

Well, the Canal Zone is not a colonial possession. It is not a long-term lease. It is sovereign United States Territory every bit the same as Alaska and all the states that were carved from the Louisiana Purchase. We should end those negotiations and tell the General: We bought it, we paid for it, we built it, and we intend to keep it.

Mr. Ford says détente will be replaced by “peace through strength.” Well now, that slogan has a – a nice ring to it, but neither Mr. Ford nor his new Secretary of Defense will say that our strength is superior to all others. In one of the dark hours of the Great Depression, Franklin Delano Roosevelt said, “It is time to speak the truth frankly and boldly.” Well, I believe former Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger was trying to speak the truth frankly and boldly to his fellow citizens. And that’s why he is no longer Secretary of Defense.

The Soviet Army outnumbers ours more than two-to-one and in reserves four-to-one. They out-spend us on weapons by 50 percent. Their Navy outnumbers ours in surface ships and submarines two-to-one. We’re outgunned in artillery three-to-one and their tanks outnumber ours four-to-one. Their strategic nuclear missiles are larger, more powerful and more numerous than ours. The evidence mounts that we are Number Two in a world where it’s dangerous, if not fatal, to be second best. Is this why Mr. Ford refused to invite Alexander Solzhenitsyn to the White House? Or, why Mr. Ford traveled halfway ‘round the world to sign the Helsinki Pact, putting our stamp of approval on Russia’s enslavement of the captive nations? We gave away the freedom of millions of people – freedom that was not ours to give.

Now we must ask if someone is giving away our own freedom. Dr. Kissinger is quoted as saying that he thinks of the United States as Athens and the Soviet Union as Sparta. “The day of the U.S. is past and today if the day of the Soviet Union.” And he added, “…My Job as Secretary of State is to negotiate the most acceptable second-best position available.”  Well, I believe in the peace of which Mr. Ford spoke – as much as any man. But peace does not come from weakness or from retreat. It comes from the restoration of American military superiority.

Ask the people of Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary – all the others: East Germany, Bulgaria, Romania – ask them what it’s like to live in a world where the Soviet Union is Number One. I don’t want to live in that kind of world; and I don’t think you do either. Now we learn that another high official of the State Department, Helmut Sonnenfeldt, whom Dr. Kissinger refers to as his “Kissinger,” has expressed the belief that, in effect, the captive nations should give up any claim of national sovereignty and simply become part of the Soviet Union. He says, “their desire to break out of the Soviet straightjacket” threatens us with World War III. In other words, slaves should accept their fate.

Well, I don’t believe the people I’ve met in almost every State of this Union are ready to consign this, the last island of freedom, to the dust bin of history, along with the bones of dead civilizations of the past. Call it mysticism, it you will, but I believe God had a divine purpose in placing this land between the two great oceans to be found by those who had a special love of freedom and the courage to leave the countries of their birth. From our forefathers to our modern-day immigrants, we’ve come from every corner of the earth, from every race and every ethnic background, and we’ve become a new breed in the world. We’re Americans and we have a rendezvous with destiny. We spread across this land, building farms and towns and cities, and we did it without any federal land planning program or urban renewal.

Indeed, we gave birth to an entirely new concept in man’s relation to man. We created government as our servant, beholden to us and possessing no powers except those voluntarily granted to it by us. Now a self-anointed elite in our nation’s capital would have us believe we are incapable of guiding our own destiny. They practice government by mystery, telling us it’s too complex for our understanding. Believing this, they assume we might panic if we were to be told the truth about our problems.

Why should we become frightened? No people who have ever lived on this earth have fought harder, paid a higher price for freedom, or done more to advance the dignity of man than the living Americans – the Americans living in this land today. There isn’t any problem we can’t solve if government will give us the facts. Tell us what needs to be done. Then, get out of the way and let us have at it.

Recently on one of my campaign trips I was doing a question-and-answer session, and suddenly I received a question from a little girl – couldn’t have been over six or seven years old – standing in the very front row. I’d heard the question before but somehow in her asking it, she threw me a little bit. She said, why do you want to be president? Well, I tried to tell her about giving government back to the people; I tried to tell her about turning authority back to the states and local communities, and so forth; winding down the bureaucracy. [It] might have been an answer for adults, but I knew that it wasn’t what that little girl wanted, and I left very frustrated. It was on the way to the next stop that I turned to Nancy and I said I wish I had it to do over again because I – I’d like to answer her question.

Well, maybe I can answer it now. I would like to go to Washington. I would like to be president, because I would like to see this country become once again a country where a little six-year old girl can grow up knowing the same freedom that I knew when I was six years old, growing up in America. If this is the America you want for yourself and your children; if you want to restore government not only of and for but by the people; to see the American spirit unleashed once again. To make this land a shining, golden hope God intended it to be, I’d like to hear from you. Write, or send a wire. I’d be proud to hear your thoughts and your ideas.

Thank you, and good night.

title: To Restore America


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A Time For Choosing

A TIME FOR CHOOSING (The Speech – October 27, 1964)

Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you and good evening. The sponsor has been identified, but unlike most television programs, the performer hasn't been provided with a script. As a matter of fact, I have been permitted to choose my own words and discuss my own ideas regarding the choice that we face in the next few weeks.

I have spent most of my life as a Democrat. I recently have seen fit to follow another course. I believe that the issues confronting us cross party lines. Now, one side in this campaign has been telling us that the issues of this election are the maintenance of peace and prosperity. The line has been used, "We've never had it so good."

But I have an uncomfortable feeling that this prosperity isn't something on which we can base our hopes for the future. No nation in history has ever survived a tax burden that reached a third of its national income. Today, 37 cents out of every dollar earned in this country is the tax collector's share, and yet our government continues to spend 17 million dollars a day more than the government takes in. We haven't balanced our budget 28 out of the last 34 years. We've raised our debt limit three times in the last twelve months, and now our national debt is one and a half times bigger than all the combined debts of all the nations of the world. We have 15 billion dollars in gold in our treasury; we don't own an ounce. Foreign dollar claims are 27.3 billion dollars. And we've just had announced that the dollar of 1939 will now purchase 45 cents in its total value.

As for the peace that we would preserve, I wonder who among us would like to approach the wife or mother whose husband or son has died in South Vietnam and ask them if they think this is a peace that should be maintained indefinitely. Do they mean peace, or do they mean we just want to be left in peace? There can be no real peace while one American is dying some place in the world for the rest of us. We're at war with the most dangerous enemy that has ever faced mankind in his long climb from the swamp to the stars, and it's been said if we lose that war, and in so doing lose this way of freedom of ours, history will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening. Well I think it's time we ask ourselves if we still know the freedoms that were intended for us by the Founding Fathers.

Not too long ago, two friends of mine were talking to a Cuban refugee, a businessman who had escaped from Castro, and in the midst of his story one of my friends turned to the other and said, "We don't know how lucky we are." And the Cuban stopped and said, "How lucky you are? I had someplace to escape to." And in that sentence he told us the entire story. If we lose freedom here, there's no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth.

And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except the sovereign people, is still the newest and the most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man.

This is the issue of this election: Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capitol can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.

You and I are told increasingly we have to choose between a left or right. Well I'd like to suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There's only an up or down—[up] man's old—old-aged dream, the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order, or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. And regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would trade our freedom for security have embarked on this downward course.

In this vote-harvesting time, they use terms like the "Great Society," or as we were told a few days ago by the President, we must accept a greater government activity in the affairs of the people. But they've been a little more explicit in the past and among themselves; and all of the things I now will quote have appeared in print. These are not Republican accusations. For example, they have voices that say, "The cold war will end through our acceptance of a not undemocratic socialism." Another voice says, "The profit motive has become outmoded. It must be replaced by the incentives of the welfare state." Or, "Our traditional system of individual freedom is incapable of solving the complex problems of the 20th century." Senator Fulbright has said at Stanford University that the Constitution is outmoded. He referred to the President as "our moral teacher and our leader," and he says he is "hobbled in his task by the restrictions of power imposed on him by this antiquated document." He must "be freed," so that he "can do for us" what he knows "is best." And Senator Clark of Pennsylvania, another articulate spokesman, defines liberalism as "meeting the material needs of the masses through the full power of centralized government."

Well, I, for one, resent it when a representative of the people refers to you and me, the free men and women of this country, as "the masses." This is a term we haven't applied to ourselves in America. But beyond that, "the full power of centralized government"—this was the very thing the Founding Fathers sought to minimize. They knew that governments don't control things. A government can't control the economy without controlling people. And they know when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. They also knew, those Founding Fathers, that outside of its legitimate functions, government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector of the economy.

Now, we have no better example of this than government's involvement in the farm economy over the last 30 years. Since 1955, the cost of this program has nearly doubled. One-fourth of farming in America is responsible for 85 percent of the farm surplus. Three-fourths of farming is out on the free market and has known a 21 percent increase in the per capita consumption of all its produce. You see, that one-fourth of farming—that's regulated and controlled by the federal government. In the last three years we've spent 43 dollars in the feed grain program for every dollar bushel of corn we don't grow.

Senator Humphrey last week charged that Barry Goldwater, as President, would seek to eliminate farmers. He should do his homework a little better, because he'll find out that we've had a decline of 5 million in the farm population under these government programs. He'll also find that the Democratic administration has sought to get from Congress [an] extension of the farm program to include that three-fourths that is now free. He'll find that they've also asked for the right to imprison farmers who wouldn't keep books as prescribed by the federal government. The Secretary of Agriculture asked for the right to seize farms through condemnation and resell them to other individuals. And contained in that same program was a provision that would have allowed the federal government to remove 2 million farmers from the soil.

At the same time, there's been an increase in the Department of Agriculture employees. There's now one for every 30 farms in the United States, and still they can't tell us how 66 shiploads of grain headed for Austria disappeared without a trace and Billie Sol Estes never left shore.

Every responsible farmer and farm organization has repeatedly asked the government to free the farm economy, but how—who are farmers to know what's best for them? The wheat farmers voted against a wheat program. The government passed it anyway. Now the price of bread goes up; the price of wheat to the farmer goes down.

Meanwhile, back in the city, under urban renewal the assault on freedom carries on. Private property rights [are] so diluted that public interest is almost anything a few government planners decide it should be. In a program that takes from the needy and gives to the greedy, we see such spectacles as in Cleveland, Ohio, a million-and-a-half-dollar building completed only three years ago must be destroyed to make way for what government officials call a "more compatible use of the land." The President tells us he's now going to start building public housing units in the thousands, where heretofore we've only built them in the hundreds. But FHA [Federal Housing Authority] and the Veterans Administration tell us they have 120,000 housing units they've taken back through mortgage foreclosure. For three decades, we've sought to solve the problems of unemployment through government planning, and the more the plans fail, the more the planners plan. The latest is the Area Redevelopment Agency.

They've just declared Rice County, Kansas, a depressed area. Rice County, Kansas, has two hundred oil wells, and the 14,000 people there have over 30 million dollars on deposit in personal savings in their banks. And when the government tells you you're depressed, lie down and be depressed.

We have so many people who can't see a fat man standing beside a thin one without coming to the conclusion the fat man got that way by taking advantage of the thin one. So they're going to solve all the problems of human misery through government and government planning. Well, now, if government planning and welfare had the answer—and they've had almost 30 years of it—shouldn't we expect government to read the score to us once in a while? Shouldn't they be telling us about the decline each year in the number of people needing help? The reduction in the need for public housing?

But the reverse is true. Each year the need grows greater; the program grows greater. We were told four years ago that 17 million people went to bed hungry each night. Well that was probably true. They were all on a diet. But now we're told that 9.3 million families in this country are poverty-stricken on the basis of earning less than 3,000 dollars a year. Welfare spending [is] 10 times greater than in the dark depths of the Depression. We're spending 45 billion dollars on welfare. Now do a little arithmetic, and you'll find that if we divided the 45 billion dollars up equally among those 9 million poor families, we'd be able to give each family 4,600 dollars a year. And this added to their present income should eliminate poverty. Direct aid to the poor, however, is only running only about 600 dollars per family. It would seem that someplace there must be some overhead.

Now—so now we declare "war on poverty," or "You, too, can be a Bobby Baker." Now do they honestly expect us to believe that if we add 1 billion dollars to the 45 billion we're spending, one more program to the 30-odd we have—and remember, this new program doesn't replace any, it just duplicates existing programs—do they believe that poverty is suddenly going to disappear by magic? Well, in all fairness I should explain there is one part of the new program that isn't duplicated. This is the youth feature. We're now going to solve the dropout problem, juvenile delinquency, by reinstituting something like the old CCC camps [Civilian Conservation Corps], and we're going to put our young people in these camps. But again we do some arithmetic, and we find that we're going to spend each year just on room and board for each young person we help 4,700 dollars a year. We can send them to Harvard for 2,700! Course, don't get me wrong. I'm not suggesting Harvard is the answer to juvenile delinquency.

But seriously, what are we doing to those we seek to help? Not too long ago, a judge called me here in Los Angeles. He told me of a young woman who'd come before him for a divorce. She had six children, was pregnant with her seventh. Under his questioning, she revealed her husband was a laborer earning 250 dollars a month. She wanted a divorce to get an 80 dollar raise. She's eligible for 330 dollars a month in the Aid to Dependent Children Program. She got the idea from two women in her neighborhood who'd already done that very thing.

Yet anytime you and I question the schemes of the do-gooders, we're denounced as being against their humanitarian goals. They say we're always "against" things—we're never "for" anything.

Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so.

Now—we're for a provision that destitution should not follow unemployment by reason of old age, and to that end we've accepted Social Security as a step toward meeting the problem.

But we're against those entrusted with this program when they practice deception regarding its fiscal shortcomings, when they charge that any criticism of the program means that we want to end payments to those people who depend on them for a livelihood. They've called it "insurance" to us in a hundred million pieces of literature. But then they appeared before the Supreme Court and they testified it was a welfare program. They only use the term "insurance" to sell it to the people. And they said Social Security dues are a tax for the general use of the government, and the government has used that tax. There is no fund, because Robert Byers, the actuarial head, appeared before a congressional committee and admitted that Social Security as of this moment is 298 billion dollars in the hole. But he said there should be no cause for worry because as long as they have the power to tax, they could always take away from the people whatever they needed to bail them out of trouble. And they're doing just that.

A young man, 21 years of age, working at an average salary—his Social Security contribution would, in the open market, buy him an insurance policy that would guarantee 220 dollars a month at age 65. The government promises 127. He could live it up until he's 31 and then take out a policy that would pay more than Social Security. Now are we so lacking in business sense that we can't put this program on a sound basis, so that people who do require those payments will find they can get them when they're due—that the cupboard isn't bare?

Barry Goldwater thinks we can.

At the same time, can't we introduce voluntary features that would permit a citizen who can do better on his own to be excused upon presentation of evidence that he had made provision for the non-earning years? Should we not allow a widow with children to work, and not lose the benefits supposedly paid for by her deceased husband? Shouldn't you and I be allowed to declare who our beneficiaries will be under this program, which we cannot do? I think we're for telling our senior citizens that no one in this country should be denied medical care because of a lack of funds. But I think we're against forcing all citizens, regardless of need, into a compulsory government program, especially when we have such examples, as was announced last week, when France admitted that their Medicare program is now bankrupt. They've come to the end of the road.

In addition, was Barry Goldwater so irresponsible when he suggested that our government give up its program of deliberate, planned inflation, so that when you do get your Social Security pension, a dollar will buy a dollar's worth, and not 45 cents worth?

I think we're for an international organization, where the nations of the world can seek peace. But I think we're against subordinating American interests to an organization that has become so structurally unsound that today you can muster a two-thirds vote on the floor of the General Assembly among nations that represent less than 10 percent of the world's population. I think we're against the hypocrisy of assailing our allies because here and there they cling to a colony, while we engage in a conspiracy of silence and never open our mouths about the millions of people enslaved in the Soviet colonies in the satellite nations.

I think we're for aiding our allies by sharing of our material blessings with those nations which share in our fundamental beliefs, but we're against doling out money government to government, creating bureaucracy, if not socialism, all over the world. We set out to help 19 countries. We're helping 107. We've spent 146 billion dollars. With that money, we bought a 2 million dollar yacht for Haile Selassie. We bought dress suits for Greek undertakers, extra wives for Kenya[n] government officials. We bought a thousand TV sets for a place where they have no electricity. In the last six years, 52 nations have bought 7 billion dollars worth of our gold, and all 52 are receiving foreign aid from this country.

No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. So governments' programs, once launched, never disappear.

Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we'll ever see on this earth.

Federal employees—federal employees number two and a half million; and federal, state, and local, one out of six of the nation's work force employed by government. These proliferating bureaus with their thousands of regulations have cost us many of our constitutional safeguards. How many of us realize that today federal agents can invade a man's property without a warrant? They can impose a fine without a formal hearing, let alone a trial by jury? And they can seize and sell his property at auction to enforce the payment of that fine. In Chico County, Arkansas, James Wier over-planted his rice allotment. The government obtained a 17,000 dollar judgment. And a U.S. marshal sold his 960-acre farm at auction. The government said it was necessary as a warning to others to make the system work.

Last February 19th at the University of Minnesota, Norman Thomas, six-times candidate for President on the Socialist Party ticket, said, "If Barry Goldwater became President, he would stop the advance of socialism in the United States." I think that's exactly what he will do.

But as a former Democrat, I can tell you Norman Thomas isn't the only man who has drawn this parallel to socialism with the present administration, because back in 1936, Mr. Democrat himself, Al Smith, the great American, came before the American people and charged that the leadership of his Party was taking the Party of Jefferson, Jackson, and Cleveland down the road under the banners of Marx, Lenin, and Stalin. And he walked away from his Party, and he never returned til the day he died—because to this day, the leadership of that Party has been taking that Party, that honorable Party, down the road in the image of the labor Socialist Party of England.

Now it doesn't require expropriation or confiscation of private property or business to impose socialism on a people. What does it mean whether you hold the deed to the—or the title to your business or property if the government holds the power of life and death over that business or property? And such machinery already exists. The government can find some charge to bring against any concern it chooses to prosecute. Every businessman has his own tale of harassment. Somewhere a perversion has taken place. Our natural, unalienable rights are now considered to be a dispensation of government, and freedom has never been so fragile, so close to slipping from our grasp as it is at this moment.

Our Democratic opponents seem unwilling to debate these issues. They want to make you and I believe that this is a contest between two men—that we're to choose just between two personalities.

Well what of this man that they would destroy—and in destroying, they would destroy that which he represents, the ideas that you and I hold dear? Is he the brash and shallow and trigger-happy man they say he is? Well I've been privileged to know him "when." I knew him long before he ever dreamed of trying for high office, and I can tell you personally I've never known a man in my life I believed so incapable of doing a dishonest or dishonorable thing.

This is a man who, in his own business before he entered politics, instituted a profit-sharing plan before unions had ever thought of it. He put in health and medical insurance for all his employees. He took 50 percent of the profits before taxes and set up a retirement program, a pension plan for all his employees. He sent monthly checks for life to an employee who was ill and couldn't work. He provides nursing care for the children of mothers who work in the stores. When Mexico was ravaged by the floods in the Rio Grande, he climbed in his airplane and flew medicine and supplies down there.

An ex-GI told me how he met him. It was the week before Christmas during the Korean War, and he was at the Los Angeles airport trying to get a ride home to Arizona for Christmas. And he said that [there were] a lot of servicemen there and no seats available on the planes. And then a voice came over the loudspeaker and said, "Any men in uniform wanting a ride to Arizona, go to runway such-and-such," and they went down there, and there was a fellow named Barry Goldwater sitting in his plane. Every day in those weeks before Christmas, all day long, he'd load up the plane, fly it to Arizona, fly them to their homes, fly back over to get another load.

During the hectic split-second timing of a campaign, this is a man who took time out to sit beside an old friend who was dying of cancer. His campaign managers were understandably impatient, but he said, "There aren't many left who care what happens to her. I'd like her to know I care." This is a man who said to his 19-year-old son, "There is no foundation like the rock of honesty and fairness, and when you begin to build your life on that rock, with the cement of the faith in God that you have, then you have a real start." This is not a man who could carelessly send other people's sons to war. And that is the issue of this campaign that makes all the other problems I've discussed academic, unless we realize we're in a war that must be won.

Those who would trade our freedom for the soup kitchen of the welfare state have told us they have a utopian solution of peace without victory. They call their policy "accommodation." And they say if we'll only avoid any direct confrontation with the enemy, he'll forget his evil ways and learn to love us. All who oppose them are indicted as warmongers. They say we offer simple answers to complex problems. Well, perhaps there is a simple answer—not an easy answer—but simple: If you and I have the courage to tell our elected officials that we want our national policy based on what we know in our hearts is morally right.

We cannot buy our security, our freedom from the threat of the bomb by committing an immorality so great as saying to a billion human beings now enslaved behind the Iron Curtain, "Give up your dreams of freedom because to save our own skins, we're willing to make a deal with your slave masters." Alexander Hamilton said, "A nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master, and deserves one." Now let's set the record straight. There's no argument over the choice between peace and war, but there's only one guaranteed way you can have peace—and you can have it in the next second—surrender.

Admittedly, there's a risk in any course we follow other than this, but every lesson of history tells us that the greater risk lies in appeasement, and this is the specter our well-meaning liberal friends refuse to face—that their policy of accommodation is appeasement, and it gives no choice between peace and war, only between fight or surrender. If we continue to accommodate, continue to back and retreat, eventually we have to face the final demand—the ultimatum. And what then—when Nikita Khrushchev has told his people he knows what our answer will be? He has told them that we're retreating under the pressure of the Cold War, and someday when the time comes to deliver the final ultimatum, our surrender will be voluntary, because by that time we will have been weakened from within spiritually, morally, and economically. He believes this because from our side he's heard voices pleading for "peace at any price" or "better Red than dead," or as one commentator put it, he'd rather "live on his knees than die on his feet." And therein lies the road to war, because those voices don't speak for the rest of us.

You and I know and do not believe that life is so dear and peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery. If nothing in life is worth dying for, when did this begin—just in the face of this enemy? Or should Moses have told the children of Israel to live in slavery under the pharaohs? Should Christ have refused the cross? Should the patriots at Concord Bridge have thrown down their guns and refused to fire the shot heard 'round the world? The martyrs of history were not fools, and our honored dead who gave their lives to stop the advance of the Nazis didn't die in vain. Where, then, is the road to peace? Well it's a simple answer after all.

You and I have the courage to say to our enemies, "There is a price we will not pay." "There is a point beyond which they must not advance." And this—this is the meaning in the phrase of Barry Goldwater's "peace through strength." Winston Churchill said, "The destiny of man is not measured by material computations. When great forces are on the move in the world, we learn we're spirits—not animals." And he said, "There's something going on in time and space, and beyond time and space, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty."

You and I have a rendezvous with destiny.

We'll preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we'll sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.

We will keep in mind and remember that Barry Goldwater has faith in us. He has faith that you and I have the ability and the dignity and the right to make our own decisions and determine our own destiny.

Thank you very much.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: A Time For Choosing


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Rh rose over Hrothgar’s hoarded gems. A sword to the boat-guard Beowulf gave, mounted with gold; on the mead-bench since he was better esteemed, that blade possessing, heirloom old.—Their ocean-keel boarding, they drove through the deep, and Daneland left. A sea-cloth was set, a sail with ropes, firm to the mast; the flood-timbers moaned; nor did wind over billows that wave-swimmer blow across from her course. The craft sped on, foam-necked it floated forth o’er the waves, keel firm-bound over briny currents, till they got them sight of the Geatish cliffs, home-known headlands. High the boat, stirred by winds, on the strand updrove. Helpful at haven the harbor-guard stood, who long already for loved companions by the water had waited and watched afar. He bound to the beach the broad-bosomed ship with anchor-bands, lest ocean-billows that trusty timber should tear away. Then Beowulf bade them bear the treasure, gold and jewels; no journey far was it thence to go to the giver of rings, Hygelac Hrethling: at home he dwelt by the sea-wall close, himself and clan. Haughty that house, a hero the king, high the hall, and Hygd right young,


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106 wise and wary, though winters few in those fortress walls she had found a home, Hæreth’s daughter. Nor humble her ways, nor grudged she gifts to the Geatish men, of precious treasure. Not Thryth’s pride showed she, folk-queen famed, or that fell deceit. Was none so daring that durst make bold (save her lord alone) of the liegemen dear that lady full in the face to look, but forgéd fetters he found his lot, bonds of death! And brief the respite; soon as they seized him, his sword-doom was spoken, and the burnished blade a baleful murder proclaimed and closed. No queenly way for woman to practise, though peerless she, that the weaver-of-peace from warrior dear


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Rh by wrath and lying his life should reave! But Hemming’s kinsman hindered this.— For over their ale men also told that of these folk-horrors fewer she wrought, onslaughts of evil, after she went, gold-decked bride, to the brave young prince, atheling haughty, and Offa’s hall o’er the fallow flood at her father’s bidding safely sought, where since she prospered, royal, thronéd, rich in goods, fain of the fair life fate had sent her, and leal in love to the lord of warriors. He, of all heroes I heard of ever from sea to sea, of the sons of earth, most excellent seemed. Hence Offa was praised for his fighting and feeing by far-off men, the spear-bold warrior; wisely he ruled over his empire. Eomer woke to him, help of heroes, Hemming’s kinsman, grandson of Garmund, grim in war.

Hastened the hardy one, henchmen with him, sandy strand of the sea to tread and widespread ways. The world’s great candle, sun shone from south. They strode along


text: The Oldest English Epic/Chapter 1/Beowulf 27


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108 with sturdy steps to the spot they knew where the battle-king young, his burg within, slayer of Ongentheow, shared the rings, shelter-of-heroes. To Hygelac Beowulf’s coming was quickly told,— that there in the court the clansmen’s refuge, the shield-companion sound and alive, hale from the hero-play homeward strode. With haste in the hall, by highest order, room for the rovers was readily made. By his sovran he sat, come safe from battle, kinsman by kinsman. His kindly lord he first had greeted in gracious form, with manly words. The mead dispensing, came through the high hall Hæreth’s daughter, winsome to warriors, wine-cup bore to the hands of the heroes. Hygelac then his comrade fairly with question plied in the lofty hall, sore longing to know what manner of sojourn the Sea-Geats made. “What came of thy quest, my kinsman Beowulf, when thy yearnings suddenly swept thee yonder battle to seek o’er the briny sea, combat in Heorot? Hrothgar couldst thou aid at all, the honored chief, in his wide-known woes? With waves of care my sad heart seethed; I sore mistrusted my loved one’s venture: long I begged thee by no means to seek that slaughtering monster,


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Butler, James (1665-1745)


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Butler, James Armar


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Rh but suffer the South-Danes to settle their feud themselves with Grendel. Now God be thanked that safe and sound I can see thee now!” Beowulf spake, the bairn of Ecgtheow:— “ ’Tis known and unhidden, Hygelac Lord, to many men, that meeting of ours, struggle grim between Grendel and me, which we fought on the field where full too many sorrows he wrought for the Scylding-Victors, evils unending. These all I avenged. No boast can be from breed of Grendel, any on earth, for that uproar at dawn, from the longest-lived of the loathsome race in fleshly fold!—But first I went Hrothgar to greet in the hall of gifts, where Healfdene’s kinsman high-renowned, soon as my purpose was plain to him, assigned me a seat by his son and heir. The liegemen were lusty; my life-days never such merry men over mead in hall have I heard under heaven! The high-born queen, people’s peace-bringer, passed through the hall, cheered the young clansmen, clasps of gold, ere she sought her seat, to sundry gave. Oft to the heroes Hrothgar’s daughter, to earls in turn, the ale-cup tendered,— she whom I heard these hall-companions Freawaru name, when fretted gold she proffered the warriors. Promised is she,


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Butler, John (d.1478)


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Butler, John (d.1800)


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Butler, Joseph


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Butler, Pierce (d.1539)


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Butler, Pierce (1652-1740)


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Butler, Richard (1578-1651)


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110 gold-decked maid, to the glad son of Froda. Sage this seems to the Scyldings’-friend, kingdom’s-keeper: he counts it wise the woman to wed so and ward off feud, store of slaughter. But seldom ever when men are slain, does the murder-spear sink but briefest while, though the bride be fair! “Nor haply will like it the Heathobard lord, and as little each of his liegemen all, when a thane of the Danes, in that doughty throng, goes with the lady along their hall, and on him the old-time heirlooms glisten hard and ring-decked, Heathobard’s treasure, weapons that once they wielded fair until they lost at the linden-play


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Butler, Richard (d.1791)


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Butler, Samuel (1774-1839)


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Rh liegeman leal and their lives as well. Then, over the ale, on this heirloom gazing, some ash-wielder old who has all in mind that spear-death of men, —he is stern of mood, heavy at heart,—in the hero young tests the temper and tries the soul and war-hate wakens, with words like these:— Canst thou not, comrade, ken that sword which to the fray thy father carried in his final feud, ’neath the fighting-mask, dearest of blades, when the Danish slew him and wielded the war-place on Withergild’s fall, after havoc of heroes, those hardy Scyldings? Now, the son of a certain slaughtering Dane, proud of his treasure, paces this hall, joys in the killing, and carries the jewel that rightfully ought to he owned by thee! Thus he urges and eggs him all the time with keenest words, till occasion offers that Freawaru’s thane, for his father’s deed, after bite of brand in his blood must slumber,


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 losing his life; but that liegeman flies living away, for the land he kens. And thus be broken on both their sides oaths of the earls, when Ingeld’s breast wells with war-hate, and wife-love now after the care-billows cooler grows. “So I hold not high the Heathobards’ faith due to the Danes, or their during love and pact of peace.—But I pass from that, turning to Grendel, O giver-of-treasure, and saying in full how the fight resulted, hand-fray of heroes. When heaven’s jewel had fled o’er far fields, that fierce sprite came, night-foe savage, to seek us out where safe and sound we sentried the hall. To Hondscio then was that harassing deadly, his fall there was fated. He first was slain, girded warrior. Grendel on him turned murderous mouth, on our mighty kinsman, and all of the brave man’s body devoured. Yet none the earlier, empty-handed, would the bloody-toothed murderer, mindful of bale, outward go from the gold-decked hall: but me he attacked in his terror of might, with greedy hand grasped me. A glove hung by him


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Rh wide and wondrous, wound with bands; and in artful wise it all was wrought, by devilish craft, of dragon-skins. Me therein, an innocent man, the fiendish foe was fain to thrust with many another. He might not so, when I all angrily upright stood. ’Twere long to relate how that land-destroyer I paid in kind for his cruel deeds; yet there, my prince, this people of thine got fame by my fighting. He fled away, and a little space his life preserved; but there staid behind him his stronger hand left in Heorot; heartsick thence on the floor of the ocean that outcast fell. Me for this struggle the Scyldings’-friend paid in plenty with plates of gold, with many a treasure, when morn had come and we all at the banquet-board sat down. Then was song and glee. The gray-haired Scylding, much tested, told of the times of yore. Whiles the hero his harp bestirred, wood-of-delight; now lays he chanted of sooth and sadness, or said aright legends of wonder, the wide-hearted king; or for years of his youth he would yearn at times, for strength of old struggles, now stricken with age, hoary hero: his heart surged full when, wise with winters, he wailed their flight. Thus in the hall the whole of that day at ease we feasted, till fell o’er earth another night. Anon full ready


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114 in greed of vengeance, Grendel’s mother set forth all doleful. Dead was her son through war-hate of Weders; now, woman monstrous, with fury fell a foeman she slew, avenged her offspring. From Æschere old, loyal councillor, life was gone; nor might they e’en, when morning broke, those Danish people, their death-done comrade burn with brands, on balefire lay the man they mourned. Under mountain stream she had carried the corpse with cruel hands. For Hrothgar that was the heaviest sorrow of all that had laden the lord of his folk. The leader then, by thy life, besought me (sad was his soul) in the sea-waves’ coil to play the hero and hazard my being for glory of prowess: my guerdon he pledged. I then in the waters—’tis widely known— that sea-floor-guardian savage found. Hand-to-hand there a while we struggled; billows welled blood; in the briny hall her head I hewed with a hardy blade from Grendel’s mother,—and gained my life, though not without danger. My doom was not yet. Then the haven-of-heroes, Healfdene’s son, gave me in guerdon great gifts of price.

“So held this king to the customs old, that I wanted for nought in the wage I gained, the meed of my might; he made me gifts,


text: The Oldest English Epic/Chapter 1/Beowulf 28


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more than a year before her death, Octavia had suffered from breathlessness, and at Easter of 1912, she became aware that her illness was serious. She at once began to plan the devolution of her work. She wrote to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and to five other owners of house property, to ask if they would appoint certain of her trained workers to take over the direct management of the houses. And she was much gratified that all these owners were ready to fall in with her suggestions; and that her lady workers were willing to undertake the responsibility of management and direction.

She decided to bequeath her own freehold property to her married nieces, the three daughters of Mrs. Charles Lewes, in the belief that they would care for the work, and continue the good management which would ensure the welfare of the tenants. Her nieces had been associated with her in many ways from their early girlhood, and their love and reverence for her made it likely that they would respond to this trust.

These arrangements entailed many letters and interviews, the looking over documents and accounts (she had no fewer than nine banking accounts for which she was personally responsible); and all this was a most arduous task in her weak state of health.

In May she went with Miss Yorke to Larksfield to try what rest and fresh air would do for her. She greatly enjoyed the beauty of the spring, and sat in an easy chair on the lawn for hours delighting in the birds and flowers, and specially in the scarlet poppies and golden broom seen against the blue distance.

However, she was fast losing strength, and when she returned to Marylebone Rd., on June 3rd, she never left the house again; but her energy never flagged. Up to within three days of her death she continued to see her friends and fellow workers, using to the utmost her failing strength, and endeavouring to arrange for the efficient carrying on of the many works in which she took such a keen interest. She was much cheered


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 by the money sent to secure the purchase of Mariners’ Hill, and she watched eagerly for letters or news of donations.

Miss Rosamond Davenport Hill had bequeathed £500 to her sister, Miss Florence Davenport Hill, on the understanding that the latter should leave it to Octavia. When, however, Miss F. D. Hill heard how very ill Octavia was, she generously sent a cheque, which came the very day before Octavia died. This £500 was more than enough to secure the purchase of Mariners’ Hill, and Octavia’s delight and thankfulness were great. It was a specially precious gift, as coming from such an old and dear friend. Octavia was anxious that her illness should not attract public attention; but, as it became known, flowers and loving messages came pouring in, which touched her deeply. She longed to see her relations and friends, and was delighted to welcome all, as far as her failing strength would allow. One of her nieces, after visiting her, wrote, “It was like Heaven, to be with her”; and others felt the same. She seemed to glow with faith and unselfish love, and she had a sweet smile for anyone who rendered the least service.

All through her illness she was surrounded by love. Miss Sim, who for many years had formed part of her household, was unfailing in her watchful care. Her sisters were constantly with her, and Miss Yorke was devoted to her day and night. She was most tenderly and carefully advised by Dr. Turnbull, who had previously attended her sister, Miranda.

When Octavia realised that she could not recover she said, speaking of her work, “I might have given it a few more touches, but I think it is nearly all planned now, very well.” It was a great comfort to her to know that Miss Yorke, who had lived and worked with her for thirty years, would stay on in the dear home in Marylebone Road, and form a centre for fellow-workers, and old friends; and, above all, that she would take the responsibility of such a large amount of the work.

Octavia was also very happy at the arrangements made for the other house property; for she knew that each group of ladies would gather others round them. She felt that she was handing on the torch to those who were animated by the right spirit,


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 and in speaking of this future for her work she said, “When I think of all this, it does not seem like death, but a new life.”

On the evening of August 12th, she gathered her household round her to say good-bye, and on the following night passed peacefully away.

She was laid by her sister, Miranda, in the quiet little churchyard at Crockham Hill; and, although no formal invitations to the funeral had been sent, friends and relations gathered from far and near, even one of her Dutch friends coming from Amsterdam for the occasion; and many representatives of public bodies with which she had been connected were present. Among the many lovely wreaths sent, was one from H.R.H. Princess Louise, bearing the following inscription:

Sir Robert Hunter had been deputed to represent the Princess as he was Chairman of the “National Trust for preserving places of beauty,” of which H.R.H. was President.

Suggestions had been made that Octavia should be buried in Westminster Abbey, but her relations were obliged to decline this honour, as her express directions had been that she should be buried at Crockham Hill.

The desire for a more public recognition, however, was gratified by a memorial service which was held in Southwark Cathedral, in the centre of a district where so much of her later work had been done. This was largely attended, and a beautifully appreciative sermon was preached by Canon Rawnsley.

Many tributes were paid to her memory in newspapers both English and foreign; but perhaps the best summary of her life’s work might be expressed in the words which she herself used in returning thanks for the portrait presented to her by her friends in 1898. “When I am gone, I hope my friends will not try to carry out any special system, or to follow blindly in the track which I have trodden. New circumstances require various efforts; and it is the spirit, not the dead form, that should be perpetuated. When the time comes that we slip


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 from our places, and they are called to the front as leaders, what should they inherit from us? Not a system, not an association, not dead formulas. We shall leave them a few houses, purified and improved, a few new and better ones built, a certain record of thoughtful and loving management, a few open spaces, some of which will be more beautiful than they would have been; but what we care most to leave them is not any tangible thing, however great, not any memory, however good, but the quick eye to see, the true soul to measure, the large hope to grasp the mighty issues of the new and better days to come—greater ideals greater hope, and patience to realise both.”


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The New International Encyclopædia/Parker, Foxhall Alexander

PARKER, (1821-79). An American naval officer, born in New York City. He graduated at the Naval School in Philadelphia in 1843, served against the Florida Indians, and in 1850 became a lieutenant. In the Civil War he first commanded the gunboats Mahaska and Wabash, and after 1863 the Potomac flotilla. In 1866 he was promoted captain, and in 1872 commander. In 1873 he was chief signal officer of the navy, and from 1878 until his death was superintendent of the Naval Academy at Annapolis. He published: Fleet Tactics Under Steam (1863); Squadron Tactics Under Steam (1863); The Naval Howitzer Afloat (1865); The Naval Howitzer Ashore (1865); The Fleets of the World: The Galley Period (1876); and The Battle of Mobile Bay (1878).


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 work felt, the form so rarely seen, both beautiful and life-like. Then I think the instance of the ennobling influence of having someone depending on one is most valuable. Then see how the truly great nature gathers good from all things thro' life. And imagine how I delight in the athletic games, and try to feel how I prize the book. I know you will feel all the objections to it quite strongly enough; and I won't try to say anything about them except; Don't hastily believe that the author advocates all he paints. There are few things in the world (are there any?) from which a great nature won't glean some good.

4, Russell Place, October 21st, 1856.

Oh, Mary, money is very powerful. I have just came in from paying several people for some work done, for the execution of an order which we accepted to give them employment. Many of them are old Guild people, who arranged to wait till the things were paid for; the payment has been a little delayed, and so it was unexpected by them; and there they were, educated and uneducated, living in nice streets renting the whole house, or in little back attics in small streets,—all glad to see me; but still more so when I told my errand; and the relieved look that for a few moments lighted up their care-worn faces touched me very much. To think of the power of those small pieces of money, to think of the thankfulness they caused! But what struck me especially was that to one the shilling was of as much importance as the pound to another; and so it was; one set had learned by hard experience not to expect the little luxuries of eating. Butter, sugar, and even meat are rarely used by them; but, more than


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The New International Encyclopædia/Parker, Francis Wayland

PARKER, (1837-1902). An American educator, born in Bedford, N. H. He was principal of a school in Manchester, N. H. (1865-68), and of one in Dayton, Ohio, from 1868 until 1872, when he went to Germany for a course at the Berlin University. Afterwards he was school superintendent in Quincy, Mass. (1875-80), supervisor in Boston (1880-83), principal of Cook County, Ill., Normal School (1883-90), and of the Chicago Normal School (1896-99). He was appointed president of the Chicago Institute in 1899. His publications include: Talks on Teaching (1883); The Practical Teacher (1884); Course in Arithmetic (1884); and How to Study Geography (1889).


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The New International Encyclopædia/Parker, (Horatio) Gilbert

PARKER, Sir (1862—). A Canadian novelist, born at Camden East, Addington, Ontario. He studied pedagogy in Ottawa and taught in Frankford and Seaforth. He studied for the ministry at Trinity University, Toronto, held a curacy at Trenton for a short time, and taught in the Belleville Deaf and Dumb Institute, but in 1880 went for his health to Australia. There he took up journalistic work and the writing or adapting of plays, but after his return to Canada was principally known as a writer of romances and short stories, such as Pierre and His People (1892); Mrs. Falchion (1893); The Translation of a Savage (1894); When Valmond Came to Poutiac (1895); The Seats of the Mighty (1896); The Battle of the Strong (1898); The Lane that Had no Turning (1900); The Right of Way (1901); and Donovan Pasha (1902). He made his home in England, was elected Conservative member of Parliament for Gravesend in 1900, and was knighted in 1902. The dramatic quality of his later books won for them considerable popularity, despite their disregard of truth in local color.


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The New International Encyclopædia/Parker, Horatio William

PARKER, (1863—). An American composer and teacher. He was born at Auburndale, Mass., and was a pupil first of his mother, then of George W. Chadwick and Stephen A. Emery, and subsequently of the Munich Conservatory. After returning to America he became organist of the Garden City Cathedral, Long Island, and professor of music at the Cathedral School. In 1886

he was organist and choirmaster at Saint Andrew's, New York, and two years later went to the Church of the Holy Trinity, Boston. He became professor of music at Yale University in 1894. His oratorio, Hora Novissima (1893), has been called by European critics one of the finest of American compositions. Other compositions are: The Holy Child (1890); The Kobold (1891); The Dream King (1893); Saint Christopher (1896); A Northern Ballad, for orchestra (1899); and choruses, anthems, organ pieces, transcriptions, and some chamber music.


text: Author:Nigamananda

title: Author:Nigamananda


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60

þone sēlestansāwol-lēasne, þāra þe mid Hrōðgārehām eahtode. Oferēode þāæþelinga bearn stēap stān-hliðo,stīge nearwe, enge ān-paðas,uncūð gelād, nēowle næssas,nicor-hūsa fela; hē fēara sumbeforan gengde wīsra monnawong scēawian, oþ þæt hē fǣringafyrgen-bēamas ofer hārne stānhleonian funde, wyn-lēasne wudu;wæter under stōd drēorig ond gedrēfed.Denum eallum wæs, winum Scyldinga,weorce on mōde tō geþolianne,ðegne monegum, oncȳð eorla gehwǣm,syðþan Æscheres on þām holm-clifehafelan mētton. Flōd blōde wēol(folc tō sǣgon), *hātan heolfre.Horn stundum song fūslīc f[yrd]-lēoð. Fēþa eal gesæt; gesāwon ðā æfter wæterewyrm-cynnes fela, sellīce sǣ-dracan,sund cunnian, swylce on næs-hleoðumnicras licgean, ðā on undern-mǣloft bewitigað sorh-fulne sīðon segl-rāde, wyrmas ond wil-dēor;hīe onweg hruron bitere ond gebolgne,bearhtm ongēaton, gūð-horn galan.Sumne Gēata lēod of flān-boganfēores getwǣfde, ȳð-gewinnes,þæt him on aldre stōd here-strǣl hearda;hē on hohne wæs

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