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The quest for peace and justice It is impossible to begin this lecture without again expressing my deep appreciation to the Nobel Committee of the Norwegian Parliament for bestowing upon me and the civil rights movement in the United States such a great honor. Occasionally in life there are those moments of unutterable fulfillment which cannot be completely explained by those symbols called words. Their meaning can only be articulated by the inaudible language of the heart. Such is the moment I am presently experiencing. I experience this high and joyous moment not for myself alone but for those devotees of nonviolence who have moved so courageously against the ramparts of racial injustice and who in the process have acquired a new estimate of their own human worth. Many of them are young and cultured. Others are middle aged and middle class. The majority are poor and untutored. But they are all united in the quiet conviction that it is better to suffer in dignity than to accept segregation in humiliation. These are the real heroes of the freedom struggle: they are the noble people for whom I accept the Nobel Peace Prize. This evening I would like to use this lofty and historic platform to discuss what appears to me to be the most pressing problem confronting mankind today. Modern man has brought this whole world to an awe-inspiring threshold of the future. He has reached new and astonishing peaks of scientific success. He has produced machines that think and instruments that peer into the unfathomable ranges of interstellar space. He has built gigantic bridges to span the seas and gargantuan buildings to kiss the skies. His airplanes and spaceships have dwarfed distance, placed time in chains, and carved highways through the stratosphere. This is a dazzling picture of modern man’s scientific and technological progress. Yet, in spite of these spectacular strides in science and technology, and still unlimited ones to come, something basic is missing. There is a sort of poverty of the spirit which stands in glaring contrast to our scientific and technological abundance. The richer we have become materially, the poorer we have become morally and spiritually. We have learned to fly the air like birds and swim the sea like fish, but we have not learned the simple art of living together as brothers. Every man lives in two realms, the internal and the external. The internal is that realm of spiritual ends expressed in art, literature, morals, and religion. The external is that complex of devices, techniques, mechanisms, and instrumentalities by means of which we live. Our problem today is that we have allowed the internal to become lost in the external. We have allowed the means by which we live to outdistance the ends for which we live. So much of modern life can be summarized in that arresting dictum of the poet Thoreau: “Improved means to an unimproved end”. This is the serious predicament, the deep and haunting problem confronting modern man. If we are to survive today, our moral and spiritual “lag” must be eliminated. Enlarged material powers spell enlarged peril if there is not proportionate growth of the soul. When the “without” of man’s nature subjugates the “within”, dark storm clouds begin to form in the world. This problem of spiritual and moral lag, which constitutes modern man’s chief dilemma, expresses itself in three larger problems which grow out of man’s ethical infantilism. Each of these problems, while appearing to be separate and isolated, is inextricably bound to the other. I refer to racial injustice, poverty, and war. The first problem that I would like to mention is racial injustice. The struggle to eliminate the evil of racial injustice constitutes one of the major struggles of our time. The present upsurge of the Negro people of the United States grows out of a deep and passionate determination to make freedom and equality a reality “here” and “now”. In one sense the civil rights movement in the United States is a special American phenomenon which must be understood in the light of American history and dealt with in terms of the American situation. But on another and more important level, what is happening in the United States today is a relatively small part of a world development. We live in a day, says the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, ”when civilization is shifting its basic outlook: a major turning point in history where the presuppositions on which society is structured are being analyzed, sharply challenged, and profoundly changed.” What we are seeing now is a freedom explosion, the realization of “an idea whose time has come”, to use Victor Hugo’s phrase. The deep rumbling of discontent that we hear today is the thunder of disinherited masses, rising from dungeons of oppression to the bright hills of freedom, in one majestic chorus the rising masses singing, in the words of our freedom song, “Ain’t gonna let nobody turn us around.” All over the world, like a fever, the freedom movement is spreading in the widest liberation in history. The great masses of people are determined to end the exploitation of their races and land. They are awake and moving toward their goal like a tidal wave. You can hear them rumbling in every village street, on the docks, in the houses, among the students, in the churches, and at political meetings. Historic movement was for several centuries that of the nations and societies of Western Europe out into the rest of the world in “conquest” of various sorts. That period, the era of colonialism, is at an end. East is meeting West. The earth is being redistributed. Yes, we are “shifting our basic outlooks”. These developments should not surprise any student of history. Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself. The Bible tells the thrilling story of how Moses stood in Pharaoh’s court centuries ago and cried, “Let my people go.” This is a kind of opening chapter in a continuing story. The present struggle in the United States is a later chapter in the same unfolding story. Something within has reminded the Negro of his birthright of freedom, and something without has reminded him that it can be gained. Consciously or unconsciously, he has been caught up by the Zeitgeist , and with his black brothers of Africa and his brown and yellow brothers in Asia, South America, and the Caribbean, the United States Negro is moving with a sense of great urgency toward the promised land of racial justice. Fortunately, some significant strides have been made in the struggle to end the long night of racial injustice. We have seen the magnificent drama of independence unfold in Asia and Africa. Just thirty years ago there were only three independent nations in the whole of Africa. But today thirty-five African nations have risen from colonial bondage. In the United States we have witnessed the gradual demise of the system of racial segregation. The Supreme Court’s decision of 1954 outlawing segregation in the public schools gave a legal and constitutional deathblow to the whole doctrine of separate but equal. The Court decreed that separate facilities are inherently unequal and that to segregate a child on the basis of race is to deny that child equal protection of the law. This decision came as a beacon light of hope to millions of disinherited people. Then came that glowing day a few months ago when a strong Civil Rights Bill became the law of our land. This bill, which was first recommended and promoted by President Kennedy, was passed because of the overwhelming support and perseverance of millions of Americans, Negro and white. It came as a bright interlude in the long and sometimes turbulent struggle for civil rights: the beginning of a second emancipation proclamation providing a comprehensive legal basis for equality of opportunity. Since the passage of this bill we have seen some encouraging and surprising signs of compliance. I am happy to report that, by and large, communities all over the southern part of the United States are obeying the Civil Rights Law and showing remarkable good sense in the process. Another indication that progress is being made was found in the recent presidential election in the United States. The American people revealed great maturity by overwhelmingly rejecting a presidential candidate who had become identified with extremism, racism, and retrogression. The voters of our nation rendered a telling blow to the radical right. They defeated those elements in our society which seek to pit white against Negro and lead the nation down a dangerous Fascist path. Let me not leave you with a false impression. The problem is far from solved. We still have a long, long way to go before the dream of freedom is a reality for the Negro in the United States. To put it figuratively in biblical language, we have left the dusty soils of Egypt and crossed a Red Sea whose waters had for years been hardened by a long and piercing winter of massive resistance. But before we reach the majestic shores of the Promised Land, there is a frustrating and bewildering wilderness ahead. We must still face prodigious hilltops of opposition and gigantic mountains of resistance. But with patient and firm determination we will press on until every valley of despair is exalted to new peaks of hope, until every mountain of pride and irrationality is made low by the leveling process of humility and compassion; until the rough places of injustice are transformed into a smooth plane of equality of opportunity; and until the crooked places of prejudice are transformed by the straightening process of bright-eyed wisdom. What the main sections of the civil rights movement in the United States are saying is that the demand for dignity, equality, jobs, and citizenship will not be abandoned or diluted or postponed. If that means resistance and conflict we shall not flinch. We shall not be cowed. We are no longer afraid. The word that symbolizes the spirit and the outward form of our encounter is nonviolence , and it is doubtless that factor which made it seem appropriate to award a peace prize to one identified with struggle. Broadly speaking, nonviolence in the civil rights struggle has meant not relying on arms and weapons of struggle. It has meant noncooperation with customs and laws which are institutional aspects of a regime of discrimination and enslavement. It has meant direct participation of masses in protest, rather than reliance on indirect methods which frequently do not involve masses in action at all. Nonviolence has also meant that my people in the agonizing struggles of recent years have taken suffering upon themselves instead of inflicting it on others. It has meant, as I said, that we are no longer afraid and cowed. But in some substantial degree it has meant that we do not want to instill fear in others or into the society of which we are a part. The movement does not seek to liberate Negroes at the expense of the humiliation and enslavement of whites. It seeks no victory over anyone. It seeks to liberate American society and to share in the self-liberation of all the people. Violence as a way of achieving racial justice is both impractical and immoral. I am not unmindful of the fact that violence often brings about momentary results. Nations have frequently won their independence in battle. But in spite of temporary victories, violence never brings permanent peace. It solves no social problem: it merely creates new and more complicated ones. Violence is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding: it seeks to annihilate rather than convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys community and makes brotherhood impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends up defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers. In a real sense nonviolence seeks to redeem the spiritual and moral lag that I spoke of earlier as the chief dilemma of modern man. It seeks to secure moral ends through moral means. Nonviolence is a powerful and just weapon. Indeed, it is a weapon unique in history, which cuts without wounding and ennobles the man who wields it. I believe in this method because I think it is the only way to reestablish a broken community. It is the method which seeks to implement the just law by appealing to the conscience of the great decent majority who through blindness, fear, pride, and irrationality have allowed their consciences to sleep. The nonviolent resisters can summarize their message in the following simple terms: we will take direct action against injustice despite the failure of governmental and other official agencies to act first. We will not obey unjust laws or submit to unjust practices. We will do this peacefully, openly, cheerfully because our aim is to persuade. We adopt the means of nonviolence because our end is a community at peace with itself. We will try to persuade with our words, but if our words fail, we will try to persuade with our acts. We will always be willing to talk and seek fair compromise, but we are ready to suffer when necessary and even risk our lives to become witnesses to truth as we see it. This approach to the problem of racial injustice is not at all without successful precedent. It was used in a magnificent way by Mohandas K. Gandhi to challenge the might of the British Empire and free his people from the political domination and economic exploitation inflicted upon them for centuries. He struggled only with the weapons of truth, soul force, non-injury, and courage. In the past ten years unarmed gallant men and women of the United States have given living testimony to the moral power and efficacy of nonviolence. By the thousands, faceless, anonymous, relentless young people, black and white, have temporarily left the ivory towers of learning for the barricades of bias. Their courageous and disciplined activities have come as a refreshing oasis in a desert sweltering with the heat of injustice. They have taken our whole nation back to those great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the founding fathers in the formulation of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. One day all of America will be proud of their achievements. I am only too well aware of the human weaknesses and failures which exist, the doubts about the efficacy of nonviolence, and the open advocacy of violence by some. But I am still convinced that nonviolence is both the most practically sound and morally excellent way to grapple with the age-old problem of racial injustice. A second evil which plagues the modern world is that of poverty. Like a monstrous octopus, it projects its nagging, prehensile tentacles in lands and villages all over the world. Almost two-thirds of the peoples of the world go to bed hungry at night. They are undernourished, ill-housed, and shabbily clad. Many of them have no houses or beds to sleep in. Their only beds are the sidewalks of the cities and the dusty roads of the villages. Most of these poverty-stricken children of God have never seen a physician or a dentist. This problem of poverty is not only seen in the class division between the highly developed industrial nations and the so-called underdeveloped nations; it is seen in the great economic gaps within the rich nations themselves. Take my own country for example. We have developed the greatest system of production that history has ever known. We have become the richest nation in the world. Our national gross product this year will reach the astounding figure of almost 650 billion dollars. Yet, at least one-fifth of our fellow citizens – some ten million families, comprising about forty million individuals – are bound to a miserable culture of poverty. In a sense the poverty of the poor in America is more frustrating than the poverty of Africa and Asia. The misery of the poor in Africa and Asia is shared misery, a fact of life for the vast majority; they are all poor together as a result of years of exploitation and underdevelopment. In sad contrast, the poor in America know that they live in the richest nation in the world, and that even though they are perishing on a lonely island of poverty they are surrounded by a vast ocean of material prosperity. Glistening towers of glass and steel easily seen from their slum dwellings spring up almost overnight. Jet liners speed over their ghettoes at 600 miles an hour; satellites streak through outer space and reveal details of the moon. President Johnson, in his State of the Union Message, emphasized this contradiction when he heralded the United States’ “highest standard of living in the world”, and deplored that it was accompanied by “dislocation; loss of jobs, and the specter of poverty in the midst of plenty”. So it is obvious that if man is to redeem his spiritual and moral “lag”, he must go all out to bridge the social and economic gulf between the “haves” and the “have nots” of the world. Poverty is one of the most urgent items on the agenda of modern life. There is nothing new about poverty. What is new, however, is that we have the resources to get rid of it. More than a century and a half ago people began to be disturbed about the twin problems of population and production. A thoughtful Englishman named Malthus wrote a book that set forth some rather frightening conclusions. He predicted that the human family was gradually moving toward global starvation because the world was producing people faster than it was producing food and material to support them. Later scientists, however, disproved the conclusion of Malthus, and revealed that he had vastly underestimated the resources of the world and the resourcefulness of man. Not too many years ago, Dr. Kirtley Mather, a Harvard geologist, wrote a book entitled Enough and to Spare . He set forth the basic theme that famine is wholly unnecessary in the modern world. Today, therefore, the question on the agenda must read: Why should there be hunger and privation in any land, in any city, at any table when man has the resources and the scientific know-how to provide all mankind with the basic necessities of life? Even deserts can be irrigated and top soil can be replaced. We cannot complain of a lack of land, for there are twenty-five million square miles of tillable land, of which we are using less than seven million. We have amazing knowledge of vitamins, nutrition, the chemistry of food, and the versatility of atoms. There is no deficit in human resources; the deficit is in human will. The well-off and the secure have too often become indifferent and oblivious to the poverty and deprivation in their midst. The poor in our countries have been shut out of our minds, and driven from the mainstream of our societies, because we have allowed them to become invisible. Just as nonviolence exposed the ugliness of racial injustice, so must the infection and sickness of poverty be exposed and healed – not only its symptoms but its basic causes. This, too, will be a fierce struggle, but we must not be afraid to pursue the remedy no matter how formidable the task. The time has come for an all-out world war against poverty. The rich nations must use their vast resources of wealth to develop the underdeveloped, school the unschooled, and feed the unfed. Ultimately a great nation is a compassionate nation. No individual or nation can be great if it does not have a concern for “the least of these”. Deeply etched in the fiber of our religious tradition is the conviction that men are made in the image of God and that they are souls of infinite metaphysical value, the heirs of a legacy of dignity and worth. If we feel this as a profound moral fact, we cannot be content to see men hungry, to see men victimized with starvation and ill health when we have the means to help them. The wealthy nations must go all out to bridge the gulf between the rich minority and the poor majority. In the final analysis, the rich must not ignore the poor because both rich and poor are tied in a single garment of destiny. All life is interrelated, and all men are interdependent. The agony of the poor diminishes the rich, and the salvation of the poor enlarges the rich. We are inevitably our brothers’ keeper because of the interrelated structure of reality. John Donne interpreted this truth in graphic terms when he affirmed: No man is an Iland, intire of its selfe: everyman is a peece of the Continent, a part of themaine: if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea,Europe is the lesse, as well as if a Promontoriewere, as well as if a Mannor of thy friendsor of thine owne were: any mans deathdiminishes me, because I am involved inMankinde: and therefore never send to knowfor whom the bell tolls: it tolls for thee. A third great evil confronting our world is that of war. Recent events have vividly reminded us that nations are not reducing but rather increasing their arsenals of weapons of mass destruction. The best brains in the highly developed nations of the world are devoted to military technology. The proliferation of nuclear weapons has not been halted, in spite of the Limited Test Ban Treaty. On the contrary, the detonation of an atomic device by the first nonwhite, non- Western, and so-called underdeveloped power, namely the Chinese People’s Republic, opens new vistas of exposure of vast multitudes, the whole of humanity, to insidious terrorization by the ever-present threat of annihilation. The fact that most of the time human beings put the truth about the nature and risks of the nuclear war out of their minds because it is too painful and therefore not “acceptable”, does not alter the nature and risks of such war. The device of “rejection” may temporarily cover up anxiety, but it does not bestow peace of mind and emotional security. So man’s proneness to engage in war is still a fact. But wisdom born of experience should tell us that war is obsolete. There may have been a time when war served as a negative good by preventing the spread and growth of an evil force, but the destructive power of modern weapons eliminated even the possibility that war may serve as a negative good. If we assume that life is worth living and that man has a right to survive, then we must find an alternative to war. In a day when vehicles hurtle through outer space and guided ballistic missiles carve highways of death through the stratosphere, no nation can claim victory in war. A so-called limited war will leave little more than a calamitous legacy of human suffering, political turmoil, and spiritual disillusionment. A world war – God forbid! – will leave only smoldering ashes as a mute testimony of a human race whose folly led inexorably to ultimate death. So if modern man continues to flirt unhesitatingly with war, he will transform his earthly habitat into an inferno such as even the mind of Dante could not imagine. Therefore, I venture to suggest to all of you and all who hear and may eventually read these words, that the philosophy and strategy of nonviolence become immediately a subject for study and for serious experimentation in every field of human conflict, by no means excluding the relations between nations. It is, after all, nation-states which make war, which have produced the weapons which threaten the survival of mankind, and which are both genocidal and suicidal in character. Here also we have ancient habits to deal with, vast structures of power, indescribably complicated problems to solve. But unless we abdicate our humanity altogether and succumb to fear and impotence in the presence of the weapons we have ourselves created, it is as imperative and urgent to put an end to war and violence between nations as it is to put an end to racial injustice. Equality with whites will hardly solve the problems of either whites or Negroes if it means equality in a society under the spell of terror and a world doomed to extinction. I do not wish to minimize the complexity of the problems that need to be faced in achieving disarmament and peace. But I think it is a fact that we shall not have the will, the courage, and the insight to deal with such matters unless in this field we are prepared to undergo a mental and spiritual reevaluation – a change of focus which will enable us to see that the things which seem most real and powerful are indeed now unreal and have come under the sentence of death. We need to make a supreme effort to generate the readiness, indeed the eagerness, to enter into the new world which is now possible, “the city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God”. We will not build a peaceful world by following a negative path. It is not enough to say “We must not wage war.” It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it. We must concentrate not merely on the negative expulsion of war, but on the positive affirmation of peace. There is a fascinating little story that is preserved for us in Greek literature about Ulysses and the Sirens. The Sirens had the ability to sing so sweetly that sailors could not resist steering toward their island. Many ships were lured upon the rocks, and men forgot home, duty, and honor as they flung themselves into the sea to be embraced by arms that drew them down to death. Ulysses, determined not to be lured by the Sirens, first decided to tie himself tightly to the mast of his boat, and his crew stuffed their ears with wax. But finally he and his crew learned a better way to save themselves: they took on board the beautiful singer Orpheus whose melodies were sweeter than the music of the Sirens. When Orpheus sang, who bothered to listen to the Sirens? So we must fix our vision not merely on the negative expulsion of war, but upon the positive affirmation of peace. We must see that peace represents a sweeter music, a cosmic melody that is far superior to the discords of war. Somehow we must transform the dynamics of the world power struggle from the negative nuclear arms race which no one can win to a positive contest to harness man’s creative genius for the purpose of making peace and prosperity a reality for all of the nations of the world. In short, we must shift the arms race into a “peace race”. If we have the will and determination to mount such a peace offensive, we will unlock hitherto tightly sealed doors of hope and transform our imminent cosmic elegy into a psalm of creative fulfillment. All that I have said boils down to the point of affirming that mankind’s survival is dependent upon man’s ability to solve the problems of racial injustice, poverty, and war; the solution of these problems is in turn dependent upon man squaring his moral progress with his scientific progress, and learning the practical art of living in harmony. Some years ago a famous novelist died. Among his papers was found a list of suggested story plots for future stories, the most prominently underscored being this one: “A widely separated family inherits a house in which they have to live together.” This is the great new problem of mankind. We have inherited a big house, a great “world house” in which we have to live together – black and white, Easterners and Westerners, Gentiles and Jews, Catholics and Protestants, Moslem and Hindu, a family unduly separated in ideas, culture, and interests who, because we can never again live without each other, must learn, somehow, in this one big world, to live with each other. This means that more and more our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. We must now give an overriding loyalty to mankind as a whole in order to preserve the best in our individual societies. This call for a worldwide fellowship that lifts neighborly concern beyond one’s tribe, race, class, and nation is in reality a call for an all-embracing and unconditional love for all men. This oft misunderstood and misinterpreted concept so readily dismissed by the Nietzsches of the world as a weak and cowardly force, has now become an absolute necessity for the survival of man. When I speak of love I am not speaking of some sentimental and weak response which is little more than emotional bosh. I am speaking of that force which all of the great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality. This Hindu-Moslem-Christian-Jewish-Buddhist belief about ultimate reality is beautifully summed up in the First Epistle of Saint John: Let us love one another: for love is of God; and everyonethat loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and Hislove is perfected in us. Let us hope that this spirit will become the order of the day. As Arnold Toynbee says: “Love is the ultimate force that makes for the saving choice of life and good against the damning choice of death and evil. Therefore the first hope in our inventory must be the hope that love is going to have the last word.” We can no longer afford to worship the God of hate or bow before the altar of retaliation. The oceans of history are made turbulent by the ever-rising tides of hate. History is cluttered with the wreckage of nations and individuals that pursued this self-defeating path of hate. Love is the key to the solution of the problems of the world. Let me close by saying that I have the personal faith that mankind will somehow rise up to the occasion and give new directions to an age drifting rapidly to its doom. In spite of the tensions and uncertainties of this period something profoundly meaningful is taking place. Old systems of exploitation and oppression are passing away, and out of the womb of a frail world new systems of justice and equality are being born. Doors of opportunity are gradually being opened to those at the bottom of society. The shirtless and barefoot people of the land are developing a new sense of “some-bodiness” and carving a tunnel of hope through the dark mountain of despair. “The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light.” Here and there an individual or group dares to love, and rises to the majestic heights of moral maturity. So in a real sense this is a great time to be alive. Therefore, I am not yet discouraged about the future. Granted that the easygoing optimism of yesterday is impossible. Granted that those who pioneer in the struggle for peace and freedom will still face uncomfortable jail terms, painful threats of death; they will still be battered by the storms of persecution, leading them to the nagging feeling that they can no longer bear such a heavy burden, and the temptation of wanting to retreat to a more quiet and serene life. Granted that we face a world crisis which leaves us standing so often amid the surging murmur of life’s restless sea. But every crisis has both its dangers and its opportunities. It can spell either salvation or doom. In a dark confused world the kingdom of God may yet reign in the hearts of men. Free at last, free at last, thank God almighty we are free at last! Source: https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1964/king/lecture/

Before I begin my talk with you, I want to ask you for a few minutes patience while I say something that is on my heart: I want to thank those home folks of my county who first gave an anxious country boy his opportunity to serve in State politics. I shall always owe a lot to those who gave me that first opportunity to serve. . . . . This is the day of myInauguration as Governor of the State of Alabama. And on this day I feel a deep obligation to renew my pledges, my covenants with you . . . the people of this great state. General Robert E. Lee said that "duty" is the sublimest word on the English language and I have come, increasingly, to realize what he meant. I SHALL do my duty to you, God helping . . . to every man, to every woman . . . yes, to every child in this state. I shall fulfill my duty toward honesty and economy in our State government so that no man shall have a part of his livelihood cheated and no child shall have a bit of his future stolen away. . . . that the farmer in the field, the worker in the factory, the businessman in his office, the housewife in her home, have decided that the money can be better spent to help our children's education and our older citizens . . . and they have put a man in office to see that it is done. It shall be done. Let me say one more time . . . . no more liquor drinking in your governor's mansion. I shall fulfill my duty in working hard to bring industry into our state, not only by maintaining an honest, sober and free enterprise climate of government in which industry can have confidence . . but in going out and getting it . . . so that our people can have industrial jobs in Alabama and provide a better life for their children. I shall not forget my duty to our senior citizens . . . so that their lives can be lived in dignity and enrichment of the golden years, nor to our sick, both mental and physical . . . and they will know we have not forsaken them. I want the farmer to feel confident that in this State government he has a partner who will work with him in raising his income and increasing his markets. And I want the laboring man to know he has a friend who is sincerely striving to better his field of endeavor. I want to assure every child that this State government is not afraid to invest in their future through education, so that they will not be handicapped on every threshold of their lives. Today I have stood, where once Jefferson Davis stood, and took an oath to my people. It is very appropriate then that from this Cradle of the Confederacy, this very Heart of the Great Anglo-Saxon Southland, that today we sound the drum for freedom as have our generations of forebears before us done, time and time again through history. Let us rise to the call of freedom- loving blood that is in us and send our answer to the tyranny that clanks its chains upon the South. In the name of the greatest people that have ever trod this earth, I draw the line in the dust and toss the gauntlet before the feet of tyranny . . . and I say . . . segregation now . . . segregation tomorrow . . . segregation forever. The Washington, D.C. school riot report is disgusting and revealing. We will not sacrifice our children to any such type school system–and you can write that down. The federal troops in Mississippi could be better used guarding the safety of the citizens of Washington, D.C., where it is even unsafe to walk or go to a ballgame–and that is the nation’s capitol. I was safer in a B-29 bomber over Japan during the war in an air raid, than the people of Washington are walking in the White House neighborhood. A closer example is Atlanta, Georgia. The city officials fawn for political reasons over school integration and THEN build barricades to stop residential integration–what hypocrisy! Let us send this message back to Washington by our representatives who are with us today– that from this day we are standing up, and the heel of tyranny does not fit the neck of an upright man . . . that we intend to take the offensive and carry our fight for freedom across the nation, wielding the balance of power we know we possess in the Southland . . . . that WE, not the insipid bloc of voters of some sections . . will determine in the next election who shall sit in the White House of these United States . . . That from this day, from this hour . . . from this minute . . . we give the word of a race of honor that we will tolerate their boot in our face no longer . . . . and let those certain judges put that in their opium pipes of power and smoke it for what it is worth. Hear me, Southerners! You sons and daughters who have moved north and west throughout this nation . . . . we call on you from your native soil to join with us in national support and vote . . and we know . . . wherever you are . . away from the hearths of the Southland . . . that you will respond, for though you may live in the fartherest reaches of this vast country . . . . your heart has never left Dixieland. And you native sons and daughters of old New England’s rock-ribbed patriotism . . . and you sturdy natives of the great Mid-West . . and you descendants of the far West flaming spirit of pioneer freedom . . we invite you to come and be with us . . for you are of the Southern spirit . . and the Southern philosophy . . . you are Southerners too and brothers with us in our fight. What I have said about segregation goes double this day . . . and what I have said to or about some federal judges goes TRIPLE this day… And while the manufacturing industries of free enterprise have been coming to our state in increasing numbers, attracted by our bountiful natural resources, our growing numbers of skilled workers and our favorable conditions, their present rate of settlement here can be increased from the trickle they now represent to a stream of enterprise and endeavor, capital and expansion that can join us in our work of development and enrichment of the educational futures of our children, the opportunities of our citizens and the fulfillment of our talents as God has given them to us. To realize our ambitions and to bring to fruition our dreams, we as Alabamians must take cognizance of the world about us. We must re-define our heritage, re-school our thoughts in the lessons our forefathers knew so well, first hand, in order to function and to grow and to prosper. We can no longer hide our head in the sand and tell ourselves that the ideology of our free fathers is not being attacked and is not being threatened by another idea . . . for it is. We are faced with an idea that if a centralized government assume enough authority, enough power over its people, that it can provide a utopian life . . that if given the power to dictate, to forbid, to require, to demand, to distribute, to edict and to judge what is best and enforce that will produce only “good” . . and it shall be our father . . . . and our God. . . . We find we have replaced faith with fear . . . and though we may give lip service to the Almighty . . in reality, government has become our god. It is, therefore, a basically ungodly government and its appeal to the psuedo-intellectual and the politician is to change their status from servant of the people to master of the people . . . to play at being God . . . without faith in God . . . and without the wisdom of God. It is a system that is the very opposite of Christ for it feeds and encourages everything degenerate and base in our people as it assumes the responsibilities that we ourselves should assume. Its psuedo-liberal spokesmen and some Harvard advocates have never examined the logic of its substitution of what it calls “human rights” for individual rights, for its propaganda play on words has appeal for the unthinking. Its logic is totally material and irresponsible as it runs the full gamut of human desires . . . including the theory that everyone has voting rights without the spiritual responsibility of preserving freedom. Our founding fathers recognized those rights . . . but only within the framework of those spiritual responsibilities. But the strong, simple faith and sane reasoning of our founding fathers has long since been forgotten as the so-called “progressives” tell us that our Constitution was written for “horse and buggy” days . . . so were the Ten Commandments. Not so long ago men stood in marvel and awe at the cities, the buildings, the schools, the autobahns that the government of Hitler’s Germany had built . . . just as centuries before they stood in wonder of Rome’s building . . . but it could not stand . . . for the system that built it had rotted the souls of the builders . . . and in turn . . . rotted the foundation of what God meant that men should be. Today that same system on an international scale is sweeping the world. It is the “changing world” of which we are told . . . it is called “new” and “liberal”. It is as old as the oldest dictator. It is degenerate and decadent. As the national racism of Hitler’s Germany persecuted a national minority to the whim of a national majority . . . so the international racism of the liberals seek to persecute the international white minority to the whim of the international colored majority . . . so that we are footballed about according to the favor of the Afro-Asian bloc. But the Belgian survivors of the Congo cannot present their case to a war crimes commission . . . nor the Portuguese of Angola . . . nor the survivors of Castro . . . nor the citizens of Oxford, Mississippi. It is this theory of international power politic that led a group of men on the Supreme Court for the first time in American history to issue an edict, based not on legal precedent, but upon a volume, the editor of which said our Constitution is outdated and must be changed and the writers of which, some had admittedly belonged to as many as half a hundred communist-front organizations. It is this theory that led this same group of men to briefly bare the ungodly core of that philosophy in forbidding little school children to say a prayer. And we find the evidence of that ungodliness even in the removal of the words “in God we trust” from some of our dollars, which was placed there as like evidence by our founding fathers as the faith upon which this system of government was built. It is the spirit of power thirst that caused a President in Washington to take up Caesar’s pen and with one stroke of it make a law. A Law which the law making body of Congress refused to pass . . . a law that tells us that we can or cannot buy or sell our very homes, except by his conditions . . . and except at HIS descretion. It is the spirit of power thirst that led the same President to launch a full offensive of twenty-five thousand troops against a university . . . of all places . . . in his own country . . . and against his own people, when this nation maintains only six thousand troops in the beleagured city of Berlin. We have witnessed such acts of “might makes right” over the world as men yielded to the temptation to play God . . . but we have never before witnessed it in America. We reject such acts as free men. We do not defy, for there is nothing to defy . . . since as free men we do not recognize any government right to give freedom . . . or deny freedom. No government erected by man has that right. As Thomas Jefferson said, “The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time; no King holds the right of liberty in his hands.” Nor does any ruler in American government…. We intend, quite simply, to practice the free heritage as bequeathed to us as sons of free fathers. We intend to re-vitalize the truly new and progressive form of government that is less that two hundred years old . . . a government first founded in this nation simply and purely on faith . . . that there is a personal God who rewards good and punishes evil . . . that hard work will receive its just deserts . . . that ambition and ingenuity and incentiveness . . . and profit of such . . .are admirable traits and goals . . . that the individual is encouraged in his spiritual growth and from that growth arrives at a character that enhances his charity toward others and from that character and that charity so is influenced business, and labor and farmer and government. We intend to renew our faith as God-fearing men . . . not government-fearing men nor any other kind of fearing-men. We intend to roll up our sleeves and pitch in to develop this full bounty God has given us . . . to live full and useful lives and in absolute freedom from all fear. Then can we enjoy the full richness of the Great American Dream. . . . This nation was never meant to be a unit of one . . . but a united of the many . . . . that is the exact reason our freedom loving forefathers established the states, so as to divide the rights and powers among the states, insuring that no central power could gain master government control. In united effort we were meant to live under this government . . . whether Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, Church of Christ, or whatever one’s denomination or religious belief . . . each respecting the others right to a separate denomination . . . each, by working to develop his own, enriching the total of all our lives through united effort. And so it was meant in our political lives . . . whether Republican, Democrat, Prohibition, or whatever political party . . . each striving from his separate political station . . . respecting the rights of others to be separate and work from within their political framework . . . and each separate political station making its contribution to our lives . . . . And so it was meant in our racial lives . . . each race, within its own framework has the freedom to teach . . to instruct . . to develop . . to ask for and receive deserved help from others of separate racial stations. This is the great freedom of our American founding fathers . . . but if we amalgamate into the one unit as advocated by the communist philosophers . . . then the enrichment of our lives . . . the freedom for our development . . . is gone forever. We become, therefore, a mongrel unit of one under a single all powerful government . . . and we stand for everything . . . and for nothing. The true brotherhood of America, of respecting the separateness of others . . . and uniting in effort . . . has been so twisted and distorted from its original concept that there is a small wonder that communism is winning the world. We invite the negro citizens of Alabama to work with us from his separate racial station . . . as we will work with him . . . to develop, to grow in individual freedom and enrichment. We want jobs and a good future for BOTH races . . . the tubercular and the infirm. This is the basic heritage of my religion, if which I make full practice . . . . for we are all the handiwork of God. But we warn those, of any group, who would follow the false doctrine of communistic amalgamation that we will not surrender our system of government . . . our freedom of race and religion . . . that freedom was won at a hard price and if it requires a hard price to retain it . . . we are able . . . and quite willing to pay it. The liberals’ theory that poverty, discrimination and lack of opportunity is the cause of communism is a false theory . . . if it were true the South would have been the biggest single communist bloc in the western hemisphere long ago . . . for after the great War Between the States, our people faced a desolate land of burned universities, destroyed crops and homes, with manpower depleted and crippled, and even the mule, which was required to work the land, was so scarce that whole communities shared one animal to make the spring plowing. There were no government handouts, no Marshall Plan aid, no coddling to make sure that our people would not suffer; instead the South was set upon by the vulturous carpetbagger and federal troops, all loyal Southerners were denied the vote at the point of bayonet, so that the infamous, illegal 14th Amendment might be passed. There was no money, no food and no hope of either. But our grandfathers bent their knee only in church and bowed their head only to God. . . . We remind all within hearing of this Southland that a Southerner, Peyton Randolph, presided over the Continental Congress in our nation’s beginning . . . that a Southerner, Thomas Jefferson, wrote the Declaration of Independence, that a Southerner, George Washington, is the Father of our country . . . that a Southerner, James Madison, authored our Constitution, that a Southerner, George Mason, authored the Bill of Rights and it was a Southerner who said, “Give me liberty . . . . . . or give me death,” Patrick Henry. Southerners played a most magnificent part in erecting this great divinely inspired system of freedom . . . and as God is our witnesses, Southerners will save it. Let us, as Alabamians, grasp the hand of destiny and walk out of the shadow of fear . . . and fill our divine destination. Let us not simply defend . . . but let us assume the leadership of the fight and carry our leadership across this nation. God has placed us here in this crisis . . . let is not fail in this . . . our most historical moment. My pledge to you . . . to "Stand up for Alabama," is a stronger pledge today than it was the first day I made that pledge. I shall "Stand up for Alabama," as Governor of our State . . . you stand with me . . . and we, together, can give courageous leadership to millions of people throughout this nation who look to the South for their hope in this fight to win and preserve our freedoms and liberties.

Baldwin vs Buckley Debate

January 07, 1948 Mr. President, Mr. Speaker, and Members of the 80th Congress: We are here today to consider the state of the Union. On this occasion, above all others, the Congress and the President should concentrate their attention, not upon party but upon the country; not upon things which divide us but upon those which bind us together--the enduring principles of our American system, and our common aspirations for the future welfare and security of the people of the United States. The United States has become great because we, as a people, have been able to work together for great objectives even while differing about details. The elements of our strength are many. They include our democratic government, our economic system, our great natural resources. But these are only partial explanations. The basic source of our strength is spiritual. For we are a people with a faith. We believe in the dignity of man. We believe that he was created in the image of the Father of us all. We do not believe that men exist merely to strengthen the state or to be cogs in the economic machine. We do believe that governments are created to serve the people and that economic systems exist to minister to their wants. We have a profound devotion to the welfare and rights of the individual as a human being. The faith of our people has particular meaning at this time in history because of the unsettled and changing state of the world. The victims of war in many lands are striving to rebuild their lives, and are seeking assurance that the tragedy of war will not occur again. Throughout the world new ideas are challenging the old. Men of all nations are reexamining the beliefs by which they live. Great scientific and industrial changes have released new forces which will affect the future course of civilization. The state of our Union reflects the changing nature of the modern world. On all sides there is heartening evidence of great energy--of capacity for economic development-and even more important, capacity for spiritual growth. But accompanying this great activity there are equally great questions, great anxieties, and great aspirations. They represent the concern of an enlightened people that conditions should be so arranged as to make life more worthwhile. We must devote ourselves to finding answers to these anxieties and aspirations. We seek answers which will embody the moral and spiritual elements of tolerance, unselfishness, and brotherhood upon which true freedom and opportunity must rest. As we examine the state of our Union today, we can benefit from viewing it on a basis of the accomplishments of the last decade and of our goals for the next. How far have we come during the last 10 years and how far can we go in the next 10? It was 10 years ago that the determination of dictators to wage war upon mankind became apparent. The years that followed brought untold death and destruction. We shared in the human suffering of the war, but we were fortunate enough to escape most of war's destruction. We were able through these 10 years to expand the productive strength of our farms and factories. More important, however, is the fact that these years brought us new courage, new confidence in the ideals of our free democracy. Our deep belief in freedom and justice was reinforced in the crucible of war. On the foundations of our greatly strengthened economy and our renewed confidence in democratic values, we can continue to move forward. There are some who look with fear and distrust upon planning for the future. Yet our great national achievements have been attained by those with vision. Our Union was formed, our frontiers were pushed back, and our great industries were built by men who looked ahead. I propose that we look ahead today toward those goals for the future which have the greatest bearing upon the foundations of our democracy and the happiness of our people. I do so, confident in the thought that with clear objectives and with firm determination, we can, in the next 10 years, build upon the accomplishments of the past decade to achieve a glorious future. Year by year, beginning now, we must make a substantial part of this progress. Our first goal is to secure fully the essential human rights of our citizens. The United States has always had a deep concern for human rights. Religious freedom, free speech, and freedom of thought are cherished realities in our land. Any denial of human rights is a denial of the basic beliefs of democracy and of our regard for the worth of each individual. Today, however, some of our citizens are still denied equal opportunity for education, for jobs and economic advancement, and for the expression of their views at the polls. Most serious of all, some are denied equal protection under laws. Whether discrimination is based on race, or creed, or color, or land of origin, it is utterly contrary to American ideals of democracy. The recent report of the President's Committee on Civil Rights points the way to corrective action by the Federal Government and by State and local governments. Because of the need for effective Federal action, I shall send a special message to the Congress on this important subject. We should also consider our obligation to assure the fullest possible measure of civil rights to the people of our territories and possessions. I believe that the time has come for Alaska and Hawaii to be admitted to the Union as States. Our second goal is to protect and develop our human resources. The safeguarding of the rights of our citizens must be accompanied by an equal regard for their opportunities for development and their protection from economic insecurity. In this Nation the ideals of freedom and equality can be given specific meaning in terms of health, education, social security, and housing. Over the past 12 years we have erected a sound framework of social security legislation. Many millions of our citizens are now protected against the loss of income which can come with unemployment, old age, or the death of wage earners. Yet our system has gaps and inconsistencies; it is only half finished. We should now extend unemployment compensation, old age benefits, and survivors' benefits to millions who are not now protected. We should also raise the level of benefits. The greatest gap in our social security structure is the lack of adequate provision for the Nation's health. We are rightly proud of the high standards of medical care we know how to provide in the United States. The fact is, however, that most of our people cannot afford to pay for the care they need. I have often and strongly urged that this condition demands a national health program. The heart of the program must be a national system of payment for medical care based on well-tried insurance principles. This great Nation cannot afford to allow its citizens to suffer needlessly from the lack of proper medical care. Our ultimate aim must be a comprehensive insurance system to protect all our people equally against insecurity and ill health. Another fundamental aim of our democracy is to provide an adequate education for every person. Our educational systems face a financial crisis. It is deplorable that in a Nation as rich as ours there are millions of children who do not have adequate schoolhouses or enough teachers for a good elementary or secondary education. If there are educational inadequacies in any State, the whole Nation suffers. The Federal Government has a responsibility for providing financial aid to meet this crisis. In addition, we must make possible greater equality of opportunity to all our citizens for education. Only by so doing can we insure that our citizens will be capable of understanding and sharing the responsibilities of democracy. The Government's programs for health, education, and security are of such great importance to our democracy that we should now establish an executive department for their administration. Health and education have their beginning in the home. No matter what our hospitals or schools are like, the youth of our Nation are handicapped when millions of them live in city slums and country shacks. Within the next decade, we must see that every American family has a decent home. As an immediate step we need the long-range housing program which I have recommended on many occasions to this Congress. This should include financial aids designed to yield more housing at lower prices. It should provide public housing for low-income families, and vigorous development of new techniques to lower the cost of building. Until we can overcome the present drastic housing shortage, we must extend and strengthen rent control. We have had, and shall continue to have, a special interest in the welfare of our veterans. Over 14 million men and women who served in the armed forces in World War II have now returned to civilian life. Over 2 million veterans are being helped through school. Millions have been aided while finding jobs, and have been helped in buying homes, in obtaining medical care, and in adjusting themselves to physical handicaps. All but a very few veterans have successfully made the transition from military life to their home communities. The success of our veterans' program is proved by this fact. This Nation is proud of the eagerness shown by our veterans to become self-reliant and self-supporting citizens. Our third goal is to conserve and use our natural resources so that they can contribute most effectively to the welfare of our people. The resources given by nature to this country are rich and extensive. The material foundations of our growth and economic development are the bounty of our fields, the wealth of our mines and forests, and the energy of our waters. As a Nation, we are coming to appreciate more each day the close relationship between the conservation of these resources and the preservation of our national strength. We are doing far less than we know how to do to make use of our resources without destroying them. Both the public and private use of these resources must have the primary objective of maintaining and increasing these basic supports for an expanding future. We must continue to take specific steps toward this goal. We must vigorously defend our natural wealth against those who would misuse it for selfish gain. We need accurate and comprehensive knowledge of our mineral resources and must intensify our efforts to develop new supplies and to acquire stockpiles of scarce materials. We need to protect and restore our land-public and private--through combating erosion and rebuilding the fertility of the soil. We must expand our reclamation program to bring millions of acres of arid land into production, and to improve water supplies for additional millions of acres. This will provide new opportunities for veterans and others, particularly in the West, and aid in providing a rising living standard for a growing population. We must protect and restore our forests by sustained-yield forestry and by planting new trees in areas now slashed and barren. We must continue to erect multiple-purpose dams on our great rivers--not only to reclaim land, but also to prevent floods, to extend our inland waterways and to provide hydroelectric power. This public power must not be monopolized for private gain. Only through well-established policies of transmitting power directly to its market and thus encouraging widespread use at low rates can the Federal Government assure the people of their full share of its benefits. Additional power--public and private--is needed to raise the ceilings now imposed by power shortages on industrial and agricultural development. We should achieve the wise use of resources through the integrated development of our great river basins. We can learn much from our Tennessee Valley experience. We should no longer delay in applying the lessons of that vast undertaking to our other great river basins. Our fourth goal is to lift the standard of living for all our people by strengthening our economic system and sharing more broadly among our people the goods we produce. The amazing economic progress of the past 10 years points the way for the next 10. Today 14 million more people have jobs than in 1938. Our yearly output of goods and services has increased by two-thirds. The average income of our people, measured in dollars of equal purchasing power, has increased--after taxes--by more than 50 percent. In no other 10 years have farmers, businessmen, and wage earners made such great gains. We may not be able to expand as rapidly in the next decade as in the last, because we are now starting from full employment and very high production. But we can increase our annual output by at least one-third above the present level. We can lift our standard of living to nearly double what it was 10 years ago. If we distribute these gains properly, we can go far toward stamping out poverty in our generation. To do this, agriculture, business, and labor must move forward together. Permanent farm prosperity and agricultural abundance will be achieved only as our whole economy grows and prospers. The farmer can sell more food at good prices when the incomes of wage earners are high and when there is full employment. Adequate diets for every American family, and the needs of our industries at full production, will absorb a farm output well above our present levels. Although the average farmer is now better off than ever before, farm families as a whole have only begun to catch up with the standards of living enjoyed in the cities. In 1946, the average income of farm people was $779, contrasted with an average income of $1,288 for nonfarm people. Within the next decade, we should eliminate elements of inequality in these living standards. To this end our farm program should enable the farmer to market his varied crops at fair price levels and to improve his standard of living. We need to continue price supports for major farm commodities on a basis which will afford reasonable protection against fluctuations in the levels of production and demand. The present price support program must be reexamined and modernized. Crop insurance should be strengthened and its benefits extended in order to protect the farmer against the special hazards to which he is subject. We also need to improve the means for getting farm products into markets and into the hands of consumers. Cooperatives which directly or indirectly serve this purpose must be encouraged--not discouraged. The school lunch program should be continued and adequately financed. We need to go forward with the rural electrification program to bring the benefits of electricity to all our farm population. We can, and must, aid and encourage farmers to conserve their soil resources and restore the fertility of the land that has suffered from neglect or unwise use. All these are practical measures upon which we should act immediately to enable agriculture to make its full contribution to our prosperity. We must also strengthen our economic system within the next decade by enlarging our industrial capacity within the framework of our free enterprise system. We are today far short of the industrial capacity we need for a growing future. At least $50 billion should be invested by industry to improve and expand our productive facilities over the next few years. But this is only the beginning. The industrial application of atomic energy and other scientific advances will constantly open up further opportunities for expansion. Farm prosperity and high employment will call for an immensely increased output of goods and services. Growth and vitality in our economy depend on vigorous private enterprise. Free competition is the key to industrial development, full production and employment, fair prices, and an ever improving standard of living. Competition is seriously limited today in many industries by the concentration of economic power and other elements of monopoly. The appropriation of sufficient funds to permit proper enforcement of the present antitrust laws is essential. Beyond that we should go on to strengthen our legislation to protect competition. Another basic element of a strong economic system is the well-being of the wage earners. We have learned that the well-being of workers depends on high production and consequent high employment. We have learned equally well that the welfare of industry and agriculture depends on high incomes for our workers. The Government has wisely chosen to set a floor under wages. But our 40-cent minimum wage is inadequate and obsolete. I recommend the lifting of the minimum wage to 75 cents an hour. In general, however, we must continue to rely on our sound system of collective bargaining to set wage scales. Workers' incomes should increase at a rate consistent with the maintenance of sound price, profit, and wage relationships and with increase of productivity. The Government's part in labor-management relations is now largely controlled by the terms of the Labor-Management Relations Act of 1947. I made my attitude clear on this act in my veto message to the Congress last June. Nothing has occurred since to change my opinion of this law. As long as it remains the law of the land, however, I shall carry out my constitutional duty and administer it. As we look ahead we can understand the crucial importance of restraint and wisdom in arriving at new labor-management contracts. Work stoppages would result in a loss of production--a loss which could bring higher prices for our citizens and could also deny the necessities of life to the hard-pressed peoples of other lands. It is my sincere hope that the representatives of labor and of industry will bear in mind that the Nation as a whole has a vital stake in the success of their bargaining efforts. If we surmount our current economic difficulties, we can move ahead to a great increase in our national income which will enable all our people to enjoy richer and fuller lives. All of us must advance together. One-fifth of our families now have average annual incomes of less than $850. We must see that our gains in national income are made more largely available to those with low incomes, whose need is greatest. This will benefit us all through providing a stable foundation of buying power to maintain prosperity. Business, labor, agriculture, and Government, working together, must develop the policies which will make possible the realization of the full benefits of our economic system. Our fifth goal is to achieve world peace based on principles of freedom and justice and the equality of all nations. Twice within our generation, world wars have taught us that we cannot isolate ourselves from the rest of the world. We have learned that the loss of freedom in any area of the world means a loss of freedom to ourselves--that the loss of independence by any nation adds directly to the insecurity of the United States and all free nations. We have learned that a healthy world economy is essential to world peace--that economic distress is a disease whose evil effects spread far beyond the boundaries of the afflicted nation. For these reasons the United States is vigorously following policies designed to achieve a peaceful and prosperous world. We are giving, and will continue to give, our full support to the United Nations. While that organization has encountered unforeseen and unwelcome difficulties, I am confident of its ultimate success. We are also devoting our efforts toward world economic recovery and the revival of world trade. These actions are closely related and mutually supporting. We believe that the United States can be an effective force for world peace only if it is strong. We look forward to the day when nations will decrease their armaments. Yet so long as there remains serious opposition to the ideals of a peaceful world, we must maintain strong armed forces. The passage of the National Security Act by the Congress at its last session was a notable step in providing for the security of this country. A further step which I consider of even greater importance is the early provision for universal training. There are many elements in a balanced national security program, all interrelated and necessary, but universal training should be the foundation for them all. A favorable decision by the Congress at an early date is of world importance. I am convinced that such action is vital to the security of this Nation and to the maintenance of its leadership. The United States is engaged today in many international activities directed toward the creation of lasting peaceful relationships among nations. We have been giving substantial aid to Greece and Turkey to assist those nations in preserving their integrity against foreign pressures. Had it not been for our aid, their situation today might well be radically different. The continued integrity of those countries will have a powerful effect upon other nations in the Middle East and in Europe struggling to maintain their independence while they repair the damages of war. The United States has special responsibilities with respect to the countries in which we have occupation forces: Germany, Austria, Japan, and Korea. Our efforts to reach agreements on peace settlements for these countries have so far been blocked. But we shall continue to exert our utmost efforts to obtain satisfactory settlements for each of these nations. Many thousands of displaced persons, still living in camps overseas, should be allowed entry into the United States. I again urge the Congress to pass suitable legislation at once so that this Nation may do its share in caring for the homeless and suffering refugees of all faiths. I believe that the admission of these persons will add to the strength and energy of this Nation. We are moving toward our goal of world peace in many ways. But the most important efforts which we are now making are those which support world economic reconstruction. We are seeking to restore the world trading system which was shattered by the war and to remedy the economic paralysis which grips many countries. To restore world trade we have recently taken the lead in bringing about the greatest reduction of world tariffs that the world has ever seen. The extension of the provisions of the Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act, which made this achievement possible, is of extreme importance. We must also go on to support the International Trade Organization, through which we hope to obtain worldwide agreement on a code of fair conduct in international trade. Our present major effort toward economic reconstruction is to support the program for recovery developed by the countries of Europe. In my recent message to the Congress, I outlined the reasons why it is wise and necessary for the United States to extend this support. I want to reaffirm my belief in the soundness and the promise of this proposal. When the European economy is strengthened, the product of its industry will be of benefit to many other areas of economic distress. The ability of free men to overcome hunger and despair will be a moral stimulus to the entire world. We intend to work also with other nations in achieving world economic recovery. We shall continue our cooperation with the nations of the Western Hemisphere. A special program of assistance to China, to provide urgent relief needs and to speed reconstruction, will be submitted to the Congress. Unfortunately, not all governments share the hope of the people of the United States that economic reconstruction in many areas of the world can be achieved through cooperative effort among nations. In spite of these differences we will go forward with our efforts to overcome economic paralysis. No nation by itself can carry these programs to success; they depend upon the cooperative and honest efforts of all participating countries. Yet the leadership is inevitably ours. I consider it of the highest importance that the Congress should authorize support for the European recovery program for the period from April 1, 1948, to June 30, 1952, with an initial amount for the first 15 months of $6.8 billion. I urge the Congress to act promptly on this vital measure of our foreign policy--on this decisive contribution to world peace. We are following a sound, constructive, and practical course in carrying out our determination to achieve peace. We are fighting poverty, hunger, and suffering. This leads to peace--not war. We are building toward a world where all nations, large and small alike, may live free from the fear of aggression. This leads to peace--not war. Above all else, we are striving to achieve a concord among the peoples of the world based upon the dignity of the individual and the brotherhood of man. This leads to peace--not war. We can go forward with confidence that we are following sound policies, both at home and with other nations, which will lead us toward our great goals for economic, social and moral achievement. As we enter the new year, we must surmount one major problem which affects all our goals. That is the problem of inflation. Already inflation in this country is undermining the living standards of millions of families. Food costs too much. Housing has reached fantastic price levels. Schools and hospitals are in financial distress. Inflation threatens to bring on disagreement and strife between labor and management. Worst of all, inflation holds the threat of another depression, just as we had a depression after the unstable boom following the First World War. When I announced last October that the Congress was being called into session, I described the price increases which had taken place since June 1946. Wholesale prices had increased 40 percent; retail prices had increased 23 percent. Since October prices have continued to rise. Wholesale prices have gone up at an annual rate of 18 percent. Retail prices have gone up at an annual rate of 10 percent. The events which have occurred since I presented my 10-point anti-inflation program to the Congress in November have made it even clearer that all 10 points are essential. High prices must not be our means of rationing. We must deal effectively and at once with the high cost of living. We must stop the spiral of inflation. I trust that within the shortest possible time the Congress will make available to the Government the weapons that are so desperately needed in the fight against inflation. One of the most powerful anti-inflationary factors in our economy today is the excess of Government revenues over expenditures. Government expenditures have been and must continue to be held at the lowest safe levels. Since V-J day Federal expenditures have been sharply reduced. They have been cut from more than $63 billion in the fiscal year 1946 to less than $38 billion in the present fiscal year. The number of civilian employees has been cut nearly in half--from 3 3/4 million down to 2 million. On the other hand, Government revenues must not be reduced. Until inflation has been stopped there should be no cut in taxes that is not offset by additions at another point in our tax structure. Certain adjustments should be made within our existing tax structure that will not affect total receipts, yet will adjust the tax burden so that those least able to pay will have their burden lessened by the transfer of a portion of it to those best able to pay. Many of our families today are suffering hardship because of the high cost of living. At the same time profits of corporations have reached an all-time record in 1947. Corporate profits total $17 billion after taxes. This compared with $12.5 billion in 1946, the previous high year. Because of this extraordinarily high level of profits, corporations can well afford to carry a larger share of the taxload at this time. During this period in which the high cost of living is bearing down on so many of our families, tax adjustments should be made to ease their burden. The low-income group particularly is being pressed very hard. To this group a tax adjustment would result in a saving that could be used to buy the necessities of life. I recommend therefore that, effective January 1, 1948, a cost of living tax credit be extended to our people consisting of a credit of $40 to each individual taxpayer and an additional credit of $40 for each dependent. Thus the income tax of a man with a wife and two children would be reduced $160. The credit would be extended to all taxpayers, but it would be particularly helpful to those in the low-income group. It is estimated that such a tax credit would reduce Federal revenue by $3.2 billion. This reduction should be made up by increasing the tax on corporate profits in an amount that will produce this sum--with appropriate adjustments for small corporations. This is the proper method of tax relief at this time. It gives relief to those who need it most without cutting the total tax revenue of the Government. When the present danger of inflation has passed we should consider tax reduction based upon a revision of our entire tax structure. When we have conquered inflation, we shall be in a position to move forward toward our chosen goals. As we do so, let us keep ever before us our high purposes. We are determined that every citizen of this Nation shall have an equal right and an equal opportunity to grow in wisdom and in stature and to take his place in the control of his Nation's destiny. We are determined that the productive resources of this Nation shall be used wisely and fully for the benefit of all. We are determined that the democratic faith of our people and the strength of our resources shall contribute their full share to the attainment of enduring peace in the world. It is our faith in human dignity that underlies these purposes. It is this faith that keeps us a strong and vital people. This is a time to remind ourselves of these fundamentals. For today the whole world looks to us for leadership. This is the hour to rededicate ourselves to the faith in mankind that makes us strong. This is the hour to rededicate ourselves to the faith in God that gives us confidence as we face the challenge of the years ahead. Source: https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/annual-message-the-congress-the-state-the-union-14

May 11, 1960   THE PRESIDENT [reading]. I have made some notes from which I want to talk to you about this U-2 incident. A full statement about this matter has been made by the State Department, and there have been several statesmanlike remarks by leaders of both parties. For my part, I supplement what the Secretary of State has had to say, with the following four main points. After that I shall have nothing further to say--for the simple reason I can think of nothing to add that might be useful at this time. The first point is this: the need for intelligence-gathering activities. No one wants another Pearl Harbor. This means that we must have knowledge of military forces and preparations around the world, especially those capable of massive surprise attacks. Secrecy in the Soviet Union makes this essential. In most of the world no large-scale attack could be prepared in secret, but in the Soviet Union there is a fetish of secrecy and concealment. This is a major cause of international tension and uneasiness today. Our deterrent must never be placed in jeopardy. The safety of the whole free world demands this. As the Secretary of State pointed out in his recent statement, ever since the beginning of my administration I have issued directives to gather, in every feasible way, the information required to protect the United States and the free world against surprise attack and to enable them to make effective preparations for defense. My second point: the nature of intelligence-gathering activities. These have a special and secret character. They are, so to speak, "below the surface" activities. They are secret because they must circumvent measures designed by other countries to protect secrecy of military preparations. They are divorced from the regular visible agencies of government which stay clear of operational involvement in specific detailed activities. These elements operate under broad directives to seek and gather intelligence short of the use of force--with operations supervised by responsible officials within this area of secret activities. We do not use our Army, Navy, or Air Force for this purpose, first, to avoid any possibility of the use of force in connection with these activities, and second, because our military forces, for obvious reasons, cannot be given latitude under broad directives but must be kept under strict control in every detail. These activities have their own rules and methods of concealment which seek to mislead and obscure--just as in the Soviet allegations there are many discrepancies. For example, there is some reason to believe that the plane in question was not shot down at high altitude. The normal agencies of our Government are unaware of these specific activities or of the special efforts to conceal them. Third point: how should we view all of this activity? It is a distasteful but vital necessity. We prefer and work for a different kind of world--and a different way of obtaining the information essential to confidence and effective deterrents. Open societies, in the day of present weapons, are the only answer. This was the reason for my "open skies" proposal in 1955, which I was ready instantly to put into effect--to permit aerial observation over the United States and the Soviet Union which would assure that no surprise attack was being prepared against anyone. I shall bring up the "open skies" proposal again at Paris--since it is a means of ending concealment and suspicion. My final point is that we must not be distracted from the real issues of the day by what is an incident or a symptom of the world situation today. This incident has been given great propaganda exploitation. The emphasis given to a flight of an unarmed nonmilitary plane can only reflect a fetish of secrecy. The real issues are the ones we will be working on at the summit-disarmament, search for solutions affecting Germany and Berlin, and the whole range of East-West relations, including the reduction of secrecy and suspicion. Frankly, I am hopeful that we may make progress on these great issues. This is what we mean when we speak of "working for peace." And as I remind you, I will have nothing further to say about this matter. [Ends reading] Q. Robert J. Donovan, New York Herald Tribune: Mr. President, since our last visit, or conference, Prime Minister Khrushchev has made some pretty vigorous statements about your plans for bringing Mr. Nixon to the summit in case you had to come home. Do his comments in any way change your intentions? THE PRESIDENT. No, indeed. And, I should clarify something. There seems to be some misunderstanding, because a friend from Congress, a friend indeed of the other party, told me the other day that he had never heard of the latter part of my press conference on this point where I said that if my absence from the conference had to. be more than 2 or 3 days, I would be right back there. And I believe I remarked, although I am not sure, that the jet plane made this kind of a trip possible. Now, as far as Mr. Khrushchev's statement, I can just say this: he has never asked me my opinion of some of his people. [Laughter] Q. Charles H. Mohr, Time Magazine: In case, Mr. President, that the Soviet Union should reject your proposal for a surprise attack conference, or an "open skies" arrangement, do you think that the development of satellites like Samos and Midas will possibly in the next few years erase our worries on the score of surveillance; and also are you doing anything now to speed up those scientific projects? THE PRESIDENT. I keep in touch with my Scientific Advisory Committee and operators, and I know of nothing we could do to speed these up. They are research items and as such no one can predict exactly what would be their degree of efficiency. So I couldn't make a real prediction of how useful they are going to be. Q. Mr. Mohr: Sir, do you think that their development will ease our worries on the question of secrecy? THE PRESIDENT. Well, I say, I just can't predict what the final results will be. Now, we do know this, right now. I believe it's Tiros that is sending back constantly pictures on the cloud cover all around the earth. That is admittedly a rather rough example of what might be done in photography, but that is being done constantly; and I don't know how many thousands of photographs have been taken. And they send them back on command. Q. Laurence H. Burd, Chicago Tribune: Mr. President, last week you used the word "if" in connection with your trip to Russia. Have you changed any plans about that, or think you might? THE PRESIDENT. NO, not at all. I have no idea, but you can never tell from one day to the other what is happening in this world, it seems, so I just said "if." I put it in the positive sense, I think. I expect to go; put it that way. Q. Felix Belair, New York Times: I know, Mr. President, you don't ordinarily tip your hand on disposition of pending legislation before you, but since the legislative leaders more than a week ago said you were very much opposed to the emergency housing bill, may I ask if you have had any change of view about it? THE PRESIDENT. Well, what it says right now, I don't know; but I have said this: I am very definitely opposed of taking another billion dollars of Federal money and making use of it, making it available for direct loans when we don't need it. And I think it's a very bad way to stimulate housing. As a matter of fact, while I think there has been some little slowup in the housing field, there is indication it's coming up--back to the level of 1.2, something of that kind. I see no reason for constantly getting excited about this one. By the way, I've got another paper. [Laughter] Q. (Questioner unidentified): How many more? THE PRESIDENT. This is something that is good news in this whole economic field, and that is what you are talking about. I understand the employment rose 1.9 million between mid-March and mid-April, and has reached a total of 66.2 million. This is the biggest April increase by far in the postwar period. There was also a sharp drop in the number of unemployed persons, a decline of more than one-half million. It has been reported by the Commerce Department that retail sales in April were more than 3 percent above March, and 5 percent above last April. Finally, figures from the Department of Commerce today show that in the first quarter of this year, gross national product reached 500.2 billion. This means that, in effect, the United States is producing goods and services at a rate of a half-trillion dollars for the first time in our history. The achievement of these high levels of employment and production, at the same time that prices have been reasonably stable--the consumer price index has varied only one-quarter of one percent in the last 6 months--is proof of the great strength of our free enterprise system and its promise for the future. And if we continue to act responsibly, I think it will keep going. Q. Edward T. Foillard, Washington Post: Mr. President, do you think the outlook for the summit conference has changed, or has been changed, in the last week or so? THE PRESIDENT. Not decisively at all, no. Q. Mrs. May Craig, Portland (Maine) Press Herald: Mr. President, when you came into office you obtained a truce in Korea. Do you think a treaty now, an effort to get a treaty now would be useful, and will you discuss that with Mr. Rhee and the acting officials of Korea when you visit there? THE PRESIDENT. Well, Mrs. Craig, I have no reason to believe that it would now be easy to achieve a treaty. Now, as far as my trip to Korea is concerned, it is to be an official one. Assuming the permission of the people now in charge of Korea, and a proper opportunity, I should be glad to see Mr. Rhee who, as I have told you people, I have admired and respected over the years. Q. Andrew F. Tully, Jr., Scripps-Howard Newspapers: Sir, I know this borders on your rule not to discuss personalities, but Mr. Truman has written an article in a magazine in which he says certain things about you, and I wonder if you would like to speak out in your own behalf for the record. THE PRESIDENT. I just haven't time. Q. Sarah McClendon, El Paso Times: Sir, now that you have been to Fort Benning and you have seen the wonderful display of modern Army weapons, I wonder if you don't realize that we need a stepping up of production of some of these weapons. THE PRESIDENT. Well, I'd say this: of course, your question implies that you know very much more about the military than I do and it's probably true. [Laughter] I can just say this: I do just as good as what the commonsense the Good Lord gave me and my own judgment and experience allow me to do. Q. Pat Munroe, Chicago American: Mr. President, when an unfriendly cartoon or column appears in the press, that is unfriendly to you, we often hear people say, "I'll bet they won't let the President see that one." Now, what are your regular habits, sir, for keeping up with what we are saying about you? THE PRESIDENT. Well, I don't know whether you can call it a habit, for the simple reason that it takes a lot of time if I was going to keep track of what all you people say. I take what I call the important sections of the Sunday papers that review world events, go over the things, and those are the things I study carefully. The kind of things that you tall of, cartoons and unfriendly quips, I just can't be bothered. Q. Ruth S. Montgomery, Hearst Headline Service: Mr. President, to go back a minute, I am very puzzled about this statement by your predecessor. As I recall, you not only participated in the inaugural parade, but you also attended the inaugural ball that night, did you not, in '49? THE PRESIDENT. I don't think I went to the ball. I had an invitation from Mr. Royall, then Secretary of the Army. He was very anxious, and he said the administration approved of his request, that I, as a five-star general, ride with him because I believe the Secretary of the Navy was going to have, oh, Admiral Nimitz or somebody, and he felt that he had to have one of these five-star generals which I still was then. So, I went along. Now, I think I went right back to Columbia that day. Q. Miss Montgomery: I attended a party where you were that evening at George Allen's, and you and Mrs. Eisenhower went in and changed into evening attire and left for the ball. THE PRESIDENT. Well, then, your memory is better than mine. [Laughter] Can I just say one thing: I have never advanced the theory that my memory is perfect, like a good many others. Q. Merriman Smith, United Press International: Quite aside from your comment about the U-2 plane episode, sir, I wonder if you could give us your reaction to a rather denunciatory speech made this morning, right ahead of the summit meeting, by the Russian Foreign Minister. Mr. Gromyko attributes to this country deeds and efforts which he said amount to dangerous ways of balancing on the brink of war. He says that the United States has deliberately engaged in provocative acts in conjunction with some of our allies. Now, with statements like this, do you still maintain a hopeful attitude toward the summit? THE PRESIDENT. I'd say yes. I have some hope, because these things have been said for many years, ever since World War II, and there is no real change in this matter. I wonder how many of you people have read the full text of the record of the trial of Mr. Abel. Well, I think he was sentenced to 30 years. Now, this business of saying that you're doing things that are provocative, why, they had better look at their own record. And I'll tell you this: the United States--and none of its allies that I know of--has engaged in nothing that would be considered honestly as provocative. We are looking to our own security and our defense and we have no idea of promoting any kind of conflict or war. This is just-it's absolutely ridiculous and they know it is. Q. Henry N. Taylor, Scripps-Howard Newspapers: Sir, would it be trespassing on your request about the U-2 to ask if you could tell us something about any possible Soviet reconnaissance flights over the western part of the world, and our response to them, if any? THE PRESIDENT. I could just say this: as far as I know, there has never been any over the United States. Q. Holmes Alexander, McNaught Syndicate: Sir, this is a question about Quemoy and Matsu; two of the Democratic candidates have said that if elected they would try to get rid of that responsibility. I know you don't deal in personalities, but I wonder if you could tell us as a military man to what extent these islands help us control the air and sea over the Formosa Strait. THE PRESIDENT. Well, I am not talking personalities because I don't know who said this. I will say this: if you go back to the Formosa doctrine, you will find that the responsibility is placed upon the President to determine, in the event of any attack upon Quemoy and Matsu, whether this is in fact a preliminary to or part of an attack against the Pescadores and Taiwan. If that is true, then he must participate because then it will be the defense of Formosa, one of our allies. Now, as to the actual value of Matsu and Quemoy, of course we must remember how much this seems to mean to the morale of all the Chinese forces on Formosa. From their viewpoint, any desertion of those islands means a complete surrender--abject surrender. So, it is a factor that anyone who is going to have to make possible decisions in the future has to take into consideration when he talks about the abandonment of these sets of islands. And frankly, no President of the United States can do it by himself. Now, he can withhold support to Taiwan, but are you going to destroy Taiwan? So, none of these problems is ever a simple, black and white thing. You have got a very great number of conflicting considerations and they take study and heart searching, and you hope and pray that you are right most of the time. Q. Chalmers M. Roberts, Washington Post: Last week, sir, you announced that the U.S. would resume underground nuclear testing for purposes of protecting the detection and control system. There seems, however, to be some dispute as to whether this would be joint or coordinated, that is, this testing in conjunction with the Soviet Union. Could you tell us what the argument there is, and what your own view is? THE PRESIDENT. Well, I'll tell you, Mr. Roberts, having heard of this misunderstanding, I had a discussion with Dr. Kistiakowsky only this morning. These things are not nuclear weapons testing. They are for one simple--and as a matter of fact in many cases I don't think will involve any nuclear explosions except under the coordinated directions of a body made up of the U.K., U.S.S.R., and ourselves. That's the way I understood the agreement, and I believe that you will find that they are not expected to have anything to do either with weapons development or the Plowshare Project, anything else except just finding out how good this testing of the weapons below 4.75 is. On May 7 a White House release stated that the President had that day announced approval of a major expansion of research and development directed toward an improved capability to detect and identify underground nuclear explosions. The release added that the program, to be known as Project VELA, had grown out of the recommendations of the Panel on Seismic Improvement ("Berkner Panel"), and that it provided that "such nuclear explosions as are essential to a full understanding of both the capabilities of the presently proposed detection system and the potential for improvements in this system would be carried out under fully contained conditions and would produce no radioactive fallout." The release further stated that Soviet negotiators at Geneva had concurred with the proposal that underground nuclear explosions should be conducted to improve the capability of the proposed control network; that they had also indicated a willingness to discuss research and development in the seismic detection area with the U.S. and the U.K.; and that agreement had been reached to convene a group of U.S.S.R., U.K., and U.S. scientists at Geneva on May 11 to exchange information on the seismic research activities of the three nations as a basis for future determination of the areas in which coordinated or joint research would be most fruitful. Q. Mr. Roberts: Well, sir, is it your understanding that we would show everything involved, mechanism and so on, to the Soviets under this program? THE PRESIDENT. Well, now, Mr. Roberts, there are some details I just can't get down to. You know that. But, I would think that everything that they found it necessary to see in order to determine whether this thing is effective, they would see and should see. Now, I think that to get a little further on the thing you might get that statement of Dr. Kistiakowsky's and show it to him--[confers with Mr. Hagerty] Mr. Hagerty just reminds me of what Dr. Kistiakowsky told me, another point. Our people are leaving tomorrow, they will meet there together-the U.S.S.R. and the U.K. and the U.S.--in determining exactly how we will do this. Q. Charles W. Roberts, Newsweek: Sir, in connection with the Abel trial which you mentioned, the Soviet Government in that case made no effort to defend Colonel Abel. I wonder if an American citizen were arrested by a foreign government and brought to trial as a spy, what the policy of this Government would be so far as his defense was concerned. THE PRESIDENT. We would certainly offer the good offices of our Embassy, and see whether there was anything we could do. Of course it would be an internal matter there, and we would have to do it with the permission of the other country. I think that if there is anything wrong diplomatically with my answer, you had better ask the State Department, but I think that would be the result. Q. Robert C. Pierpoint, CBS News: Mr. President, many people seem to feel that the result of yesterday's elections in West Virginia once and for all buries the religious issue in politics in America. Do you agree with that premise, sir, and how do you feel about it? THE PRESIDENT. Well, I don't know whether I agree completely with the conclusion or not. Certainly I have made as strong a statement as I can, deploring the insertion of the religious issue in elections. As a matter of fact, I think it is very, very bad for this country. But as to what this election means, the only thing it means to me is--as a response to one question I said that I normally read only the Sunday papers, but I have read what the newspapers said were going to happen. Now, this morning, I am a bit astonished. [Laughter] Q. Marvin L. Arrowsmith, Associated Press: Mr. President, you have said many times that you wouldn't go to the summit under any threats or ultimatums. Yesterday, as you know, the Soviets in their note threatened retaliation against us if we continued to fly these planes over their territory. Do you regard that kind of threat as within the category you were speaking of? THE PRESIDENT. No. I think that you have to set that aside in a special category. I don't believe it's the kind of thing that you call an ultimatum at all. Q. Edward P. Morgan, American Broadcasting Company: A point of clarification, Mr. President. Do we infer correctly that your prepared statement this morning is the final, complete, and ultimate answer to your critics, friendly and hostile, on the subject? THE PRESIDENT. I said that at this time I could see nothing more useful that I could say, so that's where I stand at this moment. Q. Thomas N. Schroth, Congressional Quarterly: You said last summer, sir, that you planned to put before Congress at its final session a plan to reorganize the highest echelons of Government in order to relieve the burdens on some of the high officials. Can you give us any of the details of your plans and whether you expect to send them to Congress? THE PRESIDENT. I've had to change my plan a little bit, because I became convinced that anything you did this year of extraordinary nature would probably be made political in some form or another. So I decided that regardless of who was elected to my present office, when I go up in January, as I must go under the Constitution--I must go make a statement--I'm going to put in then the plans that I have adverted to in these conferences before. In general, it is to get closer, tighter day-by-day coordination in everything that touches upon the foreign field through one proper part of the plan; and the other, get all our business affairs, our types of procurement and making of contracts and all that, get that more tightly coordinated day in and day out. The first one, I think, is tremendously important, because almost every department now has really heavy responsibilities in the foreign field. I think more and more we have to have not merely day-by-day meetings with the department heads concerned; it has to be closer, more tightly done than that. Q. John Scali, Associated Press: Mr. President, you said in your initial statement that the Soviet account of the downing of this plane contained many discrepancies, and that there was reason to doubt that the plane was downed at a high altitude, as Mr. Khrushchev claims. Can you tell us, sir, whether the administration at some future time intends to expose these discrepancies, and can you at this time without violating what you have said, give us any more details about how we believe this plane actually came down in the Soviet Union? THE PRESIDENT. You raise a question that is really an auxiliary to the main issue, and so I don't mind saying this: take the pictures themselves, we know that they were not, or we believe we know that they are not pictures of the plane that was downed, and there are other things in their statements. Now, I don't know what's going to happen in the future, but these things you can be sure will be carefully looked into. Again I say I do not foreclose any kind of statement that in the future may be necessary; I am saying that now I can see nothing more useful to say. Q. John Herling, National Newspaper Syndicate: Mr. President, in reference to the drop in unemployment to which you referred, the hard core unemployment continues in many depressed areas, including West Virginia. Now, in view of that, sir, is Senator Dirksen correct in predicting that you plan to veto the depressed areas bill? THE PRESIDENT. Well, if I don't approve of the particular depressed area bill, what do you expect me to do? As a matter of fact, as I have so far been reading this bill, the amounts there to be put under this greatly inflated bill of $251 million, or something like that, the amounts that are going into the areas like West Virginia, Southern Illinois, Pennsylvania, and Eastern Kentucky are less than they would be under ours. It's a shotgun--it's getting to be a pork barrel bill, as I see it. So I say I am not predicting anything; I am just saying this: I'll do what my judgment tells me to. Q. Frank van der Linden, Nashville Banner: Sir, recently you proposed that the several southern cities having the problems of sit-in demonstrations should have biracial committees to meet and try to solve them. Yesterday six of the stores in downtown Nashville admitted Negroes to the lunch counters. I wondered, sir, if you felt that was a solution to the problem, do you think that would be a pattern for the other cities to follow? THE PRESIDENT. Let me say this: let us assume that I had the wisdom of a Solomon. I am still a good many hundred miles away from any of these cities, and any solutions to these problems must take into account local considerations and feelings and beliefs. We here can talk and believe in the ideals that have been set up for us by the Constitution, and certainly we have a responsibility in helping to enforce or seeing that the constitutional rights guaranteed are not violated. Now, when it comes to sit-ins, I am just not enough of a lawyer to say just exactly what they do mean--what they mean in the constitutional or legal terms. We, you and I, can talk about it in social terms and you might say on a moral standard, but this is something else. I would say for that question, you ought to go to the Attorney General. I am just not that much of a lawyer. Q. Raymond P. Brandt, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: In view of your emphasis on you might go back to the summit, if you had to come back here, have you any idea how long the Paris meeting will go on--how long do you think it will take you to. get to some agreement? THE PRESIDENT. Well, I don't know. But I just want to point this out: I hear that some--I don't know whether this is all of the others or not--do not like the simultaneous translations. Now, let us assume you have called an hour's conference, and one of you, for example, wants to make a, let's say, a 10-minute exposition. When you take seriatum translations, here is already a half hour of an hour's conference gone, and you have had only 10 minutes. Now, these are very slow and laborious things, and consequently the possibility of prophesying how long this thing is going to be is really remote. Now, for my part, I am perfectly ready to work as many hours as an individual human can to get this thing along the line. I am prepared to go to this thing as long as there is any usefulness whatsoever promised, and even if I am called back--I know I have one date for 24 hours--I am still ready and prepared to go back. That is what I have been trying to insist, that I am not making my own convenience and my own duties here the decisive thing as to how long this conference will last. Q. Lillian Levy, National Jewish Post and Opinion: Mr. President, are any changes in the present borders of West Germany part of the German question to be discussed at the summit? I ask this, sir, because this issue has been raised by a responsible West German leader and member of Adenauer's Cabinet who recently suggested that Germans be allowed to return to Sudetenland. THE PRESIDENT. I didn't get the very first clause of your question. Q. Mrs. Levy: Well, what I asked--were boundaries going to be part of the German question to be raised? THE PRESIDENT. Well, at this time we wouldn't raise it. As a matter of fact, they've been living with these boundaries for a long time, and I would see at this moment no possibility of changing them except in methods that would be unacceptable. So, it might be raised by someone but I have no plan to do it. Marvin L. Arrowsmith, Associated Press: Thank you, Mr. President. Source: https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/the-presidents-news-conference-231

INSTRUMENT OF SURRENDER We, acting by command of and in behalf of the Emperor of Japan, the Japanese Government and the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters, hereby accept the provisions set forth in the declaration issued by the heads of the Governments of the United States, China, and Great Britain on 26 July 1945 at Potsdam, and subsequently adhered to by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, which four powers are hereafter referred to as the Allied Powers. We hereby proclaim the unconditional surrender to the Allied Powers of the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters and of all Japanese armed forces and all armed forces under the Japanese control wherever situated. We hereby command all Japanese forces wherever situated and the Japanese people to cease hostilities forthwith, to preserve and save from damage all ships, aircraft, and military and civil property and to comply with all requirements which my be imposed by the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers or by agencies of the Japanese Government at his direction. We hereby command the Japanese Imperial Headquarters to issue at once orders to the Commanders of all Japanese forces and all forces under Japanese control wherever situated to surrender unconditionally themselves and all forces under their control. We hereby command all civil, military and naval officials to obey and enforce all proclamations, and orders and directives deemed by the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers to be proper to effectuate this surrender and issued by him or under his authority and we direct all such officials to remain at their posts and to continue to perform their non-combatant duties unless specifically relieved by him or under his authority. We hereby undertake for the Emperor, the Japanese Government and their successors to carry out the provisions of the Potsdam Declaration in good faith, and to issue whatever orders and take whatever actions may be required by the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers or by any other designated representative of the Allied Powers for the purpose of giving effect to that Declaration. We hereby command the Japanese Imperial Government and the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters at once to liberate all allied prisoners of war and civilian internees now under Japanese control and to provide for their protection, care, maintenance and immediate transportation to places as directed. The authority of the Emperor and the Japanese Government to rule the state shall be subject to the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers who will take such steps as he deems proper to effectuate these terms of surrender. Signed at TOKYO BAY, JAPAN at 09:04 I on the SECOND day of SEPTEMBER, 1945 MAMORU SHIGMITSU By Command and in behalf of the Emperor of Japan and the Japanese Government YOSHIJIRO UMEZU By Command and in behalf of the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters Accepted at TOKYO BAY, JAPAN at 0903 I on the SECOND day of SEPTEMBER, 1945, for the United States, Republic of China, United Kingdom and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and in the interests of the other United Nations at war with Japan. DOUGLAS MAC ARTHUR Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers C.W. NIMITZ United States Representative HSU YUNG-CH'ANG Republic of China Representative BRUCE FRASER United Kingdom Representative KUZMA DEREVYANKO Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Representative THOMAS BLAMEY Commonwealth of Australia Representative L. MOORE COSGRAVE Dominion of Canada Representative JACQUES LE CLERC Provisional Government of the French Republic Representative C.E.L. HELFRICH Kingdom of the Netherlands Representative LEONARD M. ISITT Dominion of New Zealand Representative Source: https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/surrender-of-japan

Bush's Address on the L.A. Riots

War Department Office of the Chief of Staff Washington ??, D.C. 25 July 1945 To: General Carl Spaats Commanding General United States Army Strategic Air Forces 1. The 509 Composite Group, 20th Air Force will deliver its first special bomb as soon as weather will permit visual bombing after about 3 August 1945 on one of the targets: Hiroshima, Kokura, Nilgata and Nagasaki. To carry military and civilian scientific personnel from the War Department to observe and record the effects of the explosion of the bomb, additional aircraft will accompany the airplane carrying the bomb. The observing planes will stay several miles distant from the point of impact of the bomb. 2. Additional bombs will be delivered on the above targets as soon as made ready by the project staff. Further instructions will be issued concerning targets other than those listed above. 3. Dissemination of any and all information concerning the use of the weapon against Japan is reserved to the Secretary of War and the President of the United States. No communiqués on the subject or releases of information will be issued by commanders in the field without specific prior authority. Any news stories will be sent to the War Department for special clearance. 4. The forgoing directive is issued to you by direction and with the approval of the Secretary of War and of the Chief of Staff, USA. It is desired that you personally deliver one copy of this directive to General MacArthur and one copy to Admiral Nimitz for their information. Thos. T. Handy [signed] General, G.S.C. Acting Chief of Staff Source: https://www.osti.gov/opennet/manhattan-project-history/Resources/order_drop.htm

Bush's Bullhorn Speech at Ground Zero of 9/11

Buttonwood Agreement We the Subscribers, Brokers for the Purchase and Sale of the Public Stock, do hereby solemnly promise and pledge ourselves to each other, that we will not buy or sell from this day for any person whatsoever, any kind of Public Stock, at a less rate than one quarter percent Commission on the Specie value and that we will give preference to each other in our Negotiations. In Testimony whereof we have set our hands this 17th day of May at New York, 1792. Peter Anspach … 3 Great Dock Street Armstrong & Barnewall … 58 Broad Street Andrew D. Barclay … 136 Pearl Street Samuel Beebe … 21 Nassau Street G. N. Bleecker … 21 Broad Street Leonard Bleecker … 16 Wall Street John Bush … 195 Water Street John Ferrers … 205 Water Street Isaac M. Gomez … 32 Maiden Lane Travis Handak … 55 Broad Street John A. Hardenbrook … 24 Nassau Street Ephraim Hart … 74 Broadway John Henry … 13 Duke Street Augustine H. Lawrence … 132 Water Street Samuel March … 243 Queen Street Charles McEvers Jr. … 194 Water Street Julian McEvers … 140 Greenwich Street David Reedy … 58 Wall Street Robinson & Hartshorne … 198 Queen Street Benjamin Seixas … 8 Hanover Square Hugh Smith … Tontine Coffee House Sutton & Hardy … 20 Wall Street Benjamin Winthrop … 2 Great Dock Street Alexander Zuntz … 97 Broad Street Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buttonwood_Agreement#Document_agreement

The Militia Act of May 2, 1792 Section 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That whenever the United States shall be invaded, or be in imminent danger of invasion from any foreign nation or Indian tribe, it shall be lawful for the President of the United States, to call forth such number of the militia of the state or states most convenient to the place of danger or scene of action as he may judge necessary to repel such invasion, and to issue his orders for that purpose, to such officer or officers of the militia as he shall think proper; and in case of an insurrection in any state, against the government thereof, it shall be lawful for the President of the United States, on application of the legislature of such state, or of the executive (when the legislature cannot be convened) to call forth such number of the militia of any other state or states, as may be applied for, or as he may judge sufficient to suppress such insurrection. Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That whenever the laws of the United States shall be opposed or the execution thereof obstructed, in any state, by combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings, or by the powers vested in the marshals by this act, the same being notified to the President of the United States, by an associate justice or the district judge, it shall be lawful for the President of the United States to call forth the militia of such state to suppress such combinations, and to cause the laws to be duly executed. And if the militia of a state, where such combinations may happen, shall refuse, or be insufficient to suppress the same, it shall be lawful for the President, if the legislature of the United States be not in session, to call forth and employ such numbers of the militia of any other state or states most convenient thereto, as may be necessary, and the use of militia, so to be called forth, may be continued, if necessary, until the expiration of thirty days after the commencement of the ensuing session. Sec. 3. Provided always, and be it further enacted, That whenever it may be necessary, in the judgment of the President, to use the military force hereby directed to be called forth, the President shall forthwith, and previous thereto, by proclamation, command such insurgents to disperse, and retire peaceably to their respective abodes, within a limited time. Sec. 4. And be it further enacted, That the militia employed in the service of the United States, shall receive the same pay and allowances, as the troops of the United States, who may be in service at the same time, or who were last in service, and shall be subject to the same rules and articles of war: And that no officer, non-commissioned officer or private of the militia shall be compelled to serve more than three months in any one year, nor more than in due rotation with every other able-bodied man of the same rank in the battalion to which be belongs. Sec. 5. And be it further enacted, That every officer, non-commissioned officer or private of the militia, who shall fail to obey the orders of the President of the United States in any of the cases before recited, shall forfeit a sum not exceeding one year's pay, and not less than one month's pay, to be determined and adjudged by a court martial; and such officers shall, moreover, be liable to be cashiered by sentence of a court martial: and such non-commissioned officers and privates shall be liable to be imprisoned by the like sentence, or failure of payment of the fines adjudged against them, for the space of one calendar month for every five dollars of such fine. Sec. 6. And be it further enacted, That court martial for the trial of militia be composed of militia officers only. Sec. 7. And be it further enacted, That all fines to be assessed, as aforesaid, shall be certified by the presiding officer of the court martial before whom the same shall be assessed, to the marshal of the district, in which the delinquent shall reside, or to one of his deputies; and also the supervisor of the revenue of the same district, who shall record the said certificate in a book to be kept for that purpose. The said marshal or his deputy shall forthwith proceed to levy the said fines with costs, by distress and sale of the goods and chattels of the delinquent, which costs and manner of proceeding, with respect to the sale of the goods distrained, shall be agreeable to the laws of the state, in which the same shall be, in other cases of distress; and where any non-commissioned officer or private shall be adjudged to suffer imprisonment, there being no goods or chattels to be found, whereof to levy the said fines, the marshal of the district or his deputy may commit such delinquent to gaol, during the term, for which he shall be so adjudged to imprisonment, or until the fine shall be paid, in the same manner as other persons condemned to fine and imprisonment at the suit of the United States, may be committed. Sec. 8. And be it further enacted, That the marshals and their deputies shall pay all such fines by them levied to the supervisor of the revenue, in the district in which they are collected, within two months after they shall have received the same, deducting there from five per centum, as a compensation for their trouble; and in case of failure, the same shall be recoverable by action of debt or information in any court of the United States, of the district, in which such fines shall be levied, having cognizance therefor, to be sued for, prosecuted and recovered, in the name of the supervisor of the district, with interest and costs. Sec. 9. And be it further enacted, That the marshals of the several districts and deputies, shall have the same powers in executing the laws of the United States, as sheriffs, and their deputies in the several states have by law, in executing the laws of their respective states. Sec. 10. And be it further enacted, That this act shall continue and be in force, for and during the term of two years, and from thence to the end of the next session of Congress thereafter, and no longer. APPROVED, May 2, 1792. The Militia Act of 1792, Passed May 8, 1792, providing federal standards for the organization of the Militia. An ACT more effectually to provide for the National Defence, by establishing an Uniform Militia throughout the United States. I. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, That each and every free able-bodied white male citizen of the respective States, resident therein, who is or shall be of age of eighteen years, and under the age of forty-five years (except as is herein after excepted) shall severally and respectively be enrolled in the militia, by the Captain or Commanding Officer of the company, within whose bounds such citizen shall reside, and that within twelve months after the passing of this Act. And it shall at all time hereafter be the duty of every such Captain or Commanding Officer of a company, to enroll every such citizen as aforesaid, and also those who shall, from time to time, arrive at the age of 18 years, or being at the age of 18 years, and under the age of 45 years (except as before excepted) shall come to reside within his bounds; and shall without delay notify such citizen of the said enrollment, by the proper non-commissioned Officer of the company, by whom such notice may be proved. That every citizen, so enrolled and notified, shall, within six months thereafter, provide himself with a good musket or firelock, a sufficient bayonet and belt, two spare flints, and a knapsack, a pouch, with a box therein, to contain not less than twenty four cartridges, suited to the bore of his musket or firelock, each cartridge to contain a proper quantity of powder and ball; or with a good rifle, knapsack, shot-pouch, and powder-horn, twenty balls suited to the bore of his rifle, and a quarter of a pound of powder; and shall appear so armed, accoutred and provided, when called out to exercise or into service, except, that when called out on company days to exercise only, he may appear without a knapsack. That the commissioned Officers shall severally be armed with a sword or hanger, and espontoon; and that from and after five years from the passing of this Act, all muskets from arming the militia as is herein required, shall be of bores sufficient for balls of the eighteenth part of a pound; and every citizen so enrolled, and providing himself with the arms, ammunition and accoutrements, required as aforesaid, shall hold the same exempted from all suits, distresses, executions or sales, for debt or for the payment of taxes. II. And be it further enacted, That the Vice-President of the United States, the Officers, judicial and executives, of the government of the United States; the members of both houses of Congress, and their respective officers; all custom house officers, with the clerks; all post officers, and stage-drivers who are employed in the care and conveyance of the mail of the post office of the United States; all Ferrymen employed at any ferry on the post road; all inspectors of exports; all pilots, all mariners actually employed in the sea service of any citizen or merchant within the United States; and all persons who now are or may be hereafter exempted by the laws of the respective states, shall be and are hereby exempted from militia duty, notwithstanding their being above the age of eighteen and under the age of forty-five years. III. And be it further enacted, That within one year after the passing of the Act, the militia of the respective states shall be arranged into divisions, brigades, regiments, battalions, and companies, as the legislature of each state shall direct; and each division, brigade, and regiment, shall be numbered at the formation thereof; and a record made of such numbers of the Adjutant-General's office in the state; and when in the field, or in serviced in the state, such division, brigade, and regiment shall, respectively, take rank according to their numbers, reckoning the first and lowest number highest in rank. That if the same be convenient, each brigade shall consist of four regiments; each regiment or two battalions; each battalion of five companies; each company of sixty-four privates. That the said militia shall be officered by the respective states, as follows: To each division on Major-General, with two Aids-de-camp, with the rank of major; to each brigade, one brigadier-major, with the rank of a major; to each company, one captain, one lieutenant, one ensign, four serjeants, four corporals, one drummer, and one fifer and bugler. That there shall be a regimental staff, to consist of one adjutant, and one quartermaster, to rank as lieutenants; one paymaster; one surgeon, and one surgeon's mate; one serjeant-major; one drum- major, and one fife-major. IV. And be it further enacted, That out of the militia enrolled as is herein directed, there shall be formed for each battalion, as least one company of grenadiers, light infantry or riflemen; and that each division there shall be, at least, one company of artillery, and one troop of horse: There shall be to each company of artillery, one captain, two lieutenants, four serjeants, four corporals, six gunners, six bombardiers, one drummer, and one fifer. The officers to be armed with a sword or hanger, a fusee, bayonet and belt, with a cartridge box to contain twelve cartridges; and each private of matoss shall furnish themselves with good horses of at least fourteen hands and an half high, and to be armed with a sword and pair of pistols, the holsters of which to be covered with bearskin caps. Each dragoon to furnish himself with a serviceable horse, at least fourteen hands and an half high, a good saddle, bridle, mail-pillion and valise, holster, and a best plate and crupper, a pair of boots and spurs; a pair of pistols, a sabre, and a cartouchbox to contain twelve cartridges for pistols. That each company of artillery and troop of house shall be formed of volunteers from the brigade, at the discretion of the Commander in Chief of the State, not exceeding one company of each to a regiment, nor more in number than one eleventh part of the infantry, and shall be uniformly clothed in raiments, to be furnished at their expense, the colour and fashion to be determined by the Brigadier commanding the brigade to which they belong. V. And be it further enacted, That each battalion and regiment shall be provided with the state and regimental colours by the Field-Officers, and each company with a drum and fife or bugle-horn, by the commissioned officers of the company, in such manner as the legislature of the respective States shall direct. VI. And be it further enacted, That there shall be an adjutant general appointed in each state, whose duty it shall be to distribute all orders for the Commander in Chief of the State to the several corps; to attend all publick reviews, when the Commander in Chief of the State shall review the militia, or any part thereof; to obey all orders from him relative to carrying into execution, and perfecting, the system of military discipline established by this Act; to furnish blank forms of different returns that may be required; and to explain the principles of which they should be made; to receive from the several officers of the different corps throughout the state, returns of the militia under their command, reporting the actual situation of their arms, accoutrements, and ammunition, their delinquencies, and every other thing which relates to the general advancement of good order and discipline: All which, the several officers of the division, brigades, regiments, and battalions are hereby required to make in the usual manner, so that the said adjutant general may be duly furnished therewith: From all which returns be shall make proper abstracts, and by the same annually before the Commander in Chief of the State. VII. And be it further enacted, That the rules of discipline, approved and established by Congress, in their resolution of the twenty-ninth of March, 1779, shall be the rules of discipline so be observed by the militia throughout the United States, except such deviations from the said rules, as may be rendered necessary by the requisitions of the Act, or by some other unavoidable circumstances. It shall be the duty of the Commanding Officer as every muster, whether by battalion, regiment, or single company, to cause the militia to be exercised and trained, agreeably to the said rules of said discipline. VIII. And be it further enacted, That all commissioned officers shall take rank according to the date of their commissions; and when two of the same grade bear an equal date, then their rank to be determined by lots, to be drawn by them before the Commanding officers of the brigade, regiment, battalion, company or detachment. IX. And be it further enacted That if any person whether officer or solder, belonging to the militia of any state, and called out into the service of the United States, be wounded or disabled, while in actual service, he shall be taken care of an provided for at the publick expense. X. And be it further enacted, That it shall be the duty of the brigade inspector, to attend the regimental and battalion meeting of the militia composing their several brigades, during the time of their being under arms, to inspect their arms, ammunition and accoutrements; superintend their exercise and maneuvres and introduce the system of military discipline before described, throughout the brigade, agreeable to law, and such orders as they shall from time to time receive from the commander in Chief of the State; to make returns to the adjutant general of the state at least once in every year, of the militia of the brigade to which he belongs, reporting therein the actual situation of the arms, accoutrement, and ammunition, of the several corps, and every other thing which, in his judgment, may relate to their government and general advancement of good order and military disciple; an adjutant general shall make a return of all militia of the state, to the Commander in Chief of the said state, and a duplicate of the same to the president of the United States. And whereas sundry corps of artillery, cavalry and infantry now exist in several of the said states, which by the laws, customs, or usages thereof, have not been incorporated with, or subject to the general regulation of the militia. XI. Be it enacted, That such corps retain their accustomed privileges subject, nevertheless, to all other duties required by this Act, in like manner with the other militias. Approved May 8, 1792 Source: https://www.mountvernon.org/education/primary-sources-2/article/militia-act-of-1792/#:~:text=The%20Militia%20Act%20of%201792,Militia%20throughout%20the%20United%20States .

CONSTITUTION OF KENTUCKY April 19, 1792 We, the representatives of the people of the State of Kentucky, in convention assembled, do ordain and establish this constitution for its government. Article I 1. The powers of government shall be divided into three distinct departments, each of them to be confided to a separate body of magistracy, to wit, those which are legislative to one, those which are executive to another, and those which are judiciary to another. 2. No person, or collection of persons, being of one of these departments, shall exercise any power properly belonging to either of the others, except in the instances hereinafter expressly permitted. 3. The legislative powers of this commonwealth shall be vested in a general assembly, which shall consist of a senate and house of representatives. 4. The representatives shall be chosen annually, by the qualified electors of each county respectively, on the first Tuesday in May; but the several elections may be continued for three days, if, in the opinion of the presiding officer or officers, it shall be necessary, and no longer. 5. No person shall be a representative who shall not have attained the age of twenty-four years, and have been a citizen and inhabitant of the State two years preceding his election, and the last six months thereof an inhabitant of the county in which he may be chosen; unless he shall have been absent on the public business of the United States, or this State. 6. Within two years after the first meeting of the general assembly, and within every subsequent term of four years, an enumeration of the free male inhabitants above twenty-one years of age shall be made, in such manner as may be directed by law. The number of the representatives shall, at the several periods of making such enumeration, be fixed by the legislature, and apportioned among the several counties, according to the number of free male inhabitants above the age of twenty-one years in each, and shall never be less than forty, nor greater than one hundred; but no county hereafter erected shall be entitled to a separate representation, until a sufficient number of free male inhabitants above the age of twenty-one years shall be contained within it, to entitle them to one representative, agreeable to the ratio which shall then be established. 7. The senators shall be chosen for four years. 8. Until the first enumeration be made, the senate shall consist of eleven members, and thereafter for every four members added to the house of representatives, one member shall be added to the senate. 9. In choosing the senate, one member at least shall be elected from each county, until the number of counties is equal to the number of senators; after which, when a new county is made, it shall, as to the choice of senators, be considered as being a part of the county or counties from which it shall have been taken. 10. The senate shall be chosen in the following manner: All persons qualified to vote for representatives shall, on the first Tuesday in May, in the present year, and on the same day in every fourth year, forever thereafter, at the place appointed by law for choosing representatives, elect by ballot, by a majority of votes, as many persons as they are entitled to have for representatives for their respective counties, to be electors of the senate. 11. No person shall be chosen an elector who shall not have resided in the State three years next before his election, and who shall not have attained the age of twenty-seven years. 12. The electors of the senate shall meet at such place as shall be appointed for convening the legislature, on the third Tuesday in May, in the present year, and on the same day in every fourth year forever thereafter; and they, or a majority of them so met, shall proceed to elect by ballot, as senators, men of the most wisdom, experience, and virtue, above twenty-seven years of age, who shall have been residents of the State above two whole years next preceding the election. If on the ballot two or more shall have an equal number of ballots in their favor, by which the choice shall not be determined by the first ballot, then the electors shall again ballot before they separate, in which they shall be confined to the persons who, on the first ballot, shall have had an equal number, and they who shall have the greatest number in their favor on the second ballot shall be accordingly declared and returned duly elected; and if on the second ballot an equal number shall still be in favor of two or more persons, then the election shall be determined by lot between those who have equal numbers; which proceedings of the electors shall be certified under their hands, and returned to the secretary for the time being; to whom shall also be made, by the proper officers, returns of the persons chosen as electors in the respective counties. 13. The electors of senators shall judge of the qualifications and elections of members of their body, and on a contested election shall admit to a seat as an elector such qualified person as shall appear to them to have the greatest number of legal votes in his favor. 14. The electors, immediately on their meeting, and before they proceed to the election of senators, shall take an oath, or affirmation, to elect, without favor, affection, partiality, or prejudice, such person for governor, and such persons for senators, as they in their judgment and conscience believe best qualified for the respective offices. 15. That in case of refusal, death, resignation, disqualification, or removal out of this State, of any senator, the senate shall immediately thereupon, or at their next meeting thereafter, elect, by ballot, in the same manner as the electors are herein directed to choose senators, another person in his place, for the residue of the said term of four years. 16. The general assembly shall meet on the first Monday in November in every year, till the time of their meeting shall be altered by the legislature, unless sooner convened by the governor. 17. Each house shall choose its speaker and other officers, and the senate shall also choose a speaker, pro tempore, when their speaker shall exercise the office of governor. 18. Each house shall judge of the qualifications of its members; contested elections shall be determined by a committee to be selected, formed, and regulated, in such manner as shall be directed by law. A majority of each house shall constitute a quorum to do business, but a smaller number may adjourn from day to day, and may be authorized by law to compel the attendance of absent members, in such manner and under such penalties as may be provided. 19. Each house may determine the rules of its proceedings, punish its members for disorderly behavior, and, with the concurrence of two-thirds, expel a member; but not a second time for the same cause. 20. Each house shall keep a journal of its proceedings, and publish them weekly, except such parts of them as may require secrecy, and the yeas and nays of the members on any question shall, at the desire of any two of them, be entered on the journals. 21. The doors of each house and of committees of the whole shall be open, unless when the business shall be such as ought to be kept secret. 22. Neither house shall, without the consent of the other, adjourn for more than three days; nor to any other place than that in which the two houses shall be sitting. 23. The members of the general assembly and the electors of the senate shall receive from the public treasury a compensation for their services, which for the present shall be six shillings a day during their attendance on, going to, and returning from the legislature, and the place for choosing the senators; but the same may be increased or diminished by law, if circumstances shall require it, but no alteration shall be made to take effect during the existence of the legislature which shall make such alteration. They shall in all cases, except treason, felony, breach, or surety of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at the session of the respective houses, and at the place for choosing senators, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any speech or debate in either house, they shall not be questioned in any other place. 24. No senator or representative shall, during the time for which he shall have been elected, or for one year afterwards, be appointed to any civil office under this State, which shall have been created, or the emoluments of which shall have been increased, during the time such senator or representative was in office: Provided, That no member of the first legislature which shall be assembled under this constitution shall be precluded from being appointed to any office which may have been created during his time of service in the said legislature; and no minister of religious society, member of Congress, or other person holding any office of profit under the United States, or this commonwealth, except attorneys at law, justices of the peace, militia officers, and coroners, shall be a member of either house, during his continuance to act as a minister, in Congress, or in office. 25. When vacancies happen in the house of representatives, the speaker shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies. 26. All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the house of representatives, but the senate may propose amendments as in other bills. 27. Each senator, representative, and sheriff shall, before he be permitted to act as such, take an oath, or make affirmation, that he hath not directly or indirectly given or promised any bribe or treat to procure his election to said office, and every person shall be disqualified from serving as a senator, representative, or sheriff, for the term for which he shall have been elected, who shall be convicted of having given or offered any bribe or treat, or canvassed for the said office. 28. Every bill which shall have passed both houses shall be presented to the governor; if he approve, he shall sign it, but if he shall not approve, he shall return it, with his objections, to the house in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the objections at large upon their journals, and proceed to reconsider it; if after such reconsideration two-thirds of that house shall agree to pass the bill, it shall be sent with the objections to the other house, by which likewise it shall be reconsidered, and, if approved by two-thirds of that house, it shall be a law. But in such cases the votes of both houses shall be determined by yeas and nays, and the names of the persons voting for or against the bill shall be entered on the journals of each house respectively; if any bill shall not be returned by the governor within ten days, Sundays excepted, after it shall have been presented to him, it shall be a law in like manner as if he had signed it; unless the general assembly by their adjournment prevent its return, in which case it shall be a law, unless sent back within three days after their next meeting. 29. Every order, resolution, or vote, to which the concurrence of both houses may be necessary, except on a question of adjournment, shall be presented to the governor, and before it shall take effect be approved by him; or, being disapproved, shall be repassed by two-thirds of both houses, according to the rules and limitations prescribed in case of a bill. Article II 1. The supreme executive power of this commonwealth shall be vested in a governor. 2. The governor shall be chosen by the electors of the senate, at the same time, at the same place, and in the same manner that they are herein directed to elect senators, and the said electors shall make return of their proceedings in the choice of a governor to the secretary for the time being. 3. The governor shall hold his office during four years from the first of June next ensuing his election. 4. He shall be at least thirty years of age, and have been a citizen and inhabitant of this State at least two years next before his election, unless he shall have been absent on public business of the United States, or of this State. 5. No member of Congress, or person holding any office under the United States, or this State, shall exercise the office of governor. 6. The governor shall, at stated times, receive for his services a compensation, which shall neither be increased nor diminished during the period for which he shall have been elected. 7. He shall be commander-in-chief of the army and navy of this commonwealth, and of the militia, except when they shall be called into the service of the United States. 8. He shall nominate and, by and with the advice and consent of the senate, appoint all officers whose offices are established by this constitution, or shall be established by law, and whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for; but no person shall be appointed to an office within any county who shall not have been a citizen or inhabitant therein one year next before his appointment, if the county shall have been so long erected; but if it shall not have been so long erected, then within the limits of the county or counties out of which it shall have been taken. 9. The governor shall have power to fill up all vacancies that may happen during the recess of the senate, by granting commissions, which shall expire at the end of their next session. 10. He shall have power to remit fines and forfeitures, and grant reprieves and pardons, except in cases of impeachment; in cases of treason, he shall have power to grant reprieves until the end of the next session of the general assembly, in whom the power of pardoning shall be vested. 11. He may require information in writing from the officers in the executive department upon any subject relating to the duties of their respective offices. 12. He shall, from time to time, give to the general assembly information of the state of the commonwealth, and recommend to their consideration such measures as he shall judge expedient. 13. He may, on extraordinary occasions, convene the general assembly, and in case of disagreement between the two houses, with respect to the time of adjournment, adjourn them to such time as he shall think proper, not exceeding four months. 14. He shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed. 15. In case of the death or resignation of the governor, or of his removal from office, the speaker of the senate shall exercise the office of governor, until another shall be duly qualified. 16. An attorney-general shall be appointed and commissioned during good behavior; who shall appear for the commonwealth in all criminal prosecutions, and in all civil cases in which the commonwealth shall be interested in any of the superior courts; shall give his opinion when called upon for that purpose by either branch of the legislature, or by the executive, and shall perform such other duties as shall be enjoined him by law. 17. A secretary shall be appointed and commissioned during the governor’s continuance in office, if he shall so long behave himself well; he shall keep a fair register of and attest all the official acts and proceedings of the governor, and shall, when required, lay the same, and all papers, minutes, and vouchers relative thereto, before either branch of the legislature, and shall perform such other duties as shall be enjoined him by law. Article III 1. In elections by the citizens, all free male citizens of the age of twenty-one years, having resided in the State two years, or the county in which they offer to vote one year next before the election, shall enjoy the rights of an elector, but no person shall be entitled to vote except in the county in which he shall actually reside at the time of the election. 2. All elections shall be by ballot. 3. Electors shall in all cases, except treason, felony, and breach or surety of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at elections, and in going to and returning from them. Article IV 1. The house of representatives shall have the sole power of impeaching. 2. All impeachments shall be tried by the senate; when sitting for that purpose, the senators shall be upon oath or affirmation; no person shall be convicted without the concurrence of two-thirds of the members present. 3. The governor and all other civil officers shall be liable to impeachment for any misdemeanor in office; but judgment in such cases shall not extend further than to removal from office and disqualification to hold any office of honor, trust, or profit under this commonwealth; but the party convicted shall, nevertheless, be liable and subject to indictment, trial, judgment, and punishment according to law. Article V 1. The judicial power of this commonwealth, both as to matters of law and equity, shall be vested in one supreme court, which shall be styled the court of appeals, and in such inferior courts as the legislature may from time to time ordain and establish. 2. The judges of both the supreme and inferior courts shall hold their offices during good behavior; but for any reasonable cause which shall not be sufficient ground of impeachment, the governor may remove any of them on the address of two-thirds of each branch of the legislature. They shall, at stated times, receive for their services an adequate compensation, to be fixed by law, which shall not be diminished during their continuance in office. 3. The supreme court shall have original and final jurisdiction in all cases respecting the titles to land under the present land-laws of Virginia, including those which may be depending in the present supreme court for the district of Kentucky at the time of establishing the said supreme court; and in all cases concerning contracts for lands, prior to the establishment of those titles. And the said court shall have power to hear and determine the same in a summary way, and to direct the mode of bringing the same to a hearing, so as to enable them to do right and justice to the parties, with as little delay and at as small an expense as the nature of the business will allow; but the said court shall, in all such cases, oblige the parties to state the material parts of their complaint and defence in writing; and shall, on the conclusion of every cause, state on the records of the whole merits of the case, the questions arising therefrom, the opinions of the court thereupon, and a summary of the reasons in support of those opinions. 4. And it shall be the duty of each judge of the supreme court, present at the hearing of any such case, and differing from a majority of the court, to deliver his opinion in writing, to be entered as aforesaid; and each judge shall deliver his opinion in open court. And the said court shall have power, on the determination of any such cause, to award the legal costs against either party, or to divide the same among the different parties, as to them shall seem just and right. And the said court shall have full power to take such steps as they may judge proper to perpetuate testimony in all cases concerning such titles: Provided, That a jury shall always be impanelled for the finding of such facts as are not agreed by the parties; unless the parties, or their attorneys, shall waive their right of trial by jury and refer the matter of fact to the decision of the court: Provided also, That the legislature may, whenever they may judge it expedient, pass an act or acts to regulate the mode of proceedings in such cases, or to take away entirely the original jurisdiction hereby given to the said court in such cases. 5. In all other cases the supreme court shall have appellate jurisdiction only, with such exceptions and under such regulations as the legislature shall make; and the legislature may, from time to time, vest in the supreme and inferior courts, or either of them, such powers, both in law and equity, as they shall judge proper and necessary for the due administration of justice. 6. A competent number of justices of the peace shall be appointed in each county; they shall be commissioned during good behavior, but may be removed on conviction of misbehavior in office, or any infamous crime, or on the address of both houses of the legislature. 7. The judges shall, by virtue of their office, be conservators of the peace throughout the State. The style of all process shall be, “The Commonwealth of Kentucky;” all prosecutions shall be carried on in the name and by authority of the commonwealth of Kentucky, and conclude “against the peace and dignity of the same.” Article VI 1. Sheriffs and coroners shall, at the times and places of elections of representatives, be chosen by the citizens of each county, qualified to vote for representatives. They shall hold their office for three years, if they shall so long behave themselves well, and until a successor be duly qualified; but no person shall be twice chosen or appointed sheriff in any term of six years. Vacancies in either of the said offices shall be filled by a new appointment, to be made by the governor, to continue until the next general election, and until a successor shall be chosen and qualified as aforesaid. 2. The freemen of this commonwealth shall be armed and disciplined for its defence. Those who conscientiously scruple to bear arms shall not be compelled to do so, but shall pay an equivalent for personal service. 3. The field and staff officers of the militia shall be appointed by the governor, except the battalion staff-officers, who shall be appointed by the field-officers of each battalion respectively. 4. The officers of companies shall be chosen by the persons enrolled in the list of each company, and the whole shall be commissioned during good behavior, and during their residence in the bounds of the battalion or company to which they shall be appointed. 5. Each court shall appoint its own clerk, who shall hold his office during good behavior; but no person shall be appointed clerk, only pro tempore, who shall not produce to the court appointing him a certificate from a majority of the judges of the court of appeals that he hath been examined by their clerk, in their presence and under their direction, and that they judge him to be well qualified to execute the office of clerk to any court of the same dignity with that for which he offers himself. They shall be removable for breach of good behavior by the court of appeals only, who shall be judges of the fact as well as of the law. Two-thirds of the members present must concur in the sentence. 6. All commissions shall be in the name and by the authority of the State of Kentucky, and be sealed with the State seal and signed by the governor. 7. The State treasurer shall be appointed annually by the joint ballot of both houses. Article VII 1. Members of the general assembly and all officers, executive and judicial, before they enter upon the execution of their respective offices, shall take the following oath or affirmation: “I do solemnly swear [or affirm, as the case may be] that I will be faithful and true to the commonwealth of Kentucky so long as I continue a citizen thereof, and that I will faithfully execute, to the best of my abilities, the office of ———, according to law.” Article VIII 1. Treason against the commonwealth shall consist only in levying war against it, or in adhering to its enemies, giving them aid or comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimoney of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on his own confession in open court. 2. Laws shall be made to exclude from office and from suffrage those who thereafter be convicted of bribery, perjury, forgery, or other high crimes or misdemeanors. The privilege of free suffrage shall be supported by laws regulating elections, and prohibiting, under adequate penalties, all undue influence thereon from power, bribery, tumult, or other improper practices. 3. No money shall be drawn from the treasury but in consequence of appropriations made by law, nor shall any appropriations of money for the support of an army be made for a longer term than one year, and a regular statement and account of the receipts and expenditures of all public money shall be published annually. 4. The legislature shall direct by law in what manner and what courts suits may be brought against the State. 5. The manner of administering an oath or affirmation shall be such as is most consistent with the conscience of the deponent, and shall be esteemed by the legislature the most solemn appeal to God. 6. All laws now in force in the State of Virginia, not inconsistent with this constitution, which are of a general nature, and not local to the eastern part of that State, shall be in force in this State, until they shall be altered or repealed by the legislature. 7. The compact with the State of Virginia, subject to such alterations as may be made therein, agreeably to the mode prescribed by the said compact, shall be considered as a part of this constitution. Article IX 1. The legislature shall have no power to pass laws for the emancipation of slaves without the consent of their owners, previous to such emancipation, and a full equivalent in money for the slaves so emancipated. They shall have no power to prevent emigrants to this State from bringing with them such persons as are deemed slaves by the laws of any one of the United States, so long as any person of the same age or description shall be continued in slavery by the laws of this State. They shall pass laws to permit the owners of slaves to emancipate them, saving the rights of creditors, and preventing them from becoming chargeable to the county in which they reside. They shall have full power to prevent slaves being brought into this State as merchandize. They shall have full power to prevent any slaves being brought into this State from a foreign country, and to prevent those from being brought into this State who have been since the first day of January, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-nine, or hereafter may be, imported into any of the United States from a foreign country. And they shall have full power to pass such laws as may be necessary to oblige the owners of slaves to treat them with humanity, to provide for them necessary clothing and provision, to abstain from all injuries to them extending to life or limb, and in case of their neglect or refusal to comply with the directions of such laws, to have such slave or slaves sold for the benefit of their owner or owners. Article X 1. The place for the seat of government shall be fixed in the following manner: The house of representatives shall, during their session which shall be held in the year one thousand seven hundred and ninety-two, choose by ballot twenty-one persons, from whom the representation from Fayette and Mercer Counties then present shall alternately strike out one, until the number shall be reduced to five, who, or any three of them concurring in opinion, shall have power to fix on the place for the seat of government, to receive grants from individuals therefor, and to make such conditions with the proprietor or proprietors of the land so pitched on by them as to them shall seem right, and shall be agreed to by the said proprietor or proprietors, and to lay off a town thereon, in such manner as they shall judge most proper. 2. The general assembly and the supreme courts shall within five years hold their sessions at the place so pitched upon by the said commissioners; and the seat of government so fixed shall continue until it shall be changed by two-thirds of both branches of the legislature. The commissioners, before they proceed to act, shall take an oath or make affirmation that they will discharge the trust imposed on them in such manner as in their judgment will be most beneficial to the State at large. Article XI 1. That the citizens of this State may have an opportunity to amend or change this constitution in a peaceable manner, if to them it shall seem expedient, the persons qualified to vote for representatives shall, at the general election to be held in the year one thousand seven hundred and ninety-seven, vote also, by ballot, for or against a convention, as they shall severally choose to do; and if thereupon it shall appear that a majority of all the citizens in the State voting for representatives have voted for a convention, the general assembly shall direct that a similar ballot shall be taken the next year; and if thereupon it shall also appear that a majority of all the citizens in the State voting for representatives have voted for a convention, the general assembly shall, at their next session, call a convention, to consist of as many members as there shall be in the house of representatives, to be chosen in the same manner, (at [1274] the same places and at the same time that representatives are,) by the citizens entitled to vote for representatives, and to meet within three months after the said election for the purpose of readopting, amending, or changing this constitution. If it shall appear upon the ballot of either year that a majority of the citizens voting for representatives is not in favor of a convention being called, it shall not be done until two-thirds of both branches of the legislature shall deem it expedient. Article XII 1. That the general, great, and essential principles of liberty and free government may be recognized and unalterably established, we declare that all men, when they form a social compact, are equal, and that no man or set of men are entitled to exclusive or separate public emoluments or privileges from the community, but in consideration of public services. 2. That all power is inherent in the people, and all free governments are founded on their authority and instituted for their peace, safety, and happiness. For the advancement of those ends, they have at all times an unalienable and indefeasible right to alter, reform, or abolish their government, in such manner as they may think proper. 3. That all men have a natural and indefeasible right to worship Almighty God according to the dictates of their own consciences; that no man of right can be compelled to attend, erect, or support any place of worship, or to maintain any ministry against his consent; that no human authority can in any case whatever control or interfere with the rights of conscience; and that no preference shall ever be given by law to any religious societies or modes of worship. 4. That the civil rights, privileges, or capacities of any citizen shall in no ways be diminished or enlarged on account of his religion. 5. That all elections shall be free and equal. 6. That trial by jury shall be as heretofore, and the right thereof remain inviolate. 7. That the printing-press shall be free to every person who undertakes to examine the proceedings of the legislature or any branch of government, and no law shall ever be made to restrain the right thereof. The free communications of thoughts and opinions is one of the invaluable rights of man, and every citizen may freely speak, write, and print on any subject, being responsible for the abuse of that liberty. 8. In prosecutions for publications of papers, investigating the official conduct of officers or men in a public capacity, or where the matter published is proper for public information, the truth thereof may be given in evidence. And in all indictments for libels, the jury shall have a right to determine the law and the facts, under the direction of the court, as in other cases. 9. That the people shall be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and possessions, from unreasonable searches and seizures; and that no warrant to search any place or to seize any person or things, shall issue without describing them as nearly as may be, nor without probable cause supported by oath or affirmation. 10. That in all criminal prosecutions the accused hath a right to be heard by himself and his counsel; to demand the nature and cause of accusation against him; to meet the witnesses face to face; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor; and in prosecutions by indictment or information, a speedy public trial by an impartial jury of the vicinage; that he cannot be compelled to give evidence against himself, nor can he be deprived of his life, liberty, or property, unless by the judgment of his peers, or the law of the land. 11. That no person shall for any indictable offence be proceeded against criminally by information, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia when in actual service, in time of war or public danger, or by leave of the court for oppression or misdemeanor in office. 12. No person shall, for the same offence, be twice put in jeopardy of his life or limb, nor shall any man’s property be taken or applied to public use without the consent of his representatives, and without just compensation being previously made to him. 13. That all courts shall be open, and every person for an injury done him in his lands, goods, person, or reputation, shall have remedy by the due course of law, and right and justice administered, without sale, denial, or delay. 14. That no power of suspending laws shall be exercised, unless by the legislature or its authority. 15. That excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel punishments inflicted. 16. That all prisoners shall be bailable by sufficient sureties, unless for capital offences, when the proof is evident or presumption great, and the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when, in cases of rebellion or invasion, the public safety may require it. 17. That the person of a debtor, where there is not strong presumption of fraud, shall not be continued in prison after delivering up his estate for the benefit of his creditors, in such manner as shall be prescribed by law. 18. That no ex post facto law nor any law impairing contracts shall be made. 19. That no persons shall be attainted of treason or felony by the legislature. 20. That no attainder shall work corruption of blood, nor, except during the life of the offender, forfeiture of estate to the commonwealth. 21. That estates of such persons as shall destroy their own lives shall descend or vest as in case of natural death, and if any person shall be killed by casualty, there shall be no forfeiture by reason thereof. 22. That the citizens have a right in a peaceable manner to assemble together for their common good, and to apply to those invested with the powers of government for redress of grievances, or other proper purposes, by petition, address, or remonstrance. 23. That the right of the citizens to bear arms in defence of themselves and the State shall not be questioned. 24. That no standing army shall, in time of peace, be kept up, without the consent of the legislature; and the military shall, in all cases and at all times, be in strict subordination to the civil power. 25. That no soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered in any house, without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law. 26. That the legislature shall not grant any title of nobility or hereditary distinction, nor create any office the appointment to which shall be for a longer term than during good behavior. 27. That emigration from the State shall not be prohibited. 28. To guard against the high powers which have been delegated, we declare that everything in this article is excepted out of the general powers of government, and shall forever remain inviolate; and that all laws contrary thereto, or contrary to this constitution, shall be void. Schedule 1. That no inconvenience may rise from the establishing the government of this State, and in order to carry the same into complete operation, it is hereby declared and ordained, that all rights, actions, prosecutions, claims, and contracts, as well individuals as of bodies-corporate, shall continue as if the said government had not been established. 2. That all officers, civil and military, now in commission under the State of Virginia, shall continue to hold and exercise their offices until the tenth day of August next, and no longer. 3. That until the first enumeration shall be made, as directed by the sixth section of the first article of this constitution, the county of Jefferson shall be entitled to elect three representatives; the county of Lincoln, four representatives; the county of Fayette, nine representatives; the county of Nelson, six representatives; the county of Mercer, four representatives; the county of Madison, three representatives; the county of Bourbon, five representatives; the county of Woodford, four representatives; and the county of Mason, two representatives. 4. The general assembly shall meet at Lexington on the fourth day of June next. 5. All returns herein directed to be made to the secretary shall, previous to his appointment, be made to the clerk of the supreme court for the district of Kentucky. 6. Until a seal shall be provided for the State, the governor shall be at liberty to use his private seal. 7. The oaths of office herein directed to be taken may be administered by any justice of the peace, until the legislature shall otherwise direct. 8. All bonds given by any officer within the district of Kentucky, payable to the governor of Virginia, may be prosecuted in the name of the governor of Kentucky. 9. All offences against the laws of Virginia, which have been committed within the present district of Kentucky, or which may be committed within the same before the first day of June next, shall be cognizable in the courts of this State in the same manner that they would be if they were committed within this State, after the said first day of June. 10. At the elections herein directed to be held in May next, the sheriff of each county, or in case of his absence one of his deputies, shall preside, and if they neglect or refuse to act, the said elections shall be held by any one of the justices of the peace for the county where such neglect or refusal shall happen; each officer holding such election, having first taken an oath before a justice of the peace to conduct the said election with impartiality, shall have power to administer to any person offering to vote at such election the following oath or affirmation: “I do swear [or affirm] that I am qualified to vote for representatives in the county of ———, agreeably to the constitution formed for the State of Kentucky;” and such officers shall have a right to refuse to receive the vote of any person who shall refuse to take the said oath or make affirmation when tendered to him. And the said elections shall be held at the several places appointed for holding courts in the different counties. 11. The government of the commonwealth of Kentucky shall commence on the first day of June next. Done in convention, at Danville, the nineteenth day of April, one thousand seven hundred and ninety-two, and of the Independence of the United States of America the sixteenth. By order of the convention. Samuel McDowell, President. Attest: Tho. Todd, Clerk. Source: https://oll.libertyfund.org/title/thorpe-the-federal-and-state-constitutions-vol-iii-kentucky-massachusetts#lf1514-03_head_003