into existence the great TVA which is a model for all the world to emulate. David Lilienthal is going with me to Guam Saturday night. We are flying for 18 straight hours to meet with the leaders of South Vietnam to put in a plan for South Vietnam that was first born here in the Tennessee Valley. I know it is cold out there and you don't want to listen to a very long speech, but I do want to tell you that what you are doing here at Columbia is closer to my heart than any other thing I deal with in the whole range of America's national policy. You are building a new school—and a school is about the most important public building in America. You are going to provide in an attractive, modern environment the education that early Americans like Andrew Jackson and James Polk here in Tennessee sought by firelight. You are becoming a part of the revolution in American education, a revolution of quality as well as quantity. More Americans are receiving more education today than ever before in our history. About 3 out of every 10 Americans are now enrolled in our schools and our colleges. Twice as many young people are being graduated from our high schools and twice as many are in college as there were only 10 years ago. This is not only because of our rising population but it is because America in the 1960's has made a historic commitment and that commitment is first to education. This commitment is difficult to achieve, but it is very simple to state. We want every American boy and girl to have all the education that he or she can take. We want this so that each child may become all he is capable of becoming. Nothing more-nothing less. Education cannot be only for a few, any more than health can be only for those who can afford it, or national parks only for those that can travel great distances to reach them. Education, health, conservation-these are only magnificent abstractions, until we translate them into better, healthier, happier people. They are only possibilities until we turn them into opportunities. Columbia offers a fine example of how your Federal Government and your State government can work with your local government to enlarge educational opportunities. This will be a school for all the people. It can be a place such as Woodrow Wilson dreamed of-where the important issues of the day can be discussed, in what Wilson called "The Parliament of the People." It can serve as a center of excellence in the arts, a home for voluntary service projects, and a meeting ground for the community and regional planners. It is not hard for me to talk at length about education and what it means, for it meant everything to me at a time when my future hung in the balance. I hope some way, somehow, some day I can repay the debt that I owe in the time that is allotted me. I shall try. I am so happy that you good people of Tennessee are trying, too. I am so happy that you are providing for these young men and these young women because they will be the leaders of Tennessee today, and the leaders of this Nation tomorrow. Thank you. NOTE: The President spoke at 2:30 p.m. In his opening words he referred to Buford Ellington, Governor of Tennessee, John W. Gardner, Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, Dr. James W. Clark, President of the Columbia State Community College, Reverend Frank Allen, Rector of St. Peter's Episcopal Church in Columbia, Mrs. Albert Gore, wife of the senior Senator from Tennessee, and Representative William R. Anderson of Tennessee and his wife. 355 118 Statement by the President Upon Signing Bill Authorizing Supplemental Appropriations for the Department of Defense. March 16, 1967 I HAVE today signed S. 665, authorizing supplemental appropriations for the Department of Defense for the fiscal year 1967. The funds authorized by this bill are necessary for the procurement of missiles, aircraft, and tracked combat vehicles, for research, development and evaluation, and for military construction. The Congress, by an overwhelming vote, amended the bill to declare its firm intentions -to provide all necessary support for our -to support the efforts that have been similarly involved and interested, as soon as possible, for the purpose of pursuing the general principles of the Geneva accords of 1954 and 1962, and for formulating plans for bringing the conflict to an honorable solution. With each part of this declaration, I am in full accord. Though the battle has been long and hard, and though our adversary has shown no desire to reduce the level of his aggression and bring the controversy to the negotiating table, we shall persist both on the battlefield and in our pursuit of an honorable settlement. Our course lies between the extremes of provoking a wider war, and yielding to a settlement by terror. It is neither a simple nor an easy course. Yet it offers the hope of lasting peace in Southeast Asia. That the vast majority of the Congress approves it is a source of continuing strength to me, and to those associated with me in the conduct of our policy. NOTE: As enacted, S. 665 is Public Law 90-5 (81 119 Statement by the President Following Senate Approval of the Consular Convention With the U.S.S.R. March 16, 1967 IN GIVING its advice and consent to the ratification of the Consular Convention today, the Senate acted in the best tradition of American government. The impressive vote for ratification was the product, not only of strong bipartisan leadership, but also of responsible action by the membership. The Convention will provide important measures to protect Americans traveling in the Soviet Union. Last year more than 18,000 of our citizens visited the U.S.S.R. These measures will become applicable as soon as the treaty enters into force. I hope the Soviet Government will now move promptly to ratify the Convention and that arrangements will be made for its early entry into force. NOTE: The text of the Convention, which was ratified by the United States on March 31, 1967, is printed in Executive D (88th Cong., 2d sess.). 120 Statement by the President Announcing the Release of Deferred LAST SEPTEMBER, as part of an overall I am today instructing Federal agencies to release $791 million of those deferred funds. The areas affected are: -special mortgage assistance for low-cost -local flood protection and other projects In fiscal 1967, budget expenditures out of these released funds will amount to approximately $105 million. These programs provide important benefits for the American people. Otherwise, I would not have proposed, and the Congress would not have enacted them. The deferrals and reductions undertaken last fall were put into effect as a necessary means of reducing the overheating which then threatened the American economy-not because the programs themselves were in any sense undesirable. The deferral of Federal contracts and the other economic measures adopted last fall have had the desired effect. Inflationary pressures have subsided. As a consequence it has been possible, in a careful and orderly manner, to release some of the funds which had been deferred. Earlier this year we released $175 million of highway funds and $380 mil lion in special assistance for low-cost and multi-family housing. Today's action brings the total of funds released to about $1.4 billion, approximately 27 percent of the total amount of funds deferred. I have instructed Federal agencies to make the release effective on April 1. This will leave time for planning, notification to States, and other necessary administrative steps. In one case-emergency loans to farmers who have been affected by disasters-the release will become effective immediately. A list of the funds released by the action today, and by earlier actions follows: RELEASE OF Deferred FedeRAL PROGRAM FUNDS [Millions of dollars] Department of Transportation: Special mortgage assistance renewal housing..... Farm operating loans. ..... Corps of Engineers: 1967 programs March 17 Prior actions actions 350 175 250 300 30 25 25 Local flood protection and 90 .... ects.... Department of Health, Educa- funds 121 Special Message to the Congress: The Quality of American Government. March 17, 1967 To the Congress of the United States: THE BACKGROUND History will say this of America—that it established a community of freedom and order, preserved and perfected the concept of democracy, and enriched the lives of its citizens-all under a rule of law. The law is our instrument for developing our society along that vision of government which was the dream of our fathers and is the hope of our sons. It is only part of the total instrument, however. The rest of that instrument is the institutional machinery which enables law to work in response to the will of the Congress and the people. It is a condition of any law that its effectiveness must be judged by its administration. The machinery of our Government has served us well. It has been the vehicle of the greatest progress and prosperity any nation has ever achieved. But this record should give us no cause for complacency. For any realistic review today reveals that there are substantial improvements to be made. -Further reorganization of the Executive the joint responsibility of Federal, State -At every level of government, steps must be taken to assure a steady flow of qualified and trained managers and administrators for the years ahead; -We must pursue our efforts to expand the modern techniques which already. are at work to reduce costs and improve the efficiency of government. GOVERNMENT REORGANIZATION Government's relative simplicity did not demand many major reforms in administrative machinery until this century, with the great changes it brought to our society. Then Presidents beginning with Theodore Roosevelt began finding and reporting to the Congress obsolescence which hampered the efficient execution of the Nation's policies. In 1937, Franklin Roosevelt and the 75th Congress were still harnessing the resources of government to continue the rout of the great depression which had threatened to overwhelm the country. President Roosevelt submitted to the Congress a recommendation for reorganization legislation with these words: "A government without good management is a house builded on sand." Little more than a decade later, under President Truman's Administration, a distinguished Commission headed by former President Herbert Hoover looked deeply into the need for reorganization and sounded the same warning: “... The highest aims and ideals of democracy can be thwarted through excessive administrative costs and through waste, disunity, irresponsibility, and other byproducts of inefficient government." Since those words were spoken, the machinery of American government has undergone many changes. Two major ones have been accomplished in this Administration: -In 1965, the 89th Congress established the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which brought the hope of renewed life for our cities. -In 1966, the same Congress provided the mechanism for straightening out our transportation lifeline by establishing the Department of Transportation. In addition, in the same two-year period we have completed 10 additional reorganizations to consolidate programs and strengthen functions. I have submitted two new reorganization plans so far this year. We have not reached the end of the reorganizations which are required if we are to adapt our government structure to the changes which have been taking place in our national life. Nor will we reach it soon. Having undertaken major reorganizations in the fields of housing and community development, transportation, and water pollution, we must now carefully consider the question of how our government can better be organized to achieve its major economic objectives. In my State of the Union Address, and later in my Budget and Economic Messages to the Congress, I proposed the creation of a new Department of Business and Labor. For ten years, beginning in 1903, Labor and Commerce existed jointly as the 9th Cabinet office in the United States govern ment. Then in 1913, President William Howard Taft, on his last day in office, signed the Act which made them separate departments. The legislation which accomplished this was enacted in response to a growing belief that workers would be benefitted by a voice distinctly their own in the highest councils of government. Woodrow Wilson, the incoming President, expressed concisely the public's understanding of the action that had been taken. "The Department of Labor," he said, "was created in the interest of the wage earners of the United States." The concept of two departments representing the separate-and sometimes diverse-voices of business and labor in the government family fitted the needs of the America of more than a half century ago, and in diminishing degree that of the decades which followed. The years with their changing conditions brought an increasing alteration of that concept. In the America which exists today, the concept has, I believe, lost much of its force. -Labor unions are no longer small and weak, struggling to achieve their legiti -Business is no longer principally con- Except for their names, the Departments of Commerce and Labor are not the same departments as those which existed in the past. Both were once almost exclusively involved with statistical and information programs and regulatory activity. Today a major part of the efforts of the Department of Commerce is directed toward economic development and the promotion of international trade. Today a major part of the efforts of the Department of Labor is directed toward the training and development of manpower. Conversely, there are many activities directly concerning industry and labor which |