job in dealing with the Federal Government. Representatives of State and local governments will be working with him on a joint task force to produce this plan. I expect their report within a month, and shortly thereafter I will submit legislation to the Congress to carry out their plan.

-State and local governments are in need of modernization in organization and finances. Some of the assistance they need to do this can be found in the model cities program, for which we are asking the fully authorized funds this year.

-All levels of government need to com

municate among each other more easily and regularly than they have in the past. In my State of the Union Message this year, I said that one of our objectives is creating an effective partnership at all levels of government.

And that partnership rests, to some degree, on money. During the past 3 years we have returned to State and local governments almost $40 billion in grants-in-aid. About 70 percent of our Federal expenditures for domestic programs will be

distributed

through State and local governments. If these enormous sums are to hit their mark-and improve the lives of 200 million Americans— we must work as partners to improve and simplify their administration.

But any sound partnership rests on some

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thing more important than money. It rests on trust-mutual confidence and on common goals.

If that sometimes seems difficult to achieve as we argue over guidelines and criteria and matching funds, think what it was like two centuries ago when the Founders tried to make a nation out of thirteen proud colonies.

John Adams looked back on those days when he wrote to a friend, in 1818, that "The colonies had grown up under constitutions of government so different; there was so great a variety of religions; they were composed of so many nations; their customs, manners and habits had so little resemblance; and their intercourse had been so rare and their knowledge of each other so imperfect, that to unite them in the same principles in theory and the same system of action was certainly a very difficult enterprise. The complete accomplishment of it, in so short a time and by such simple means, was perhaps a singular example in the history of mankind. Thirteen clocks were made to strike together a perfection of mechanism which no artist had ever before effected."

Now there are 50 clocks. Through trust, through tolerance and good sense, and through an unswerving devotion to our people's needs and dreams, they can be made to strike together-and they will.

NOTE: The President spoke at 2:13 p.m. in the State Dining Room at the White House.

As printed above, this item follows the text released by the White House Press Office.

hope alive in that land where our commitment is tested. But pursue it we must.

In just a short while I will have to take my leave of you. We are going out across the Pacific again-this time to Guam. There

we will review our course of action with our military commanders and the leaders of the Vietnamese Government.

But before I take my leave, let me say that it is a pleasure and a privilege to have you with us here tonight.

Theodore Roosevelt started something very valuable to this Government back in 1908 when he asked the Governors to come to Washington to meet with him. When that first Governors' conference passed a resolution supporting his great conservation program, President Roosevelt called the resolution-and I quote-"A document which ought to be hung in every schoolhouse throughout the land."

Generations of Americans have profited from the joint concern that was shared and voiced by the President and the Governors six decades ago. In the years since then we have learned time and again that the Nation always profits when the Federal Government and the States bring their combined energies and devotions to programs affecting the national welfare.

We are all witnessing now-more than witnessing, we are helping to create—a new and exciting phase of the ancient partnership that unites the States and local communities with the Federal Government. As America grows greater and stronger and more complex, that partnership, which underpins our entire philosophy of government, represents the most valid hope of our future.

In this busy day that is ending, we have tried to tell you what we are doing to strengthen the partnership between us. You have told us much that is valuable about the problems we face as a people. Together we have strengthened and extended the free communication on which our partnership is built. That is the basis for our common progress in the future.

Earlier this week I visited the home of one of the true giants of the American Presidency, Andrew Jackson. At a dinner 137 years ago, President Jackson gave a toast which is now a part of his legend. “Our Federal Union," he said, "it must be preserved."

No President could improve upon Jackson's words. But to the great good fortune of America, history has made his toast unnecessary to repeat. Our Union has been preserved. It is strong, it is durable, and it is confident.

Tonight, I would give you a new toast, voiced in the context of the America we live in today-

Our Federal Union: May we build on its past to lift the quality of its life in the future. May we build a land where the least among us can find contentment, and the best among us will find greatness.

Ladies and gentlemen, to the Union. NOTE: The President spoke at 9:33 p.m. in the State Dining Room at the White House.

As printed above, this item follows the text released by the White House Press Office.

We have come to Guam to confer with our military commanders, our diplomatic representatives, and with those who are helping to wage the peaceful campaign against poverty

and want in Vietnam.

We have come to meet once again with the leaders of South Vietnam, whose people continue to bear the great burdens of a war that they did not invite, but which was thrust upon them by Communist terror.

We will discuss the progress and the future course of our military effort.

We will review our diplomatic initiatives. And we will try to estimate the chances of bringing peace to Vietnam through an honorable settlement.

Our new team of representatives in Saigon-Ambassador Bunker, Ambassador Locke, Mr. Komer-will be here with us, as will the great patriot whom Mr. Bunker will succeed-Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge. We chose Guam as the site of our meeting for its convenience to those who are conducting the military and peaceful development campaign in Vietnam. But beyond that consideration, there is a historical significance to this island that stirs the memories of those who remember the dark hours of World War II, and which strengthens our determination to persevere in Vietnam today.

Guam knows a war in a way that no other part of America knows it. It was the only inhabited part of our Nation to be occupied by hostile forces during the Second World War.

That war, and all of its anguish, changed forever the world as we had known it. It taught us lessons that we shall never forgetmost important, that the peace of all the world is threatened when aggressors are encouraged to feed on any part of it.

America, which lost Guam and then freed it again with blood that now stains this ground, has not forgotten that lesson. And so American boys in Vietnam are once again carrying the American commitment to resist aggression and to make possible the sacred work of peace among men.

We are grateful to you-all of you-for coming out here to welcome us. Pray that our work here will bear fruit, for we labor for you, for your fellow Americans, for the people of Vietnam, and for all of those who love peace and freedom throughout the world.

And now I should like to address a very special word to my Guamanian friends.

I am proud of the distinction which this trip gives me of being the first American President to come here while in office. I am very proud of Guam. All America is proud of the record that it has made toward selfgovernment in the short time since civil administration came to this island in 1950.

We are proud of the strides that you have taken under a very fine public servant, Governor Guerrero. His first term of office is now ending. It gives me real pleasure to tell you that just before we landed I signed a nomination to go to the United States Senate giving my recommendation that the Honorable Manuel Guerrero be appointed to a second term as the Governor of Guam.

I hope that Governor Guerrero will be the last Governor to be appointed by a President. If the Congress acts favorably on legislation that I have proposed, he will be. That legisla tion will give the American citizens of Guam, along with your fellow citizens in other parts of the United States, the right to elect your own Governor.

Then all of you who are already contributing so much to the efforts of your country and the effort that your country is making in Vietnam will at long last have one of the great rights of the American democracy. I look forward to the day when I may sign that bill that is now pending into the law of our land.

Thank you, my friends, for this warm welcome. I know that I shall enjoy spending the next few days with you.