Speeches by Eugene McCarthy and Robert Kennedy on the Presidential Campaign in Corvallis (Oregon)

I think you're exaggerating. There's only one, at a time, and they're not guards... they're bodyguards. I don't care what you call 'em. You said that I could leave this place whenever I wanted, that I wasn't a prisoner here. And you're not, after today. What's today? You FORGOT?...[overlapping dialogue]... These Oregonians are in Gill Coliseum on the Oregon State University campus in Corvallis. It is from this platform that tonight we shall see and hear two men who seek to become the next President of the United States. These two men. [applause] Good evening. I'm Tom Doggett for Oregon Educational Broadcasting. When Oregonians enter the voting booth on Tuesday. One of the key races to be decided will be the confrontation between Democratic presidential hopefuls Eugene McCarthy

and Robert Kennedy. Last month when Senator Kennedy spoke at Gill Coliseum we recorded his speech and the question and answer session that followed. Earlier this week we videotaped Senator McCarthy under similar circumstances. It was our hope tonight to present statements by each of these candidates on the same major issues. Circumstances have precluded our doing that. Political campaigns, like other news, do not always work out as they were planned in advance. On only one issue is there a direct comparison. That issue is the draft system. You will see tonight what we believe to be the essence of each man's presentation by placing these two candidates side by side electronically, when it seems this cannot be done physically, it's our hope that you will be able to evaluate for yourselves their candidacy. Here, then, is Senator Kennedy with a portion of his prepared address. We have had deep divisions within our own country, and there's great concern

within the United States at the direction that we are taking, despite the great affluence that we have within the United States, our gross national product growing at 40 or 50 billions of dollars a year, gross national product about... over eight hundred billions of dollars. And yet a feeling of great unease, and great concern as to the direction of the United States is going and what we stand for, what we want to accomplish with this great wealth. We have the military capacity to destroy all of mankind. And yet we can't deal with a fourth-rate military power in Southeast Asia, and that causes great concern. We have Blacks and whites who are turning against one another, in greater bitterness and greater polarization of the races, until we have riots and violence and lawlessness in our cities. And representative of the administrations tells us that we can expect to have those kind of conditions summer after summer, for the next few years. What does that mean for our country? Is it acceptable in the United States that we have that kind of lawlessness?

That we have that kind of violence? That we have a member of m-group of a minority of our population, have such despair and such hopelessness about our system and our government that they care no longer that they-whether they abide by the law..? That they turn to looting and they turn to rioting. Where is the fault? Where rests the fault? In the last analysis it rests with all of us obviously, not just the Executive branch of the government, not just the Legislative branch of the government but the sins of the last hundred years and the poverty and the despair that has been established in this element of our population. We can't tolerate vio-violence. And we can't tolerate vi-disorder and we can't tolerate these kind of riots. But also we cannot tolerate the injustices that still exist for so many of our population. [applause] We are for the most part removed from all those kind of problems. A man that works in the city of New York, he gets in his car and he drives home at night or gets in his train, he drives out to the suburbs, has

very little contact with the poor that exists in his city, very rarely sees them, except like fall and matches sometimes they riot, and then we read about them in the paper. Or the Indians on the res-reservation very few of them vote. Very few of them p-participate in the political process, our FIRST CITIZEN, and here WE stand in relative comfort, while they are filled with such despair and hopelessness. In the Eastern part of Oklahoma, Ninety percent of them live under the welfare program and receive welfare payments. Ninety nine percent of them live under the poverty level. And again we made treaties with these people. We promised them certain things. We said that we'd do certain things for them we said we'd provide an education for them, and none of those treaties have been kept. And we are responsible for it. We try to tell the Russians of the Soviet Union to the Chinese that they can't be trusted because they won't keep their word -- but we haven't kept our word to our own citizens! We haven't kept our word to our Indian

citizens, to our Black citizens, or Puerto Rican or Mexican Americans, that they have an opportunity under our system here in the United States, and I think these things should be changed. I think they're indecent and they should be changed. [applause] And I think we should find -- as I said to you two years ago when I was here and spoke -- I think that we should find a negotiated settlement to the struggle in Vietnam and take the money that is being spent THERE and spend it for our OWN people and to help also other peoples around the globe. [applause] I think we have to remember, again, as we stay here... all of us, as you sit up there and I stand here, that there are young Americans being killed, and that there are South Vietnamese being killed, and that there are many women and children and innocent people being killed. And I think that

it's partially our responsibility. It's not just the responsibility of the United States government. It's the responsibility of the American people. And I think that we have to accept that responsibility. [applause] The last week a-our combat deaths were the highest for any time in the previous five weeks. Once again, our combat deaths were greater among Americans than they were in the ranks of the South Vietnamese army. I don't think again that this is acceptable. I don't think that this -- I, I think we can help them! I think we can help the South Vietnamese, but I don't think that we're over there to win the war FOR them, or conduct the war for them, or that we should make this an American war. And I think that's what we've done over the period of the last several years.. that we've made it an American war and not the war of the South Vietnamese for their own independence and freedom. I think it's been the gravest kind of error. But the result is that the deaths and the destruction that has taken place has been largely our

responsibility. The result is that the South Vietnamese Army has let us, the United States, conduct the major part of the fighting. I don't think that's acceptable. I don't think it's acceptable that we should have the corruption and the dishonesty that exists in the South Vietnamese government. I don't think it's acceptable for the United States that a young soldier, a young boy, in South Vietnam could easily buy its way out of the draft. I don't think it's acceptable in this country that we spend money for refugees and only one out of every three dollars ever gets to the refugees. I think our policy should change. I think that the government of South Vietnam should broaden its political base and take in all the groups within South Vietnam so that they are prepared to negotiate with our adversaries at the appropriate time. I think they should be prepared to do that. And I think that we should be sure that they move in that direction. I think any other policy, any other program followed by us is unacceptable. And I think it's causing great deaths amongst - great numbers of deaths

amongst Americans, as well as the death and destruction in South Vietnam. A portion of Senator Robert F. Kennedy's prepared remarks, delivered at Gill Coliseum. While bordering on some of the same issues, Senator McCarthy's speech of earlier this week was based on an entirely different thesis. Here is Senator Eugene McCarthy. [McCarthy] We're demonstrating that the American political process is much more open than it was believed to be, uh, seven or eight months ago when Mr. John Bailey of the National Committee said that the convention had already been held as far as he was concerned. And that President Johnson had been renominated and his policies had all been endorsed. His judgment was a little bit premature. [scattered laughter] Judgment on American politics and on the processes of - by which our parties operate... and we have in fact passed a judgment on the war. We've moved on, I think, to indicate the of people this

country have... that they have a set of priorities which they would like to have this nation attend to. They believe that the processes of democracy must be made to work, that this is not a closed system, and that there is a place for the judgment of the people. They've also indicated, I think, in response to the party, to my campaign and what's gone on with it, that they believe that all of the institutions of government are subject in this year of nineteen hundred and sixty-eight, to re-examination... whether it's the CIA, or selective service, or the FBI, which until now has been quite sacred. For almost 40 years in American politics, if we dared to suggest that J. Edgar Hoover was over 70 years old, it was considered almost a subversive suggestion to indicate that. [laughter, applause] And also to talk about some of the personalities in government, and to try to clear..

I think that ours is a government of laws and also of institutions, but there are certain points at which the power of personality and the ideas of persons who are in government have some influence on policy itself and that consequently this was a year really, and still is a year, for a kind of total examination of American politics and the processes of politics and of government as well as of the institutions and of the persons who do influence policy today or who may influence it tomorrow and beyond tomorrow. I'd like to speak to you primarily of my remarks about the military establishment. In the question period of course, I would expect you to cover the whole field of government operations and of politics.. But this, I think, deserves special attention. In nineteen hundred and sixty, President Eisenhower, in what was a kind of farewell message, warned of what he called the Military Industrial Complex of this country.

It was his... I think it was his best speech. In any case it was one to which it was important that the country respond. His warning still is most necessary, for since nineteen hundred and sixty, we've seen in this country a continuing growth of a huge and powerful military establishment, whose influence now reaches into every aspect of our national life. There's been a growing militarization of our foreign policy. Today we have military missions in over 50 countries in the world. The Department of Defense runs its own intelligence operation. There's agents who sell American arms all over the globe and who recently announced that they had a global goal of 15 billion dollars in arms sales in the next 10 years. At the same time that we talk about holding disarmament conferences. If we could just stop the sale we'd accomplish more in one year than we will in 10 years of disarmament

conferences... In a plan to sell 15 billion dollars in arms, some of it of course is selling obsolescence. There needs to be a market for mistakes in the Pentagon. [laughter, applause] Thank you. [applause] In addition of course to the influence on foreign policy, the fact is that the growth of the Defense Department, the great increase in expenditures there, has had a growing influence also on the domestic affairs of the United States of America. We now spend nearly 80 billion dollars; twice as much as we did in nineteen hundred and sixty. We've seen very clearly the effect of these military expenditures on inflation at home. Beginning in late 1965 with the increase in the cost of the war in Vietnam. A rising rate of inflation to something like 3 percent a year now and also its effect upon the

balance of payments, which has gone from about a billion a year to something like 3 billion dollars a year, largely because of the increased expenditures for the war in Vietnam, indicating a rather interesting development with reference to the economics of this country. For until this war, the record rather clearly showed that expenditures for military purposes generally had the effect of stimulating economic growth in this country. But the evidence of the last year and a half shows that - in fact the last two years - shows that we've reached a point of mastery of the economy so that really none of the old classical statements which were made about our economic system any longer hold true. The idea that you could not have economic growth without the class struggle or without the exploitation of the poor. We now know that the exploitation of people whether it's in the class struggle or the poor is very costly from an economic point of view and we're only beginning to try

to make up for that exploitation in the past. We know that ignorance, really, and the exploitation of the ignorant does not, in the long run, help economic growth. We have learned that we can move without the business cycle although it was hard for some businessmen to give it up. The military has become the largest purchaser of goods and services in the country. Estimated expenditures of forty five billion dollars a year and something like 8 million Americans comprising 10 percent of our labor force earn their living from defense spending. The influence of the military is also expanded. Well, I should say - I should not use that word - at least it's present in the educational institutions of our country. Presently 90 percent of federal research and development is directed to military programs. This leaves leaves only 10 percent for education, and for health, and for social change, and social improvement in this country. The

Defense Department spends nearly half a billion dollars on grants to universities and colleges. It's come to regard the universities and the colleges as a key source of their basic research. Universities, in turn... many of them have looked more and more to the Defense Department as a source of badly needed capital and research money. And inevitably in this relationship a kind of mutual dependence or convenience is likely to develop. And to some extent this great expenditure together with the emphasis that goes with it has I think constituted at least a significant threat to the independence of scholarship and of research and even of teaching in the American colleges and universities. By it's choice of grant awards, the military can determine the direction of science and technology in America. By establishing the criteria for draft deferments and manpower needs, it can influence college admissions and curriculum and even the choice of subjects to be taken by college

students and by graduate students. By setting military guidelines for grant assistance it can jeopardize the tradition of open research. And, indirectly, as research directors and as universities anticipate what the military may be looking for as it seeks places to put its research money, a kind of general not quite unconscious, but a general tendency to condition the whole approach to research so that one school may be noticed, when the military begins to look for a place to establish some special kind of research effort or research foundation. Senator Eugene McCarthy speaking at Gill Coliseum. Each of our candidates responded to questions from the audience and we've selected what we believe are two of the most significant. Senator McCarthy told his audience what he would do as President to prevent the military-defense combination from becoming a

national institution. [McCarthy] The significant concern, of course, is that we must be on guard lest militarism become really institutionalized in this country and are no longer accountable to public judgment and to public will. And I think there are a number of things we can do and that we must do in order to prevent this from happening. First: to make all feasible cuts in the defense budget itself and a significant one, of course... [applause] significant one, of course, would come if we could work out an end to the war in Vietnam. [applause] And the Congress itself must take greater responsibility for reviewing and controlling military spending and also examine the operation of the

military missions. And this is the object to which the Foreign Relations Committee has really set for itself. We've made only limited progress. Cutting down the amount of money that could be used and to setting a limit on how much in the way of arms and arms sales would be allowed in Africa and in South America. Setting a limitation on the number of countries, at least, into which various programs might be sent. This is a rather indirect way of approaching it, but in any case a beginning. Thirdly, I think we have to begin to think about reconversion programs, whereby efforts that were previously directed at military purposes can be rechanneled into creating peacetime activity, the problems of our cities, and the problems of the poor in America. [applause] Fourth, we must proceed as we have been - with limited success - in

putting some restraints on the activities of American arms salesmen, for in many ways they generate their own independent political power, both at home, and also abroad. Sixth... [scattered applause] I think we must find ways to, certainly so as not to have a recurrence of what we have in Vietnam, of having the military finally take over the administration of foreign aid and civic action programs in the underdeveloped countries of the world. [applause] And we must move away from what seems to be a growing disposition on the part of our country and its foreign policy to look to military solutions to almost every serious problem that arises. I, uh... I have been supporting most of, I think, the authorizations and the money for the space program. Even the man on the moon project, I think, was

alright when we had enough money... we weren't needing it for other purposes, or didn't realize that we needed it. But of all the space projects, if you leave out...if there are incidental benefits that come from it, I'd be prepared to carry it on, but the simple proposition that we put a man on the moon because we want to do it first... I don't think justifies the kind of expenditures which is now indicated are made in order to accomplish that purpose. [applause] If there were no other needs or other priorities in the country one could say, "Well, all right. This is something we can do," but I don't think this is the situation today. Senator Kennedy was asked by a young lady in the Coliseum audience what steps he would take to end the war in Vietnam and to solve the problems of the nation's cities and the urban and rural poor. [Kennedy]Well, I tell you, I would be glad to say what I would to do in both the -- for unemployment

in the United States. I think that the... and also I'll be glad to tell you what I would do and what I've suggested be done over the period of the last several years in Vietnam. I think at first, as I said, that I think that they have to end the corruption and the dishonesty in the government of South Vietnam. Secondly, that they have to call for general mobilization. Third, I think that they should have drafted their - began - begin drafting their 18-year-olds and their 19-year-olds at a much earlier date than they have. I think they should use all the resources within their country. Fourth, I think they should broaden the political base of the government in South Vietnam and not have it dependent just on General Ky and General Thieu. Fifth, I would take steps to end our search and destroy missions. Sixth, I would take the step of withdrawing, bringing our own troops. down from the DMZ as rapidly as possible. If it's felt that it was necessary to have troops up there I think that they should be

South Vietnamese troops. The next, I would make it quite clear that we would negotiate with the National Liberation Front. That we would talk with the National Liberation Front. And that we would meet with the National Liberation Front. I would stop the bombing, as I have said, in North Vietnam to bring about negotiations. I thought we should have done it in February of 1967. I advocated it at that time. I thought it was clear from the statements that were made by Ho Chi Minh and were made by Pham Van Dong that they were to come to the negotiating table. Secretary McNamara's testimony before the congressional committee indicated quite clearly that the bombing wasn't going to stop the North from sending whatever men and materials they needed into the South. And therefore, I didn't feel that it was a great risk for the United States to take, that we could stop the bombing of the North, that we could go to the negotiating table and see if we could find a negotiated settlement. Once we get to the negotiating table, I said that I felt that we had to make it clear that our adversaries, which included the

National Liberation Front and the Viet Cong, would play some role in the political process, the future political process, of South Vietnam. That whether that was a coalition government or whether it was some other form of government, I didn't specify. I felt that that should be worked out by those who were negotiating at the time and not by us in advance of that. But, at least they were going...we have to recognize the fact that they were coming to the negotiating table -- not to surrender, not to hand over their swords, not do as it was at Appomattox or not as it was on the Battleship Missouri. That it would be negotiations, and we would have to give something up, and that they in turn would have to give something up. But I thought it was clear that our principle had to be, is that we wouldn't turn the South Vietnamese over against their will to a foreign power or a foreign ideology. That it was going to be left up to the South Vietnamese to do what they wanted in the future. And I thought for the North Vietnamese, what they could not conceive was that a government would be established in South Vietnam which would be kept

in power and kept in authority and kept in position by the military might of the United States. I thought those were two points. One point that we couldn't concede, and the other point that we have to accept that the North Vietnamese and the Viet Cong couldn't concede but beyond that I thought this subject was open to negotiation. Once we accepted the idea that we had to negotiate with the National Liberation Front, and once we accepted the idea that this - all of these people would play some future role in the political process of South Vietnam those are about 12 steps that I would take if I was elected President of the United States. [applause] Let me just tell you what I would do as far as the cities are concerned: just briefly. But the most important step that we should be taking at the moment is jobs. And I think government should be the employer of the last resort and that we should have an appropriation by the government. There are many needed jobs and many jobs

that are necessary within the ghetto and in other rural areas of the United States that need to be done. I'd put those who are presently on welfare and those who are unemployed, I'd put them to work doing those jobs. Second.. [applause] Second, I would take -- give a tax incentive and tax credits to the private sector to get them actively involved in dealing with the social problems of our country. I'd get them... [applause] I wouldn't have it run just out of Washington, which all of these programs have been in the past, I'd bring it back to local control and local direction. I would have them go in to do housing. Out of the 500 largest companies in the United States, only one company is involved in housing. I would have them involved in housing and I'd make it attractive for them, we'd make it attractive for business to go bi-- go dig oil wells. Through tax incentives that have them - make it attractive for them to build housing in

areas of great unemployment or at ghetto areas or rural areas where there is a great poverty. Secondly, I would give them tax credits to establish business and take people off welfare. With special tax credits if they took people off welfare or people who are presently unemployed. I would do -- take those steps, and I would also have an active effort within the area so that the people could decide and determine their own future, and that it's not Washington, it's not the state government, it's not some white people that come in from the outside and tell other people what's best for them. I think that's terribly important. [applause] Here are answers by Senator Kennedy and Senator McCarthy to the same question. As president what would you do about the draft? [Kennedy] But as far as the principle of it I would -- that's the direction I would want to move in. But I would not move into that -- in that direction, while the war in Vietnam is going on. I don't think it would be fair or equitable

to do it in any other way than that every individual would serve his time, and that otherwise I think the war would become, even more than it is at the present time, a poor man's war. I think that I would... I voted against the draft because I thought it was inequitable and unfair. I'm opposed to ending the deferments in graduate school at the moment because I think that's unfair and makes no sense. [McCarthy] Proposal made by the President's commission on the draft was that there should be a lottery, which with some exceptions, would run across the board for those who were subject to the draft. That would have been the fair and the more equitable way to proceed. But not having done that, and now coming on to the question of what do you do about graduate school students: You compound the mistake by trying to make it right with a second mistake, which has the effect of dislocating and disordering science, and research, and education,

which I could say the simple thing of course is to cut back on a war. That's too easy a solution. I think we have to have a draft. I don't think we should try to develop a professional army in this country because it would be more -- even more, independent, really, and detached from social control than the army we have now with the draft. In presenting tonight's program, Oregon Educational Broadcasting, as an agency of the State of Oregon, takes no position on political or controversial matters. This has been a public affairs presentation of Oregon Educational Broadcasting recorded at KOAC TV in Corvallis. A.