LT Saloon

Republican Party Platform of 1956
August 20, 1956

Declaration of Faith

America’s trust is in the merciful providence of God, in whose image every man is created … the source of every man’s dignity and freedom.

In this trust our Republic was founded. We give devoted homage to the Founding Fathers. They not only proclaimed that the freedom and rights of men came from the Creator and not from the State, but they provided safeguards to those freedoms.

Our Government was created by the people for all the people, and it must serve no less a purpose.

The Republican Party was formed 100 years ago to preserve the Nation’s devotion to these ideals.

On its Centennial, the Republican Party again calls to the minds of all Americans the great truth first spoken by Abraham Lincoln: “The legitimate object of Government is to do for a community of people whatever they need to have done but cannot do at all, or cannot so well do, for themselves in their separate and individual capacities. But in all that people can individually do as well for themselves, Government ought not to interfere.”

Our great President Dwight D. Eisenhower has counseled us further: “In all those things which deal with people, be liberal, be human. In all those things which deal with people’s money, or their economy, or their form of government, be conservative.”

While jealously guarding the free institutions and preserving the principles upon which our Republic was founded and has flourished, the purpose of the Republican Party is to establish and maintain a peaceful world and build at home a dynamic prosperity in which every citizen fairly shares.

We shall ever build anew, that our children and their children, without distinction because of race, creed or color, may know the blessings of our free land.

We believe that basic to governmental integrity are unimpeachable ethical standards and irreproachable personal conduct by all people in government. We shall continue our insistence on honesty as an indispensable requirement of public service. We shall continue to root out corruption whenever and wherever it appears.

We are proud of and shall continue our far-reaching and sound advances in matters of basic human needs—expansion of social security—broadened coverage in unemployment insurance —improved housing—and better health protection for all our people. We are determined that our government remain warmly responsive to the urgent social and economic problems of our people.

To these beliefs we commit ourselves as we present this record and declare our goals for the future.

Nearly four years ago when the people of this Nation entrusted their Government to President Eisenhower and the Republican Party, we were locked in a costly and stalemated war. Now we have an honorable peace, which has stopped the bitter toll in casualties and resources, ended depressing wartime restraints, curbed the runaway inflation and unleashed the boundless energy of our people to forge forward on the road to progress.

In four years we have achieved the highest economic level with the most widely shared benefits that the world has ever seen. We of the Republican Party have fostered this prosperity and are dedicated to its expansion and to the preservation of the climate in which it has thrived.

We are proud of our part in bringing into a position of unique authority in the world one who symbolizes, as can no other man, the hopes of all peoples for peace, liberty and justice. One leader in the world today towers above all others and inspires the trust, admiration, confidence and good will of all the peoples of every nation—Dwight D. Eisenhower. Under his leadership, the Republican Administration has carried out foreign policies which have enabled our people to enjoy in peace the blessings of liberty. We shall continue to work unceasingly for a just and enduring peace in a world freed of tyranny.

Every honorable means at our command has been exercised to alleviate the grievances and causes of armed conflict among nations. The advance of Communism and its enslavement of people has been checked, and, at key points, thrown back. Austria, Iran and Guatemala have been liberated from Kremlin control. Forces of freedom are at work in the nations still enslaved by Communist imperialism.

We firmly believe in the right of peoples everywhere to determine their form of government, their leaders, their destiny, in peace. Where needed, in order to promote peace and freedom throughout the world, we shall within the prudent limits of our resources, assist friendly countries in their determined efforts to strengthen their economies.

We hold high hopes for useful service to mankind in the power of the atom. We shall generously assist the International Atomic Energy Agency, now evolving from President Eisenhower’s “Atoms for Peace” proposal, in an effort to find ways to dedicate man’s genius not to his death, but to his life.

We maintain that no treaty or international agreement can deprive any of our citizens of Constitutional rights. We shall see to it that no treaty or agreement with other countries attempts to deprive our citizens of the rights guaranteed them by the Federal Constitution.

President Eisenhower has given the world bold proposals for mutual arms reduction and protection against aggression through flying sentinels in an “open sky.”

We support this and his further offer of United States participation in an international fund for economic development financed from the savings brought by true disarmament. We approve his determined resistance to disarmament without effective inspection.

We work and pray for the day when the domination of any people from any source will have ended, and when there will be liberation and true freedom for the hundreds of millions of individuals now held in subjugation. We shall continue to dedicate our best efforts to this lofty purpose.

We shall continue vigorously to support the United Nations.

We shall continue to oppose the seating of Communist China in the United Nations.

We shall maintain our powerful military strength as a deterrent to aggression and as a guardian of the peace. We shall maintain it ready, balanced and technologically advanced for these objectives only.

Good times in America have reached a breadth and depth never before known by any nation. Moreover, it is a prosperity of a nation at peace, not at war. We shall continue to encourage the good business and sound employee relationships which have made possible for the first time in our history a productive capacity of more than $400 billion a year. Nearly 67 million people have full-time jobs, with real wages and personal income at record highs.

The farmers of America are at last able to look to the future with a confidence based on expanding peacetime markets instead of on politically contrived formulas foredoomed to fail except in a wartime economy. The objective is to insure that agriculture shares fairly and fully in our record prosperity without needless Federal meddlings and domination.

Restoration of integrity in government has been an essential element to the achievement of our unparalleled good times. We will faithfully preserve the sound financial management which already has reduced annual spending $14 billion below the budgets planned by our Democratic predecessors and made possible in 1954 a $7.4-billion tax cut, the largest one-year tax reduction in history.

We will ever fight the demoralizing influence of inflation as a national way of life. We are proud to have fulfilled our 1952 pledge to halt the skyrocketing cost of living that in the previous 13 years had cut the value of the dollar by half, and robbed millions of the full value of their wages, savings, insurance, pensions and social security.

We have balanced the budget. We believe and will continue to prove that thrift, prudence and a sensible respect for living within income applies as surely to the management of our Government’s budget as it does to the family budget.

We hold that the major world issue today is whether Government shall be the servant or the master of men. We hold that the Bill of Rights is the sacred foundation of personal liberty. That men are created equal needs no affirmation, but they must have equality of opportunity and protection of their civil rights under the law.

We hold that the strict division of powers and the primary responsibility of State and local governments must be maintained, and that the centralization of powers in the national Government leads to expansion of the mastery of our lives,

We hold that the protection of the freedom of men requires that budgets be balanced, waste in government eliminated, and taxes reduced.

In these and all other areas of proper Government concern, we pledge our best thought and whole energy to a continuation of our prized peace, prosperity and progress.

For our guidance in fulfilling this responsibility, President Eisenhower has given us a statement of principles that is neither partisan nor prejudiced, but warmly American:

The individual is of supreme importance.

The spirit of our people is the strength of our nation.

America does not prosper unless all Americans prosper.

Government must have a heart as well as a head.

Courage in principle, cooperation in practice make freedom positive.

To stay free, we must stay strong.

Under God, we espouse the cause of freedom and justice and peace for all peoples. Embracing these guides to positive, constructive action, and in their rich spirit, we ask the support of the American people for the election of a Republican Congress and the re-election of the Nation’s devoted and dedicated leader—Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Declaration of Determination

In the interest of complete public understanding, elaboration of Republican aspirations and achievements is desirable in the areas of broadest public concern.

Dynamic Economy—Free Labor

Taxation and Fiscal Policy

The Republican Party takes pride in calling attention to the outstanding fiscal achievements of the Eisenhower Administration, several of which are mentioned in the foreword to these resolutions.

In order to progress further in correcting the unfortunate results of unwise financial management during 20 years of Democrat Administrations, we pledge to pursue the following objectives:

Further reductions in Government spending as recommended in the Hoover Commission Report, without weakening the support of a superior defense program or depreciating the quality of essential services of government to our people.

Continued balancing of the budget, to assure the financial strength of the country which is so vital to the struggle of the free world in its battle against Communism; and to maintain the purchasing power of a sound dollar, and the value of savings, pensions and insurance.

Gradual reduction of the national debt.

Then, insofar as consistent with a balanced budget, we pledge to work toward these additional objectives:

Further reductions in taxes with particular consideration for low and middle income families.

Initiation of a sound policy of tax reductions which will encourage small independent businesses to modernize and progress.

Continual study of additional ways to correct inequities in the effect of various taxes.

Consistent with the Republican Administration’s accomplishment in stemming the inflation —which under five Democrat Administrations had cut the value of the dollar in half, and so had robbed the wage earner and millions of thrifty citizens who had savings, pensions and insurance—we endorse the present policy of freedom for the Federal Reserve System to combat both inflation and deflation by wise fiscal policy.

The Republican Party believes that sound money, which retains its buying power, is an essential foundation for new jobs, a higher standard of living, protection of savings, a secure national defense, and the general economic growth of the country.

Business and Economic Policy

The Republican Party has as a primary concern the continued advancement of the well-being of the individual. This can be attained only in an economy that, as today, is sound, free and creative, ever building new wealth and new jobs for all the people.

We believe in good business for all business—small, medium and large. We believe that competition in a free economy opens unrivaled opportunity and brings the greatest good to the greatest number.

The sound economic policies of the Eisenhower Administration have created an atmosphere of confidence in which good businesses flourish and can plan for growth to create new job opportunities for our expanding population.

We have eliminated a host of needless controls. To meet the immense demands of our expanding economy, we have initiated the largest highway, air and maritime programs in history, each soundly financed.

We shall continue to advocate the maintenance and expansion of a strong, efficient, privately-owned and operated and soundly financed system of transportation that will serve all of the needs of our Nation under Federal regulatory policies that will enable each carrier to realize its inherent economic advantages and its full competitive capabilities.

We recognize the United States’ world leadership in aviation, and we shall continue to encourage its technical development and vigorous expansion. Our goal is to support and sponsor air services and to make available to our citizens the safest and most comprehensive air transportation. We favor adequate funds and expeditious action in improving air safety, and highest efficiency in the control of air traffic.

We stand for forward-looking programs, created to replace our war-built merchant fleet with the most advanced types in design, with increased speed. Adaptation of new propulsion power units, including nuclear, must be sponsored and achieved.

We should proceed with the prompt construction of the Atomic Powered Peace Ship in order that we may demonstrate to the world, in this as in other fields, the peaceful uses of the atom.

Our steadily rising prosperity is constantly reflecting the confidence of our citizens in the policies of our Republican Administration.

Small Business

We pledge the continuation and improvement of our drive to aid small business. Every constructive potential avenue of improvement both legislative and executive—has been explored in our search for ways in which to widen opportunities for this important segment of America’s economy.

Beginning with our creation of the very successful Small Business Administration, and continuing through the recently completed studies and recommendations of the Cabinet Committee on Small Business, which we strongly endorse, we have focused our attention on positive measures to help small businesses get started and grow.

Small Business can look forward to expanded participation in federal procurement—valuable financing and technical aids—a continuously vigorous enforcement of anti-trust laws—important cuts in the burdens of paper work, and certain tax reductions as budgetary requirements permit.

Small business now is receiving approximately one-third, dollar-wise, of all Defense contracts. We recommend a further review of procurement procedures for all defense departments and agencies with a view to facilitating and extending such participation for the further benefit of Small Business.

We favor loans at reasonable rates of interest to small businesses which have records of permanency but who are in temporary need and which are unable to obtain credit in commercial channels. We recommend an extension at the earliest opportunity of the Small Business Administration which is now scheduled to expire in mid 1957.

We also propose:

Additional technical research in problems of development and distribution for the benefit of small business;

Legislation to enable closer Federal scrutiny of mergers which have a significant or potential monopolistic connotations;

Procedural changes in the antitrust laws to facilitate their enforcement;

Simplification of wage reporting by employers for purposes of social security records and income tax withholding;

Continuance of the vigorous SEC policies which are providing maximum protection to the investor and maximum opportunity for the financing of small business without costly red tape.

Labor

Under the Republican Administration, as our country has prospered, so have its people. This is as it should be, for as President Eisenhower said: “Labor is the United States. The men and women, who with their minds, their hearts and hands, create the wealth that is shared in this country—they are America.”

The Eisenhower Administration has brought to our people the highest employment, the highest wages and the highest standard of living ever enjoyed by any nation. Today there are nearly 67 million men and women at work in the United States, 4 million more than in 1952. Wages have increased substantially over the past 3 1/2 years; but, more important, the American wage earner today can buy more than ever before for himself and his family because his pay check has not been eaten away by rising taxes and soaring prices.

The record of performance of the Republican Administration on behalf of our working men and women goes still further. The Federal minimum wage has been raised for more than 2 million workers. Social Security has been extended to an additional 10 million workers and the benefits raised for 6 1/2 million. The protection of unemployment insurance has been brought to 4 million additional workers. There have been increased workmen’s compensation benefits for longshoremen and harbor workers, increased retirement benefits for railroad employees, and wage increases and improved welfare and pension plans for federal employees.

In addition, the Eisenhower Administration has enforced more vigorously and effectively than ever before, the laws which protect the working standards of our people.

Workers have benefited by the progress which has been made in carrying out the programs and principles set forth in the 1952 Republican platform. All workers have gained and unions have grown in strength and responsibility, and have increased their membership by 2 millions.

Furthermore, the process of free collective bargaining has been strengthened by the insistence of this Administration that labor and management settle their differences at the bargaining table without the intervention of the Government. This policy has brought to our country an unprecedented period of labor-management peace and understanding.

We applaud the effective, unhindered, collective bargaining which brought an early end to the 1956 steel strike, in contrast to the six months’ upheaval, Presidential seizure of the steel industry and ultimate Supreme Court intervention under the last Democrat Administration.

The Eisenhower Administration will continue to fight for dynamic and progressive programs which, among other things, will:

Stimulate improved job safety of our workers, through assistance to the States, employees and employers;

Continue and further perfect its programs of assistance to the millions of workers with special employment problems, such as older workers, handicapped workers, members of minority groups, and migratory workers;

Strengthen and improve the Federal-State Employment Service and improve the effectiveness of the unemployment insurance system;

Protect by law, the assets of employee welfare and benefit plans so that workers who are the beneficiaries can be assured of their rightful benefits;

Assure equal pay for equal work regardless of Sex;

Clarify and strengthen the eight-hour laws for the benefit of workers who are subject to federal wage standards on Federal and Federally-assisted construction, and maintain and continue the vigorous administration of the Federal prevailing minimum wage law for public supply contracts;

Extend the protection of the Federal minimum wage laws to as many more workers as is possible and practicable;

Continue to fight for the elimination of discrimination in employment because of race, creed, color, national origin, ancestry or sex;

Provide assistance to improve the economic conditions of areas faced with persistent and substantial unemployment;

Revise and improve the Taft-Hartley Act so as to protect more effectively the rights of labor unions, management, the individual worker, and the public. The protection of the right of workers to organize into unions and to bargain collectively is the firm and permanent policy of the Eisenhower Administration. In 1954, 1955 and again in 1956, President Eisenhower recommended constructive amendments to this Act. The Democrats in Congress have consistently blocked these needed changes by parliamentary maneuvers. The Republican Party pledges itself to overhaul and improve the Taft-Hartley Act along the lines of these recommendations.

Human Welfare and Advancement

Health, Education and Welfare

The Republican Party believes that the physical, mental, and spiritual well-being of the people is as important as their economic health. It will continue to support this conviction with vigorous action.

Republican action created the Department of Health, Education and Welfare as the first new Federal department in 40 years, to raise the continuing consideration of these problems for the first time to the highest council of Government, the President’s Cabinet.

Through the White House Conference on Education, our Republican Administration initiated the most comprehensive Community-State-Federal attempt ever made to solve the pressing problems of primary and secondary education.

Four thousand communities, studying their school populations and their physical and financial resources, encouraged our Republican Administration to urge a five-year program of Federal assistance in building schools to relieve a critical classroom shortage.

The Republican Party will renew its efforts to enact a program based on sound principles of need and designed to encourage increased state and local efforts to build more classrooms.

Our Administration also proposed for the first time in history, a thorough nation-wide analysis of rapidly growing problems in education beyond the high schools.

The Republican Party is determined to press all such actions that will help insure that every child has the educational opportunity to advance to his own greatest capacity.

We have fully resolved to continue our steady gains in man’s unending struggle against disease and disability.

We have supported the distribution of free vaccine to protect millions of children against dreaded polio.

Republican leadership has enlarged Federal assistance for construction of hospitals, emphasizing low-cost care of chronic diseases and the special problems of older persons, and increased Federal aid for medical care of the needy.

We have asked the largest increase in research funds ever sought in one year to intensify attacks on cancer, mental illness, heart disease and other dread diseases.

We demand once again, despite the reluctance of the Democrat 84th Congress, Federal assistance to help build facilities to train more physicians and scientists.

We have encouraged a notable expansion and improvement of voluntary health insurance, and urge that reinsurance and pooling arrangements be authorized to speed this progress.

We have strengthened the Food and Drug Administration, and we have increased the vocational rehabilitation program to enable a larger number of the disabled to return to satisfying activity.

We have supported measures that have made more housing available than ever before in history, reduced urban slums in local-federal partnership, stimulated record home ownership, and authorized additional low-rent public housing.

We initiated the first flood insurance program in history under Government sponsorship in cooperation with private enterprise.

We shall continue to seek extension and perfection of a sound social security system.

We pledge close cooperation with State, local and private agencies to reduce the ghastly toll of fatalities on the Nation’s highways.

Rural America’s Recovery—Agriculture

The men and women operating the farms and ranches of America have confidence in President Eisenhower and the Republican farm program. Our farmers have earned the respect and appreciation of our entire nation for their energy, resourcefulness, efficiency, and ability.

Agriculture, our basic industry, must remain free and prosperous. The Republican Party will continue to move boldly to help the farmer obtain his full share of the rewards of good business and good Government. It is committed to a program for agriculture which creates the widest possible markets and highest attainable income for our farm and ranch families. This program must be versatile and flexible to meet effectively the impact of rapidly changing conditions. It does not envision making farmers dependent upon direct governmental payments for their incomes. Our objective is markets which return full parity to our farm and ranch people when they sell their products. There is no simple, easy answer to farm problems. Our approach as ever is a many-sided, versatile and positive program to help all farmers and ranchers.

Farm legislation, developed under the Democrat Administration to stimulate production in wartime, carried a built-in mechanism for the accumulation of price-depressing surpluses in peacetime. Under laws sponsored by the Republican Administration, almost $7 billion in price-depressing surplus farm products have been moved into use, and the rate of movement is being accelerated.

Agriculture is successfully making the transition from wartime to peacetime markets, with less disruption than at any time after a great war. We are gratified by the improvement this year in farm prices and income as a result of our policies.

Our Republican Administration fostered a constructive Soil Bank Program further to reduce surpluses and to permit improvement of our soil, water and timber resources. The Democrat Party tactics of obstruction and delay have prevented our farm families from receiving the full benefits of this program in 1956.

However, by aggressive action, we now have the Soil Bank in operation, and in 3 months, half a million farmers have contracted to shift more than 10 million acres from producing more surpluses to a soil reserve for the future. For this they already have earned $225 million.

This program is a sound aid to removing the burdens of surpluses which Democrat programs placed on farmers. It is now moving into full operation.

Benefits of Social Security have been extended to farm families. Programs of loans and grants for farm families hit by flood and drought have been made operative.

Tax laws were improved to help farmers with respect to livestock, farm equipment, and conservation practices. We initiated action to refund to the farmers $60 million annually in taxes on gasoline used in machinery on the farm.

Cooperation between the U. S. Department of Agriculture, the State Departments of Agriculture and land grant colleges and universities is at an all-time high. This Republican Administration has increased support for agricultural research and education to the highest level in history. New records of assistance to farm and ranch families in soil and water conservation were attained in every year of this Republican Administration.

Convinced that the Government should ever be the farmer’s helper, never his master, the Republican Party is pledged:

To establish an effective, new research program, fully and completely implemented to find and vigorously promote new uses for farm crops;

To move our agriculture commodities into use at home and abroad, and to use every appropriate and effective means to improve marketing, so that farmers can produce and sell their products to increase their income and enjoy an improving level of living;

To encourage the improvement of quality in farm products through agricultural research, education and price support differentials, thus increasing market acceptance both at home and abroad;

To further help and cooperate with the several States as co-equals with the federal government to provide needed research, education, service and regulatory programs;

To develop farm programs that are fair to all farmers;

To work toward full freedom instead of toward more regimentation, developing voluntary rather than oppressive farm programs;

To encourage agricultural producers in their efforts to seek solutions to their own production and price problems;

To provide price supports as in the Agricultural Act of 1954 that protect farmers, rather than price their products out of the market;

To continue our commodity loan and marketing agreement programs as effective marketing tools;

To make every effort to develop a more accurate measurement of farm parity;

To safeguard our precious soil and water resources for generations yet unborn;

To encourage voluntary self-supporting federal crop insurance;

To bring sympathetic and understanding relief promptly to farm and ranch families hard hit with problems of drought, flood or other natural disaster, or economic disaster, and to maintain the integrity of these programs by terminating them when the emergency is over;

To assist the young people of American farms and ranches in their development as future farmers and homemakers;

To continue and expand the Republican-sponsored school milk program, to encourage further use of the school lunch program now benefiting 11 million children, and to foster improved nutritional levels;

To provide constructive assistance by effective purchase and donation to ease temporary market surpluses, especially for the producers of perishable farm products;

To give full support to farmer-owned and farmer-operated co-operatives;

To encourage and assist adequate private and cooperative sources of credit, to provide supplemental credit through the Farmers Home Administration where needed, with an understanding of both the human and economic problems of farmers and ranchers;

To expand rural electrification through REA loans for generation and transmission, and to expand rural communication facilities;

To continue the improvement of rural mail delivery to farm families;

To promote fully the Republican-sponsored Rural-Development Program to broaden the operation and increase the income of low income farm families and help tenant farmers;

To work with farmers, ranchers and others to carry forward the Great Plains program to achieve wise use of lands in the area subject to wind erosion, so that the people of this region can enjoy a higher standard of living; and in summation:

To keep agriculture strong, free, attuned to peace and not war, to stand ready with a reserve

capacity at all times as a part of our defense, based on sound agricultural economy.

We are an expanding nation. Our needs for farm products will continue to grow. Farm prices are improving and farm income is climbing.

Our farm and ranch people are confident of the future, despite efforts to frighten them into accepting economic nostrums and political panaceas. Record numbers of farms are owned by those who operate them.

The Republican Party is pledged to work for improved farm prices and farm income. We will seek that improvement boldly, in ways that protect the family farm. Our objective is a prosperous, expanding and free agriculture. We are dedicated to creating the opportunity for farmers to earn a high per-family income in a world at peace.

Federal Government Integrity

The Republican Party is wholeheartedly committed to maintaining a Federal Government that is clean, honorable and increasingly efficient. It proudly affirms that it has achieved this kind of Government and dedicated it to the service of all the people.

Our many economic and social advances of the past four years are the result of our faithful adherence to our 1952 pledge to reverse a 20-year Democratic philosophy calling for more and more power in Washington.

We have left no stone unturned to remove from Government the irresponsible and those whose employment was not clearly consistent with national security.

We believe that working for the Government is not a right but a privilege. Based on that principle we will continue a security program to make certain that all people employed by our Government are of unquestioned loyalty and trustworthiness. The Republican Party will, realistically and in conformity with constitutional safeguards for the individual, continue to protect our national security by enforcing our laws fairly, vigorously, and with certainty. We will act through the new division established to this end in the Department of Justice, and by close coordination among the intelligence services.

We promise unwavering vigilance against corruption and waste, and shall continue so to manage the public business as to warrant our people’s full confidence in the integrity of their Government.

We condemn illegal lobbying for any cause and improper use of money in political activities, including the use of funds collected by compulsion for political purposes contrary to the personal desires of the individual.

Efficiency and Economy in Government.

We pledge to continue our far reaching program for improving the efficiency and the effectiveness of the Federal Government in accordance with the principles set forth in the report of the Hoover Commission.

We are unalterably opposed to unwarranted growth of centralized Federal power. We shall carry forward the worthy effort of the Kestnbaum Commission on Intergovernmental Affairs to clarify Federal relationships and strengthen State and local government.

We shall continue to dispense with Federal activities wrongfully competing with private enterprise, and take other sound measures to reduce the cost of Government.

Governmental Affairs

Postal Service.

In the last four years, under direction from President Eisenhower to improve the postal service and reduce costs, we have modernized and revitalized the postal establishment from top to bottom, inside and out. We have undertaken and substantially completed the largest reorganization ever to take place in any unit of business or government:

We have provided more than 1200 badly-needed new post office buildings, and are adding two more every day. We are using the very latest types of industrial equipment where practicable; and, through a program of research and engineering, we are inventing new mechanical and electronic devices to speed the movement of mail by eliminating tedious old-fashioned methods.

We have improved service across the country in hundreds of ways. We have extended city carrier service to millions of new homes in thousands of urban and suburban communities which have grown and spread under the favorable economic conditions brought about by the Eisenhower Administration.

We have re-inspired the morale of our half-million employees through new programs of promotion based on ability, job training and safety, and through our sponsorship of increased pay and fringe benefits.

We have adopted the most modern methods of transportation, accounting and cost control, and other operating procedures; through them we have saved many millions of dollars a year for the taxpayers while advancing the delivery of billions of letters by a day or more—all this while reducing the enormous deficit of the Department from its all time high of almost three-quarters of a billion dollars in 1952 to less than half that amount in 1955.

We pledge to continue our efforts, blocked by the Democratic leadership of the 84th Congress, for a financially sound, more nearly self-sustaining postal service—with the users of the mails paying a greater share of the costs instead of the taxpayers bearing the burden of huge postal deficits.

We pledge to continue and to complete this vitally needed program of modernization of buildings, equipment, methods and service, so that the American people will receive the kind of mail delivery they deserve—the speediest and best that American ingenuity, technology and modern business management can provide.

Civil Service.

We will vigorously promote, as we have in the past, a non-political career service under the merit system which will attract and retain able servants of the people. Many gains in this field, notably pay increases and a host of new benefits, have been achieved in their behalf in less than four years.

The Republican Party will continue to fight for eagerly desired new advances for Government employees, and realistic reappraisement and adjustment of benefits for our retired civil service personnel.

Statehood for Alaska and Hawaii.

We pledge immediate statehood for Alaska, recognizing the fact that adequate provision for defense requirements must be made.

We pledge immediate statehood for Hawaii.

Puerto Rico.

We shall continue to encourage the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico in its political growth and economic development in accordance with the wishes of its people and the fundamental principle of self-determination.

Indian Affairs.

We shall continue to pursue our enlightened policies which are now producing exceptional advances in the long struggle to help the American Indian gain the material and social advantages of his birthright and citizenship, while maintaining to the fullest extent the cultural integrity of the various tribal groups.

We commend the present administration for its progressive programs which have achieved such striking progress in preparing our Indian citizens for participation in normal community life. Health, educational and employment opportunities for Indians have been greatly expanded beyond any previous level, and we favor still further extensions of these programs.

We favor most sympathetic and constructive execution of the Federal trusteeship over Indian affairs, always in full consultation with Indians in the management of their interests and the expansion of their rights of self-government in local and tribal affairs.

We urge the prompt adjudication or settlement of pending Indian claims.

District of Columbia.

We favor self-government, national suffrage and representation in the Congress of the United States for residents of the District of Columbia.

Equal Rights.

We recommend to Congress the submission of a constitutional amendment providing equal rights for men and women.

Equal Opportunity and Justice

Civil Rights

The Republican Party points to an impressive record of accomplishment in the field of civil rights and commits itself anew to advancing the rights of all our people regardless of race, creed, color or national origin.

In the area of exclusive Federal jurisdiction, more progress has been made in this field under the present Republican Administration than in any similar period in the last 80 years.

The many Negroes who have been appointed to high public positions have played a significant part in the progress of this Administration.

Segregation has been ended in the District of Columbia Government and in the District public facilities including public schools, restaurants, theaters and playgrounds. The Eisenhower Administration has eliminated discrimination in all federal employment.

Great progress has been made in eliminating employment discrimination on the part of those who do business with the Federal Government and secure Federal contracts. This Administration has impartially enforced Federal civil rights statutes, and we pledge that we will continue to do so. We support the enactment of the civil rights program already presented by the President to the Second Session of the 84th Congress.

The regulatory agencies under this Administration have moved vigorously to end discrimination in interstate commerce. Segregation in the active Armed Forces of the United States has been ended. For the first time in our history there is no segregation in veterans’ hospitals and among civilians on naval bases. This is an impressive record. We pledge ourselves to continued progress in this field.

The Republican Party has unequivocally recognized that the supreme law of the land is embodied in the Constitution, which guarantees to all people the blessings of liberty, due process and equal protection of the laws. It confers upon all native-born and naturalized citizens not only citizenship in the State where the individual resides but citizenship of the United States as well. This is an unqualified right, regardless of race, creed or color.

The Republican Party accepts the decision of the U.S.. Supreme Court that racial discrimination in publicly supported schools must be progressively eliminated. We concur in the conclusion of the Supreme Court that its decision directing school desegregation should be accomplished with “all deliberate speed” locally through Federal District Courts. The implementation order of the Supreme Court recognizes the complex and acutely emotional problems created by its decision in certain sections of our country where racial patterns have been developed in accordance with prior and long-standing decisions of the same tribunal.

We believe that true progress can be attained through intelligent study, understanding, education and good will. Use of force or violence by any group or agency will tend only to worsen the many problems inherent in the situation. This progress must be encouraged and the work of the courts supported in every legal manner by all branches of the Federal Government to the end that the constitutional ideal of the law, regardless of race, creed or color, be steadily achieved.

Immigration

The Republican Party supports an immigration policy which is in keeping with the traditions of America in providing a haven for oppressed peoples, and which is based on equality of treatment, freedom from implications of discrimination between racial, nationality and religious groups, and flexible enough to conform to changing needs and conditions.

We believe that such a policy serves our self-interest, reflects our responsibility for world leadership and develops maximum cooperation with other nations in resolving problems in this area.

We support the President’s program submitted to the 84th Congress to carry out needed modifications in existing law and to take such further steps as may be necessary to carry out our traditional policy.

In that concept, this Republican Administration sponsored the Refugee Relief Act to provide asylum for thousands of refugees, expellees and displaced persons, and undertook in the face of Democrat opposition to correct the inequities in existing law and to bring our immigration policies in line with the dynamic needs of the country and principles of equity and justice.

We believe also that the Congress should consider the extension of the Refugee Relief Act of 1953 in resolving this difficult refugee problem which resulted from world conflict. To all this we give our wholehearted support.

Human Freedom and Peace

Under the leadership of President Eisenhower, the United States has advanced foreign policies which enable our people to enjoy the blessings of liberty and peace.

The changes in the international scene have been so great that it is easy to forget the conditions we inherited in 1953.

Peace, so hardly won in 1945, had again been lost. The Korean War, with its tragic toll of more than an eighth of a million American casualties, seemed destined to go on indefinitely. Its material costs and accompanying inflation were undermining our economy.

Freedom was under assault, and despotism was on the march. Armed conflict continued in the Far East, and tensions mounted elsewhere.

The threat of global war increased daily.

International Communism which, in 1945, ruled the 200 million people in the Soviet Union and Baltic States, was conquering so that, by 1952, it dominated more than 700 million people in 15 once-independent nations.

Today.

Now, we are at peace. The Korean War has been ended. The Communist aggressors have been denied their goals.

The threat of global war has receded.

The advance of Communism has been checked, and, at key points, thrown back. The once-monolithic structure of International Communism, denied the stimulant of successive conquests, has shown hesitancy both internally and abroad.

The Far East.

The Korean War was brought to a close when the Communist rulers were made to realize that they could not win.

The United States has made a Collective Defense Treaty with the Republic of Korea which will exclude, for the future, the Communist miscalculation as to announced American interests and intentions which led to the original aggression.

The United States has made a security Treaty with the Republic of China coveting Formosa and the Pescadores; and the Congress, by virtually unanimous action, has authorized the President to employ the armed forces of the United States to defend this area. As a result, the Chinese Communists have not attempted to implement their announced intention to take Formosa by force.

In Indochina, the Republics of Vietnam and Cambodia and Laos are now free and independent nations. The Republic of Vietnam, with the United States assistance, has denied the Communists the gains which they expected from the withdrawal of French forces.

The security of Southeast Asia has now been bolstered by the collective-defense system of SEATO, and its peoples encouraged by the declarations in the Pacific Charter of the principles of equal rights and self-determination of peoples.

The Middle East and Southeast Asia.

The Middle East has been strengthened by the defensive unity of the four “northern tier” countries—Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Pakistan—which hold gateways to the vast oil resources upon which depend the industry and military strength of the free world. This was made possible by the liberation of Iran from the grip of the Communist Tudeh Party. Iran has again made its oil reserves available to the world under an equitable settlement negotiated by the United States.

We have maintained, and will maintain, friendly relations with all nations in this vital area, seeking to mediate differences among them, and encouraging their legitimate national aspirations.

Europe.

In Western Europe, the scene has been transformed. The Federal Republic of Germany, which until 1953 was denied sovereignty and the opportunity to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, has now had full sovereignty restored by the Treaties of 1954, and has become a member of NATO despite the intense opposition of the Soviet Union.

NATO itself has been strengthened by developing reliance upon new weapons and retaliatory power, thus assisting the NATO countries increasingly to attain both economic welfare and adequate military defense.

On our initiative, the political aspects of NATO are being developed. Instead of being merely a military alliance, NATO will provide a means for coordinating the policies of the member states on vital matters, such as the reunification of Germany, the liberation of the satellites, and general policies in relation to the Soviet Union.

Austria has been liberated. The freedom treaty, blocked since 1947 by the Soviet Union, was signed in 1955. For the first time since the end of World War II, Red Army forces in Europe evacuated occupied lands.

The emotion-charged dispute between Italy and Yugoslavia about Trieste was settled with the active participation of the United States. The City of Trieste was restored to Italian sovereignty, and United States and British forces withdrawn.

The Spanish base negotiations, which had long languished, were successfully concluded, and close working relations in this important respect established between the United States and Spain.

The Americas.

Our good neighbor policy continues to prove its wisdom.

The American Republics have taken effective steps against the cancer of Communism. At the Caracas Conference of March, 1954, they agreed that if International Communism gained control of the political institutions of any American republic, this would endanger them all, and would call for collective measures to remove the danger. This new Doctrine, first proposed by the United States, extends into modern times the principles of the Monroe Doctrine.

A first fruit of the Caracas Doctrine was the expulsion of the Communist regime ruling Guatemala. Today, Guatemala is liberated from Kremlin control. The Organization of American States has grown in vigor. It has acted promptly and effectively to settle hemispheric disputes. In Costa Rica, for the first time in history, international aerial inspection was employed to maintain peace. The Panama Conference was probably the most successful in the long history of the Organization of American States in its promotion of good will, understanding and friendship.

Relations with Soviet Russia.

Far-reaching steps have been taken to eliminate the danger of a third world war. President Eisenhower led the way at Geneva. There he impressed the Soviet leaders and the world with the dedication of the United States to peace, but also with its determination not to purchase peace at the price of freedom.

That Summit Conference set new forces into motion. The Soviet rulers professed to renounce the use of violence, which Stalin had made basic in the Communist doctrine. Then followed a repudiation of Stalin, the growth of doctrinal disputes within the Communist Party, and a discrediting of Party authority and its evil power. Forces of liberalism within the Soviet Bloc challenge the brutal and atheistic doctrines of Soviet Communism. For the first time, we see positive evidence that forces of freedom and liberation will inevitably prevail if the free nations maintain their strength, unity and resolution.

The future.

We re-dedicate ourselves to the pursuit of a just peace and the defense of human liberty and national independence.

We shall continue vigorously to support the United Nations.

We shall continue our cooperation with our sister states of the Americas for the strengthening of our security, economic and social ties with them.

We shall continue to support the collective-security system begun in 1947 and steadily developed on a bipartisan basis. That system has joined the United States with 42 other nations in common defense of freedom. It has created a deterrent to war which cannot be nullified by Soviet veto.

Where needed, we shall help friendly countries maintain such local forces and economic strength as provide a first bulwark against Communist aggression or subversion. We shall reinforce that defense by a military capacity which, operating in accordance with the United Nations Charter, could so punish aggression that it ceases to be a profitable pursuit.

We will continue efforts with friends and allies to assist the underdeveloped areas of the free world in their efforts to attain greater freedom, independence and self-determination, and to raise their standards of living.

We recognize the existence of a major threat to international peace in the Near East. We support a policy of impartial friendship for the peoples of the Arab states and Israel to promote a peaceful settlement of the causes of tension in that area, including the human problem of the Palestine-Arab refugees.

Progress toward a just settlement of the tragic conflict between the Jewish State and the Arab nations in Palestine was upset by the Soviet Bloc sale of arms to Arab countries. But prospects of peace have now been reinforced by the mission to Palestine of the United Nations Secretary General upon the initiative of the United States.

We regard the preservation of Israel as an important tenet of American foreign policy. We are determined that the integrity of an independent Jewish State shall be maintained. We shall support the independence of Israel against armed aggression. The best hope for peace in the Middle East lies in the United Nations. We pledge our continued efforts to eliminate the obstacles to a lasting peace in this area.

We shall continue to seek the reunification of Germany in freedom, and the liberation of the satellite states—Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Rumania, Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and other, once-free countries now behind the Iron Curtain. The Republican Party stands firmly with the peoples of these countries in their just quest for freedom. We are confident that our peaceful policies, resolutely pursued, will finally restore freedom and national independence to oppressed peoples and nations.

We continue to oppose the seating of Communist China in the United Nations, thus upholding international morality. To seat a Communist China which defies, by word and deed, the principles of the United Nations Charter would be to betray the letter, violate the spirit and subvert the purposes of that charter. It would betray our friend and ally, the Republic of China. We will continue our determined efforts to free the remaining Americans held prisoner by Communist China.

Recognizing economic health as an indispensable basis of military strength and world peace, we shall strive to foster abroad and to practice at home, policies to encourage productivity and profitable trade.

Barriers which impede international trade and the flow of capital should be reduced on a gradual, selective and reciprocal basis, with full recognition of the necessity to safeguard domestic enterprises, agriculture and labor against unfair import competition. We proudly point out that the Republican Party was primarily responsible for initiating the escape clause and peril point provisions of law to make effective the necessary safeguards for American agriculture, labor and business. We pledge faithful and expeditious administration of these provisions.

We are against any trade with the Communist world that would threaten the security of the United States and our allies.

We recognize that no single nation can alone defend the liberty of all nations threatened by Communist aggression or subversion. Mutual security means effective mutual cooperation. Poverty and unrest in less developed countries make them the target for international communism. We must help them achieve the economic growth and stability necessary to attain and preserve their independence.

Technical and economic assistance programs are effective countermeasures to Soviet economic offensives and propaganda. They provide the best way to create the political and social stability essential to lasting peace.

We will strive to bring about conditions that will end the injustices of nations divided against their will, of nations held subject to foreign domination, of peoples deprived of the right of self-government.

We reaffirm the principle of freedom for all peoples, and look forward to the eventual end of colonialism.

We will overlook no opportunity that, with prudence, can be taken to bring about a progressive elimination of the barriers that interfere with the free flow of news, information and ideas, and the exchange of persons between the free peoples and the captive peoples of the world. We favor the continuance and development of the “exchange-of-persons” programs between free nations.

We approve appropriate action to oppose the imposition by foreign governments of discrimination against United States citizens, based on their religion or race.

We shall continue the bipartisan development of foreign policies. We hold this necessary if those policies are to have continuity, and be regarded by other free nations as dependable.

The Republican Party pledges itself to continue the dynamic, courageous, sound and patriotic policies which have protected and promoted the interests of the United States during the past four years.

In a world fraught with peril, peace can be won and preserved only by vigilance and inspired leadership. In such a world, we believe it is essential that the vast experience of our proven leader, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, continues to guide our country in the achievement and maintenance of a just, honorable and durable peace.

Bulwark for the Free World—Our National Defense

The military strength of the United States has been a key factor in the preservation of world peace during the past four years. We are determined to maintain that strength so long as our security and the peace of the world require it.

This Administration, within six months after President Eisenhower’s inauguration, ended the war in Korea by concluding an honorable armistice. The lesson of that war and our lack of preparedness which brought it about will not be forgotten. Such mistakes must not be repeated.

As we maintain and strengthen the security of this Nation, we shall, consistent with this Administration’s dedication to peace, strive for the acceptance of realistic proposals for disarmament and the humanitarian control of weapons of mass destruction.

Our country’s defense posture is today a visible and powerful deterrent against attack by any enemy, from any quarter, at any time.

We have the strongest striking force in the world—in the air—on the sea—and a magnificent supporting land force in our Army and Marine Corps. Such visible and powerful deterrents must continue to include:

A) A jet-powered, long-range strategic air force, and a tactical air force of the fastest and very latest type aircraft, with a striking capability superior to any other;

B) The most effective guided and ballistic missiles;

C) A modern navy, with a powerful naval aircraft arm prepared to keep the sea lanes open to meet any assignment;

D) An army whose mobility and unit firepower are without equal;

E) Bases, strategically dispersed at home and around the world, essential to all these operations.

We will maintain and improve the effective strength and state of readiness of all these armed forces.

To achieve this objective, we must depend upon attracting to, and retaining in our military services vigorous and well-trained manpower, and upon continuously maintaining in reserve, an enthusiastic and well-informed group of men and women. This will require incentives that will make armed service careers attractive and rewarding. A substantial start has been made toward bolstering the rewards and benefits that accompany a military career. We must continue to provide them.

In order that American youth in our armed services shall be provided with the most modern weapons, we have supported and will continue to support an effective and well-directed program of research and development, staffed by men of the highest caliber and ability in this field. There is no substitute for the best where the lives of our men and the defense of our Nation are concerned.

We fully appreciate the importance of scientific knowledge and its application particularly in the military field.

We pledge ourselves to stimulate and encourage the education of our young people in the sciences with a determination to maintain our technological leadership.

In this age of weapons of inconceivable destructiveness, we must not neglect the protection of the civilian population by all known means, while, at the same time, preparing our armed forces for every eventuality.

We wholeheartedly agree with President Eisenhower that our military defense must be backed by a strong civil defense, and that an effective civil defense is an important deterrent against attack upon our country, and an indispensable reliance should our nation ever be attacked.

We support his proposals for strengthening civil defense, mindful that it has become an effective Government arm to deal with natural disasters.

We shall continue to carry forward, vigorously and effectively, the valued services of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, as well as all other Government intelligence agencies, so as to insure that we are protected at all times against subversive activities. We will never relax our determined efforts to keep our Government, and our people, safely guarded against all enemies from within.

We agree and assert that civilian authority and control over our defense structure and program must be maintained at all times. We believe, without qualification, that in our present Commander-in-Chief, Dwight D. Eisenhower, this Nation possesses a leader equipped by training, temperament, and experience in war and in peace, for both that personal example and that direction of our national defense in which the American people will continue to have confidence, and in which the peoples of all the free world will find an increasing sense of security and of an opportunity for peace.

Veterans

We believe that active duty in the Armed Forces during a state of war or national emergency is the highest call of citizenship constituting a special service to our nation and entitles those who have served to positive assistance to alleviate the injuries, hardships and handicaps imposed by their service.

In recognizing this principle under previous Republican Administrations we established the Veterans Administration. This Republican Administration increased compensation and pension benefits for veterans and survivors to provide more adequate levels and to off-set cost of living increases that occurred during the most recent Democratic Administration.

We have also improved quality of hospital service and have established a long-range program for continued improvement of such service. We have strengthened and extended survivors’ benefits, thus affording greater security for all veterans in the interest of equity and justice.

In advancing this Republican program we pledge:

That compensation for injuries and disease arising out of service be fairly and generously provided for all disabled veterans and for their dependents or survivors;

That a pension program for disabled war veterans in need and for their widows and orphans in need be maintained as long as necessary to assure them adequate income;

That all veterans be given equal and adequate opportunity for readjustment following service, including unemployment compensation when needed, but placing emphasis on obtaining suitable employment for veterans, particularly those disabled, by using appropriate facilities of government and by assuring that Federal employment preference and re-employment rights, to which the veteran is entitled, are received;

That the Veterans Administration be continued as a single independent agency providing veterans services;

That the service-disabled continue to receive first-priority medical services of the highest standard and that non-service disabled war veterans in need receive hospital care to the extent that beds are available.

Guarding and Improving Our Resources

One of the brightest areas of achievement and progress under the Eisenhower Administration has been in resource conservation and development and in sound, long-range public works programing.

Policies of sound conservation and wise development—originally advanced half a century ago under that preeminent Republican conservation team of President Theodore Roosevelt and Gifford Pinchot and amplified by succeeding Republican Administrations—have been pursued by the Eisenhower Administration. While meeting the essential development needs of the people, this Administration has conserved and safeguarded our natural resources for the greatest good of all, now and in the future.

Our national parks, national forests and wildlife refuges are now more adequately financed, better protected and more extensive than ever before. Long-range improvement programs, such as Mission 66 for the National Parks system, are now under way, and studies are nearing completion for a comparable program for the National Forests. These forward-looking programs will be aggressively continued.

Our Republican Administration has modernized and vitalized our mining laws by the first major revision in more than 30 years.

Recreation, parks and wildlife.

ACHIEVEMENTS: Reversed the 15-year trend of neglect of our National Parks by launching the 10-year, $785 million Mission 66 parks improvement program. Has nearly completed field surveys for a comparable forest improvement program. Obtained passage of the so-called “Week-end Miner Bill.” Added more than 400,000 acres to our National Park system, and 90,000 acres to wildlife refuges. Has undertaken well-conceived measures to protect reserved areas of all types and to provide increased staffs and operating funds for public recreation agencies.

We favor full recognition of recreation as an important public use of our national forests and public domain lands.

We favor a comprehensive study of the effect upon wildlife of the drainage of our wetlands.

We favor recognition, by the States, of wild-life and recreation management and conservation as a beneficial use of water.

We subscribe to the general objectives of groups seeking to guard the beauty of our land and to promote clean, attractive surroundings throughout America.

We recognize the need for maintaining isolated wilderness areas to provide opportunity for future generations to experience some of the wilderness living through which the traditional American spirit of hardihood was developed.

Public land and forest resources.

ACHIEVEMENTS: Approved conservation programs of many types, including improvement of western grazing lands through reseeding programs, water-spreading systems, and encouragement of soil-and moisture-conservation practices by range users. Returned to the States their submerged lands and resources of their coasts, out to their historical boundaries—an area comprising about one tenth of the area off the Continental Shelf and about 17 per cent of the mineral resources. Initiated leasing of the Federally owned 83 per cent of the Continental Shelf which is expected ultimately to bring from 6 to 8 billion dollars into the Treasury and already has brought in over 250 million dollars. Enacted new legislation to encourage multiple use of the public domain.

We commend the Eisenhower Administration for its administration of our public lands and for elimination of bureaucratic abuses. We recommend continuing study and evaluation of the advisability of returning unused or inadequately used public lands.

We commend the Administration for expanding forest research and access road construction.

We shall continue to improve timber conservation practices, recreational facilities, grazing management, and watershed protection of our national forests and our public domain.

Minerals.

Recognizing that a vigorous and efficient mineral industry is essential to the long-term development of the United States, and to its defense, we believe the Federal Government should foster a long-term policy for the development and prudent use of domestic mineral resources, and to assure access to necessary sources abroad, without dangerously weakening the market for domestic production of defense-essential materials.

We favor reasonable depletion allowances. We favor freedom of mineral producers from unnecessary governmental regulation; expansion of government minerals exploration and research, and establishment of minerals stockpile objectives which will reduce, and, where possible, eliminate foreseeable wartime shortages.

ACHIEVEMENTS: St. Lawrence Seaway and power projects, Colorado River Storage Project, Great Lakes connecting channels, small watershed protection and flood prevention under local control, Mississippi Gulf level canal, extension of water-pollution control program, survey of power potential of Passamaquoddy Bay tides, expansion of small project development for flood control, navigation and reclamation; extension to all 48 States of water facilities act, accelerated research on saline water conversion, authorized planning surveys and construction of more than 200 navigation, flood-control, beach erosion, rivers and harbors, reclamation, and watershed projects throughout the nation, advanced partnership water resource developments in a number of states.

Water resources.

Water resource development legislation enacted under the Eisenhower Administration already has ushered in one of the greatest water resource development programs this Nation has ever seen, a soundly-conceived construction program that will continue throughout this Century and beyond.

We recognize that the burgeoning growth of our Nation requires a combination of Federal, State and local water and power development—a real partnership of effort by all interested parties. In no other way can the nation meet the huge and accelerated demands for increasing generating capacity and uses of water, both by urban and agricultural areas. We also are aware that water demands have been accentuated by the ravages of drought, creating emergency conditions in many sections of our country. We commend the Eisenhower Administration for encouraging state and local governments, public agencies, and regulated private enterprise, to participate actively in comprehensive water and power development. In such partnership we are leading the way with great Federal developments such as the Upper Colorado Project and with partnership projects of great importance, some of which have been shelved by the Democratic 84th Congress.

In the marketing of federally produced power we support preference to public bodies and cooperatives under the historic policy of the Congress.

We will continue to press for co-operative solution of all problems of water supply and distribution, reclamation, pollution, flood control, and saline-water conversion.

We pledge legislative support to the arid and semi-arid states in preserving the integrity of their water laws and customs as developed out of the necessities of these regions. We affirm the historic policy of Congress recognizing State water rights, as repeatedly expressed in Federal law over the past 90 years.

We pledge an expansion in research and planning of water resource development programs, looking to the future when it may be necessary to re-distribute water from water-surplus areas to water-deficient areas.

Fisheries.

ACHIEVEMENTS: Accelerated research and administrative action to rehabilitate our long-neglected fishing industry. Approval of measures for additional conservation and propagation of fish. Development of the comprehensive program for fisheries management and assistance adopted by the Congress.

We favor continuation of the Eisenhower program to rehabilitate our long-neglected domestic fishing industry.

We advocate protective treaties insuring the United States commercial-fisheries industry against unfair foreign competition.

The Republican Party is acutely aware that a foundation stone of the nation’s strength is its wealth of natural resources and the high development of its physical assets. They are the basis of our great progress in 180 years of freedom and of our nation’s military and economic might.

We pledge that we will continue the policies of sound conservation and wise development instituted by this Administration to insure that our resources are managed as a beneficial trust for all the people.

For a Brighter Tomorrow: Atomic Energy.

The Republican Party pledges continuous, vigorous development of Atomic Energy:

for the defense of our own country and to deter aggression, and

for the promotion of world peace and the enhancement of our knowledge of basic science and its application to industry, agriculture and the healing arts.

From the passage of the first Atomic Energy Act in 1946 to the beginning of this Republican Administration, a stalemate had existed, and only an arms race with the prospect of eventual catastrophe faced the nations of the world.

President Eisenhower has inaugurated and led a strong program for developing the peaceful atom—a program which has captured the imagination of men and women everywhere with its widespread, positive achievements.

The Government and private enterprise are working together on a number of large-scale projects designed to develop substantial quantities of electric power from atomic sources. The first power reactor will be completed next year. More and more private funds are being invested as the Government monopoly is relaxed.

In relaxing its monopoly, Government can stimulate private enterprise to go ahead by taking recognition of the tremendous risks involved and the complexity of the many technical problems that will arise, and assist in those ways that will make advances possible.

The Atomic Energy Commission also is encouraging a vigorous rural electrification program by cooperatives.

Every day, radioactive isotopes are brought more and more into use on farms, in clinics and hospitals, and in industry. The use of isotopes already has resulted in annual savings of hundreds of millions of dollars and the nuclear age has only begun.

It is to the benefit of the United States, as well as to all nations everywhere, that the uses of atomic energy be explored and shared. The Republican Party pledges that it will continue this imaginative, world-embracing program. We shall continue to chart our course so as to fortify the security of the free nations and to further the prosperity and progress of all people everywhere.

Declaration of Dedication

With utmost confidence in the future and with justifiable pride in our achievements, the Republican Party warmly greets the dawn of our second century of service in the cause of unity and progress in the Nation.

As the Party of the Young and in glowing appreciation of his dynamic leadership and inspiration, we respectfully dedicate this Platform of the Party of the Future to our distinguished President Dwight D. Eisenhower, and to the Youth of America.

What happened to the Republican Party?