State of the Union AddressesNixon, Richard M. (Richard Milhous)
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State of the Union Addresses
Nixon, Richard M. (Richard Milhous)
Presidents -- United States -- Messages; United States -- Politics and government -- Sources
I have faith in people. I trust the judgment of people. Let us give the
people of America a chance, a bigger voice in deciding for themselves those
questions that so greatly affect their lives.
The sixth great goal is a complete reform of the Federal Government
itself.
Based on a long and intensive study with the aid of the best advice
obtainable, I have concluded that a sweeping reorganization of the
executive branch is needed if the Government is to keep up with the times
and with the needs of the people.
I propose, therefore, that we reduce the present 12 Cabinet Departments to
eight.
I propose that the Departments of State, Treasury, Defense, and Justice
remain, but that all the other departments be consolidated into four: Human
Resources, Community Development, Natural Resources, and Economic
Development.
Let us look at what these would be:
--First, a department dealing with the concerns of people--as individuals,
as members of a family--a department focused on human needs.
--Second, a department concerned with the community--rural communities and
urban communities--and with all that it takes to make a community function
as a community.
--Third, a department concerned with our physical environment, with the
preservation and balanced use of those great natural resources on which our
Nation depends.
--And fourth, a department concerned with our prosperity--with our jobs,
our businesses, and those many activities that keep our economy running
smoothly and well.
Under this plan, rather than dividing up our departments by narrow
subjects, we would organize them around the great purposes of government.
Rather than scattering responsibility by adding new levels of bureaucracy,
we would focus and concentrate the responsibility for getting problems
solved.
With these four departments, when we have a problem we will know where to
go--and the department will have the authority and the resources to do
something about it.
Over the years we have added departments and created agencies at the
Federal level, each to serve a new constituency, to handle a particular
task--and these have grown and multiplied in what has become a hopeless
confusion of form and function.
The time has come to match our structure to our purposes---to look with a
fresh eye, to organize the Government by conscious, comprehensive design to
meet the new needs of a new era.
One hundred years ago, Abraham Lincoln stood on a battlefield and spoke of
a "government of the people, by the people, for the people." Too often
since then, we have become a nation of the Government, by the Government,
for the Government.
By enacting these reforms, we can renew that principle that Lincoln stated
so simply and so well.
By giving everyone's voice a chance to be heard, we will have government
that truly is of the people.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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