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Good evening.
This
is the 37th time I have spoken to you from this office, where so many decisions have been
made that shaped the history of this Nation. Each time I have done so to discuss with you
some matter than I believe affected the national interest.
In all the decisions I have made in my public life, I have always tried to do
what was best for the Nation. Throughout the long and difficult period of Watergate, I
have felt it was my duty to persevere, to make every possible effort to complete the term
of office to which you elected me.
In the past few days, however, it has become evident to me that I no longer
have a strong enough political base in the Congress to justify continuing that effort. As
long as there was such a base, I felt strongly that it was necessary to see the
constitutional process through to its conclusion, that to do otherwise would be unfaithful
to the spirit of that deliberately difficult process and a dangerously destabilizing
precedent for the future.
But with the disappearance of that base, I now believe that the constitutional
purpose has been served, and there is no longer a need for the process to be prolonged.
I would have preferred to carry through to the finish whatever the personal
agony it would have involved, and my family unanimously urged me to do so. But the
interest of the Nation must always come before any personal considerations.
From the discussions I have had with Congressional and other leaders, I have
concluded that because of the Watergate matter I might not have the support of the
Congress that I would consider necessary to back the very difficult decisions and carry
out the duties of this office in the way the interests of the Nation would require.
I have never been a quitter. To leave office before my term is completed is
abhorrent to every instinct in my body. But as President, I must put the interest of
America first. America needs a full-time President and a full-time Congress, particularly
at this time with problems we face at home and abroad.
To continue to fight through the months ahead for my personal vindication would
almost totally absorb the time and attention of both the President and the Congress in a
period when our entire focus should be on the great issues of peace abroad and prosperity
without inflation at home.
Therefore, I shall resign the Presidency effective at noon tomorrow. Vice
President Ford will be sworn in as President at that hour in this office.
As I recall the high hopes for America with which we began this second term, I
feel a great sadness that I will not be here in this office working on your behalf to
achieve those hopes in the next 2 1/2 years. But in turning over direction of the
Government to Vice President Ford, I know, as I told the Nation when I nominated him for
that office 10 months ago, that the leadership of America will be in good hands.
In passing this office to the Vice President, I also do so with the profound
sense of the weight of responsibility that will fall on his shoulders tomorrow and,
therefore, of the understanding, the patience, the cooperation he will need from all
Americans.
As he assumes that responsibility, he will deserve the help and the support of
all of us. As we look to the future, the first essential is to begin healing the wounds of
this Nation, to put the bitterness and divisions of the recent past behind us, and to
rediscover those shared ideals that lie at the heart of our strength and unity as a great
and as a free people.
By taking this action, I hope that I will have hastened the start of that
process of healing which is so desperately needed in America.
I regret deeply any injuries that may have been done in the course of the
events that led to this decision. I would say only that if some of my judgments were
wrong, and some were wrong, they were made in what I believed at the time to be the best
interest of the Nation.
To those who have stood with me during these past difficult months, to my
family, my friends, to many others who joined in supporting my cause because they believed
it was right, I will be eternally grateful for your support.
And to those who have not felt able to give me your support, let me say I leave
with no bitterness toward those who have opposed me, because all of us, in the final
analysis, have been concerned with the good of the country, however our judgments might
differ.
So, let us all now join together in affirming that common commitment and in
helping our new President succeed for the benefit of all Americans.
I shall leave this office with regret at not completing my term, but with
gratitude for the privilege of serving as your President for the past 5 1/2 years. These
years have been a momentous time in the history of our Nation and the world. They have
been a time of achievement in which we can all be proud, achievements that represent the
shared efforts of the Administration, the Congress, and the people.
But the challenges ahead are equally great, and they, too, will require the
support and the efforts of the Congress and the people working in cooperation with the new
Administration.
We have ended America's longest war, but in the work of securing a lasting
peace in the world, the goals ahead are even more far-reaching and more difficult. We must
complete a structure of peace so that it will be said of this generation, our generation
of Americans, by the people of all nations, not only that we ended one war but that we
prevented future wars.
We have unlocked the doors that for a quarter of a century stood between the
United States and the People's Republic of China.
We must now ensure that the one quarter of the world's people who live in the
People's Republic of China will be and remain not our enemies but our friends.
In the Middle East, 100 million people in the Arab countries, many of whom have
considered us their enemy for nearly 20 years, now look on us as their friends. We must
continue to build on that friendship so that peace can settle at last over the Middle East
and so that the cradle of civilization will not become its grave.
Together with the Soviet Union we have made the crucial breakthroughs that have
begun the process of limiting nuclear arms. But we must set as our goal not just limiting
but reducing and finally destroying these terrible weapons so that they cannot destroy
civilization and so that the threat of nuclear war will no longer hang over the world and
the people.
We have opened the new relation with the Soviet Union. We must continue to
develop and expand that new relationship so that the two strongest nations of the world
will live together in cooperation rather than confrontation.
Around the world, in Asia, in Africa, in Latin America, in the Middle East,
there are millions of people who live in terrible poverty, even starvation. We must keep
as our goal turning away from production for war and expanding production for peace so
that people everywhere on this earth can at last look forward in their children's time, if
not in our own time, to having the necessities for a decent life.
Here in America, we are fortunate that most of our people have not only the
blessings of liberty but also the means to live full and good and, by the world's
standards, even abundant lives. We must press on, however, toward a goal of not only more
and better jobs but of full opportunity for every American and of what we are striving so
hard right now to achieve, prosperity without inflation.
For more than a quarter of a century in public life I have shared in the
turbulent history of this era. I have fought for what I believed in. I have tried to the
best of my ability to discharge those duties and meet those responsibilities that were
entrusted to me.
Sometimes I have succeeded and sometimes I have failed, but always I have taken
heart from what Theodore Roosevelt once said about the man in the arena, "whose face
is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes short
again and again because there is not effort without error and shortcoming, but who does
actually strive to do the deed, who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who
spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumphs of high
achievements and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly."
I pledge to you tonight that as long as I have a breath of life in my body, I
shall continue in that spirit. I shall continue to work for the great causes to which I
have been dedicated throughout my years as a Congressman, a Senator, a Vice President, and
President, the cause of peace not just for America but among all nations, prosperity,
justice, and opportunity for all of our people.
There is one cause above all to which I have been devoted and to which I shall
always be devoted for as long as I live.
When I first took the oath of office as President 5 1/2 years ago, I made this
sacred commitment, to "consecrate my office, my energies, and all the wisdom I can
summon to the cause of peace among nations."
I have done my very best in all the days since to be true to that pledge. As a
result of these efforts, I am confident that the world is a safer place today, not only
for the people of America but for the people of all nations, and that all of our children
have a better chance than before of living in peace rather than dying in war.
This, more than anything, is what I hoped to achieve when I sought the
Presidency. This, more than anything, is what I hope will be my legacy to you, to our
country, as I leave the Presidency.
To have served in this office is to have felt a very personal sense of kinship
with each and every American. In leaving it, I do so with this prayer: May God's grace be
with you in all the days ahead.
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