President Quirino’s State of the Nation Address

Title

Language

English

Year

1950

Rights

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Fulltext

Editorials “ ... to promote the general welfare” It can not be questioned that President Quirino has the “right answers”,—the right answers to our economic and financial problems. Despite President Quirino’s the rose-tinted glasses which, bless State-of-the-Nation him, he still wears, he sees clearly, Address as he said in his important Stateof-the-Nation Address, delivered from his hospital room in Baltimore, that— "Our most serious concern for the next four years should be: “1. Immediate increased production through rapid rehabilitation and development; “2. Decreased public and external expenditures; “3. Government reorganization to achieve efficiency, economy, and effective rendition of public service responsive to the needs and welfare of our people; “4. Vigorous and honest enforcement of the tax laws; “5. Preservation of our national integrity and continued friendly relations with our neighbors and the entire world.” These answers may appear obvious, but their very obviousness attests to their fundamental importance. The obvious is often too easily overlooked or disregarded in favor of something more recondite. And, obvious or not, these answers might easily not have been brought out with the great emphasis which the President rightly gave them. The President not only has the right answers, but he put them in what seems to us to be the right order of prio rity, though No. 5, in a somewhat different class from the rest, is of the highest importance in its class. We have called these points “answers”, but actually there are, as the President said, matters of the most serious concern; they are aims, calling for certain measures. The Government may have the right aims, but the measures necessary to achieve them, though adopted, may not be faithfully carried out, or the measures adopted may be inadequate or faulty. The people may fail to understand or to support him, or groups in the population may refuse to cooperate. The President realizes all that. He realizes that he can not solve the country’s problems with a speech. He realizes that a united effort must be made and sustained, and said so at the end of his address: “Let us exert every effort and employ every ounce of our energy to implement these high objectives. Let us pool our enthusiasm, the labors, and the patriotism of a united people and honestly pull together for the promotion of the common good, to make secure, for all time, our national structure.” It is a good thing to have first things put first; to have clear and definite aims; to issue a call for effort and to rally support. Now let us trust that not only the proper new measures will be formulated and carried out, but that some of the earlier errors that have been made will be corrected, for otherwise these will continue to handicap us fatally. The Journal extends its best wishes to the people and Government of the Republic of India which was offi cially inaugurated on January 26 with the India and induction into office of President Rajendra Nationalism Prasad, who, like Prime Minister Nehru, was one of the group of men close to the late Mahatma Gandhi. India has now become a fully independent “sovereign democratic republic”, t>ut it voluntarily, and wisely, re mains, politically and economically, a member of the British Commonwealth of Nations. The American people both through the spread of the ideals which inspire them and the policies which the Amer ican Government has long followed, have played no small part in the rise of such nations as India and Indonesia, as well as the Philippines, and view such events as those at Batavia recently, and lately at New Delhi, as at Manila some years ago, with deep satisfaction. That it is to be anticipated that the new governments which have for some years been coming into power in Asia and elsewhere will encounter great difficulties and that they will make mistakes, some perhaps of a very serious nature, can not affect the basic American attitude as to the rightness of national independence, at least until the time that mankind will develop a democratic government which will embrace the whole world. The American Secretary of State, Dean Acheson, in the important address he delivered at the National Press Club in Washington some weeks ago, correctly analyzed, we believe, the present trends in Asia and the view of thf 47

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