President Gignilliat, Senator Talmadge, Senator Nunn, Congressman Bo Ginn, Mayor Rousakis, and fellow Irishmen:

As many of you know, this is one of the few times in the last 10 years that I have missed a St. Patrick's Day Parade in Savannah, and it was a sad day for me because of that reason. But the memories of past St. Patrick's Days in Savannah have left an indelible impression on my mind and on my heart. I remember how difficult it was for me to get an invitation to the Hibernian Society banquet. [Laughter]

I remember the first year that I was running for Governor of Georgia with a great number of well-known and distinguished opponents. Toby Buttimer was in a car pretty much at the end of the line in the parade. He asked me to ride with him. And when I approached the starting point of the parade, a very irate minor official among the parade marshals came forward and said, "Young man, what right do you have to ride in the parade?" It's something that I'll never forget. His name was Nick Kenny. [Laughter] And I sincerely hope as President that you've not let him have anything to do with the parade since then. [Laughter]

There's only one city in Georgia about which I've ever made this statement: Savannah's my favorite city of all, because you present to Georgia and to the rest of the world a unique and very fine combination of pride in the past-preserving what's right and decent and enjoyable and harmonious and inspirational-with no fear of the future and making the most of the present. And I'm very proud that you've invited me as President of the United States to come back and share this honor with you.

I've been honored in many ways in the last number of months. One of the greatest honors that I've had has been to work very closely with the distinguished leaders of the Congress. And I would like to recognize in particular the superb courage and leadership and inspiration that has been provided to our own State and to the country by Senator Talmadge and Senator Nunn, on the platform with me tonight.

I also feel particularly close to Toby Buttimer. As you know, if I had as many sons and grandchildren as Toby Buttimer, I would have been President 4 years earlier than I was. [Laughter] But in a way, in addition to his great family-I have two grandsons of my own-there are some other things that bind me together with Toby. As you know, he's a wholesale beer distributor. And my brother, Billy, is a wholesale beer consumer. [Laughter]

I hope that you won't mention to Billy my comment about him, because when I first was elected President, I made some humorous remark about Billy one night at a banquet, and the next day the national news media representatives went to Billy's filling station and said, "What do you think about your brother?" And he said, "Well, I'd rather not comment." And they said, "Well, I'm not talking about his character or his ability as a campaigner or a President, just some minor characteristic of his." And Billy said, "Well, I'd just rather not comment on my brother Jimmy." They said, "What do you think about Jimmy's smile?" And Billy thought for a while, and he said, "Well, it reminds me of a fox, intoxicated, licking sorghum syrup out of a live light socket." [Laughter] So, I would appreciate you keeping harmony between me and my brother. [Laughter]

Another thing I like about the Irish, and the Hibernian members particularly, is that you are perfectly willing to go from the sublime to the ridiculous. Last year Bishop Fulton Sheen was your main speaker. This year, as the first choice-I was second choice-you invited Hamilton Jordan. I thought the same thing about sublime to the ridiculous the first time I observed that you began your festivities at the beautiful cathedral with Mass and wound up here, at night, with just the opposite. [Laughter] Hamilton, really, and all of us have suffered some from the news coverage. As you know, in Washington we haven't been the favorites there. Jody Powell, Griffin Bell, Bert Lance, myself, Jack Watson, Andy Young, and other Georgians have not come out completely unscathed. And sometimes we can't understand it.

I remember a couple of weeks ago I felt very sorry for Hamilton at the latest episode. I didn't want to complain to him personally, because I knew he was already embarrassed. He came by to see me, and I was a little surprised. He said, "Mr. President, I want to talk to you for a few minutes. I don't understand Washington." And he said, "I get my name spread all across the Washington Post in headlines for doing the same thing we used to do every night in Savannah." [Laughter]

So in some ways, you've been good training for us. One of the news people observed, as I was leaving Washington to get in the helicopter to come to the airport to come down here, said, "Mr. President, I think you've contributed more to St. Patrick's Day than any other President that's ever lived." And I said, "I really appreciate that." He said, "Yes, your whole administration is green." [Laughter]

At least they're learning how to speak southern in Washington. That's good. [Laughter]

As all of you know, my family has great credentials as Irishmen. We came here as a result of the great peanut famine. [Laughter] I've always felt very close to the rest of you who came here accordingly.

I have been surprised at some of the characteristics of the President. I thought that when I got elected to the highest office in the land that there would be some special characteristics about it. I haven't found that to be true. Yesterday morning, the Ambassador from Ireland came to tell me that they had just flown in from Ireland some shamrock especially for me to wear on St. Patrick's Day. And I put it on. I've only worn it 2 days, and even pinned to the lapel of the President, it wilted. [Laughter]

This has not been the only time I've been disappointed. I have been dealing lately, as you know, with a very difficult subject, the Panama Canal treaties. It's not been one of the most popular subjects that I've endorsed. And I called a couple of months ago a kind of a staff meeting and said, "What can I do to boost my spirits about this difficult but very important subject?" And my staff said, "Why don't we have a mass meeting at the White House?" So I called a mass meeting. Both of us were glad the other one came. [Laughter]  It was one of the worst days I ever had. I went home that night. The only way I could relax the tension that I felt as President was to take a warm bath in the tub. I got in the tub; my Ivory soap sank. [Laughter]

As Senator Talmadge well knows, we've also been afflicted in Washington with farmer strike members, who came to express their displeasure with crop yields and weather and farm prices. Last night I was writing some notes about my serious part of my speech to be made to you. And when I went to sleep, I had a nightmare. I just thought to myself, what if all the Irishmen in Savannah rode on tractors? [Laughter] I can see Savannah after a St. Patrick's Day parade under those circumstances. The highest building in town would be 2 feet high.

We've tried, as you know, to do the best we could with some very difficult subjects. I have been pleased on occasion. We've had a coal contract every week. That's boosted my spirits some. [Laughter]

But one of the main things that has boosted my spirits has been the knowledge that many of you who helped me become President still have confidence in me and my administration, give me your support, and I hope you'll continue to do so.

We've not been afraid to address difficult questions. When I became President a little more than a year ago, out of every hundred persons who were looking for a job, eight couldn't find work. And with the help of the Congress during this last year, 1977, we had a net increase in jobs in the United States of more than 4 million. We've never had that much increase before. The unemployment rate has dropped 2 percent. And it shows that if American people have a chance to work, they'd rather work.

We've also begun, as Sam Nunn said, to address the urban problems. My wife met tonight, as I have met before, with some of the leaders in Savannah who initiated on their own-private citizens, black and white, rich and not so rich-an effort, 15 or so years ago, to rejuvenate what is inherently one of the most beautiful cities on Earth, that was in danger of being embarrassed with the deterioration of your own downtown area. And since then, you've set an example for the whole Nation to emulate, and in our new urban policy, we are using Savannah as an example of what people can do if they're willing to take advantage of what God gives them.

We're a nation of people who believe in peace. We like to get along with our neighbors. We want to protect our women and children and our future generations from the threat of nuclear war, and so far we've been successful-one of the first times in modern history that in the first year or 18 months of a new administration we haven't had American soldiers dying somewhere on Earth. But if God gives me strength and judgment, I pray, joined by you, that we can preserve and enhance peace around the world-not based on weakness, but based on strength.

Today I made a speech in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Wake Forest University, about national security and then came out this afternoon, flew from Savannah by helicopter to land on the greatest warship in the world, a brand new atomic-powered aircraft carrier, 95,000 tons, the U.S.S. Eisenhower, operating off your coast. And I saw there a superb crew, young crew-the average age, 19 1/2 years old. More than half of the crew, before the Eisenhower was commissioned last fall, had never been on a ship. And we watched the most complicated, challenging military exercises that I have ever seen, and they went off with absolute perfection. And as the President of our country, as Commander in Chief, I realized even more intently that the best way to peace is to be strong. And as long as I'm President, our country's going to stay strong.

The South has known better than any other part of our great Nation what it means to be devastated and occupied as a result of war. And we are determined to maintain the leadership that's been shown by Senator Talmadge, by Bo Ginn, by Sam Nunn, who's taken the place in every way of the great Senator Dick Russell, that our country will have armed forces adequate to protect our country.

Another thing I learned when I was campaigning around our Nation was that as a result of the Vietnam war, as a result of Watergate, as a result of mistakes made and revealed in the CIA, that there had been a loss of spirit and confidence, there had been a loss of respect and a sense of partnership between the American people and our government. And I felt that something needed to be done, not only to correct those mistakes and to deal in such a way that those would not be repeated but to hoist a banner that would make our people proud to follow. And I searched back in the early days of Savannah, Georgia, and the rest of the Thirteen Colonies and tried to understand what our people stood for who wrote the Declaration of Independence and who wrote the Constitution of the United States. And I knew then and I know now that our country always has to be the well-recognized leader and bulwark in protecting basic human dignity, basic human liberty, basic self-respect, known by the words "human rights." And they will be protected also as long as I'm in Washington and you give me your support.

I had a lot of criticism by some of the cynics in Washington and the national news media about saying that I wanted a government that was as good and decent and honest and truthful as the American people. But I sense among our people a hunger for that kind of knowledge that you need not ever be ashamed again, recognizing that government is not infallible, that we do make mistakes, recognizing that the Federal Government cannot and ought not to do everything to shape and control our lives, understanding that the Federal Government ought to be simple, well-organized. Let us alone to manage the things that we can manage individually, in a family, in a neighborhood, in a city, in a State, but at the same time setting an example and lending a helping hand with taxpayers' dollars in an efficient way.

We're trying now with the Congress help to reorganize the basic structure of our Government to make sure not only that people outside Government have a chance to work but that people in Government have a chance to do a good job and are required to do a good job, because most of them want to. And I hope you'll help me with Government reorganization, civil service reform, welfare reform, tax reform, a cutting down of paperwork and red tape, to make your Government simple and workable so you can understand and control it.

I'd just like to say one more thing. The problems that face any President of this country are extremely complicated, they are difficult, and they are a great personal burden when you share the responsibility for the lives of more than 200 million Americans. But I've enjoyed this responsibility, because I have a sense that there is a partnership between me and people like you all over the world.

I don't know all the answers. But I believe that I will be right in my judgment, I will be fair and enlightened in my decisions. I will be inspired on occasion to restore and even to enhance the greatness of our country to the extent that I stay close to people who are interested, as are you, in the finest aspects of government in the greatest nation on Earth.

We have unresolved problems. We need a national energy policy. We need a comprehensive Government reform. We need to have a settlement of the major labor disputes like the coal strike. We need to have a SALT agreement with the Soviet Union to cut down on the threat of nuclear holocaust that might destroy us all. We need to have a ban against the testing of atomic explosives, in our country, the Soviet nation, Britain, France, and China. We need to have a prohibition against the testing or the evolution of explosives among the many nations on Earth that don't presently belong to the nuclear club. And we need to have again a government that's close to you.

There are many questions that need to be resolved that might take a long time. But I believe that it's best not to ignore them any longer. I'll do the best I can not to disappoint you. Many of you are responsible for my being in the White House. And you have a responsibility to assure and to help me do a good job. And I hope you'll never let me down. I'll never let you down. And we, together, will assure that we will represent the United States of America, the greatest nation on Earth.

Thank you very much.