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1、五、Richard M. NixonCheckersMy Fellow Americans, I come before you tonight as a candidate for the Vice Presidency and as a man whose honesty and integrity has been questioned.Now, the usual political thing to do when charges are made against you is to either ignore them or to deny them without giving
2、details. I believe weve had enough of that in the United States, particularly with the present Administration in Washington, D.C. To me the office of the Vice Presidency of the United States is a great office, and I feel that the people have got to have confidence in the integrity of the men who run
3、 for that office and who might obtain it.I have a theory, too, that the best and only answer to a smear or to an honest misunderstanding of the facts is to tell the truth. And thats why Im here tonight. I want to tell you my side of the case. Im sure that you have read the charge, and youve heard it
4、, that I, Senator Nixon, took 18,000 dollars from a group of my supporters.Now, was that wrong? And let me say that it was wrong. Im saying, incidentally, that it was wrong, not just illegal, because it isnt a question of whether it was legal or illegal, that isnt enough. The question is, was it mor
5、ally wrong? I say that it was morally wrong - if any of that 18,000 dollars went to Senator Nixon, for my personal use. I say that it was morally wrong if it was secretly given and secretly handled. And I say that it was morally wrong if any of the contributors got special favors for the contributio
6、ns that they made.And now to answer those questions let me say this: Not one cent of the 18,000 dollars or any other money of that type ever went to me for my personal use. Every penny of it was used to pay for political expenses that I did not think should be charged to the taxpayers of the United
7、States. It was not a secret fund. As a matter of fact, when I was on Meet the Press - some of you may have seen it last Sunday - Peter Edson came up to me after the program, and he said, Dick, what about this fund we hear about? And I said, Well, theres no secret about it. Go out and see Dana Smith
8、who was the administrator of the fund. And I gave him Edson his Smiths address. And I said you will find that the purpose of the fund simply was to defray political expenses that I did not feel should be charged to the Government.And third, let me point out - and I want to make this particularly cle
9、ar - that no contributor to this fund, no contributor to any of my campaigns, has ever received any consideration that he would not have received as an ordinary constituent. I just dont believe in that, and I can say that never, while I have been in the Senate of the United States, as far as the peo
10、ple that contributed to this fund are concerned, have I made a telephone call for them to an agency, or have I gone down to an agency in their behalf. And the records will show that, the records which are in the hands of the administration.Well, then, some of you will say, and rightly, Well, what di
11、d you use the fund for, Senator? Why did you have to have it? Let me tell you in just a word how a Senate office operates. First of all, a Senator gets 15,000 dollars a year in salary. He gets enough money to pay for one trip a year - a round trip, that is - for himself and his family between his ho
12、me and Washington, D.C. And then he gets an allowance to handle the people that work in his office to handle his mail. And the allowance for my State of California is enough to hire 13 people. And let me say, incidentally, that that allowance is not paid to the Senator. Its paid directly to the indi
13、viduals that the Senator puts on his pay roll. But all of these people and all of these allowances are for strictly official business; business, for example, when a constituent writes in and wants you to go down to the Veterans Administration and get some information about his GI policy - items of t
14、hat type, for example. But there are other expenses which are not covered by the Government. And I think I can best discuss those expenses by asking you some questions.Do you think that when I or any other Senator makes a political speech, has it printed, should charge the printing of that speech an
15、d the mailing of that speech to the taxpayers? Do you think, for example, when I or any other Senator makes a trip to his home State to make a purely political speech that the cost of that trip should be charged to the taxpayers? Do you think when a Senator makes political broadcasts or political te
16、levision broadcasts, radio or television, that the expense of those broadcasts should be charged to the taxpayers? Well I know what your answer is. Its the same answer that audiences give me whenever I discuss this particular problem: The answer is no. The taxpayers shouldnt be required to finance items which are not official business but which are primarily political business.Well, then the question arises, you say, Well, how do
