 Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States. Thank you all very much. It's just occurred to me that with this blistering weather maybe I could do something that might set a style you'd appreciate. It does feel better, doesn't it? Well, I'm delighted to be here. There, I started it out again. I was just with Richard Little last night, and here I am again saying, well, to start things out. In his imitations of me, he says that's a characteristic. But I'm delighted to be here today. This is a great day for each one of you, and I hope you will treasure this day all through your lives. As you know, this is the 20th anniversary of the Presidential Scholars Program, a program that has done much to reward initiative and encourage excellence in America's schools. It's also the second opportunity that I've had to host a gathering like this, and I have to confess I'm always a bit uneasy in the midst of all this scholarly achievement. I guess it's because I start thinking back to my own days as a student. In fact, some time ago, my alma mater, Eureka College, gave me an honorary degree, and I thanked them profusely. But I had to admit that they had compounded a sense of guilt I'd nursed for about 25 years because I always thought the first one they gave me was honorary. So I congratulate all of you. I congratulate all of you today on taking advantage of the tremendous educational opportunities you've been offered and encourage you to keep up the good work. I don't think it's too optimistic to say that you can look forward to an age where a great value will be placed on your obvious capacity for achievement and excellence, an age that will be rife with opportunity. In many ways, the things that we've been doing here in Washington the last few years have been part of this effort to open up new opportunities for all Americans. And as you know, that means cutting back on the size and scope of government, reducing its drag on the private economy. You know, it's one of the oldest lessons of history, but one that mankind always seems to forget. Too much government has always meant the oppression of the human spirit and the stultification of human progress. As Jefferson once said, I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive. Now, you think about that sometimes when you read some of those hostile columnists that say I spend a lot of time napping. I really don't. But I think that our own time is increasingly going to realize this truth. Repelled by the suffering caused by aggressive totalitarianism, our century seems to be awakening to the great prospects of human freedom and the democratic way of life. That's why I've always believed a truly American foreign policy means more than the pragmatic business of getting along with other nations. It also means standing up for values like human freedom and our own obligation to see that freedom is spread someday to all the nations of the earth. In a few short years, this will be the task before you and I think you're preparing yourself well for it. I'm especially encouraged by some of the fundamental changes that we see in American education today. We are beginning to realize once again that education at its core is more than just teaching our youngness skills that are needed for a job. However important that is, it's also about passing on to each new generation the values that serve as the foundation and cornerstone of our free democratic society. Patriotism, loyalty, faithfulness, courage, the ability to make the crucial moral distinctions between right and wrong, the maturity to understand that all that we have and achieve in this world comes first from a beneficent and loving God. So we're gathered here to congratulate all of you on your success, on the credit that you've brought to yourselves, to your schools, and to your communities. We're here too to congratulate teachers for the enormous and unselfish dedication that they've shown to your welfare and to the highest standards of their own profession. I had a teacher one day in a high school and on a visit to the principal's office. He is also the principal. Make a very wise remark. He said, it isn't very important what you think of me now. He said, what I'm concerned with is what you're going to think of me for 15 years from now. And even before 15 years was up, I knew I'd been in the hands of a very good friend and a very fine teacher. But I think we also do well today to reflect on the fact that education and learning, success and power, are only relative values that they must be grounded first in the higher values of right and morality if they're to have any meaning at all. You know, being president and there's a word here for someone in their 70s but I'm not sure that I can pronounce it. So anyway, being in that range, I've discovered, for example, that people do tend to let you get away with giving them some advice. So while I want to extend my congratulations to all of you, I hope you'll also permit me a few words of counsel and advice. Thomas Jefferson, whom I mentioned a few minutes ago on the business of governing, also had some wise things to say about the business of living. When he was advising his nephew what path he should follow to find success, he reminded him that he must pursue his own and his country's best efforts with what he called the purest integrity, the most chaste honor. Well, make these, then he said, your first object. Give up money, give up fame, give up science, give the earth itself and all it contains rather than do an immoral act and never suppose that in any possible situation or under any circumstances that it is best for you to do a dishonorable thing, however slightly so it may appear to you. Well, I think that's good advice for all of us. And once again, congratulations to all our presidential scholars, their families and our distinguished teachers who are here today. And now Secretary Bell is going to do the honors for me and distribute these awards and I'm going back to the awful office and do what a little girl told me to do who wrote me a letter one day and told me all the problems that she thought I should solve and then said, now get back to the oval office and go to work. And I'll do just that. Thank you all and God bless you all. Thank you Mr. President if you'll all be seated. One of the lucky breaks of the president coming here and taking off his coat is that my speech is in the coat that I just handed out here. An honor today the most distinguished students that we have in America. We set out through this program to pick the very top and the most outstanding students and what a great honor it is for you to be here. And the chairman of the commission Mrs. White told me that this is the greatest group ever. Of course she's told me that each year. So each year the group gets more outstanding even than those before. So it's now our great honor to you students to present you your gold medallions and what a great privilege it is for us to do that. Congratulations again on behalf and the scholars commission and behalf of your teachers that you honored by asking them to be here. It's now more word. Chuck Karen K. Abel and David Emerson from Arkansas Leslie McKenzie and David R. Tressel California and I think it's very interesting that we have nine from California this year that is the most ever in the history of this program that we have had that many from any state and it has nothing to do with the fact that our president is from California. Jonathan Alphong Todd Christopher Flynn Lisa M. Gortis Eric A. Grant Daniel L. Hurwitz Nicole McCullough Valerie Roy Jeffrey Rollins Catherine Saucer Colorado John Stephen Garrity Paula Wagenbach Connecticut Jack Shin Ramona Duté Rachel Sexton Delaware Jeffrey Lu Karen McGinley District of Columbia Julia Glade Christine Pavlovich Florida Jennifer Lee Linda Levitt and Manuel Lopez Georgia Jill A. Hodges and Johnny Worth Hawaii David L. Bloom and Janice R. Mitchell Idaho Julia Fulweiler Catherine Ring from Illinois Michael Beck Daniel Hickman and Matthew Parr Indiana Sarah Randall Andrew Smith from Iowa Eric Brown and Emeline Tai Kansas Maryland Rich Derrick and Andrew Thomas Stephen S. Taylor and Paige G. Wilhite Louisiana Souven Bernofsky Nicole Cooley Stephen Thomas and Sue Young Key Maine Joseph Faber Laura J. McLean Maryland Mary Cavender Jan Rivkin Massachusetts Keith R. Barnett Ingrid Booth Ian H. Gershin-Gorn Next is Leigh-Aum Harney Michigan Richard Couchman Julie Hesler Scott Van Ornam Alicia R. Washington also Jeffrey Wessler Minnesota Nadia Anderson David M. Caffeine Mississippi Eric C. Banks Pamela Kola Missouri David Van George Bradley Louis Freedman Elba E. Young Montana Steven Louriston and Jennifer J. Trosh Nebraska Carla Cloninger Nathan Hunt Lada Robert S. Mitcher-Raren and Susanna Yee-Yung Shin Boy y'all have really done it to me this year New Hampshire Thomas E. Laveraire Christine L. Thieberg New Jersey Jeffrey Butler Scott Lichman Mary Sarah McPeak Andre Shin New Mexico Gal Tim Pley and Diane Schaefer New York Sarah Myers Robert C. Rudnitsky Catherine Snyder Eileen Stremple Beyond Yu Ting Sang Erica Yoder North Carolina Don Cho Trisha Francesca Lee White North Dakota Karen Olson and Richard Couchman Ohio Jean-Paul Beck Redonda Miller Howard Peter Steves Oklahoma Granger B. Matter Kelsen Michelle Walters Oregon Heidi Prichard and Donald Wright Pennsylvania Donna M. Kuttner Thomas Tael Ming Lee Jayce M. Wittman William M. Lee Jason T. McNichol Jonel M. Mallott Mimi Yum Puerto Rico Ivan Sunyer Ry Eidza M. Torres Rhode Island Stephen Bland Lori L. May South Carolina David N. Kuhlman Jocelyn K. Tirras South Dakota Miaz Friesen and Mark Summer Tennessee Mark Levine Susan Stewart Texas Louis David Cardenas Jennifer Cook Desiree Doyne and Gloria Justin Utah Bridget Condi and Darren Hawkins Vermont Ethan Knapp Karen Schlemmer Virginia Heather Hadlock and Maury Schenck Washington David W. Launberg Seon Osburn Sirre and Wilbur West Virginia Harold Neil Jr. Valerie S. Steele Wisconsin Mary O'Human David A. Zagorski Wyoming John Brandner Anastasia Kelly Ladies and gentlemen your 1984 Presidential Scholars