thank you very much.

governor, are you prepared to take the constitutional. i am. if you place your left hand on the bible and raise your right hand and repeat after me, i, ronald reagan, do solemnly swear. i, ronald reagan, do solemnly swear. that i will faithfully execute the office of president of the united states and i will faithfully execute the office of president of the united states. and will, to the best of my ability and will to the best of

my ability, preserve, protect and defend. preserve, protect and defend. but consider tution of the united states, the constitution of the united states. so help you god. so help me god. i congratulate you, sir. on.

that. since the president of the united states. thank you. thank you. senator hatfield, mr. chief justice. mr. president, vice president bush. vice president mondale. senator baker. speaker o'neill. reverend moomaw. and my fellow citizens, to a few of us here today. this is a solemn and most momentous occasion. and yet in the history of our

nation, it is a commonplace occurrence. the orderly transfer of authority, as called for in the constitution, routinely takes place as it has for almost two centuries, and few of us stop to think how unique we really are in the eyes of many in the world. this every four years ceremony we accept as normal is nothing less than a miracle. mr. president, i want our fellow citizens to know how much you did to carry on this tradition by your gracious, cooperate nation in the transition process. you have shown i'm watching world that we are a united people pledged to maintaining a political system which guarantees individual liberty to a greater degree than any other. and i thank you and your people for all your help in maintaining the continuity, which is the

bulwark of our republic. the business of our nation goes forward. these united states are confronted with an economic affliction of great proportions. we suffer from the longest and one of the worst sustained inflations in our national history. it distorts our economic decisions, penalizes thrift, and crushes the struggling young and the fixed income, elderly alike. it threatens to shatter the lives of millions of our people, idle industries have cast workers into unemployment, human misery and personal indignity. those who. do work are denied a fair return for their labor by a tax system which penalizes success for achievement and keeps us from

maintaining full productivity. but great as our tax burden is, it has not kept pace with public spending for decades. we have piled deficit up on deficit, mortgaging our future and our children's future for the temporary convenience of the present. to continue this long trend is to guarantee tremendous social, cultural, political and economic upheavals. you and i, as individuals, can, by borrowing live beyond our means. but for only a limited period of time. why then should we think that collectively, as a nation, we are not bound by that same limitation? we must act today in order to preserve tomorrow. and let there be no misunderstood ending. we are going to begin to act beginning today.

the economic ills we suffered have come upon us over several decades. they will not go away and days, weeks or months. but they will go away. they will go away because we as americans have the capacity now as we've had in the past, to do whatever needs to be done to preserve this last and greatest bastion of freedom in this present crisis. government is not the solution to our problem. government is the problem. for. from time to time, we've been tempted to believe that society has become too complex to be managed by self-rule. that government by an elite group is superior to government

for by and of the people. well, if no one among us is capable of governing himself, then who among us has the capacity to govern someone else? all of us together in and out of government, must bear the burden. the solutions we seek must be equitable. with no one group singled out to pay a higher price. we hear much of special interest groups. well, our concern must be for a special interest group that has been too long neglected. it knows no sectional boundaries or ethnic and racial divisions, and it crosses political party lines. it is made up of men and women who raise our food patrol, our streets, man our minds and factories, teach our children, keep our homes and healers when we're sick. professionals in dust, realists,

shopkeepers, clerks, cabbies and truck drivers. they are, in short, we the people. this breed called americans. well, this administration objective will be a healthy, vigorous, growing economy that provides equal opportunities for all americans with no barriers born of bigotry or discrimination. putting america back to work means putting all americans back to work. ending inflation means freeing all americans from the terror of runaway living costs. we all must share in the productive work of this new beginning, and all must share in the bounty of a revived economy with the ideal resume and fair play, which are the core of our system and our strength. we can have a strong and prosperous america at peace with itself and the world. so as we begin, let us take

inventory. we are a nation that has a government, not the other way around. and this makes us special among the nations of the earth. our government has no power except that granted it by the people. it is time to check and reverse the growth of government, which shows signs of having grown beyond the consent of the governed. it is my to curb the size and influence of the federal establishment and to demand recognition of the distinction between the powers granted to the federal government and those reserved to the states or to the people. all of us, all of us need to be reminded that the federal government did create the states. the states created the federal.

now, so there will be no misunderstanding. it's not my intention to do away with government. it is rather to make it work. work with us, not over us. to stand by our side. not ride on our back. government can and must provide opportunity, not smother it. foster productivity. not stifle it. if we look to the answer as to why for so many years we achieved so much, prospered as no other people on earth. it because here in this land we unleashed the energy and individual genius of man to a greater extent than has ever been done before. freedom and the dignity the individual have been more available and assured here than in any other place on earth.

the price for this freedom at times has been high, but we have never been unwilling to pay that price. it is no coincidence that our present troubles parallel and our proportionate the intervention and intrusion in our lives that result from unnecessary and excessive growth of government. it is time for us to realize that we are too great a nation to limit ourselves to small dreams. we are not, as some would have us believe, doomed to an inevitable decline. i do not believe in a fate that will fall on us no matter what we do. i do believe in a fate that will fall on us if we do nothing. so with all the creative energy at our command, let us begin an era of national renewal. let us renew our determination and our courage and our

strength. and let us renew our faith and our hope. we have every right to dream heroic dreams. those who say that we are in a time when there are no heroes. they just don't know where to look. you can see heroes every day going in and out of factory gates. others, a handful. a number produce enough food to feed all of us. and then the world beyond. you meet heroes across the counter and they're on both sides of that counter. there are entrepreneurs with faith in themselves and faith in an idea who create new jobs, new wealth and opportunity. they are individuals and, families who take taxes, support the government and whose voluntary gifts support church charity, culture, art and education. their patriotism quiet but deep.

their values sustain our national life. now i have used the words they and they're in speaking of these heroes. i could say you and your because i am addressing the heroes of whom i speak you the citizens of this blessed land. your dreams, your hopes. your goals are going to be the dreams. the hopes and the goals of this administration. so help me god. we shall reflect the compassion that is so much a part of your makeup. how can we love our country and not love our countrymen and loving them? reach out a hand when they fall. heal them when they're sick and

provide opportunities to make them self-sufficient. so they will be equal. in fact. and not just in theory. can we solve the problems confronting us? well, the answer is an unequipped black, an emphatic yes. to paraphrase winston churchill, i did not take the oath. i've just taken with the intention of presiding over the dissolution of the world's strongest economy. in the days ahead, i will propose removing the roadblocks that have slowed our economy and reduced productivity. steps will be taken aimed at restoring the balance between the various levels of government. progress may be slow. measured in inches and feet. not miles, but we will progress. it is time to reawaken this industrial giant to get government back within its means and to lighten our punitive tax burden.

and these will be our first priorities. and on these principles, there will be no compromise. on the eve of our struggle for independence, a man who might have been one of the greatest among the founding fathers, dr. joseph warren, president of the master choose, which congress said to his fellow americans. our country is in danger, but not to be despaired of and you depend the fortunes of america. you are to decide the important question, which upon which rests the happiness and, the liberty of millions yet unborn, act worthy of yourselves. well, i believe we, the americans of today, are ready to act worthy of ourselves, ready to do what must be done to insure happiness and liberty for ourselves, our children, and our

children's children. and as we renew ourselves here in our own land, we will be seen as having greater strength throughout the world. we will again be the exemplar of freedom and a beacon of hope for those who do not now have freedom. to those neighbors and allies who share our freedom, we will strengthen our historic ties and assure them of our support and firm commitment. we will match loyalty with loyalty. we will strive for mutually beneficial relations. we will not use our friendship to impose on their sovereignty for our own sovereignty is not for sale. as for the enemies of freedom, those who are potential adversaries, they will be reminded that peace is the highest aspiration of the american people. we will negotiate for it. sacrifice for it. we will surrender for it now or

ever. our forbearance should never be misunderstood. our reluctance for conflict should not be misjudged as a failure of will. when action is required to preserve our national security. we will act. we will maintain sufficient strength to prevail if need be. knowing that if we do so, we have the best chance of never having to use that strength. above all, we must realize that no arsenal or no weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women. it is a weapon our adversaries. in today's world do not have. it is a weapon that we as

americans do have. let that be understood by those who practice terrorism and prey their neighbors. i'm. i'm told that tens of thousands of prayer meetings are being held on this day. for that, am deeply grateful. we are a nation under god, and i believe god intended for us to be free. it would be fitting and good. i think, if on each inaugural day and future years it should be declared a day of prayer. this the first time in our history that this ceremony has been held, as you've been told, on this west front of the capitol. standing here, one faces a magnificent vista opening up on this city's special beauty and history.

at the end of this open mall, are those shrines to the giants on whose shoulders we stand. directly in front of me. the monument to a monument ol man. george washington, father of our country, a man of humility, who came to greatness reluctantly. he led america out of revolution and every victory. and to invent nationhood. off to one side, a stately memorial to thomas jefferson. a declaration of independence. flames with his eloquence. and then beyond the reflecting pool, the dignified columns of the lincoln memorial. whoever would understand god in his heart, the meaning of america will find in the life of abraham lincoln. beyond those moment, those monuments to heroism is the potomac river. and on the far shore, the sloping hills of arlington national cemetery.

with its row upon row of simple white markers bearing crosses or stars of david. they add up to only a tiny fraction of the price that has been for our freedom. each one of those markers is a monument to the kind of hero i spoke of earlier. their lives ended in places called belo wood. they are gone. omaha beach, salerno. and halfway around the world on guadalcanal. now tarawa, pork chop hill, the chosin reservoir. and in 100 rice paddies and jungles of a place called vietnam, under one such marker lies a young man, martin, trapped down, who left his job in a small town barber shop in 1917 to go to france with the famed rainbow division there on

the western front. he was killed trying to carry a message between battalions under heavy artillery fire. we're told that on his body was found a diary on the flyleaf under the heading. my pledge. he had written these words. america must win this war. therefore, i will work. i will save. i will sacrifice. i will endure. i will fight cheerfully and do my utmost as if the issue of the whole struggle depended on me alone. the crisis we are facing today does not require of us the kind of sacrifice that martin tracked down. so many thousands of others were called upon to make. it does, however, our best effort and our willingness to

believe in ourselves and to believe in our capacity to perform great deeds, to believe that together with god's help, we can and will resolve the problems which now confront us. and after all, why shouldn't we believe that we are americans? god bless you, and thank. thank you very.