The measures I have outlined in this message set an agenda for truly significant progress for this Nation and the world in 1974. Before we chart where we are going, let us see how far we have come.
It was 5 years ago on the steps of this Capitol that I took the oath of office as your President. In those 5 years, because of the initiatives undertaken by this Administration, the world has changed. America has changed. As a result of those changes, America is safer today, more prosperous today, with greater opportunity for more of its people than ever before in our history.
Five years ago, America was at war in Southeast Asia. We were locked in confrontation with the Soviet Union. We were in hostile isolation from a quarter of the world's people who lived in Mainland China.
Five years ago, our cities were burning and besieged.
Five years ago, our college campuses were a battleground.
Five years ago, crime was increasing at a rate that struck fear across the Nation.
Five years ago, the spiraling rise in drug addiction was threatening human and social tragedy of massive proportion, and there was no program to deal with it.
Five years ago--as young Americans had done for a generation before that--America's youth still lived under the shadow of the military draft.
Five years ago, there was no national program to preserve our environment. Day by day, our air was getting dirtier, our water was getting more foul.
And 5 years ago, American agriculture was practically a depressed industry with 100,000 farm families abandoning the farm every year.