Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 315 › Conversation 315-017
Nixon alone in his EOB office on State of the Union and Speech rehearsal
Monday, January 17, 1972 · 2:34 PM–3:43 PM ET · Old Executive Office Building
AI Summary
President Richard Nixon utilized this private session to rehearse the delivery of his 1972 State of the Union address. He practiced articulating key themes, including the necessity of bipartisan cooperation in Congress, the importance of maintaining national strength, and his foreign policy vision regarding defense spending and the transition toward a generation of peace. The rehearsal served to refine the rhetorical tone and substantive priorities of his upcoming legislative agenda.
Audio
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This conversation has not yet been cut into its own clip, so the player above contains the full tape segment shared with neighbouring conversations. It begins about 01:14:36 into the tape and ends around 01:39:12.
Transcript (AI-generated)
This transcript was generated automatically by AI (WhisperX) and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Names and numbers are often wrong; speakers are not identified. Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.
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· Timestamps are positions within the full tape recording.
1:14:42Twenty-five years ago, I sat here as a freshman congressman among the speaker government, and listened for the first time to the President and President of the United States.
1:14:51I shall never forget the majesty of that moment.
1:14:54The Senate, the liberal elite core, the Supreme Court, the Cabinet, and the Chamber, and the President of the United States.
1:15:03All of the older guys, the presidents, the president, and the president.
1:15:07And I remember that on the day he addressed that drum session at the New York Republican Congress,
1:15:13He spoke not as a partisan, but as president of all of them, calling upon the Congress for a set of partisan considerations and national interests.
1:15:23Here you turn the shape of the Marshall Plan, the great foreign policy that shows that you've been responsible for avoiding a little war for the past 25 years, for a group underneath the Congress by the bipartisan majority, which I was proud to be a part of.
1:15:381972, the 4th.
1:15:42We must not waste it.
1:15:44I know the political pressures in this session of Congress will be great.
1:15:47There are more candidates for the presidency in this chamber today than there have probably been for any one time in the whole history of the Republic.
1:15:55There is an honest difference between the parties, but within the parties, on some issues of board policy and other policies as well.
1:16:03However, there are great national problems that are so likely to transcend our leadership.
1:16:09Let us have our debates.
1:16:10Let us have our honest differences.
1:16:12But let us join in keeping the nation at first place.
1:16:16Let us join in making sure that the legislation America needs does not become a hostage to the political interests of any country or any person.
1:16:25There is an impressive selection here to be presented with a huge list of new proposals.
1:16:30Knowing full well that there could be no possibility that they would be an act that you can do work on today, I shall not complain.
1:16:37I present the leaders of Congress today a message of 15,000 words, discussing in some detail where the nation stands, and setting forth specific legislative ideas for the triumphant economy we have.
1:16:51Much of this is legislation we tried to propose in 1967, and in the first session of this 9th Senate Congress last year, in which I gave an essential redaction to this year.
1:17:00I have not presented proposals which have attractive labels, but probably have some.
1:17:04I am presenting only vital documents which are within the capacity of the Congress to enact, within the capacity of the budget to enact, and which I believe should be above partisanship.
1:17:15Programmes which deal with urgent priorities for the nation, which even must be decided by a part of the National, by this Congress, in the end of the Congress of 1973.
1:17:25When I took the oath of office in the 17th of November, the nation was under one of the most harsh decades of
1:17:34The 1960s were a time of great progress in many areas.
1:17:36They were also a time of great agony.
1:17:39The agonies of war, of inflation, of rapidly rising crime in the third and least states, of hopes raged and disappointed, of anger and frustration that led finally to violence and to the worst civil disorder of the century.
1:17:51To recall these troubles was not a fun thing to plan.
1:17:54The nation was so torn in those final years and centuries that many of the bold parties questioned whether America could govern at all.
1:18:03The nation has made significant progress in its first years of service.
1:18:07Our cities are no longer the goal of a civil society.
1:18:10Our colleges and universities have again become places of learning and a set of battlegrounds.
1:18:15A beginning has been made in preserving and protecting our environment.
1:18:19The rate of increase in crime has been slowed, and here in the district of Colombo, the one state where the federal government has direct jurisdiction, serious crime in 1970 almost actually reduced by 30% in 2004.
1:18:30But most importantly,
1:18:32Because at the beginnings of it may we consider that the year 1972 can be the year in which America may make the greatest progress in 25 years for achieving our goal of being at peace with all the nations in the world.
1:18:46As our involvement in the war at Vietnam comes to an end, we must now go on to build a generation of peace.
1:18:52To achieve that goal, we must realistically face the need to maintain our independence.
1:18:59In the past three years, we have reduced the burden of arms.
1:19:02For the first time in 20 years, spending through defense has been brought below spending money and resources.
1:19:09As we look into the future, we might encourage progress in our negotiations with the Soviet Union and the United States and the United States of America.
1:19:16Looking further into the future, we hope there can eventually be agreement on the mutual reduction of arms.
1:19:23But until there is such a mutual agreement, we must maintain the strength necessary to do so.
1:19:28Because of rising research and development costs, because of increases in military and legislative pay, because of the need to proceed with a new weapon system, my budget for the coming fiscal year will provide for an increase in defense spending.
1:19:42Strong military defenses are not the enemy of peace.
1:19:47They are the darkness.
1:19:48There could be no more misguided set of priorities than one which would tempt others by weakening an army, and thereby endangering the security of the army.
1:19:57The world has changed greatly over the 11 years since President Kennedy said in his inaugural address, we shall pay any price, bear any burden, eat any hardship, support any brand, oppose any foe, and we are sure to survive successfully.
1:20:13Our policy has been carried away since the birth of the U.S. and to meet the new reality of the new world we now live in.
1:20:20We make only those commitments we are capable and prepared to meet.
1:20:25Our commitment to freedom remains strong and undisputed, but others must bear their share of the burden of the momentary amount of freedom.
1:20:33This is our policy.
1:20:34We will maintain a military return, adequate to be any threat to society.
1:20:46We will act to defend our interests whenever and wherever they are threatened.
1:20:51But where our interests or our treaty commitments are not involved, our role will be limited.
1:20:58We will not intervene in terror.
1:21:00We will use our influence to prevent war.
1:21:03The war economy will use our influence to try to stop it.
1:21:06Once war is over, we will do our share in helping to bind up the wounds of those who have been killed.
1:21:13I shall soon be dead in
1:21:51Thank you for watching!
1:22:57for tomorrow's meeting.
1:24:08Thank you.
1:29:46Takk for watching!
1:36:14Thank you.
1:37:43Undertexter av Amara.org-gemenskapen
1:38:01Thanks for watching!
NARA Description
On January 17, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 2:34 pm and 3:43 pm. The Old Executive Office Building taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 315-017 of the White House Tapes.
Nixon Library Finding Aid
Conversation No. 315-17 Date: January 19, 1972 Time: Unknown between 2:34 pm and 3:43 pm Location: Executive Office Building The President rehearsed his "Address on the State of the Union Delivered Before a Joint Session of Congress". [A transcript of the speech in its final form appears in Public Papers of the Presidents, Richard M. Nixon, 1972, pp. 34-41]
Also recorded on January 17, 1972
- 315-016 2:29 PM · 8 min — President Richard M. Nixon and John B. Connally met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building from 2:29 pm to 2:34 pm.
- 315-018 2:34 PM · 35 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 2:34 pm and 3:43 pm.
- 315-019 2:34 PM · 1 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Roger Staubach met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 2:34 pm and 3:43 pm.
- 018-089 2:39 PM · 7 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Raymond K. Price, Jr. talked on the telephone from 2:39 pm to 2:43 pm.
- 315-004 2:39 PM · 4 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Raymond K. Price, Jr. met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building from 2:39 pm to 2:43 pm.
- 018-090 2:43 PM · 6 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 2:43 pm and 2:47 pm.
- 315-005 2:43 PM · 17 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 2:43 pm and 2:47 pm.
- 018-091 2:47 PM · 22 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Charles W. Colson talked on the telephone from 2:47 pm to 3:10 pm.
Cite this conversation
Conversation 315-017, January 17, 1972. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/315-017 (accessed September 29, 2026).