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So that's on the back. That's great. Now you can take your hat off if you want to stick it out. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Well, Mr President Dick Cave, ladies and gentlemen, I am deeply honored by the action that has been

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taken here tonight. I'm quite sure with what I know about Pepperdine College that it was not due to the fact that I once led a student strike in college. Yeah, the first degree I ever received was as the result of four years of undergraduate effort in

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the line of economics and I have nursed a suspicion for all this time that it too was honorary. As a matter of fact, I never thought of having reached a point of completion in the courses as it is described in the catalog. But more that I

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had just used up my athletic eligibility in the last three years. I've discovered a heretofore unsuspected and kind of latent vindictiveness in my nature. I'm already thinking of those in Sacramento. I will insist addressed me henceforth as Dr Reagan. I was hoping Doctor Young that you

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wouldn't have laid so much stress on the fact that it was Doctor of laws because my vindictiveness even goes so far as that I had considered maybe stretching the term doctor far enough that it might qualify me for a couple of transplant operations. No, I am,

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I am not as has been said by some anti intellectual, although I think I share with you the same disdain for the pseudo intellectual, the one who tries to stretch a little learning and make it go a long ways. And I've always been fond of a

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story involving Mark Twain who on an ocean voyage found himself trapped at his table in the dining salon with a, with someone who was trying to impress him in just this regard. And finally, at one point, when Twain asked him to pass the sugar for his

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coffee, the man couldn't resist another attempt. And he said, isn't it interesting, Mr Twain that the only two words in the English language with the su spelling having a sh sound are sugar and Shumack and Twain said, are you sure? No, but they so much has

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been said here tonight about this wonderful institution in these schools, the independent schools are absolutely essential to the total education system of this nation. It is absolutely essential that we have these independent colleges. They serve as an educational whetstone and they helped to hone the educational

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process. They forced the public system to compete in the drive for excellence. Indeed, by that very competition, they help preserve the public institution from political interference. I guarantee, I guarantee a measure of academic freedom that the public universities and colleges couldn't attain without schools such as

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this one, the independent colleges and universities educate about 25% of all the graduate and four year undergraduate students in California. And for this reason, that's why I believe and why I have worked and tried to persuade our own representatives in Washington that the federal government should

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grant tax credits, not deductions, but tax credits for at least a portion of the tuition fees that are paid by parents as they send their sons and daughters to college. Yeah. And I don't believe with all of us working toward this, that this is an impossible

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idea. I think we should seriously explore the possibility of extending federal aid not through a bureaucracy at the risk of violating our traditional separation of church and state. But again, in a spirit of competition granting tax credits for contributions to schools and colleges within a prescribed

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limit. Of course, as to the overall amount, the private sector, the business communi community can make no greater investment in freedom than their contributions to the independent colleges and the schools of this country. Now, if they did the real winner, of course, as they do, this

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would be our way of life. I once drew a parallel between the rise and fall of Rome and the course of our own Republic. The similarity is frighteningly eerie. It is so accurate and even as to detail, the institution of a welfare system that created a

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whole segment of society depended on their fellow citizens, silver coins that were replaced by copper taxes growing every heavy ever heavier on the middle class of Rome and scholars of that day affecting ragged clothing and heaping scorn upon what they called the middle class values of

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the Roman citizens crime was rampant and rioting was commonplace. It's been pointed out that the days of a democracy are numbered when the belly takes command to the head. When the less affluent feel an urge to break a commandment and begin to covet that which their

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more affluent neighbors possess, then they are tempted to use their votes to obtain instant satisfaction and equal opportunity at the starting line becomes an extended guarantee of a tie at the end of the race. Under the euphemism, the greatest good for the greatest number. We move

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toward a managed economy and we destroy the system that has given us just exactly that for 200 years, the greatest good for the greatest number. And we mortgage the earnings of generations yet unborn. We've known riots in our streets. We no longer walk in the countryside

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of the city streets without fear and the jungle seems to be closing in on this little plot. We've been trying to civilize for 5000 years and all of us I know are disturbed at the virus that's infected the campus during the recent years. Just listen to

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some words that I know will sound very familiar to you. The revolt of the coming generation is against all that is senile and rotten in the decay of our democratic society. Sons are pitted against fathers because the generations cannot understand each other. They are deadly enemies

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and no 1/30 is trustworthy. The student rebels are a new generation disgusted with the complacency of their parents fighting courageously for a better world. Young idealists concerned with the real issues of society. Well, we've heard that so much these last few years. This is the creed

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of the campus revolutionary. But I think I should tell you that some of us perhaps have an earlier memory because the words I've just read are not the words of today's young radicals. These were the words of Adolf Hitler to the youth of Germany in the

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early thirties, national socialism, Nazism, he said would come to power as a party of the youth. And so it was with fascism in Italy. The hymn of fascism was called Giove youth. The first cave in came in the great German universities, government controlled and supported whose

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professors were forced by their students to teach aryan supremacy. Actually, the youth of that period feeding on emotion were fascinated with violence. And the history of the time now says their favorite device was disruption of the meeting and creation of disorder to demonstrate that the system

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was unable to function. Well, one day in a meeting on one of our own campuses of the trustees, I listened to a tape recording that had been taken of a group of citizens who were meeting, planning their own disruption of the campus. And on the tape,

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we heard the explicit directions given on how to start fires in the college buildings and subsequently 50 were started in the buildings of that campus. And then we heard them as we continued to listen, outline where the pickets would go, how they would parade and what

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they would do and how they would take over the college. And then as we listened, we heard a voice in the same matter of fact, tone say if in the process of doing this, it becomes necessary to kill, you will kill in the unreality, the overwhelming

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sense of unreality as we were listening, but that it was happening at all. But even more frightening is how close we are and we've come to accepting it as a kind of normal way of life. Dr Spock's babies have grown up, which is probably more than

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we can say for the doctor. Mm I and when and how did all this begin? Well, it began with those who in the name of change and progress decided that we could scrap all the time tested wisdom that man has accumulated in his climb from the

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swamp to the stars simply call its constricting tradition and morality. The dead hand of the past wipe out the discipline as no longer binding upon us. Just as the chancellor told us here, Saint Thomas Aquinas warned teachers that they must never dig a ditch in front

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of a student that they fail to fill in, to cleverly raise doubts and to never find an answer to discuss freely, all sides of the question without values. And thus, to ensure the creation is thus to CRE ensure the creation of a generation of uninformed and

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talkative minds. Our obligation is to help our young people find truth and purpose to find identity and a goal. Forgetting for a moment, these nihilists and radicals, there is another kind of unrest on our campuses involving the great majority. They have complaints and many of their

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complaints are legitimate. They want to invest their energy and their idealism and causes. They can believe in the chancellor was right about that. They refuse to become numbers in a computer. They want more than a four year ride on an assembly line in some kind of

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diploma mill. They want a reordering of the priorities and there's a certain validity to many of the points they raise as they criticize what they call the establishment. But in their exuberance and their impatience to build a better world, they have at times allowed themselves to

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be misled into excessively and premature actions by others who have taken advantage of their concern. I think now there are some hopeful signs that they're wiser to the ways of the zealots and that they, even some of those teachers among them who led them down those

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paths, who used them for nonconstructive alien purposes. Many of our young people today and they are idealists as you've been told, talk about a greater participation in our American democracy. When asked about their plans for the future, they say they want to serve, they want to

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become as they put it meaningfully involved. Well, if young people are looking for action, constructive action, which can give spirit an uplift to the decade of the seventies and make it a benchmark in man's search for a better world. They can find it by working within

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this system, improving it, making it more responsive to the citizens and to the needs of the future. And part of this preparation and participation must begin on the campus and in the mind, meaningful participation by its very nature must have a modicum of wisdom as well

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as idealism and enthusiasm. It's possible that even among the most radical, some of their protests and their noise have in reality been a cry for help. I've told some of you, I'm sure about an experience I had as a participant in a lecture series at a

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large university in the Midwest. We took place in a field house and there were several 1000 civilians or I should say off campus. People adults mainly in the, on the main floor. And then in the seats around this huge fieldhouse were some 10,000 students. And in

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a question answer period that followed one of the questions from an adult to me expressed a concern about young people not accepting the moral standards of the principles that we've tried to teach them. And my answer suggested that perhaps they weren't rebelling against the principles and

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the standards so much as because they don't believe that we're living up to those principles and standards. And there was a split second of silence. And then 10,000 kids came to their feet with a roar that I shall never forget. Have they lost faith in us

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or in our rules? Do they doubt our willingness to practice what we preach? Where were we, for example, when God was expelled from the classroom? And if we believed, why didn't we fight back? As the country Parson once said, the fellow who left the gate open

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is only slightly more guilty than the one who saw it open and didn't close it. I suppose what I'm really calling for is the old fashioned custom of bearing witness. It's so much more powerful than just mere talking or sermonizing or teaching a lesson. I had

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an experience recently of bearing witness. I'd like to share with you. I have an 11 year old son, Nancy and I have reared probably the world's greatest Ram football fan that ever lived, he was three years ago, was given a size 54 Ram t-shirt by Roman

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Gabriel and he will not watch a football game on TV without wearing it. It's more fun than watching the set. Well, the only game we could get to in person was at the end of the 11 game winning streak when the Rams lost to the Vikings

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here in the Coliseum. We had a heartbroken son, but I, what was worse around us was the kind of somewhat cynical talk that goes on in a round of football game. There were fans that were saying, well, they don't need it. They've won the title, so

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they're really not trying. And then there were even some who were saying, I understand that the, that the pros kind of shade points. So now and then for the gamblers, well, I was suffering a little under this and there wasn't much I could do about it.

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I couldn't put cotton in his ears, but the secret I was nursing was that if the game ended in time for us to catch our plane to Sacramento, I had an invitation to take him down to the locker room. Well, there was time so I sprung

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the invitation and this eased the disappointment somewhat and we left Nancy outside the door of the dressing room and we went in and if there was any doubt as to whether they were trying or not in that game in, they came and they literally were bleeding.

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These big Hawks came in and they were angry and Deacon Jones came through saying everybody up and they all gathered in a little kind of meeting room looked like a school room. And then for about seven minutes, you found out how mad they were at themselves

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over the way they played and the fact they lost the game. Well, this was pretty impressive. And then after about seven minutes of it, in a matter of fact, tone of voice that made you realize what was taking place was a regular weekly occurrence. George Allen,

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the coach said, all right, that's enough. Let's give thanks and 35 of the sweating, bleeding giants in the presence of this hero worshiper of ours dropped to their knees and repeated the Lord's prayer. I don't think I can ever say anything to my son that will

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be as great as that example of bearing witness. It's time we bear witness, not as individuals alone, but our institutions like this college. And I'm sure it will with what we've heard here tonight, its plans and its policies. The United States Department of Education survey of

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68 campuses and 7500 faculty members asked a question, what is the primary obligation of the university? And the answer from the overwhelming majority of the faculty was to protect the academic freedom of the faculty. What about teaching? Where is the obligation to the students in our

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quest for academic excellence. If we lost sight of the primary purpose, it's time perhaps to reorder the priorities, the doctrine of Publisher Parish must give way to prestige that is based on the ability to teach, reward must be related to the quality of the young men

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and women that we send out into the world from our campuses as the end product of our educational effort. Now, no one at all and certainly no one in my present position would deny the great value of our great public universities and colleges. They are of

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course essential in the backbone of our educational system. But let no one carelessly dismiss our obligation to the independent colleges and universities which are so much a part of the educational tapestry of America without them. I promise you that tapestry would soon become a very simple

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fabric of great monotony and very little color. It would be dull. Indeed. You have done me a very great honor here tonight and one of which I am more proud than I can say. I doubt that you've added any particular luster to your own scholastic prestige

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as an educational institution by this deed. As a matter of fact, you may find yourself in the days to come. Looking forward to a time when at least the mantle of old age will have settled a patina on me that will make me more acceptable among

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your peers on other campuses. Well, all I can say in addition to thanks is by way of some ray of hope for you in that situation. Take heart because we age faster in Sacramento. Thank you. Let's pass this uh degree down bill. So I won't forget

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it here this time. Huh.