You're watching a production of South Dakota Public Broadcasting.

William John Janklow is often characterized as being outspoken and candid.

He was born in Chicago in 1939.

Along with his mother and siblings, he would move to Flandreau, South Dakota, at the age of 11 after the death of his father, Bill, a self-proclaimed hell raiser, dropped out of high school and then enlisted in the United States Marine Corps, which is often credited for changing his life.

While serving.

Bill was wounded in an international crisis off the coast of mainland China and honorably discharged.

He would return to South Dakota, where he enrolled at the University of South Dakota in 1960, six years later.

He graduated from the USC School of Law and shortly thereafter found his first job working for the people of South Dakota as a legal aid lawyer on the Rosebud Reservation.

Bill has spent much of his life as a public servant, sitting in office serving the people of our state.

He has served one four year term, a South Dakota's attorney General.

He served as South Dakota's governor for a total of four terms, which is the longest serving governor in our state's history.

Bill Janklow served one year as South Dakota's member of the United States House of Representatives in 2003.

He resigned from Congress after killing a man in a traffic accident.

Bill Janklow is a household name in South Dakota.

His policies, style, enacted legislation are all part of our state's history.

That history also includes a number of appearances and speeches that Bill has left behind for historians to analyze and for our citizens to remember.

Here's a look back at some of those more memorable moments.

But I wasn't going to run for governor.

I made statements that I wasn't going to run for governor and I had a lot of pressure from people to run.

And then I don't even remember the process that I went through mentally with the side.

I had to try and do this.

And so I did.

Would you please raise your right hand and repeat after me?

I, William Janklow, I, William Janklow, solemnly swear.

Do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States.

That I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of South Dakota and the Constitution of the State of South Dakota.

And that I will faithfully discharge, and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of governor, for the duties of the office of the governor for every day.

So thank you.

Somebody said to me yesterday, he says, you know, Janklow, everybody likes it, that you tell it like it is and tell you do.

When you get into trouble.

She knows we're about to embark upon the stewardship for you citizens of this state for the next four years.

It kind of reminds me, as I look at the government of the old story, of the mountain climbers who were climbing the tall mountains in the Himalayas, and as they got up near the top and didn't quite get there, they ran into a big storm.

So they found refuge in a cabin, and they stayed in the cabin.

When the storm was over, just as they were going to leave, another storm came up.

And so they found refuge again.

And then another storm and another storm.

And after about six months of th they asked the native when the storm was going to end.

And the native said there are always storms near the top.

So unless you get out and try and claim the remaining amount to the top, you'll never make it.

Waiting for the storms to quit.

And that's what we really think of as we embark on government.

There are times when you have to speak out boldly.

There are times when you have to engage in serious, confidential diplomacy, but there are all times when you have to engage in responsible stewardship.

You know, when we talk about the challenges of our times, and as I look out here at the legislature, you ladies and gentlemen who will be serving in the legislative branch, you know, as I do, that we've traveled the state for the last ten, 11, 12 months, some of you a lot longer than that, as your repeat people coming, individuals coming back.

And we haven't sat down and invented what we felt were the problems of the people of South Dakota.

We've listened to the citizens tell us how they feel about education.

We understand that one of the few things that separates America from all the rest of the people of the world is the right to a basic, free public education.

Whether you happen to be born white or black or red or yellow, or a mixture, it makes no difference in this country.

You have a right to a free public education, which opens up the doors and the horizons of what a lot of us feel as the beautiful things about America are.

The first time in probably 40 years in America, I think people at all political parties have come to agree and believe that the government can no longer solve everybody's problem in every area.

We have to recognize that people solve people's problems and not the government, and that it's really not enough.

When we run into a problem to turn to the government and ask the government for a solution and then criticize the government because the government has now become involved in our daily lives to a greater extent.

The government will only become as involved in the people's lives as the people allow it to become.

And I'm not much of a person for quotes, but I couldn't say it any better than Abraham Lincoln could.

Way back in 1860, when he said, the legitimate object of the government is to do those things that people cannot do for themselves.

In all other things, the government ought not to interfere.

And we really come to recognize that in the 70s in America, unfortunately, we in South Dakota never really forgot it.

But we can now give a lesson to the rest of people in America who forgotten the message that was given to us by Abraham Lincoln, that we're only on this planet for a short period of time.

In the history of the world, we only get a very small part of it.

The graveyards are full of people who thought the world couldn't get along without them, and somehow the world does.

But those of us that are lucky enough to be put into the stewardship of our fellow men and women have to recognize that that's an awesome responsibility.

And as we go about that task, we're going to do it with openness.

We're going to do it by speaking out, and we're going to do it in partnership with the other branches of government.

And most importantly, always recognizing that you people out there who get up and go to work, get up and go to your religious services, vote in the elections, and who pay your taxes are the ones that own this business that we call our government, and we will never forget and never deviate from the understanding that we have that was laid out for us in our state.

Motto several decades ago when they said that in South Dakota, under God, the people rule.

Thank you very much.

Well, I can see a lot of possibilities, but I honestly don't accept your premise that it's a one way street coming from the tribes, or even that it's been that particular type of thing.

I'm aware of approximately 85 to 90 different things that, the state of South Dakota does for the various Indian tribes in the state, which are normally things that sovereign do for themselves, everything from birth registration to venereal disease control, driver's licensing and the whole gamut of governmental services.

We do these without agreements at the present time because someone has to perform those necessary governmental functions.

I think in every one of those areas, there ought to be state tribal agreements that I happen to believe that the state of South Dakota is sovereign, as are the tribes sovereign, at least with respect to their relationship with each other.

Neither one of us are sovereign when it comes to the United States, because of the Supremacy Clause in the Constitution.

But, in our relationship with each other, if we dealt with each other as sovereigns, I think we'd have a much better relationship.

It's when we ignore the sovereignty aspect that we, people start depending on relying on each other and assuming that we have rights to things that we don't necessarily have a right to.

And I think it creates problems.

And I think if we work along clearly delineated lines, it'll work a lot better.

But everything from the areas of law enforcement to hunting and fishing, to the maintenance of highways to snow removal, to carrying out of social services programs.

I guess I could sum it up by saying, in any area where a government works, I could see where with different tribes, not all of them at the same time, because they all have their own uniqueness.

But in all of those areas, those are areas where you could have intergovern And frankly, those decisions have not yet been made.

The July, August, September quarter, where the taxes were paid in October through the month of November, because people have filed late because of the uncertainty of the economic times, we still can't tell you at this point whether or not those kinds of cuts will be necessary.

But I can tell you this very candidly.

We monitor it every day.

We watch our cash, we watch our projections, and if it ever becomes necessary to make the budget cuts, we'll make them unhesitatingly.

Whether or not that involves any political flak or criticism, frankly, I couldn't care less.

My first primary responsibility as a chief executive of this state is to make sure that our books always stay in balance, and that we never spend any money, more money than we have available to spend.

Frankly, the people of the state through their business that way, and they wouldn't expect any less of us in the way that we do our business.

We tried to go to one time sources because we had a general philosophy.

From the moment we put this budget book together, there would be no new taxes, period, for a lot of reasons.

The first one is there's nobody in South Dakota that can afford to pay any new taxes.

You know, we talk a lot about taxing structure all the time, but there's something every one of us should understand.

It's something that's very fundamental, especially to our society in South Dakota.

The rich have truly never paid taxes of any substance.

They haven't.

Whether you've had a liberal or conservative government run in this country, they haven't.

Whether you've had Republicans or Democrats running this country, they've always have escape mechanisms and tax shelters that they can hide behind.

They've never truly, truly paid a disproportionate share of their income in taxes.

And let's not kid ourselves, the poor have never really paid taxes either of great substance.

Yes, they pay some, like the rich do, but they've never been the great broad based taxpayers, the people that really pay the taxes.

And America's that great middle class, and they're the ones if you want to eliminate poverty, they're the ones if you want to truly address the problems that America has today, it's the middle class that are going to solve those because they're the working men and women.

They're the technocrats, they're the white collar workers.

They're the blue collar workers are the people that roll up their sleeves and go to work.

And if there's ever been a group that government ought to take a viable interest in protecting, it's that group, because that group just has no more money that they can give.

They've given and they've given and they've given.

They've given it the office, they've given it home, they've given it the straight and they've given it the inflation trough.

They've given every place you can imagine.

And there's no more that they can give.

And I think that truly our philosophy is, is that government should be a reflection of its citizenry.

When we've had good, booming times and South Dakota government has benefited from that, and we've taken the money into our coffers and had funds available to do those extra things that our citizens have sometimes wanted done.

And when times are difficult, what we shouldn't do is go take more money from our citizens.

What we should do is make things as difficult for government as they are for the people that are supporting government, and they are for those people that are defending, depending on government.

And so our philosophy was this year is let's take care of the basic needs of one, those that can't take care of themselves.

To those institutions which include people which provide for the building of the future of South Dakota, and three some other areas that we may like that may provide an added bonus to us, but aren't absolutely necessary.

We may have to prune.

We may have to cut and unfortunately, in some instances, we may have had to eliminate.

We're asking for an increase of approximately $2 million in state aid education.

We would like it to be substantially greater.

The resources this year are not there.

But what we are asking is in a very serious way that we all the legislature and the executive branch finally come to grips with bringing about true fairness in the formula that's utilized for the allocation of the school moneys through state aid, education.

No longer should a community be allowed to continue to benefit by deliberately holding their resources down, while other while other communities maintain fairness at the taxing level.

No longer should a community put itself into a position or be allowed to put itself into a position where it gets substantial sums or substantially increased sums of state aid education at the expense of the other neighboring communities in South Dakota, solely by reason of its refusal to recognize the community based responsibility to provide for public education in this state.

I think we have to understand the axiom that of what they call the modern Golden rule, those that have the gold make the rules, and the same people that scream the loudest about the community's right to determine the course of education are the same people.

Sometimes there's not all the times, but sometimes are the same people who insist on increased state funding while they refuse to meet those needs head on in terms of the local context.

So we're well aware that there's been a summer study going and a a study going that's not yet finally been determined, but we're asking that we all have the courage and the fortitude to meet this issue head on, to make a determination, not once and for all, but in light of the current needs of South Dakota, as to how we're going to deal with the funding of schools at the elementary and secondary level.

We've got 134 convicted sex offenders who are males in the Springfield prison, where we can find 110 women.

And I honestly don't think there's a lady or a gentleman in this legislative body or in the state of South Dakota, that would argue that they should be kept together under the physical plant layout.

At Springfield, it's not possible to separate the men and the women except when they're in their dormitories, or they're sleeping or resting under all other circumstances.

They co-mingle.

And we have neither the resources nor the desire to hire enough people to make sure that they enforce what is called the one foot rule.

This is not something that we should honestly delay on if we all agree it needs to be fixed.

And so what I ask you, ladies and gentlemen of the legislature, to do is put your best honest judgment together and let's come up with a solution to this before you go home.

This year.

What I'm asking you to do today is notwithstanding the politics that's rising with an ever increasing dimension between the parties, let's go back to what I honestly believed when I was in there and prove me wrong, that there is a genuine bipartisan, genuine bipartisan desire to provide the property tax reform and take care of the unmet needs that we've all got a responsibility to do.

And then when we're done, everybody can go home and play politics and make their speeches and try and seize the best political advantage.

But in the meantime, we do what we came here to do not only start the work that needed to be done, but finish the work that the people expect of us to get done.

One of the things that happens to politicians, they get lost in the fog sometimes, and I don't mean their brain doesn't work.

I mean, sometimes you have trouble focusing on what, like a laser beam?

What's the issue?

What's important here?

What?

What's important?

And, and it helps you do that.

All the training that I've had, helps me do that.

I have a dear buddy named Dave Convention.

And Dave said to me before I took office, eight years ago, right about this time of the year, he and I had a meeting.

We had supper, and he said, Bill, every day as governor, you're going to be hit with issues that are urgent and those that are important.

If you waste your time all the time on what's urgent, you're never going to get to what's important.

And you know what was remarkable about this blizzard?

Nobody quit in South Dakota, and nobody's quitting now.

What I want to emphasize to all of us who live below the red zone, there's a lot of suffering up in that red zone.

There's a lot of snow.

There's a lot of problems.

And I emphasize also, we're going to have them the rest of this winter because we haven't even hit the Blizzard season yet, and we have no place for the snow to go.

So all I can say, South Dakota, it's a pleasure and I mean a pleasure to have the chance to speak for all of these people, to say on behalf of all those folks that are out there from Dot and the Highway Patrol, the AG Department, your men and women of the South Dakota National Guard, all the men and women in those county governments, I know their budgets are out of snow money.

I know the municipalities are out of snow money where out of snow money.

But nobody has said no in any town, in any city, in any county.

Nobody has said no, we're out of money, so we're not going to plow the snow.

We're not going to get things moving.

We're not going to deal with emergencies.

It's going to cost us a lot of money.

It's going to be a lot of fighting, probably an anguish.

But we're going to get through this winter in good shape.

If everybody goes out and does what you just did in the last blizzard, call on your neighbors that are elderly, call on the handicapped, take care of the kids, keep yourselves out of the cold.

And when it's terrible blizzard conditions, please, please, we won't try and tell you too often, but if we ask you to stay off the roads, please stay off the roads.

We want you to be someone we can deal with and not a statistic on our death records.

Thanks for tuning in and thanks for giving me the opportunity to visit with you this evening and bring you up to date as to what we're trying to do to get South Dakota back to normal.

I am what I am today because my friends have gotten away, one that I never could have done it without them.

They've been there when they've been there when I've been sick.

They've been there when I've been healthy.

They've been there in my down moments when I feel bad, I just want to chuck it all and quit.

I, I have a downtime.

One time, years ago, I was actually thinking of quitting as governor.

I literally was going to quit as governor.

I was tired of what they were saying about me and I. And I had a friend that drove up from winter shut up myself.

And he said, I'm just here.

If you want to go for a ride, I'll drive.

If you want to drive, I sit next to you.

If you want to talk, let's talk.

If you don't want to talk, then I'll just sit here silently.

I'm just here to do whatever you want to do.

I got a lot of friends like that.

Money can't buy that.

I love you all.

Thank you.

I just speak as a as a citizen.

I don't think it was a good process at all to.

I don't think there was anything bipartisan or nonpartisan about it.

I think it what it it really epitomizes where America is at in 1998 and 1999.

This is a country that thrives on scandal.

Nobody's perfect, but it's a country that thrives on scandal.

I mean, there isn't anybody in America that believed his story.

It didn't take a year to discover that dealing in that.

I mean, I tell people and I don't say this with any criticism towards the Congress, our legislatures in peer right now.

They're going to be there for 40 days.

They're going to pass a budget of about $2 billion.

They're going to decide how much government we need over the next year.

They're going to decide how much we're going to spend, and if they're going to decide who's going to pay for it, they're going to go home in 40 days, less time than it took the people from the House of Representatives to present their documents and then try their case in the Senate.

Everything is drug out in a drama in Washington that never ends, just like a movie that just goes on and on and on and on.

And I really think what it does is epitomize what the state of politics is in America today.

In both parties, it's claiming that you're bipartisan, is claiming that you want to be above the ILG, but it's looking for the scandal that breaks somebody into the mud to give you a political advantage.

I think both parties do it.

I think this is probably the low point of American politics.

How can anybody who's an immigrant to this country look at the process the last couple of years and say to themselves, what a marvelous system, what a system.

This is what I was willing to take a boat from Cuba for.

This is what I was willing to try and sneak over a fence someplace for, to see this type of system.

And I it's all I can suggest is I think we all learn something from it.

I think the media has learned something from it.

I would hope the Republicans have learned something from it.

I would hope the Democrats have learned something from it.

And I would hope all public offi You hear that all the time.

What's the public think of you?

Is that as important as what I think of myself?

I don't think so.

You see, if you look in the mirror and the person you're looking at is a liar, you know it.

That person can't fool you.

If that person says, if the public thinks you did the best you could, the person in the mirror knows if you did.

You see, as a student, you may.

You may come this much short of scoring a touchdown and the game ends.

And everybody I'll say he really tried.

You're the only one that knows how hard you really tried to get that extra three inches to score the touchdown.

Nobody else will ever know.

They just see the perception of you.

You are the reality of you and and so I am my harshest critic.

Nobody gets mad at me than me.

Nobody is harder on me than me.

Because I don't get a second chance to do all this stuff.

You see, if I'm making an investment for myself, if I lose money, I've just lost my money.

But if I make an investment for you and all the people of South Dakota.

If I lose money, I've lost your money.

Something you trusted me to do.

And that's more important.

It's the worst thing.

It's.

And I've never been in a legislative body, but they're giving up the most institutional knowledge and information in the Democrat.

Look at who the Democrats are going to lose in the House, in the Senate two years from now.

Look who the Republicans are going to lose.

These are really cream of the crop folks.

And the fact of the matter is, as a natural matter, the state legislature historically has turned over 25 to 33% every single election, every election 25 to 33%.

So what's the problem?

It isn't like you don't know people one and two.

It isn't like people are spending 100 grand to get elected to the state legislature.

If someone spent 15,000, it's a big race.

So the net result is in most communities in Vermillion.

Do you know your legislators?

You know him by first name.

You know who they are.

You know why you like them.

You know why you don't like them.

Is it the same in winter?

Is it the same in mortgage?

So the point that I'm making is term limits don't accomplish anything at the Congress.

All they're going to do is I mean, South Dakota has waited a 100 years, 110 years.

They have the senior person in a political party in a position where Senator Daschle is he's the minority leader in the U.S.

Senate.

He's 4 or 5 Senate seats away from being the majority leader.

Good grief.

Is there anybody in the state that doesn't understand the significance of that, what it means for South Dakota, what it means if he's a person that performs for this state, and we should subjective the term limits and throw him out just because his time is up, what kind of new idea is that?

I mean, it just doesn't make sense and it doesn't make sense to do it for Republicans either.

If they're good, you reelect them.

If they're happy, throw them out of office.

Term limits are for people who are too lazy to use the process to purge the system from folks you don't like or don't want representing you.

It's the lazy person's average bill.

Janklow is one of the smartest guys I know.

Term limits takes away the right of a voter to pick who represents them.

Don't ever forget that.

That's a powerful thing we're giving away when we amend our Constitution to pass term limits.

I always say to myself, one if there's a problem, try and solve it.

Government can't solve all problems and I can't solve all problems.

I know that, but if but I got to try and solve them two if something's starting to become a problem, cut it off at the pass before it becomes one and three.

Don't do anything to create some.

Don't you know government shouldn't be creating problems.

This is the first revolution in the history of the world that's being driven by grade schoolers.

And it's going to continue to be that way forever.

It really is.

This technology revolution is truly not top down.

It's bottom up.

It's being driven by the kids.

Matter of fact, I've always kind of chuckled that that idiot Saddam Hussein thought he could whip a U.S.

Air Force or Marine Corps or Navy pilots who spent their lives growing up an arcade shooting down airplanes.

They didn't have a prayer.

Our kids have been shooting down airplanes since they were five years old.

Six years old.

By the time they climbed in a real flier planes, it was a no brainer.

And that's the world that they've really grown up in.

And once we get these people, how long should we put them in a cage?

That's the question that's going to be the biggest argument.

They're gonna say, well, Janklow always wants to lock people up, and others are going to think we can counsel them to death.

But somewhere in between there, they got to get in the cage for a while, and then you can counsel them to death.

But we had to counsel them from the cage because that's where they belong.

In the cage.

They can't go pester the kids.

They can't meet them.

They can't exploit them.

They can't play with them.

They can't touch with them, and they can't screw with their brains.

It all comes down to one simple conclusion individually fighting this, we're guaranteed to lose all of us together.

We're going to win.

What's the result?

If we win, we're going to have healthy, normal kids in this regard.

Will that guarantee a healthy, normal kid?

No.

But I will tell you this.

Kids that are exposed to pornography, that are exposed to smut talk that more and more evolved towards that direction before they fully understand their own body and their mind is development.

I guarantee you they will not be normal, healthy kids.

And thank you for giving me the privilege of coming before you for a few moments this morning.

I realize this is extraordinary and this is an extraordinary session to deal with that you're having to deal with redistricting.

But I also feel that it's incredibly important that you, ladies and gentlemen, who are the elected representatives of the people of South Dakota, along with myself, who's elected, are really informed as to what's going on, what we're doing, why we're doing it, how we're doing it, and to what extent we're doing it.

And I, given, the way this world has changed so dramatically since we all met last time, you know, back on September 11th, the world changed.

It changed in a way that it's never going to go back and be the way it was before.

This is a country that was built, that has not been occupied or really concerned other than a short time in December of 1941.

That's not been concerned since 1812 with having foreign troops within its borders on September 11th, when they gave the orders to bring down all of the airplanes in America, land them wherever they were, and get them out of the sky.

And they sent, United States Air Force, Army, a marine Corps and National Guard airplanes into the sky, to, to be prepared, if necessary, to shoot, civilian airplanes down.

This country didn't know what it was facing.

We have never in our history built a defense that would prepare ourselves for an attack.

From coming from Cleveland to Dallas, or from Miami to Atlanta, or from Kansas City to Los Angeles.

Everything we have looks out of our borders.

And other than a few pieces of civilian, radar that are used for aeronautics purposes, there was no ability to deal with, finding and seeing airplanes in the sky in a military defense posture.

Unbelievable times.

We've heard a lot of talk over the last decade or two about, bioterrorism and the threats of biological warfare.

The debate still goes on, and whether or not our men and women who served in Desert Storm had to face such a thing.

But there's no debate going on anymore that bioterrorism has hit the world, and not in the laboratories, and not in the places where people are researching on how to do evil, but actually now exhibiting and doing the evil.

And one of the one of the most dangerous things about terrorism is that no one who is a terrorist ever confronts and takes on another nation's military, ever.

The nature of terrorism is to scare human beings, put them in a panic, give them fear, make them show they can't make their ordinary economic decisions.

Make them so they can't make their business decisions.

Make them so they can't make their family decisions.

Make them so they have to live abnormal lives, wrecked the society they live in, pit them against each other, get them into arguments, affect their economics to drive down the economic level of the whole society.

And from that standpoint, America is under attack like it never has been before.

These people amongst us who are going around wreaking havoc are no different than paratroopers in uniform, who've been dropped in our midst.

They're soldiers in an army who are out to kill our people.

They're soldiers in an army who are out to wreck our society.

They're soldiers in a society that have been sent out to wreck us.

But if I can this morning, I'm going to run through and try and give you a brief summary of what we've been doing in South Dakota, to try and address this.

The first slide I just wanted to put up there, about three years ago, the national government asked all of the states to bring together, anti-terrorism task forces to start working on these issues.

We are one of only 4 or 5 states in the union that responded.

I appointed General Kelly, the adjutant general of the South Dakota National Guard, to be the relevant coordinator to bring these kinds of forces together.

And for the last couple of years, they've actually assembled and been meeting.

It involves all the relevant state agencies.

In addition to that is involved the two levels of the most sophisticated nation we have in dealing with the emergency crisis, the, the Sioux Falls Fire Department, police Department and sheriff's Office, the Rapid City Police Department, fire department and sheriff's offices, both of those, communities with their resources have been part of this, and I terrorism task force.

Let's move forward.

And it isn't that we were prepared for this because nobody's prepared for this.

The tabletop exercises, as you go through the planning, you go through never prepares you for the sudden onslaught of what you have to face.

But we were far more prepared in terms of looking at this in an analytical way, than, than most of our neighbors around America.

This is one neighborhood.

We all know.

It.

We all preach it.

We all say we believe it.

Now's the time.

More than any time since this country was in its last war, that everybody has to get together on one team, no question about it.

What they're proving in Washington is what can be accomplished when they put down the mantle of the, if I can call it the B.S., a politics of gamesmanship sometimes, and get on to the reality of dealing with what's important.

And I'm not suggesting for a minute we don't have our politics.

What I am suggesting there is nothing Republican, Democrat, independent, libertarian or anything about any of these issues.

They deal with the health, the safety, the welfare and the survival of the people of America and the people of South Dakota.

So, I appreciate it's taking a lengthy period this morning.

I really appreciate you giving me the opportunity to come here, but I really wanted every one of you this elected to understand what it is that we're doing, why we've been doing it, how we've been doing it, and how we plan on moving forward as we approach, as we engage ourselves in defending our people in this war that it's in.

And frankly, my friends, it's a war that's going to have a lot the best information I get is it's going to have a lot of casualties.

And our country is doing everything that this can, to take the battle to the people that are out to destroy us.

And, and we can just leave it in their hands to, to do the best for all of us.

Thank you for letting me come before you.

And please, let's get together and make sure that every South Dakotan flat gets their flu shots, whether they can afford it or when they can.

It's too important to the survival of this state and nation that everybody get not have the flu.

There are no flags burning in America today.

There are no people in America today that argue against are ashamed to talk about prayer in public institutions and our workplaces and our halls of government, in our halls of Congress and our legislators and our city councils.

There are people today that no longer no longer are willing to stand aside, while others to file this flag and all of those that have fought for it.

You know, I got a friend that's not with us now.

My senior Sampson from Sioux Falls grew from humble beginnings, joined the armed forces in the Second World War as a chaplain, was one of the first people to jump out over Normandy with the 101st Airborne Division unarmed.

As a chaplain, the Faith for the men who jumped over Normandy.

And as we visited, he said, Bill, I tell you what I've heard many others say.

I've never, ever met an atheist in a foxhole.

We all understand what that means today.

Today I stand before you darn proud to be an American and a citizen of this country.

You know, when we talk about memorials, what we're really talking about is remembering and teaching those that you who are soon to leave will leave behind.

I was embarrassed when I found out that we didn't have a World War Two memorial.

I just always assumed we did.

You know, today.

Today it's different.

Today this country is at war again.

You know, sometimes we're a little slow in America.

Sometimes we try so hard to think that we can reason and that we can deal and that we can negotiate, that we forget that there are people out to destroy us and our way of life.

And when they blew up our marine barracks many years ago, after a little bit of outrage, we ignored it.

These people that were at war with us.

And then they took our whole entire embassy hostage in Iran, some others of people who are at war with us.

And yes, we had outrage when we put the yellow ribbons around, but it wasn't very long and we forgot about that.

And then they blew up our embassy in the Sudan, and then they blew up our embassy in Kenya, and we forgot about that.

And then they shot down the people in the Frankfurt airport, all those Americans they killed.

And we forgot about that.

And then they attacked the USS Cole in Yemeni.

And blew up that ship and killed so many of our sailors.

And we've just been in the process of forgetting about that.

And they blew up or tried to blow up our World Trade Center several years ago.

No, these people aren't from one country.

They're from a lot of countries, and they're harbored and sheltered by those who run the governments of places like Syria and Iraq and Iran and Yemen and North Korea.

They're harbored by countries like Afghanistan.

And we've reached the point now that it was driven home to us in living color, the senseless, wanton destruction of people that were innocent.

There's no defense for Pearl Harbor, but it was one nation attacking another nation, one military against another military.

But these folks, all they're afraid to take on our military.

So they take on our babies that are still being fed by their mothers.

They take on the old and the infirm that are in wheelchairs.

They take on people who are sitting at their desks and their offices.

Now, these warriors of today that have declared war on America, they are people who believe they can destroy our will as a people.

They've made a mistake.

They've made a mistake.

They've done something.

No human being, no human being in this country has been able to do since the Second World War.

And it they have united every human being in the United States of America, every man, woman and child, every Protestant, Catholic, Jew and Moslem, every person that was born red, yellow, black or white or some mixture, every person of every gender and every age and every geographical location.

Yes, they've done something no politician has been able to do.

They have unified the American people.

We talk about commitment.

You know, for a lot of people, commitments, the flavor of the week.

You want to know what commitment is to South Dakota.

This state was number one in the percentage of each of its people that put on a uniform and went off to war in the 40s.

We were first in the nation.

When you think when you think that 25% of you, 25% of you were Germanic in your origin, 25% of the state is Germanic, and yes, 25% of you that put on that uniform, many of you went over to fight your grandfathers in your uncles, in your cousins.

Think of this.

It's unbelievable to think of, but it's unbelievable what your country called you and you did your commitment.

We're number one in the percentage of our people that served in the United States Navy, and we're number one of the percentage of our people that served in the United States Marine Corps.

And we're number one in the fewest percentage of our people that were draft dodgers during the war and were number one in the percentage of our people that were underage veterans, joined the service when they were two young and went off to fight.

That's what we have that you taught us.

My friends, my friends, as you look at this memorial today, let me tell you what you're going to see.

You're going to see that every generation sets a standard for itself.

America is always held to a higher standard than anybody else.

We're held to the highest standards of all.

People expect more from us than they expect from other.

And while most of the other countries in the world look at their greatness in class in terms of their last victories, we in America have always measured our greatness in terms of our future.

That's how we measure greatness, the true greatness of this country lies not what has been accomplished by others, but it lies in terms of what we are capable of becoming.

We all know all of us here know that America's greatest generation is yet to come.

It's every new generation.

But I can tell all of you, each and every one of you that's here today, each and every one of you that saw your friends killed and slaughtered, each and every one of you that answered your country's call.

Each and every one of you that fought.

Hedgerow, the hedgerow one ditch the dish that floated in a sea.

I can tell you all on behalf of all the people of South Dakota, not one of you ever went looking for greatness, but you all found it.

You found it, and you gave it to us as a legacy.

And as long as God is our witness, as long as this nation stand, we will remember you.

We will remember your service, and we will remember what it is our responsibility to do to carry on in your legacy.

God bless every one of you and God bless America and God bless South Dakota.

When I left office in 1986, I went out to the airport, walked out the captain, went out to the airport and climbed in that mood to say to them, you two?

And the pilot said to me, you want to fly at home.

I'd never flown it.

And I said, sure.

I got behind the wheel of that airplane, and I flew it to Sioux Falls with the pilot sitting next to me.

And that trip was the funniest trip I've ever taken, because as I looked down as I flew and it was a perfect, beautiful evening, every town I saw, I had a memory of meeting with somebody or a community or doing something.

But I had a memory all the way down there.

It was just nostalgia.

And when I drove to pier a few weeks ago to give my budget address, I drove in the car and I went on the interstate, and then I went north to highway 34.

I went through Artesian and Fedora and and, Woonsocket and, Washington Springs and Crow Creek.

I had the same feeling I can and there's 310 towns and cities in this state.

I know somebody, and every one, I wouldn't know anybody if I hadn't had done these things.

And I can drive by fire halls and community buildings and wired schools or a grocery store that's there, drive on a highway.

I didn't build any of these.

I didn't put up any more money than anybody else did, but I was involved in the decision process that made these things possible.

And so it's I'm a very I'm I'm an emotional person.

That's the way I made, you know, I was a Freeman one time talking to students.

And a student said to me, would you ever like to be a teacher?

I said, no, I don't want to be a teacher.

I wouldn't I couldn't stand it because I couldn't stand getting the like you all.

And then at the end, you're saying goodbye to you.

I can't stand saying goodbye.

It kills me to say goodbye.

I never say goodbye.

When I move away or others move away I just go away.

And I can't stand saying I couldn't stand the emotion.

Every year of seeing the baby.

All the people.

Like if I died today and I'd sure don't want to.

I've had a heck of a life.

I've had a good time.

I've never had a job that I don't like.

I've met a powerful a lot of people I do like, and I've had a ton of fun.

And when you can say that every job you've had has been fun, you've been rewarded.

And that's the way I am.