I am honored by Mayor Corradini's invitation to speak to you. I am glad you have come to Salt Lake City. It is a good city, not without its problems, but a good place to live. It is a city with a unique beginning and a great history. I think I have been in most of the cities from which you come. Each city has its own individual personality, its own attractions, and its own set of problems, although they are much alike, particularly the problems.
I hope that while you are here you will visit our Family History Library. I am told that it is the largest of its kind in the world. It is a great treasure house of genealogical information, and I will be surprised if you cannot find something of your family roots.
In addition to this central resource we have 1,674 satellite facilities across the nation. They are open to everyone. Half of those who use them are not members of the Church. You will be welcome in any one of them. In many instances you will find them in the cities from which you come.
I hope you will also visit the Sunday morning broadcast of the Tabernacle Choir. I think you will enjoy it. This body of 300 volunteer singers has been broadcasting to the nation for 69 years. There is nothing to compare with it in broadcast history. The choir has become a great national treasure.
Now, Mayor Corradini has suggested I talk on family values.
I need not remind you that the cities of America are in trouble. They have been for a good while, and in most cases the situation is growing worse.
I should like to briefly highlight a few of the problems of which you are all well aware. Perhaps the most serious of these is the growing number of families without fathers. In 1996 there were 7,874,000 fatherless families with children under 18 in the United States. This represents 23% of all families with children under 18. They are headed by single women who struggle to make a go of things. Forty-one percent of these have never been married. This according to the National Center for Health Statistics.
In 1996 there were1,260,000 children born to single mothers. This represents 32% of all live births.
Every young woman should know that in giving birth to a child, she places upon herself a responsibility from which she will never be entirely free. How tragic is the desolate and ever-increasing picture of illegitimate birth. With each such birth comes responsibility to the mother, and, inevitably to society at large. A lack of self-discipline, of a sense of responsibility, in my judgment, is symptomatic of the troubles that afflict us in growing numbers.
An editorial in the Wall Street Journal speaks of a report issued by the Council on the Family in America after two years of intense study. The conclusion of that report is this: "American society would be better off if more people got married and stayed married." What a remarkable conclusion that is. Any of us in this hall could have said that without a long and costly study.
In support of its conclusion, the study states "that children who don't live with both parents are most likely to grow up poor, have problems in school, and get into trouble with the law; . . . the children in fatherless homes are five times more likely to be poor than those who live with both parents. In black families, where the decline in marriage has been most acute, 57% of children in fatherless households live in poverty, while only 15% of children in intact families are poor."
The editorial in the Journal concludes: "Marriage may be an imperfect institution, but so far in human history no one has come up with a better way to nurture children in a stable society" (Wall Street Journal, April 25, 1995).
Marriage was once generally regarded as a sacred sacrament. Fortunately it still is with many, but with the people of the nation as a whole it is becoming an increasingly secular experience. We are losing something. We are losing something that speaks of accountability, not only to one another, but to God who is our Father and who will stand in judgment upon us.
The Center for Disease Control and Prevention states that in the United States in 1994 there were 1,400,000 abortions. Such a figure is indicative of the moral indifference that has overcome so many in this nation. It says something about the value we place on human life. Have we forgotten that all of us are sons and daughters of God?
The scourge of drugs is a national disgrace. A lying sophistry lurks behind the invitation to partake of these illegal substances. As you so well know, their use leads only to degradation, to a terrible gnawing dependency, to absolute loss of one's self-control, of one's health, of one's happiness. A 1997 University of Michigan study concluded that 18% of all 8th graders and 35% of all 10th graders have tried marijuana within the last year. What has become of self-discipline? What has become of self-esteem? You are all too familiar with this problem. You know of its cost, of its consequences, of the dreadful loss of human productivity because of these lost values.
The terrible blight of gangs affects our cities. These young men and women scheme, they roam, they destroy property, they fight, they murder one another and innocent victims who happen to get in their way. They are an ill-begotten lot of young people who drift in a mire of terror and whose lives lead in only one direction, if they survive, and that is to prison.
We cannot build jails and prisons in this nation fast enough to accommodate the need.
I might continue, but you are all too familiar with this litany of urban troubles. These and others are your problems with which you constantly wrestle. What is the answer? What can be done about it? Long term, these problems will not be remedied by increasing taxes and spending more money. You might put more policemen on the beat. You might build more jails. But the problems will largely continue until you get at the root. That root, I believe, lies in two places--in our schools and in our homes.
Unless there can be some reformation here, it is not likely to occur anywhere. It will not happen in a day or a year, but it could happen in a generation.
When I was a boy, I attended public school in this city. The name of the school was Hamilton. It was named after Alexander Hamilton, one of the great Founding Fathers of our nation, and the name of our school was a constant reminder to us of strength and greatness in men. We did not slouch into the classroom each morning. Weather permitting, the flag was raised above the school. We lined up on the walk in front, saluted and gave the Pledge of Allegiance. We then marched to our classrooms.
We had heroes in those days. Among them were George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Their birthdays in February were holidays. There was none of this so-called Presidents' Day, which simply affords a day off to go to the mall without any thought whatever of great leaders who have preceded us.
In our public school we were taught honesty through the examples of these men. We learned love of country. We learned respect for the flag. We learned the meaning of citizenship. We learned respect for our principal and our teachers and our parents. We learned respect for one another.
What has happened to our schools? There are still many that are excellent, but there are very many that are failing. What has become of the teaching of values? We are told that educators must be neutral in these matters. Neutrality in the teaching of values can only lead to an absence of values. Is it less important to learn something of honesty than to learn something of computer science?
What has happened to the discipline we knew? Not the sometimes absurd punishment arbitrarily meted out to a child for a frivolous offense, but the self-discipline which is born of respect for others and an accountability for one's actions. Discipline is not just a matter of punishment for wrongdoing, but of teaching our youth not to do wrong in the first place.
When I was in the 7th grade, a number of us boys did not like an action taken by the school. We talked the matter over out on the school grounds. The next day we went on strike to protest. We wandered around for a day, hoping the truancy officer would not see us, wasting our time and grumbling about an injustice the school had dealt us.
The next morning when we came to school Mr. Stearns, our principal, stood at the front door. He firmly advised us that we were suspended and could not come back until we brought a note from home. At that early age we learned the meaning of a lockout.
I recall walking home and entering the house. My mother asked what was wrong. I told her the whole story. She did not sympathize with me. She did not try to justify or defend my behavior. She told me I had done wrong, and taught me that if we had a complaint to make there was a better way to address it. She finally wrote a note which I sheepishly carried back to school. One by one all of the boys came, each with a note in hand.
We never tried that tactic again. From our teacher and our parents we had learned a lesson in following the proper avenues for settling grievances.
In the normal course of our lives in that school we were far from perfect. We had fist fights with one another until our noses ran with blood. We were not very good athletes, but we were very determined in our competition.
But so far as I am able to ascertain, no boy in that class was ever arrested for anything worse than a traffic violation. All went on to higher study and productive lives. How grateful I am for the values we were taught, for the discipline that was expected of us, for parents and teachers who pointed a better way to live.
Where today are the heroes from whose lives we learned honesty and integrity and the meaning of work? The debunkers of Washington and Lincoln have done their job and we all are the poorer for it.
To you men and women of great influence, you who preside in the cities of the nation, to you I say that it will cost far less to reform our schools, to teach the virtues of good citizenship than it will to go on building and maintaining costly jails and prisons in which to warehouse the many who violate the law.
But there is another institution of even greater importance than the schools. It is the home. I believe that no nation can rise higher than the strength of its families. And yet the family is falling apart. Not only in America, but across the world.
Long ago, 40 years ago, back in 1958, I read an article in the Readers' Digest entitled "Put Father Back at the Head of the Family." It was written by a Judge Liebowitz of New York City. In his capacity as judge, he spent his days listening to evidence and handing down sentences. He traveled to Europe, and discovered that the conditions among the youth there were often much better than in America. He investigated and thought and pondered, and out of a vast experience came to the conclusion that the easiest, most simple remedy in reducing delinquency among the young was to put father back as head of the family.
The God of heaven designed the family as the basic unit of society. He did not design that children should be begotten and left to a single and often poor mother to rear. He designed that a father should stand as a pillar of strength in every household.
I do not believe that women resent the partnership, even the leadership of a good man in the home, and I emphasize the word good. They welcome it. He becomes the provider, the defender, the counselor, the companion who will listen and give support when needed. There is no adequate substitute for husband and wife, father and mother, working together to strengthen each other and guide the destinies of their children.
How do we get father to take his place? It may be a slow process, but it is worth the effort. We begin with very young boys and teach them, and motivate them, and point them in this direction. It will not be easy. We will not save them all. But we can save many who are now being lost.
It is my belief that no one else, other than a good and exemplary father, can so effectively teach children the value of education, of the dead-end nature of street gangs, of the utter stupidity of partaking of drugs, of the miracle of self-esteem which can change their lives for good.
I remember reading in the Wall Street Journal four or five years ago of a lawyer in Ohio, a well-educated African-American, whose name was King. He spoke of his boyhood, and told of his father taking the family for a ride on a Sunday afternoon in their old car. While they were going down the street, a fancy red Cadillac passed them.
The boy asked his father why some people had Cadillacs while their's was an old jalopy. His father responded that everyone couldn't have the same, but that he, his son, had something that was of absolutely tremendous worth, which many others did not have, which was of greater worth than any Cadillac. He said that his boy was a son of the King family and of the Jones family and that there flowed in his veins the best blood of each of those families. He taught his son that while all could not achieve temporal equality, everyone could cultivate those wonderful values which we speak of as self-esteem and self-discipline. The boy grew to manhood, studied law, and is today a successful practitioner.
I read this from Jenkins Lloyd Jones some years ago:
"The kid who isn't loved knows it. There is no trauma so excruciating as parental rejection. No other form of human cussedness can more efficiently wreck a human life. Yet there persists a superstition that 'advantages' are a substitute for affection. They aren't.
"The finest of the advantages a family can offer can't be found in a department store, a car dealer's showroom, or a prep school. The only priceless one is a sense of belonging. Otherwise, the family becomes a combination café and dormitory. There is no glue in it." (Jenkins Lloyd Jones, Deseret News, July 13, 1968.)
I think we must point out to our youth of all races that there is a better way than the way so many are now going. It will take patience. It will take persuasion. It will take the counsel of good and loving and wise fathers. I believe it will take a great improvement in our homes. I believe it will take prayer.
The problem we face with family life in America is a greater problem than any of us can solve with our own wisdom. It is a problem for which we need inspiration and spiritual guidance. The things of God are understood by the spirit of God, and I submit that what is needed is that motivating and powerful spiritual inspiration which is real and which can come into the lives of those who seek it.
I put father back as head of the family, and while doing so, I plead with him to institute and follow a practice which was commonplace in the homes of America a century ago. We have largely lost sight of it. That is the practice of prayer.
Regardless of religious affiliation, a father who will kneel with his wife and children will do wonders for them. The very act of getting on one's knees before a higher power becomes an acknowledgment of our need for help. To thank the Lord in the presence of one another for life, health and strength and family, carries with it a wonderfully salutary effect. Remembering the poor and the unfortunate before the Almighty has an inevitable effect upon children. It leads to unselfishness, to concern for others, to a desire to lift and bless those in distress. To pray for guidance in one's life, to offer an invocation for the blessings of heaven upon children, inevitably has a positive effect.
In the church which I have the honor to represent we stress a basic and fundamental teaching, and that is that each of us is a child of God. It matters not the race. It matters not the slant of our eyes, or the color of our skin. Each of us is a son or daughter of the Almighty who loves us and who stands ready to listen to our pleadings and help us with our problems. When a child comes to realize that there is something of divinity within him, then something wonderful begins to happen.
We have issued a Proclamation on the Family which has received wide acceptance. I brought some copies with me should you care to read it.
What I have suggested may sound a little strange as I speak to you, the mayors of the cities of America. Am I getting into a field where I do not belong, when I take the liberty of suggesting to you able and concerned people that the time has come for the citizens of this land to acknowledge our failures and our weaknesses in dealing with some of these terrible problems and to get on our knees and seek the wisdom of heaven?
The marvelous thing is that it works. I have seen it. I have experienced it.
I conclude by repeating that I believe that only to the degree that we reform young lives will we reform our society. And that reformation must occur with a return to the teaching of values in our schools, and in putting a good father who will stand beside a good mother in a home where virtue, honesty, integrity, and a reliance upon God will be taught by example as well as by precept.
I believe there is no simpler thing we can do, none less costly, none greater and none more fruitful of good. God bless you, my dear friends, in your very serious work. Thank you.
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