The next move is up to Copenhagen. They have two choices. Either they can extend to us the diplomatic courtesy we have requested of them under international law; or, in the face of that request, they can continue to display the intransigence, belligerence and contempt that originally touched off this grave confrontation. Now if they choose within the next twelve hours to negotiate with us in good faith by conceding to us what we want, I shall immediately call off the blockade of their coast, just as John F. Charisma called off the blockade of Cuba in his finest hour. Furthermore, I will reduce at the rate of one sixteenth a year the number of troops massed at their borders. Lastly, the guard taken prisoner at Elsinore castle will be returned to Copenhagen, provided the interrogation now being conducted does not reveal him to be a Danish citizen in the employ of the Danish government.
If, however, Copenhagen should refuse to negotiate in good faith by giving us what we want, I shall immediately order 100,000 armed American troops onto Danish soil.
Now, quickly, let me make one thing very clear: this will not constitute an invasion, either. Once we have overrun the country, bombarded the major cities, devastated the countryside, destroyed the military, disarmed the citizenry, jailed the leaders of the Pro-Pornography government, and established in Copenhagen the government currently in exile so that, as Abraham Lincoln said, it shall not perish from this earth, we shall immediately withdraw our troops.
For unlike the Danes, this great country harbors no designs on foreign territory. Nor do we wish to interfere in the internal affairs of another country. Despite our very deep sympathy with the aspirations of the Danish Anti-Pornography Resistance, we have over the years maintained a scrupulous wait and — see attitude, in the hope that these eminently decent and idealistic men of the D.A.R. would be permitted to achieve political office in Copenhagen through democratic means. Unfortunately, the Pro — Pornography Party would not permit this to come about, but repeatedly, in one so-called free election after another, chose to brainwash the Danish people in voting against the D.A.R. So elaborate and thoroughgoing were these brainwashing techniques, that eventually the D.A.R. did not collect a single vote and, to all intents and purposes, might just as well not have been on the ballot. In this way did the forces of filth and smut make a mockery of the democratic processes in Denmark.
My fellow Americans, it is precisely this sort of contempt for the rights of others that Copenhagen would now display toward the United States of America. Only this country is not about to be bullied and disgraced by a tenth-rate military power, and see our credibility destroyed in every area of the world where only the power of the United States deters aggression. And that is why tonight I have put the leaders in Copenhagen on notice that if they continue to refuse what we ask them, I will bring all our military might to bear to restore to legitimate authority in Denmark a government that will respond to reason instead of force, a government that stands for decency instead of degradation, a government, as Abraham Lincoln said, of, by and for, not only the Danish people, but the American people and all good people everywhere.
What are we asking of Copenhagen, my fellow Americans? Neither more nor less than what we requested and received from the United Kingdom in 1968, when, according to the rules of international law and the custom of civilized nations, that country returned to our shores the fugitive from justice who was later convicted of the murder of Martin Luther King.
What are we asking of Copenhagen? Neither more nor less than what we would have requested of the Soviet Union in 1963, had President Charisma’s murderer attempted to take refuge for a second time in that country.
What are we asking of Copenhagen? Nothing more nor less than that they surrender to the proper American authorities the fugitive from the Washington Senators of the American League of Professional Baseball Clubs, the man who fled this country on April 27, 1971, exactly one week to the day before the uprising of the Boy Scouts in Washington — the man named Charles Curtis Flood.
Now events have moved so rapidly during these past twenty-four hours that in the interest of clarity I should like to review for you in all its pertinent details, the case of Charles Curtis Flood, who, previous to his disappearance, played baseball right here in Washington, under the alias “Curt Flood.” As always, I want to make everything as per perfectly clear to you as I can. That is why you hear me say over and over again, in my speeches and press conferences and interviews, that I want to make one thing very clear, or two things, or three things, or as many things as I have on my agenda to make very clear. To give you a little glimpse of the lighter side of the President’s life (impish endearing smile), my wife tells me that I even say it in my dreams. (Back to business) My fellow Americans, I am confident that you recognize as well as I do, that any man who says he wants to make things perfectly clear as often as I do, both awake and in his sleep, obviously does not have anything to hide.
Now who is this man who calls himself “Curt Flood”? To many Americans, particularly the wonderful mothers of our land, that name is probably as strange as the name Eric Starvo Galt, which, you may remember, was the alias taken by James Earl Ray, the convicted murderer of Martin Luther King.
Who is “Curt Flood”? Well, until a year or so ago, the answer would have been simple enough. Flood was a baseball player for the St. Louis Cardinals of the National League, a center fielder with a more than respectable lifetime batting average of.294. Not a Hall of Famer, not the best baseball player in the big leagues, but far from the worst. Many even believed that his finest years lay ahead of him. I am proud to say that I, as an avid fan of baseball as well as all manly sports, was among them.
Then tragedy struck. In 1970, with no more warning than the Japanese gave at Pearl Harbor, “Curt Flood,” as he then called himself, turned upon the very sport that had made him one of the highest-paid Negroes in the history of our country. In 1970, he announced — and this is an exact quotation from his own writings — “Somebody needs to go up against the system,” and proceeded to bring a legal action against Organized Baseball. According to the Commissioner of Baseball himself, this action would destroy the game of baseball as we know it, if Flood were to emerge victorious.
Now no one expects ordinary citizens, who earn their livelihoods outside the legal profession, to be able to wade through the intricacies of a legal suit such as this fugitive from justice has brought against our great national pastime for the purpose of destroying it. That’s why people hire lawyers in the first place. I know when I was a lawyer that was why people hired me, and I think without boasting, that I was able to help them. When I was a young, struggling lawyer, and Pitter and I were living on nine dollars a week out in Prissier, California, which is right here (points), I would read through my law books and study long into the night in order to help my clients, most of whom were wonderful 100.