As today marks the 70th anniversary of the D-Day invasions of Normandy, the New Nixon Blog rewinds to 1969, when President Nixon issued a proclamation on the 25th anniversary of D-Day. Read the full proclamation below:
Proclamation 3915
D-Day Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Day
By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation
Twenty-five years ago on June 6, Allied Forces under the leadership of Dwight David Eisenhower, made a successful landing on the beaches of Normandy. What happened on that day–and in the days and months immediately following–is now part of the acts of valor which have been the inspiration and often the salvation of Western civilization. The Sixth of June was transformed on that day from a date on the calendar to a historical landmark in the history of freedom.
The valiant leader and many of the valiant men who made victory possible by their efforts on that day are now gone. Their triumph, however, remains, for it was a triumph of the human spirit. Our Nation and nations of free men everywhere are forever grateful for the sacrifices made in Normandy. Twenty-five years have not diminished but have, rather, enhanced the profound importance of that day.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, RICHARD NIXON, President of the United States of American, do hereby proclaim June 6, 1969, as D-Day Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Day; and I invite the people of this Nation to observe that day with appropriate ceremonies designed to commemorate the brave men living and dead who did so much to open this path to victory and peace.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this thirty-first day of May, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and sixty-nine, and of the Independence of the United States of America, the one hundred and ninety-third.
Signed, Richard Nixon