The only way to achieve the growth in the urban tax base required to meet rising expenditures is through a healthy local economy.

It is time for our government leaders to recognize that the people who inhabit even the poorest and most deteriorating of our central cities are our fellow Americans.

A nation that can send men to the moon can meet its urban needs.

I pledge to you that if I become President, you, the mayors of America, will have a friend, an ally, and a partner in the White House.

I believe that, working together, we can turn the tide, stop the decay, and set in motion a process of growth that by the end of this century can give us cities worthy of the greatest nation on earth.

I can insure that consolidation will not be a cover to reduce needed federal assistance, or to change the distribution of benefits so as to discriminate against those individuals with the greatest need.

Today, America's No. 1 economic problem is our cities.

We simply can no longer afford the price of the red tape.

The time has come for us to work together toward a restoration of federalism, through the creation of a balanced national partnership that is based on mutual trust, mutual respect, and mutual commitment to the future of the American city.

Our goal must be to develop a coherent national urban policy that is consistent, compassionate, realistic, and that reflects the decency and good sense of the American people.

We must get the money and services to the people who need them, and not just to the communities that happen to be most skilled in the art of grantsmanship.

Our present system is a failure deplored alike by those who pay for it, those who administer it, and those who supposedly benefit from it.