Thank you. Here is Paul Douglas, a great Democrat, and here is the next United States Senator and the present Senator. And Otto Kerner, the candidate for Governor on the Democratic Ticket, and your own Mel Price, the candidate who will be elected. I am a candidate for the office of the Presidency, and the Presidency is a key office. If the people's interest is going to be protected, the President of the United States must stand for that protection. It is the President of the United States that can set the goals for the country in housing, minimum wage, social security, unemployment compensation, and in equality of rights for all Americans, regardless of their race or color. I stand in direct succession to Truman and Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson, who advanced the right of all Americans to participate equally in our society. I can assure you that if I am successful of this occasion, the same spirit will move us, the same spirit forward. We ask your help in this campaign. (Applause)
Source: Papers of John F. Kennedy. Pre-Presidential Papers. Senate Files, Box 912, "15th and Broadway, East St. Louis, Illinois, 3 October 1960." John F. Kennedy Presidential Library.