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John F. Kennedy Quotes about Children

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Children are the world's most valuable resource and its best hope for the future.

Children are the world's most valuable resource and its best hope for the future.

John F. Kennedy
Hope, Children, Presidential
United States Committee for UNICEF, July 25, 1963.

Israel was not created in order to disappear - Israel will endure and flourish. It is the child of hope and the home of the brave. It can neither be broken by adversity nor demoralized by success. It carries the shield of democracy and it honors the sword of freedom.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Adversity, Home

Let us not be blind to our differences-but let us also direct attention to our common interests and to the means by which those differences can be resolved. And if we cannot end our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity. For, in the final analysis, our most common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Mean, Air
American University Commencement Address, delivered 10 June 1963

It is with great satisfaction that I have signed into law the Social Security Amendments of 1961. They represent an additional step toward eliminating many of the hardships resulting from old age, disability, or the death of the family wage-earner. A nation's strength lies in the well-being of its people. The Social Security program plays an important part in providing for families, children, and older persons in time of stress, but it cannot remain static. Changes in our population, in our working habits, and in our standard of living require constant revision.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Stress, Lying
"Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1961".

A child miseducated is a child lost.

John F. Kennedy
Education, Teacher, Children

By the age of six the average child will have completed the basic American education.... From television, the child will have learned how to pick a lock, commit a fairly elaborate bank holdup, prevent wetness all day long, get the laundry twice as white, and kill people with a variety of sophisticated armaments.

John F. Kennedy
Children, School, Average

Not every child has an equal talent or an equal ability or equal motivation, but they should have the equal right to develop their talent and their ability and their motivation, to make something of themselves.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Motivation, Should Have
Civil Rights Address, delivered 11 June 1963

The Greeks understood that mind and body must develop in harmonious proportions to produce a creative intelligence. And so did the most brilliant intelligence of our earliest days - Thomas Jefferson - when he said, not less than two hours a day should be devoted to exercise. If the man who wrote the Declaration of Independence, was Secretary of State, and twice President, could give it two hours, our children can give it ten or fifteen minutes.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Exercise, Men

I think when we talk about corporal punishment, and we have to think about our own children, and we are rather reluctant, it seems to me, to have other people administering punishment to our own children, because we are reluctant, it puts a special obligation on us to maintain order and to send children out from our homes who accept the idea of discipline. So I would not be for corporal punishment in the school, but I would be for very strong discipline at home so we don't place an unfair burden on our teachers.

John F. Kennedy
Teacher, Strong, Children
News Conference 56, May 22, 1963.

We can say with some assurance that, although children may be the victims of fate, they will not be the victims of our neglect.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Fate, Presidential
"Remarks upon signing the Maternal and Child Health and Mental Retardation Planning Bill". October 24, 1963.

For plague and pestilence, plunder and pollution, the hazards of nature and the hunger of children are the foes of every nation. The earth, the sea and the air are the concern of every nation.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Air, Sea
Final Address to the United Nations General Assembly, delivered 20 September 1963, New York, NY

Our deep spiritual confidence that this nation will survive the perils of today - which may well be with us for decades to come - compels us to invest in our nation's future, to consider and meet our obligations to our children and the numberless generations that will follow.

John F. Kennedy
Spiritual, Children, Presidential
"Special message to the Congress on Conservation". March 1, 1962.

The effort to improve the conditions of man, however, is not a task for the few. It is the task of all nations-acting alone, acting in groups, acting in the United Nations, for plague and pestilence, plunder and pollution, the hazards of nature and the hunger of children are the foes of every nation. The earth, the sea and the air are the concern of every nation. And science, technology and education can be the ally of every nation.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Technology, Men
Final Address to the United Nations General Assembly, delivered 20 September 1963, New York, NY

Israel will endure and flourish. It is the child of hope and the home of the brave.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Home, Israel

It is for these reasons that I believe we must expand day-care centers and provide other assistance which I have recommended to the Congress. At present, the total facilities of all the licensed day-care centers in the Nation can take care of only 185,000 children. Nearly 500,000 children under 12 must take care of themselves while their mothers work. This, it seems to me, is a formula for disaster.

John F. Kennedy
Mother, Children, Believe
"Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1963".

This is one country. It has become one country because all of us and all the people who came here had an equal chance to develop their talents. We cannot say to ten percent of the population that you can't have that right; that your children cannot have the chance to develop whatever talents they have; that the only way that they are going to get their rights is to go in the street and demonstrate. I think we owe them and we owe ourselves a better country than that.

John F. Kennedy
Country, Children, Thinking
Civil Rights Address, delivered 11 June 1963

I am talking about genuine peace, the kind of peace that makes life on earth worth living, the kind that enables men and nations to grow and to hope and to build a better life for their children - not merely peace for Americans but peace for all men and women - not merely peace in our time but peace for all time.

John F. Kennedy
Peace, Children, Men
American University Commencement Address, delivered 10 June 1963

Our children and grandchildren are not merely statistics towards which we can be indifferent.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Statistics, Indifferent
Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Address to the Nation, delivered 26 July 1963

I have said that control of arms is a mission that we undertake particularly for our children and our grandchildren and that they have no lobby in Washington.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Presidential, Arms
"Statement by the President to American Women Concerning their Role in Securing World Peace". November 1, 1963.

Football today is far too much a sport for the few who can play it well; the rest of us, and too many of our children, get out exercise from climbing up the seats in stadiums, or from walking across the room to turn on our television sets.

John F. Kennedy
Sports, Football, Children

We must live our lives in such a way that our children, and their children after them, will form a natural and lasting commitment to the vigorous life. Only in this way can we be assured that the spirit and strength of America will be constantly replenished.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Commitment, America

Every American ought to have the right to be treated as he would wish to be treated, as one would wish his children to be treated. This is not the case.

John F. Kennedy
Children, America, Wish
Broadcast address on civil rights, 11 June 1963

If an American, because his skin is dark, cannot eat lunch in a restaurant open to the public, if he cannot send his children to the best public school available, if he cannot vote for the public officials who represent him, if, in short, he cannot enjoy the full and free life which all of us want, then who among us would be content to have the color of his skin changed and stand in his place? Who among us would then be content with the counsels of patience and delay?

John F. Kennedy
Children, School, Dark
Civil Rights Address, delivered 11 June 1963

There is nothing, I think, more unfortunate than to have soft, chubby, fat-looking children who go to watch their school play basketball every Saturday and regard that as their weeks exercise.

John F. Kennedy
Basketball, Children, School
Kennedy, John F. (1963). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1962”, p.309, Best Books on

It is extremely important that adequate provision be made for reasonable levels of income to them, for the care of the children which they must leave at home or in school, and for protection of the family unit. One of the prime objectives of the Commission on the Status of Women, which I appointed 18 months ago, is to develop a program to accomplish these purposes.

John F. Kennedy
Children, Home, School
Kennedy, John F. (1964). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1963”, p.465, Best Books on