Reagan’s Farewell Speech American Practical Experience Official Website
The acceptance of, and continuance hitherto in, the office to which your suffrages have twice named me, have been a uniform sacrifice of inclination to the opinion of duty, and to a deference for what appeared to be your need. I continuously hoped, that it would have been considerably earlier in my power, regularly with motives, which I was not at liberty to disregard, to return to that retirement, from which I had been reluctantly drawn. This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a significant arms sector is new in the American encounter. The total influence-economic, political, even spiritual-is...