JFK excerpt of speech given April 27th 1961

John F. Kennedy when he was president was trying to create a more free and open society. However, that tended to create a lot of enemies both within the U.S. and without. And likely one or more of those enemies conspired to assassinate him. However, this speech says a lot about what he actually was trying to accomplish. Since I was basically about 12 years old when this speech was given I remember how the government functioned before him. And the openness of the Kennedy administration was like a breath of fresh air that people hadn't experienced since the Great Depression with a younger (not dead yet) Franklin Delano Roosevelt. There was a stiffness to the 1950s of the government that was reminiscent of World War II. There was a mass PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder which would be like multiplying the stress of 9-11 about 1000 times) of the people of the world having lost about 100 million people in that war and President Kennedy was the first breath of fresh air for the people of the U.S. and the world. The mark Kennedy and his wife made tended to make all Presidents who followed him more personable and lighter in tone than before in regard to what they chose to share with the American people and the world.

Begin quote:
On April 27, 1961, shortly after being sworn into office, President Kennedy gave a speech to the American Newspaper Publishers Association at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York where he was very clear on his government’s approach to transparency. At this time, JFK may have believed that the publishers and editors in the press would be friends, and would be truthful and uncompromised.
In this speech, he said, “… two requirements that may seem almost contradictory in tone, but which must be reconciled and fulfilled if we are to meet this national peril. I refer, first, to the need for far greater public information; and, second, to the need for far greater official secrecy. The very word "secrecy" is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings. We decided long ago that the dangers of excessive and unwarranted concealment of pertinent facts far outweighed the dangers which are cited to justify it … there is little value in insuring the survival of our nation if our traditions do not survive with it. And there is very grave danger that an announced need for increased security will be seized upon by those anxious to expand its meaning to the very limits of official censorship and concealment. That I do not intend to permit to the extent that it is in my control. And no official of my Administration, whether his rank is high or low, civilian or military, should interpret my words here tonight as an excuse to censor the news, to stifle dissent, to cover up our mistakes or to withhold from the press and the public the facts they deserve to know … And so it is to the printing press –
to the recorder of man’s deeds, the keeper of his conscience, the courier of his news – that we look for strength and assistance, confident that with your help man will be what he was born to be: free and independent”.

end quote from:

A Profile in Courage!