WASHINGTON, Jan. 13 — Citation of a legacy of stable currency achieved by the Eisenhower Administration, and an admonition to the new national leadership to continue policies of fiscal responsibility highlighted the State of the Union message delivered to Congress Thursday.
Recalling that from 1939 to 1953 the U.S. dollar dropped in buying value to 52 cents, and that the cost of living rose in an inflationary spiral by 36% in the period 1946 to 1952, Mr. Eisenhower said in his message that the spiral "has all but ceased and the value of the dollar virtually stabilized."
"This Administration has directed constant efforts toward fiscal responsibility," the President said. "Balanced budgets have been sought when the economy was advancing, and a rigorous examination of spending programs has been maintained at all times."
"Resort to deficit financing in prosperous times could easily erode international confidence in the dollar and contribute to inflation at home. In this belief, I shall submit a balanced budget for fiscal 1962 to the Congress next week."
The nation has built a new economic vitality without inflation while adjusting from the artificial impetus of a hot war to constructive growth in a precarious peace, President Eisenhower told Congress.
The message reviewed the actions of his Administration with the clearly indicated purpose of urging the new Kennedy Administration to heed past experience in meeting current problems, "for progress implies new and continuous problems, and unlike Presidential Administrations, problems rarely have terminal dates."
The President said that despite the changeover from war to peace and the successful effort to hold the dollar stable, "we have also increased public expenditures to keep abreast of the needs of a growing population and its attendant new problems, as well as our added international responsibilities.
"We have worked toward these ends in a context of shared responsibility — conscious of the need for maximum scope to private effort and for State and local as well as Federal Governmental action."
He noted that this country "stimulated" a doubling of the capital of the World Bank and a 50% capital increase in the International Monetary Fund, as well as the formation of the Development Loan Fund, International Development Association and the Inter-American Development Bank.
