We come to Berlin, we American Presidents, because it's our duty to speak, in this place, of freedom. You see, like so many Presidents before me, I come here today because wherever I go, whatever I do: "Ich hab noch einen koffer in Berlin." [I still have a suitcase in Berlin.]
To those listening in East Berlin, a special word: Although I cannot be with you, I address my remarks to you just as surely as to those standing here before me. For I join you, as I join your fellow countrymen in the West, in this firm, this unalterable belief: Es gibt nur ein Berlin. [There is only one Berlin.]
Behind me stands a wall that encircles the free sectors of this city, part of a vast system of barriers that divides the entire continent of Europe. From the Baltic, south, those barriers cut across Germany in a gash of barbed wire, concrete, dog runs, and guardtowers. Every man is a Berliner, forced to look upon a scar.
President von Weizsacker has said: "The German question is open as long as the Brandenburg Gate is closed." Today I say: As long as this gate is closed, as long as this scar of a wall is permitted to stand, it is not the German question alone that remains open, but the question of freedom for all mankind.
"Our policy is directed not against any country or doctrine, but against hunger, poverty, desperation, and chaos."
Where four decades ago there was rubble, today in West Berlin there is the greatest industrial output of any city in Germany-busy office blocks, fine homes and apartments, proud avenues, and the spreading lawns of park land.
In the 1950's, Khrushchev predicted: "We will bury you." But in the West today, we see a free world that has achieved a level of prosperity and well-being unprecedented in all human history. In the Communist world, we see failure, technological backwardness, declining standards of health, even want of the most basic kind-too little food. Even today, the Soviet Union still cannot feed itself. After these four decades, then, there stands before the entire world one great and inescapable conclusion: Freedom leads to prosperity. Freedom replaces the ancient hatreds among the nations with comity and peace. Freedom is the victor.
Are these the beginnings of profound changes in the Soviet state?. Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
Address from the Brandenburg Gate (Berlin Wall), Ronald Reagan, June 12, 1987
Question
Use the passage to answer the question.
Conclusion: Freedom results in prosperity.
What premise does the speechwriter use to support this conclusion?
(1 point)
Responses
East Berlin has the largest industrial output of any German city.
East Berlin has the largest industrial output of any German city.
Soviet leaders have stopped jamming certain foreign news broadcasts.
Soviet leaders have stopped jamming certain foreign news broadcasts.
The release of political prisoners is a token action by Khrushchev.
The release of political prisoners is a token action by Khrushchev.
Restrictions due to Communist policies reduced the economic potential of the people.
1 answer
The correct premise used to support the conclusion "Freedom results in prosperity" is:
Restrictions due to Communist policies reduced the economic potential of the people.
This premise aligns with Reagan’s argument contrasting the prosperity in the West with the failures in the Communist world, highlighting that the lack of freedom under Communist regimes has led to economic limitations and hardships.
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