The 1982 State of the Union Address was given by the 40th

president of the United States The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president directs the Federal government of the United States#Executive branch, executive branch of the Federal government of t ...

Ronald Reagan Ronald Wilson Reagan (February 6, 1911 – June 5, 2004) was an American politician and actor who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He was a member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party a ...

, on January 26, 1982, at 9:00 p.m. EST, in the chamber of the

United States House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the lower house, with the U.S. Senate being the upper house. Together, the House and Senate have the authority under Artic ...

to the

97th United States Congress The 97th United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, composed of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It met in Washington, D.C., from January 3, 19 ...

. It was Reagan's first

State of the Union Address The State of the Union Address (sometimes abbreviated to SOTU) is an annual message delivered by the president of the United States to a joint session of the United States Congress near the beginning of most calendar years on the current condit ...

and his second speech to a

joint session of the United States Congress A joint session of the United States Congress is a gathering of members of the two chambers of the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States: the Senate and the House of Representatives. Joint sessions can be held on ...

. Presiding over this joint session was the House speaker,

Tip O'Neill Thomas Phillip "Tip" O'Neill Jr. (December 9, 1912 – January 5, 1994) was an American Democratic Party politician from Massachusetts who served as the 47th speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 1977 to 1987, the third-l ...

, accompanied by

George H. W. Bush George Herbert Walker BushBefore the outcome of the 2000 United States presidential election, he was usually referred to simply as "George Bush" but became more commonly known as "George H. W. Bush", "Bush Senior," "Bush 41," and even "Bush th ...

, the

vice president A vice president or vice-president, also director in British English, is an officer in government or business who is below the president (chief executive officer) in rank. It can also refer to executive vice presidents, signifying that the vi ...

in his capacity as the

president of the Senate President of the Senate is a title often given to the presiding officer of a senate. It corresponds to the Speaker (politics), speaker in some other assemblies. The senate president often ranks high in a jurisdiction's Order of succession, succes ...

. The speech lasted 40 minutes and 14 seconds and contained 5154 words. The address was broadcast live on radio and television. The speech was the first to acknowledge a special guest, Lenny Skutnik, who was an ordinary hero of

Air Florida Flight 90 Air Florida Flight 90 was a scheduled domestic passenger flight operated from Washington National Airport (now Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport) to Fort Lauderdale–Hollywood International Airport, with an intermediate stopover at T ...

took place two weeks earlier. Taking the place of

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Justice

Byron White Byron Raymond "Whizzer" White (June 8, 1917 – April 15, 2002) was an American lawyer, jurist, and professional American football, football player who served as an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, associate justice of the Supreme ...

was retired Justice

Potter Stewart Potter Stewart (January 23, 1915 – December 7, 1985) was an American lawyer and judge who was an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court from 1958 to 1981. During his tenure, he made major contributions to criminal justice reform ...

. The Democratic Party

response Response may refer to: *Call and response (music), musical structure *Reaction (disambiguation) *Request–response **Output or response, the result of telecommunications input *Response (liturgy), a line answering a versicle * Response (music) o ...

was delivered by Senator Donald Riegle (MI), Senator James Sasser (TN), Rep. Albert Gore Jr. (TN), Senator

Robert Byrd Robert Carlyle Byrd (born Cornelius Calvin Sale Jr.; November 20, 1917 – June 28, 2010) was an American politician who served as a United States senator from West Virginia for over 51 years, from 1959 until his death in 2010. A Democratic Pa ...

(WV), Senator

Edward Kennedy Edward Moore Kennedy (February 22, 1932 – August 25, 2009) was an American lawyer and politician from Massachusetts who served as a member of the United States Senate from 1962 to his death in 2009. A member of the Democratic Party and ...

(MA), House Speaker Thomas P. O'Neill III (MA), Senator

Gary Hart Gary Warren Hart (''né'' Hartpence; born November 28, 1936) is an American politician, diplomat, and lawyer. He was the front-runner for the 1984 and 1988 Democratic presidential nominations, until in 1988, he dropped out amid revelations of ex ...

(CO), Senator

Paul Sarbanes Paul Spyros Sarbanes (; February 3, 1933 – December 6, 2020) was an American politician and attorney from Maryland. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served in both chambers of the United States Congr ...

(MD), Senator J. Bennett Johnston (LA), and Senator

Alan Cranston Alan MacGregor Cranston (June 19, 1914 – December 31, 2000) was an American politician and journalist who served as a United States Senate, United States Senator from California from 1969 to 1993, and as President of the Citizens for Global S ...

(CA).

References

External links

(full transcript), ''The American Presidency Project''

UC Santa Barbara The University of California, Santa Barbara (UC Santa Barbara or UCSB) is a public land-grant research university in Santa Barbara County, California, United States. Tracing its roots back to 1891 as an independent teachers college, UCSB joined ...

.
Full video and audio
''

Miller Center of Public Affairs The Miller Center is a nonpartisan affiliate of the University of Virginia that specializes in United States presidential scholarship, public policy, and political history. It is headquartered at Faulkner House. History The Miller Center wa ...

'',

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia, United States. It was founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson and contains his The Lawn, Academical Village, a World H ...

.
1982 State of the Union Address
(video) at C-SPAN State of the Union Address 1982

Presidency of Ronald Reagan Speeches by Ronald Reagan Articles containing video clips 1980s State of the Union addresses {{US-politics-stub

See also

References

External links