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MARKER
This is not a textual record. This is used as an
administrative marker by the William J. Clinton
Presidential Library Staff.
Collection/Record Group:
Clinton Presidential Records
Subgroup/Office of Origin:
Speechwriting
Series/Staff Member:
Michael Waldman
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14443
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FolderlD:
Folder Title:
State of the Union 1997 - The Original Drafts Volume I [Binder] [2]
Stack:
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Section:
Shelf:
Position:
s
92
3
11
1
�STATE OF THE UNION - POLICY OPTIONS
Tuesday, January 28,1997
(* Policy decision outstanding)
1. Finish the unfinished business before this body
Included in draft:
A. Balance the budget
Support for balanced budget
Entitlements discussion (Sperling/Raines working up language)
Call for bipartisan action
B. Welfare-to-Work
Tax credit to private sector employers
Tax credit to private job placement firms
(^•Private sector initiative — announce CEOs (if ready)) - — ^ H
^800 nnmhor f n r nmplnygrq
C Campaignfinancereform
McCain-Feingold by 7/4 _ J ^ <
Not included in draft:
^j^- (t
Fixing last year's welfare bill
-How many atate welfare plana approved—"
f
(^"Proposals to expand electoral participation (election day as holiday, etc./)
2. Stronger education
Included in draft:
A. Plan for America's Schools
Education plar^ooklet
*Call for higher standards
Call for national 4th grade literacy and 8th grade math test, pledge to
develop and make available;
Set national goal of 12th grade test as graduation requirement;
�No social promotions, teacher standards;
Announce campaign to get states to adopt testing and standards plan.
^Charter schools (budget doubles #)
America Reads challenge — work study announcement by college presidents,
Computerfrin the classrooms (in budget)
^Increase in Technology Literacy Fund (connect classrooms to Internet
by 2000)
/
••All 6th grade teachers leam oomputora in aummer of '9%
-^Sphool construction
^ JLMJ^- ittH ^
-tarly learning
^
^
1 million children in HepdStart by 2002
WH Conference on thaBrain N
VP Family Conference on Parent d Involvement in Early Learning
jV
(
B. College:
/
Hope Scholarships
t'Taxfreesavings for college (IRAs, $10,000 deduction, Hope Scholarship)
[/Pe\\ Grant expansion
Training: GI Bill/skills grants
3. Stronger families and communities
A. Families
Included indraft:
^-
^ - ^ ^
fQ-O^yV^
^
C?^
family leave expansion: allow time off for PTA meetings, routine doctor visits
Flextime: employees choose how to use their overtime
^
Healthcare:
"
^ ^ cc:.
Children's health initiative
— ^
^ V C ^ f
^
Coverage for workers between jobs
^
/Drive-through mastertomie£3== T
Not included in draft:
^
Breast cancer benefits through Medicare
*Support Feinstein-D'Amato breast cancer legislation
WIC fully funded
*Health care quality
dgolg of men in famflieT"-^
Recent food safety propo"sal
r
�•Possible tobacco initiative
TV ratings — success to date
-*Statement on record lyrics""
1
B. Environment
Included iii draft:
udc waste cleanup: 500 sites, 2/3 by 2000
...jke polluters pay
Call for passage of Brownfields plan
^
Eat included in draft:
r
C ^ €
^ ^
{
0
I T
^
^American heritage rivers designation)
^Children's health executive Older '
tEvpansinn of right tn liuiny imiiliiri liihHin£;
Included in draft:
CNJ (L
^ F W t ^ O — %
Round two of Empowerment Zones
^included in draft:
^o
: cA+J ^
p . ^ f ^
pft**^
<-firt^ TA"—
t^T
^
Cffmmif"'ty Dftv^pmffnt Financial TnntinitinnfL
CRA—
D. Crime
Included in draft:
ffy i o
Juvenile justice bill (antigang initiative, Brady expansion to youth
offenses, after-school programs, trigger safety lock, other provisions)
Largest anti-drug budget ever
^Announce public service ads on drugsj
Plea to young people to stay off drugs
Not included in draft:
JMumuuikie tsratton as community cnme hghlulg leader
*
^
^
'
^
C
�Victims Rights Amendment
Drug testing for driver's licenses legislation
Opposing CA and AZ medical marijuana initiatives
Immigration:
r
1,000 new border agents
Speed up deportation of illegal immigrants
•Challenge Congress for more agents
nE. Service
Included in draft:
Summit of Service
Presidential Medal of Service-
0
/C^tronger preparation for the Infonnation Age
Included in draft:
V
M1
*
k/
S^ond generation Internet (in budget)
c^ncrease in funding for medical laboratories
Speed up Human Genome Project: map DNA to help solve genetically-related diseases
and defects (not yet approved) —jp>
^Xir safety: new satellite-based navigation system by 2005 instead of 2015 (Kamarck j
- y / checking with VP)
#mem connection to children's hospitals ; cMMAJS^y€
met
Ce>*«f>> *et obscenity (restating support for law, now in Supreme Court)
tting Smithsonian collection on-line
Cfr^^
ferlaw cnforcament
MflMu Ami
JI
included in draft:
rf
idatic
Other air safety reforms: recommendationsfromVP commission
New, tougher standards for aging aircraft (forfirsttime, test old wiring)
$500 million in NASA funding for air safety R&D ^
AIDS vaccine ~ not approved
^ 7 ^^cV
\
u /
CA0
3
1-
�5. Stronger leadership in the world
A. Undivided Europe of democracies at peace
Included in draft:
Expand NATO
Strengthen NATO/Russia partnership
Not included in draft:
Democracy and economic reform in Russia
B. Build an Asia-Pacific community
Included in draft:
Bring China into world community
De-nuclearize and advance peace in Korea
Not included in draft:
Japan
India-Pakistan nuclear weapons
C. Strengthen hand of peace
Included in draft:
Bosnia (ask Congress to pay for troops)
Mentions of Middle East, Ireland, Africa
Not included in draft:
Special envoy for Cyprus/Greece/Turkey
D. Terror/weapons of mass destruction/drugs
Included in draft:
CWC
CTBT
�Not included in draft:
Secure START II with Russia, move to START III
Keep securing loose nuclear weapons
Worldwide ban on landmines
Drug eradication or consumption goal
International Crime Control Act
Taggants and wiretaps
E. Open global economy
Included in draft:
Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA)
Announce trips to Mexico/Caribbean, South America
Not included in draft:
WTO telecommunications agreement
Preview of G-7
Labor and environmental standards
F. ShQuldering the burden
Included in draft:
Armed forces modernization
Increasing diplomatic budget .
UN reform and arrears
, ,
^
X? 'Wrc
5. Stronger American union
Included in draft:
Race (issue raised: need specific actions)
<
~
/
,„
^'tf. ^ 5 ) .
�it
6
J
�STATE OF THE UNION -- POLICY OPTIONS
Tuesday, January 28, 1997
(* Policy decision outstanding)
1. Finish the unfinished business before this body
Included in draft:
A. Balance the budget
Support for balanced budget
Entitlements discussion (Sperling/Raines working up language)
Call for bipartisan action
B. Welfare-to-Wprk
Tax credit to private sector employers
Tax credit to private job placement firms
•Private sector initiative ~ announce CEOs (if ready)
800 number for employers
C. C m ag financereform
a pin
McCain-Feingold by 7/4
Not included in draft:
Fixing last year's welfare bill
How many state welfare plans approved
•Proposals to expand electoral participation (election day as holiday, etc.)
2. Stronger education
Included in draft:
A. Plan for America's Schools
Education plan/booklet
•Call for higher standards
Call for national 4th grade literacy and 8th grade math test, pledge to
develop and make available;
Set national goal of 12th grade test as graduation requirement;
�No social promotions, teacher standards;
Announce campaign to get states to adopt testing and standards plan.
Charter schools (budget doubles #)
America Reads challenge — work study announcement by college presidents
Computers in the classrooms (in budget)
Increase in Technology Literacy Fund (connect classrooms to Internet
by 2000)
*A116th grade teachers leam computers in summer of '98
School construction
Early learning
1 million children in Head Start by 2002
WH Conference on the Brain
VP Family Conference on Parental Involvement in Early Learning
B. CoUege:
Hope Scholarships
Taxfreesavings for college (IRAs, $10,000 deduction, Hope Scholarship)
Pell Grant expansion
C. Training: GI Bill/skills grants
3. Stronger families and communities
A. Families
Included in draft:
Family leave expansion: allow time off for PTA meetings, routine doctor visits
Flextime: employees choose how to use their overtime
Health care:
Children's health initiative
Coverage for workers between jobs
Drive-through mastectomies
Not included in draft:
Breast cancer benefits through Medicare
•Support Feinstein-D'Amato breast cancer legislation
WIC fully funded
•Health care quality
Role of men in families
Recent food safety proposal
�•Possible tobacco initiative
TV ratings — success to date
•Statement on record lyrics
B. Environment
Included in draft:
Toxic waste cleanup: 500 sites, 2/3 by 2000
Make polluters pay
Call for passage of Brownfields plan
Not included in draft:
•American heritage rivers designation
•Children's health executive order
•Expansion of right-to-know product labeling
C. Underclass
Included in draft:
Round two of Empowerment Zones
D.C.
Not included in draft:
Community Development Financial Institutions
CRA
D. Crime
Included in draft:
Juvenile justice bill (antigang initiative, Brady expansion to youth
offenses, after-school programs, trigger safety lock, other provisions)
Largest anti-drug budget ever
Announce public service ads on drugs
Plea to young people to stay off drugs
Not included in draft:
•Announce Bratton as community crimefightingleader
�Victims Rights Amendment
Drug testing for driver's licenses legislation
Opposing CA and AZ medical marijuana initiatives
Immigration:
1,000 new border agents
Speed up deportation of illegal immigrants
•Challenge Congress for more agents
E. Service
Included in draft:
Summit of Service
Presidential Medal of Service
4. Stronger preparation for the Information Age
Included in draft:
Second generation Internet (in budget)
Increase in funding for medical laboratories
•Speed up Human Genome Project: map DNA to help solve genetically-related diseases
and defects (not yet approved)
•Air safety: new satellite-based navigation system by 2005 instead of 2015 (Kamarck
checking with VP)
•Internet connection to children's hospitals
Internet obscenity (restating support for law, now in Supreme Court)
•Putting Smithsonian collection on-line
Spectrum allocation for law enforcement
Not included in draft:
•Other air safety reforms: recommendations from VP commission
New, tougher standards for aging aircraft (for first time, test old wiring)
$500 million in NASA funding for air safety R&D
•AIDS vaccine — not approved
�5. Stronger leadership in the world
A. Undivided Europe of democracies at peace
Included in draft:
Expand NATO
Strengthen NATO/Russia partnership
Not included in draft:
Democracy and economic reform in Russia
B. Build an Asia-Pacific community
Included in draft:
Bring China into world community
De-nuclearize and advance peace in Korea
Not included in draft:
Japan
India-Pakistan nuclear weapons
C. Strengthen hand of p a e
ec
Included in draft:
Bosnia (ask Congress to pay for troops)
Mentions of Middle East, Ireland, Afiica
Not included in draft:
Special envoy for Cyprus/Greece/Turkey
D. Terror/weapons of mass destruction/drugs
Included in draft:
CWC
CTBT
�Not included in draft:
Secure START n with Russia, move to START III
Keep securing loose nuclear weapons
Worldwide ban on landmines
Drug eradication or consumption goal
International Crime Control Act
Taggants and wiretaps
E. Qpen global economy
Included in draft:
Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA)
Announce trips to Mexico/Caribbean, South America
included in draft:
WTO telecommunications agreement
Preview of G-7
Labor and environmental standards
F. Shouldering the burden
Included in draft:
Armed forces modernization
Increasing diplomatic budget
UN reform and arrears
S. Stronger American union
Included in draft:
Race (issue raised: need specific actions)
�STATE OF THE UNION POLICY MEETING - AGENDA
Wednesday, January 29, 1997 10:00 a.m.
L Domestic Policy — outstanding policy decision assessment/speech inclusion:
1. Unfinished Business
A. Balancing the budget
B. Welfare-to-Work
C. Campaignfinancereform
2. Stronger education
A. Plan for America's schools
B. College
C. Training
3. Stronger families and communities
A. Families
B. Environment
C. Underclass
D. Crime
E. Service
4. Stronger preparation for the Information Age
5. Stronger American union (race/unity)
I I . Foreign policy/global economy — outstanding policy decisions/speech inclusion:
1. Stronger leadership in the world
A. Undivided Europe of democracies at peace
B. Build an Asia-Pacific community
C. Strengthen hand of peace
D. Terror/weapons of mass destruction/drugs
E. Open global economy
F. Shouldering the burden
�STATE OF THE UNION - POLICY OPTIONS
Tuesday, January 28, 1997
(* Policy decision outstanding)
1. Finish the unfinished business before this body
Included in draft:
A. Balance the budget
Support for balanced budget
Entitlements discussion (Sperling/Raines working up language)
Call for bipartisan action
B. Welfare-to-Work
Tax credit to private sector employers
Tax credit to private job placement firms
•Private sector initiative — announce CEOs (if ready)
800 number for employers
C. Campaignfinancereform
McCain-Feingold by 7/4
Not included in draft:
Fixing last year's welfare bill
How many state welfare plans approved
•Proposals to expand electoral participation (election day as holiday, etc.)
2. Stronger education
Included in draft:
A. Plan for America's Schools
Education plan/booklet
•Call for higher standards
Call for national 4th grade literacy and 8th grade math test, pledge to
develop and make available;
Set national goal of 12th grade test as graduation requirement;
�No social promotions, teacher standards;
Announce campaign to get states to adopt testing and standards plan.
Charter schools (budget doubles #)
America Reads challenge — work study announcement by college presidents
Computers in the classrooms (in budget)
Increase in Technology Literacy Fund (connect classrooms to Internet
by 2000)
•All 6th grade teachers leam computers in summer of'98
School construction
Early learning
1 million children in Head Start by 2002
WH Conference on the Brain
VP Family Conference on Parental Involvement in Early Learning
B. College:
Hope Scholarships
Tax free savings for college (IRAs, $10,000 deduction, Hope Scholarship)
Pell Grant expansion
C. Training: GI Bill/skills grants
3. Stronger families and communities
A. Families
Included in draft:
Family leave expansion: allow time off for PTA meetings, routine doctor visits
Flextime: employees choose how to use their overtime
Health care.
Children's health initiative
Coverage for workers between jobs
Drive-through mastectomies
Not included in draft:
Breast cancer benefits through Medicare
•Support Feinstein-D'Amato breast cancer legislation
WIC fully funded
•Health care quality
Role of men in families
Recent food safety proposal
�•Possible tobacco initiative
TV ratings - success to date
•Statement on record lyrics
B. Environment
Included in draft:
Toxic waste cleanup: 500 sites, 2/3 by 2000
Make polluters pay
Call for passage of Brownfields plan
Not included in draft:
•American heritage rivers designation
•Children's health executive order
•Expansion of right-to-know product labeling
Included in draft:
Round two of Empowerment Zones
D.C.
*
^
jpufi*
Not included in draft:
Community Development Financial Institutions
CRA
D. Crime
Included in draft:
Juvenile justice bill (antigang initiative, Brady expansion to youth
offenses, after-school programs, trigger safety lock, other provisions)
Largest anti-drug budget ever
.
Announce public service ads on drugs / — P / t ^ G - •*TAAI8G-^
Plea to young people to stay off drugs
faded in draft:
lounce Bratton as community crimefightingleader
V.-cftte*. Ai<fJbi A»JUt.
�Victims Rights Amendment
Drug testing for driver's licenses legislation
Opposing CA and AZ medical marijuana initiatives
Immigration:
1,000 new border agents
Speed up deportation of illegal immigrants
•Challenge Congress for more agents
E. Service
Included in draft:
Summit of Service
Presidential Medal of Service
4. Stronger preparation for the Infonnation Age
Included in draft:
Second generation Internet (in budget)
Increase in funding for medical laboratories
•Speed up Human Genome Project: map DNA to help solve genetically-related diseases \
and defects (not yet approved)
•Air safety: new satellite-based navigationsysteniby 2005 instgaiiflf 2015 (Kamarck
"cfiecking with VPK—^
"^-7**"
"
•Internet connection to children's hospitals v
(
JtRLUiitji ( i m
•Putting Smithsonian collection on-line
Not included in draft:
OTPh'r%**4. h
fUffoJfft
�5. Stronger leadership in the world
A. Undivided Ewope of democracies at peace
Included in draft:
Expand NATO
Strengthen NATO/Russia partnership
Not included in draft:
Democracy and economic reform in Russia
B. Build an Asia-Pacific community
Included in draft:
Bring China into world community
De-nuclearize and advance peace in Korea
Not included in draft:
Japan
India-Pakistan nuclear weapons
C Strengthen hand of peace
Included in draft:
Bosnia (ask Congress to pay for troops)
Mentions of Middle East, Ireland, Africa
Not included in draft:
Special envoy for Cyprus/Greece/Turkey
D. Terror/weapons of mass destmction/drugs
Included in draft:
CWC
CTBT
�Not included in draft:
Secure START I I with Russia, move to START HI
Keep securing loose nuclear weapons
Worldwide ban on landmines
Drug eradication or consumption goal
International Crime Control Act
Taggants and wiretaps
E. Open global economy
Included in draft:
Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA)
Announce trips to Mexico/Caribbean, South America
Not included in draft:
WTO telecommunications agreement
Preview of G-7
Labor and environmental standards
F. Shouldering the burden
Included in draft:
Armed forces modernization
Increasing diplomatic budget
UN reform land arrears
i^nc
5. Stronger American union
Included in draft:
Race (issue raised: need specific actions)
�STATE OF THE UNION -- POLICY OPTIONS
Wednesday, January 29,1997 11:30 a.m.
(* Policy decision outstanding)
1. Finish the unfinished business before this body
Included in draft:
A. Balance the budget
Support for balanced budget
Entitlements discussion (Sperling/Raines working up language)
Statement against balanced budget amendment
ReGo language (coming from Kamarck)
Call for bipartisan action
B. Welfare-to-Work
Tax credit to private sector employers
Tax credit to private job placement firms
Fixing last year's welfare bill (language coming from Reed)
•Private sector initiative - announce CEOs (will know if this is ready today)
C. Campaign finance reform
McCain-Feingold by 7/4 (Rahm/Hilley checking on date)
Not included in draft:
How many state welfare plans approved
•Proposals to expand electoral participation (election day as holiday, etc.)
2. Stronger education
Included in draft:
A. Plan for America's Schools
Overall sentence about education commitment in budget (coming from Raines)
•Education plan/booklet
•Call for higher standards
Call for national 4th grade literacy and 8th grade math test, pledge to
�develop and make available;
Set national goal of 12th grade test as graduation requirement;
No social promotions, teacher standards;
Announce campaign to get states to adopt testing and standards plan.
Charter schools (budget doubles #)
America Reads challenge -- work study announcement by college presidents
Computers in the classrooms (in budget)
Increase in Technology Literacy Fund (connect classrooms to Internet
by 2000), make this year "Net Year"
* All 6th grade teachers leam computers in summer of '98
School construction
Early learning
1 million children in Head Start by 2002
WH Conference on the Brain (try to change name to Early Learning; need
date from Podesta)
VP Family Conference (6/23) on Parental Involvement in Early Learning
B. College:
Hope Scholarships
Tax free savings for college (IRAs, $10,000 deduction, Hope Scholarship)
Pell Grant expansion
C. Training: GI Bill/skills grants
3. Stronger families and communities
A. Families
Included in draft:
Family leave expansion: allow time off for PTA meetings, routine doctor visits
(need decision on when to resubmit bill)
Flextime: employees choose how to use their overtime
Child support
Health care:
Need to sustain Medicare/Medicaid (language from Sperling/Raines)
Children's health initiative
Coverage for workers between jobs
Drive-through mastectomies
�Not included in draft:
Breast cancer benefits through Medicare
•Support Feinstein-D'Amato breast cancer legislation
WIC fully funded/Head Start - sentence coming from Raines
•Health care quality
Role of men in families
Recent food safety proposal
•Possible tobacco initiative
TV ratings ~ success to date
•Statement on record lyrics
B. Environment
Included in draft:
Toxic waste cleanup: 500 sites, 2/3 by 2000
Make polluters pay
Call for passage of Brownfields plan, including tax credits
Not included in draft:
•American heritage rivers designation
•Children's health executive order
C. Underclass
Included in draft:
Statement of overall goal: to increase investments in poorest neighborhoods
Round two of Empowerment Zones
D.C.
Not included in draft:
Community Development Financial Institutions
CRA
�D- Crime
Included in draft:
Juvenile justice bill (antigang initiative, Brady expansion to youth
offenses, after-school programs, trigger safety lock, other provisions)
Largest anti-drug budget ever
Plea to young people to stay off drugs
Sentence on immigration
Not included in draft:
Announce public service ads on drugs (announce on 1/10 instead?)
Victims Rights Amendment
Drug testing for driver's licenses legislation
Opposing CA and AZ medical marijuana initiatives
Immigration:
1,000 new border agents
Speed up deportation of illegal immigrants
•Challenge Congress for more agents
E. Service
Included in draft:
Summit of Service
Presidential Medal of Service
Not included in draft:
Call for service by high school students
4. Stronger preparation for the Information Age (move section after education?)
Included in draft:
Second generation Internet (in budget)
Increase in funding for medical laboratories
•Speed up Human Genome Project: map DNA to help solve genetically-related
diseases and defects (not yet approved)
�*Air safety: new satellite-based navigation system by 2005 instead of 2015
(Kamarck checking with VP)
Internet connection to children's hospitals
Internet obscenity (restating support for law, now in Supreme Court)
•Putting Smithsonian collection on-line
Not included in draft:
•Other air safety reforms: recommendations from VP commission
New, tougher standards for aging aircraft (for first time, test old wiring)
$500 million in NASA funding for air safety R&D
•AIDS vaccine/national AIDS goal ~ not approved
Spectrum allocation for law enforcement
Language about NASA/space program - coming from Simon
Fact that speech is first SOTU being covered live on Internet
5. Stronger leadership in the world
A. Undivided Europe of democracies at peace
Included in draft:
Expand NATO
Strengthen NATO/Russia partnership
Not included in draft:
Democracy and economic reform in Russia
B. Build an Asia-Pacific community
Included in draft:
Bring China into world community
De-nuclearize and advance peace in Korea
Not included in draft:
Japan
India-Pakistan nuclear weapons
�C. Strengthen hand of peace
Included in draft:
Bosnia (ask Congress to pay for troops)
Mentions of Middle East. Ireland. Africa
Not included in draft:
Special envoy for Cyprus/Greece/Turkey
D. Terror/weapons of mass destruction/drugs
Included in draft:
CWC
CTBT
Not included in draft:
Secure START II with Russia, move to START III
Keep securing loose nuclear weapons
Worldwide ban on landmines
Drug eradication or consumption goal
International Crime Control Act
Taggants and wiretaps
E. Open global economy
Included in draft:
Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA)
Announce trips to Mexico/Caribbean, South America
Not included in draft:
WTO telecommunications agreement
Preview of G-7
Labor and environmental standards
�F. Shouldering the burden
Included in draft:
Armed forces modernization
Increasing diplomatic budget
UN reform and arrears
5. Stronger American union
Included in draft:
Race (issue raised: need specific actions)
�State of the Union
Outline for Foreign Policy Section
DRAFT
I. Building a New American Century
From its birth, America has stood for an idea: that people have the right to control their own lives
and pursue their own dreams — to be, more than any people on earth, masters of their own
destinies. In this century especially, the American people have done more than stand for these
principles — they have acted on them and sacrificed for them. America fought two world wars so
that freedom could triumph over tyranny. Then we made the commitments and built the
institutions that kept the peace... that brought us unparalleled prosperity... and that won the Cold
War. Now, in the twilight of what has been called the American Century, the world is converging
around the ideals that define America, and the interests that America defends.
Tonight, we stand closer to the stall of the 21st century than to the defining moment of the 20th
century - the end of the Cold War. We have succeeded in taking down many of the blocs and
barriers that divided the world for our parents and grandparents - but we have onlv just begun
the hard work of building the new institutions of cooperation and integration that must take their
place. In this period of constmction, the decisions we make over next four years will shape the
century to come. It's a century that can be an America century, too — if we have the vision, the
determination and the strength to seize the opportunities of this moment and stand against its
perils.
11. The Strategic Foundation for a New American Century
1. An undivided Europe of democracies at peace, built around an expanded NATO
and a strong NATO-Russia partnership.
Initiatives: (i) NATO Summit to advance adaptation, enlargement and partnership
with Russia; (ii) Partnership for Freedom with NIS.
2. An Asia Pacific Community with America its stabilizing force, built around
strong alliances with Japan and Korea and a productive relationship with China
Initiatives: (i) regular summits with China; (ii) move forward with Agreed
Framework to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula and Four Party talks; (iii) Japan objective?
3. Strengthening the hand and extending the reach of peace and democracy in key
strategic areas: Bosnia, the Middle East, Northern Ireland, Cyprus^
Initiatives: (i) in Bosnia, help make peace self-sustaining through SFOR, economic
reconstruction, political reconciliation; (ii) in the Middle East, build on Hebron by moving
forward on interim agreement and widen circle of peace to Syria, Lebanon; (iii) in Northern
Ireland, work to reinstitute cease fire and advance talks; (iv) in Cyprus, appoint Special Envoy to
make new push for settlement.
�DRAFT
4 Forging an international coalition against proliferation, terrorism & rogue states,
crime & drugs and environmental degradation
Initiatives: (i) on proliferation, pass CWC and CTBT, secure START II and move
to START III, increase security of nuclear materials, (ii) on terrorism, increase cooperation and
common efforts with allies, pass legislation (?), reduce vulnerability of infrastructure; (iii) on
crime & drugs, set eradication/consumption targets, increase pressure on cartels; (iv) on
environment, limit greenhouse gas emissions.
5, Building an open global economy to secure jobs and growth in America
Initiatives: (i) fast track authority; (ii) broaden NAFTA; (iii) telecommunications
agreement.
III. Strength, Diplomacy, Sharing Risks and Costs: The Tools We Need to Lay the
Foundation
We cannot build a new American century without the strength and the resources to get the job
done — and without sharing the risks and costs of our leadership with other like-minded nations.
That means maintaining our commitment to a strong and ready military ~ and renewing our
commitment to a fully funded, efficient diplomacy. And it means reforming the United Nations to
meet new demands, while giving it the money it must have to succeed.
Initiatives: (i) armed forces modernization; (ii) 150 account; (iii) UN reform and
arrears; (iv) MDB funding.
IV. Building a New American Century Can't be Done on the Cheap — But the Price of
Escapism is even Greater.
�THE W H I T E H O U S E
WASH INGTON
January 25, 1997
MEMORANDUM FOR THE PRESIDENT
FROM:
DON BAER
CC:
ERSKINE BOWLES
SUBJECT:
STeecH
STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS
Attached for your review are two preliminary outlines to organize the State of the Union.
Thefirstprovides an overview of major themes that could be covered, for a quick review of how
the speech could flow. The second is more detailed, showing how specific policy areas might fit
into the larger framework.
These materials are the result of a planning process that is being run by Erskine and
includes the heads of OMB, DPC, NEC and NSC as well as Ann Lewis, Rahm Emanuel, Doug
Sosnik, Marie Penn and the speechwriters. I will also be reaching out to people outside the
administration whose views you would want included. Our plan now is to give you afirstdraft of
the speech on Tuesday. I am also attaching a schedule that we are proposing to Erskine for the
completion of the entire process.
As we move forward with this process we are making several broad assumptions, and it
would be useful to know your thoughts:
Working /tompftVw
An action plan. Our thinking is that the State of the Union should offer a clear,
consistent and concrete plan of action to implement your larger vision of preparing America for
the 21st Century. This speech should be considered as the follow-through on the Inaugural
address. That was your statement of vision and purpose; this is the work plan to get it done.
Vigor and activism. After a period which has deliberately been more thoughtful and
reflective, Mark Penn and others believe you should now convey a sense of vigor and activism to
meet our challenges.
A focus on education, foreign policy and race issues - and critical unfinished
business. There is broad agreement among the people we are working with that one purpose of
�-2the State of Union is to emphasize three major, legacy-based areas — education, foreign policy
and race. You will also want to make clear your ongoing commitment tofinishthe work of
balancing the budget (while investing in those things that help the American people thrive and our
economy grow); the process of ending welfare and the problems of the underclass, and campaign
finance reform. This means that some other priorities necessary to prepare America for the 21st
Century might have to be discussed more briskly — to save time (this will already be a long
speech) and to clarify our sense of focus. It will he a real challenge to convey our emphasis on
key areas without neglecting other important priorities. It is therefore important to know the
importance you place on these issues so that we can determine their relative weight in the speech.
The Larger Sections of the Address
Finishing unfinished business. By opening the speech with a strong statement of
determination tofinishthe job of balancing the budget, reforming welfare and reforming campaign
finance laws, you can show that on major historic issues you have already laid the foundation to
prepare America for the 21st Century.
Education. There is a strong feeling among most of us that it would be good for the
topic of education to stand out. This would include what you could say about K-12 reform, the
elementary and secondary issues discussed during the campaign (charter schools, school
construction, America Reads) and your entire college opportunity agenda. Policy people are now
moving forward to provide more detail for those issues not nowfleshedout; in particular, Erskine
is arranging for them to work with you this week on the standards debate to see if we can move
beyond rhetoric to a concrete plan of action. If we are unable to develop such an action plan, we
must seriously consider how to address the issue of standards in this speech.
Foreign policy/global economy. There is strong thinking that these areas should form a
larger proportion of the speech than in years past.
Race/unity. Everyone seems to agree that it would be desirable to end the speech with
another strong appeal on race/unity. If so, we need to decide whether the focus is simply
exhortation or whether we could expand on the approach of the Inaugural and propose any
specifics.
Technology. We are including this section because Mark Penn and others believe that as
you speak about the challenges of the 21st Century, your commitment to "democratizing"
technology in the Information Age would help promote a future-oriented focus.
Stronger families, stronger communities. Given all of the above topics — especially the
first three, which would require greater time and emphasis to signal that they are key priorities —
we are proposing this catch-all section to deal with other domestic issues such as crime, welfare
and health care. While we might not spend a great deal of time on these issues, we could at least
indicate upcoming announcements in these areas, so that we can focus on them in greater detail in
�-3the weeks following the speech.
Let me know your thoughts. In the meantime, while some policy decisions remain to be
made, we will proceed with the drafting of the speech.
�STATE OF THE UNION - OVERVIEW
Saturday, January 25,1997
Introduction/thesis of speech (5 minutes): Concrete action plan to prepare for challenges of next
century.
This is fleeting moment — we have opportunity, not guarantee, to create future brighter than our
past. The enemv is inaction... state of union is strong, opportunity we face as a nation is even
stronger. Here is my action plan:
L Finish the unfinished business before this body: balanced budget, welfare reform, campaign
finance reform. (5-10 minutes)
EL Stronger education (10 minutes)
UL Stronger families and communities (families, environment, underclass, service, crime) (510 minutes)
IV. Stronger preparation for the Information Age (technology) (5 minutes)
V. Stronger leadership in the world (indispensable nation) (foreign policy/global economy)
(10 minutes)
VL Stronger American union (race/unity) (5 minutes)
TOTAL; 50 minutes
�STATE OF THE UNION - POLICY OUTLINE
Saturday, January 25,1997
Thesis of speech: This speech will be a concrete action plan to prepare our people for the
challenges of the next century.
"This is afleetingmoment — a time when we have an opportunity, not a guarantee, but an
opportunity to create an American future even brighter than our past. It would be easy to be
complacent, for we are at a moment of peace and prosperity, and we face no enemy bent on
destroying our countiy. Instead, the e e y of our time is inaction. The opportunity created by
nm
the global e o o y and the Information Age can be lost - or even turned to our disadvantage cnm
if we do not act to prepare America for the 21st Century. The state of our union is strong, but
the opportunity we face as a nation is even stronger
"A child bom tonight is likely to have almost no memory of the 20th Century. Everything
she is likely to know personally about the progress of America will be because of the work we do
now to help build the future in which she will live. So tonight, I present a plan of action to
prepare our people and our nation for the challenges of the next century."
1. Finish the unfinished business before this body (5-10 minutes)
A. Balance the budget
Support for balanced budget — our plan to be submitted shows we can balance the
budget while investing in our people
Entitlements discussion (Sperling/Raines working up language)
Call for bipartisan action
B. Welfare-to-Work (there is some overlap between this and Underclass issues below, but
this seems important to do high up)
Tax credit to private sector employers
Tax credit to private job placement firms
Private sector initiative — announce CEOs (if ready)
(Fixing last year's bill)
C. Campaignfinancereform
McCain-Feingold
[possible proposals to expand electoral participation]
2. Stronger education (10 minutes)
�When it comes to preparing our children, nothing is more important than education. Our
goal: every 8 year old can read, every 12 year old can log on to the Internet, every 18 year old can
go to college — and all our children go to world-class schools.
A. Plan for America's Schools (present all our efforts/plans as a unified approach to
reform K-12 for the 21st Century)
Call for higher standards
[Call for national 4th grade literacy and 8th grade math test — and set
national goal of 12th grade test as graduation requirement; no social
promotions; teacher hiring issues]
[Announce state legislative campaign for testing and standards, possibly
including model legislation or declaration of principles for school reform]
[One idea is to praise good teachers]
Charter schools (budget doubles #)
America Reads challenge — work study announcement by college presidents
School construction
Early learning
1 million children in Head Start by 2002
WH Conference on the Brain
VP Family Conference on Parental Involvement in Early Learning
B. CoUege: make the 13 th & 14th years of education universal
Hope Scholarship
Taxfreesavings for college (IRAs, $10,000 deduction, Hope Scholarship)
Pell Grant expansion
C. Training: GI Bill/skills grants
3. Stronger families and communities (5-10 minutes)
A. Families
Health care:
Children's health initiative
Coverage for workers between jobs
Breast cancer benefits (Feinstein-D'Amato proposal) or drive-by
mastectomies
�Family leave expansion: allow time off for PTA meetings, routine doctor
Flextime: employees choose how to use their overtime
Possible tobacco initiative (if anything new)
visits
B. Environment
Toxic waste cleanup: 500 sites, 2/3 by 2000
Make polluters pay
C. Underclass (explain coherence of our policy for urban and rural areas in need —
sparking the creation of private sector economic activity)
(In addition to welfare-to-work:)
Round two of Empowerment Zones
D.C: as example of approach throughout
D. Service
Service Summit
Presidential Medal of Service (if you went forward, this would be akin to physical
fitness award)
E. Crime
Juvenile justice bill (including antigang initiative, Brady expansion to youth
offenses, after-school programs, trigger safety lock, other provisions)
Announce Bratton as community crimefightingleader
Set date for 100,000 police on street
Largest anti-drug budget ever
Plea to young people to stay off drugs
4. Stronger preparation for the Infonnation Age (5 minutes)
Computers in the classrooms (in budget)
- more Net Days
- all 6th grade teachers leam computers in 1 summer
Second generation Internet (in budget)
Internet connection to children's hospitals
Putting Smithsonian collection online
Internet obscenity (restating support for law, now in Supreme Court)
Air safety reforms: announce three major recommendations from VP commission
New satellite-based navigation system by 2005 (instead of 2015)
�New, tougher standards for aging aircraft (for first time, test old wiring)
$500 million in NASA funding for air safety R&D
Spectrum allocation for law enforcement
Big items, policy not yet approved:
[Goal of AIDS vaccine by 2000]
[Speed up Human Genome Project: map DNA to help solve genetically-related
diseases and defects]
5. Stronger leadership in the worid (indispensable nation) (foreign policy/global economy)
(10 minutes)
A. Undivided Europe of democracies at peace
Expand NATO
Strengthen NATO/Russia partnership
B. Build an Asia-Pacific Community
Bring China into world community
Denuclearize and advance peace in Korea
C. Strengthen hand of peace and democracy
Bosnia (ask Congress to pay for troops)
[Announce special envoy for Cyprus/Greece/Turkey] [?]
[mentions of Middle East, Ireland, Africa]
D. Terror/weapons of mass destruction/drugs
CWC
E. Open global economy (very important to totality of speech; might need to be higher
up)
Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA)
[Announcing trips to Mexico/Caribbean, South America]
F. Shouldering the burden
Armed forces modemiiation
Increasing diplomatic budget
UN reform and arrears
�5. Stronger American union (race/unity) (5 minutes)
Race (issue raised: we need specific actions)
�PROPOSED SCHEDULE FOR STATE-OF-THE-UNION PROCESS
Saturday, 1/25
Outline of State-of-the-Union Address to President
Tuesday, 1/28
Decision Memo to President on Budget language and other politically
sensitive issues
Circulate first draft of State-of-the-Union address
Submit first draft of State-of-the-Union address to President
State-of-the-Union policy meeting with President and heads of Policy
Councils to review policy issues (non-educational standards) with the
President
Wednesday, 1/29
Meeting with President on School Standards for policy action plan
decisions
Speech prep - 1 hour
Thursday, 1/30
Speech prep - 1 hour
Friday, 1/31
Speech prep - 1 hour
Saturday, 2/1
Speech prep - 1 hour
Sunday, 2/2
Rehearse Address in Family Theater - 2.5 hrs
Monday, 2/3
Rehearse Address in Family Theater - 2.5 hrs
Tuesday, 2/4
Rehearse Address in Family Theater - All Day
STATE-OF-THE-UNION-ADDRESS - U.S. Congress
�OUTLINE FOR 1997 STATE-OF-THE-UNION
[option A — 50 minutes]
Thesis of speech: What must we do to prepare America for the 21 st Century? (5 minutes)
1. The unfinished business before this body: Balanced budget (5 minutes)
2. Stronger individuals - education (10 minutes)
3. Stronger families and communities (15 minutes)
- welfare to work
- crime
- health care
- home and work
- environment
- technology
- service
- political reform (?)
- reinventing government (?)
3. Stronger American leadership -- foreign policy (10 minutes)
4. Stronger American union — race (5 minutes)
�OUTLINE FOR 1997 STATE-OF-THE-UNION
[option B -- 55 minutes]
Thesis of speech: What must we do to prepare America for the 21st Century? (5 minutes)
1. Finish the unfinished business before this body: Balanced budget (5 minutes)
2. World's best education (10 minutes)
3. End the problems of the underclass (5 minutes)
- welfare to work
- crime
4. Stronger families and communities (10 minutes)
- health care
- home and work
- environment
- technology
- service
5. Modernize and reform our government (5)
- political reform
- reinventing government
5. Prepare the world for the 21st Century — foreign policy (10 minutes)
6. New spirit of community for the new century — race (5 minutes)
�S.O.T.U. Drafts
1-26-97
�Draft 1/26/97
PRESIDENT WILLIAM J. CLINTON
STATE-OF-THE-UNION ADDRESS
UNITED STATES CAPITOL
FEBRUARY 4,1997
Mr. Speaker, Mr. Vice-President, Members of the 105th Congress, distinguished guests:
I come before you tonight to put forward a concrete plan of action to prepare our people
and our nation for the challenges of the next century.
We have so much to be thankful for as a nation. Our economy is in its 69th month of
strong growth; crime, welfare, and teen pregnancy are receding; by the force of our arms and the
force of our example, we are helping bring peace throughout the world. And beyond that, we are
living in a moment of tremendous opportunity, because of a new global economy and the
Information Age.
It would be easy to be complacent, to rest at this moment. But we must not rest. We won
the peace of the great struggle with Communism. Through hard work and dogged effort, we won
back our economy and put it on track. We have won back our native American optimism. But
we must not win these wars only to lose the peace in this moment of opportunity. We must not
establish our prosperity but lose the chance to extend it to our children.
Today, we face no enemy bent on destroying our country. Instead, the enemy of our time
is inaction. The opportunity created by the global economy and the Information Age can be lost
- or even turned to our disadvantage - if we do not act to prepare America for the 21 Century.
The very forces of technology and change that are creating wider opportunity for our people will
demand stronger education, stronger families and stronger communities. They will demand that
we harness the forces of science and technology and preserve American leadership in the world.
And they call on us to build a stronger union here at home.
st
This is a fleeting moment - a time when we have an opportunity, not a guarantee, but an
opportunity, to create an American future even brighter than our past. So tonight, I say to you:
The State of our Union is strong, but the opportunity we face is even stronger. And we must not
lose it.
To focus your minds on the urgency of the task, I ask you to think about this: A child
born tonight is likely to have almost no firsthand memory of the 20 Century. Everything she is
likely to know personally about the progress of America, she will know because of the work we
lh
�do now in the closing years of this century to help build the future in which she will live.
Everything she can be, she will have the opportunity to be because of the choices we make and
the challenges we address today. So I ask you tonight to think about our responsibilities to help
make that future real.
To prepare for the 21st Century, we must finish the unfinished business hwich we
here together must accomplish: balancing our budget,finishingthe job of welfare reform,
restoring our democracy.
To keep our economy growing, to strengthen it for a vigorous new world of competition,
we must finish the job of balancing the budget.
For years, the budget deficit shackled our progress and weakened our economy. Year by
year, we have cut the deficit so that it is now the smallest in the industrialized world. In two
days, I will formally propose a detailed plan to balance the budget by the year 2002. My plan
proves that we can protect our children from a future burdened by reckless debt, even as we give
them the educational opportunities they need to make the most of their God-given promise. This
budget finally moves us beyond the false choices that have held us back too long ~ it shows that
we can balance our budget and still invest in our children.
[entitlements discussion — options to be provided by NEC]
We should not wait years for a constitutional amendment that could cripple our country in
time of crisis; we should not wait a year for an agreement. Let this be the Congress that finally
acted to balance the budget, and let this happen now, not later, but now.
There is a second piece of unfinished business for us in this chamber: We must make the
permanent underclass a thing of the past, and finish the job of welfare reform.
Last year, I signed landmark welfare reform. We said that everyone in this country who
can work must work. Now, we must take responsibility, as lawmakers, as business leaders, as
civic leaders, to do everything we can to make sure that opporutnity is made real and that jobs are
available for those moving off of welfare.
To do that, here is what we must do: We must spark private enterprise, so jobs with a
future move into our inner cities. We should give tax credits to businesses that hire people off
welfare. We should give tax credits to job placement firms that help find a job for welfare
recipients. Every state in America should use the power it now has to tum a welfare check into a
private sector paycheck. If we do all this, we can lift one milion more people from the
dependence of welfare to the dignity of work.
When I signed this new law, I challenged every business in America to do what it can to
hire someone off welfare. In communities all across this country, businesses large and small are
rising to meet this challenge. And I am very pleased to announce tonight that [x] and [x] have
�agreed to lead a national mobilization of businesses to hire people off welfare.
A third piece of unfinished buisiness haunts this chamber and stains our democracy.
Tonight, before the eyes of America, together commit to passing bipartisan campaign finance
reform.
We have just come through an election in which [twice as much money] was raised and
spent on races for Congress and the Presidency than ever before. This system is badly broken.
Every one involved in it - every one of us here - must take responsibility for this system, and for
ending it.
Senators McCain and Feingold, and Representatives Shays and Meehan — Republicans
and Democrats — have reached across the aisle to craft reform that would reclaim our democracy.
It curbs spending, reduces the role of special interests, creates a level playing field between
challengers and incumbents, and bans the large soft money contributions that both parties
receive.
You know and I know: delay will mean the death of reform. It has before, and we must
not let it happen again. We must work together and enact campaign finance refoim, and we
should do it by the day we celebrate the birth of our democracy, by July 4.
If we balance the budget, finish the job of welfare reform, and enact campaign finance
reform, we will have cleared our once-obstructed path to prepare our country for the new century
ahead.
The most important thing we can do - and my number one prioirty as President for
the next four years — is to give every child in America the best education in the world.
Tonight, set this goal: In the year 2000, every 8 year old will be able to read, every 12
year old will be able to log on to the Internet, every 18 year old will be able to go to college ~
and America will have the best schools in the world.
To achieve that goal, we have a plan to get there. This [hold up] is my plan. A Plan for
America's Schools. It is based on five key principles.
First, it is time to change the way we educate our children, by setting the highest
standards and helping them to reach them.
What do we mean by higher standards? Actually, it's basic ~ they must learn the basics,
the essential building blocks that will help them to thrive in the new century. 4th graders must be
able to read, and read well. 8th graders must be able tojde-aleebra. 12th graders must master a
complete high school curriculum before they graduat^/Dur schools need to teach them what
schools around the world are teaching other children, ajad'wo need to mako-sureLthey-are"^
rarning-ti.- Parents have a right to know how well they are doing compared to other children in
�their community and around the world.
Tonight, I challenge every state to require a national reading test in 4th grade and a
national math test in 8th grade. Over the next 18 months, we will complete development of these
tests and make them available around the country. We will give them federal assistance to
administer these tests. And every state should enact school reforms to requires 12th graders to
pass a tough exam before they graduate, [what about tests proposed last year at NGA — to move
from elementary school to middle school, middle school to high school? What about TIMS test
discussed last week in Chicago?]
[Don -- rather than doing the "Governors " paragraph here, it makes more sense at the
end of the "plan " discussion, since the states have to do all of it.]
It is time to end social promotion in America. Children shouldn't move from grade to
grade unless they're ready. And no one in America should get a high school diploma unless he
can pass a test to shows he's earned it — we have to make diplomas mean something again.
If we want our children to read, we must do our part to make sure they can. Parents
should read 30 minutes a day to their children, and you can't start early enough. But this is a
national challenge which requires all of us to do our part.
I want a citizen army of one million Volunteers to tutor young people who need extra
help. My balanced budget invests $2.75 billion in the America Reads challenge fund: to help
parents become better first teachers, to train reading specialists who can train volunteer tutors,
and to expand Head Start. And tonight, I am proud to announce that [20] college presidents have
pledged half of their new work study positions to this effort. If we work together, we can make it
so that every child in Ameirca can point at their favorite book and say: " I read it myself."
Second, evert state must enact public school choice, so parents can choose the school
that's right for their children. Innovaiton and competition will make all our schools better. We
must do more to encourage teachers and parents to start public charter schools that set and meet
the highest standards. My balanced budget doubles the funding set aside to help start these
schools, so that by the Year 2000, there will be 3000 charter schools, [at least one for every
school district]. Strong schools must be modern schools. My budget includes $5 billion to spur
$20 billion in school construction and modernization over the next four years.
Third, my plan calls on states to reward good teachers, and find ways to quickly and fairly
remove those few teachers who don't measure up. Our teachers are among the most dedicated
and talented public servants in America.
Fourth, we must harness the Information Age to make our schools worthy of the 21 st
century. The wondrous power of the Internet is that it brings the same incredible universe of
knowledge to an isolated rural schoolhouse, an inner city high school, or a magnet school in a
wealthy suburb. My balanced budget increases our Technology Literacy Fund by [$N], so we
�can meet our goal to connect every classroom and library to the Internet by the year 2000. Last
year, Vice-President Gore and I joined with 20,000 volunteers to connect thousands of schools in
Califomia at the first Net Day. This year, I want every computer company, communications
company, and computer lover in America to join us in April for Net Year. Lend a modem, a
wire, or just a hand. Help us connect all our schools to the future.
To truly unleash the instructive power of computers, we must have trained teachers to
help children make the most of them. Tonight, I am announcing a private-sector partnership that,
over the summer of 1998, will train every sixth grade teacher in America to make the most of
classroom computers, [more detail to come]
Finally, we must use our schools to help parents teach children good values. We should
press forward to make sure that character education is a part of every curriculum. There is no
reason our schools should teach everything else, and not how to be a good citizen. And we
should continue to promote order and discipline in our schools, by supporting school uniforms
and enforcing truancy laws. Where they have been tried, these things have worked, and I want
every community to try them if they think they will work.
High standards and tests to measure how well our children meet them. School choice and
charter schools. The best teachers. Computers in every classroom. Values and discipline in
every school. Those are the basic elements of my plan to make America's schools the best in the
world for the 21 st Century.
We here can help to make this plan a reality. But the success of this effort is not in our
hands alone. This is the job of parents, teachers, businesspeople, clergy, state officials and
school boards across America. We have to marshall these forces toward achieving the goals of
this plan. Oterhweise, our educatonal system will not be strong enough to give our children the
education they need.
So tonight, I pledge to take this plan to the country, to state capitals and schoolboards, to
parents and to teachers ~ to enlist their support in what we must regard as a crusade for
tomorrow's children.
If we are truly going to prepare our people for the 21st century, we must make sure every
American has the opportunity to go to college. We must literally expand the fronteirs of
education: We must make the 13th and 14th years of education — at least two years of college —
as universal in America as high school is today.
And we should cut taxes to do it. We should pass America's HOPE Scholarship: a $1,500
tax credit for college tuition, enough to pay the tuition at a typical community college. We
should give every family a $10,000 deduction for all education after high school. And we should
let families save tax-free in an IRA to send their children to college.
My balanced budget plan, with these tax cuts included, will mean that no working family
5
�will ever pay a nickel of taxes on the money they save for college.
We should do more than ever before to provide college scholarships to deserving
students. My plan provides the largest increase in Pell Grants in 20 years.
With this budget, national support for college education will be more than double what it
was on the day I took office. Over the last four years, we made it possible for [N] people go to
college, and we made it more affordable for [N]. If we make the most of the opportunity of these
times, [N] more people will be ready for the 21st century when it comes, because they will be
getting a college education.
And we must recognize that learning begins in the cradle and must continue throughout a
lifetime. We should help parents to teach their own children in the earliest years, the years when
learning takes root. My balanced budget expands Head Start by one million children by 2002.
In the coming months we will work to understand how young children leam, at a White House
Conference on [Early Learning and] the Brain, and at the Vice President's Family Conference in
June.
And all our people must have the chance to learn new skills throughout their lives. The
G.I. Bill for Workers will transform the confusing tangle of federal training programs into a
single, simple skill grant that will go directly to workers. We would put into the hands of every
single worker the pwoer to compete in the new economy. For twoo long now, this bill has sat
before this body, without action. We have to face up to it: our worker training system does not
work. And we have to find a way tofixit.
To prepare America for the 21st Century, we must build stronger families and
communities.
It is not enough to help individuals be stronger for the 21 st century. The family is the
foundation of American life. It is through our families and our communities that our children
learn the values that keep us strong. In the new century, with new pressures on people in the way
they work and live, we must do what we can to make it easier for parents to raise strong families.
That work must start at the beginning of life. The Family and Medical Leave Law has
allowed [12] million parents to take time off for the birth of a child or to care for a sick family
member. I am submitting legislation to expand Family Leave so parents can take time off from
work for parent teacher conferences or to take a child for a routine checkup. And I have also
[submitted legislation] to give workers flextime so they can choose to use overtime as income or
for time off to be with their families.
For our families to be strong in the 21 st Century, they must have access to affordable,
quality health care. We know that we have to move step by step to expand access to health care.
Last year, working in a bipartisan way, we passed legislation to make sure no family is denied
health insurance because one family member has a preexisting condition, and to make sure
�people can take their health care with them when they change jobs. Now, we must take the next
step ~ in many ways, the most improtant step ~ to cover our children. My balanced budget plan
will extend health coverage to five million children - cutting in half the number of uninsured
children in America. It will help people between jobs pay their premiums for up to six months,
so children don't lose their insurance while thier parents are looking for a new job.
Last year, we took an important step to protect the health of women and children in
America. We ended "drive-through deliveries," requiring that new mothers and their babies get
at least 48 hours of hospital care. This year, we must end the dangerous and demeaning practice
of drive-through mastectomies, where women are sent home in pain, groggy from anesthesia,
and even with drainage tubes still in place. You should pass the bipartisan legislation already
before you to require at least 48 hours in the hospital for mastectomies.
To make our families and communities stronger for the 21 st century, nothing is more
important than protecting our environment for the 21 st century. My balanced budget provides
the resources to clean up over 500 toxic waste sites ~ 2/3 of all the toxic waste sites in America - by the year 2000. Our young people should grow up next to parks, not poison.
Even as we clean up our communities, we must make sure that taxpayers never again pay
to clean up polluters' mess. I urge you to pass my proposal to make polluters live by this simple
rule: if you pollute our environment, you clean it up.
Some of the worst pollution is in the heart of our cities, making it even more difficult to
strenghten communities most in need of renewal. I urge you to pass the brownfields initiative in
my balanced budget, so we can clean up contaminated properties and restore them to productive
use. We must bring the full force of the private sector to bear: to create jobs, spur investment,
and restore hope. In [99] communities across America, from South Texas to South Central, our
Empowerment Zones and Enterprise Communites are restoring economic growth and opportunity
by harnessing the power of the private sector through tax incentives and increased flexibility.
My balanced budget calls for a new round of Empowerment Zones, to bring new jobs and new
hope to another [N] communities.
And pledge tonight, that all of us in this room will work together to meet the challenges
of this great capital city, so that it is once again the proud face that America shows the world.
In the fight for strong communites, nothing is more important than the fight against crime
and violence. Over the last four years, we have made tremendous progress: the FBI reported last
month that serious crime has dropped five years in a row ~ the longest decline in more than 25
years. The key to our strategy has been community policing. We have brought citizens together
with the police officers who patrol their neighborhoods, to make our communities safer. Our
strategy is working, and we must finish the job of putting 100,000 police officers on the street.
But even as crime recedes across America, there remains one stubborn threat to our
future we can never tolerate. We must make a full scale assault on juvenile crime our top
�priority in the fight for law and order. I will submit comprehensive legislation to combat
youth violence and drug abuse. My legislation declares war on criminal gangs: it gives
prosecutors new resources and tougher penalties to break them. It gives judges more power to
crack down on gang members who try to intimidate witnesses against them. It extends the
Brady Bill to cover violent crimes by young people, so a minor who commits a violent crime
will lose the right to own a handgun just as surely as if he was an adult. It requires trigger
safety locks on [all new handguns] to prevent unauthorized - or accidental- use. It gives
communities the resources they need to keep schools open late, on weekends, and in the
summer, so young people have someplace to go and something to say yes to.
Helping young people to find something to say yes to is exactly why President Bush
and General Colin Powell joined me at the White House two weeks ago to launch the
Presidents' Summit of Service. We want to moblize an unprecedented force of volunteers, to
work with young people, to mentor them, to inspire them to serve themselves.
And tonight, I am proud to announce that I will award a Presidential Medal of Service to
thousands of elementary school students each year who make and keep a commitment to serve
their communities during the year. For [N] years, we have recognized young people who meet
high standards for personal health with the President's Award for Physical Fitness. I want to
recognize young people who make a contribution to the health and strength of their community.
And to our youne people: As you go about strengthening your communities, you
should never forget that your first responsibility is to yourself. That's why I want to talk to
you about drugs for a minute.
We must do more to stop the scourge of drugs. My balanced budget includes the largest
anti-drug effort ever: to stop drugs at their source, punish those who push drugs, and steer young
people away. And I am very pleased to announce tonight that General McCaffrey, who I
appointed one year ago to lead America's fight against drugs, will be launcing a new public
service ad campaign [details].
But the war on drugs will be won or lost by our young people themselves. Let me say a
word directly to you, our children: We must do our job to build a strong 21 st century for you, but
you have to think about what kind of future you want to have for yourself. If you let them, drugs
will snatch your future from you before you know what's happening. Nothing your parents do,
nothing anyone can do, will keep drugs out of your hands if you set out to find them. It is up to
you. Drugs are deadly. They will ruin your life. Don't let them. Look within yourself; you can
find the strength to say no. And I promise that we will keep doing everything in our power to
give you the future you deserve.
To prepare America for the 21st century, we must harness the remarkable power of
modern technology to improve the lives of all Americans.
�Four years ago, the Internet was little more than the mystcial realm of physicists. Today
there are nearly half a million Web sites covering everything from the latest news to the complete
works of Shakespeare. But we have only scratched the surface of what the Internet's potential to
improve our lives. Now, we must build the second generation Internet. I want to launch a
partnership to connect 100 universities and national labs with an Internet up to 1,000 times as
fast as today's. My balanced budget includes $100 million to build this new Internet, which will
connect patients in rural hospitals to the best doctors in America and cutting edge medical
equipment. It will allow students to take virtual field trips to the bottom of the ocean or the North
Pole, and to work with other students around the world in real time.
In the last few years, breakthroughs in medical science have brought to new hope to
people suffering from diseases like spina bifida, AIDS, and cancer. America must continue its
commitment to the best medical research in the world, and my balanced budget includes a N %
increase in funding for our medical laboratories. [Tonight, I am announcing that I have asked the
Director of the National Institutes of Health to speed up the remarkable work of the Human
Genome Project, and complete it by 2005. This stunning research will provide a blueprint for
human life that will help doctors and scientists unlock the secrets of our deadliest diseases. We
don't have a moment to waste.]
We must use technology to enrich and improve people's daily lives. Tonight, I am
announcing the first recommendation of the Vice President's Commission on Air Safety: to
equip every plane with state of the art satellite technology that will make American navigation
systems the safest in the world. I am announcing that we have allocated a new portion of the
spectrum to law enforcement, so they can take advantage of the newest communications
technology to stay in touch and protect our citizens.
We should do more. We should connect every children's hospital to the Internet, so a
child in bed can stay in school and in touch with her classmates. We should launch a major
public-private partnership to digitize 10 million pieces in the Smithsonian collection, and put
them on the Internet where schoolchildren ~ and adults ~ around the world can study them and
learn about them.
Even as we tap technology's vast potential to improve our lives, we also know that
sometimes it poses dangers, especially to our children. I strongly support the Communications
Decency Act to protect our children from obscenity on the Internet. It is being challenged. I
pledge that I will take the fight to protect our children all the way to the Supreme Court.
As we harness the power of the Information Age, we must also master the forces of
global change. To prepare America for the 21st Century, we must build stronger
leadership in the world, so that America remains the indispensible nation in the next
century.
From its birth, America has stood for an idea: that people have the right to control their
own lives and pursue their own dreams. In this century, America fought two world wars so that
�freedom could triumph over tyranny. Then we made the commitments and built the institutions
that kept the peace . . . that brought us unparalleled prosperity . .. and that won the Cold War.
Tonight, as we near the summit of the 20th century, more people than ever before share
the ideals that define America and the interests that America defends. We can be proud of our
efforts to take down many of the blocs and barriers that divided the world for our parents. Now,
we must create the new institutions and new understandings that will define the world for our
children.
Our first task must be to build a Europe that is undivided, democratic and at peace for the
first time in history. When Europe is stable, our own security is strengthened. When Europe
prospers, so does America. Today, the bloodiest battleground of the 20th century is blessed with
freedom. Now, it is our responsibility to see that freedom is never lost again.
We can succeed if we live up to the legacy of a previous generation of Americans. A
half century ago, in creating NATO and the Marshall Plan, they helped prevent a return to
terrible rivalries... strengthened democracy against future threats... and created the conditions for
prosperity in Europe's west. Now, by opening NATO's doors to Europe's new democracies and
strengthening its partnership with Russia, we can do the same for Europe's east.
Six months from this week, in Madrid, NATO will begin to take in new members.
Tonight, I say to this Congress: work together so that by 1999 ~ NATO's 50th anniversary and
ten years after the fall of the Berlin Wall ~ the first group of countries we invite to join are full
fledged members of NATO.
In a global economy with global security challenges, America must look to the East no
less than to the West ~ and build a true community of nations in the Asia Pacific. Our security
demands it: Americans have fought three wars in Asia in living memory. Our prosperity requires
it: one-third of our exports and more than 2 million American jobs depend on trade with Asia.
With America's help, Asia's extraordinary growth and dynamism can be channeled into a
community of shared progress.
Four years ago, we began to forge an Asia Pacific community by tearing down trade
barriers and building up our security alliances. Today, America's partnerships in Asia, from
Japan to Thailand, are stronger than ever.
We must not let the progress achieved divert us from the promise yet realized — or the
peril that remains. We have frozen North Korea's dangerous nuclear program. But it still must
be dismantled — I call on Congress to fully fund America's contribution to this effort. And we
need your support as we work to bring South Korea and North Korea together in peace talks ~
and finally bridge the divide of the Cold War's last frontier.
And pursue a deeper dialogue with China. An isolated, inward looking China is not in
America's interest. Instead, we must work together on common problems like the spread of
�weapons of mass destruction -- and deal with our fundamental differences, especially human
rights. As contacts across borders, among people and between governments grow... as markets
expand and information flows... as China plays its rightful role in the world community... the
roots of a more open society can gain strength. I look forward to exchanging state visits with
President Jiang. And I am determined that China and the United States engage on all levels, for
that is what great powers must do.
As we strengthen our ties to Europe and Asia, we also must strengthen the hand of peace
from Bosnia to the Aegean... from the Middle East to Northern Ireland. President Theodore
Roosevelt's Nobel Peace Prize for ending the war between Russia and Japan is proudly displayed
across the hall from my office. It was the first of XX peace prizes won by Americans. Our world
is safer and better for their leadership ~ and so is America. Promoting peace lessens the
likelihood of conflict that could draw in our troops and draw down our treasure. It encourages
other nations to spend resources on their people, not their arsenals. It helps build a community of
nations willing to make common cause of shared problems.
In Bosnia, our armed forces helped end the bloodiest conflict in Europe since World War
II. The killing has stopped, but the habits of peace have been slow to take hold. That is why,
after our troops completed their mission on schedule in December, I agreed they should take part
in a smaller follow-on force in Bosnia. Their task is to prevent hostilities from resuming so that
economic reconstruction and political reconciliation can accelerate — and peace can become selfsustaining. By June of next year, the follow-on force should be able to withdraw. Tonight, I ask
Congress to continue its strong support for our troops by giving them the tools they need to
succeed. They are doing a remarkable job for America — America must do right by them.
Preparing America for the 21st Century also requires moving strongly against the threats
change has produced: the spread of weapons of mass destruction... terrorism and rogue states...
international crime and drug trafficking. These forces of destruction find benefit in the very
freedom and technological progress we cherish. We must never let up in our fight against them,
because they will never give in.
Nowhere have we done more — but nowhere is there more yet to do ~ than in our work to
reduce the threat of weapons of mass destruction. The American people should be proud that our
leadership produced a treaty to stop all nuclear testing for all time. They should be proud that
our efforts extended indefinitely an 164-nation agreement to prevent the spread of nuclear
weapons. They should be proud that, with Russia, we are cutting our nuclear arsenals by twothirds from their Cold War height... and that our remaining missiles no longer target each other's
citizens.
But the American people will have no cause for pride if we fail the test of leadership that
lies immediately before us: ratifying the Chemical Weapons Convention. The Reagan
Administration negotiated the Convention. The Bush Administration signed it. XX nations
around the world have approved it. The Convention will make our troops safer from chemical
attack. It will give our law enforcement more powerful tools to fight terrorists and help isolate
11
�rogue states. If we fail to act before April 29 ~ when the treaty goes into effect with or without
us - our chemical industry will pay the price of mandatory trade restrictions aimed at countries
that refuse to sign. So I say to Congress: together, make the Chemical Weapons Convention
law so that finally ~ finally — we can begin to banish poison gas from this earth.
The American people will only know true security if they are given the tools and the
chance to prosper in the new global economy. These past four years, we made it America's
mission to open markets abroad in order to create good new jobs at home. America has the best
workers and the finest products in the world. Give them a fair deal with free trade and they will
compete - and outcompete - anybody.
More than two hundred trade agreements later, our determination to make the global
economy work for America has been rewarded. Once again, America is the world's number one
exporter. Once again, we are the most competitive nation on earth. Once again, we are bending
the forces of change to our benefit.
Here in the Americas — the fastest growing region in the world for American exports ~
we are creating a Free Trade Area from Alaska to Argentina, agreement by agreement. By 2005
the United States will sell more to Latin America than to Western Europe or Japan. And we will
create one million new, high paying jobs -- the kind of jobs that will help prepare America's
working families for the 21st century and give them a fair shot at the American Dream. When I
travel to Latin America this spring I will be working to bring our hemisphere even closer together
as a community of free market democracies. That's a vision worthy of America's future.
Preparing America for the 21st century cannot be done on the cheap. But the price of
escapism would be even greater. We must maintain our commitment to a strong and ready
military — and we will, by increasing funding for weapons modernization by 40 percent over the
next four years. The men and women of America's military have never failed to preserve our
freedom in the past. If called upon, they must have the equipment and training they need to
dominate the conflicts of the future.
We also must renew our commitment to fully fund America's diplomacy. More than ever
before, the well-being of our people at home depends on America's leadership abroad. Yet
international affairs spending has been cut sharply in recent years and today totals just one
percent of the federal budget ~ one penny out of each tax dollar.
Every dollar we devote to international affairs brings a sure return in increased security
and savings. Arms control agreements allow us to cut our own spending on strategic weapons by
billions of dollars. Our support for reform in Central Europe and the former Soviet Union ~ less
than a billion dollars - promotes stability in an area that will become a vast market for the
United States, and where we spent literally trillions of dollars to win the Cold War. By helping
developing nations fight overpopulation, AIDS, drug smuggling, and environmental decay, we're
making sure the problems they face today don't become our problems tomorrow. And the money
we devote to development or peacekeeping or disaster relief helps prevent future crises whose
12
�cost would be far, far greater, not be penny wise and pound foolish.
The United Nations is an important tool in our foreign policy arsenal. It vaccinates
children against disease... protects refugees... teaches farmers to grow crops... gives diplomacy a
chance to work and peace a chance to take hold. There are times when the United States must
and will act alone. But where possible, we should spread the risks and the costs of leadership by
working with others, including the UN. It's simply common sense. In Kofi Annan, the UN has
a strong new leader committed to eliminating waste, streamlining staff, wiping out abuse. As he
meets his obligations to reform, the United States should meet its obligations to the UN by
paying our debts and our dues.
Members of Congress, at the key turning points of the second half of this century,
Republicans and Democrats have debated and disagreed on specific policies — sometimes
heatedly. But we have always agreed on the need for American leadership in the cause of
freedom, security and prosperity. That bipartisan support for America's indispensable role in the
world has been a key to our strength — and I am determined that it continue as we face another
time of change and a moment of choice.
Before this month is out, I would like to meet with the leadership of both houses, and
both parties to discuss the broad foreign policy agenda I have laid out. We must go forward
together sobered by the knowledge that the actions we take over next four years will shape the
decades to come ~ and the lives of every American.
My fellow Americans, as our great American journey takes us to the edge of a new
century, our greatest challenge must be to enter this new era as one America. In the 21 st century,
our diversity must be our greatest strength, not our greatest weakness. No other nation on earth
is as blessed as we are with such a rich blending of cultures and races. And the diversity of our
people ensures that no other country is as prepared as we are to succeed in the new global
economy. We must not squander our great advantage by clinging to the hatreds and divisions of
the past.
I am reminded of the words of George Mason of Virginia, one of the architects of our
Constitution. Upon completion of that great document, he said, "It is hard to imagine 150 years
from now, as we move across the great expanse of this country, that we will still be one union."
My fellow citizens, we must imagine that 150 years from today, we will not only be one union,
but also one people, inseparable and finally free of the shackles of racism and bigotry that for too
long have weighed heavily upon us. I know that the work of holding together as one is
sometimes hard. But it is the most important work we must do for our children and our future.
Last year, we saw fresh evidence that America's work in ensuring liberty and justice for
all is not yet done. We saw this in the awful resurgence of church burnings and other hate
crimes. We saw it in the sullen faces of hopelessness worn by too many of our inner city youth.
And we heard it in the ugly voices of division, both on our streets and in our halls of business
and government trying to drive wedges between us ~ black and white, haves and have nots, old
13
�immigrants and new immigrants.
But we also saw signs of hope. We saw people cross lines of faith, race and region
reaching out with open hearts and helping hands to assist in the rebuilding of houses of worship
that were burned. We saw strangers of different races who had lived for years side by side in
isolation, begin to extend the hand of fellowship and reconciliation. And we saw extraordinary
examples of the strength and resilency of the human spirit. Tonight, I am pleased that two men
of uncommon faith who inspired us in special ways this year are sitting with my wife, Hillary in
the gallery.
Rev. Terrence Mackey, pastor of Mount Zion AME Church in Greelyville, South
Carolina, refused to be bitter about the arson fire that completely destroyed his church last year.
He comforted his daughter who wanted to know why anyone would set fire to their church home
by telling her: "They didn't burn down the church. They burned down the building in which we
hold church. The church is inside all of us." Rev. Mackey did not waste time in bitterness. He
and his community went to work rebuilding that church and they marched from the site of the old
church to a brand new building last June. Thank you, Rev. Mackey for the example of your faith.
Two weeks ago, when I took the oath of office, another man of uncommon faith touched
my heart. Rev. Schuler of
suggested the scripture that lay open as I placed my hand upon
my family bible to take the oath of office. It was a verse from Isaiah 58:12 — "Thou shalt raise
up the foundations of many generations, and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach. The
restorer of paths to dwell in." Rev. Schuler has changed thousands of lives with lessons of
wisdom and acts of goodwill. I want to thank him for all he has done for America.
So as we think about those children born tonight who will be making their way in a world
vastly different than any we could have imagined for ourselves, remember that the most
important thing we can do for them is to keep this nation together. As of tonight, there are 1060
days to the year 2000. That isn't very long. We have work to do. Let's go to it.
Thank you, God bless you, and God bless America.
14
�Draft 1/26/97
PRESIDENT WILLIAM J. CLINTON
STATE-OF-THE-UNION ADDRESS
UNITED STATES CAPITOL
FEBRUARY 4,1997
Mr. Speaker, Mr. Vice-President, Members of the 105 th Congress, distinguished guests:
I come before you tonight to put forward a concrete plan of action to prepare our people
and our nation for the challenges of the next century.
We have so much to be thankful for as a nation. Our economy is in its 69th month of
strong growth; crime, welfare, and teen pregnancy are receding; by the force of our arms and the ^vw
forcqof our example, we are helping bring peace throughout the world. AnH^Eja^^Bfc we are
^
living in a moment of tremendous opportunity, because of a new global economy and the
Information Age.
a-ft-^n V i
v
It would be easy to be complacent, to rest at this moment g^it^we must not rest. We won
the peace of the great struggle with Communism^
back our economy and put it ontrack.
we must not win these-w
lose"the peace in this moment of opportunity. We must not
establish our prosperity-fef lose the chance to extend it to our children.
Today, we face no enemy bent on destroying our country. Jtutgadrthe, enemy of our time
is inaction. The opportunity created by the global economy and the Information Age can be lost
- or even turned to our disadvantage - if we do not act to prepare America for the 21 Century.
f T h e "very forces nf t^rlinnlfig^jinrl nhange that are creating wider opportunjtv fc|r Qur people will ^
demand stronger education, stronger families and stronger communities. ""They' wulde^nand that^.
we harness the forces of science and technology and^fes§fve~AmericaiT leadershipjn4her-tf?orIdT
And they call on us to build a stronger union herejitjiome.
s1
(
lis is a fleeting moment - a time when we have an opportunity, not a guarantee, but an
opportunity, to create an American future even brighter than our past. So tonight, I say to you:
The State of our Union is strong, but the opportunity we face is even stronger. And we must not
vlose it.
fur <rusTo focus ytfurminds on the urgency of the task, I aslcyou to think about this: A child
born tonight ia Ij^trhrto have almost no {wBliBMi-memoryjof the 20 Century. Everything she is
likely to know-^Maiuilty^bout the progress of America, she will know because of the work we
,h
PHOTOCOPY
PRESERVATION!
�5?'
closing years of this century to help build the future in which she will live,
'she can be, she will have the ^pdrtumty to be because of the choices we make and
we address today. So I ask you tonight to think about our responsibilities to help
are real^Je^o-— <£> <dJL
CXJUM^-^
' T o prepare ftn^fhe 21st Century, we must finish the unfinished business/tyvich we
here together must^accomplish: balancing our budget, finishing th^ftrfTofwelfare r e f o r n j ^ - c l
restoring our democracy.
\
To keep our economy growing, to strengthen it fo/^vigorous new world
we must finish the job of balancing the budget.
(
—
For years, the budget deficit shackled our progress and^^veakened-otn^economy./^fear by
year, we have cut the deficit so that it is now the smallest in the industrialized world. In two
days, I will formally propose a detailed plan to balance the budget by the year 2002. tMy p l a n ^
proves that we can protect our children from a future burdened by reckless debt, even as we give \
.^them the educational opportunities they need to make the most of their God-given promise. This ^ \
' budget finally moves us beyond the false choices that have held us back too long — it shows that j
we can balance our budget and still invest in our children.
——^
-
^^gntitlements discussion — options to be provided by NE^Cy—
We should not wait years for a constitutional amendment that could cripple our country in
time of crisis; we should not wait a year for an agreement. Let this be the Congress that finally
acted to balance the budget,, and let this happen now, not later, but now.
There is a second piece of unfinished business for us in this chamber: We must make the
permanent underclass a thing of the past, and finish the job of welfare reform.
.
/i
Last year,«fcsigB©d landmark welfare reform. -Wc said that everyone in this country who
can work must work. Now, we must take resppnsiDiAity, as lawmakers, as business leaders, as
civic leaders, to do everything we can to mdtagurcTKat opporutnity is made reaLaadtthat jobs are
available for those moving off^welfare.
'
J
y_
To do that, hefe-is-whal fte uiust^^We must spark private enterprise, so jobs with a
future move into our inner cities. We shoiml give tax credits to businesses that hire people off
welfare. We should give tax credits to job placement firms that help find a job for welfare
recipients. Every state in America should use the power it now has to tum a welfare check into a
private sector paycheck. If we do all this, we can lift one milion more people from the
dependence of welfare to the dignity of worl^
U&^-N '
When I signed this new law, I challenged every business in America to do what it can to
hire someone off welfare. In communities all across this country, businesses large and small are
rising to meet this challenge. And I am very pleased to announce tonight that [x] and [x] have
PHOTOCOPY
PRESERVATION
�obligation, to make sure that people who are being required to work have the opportunity to
work. We must make sure the jobs are there.
A third piece of unfinished business continues to stain our democracy. Tonight, before
the eyes of America, together we should commit to passing bipartisan campaign finance reform.
We have just come through an election in which more was raised and spent on races for
Congress and the Presidency than ever before. This system is badly broken. Every one involved
in it - every one of us here - must take responsibility for this system, and for ending it.
Senators McCain and Feingold, and Representatives Shays and Meehan — Republicans
and Democrats — have reached across the aisle to craft reform to reclaim our democracy. It curbs
spending, reduces the role of special interests, creates a level playing field between challengers
and incumbents, and bans the large soft money contributions that both parties receive.
You know and I know: delay will mean the death of reform. It has before, and we must
not let it happen again. We must work together to enact campaign finance reform, and we should
do it by the day we celebrate the birth of our democracy, by July 4.
If we balance the budget, finish the job of welfare reform, and enact campaign finance
reform, we will have cleared our once-obstructed path to prepare our country for the new century
ahead.
Then, the most important thing we can do - and my number one priority as
President for the next four years - is to work together to give every child in America the
best education in the world.
Tonight, we must set this goal: In the year 2000, every 8 year old will be able to read,
every 12 year old will be able to log on to the Internet, every 18 year old will be able to go to
college — and America will have the best schools in the world.
To achieve that goal, we have a plan to get there. This is my Plan for America's Schools,
and it is based on five key principles, [hold up booklet]
First, it is time to set the highest standards for education, and help our children to reach
them.
What do we mean ny4ugher standards?—Actually, it-s basic-^chiIdren must learn the
basics, the essential building blocks that will help them to thrive in the new century. We need a
common national standard of what students should achieve in basic skills like reading and math,
to help raise the level of excellene are children strive to achieve.
lh
th
4 graders must be able to read, and read well. 8 graders must be able to do algebra.
12 graders must master a rigorous high school curriculum before they graduate. Our schools
,h
�need to teach them what the best schools around the world are teaching other children. Parents
have a right to know how_welLtheir children are doing compared to other children in their
community an^iifoundthe worldT^L-^
< U ^WCvusUiJ
7
The way to make standards real is through tests. Tonight, I challenge every state to
require a national reading test in 4 grade and a national math test in 8 grade. Over the next 18
months, we will complete development of these tests and make them available around the
country. We will give them federal assistance to administer these tests, [details TK\ And my
plan calls on every state to enact school reforms to require 12 graders to pass a tough exam
before they graduate.
th
th
th
These tests will help us identify schools that need to be improved. They will help us
measure how well our children are doing in school, and find out who needs extra help. And they
will let us know when a child has not mastered the basics, and is not ready to move on to the next
level. It is time to end social promotion in America. Children shouldn't move from grade to
grade unless they're ready. And high school seniors should not get a diploma unless they can
pass a test to show they've earned it. We have to make diplomas mean something again.
If we want our children to read, we must do our part to make sure they can. Parents
should read 30 minutes a day to their children — and you can't start early enough.
We must all do our part. I want a citizen army of one million volunteers to tutor young
people who need help. My balanced budget invests $2.75 billion to help parents become better
first teachers, to train reading specialists to train volunteer tutors, and to expand Head Start. And
tonight, I am proud to announce that [20] college presidents have pledged half of their new work
study positions to this effort. If we work together, we can make it possible for every child in
America can point out their favorite book and say: " I read it myself."
The second part of this plan calls on every state to enact public school choice, so parents
can choose the school that's right for their children. Innovation and competition will make all
our schools better. We must do more to encourage teachers and parents to start public charter
schools that set and meet the highest standards. My balanced budget doubles the funding set
aside to help start these schools, so that by the Year 2000, there will be 3000 charter schools.
Third, my plan calls on states to reward good teachers, and find ways to quickly and fairly
remove those^i^ teachers who don't measure up. Our teachers are among the most dedicated
and talented public servants in America, [possible praise for teachers, in First Lady's box]
1
Fourth, we must harness the Information Age to make our schools worthy of the 2P
Century. The wondrous power of the Internet is that it brings the same incredible universe of
knowledge to an isolated rural schoolhouse, an inner city high school, or a magnet school in a
wealthy suburb. My balanced budget increases our Technology Literacy Fund by [$N], so we
can meet our goal to connect every classroom and library to the Internet by the year 2000. Last
year, Vice-President Gore and I joined with 20,000 volunteers to connect thousands of schools in
�California at the first Net Day. This year, I want every computer company, communications
company, and computer lover in America to join us in April for Net Year. Lend a modem, a
wire, or just a hand. Help us connect all our schools to the future.
To truly unleash the instructive power of computers, we must have trained teachers to
help children make the most of them. Tonight, I am announcing a private-sector partnership that,
over the summer of 1998, will train every sixth grade teacher in America to make the most of
classroom computers, [more detail to come]
Today, nearly half the schools do not even have the electrical wiring to run computers.
We cannot raise our children up in schools that are literally falling down. My budget includes $5
billion to spur $20 billion in school construction and modernization over the next four years.
Finally, we must press forward to make sure that character education is a part of every
curriculum. There is no reason our schools should teach everything else, and not how to be a
good citizen. And we should continue to promote order and discipline in our schools, by
supporting school uniforms and enforcing truancy laws. Where they have been tried, these
approaches have worked, and I want every community to consider trying them if they think they
will work.
High standards and tests to measure how well our children meet them. School choice and
charter schools. The best teachers. Computers in every classroom. Values and discipline in
every school. Those are the basic elements of my plan to make America's schools the best in the
world for the 21 Century.
st
We here can and should help to make this plan a reality. But the success of this effort is
not in our hands alone. This is the job of parents, teachers, businesspeople, clergy, governors and
state officials and school boards across America. We have to marshal these forces toward
achieving the goals of this plan. Otherwise, our educational system will not be strong enough to
give our children the education they need.
So tonight, I pledge to take this plan to the country, to state capitols and school boards, to
parents and to teachers — to enlist their support in what we must regard as a crusade for
tomorrow's children.
l
Beyond this, to prepare our people for the 2 r Century, we must literally expand the
frontiers of education: We must make the 13 and 14 years of education — at least two years of
college ~ as universal in America as high school is today.
th
th
And we should cut taxes to do it. We should pass America's HOPE Scholarship: a $1,500
tax credit for college tuition, enough to pay the tuition at a typical community college. We
should give every family a $10,000 deduction for all education after high school. And we should
let families save tax-free in an IRA to send their children to college.
�My balanced budget plan, with these tax cuts included, will mean that no working family
will ever pay a nickel of taxes on the money they save for college.
We should do more than ever before to provide college scholarships to deserving
students. My plan provides the largest increase in Pell Grants in 20 years.
With this budget, national support for college education will be more than double what it
was on the day I took office. Over the last four years, we made college more affordable for 10
million Americans. If we make the most of the opportunity of these times, [millions] more
people will be ready for the 21 century when it comes, because they will be getting a college
education.
st
We must recognize that learning begins in the cradle and must continue throughout a
lifetime. We should help parents teach their own children in the earliest years, when learning
takes root. My balanced budget expands Head Start by one million children by 2002. I am
pleased to announce that in the coming months we will work to understand how young children
learn, at a White House Conference on Early Learning and the Brain, and at the Vice President's
Family Conference in June.
All our people must have the chance to learn new skills throughout their lives. The G.I.
Bill for Workers will transform the confusing tangle of federal training programs into a single,
simple skill grant that will go directly to workers. We would put into the hands of every single
worker the power to compete in the new economy. For too long now, this bill has sat before this
body, without action. We have to face up to it: our worker training system does not work. And
we have to fix it.
sl
It is not enough to help individuals alone to be stronger for the 21 century. To
prepare America for the 21 Century, we must build stronger families and communities.
s1
Through our families and our communities, our children learn the values that keep us
strong. In the new century, with new pressures on people in the way they work and live, we must
do what we can to help parents raise strong families ~ and help our communities grow stronger.
The Family and Medical Leave Law has allowed [12] million people to take time off for
the birth of a child or to care for a sick family member. I am submitting legislation to expand
Family Leave so parents can take time off from work for parent teacher conferences or to take a
child for a routine checkup. And I have also [submitted legislation] to give workers flextime so
they can choose to use overtime as income or for time off to be with their families.
For our families to be strong, they must have access to affordable, quality health care.
We know that we have to move step by step to expand access to health care. Last year, we
passed bipartisan legislation to make sure no family is denied health insurance because one
family member has a preexisting condition, and to make sure people can take their health care
with them when they change jobs. Now, we must take the next step ~ in many ways, the most
�important step - to cover our children. My balanced budget plan will extend health coverage to
five million children - cutting in half the number of uninsured children in America. It will help
people between jobs pay their premiums for up to six months. No child should be without a
doctor just because a parent is without a job.
Last year, we took an important step to protect the health of women and children in
America. We ended "drive-through deliveries," requiring that new mothers and their babies get
at least 48 hours of hospital care. This year, we must end the dangerous and demeaning practice
of drive-through mastectomies, where women are sent home in pain and still groggy from
anesthesia. I call on you to pass the bipartisan legislation already before you to require at least 48
hours in the hospital for mastectomies.
To make our families and communities stronger, nothing is more important than
protecting our environment for the 21 century. My balanced budget provides the resources to
clean up over 500 toxic waste sites - 2/3 of all the toxic waste sites in America - by the Year
2000. Our young people should grow up next to parks, not poison.
st
Even as we clean up our communities, we must make sure that taxpayers never again pay
to clean up polluters' mess. I urge you to pass my proposal to make polluters live by this simple
rule: if you pollute our environment, you clean it up.
Some of the worst pollution is in the heart of our cities, making it even more difficult to
strengthen communities most in need of renewal. I urge you to pass the brownfields initiative in
my balanced budget, so we can clean up contaminated properties and restore them to productive
use. Our way is to bring the full force of the private sector to bear: to create jobs, spur
investment, and restore hope. In 105 communities across America, from South Texas to South
Central, our Empowerment Zones and Enterprise Communities are restoring economic growth
and opportunity by harnessing the power of the private sector through tax incentives and
increased flexibility. My balanced budget calls for a new round of Empowerment Zones, to bring
new jobs and new hope to another 100 communities.
And we must pledge tonight that all of us in this room will work together to meet the
challenges of this great capital city, so that it is once again the proud face that America shows the
world.
In the fight for strong communites, nothing is more important than the fight against crime
and violence. Over the last four years, we have made tremendous progress: the FBI reported last
month that serious crime has dropped five years in a row - the longest decline in more than 25
years. The key to our strategy has been community policing. We have brought citizens together
with the police officers, walking the beat, catching criminals, preventing crime before it happens.
Our strategy is working, and we must finish the job of putting 100,000 police officers on the
street.
But even as crime recedes across America, there remains one stubborn threat to our
7
�future we can never tolerate - juvenile crime. I will submit comprehensive legislation to
combat youth violence and drug abuse. My legislation declares war on criminal gangs: it
gives prosecutors new resources and tougher penalties to break them. It gives judges more
power to crack down on gang members who try to intimidate witnesses against them. It
extends the Brady Bill to cover violent crimes by young people, so a minor who commits a
violent crime will never be given the right to own a handgun. It requires trigger safety locks
on [all new handguns] to prevent unauthorized - or accidental- use. It gives communities the
resources they need to keep schools open late, on weekends, and in the summer, so young
people have someplace to go and something to say yes to.
Helping young people to find something to say yes to is exactly why President Bush,
General Colin Powell, and former Housing Secretary Henry Cisneros joined Vice President
Gore and me at the White House two weeks ago to announce the Presidents' Summit of
Service to be held in Philadelphia in June. We want to mobilize an unprecedented force of
volunteers, to work with young people, to mentor them, to inspire them to serve themselves.
[And tonight, I am proud to announce that I will establish a Presidential Medal of Service
to thousands of elementary school students each year who make and keep a commitment to serve
their communities during the year. For three decades, we have recognized young people who
meet high standards for personal health with the President's Award for Physical Fitness. I want
to recognize young people who make a contribution to the health and strength of their
community.]
As our young people take more responsibility for our communities, they should never
forget that their first responsibility is to themselves. That's why I want to talk to our young
people about drugs for a minute.
We must do more to stop the scourge of drugs. My balanced budget includes the largest
anti-drug effort ever: to stop drugs at their source, punish those who push drugs, and steer young
people away. And I am very pleased to announce tonight that General McCaffrey, who I
appointed one year ago to lead America's fight against drugs, will be launching a new public
service ad campaign [details].
But the war on drugs will be won or lost by our young people themselves. Let me say a
word directly to you, our children: As we work to build a strong future for you, you have to think
about what kind of future you want to have for yourself. If you let them, drugs will snatch your
future from you before you know what's happening. Nothing your parents do, nothing anyone
can do, will keep drugs out of your hands if you set out to find them. It is up to you. Drugs are
deadly. They will ruin your life. Don't let them. Look within yourself; you can find the strength
to say no. And I promise that we will keep doing everything in our power to give you the future
you deserve.
st
To prepare America for the 21 century, we must harness the remarkable power of
�modern technology to improve the lives of all Americans.
Ten years ago, the Internet was the mystical realm of physicists. Today there are nearly
half a million Web sites ~ and tonight, this speech is ths first State of the Union in history to be
carried live over the Internet. But we have only scratched the surface of the Internet's potential
to improve our lives. Now, we must build the second generation Internet. I want to launch a
partnership to connect 100 universities and national labs with an Internet up to 1,000 times as
fast as today's. My balanced budget includes $100 million to build this new Internet, which will
connect patients in rural hospitals to the best doctors in America and cutting edge medical
equipment. It will allow students to take virtual field trips to the bottom of the ocean or the North
Pole, and to work with other students around the world in real time.
In the last few years, breakthroughs in medical science have brought to new hope to
people suffering from diseases like spina bifida, AIDS, and cancer. America must continue its
commitment to the best medical research in the world, and my balanced budget includes a N%
increase in funding for our medical laboratories. [Tonight, I am announcing that I have asked the
Director of the National Institutes of Health to speed up the remarkable work of the Human
Genome Project, and complete it by 2005. This stunning research will provide a blueprint for
human life that will help doctors and scientists unlock the secrets of our deadliest diseases. We
don't have a moment to waste.]
We must use technology to enrich and improve people's daily lives. Tonight, I am
announcing the next recommendation of the Vice President's Commission on Air Safety: to
equip every plane with state of the art satellite technology that will make American navigation
systems the safest in the world. I am announcing that we have allocated a new portion of the
broadcast spectrum to law enforcement, so they can take advantage of the newest
communications technology to stay in touch and protect our citizens.
Working with the private sector, we should connect every children's hospital to the
Internet, so a child in bed can stay in school. And we should use technology to expand access to
the full richness of American heritage and culture working with business, we will digitize 10
million items in the Smithsonian collection, and put them on the Internet where people around
the world can study them and learn about them.
Even as we tap technology's vast potential to improve our lives, we also know that
sometimes it poses dangers, especially to our children. I strongly support the Communications
Decency Act passed last year to protect our children from obscenity on the Internet. It is being
challenged in court. I pledge that I will take the fight to protect our children all the way to the
Supreme Court.
[As we harness the power of the Information Age, we must also master the forces of
global change. To prepare America for the 21 Century, we must build stronger leadership
in the world, so that America remains the indispensable nation in the next century.
st
�Fifty years ago, President Truman and a remarkable generation of Americans made our
country the world's indispensable nation. After a war that had claimed so much of America's
toil and treasure, few could have blamed them for shifting their energies from the front lines to
the homefront. Instead, through NATO, the United Nations and the Marshall Plan, they created
the institutions and provided the resources that brought half a century of security and prosperity
to the West... brought our former adversaries back to life... and brought victory in the Cold War.
As we near the summit of the 20th century, we face another time of change and a moment
of choice. The ideals that define America and the interests we defend are shared by more people
than ever. We have taken down many of the blocs and barriers that divided the world for our
parents. But we still must create the new institutions and understandings that will define the
world for our children. If we stop now — if we choose complacency over commitment ~ we will
squander the promise of our time. But if we live up to the legacy of a generation that forged an
American century, then the next one hundred years can be an American century, too.
Our first task must be to build, for the first time in history, a Europe that is
undivided, democratic and at peace. When Europe is stable, America's security is
strengthened. When Europe prospers, so does America.
Fifty years ago, NATO helped prevent a return to terrible rivalries... strengthened
struggling democracies... and created the conditions for prosperity in Europe's west. Now, we
can do the same for Europe's east by opening NATO's doors to new democracies and building a
strong NATO - Russia partnership. Tonight, I say to Congress: let us work together so that by
1999 -- NATO's 50th anniversary - the first group of countries we invite to join are full fledged
members of the Alliance. [Russia sentence?]
Second, in a global economy with global security challenges, America must look to
the East no less than to the West — and build a true community of nations in the Asia
Pacific. Our security demands it: Americans have fought three wars in Asia in living memory.
Our prosperity requires it: one-third of our exports and more than 2 million American jobs
depend on trade with Asia. Four years ago, we began to forge a community across the Pacific by
tearing down trade barriers and building up our security alliances. Today, America's
partnerships in Asia are stronger than ever.
We must not let the progress achieved mask the peril that remains. We have frozen North
Korea's dangerous nuclear program. Now, it must be dismantled, as North Korea has agreed. I
call on Congress to fully fund America's contribution to this effort. And we need your support
for peace talks that bring together South Korea and North Korea ~ and bridge the final divide of
the Cold War's last frontier.
And let us pursue a deeper dialogue with China. An isolated, inward looking China is not
in America's interest. Instead, we must work together on common problems like the spread of
weapons of mass destruction — and deal with our fundamental differences like human rights. As
contacts across borders, among people and between governments grow... as markets expand and
10
�information flows... as China plays its rightful role in the world community... the roots of a more
open society can gain strength. I look forward to exchanging state visits with President Jiang not because we agree on everything, but because a strong U.S. - China relationship is important
to the world.
Third, as we strengthen our ties to Europe and Asia, we must continue to be an
unrelenting force for peace from Bosnia to the Aegean... from the Middle East to Northern
Ireland. Taking prudent risks for peace lessens the likelihood of more costly conflicts. It
encourages other nations to spend resources on their people, not their arsenals. It helps build a
community of nations willing to make common cause of shared problems.
In Bosnia, with American leadership, the killing has stopped, but the habits of peace are
slow to take hold. That is why I agreed that our troops should take part in a smaller follow-on
force. Their task is to prevent hostilities from resuming so that economic reconstruction and
political reconciliation can accelerate — and Bosnia's peace can become self-sustaining. By June
of next year, the follow-on force should be able to withdraw. Tonight, I ask Congress to continue
its strong support for our troops by giving them the tools they need to succeed. They are doing a
remarkable job for America ~ America must do right by them.
Fourth, preparing America for the 21st Century requires moving strongly against
new threats to our security: the spread of weapons of mass destruction... terrorism and
rogue states... international crime and drug trafficking.
Nowhere have we done more ~ but nowhere is there more yet to do - than in reducing
the threat of weapons of mass destruction. The American people should be proud that our
leadership produced a treaty to stop all nuclear testing for all time. We extended indefinitely an
164-nation agreement to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons. With Russia, we are cutting our
nuclear arsenals by two-thirds from their Cold War height... and our remaining missiles no longer
target each other's citizens.
But the American people will have no cause for pride if we fail the test of leadership that
lies ahead: ratifying the Chemical Weapons Convention. The Convention will make our troops
safer from chemical attack. It will help us fight terrorism and isolate rogue states. That is why
the Reagan Administration negotiated the Convention... the Bush Administration signed it... and
XX nations have approved it. If we fail to act before the treaty takes effect on April 29, our
chemical industry will pay the price of trade restrictions aimed at countries that refuse to sign.
Together, let us make the Chemical Weapons Convention law so that finally —finally— we can
begin to banish poison gas from this earth.
Fifth, the American people will only know true security if they are given the
opportunity to prosper in the new global economy. These past four years, we made it
America's mission to open markets abroad in order to create good new jobs at home. Give our
workers a fair deal and they will outcompete anybody.
11
�More than two hundred trade agreements later, our determination has been rewarded.
Once again, America is the world's number one exporter. Once again, we are the most
competitive nation on earth. Once again, we are bending the forces of change to our benefit.
Here in the Americas — the fastest growing region in the world for American exports —
we seek a Free Trade Area from Alaska to Argentina. When I travel to Latin America in May, I
will work to bring our hemisphere even closer together as a community of free market
democracies. By 2005, we will create one million new, high paying jobs through trade with our
neighbors - jobs that will help prepare America's working families for the 21st century and give
them a fair shot at the American Dream. That's a vision worthy of America's future.
Finally, preparing America for the 21st century cannot be done on the cheap. But
the price of neglect would be far greater. We must maintain our commitment to a strong and
ready military — and we will, by increasing funding for weapons modernization by 40 percent
over the next four years. The men and women of America's military have always preserved our
freedom in the past. If called upon, they must have the equipment and training they need to
prevail in the conflicts of the future.
We also must renew our commitment to America's diplomacy. Every dollar we devote to
international affairs brings a sure return in increased security and savings. Yet international
affairs spending totals just one percent of the federal budget ~ versus sixteen percent when Harry
Truman stood before Congress and asked the American people to choose engagement over
escapism. Think about it: one percent of our budget for fifty percent of our destiny. We have to
do better.
The United Nations can help us spread the risks and the costs of leadership. That's just
common sense. The UN vaccinates children against disease... protects refugees... teaches
farmers to grow crops... gives peace a chance to take hold. Its new Secretary General, Kofi
Annan, is committed to eliminating waste and streamlining staff. As the UN reforms, the United
States should pay our debts and our dues.
At the key turning points of the second half of this century, Republicans and Democrats
have disagreed on specific policies ~ sometimes heatedly. But we have always agreed on the
need for American leadership. That bipartisan support for America's unique role in the world
has been a key to our strength ~ it must remain so.
Before this month is out, I will ask the leadership of both houses and both parties to join
with me to discuss the broad foreign policy agenda I have laid out. We have an opportunity to
build new policies and practices that advance the cause of peace and prosperity. Let us make the
most of this moment, sobered by the knowledge that the actions we take together will shape the
decades to come — and the lives of every American.]
But nothing we do will matter unless we build a stronger American union for the
21st century.
12
�America's great gift to the world is the example we set for how we can all live together
with all our differences. We see people and countries all over the world, splitting apart because
of differences of race or religion or ethnicity. We see this division fueling the fanaticism of
terror. We have to show the world that only way for all of us to survive and prosper in the next
century is for all of us to leam to live together. America's great diversity puts us at a distinct
advantage in this new global era.
But, despite that, we see evidence, all around us that our work is not yet done. Last year,
we saw it in the awful resurgence of church burnings. We see it every day in the sullen faces of
hopelessness worn by too many of our youth. And, sadly, we sometimes see it in our corridors of
business and halls of government. Too many spend their precious time trying to drive wedges
between us ~ black against white, haves against have nots, old immigrants against new
immigrants.
But we also see signs of hope. There are two men of faith with us tonight, who I believe
represent the forces of reconciliation that we all have to draw on in our lives. One of them is
Rev. Terrence Mackey, pastor of Mt. Zion AME Church in Greelyville, South Carolina. His
church was one of those destroyed by arson last year. But Rev. Mackey refused to give in to
bitterness. He and the people of his community - people of different races and faiths - joined
together to rebuild that church. And I hope none of us forget the words he told his daughter
when she asked how could anyone set fire to their precious church home. He told her, "They
didn't burn down the church. They burned down the building in which we hold church. The
church is inside all of us."
The second man I want to call your attention to is Rev. Robert Schuler, so well known for
his "Hour of Power" television ministry. A few weeks before my second inauguration, Rev.
Schuler suggested that I look at some special words of scripture. I was so moved by the power of
the words he showed me that it was that passage from the bible that I placed my hand upon when
I was sworn in for a second term. Isaiah 58:12: "Thou shalt rise up the foundations of many
generations, and thou shall be called, the repairer of the breach, the restorer of paths to dwell in."
Rev. Mackey and Rev. Schuller are sitting with my wife Hillary. They show us what it means to
come together across all the lines that might divide us ~ the lines of party, the lines of faith, the
lines of race. I'd like them both to stand. Their giant spirits remind us that we all must be
repairers of the breach. We all must leam to live and learn and work together as one American
people.
At the end of the Constitutional Convention, one of the drafters stood up and asked this
question: "Can you imagine that this vast country, including the Western territory, will 150 years
hence remain one nation?" It may be hard to imagine, with all the forces of change swirling
about us at this moment in our history, that 150 years from today we will still be one nation. I
know this is hard work, but there is nothing more important we can do for our children than to
create the strongest, most united nation we can.
There are barely 1000 days between tonight and the year 2000. My fellow Americans, we
13
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' ^ ' s get on win ii.
Thank you, God bfe, „
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14
�Perhaps most important of all, we have to build a stronger American Union for the
21st century.
The world looks to us as the most diverse country in the world, to stand as the shining
example for how we can live together despite our differences. These forces of division are tearing
people apart all over the world ... and fueling the fanatacism of terror. We have to show that it's
possible for people to live together desipte those differences. It's a great advantage for us.
Despite that, sadly, we see evidence all the time of how difficult that is — on our streets
and, sometimes sadly still, even in the halls of business and government.
But we know that there are signs of hope.
There are two men of faith who are with us tonight, who I believe represent the forces of
reconciliation that we have to all draw on in our lives. One of them is Mackey. His church was
one of those destroyed this year. But he would not give in to the bitterness. And he and people
of different backgrounds joined together to rebuild that church. And I hope none of us forget the
words he told his daughter when she asked...
The second man I want to call your attention to is Schuler, so well known across this
country for SHOW. A few weeks before I was inaug, Sch suggested I look at a reference from
Scripture. And I thought it was so important, that it was that passage I placed my hand on when I
was sworn in for a second term.
Schuler, Mackey, are here tonight, sitting up there with Hillary. They show us what it
means to be come together across all the lines that might divide us - the lines of party, the lines
of faith, the lines of... I'd like them to stand. Their giant spirits stand astride the breach, and call
on us all to be its repairers.
At the end of the Constitutional Convention, one of the drafters stood up and asked this
question: Can you imagine...?
It may be hard to imagine, with all the forces of change, swirling around us, that we can
stay together and build the future we want for our children. This is hard work. But my fellow
Americans, there is nothing more important we can do, as we think about that child bom tonight
who will live in the 21 st century we must create, to create the strongest America we can.
There are barely 1,000 days between this night and the first day of the Year 2000. My
fellow Americans, we have work to do.
15
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Michael Waldman
Description
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<p>Michael Waldman was Assistant to the President and Director of Speechwriting from 1995-1999. His responsibilities were writing and editing nearly 2,000 speeches, which included four State of the Union speeches and two Inaugural Addresses. From 1993 -1995 he served as Special Assistant to the President for Policy Coordination.</p>
<p>The collection generally consists of copies of speeches and speech drafts, talking points, memoranda, background material, correspondence, reports, handwritten notes, articles, clippings, and presidential schedules. A large volume of this collection was for the State of the Union speeches. Many of the speech drafts are heavily annotated with additions or deletions. There are a lot of articles and clippings in this collection.</p>
<p>Due to the size of this collection it has been divided into two segments. Use links below for access to the individual segments:<br /><a href="http://clinton.presidentiallibraries.us/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=43&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=2006-0469-F+Segment+1">Segment One</a><br /><a href="http://clinton.presidentiallibraries.us/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=43&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=2006-0469-F+Segment+2">Segment Two</a></p>
Creator
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Michael Waldman
Office of Speechwriting
Date
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1993-1999
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2006-0469-F
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Segment One contains 1071 folders in 72 boxes.
Segment Two contains 868 folders in 66 boxes.
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Clinton Presidential Records: White House Staff and Office Files
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William J. Clinton Presidential Library & Museum
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Adobe Acrobat Document
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paper
Dublin Core
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Title
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State of the Union 1997 - The Original Drafts Volume I [Binder] [2]
Creator
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Office of Speechwriting
Michael Waldman
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Box 68
<a href="http://clinton.presidentiallibraries.us/items/show/36403"> Collection Finding Aid</a>
<a href="https://catalog.archives.gov/id/7763296">National Archives Catalog Description</a>
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
2006-0469-F Segment 1
Provenance
A statement of any changes in ownership and custody of the resource since its creation that are significant for its authenticity, integrity, and interpretation. The statement may include a description of any changes successive custodians made to the resource.
White House Staff and Office Files
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
William J. Clinton Presidential Library & Museum
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Adobe Acrobat Document
Medium
The material or physical carrier of the resource.
Preservation-Reproduction-Reference
Date Created
Date of creation of the resource.
6/3/2015
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
7763296
42-t-7763296-20060469F-Seg1-068-009-2015