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Opening Ceremonies ofAmerica's
Millennium Celebration
Washington, DC
12/31199
�THE WHITE HOUSE
Office, of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
December 3 1, 1999
REMARKS' BY THE PRESIDENT
ANDI THE FIRST LADY
.
AT OPENING CEREMONIES Of AMERICA'S MILLENNIUM CELEBRATION
12th and Constitution Avenue, N.W. ,
Washington, D. C.
11:51 AM. EST
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you v~ry much. Thank you, good morning, Happy New
Year. Thank you, Senator Daschle; to other members of the Congress who are here. Thank you,
Mayor Williams, for your kind comments to Hillary and to me, and for your outstanding
leadership in this city. Thank you, Robert Pinsky, for being here today, and for opening the ears
and eyes and hearts of so many young ch~ldren to the wonders of poetry. Thank yoti, Dean
Baxter.
.
I want to thank the Children's ChQir and the Military Band. They were wonderful today
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- (applause) -- and the Singing Sergeants who have left. (Applause.). I want to thank Ellen
Lovell and the members of our Millennial Council, and Terry McAuliffe and all those who made
it possible for us to have all these wonder;ful events today. (Applause.) I alsowant to thank the
Lord for this wonderful weather, so we al~ feel good be~ng out here. (Applause.)
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The New Millennium Choir sang "Rising Like The.Sun." Their vitality and their voices
are living proof that the light may be fadi~g on the 20th century, but the sun is still rising on
. America. Even though this is an opening' ceremony, what we celebrate did' not begin today and it
won't end tomorrow.
.
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Two years ago, Hillary and I creat,ed the White House Millennium Council to bring
Americans together, in her words, "to honor our past and imagine our future." Since then, she
has hosted Millennium Evenings at the White House with some of our nation's most gifted
scholars and artists. And people allover the world have participated'on the Internet. She has
criss-crossed America to save our historidal treasures, from Harriet Tubman's home to Thomas
Edison's factory, to Native American pueblos. This morning, we kick off not only a weekend of
celebrations, but a whole series of events throughout the coming year, that will further mark our
new millennium.
.
�This is more than a unique moment for our calendar. It is also a unique moment for our
country. Our economy is strong; our so~ial fabric is on the mend. We're moving forward on
America's remarkable journey of creating a more unified nation, a more just society, a more
perfect union.
.
There is no better moment to refIrct on our hopes and dreams, and the gifts we want to
leave our children; no better opportunity to open a new chapter of progress and possibility for all
people; no better time to join hands and build the one America of our dreams; no better time to
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be a truly good neighbor to the people of;the world who share this smaller and smaller planet of
ours.
So as we honor the past, let us truly imagine the future. I hope every single one of you,
sometime today, and everyone within the: sound of my voice, will take just a little time to dream
about what you want for yourgrandchildten and their grandchildren, and what you would like
the story of the 21st century to be.
Now it is my privilege to present the person who has done more than anyone else in
America to help us appreciate, and prope:tly celebrate, the dawn ,of the new millennium. Ladies
and gentlemen, the First Lady of the United States. (Applause.)
MRS. CLINTON: Good moming~.. Thank you all for being here this morning, on this
.
glorious day, to be part of the Millennial celebrations. I, too, wish to thank our Poet Laureate,
Robert Pinsky, and Reverend Baxter, for fheir beautiful, wise, and inspiring words. And it has
been a delight to hear the voices and musi,c of so many generations -- a World War II veteran,
our'current servicemen, and the New Mill~nnium Choir.
,
I look forward to hearing from Washington, D.C. native, Denise Graves, who always
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sounds magnificent. I thank Senator Das~hle for joining us here today and for his extraordinary
remarks. And I also thank the other congressional co-chairs of America's Millennium, Senate
Majority Leader Trent Lott, Speaker Dennis Hastert, and Minority Leader Dick Gephardt.
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My thanks also go to the Kovler Family F~undation and the Smithsonian Institution, ~d
Rashid Chaudry and Kamran Khan for ho$ting this opening ceremony. I also thank Terry
McAuliffe and the America's Millennium Leadership Committee, particularly InfoUSA.com,
SlimFast Foods Company and Cisco who have done so much to make these days possible.
(Applause.) .
I particularly thank Mayor Williart1s and the City of Washington for the extraordinary
effort they have put in to making this celebration one that is accessible and free to all of the
residents of the greater D.C. area. And I thank the members of the President's Cabinet who are
JOInIng us.
There are many distinguished gues~s in this vast audience, including some of our team
. leaders for our explorations in space, whicl,1 is one of the ways we imagine the. future. I know
that Donna Shirley is here, who led the team that landed the Rover on .Mars, and at least two
astronauts, Roger Crouch and Wendy Lawrence. They will all be speaking later today at the
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�National Air and Space Museum, to which you are invited. And I thank the various AmeriCorps
volunteer teams who are helping us this weekend. (Applause.)
So to everyone who, under the leadership of Ellen Lovell and the White House
Millennium Council, have made these days and this yvent possible, ~e appreciate all of your
efforts.
Now, just think for a minute of tHe items, the events and the ideas of this century that you
would put into a time capsule, that you tliink would really represent the United States and the
American century: A transistor? Louis Annstrong's trumpet? A piece of the Berlin Wall? Take
any of these items, and it alone could telfa story of the 20th century. It was, after all, the
. transistor that launched the Information Age, and enabled man to walk on the moon. It was
Satchmo's trumpet that heralded the rise Of jazz and of American music all over the word. And it
was a broken block of concrete covered itt graffiti from the Berlin Wall that announced the
.triumph of democracy over dictatorship..These are just some of the items that will be placed,
. along with scores of other objects representing the ideas and innovations that shaped the
American century, into our National Mim~nnium Time Capsule ..
Almost three years. ago, when the IWhite House Millennium Council began planning a
celebration for the National Mall, built around our theme, "to honor the past and imagine the
future," we decided that an important way to capture this moment in time would be by filling a
national time capsule -- filled not only withthe symbols and achievements of the century just
past, ,but with our hopes and dreams for tHe next. We invited the thinkers and builders and
creators of this century -- all the past recipients of our nation's highest honors in the arts and
humanities, in science and technology, in:citizenship and leadership, as well as builders and
creators of the future, the students who are taught by the state teachers of the year across .
America. We asked them all to help us fill this time capsule, and their responses have been
overwhelming.
Teachers and students nom~nated computers, while scientists nominated.the transistors
that made them possible. Bruce Peniman's English class in Amherst, Massachusetts, sent a
highlighted copy of Ralph Ellison's "The Invisible Man;" while novelist Philip Roth
recommended works by William Faulkner: and Saul Bellow. June Moore's second grade class in
Laramie, Wyoming, selected the sport ofqaseball; while playwright, August Wilson, suggested a
recording by Bessie Smith. When it came:to hopes for the future, the young people and adults
spoke as one: 'Yorld peace,. cures for cancer and AIDS, an end to hunger and racism.
,
I was also impressed by how children were determined to shape the frtture for
. themselves. "Helping others is at the veryitop of my lIst of careers," wrote a student from
Nevada. While another 7-year-old from Idaho wrote, "I wish that all children can have a loving
family. I wish someday I will help the world."
In a few minutes, we will invite soipe of these students and leading citizens to share their
nominations for the time capsule. Now, th~ prototype is sitting right there. It was created by
Pentagrams Design, In~., and the time capsule will be made ofthree metals: steel for the
Industrial Age, copper for the Information Age, and titanium for the age to come. As you can
�see, it is molded in the shape of a waving American Flag, symbolizing our optimistic countlY
that is always in motion, always movinglorward, always pushing back the frontiers of
technology and progress, of tolerance an~ justice.
,
, This prototype will go on display. in The National Museum of American History. And at
. the end of the year, after all of the items ~ave been received and selected, the actual time capsule
will be exhibited and sealed at the NatiOlial Archives, where it will remain until it is opened 100
years from today.
Throughout the weekend, the President and I invite you to visit the capsule and to enjoy
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the various programs at the Smithsonian,: from symposia on great Americans of the past and
present -- Thomas Jefferson, 'Elizabeth Cady Stanton and B.B. King -- to sessions pondering the
future of American taste and the future of American democracy. And we invite you to take your
children to the Story Circle at the National Museum of American History. And, of course, you
are all invited to come to the Lincoln Me~orial tonight to join us in a national celebration of
America's Millennium.
!
But by no means will the celebration end at the stroke of midnight tonight. Throughout
this millennial year, the White House Millennium Council will lead even more efforts to honor
the past and imagine the future. We will c:;ontinue to recruit more citizens to work together to
.save America's treasures, whether it's the :home of a great American, !such as Harriet Tubman, ·01'
letters from a soldier in wartime, or a fam1ly's scrapbook that may just be sitting in the attic
somewhere. We will continue to open ne~ millennium trails in our most scenic parks and
histori y sites. And through the Millenniutn Green program, wehope to inspire every single·
American to plant a tree for future generations to enjoy. And through the National Endowment
for the Humanities project "My History is America's History," we hope to help every child in
America value their own family history,ahdhonor our nation's immigrants, past and present.
This time capsule is one ofour gifts to the future, a gift that will convey to our great
grandchildren and their children what it w,as like and what we were thinking at the end of the
20th century. In many ways, what our descendants find inside this capsule can be viewed not
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merely as a relic of the past, but as this geheration's promise to the future.
There will be a photo of Rosa Par~ in the days after that fateful bus ride, to serve to
remind us not only of her courage, but of our solemn pledge to move forward in the long march
towarq justice, and to live even closer to bur ideals of freedom and equality. The model of the
DNA double helix will be placed in the dpsule, not just as a symbol of one of the greatest
scientific breakthroughs of all history, but:of our commitment to completing the Human Genome
project, cracking the code of life and putting it to work for the good of humanity. And the film
of Neil Armstrong's walk on the moon mU,st also be our pledge to keep America the world's
leading space-faring nation.
So all of us have a chance to work to give these gifts, and so many others, to the future -
the gift of our natural monuments and historic places preserved; the gift of safe schools and a
world-class education for our children; the, gift of quality affordable h~alth care for all
Americans; the gift of peace and justice on Earth. If we make this historic millennial ,,;,eekend,
�and the millennial year to come, a time for thanksgiving, each one of us will be able to do as the
President suggested -- not merely to thin~ of what we might want, or what we would wish for,
but what we can do to create the future ,-,;e all hope and dream for.
I hope that all of us, as we contemplate this passing of the calendar, will think of our own
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ways of giving gifts to the future, and im,agine the kind of world we could help to create.
Now I would like to invite our sp¢cial guests to step forward and to announce their
contributions to our National Millenniun:). Time Capsule. Thank you all very much. (Applause.)
END
12:07 P.M. EST
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Lissa Muscatine - Press Office
Creator
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First Lady's Office
Press Office
Lissa Muscatine
Date
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1993 - 1997
Is Part Of
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<a href="http://clinton.presidentiallibraries.us/items/show/36239" target="_blank">Collection Finding Aid</a>
<a href="http://catalog.archives.gov/id/7431941" target="_blank">National Archives Catalog Description</a>
Identifier
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2011-0415-S
Description
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<p>Lissa Muscatine first served in the Clinton Administration as a speechwriter. Within the First Lady’s Office, she served as Communications Director to the First Lady.</p>
<p>Lissa Muscatine’s records consist of materials from First Lady Hillary Clinton’s Press Office, highlighting topics such as health care, women’s rights, the Millennium Council, Hillary Clinton’s 2000 Senate campaign, and deal extensively with press interviews given by the First Lady; her domestic and foreign travel; and speeches and remarks, on a wide variety of topics, given by her before and during her time as First Lady. The records include interview transcripts, press releases, speeches and speech transcripts.</p>
Provenance
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Clinton Presidential Records: White House Staff and Office Files
Publisher
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Clinton Presidential Library & Museum
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Adobe Acrobat Document
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1,324 folders in 27 boxes
Text
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Original Format
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Paper
Dublin Core
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Title
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FLOTUS Statement and Speeches 10/16/99 - 4/28/00 [Binder]: [Opening Ceremonies of America's Millennium Celebration - Washington D.C. 12/31/1999]
Is Part Of
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Box 24
<a href="http://clintonlibrary.gov/assets/Documents/Finding-Aids/Systematic/2011-0415-S-Muscatine.pdf" target="_blank">Collection Finding Aid</a>
<a href="http://catalog.archives.gov/id/7431941" target="_blank">National Archives Catalog Description</a>
Creator
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First Lady's Office
Press Office
Lissa Muscatine
Identifier
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2011-0415-S
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.
Clinton Presidential Records: White House Staff and Office Files
Publisher
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Clinton Presidential Library & Museum
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Adobe Acrobat Document
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Reproduction-Reference
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11/26/2012
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2011-0415-S-flotus-statements-speeches-10-16-99-4-28-00-binder-opening-ceremonies-americas-millennium-celebration-washington-dc-12-31-1999
7431941