Remarks to the Democratic Leadership Council in Hyde Park, New York - Transcript

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, May 29, 2000

Third, he ran the RIGO program, which many of you were involved in, which in addition to reducing the size of Government, has dramatically improved the performance of many agencies, expanding health care for children and parents of working families, and the mental health parity issue, and the fatherhood initiative.

He cast the deciding vote on the economic plan and on the gun safety legislation in the Senate, and on every tough decision I had to make, from Haiti to Bosnia to Kosovo to loaning money to Mexico--now, there was a winner. The day I made that decision, there was a poll that said, by 81-15, the people didn't want me to do it. To taking on the gun issue and tobacco issue, to lobbying for NASA at the beginning and now all the calls he's made on China PNTR at the end, he's been there.

So I wanted to say that because we did this together. And that's the last thought I'll leave you with. Roosevelt loved ideas, had good ideas, but he had a first-class temperament, and he had a good time, and he enjoyed working with people. So you guys have got to keep working together. We've got to get behind all of our crowd; we've got to work to win elections. But afterward, remember, this document is a big deal.

Some day somebody will write a whole book on how this New Orleans Declaration was the foundation of the success of the last 8 years. That's what what you do at Hyde Park ought to be. And if you do it, you will change America forever for the better. And what happens in 2000 fundamentally is just as important as what happened in '92 and '96, because what a country does with its prosperity is just as stem a test of its character and vision and wisdom as what it does when its back is against the wall.

I've done everything I could to turn the ship of state around. Now you've got to make sure that it keeps sailing in the right direction.

Thank you, and God bless you.

NOTE: The President spoke at 3 p.m. at the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Presidential Library. In his remarks, he referred to former Ambassador William J. vanden Heuvel, president, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute; Al From, president, Democratic Leadership Council, and his wife, Ginger; Gov. George E. Pataki of New York; Mayor Anthony A. Williams of Washington, DC; Mayor Lee P. Brown of Houston, TX; Hong Kong Democratic Party Chair Martin Lee; Prime Minister Zhu Rongji of China; President Chen Shui-bian of Taiwan; Mayor Wellington E. Webb of Denver, GO; and Georgia Department of Labor Commissioner Michael L. Thurmond.