Remarks at a Democratic National Committee Dinner - Transcript

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, Nov 6, 2000

November 1, 2000

Thank you very much. I will be quite brief because I want to just sit around and have a conversation. But I want to begin by thanking all of you, especially Andy, for taking on this role with the Democratic Party, and thank you, Terry, for tonight and for so much else. And I want to thank all of you who have helped us along the way, particularly those of you who have been part of our administration in some way or another. I'm very grateful to you.

I thought it was quite interesting, you made that reference to George Washington's speech to the Jewish community--I've read it several times--because it was actually quite a keen insight for a person to have in the 18th century; the tolerance implies that a superior group is abiding a group that's not equal. And I never thought much of that. I always tell people we ought to celebrate our diversity and affirm the primary importance of our common humanity, and that's the way I look at this.

I want to thank you, too, for the last 8 years. It's been an honor to serve. I'm thrilled that it worked out as well as it did. [Laughter] I believed 8 years ago, and I believe more strongly today, that we need a unifying politics and a unifying policy, which is different from soothing words; it has to do with the decisions we make. And, for example, I thought that you should be part of America's community. But I thought it in other ways, too.

I thought that we could have an economic policy that was pro-business and pro-labor. And, sure enough, this is the first time in three decades we not only have the longest economic expansion in history, but we've got incomes going up at all levels. Average incomes have increased by 15 percent since 1992, after inflation--real increase.

I thought it would be possible to grow the economy and improve the environment, and sure enough, it turned out to be true. We have cleaner air, cleaner water, safer drinking water, safer food, more land set aside than any administration since Theodore Roosevelt, and 3 times as many toxic waste dumps cleaned up in our 8 years as in the previous 12, under the other party.

So it seemed to me that you could be for--in education--more investment and for higher standards at the same time. And we've got test scores going up and the college-going rate at an all-time high.

I could go through this on and on and on, but I think the point I want to make is, we sometimes think that we have to divide things up, and what we really have to do is fuse them, unite them, and move forward together. And it's worked. Everyone knows the economy is stronger, but I think it's worth pointing out, also, we have-for the first time in a dozen years, the number of people without health insurance is going down, not up. The schools are clearly getting better, and the college-going rate is at an all-time high. The environment is cleaner. The crime rate is at a 26-year low. The welfare rolls are at a 32-year low. Teen pregnancy and teen drug abuse are down. The country is moving in the right direction.

And so I think the question we have to ask ourselves--or the three questions--that I hope that you'll help us in the next 6 days to ask and get answered properly are: Do you want to build on the prosperity or adopt policies that will not allow us to pay the debt down and continue to invest in our future, but instead will take us back to deficits; do you want to build on the social progress or adopt policies which plainly will undermine the direction in which we're going; and the third thing, and maybe the most important, is, how do we take all this effort toward one America a step further?

That's really what the hate crimes bill, the "Employment Non-Discrimination Act," and the equal pay for women legislation is about. Are we going to continue to try to build the bridges of unity and the bonds of common interdependent community as we go forward? And I think if people--the election really is about three things.

The court appointments are a part of that one America. And it's about far more than just preserving a woman's right to choose. It's also about whether the courts will or will not continue to restrict the ability of the National Government to protect civil rights and human rights and the basic public interest. Most Americans don't know that, just in the last year or so, a slim majority of the courts already invalidated a provision of the Violence Against Women Act, a provision of the Brady law, a provision of an anti-age-discrimination law. So there are big issues here.

But when you boil them all down, are we better off than we were 8 years ago, economically? And, if so, do you want to build on the economic policy or reverse it? Are we going in the right direction and coming together as a society? If so, do you want to build on the progress of the 8 years or take down the policies--the environmental, the crime, the education, the health care policies? And should we continue to try to become one America? That's what hate crimes and ENDA and the equal pay for women and all those initiatives and the court appointments are all about.