Remarks on receiving the Irish-American of the Year Award in New York City

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, March 18, 1996

I have a better understanding now than I did when I went to Ireland of the long struggle within the souls of the Irish people over the last few decades. When I came home, having had the opportunity to meet Seamus Heaney, as he said in his letter to the Ambassador, I was profoundly honored that he autographed a copy of the "The Cure at Troy" for my wife, not for me--[laughter]--wisely picking the more literate in our family. [Laughter]

But for me he hand-wrote out the lines from that magnificent work that I spoke in Derry. And so I framed them and put them in my personal office at the White House, "The moment where hope and history rhyme." And after I got back I asked a friend of mine who is a writer to get me a copy of Seamus Heaney's address upon receiving the Nobel Prize. And I read it. And if you have not read it, I commend it to you. It is an astonishing journey of the soul, a journey of personal courage, a fight against cynicism and giving up, a fight against the anger and anguish that comes from feeling impotent in the face of larger events.

I imagine it describes the same journey of the heart that our friend John Hume has taken in his own way over the last several years. I say that because the truth is, no one knows whether human nature craves dominance and division over peace and hope, but we all believe we know, and in the believing we can make a new reality.

We cannot let our children grow up in the world toward which we are moving, where events are unfolding at such a rapid pace and people are being thrown against each other with greater intensity than ever before, and huge decisions that involve the very survival of the ecostructure of the planet will have to be made. We cannot afford to let another generation of young people grow up believing that it's more important to define themselves in terms of who they are not, instead of what they are. And that, in the end, is the great struggle that every generation, that every nation, that every community, that every family, that every person must wage.

If we believe we are children of God, then what is important is what we are, not what we are not. And that is the gift that Irish-Americans must give to Ireland in our lifetime.

Thank you, and God bless you all.

Note: The President spoke at 6:58 p.m. in the ballroom at the Plaza Hotel. In his remarks, he referred to U.8. Ambassador to Ireland Jean Kennedy Smith; Niall O'Dowd, publisher, Irish America; John Hume, leader, Northern Ireland Social Democratic and Labor Party; former Prime Minister Albert Reynolds of Ireland; actors Anjelica Huston and Liam Neeson; Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams; Prime Minister John Bruton of Ireland; and Prime Minister John Major of Great Britain.