Remarks at the Northeastern University commencement ceremony in Boston, Massachusetts - President Bill Clinton - Transcript

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, June 28, 1993

Thank you very much. I must tell you, I have marched in many of these processions over the years. I don't think I ever marched in one that made me any happier than when we were coming down this line and all of you were giving me the "high five." And when we arrived here on the podium, I turned to Senator Kennedy, and I said, "Those are the people I ran for President to help. I'm glad to see them here today."

I want to say a special word of thanks to President Curry, to the faculty and staff for the honorary degree and the invitation to come. To Senator Kennedy and Senator Kerry, Congressman Frank and Congressman Meehan, to Mayor Flynn, and to my good friend Governor Dukakis, and all others who are here, but especially to the graduates and their families. I am so pleased to be here in the Boston Garden with you here today. I'm also glad to be here with someone who's spent a lot of time thinking about the graduates' future, the Secretary of Labor, Bob Reich, whose wife, Clare Dalton, is on the faculty here at Northeastern. Glad to be here.

I know it's warm, and I don't want to prolong the introductory remarks, or any of them, for that matter. But since President Curry mentioned Senator Kennedy's role in student financial aid, I can't help but note that in the last few months, of all the Members in the United States Congress, one stands out at having achieved a phenomenal amount of support from Republicans and Democrats for initiatives to make this country a better place. For out of Senator Kennedy's committee, with big votes from Republicans and Democrats, have come the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993, to give people the right to have a little time off when a baby is born or a parent is sick; a bill that will require the National Institute of Health to give far greater attention than ever before to issues affecting women's health and their children's; a bill that will enable us to immunize all the children of this country against serious childhood diseases; a bill that will set national academic standards for our public schools, to deal with what the former speaker said we needed to do before you get to college; and finally, the national service and student loan bills, which will open college education to all Americans by providing loans on more generous terms and allowing them to be repaid as a percentage of your earnings, no matter how much you borrow, so you'll never go broke repaying your loans, and allowing more young people to pay them back with service to their communities. All of that came through Senator Kennedy's committee.

I want to congratulate all of you who've survived this 5-year program, and also I want to congratulate you on surviving the Boston traffic jams. That's the second greatest example of gridlock in the United States. [Laughter]

I want to say, too, that I treasure a degree from an institution that really exalts public service, not only by elected officials but by private citizens as well. This year I received more than 200 invitations to address graduating classes. But Northeastern stood out to me because I believe you are a symbol of the American dream, built on education and work and community service, blending work and learning, having partnerships with the private sector in this wonderful community of yours to build people, which is, after all, the only real product America has ever been able to depend upon.

When I was working so hard to put together this provision of student aid to make college loans available to all on lower interest rates and better repayment terms and to let more people repay their loans through community service either before or during or after college, it was students like you that I had in mind: hard-working, good people from either middle class families that could otherwise not afford a college education or from poorer families who want to work their way into a better life. You symbolize the very thing that America has always been about and that we must today get back to if we're going to revitalize this great Nation. And I'm very proud to be here with you today.

I can also tell you that I was deeply impressed by Doug Luffborough, and if I could sing like him I wouldn't be up here today as President. I read an article about Doug and his mother and his family and his trials in working his way through college before I came here, In the article he said he planned to invite himself and his mother to the White House. [Laughter] Well, I'm going to beat him to the punch. I'd like for Doug and his mother to come to the White House.

If any man in America knows what having a good, hard-working, strong, loving, and disciplining mother can mean, I certainly do. I know it can make all the difference in the world, as it did for Doug and as it has for me. I think it would be appropriate just sort of as a symbol of all the parents who are here if Doug's mother, Mrs. Elsa Luffborough Mensah, would stand up. I think she's over there. Stand up! Give her a hand. See her up there in the white dress? [Applause]