[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 8 (Thursday, February 3, 1994)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: February 3, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
   THE INAUGURAL SPEECH OF CHRISTINE TODD WHITMAN, THE WAR MEMORIAL, 
                              TRENTON, NJ

                                 ______


                            HON. JIM SAXTON

                             of new jersey

                    in the house of representatives

                       Thursday, February 3, 1994

  Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I insert the following speech for the 
Record:

       Mr. Chief Justice, Governor Florio, Mr. President, Mr. 
     Speaker, Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen:
       It is with an eagerness to tackle the challenges ahead that 
     I take office as New Jersey's 50th chief executive--and its 
     first woman governor.
       On behalf of the people of New Jersey, I would like to 
     thank Governor Florio for his years of public service. We 
     agreed on some issues, disagreed on others, but no one ever 
     doubted that you cared deeply.
       Some say it is a proud moment to be sworn into such a high 
     office as governor. For me, however, this is also a humbling 
     moment.
       No one reaches this position alone. Certainly I didn't, and 
     I want to thank all of you who made it possible.
       I especially want to thank my husband John and my two 
     children, Kate and Taylor, for standing by me during a long 
     tough campaign.
       Today's inauguration marks not a victory of partisanship, 
     but a test of our democracy, of our ability to govern 
     ourselves.
       As a people, we face a crisis of confidence.
       Many have lost faith in the ability of government to 
     deliver services efficiently, to lend a helping hand when it 
     is needed and to get out of the way when it is not.
       We worry about the ability of our economy to generate jobs 
     and restore prosperity.
       We question the ability of our schools to deliver the 
     quality education our children deserve at a price their 
     parents can afford.
       And we question the ability of our criminal justice system 
     to prevent crime, and to deliver justice and safety.
        Americans have lost faith in the institutions that are the 
     foundations of our democracy. They question those they have 
     elected to serve them.
       Wherever I go, whether I'm in a shopping mall, attending a 
     Devils or Nets game, or taking questions on a call-in show, I 
     hear the same implicit question:
       ``After the oaths, after the speeches, after all the 
     parties and festivities, will you remember your promises and 
     will you keep them?
       As the first statement of my governorship, to every voter 
     in New Jersey, let me answer that question: ``I have just 
     taken the oath of this office you have entrusted to me. To 
     me, this oath means one thing: I will not hedge, I will not 
     backtrack, I will keep my promises to you, my friends, to the 
     best of my ability, so help me God.''
       But I can't do it alone.
       I need your help, your wisdom and your support.
       If government is to be ``for the people,'' it must be 
     ``of'' and ``by the people.''
       For democracy to work, as Abraham Lincoln said in his first 
     inaugural speech, we in government must have ``a patient 
     confidence in the ultimate justice of the people.''
       Government must trust and listen to the people, or it is 
     not a democracy.
       That is why I have spent the last four years listening to 
     you.
       And it is why I will keep listening for as long as I am 
     your governor.
       I believe in the people of this state. I believe in open 
     government. I believe that the best decisions are based on 
     consensus. And, like you, I believe deeply in the need for 
     fundamental change.
       To those who question whether I am serious about bucking 
     the special interests who hold so much quiet power in the 
     city, let me be clear: I did not run for governor to conduct 
     ``business as usual.''
       I'm not one of the boys. It is going to be different around 
     here.
       The only way government can win back your trust is to earn 
     it.
       Our principal problems are not the product of great global 
     economic shifts or other vast, unseen forces. They are the 
     creation of government.
       Of government that puts special interests ahead of the 
     people's interests.
       Of government that refuses to change.
       You know it. I know it. And this time, together, we're 
     going to fix it.
       New Jersey should lead the nation.
       In a world driven by ideas and technology, we boast some of 
     the world's leading telecommunications, pharmaceutical, 
     chemical and other high-tech firms.
       We have first-class universities, great ports, and a prime 
     location between American's financial and political seats of 
     power. We have great natural resources, from the Highlands to 
     the Shore.
       New Jersey should be the engine of economic growth that 
     leads this nation into the 21st Century. It should be a 
     powerful engine of prosperity that gives our children the 
     same opportunity that our parents worked so hard to give us--
     the chance for a better life.
       Together, we will unshackle that economic engine from the 
     restraining chains of high taxes.
       Four months ago, I said I would put 1.4 billion of your tax 
     dollars back into your pocket by cutting taxes over the next 
     three years, with the first cut coming in July.
       The skeptics groaned * * *
       But here we are.
       And I say, why wait until the next fiscal year starts in 
     July?
       Between now and then, families have car payments and credit 
     card bills that will come due. Senior citizens on fixed 
     incomes will be struggling to make ends meet.
       And businesses have payrolls to make. Their plans to create 
     new jobs are sitting on shelves, waiting for a stronger 
     economy.
       Let's not keep economic growth waiting another minute.
       If President Clinton and his Congress can reach backward 
     into time and raise your taxes retroactively, your governor 
     and your Legislature can cut them retroactively.
       That is why I am asking my partners in the Legislature, 
     Senate President Donald DiFrancesco and Assembly Speaker 
     Chuck Haytaian, to enact a 5 percent income tax cut for every 
     family in New Jersey effective January 1, 1994--17 days ago.
       Second, I am asking the Legislature to eliminate all income 
     taxes on those earning less than $7,500, again retroactively 
     to January 1 this year. Those who are struggling the hardest 
     need a tax cut the most.
       Third, I am asking the Legislature to cut the corporate 
     business tax to 9 percent, again effective January 1 this 
     year.
       We will be competitive. No more losing our employers to job 
     raids by low-tax states!
       New Jersey is open for business.
       Crafting a budget that covers not only the cost of these 
     tax cuts, but also makes up for more than $1 billion in 
     previous ``one shot'' revenues will not be easy.
       We must do so without gutting the state services on which 
     so many of us depend. And we must do so without driving up 
     property taxes.
       The ``shell game'' of raising one tax to cut another is 
     over.
       My budget task force and the 350 citizens who served on my 
     transition teams have been poring over every department's 
     budget. My cabinet officials take office with a mandate to 
     find ways to provide the same or better service for less. 
     Hundreds of citizens have been writing in with their ideas on 
     how we can save 5 cents on every tax dollar we spend.
       Let me tell you: Once we all put our minds to it, it's 
     amazing all the ways we can find to save money.
       Take just three areas: A vast amount of uncollected ``bad 
     driver'' surcharges are owed to the state, yet no attempt has 
     been made to collect them. We're owed unclaimed federal 
     Medicaid funds for health care services provided to poor 
     children by their schools.
       And even an inmate from Rahway state prison wrote in to the 
     ``Our Tax Dollars'' program to point out that more than $160 
     million in fines owned by criminals have never been 
     collected.
       Together, these three areas alone offer the potential for 
     closing the budget gap by several hundred million dollars.
       What's more, almost $200 million has been left unspent in 
     each of the last two budgets because programs were 
     overfunded. I am directing my cabinet to try to save at least 
     that much from current-year accounts.
       Budget cuts are just part of the equation.
       To cut taxes in each of the next three fiscal years will 
     require sustained economic growth.
       Economic growth doesn't just happen. We have to plan for 
     it, encourage it, and court it.
       That's why I have directed my secretary of state to serve 
     as an advocate for business. And it's why the first executive 
     order of my administration--which I am signing in front of 
     you today--creates a New Jersey Economic Master Plan 
     Commission to develop the long term strategy we need to make 
     New Jersey the economic powerhouse it deserves to be.
       (Peter Verniero brings the executive order to the podium. 
     The governor signs it.)
       Done!
       (Governor hands executive order to Verniero, who returns to 
     his seat.)
       Make no mistake about it: We are in a battle for jobs with 
     Pennsylvania, the Carolinas, and the Sunbelt every day. One 
     of the main reasons we've been losing that battle is state 
     government.
       We must cut through the needless overregulation that drives 
     businesses out of New Jersey and discourages new firms from 
     locating here. We can protect the environment without taking 
     years to process a permit.
       Our businesses deserve better and you deserve better.
       It isn't just a question of money being wasted. It's a 
     question of duplication, inept planning, and inadequate 
     service.
       We have 68 Department of Labor field offices, yet in some 
     counties we require unemployed workers to sign up for 
     unemployment benefits in one office, then drive 10 miles to 
     another office to find out what jobs are available.
       Look at how the state regulates cemeteries: If you are 
     buried with members of your own religion, your corpse is 
     regulated by the Attorney General's office. But if you are 
     buried in a non-sectarian cemetery, the Department of Banking 
     has jurisdiction over your remains. That's right * * * 
     Banking. Do we really need two different state agencies to 
     regulate the dead?
       From cradle to grave, our state government needs reform.
       We must reinvent government the way American corporations 
     have been reinventing themselves to survive in the 1990's.
       You elected me as the chief executive officer of a $15 
     billion service corporation with 60,000 employees. And that's 
     what we're going to provide: Service, Efficient, cost-
     effective service.
       After all, we work for you.
       And of all the tasks we are entrusted to perform as your 
     state government, nothing is more sacred than our 
     responsibility to educate your children.
       The school system we have today was developed in the 19th 
     Century to prepare children of farmers and new immigrants for 
     an Industrial Revolution that wanted bodies to do repetitive 
     factory work.
       The world has changed and our education system must change 
     with it.
       Employers today require a highly educated work force that 
     knows how to think and how to be creative. The state that can 
     provide the best-educated workers is the state that will be 
     the economic powerhouse of the 21st Century.
       The states that fail will fall behind.
       We must make New Jersey number one.
       We--parents, teachers, students, administrators, government 
     leaders and business executives--must work together to 
     reinvent education.
       We must make it our top priority to teach our children--all 
     our children--to read in kindergarten, first grade and second 
     grade when they are enthusiastic about learning. That way, we 
     will not have to spend tens of millions of dollars in junior 
     high school, high school and college trying to rectify the 
     failures of the past.
       We are going to inject competition and encourage innovation 
     in our schools by developing alternatives like magnet schools 
     and charter schools within our public school systems to give 
     parents a choice of where to send their children.
       Schools should compete for the chance to teach our 
     children. They are our greatest treasurers.
       If we are going to teach democracy in our schools, we 
     should practice democracy in our school system.
       In Jersey City, five long years of state control have not 
     fixed schools that continue to do far too little. We should 
     give Mayor Bret Schundler the green light to test school 
     vouchers and invite the top school experts in the nation to 
     measure the results.
       We will get politics out of the Department of Education by 
     giving the education commissioner an independent five-year 
     term.
       We will push authority down to the local level, because I 
     trust parents who love their children to get involved in 
     school boards and PTA's. The state can give you better 
     schools, but you must be responsible for raising your 
     children.
       We will develop a strong core curriculum that teaches every 
     student the basics of reading, writing, arithmetic, and a 
     respect for our nation's heritage.
       We will make our schools safe, and we will demand 
     discipline in our classrooms. The last thing children should 
     learn about in school is violence and fear.
       Personal safety is a sacred right in America. Our children, 
     our parents, all of us, deserve to live in peace.
       Yet far too many of us are imprisoned by fear of crime.
       Some say we should turn our heads, give up, and just accept 
     a violent crime-ridden society.
       Some say crime is too tough a problem to solve. My answer 
     to them? We're tougher.
       We know that a small percentage of hardened criminals 
     commit most of the violent crime. It's time to make every 
     criminal know that he or she will serve 70 percent of the 
     court's sentence. And for three-time violent offenders--those 
     who make a career out of crime--it should be ``three strikes 
     and you're in'' * *  for life.
       We also need to set up boot camps and other alternatives to 
     teach young people who are toying with the criminal life that 
     they want to go straight instead. Everybody deserves a second 
     chance. But not a third.
       Criminals are not the victims of society. Society is the 
     victim of criminals. The way to make our streets safe again 
     is to make sure criminals know they will pay dearly--and 
     perhaps permanently--for their crimes. We will.
       Our blueprint to make New Jersey first is an agenda of 
     economic growth, good schools and safe streets. An agenda of 
     hope, optimism and determination. Of government that is ``for 
     the people'' because it is ``of'' and ``by the people.''
       The hope, the vision, the strength of our people is our 
     guarantee of success.
       And what remarkable people make up this state! In the 
     factories of Paterson and the research laboratories of 
     Princeton, in the ethnic neighborhoods of Perth Amboy and 
     senior citizen villages of Lakewood, in the towns of the 
     Shore and the Pinelands, and in cities like Camden and 
     Newark--all across our state, I have come to know so many of 
     New Jersey's people.
       We are one Family. One community. One state.
       There is a phrase in Spanish that means all that: ``Somos 
     un solo pueblo.''
       When one of us is out of work, homeless, cannot read, or is 
     a victim of violent crime, we all suffer. And when we help 
     one another succeed, we all succeed.
       I remember a young writer who, I think, must have learned 
     about America as a student in New Jersey. Over six decades 
     ago, he wrote of ``a sense of overwhelming gratitude and 
     gladness that America was there .  .  . that in the heart of 
     the . . . people the old generosities and devotions fought on 
     . . . indomitable and undefeated.''
       ``The best of America,'' F. Scott Fitzgerald concluded, is 
     ``the best of the world.'' And I can tell you that the best 
     of New Jersey is the best of America.
       In the people, we will place our faith. On trust in the 
     people, we will build our agenda of opportunity and growth.
       This is our state.
       This is our time.
       Last week, I met the children from Mrs. Reilly's second 
     grade class at the Gables School in Neptune. Each child 
     brought along a letter.
       ``We should all learn to share and be nice to each other,'' 
     Claudia Grier wrote. ``I know that you have a demanding job 
     ahead of you and I will be there to help you.'' Claudia's 
     here today, and Claudia, thank you for offering to help.
       It will take everyone's help to meet the challenge ahead.
       It won't always be easy and we won't always agree. But we 
     must not fear change.
       In 1776, this state was at the forefront of a revolution. 
     We are there again today. Let's show the world what New 
     Jersey can do.
       Together, we will make New Jersey first.

                          ____________________