    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1993, Book I)]
    [July 24, 1993]
    [Pages 1174-1177]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Remarks to the American Legion Boys Nation
    July 24, 1993

        The President. Thank you very much, and please be seated. I told the
    Vice President what I was about to do, and he wanted to come out and say
    hello to you. But he has another meeting; he's trying to pass our
    economic plan, so he has to go. He just wanted to say hello. So I'm
    going to let him come up here and say a few words to you, so he can go
    back to work while I have a good time with you.
        The Vice President. Thanks very much. I know this is a very exciting
    day for all of you. And I want to wish you well. And if there is anyone
    here who has in the back of his mind any notion at all of going into
    public service or politics, I only have one word of advice. If you can
    manage somehow to get a picture of you shaking hands with President
    Clinton here today, it might come in handy later on. [Laughter]
        The President. Thank you very much, and welcome. I want to
    acknowledge the presence here of the national commander of the American
    Legion, Roger Munson; and the national chaplain, James Wagner; the
    executive director, John Sommer; and the director of activities, Jack
    Mercier, who was at Boys Nation 30 years ago when I was here--he started
    I think 31 years ago; George Blume, the legislative director; and a
    number of people here from my time of involvement, including one Member
    of Congress, a Republican from Minnesota, Congressman Jim Ramstad. Where
    are you? Stand up there. I think all of you know that we're also having
    a 30-year reunion here this weekend, those of us who were here with me.
    And the organizer of that was Judge Pete Johnson from Alabama. Pete,
    where are you? Stand up over there. Gary Sammons, the chair of the
    National Americanism Commission, is here, the policymaking body that
    oversees Boys Nation. He was a Michigan Boys Stater in 1963. And I'm
    just curious. Would all the people who are here from our reunion class
    of '63 please stand up. See, they look pretty good, don't they? None the
    worse for the wear. [Applause] Thank you.
        Let me say to all of them, we're going to have this ceremony, I'm
    going to take pictures with the young men who are here as delegates, and
    then afterward I hope all of you here for the reunion will hang around a
    little and we'll have a chance to visit, too.
        For those of you who are here, I say welcome, and those of you who
    were here 30 years ago, I say welcome back. All of us share a common
    bond. We owe a great deal of gratitude to the American Legion for the
    exceptional chance they have given us and so many others over the last
    many, many years to learn so much about the responsibilities as well as
    the rights we have as American citizens.
        Three decades to the day have passed since my group and I were here
    in the Rose Garden to meet President Kennedy. But I think that all of us
    probably remember exactly how we felt then. It was a very different time
    for America. There was virtually no cynicism. None of us had any doubt
    that our country could solve its problems, meet its challenges, bridge
    its gaps. Nor did we have any doubt that our President, our Congress,
    the people whom we elected, could faithfully and fully represent us in
    meeting the great challenges of that day.
        One of the most important moments at Boys Nation is the debate about
    resolutions. And 30 years ago when we were here, believe it or not, we
    always assumed that President Kennedy would be running for reelection,
    that Senator Goldwater would probably be his opponent, although there
    was a lot of turmoil within the Republican Party at that time about who
    the nominee would be, and that the great issue

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    would be civil rights. Our Boys Nation group passed a resolution against
    racial discrimination. Many of us had grown up in segregated societies.
    We understood the pain, the cost, the incredible waste in human
    potential that that had caused. And so we voted for it.
        I was very proud to be one of the southerners that voted for it, and
    I think that two others that I remember were my two colleagues from
    Louisiana. I think they're both here today, and they both voted for it.
    I remember clearly the discussions we had late at night in the dorms
    discussing it.
        The Nation's Governors had just met that week, and they broke up
    their resolution conference so they wouldn't have to deal with civil
    rights. So when we showed up here, President Kennedy said that we had
    shown more initiative than the Nation's Governors. Now, we loved it, but
    the Governors didn't like it very much. And it got him in a lot of hot
    water with them.
        Sixteen weeks later, President Kennedy was taken from us before he
    was able to fulfill his commitments in civil rights. But when President
    Johnson and the civil rights movement carried it through, it was the
    greatest domestic achievement of my lifetime, and it helped to make
    possible so many good things for so many people over the last 30 years,
    even though, to be sure, the work is nowhere near over.
        Most of you now attending Boys Nation were born in 1976, the
    bicentennial year of our independence. And you will live your entire
    lives in the third century of America's life. I think about that often
    because my daughter will soon be your age, and everything that we are
    working on that really matters is designed as much to help you and your
    tomorrows as to improve the lives of Americans today.
        We have a covenant with you which requires us to make some very
    tough choices. We have some of the same problems we had in 1963 but some
    very different ones as well. From the time we became a nation until
    1980, we had amassed over that entire life of this country a national
    debt of only $1 trillion. As a percentage of our income, it seemed to be
    quite manageable, and we were still free to invest in those things we
    ought to invest in. In the last 12 years, partly because of misguided
    policies, partly because of gridlock, partly because of people trying to
    outbid one another, we have gone from $1 to $4 trillion in national
    debt. The estimated annual deficit when I took office was well over $300
    billion, although we've gotten it down some this year. And clearly, we
    have unmet needs that we don't have the money to invest in.
        As compared with many other nations, just for example, we spend too
    little money on new technologies for the 21st century which will shape
    the jobs that you and your colleagues will have. We spend too little
    money on the continued education and training of our work force. We have
    all kinds of other challenges occasioned by the builddown of the
    reduction in defense spending. We owe it to the people who worked hard
    to help us win the cold war not to leave them out in the cold, and yet
    we don't have all the funds we need to spend on that. And yet, we have
    this enormous debt. It is a terrible dilemma for this country.
        We have whole sections of America where unemployment is too high and
    poverty is too high and the major source of income is drugs and the
    major organizations that works in society are gangs. We have to change
    all that. But we have to also free ourselves economically of the
    paralysis that this enormous annual deficit and the accumulated debt
    impose. And so we are trying to do that here for you as well as for your
    parents and your grandparents.
        In your lifetime, communism, the great threat of my childhood, has
    been defeated. I can still remember going to high school assemblies and
    junior high school assemblies and sitting there being given instructions
    about how to find the nearest bomb shelter and what we would do if a
    nuclear war occurred. I can still remember hearing people speak about
    what communism was like in the Soviet Union and how there would be a
    lifelong struggle between the forces of freedom and the forces of
    communism. Well, in 1989 when the Berlin Wall fell, it was a stunning
    reaffirmation of America's commitment to freedom and democracy and to
    free market economics and the right of individuals to seek their own way
    as long as they didn't hurt their communities. That is an incredible
    achievement. In all probability, you will be able to raise your children
    without any threat of the annihilation of this society or this globe on
    which we live.
        On the other hand, as we have learned from every source of wisdom
    beginning with the Scriptures, there will never be an end to problems,
    never be an end to challenges. It is part of human nature that as new
    opportunities develop, new problems do, too. We have to do

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    something about our debt here. We have to invest. We have to compete. We
    have to create opportunities for your future. We also have to recognize
    that the world remains a dangerous place, and there are people running
    governments who desperately want to develop weapons of mass destruction
    and have very little concern what is done in retaliation to their own
    citizens. That is a deeply troubling thing. We still face the threat of
    terrorism from people who honestly believe that the best way to achieve
    their political objectives is to kill, even if they kill innocent
    people. And we still have the terrible, terrible burden of knowing that
    in spite of all the progress we have made, there are millions of
    Americans who do not have the chance to grow up to live to their God-
    given potential. And until that happens, we will never be as secure, as
    strong, as full as we need to be.
        We are trying, among other things in this administration, to make
    people believe again that their collective efforts can make a
    difference. Until the American people can overcome their cynicism and
    believe that if they act, it can matter, it is going to be very
    difficult for us to solve the problems of this country. I believe that
    every Member of Congress, without regard to party, would admit that the
    National Government has a responsibility to set up a framework within
    which opportunity can be seized, but that many of our problems have to
    be dealt with person to person, family to family, school to school, job
    to job, community to community, at the grassroots level. We have to
    create a climate in which people are challenged to take responsibility
    for themselves, their families, and their communities; given as many
    opportunities to do so as possible. But the nature of the problems we
    have today require the concerted action of millions of Americans.
        The good news about that is that all of you can make a difference.
    That's why I have worked so hard since becoming President to create this
    program of national service, which would open the doors of college
    education on better terms to millions of Americans and then give
    hundreds of thousands of them--hundreds of thousands of people like you,
    I hope--the opportunity to pay all or a portion of their college loans
    back with work for their country, in their communities or in other
    communities here at home, rebuilding America from the grassroots up and
    doing it either before, during, or after college. This national service
    program can make a fundamental difference to the way we view ourselves
    and our country. It can make more and more people have the same kind of
    enthusiasm I saw on your face when the Vice President and I walked in
    here today. We know you're connected to America. We need to connect
    everyone else to America, as well.
        Right now there's a little bit of political maneuvering going on in
    the Congress about national service. It's sad to me because we have good
    Republican and Democratic support for this bill. And I earnestly hope
    that this whole idea will be saved from becoming a political football.
    It is too important to America. It has nothing to do with partisan
    politics and everything to do with giving people a chance to serve their
    country and, in so doing, to help to build a belief in their country
    again.
        People my age remember President Kennedy starting the Peace Corps.
    Our fathers and mothers remember when President Roosevelt launched the
    Civilian Conservation Corps during the Great Depression and gave people
    a chance to build their way out of that depression. In my State I could
    take you to community after community after community where there are
    still CCC projects that older people today point to with pride, their
    hearts swelling, because they, with their own hands, at a time when 25
    percent of the American people were unemployed, were given a chance to
    rebuild their country. We just had a big reunion out in California of
    the Peace Corps volunteers, and I have named a former Peace Corps
    volunteer to be the first ex-Peace Corps person to run the Peace Corps.
    They are swelling with pride to this day for what they did 25 and 30
    years ago. And so it will be with national service if we can do it.
        I want to say one last thing to all of you. Thomas Jefferson, whose
    memorial is right back over there and was built 50 years ago this year,
    was fond of saying that the Earth belongs to the living in trust; that
    all of us have to balance our lives between doing what is good for us
    today and what is good for our country, our families, our friends, and
    our children and grandchildren tomorrow. That means that for all the
    opportunities you will have, and you young men will have more than most
    Americans, you have an immense responsibility to give something back to
    your country. One day you will understand that even more clearly than
    you

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    do today, although I wish that Americans twice your age understood it as
    well as you clearly do at this moment.
        Regardless of what you do, remember this: It is not enough in life
    to have feelings. It is not enough in life to have convictions. You must
    act on them. You must act on them. You must move. You must do. You must
    make things happen. That is surely the ultimate lesson of Boys State and
    Boys Nation. We were given a system by the Founding Fathers which
    permitted people in every generation of Americans to the end of time to
    join together and to act, to deal with the challenges, seize the
    opportunities, and beat back the problems of the day. That is the legacy
    that you have been given. And that is the responsibility that you must
    assume.
        I can tell you that, to me, it seems only yesterday that I was your
    age, standing here. It doesn't take long to live a life. But it can be
    very rewarding if you have convictions, if you believe in your feelings,
    and if you act.
        I wish you well, and God bless you. [Applause] Thank you. Thank you.
    Thank you very much.
        I'd like now to ask Roger Munson to come forward, and ask the rest
    of you to sit down. It won't be much longer. I know it's hot out here.
    When Girls Nation was here a couple of days ago, it wasn't so warm. But
    it's still a nice day.

    [At this point, Arkansas delegates Traftin Thompson and James Welch
    presented the President with a 1963 photograph of himself with President
    Kennedy.]

        Thank you very much. I think now we're going to take the pictures
    over here. Is that right? No, we're going to do--we've done that. Oh,
    they're coming to speak? One of the things that happens to you when you
    become President is you sometimes don't get good instructions.
    [Laughter] Then you just have to fall on the sword.
        Who am I supposed to introduce? Pete, are you coming up here? And
    Jeff Keyes, is he here? Come on.
        Let me say, I saw Pete again during the course of the Presidential
    campaign. And until that happened, I had one Boys Nation person who went
    to Georgetown with me who was in my class; the two guys from Louisiana,
    one who went to Georgetown with me, one who went to law school with me,
    those two guys I had stayed in close touch with; and one other person
    who was a delegate from Virginia who I stayed in touch with over the
    years. Now, when I ran for President, I met so many of them again.
        And I wanted to make one other point. It wasn't in my notes, but I'd
    be remiss if I didn't. It is a very great thing to be given the chance
    to serve this country as President. But it is a very great mistake to
    think that that is the thing that counts the most in America. The thing
    that counts the most in America is the contributions that are made by
    all Americans who work hard, play by the rules, raise their children
    well, make their communities stronger. And I was so terribly impressed
    by learning about the life stories of the other people with whom I was
    here, the struggles that they'd had, the tragedies they'd faced, the
    triumphs that they had created. And I want you to remember that, too.
    Each of you has to serve, and each of you can serve, and each of you can
    make a difference. And the collective efforts we make are far more
    important than the individual achievements of any person.

    Note: The President spoke at 11:11 a.m. in the Rose Garden at the White
    House. Following his remarks, 1963 Boys Nation delegate Jeff Keyes
    presented him with a plaque and a second photograph with President
    Kennedy.