    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1993, Book II)]
    [October 23, 1993]
    [Page 1813]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    [[Page 1813]]

    Remarks on the 200th Anniversary of the Capitol and the Reinstallation
    of the Statue of Freedom
    October 23, 1993

        Thank you, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Vice President, distinguished leaders of
    the House and Senate, Mr. Justice Blackmun, my fellow Americans.
        We come here today to celebrate the 200th birthday of this great
    building, the cornerstone of our Republic. We come here to watch our
    Capitol made whole 130 years after the beautiful Statue of Freedom was
    first raised above this Capitol.
        This is a moment of unity in this great city of ours so often known
    for its conflicts. In this moment, we all agree, we know in our minds
    and feel in our hearts the words that Thomas Jefferson spoke in the
    first Inaugural Address ever given on these grounds. He said that people
    of little faith were doubtful about America's future, but he believed
    our Government was the world's best hope.
        What was that hope? The hope that still endures that in this country
    every man and woman without regard to race or region or station in life
    would have the freedom to live up to the fullest of his or her God-given
    potential; the hope that every citizen would get from Government not a
    guarantee but the promise of an opportunity to do one's best, to have an
    equal chance, for the most humble and the most well born, to do what God
    meant for them to be able to do.
        That hope was almost dashed in the great Civil War. When the Statue
    of Freedom was raised, many people questioned whether Abraham Lincoln
    should permit this work to go on. But he said, during the war when so
    many thought our country would come to an end, that if people see the
    Capitol going on, it is a sign we intend the Union to go on. In 1865,
    Abraham Lincoln gave the first Inaugural Address ever given under the
    Statue of Freedom. And he said, ``With malice toward none, with charity
    for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right,
    let us strive on to finish the work we are in.'' And in that, the
    greatest of all Presidential Inaugural Addresses, Abraham Lincoln gave
    us our charge for today, for the work of keeping the hope of America
    alive never finishes.
        It is not enough for use to be mere stewards of our inheritance. We
    must always be the architects of its renewal. The Capitol is here after
    200 years, this beautiful Statute of Freedom can be raised, renewed
    after 130 years, because our forebears never stopped thinking about
    tomorrow.
        We require the freedom to preserve what is best and the freedom to
    change, the freedom to explore, the freedom to build, the freedom to
    grow. My fellow Americans, I tell you that perhaps the biggest of our
    problems today is that too many of our people no longer believe the
    future can be better than the past. And too many others, most of them
    young, have no connection to the future whatsoever because their present
    is so chaotic. But the future, the future has a claim on all of us.
        We have, because of our birthright as Americans, a moral obligation
    to face the day's challenges and to make tomorrow better than today. All
    we really owe to this great country after 200 years is to make sure that
    200 years from now this building will still be here and our
    grandchildren many generations in the future will be here to celebrate
    it anew.
        Thank you, and God bless you all.

    Note: The President spoke at 12:33 p.m. at the West Front of the
    Capitol.