    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1995, Book I)]
    [March 13, 1995]
    [Pages 334-343]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Remarks to the National League of Cities
    March 13, 1995

        Thank you very much, Carolyn, for that warm introduction. And thank
    you, ladies and gentlemen, for the wonderful welcome you have given me.
    I'm glad to be here on this podium with all your officers, including
    Mayor Lashutka of Columbus. Did I pronounce that right? Close? Lashutka.
        I just had the Nebraska football team over at the White House, and
    so I had a lot of practice pronouncing names this morning. [Laughter]
    The Nebraska football team are so big, that's the only group of people
    in America I could stand with and look like the resident ballet dancer.
    [Laughter]
        Mayor James, it's good to see you here, and all the other mayors who
    are here and all of the other representatives of the cities and towns of
    our country.
        I like to come here and meet with you because you deal with people
    at the level where you can have the greater contact with them. When I
    was Governor, nothing was more important to me than actually being able
    to spend a lot of time with the citizens at the grassroots community
    level who were interested in solving the problems of people. And I've
    always said that one of the things I like most about the job I used to
    have and one of the things I

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    like least about the job I have now is that the closer you get to the
    people, the less political the work is, and the closer you get to
    Washington, the more political it becomes.
        The most frustrating thing about being President is that I don't get
    enough time to speak with ordinary Americans in terms that they can
    understand about what we're trying to do up here. Although I must say,
    when I was driving up here today, I thought, these local officials may
    be out of touch, too. This is the most beautiful day we've had in
    Washington in 6 months, and here you are listening to a politician
    inside. [Laughter] I don't know.
        You have the opportunity to see people struggling to keep the
    American dream alive every day. And when you think of these issues, it
    must stun you at times what you hear in the news about what's going on
    up here, when it seems too rhetorical. Because I know when you think of
    these issues, you know a name, you see a face, you know a life story.
    That gives meanings to the problems that we are dealing with. And I
    think Washington has suffered grievously from losing that connection,
    losing that touch with the people who sent us here, and trying to
    communicate with people from such a long way away over the mass media,
    through so many millions of conflicting messages with high levels of
    rhetoric.
        I want to try to move back from that today and just to speak frankly
    about the choices that we face here and the choices that you face in
    doing your job and how we both can make the right decisions. As we stand
    on the edge of a new century and a new millennium, I think there are two
    great tasks facing America and our generation.
        The first is to make sure that we enter the next century with the
    American dream alive and well for all of our people, for the middle
    class whose interests are so often forgotten, for those who are
    struggling to make it in the global economy, for all the poor people in
    this country who are working hard to play by the rules and to live up to
    their God-given capacity.
        The second thing we have to do is to make sure we enter the next
    century making sure that America is still the strongest country on
    Earth, still the greatest force in the world for freedom and democracy
    and opportunity.
        There are two great threats to this endeavor. One is the stagnation
    of middle class economics. The other is the erosion of mainstream
    values. And the third thing that I want to talk to you about is the fact
    that the Government has often made these problems worse, not better, in
    the last several years. So we have to ask ourselves, what can we do to
    restore middle class economics, the opportunity part of the American
    dream? And what can we do to restore mainstream values, the
    responsibility part of the American dream? And what kind of Government
    changes do we need here to make sure we're good partners with the
    American people where you live and work?
        For the last 20 years, most people have worked the same hours or
    even longer hours for the same or even lower wages. There is a new class
    of permanently poor people, mostly young women and their small children,
    and they're growing. And the anxieties of people are pronounced,
    economically. Even in this time of economic recovery, people worry about
    downsizing everywhere and whether they really count in the workplace
    anymore. And there is a huge inequality growing among our workers, where
    those with good education and those capable of learning new skills tend
    to get good jobs with growing incomes and those without tend to be stuck
    in a rut forever.
        We have all this good news. We had in 1993--we haven't gotten the
    '94 figures yet--in '93 we had the largest number of new businesses
    started in the United States of America in any year in our history, and
    that's something to be proud of. But we also see people struggling just
    to hold on and to maintain their lifestyle, even though in many families
    both the husband and the wife are working and having less and less time
    to spend with their children.
        On the social front, the values we all cherish, work and family and
    community, are threatened as crime and violence and drug use rises all
    across America. And even when it falls, it's still too high. The rate of
    children that are born out of wedlock continues to go up. Our social
    problems, in many ways, seem more profound today than they have in a
    long time.
        And you see the traditions of breakdown in family, community, rooted
    in a loss of allegiance to these mainstream values and a lack of
    opportunity. This is a dangerous erosion of the things that made America
    great and kept us strong for over 200 years.
        We are now in the midst of a great debate here in Washington about
    what we ought to do about this. How can we make the good

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    things more present, and how can we reduce the bad things in America?
    How can we do the things we need to do to keep the American dream alive
    and keep our country strong? How we answer these questions will say an
    awful lot about what kind of people we're going to be and what kind of
    country we're going to pass on to our children in the 21st century.
        There is on one side of the debate, on the extreme, the old and now
    discredited Washington view that a big, bureaucratic, one-size-fits-all
    Government can provide big solutions to all America's big problems and
    maybe to some of America's not so big problems.
        The other extreme is the view of the Republican contract, that
    Government is the source of all the problems, and if we could just get
    rid of it completely or at least reduce the Federal Government's
    spending role, every problem in America would miraculously solve itself.
        I have a different view, and it's probably rooted in the fact that I
    didn't live and work here until 2 years ago. My view is rooted in the
    fact that my experiences as a Governor of a small State are much more
    like yours than they are like most of the people who make most of the
    decisions in this community. I think we have to chart a course between
    and beyond the old way of big Government and the new rage of no
    Government.
        No great country can survive without a National Government that in
    the information age is more limited but is still strong and effective.
    We do have, after all, common problems as a people. We have common
    opportunities. And these require a common response. We need the
    Government, in short, to be a partner with people in their private lives
    as citizens, a partner with State and local government, a partner with
    all of us.
        I believe in a Government that promotes opportunity and demands
    responsibility, that deals with middle class economics and mainstream
    values, a Government that is different radically from the one we have
    known here over the last 30 to 40 years but that still understands it
    has a role to play in order for us to build strong communities that are
    the bedrock of this Nation. That's what the New Covenant I talk about
    all the time is really all about, more opportunity and more
    responsibility.
        Our job is to work together to grow the middle class, to shrink the
    under class, to expand opportunity and to shrink bureaucracy, to empower
    people to make the most of their own lives. We can't give any guarantees
    in this rapidly changing world, but we can give people the capacity to
    do for themselves. And we must do that; all of us must do it.
        And finally, we have to work to enhance our security on our own
    streets and around the world. I believe, in short, that the role of this
    Government is to be a partner in the fight for the future, not a
    savior--it can't be that--but not a spectator on the sidelines either.
    We've tried that, and it didn't work out very well.
        We must face the fact that we live in a certain historical period in
    which the economy is global. The information age means that the basis of
    most wealth in the future will be knowledge and that we can be far more
    decentralized and flexible than we ever have been before. No one will
    ever again have to rely on a distant bureaucracy to solve every problem
    in today's rapidly changing environment.
        We have to focus more on equipping people with the resources they
    need to tackle their own problems and to give people the responsibility
    to determine how best to do that. We have to send more and more
    decisions back not only to State and local government but to citizens
    themselves.
        We must cut spending. We must cut Government. But I believe we must
    also invest more in jobs, incomes, technology, education, and training.
    That's what will make us wealthy.
        I ran for President because I felt these challenges were not being
    met, because I felt that there was no economic strategy for putting our
    people first. We had 12 years of trickle-down economics in which the
    deficit quadrupled and our future was mortgaged. But we didn't invest in
    our people or our economy. We had both less opportunity and less
    responsibility. In Washington all I ever heard was the blame game. And
    it often reminded me of--I felt often when I was out there in the
    country like you, like people must feel in a jury box, you know, when
    two lawyers get in an argument with a judge over what they can say or
    not. All the jury wants to know is who did it. [Laughter]
        And the American people, what they want to know is, what are we
    going to do? And are we going to do? And so I ran for this job because I
    was tired of a system in which both middle class economics and
    mainstream values were suffering. And the Government was doing well by
    special interests but not the public inter-

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    est. I felt very strongly that we had to do something to stop the
    conditions in which most Americans were living, where people were
    working harder and harder and harder for less and less and less
    security. And I still believe that's what we ought to be about.
        Now we have begun to change all that. We have begun to change all
    that. And it required some pretty tough decisions. Some of them were
    unpopular. Some of the people who made those unpopular decisions lost
    their seats in Congress last year, because people were told for years
    and years and years they could have a free lunch, that there were no
    tough decisions to be made.
        Everything here operated at the level of rhetoric. We got down to
    business. They talked about cutting the deficit. We did, by $600
    billion. And we did it with over a quarter of a trillion dollars in
    spending cuts, with income tax increases on the wealthiest 1.2 percent
    of our people, with discipline--not by the way, because I think that's a
    good thing to do but because they were the ones best able to pay. And
    those were the people who were benefiting most economically from the
    economy.
        And at the same time, we were cutting 300 domestic programs. We were
    also providing tax relief for 15 million working families who were
    working at or near the poverty line to make sure that nobody who works
    40 hours a week with children in their home should ever live in poverty.
    It's the biggest incentive to stay off welfare to know that if you work
    hard and you raise your kids, you're going to be able to make a living
    wage. These are the things that we worked on.
        Now, we eliminated or consolidated or cut about 300 programs. And in
    this new budget that I've got--we'll talk more about that in a minute--
    we propose to eliminate or consolidate 400 more. We reduced the size of
    the Federal work force in 2 years by over 100,000. And if no new laws
    pass--[applause]--thank you. If no new laws pass, the work force will be
    reduced over a 6-year period to its smallest size since John Kennedy was
    President. It will be 272,000 fewer people working here than on the day
    I was inaugurated President. I'm proud of that.
        We have shifted power away from Washington to more responsibility
    for States and counties and cities and towns. The Vice President has
    lead our reinventing Government initiative, which has already saved the
    taxpayers $63 billion and will save more. We've already cut regulations
    in banking and intrastate trucking and many other areas that make it now
    easier for businesses to create jobs and create opportunities. And we
    must do more, and we will. We've worked hard to try to make it easier
    for you to do your jobs and to improve the lives of the people that we
    both serve.
        Now, we've done a lot of other things as well that often get lost in
    the smoke around here. We passed the family leave law after 6 years of
    arguing about it. We passed the crime bill after 6 years of arguing
    about it. We expanded Head Start and provided for the immunization of
    all children under 2 by 1996. And we made lower cost, better repayment
    college loans available to 20 million young Americans so more people
    could go to college. We were busy around here in the last 2 years.
        And along the way we were able to pass two major trade agreements,
    resolve major trade disputes with China and other countries, and expand
    trade by more than at any time in a generation--very important when you
    consider the fact that low-cost goods from other countries come into our
    open markets if we have no trade agreements, but the trade agreements
    open markets for high value-added American goods and American services
    and American jobs all around the world. I say this to point out how much
    different it is where you live than where we live. If you had done that,
    your voters would know it, right? [Laughter]
        And all the nay-sayers said, ``Oh, if they put this economic plan
    in, it'll be the worst thing that ever happened to the country. The
    economy will collapse immediately. Everything will be terrible.'' Now
    they're all going to New Hampshire and giving the same speech all over
    again. I heard it for 2 years. You know, since no country has permanent
    growth, if they keep predicting a recession, eventually we'll get around
    to it. [Laughter] They said, ``Oh, this is a terrible thing, if they
    pass this program. Oh, it's terrible. The economy will just--it'll be
    terrible.''
        Well, what's happened in the last 2 years? We've got the lowest
    combined rate of unemployment and inflation in 25 years because we took
    it on. Over 6.1 million Americans have new jobs in the last 2 years.
    That is a good beginning.

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        Now, having said all that, let's face the facts. You live with these
    folks, and you know as well as I do, there are still profound problems
    out there. Most people still have not gotten a raise. Every year more
    and more people lose their health insurance even though they're in the
    work force. This is the only advanced country in the world that has a
    smaller percentage of people in the work force covered by health
    insurance in 1995 than had it in 1985. No other country can say that.
        And we know these other problems are still with us. Half of all
    Americans are living on less money than they had 15 years ago. So we now
    have to focus not only on creating jobs but raising incomes and
    improving the security of working life and family life when people do
    the right thing. If we're going to strengthen the middle class and
    shrink the under class, we have got to do those things which will enable
    people to really feel the American dream. We've got to begin by
    equipping people with the skills they need to compete in today's
    economy. Even as we cut yesterday's Government, we must invest more in
    the education and training of our people. We must. We must.
        We have tried to approach that work as the partner of people at the
    local level. Most folks around here think last year was the best year
    for education legislation passing through Congress in 30 years as we
    expanded Head Start and provided more funds for apprenticeships for
    young people who don't go onto college and made those college loans more
    affordable and wrote into Federal law the Goals 2000, the world-class
    standards for our schools.
        But we changed the way we were making education law in Washington
    pretty dramatically. We didn't neglect our responsibilities to help
    create educational opportunity, but we didn't presume to tell the people
    at the grassroots level how to meet the standards as the Government had
    done so much in the past. Instead, we gave to local educators and to
    parents the power to decide how to meet global standards of excellence.
        We said, ``Here are some things that have to be done to improve our
    children's education. Here are things we'd like to do to help you do it.
    But you decide how to do it.'' In many ways, in dealing more directly
    with city government, our empowerment zones and enterprise communities
    are the embodiment of that kind of approach: to create opportunity, to
    shrink bureaucracy, to demand more responsibility, and then let you
    decide what you want to do with it and how you can best create jobs and
    opportunities.
        We said to distressed communities, ``Give us a comprehensive plan to
    create jobs, to revitalize neighborhoods, to bring the community
    together, to involve the private sector. Find the solutions together.
    The opportunity you get will be some cash money and tax incentives to
    encourage investment and resources to deal with other problems, like
    transportation or safety. And we'll cut the redtape so you can apply
    those resources as you see fit.'' This is a partnership between
    government, the private sector, and communities to encourage investment,
    to create jobs in places where too many people have been left completely
    behind.
        If you think about it, our country has had major initiatives in the
    last several years to invest in Latin America, to invest in the
    Caribbean, to invest in all different kinds of places. They're fine. But
    this is the first major initiative we've had to get people to invest in
    America, to create jobs and markets and our best opportunities.
        And by the way, I hope that before this session is over we will see
    an expansion of that program, not a contraction of it, one that is paid
    for, one that is funded, but we ought to work to expand it, to involve
    more communities. We had hundreds of communities wanting to be involved
    in it who had good proposals that could not be funded. We have to
    recognize that if we want people to live by the work ethic, there must
    be work for them to do.
        That also is something we should remember as we deal with the next
    issue that is coming in this session of Congress that affects some of
    you more than others, depending on how the system operates in your
    State, but all of you in some ways, and that is, how are we going to fix
    the welfare system? I believe we should offer more opportunity in the
    form of education and work to people on welfare and then insist on more
    responsibility, requiring work after 2 years, tougher child support
    enforcement, responsible parenting. I've been working on this issue for
    15 years now, and I know that Washington doesn't have all the answers
    and neither does anybody else, or we'd have solved it by now.
        But we have done our best here to give more and more and more
    authority to conduct sweeping welfare reform efforts to the States. We

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    have given 25 States waivers from the Federal rules and regulations to
    pursue welfare reform. Today we will give a waiver to Oklahoma, the 26th
    State to pursue a welfare reform proposal. That is more combined shift
    of power from the Federal Government to the States than occurred under
    my two predecessors, combined. I believe in this. I believe in this.
        I know that the Government shouldn't dictate all the rules from
    Washington. On the other hand, I don't think we should give States
    welfare money without any standards at all. We do have a national
    interest in promoting work and responsible parenting, the reduction of
    out of wedlock births. We have a national interest in doing this.
        Last year, I sent to Congress the most sweeping welfare reform plan
    ever proposed by an administration. It included the toughest possible
    child support enforcement. Let me just mention child support for a
    minute. Do you know, if we collected all the money owed in this country
    by deadbeat parents, we could move 800,000 mothers and children off the
    welfare rolls immediately, 800,000.
        Now, one of the things that we have reached agreement with the
    Congress on is that in this area there has to be some national standard
    setting, because 30 percent of these cases cross States lines. So even
    though we want to move decisions back to the States, when the Governors
    came to town, they said, ``Look, we know we've got to have some national
    action on child support enforcement, otherwise we can't ever collect on
    these orders that cross State lines.'' Justice should not depend solely
    on geography.
        Reforming welfare is now a top priority for both parties, and that's
    good news. And we've worked together to find common solutions, and
    that's good news. We still have our differences. My plan and the one our
    administration has been behind for over a year now sends a clear message
    to young people. It says, ``Take responsibility to turn your life
    around.'' Teen fathers must pay child support. Teen mothers should stay
    at home or in other appropriate settings, and they have to stay in
    school if they want to get a check.
        But the Republican plan sends a different message at some points. It
    says, for example, ``If you make a mistake before you're 18, and you
    have a baby, you're on your own''--no benefits for teenagers and their
    children who have babies before they're 18, until they turn 18, and then
    if the States want to keep them out of benefits forever, that's okay. I
    think that's a mistake. I think what we ought to be saying to people is,
    ``You should not have done that. You made a mistake. We don't want
    anybody else to do it. But we're going to help you succeed as a student
    and a parent and a worker, and you have to help yourself by playing by
    these rules.'' I think that is a better approach.
        And I think it's in your interest. Look, when people get--if we just
    cut people off without putting them to work or keeping them in school,
    without making sure they have child care, if we just end all this, well,
    the Federal Government will save a little money. And you know what will
    happen, don't you? They'll be on your doorstep. They won't be part of
    some Federal statistic, and people will say, ``Oh, we're not spending
    money on that up here like we used to. We'll just give you the problem,
    and you figure out what to do with it.''
        Well, my own view is that just shifting the problem is not enough.
    Like many of the cuts currently being debated, I think it will
    ultimately be counterproductive. It will cost us more than we will save.
    The Federal Government, the cities, the States, the taxpayers all will
    pay more down the road if we do something that fundamentally undermines
    the health of our children, the future of our children, and our
    commitment to getting more Americans to live with the opportunities of
    middle class economics and the responsibilities of mainstream values.
    That's what I believe.
        Now, yes, yes, we do have to continue to cut the deficit. We do have
    to continue to save money. My new budget cuts the deficit another $81
    billion and has over $140 billion in spending cuts. And I want to work
    with the Republicans to do more. We have already reduced the rate of
    health care cost increases in the Federal budget over the next 5 years
    by $100 billion. We have to keep working on the deficit.
        But we have to do it in the right way. One of the things that the
    Republican leadership and I agree on is the line-item veto. We're about
    to take up debate on the line-item veto in the Senate. I hope it will
    pass quickly because it will give the President the opportunity and the
    responsibility to look at every single line item in the budget for
    waste. It will give us the chance to cut pork without hurting people.
    And that is an important distinction.

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        Let me give you an example of what I mean. Everybody knows we have
    to shrink the Department of Agriculture. Ross Perot had the best line of
    any of the candidates in the 1992 election. It grieves me to say that,
    but he did. [Laughter] Ross Perot had this great line where he said,
    ``Did you hear about the employee at the Department of Agriculture that
    had to go see a psychiatrist because he lost his farmer?'' [Laughter]
    And what he meant by that was, of course, that the number of farmers was
    shrinking and that technology and the modern world had reduced the need
    for some of the size and scope of organization of the Agriculture
    Department. So we all wanted to do that. Everybody knows we've got to
    save money.
        One of the reasons I fought so hard for that GATT world trade
    agreement is so we could cut agricultural subsidies here without hurting
    our farmers in the global market. So my budget cuts agricultural
    subsidies, but now our competitors have to cut theirs more to give our
    people a fair break.
        I'll give you another example. We wanted to cut the Agriculture
    Department, so we just closed 1,200 offices, 1,200. That's a lot of
    money. I do not think the way to cut the Agriculture Department is to
    freeze the School Lunch Program and send it to you, which means we're
    going to cut school lunches as the price of food goes up and the number
    of kids goes up. I don't agree with that.
        And you cannot make me believe with all the poor kids in this world
    today and in this country who show up hungry to school every day, whose
    only decent meal occurs in school, you cannot make me believe that we
    cannot find a way to eliminate unnecessary spending from the Government
    budget without cutting the School Lunch Program. We can, and we will. We
    will.
        I'll give you another example that affects a lot of you here. Some
    in Congress want to eliminate our community development bank initiative.
    Most of you probably have never heard of that, but let me tell you what
    it does. It's an initiative that would spend $500 million to either
    establish or support banks that are set up in economically distressed
    areas, whose primary purpose is to get lower income people in high
    unemployment areas into the free enterprise system.
        Now, I found out about this a few years ago when I was in Chicago,
    when I had a friend working for the South Shore Development Corporation.
    And we set up a community development bank in Arkansas when I was
    Governor that operated in a rural area, and it did amazing things.
    People got credit who could never get credit from any bank before, and
    they set up businesses, and they started working, and they started
    hiring people. And it changed lives for a lot of people in these
    communities.
        So when I ran for President, I said here's a good idea that came out
    of grassroots America. We could put a little money in it and make a lot
    of difference. It is estimated that the $500 million that we could spend
    on the community development bank initiative in your communities all
    over the country will generate $22 billion in activity in the free
    enterprise system in places that have no enterprise today. So I think it
    would be a mistake to eliminate it. That's what I believe.
        Believe you me, there's a lot of Government programs that don't have
    that kind of return. And keep in mind, what is the purpose of the
    Government? It's to empower people to make the most of their own lives,
    to enhance their security, and to help create opportunity as a partner.
    That's what this does.
        I'll give you another example of the things that I don't think
    should be cut. Our national service project, AmeriCorps, is all about
    opportunity and responsibility. A lot of you have AmeriCorps projects in
    your communities. Young people get a helping hand with their college in
    exchange for helping people solve their problems at the local community.
    Thousands of young people now are participants, as partners, as nurses,
    as teachers, working with pastors, working with police officers at the
    grassroots level. They walk police beats in Brooklyn. They build homes
    in Georgia. They fight fires in Idaho.
        But some people in the House want to cut this effort, to deny 15,000
    young people the chance to participate in it. Now, I've offered spending
    cuts, and I'll find some more. But I think it is a mistake to cut
    AmeriCorps because it's a good deal. It gives us better citizens,
    stronger communities, more education for limited money. And it enables a
    lot of people to do things in their communities that simply would not
    get done any other way.
        Ironically, one other area where we're having a big difference of
    opinion is in college loans. There's some in the Congress who want to
    se-

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    verely limit the reach of the so-called direct loan program that we
    started which, believe it or not, lowers the cost of the loans to the
    students, cuts the time of paperwork and bureaucracy to the colleges,
    and saves money for the taxpayers because we get around the middleman.
    So here's one area where we can do more to send people to school for
    lower cost and actually save money. We've offered millions and millions
    of young people the opportunity to take these loans out and then pay
    them back as a percentage of their income.
        But I want to emphasize that we've also been more responsible than
    Government was before. When I took office it was costing you as
    taxpayers, $2.8 billion a year to pay tax money for defaulted loans. We
    have cut that $2.8 billion down to $1 billion. We've cut it by nearly
    two-thirds and made more loans available so people can go to college.
    That's the approach we ought to be taking. That is the way to save money
    on the program.
        Now, one last thing in this area that I'm very concerned about, in
    the education area, and that is that one of the things in the House list
    of rescissions to cut is all the money for safe and drug-free schools
    that would go to 94 percent of the schools in this country. And that's
    very important to me, personally. I invested a lot of time in fighting
    the problem of drugs when I was a Governor. We have worked hard to get
    more investment to fight drugs in every area in which we fight it here,
    since I've been President. And we see disturbing signs that in parts of
    our population, among young people, drug use is going up again, more
    casual drug use, young people thinking, after a decade of it going down,
    that somehow it's maybe not dangerous anymore, forgetting that it's
    illegal. And a lot of our schools are still not safe because of the root
    problems of drugs and violence. Now this money gives schools the ability
    to hire police officers, to put up metal detectors, but also to have
    drug education programs, the programs like the D.A.R.E. program that so
    many of you have had in your schools and others that try and help these
    kids stay off drugs. I think it would be a mistake to cut this money
    out.
        Let me remind you that this money got into the crime bill, which you
    worked so hard for, because I gave the Congress, for the first time, a
    plan to cut the size of the Federal Government by 270,000. So we didn't
    raise any taxes. We didn't take any money away from anybody. We shrunk
    the Government and gave the money to the communities of this country to
    fight crime, including the safe and drug-free schools money. We should
    not eliminate that. We should fight for it, not fight to cut it out.
        As we are trying, you and I, to make responsibility a way of life in
    this country again, to teach young people the value of work, I think
    that all of us are going to have to say, first of all, without regard to
    our party, we agree with that.
        Now that brings me to one other point I want to make beyond
    education. When I was a child, my mother used to say, ``Idle hands are
    the devil's workshop.'' You're going to have a whole lot more idle hands
    this summer if we cut out those 600,000 summer jobs for our young
    people. And is it worth it to deny 1,000 young people in Louisville or
    1,600 young people in Boston--I met with a young--the Mayor's Youth
    Council up there not very long ago, 2,000 in the San Jose area. Is it
    worth it to deny them the chance to work, to be around responsible
    adults, to learn what it's like to sort of show up on time, put a day's
    work in, how you relate to other people at work? I mean, this goes way
    beyond the little amount of money you get out of this.
        Now, I have proposed, I will say again, to consolidate 60 programs
    and eliminate 4,000 bureaucrats to save money in the Housing and Urban
    Development Department, for example. I have proposed to do a lot of
    things like that.
        I told you about the Agriculture Department. We're coming with more.
    Hold on; every week, there will be more. I am not here to defend the way
    Government has operated in the past in Washington. But we have to make
    judgments here. We get hired to make judgments and the right decisions
    and not to throw out the baby with the bath water.
        Take the HUD Department, for example, I'm all for--I'm consolidating
    60 programs. We're getting rid of 4,000 people. We're phasing the
    Department down. But I don't believe in the proposed cut to housing
    assistance that helps 63,000 families--women with small children, low-
    income senior citizens.
        What we ought to do is to look at the right kind of cuts. This whole
    rescission package does some interesting things. We're supposed to be
    passing responsibility back to you, but not undermining your ability to
    do your job. I think it's smarter to streamline programs and cut bu-

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    reaucrats than to put families on the street or to leave you to deal
    with the problem.
        Many of the people willing to pass you the buck are talking about
    ending unfair burdens on local government. I do want to say this: I
    think--and the Speaker probably said this earlier today--it looks like
    we may have an agreement now among all of the conferees and the
    administration and everybody on this unfunded mandate bill. I am very
    strongly in favor of that. It is a good thing to do. It's something we
    should do.
        It is long since past time to stop imposing those mandates on you
    without paying for them. I spent a decade in the Governor's office in
    Arkansas, writing checks for decisions other people made. Now, I'm
    excited about that. That bill just passed the House a few weeks ago. It
    passed the Senate. It's a good, good thing.
        But look at this: The rescission package that's moving through the
    Congress actually cuts off funds to help you comply with present Federal
    requirements, including safe drinking water, lead paint, and asbestos
    removal. So that makes them, I guess, not unfunded, but de-funded
    mandates. [Laughter] So we eliminate burdens on the one hand and create
    new ones on the other. I think that is an error.
        Let me mention just one final area where we worked closely last
    year. We passed the crime bill after the people who were here before
    just talked about it for 6 years, played politics with it, and the
    rhetoric was so juicy on both sides they could never get around to
    passing a bill. That's what always happens, you know?
        Every one of these issues are tough. If they were easy, somebody
    would have done them. And you could pick either side and say it in a way
    that a majority is for you, right? I mean, you can. Are you for a
    balanced budget? Yes. Do you want to cut Social Security? No. [Laughter]
    See what I mean? So both sides win, right? Meanwhile, you're like the
    jurors listening to the lawyers' argument. Well, what's going to happen?
    Who did it? So we've got to work on this.
        But I want to say this about the crime bill. We finally did that.
    And what we did largely was what was recommended by law enforcement
    officials and community leaders around the country: money for prevention
    with a lot of flexibility for people at the local level; tougher
    punishment, but help for States that would adopt tougher punishment, to
    build more prisons; and of course, more police, 100,000 more police on
    the street.
        We did that because of two things. First of all, the law enforcement
    people said, we need more police. They also said they wanted a
    prevention fund. Secondly, we did it because of the evidence of what
    happens when community policing is properly instituted in the cities of
    our country.
        From over about the last 30 years, the number of police in our
    country had grown by only about 10 percent, while the violent crime rate
    tripled. Clearly, there is a connection between those two statistics.
    And yet, still we've seen in place after place, where more police are
    put on the street in community policing modes, the crime rate will drop.
    That's why every major law enforcement organization supported that.
        Now, the congressional bills and the crime bill are different from
    the House and Senate, but I ask you to look at the system we have now
    and the work it did, not only to catch criminals but to prevent crime.
    In New York City, the police commissioner implemented an aggressive
    community policing program that helped to significantly reduce serious
    crimes last year: auto thefts down 15 percent, robberies down 16
    percent, murder down 19 percent. Not just in big cities: The mayor of
    Odessa, Texas, wrote to tell me that in 1991 and '92, they had a very
    high crime rate. Then they implemented community policing, and 3 years
    later, serious crimes have dropped a total of 43 percent. Union City,
    Tennessee, calls for help from the police went down by 30 percent and
    arrests went up by 35 percent with community policing.
        That's why this crime bill was a partnership to help communities
    willing to take the responsibility to invest in their own security be
    more secure. An opportunity that is buried in redtape can hurt more than
    it helps. I don't know how many times I've seen little towns in my State
    have to hire consultants to figure out how to get Federal money, and it
    cut the margin of benefit dramatically.
        What we did was to set this police program up so that cities and
    counties can apply directly to the Federal Government, using a one-page
    application with eight questions, awarding police resources directly to
    you. Now, I think that's a pretty good deal. I know one of those bills
    wants to add another layer to that. I don't think that's a very good
    idea, either. I think that we ought to have an opportunity for
    communities

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    to apply directly and get the funds directly for law enforcement. My
    fellow Governors may disagree with that, but that's what I think.
        Now, in just the last few months since the crime bill took effect
    last fall, half the police departments in America have already received
    authority to hire almost 17,000 new police officers. We are ahead of
    schedule, and we're under budget. Some people who criticize our bill
    said that local governments wouldn't really want it; it was too much of
    a burden; it's an imposition; they can't afford to pay any match. All I
    know is, we have already received almost 11,000 applications
    representing over 60 percent of the police departments in America.
    Somebody thinks it's a good idea, and I think we ought to stay with it.
        Here's the bottom line: The crime bill now on the books guarantees
    100,000 new police officers. The alternative proposal doesn't guarantee
    a single one. We do give more flexibility and responsibility to you.
    Some of their proposals add bureaucracy and cut funds at the same time.
    So I say to you, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
        We should never, never close the door to writing new laws that will
    make us more secure in the fight against crime. And it should never be a
    partisan issue again. I was sick when I got here 2 years ago and I
    realized they'd been fooling around with that crime bill for 4 years
    because each side could figure out how to gain rhetorical advantage. And
    small differences obscured large agreements. So I want to continue to
    work on this problem.
        But this police initiative is a better deal for you and a better
    deal for the American people. And as I have said repeatedly, if
    necessary, I will veto any effort to repeal or undermine it.
        But let me say this, what we need is not more vetoes. What we need
    is more action. What we need is for people here to behave the way you
    have to behave or you couldn't survive. Half of you come from places so
    small that if you made people declare their party every time they walked
    through the door to see if they got anything done or not, you'd be run
    out on a rail within a week. [Laughter]
        So, the veto is a useful device and an important thing on occasion.
    But what the country really needs is action. We need action. We need to
    remember these problems have faces, names, and life histories. We need
    to pull together. We're doing it on the unfunded mandates. We can do it
    on the line-item veto. We can do it on all these other areas if we will
    exercise simple common sense and recognize what our mission is. We've
    got to keep the American dream alive: middle class economics, mainstream
    values, jobs, incomes, work, and family. We've got to make sure this
    country stays strong.
        And I'm telling you, it takes action, not just words. You live where
    the action is. If you don't do anything else while you're here, give us
    your energy and tell us you want action.
        Thank you, and God bless you all.

    Note: The President spoke at 1:02 p.m. at the Washington Hilton Hotel.
    In his remarks, he referred to Carolyn Long Banks, president, National
    League of Cities; Mayor Greg Lashutka of Columbus, OH; and Mayor Sharpe
    James of Newark, NJ. A portion of these remarks could not be verified
    because the tape was incomplete.