[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1995, Book I)]
[May 23, 1995]
[Pages 739-743]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks at the Democratic Congressional Dinner
May 23, 1995

    Thank you, Senator Daschle, for your leadership and your stirring 
introduction and your wise predictions. [Laughter] Thank you, 
Congressman Gephardt, for your leadership and your steadfastness. 
Congressman Matsui, Senator Dorgan, Senator Kerrey, and Congressman 
Frost, thank you for taking on the burden of our campaign committees and 
the hard work of recruiting our candidates and raising our funds and 
rebuilding our majorities. And thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for 
being here.
    I thank all the Democratic Senators and Members of the House who are 
here, and many Members of Congress who are former Members of Congress 
who are here. If you will forgive me, I'd like to ask for a moment of 
applause for the memory of a former Member of Congress who is not here, 
Les Aspin, one of the finest people I ever knew. [Applause]
    This has certainly been an interesting time, hasn't it? [Laughter] 
What's that old adage that we should--somebody should spare us from 
living in interesting times. It is a great honor and a great obligation 
for us to have the chance to serve in an interesting and profoundly 
important time, a time of great change, great opportunity, great 
dislocation, great difficulty, and great challenge for the people of 
this country and, therefore, those of us who wish to serve them.
    At a time when many are so preoccupied with their own difficulties, 
it is difficult to sort through the blizzard of information and 
disinformation they get, even to understand what it is we are trying to 
do, much less to grasp how it will affect them. But I think, more and 
more, as time goes on now, the choices before the American people are 
becoming clearer, and I trust the direction we must take is as well.
    We now hear the folks in the other party claiming great high ground 
for wanting to reduce the deficit and asking us to help. You remember 
how much help we got from them in the last 2 years? And I would remind 
you, those of you who voted for that, to remember that by their new 7-
year calculations the 1993 budget plan that the Democrats adopted, 
without any help or even so much as serious discussion, cut the deficit 
a trillion dollars. They predicted the world would come to an end. 
Instead, the recession came to an end, and we had lower unemployment, 
low inflation, a booming stock market; first time in 20 years we've had 
unemployment among African-Americans below 10 percent; highest number of 
high-wage jobs in 6 years; a real sense of change in the economy, 
according to all the numbers.
    But that hasn't filtered down to a lot of Americans yet. And that's 
what I want to talk to you about tonight. What are we doing here? Why 
are we Democrats? What do we hope to achieve? How do we communicate with 
the American people? And what does it all mean?
    Well, the first thing I want to say is that we should just be 
grateful that we've had the chance in the last 2 years to do the right 
things. And we should understand if we failed, either through our own 
limitations or because of the circumstances of the time, to communicate 
what we had done to the people of this country, the fact is that in the 
light of history, the last 2 years will be viewed as a time when we got 
the deficit down, regained control of our economic destiny, actually 
invested more in our people and in their education and in their future, 
and made a serious effort to have the American people move into the 21st 
century with the American dream alive and well and with our security 
better protected at home and abroad.

[[Page 740]]

    In the last 2 years, we had the most productive time in terms of a 
partnership between the President and Congress in the last 30 years. And 
what was done in the crime bill, in the trade legislation, in the family 
and medical leave law, in act after act after act, was good for the 
American people. And we should be proud of that, and we should talk 
about it. And we should move forward.
    We should also say to our friends in the other party, we do not 
intend to do you the way you did us, even though you were richly 
rewarded for doing it--[laughter]--because, unlike you in the last 2 
years, we care so much about this country, we'll work with you. But you 
have to remember what we stand for, and you have to be willing to deal 
with what we stand for.
    They are learning a little lesson now with their budget proposals 
and the real meaning of their contract on America, of what all people in 
public life learn, and that is that there are limits to calls for 
sacrifice. [Laughter]
    My senior Senator, Dale Bumpers, he loves to tell a story about Huey 
Long being out on a country cross--is he here? I heard somebody 
clapping; I thought he was clapping. [Laughter] He loves to tell a story 
about Huey Long being out on a country crossroads speaking to a group of 
people about--in the Depression--about how we needed to share the 
wealth. And he spotted a farmer he knew, and he said, ``Now, Brother 
Jones, as hard as times are, if you have three Cadillacs, wouldn't you 
give one of them up so we could go around and take up all the little 
kids in the country and take them to school during the week and to 
church on Sunday?'' And he said, ``Sure, I'd do that.'' And he said, 
``If you had $3 million, wouldn't you give up a million dollars so we 
could feed all the people in this county and put a roof over their 
head?'' He said, ``Of course I would.'' He said, ``And if you had three 
hogs--'' He said, ``Now, wait a minute, I've got three hogs.'' 
[Laughter]
    You think about that. We might have had some difficult cases to make 
in the last 2 years, but we never had to try to argue with a straight 
face why we ought to cut Medicare and Medicaid for elderly people in 
nursing homes to pay for a tax cut for people who have done very, very 
well in the 1980's and 1990's, and will do well in the 21st century. At 
least we didn't have to make that case.
    On the other hand, it is important for us to participate and to be a 
part of changing this country for the better. The Democrats are a 
positive party. We win by promoting hope over fear, by promoting unity 
over division, by promoting progress over the status quo. And 
fundamentally, the difference between our party and the other party is 
still that we believe in the potential of every human being, and we 
believe that every person has a right to be protected from oppressive 
forces that would weigh him or her down, and every person has the right 
to be empowered to make the most of their own lives.
    We believe in ``cut and invest,'' not ``slash and burn.'' We believe 
not in trickle-down, but in growing the middle class and shrinking the 
under class. We believe not in cutting people loose in a market-only 
world that is a cold and hard world but in having a partnership between 
the people and their Government and the private sector that grows the 
economy, creates jobs, and also makes sure everybody has a chance to 
stake out their piece of the American dream. We believe that the power 
of the Government ought to be used to elevate people. We believe that we 
should have a partnership with business that challenges them to train 
their workers and treat them right but challenges us here in Government 
to create policies that will enable us to succeed at home and abroad. 
And we have done that. And we will continue to do that.
    Now, what are some examples of that? Well, the Commerce Department 
is one. Sometimes I think the reason our friends on the other side of 
the aisle are so anxious to eliminate the Department of Commerce is they 
are absolutely livid that a Democratic Secretary of Commerce has gotten 
more jobs for Americans abroad than all the Republicans in the last 
several decades.
    We believe you can cut Government and make it work better for 
people. What are some examples of that? The Small Business 
Administration has lowered its budget and dramatically increased its 
loan volumes to women, to minorities, and to white males all at the same 
time, and nobody unqualified got a loan. And America is stronger as a 
result of that kind of effort.
    We believe America has more than one kind of deficit. Yes, there is 
a budget deficit. We know all about it. It's a lot lower than it was 
before we went to work on it. And yes, we want to bring it down again. 
If, in fact, by bringing it down we could lower interest rates, put 
money into the pockets of ordinary Americans

[[Page 741]]

in the business sector, and invest and grow and get more jobs in this 
economy, that's what we ought to do. But let's not pretend that nothing 
we do here is worthwhile. We also have an education deficit in this 
country, and we have to address that as well.
    And it isn't popular to say anymore because there is this sense that 
all of the money we spent on poor people is wasted, but that's just not 
true. And whether we like it or not, an increasing percentage of the 
babies that are born in this old world, in this country, are poor. And 
they need food to eat, and they need medical care and medicine for their 
bodies, and they need an opportunity to get off to a good start in life. 
And if we don't give it to them, we may balance the budget for the next 
5 years, but in 15 years we'll have the awfullest deficit you ever saw, 
and we'll be spending it all on prisons and drug rehab programs instead 
of education and training and job creation.
    Something else that isn't popular to say--today it's all the rage, 
if you ask any American what should you do to balance the budget, 
they'll say, ``Cut foreign aid.'' But a recent poll has done us a great 
service. It's told us what the American people really mean. They were 
asked, ``Well, how much money is in foreign aid?'' The American people 
say, ``Fifteen percent of the budget.'' ``How much is too much?'' They 
say, ``Ten percent is way too much.'' ``What's about right?'' ``Five 
percent.'' ``What's too little?'' ``Under 3 percent.'' How much do we 
really spend? Just a little over one percent. [Laughter]
    So this matters, folks. It matters to our ability to grow in the 
21st century whether these countries that have embraced democracy and 
free markets are going to be given a little bit of help now, most of 
which immediately benefits us, by the way, to have their people get a 
good education and a good job and encourage American investment and 
become people who can buy our products and our services in the 21st 
century.
    The Democrats believe, in short, that we have a budget deficit and 
an education deficit, that we need a thriving free market that is 
vigorous and competitive, but that the Government has a role to play in 
partnership with that market to help us abroad and to strengthen us at 
home, and that if we can grow the middle class and shrink the under 
class and keep a healthy economic environment, the rest of us will do 
very well indeed.
    I am proud of the fact that in the last 2 years we've had more new 
businesses and more new millionaires created in the United States than 
at any comparable time in the history of our Republic. I am proud of 
that. But let's not kid ourselves. One of the reasons that we had 
difficulty in 1994, having both the White House and the Congress, is 
that millions and millions of Americans are out there working harder 
today than they were 10 years ago for less money. Millions of Americans 
go home every night from work and sit across the table from their 
children and their spouses and wonder if somehow they have failed. They 
hear all this stuff about the glories of the global economy and all 
these things about the glories of the market. And they read all these 
things that I say about how we've gotten the deficit down and got the 
jobs up. And all they know is, they're in a tight, and they're scared, 
and they're concerned about the future. And they wonder if anybody's 
still on their side. They wonder if anybody really cares about them.
    Did you see the story of the young woman who brought her sister and 
her mother to see me, whose husband was--her father, the young girl's 
father, was on the picket line at the Bridgestone strike? And because 
her father was on strike and because they'd been replaced, this family 
had to pick up their own health insurance, as the law now provides. And 
so she missed out on her trip to Washington until Jesse Jackson ran into 
this young girl and paid to bring her family up here, because this girl 
and her sister were diabetics. And they were paying $600 a month for 
health insurance while they were unemployed. That's true all over 
America today.
    There are people out there who just want to know that we are on 
their side, that we are still fighting for them, that we still believe 
in them, and that we're going to make America work for them. And they're 
entitled to know that.
    I'm very proud of the fact that the crime rate has come down in this 
country now in both years I've been President. I am proud of that. And 
we've worked on that. But before we get carried away, let me remind you 
that the rate of violent, arbitrary crime by teenagers against teenagers 
is still going up because we've got all these kids out there who are 
discon-


[[Page 742]]

nected. And they need to know somebody cares about them, and they need 
to know that they don't have to resort to violence, they don't have to 
resort to a gang, they don't have to leave school and do something 
terrible to feel like they're a part of something that will get them 
through to tomorrow.
    This is not all that complicated. Oh, I know we're living in a new 
and different and exciting time, and I'm the biggest policy wonk in 
town. [Laughter] But when you strip it all away, we, the Democrats, have 
got to be there to say you can have economic growth and social justice. 
In fact, you cannot have economic growth over the long run without 
justice.
    Do we want to make folks on welfare go to work when they can? You 
bet we do. Do we want to be able to reexamine our programs? Of course, 
we do. Do we want to be able to shed unnecessary bureaucracy? Yes, we 
do. Our administration has shrunk the Federal Government more than the 
folks that were here before us, and we will do more. We will do that. 
But let's not forget: Why are we doing all of this? Why are we here? 
Because we believe we can make a difference to the future of this 
country. And there is no other reason.
    So I say to you, you should be of good cheer. We have a lot of 
things to do. We've taken a licking, and we're--as Mark Twain said, the 
reports of our demise are entirely premature. [Laughter] But the most 
important thing is, we have a chance tomorrow to go out and do something 
good for America. And we're going to do it. We're going to do it.
    We're going to prove that you can reduce the deficit, that we can 
bring this budget into balance over a period of time without ignoring 
the investment deficit in our people, without gutting the environment, 
without destroying our future, without forgetting our obligation to grow 
the middle class, to shrink the under class, and to give our people some 
hope and decency and dignity in life. We're going to prove that you can 
do that. We are. They are. The Members here are. We're going to do that 
for America, and we can.
    So you go home tonight, you just remember, one of the biggest 
problems with Washington is, most of our headlines and most of our 
conversation is consumed by process and conflict within the Beltway. And 
when we talk about people beyond the Beltway, we're normally talking 
about them in terms of the latest poll numbers: Who are they for this 
week? What are they saying this week? The fundamental reality of those 
people's lives has not changed all that much yet. And we have to give 
them a strong economy, a decent sense to empower themselves through 
education, a real commitment to a Government that serves everybody and 
not just the special interests, and does not forget the poor, because 
the children are the poor in this country, the children are the new poor 
in America, and they will be not children before you know it.
    And we have got to find a way to solve all these problems together. 
The biggest problem we face today, I sometimes think, is that there 
aren't any simple answers to complex challenges. But there are answers. 
There are answers. And I have the privilege to go all over the world in 
your behalf. And I can tell you that nearly anybody would gladly trade 
places with where we are now at this point in our history.
    So I say again, be of good cheer, but don't forget why you're 
here.Yes, we want to win elections, but we want to win elections for a 
purpose, because we believe you can attack the budget deficit and the 
investment deficit, the education deficit; because we believe we can 
make more millionaires and grow the middle class and stop this awful two 
decades of stagnant and declining incomes and increasing inequality; 
because we believe most poor people will go to work and do the right 
thing, given the opportunity and the responsibility to do so; because we 
believe we have a responsibility to the national security of this 
country in terms of making our streets safer at home and America safer 
abroad. And we are making progress on all those fronts.
    So I say to our friends across the aisle: We will be your partner. 
We will not walk away from you in spite of our experience in the last 2 
years. But we will come on our own terms with our own values, putting 
the American people first.
    Thank you, God bless you, and good night.

Note: The President spoke at 9:25 p.m. at the Washington Hilton.

[[Page 743]]