    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1995, Book II)]
    [July 20, 1995]
    [Pages 1127-1128]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Remarks to Federal Law Enforcement Officials
    July 20, 1995

        Thank you very much, Eljay. If you want to see which job has more
    stress, this is the print on his introduction, and this is the print on
    my card. [Laughter]
        Let me say, first of all, I came here to express my appreciation to
    all of you for continuing these regular meetings and increasing our
    ability to do the work of law enforcement by this kind of coordination.
    I think it is terribly important, and I thank you for doing it.
        Because so many issues involving Federal law enforcement have been
    in the public's mind in the last several weeks, I would like to say a
    few things and then just sit here and visit with you and listen to you
    for a while. Let me begin by saying that we all know that this country
    still has too much violence, too many drugs, too many gangs, that the
    culture of violence is still causing enormous difficulty in our country.
        There was a profoundly moving story in one of our newspapers today
    about a 16-year-old boy who just shot a 12-year-old boy dead because he
    thought he'd been treated with disrespect. And this comes just a few
    days after a national survey in which two-thirds of young gang members
    said they thought it was acceptable to shoot a person just because they
    treated you with disrespect.
        This is the environment that we have to change in America today, the
    paranoia, the division, the willingness to resort to that kind of
    destructive behavior. And that's why I've been so disturbed about the
    recent attempts to attack police officers, in general, for doing their
    jobs. People may disagree with certain laws, like the ban on assault
    weapons, but that doesn't give them a right to disobey the law. People
    have no right to assault or kill police officers simply for doing their
    duty.
        Now, I want to talk just a minute about the Waco hearings and
    especially what happened yesterday. We know that law enforcement people
    made mistakes at Waco. Our administration said that in 1993. We had an
    exhaustive review, and when the results came in, we took appro-

    [[Page 1128]]

    priate action. Changes were made; people were dismissed. That's the way
    our system is supposed to work, in an open and accountable way.
    Congressional hearings were held in 1993 and in 1994. And if Congress
    wants to have further hearings today, that is their right, and it is
    entirely appropriate. We have to hope some more good things will come
    out and we can learn how to better do our jobs.
        But I think it's important to get the facts here quite clear.
    Yesterday's testimony was a sad and painful reminder of the depravity
    that took place inside that compound and the facts which confronted the
    President, the Attorney General, and the Federal law enforcement
    officials at the time. Here was a man who was molesting young girls and
    paddling children with boat oars, a man who was laying up supplies and
    illegal weapons for Armageddon, a man who was instructing women and
    children about how to commit suicide, a man who took the trust of young
    children and twisted it, who told people that if they wanted to do the
    will of God they had to be willing to kill for God.
        Those are the facts. There is no moral equivalency between the
    disgusting acts which took place inside that compound in Waco and the
    efforts that law enforcement officers made to enforce the law and
    protect the lives of innocent people. There is no moral equivalency.
    That is the point that has to be hammered home over and over. It is
    irresponsible for people in elected positions to suggest that the police
    are some sort of armed bureaucracy acting on private grudges and hidden
    agendas. That is wrong. It's inaccurate, and people who suggest that
    ought to be ashamed of themselves.
        People in law enforcement make mistakes. There are all kinds of
    people in law enforcement, just like there are all kinds of people in
    any endeavor, and all people, the last time I checked, were imperfect.
    When people make mistakes, they ought to be held accountable and
    appropriate action ought to be taken.
        I said yesterday, I am appalled by what happened at that gathering
    in Tennessee. We're going to find the facts. We're going to take
    appropriate action. But that is a very different thing from suggesting
    that there is some sort of equivalency between what the law enforcement
    officers tried to do at Waco and the kind of things that were going on
    in that compound. And this country needs to be able to make that
    distinction and not to forget it.
        In Oklahoma City, after the terrible bombing, Americans were wearing
    a T-shirt--I've got a copy of it here that was given to me, and I'd
    never seen this before. But this T-shirt shows all the different things
    that Federal law enforcement officials do and mentions all the different
    agencies and has the following quote on it, ``A society that makes war
    against its police had better learn to make friends with criminals.''
    That's a fact.
        We need to be accountable. We need to get all the facts out. If we
    make a mistake, we need to correct it. But we must not make war against
    police. And we must not confuse making mistakes with the moral
    equivalency of what decent people are doing to protect the citizens of
    this country with the awful things that happened in that compound at
    Waco.
        Thank you.

    Note: The President spoke at 12:12 p.m. in the Blair House. In his
    remarks, he referred to Eljay Bowron, Director, U.S. Secret Service.