[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1995, Book II)]
[December 19, 1995]
[Pages 1908-1910]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



[[Page 1908]]


Remarks on Vetoing the Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, the 
Judiciary, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 1996, and an 
Exchange With Reporters
December 19, 1995

    The President. Good afternoon. I'm delighted to be joined by these 
police officers and by the Attorney General and Secretary Brown and the 
mayors of Chicago and Philadelphia and representatives of law 
enforcement who are here today.
    For yet another day, the Republican Congress continues to keep our 
Government closed. Shortly, I will meet with Senator Dole and Speaker 
Gingrich. I hope we can resolve the situation and give the American 
people their Government back by Christmas.
    We also should give them a balanced budget that reflects our values 
of opportunity for all, respecting our duty to our parents and our 
children, building strong communities and a strong America.
    There is no value more basic than keeping our children safe. 
Unfortunately, the bill that the Congress passed to fund the Justice, 
Commerce, and State Departments failed to fulfill that essential 
obligation.
    Last year, with the support of Members of both parties in Congress, 
I signed a crime bill into law. The key to that crime bill was our 
effort to put 100,000 new police officers on the street because we had 
clear, hard evidence that more police officers in community policing 
would actually lower the crime rate not only by catching more criminals 
but by preventing crime. Today we are awarding 5,500 police officers to 
communities all across America. That brings the grand total in less than 
15 months to 31,000 new police officers for America's streets, almost a 
third of the 5-year total.
    Everywhere I go, mayors and police chiefs and sheriffs tell me that 
community policing is helping them to fight crime and lower the crime 
rate. And the tide is turning. Yesterday, the FBI reported that the 
murder rate has dropped 12 percent in the last year. That's the largest 
decline in the murder rate since the FBI started keeping statistics 35 
years ago. Violent crime is down 5 percent overall from last year's 
rate. We are turning the tide. We are beginning to win the fight against 
crime. This is no time to turn back the clock.
    The crime bill is working because it provides funds for police 
officers directly to police departments. Unfortunately, this bill 
replaces this initiative which is guaranteed to put 100,000 police on 
the street with a block grant that has no guarantees at all. The bill 
that is before me does not guarantee that even one more police officer 
will be put on our streets, not one.
    I gave my word in 1992 that I would work for 100,000 more police 
officers on the street. In 1994, when I signed that bill into law, it 
represented a solemn commitment by the United States Government that we 
would put 100,000 more police officers on the street. I intend to keep 
my word.
    That is not the only reason I am vetoing this bill. Looking out for 
our families and our children is essential, and to do that, we have to 
look out for our future. The dawn of the information age is no time to 
turn out the lights on our research laboratories and our technology 
centers. But the Republican budget could cut nondefense research and 
development by as much as one-third over the next 7 years.
    America thrives because we create opportunities for our children to 
create a better future. In this era of rapid technological change, we 
will only pass opportunity on to our children if we take advantage of 
American ingenuity and innovation. No business in the world today facing 
the pressures of the 21st century would gut its investment in research 
and technology, and no country should either.
    The Japanese are in the midst of a serious recession. Yet their 
government just announced plans to double the Japanese research budget 
over the next 5 years. We have the lowest combined rates of unemployment 
and inflation in 27 years, and I do not intend to preside over a 
decision by Congress to cut our investment in research and technology by 
a third.
    Look at the people who are winning the Nobel Prizes and see how many 
of them got Government-funded research. Look at the research that has 
been funded by our Government agencies over the last several years in 
new technologies, in new developments, and see the con-


[[Page 1909]]

tribution that is made here. America has the strongest economy in the 
world in large measure because we are leading the race to the technology 
age. And I don't believe we should drop out of the race on the edge of a 
new century.
    Of course, we have to balance the budget, but we don't need to do it 
by cutting back on police officers and risking our safety. We don't need 
to do it by slashing our research in science and technology and risking 
our future. Remember, balancing the budget is more important to our 
children than anything else. It's lifting the burden of future debt off 
our children. We don't want to impose on our children a restricted 
future by making them less safe today and less secure in terms of 
economic opportunity tomorrow.
    There is one last thing I'd like to say. Eight months ago today, 
terror visited our children in Oklahoma City. The memory of that awful 
tragedy will be with us forever. Just yesterday, law enforcement 
officers found a bomb outside a Federal office building in Reno, Nevada. 
In the weeks after Oklahoma City, I sent to the Congress a bill to give 
law enforcement the tools they need to crack down on terrorism and to 
protect our families--terrorism arising from within the United States, 
terrorism coming from beyond our borders.
    The Senate passed the bill last June with sweeping bipartisan 
support. But a few people with extreme views have prevented the House of 
Representatives from even considering the bill. They have held it up 
long enough. Here in this time of peace for our country, I ask all 
Americans to remember the victims of Oklahoma City, and I ask the 
Congress to give law enforcement the tools they need to be truly peace 
officers.
    When they send me a bill that protects our families by keeping our 
promise to put 100,000 police officers on the street, they should also 
protect our families by keeping their promise to send us a strong 
antiterrorism bill.
    Thank you.

[At this point, the President signed the veto message.]

    Q. Mr. President, are your numbers on Medicare and Medicaid savings 
negotiable?
    The President. You know what I said yesterday; I said--I carry this 
little statement around with me. This is the agreement I made with the 
Congress when we reopened the Government. The agreement says that we 
will enact legislation to balance the budget in 7 years, protecting 
Medicare, Medicaid, education, the environment, and other things, and 
that the agreement we finally make must be scored by the Congressional 
Budget Office as bringing the budget into balance. What is not 
negotiable with me is that we must protect these things. I have proposed 
savings in Medicare and Medicaid that are considerable but that will 
protect both the integrity of the programs and the interest of the 
people who depend upon Medicare and Medicaid.
    So what I said to the Speaker and to Senator Dole yesterday was if 
they wanted me to put down a 7-year budget on the front end, I expected 
them to respond to the second part of this resolution. This is not a 
resolution about just any old 7-year budget. This 7-year budget has all 
these things that we all agreed to to protect, and Medicare and Medicaid 
are at the top of that list.
    Q. Can you protect Medicare and Medicaid with----
    Q. ----seven years protecting all these things, including the things 
the Republicans added to it?
    The President. Well, it depends on a lot of other variables. That's 
why--we were negotiating in good faith at the time they called the 
negotiations off last week, apparently because of the group in the House 
that has been controlling a lot of the decisions here for the last 
several months. We have put forward more than twice as many policy 
changes as they had in a good-faith effort to reach agreement.
    The answer to your question is, yes, we could pass a 7-year budget 
that protects Medicare and Medicaid, education and the environment, and 
that does not--and our research and technology budget--and does not 
raise taxes on working families and that has great credibility in the 
financial markets. We can do that. If that is what the Congress wants to 
do, we can do it.
    If instead the balanced budget is a cover for making war on the 
ability of the National Government to protect our common interest and to 
move us ahead, then I can't go along with that. But of course we can do 
it. And I hope that after this meeting I'm going to have in a few 
minutes, we'll be closer to doing it.
    Q. Do you expect to get an agreement to reopen the Government at 
this meeting?

[[Page 1910]]

    The President. I don't know. That's up to the Congress. Only the 
Congress can shut the Government down, and only the Congress can reopen 
it. But they can certainly reopen it, and I hope they will, particularly 
this week. It's just wrong for the Federal employees, and even more for 
the American people, to have the Government close the week before 
Christmas. It is a decision they made, and they can undo it and I hope 
they will.
    Q. Do you share the concerns, Mr. President, of the financial 
markets that lack of a budget agreement may keep interest rates locked 
in place or even turn them around and head them back upward?
    The President. Well, let me say this. I think the action of the 
Federal Reserve today--although I don't want to comment on the merits of 
it one way or the other, but there's a general understanding that we 
have a--first of all, back in '93, we made some very tough decisions 
without any bipartisan support to bring the deficit down and to increase 
investment in technology and research and education and the environment, 
things that would grow the economy. Interest rates came down; billions 
of dollars were invested; there was a homebuilding boom; we got the 
economy going again.
    The fundamentals of this economy were sound. There is good growth. 
There is low inflation--I will say again, the lowest combined rates of 
inflation and unemployment in 27 years. And we have to continue on that 
track. I think the message ought to be to people who are concerned about 
that is that this deficit is going to keep coming down, regardless. 
There is too much determination for that. That is not what this debate 
is all about. The deficit will keep coming down, regardless. The 
leadership of both parties favors that.
    But we must have a 7-year balanced budget plan that reflects our 
other values. We are doing well in the world economy because the deficit 
is coming down and because the other things that are being done in the 
private sector are good and because the other things the Government is 
doing are good things. So we have to keep doing all the right things if 
we want to succeed. That's what the debate over the budget plan is 
about.
    If the markets are worried about whether the deficit is going to 
keep coming down, they should forget about that. The deficit is going to 
keep coming down, regardless.
    Thank you.

Note: The President spoke at 2:34 p.m. in the Oval Office at the White 
House.