    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1996, Book II)]
    [October 25, 1996]
    [Pages 1926-1930]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Teleconference Remarks to Religious and Community Leaders in Atlanta
    October 25, 1996

        Thank you very much, my good and longtime friend Andrew Young. And I
    want to thank all of those who are gathered here at Paschal's in
    Atlanta. We have a good crowd of folks here. I know we've got about 300
    ministers and 600 elected officials from across the country. We've got
    people in homes and churches and church conferences.
        I'm glad to be joined here by two of my good friends and associates,
    Alexis Herman, who is the Special Assistant to the President for Public
    Liaison at the White House, and Carol Willis, who is with the Democratic
    National Committee, who helped to put this phone call together.
        I know that Mayor Cleaver is on the phone; Congressman Donald Payne,
    the chairman of

    [[Page 1927]]

    the Congressional Black Caucus; Congressman and Reverend Floyd Flake, my
    longtime friend and one of my earliest supporters; our campaign
    cochairs, Alma Brown and Congressman John Lewis, who was just with me at
    this rally in Atlanta. And I understand that Reverend Henry Lyons, the
    president of the National Baptist Convention, is on the phone, and I
    want to thank you, Reverend Lyons, for your efforts to restore calm in
    the aftermath of last night's unfortunate events in St. Petersburg. We
    all have a responsibility to foster a climate of reconciliation and
    peace and to address the underlying causes of this outbreak of violence
    as well, and I thank you for what you're doing there in St. Petersburg;
    it's important to all of us in America.
        And I want to say a word of recognition to Bishop Chandler Owens of
    the Church of God in Christ and to others in that congregation. Let me
    say one of the oldest and most distinguished pastors of the Church of
    God in Christ, from my home State of Arkansas, passed away the day
    before yesterday, Elder Famous Smith, and I want to extend my sympathies
    to all of you who knew him.
        We just have a few days to go in this election. We just had a great
    rally in Atlanta. We had several thousand people there, and we focused
    on young people and their future. I talked about my plans to open the
    doors of college education to all Americans. I also challenged these
    young people to take some time to serve in their communities, especially
    to teach young children to read.
        And I guess that I'd like to begin by saying I ran for President not
    only to enact certain policies that I think are important for the 21st
    century--to give us a strong economy, a clean environment, the world's
    best educational system, a way of dealing with the problems abroad to
    make America safer and more secure, and a way of driving down the crime
    rate and the violence rate here at home--I had certain policies I wanted
    to implement, but I also wanted to change the way our country was
    working.
        Politics for so long in America has been about dividing people, and
    at the national level especially, the whole rhetoric, the language that
    you use, the labels that are put on people, always about dividing us one
    from another, whereas that's not the way we run anything else. Those of
    you that are listening to me, you couldn't run a church that way.
    Atlanta couldn't have put on the Olympics that way. We're having a
    brilliant Major League World Series; if all of a sudden one of the teams
    starts calling their own team members names in public, they're not going
    to win. I tell you, whichever team does that, the other team is going to
    win. And so our national politics had gotten to the point where we were
    running it the way we wouldn't run our families, our businesses, our
    churches, our common community endeavors.
        Yesterday I was in the town of Lake Charles, Louisiana--has a very
    dynamic young woman mayor named Willie Mount. And she got the community,
    which is a very biracial and increasingly multiethnic community, to
    adopt the slogan of ``moving forward together.'' Atlanta now, I think,
    is one of the, literally, the urban centers of the world because 40
    years ago it became the city too busy to hate. And yet, national
    politics was dominated essentially by negative political ads and name-
    calling. And we changed all that.
        I wanted to have an administration that looked like America and an
    administration that worked more like the other things that work in
    America. And one of the reasons I spend so much time on community
    colleges and one reason I try to open the doors of college to every
    American, to make sure every person would be guaranteed at least 2 years
    of education after high school is that I think our country ought to work
    more the way these community colleges do. If you go to one, they're not
    bureaucratic; they're flexible; they're changing all the time. They have
    to meet high standards of performance or they go broke. Everybody that
    graduates from them gets hired. And they're open to everybody, and
    everybody is treated the same. That's what I'm trying to do for America.
        So I'm proud of the results we've achieved. It's not only true that
    the overall economy is better, but we have, according to the Government
    statistics from the Census Bureau just last month, the biggest decline
    in inequality among working people in 27 years, the biggest drop in
    child poverty in 20 years, the biggest drop in poverty among female head
    of households in 30 years, and the lowest overall poverty rate among
    African-Americans and American senior citizens ever recorded.
        Now, African-Americans have had a higher increase in their average
    earnings in the last 2 years, even in the overall economy. And things

    [[Page 1928]]

    like homeownership, which is at a 15-year high overall, are much up
    among African-Americans. The Small Business Administration has doubled
    its loans overall and tripled its loans to women and minorities. And we
    haven't been making loans that violate our standards of quality. We're
    just outreaching, working hard, trying to move this country together and
    move this country forward.
        I'm sure most of you on this phone call know we have appointed more
    African-Americans to important positions in the Cabinet and the White
    House, in the administration, on the Federal bench than any other
    administration in history by a good long ways. And yet, I'm proud of the
    fact that my Federal judges, even though there have been more women and
    minority appointments by far than any previous administration, the
    American Bar Association has given higher ratings to my Federal judges
    than any other President since the rating system began, which proves we
    can have excellence and diversity, which proves you can have affirmative
    action and equal opportunity and high standards.
        When we were fighting for the battle over affirmative action, the
    battle which still rages in our country, and it became all the rage to
    just say, ``Let's get rid of it,'' I said, ``No, we ought to mend it,
    not end it.'' And I believe my view is beginning to prevail in the world
    and in the United States.
        I was in Houston the other day, which is hardly a bastion of
    strength for the Democratic Party. And the mayor there, who is a very
    talented mayor, explicitly, forthrightly, and aggressively defended the
    city's affirmative action policy and still won support for reelection
    from over 80 percent of the people in his city. And so I think our
    ``mend it, not end it'' policy in the end will prevail.
        I believe that the economic efforts we have made are important. You
    know, our campaign became the first campaign ever to invest some of the
    money that we have to save--that we get from the taxpayers and we have
    to save to pay bills and make up for any mistakes that have been made
    and make sure all the accounting is right--Peter Knight, our campaign
    chairman, announced that we were going to deposit millions of dollars in
    four leading minority banks in America. No campaign had ever done this--
    two African-American banks, including the Citizens Trust here in
    Atlanta, and two Hispanic banks--and I'm proud of that.
        The empowerment zones that we created and the enterprise communities
    we created, and the community development banks that we created,
    including one worth almost $500 million in Los Angeles, these are
    beginning to loan money to people and to create jobs. In Detroit, under
    the leadership of Mayor Archer--when I took office, the Detroit
    unemployment rate was nearly 9 percent. Today, the unemployment rate in
    Detroit is 4\1/2\ percent. The empowerment zone has generated $2 billion
    in private sector capital.
        So we can turn our cities around. In virtually every city in the
    country there has been a big drop in the violent crime rate as we put
    more police officers on the street and adopt strategies to prevent crime
    from happening in the first place.
        So I believe we're moving in the right direction there. We still
    have a lot of challenges in the future, and I'd just like to mention two
    or three, if I might, that you can play a particular role in.
        Our young people are still faced with a lot of challenges. And you
    know that as well as I do. If anyone had told me 4 years ago we could
    bring the violent crime rate in America down 4 years in a row to a 10-
    year low, but we just barely make a dent in crime among young people,
    people under 18, I would have had a hard time believing that. If anyone
    had told me 4 years ago our efforts would stem a lot of the flow of
    drugs into America, we'd have a 30 percent decline in cocaine use and a
    13 percent decline in overall casual drug use among adults, especially
    young adults, but drug use would go up among children under 18, I would
    have had a hard time believing that. So we've got some challenges to
    meet there, and let me just make some suggestions.
        First of all, we should do no harm; we should keep doing what we've
    been doing, getting that message out in our churches and in our schools
    that drugs are illegal and wrong and can kill you. We definitely should
    not do what the other side wants to do, which is to cut the safe and
    drug-free schools program. We need more things for our children to say
    yes to. We shouldn't cut our school programs that--we're giving funds
    now to schools to stay open after school so kids will have something
    else to do. We're trying to help our cities start things like sports
    leagues to give kids positive things to be involved in, to increase
    recreational opportunities.

    [[Page 1929]]

        And so the fight I had with folks in the other party when they
    wanted to cut out the summer job program or cut back on the safe and
    drug-free schools program and undermine that is that I just don't think
    you can punish these children into obedience. I think we have to lead
    them into a good, harmonious, positive life. If somebody does something
    terrible and they need to be punished and put in jail, fine, let's do
    that. But first we have to try to give them a chance to have a better
    life.
        And let me just say one other thing. Last week, I asked our young
    people to make a little sacrifice to serve our country, and I hope you
    will help me sell it, because I know a lot of them won't like it. But
    it's important to point out that 90 percent of our children are still
    drug-free. Ninety percent of these kids are out there doing the right
    thing, trying to be good citizens. But still, to have 10 percent, or
    nearly 11 now, having experimented with drugs is too many, when we had
    it down to about 5\1/2\ or 6 percent just a few years ago.
        And so I think that we ought to make a drug test a part, a regular
    part, of getting a driver's license. Now, we know that for 90 percent of
    the kids, they don't need it, but if they'll do that and be responsible
    and help us, how many of these other children are we going to be able to
    find and save before they get in serious trouble and before it's too
    late? I think this is very important.
        And the last point I'd like to make is this: We have to keep growing
    the economy, and we have to keep moving people into work, and we have to
    do it in the right way. In the last 4 years, I'm very proud of the fact
    that we've moved about 2 million people from welfare to work and we've
    increased child support collections by almost 50 percent, right at $4
    billion a year.
        The welfare reform bill poses a special challenge to all of us, but
    it also give us a terrific opportunity. Because what it says is, we'll
    keep paying for the health care and the food for poor families as a
    national guarantee for all poor families. If someone moves from welfare
    to work we will spend more on child care than ever before. But that
    portion of the Federal Government's money that used to go to the welfare
    check will now go to States and by extension, the local communities. And
    everybody will have 2 years to figure out how to turn that welfare check
    into a paycheck.
        Now, this is a terrific opportunity for us. And let me give you an
    example--Mayor Cleaver is on the phone here--in Kansas City 2 years ago
    we gave them the chance to do something I've been begging every State in
    America to do. We gave them all the welfare funds, and we said that you
    could have permission to give employers a welfare check as a wage
    supplement for up to 4 years if they will hire people off welfare in
    creating new jobs, not replacing people. And we'll guarantee that
    they'll be able to keep their Medicaid for several years if they go to
    work in a business that doesn't give health insurance.
        Almost immediately hundreds of people got jobs. And businesses that
    never thought they would even consider hiring anybody off welfare before
    did it and could afford to help train the people because they were
    getting the welfare check as a wage supplement.
        Now, I want to challenge all the pastors here--you can think about
    that, if that option were given to you, you might be able to do such a
    thing as that. You might be able to add to the church staff if the local
    folks would give you the welfare check and say, ``Here is the welfare
    check; this is the premium we're paying you to train folks, to see after
    their kids, and make sure they're all right and they're going into the
    future.''
        We can do this. This is the right way to do it. We're going to give
    special targeted tax credits to private sector businesses to do the same
    thing. This is the right way to do it. We don't have the ability to have
    a big Government public works job, and we want all these families to be
    brought into the mainstream. They need homes and neighborhoods and
    support systems. And we can do this.
        Now, all of this depends upon this election. And that's the last
    thing I want to say. Your vote will decide this election. But whether
    you vote will also decide this election. And I can do a pretty good job
    of saying no if I have to. I've shown that I know how to sign that veto
    pen pretty good.
        But we also want to say yes to America--to a new direction, to keep
    this economy growing, to keep preserving the environment, to clean up
    these toxic waste sites in our cities so our children will be growing up
    next to parks, not poison, to continue to expand health care coverage to
    people when they're unemployed for 6 months, to expand coverage to a
    million

    [[Page 1930]]

    more children--all this is in my balanced budget plan--to provide
    mammograms to women who are on Medicare, to help families care for a
    member who has Alzheimer's, to give them a little time off. All this is
    in our balanced budget plan--to open the doors of college education to
    all. All these things require affirmative steps to move America forward.
        And you can look at these races all across America, and you can
    look--a lot of States in the Presidential race are very close, and the
    outcome will be determined by the turnout.
        Don't be fooled by the polls. In the first place, the polls don't
    count much in Presidential elections; it's who wins the largest number
    of States. You know, I could win one State by two to one and Senator
    Dole could win two States by one vote, and I'd have lots more votes, and
    he'd have more electoral votes.
        And let me tell you, that's not an accident. We've had two times in
    American history where the person with the most votes lost the White
    House. This turnout question is not an academic question. Twice already
    in American history, the President--the person that ran for President,
    got the most votes, actually lost the White House. The choice of the
    people didn't serve. The choice of the States served. We still have the
    system we started with.
        We won Georgia in 1992 by eight-tenths of one percent. The last poll
    had us 6 percent ahead on Saturday night before the election. And you
    may remember, I came here, and Senator Nunn and Governor Miller and Hank
    Aaron and I did a rally in a stadium outside Atlanta. We had over 25,000
    people there. But on election day--and the 6-point poll was right, but
    on election day they showed up in higher numbers than we did. That's
    what happened. We won New Jersey by one percentage point. We won Ohio by
    2 percentage points. And I could go on and on and on and on.
        So in the President's race, in the Senate races, in the House races,
    in the governorships, it's not--the choice people make for their future
    is not just for whom they vote, but it's whether they vote.
        Now, you know what to do. You know how to do it. I think every one
    of you listening to me today understands the profound historic
    significance of this vote.
        But I just sit here--I'm in Georgia today, we just left this rally,
    so I'm thinking especially about Max Cleland. It's hard to imagine an
    American serving in public life today who sacrificed more for his
    country than Max Cleland, a man who nearly gave his life, gave up three
    of his limbs to serve America in the war in Vietnam. But he's still out
    there with a smile on his face, a song in his heart, trying to serve the
    public--being attacked as being too liberal? Is he? I don't think so.
        It's just that his idea of sacrifice is not taking Head Start away
    from children or telling people they can't have a college loan or
    telling young people who live in poor inner-city neighborhoods they have
    to go on living by their toxic waste dumps because we're going to cut
    environmental enforcement and environmental protection. His idea of
    service is helping other people to make the most of their own lives so
    that the sacrifice he made so many years ago is for the America of his
    dreams. And that's why I so--I want Max Cleland to win. He is a
    remarkable man. I've known him many, many years. He's a wonderful man.
        It all depends on the turnout. So I ask you all to think about that.
    Do what you can. You know what to do. You know how to do it. And if we
    all show up, we'll have a real celebration on November 5th.
        Thank you.

    Note: The President spoke at 2:05 p.m. from Paschal's Restaurant. In his
    remarks, he referred to former United Nations Ambassador Andrew Young;
    Carol Willis, senior adviser to the chair, Democratic National
    Committee; Mayor Emanuel Cleaver II of Kansas City, MO; Alma Brown,
    national cochair, and Peter Knight, campaign manager, Clinton/Gore '96;
    Bishop Chandler Owens, presiding bishop, Church of God in Christ; Mayor
    Bob Lanier of Houston, TX; Mayor Dennis W. Archer of Detroit, MI; Gov.
    Zell Miller of Georgia; former Major League baseball player Hank Aaron;
    and Max Cleland, Georgia senatorial candidate.