[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1996, Book II)]
[November 6, 1996]
[Pages 2085-2086]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



[[Page 2085]]


Remarks at a White House Victory Celebration
November 6, 1996

    Thank you very much. Thank you. Well, you know, I really appreciate 
that lesson in history from the Vice President. [Laughter] I'll tell you 
one thing--you remember what John Nance Garner said about the Vice 
Presidency; he said it wasn't worth a warm--what--kettle of spit, or 
something like that. [Laughter] That's before Al Gore got ahold of it. 
Nobody will ever say that again--ever, ever, ever say that again.
    And just for your information, George Clinton of New York, doubtless 
a relative of mine--[laughter]--the only man in America ever to be the 
Governor of a State in excess of 20 years--he served for 21 years as 
Governor of New York. He served 4 years and then laid out and served 17 
years, until he became Vice President. And that's a pretty good record. 
[Laughter] It just sort of runs in the family, you know. [Laughter]
    I want to tell you all--first to the White House staff and to all 
the appointees who are here; to the members of the Clinton/Gore 
campaign, from our wonderful campaign manager, Peter Knight, on down; 
and to the members of--the people who work for our Democratic Party 
campaign. I want to say a special word of thanks to Don Fowler and Chris 
Dodd; they did a wonderful job, all the people at the party. To our 
terrific Cabinet over here on the left--you know, they've labored for 4 
years to uphold the dignity of our Government, and they sort of changed 
their image today. [Laughter] That picture of Warren Christopher in that 
T-shirt gets out--[laughter]--he'll be on Letterman and Leno within 48 
hours. I thank you all so much.
    Last night I had a chance to do something really quite wonderful for 
me. I was able to have a meeting with--when I was home in Arkansas--with 
everybody who ever worked for me there--at least we invited them all--
the people who worked for me 20 years ago when I was attorney general, 
the people who worked for me during all my five terms as Governor. And I 
told them something I want to tell you; that is, I have always been a 
very hard-working, kind of hard-driving person. I'm always focused on 
the matter before me. Sometimes I don't say thank you enough. And I've 
always been kind hard on myself, and sometimes I think just by omission 
I'm too hard on the people who work here.
    You have accomplished a phenomenal amount in the last 4 years, and 
you have proved that even in this vast country of ours, where the 
Government is only one part of our national partnership and billions 
upon billions of decisions are made every day by people who are not in 
our Government--thank goodness we are primarily a country of free 
individuals with a free enterprise system--but you have proved again 
something that was clearly in doubt in 1992 at election time. You have 
proved that with disciplined, sustained, focused effort, America can be 
changed for the better.
    You have proved that our problems are not all intractable. You have 
proved that we can galvanize the energies of the American people and 
that we can, in fact, bring the deficit down--it's not a permanent 
feature of American life; we can, in fact, grow the economy on a 
sustained basis; we can, in fact, improve the education and the 
educational opportunities of our children; we can, in fact, lower the 
crime rate; and in fact, if people will help us enough in communities 
across the country, we can even help to change some of the very 
difficult cultural patterns that had begun to develop in our country 
over the last several years. You all did that.
    Very often, I get the credit for the work you do, and then when 
something goes haywire, if I make a mistake, you have to try to figure 
out how to clean it up. [Laughter] And I appreciate that. [Laughter] And 
I'm sure I'll give you other opportunities in the year ahead. [Laughter]
    I just want you to know, all of you, from the Cabinet to the staff, 
to the appointees, to all the others who are here, you should be very 
proud of this. This race was won because of the record we made and 
because of the plans we have and because we have established in the 
minds of the American people that it's more than talk with us, that we 
work at it hard every day. All of us, we work hard. And in the end 
that's what sustained us: a vision, a strategy, hard work, and success. 
And we have a lot more work to do. But when our work is done and when 
there is 8 years of sustained, disciplined

[[Page 2086]]

effort, we will have gone a long way toward preparing our country for 
this new century.
    I can't even imagine what the world is going to be like, but I try 
to imagine it all the time, 20 or 30 or 40 years from now. And we are 
lucky enough to just be here at a moment in history when it is our 
profound obligation to move the American people closer to what they 
believe by opening up new opportunities for people to live out their 
dreams, and when we have the opportunity to prove that we can actually 
reduce our problems. We have to keep working on that.
    We've got a lot to do. I talked a little about it last night. But I 
begin this new tenure with high opportunity and with renewed energy and 
with profound gratitude to the American people and to all of you. Two 
years ago, not many people thought we would be here. But I believed if 
we just kept doing the right things, kept trying to do them in the right 
way, and kept working hard and refused to be distracted by the things 
which dominate too much of our public life today, in the end the 
American people would render the right judgment.
    I am profoundly grateful for what they did last night and very, very 
grateful to all of you for making it possible.
    Thank you, and God bless you.

Note: The President spoke at 4:25 p.m. on the South Lawn at the White 
House. In his remarks, he referred to Donald L. Fowler, national 
chairman, and Senator Christopher J. Dodd, general chairman, Democratic 
National Committee.