[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1996, Book II)]
[November 21, 1996]
[Pages 2139-2141]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



[[Page 2139]]


Remarks in Sydney, Australia
November 21, 1996

    Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you, Prime Minister. Thank 
you, Premier Carr. Mr. Lord Mayor, Mrs. Howard, Mrs. Carr. Andrew Hoy, 
thank you very much for reminding us how you defeated us in Atlanta--
[laughter]--and thank you for what you said about the Olympics.
    Premier, you invited me to come back in the year 2000 to the 
Olympics. I have to make full disclosure--this morning when I woke up, 
the very first thing Hillary said to me was, ``Now, in 2000, I think you 
ought to make me your official representative to the Olympics in 
Sydney,'' which means I suppose I'll have to come back as her valet if I 
wish to come. [Laughter] But I've had such a good time here, I'd like to 
come back in any capacity.
    I thank you all very much for your hospitality. It's a great 
privilege for me to stand here in Sydney Harbor, to be in these 
beautiful botanical gardens, where I had the privilege this morning to 
go on my morning run right by this site; to see the magnificent opera 
house, where I had the chance to tour on an impromptu basis this 
morning. A wonderful and surprised guard even took me up to the organ, 
and I virtually got to count all 10,500 pipes. [Laughter] This is a 
magnificent place. I'm also glad to be here in the shadow of Harbor 
Bridge. If any of you followed our campaign at all, you know I'm kind of 
into bridges this year. [Laughter] And I think that that's a bridge that 
will take you into the 21st century in good shape.
    As the Prime Minister and the Premier have said, Americans have 
visited Sydney and felt welcome for a long time. You might be interested 
to know that almost exactly 100 years ago, our great American writer 
Mark Twain came to Australia. Now, Mark Twain is famous for many things, 
his great books ``Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court,'' ``Tom 
Sawyer,'' ``Huckleberry Finn,'' all those books, but those of us in 
public life in America appreciate him because he was always puncturing 
the pompous and always reminding people that they should have a very 
sort of philosophical and good-humored attitude about their troubles in 
life.
    And we got to talking about Mark Twain last night in this very 
harbor, and I told the Prime Minister--I said, ``Prime Minister, you're 
riding high now, but the first time you get in trouble remember what 
Mark Twain said about dogs. Mark Twain said, `Every dog should have a 
few fleas; keeps them from worrying so much about being a dog.' '' 
[Laughter] Now, whenever I complain at home, that's what my staff tells 
me. Just once I'd like to be a flea instead of a dog, though, in this 
business. [Laughter]
    Anyway, Mark Twain came here almost 100 years ago, and I found out 
something that I did not know until we decided to make this trip. Like 
all of us, he was struck by what he said was ``the lavish hospitality of 
Sydney's people.'' He liked the warmth of Sydney in every way. But he 
said that Sydney reminded him, more than any other place, of one 
particular town in America, which was exactly as far north of the 
Equator as Sydney is south of it, my hometown, Little Rock, Arkansas. 
Interesting. Except Sydney got the better of the comparison--
[laughter]--because while he said they were a lot alike and the people 
were very friendly, Sydney was better because it didn't have Little 
Rock's cold winters. He wrote, ``You could cut up an Arkansas winter 
into a hundred Sydney winters and still have enough left for Arkansas 
and all the poor.'' Well, that's another reason for me to come back in 
Sydney's winter, to see if it's true.
    This is a remarkable community and a remarkable nation. In this new 
global culture that we're all experiencing, Australia's contribution has 
been far out of proportion to its population in modern art, in learning, 
in music, in theater, in opera, in the cinema; the novels of Patrick 
White, Thomas Keneally, David Malouf; the paintings of Sidney Nolan, 
Russell Drysdale, Utopia artists; the films of Baz Luhrmann, Peter Weir, 
and so many others; and according to the young people in my group, bands 
like Midnight Oil and Silverchair; Dame Joan Sutherland; and great jazz 
musicians. I want to thank you, Prime Minister, for making it possible 
for me to hear James Morrison and Grace Knight yesterday. They were 
magnificent. Thank you very much.
    I'm glad to stand here today with Andrew Hoy, who did lead your 
remarkable team to

[[Page 2140]]

its remarkable showing in the centennial Olympics in Atlanta. His own 
gold medal performance, repeating his victory in Barcelona, were one of 
the things that made the games such a great success. And I am very 
pleased that at the dawn of our new century, the Olympic torch will 
arrive here in Sydney. We know the Olympics will be an enormous success 
for Sydney, just as they were for Atlanta.
    The Olympics have captured the imagination and the heart of people 
everywhere. I have thought a lot about why, maybe because we all love 
athletics and maybe because we all love competition, but I think there's 
more to it than that. And there's something I hope you will be able to 
play upon here in Sydney because you're perfectly positioned to do it. I 
think people yearn for the Olympics today because they work pretty much 
the way we think the world should work. There are rules and everybody 
follows them, and everybody has a chance to play without regard to their 
race or gender or where they start out in life, and people are valued 
based on their performance and their effort.
    Even those who do not win medals--and most of the people who will 
come to Sydney won't come close to winning a medal--but everybody gets a 
chance to do his or her best, to reach down deep inside, and everybody's 
better off for having tried. Unlike so many other human endeavors, 
including the field of politics, no one wins by tripping his or her 
opponent up in the competition or standing before a microphone and bad-
mouthing the other side. You only win by playing by the rules and doing 
well. And I think the world should work more that way.
    When the world comes to Sydney for the Olympics, either literally or 
over the electronic media, they'll have a chance to see a city and a 
nation struggling to meet that ideal. We have a chance on the verge of 
this new century to make it possible for more people than ever in human 
history to live out their dreams and to live up to their God-given 
potential.
    This city has people who traced their origins to more than 140 
different nations. There are only 197 different national groups 
represented in the Olympics. In our largest county, Los Angeles County, 
we have people from over 150 of those groups. We're becoming an 
increasingly interconnected world. Australia has a higher percentage of 
immigrants who came here and built decent lives and strengthened your 
country through hard work than almost any other country on Earth.
    When you drive down the streets of Sydney tonight and you look at 
all these different people making a contribution to your country, think 
with sadness but prayerful hope about all the people who live around the 
world who are still being persecuted because they are different from 
their neighbors, because they have different religious views or they're 
from different racial or ethnic or tribal groups.
    Think of the terrible spectacle we have seen in Africa just in the 
last few days, hundreds of thousands of refugees trooping back and forth 
looking for a safe place to spend the night, parents losing their 
children along the way, just because they're in different tribes. And to 
those of us of untrained eyes who have never been there, they look the 
same as those who carry guns and would oppress them.
    Think of what it's like in the Holy Land, for all of us who are 
either Jewish or Muslim or Christians, where people still believe they 
cannot live with one another because they worship only one God but in a 
different way.
    Think of what it is like in Bosnia, where there is literally 
biologically no difference between the Serbs, the Croats, and the 
Muslims; where they belong to different religious groups by accident of 
political history; where people killed each other's children with 
abandon after having lived for decades in peace.
    But there is a lot of evidence that we can all do better than that. 
And when the world comes to Sydney, they will see that. So think about 
that. Think about how every day in every way, when you bring in people 
who are those like me who trace their roots to England or Ireland or 
Scotland, to various Asian countries or South Asia or Latin America or 
the Middle East or Africa--every day you do that when the world is 
looking at you, you offer a rebuke to all those who would take away the 
lives and the futures and the fortunes of the children of this world 
because they are different from them.
    We somehow must find a way to let our children define themselves in 
terms of who they are, not who they are not; in terms of what they 
believe, not what someone else believes; in terms of what is good inside 
them and what can be developed into something really beautiful, instead 
of what can be developed in terms of hatred, so they can know that 
they're better

[[Page 2141]]

than somebody else who's different from them. That is the single great 
challenge that is keeping us from making the 21st century the era of 
greatest possibility in human history. And I cannot think of a better 
place in the entire world, a more shining example of how people can come 
together as one nation and one community than Sydney, Australia.
    I'm so grateful that you'll be here for the Olympics in 2000. I want 
you to know that the world is looking to you. And I also want you to 
know that America will keep looking to you. The Prime Minister mentioned 
our comradeship in World War I, the first time our soldiers ever fought 
together. The Australians had been in combat for more than 3 years when 
America's troops first went to France. And one of them asked the 
Americans, ``Are you going to win the war for us?'' The American 
answered, ``Well, I hope we'll fight like the Australians.'' Ever since 
then the spirit of Australia has been renowned in America. We respect 
it, and we love working with you.
    Again let me say, as I did in Canberra yesterday, the United States 
and people all over the world are especially in your debt for your 
determination to end nuclear explosions on Earth and your leadership in 
helping us to complete the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
    We are in your debt for setting a standard of caring about people 
beyond your shores. Time and again you have sent peacekeepers into 
harm's way to end bloodshed: Rwanda, Haiti, Somalia, Cambodia. Almost 
two-thirds of all the United Nations peacekeeping missions have had 
Australian troops. Whenever the troubled places of the Earth call out, 
Australia has always been there to help. Throughout the Asia-Pacific 
region and the entire world, you are seen as a beacon of strength and 
freedom and democracy.
    Today, when for the first time in history more than half the world's 
people actually are ruled by governments of their own choosing, we know 
it is the powerful example of Australia and other freedom-loving peoples 
that made it possible. Today, more people will live lives of dignity and 
peace because of the work that Australia has done in the historic 
struggle for freedom.
    So let me say again, I have had a wonderful time here. I have 
enjoyed it immensely. I am about to go try to survive a golf game with 
your most famous golfer. But more than anything else, on behalf of all 
the American people, I want to thank you for what you have done and been 
for the United States and the world together. And I want to wish you 
well as we work through this 21st century together. And I want to ask 
you to remember again when the Olympics comes here, if you can live by 
the rules which govern the Olympics and show that light to the world, it 
will stand as a beacon of hope for all that everyone who lives on the 
face of the Earth can become in this great new century. And that can be 
the enduring legacy of Sydney in the year 2000.
    Thank you. God bless you. God bless Australia and the United States.

Note: The President spoke at 2 p.m. at the Royal Botanical Gardens. In 
his remarks, he referred to Prime Minister John Howard of Australia and 
his wife, Janette; Premier Bob Carr of New South Wales and his wife, 
Helena; Lord Mayor Frank Sartor of Sydney; Andrew Hoy, equestrian 
Olympic Gold Medalist; and professional golfer Greg Norman.