    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1998, Book I)]
    [February 23, 1998]
    [Pages 272-275]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    Remarks at the Democratic Governors' Association Dinner
    February 23, 1998

        Thank you very much for that wonderful, wonderful welcome. Thank
    you, Governor Rossello, for your remarks and
    your leadership. It's good to see you and Maga
    here. And let me say it's a great tribute to you and to Governor
    O'Bannon and Judy O'Bannon and the other Governors here that this is the most
    successful DGA fundraiser in history. Thank you. And thank Katie Whelan and all the staff; you did a wonderful job
    tonight.
        I'm delighted to be here with all the Governors and a lot of former
    Governors who came back to see me. We all had our pictures taken
    together--ex-Governors. And I began to think about the ``ex'' thing.
    [Laughter] I don't know how many of you saw the wonderful movie
    ``Amistad,'' but it's a fabulous movie. But I went to the Washington
    premier, and I was sitting back in the audience and Anthony
    Hopkins, who is a magnificent actor, was
    portraying John Quincy Adams, who after he left the White House, served
    8 terms in the Congress, and made the argument before the Supreme Court
    in behalf of the people who were turned into slaves on the ship and
    brought over here. But when he was preparing--there's a great line in
    the movie where John Quincy Adams says of himself--he said, ``There is
    nothing in life more pathetic than a former President.'' [Laughter] So I
    got to thinking, I hope that's not true. [Laughter]

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        I like being a former Governor. I was the chairman of this group in
    1980, 18 years ago. I'm the only person who ever served as chairman of
    this group who was not yet old enough to vote. [Laughter] And that's
    because Jim Hunt made me do it.
    [Laughter].
        But for nearly 20 years now, I have followed the fortunes of the
    Democratic Governors. And I want to try to emphasize tonight one of the
    points that Governor Rossello made about the importance of the '98
    elections and why it matters what the party affiliation, but more
    importantly, what the philosophy, the values, the direction of the
    Governors is and will be as we move quickly into a new century.
        I'd like to begin with a kind of a representative issue that is
    rather unique in American public life, the issue that Governor
    Rossello's whole career embodies, that of
    Puerto Rico. This is the centennial year of Puerto Rico's affiliation
    with the United States. And I think that it is time that we responded to
    the aspirations of the 4 million U.S. citizens who live there and allow
    them to determine their ultimate political status.
        The people in Puerto Rico have local self-government, but they do
    not have votes that are fully votes in their National Government. My
    colleague, when I was a Governor, was Carlos Romero-Barcelo, who now represents Puerto Rico in the
    Congress, and he does a great job. I'm glad to see him back there.
        I have always said that the people of Puerto Rico should decide for
    themselves, and Congress ought to give them a chance to do that, what
    they want their relationship to the United States to be. There is now a
    bipartisan bill making its way through the Congress to establish a
    process for resolving this issue that gives Puerto Ricans the powers to
    vote on the long-discussed options of statehood, commonwealth, or
    national sovereignty, independent or linked with the United States.
        Some people question the option of statehood because of the Hispanic
    culture of Puerto Rico. And with all respect, I disagree with them.
    After all, this is an issue for the 21st century for America.
        Consider the history: We have made Puerto Ricans citizens. We have
    drafted them into the Armed Forces. We extend most laws to them,
    especially those that are convenient to us--the rest of us. To use their
    culture, to bar them from voting rights or responsibilities in our
    country if they so choose to seek them by majority vote is wrong. And
    this is not primarily about Puerto Rico, but about the rest of us. What
    are our values? What is our culture? How can we make one America in a
    world and a nation ever more diverse? We have to begin by saying, ``It
    doesn't matter what your ethnic or racial or religious heritage is; it
    matters only if you embrace the ideas of the Founders as embodied in the
    Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Bill of Rights.
        I say that because I think tonight I want to bring you back to first
    principles. I've spent a lot of time over the last--well, going back to
    at least to 1984 trying to modernize the Democratic Party, trying to get
    rid of all the things that people used to be able to say about us that
    would keep us from winning the White House, that would keep us in an
    almost defensive position constantly in the national political debate. I
    have constantly argued that we had to go beyond the debate that
    paralyzed Washington in the 1980's between those who said Government was
    the problem and those who said Government was the solution, to embrace
    nationally a philosophy that was embedded in the work of every
    Democratic Governor I ever worked with, going back to the 1970's--the
    belief that Government ought to be no bigger than necessary, ought to be
    as little inefficiency, and ought to be as little bureaucracy in the
    Government as possible, but that Government should be progressive,
    should be committed to being a good partner, should be a catalyst for
    new ideas at work, and most important of all, should be absolutely
    unequivocally committed to giving people the tools they need to make the
    most of their own lives and to making sure everyone had a fair chance at
    their version of the American dream.
        So I spent a lot of time on that, and I think there's a lot of
    evidence that it works. The Government is the smallest it's been since
    President Kennedy was here, but we have done more to open the doors of
    college to all Americans, for example, than ever before. We are making
    the biggest investment in child health in a generation, as Governor
    Rossello said. My present balanced budget has the largest effort to
    improve kindergarten through 12th grade education in the history of the
    Republic. So I spent a lot of time talking about how we have modernized
    our party and how there is a third way that broke the logjam of the
    eighties. But what I

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    want to say to you tonight is--the most important thing is, all
    modernizing our party did was to give us a way of being true to the
    oldest ideals of both our party and our Nation.
        Who came here and why in the beginning? A bunch of folks came here
    who had suffered all kinds of persecution, political persecution,
    religious persecution. And what did they want to do? They wanted to be
    rid of the arbitrary, abusive exercise of unlimited power by people in
    Government. Why? Because they thought free people, who could direct the
    Government instead of being directed by it, could do a good job of,
    first, protecting liberty; second--go back and read it at the
    beginning--pursuing happiness; and third, forming a more perfect Union.
        And I would argue to you that at every important time in the history
    of this country, our country's greatness has depended upon our
    willingness to reaffirm those three missions. We had to deepen the
    meaning of our freedom, widen the circle of opportunity, and strengthen
    the bonds of our Union.
        Now, the Democratic Party may not have always been right. But in the
    20th century, from Woodrow Wilson through Franklin Roosevelt and Harry
    Truman and John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson and Jimmy Carter to the
    present day, I don't think you have any doubt which party was more
    constantly standing up for always, always deepening the freedom of the
    American dream and broadening it to more people, and expanding the
    circle of American opportunity, and trying to hold this Union together
    and make it stronger and stronger instead of letting it be thrown apart.
    I don't think you have any doubt.
        So I say to you tonight, if we're going to strengthen this country
    for the 21st century, we at the national level have to create an economy
    based on opportunity for all. That means we have to bring the light of
    free enterprise to the neighborhoods and the urban areas and the rural
    areas that haven't felt it yet. It means we have to give our country the
    best system of K-through-12 education in the world for everybody, not
    just a few. It means we have to do a lot more to continue to grow the
    economy.
        Now, if we already have 4.7 percent unemployment--the lowest in 24
    years--the lowest inflation rate in 30 years, the highest homeownership
    in history, which party is most likely to finish America's mission? And
    you know as well as I do, those of you who are Governors or who work for
    Governors or who have been Governors, a great deal of the remaining work
    of building this economy has to be done community by community, State by
    State.
        If we want, as I said in the State of the Union, a society based on
    responsibility--what does that mean? It means people ought to be able to
    have health care if they're good, responsible citizens and they're
    willing to do what they can for it. We ought to let people who are over
    55, who have been cast aside by their employers, buy into the Medicare
    system and not be bereft for 10 years when they're very vulnerable. We
    ought to pass the health care Patients' Bill of Rights. We ought to do
    more to make child care safer and more affordable and more accessible.
    We ought to do more not only to protect our streets from juvenile crime
    but to open our schools between the time the learning in the classroom
    is over and the parents get home, so we give kids something positive to
    do and keep them out of trouble in the first place. These are the
    missions of building a society based on responsibility.
        Now, I can do some things with the Congress to achieve those goals.
    But how all these programs are implemented along with welfare reform--
    will welfare reform be a way of empowering people to move from welfare
    to work so that people can succeed at work and succeed as parents and
    take care of their children, or will it be just a back-handed way to
    save money?
        Now, there are a lot of Governors in the other party who have done
    some things I agree with. But, on balance, who do you think is more
    likely to build a society based on opportunity, that tries to lift
    everybody up and give everybody a chance and rescue the kids that have
    been left behind and build strong families and strong communities? I
    think you know the answer to that. And I think you're proud to be here
    tonight, just like I am, because of the answer to that question.
        If we want to build a nation that lives by community--what does that
    mean? It means we have to continue to improve the environment even as we
    grow the economy--cleaner water, cleaner air, safer food, fewer toxic
    waste dumps. It means we have to meet our challenge of doing our part on
    the issue of global warming. And it means we have to do it in a way that
    uses technology and common sense and creativity to continue to create
    jobs and grow the

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    economy as we improve the environment. Now, which party is more likely
    to do that?
        If we want to be one community, we have to be willing to reach
    across the divides of America. Look at the last 20 years. Which party
    has tried to win elections by bringing people together and which has
    tried to win elections by driving a wedge through the heart of the
    American electorate? I'm proud to be here tonight with all of you, and I
    think you know the answer to that question.
        So, as I have said many times, I want to say one more time, we have
    to give it to our friends in the Republican Party. From the time Abraham
    Lincoln was elected until the time Teddy Roosevelt left office, if we
    are honest, we will say they did a better job than we did of standing
    for deeper freedom, wider opportunity, and a stronger Union. Those were
    not our best years. But from the time of Woodrow Wilson to the present
    day and toward the 21st century, we may not have always been right, but
    we were always on the right side.
        And so, I ask you to think about that. I'm proud of the fact that
    our administration has done more than my two predecessors of the
    Republican Party in giving more power to the States. I'm proud of the
    fact that we have waived more Federal rules in more areas in 5 years
    than they did in 12 years. I'm proud of all that because I trust the
    concept of the States as laboratories of democracy. But the more
    responsibilities the Governors get, the more it matters who the Governor
    is.
        And I want you to think about that. And when you go home tonight, I
    want you to ask yourself if you agree with my definition of what it
    means to be an American and to meet our challenges and to do the right
    thing at every moment of challenge and change. This is a big change
    time. This is huge.
        You know, the other night after the State of the Union Address, our
    webpage had 400,000 hits on the Internet. One webpage. And, of course,
    there are millions upon millions of webpages. You know how many places
    there were on the Web when I was elected President? Fifty--50--5 years
    ago. And they all belonged to physicists. [Laughter] So if you could
    have gotten in, most of you would have been like me and you wouldn't
    have understood it. [Laughter] That is just a metaphor for how the world
    is changing. Knowledge, the whole volume of knowledge, doubling every 5
    years.
        Hillary came up with this idea
    that we should honor the end of our service here after 2 terms with a
    gift to the millennium entitled ``Remembering the past, and imagining
    the future.'' We want to save Old Glory and the Declaration of
    Independence and the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, those four
    things, and get communities all over America to do the same. And we want
    to have the biggest investment in the future in medical and other
    research in the history of America to look toward the future.
        But in the end, all this newfangled stuff and all this change will
    only work to make us a happier, healthier, stronger people if we end
    where we started. That great line from T.S. Eliot, ``the end is in our
    beginning''--we have to end where we started. You be proud when you
    leave here tonight, because you belong to a party that is fighting to
    expand and deepen the meaning of freedom and to widen the circle of
    opportunity and to make this a stronger United States of America. I'm
    proud, and I'm proud of you for being here.
        Thank you, and God bless you.

    Note: The President spoke at 9:07 p.m. at the Washington Convention
    Center. In his remarks, he referred to Democratic Governors' Association
    chairman Gov. Pedro Rossello of Puerto Rico and his wife, Maga;
    Democratic Governors' Association Vice Chairman Gov. Frank O'Bannon of
    Indiana and his wife, Judy; Democratic Governors' Association Executive
    Director Katie Whelan; and Gov. James B. Hunt, Jr., of North Carolina.