[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: WILLIAM J. CLINTON (1999, Book II)]
[July 27, 1999]
[Pages 1335-1337]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]
[[Page 1335]]
Remarks on the 25th Anniversary of the Legal Services Corporation
July 27, 1999
Thank you very much. Let me say, first of all, I apologize for being
late. I've been over meeting with the Russian Prime Minister, and you would have given me a pass, I think. I was
doing good work, I hope.
Lucy, thank you for your statement, and on
behalf of all of us, for the award. Let me say, I could just sit here
and sort of look at all the people that are here. I hesitate to even
call people by name, but I want to thank all the Members of Congress who
are here, including Congressman Berman and
Congressman Ramstad. I'd also--I see Mr.
Conyers and Congressman Cardin, Congressman Allen,
Congresswoman Waters, former Congressman
Fox, and Father Drinan, we're glad to see you here, sir. Thank you. Sarge and Eunice Shriver; the ABA presidents, Jerry Shestack, Bill Ide, Roberta Cooper
Ramo, William Paul. And I see former Secretary of Commerce and Trade
Ambassador Mickey Kantor, who was on
the Legal Services board with Hillary.
We all go back a long way, all of us who care about this, it seems
like. Doug Eakeley and Tom Allen and I, we went abroad together as young men 30
years ago. We must have gotten infected with a Legal Services virus.
[Laughter] Judge Broderick, it's good to
see you here. And Jim Ramstad said, we were there 36 years ago--is that
how long it was? [Laughter] They're coming tomorrow; you should come
back. Make you feel old, or young, as the case may be.
I want to say that for our family, the Legal Services Corporation
has been very important. My wife has
done many things I've been proud of, but I have never been more proud of
anything than her service on the Legal Services Corporation to which
President Carter appointed her, and the work she did as the chair of
that Corporation.
You know, here in Washington, everybody's got a lawyer. Whether you
need one or not, everybody's got a lawyer, you know? [Laughter] We
forget what it's like to have a lawyer be the difference between
homelessness and having a stable home; between unemployment and the
security of a job; between the disintegration of a household and holding
a family together in difficult times. The Legal Services Corporation has
made equal justice not a political cause but an everyday occurrence. We
have tried to advocate that--I see our former chief advocate, Mr.
Dellinger, there--but this is a personal
thing for those of us who have experienced it.
Hillary's brother, in the back, was a public
defender for many years in Miami. And Janet Reno,
as a prosecutor, supported efforts to make sure that everybody had a
decent defense--something that I think is a sterling example.
Every one of you in this room has that sort of story. But those of
us who are old enough to remember when it was different feel it perhaps
the more strongly. And I want to thank Howard Berman and Jim Ramstad for giving voice
to the struggles we're now engaged in in Congress. Sometimes I think
that the Legal Services Corporation, even though it's very young--25
years old--is suffering from the infirmity of its success and, perhaps,
from the success of our economy at this moment that we have people who
may make this decision without the benefit of memory. So I ask you to
remember.
It was in 1962, not that long ago, when the Supreme Court had not
yet established a constitutional right to counsel in criminal cases.
Then, the idea of legal assistance in civil cases was a distant dream.
Disadvantaged Americans who had a hard enough time just getting through
the day found that the legal system was stacked against them, and even
if it wasn't, they couldn't possibly know it because they couldn't get a
lawyer.
Our country's faith in the law was strained in the hearts of many
because of injustice and the stain of racism. But the men and women who
founded the Legal Services Corporation knew that educating people about
the legal rights they did have was critical in the fight for equal
rights; that if people did not know about their rights and could not
exercise them, the fact that the Supreme Court had enshrined them was of
little practical impact.
Today, thanks in large measure to the efforts of the Legal Services
Corporation and the countless lawyers you have inspired, it is clear
that a lot of progress has been made. Lucy's
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story really tells the tale. The doors of opportunity are open wider,
and we are fortunate now to be living in a period of unique prosperity,
with the lowest minority unemployment in our history and the highest
homeownership in our history. We have the lowest crime rates and welfare
rolls in a generation. But you and I know there are still a lot of poor
folks out there. There are still people in places that have been left
behind, even by this great recovery.
I traveled across the country a couple of weeks ago, from Appalachia
to the Mississippi Delta, to East St. Louis, to the Pine Ridge Indian
Reservation, south Phoenix, and East Los Angeles. And there are still
people out there--most of them, by the way, are working; most of them
are working, doing the same thing you and I do every day, for much
lesser rewards--who are having enormous difficulties. So we have this.
It is also true that in spite of the progress that we've made in
meeting the promise of equal justice, there are still a lot of people
out there who don't trust the legal system or the law enforcement
system. So there is a need, a crying need for the work of the Legal
Services Corporation. And that's idealistic, hard-working lawyers--
virtually 100 percent of whom could be making a lot more money doing
something else--who believe that the law should be an instrument that
benefits us all equally and that the rights that are enunciated in the
law books and in the Supreme Court cases should be real in the lives of
all Americans.
President Kennedy did call for equal justice here 36 years ago. Last
week in this room, with another glittering array of legal talent, from
lawyers to judges to scholars of all races and backgrounds in this
country, we renewed our pledge to that ideal.
Today I think we have to say again, equal justice is the birthright
of every American. It is the obligation of those of us in public life
and politics to try to bring the benefits of this economic recovery into
every corner of our country. But the Scripture says that the poor will
be with us always. But American law says they will not be disadvantaged
under the law. And until we close the gap between our principles and our
reality, we will need the Legal Services Corporation.
For years now, some in Congress have tried to dismantle it. They
have seen it as a political thing. I do not believe it is political to
say a poor person should have the same right as a rich person. I do not
believe it is political to say we have to bring the law into the real
lives of all Americans.
We have stood firm against the opposition to the Legal Services
Corporation. I'm proud that every budget we have submitted has requested
more funding for Legal Services. Like Congressman Ramstad and Congressman Berman--and
by their presence here, all the other Members who are here--I was deeply
disappointed that last week the Appropriations Subcommittee in the House
voted to cut my request in half, leaving hundreds of thousands of
American families without the critical legal protections they need.
But need is the wrong word. Under the law, they are entitled to them
as citizens. For 25 years, the Legal Services Corporation has stood
above the fray of partisanship, but in the fray of the grimy details of
daily life that require legal protection and legal assistance. I ask
Congress to put politics aside, to follow on this issue the model of the
Legal Services Corporation, and give the full funding and support the
Corporation needs. In a very large budget, it is a very small item. But
it has an enormous impact.
Think how outraged Americans of both political parties in all
political philosophies would have been if this fine woman and all of her
fellow tenants had been thrown on the street for failure to pay electric
bills that they paid. We could have passed the hat in America and
collected the annual budget of the Legal Services Corporation to help
them. You know that's true. How then can we walk away from the people
who save them, and can save so many like them every day, in every way--
in publicized and quiet ways that we will never know?
Thomas Jefferson once said that equal justice is a bright
constellation of our political faith. With conscience and conviction,
let us get the support for the Legal Services Corporation it needs. We
cannot let the bright constellation dim. Twenty-five is too young, and
there are still too many people out there who need you.
Thank you, and God bless you.
Note: The President spoke at 5:08 p.m. in the East Room at the White
House. In his remarks, he referred to Prime Minister Sergey Stepashin of
Russia; Legal Services Corporation client Lucy Johnson, who introduced
the President; former
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Representative Jon D. Fox; R. Sargent Shriver, honorary cochairman,
Consortium for the National Equal Justice Library, and his wife, Eunice
Kennedy Shriver; Father Robert F. Drinan, professor of law, Georgetown
University; Jerome J. Shestack, R. William Ide III, Roberta Cooper Ramo,
former presidents, and William G. Paul, president-elect, American Bar
Association; Douglas Eakeley, chair, Legal Services Corporation board of
directors; retired Marin County, CA, Superior Court Judge Henry J.
Broderick; former Justice Department Solicitor General Walter E.
Dellinger; and the First Lady's brother, Hugh Rodham. The transcript
released by the Office of the Press Secretary also included the remarks
of the First Lady. The proclamation of July 26 is listed in Appendix D
at the end of this volume.