    [Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 31, Number 21 (Monday, May 29, 1995)]
    [Pages 901-905]
    [Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

    <R04>
    Remarks to the White House Conference on Trade and Investment in Ireland

    May 25, 1995

        Thank you very much. Secretary Christopher, Secretary Brown, Senator
    Mitchell, Deputy Prime Minister Spring, Sir Patrick Mayhew, Mr.
    Ambassador, ladies and gentlemen, to all of you of Irish, British, and
    American heritage from the business communities of these great nations,
    I thank you for being here. I have looked forward to this day for a long
    time, to having people like you here who see the opportunities for trade
    and in-

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    vestment that come from peace and the opportunities for trade and
    investment to support peace. I'm especially delighted that so many are
    here from Ireland and the United Kingdom. And to all of our friends from
    Northern Ireland, your attendance here shows your dedication to a future
    of cooperation and prosperity, and we're particularly glad to have you.
        Let me say a special word of thanks to George Mitchell for the
    tremendous work he has done in organizing this conference. His devotion
    to the cause of nurturing peace and growth in Northern Ireland and the
    Republic's border counties has played a central part in the progress
    that we celebrate here today. I'm delighted that he will lead another
    mission to Ireland this summer and even more pleased that he's agreed to
    continue his work in overseeing our economic initiatives through the end
    of this year.
        Ireland is lucky to have George Mitchell on its side, even if it has
    to put up with the envy of the United States Senate, the Supreme Court,
    and Major League Baseball. [Laughter] You know, George is Irish and
    Lebanese. Maybe when we succeed in Ireland, if the Secretary of State is
    not finished, he'll volunteer for other duty. [Laughter]
        As all of you know, the United States has a keen interest in a
    stable and democratic and prosperous Europe, but that interest is
    particularly strong when it comes to Ireland. Our strong bonds of
    kinship, culture, and history shared with the peoples of the United
    Kingdom in Ireland are well-known.
        This is a moment of historic opportunity for you and historic
    interest for the United States. For my own part, people ask me from time
    to time why this is a matter of such deep personal interest to me. It
    goes beyond my Irish roots. I wish I could just say that's all there was
    to it. But an important part of our mission at this moment in time as
    Americans is to help reconcile the divisions which keep people apart and
    lead them sometimes to violence both within our own country and around
    the world.
        If you look into the next century, you could thank the good Lord
    that we may--we may--succeed in removing the nuclear threat from the
    children of the 21st century. But we still see these ancient impulses
    that keep people apart based on religious or racial or ethnic
    differences. I tell my fellow Americans all the time that the great
    genius of our country in the next century may be our ability to exalt
    the greatest amount of diversity of any large country in the world. But
    it is still a challenge for us here. You see it all the time. And we can
    think of no greater mission in our quest to reconcile diversity than
    trying to help peace and prosperity succeed in Northern Ireland and in
    Ireland in general.
        This is, as I'm sure you know, an extraordinary gathering of which
    you are a part. Never before have representatives of all the political
    parties in Northern Ireland, officials from the United Kingdom and
    Ireland, and so many business leaders joined to help us to build a
    better tomorrow. The conference shows anew the historic progress that
    has been made toward a just and lasting settlement and toward a peace
    that respects the rights and traditions of both communities.
        In the last few months, thanks to the cease-fire and the momentum of
    the negotiations, a powerful transformation has begun. Peace is closer
    than it's been in a generation. For the first time in decades, children
    can walk to school without worrying. Families that have endured so much
    violence with so much dignity can now enjoy the blessings of days
    without violence and nights without fear. The roads between North and
    South are more open than they have been in 25 years. And citizens of the
    Republic are visiting the North in even greater numbers. In Belfast, the
    army patrols have ended, the body armor and helmets are gone, hundreds
    of troops are now going home.
        These landmark achievements would not have been possible without the
    leadership and courage of Prime Minister Major, Prime Minister Bruton,
    and before him, Prime Minister Reynolds. With the Joint Framework
    Document, they are paving the way for a new and hopeful era of
    reconciliation. All true friends of Ireland are grateful to them and to
    the parties that have risen to their challenge. I salute them, and I
    salute others who work for peace, individuals such as Foreign Minister
    Spring, Sir Patrick Mayhew, and that tireless advocate of peace, our
    friend John Hume.

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        We pay tribute as well to the brave people of Northern Ireland,
    whose courage has brought them to this point. The United States is proud
    to have helped them and all peacemakers, and today I renew my pledge to
    do everything in my power to support their efforts. I know--[applause]--
    thank you. I know I speak for all Americans when I say that people who
    take risks for peace, here and anywhere else in the world, will always
    be welcome in the White House, in Washington, and throughout our
    country.
        This momentum must be maintained. The ministerial-level talks
    represent a step of tremendous promise. I hope the parties can soon sit
    down together to discuss the future and their differences. That is the
    best guarantee of a permanent peace.
        But there must be progress as well outside the conference rooms.
    Violence is diminished, but it has not disappeared. I call on all those
    who continue to employ violence to end the punishment beatings and the
    intimidation. And to all who are observing the cease-fire, I appeal to
    you to take the next step and begin to discuss serious decommissioning
    of weapons. Paramilitaries on both sides must get rid of their bombs and
    guns for good. And the specter of violence that has haunted Ireland must
    be banished, once and for all.
        It is also time to begin healing the wounds of a generation. Many
    innocents disappeared during ``the troubles.'' Others were banished from
    their homes. Today there are families that have still not had the chance
    to grieve in peace, to visit the graves of their loved ones, to reunite
    after years of separation. It is time to allow families to be whole
    again.
        As everyone knows, peace is more than cease-fires and formal
    agreements. It demands real hope and progress in the hearts of people.
    It demands common striving for the common good. It is time for those who
    have been most affected by the fighting to feel this kind of hope and
    this sense of progress. As Yeats wrote, ``Too long a sacrifice can make
    a stone of the heart.'' There must be a peace dividend in Northern
    Ireland and the border counties so that everyone is convinced that the
    future belongs to those who build, not those who destroy, so that the
    majority that supports peace is strengthened, so that there is no
    slipping back into the violence that frustration breeds.
        That is why this conference is so important. It underscores that all
    sides have an interest in investing in the future of Northern Ireland
    and that all sides will benefit from the peace. Our own experience here
    in America shows what a difference that kind of progress and benefit can
    bring. More than a century ago, our great sage Ralph Waldo Emerson said
    that trade was the principle of liberty, that it made peace and keeps
    peace. That is what we wish for Ireland, and now it is time to realize
    that wish. The end of organized violence makes that possible.
        So I urge American businesses and all others to consider investing
    in Northern Ireland and the border counties. The opportunities are
    excellent. The work force is well-educated and well-motivated. The
    productivity levels are high. The unit labor costs are low. The labor
    relations are good. The infrastructure, the communications, the access
    to the European market are fine. With the prospect of an enduring
    settlement on the horizon, business confidence is rising fast. Experts
    predict investment booms on both sides of the border and an increase in
    tourism in the North that could exceed 100 percent.
        Already, the United States is the number one investor in both
    Northern Ireland and the Republic. American companies employ nearly 10
    percent of all the workers in Northern Ireland's manufacturing sector.
    And Ireland imports almost $3 billion worth of American goods. The firms
    that we have in these markets are increasing their investments,
    strengthening their positions in Europe, building businesses that create
    jobs on both sides of the Atlantic. By doing well, these companies are
    also doing good.
        More investment in Northern Ireland promises to lift the region out
    of the cycle of despair that leads to violence. It will reduce the
    chronic unemployment than runs around 50 percent in some urban areas and
    has deadened the dreams of so many. If growth is accompanied by an end
    to discrimination, by fair and nonsectarian employment practices, and
    encouraging investment in areas in greatest need, then both Catholics
    and Protestants will feel that they have a stake in their society and
    its peaceful future.

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    When both communities feel the benefits of peace and see that they are
    distributed fairly, despair will lose its hold, and all will have the
    chance they deserve to fulfill their God-given potential.
        ``Peace,'' Yeats said, ``comes dropping slow.'' The past will not be
    overcome in a day, but the perception of change provides the kindling
    for hope, and the opportunities for positive, powerful, profitable
    change clearly are now present in Northern Ireland.
        As long as I am President, the United States will continue to
    encourage that change. I am proud of all that Secretary Brown has done
    in achieving--on his mission to Ireland last December. I'm proud of the
    many efforts of the Department of Commerce, USAID, USIA, and other
    Government agencies to support reconciliation in Ireland. I am proud of
    the work of the State Department, and I want to say a special word of
    thanks to our Ambassadors in the area, Ambassador Crowe and Ambassador
    Jean Kennedy Smith, for the outstanding work that they have both done.
    Thank you.
        Ours is the first administration ever to include appropriations for
    the International Fund for Ireland. The IFI have lived up to our hopes
    for it. The fund supports over 3,000 economic development projects and
    has created some 23,000 jobs in areas that were recruiting grounds for
    the paramilitaries. It is promoting cooperation across the border and
    between communities.
        The record challenges us to go even further. So we have increased
    our funding request for the IFI to almost $60 million over the next 2
    years. And we are working to build more bridges across the ocean through
    exchange programs for managers, students, agricultural experts, artists,
    and scholars, programs that establish bonds of friendship, while
    transporting ideas and information, benefiting people on both sides of
    the ocean.
        There are some in Washington who would like to cut our funding for
    these and other programs that support peace in Ireland and throughout
    the world. That would be a grave error. The United States has an abiding
    interest in creating peace and the opportunities it brings. We must have
    the resources to foster peace and stand by those who take the hard risks
    for peace. We have seen time and again that our investments in peace,
    whether in the Middle East, southern Africa, Haiti, or Ireland, have
    always yielded great benefits for the American people in growing
    markets, great stability, increased security.
        I hope all those who want to see peace in Northern Ireland will keep
    that in mind. Peace has a price, but it is a small one compared to the
    alternative, and it is a price very much worth paying.
        I'm also glad we've been able to help the cause of peace through
    this conference and other economic initiatives, because Ireland has
    given us so much. The two communities that today are coming together in
    cooperation have each given America a rich legacy. In our Nation,
    Catholic and Protestants have been intertwined, and together they have
    contributed immensely to the greatness of our people and the success of
    America. There is evidence all around us. In places like New York,
    Pennsylvania, and Ohio, counties, cities, and towns with names like
    Londonderry, Ulster, and Antrim dot the map. Often these places mark the
    frontier in the 18th century when Ulster Protestants, some of them my
    ancestors, pushed west to build new lives and a new nation. These
    settlers were the forebears of nearly a dozen American Presidents,
    including Andrew Jackson, William McKinley, and Woodrow Wilson.
        Irish Catholics contributed just as much to our country's rise,
    whether in building railroads or institutions. A visiting journalist in
    the last century took the measure of that effort when he said that in
    America you could see water power, steam power, horse power, and Irish
    power. [Laughter] And, he concluded, ``the last works hardest of all.''
    [Laughter]
        In this half of our century, the names John F. Kennedy, Justice
    William Brennan, Speaker Tip O'Neill only began to tell the story of
    Irish Catholics' contribution to all the branches of American democracy.
    These true traditions, harnessed together in the New World for common
    goals, has been America's great fortune. Time and again, we have seen
    peoples of different backgrounds and ancestries put freedom over
    faction, the goals of the community over the interests of its separate
    parts.

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        Of the gifts we can give to Ireland, this example of people joining
    together for the common good clearly is the greatest. The challenges of
    the coming century demand that we keep in mind the example of those who
    went before us, who built bridges across their differences and found the
    strength to pull together.
        We now face a whole new set of challenges in this new era. The
    global economy, the explosion of information, the advance of technology,
    the growing mobility of people, all these forces are bringing us into a
    more integrated world, more full of possibilities than ever before. The
    next century can be the most exciting time in all human history because
    of the opportunities for human possibilities.
        But we have to recognize that all these forces of integration have a
    darker side, as well. If we do not rise to the challenges they present,
    we become vulnerable to the organized forces of destruction and evil,
    for the modern world requires us to be open in order to take advantage
    of all the forces of integration. And as we become more open, we become
    more vulnerable to those who would hate and those who would destroy.
        As the people of Northern Ireland are showing, we can seize the
    moment. We can turn away from terror. We can turn away from destruction.
    We can turn toward peace and unity and possibility. But to keep this
    process going, to lock in the accomplishments, we must make hope real.
    To grasp the opportunity, we must build stronger businesses and
    communities and families. We must have more and better jobs. We must
    strengthen the prospects of a better tomorrow.
        That is the way to preempt fanaticism. That is the way to close the
    book on old and bloody conflicts. That is the way to give our children
    the future they all deserve. The chance is there. It is here. It is now.
    We have it in our power to make all the difference. Let us do it.
        Thank you, and bless you all.

    Note: The President spoke at 10:48 a.m. at the Sheraton Washington
    Hotel. In his remarks, he referred to George Mitchell, Special Adviser
    for Economic Initiatives in Ireland; Deputy Prime Minister Richard
    Spring, Prime Minister John Bruton, and former Prime Minister Albert
    Reynolds of Ireland; Prime Minister John Major and Secretary of State
    for Northern Ireland Sir Patrick Mayhew of the United Kingdom;
    Ambassadors to the U.S. Sir Robin William of Great Britain and Dermot
    Gallagher of Ireland; John Hume, leader, Northern Ireland Social
    Democratic and Labor Party; U.S. Ambassador to Ireland Jean Kennedy
    Smith; and U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain William J. Crowe.