    [Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 33, Number 4 (Monday, January 27, 1997)]
    [Pages 91-93]
    [Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

    <R04>
    Remarks Announcing the President's Summit On Citizen Service

    January 24, 1997

        The President. I thank the Vice President and the First Lady for
    their remarks. Obviously, I am delighted to have President Bush, General
    Powell, and Secretary Cisneros back. Henry's only been off the payroll a
    day or two. [Laughter] I didn't really know if he'd come. [Laughter]
        I thank so many people here who have advocated national service and
    citizen service of various kinds for a long time. Especially I'd like to
    acknowledge, in addition to Harris Wofford and Bob Goodwin, Eli Segal
    and Ray Chambers; Al From with the Democratic Leadership Council;
    Charles Moskos, the national scholar of citizen service, who was for all
    this years before the rest of us knew it was an issue. Thank you, sir,
    for all your lifetime of work devoted to the proposition that the
    American people can forge their own destiny and solve their own
    problems. We thank you.
        This is an extraordinary collection of Americans who have gathered
    here, not only on the stage but out here in the room, to advance the
    cause of citizen service. Much of the work of America cannot be done by
    government. Much other work cannot be done by government alone. The
    solution must be the American people through voluntary service to
    others. The challenges we face today, especially those that face our
    children, require something of all of us, parents, religious and
    community groups, business, labor organizations, schools, teachers, our
    great national civic and service organizations, every citizen.
        One of my proudest moments as President was signing the bill
    creating the Corporation for National Service and AmeriCorps. During the
    last 3 years, about 50,000 Americans have earned aid for college by
    serving in their communities, doing real work to address critical
    problems, cleaning up rivers, working with the police to make the
    streets safe, helping children learn to read, and doing many, many more
    things in every State in the country.
        These AmeriCorps members and even larger numbers of Senior Service
    Corps and student volunteers have really helped to revive the spirit of
    service in America. I noticed just a few days before the Inauguration
    the publication of a national poll--I can mention that now and you think
    I have not self-interest, you see--[laughter]--the publication of a
    national poll that said that young people are serving in their
    communities in far higher percentages than just a few years ago.
        I think this is a culmination of years and years of effort. When
    President Bush held this office, he understood that so much of what is
    good in America has to be done and is being done by people who are
    outside Washington and outside the Federal Government. And we share his
    hope that by holding up examples of ordinary Americans engaged in
    extraordinary service, by holding up those 1,000 Points of Light, they
    will grow by the power of their example into millions of points of
    light. And we thank you for that.
        Citizen service belongs to no party, no ideology. It is an American
    idea which every American should embrace. Today I am pleased to announce
    that we are taking an important step to give more Americans the
    opportunity to fulfill that promise. On April 27th, in Philadelphia,
    with the support and leadership of the Corporation for National Service,
    the Points of Light Foundation, General Colin Powell and Secretary Henry
    Cisneros, President Bush and I will convene the first President's Summit
    on Citizen Service. Our goal is to mobilize America's citizen power in a
    united effort to solve our common problems, especially those that
    threaten our young people.
        Leaders from a broad spectrum will come with commitments in hand,
    concrete pledges of support and volunteers to solve their local
    problems. In preparation for the summit some of our most prominent
    corporations and service organizations have already stepped forward. Big
    Brothers-Big Sisters has pledged to double their mentoring relations,
    matching 200,000 deserving young people with caring adults through the
    2000. And they have pledged to compound their efforts by having these
    adult volunteers actually do other citizen service projects with the
    young people they mentor. They not only will be serving the young but
    calling on the young to serve. Lens Crafters will provide one mil

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    lion needy Americans, especially children, with free vision care by the
    year 2003. Columbia HCA, a leading health care company, has committed to
    immunize one million children through their health care facilities by
    the year 2000. And that is just the beginning.
        I am delighted that General Colin Powell, who has served our country
    is so very many ways, has agreed to serve once again, this time as
    general chair of the summit. General, we're grateful that you're joining
    us. And I remember well when you had your retirement ceremony, you said
    that you were going to devote more of your life to helping young people
    to have better lives and better futures. There is nothing, nothing you
    could do that would have a bigger impact on that goal than this. And we
    are very grateful to you, sir.
        All of you know that I believe Henry Cisneros is the finest HUD
    Secretary who ever served our country. He had a special way of getting
    people to take responsibility for their own lives and of generating real
    interpersonal human contacts in places where they had been too long
    absent. He just has a great new leadership job at Univision, and I am
    very grateful that he was willing to take substantial time out of an
    already very busy schedule in a new and fulfilling, in some ways more
    rewarding life--[laughter]--to do what I know he loves best, which is to
    help people realize their own promise. Thank you, Henry, for doing this.
        Finally, let me say I am deeply honored to be embarking on this
    joint venture with President Bush. As far as I know, there's not much of
    a precedent for this sort of thing, at least in recent history, but
    there should be. It must be true that the things which unite us as
    citizens are bigger than any one person, one party, one election, or one
    ideology. They can only be solved if we come together in partnership to
    lift each other up, a person at a time, a family at a time, a
    neighborhood at a time, a school at a time.
        The organizers of this effort have wisely chosen Philadelphia as the
    site of the summit, for the reasons that the Vice President said. I'm
    reminded at the close of the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin
    Franklin made an observation about a design of the sun that was hanging
    low on the horizon in the chair that General Washington sat in to
    preside over the Convention. And after the Constitutional Convention was
    over, he said there had been a lot of speculation about whether it was a
    rising or a setting sun; having seen the Constitution he could say that
    it was definitely a rising sun.
        I believe we can look at this assemblage today, look forward to
    Independence Hall in Philadelphia, and say this is a rising sun.
        I thank all of you. I thank especially those who are here on this
    platform. And I'd like to ask all of you to join me as we hear from our
    speakers. First, President Bush; to be followed by General Powell and
    Henry Cisneros.
        Mr. President, welcome back.

    [At this point, former President George Bush, former Chairman of the
    Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Colin Powell, USA, Ret., and former Secretary
    of Housing and Urban Development Henry Cisneros made brief remarks.]

        The President. Well, let me again thank President Bush and General
    Powell and Secretary Cisneros and all the rest of you for being here;
    especially the Members of Congress, members of the administration, the
    mayors, and others who are here.
        We are going to adjourn now and have a reception. But as we leave
    I'd like to just ask that we keep in mind the last point that Secretary
    Cisneros made. I imagine that Ray Chambers was a happy and successful
    man before he decided to give his whole life over to other people's
    welfare. But I can't imagine that he emanated the glow that he does
    today that we all see and that you see in the lives of other people who
    give.
        And I guess--you know, our wealth and power are very important in
    America, and they must be maintained. But the pursuit of happiness
    involves more. And it really is true that in giving, we receive. So if
    we give a lot, we'll get a lot, and our country will enter this new
    century in wonderful, wonderful shape.
        Thank you all, and God bless you. We're adjourned.

    Note: The President spoke at 2:52 p.m. in the East Room at the White
    House. In his remarks, he referred to Harris Wofford, Chief Executive
    Officer, and Eli Segal, board member, Corporation for National and
    Community Service; Bob

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    Goodwin, president, Points of Light Foundation; Raymond G. Chambers,
    president, Amerlior Foundation; Al From, president, Democratic
    Leadership Council; and Charles C. Moskos, professor of sociology,
    Northwestern University.