[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 35, Number 19 (Monday, May 17, 1999)]
[Pages 873-875]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on the Secretary of the Treasury Transition

May 12, 1999

    The President. Please be seated. I'd like to welcome all of you here 
today, especially the families of the people who are at the center of 
this announcement, and members of the Cabinet, Members of the Congress, 
Mr. Greenspan, ladies and gentlemen.
    For 6\1/2\ years now, I have worked hard to build an economy that 
gives all of our people a chance to prosper and to live out their 
dreams. When I took office in 1993, it was a time of record deficits, 
high unemployment, decades of stagnant wages. It was clear then that we 
needed to make difficult and too long deferred choices.
    So we put in place a new economic strategy rooted in the realities 
of the emerging information age. By now, the elements of that strategy 
are tiresomely familiar to those of you who have been a part of this: 
fiscal discipline, investment in our people, expanded trade. But the 
results are plain: over 18 million new jobs; the lowest unemployment and 
inflation in three decades; the strongest economy in a generation, 
perhaps ever, ushered in by new technologies; the productive energies of 
the American people; and sensible policies.
    In 1992 I told the American people I would focus on the economy like 
a laser beam. The first step was to establish within the White House a 
National Economic Council, modeled on the National Security Council, and 
then to pick Bob Rubin to lead it.
    As the first Chair of the National Economic Council, Bob forged a 
true team and built an enduring and vital institution, now ably led by 
his successor, Gene Sperling.
    Four years ago, when Secretary Bentsen resigned, I appointed Bob to 
be Secretary of the Treasury. Alexander Hamilton, our first Treasury 
Secretary, insisted that the United States pay its debts and practice 
fiscal prudence. That then-controversial proposal gave the new Nation a 
chance to grow into the powerhouse it is today. Bob has been acclaimed 
as the most effective Treasury Secretary since Alexander Hamilton, and I 
believe that acclaim is well deserved. I thank again the Members of 
Congress who have come here, both Republicans and Democrats, in 
testament to that.
    He has upheld the highest traditions of the office. He has merged 
old-fashioned fiscal conservatism with new ideas to help all Americans 
benefit from the new economy and to maintain and enhance America's 
leadership in the world economy. He understood the importance of fiscal 
discipline and the accountability and the impact that it would bring, 
not only low interest rates but also intangible economic confidence, 
both of which have brought us more jobs, more businesses, higher wages, 
lower mortgage rates, and a rising standard of living for all Americans.
    He cares very deeply about the impact of abstract economics on 
ordinary people. I can tell you that for all these years, he has always 
been one of the administration's most powerful advocate for the poor and 
for our cities, for the investments that we put into the empowerment 
zones, for the earned-income tax credit, for the community development

[[Page 874]]

banks and the Community Reinvestment Act, and for the new markets 
initiative that I was out promoting in Atlanta yesterday. He has also 
tried to help our friends abroad when they needed it, knowing that our 
friends and trading partners need to do well if America is to do well.
    We were reminiscing in the Oval Office just a moment ago about the 
night just before he was appointed Secretary of the Treasury when we 
decided we had to give assistance to Mexico. At the time, I think 11 
percent of the American people thought we were doing the right thing. 
But since then, I think almost always, the American people have 
concluded that Bob Rubin's recommendations have been the right thing for 
our country.
    It's no secret to all of you who know him that Bob has been pining 
for private life for a long time now, and I have been pleading for all 
that long time for him not to pine too much. But 2 weeks ago, he told me 
that he was ready to go. I will miss his cool head and steady hand, his 
sharp mind and his warm heart. I also want to put him on notice that I 
expect him to show up here regularly for the next 2 years until we're 
done, for lots of free advice.
    I used to joke that Bob Rubin came to Washington to help me save the 
middle class, and he'd stayed so long that by the time he left he'd be 
one of them. [Laughter] He just wants a little time to prove me wrong. 
[Laughter] But I thank him form the bottom of my heart for being a true 
patriot and a true friend.
    To carry forward our economic strategy, I will nominate Larry 
Summers to be the next Secretary of the Treasury. He is brilliant, able, 
a critical part of our economic team during the entire life of this 
administration, therefore, deeply knowledgeable and more than ready to 
help steer our Nation through the strong and sometimes turbulent 
currents of the new economy.
    Rarely has any individual been so well prepared to become Secretary 
of the Treasury. For the past 6 years he has been a senior official at 
Treasury, first Under Secretary of the Treasury for International 
Affairs, and then for 4 years as Deputy Secretary. He has always been 
Bob Rubin's partner in many, many ways, working with him to balance the 
budget, to strengthen Social Security, to reform the IRS, to build a 
stronger economy at home and abroad. He has a close working relationship 
not only with Chairman Greenspan but with key finance ministers and 
central bankers around the world. He has the rare ability to see the 
world that is taking shape and the skill to help to bring it into being.
    I will also nominate Stu Eizenstat to be Deputy Secretary of the 
Treasury. I have known him now for well over 20 years, since he was 
President Carter's Domestic Policy Adviser. He has served our 
administration very well in several positions: Ambassador to the 
European Union, Under Secretary of Commerce for International Trade, and 
most recently Under Secretary of State for Economic Affairs.
    Of all the people on this platform today, the person making the 
greatest sacrifice for the national interest is Secretary Madeleine 
Albright. And I appreciate her presence here and the absence of tears in 
losing a man as able as Stu Eizenstat. [Laughter]
    Stu has handled many of our Nation's most difficult missions over 
the last 6 years, from our successful efforts to lift food and medicine 
sanctions on trading partners--or non-trading partners--to the struggle 
for justice and compensation on behalf of the victims of the Holocaust, 
an endeavor he will continue.
    I would like to say a special word of thanks to him for all the many 
missions he has undertaken, but especially for the work he's done in the 
Holocaust area. He has done it better, more energetically, more 
completely, and with greater sensitivity for all the elements involved 
than I think any other American could have. And not just Jewish-
Americans and other survivors and family members of survivors of the 
Holocaust around the world, but all Americans should be grateful for 
this unique contribution he has made to making the American dream real.
    With his legendary grasp of policy and the art of practical 
government, his long experience, his stamina, and his steady judgment, 
he will be a vital, full member of our economic team.

[[Page 875]]

    Our economy continues on its remarkable path, but we must press 
forward with the strategy that has brought us thus far. We have a lot to 
do to strengthen Social Security and Medicare in the months ahead to 
maintain our fiscal discipline and begin to pay down this debt; to renew 
our public schools so that they can play the role that they must play in 
preparing all of our people to succeed in the economy we are working to 
build; and to bring economic opportunity where it is still not in 
sufficient supply in underinvested urban and rural areas in America.
    With a steady strategy and now, a strong economic team, I am 
confident we can enter the 21st century stronger than ever. But I would 
like to say that more than any other single citizen, Bob Rubin deserves 
the credit for building all the teams we've had with all the members, 
because he started with his National Economic Council. No one had ever 
made it work before. No one had ever made it really a priority to bring 
together all the strands and all the economic actors, to bring together 
the State Department and the Treasury Department and the Commerce 
Department and the Export-Import Bank and the Overseas Private 
Investment Corporation and a lot of other things most Americans had 
never heard of. He brought it all together. He got us to work as a team. 
He worked for a consensus. He was always honest with me in presenting 
disagreements, and he built a spirit and a belief that we could actually 
make this economy what it ought to be for our people. That will be his 
enduring achievement, along with the fact that everybody believed as 
long as he was Secretary of the Treasury, nothing bad could happen.
    Ladies and gentlemen, Bob Rubin.
    Secretary Rubin. Thank you.
    The President. You're not used to this.

[At this point, Treasury Secretary Robert E. Rubin, Treasury Secretary-
Designate Lawrence H. Summers, and Deputy Treasury Secretary-Designate 
Stuart E. Eizenstat made brief remarks.]

    The President. Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you.

Note: The President spoke at 3:48 p.m. in the Rose Garden at the White 
House.