    [Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 36, Number 4 (Monday, January 31, 2000)]
    [Pages 160-172]
    [Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

    <R04>
    Address Before a Joint Session of the Congress on the State of the Union

    January 27, 2000

        Mr. Speaker, Mr. Vice President, Members of Congress, honored
    guests, my fellow Americans:
        We are fortunate to be alive at this moment in history. Never before
    has our Nation enjoyed, at once, so much prosperity and social progress
    with so little internal crisis and so few external threats. Never before
    have we had such a blessed opportunity and, therefore, such a profound
    obligation to build the more perfect Union of our Founders' dreams.
        We begin the new century with over 20 million new jobs; the fastest
    economic growth in more than 30 years; the lowest unemployment rates in
    30 years; the lowest poverty rates in 20 years; the lowest African-
    American and Hispanic unemployment rates on record; the first back-to-
    back surpluses in 42 years; and next month, America will achieve the
    longest period of economic growth in our entire history.
        We have built a new economy.
        And our economic revolution has been matched by a revival of the
    American spirit: crime down by 20 percent, to its lowest level in 25
    years; teen births down 7 years in a row; adoptions up by 30 percent;
    welfare rolls cut in half to their lowest levels in 30 years.
        My fellow Americans, the state of our Union is the strongest it has
    ever been.
        As always, the real credit belongs to the American people. My
    gratitude also goes to those of you in this Chamber who have worked with
    us to put progress over partisanship.
        Eight years ago, it was not so clear to most Americans there would
    be much to celebrate in the year 2000. Then our Nation was gripped by
    economic distress, social decline, political gridlock. The title of a
    best-selling book asked: ``America: What Went Wrong?''

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        In the best traditions of our Nation, Americans determined to set
    things right. We restored the vital center, replacing outmoded
    ideologies with a new vision anchored in basic, enduring values:
    opportunity for all, responsibility from all, a community of all
    Americans. We reinvented Government, transforming it into a catalyst for
    new ideas that stress both opportunity and responsibility and give our
    people the tools they need to solve their own problems.
        With the smallest Federal work force in 40 years, we turned record
    deficits into record surpluses and doubled our investment in education.
    We cut crime with 100,000 community police and the Brady law, which has
    kept guns out of the hands of half a million criminals.
        We ended welfare as we knew it, requiring work while protecting
    health care and nutrition for children and investing more in child care,
    transportation, and housing to help their parents go to work. We've
    helped parents to succeed at home and at work with family leave, which
    20 million Americans have now used to care for a newborn child or a sick
    loved one. We've engaged 150,000 young Americans in citizen service
    through AmeriCorps, while helping them earn money for college.
        In 1992 we just had a roadmap. Today, we have results.
        Even more important, America again has the confidence to dream big
    dreams. But we must not let this confidence drift into complacency. For
    we, all of us, will be judged by the dreams and deeds we pass on to our
    children. And on that score, we will be held to a high standard, indeed,
    because our chance to do good is so great.
        My fellow Americans, we have crossed the bridge we built to the 21st
    century. Now, we must shape a 21st century American revolution of
    opportunity, responsibility, and community. We must be now, as we were
    in the beginning, a new nation.
        At the dawn of the last century, Theodore Roosevelt said, ``The one
    characteristic more essential than any other is foresight . . . it
    should be the growing Nation with a future that takes the long look
    ahead.'' So tonight, let us take our long look ahead and set great goals
    for our Nation.
        To 21st century America, let us pledge these things: Every child
    will begin school ready to learn and graduate ready to succeed. Every
    family will be able to succeed at home and at work, and no child will be
    raised in poverty. We will meet the challenge of the aging of America.
    We will assure quality, affordable health care, at last, for all
    Americans.
        We will make America the safest big country on Earth. We will pay
    off our national debt for the first time since 1835.<SUP>*</SUP> We will
    bring prosperity to every American community. We will reverse the course
    of climate change and leave a safer, cleaner planet. America will lead
    the world toward shared peace and prosperity and the far frontiers of
    science and technology. And we will become at last what our Founders
    pledged us to be so long ago: One Nation, under God, indivisible, with
    liberty and justice for all.
        <SUP>*</SUP> White House correction.
        These are great goals, worthy of a great nation. We will not reach
    them all this year, not even in this decade. But we will reach them. Let
    us remember that the first American Revolution was not won with a single
    shot; the continent was not settled in a single year. The lesson of our
    history and the lesson of the last 7 years is that great goals are
    reached step by step, always building on our progress, always gaining
    ground.
        Of course, you can't gain ground if you're standing still. And for
    too long this Congress has been standing still on some of our most
    pressing national priorities. So let's begin tonight with them.
        Again, I ask you to pass a real Patients' Bill of Rights. I ask you
    to pass commonsense gun safety legislation. I ask you to pass campaign
    finance reform. I ask you to vote up or down on judicial nominations and
    other important appointees. And again, I ask you--I implore you to raise
    the minimum wage.
        Now, 2 years ago--let me try to balance the seesaw here--
    [laughter]--2 years ago, as we reached across party lines to reach our
    first balanced budget, I asked that we meet our responsibility to the
    next generation by maintaining our fiscal discipline. Because we refused
    to stray from that path, we are doing

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    something that would have seemed unimaginable 7 years ago. We are
    actually paying down the national debt. Now, if we stay on this path, we
    can pay down the debt entirely in just 13 years now and make America
    debt-free for the first time since Andrew Jackson was President in 1835.
        In 1993 we began to put our fiscal house in order with the Deficit
    Reduction Act, which you'll all remember won passages in both Houses by
    just a single vote. Your former colleague, my first Secretary of the
    Treasury, led that effort and sparked our long boom. He's here with us
    tonight. Lloyd
    Bentsen, you have served America well, and we thank you.
        Beyond paying off the debt, we must ensure that the benefits of debt
    reduction go to preserving two of the most important guarantees we make
    to every American, Social Security and Medicare. Tonight I ask you to
    work with me to make a bipartisan downpayment on Social Security reform
    by crediting the interest savings from debt reduction to the Social
    Security Trust Fund so that it will be strong and sound for the next 50
    years.
        But this is just the start of our journey. We must also take the
    right steps toward reaching our great goals. First and foremost, we need
    a 21st century revolution in education, guided by our faith that every
    single child can learn. Because education is more important than ever,
    more than ever the key to our children's future, we must make sure all
    our children have that key. That means quality pre-school and after-
    school, the best trained teachers in the classroom, and college
    opportunities for all our children.
        For 7 years now, we've worked hard to improve our schools, with
    opportunity and responsibility, investing more but demanding more in
    turn. Reading, math, college entrance scores are up. Some of the most
    impressive gains are in schools in very poor neighborhoods.
        But all successful schools have followed the same proven formula:
    higher standards, more accountability, and extra help so children who
    need it can get it to reach those standards. I have sent Congress a
    reform plan based on that formula. It holds States and school districts
    accountable for progress and rewards them for results. Each year, our
    National Government invests more than $15 billion in our schools. It is
    time to support what works and stop supporting what doesn't.
        Now, as we demand more from our schools, we should also invest more
    in our schools. Let's double our investment to help States and districts
    turn around their worst-performing schools or shut them down. Let's
    double our investments in after-school and summer school programs, which
    boost achievement and keep people off the streets and out of trouble. If
    we do this, we can give every single child in every failing school in
    America--everyone--the chance to meet high standards.
        Since 1993, we've nearly doubled our investment in Head Start and
    improved its quality. Tonight I ask you for another $1 billion for Head
    Start, the largest increase in the history of the program.
        We know that children learn best in smaller classes with good
    teachers. For 2 years in a row, Congress has supported my plan to hire
    100,000 new qualified teachers to lower class size in the early grades.
    I thank you for that, and I ask you to make it three in a row. And to
    make sure all teachers know the subjects they teach, tonight I propose a
    new teacher quality initiative, to recruit more talented people into the
    classroom, reward good teachers for staying there, and give all teachers
    the training they need.
        We know charter schools provide real public school choice. When I
    became President, there was just one independent public charter school
    in all America. Today, thanks to you, there are 1,700. I ask you now to
    help us meet our goal of 3,000 charter schools by next year.
        We know we must connect all our classrooms to the Internet, and
    we're getting there. In 1994, only 3 percent of our classrooms were
    connected. Today, with the help of the Vice President's E-rate program,
    more than half of them are. And 90 percent of our schools have at least
    one Internet connection. But we cannot finish the job when a third of
    all our schools are in serious disrepair. Many of them have walls and
    wires so old, they're too old for the Internet. So tonight, I propose to
    help 5,000 schools a year make immediate and urgent repairs and, again,
    to help build or modernize 6,000 more, to get

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    students out of trailers and into high-tech classrooms.
        I ask all of you to help me double our bipartisan GEAR UP program,
    which provides mentors for disadvantaged young people. If we double it,
    we can provide mentors for 1.4 million of them. Let's also offer these
    kids from disadvantaged backgrounds the same chance to take the same
    college test-prep courses wealthier students use to boost their test
    scores.
        To make the American dream achievable for all, we must make college
    affordable for all. For 7 years, on a bipartisan basis, we have taken
    action toward that goal: larger Pell grants, more affordable student
    loans, education IRA's, and our HOPE scholarships, which have already
    benefited 5 million young people.
        Now, 67 percent of high school graduates are going on to college.
    That's up 10 percent since 1993. Yet millions of families still strain
    to pay college tuition. They need help. So I propose a landmark $30-
    billion college opportunity tax cut, a middle class tax deduction for up
    to $10,000 in college tuition costs. The previous actions of this
    Congress have already made 2 years of college affordable for all. It's
    time make 4 years of college affordable for all. If we take all these
    steps, we'll move a long way toward making sure every child starts
    school ready to learn and graduates ready to succeed.
        We also need a 21st century revolution to reward work and strengthen
    families by giving every parent the tools to succeed at work and at the
    most important work of all, raising children. That means making sure
    every family has health care and the support to care for aging parents,
    the tools to bring their children up right, and that no child grows up
    in poverty.
        From my first days as President, we've worked to give families
    better access to better health care. In 1997, we passed the Children's
    Health Insurance Program--CHIP--so that workers who don't have coverage
    through their employers at least can get it for their children. So far,
    we've enrolled 2 million children; we're well on our way to our goal of
    5 million.
        But there are still more than 40 million of our fellow Americans
    without health insurance, more than there were in 1993. Tonight I
    propose that we follow Vice President Gore's suggestion to make low
    income parents eligible for the insurance that covers their children.
    Together with our children's initiative--think of this--together with
    our children's initiative, this action would enable us to cover nearly a
    quarter of all the uninsured people in America.
        Again, I want to ask you to let people between the ages of 55 and
    65, the fastest growing group of uninsured, buy into Medicare. And this
    year I propose to give them a tax credit to make that choice an
    affordable one. I hope you will support that, as well.
        When the baby boomers retire, Medicare will be faced with caring for
    twice as many of our citizens; yet, it is far from ready to do so. My
    generation must not ask our children's generation to shoulder our
    burden. We simply must act now to strengthen and modernize Medicare.
        My budget includes a comprehensive plan to reform Medicare, to make
    it more efficient and more competitive. And it dedicates nearly $400
    billion of our budget surplus to keep Medicare solvent past 2025. And at
    long last, it also provides funds to give every senior a voluntary
    choice of affordable coverage for prescription drugs.
        Lifesaving drugs are an indispensable part of modern medicine. No
    one creating a Medicare program today would even think of excluding
    coverage for prescription drugs. Yet more than three in five of our
    seniors now lack dependable drug coverage which can lengthen and enrich
    their lives. Millions of older Americans, who need prescription drugs
    the most, pay the highest prices for them. In good conscience, we cannot
    let another year pass without extending to all our seniors this lifeline
    of affordable prescription drugs.
        Record numbers of Americans are providing for aging or ailing loved
    ones at home. It's a loving but a difficult and often very expensive
    choice. Last year I proposed a $1,000 tax credit for long-term care.
    Frankly, it wasn't enough. This year let's triple it to $3,000. But this
    year, let's pass it.
        We also have to make needed investments to expand access to mental
    health care. I want to take a moment to thank the person

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    who led our first White House Conference on Mental Health last year and
    who for 7 years has led all our efforts to break down the barriers to
    decent treatment of people with mental illness. Thank you, Tipper Gore.
        Taken together, these proposals would mark the largest investment in
    health care in the 35 years since Medicare was created--the largest
    investment in 35 years. That would be a big step toward assuring quality
    health care for all Americans, young and old. And I ask you to embrace
    them and pass them.
        We must also make investments that reward work and support families.
    Nothing does that better than the earned-income tax credit, the EITC.
    The ``E'' in the EITC is about earning, working, taking responsibility,
    and being rewarded for it. In my very first address to you, I asked
    Congress to greatly expand this credit, and you did. As a result, in
    1998 alone, the EITC helped more than 4.3 million Americans work their
    way out of poverty toward the middle class. That's double the number in
    1993.
        Tonight I propose another major expansion of the EITC: to reduce the
    marriage penalty, to make sure it rewards marriage as it rewards work,
    and also to expand the tax credit for families that have more than two
    children. It punishes people with more than two children today. Our
    proposal would allow families with three or more children to get up to
    $1,100 more in tax relief. These are working families; their children
    should not be in poverty.
        We also can't reward work and family unless men and women get equal
    pay for equal work. Today the female unemployment rate is the lowest it
    has been in 46 years. Yet, women still only earn about 75 cents for
    every dollar men earn. We must do better, by providing the resources to
    enforce present equal pay laws, training more women for high-paying,
    high-tech jobs, and passing the ``Paycheck Fairness Act.''
        Many working parents spend up to a quarter--a quarter--of their
    income on child care. Last year, we helped parents provide child care
    for about 2 million children. My child care initiative, before you now,
    along with funds already secured in welfare reform, would make child
    care better, safer, and more affordable for another 400,000 children. I
    ask you to pass that. They need it out there.
        For hard-pressed middle income families, we should also expand the
    child care tax credit. And I believe strongly we should take the next
    big step and make that tax credit refundable for low income families.
    For people making under $30,000 a year, that could mean up to $2,400 for
    child care costs. You know, we all say we're pro-work and pro-family.
    Passing this proposal would prove it.
        Ten of millions of Americans live from paycheck to paycheck. As hard
    as they work, they still don't have the opportunity to save. Too few can
    make use of IRA's and 401k plans. We should do more to help all working
    families save and accumulate wealth. That's the idea behind the
    Individual Development Accounts, the IDA's. I ask you to take that idea
    to a new level, with new retirement savings accounts that enable every
    low- and moderate-income family in America to save for retirement, a
    first home, a medical emergency, or a college education. I propose to
    match their contributions, however small, dollar for dollar, every year
    they save. And I propose to give a major new tax credit to any small
    business that will provide a meaningful pension to its workers. Those
    people ought to have retirement as well as the rest of us.
        Nearly one in three American children grows up without a father.
    These children are 5 times more likely to live in poverty than children
    with both parents at home. Clearly, demanding and supporting responsible
    fatherhood is critical to lifting all our children out of poverty. We've
    doubled child support collections since 1992. And I'm proposing to you
    tough new measures to hold still more fathers responsible.
        But we should recognize that a lot of fathers want to do right by
    their children but need help to do it. Carlos Rosas of St. Paul,
    Minnesota, wanted to do right by his son, and he got the help to do it.
    Now he's got a good job, and he supports his little boy. My budget will
    help 40,000 more fathers make the same choices Carlos Rosas did. I thank
    him for being here tonight. Stand up, Carlos. [Applause] Thank you.

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        If there is any single issue on which we should be able to reach
    across party lines, it is in our common commitment to reward work and
    strengthen families. Just remember what we did last year. We came
    together to help people with disabilities keep their health insurance
    when they go to work. And I thank you for that. Thanks to overwhelming
    bipartisan support from this Congress, we have improved foster care.
    We've helped those young people who leave it when they turn 18, and we
    have dramatically increased the number of foster care children going
    into adoptive homes. I thank all of you for all of that.
        Of course, I am forever grateful to the person who has led our
    efforts from the beginning and who's worked so tirelessly for children
    and families for 30 years now, my wife, Hillary, and I thank her.
        If we take the steps just discussed, we can go a long, long way
    toward empowering parents to succeed at home and at work and ensuring
    that no child is raised in poverty. We can make these vital investments
    in health care, education, support for working families, and still offer
    tax cuts to help pay for college, for retirement, to care for aging
    parents, to reduce the marriage penalty. We can do these things without
    forsaking the path of fiscal discipline that got us to this point here
    tonight.
        Indeed, we must make these investments and these tax cuts in the
    context of a balanced budget that strengthens and extends the life of
    Social Security and Medicare and pays down the national debt.
        Crime in America has dropped for the past 7 years--that's the
    longest decline on record--thanks to a national consensus we helped to
    forge on community police, sensible gun safety laws, and effective
    prevention. But nobody, nobody here, nobody in America believes we're
    safe enough. So again, I ask you to set a higher goal. Let's make this
    country the safest big country in the world.
        Last fall, Congress supported my plan to hire, in addition to the
    100,000 community police we've already funded, 50,000 more, concentrated
    in high-crime neighborhoods. I ask your continued support for that.
        Soon after the Columbine tragedy, Congress considered commonsense
    gun legislation, to require Brady background checks at the gun shows,
    child safety locks for new handguns, and a ban on the importation of
    large-capacity ammunition clips. With courage and a tie-breaking vote by
    the Vice President--[laughter]--the Senate faced down the gun lobby,
    stood up for the American people, and passed this legislation. But the
    House failed to follow suit.
        Now, we have all seen what happens when guns fall into the wrong
    hands. Daniel
    Mauser was only 15 years old when he was gunned down at Columbine. He
    was an amazing kid, a straight-A student, a good skier. Like all parents
    who lose their children, his father, Tom, has borne unimaginable grief.
    Somehow he has found the strength to honor his son by transforming his
    grief into action. Earlier this month, he took a leave of absence from
    his job to fight for tougher gun safety laws. I pray that his courage
    and wisdom will at long last move this Congress to make commonsense gun
    legislation the very next order of business. Tom Mauser, stand up. We
    thank you for being here tonight. Tom. Thank you, Tom.
        We must strengthen our gun laws and enforce those already on the
    books better. Federal gun crime prosecutions are up 16 percent since I
    took office. But we must do more. I propose to hire more Federal and
    local gun prosecutors and more ATF agents to crack down on illegal gun
    traffickers and bad-apple dealers. And we must give them the enforcement
    tools that they need, tools to trace every gun and every bullet used in
    every gun crime in the United States. I ask you to help us do that.
        Every State in this country already requires hunters and automobile
    drivers to have a license. I think they ought to do the same thing for
    handgun purchases. Now specifically, I propose a plan to ensure that all
    new handgun buyers must first have a photo license from their State
    showing they passed the Brady background check and a gun safety course,
    before they get the gun. I hope you'll help me pass that in this
    Congress.
        Listen to this--listen to this. The accidental gun rate--the
    accidental gun death rate of children under 15 in the United States

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    is 9 times higher than in the other 25 industrialized countries
    combined. Now, technologies now exist that could lead to guns that can
    only be fired by the adults who own them. I ask Congress to fund
    research into smart gun technology to save these children's lives. I ask
    responsible leaders in the gun industry to work with us on smart guns
    and other steps to keep guns out of the wrong hands to keep our children
    safe.
        You know, every parent I know worries about the impact of violence
    in the media on their children. I want to begin by thanking the
    entertainment industry for accepting my challenge to put voluntary
    ratings on TV programs and video and Internet games. But frankly, the
    ratings are too numerous, diverse, and confusing to be really useful to
    parents. So tonight, I ask the industry to accept the First Lady's
    challenge to develop a single voluntary rating system for all children's
    entertainment that is easier for parents to understand and enforce. The
    steps I outline will take us well on our way to making America the
    safest big country in the world.
        Now, to keep our historic economic expansion going, the subject of a
    lot of discussion in this community and others, I believe we need a 21st
    century revolution to open new markets, start new businesses, hire new
    workers right here in America, in our inner cities, poor rural areas,
    and Native American reservations.
        Our Nation's prosperity hasn't yet reached these places. Over the
    last 6 months, I've traveled to a lot of them, joined by many of you and
    many far-sighted business people, to shine a spotlight on the enormous
    potential in communities from Appalachia to the Mississippi Delta, from
    Watts to the Pine Ridge reservation. Everywhere I go, I meet talented
    people eager for opportunity and able to work. Tonight I ask you, let's
    put them to work. For business, it's the smart thing to do. For America,
    it's the right thing to do. And let me ask you something: If we don't do
    this now, when in the wide world will we ever get around to it?
        So I ask Congress to give businesses the same incentives to invest
    in America's new markets they now have to invest in markets overseas.
    Tonight I propose a large new markets tax credit and other incentives to
    spur $22 billion in private-sector capital to create new businesses and
    new investments in our inner cities and rural areas. Because empowerment
    zones have been creating these opportunities for 5 years now, I also ask
    you to increase incentives to invest in them and to create more of them.
        And let me say to all of you again what I have tried to say at every
    turn: This is not a Democratic or a Republican issue. Giving people a
    chance to live their dreams is an American issue.
        Mr. Speaker, it was a powerful moment last November when you joined
    Reverend Jesse Jackson and me in your home State of Illinois and
    committed to working toward our common goal by combining the best ideas
    from both sides of the aisle. I want to thank you again and to tell you,
    Mr. Speaker, I look forward to working with you. This is a worthy joint
    endeavor. Thank you.
        I also ask you to make special efforts to address the areas of our
    Nation with the highest rates of poverty, our Native American
    reservations and the Mississippi Delta. My budget includes a $110
    million initiative to promote economic development in the Delta and a
    billion dollars to increase economic opportunity, health care,
    education, and law enforcement for our Native American communities. We
    should begin this new century by honoring our historic responsibility to
    empower the first Americans. And I want to thank tonight the leaders and
    the members from both parties who've expressed to me an interest in
    working with us on these efforts. They are profoundly important.
        There's another part of our American community in trouble tonight,
    our family farmers. When I signed the farm bill in 1996, I said there
    was great danger it would work well in good times but not in bad. Well,
    droughts, floods, and historically low prices have made these times very
    bad for the farmers. We must work together to strengthen the farm safety
    net, invest in land conservation, and create some new markets for them
    by expanding our programs for bio-based fuels and products. Please, they
    need help. Let's do it together.
        Opportunity for all requires something else today, having access to
    a computer and

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    knowing how to use it. That means we must close the digital divide
    between those who've got the tools and those who don't. Connecting
    classrooms and libraries to the Internet is crucial, but it's just a
    start. My budget ensures that all new teachers are trained to teach 21st
    century skills, and it creates technology centers in 1,000 communities
    to serve adults. This spring, I'll invite high-tech leaders to join me
    on another new markets tour, to close the digital divide and open
    opportunity for our people. I want to thank the high-tech companies that
    already are doing so much in this area. I hope the new tax incentives I
    have proposed will get all the rest of them to join us. This is a
    national crusade. We have got to do this and do it quickly.
        Now, again I say to you, these are steps, but step by step, we can
    go a long way toward our goal of bringing opportunity to every
    community.
        To realize the full possibilities of this economy, we must reach
    beyond our own borders, to shape the revolution that is tearing down
    barriers and building new networks among nations and individuals and
    economies and cultures: globalization. It's the central reality of our
    time.
        Of course, change this profound is both liberating and threatening
    to people. But there's no turning back. And our open, creative society
    stands to benefit more than any other if we understand and act on the
    realities of interdependence. We have to be at the center of every vital
    global network, as a good neighbor and a good partner. We have to
    recognize that we cannot build our future without helping others to
    build theirs.
        The first thing we have got to do is to forge a new consensus on
    trade. Now, those of us who believe passionately in the power of open
    trade, we have to ensure that it lifts both our living standards and our
    values, never tolerating abusive child labor or a race to the bottom in
    the environment and worker protection. But others must recognize that
    open markets and rule-based trade are the best engines we know of for
    raising living standards, reducing global poverty and environmental
    destruction, and assuring the free flow of ideas.
        I believe, as strongly tonight as I did the first day I got here,
    the only direction forward for America on trade--the only direction for
    America on trade is to keep going forward. I ask you to help me forge
    that consensus. We have to make developing economies our partners in
    prosperity. That's why I would like to ask you again to finalize our
    groundbreaking African and Caribbean Basin trade initiatives.
        But globalization is about more than economics. Our purpose must be
    to bring together the world around freedom and democracy and peace and
    to oppose those who would tear it apart. Here are the fundamental
    challenges I believe America must meet to shape the 21st century world.
        First, we must continue to encourage our former adversaries, Russia
    and China, to emerge as stable, prosperous, democratic nations. Both are
    being held back today from reaching their full potential: Russia by the
    legacy of communism, an economy in turmoil, a cruel and self-defeating
    war in Chechnya; China by the illusion that it can buy stability at the
    expense of freedom.
        But think how much has changed in the past decade: 5,000 former
    Soviet nuclear weapons taken out of commission; Russian soldiers
    actually serving with ours in the Balkans; Russian people electing their
    leaders for the first time in a thousand years; and in China, an economy
    more open to the world than ever before.
        Of course, no one, not a single person in this Chamber tonight can
    know for sure what direction these great nations will take. But we do
    know for sure that we can choose what we do. And we should do everything
    in our power to increase the chance that they will choose wisely, to be
    constructive members of our global community.
        That's why we should support those Russians who are struggling for a
    democratic, prosperous future; continue to reduce both our nuclear
    arsenals; and help Russia to safeguard weapons and materials that
    remain.
        And that's why I believe Congress should support the agreement we
    negotiated to bring China into the WTO, by passing permanent normal
    trade relations with China as soon as possible this year.
        I think you ought to do it for two reasons: First of all, our
    markets are already open to

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    China; this agreement will open China's markets to us; and second, it
    will plainly advance the cause of peace in Asia and promote the cause of
    change in China. No, we don't know where it's going. All we can do is
    decide what we're going to do. But when all is said and done, we need to
    know we did everything we possibly could to maximize the chance that
    China will choose the right future.
        A second challenge we've got is to protect our own security from
    conflicts that pose the risk of wider war and threaten our common
    humanity. We can't prevent every conflict or stop every outrage. But
    where our interests are at stake and we can make a difference, we should
    be, and we must be, peacemakers.
        We should be proud of our role in bringing the Middle East closer to
    a lasting peace, building peace in Northern Ireland, working for peace
    in East Timor and Africa, promoting reconciliation between Greece and
    Turkey and in Cyprus, working to defuse these crises between India and
    Pakistan, in defending human rights and religious freedom. And we should
    be proud of the men and women of our Armed Forces and those of our
    allies who stopped the ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, enabling a million
    people to return to their homes.
        When Slobodan Milosevic unleashed his terror on Kosovo, Captain John
    Cherrey was one of the brave airmen who turned the tide. And when
    another American plane was shot down over Serbia, he flew into the teeth
    of enemy air defenses to bring his fellow pilot home. Thanks to our
    Armed Forces' skill and bravery, we prevailed in Kosovo without losing a
    single American in combat. I want to introduce Captain Cherrey to you.
    We honor Captain Cherrey, and we promise you, Captain, we'll finish the
    job you began. Stand up so we can see you.
        A third challenge we have is to keep this inexorable march of
    technology from giving terrorists and potentially hostile nations the
    means to undermine our defenses. Keep in mind, the same technological
    advances that have shrunk cell phones to fit in the palms of our hands
    can also make weapons of terror easier to conceal and easier to use.
        We must meet this threat by making effective agreements to restrain
    nuclear and missile programs in North Korea, curbing the flow of lethal
    technology to Iran, preventing Iraq from threatening its neighbors,
    increasing our preparedness against chemical and biological attack,
    protecting our vital computer systems from hackers and criminals, and
    developing a system to defend against new missile threats, while working
    to preserve our ABM missile treaty with Russia. We must do all these
    things.
        I predict to you, when most of us are long gone but some time in the
    next 10 to 20 years, the major security threat this country will face
    will come from the enemies of the nation state: the narcotraffickers and
    the terrorists and the organized criminals, who will be organized
    together, working together, with increasing access to ever-more
    sophisticated chemical and biological weapons. And I want to thank the
    Pentagon and others for doing what they're doing right now to try to
    help protect us and plan for that, so that our defenses will be strong.
    I ask for your support to ensure they can succeed.
        I also want to ask you for a constructive bipartisan dialog this
    year to work to build a consensus which I hope will eventually lead to
    the ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty.
        I hope we can also have a constructive effort to meet the challenge
    that is presented to our planet by the huge gulf between rich and poor.
    We cannot accept a world in which part of humanity lives on the cutting
    edge of a new economy and the rest live on the bare edge of survival. I
    think we have to do our part to change that with expanded trade,
    expanded aid, and the expansion of freedom.
        This is interesting: From Nigeria to Indonesia, more people got the
    right to choose their leaders in 1999 than in 1989, when the Berlin Wall
    fell. We've got to stand by these democracies, including, and especially
    tonight, Colombia, which is fighting narcotraffickers, for its own
    people's lives and our children's lives. I have proposed a strong 2-year
    package to help Colombia win this fight. I want to thank the leaders in
    both parties in both Houses for listening to me and the President of
    Colombia about it. We have got to pass this. I want to ask your help. A
    lot is riding on it. And it's so important for the long-term stability
    of our country and for what happens in Latin America.

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        I also want you to know I'm going to send you new legislation to go
    after what these drug barons value the most, their money. And I hope
    you'll pass that as well.
        In a world where over a billion people live on less than a dollar a
    day, we also have got to do our part in the global endeavor to reduce
    the debts of the poorest countries, so they can invest in education,
    health care, and economic growth. That's what the Pope and other
    religious leaders have urged us to do. And last year, Congress made a
    downpayment on America's share. I ask you to continue that. I thank you
    for what you did and ask you to stay the course.
        I also want to say that America must help more nations to break the
    bonds of disease. Last year in Africa, 10 times as many people died from
    AIDS as were killed in wars--10 times. The budget I give you invests
    $150 million more in the fight against this and other infectious
    killers. And today I propose a tax credit to speed the development of
    vaccines for diseases like malaria, TB, and AIDS. I ask the private
    sector and our partners around the world to join us in embracing this
    cause. We can save millions of lives together, and we ought to do it.
        I also want to mention our final challenge, which, as always, is the
    most important. I ask you to pass a national security budget that keeps
    our military the best trained and best equipped in the world, with
    heightened readiness and 21st century weapons, which raises salaries for
    our service men and women, which protects our veterans, which fully
    funds the diplomacy that keeps our soldiers out of war, which makes good
    on our commitment to our U.N. dues and arrears. I ask you to pass this
    budget.
        I also want to say something, if I might, very personal tonight. The
    American people watching us at home, with the help of all the
    commentators, can tell, from who stands and who sits and who claps and
    who doesn't, that there's still modest differences of opinion in this
    room. [Laughter] But I want to thank you for something, every one of
    you. I want to thank you for the extraordinary support you have given,
    Republicans and Democrats alike, to our men and women in uniform. I
    thank you for that.
        I also want to thank, especially, two people. First, I want to thank
    our Secretary of Defense, Bill Cohen, for symbolizing our bipartisan
    commitment to national security. Thank you, sir. Even more, I want to
    thank his wife, Janet, who, more than any other American citizen, has
    tirelessly traveled this world to show the support we all feel for our
    troops. Thank you, Janet Cohen. I appreciate that. Thank you.
        These are the challenges we have to meet so that we can lead the
    world toward peace and freedom in an era of globalization.
        I want to tell you that I am very grateful for many things as
    President. But one of the things I'm grateful for is the opportunity
    that the Vice President and I have had to finally put to rest the bogus
    idea that you cannot grow the economy and protect the environment at the
    same time.
        As our economy has grown, we've rid more than 500 neighborhoods of
    toxic waste, ensured cleaner air and water for millions of people. In
    the past 3 months alone, we've helped preserve 40 million acres of
    roadless lands in the national forests, created three new national
    monuments.
        But as our communities grow, our commitment to conservation must
    continue to grow. Tonight I propose creating a permanent conservation
    fund, to restore wildlife, protect coastlines, save natural treasures,
    from the California redwoods to the Florida Everglades.
        This lands legacy endowment would represent by far the most enduring
    investment in land preservation ever proposed in this House. I hope we
    can get together with all the people with different ideas and do this.
    This is a gift we should give to our children and our grandchildren for
    all time, across party lines. We can make an agreement to do this.
        Last year the Vice President launched a new effort to make
    communities more liberal--livable--[laughter]--liberal, I know.
    [Laughter] Wait a minute, I've got a punchline now. That's this year's
    agenda; last year was livable, right? [Laughter] That's what Senator
    Lott is going to say in the commentary afterwards--[laughter]--to make
    our communities more livable. This is big business. This is a big issue.
    What does that

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    mean? You ask anybody that lives in an unlivable community, and they'll
    tell you. They want their kids to grow up next to parks, not parking
    lots; the parents don't have to spend all their time stalled in traffic
    when they could be home with their children.
        Tonight I ask you to support new funding for the following things,
    to make American communities for liberal--livable. [Laughter] I've done
    pretty well with this speech, but I can't say that.
        One, I want you to help us to do three things. We need more funding
    for advanced transit systems. We need more funding for saving open
    spaces in places of heavy development. And we need more funding--this
    ought to have bipartisan appeal--we need more funding for helping major
    cities around the Great Lakes protect their waterways and enhance their
    quality of life. We need these things, and I want you to help us.
        The greatest environmental challenge of the new century is global
    warming. The scientists tell us the 1990's were the hottest decade of
    the entire millennium. If we fail to reduce the emission of greenhouse
    gases, deadly heat waves and droughts will become more frequent, coastal
    areas will flood, and economies will be disrupted. That is going to
    happen, unless we act.
        Many people in the United States, some people in this Chamber, and
    lots of folks around the world still believe you cannot cut greenhouse
    gas emissions without slowing economic growth. In the industrial age,
    that may well have been true. But in this digital economy, it is not
    true anymore. New technologies make it possible to cut harmful emissions
    and provide even more growth.
        For example, just last week, automakers unveiled cars that get 70 to
    80 miles a gallon, the fruits of a unique research partnership between
    Government and industry. And before you know it, efficient production of
    bio-fuels will give us the equivalent of hundreds of miles from a gallon
    of gasoline.
        To speed innovation in these kind of technologies, I think we should
    give a major tax incentive to business for the production of clean
    energy and to families for buying energy-saving homes and appliances and
    the next generation of super efficient cars when they hit the showroom
    floor. I also ask the auto industry to use the available technologies to
    make all new cars more fuel-efficient right away.
        And I ask this Congress to do something else. Please help us make
    more of our clean energy technology available to the developing world.
    That will create cleaner growth abroad and a lot more new jobs here in
    the United States of America.
        In the new century, innovations in science and technology will be
    key not only to the health of the environment but to miraculous
    improvements in the quality of our lives and advances in the economy.
    Later this year, researchers will complete the first draft of the entire
    human genome, the very blueprint of life. It is important for all our
    fellow Americans to recognize that Federal tax dollars have funded much
    of this research and that this and other wise investments in science are
    leading to a revolution in our ability to detect, treat, and prevent
    disease.
        For example, researchers have identified genes that cause
    Parkinson's, diabetes, and certain kinds of cancer; they are designing
    precision therapies that will block the harmful effect of these genes
    for good. Researchers already are using this new technique to target and
    destroy cells that cause breast cancer. Soon, we may be able to use it
    to prevent the onset of Alzheimer's. Scientists are also working on an
    artificial retina to help many blind people to see and--listen to this--
    microchips that would actually directly stimulate damaged spinal cords
    in a way that could allow people now paralyzed to stand up and walk.
        These kinds of innovations are also propelling our remarkable
    prosperity. Information technology only includes 8 percent of our
    employment, but now it counts for a third of our economic growth along
    with jobs that pay, by the way, about 80 percent above the private
    sector average. Again, we ought to keep in mind, Government-funded
    research brought supercomputers, the Internet, and communications
    satellites into being. Soon researchers will bring us devices that can
    translate foreign languages as fast as you can talk, materials 10 times
    stronger than steel at a fraction of the weight, and--this is
    unbelievable to me--molecular computers the

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    size of a teardrop with the power of today's fastest supercomputers.
        To accelerate the march of discovery across all these disciplines in
    science and technology, I ask you to support my recommendation of an
    unprecedented $3 billion in the 21st century research fund, the largest
    increase in civilian research in a generation. We owe it to our future.
        Now, these new breakthroughs have to be used in ways that reflect
    our values. First and foremost, we have to safeguard our citizens'
    privacy. Last year we proposed to protect every citizen's medical
    record. This year we will finalize those rules. We've also taken the
    first steps to protect the privacy of bank and credit card records and
    other financial statements. Soon I will send legislation to you to
    finish that job. We must also act to prevent any genetic discrimination
    whatever by employers or insurers. I hope you will support that.
        These steps will allow us to lead toward the far frontiers of
    science and technology. They will enhance our health, the environment,
    the economy in ways we can't even imagine today. But we all know that at
    a time when science, technology, and the forces of globalization are
    bringing so many changes into all our lives, it's more important than
    ever that we strengthen the bonds that root us in our local communities
    and in our national community.
        No tie binds different people together like citizen service. There's
    a new spirit of service in America, a movement we've tried to support
    with AmeriCorps, expanded Peace Corps, unprecedented new partnerships
    with businesses, foundations, community groups; partnerships, for
    example, like the one that enlisted 12,000 companies which have now
    moved 650,000 of our fellow citizens from welfare to work; partnerships
    to battle drug abuse, AIDS, teach young people to read, save America's
    treasures, strengthen the arts, fight teen pregnancy, prevent violence
    among young people, promote racial healing. The American people are
    working together.
        But we should do more to help Americans help each other. First, we
    should help faith-based organizations to do more to fight poverty and
    drug abuse and help people get back on the right track, with initiatives
    like Second Chance Homes that do so much to help unwed teen mothers.
    Second, we should support Americans who tithe and contribute to
    charities but don't earn enough to claim a tax deduction for it. Tonight
    I propose new tax incentives that would allow low and middle income
    citizens who don't itemize to get that deduction. It's nothing but fair,
    and it will get more people to give.
        We should do more to help new immigrants to fully participate in our
    community. That's why I recommend spending more to teach them civics and
    English. And since everybody in our community counts, we've got to make
    sure everyone is counted in this year's census.
        Within 10 years--just 10 years--there will be no majority race in
    our largest State of California. In a little more than 50 years, there
    will be no majority race in America. In a more interconnected world,
    this diversity can be our greatest strength. Just look around this
    Chamber. Look around. We have Members in this Congress from virtually
    every racial, ethnic, and religious background. And I think you would
    agree that America is stronger because of it. [Applause]
        You also have to agree that all those differences you just clapped
    for all too often spark hatred and division even here at home. Just in
    the last couple of years, we've seen a man dragged to death in Texas
    just because he was black. We saw a young man murdered in Wyoming just
    because he was gay. Last year we saw the shootings of African-Americans,
    Asian-Americans, and Jewish children just because of who they were. This
    is not the American way, and we must draw the line.
        I ask you to draw that line by passing without delay the ``Hate
    Crimes Prevention Act'' and the ``Employment Non-Discrimination Act.''
    And I ask you to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act.
        Finally tonight, I propose the largest ever investment in our civil
    rights laws for enforcement, because no American should be subjected to
    discrimination in finding a home, getting a job, going to school, or
    securing a loan. Protections in law should be protections in fact.

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        Last February, because I thought this was so important, I created
    the White House Office of One America to promote racial reconciliation.
    That's what one of my personal heroes, Hank Aaron, has done all his
    life. From his days as our all-time home run king to his recent acts of
    healing, he has always brought people together. We should follow his
    example, and we're honored to have him with us tonight. Stand up, Hank
    Aaron.
        I just want to say one more thing about this, and I want every one
    of you to think about this the next time you get mad at one of your
    colleagues on the other side of the aisle. This fall, at the White
    House, Hillary had one of her millennium dinners, and we had this very
    distinguished scientist there, who is an expert in this whole work in
    the human genome. And he said that we are all, regardless of race,
    genetically 99.9 percent the same.
        Now, you may find that uncomfortable when you look around here.
    [Laughter] But it is worth remembering. We can laugh about this, but you
    think about it. Modern science has confirmed what ancient faiths have
    always taught: the most important fact of life is our common humanity.
    Therefore, we should do more than just tolerate our diversity; we should
    honor it and celebrate it.
        My fellow Americans, every time I prepare for the State of the
    Union, I approach it with hope and expectation and excitement for our
    Nation. But tonight is very special, because we stand on the mountain
    top of a new millennium. Behind us we can look back and see the great
    expanse of American achievement, and before us we can see even greater,
    grander frontiers of possibility. We should, all of us, be filled with
    gratitude and humility for our present progress and prosperity. We
    should be filled with awe and joy at what lies over the horizon. And we
    should be filled with absolute determination to make the most of it.
        You know, when the Framers finished crafting our Constitution in
    Philadelphia, Benjamin Franklin stood in Independence Hall, and he
    reflected on the carving of the Sun that was on the back of a chair he
    saw. The Sun was low on the horizon. So he said this--he said, ``I've
    often wondered whether that Sun was rising or setting. Today,'' Franklin
    said, ``I have the happiness to know it's a rising Sun.'' Today, because
    each succeeding generation of Americans has kept the fire of freedom
    burning brightly, lighting those frontiers of possibility, we all still
    bask in the glow and the warmth of Mr. Franklin's rising sun.
        After 224 years, the American revolution continues. We remain a new
    nation. And as long as our dreams outweigh our memories, America will be
    forever young. That is our destiny. And this is our moment.
        Thank you, God bless you, and God bless America.

    Note: The President spoke at 9:18 p.m. in the House Chamber of the
    Capitol. In his remarks, he referred to civil rights leader Rev. Jesse
    Jackson; President Slobodan Milosevic of the Federal Republic of
    Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro); President Andres Pastrana of
    Colombia; Pope John Paul II; and Eric Lander, director, Whitehead
    Institute/MIT Center for Genome Research.