[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 36, Number 38 (Monday, September 25, 2000)]
[Pages 2147-2150]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks at a Reception for Governor Jeanne Shaheen

September 20, 2000

    Thank you very much. Thank you. First thing I would like to say is 
that back when we were taking pictures, a number of you commented on my 
dress. I'm here to take your drink order before the movie begins. 
[Laughter]
    Actually, this is a terrific theater, and I would like to thank the 
owners who are here. Our hosts are here tonight, and I think we should 
give them a big hand. [Applause] This is a beautiful place, a project, I 
might add, financed by the Small Business Administration loan.
    I want to thank my friend Parris Glendening for being here. We've 
had a wonderful partnership with Maryland. You know, they're kind of 
right next door to DC here. We do a lot of things with Governor 
Glendening. He's done a fabulous job. He's a very generous person. He's 
spent a lot of his time this year trying to raise money to create other 
Democratic governorships and

[[Page 2148]]

help the ones that we have get reelected, and I'm grateful.
    I really wanted to come here tonight. First, I have known Jeanne 
Shaheen a long time, a long time before I was President, a long time 
before she was Governor. I went to New Hampshire the first time when 
Hugh Gallen was Governor. That was when I didn't have any gray hair. 
[Laughter]
    And I went once to campaign for a man named Paul McEachern who is a 
very good man who didn't win. But I was glad to be there. Jeanne and I 
had a long talk then. I used to read about her all the time in the 
articles about what an important political operative she was, and if you 
wanted to run for President and you went to New Hampshire, you had to 
have her for you. And it's not easy--I can say this; I worked in 
politics from the time I was a teenager--it's not easy to make the 
transition from being somebody that helps someone else, to being a 
candidate in your own right, particularly in a very difficult 
environment.
    So, I'm here because I really believe that I know her much better 
than most Presidents know most Governors. And everything she said about 
her record, everything she said about the difference between herself and 
her opponent, that's all true.
    It's also true that she's had a lot of difficult challenges, one of 
which I'll say more about in a moment, that I think she's tried to meet 
in a forthright way, keeping her commitments to the voters, trying to do 
what's best for the people of New Hampshire, and not running away from 
decisions that are bound to make everybody a little bit unhappy just 
because they break so many eggs. And I admire her.
    And I think that people who are strong leaders who do what needs to 
be done should be rewarded at election time and kept in office. So 
that's one reason I'm here. The second reason I'm here is, there is 
nobody in America, no living public figure, who owes more to the State 
of New Hampshire or loves it more than I do.
    Hillary and I were laughing the other night about how quickly these 
8 years have gone by, how busy they were, how jampacked they were, how 
full of pressure they were, how embarrassing it is that I can't remember 
some things that I'm supposed to be able to remember, or I remember some 
things we did, and I can't remember the year in which we did it. I used 
to pride myself on having a flawless memory. But I remember everything 
about New Hampshire in 1992. [Laughter]
    And a lot of you here helped me. And the people of New Hampshire, 
even the ones that didn't vote for me--even the Republicans helped me--
because I spent a lot of time just going around talking to people and 
listening to them and hearing the rhythm of their dreams and hopes and 
frustrations and seeing the personal manifestation of the difficulties 
our countries faced back then.
    And I think it would be good for them if Governor Shaheen was 
reelected. And I'm doing what I think is right by people who have done 
right by me, twice. I never thought a Democrat could win New Hampshire 
once, much less twice, for President. [Laughter] And I hope we'll make 
it three in a row this time.
    But here is the third thing I would like to say, and I hope it 
causes no difficulty for the Governor. I don't think it will. But the 
most difficult problem she's had to face that can't make anybody happy 
is how to finance the schools. But what I would like the people of New 
Hampshire to know is that today, there are 36 States, 36 of our 50 
States are in court today, not just one or two or three, 36, trying to 
work out the agonizing conflicts between everyone's desire to have taxes 
as low as possible, everybody else's desire to maintain maximum local 
control, and figuring out how to equalize school funding so that all 
kids have a chance to get a good education at an adequate level of 
funding.
    And what I would like you to know is, there are no perfect answers. 
There is no perfect answer. But I have fought--one of the big reasons I 
have fought so hard--and we nearly doubled Federal funding for education 
and training while we were getting rid of the deficit and going from a 
$290 billion deficit to a $211 billion surplus--we have nearly doubled 
funding for education and training since I've been here.
    And I know that some people in New Hampshire, because they believe 
in local control and want it all local taxes, even in

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those State taxes, they turned down the Goals 2000 money. Do you know 
what Goals 2000 required States to do? Here is the strings we attached. 
We said, ``If you take this money, you have to set standards to reach 
the national education goals and figure out how you're going to reach 
them.'' That's it.
    The truth is that under Secretary Riley, himself a former Governor, 
we have actually cut the rules and regulations imposed on local school 
districts in States for the Department of Education by two-thirds over 
what they were in the previous Republican administration, a little-known 
fact. I would appreciate it if my friends from New Hampshire would not 
keep that a secret in the coming election.
    But what we did do is say, ``Hey, we want to give you more money, 
and we want you to figure out how to spend it. But you have to spend it 
in a way that is designed to get results.'' Now, that's the only string 
we imposed, which is why the Governor was right and her adversary was 
wrong on whether they should take Goals 2000 money.
    New Hampshire needs all the Federal money we can get to New 
Hampshire, because there are a lot of people in New Hampshire that don't 
have a lot of money. There are a lot of school districts in New 
Hampshire that don't have a lot of property wealth. And whatever the 
right decision is for New Hampshire and how to resolve all these 
difficult questions, the National Government should make education a 
national priority, should recognize that even though we have more 
schoolchildren in school than ever before, in most States, a smaller 
percentage of the property owners have kids in the schools.
    So you have these blinding crosscurrents of politics. And in New 
Hampshire, anything that has the word ``tax'' in it is more explosive 
than in most places, as all of you know. But what you need to understand 
is that she needs our support, because she's supported improvements in 
education, and because there is no perfect answer to how the schools can 
fairly and adequately be financed.
    And one of the things that we ought to do, and one of the reasons Al 
Gore ought to be elected President, one of the reasons the people of New 
Hampshire ought to vote for him and Joe Lieberman and make it three in a 
row for our side--maybe has never happened--is that we are committed to 
doing this.
    You know, the 100,000 teacher program allows States that are growing 
rapidly and don't have a lot of money to have smaller classes in the 
early grades. We know it gets results. The school financing program 
allows States who have to do new building or major repairs to do it and 
keep their property taxes lower than they otherwise would be.
    So it is true that under our administration, we have set more 
rigorous standards, and we've been more results-oriented for spending 
Federal money. That's true. I plead guilty. But it's also true that 
we've tried to say less to the States about how they had to do it.
    We have cleared out a lot of the underbrush of micromanagement that 
was there before we showed up. And by doubling the amount of education 
and training funds, we have tried to at least make the solutions that 
have to be found by the Governor and the New Hampshire Legislature and 
the people of New Hampshire and people like that all over the country.
    There are 36 States in court, but over 40 could be easily. So I 
would hope that our friends from New Hampshire would go back and tell 
the voters that--that we're out here trying to help you. Whatever 
solution you resolve, the burden on the people of New Hampshire will be 
lower if our policies prevail. And on every single decision that she 
mentioned, she was on the right side, from the Martin Luther King 
holiday to participating in Goals 2000 to taking our school-to-work 
funds and all these other education initiatives.
    There isn't anything more important than figuring out how to do 
this, because if you look at the growth of the New Hampshire economy, 
they've almost got negative unemployment up there now. But what that 
means is that the education premium is even bigger than it was before.
    I'm here because I admire her, because I support her, because I love 
New Hampshire. And I'll never repay my debt to the people there--and 
because I understand them, even when they're being ornery. [Laughter] 
And I know that they're stern

[[Page 2150]]

taskmasters at election time, but she has worked hard. She's worked 
effectively with us, and if for no other reason than New Hampshire ranks 
first in the participation of children in the Child Health Insurance 
Program, she's earned reelection.
    That's the last thing I want to tell you. We appropriated funds at 
the Balanced Budget Act in 1997, the biggest expansion of child health 
care since Medicaid was passed in 1965. We appropriated funds for 5 
million children from low-income working families to get health 
insurance, children that desperately needed it, but their parents earned 
just a little too much money to get them into the Medicaid program--5 
million.
    Today, 3 years later, we have only enrolled a little over 2 million. 
Why? And Parris has done well, too. But the reason is that not every 
State has done that well. So there are children all over America tonight 
who are sick, who need to see doctors, who need to have checkups, who 
need to have everything that's covered in these programs who don't get 
it. But they get it in New Hampshire because she's been a good Governor.
    So I want you to go home, those of you from New Hampshire, and 
redouble your effort. I did say to Jeanne, for those of you who gave 
money tonight, in New Hampshire, $75,000 is still real money. That's a 
lot of television ads on the Manchester TV station. And if you can do 
anything to help her, I hope you will.
    I think that this election, because of what she represents and 
because of her opponent and the clear ideological divide, represents one 
of the seminal contests in our country this year. But the most important 
thing is that the people that live in New Hampshire need, deserve, and 
ought to have her leadership for another term.
    I'm glad we're here tonight. And if you can do anything between now 
and November to help her, I hope you will do that, too. Thank you very 
much.

Note: The President spoke at 9:15 p.m. in Theater One at the Visions 
Theater. In his remarks, he referred to Gov. Parris N. Glendening of 
Maryland; and Gordon Humphrey, Republican gubernatorial candidate in New 
Hampshire. Gov. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire is a candidate for 
reelection.