Cultural Politics
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The United States during the last decade of the twentieth century has been a nation ricocheting between extremes in search of a stable center. In politics, as an editorial in Business Week stressed in 1996, "voters want their leaders to govern from the center." In 1992 Bill Clinton defeated George Bush by portraying himself as a new type of Democrat, a centrist and a Washington outsider committed to reducing the size and cost of government. Once in office, however, he fell under the sway of old-style liberals who convinced him to focus on apportioning government jobs to minorities, promoting gay rights within the military, and allowing his wife Hillary to design a government-run health-care reform package that smacked of New Dealism.
The results were catastrophic for the Democrats. Republicans scored a major victory in the 1994 elections. For the first time in forty years, they seized control of both houses of Congress and announced that their "Contract with America" involved nothing less than the dismantling of the welfare state. "It’s the Russian revolution in reverse," said Republican strategist Bill Kristol. Newt Gingrich outspoken new Speaker of the House, declared that "We are at the end of an era." Tom DeLay, Gingrich’s lieutenant in the House, brazenly stressed that "we are ideologues."
Yet the radical Republicans soon found themselves the victims of their own hubris. Middle-of-the-road Americans balked at the idea of shutting down the federal government, and the ever-resilient Clinton surprised his opponents by moving decisively toward the political center. He hired a new stable of advisors and began stressing that the "era of Big Government is over." He used his State of the Union address in 1995 to co-opt the Republicans on key issues such as welfare reform and balancing the budget. Clinton now insisted that the Democratic party had allowed itself to be seduced by "identity politics"—self-interested groups preoccupied with race, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation. He promised to abandon such factionalism by moving the party’s orientation toward the center of American values. He began talking about the need to curb teen pregnancy and underage smoking, as well as improve the quality of TV programs.
By 1996 the editor of U.S. News and World Report could remark that Clinton had stopped the Republican "revolution and successfully placed himself in the political center, uniting his own party and widening his appeal to independents." His victory over Bob Dole in the 1996 presidential election confirmed his successful makeover. One of Clinton’s top aides declared after the election that "We’re going to see government from the center."
The same conservative forces steering Bill Clinton toward the center were also affecting racial attitudes during the 1990s. People in both political parties began to question the affirmative action policies that had given preferential treatment to women and minorities. When the Supreme Court ruled in Adarand Constructors v. Pena (1995) that the government required a "compelling interest" to justify affirmative action mandates, efforts spread across the country to set aside race- and gender-based preferences. In 1996 the state of California eliminated affirmative action programs in employment, contracting, and university admissions. Democratic Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut expressed the widespread view that racial and gender preferences were "patently unfair."
A new generation of conservative African-American intellectuals agreed. Thomas Sowell, Shelby Steele, Glen Loury, and Ward Connerly, among others, stressed that affirmative action and social welfare programs had backfired. Instead of liberating and uplifting blacks, they had made them dependent on government assistance and undercut individual initiative. Connerly, a member of the board of regents of the University of California, asked, "Are we going to
continue to believe that blacks by definition are disadvantaged? As a black man, I say no."
Another widespread concern during the 1990s was the erosion of civic virtue and public involvement. Between 1960 and 1990, a quarter of the electorate lost interest in voting. In 1994 only 39 percent of the registered voters cast ballots. Apathy at the polls was indicative of a larger trend toward declining participation in community affairs. A dramatic rise in people declaring themselves as "independents" rather than Democrats or Republicans, a sharp decline in membership in voluntary associations, and a growing cynicism toward politicians, the political process, and each other prompted social scientists to analyze the reason for a diminishing sense of civic engagement. The Harvard political scientist Robert Putnam declared in 1995 that the "social fabric is becoming visibly thinner our connections among each other are becoming visibly thinner. We don’t trust one another as much, and we don’t know one another as much. And, of course, this is behind the deterioration of the political dialogue, the deterioration of
public debate."
Putnam blamed television, VCRs, and computers for distracting people from their social responsibilities; others cited the sharp increase in working wives the self-absorbed hedonism of the "baby-boom" generation and their children—"Generation X." Whatever the case, Americans headed toward the twenty-first century with an uncertain confidence that the center would hold. In 1996 President Clinton told the nation, "Cynicism is our opponent. Apathy is our opponent."
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The New Segregation (1992), Shelby Steele
Please read this document and answer the following questions.
A senior fellow at the Hoover Institute at Stanford University and a professor of literature at San Jose State University, Shelby Steele has emerged as one of the most persuasive African-American critics of affirmative action.
The Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s–1960s culminated in the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act—two monumental pieces of legislation that have dramatically altered the fabric of American life. During the struggle for their passage, a new source of power came into full force. Black Americans and their supporters tapped into the moral power inspired by a 300-year history of victimization and oppression and used it, to help transform society, to humanize it, to make it more tolerant and open. They realized, moreover, that the victimization and oppression that blacks had endured came from one "marriage"—a marriage of race and power. They had to stop those who said, "merely because we are white, we have the power to dominated, enslave, segregate and discriminate."
Race should not be a source of power or advantage or disadvantage for anyone in a free society. This was one of the most important lessons of the original civil rights movement. The legislation it championed during the 1960s constituted a new "emancipation proclamation." For the first time segregation and discrimination were made illegal. Blacks began to enjoy a degree of freedom they had never experienced before.
Delayed Anger
This did not mean that things changed overnight for blacks. Nor did it ensure that their memory of the past injustice was obliterated. I hesitate to borrow analogies from the psychological community, but I think this one does apply: Abused children do not usually feel anger until many years after the abuse has ended, that is, after they have experienced a degree of freedom and normalcy. Only after the civil rights legislation had been enacted did blacks at long last begin to feel the rage they had suppressed. I can remember that period myself. I had a tremendous sense of delayed anger at having been forced to attend segregated schools. (My grade school was the first school to be involved in a desegregation suit in the north.) My rage, like that of other blacks, threatened for a time to become all consuming.
Anger was both inevitable and necessary. When suppressed, it eats you alive; it has got to come out, and it certainly did during the 1960s. One form was the black power movement in all of its many manifestations, some of which were violent. There is no question that we should condemn violence, but we should also understand why it occurs. You cannot oppress people for over three centuries and then say it is all over and expect them to put on suits and ties and become decent attaché-carrying citizens and go to work on Wall Street.
Once my own anger was released, my reaction was that I no longer had to apologize for being black. That was a tremendous benefit and it helped me come to terms with my personal development. The problem is that many blacks never progressed beyond their anger.
The Politics of Difference
The black power movement encouraged a permanent state of rage and victimhood. An even greater failing is that it rejoined race and power—the very "marriage" that civil rights had been designed to break up. The leaders of the original movement said, "Anytime you make race a source of power, you are going to guarantee suffering, misery and inequity." Black power leaders declared: "We're going to have power because we're black."
Well, is there any conceivable difference between black power and white power? When you demand power based on the color of your skin, aren't you saying that equality and justice are impossible? Somebody's going to be in, somebody's going to be out. Somebody's going to win, somebody's going to lose, and race is once again a source of advantage for some and disadvantage for others. Ultimately, black power was not about equality or justice; it was, as its name suggests, about power.
And when blacks began to demand entitlements based on their race, feminists responded with enthusiasm, "We've been oppressed too!" Hispanics said, "We're not going to let this bus pass us by," and Asians said, "We're not going to let this pass us by either." Eskimos and American Indians quickly hopped on the bandwagon, as did gays, lesbians, the disabled and other self-defined minorities. By the 1970's, the marriage of race and power was once again firmly established. Equality was out: the "politics of difference" was in. From then on, everyone would rally around the single quality that make them different from the white males and pursue power based on that quality. It is a very simple formula. All you have to do is identify that quality, whatever it may be, with victimization. And victimization is itself, after all, a tremendous source of moral power.
The politics of difference demanded shifting the entire basis of entitlement in America. Historically, entitlement was based on the rights of citizenship elaborated in the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution. This was the kind of entitlement that the original civil rights movement leaders claimed for blacks: recognition of their rights as American citizens to equal treatment under the law. They did not claim, "We deserve rights and entitlements because we are black," but, "We deserve them because we are citizens of the United States and like all other citizens are due these rights." The politics of difference changed all that. Blacks and other minorities began demanding entitlement solely based on their history of oppression, their race, their gender, their ethnicity, or whatever quality that allegedly made them victims.
Grievance Identities
By the 1980's, the politics of difference had, in turn, led to the establishment of "grievance identities." These identities are not about such things as the great contributions of women throughout history or the rich culture of black Americans. To have a strong identity as a woman, for example, means that you are against the "oppressive male patriarchy"—period. To have a strong identity as a black means that you are against racist white America—period. You have no choice but to fulfill a carefully defined politically correct role: (1) you must document the grievance of your group; (2) you must testify to its abiding and ongoing alienation; and (3) you must support its sovereignty. As a black who fails any of these three requirements you are not only politically incorrect, you are a traitor, an "Uncle Tom." You are blaming the victim, you are letting whites off the hook, and you are betraying your people.
In establishing your grievance identity, you must turn your back on the enormous and varied fabric of life. There is no legacy of universal ideas or common human experience. There is only one dimension to your identity: anger against oppression. Grievance identities are thus "sovereignties that compete with the sovereignties of the nation itself. Blacks, women, Hispanics and other minorities are not even American citizens anymore. They are citizens of sovereignties with their own right to autonomy.
The New Segregation on Campus
The marriage of race and power, the politics of difference, and grievance identities—these are nurtured by the American educational establishment. They have acted on the establishment and affected it in significant ways. After a talk I gave recently at a well-known university, a woman introduced herself as the chairperson of the women's studies department. She was very proud of the fact that the university had a separate degree granting program in women's studies and stressed that I had always been very much in favor of teaching students about the contributions of women. But I asked her what it was that students gained from segregated women's studies that could not be gained from studying within the traditional liberal arts disciplines. Her background was in English, as was mine, so I added, "What is a female English professor in the English department doing that is different from what a female professor in the women's studies department is doing? Is she going to bring a different methodology to bear? What is it that academically justifies a segregated program for women or for blacks, or any group? Why not incorporate such studies into the English department, the history department, the biology department or into any of the other regular departments?"
As soon as I began to ask such questions, I noticed a shift in her eyes and a tension in her attitude. She began to see me as an enemy and quickly made an excuse to end the conversation. This wasn't about a rational academic discussion of women's studies. It was about the sovereignty of the feminist identity and unless I tipped my hat to that identity by saying, "Yes, you have the right to a separate department," no further discussion or debate was possible. Meanwhile, the politics of difference is overtaking education. Those with grievance identities demand separate buildings, classrooms, offices, clerical staff—even separate XEROX machines. They all want to be segregated universities within the universities. They want their own space—their sovereign territory. Metaphorically, and sometimes literally, they insist that not only the university but society at large must pay tribute to their sovereignty.
Today, there are some 500 women's studies departments. There are black studies departments, Hispanic studies departments, Jewish studies departments, Asian studies departments. They all have to have space, staff, and budgets. What are they studying that can't be studied in other departments? They don't have to answer this question, of course, but when political entitlement shifted away from citizenship to race, class and gender, a shift in cultural entitlement was made inevitable.
Those with grievance identities also demand extra entitlements far beyond what should come to us as citizens. As a black, I am said to "deserve" this or that special entitlement. No longer is it enough just to have the right to attend a college or university on an equal basis with others or to be treated like anyone else. Schools must set aside special money and special academic departments just for me, based on my grievance. Some campuses now have segregated dorms for blacks students who demand to live together with people of their "own kind." Students have lobbied for separate black student unions, black yearbooks, black Homecomings dances, black graduation ceremonies—again, all so that they can be comfortable with their "own kind." One representative study at the University of Michigan indicates that 70 percent of the school's black undergraduates have never had a white acquaintance. Yet, across the country, colleges and universities like Michigan readily and even eagerly continue to encourage more segregation by granting the demands of every vocal grievance identity.
White Guilt
A great contributing factor is, of course, white-guilt—specifically a knowledge of ill-gotten advantage. Ignorance is innocence, knowledge is guilt. Whites in America generally know that there is at least a slight advantage in being white. If a white person walks into a department store, chances are he or she is not going to be followed by the security guard as I am. This kind of knowledge makes whites vulnerable. (Incidentally, I do not mean to deride all forms of guilt. Guilt can be a wonderful thing, a truly civilized emotion. Prisons are full of people incapable of feeling guilt.) A member of a grievance identity points a finger and says, "Hey whitey, you've oppressed my people! You have had generations to build up wealth and opportunity while I've had nothing." Almost automatically, the white person's first reaction is, "Am I guilty? Am I a racist?"
The second reaction is escapism. "All right, what do you want? What is it going to take to prove to you that I am not racist?" White college and university administrators say, "You want a black student lounge? You got it. We have a little extra money, so we can pay for a black yearbook. We can hold a separate graduation just for you. What else do you want?"
The third reaction is blindness. Obviously, when you are preoccupied with escaping your own feeling of guilt, you are utterly blind to the people causing it. So college and university administrators blindly grant black students extra entitlements, from dorms to yearbooks, and build an entire machinery of segregation on campus while ignoring the fact that 72 percent of black American college students are dropping out. Black students have the lowest grade point average of any student group. If whites were not so preoccupied with escaping their own guilt, they would see that the real problem is not racism; it is that black students are failing in tragic numbers. They don't need separate dorms and yearbooks. They need basic academic skills. But instead they are taught that extra entitlements are their due and that the greatest power of all is that power that comes to them as victims. If they want to get anywhere in American Life, they had better wear their victimization on their sleeve, they had better tap into white guilt, making whites want to escape by offering money, status, racial-preferences—something, anything—in return. Is this the way for a race that has been oppressed to come into its own? Is this the way to achieve independence?
A Return to a Common Culture
Colleges and universities are not only segregating their campuses, they are segregating learning. If only for the sake of historical accuracy, we should teach all students—black, white, female, male—about many broad and diverse cultures. But those with grievance identities use the multi-cultual approach as an all-out assault on the liberal arts curriculum, on the American heritage, and on Western culture. They have made our differences, rather than our common bonds, sacred. Often they do so in the name of building the "self-esteem" of minorities. But they are not going to build anyone's self-esteem by condemning our culture as the product of "dead white males."
We do share a common history and a common culture, and that must be the central premise of education. If we are to the end the new segregation on campus, and everywhere else it exists, we need to recall the spirit of the original civil rights movement, which was dedicated to the "self evident truth" that all men are created equal.
Even the most humble experiences unite us. We have all grown up on the same sitcoms, eaten the same fast food, and laughed at the same jokes. We have practiced the same religions, lived under the same political system, read the same books, and worked in the same marketplace. We have the same dreams and aspirations as will as fears and doubts for ourselves and for our children. How, then, can our differences be so overwhelming?
[From Shelby Steele, "The New Segregation,"
Imprimus 21 (August 1992):1–4.]
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California Proposition 187 - Limits the Privileges and Rights of Legal Aliens
Please read this document and answer the following questions.
In a statewide referendum in November 1994, California voters approved Proposition 187 by a 3 to 2 majority.
Section 1: Findings and Declaration.
The People of California find and declare as follows: That they have suffered and are suffering economic hardship caused by the presence of illegal aliens in this state.
That they have suffered and are suffering personal injury and damage caused by the criminal conduct of illegal aliens in this state.
That they have a right to the protection of their government from any person or persons entering this country unlawfully.
Therefore, the People of California declare their intention to provide for cooperation between their agencies of state and local government, and to establish a system of required notification by and between such agencies to prevent illegal aliens in the United States from receiving benefits of public services in the State of California.
Section 2: Manufacture, Distribution or Sale of False Citizenship or Resident Alien Document: Crime and Punishment.
Any person who manufactures, distributes or sells false documents to conceal the true sitizenship or resident alien status of another person is guilty of a felony, and shall be punished by imprisonment in the state prison for five years or by a fine of seventy-five thousand dollars ($75,000).
Section 3: Use of False Citizenship or Resident Alien Documents: Crime and Punishment.
Any person who uses false documents to conceal his or her true citizenship or resident alien status is guilty of a felony, and shall be punished by imprisonment in the state prison for five years or by a fine of twenty-five thousand dollars ($25,000). . . .
Section 5: Exclusion of Illegal Aliens from Public School Services. . . .
(b) A person shall not receive any public social services to which he or she may be otherwise entitled until the legal status of that person has been verified as one of the following:
(1) A citizen of the United States.
(2) An alien lawfully admitted as a permanent resident.
(3) An alien lawfully admitted for a temporary period of time. . . .
Section 6: Exclusion of Illegal Aliens from Publicly Funded Health Care. . . .
(b) A person shall not receive any health care services from a publicly funded health care facility, to which he or she is otherwise entitled until the legal status of that person has been verified as one of the following:
(1) A citizen of the United States.
(2) An alien lawfully admitted as a permanent resident.
(3) An alien lawfully admitted for a temporary period of time. . . .
Section 7: Exclusion of Illegal Aliens from Public Elementary and Secondary Schools.
(a) No public elementary or secondary school shall admit, or permit the attendance of, any child who is not a citizen of the United States, an alien lawfully admitted as a permanent resident, or a person who is otherwise authorized under federal law to be present in the United States.
(b) Commencing January 1, 1995, each school district shall verify the legal status of each child enrolling in the school district for the first time in order to ensure the enrollment or attendance only of citizens, aliens lawfully admitted as permanent residents, or persons who are otherwise authorized to be present in the United States. . . .
(f) For each child who cannot establish legal status in the United States, each school district shall continue to provide education for a period of ninety days from the date of notice [of violation of the law]. Such ninety day period shall be utilized to accomplish an orderly transition to a school in the child's country of origin. Each school district shall fully cooperate in this transition effort to ensure that the educational needs of the child are best served for that period of time.
Section 8: Exclusion of Illegal Aliens from Public Postsecondary Educational Institutions.
(a) No public institution of postsecondary education shall admit, enroll, or permit the attendance of any person who is not a citizen of the United States, an alien lawfully admitted as a permanent resident in the United States, or a person who is otherwise authorized under federal law to be present in the United States.
(b) Commencing with the first term or semester that begins after January 1, 1995, and at the commencement of each term or semester thereafer, each public postsecondary educational institution shall verify the status of each person enrolled or in attendance at that institution in order to ensure the enrollment or attendance only of United States citizens, aliens lawfully admitted as permanent residents in the United States, and persons who are otherwise authorized under federal law to be present in the United States. . . .
[From California State Documents, 1994.]
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Contract With America (1994)
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On September 27, 1994, over 300 Republican candidates for Congress led by Representatives Newt Gingrich of Georgia and Dick Armey of Texas pledged themselves to a "Contract with America." The document represented their shared platform for the upcoming election. The "contract" struck a responsive chord with the voters, who gave the Republicans a stunning victory at the polls. For the first time in forty years, Republicans gained control of both houses of Congress (230 to 205 in the House and 53 to 47 in the Senate). After being elected the Speaker of the House, Gingrich began transforming the elements of the Contract with America into legislation.
As Republican Members of the House of Representatives and as citizens seeking to join that body we propose not just to change its policies, but even more important, to restore the bonds of trust between the people and their elected representatives.
That is why in this era of official evasion and posturing, we offer instead a detailed agenda for national renewal, a written commitment with no fine print.
This year's election offers the chance, after four decades of one-party control, to bring to the House a new majority that will transform the way Congress works. That historic change would be the end of government that is too big, too intrusive, and too easy with the public's money. It can be the beginning of a Congress that respects the values and shares the faith of the American family.
Like Lincoln, our first Republican president, we intend to act "with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right." To restore accountability to Congress. To end its cycle of scandal and disgrace. To make us all proud again of the way free people govern themselves. On the first day of the 104th Congress, the new Republican majority will immediately pass the following major reforms, aimed at restoring the faith and trust of the American people in their government:
FIRST, require all laws that apply to the rest of the country also apply equally to the Congress;
SECOND, select a major, independent auditing firm to conduct a comprehensive audit of Congress for waste, fraud or abuse;
THIRD, cut the number of House committees, and cut committee staff by one third;
FOURTH, limit the terms of all committee chairs;
FIFTH, ban the casting of proxy votes in committee;
SIXTH, require committee meetings to be open to the public;
SEVENTH, require a three-fifths majority vote to pass a tax increase;
EIGHTH, guarantee an honest accounting of our Federal Budget by implementing zero base-line budgeting.
Thereafter, within the first 100 days of the 104th Congress, we shall bring to the House Floor the following bills, each to be given full and open debate, each to be given a clear and fair vote and each to be immediately available this day for public inspection and scrutiny.
1. THE FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY ACT
A balanced budget/tax limitation amendment and a legislative line-item veto to restore fiscal responsibility to an out-of-control Congress, requiring them to live under the same budget constraints as families and businesses.
2. THE TAKING BACK OUR STREETS ACT
An anti-crime package including stronger truth-in-sentencing, "good faith" exclusionary rule exemptions, effective death penalty provisions, and cuts in social spending from this summer's "Crime" bill to fund prison construction and additional law enforcement to keep people secure in their neighborhoods and kids safe in their schools.
3. THE PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY ACT
Discourage illegitimacy and teen pregnancy by prohibiting welfare to minor mothers and ending increased AFDC (Aid to Families with Dependent Children) for additional children while on welfare, cut spending for welfare programs, and enact a tough two-years-and-out provision with work requirements to promote individual responsibility.
4. THE FAMILY REINFORCEMENT ACT
Child support enforcement, tax incentives for adoption, strengthening rights of parents in their children's education, stronger child pornography laws, and an elderly dependent care tax credit to reinforce the central role of families in American society.
5. THE AMERICAN DREAM RESTORATION ACT
A $500 per child tax credit, begin repeal of the marriage tax penalty, and creation of American Dream Savings Accounts to provide middle class tax relief.
6. THE NATIONAL SECURITY RESTORATION ACT
No U.S. troops under U.N. command and restoration of the essential parts of our national security funding to strengthen our national defense and maintain our credibility around the world.
7. THE SENIOR CITIZENS FAIRNESS ACT
Raise the Social Security earnings limit which currently forces seniors out of the work force, repeal the 1993 tax hikes on Social Security benefits and provide tax incentives for private long-term care insurance to let Older Americans keep more of what they have earned over the years.
8. THE JOB CREATION AND WAGE ENHANCEMENT ACT
Small business incentives, capital gains cut and indexation, neutral cost recovery, risk assessment/cost-benefit analysis, strengthening the Regulatory Flexibility Act and unfunded mandate reform to create jobs and raise worker wages.
9. THE COMMON SENSE LEGAL REFORM ACT
"Loser pays" laws, reasonable limits on punitive damages and reform of product liability laws to stem the endless tide of litigation.
10. THE CITIZEN LEGISLATURE ACT
A first-ever vote on term limits to replace career politicians with citizen legislators.
[From Republican National Committee,
Contract with America: The Bold Plan by Representative Newt Gingrich, Representative Dick Armey, and the House Republicans to Change the Nation, Ed Gillespie and Bob Schellhas, eds. (New York: Times Books, 1994), pp. 7–11.]
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The New Covenant (1995), President Clinton
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The landslide Republican victory in the November 1994 Congressional elections sobered President Clinton and the Democrats. In his State of the Union address two months later, he acknowledged that the electorate expected him to change his direction.
Mr. President, Mr. Speaker, members of the 104th Congress, my fellow Americans: Again we are here in the sanctuary of democracy, and once again, our democracy has spoken. So let me begin by congratulating all of you here in the 104th Congress, and congratulating you, Mr. Speaker.1
If we agree on nothing else tonight, we must agree that the American people certainly voted for change in 1992 and in 1994. And as I look out at you, I know how some of you must have felt in 1992.
I must say that in both years we didn't hear America singing, we heard America shouting. And now all of us, Republicans and Democrats alike, must say: We hear you. We will work together to earn the jobs you have given us. For we are the keepers of the sacred trust, and we must be faithful to it in this new and very demanding era. . . .
In another time of change and challenge, I had the honor to be the first president to be elected in the postÐCold War era, an era marked by the global economy, the information revolution, unparalleled change and opportunity and insecurity for the American people.
I came to this hallowed chamber two years ago on a mission—to restore the American Dream for all our people and to make sure that we move into the 21st century still the strongest force for freedom and democracy in the entire world. I was determined then to tackle the tough problems too long ignored. In this effort I am frank to say that I have made my mistakes, and I have learned again the importance of humility in all human endeavor. But I am also proud to say tonight that our country is stronger than it was two years ago.
Record numbers—record numbers of Americans are succeeding in the new global economy. We are at peace and we are a force for peace and freedom throughout the world. We have almost six million new jobs since I became president, and we have the lowest combined rate of unemployment and inflation in 25 years. Our businesses are more productive and here we have worked to bring the deficit down, to expand trade, to put more police on our streets, to give our citizens more of the tools they need to get an education and to rebuild their own communities.
But the rising tide is not lifting all boats. While our nation is enjoying peace and prosperity, too many of our people are still working harder and harder, for less and less. While our businesses are restructuring and growing more productive and competitive, too many of our people still can't be sure of having a job next year or even next month. And far more than our material riches are threatened; things far more precious to us—our children, our families, our values.
Our civil life is suffering in America today. Citizens are working together less and shouting at each other more. The common bonds of community which have been the great strength of our country from its very beginning are badly frayed. What are we to do about it?
More than 60 years ago, at the dawn of another new era, President Roosevelt told our nation, "New conditions impose new requirements on government and those who conduct government." And from that simple proposition, he shaped the New Deal, which helped to restore our nation to prosperity and define the relationship between our people and their government for half a century.
That approach worked in its time. But we today, we face a very different time and very different conditions. We are moving from an Industrial Age built on gears and sweat to an Information Age demanding skills and learning and flexibility. Our government, once a champion of national purpose, is now seen by many as simply a captive of narrow interests, putting more burdens on our citizens rather than equipping them to get ahead. The values that used to hold us all together seem to be coming apart.
So tonight, we must forge a new social compact to meet the challenges of this time. As we enter a new era, we need a new set of understandings, not just with government, but even more important, with one another as Americans.
That's what I want to talk with you about tonight. I call it the New Covenant. But it's grounded in a very, very old idea—that all Americans have not just a right, but a solid responsibility to rise as far as their God-given talents and determination can take them; and to give something back to their communities and their country in return. Opportunity and responsibility: They go hand in hand. We can't have one without the other. And our national community can't hold together without both.
Our New Covenant is a new set of understandings for how we can equip our people to meet the challenges of a new economy, how we can change the way our government works to fit a different time, and, above all, how we can repair the damaged bonds in our society and come together behind our common purpose. We must have dramatic change in our economy, our government and ourselves.
My fellow Americans, without regard to party, let us rise to the occasion. Let us put aside partisanship and pettiness and pride. As we embark on this new course, let us put our country first, remembering that regardless of party label, we are all Americans. And let the final test of everything we do be a simple one: Is it good for the American people? . . . I think we all agree that we have to change the way the government works. Let's make it smaller, less costly and smaller—leaner, not meaner. . . .
The New Covenant approach to governing is as different from the old bureaucratic way as the computer is from the manual typewriter. The old way of governing around here protected organized interests. We should look out for the interests of ordinary people.
The old way divided us by interest, constituency or class. The New Covenant way should unite us behind a common vision of what's best for our country. The old way dispensed services through large, top-down, inflexible bureaucracies. The New Covenant way should shift these resources and decision-making from bureaucrats to citizens, injecting choice and competition and individual responsibility into national policy.
The old way of governing around here actually seemed to reward failure. The New Covenant way should have built-in incentives to reward success. The old way was centralized here in Washington.
The New Covenant way must take hold in the communities all across America. And we should help them to do that.
Our job here is to expand opportunity, not bureaucracy; to empower people to make the most of their own lives; and to enhance our security here at home and abroad. We must not ask government to do what we should do for ourselves. We should rely on government as a partner to help us to do more for ourselves and for each other.
I hope very much that as we debate these specific and exciting matters, we can go beyond the sterile discussion between the illusion that there is somehow a program for every problem on the one hand, and the other illusion that the government is a source of every problem we have. Our job is to get rid of yesterday's government so that our own people can meet today's and tomorrow's needs. And we ought to do it together. . . .
And we need to get government closer to the people its meant to serve. We need to help move programs down to the point where states and communities and private citizens in the private sector can do a better job. If they can do it, we ought to let them do it. We should get out of the way and let them do what they can do better.
Taking power away from federal bureaucracies and giving it back to communities and individuals is something everyone should be able to be for. It's time for Congress to stop passing on to the states the cost of decisions we make here in Washington. . . .
But I think we should all remember, and almost all of us would agree, that government still has important responsibilities. Our young people—we should think of this when we cut—our young people hold our future in their hands. We still owe a debt to our veterans. And our senior citizens have made us what we are.
Now, my budget cuts a lot. But it protects education, veterans, Social Security and Medicare—and I hope you will do the same thing. You should, and I hope you will.
And when we give more flexibility to the states, let us remember that there are certain fundamental national needs that should be addressed in every state, north and south, east and west—immunization against childhood disease—school lunches in all our schools—Head Start, medical care and nutrition for pregnant women and infants—medical care and nutrition for pregnant women and infants. All these things—all these things are in the national interest.
I applaud your desire to get rid of costly and unnecessary regulations. But when we deregulate, let's remember what national action in the national interest has given us: safer foods for our families, safer toys for our children, safer nursing homes for our parents, safer cars and highways, and safer workplaces, clean air and cleaner water. Do we need common sense and fairness in our regulations? You bet we do. But we can have common sense and still provide for safe drinking water. We can have fairness and still clean up toxic dumps, and we ought to do it.
Should we cut the deficit more? Well, of course, we should. Of course, we should. But we can bring it down in a way that still protects our economic recovery and does not unduly punish people who should not be punished, but instead should be helped.
I know many of you in this chamber support the balanced budget amendment. I certainly want to balance the budget. Our administration has done more to bring the budget down and to save money than any in a very, very long time.
If you believe passing this amendment is the right thing to do, then you have to be straight with the American people. They have a right to know what you're going to cut—and how it's going to affect them.
We should be doing things in the open around here. For example, everybody ought to know if this proposal is going to endanger Social Security. I would oppose that, and I think most Americans would.
Nothing is done more to undermine our sense of common responsibility than our failed welfare system. This is one of the problems we have to face here in Washington in our New Covenant. It rewards welfare over work. It undermines family values. It lets millions of parents get away without paying their child support. It keeps a minority, but a significant minority of the people on welfare trapped on it for a very long time. . . .
Last year I introduced the most sweeping welfare reform plan ever presented by an administration. We have to make welfare what it was meant to be—a second chance, not a way of life. We have to help those on welfare move to work as quickly as possible, to provide child care and teach them skills if that's what they need for up to two years. And after that, there ought to be a simple hard rule: anyone who can work must go to work. If a parent isn't paying child support, they should be forced to pay.
We should suspend drivers' licenses, track them across state lines, make them work off what they owe. That is what we should do. Governments do not raise children, people do. And the parents must take responsibility for the children they bring into this world.
I want to work with you, with all of you, to pass welfare reform. But our goal must be to liberate people and lift them up, from dependence to independence, from welfare to work, from mere childbearing to responsible parenting. Our goal should not be to punish them because they happen to be poor.
We should—we should require work and mutual responsibility. But we shouldn't cut people off just because they're poor, they're young, or even because they're unmarried. We should promote responsibility by requiring young mothers to live at home with their parents or in other supervised settings, by requiring them to finish school. But we shouldn't put them and their children out on the street. . . .
No one is more eager to end welfare—I may be the only president who has actually had the opportunity to sit in a welfare office, who's actually spent hours and hours talking to people on welfare. And I am telling you, people who are trapped on it know it doesn't work. They also want to get off. So we can promote together education and work and good parenting. I have no problem with punishing bad behavior or the refusal to be a worker or a student, or a responsible parent. I just don't want to punish poverty and past mistakes. All of us have made our mistakes, and none of us can change our yesterdays. But every one of us can change our tomorrows. . . .
We are a nation of immigrants. But we are also a nation of laws. It is wrong and ultimately self-defeating for a nation of immigrants to permit the kind of abuse of our immigration laws we have seen in recent years, and we must do more to stop it.
The most important job of our government in this new era is to empower the American people to succeed in the global economy. America has always been a land of opportunity, a land where, if you work hard, you can get ahead. We've become a great middle-class country. Middle-class values sustain us. We must expand that middle class, and shrink the underclass, even as we do everything we can to support the millions of Americans who are already successful in the new economy. America is once again the world's strongest economic power, almost six million new jobs in the last two years, exports booming, inflation down, high-wage jobs are coming back. A record number of American entrepreneurs are living the American Dream. If we want it to stay that way, those who work and lift our nation must have more of its benefits. . . .
Well, my fellow Americans, that's my agenda for America's future: Expanding opportunity, not bureaucracy; enhancing security at home and abroad; empowering our people to make the most of their own lives. It's ambitious and achievable, but it's not enough. We even need more than new ideas for changing the world or equipping Americans to compete in the new economy; more than a government that's smaller, smarter and wiser; more than all the changes we can make in government and in the private sector from the outside in.
Our fortunes and our posterity also depend upon our ability to answer some questions from within—from the values and voices that speak to our hearts as well as our heads; voices that tell us we have to do more to accept responsibility for ourselves and our families, for our communities, and, yes, for our fellow citizens.
We see our families and our communities all over this country coming apart. And we feel the common ground shifting from under us. The PTA, the town hall meeting, the ball park—it's hard for a lot of overworked parents to find the time and space for those things that strengthen the bonds of trust and cooperation. Too many of our children don't even have parents and grandparents who can give them those experiences that they need to build their own character and their sense of identity. . . .
We all gain when we give, and we reap what we sow. That's at the heart of this New Covenant—responsibility, opportunity and citizenship.More than stale chapters in some remote civics book; they're still the virtue by which we can fulfill ourselves and reach our God-given potential and be like them; and also to fulfill the eternal promise of this country—the enduring dream from that first and most sacred covenant.
I believe every person in this country still believes that we are created equal, and given by our Creator, the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. This is a very, very great country. And our best days are still to come. Thank you, and God bless you all.
1. Republican Newt Gingrich. (Return to text)
[From
Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States, William J. Clinton, 1995 (Washington, D.C., 1996), pp. 75–81, 84, 86.]
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