From @lex-luthor.ai.mit.edu:jcma@REAGAN.AI.MIT.EDU  Thu May 20 16:27:04 1993
Date: Thu, 20 May 1993 16:08-0400
From: The White House <75300.3115@compuserve.com>
To: Clinton-News-Distribution@campaign92.org,
Subject: TRanscript of President's Remarks at Motor-Voter Signing

                           THE WHITE HOUSE

                    Office of the Press Secretary
_____________________________________________________________________
For Immediate Release                                    May 20, 1993

                       REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
                          AT SIGNING OF THE 
               NATIONAL VOTER REGISTRATION ACT OF 1993
	     
                            The South Lawn

11:32 A.M. EDT
	     

	     THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you very much.  Joel, thank you 
for the t-shirt.  In a few moments I'll give our bill-signing pens, 
but I'd rather have the t-shirt.  (Laughter.)
	     
	     Getting to know the young people across this country, 
beginning in New Hampshire who pushed the motor voter bill, was one 
of the most rewarding parts of the 1992 campaign.  But the effort 
that we come here to celebrate today has a long and venerable 
heritage.  A few moments ago, you heard the voice of President 
Johnson crossing the chasm of time back to 1965 as he signed the 
Voting Rights Act into law.  As a southerner and as President, his 
words have special significance to me.  
	     
	     During my childhood, no family's dinner table, no church 
congregation, no community, and no place of work was immune from the 
searing struggle for civil rights.  To hear Johnson's voice is to 
make vivid for me once again those difficult, yet glorious years of 
struggle -- difficult and terrible because so many people gave their 
lives moving the stone of freedom up the side of a mountain; glorious 
because the year's of contention eventually gave way to an overdue 
seasons of reconciliation and renewal, and gave our region and our 
country a second chance to fulfill our promise.

	     The victory we celebrate today is but the most recent 
chapter in the overlapping struggles of our nation's history, to 
enfranchise women and minorities, the disabled and the young, with 
the power to affect their own destiny and our common destiny by 
participating fully in our democracy.  When blacks and women won the 
right to vote; when we outlawed the poll tax and literacy test; when 
the voting age was lowered to 18; and when finally we recognized the 
rights of disabled Americans, it was because the forces of change 
overcame the indifference of the majority and the resistance by the 
guardians of the status quo.
	     
	     And who prevailed?  Brave people, working at the grass 
roots, impatient with an always imperfect democracy, and dedicated to 
widening the circle of liberty to encompass more and more of our 
fellow citizens.  
	     
	     I have said many times in many places that in this 
country we don't have a person to waste.  Surely the beginning of 
honoring that pledge is making sure the franchise is extended to and 
used by every eligible American.  (Applause.)  Today we celebrate our 
noble tradition by signing into law our newest civil rights law, the 
National Voter Registration Act of 1993, which all of us know and 
love as motor voter.  
	     
	     And extraordinary coalition of organizations, many of 
whom played historic roles in our expanding democratic rights, joined 
many years ago with the hope that they would see this day come.  I'm 
honored to share this podium with representatives with three fighters 
for freedom -- the NAACP, the League of Women Voters, and Human 
Serve.  I want to pay special tribute to Disabled And Able To Vote, 
to Project Vote and to Rock The Vote, and literally, the scores of 
other groups for whom the goal of full voter participation has been a 
durable and lasting dream.  I want to pay special tribute to the 
young people who lobbied me personally for motor voter and who voted 
with renewed energy and conviction for their own futures in the 
election last November.  
	     
	     They all labored hard because this bill was necessary.  
As many as 35 percent of otherwise eligible voters in our nation are 
not registered.  And the failure to register is the primary reason 
given by eligible citizens for their not voting.  The principle 
behind this legislation is clear:  Voting should be about discerning 
the will of the majority, not about testing the administrative 
capacity of a citizen.
	     
	     The state of Washington instituted a similar measure 
during the 1992 election, and their motor voter program registered in 
that state alone an additional 186,000 people.  Motor voter works
at registering voters and people who register vote.
	     
	     With this law and its appropriate implementation by 
states, voters can register by applying for a driver's license, 
through uniform mail application, or by applying in person at various 
agencies designated by the states.  As a result, registration for 
federal election will become as accessible as possible, while the 
integrity of the electoral process is clearly preserved.
	     
	     As I said, I have long supported the idea of motor 
voter.  More than a year ago, I promised as President that I would 
sign HR-2 and fight for it's passage.  I'm pleased to be able to keep 
today that I made on this Rock the Vote card which still has my 
signature back in New Hampshire. (Applause.)  
	     
	     I also want to point out that all the President does ia 
lobby for and sign laws.  If the Congress doesn't pass them they 
don't get passed.  The Rock the Vote card that I signed here says, 
"Why don't politicians want you to vote?"  Well, there a lot of 
members of the Congress here from both parties who do want you to 
vote, and I want to thank not only those on the platform here but all 
of those out in the audience who, after all, passed this bill into 
law.  It was their votes that made this day possible.  (Applause.)
	     
	     This bill in its enactment is a sign of a new vibrancy 
in our democracy.  With all the challenges and difficulties, with the 
years of accumulated economic problems we face, with all the 
divisions among our people, there is a new determination to make 
progress.  You can see it in many ways:  Voter participation was up 
in November, and after the election it didn't stop.  Here at the 
White House, mail has climbed to unprecedented levels.  After I had 
been in office 14 weeks, the White House had received more mail than 
was received in all of 1992.  (Applause.)
	     
	     We have had the switchboards jammed, the E-mail system 
full.  And if you haven't gotten an answer to your letter, we're 
working on it.  (Laughter.)
	     
	     This country is pulsing with the power of individual 
citizens ideas in their determination to get something done.  The 
legislators who worked so hard to adopt this bill, the organizations 
that gave themselves so completely to its endeavor, the young people, 
the activists, MTV, all of them, tapped a powerful current of energy 
that is still flowing in this country. 
	     
	     The Congress has responded in other ways:  the United 
States Senate passing just a few days ago a lobbying bill requiring 
registration by all lobbyists and requiring the disclosure of 
lobbyists' spending on members of Congress is an example of that.  
The campaign finance reform, which has been presented, dramatically 
trying to lower the costs of campaign and reduce the influence of 
special interest groups is an example of that.  The current of reform 
is moving in this country.  And those of you who helped to bring this 
bill to pass can take a large share of credit not only for this bill 
but for the general movement and energy and involvement and 
determination of all of our fellow citizens.
	     
	     It was never right to sit on the sidelines of our 
democracy.  And now with motor voter, there will be fewer and fewer 
excuses for anyone to do so.  
	     
	     Let us remember this in closing, voting is an empty 
promise unless people vote.  Now, there is no longer the excuse of 
the difficulty of registration.  It is the right of every American to 
vote.  It is also the responsibility of every American to vote.
	     
	     We have taken an important step this morning to protect 
that right.  And I want to challenge Joel and all the young people 
who did so much to register voters for the last election, and all of 
you who did so much to bring this voting rights bill to law and all 
the ones that preceded it to make sure now that we keep the rights 
alive by making sure that the responsibility to exercise it is 
exercise by every eligible American.  
	     
	     When we leave here today, we ought to say this voting 
rights bill and the others will not be in vain.  Every year from now 
on, we're going to have more registered voters and more people 
voting.  We're going to make the system work.  The law empowers us to 
do it.  It's now up to us to assume the responsibility to see that it 
gets down.  
	     
	     Thank you very much.  (Applause.)
	     
	     (The bill is signed.) 

                                 END11:41 A.M. EDT