pd08mr99 The President's News Conference With Prime Minister Massimo D'Alema of...

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Note: Identical letters were sent to J. Dennis Hastert, Speaker of the 
House of Representatives, and Jesse Helms, chairman, Senate Committee on 
Foreign Relations.


<DOC>
[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents]
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[Page 337]
 
Monday, March 8, 1999
 
Volume 35--Number 9
Pages 329-376
 
Week Ending Friday, March 5, 1999
 
Statement on Reaching Agreement To Preserve California's Headwaters 
Forest

March 2, 1999

    Three years ago we set out to preserve California's Headwaters 
Forest, the world's largest unprotected stand of old-growth redwoods. 
Late yesterday we achieved our goal. We completed an agreement with the 
Pacific Lumber Company to put the Headwaters Forest in public hands and 
ensure that it will never be logged.
    These redwoods are a natural treasure, as much a part of our legacy 
as the world's great libraries and cathedrals. Thanks to the tireless 
efforts of Federal and State negotiators, future generations will know 
the majesty and awe of Headwaters. This ancient forest, and the web of 
life it sustains, are now saved for all time.
    I thank Senator Feinstein and Governor Davis for their critical help 
in achieving this historic agreement. And I am truly grateful that we 
are able to bestow this priceless gift on generations yet to come.

Note: A portion of the President's statement was made available on the 
White House Press Office Radio Actuality Line.


<DOC>
[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents]
 [frwais.access.gpo.gov]
                         

[Page 337]
 
Monday, March 8, 1999
 
Volume 35--Number 9
Pages 329-376
 
Week Ending Friday, March 5, 1999
 
Message to the Congress Transmitting a Report of the Federal Labor 
Relations Authority

March 2, 1999

To the Congress of the United States:

    In accordance with section 701 of the Civil Service Reform Act of 
1978 (Public Law 95-454; 5 U.S.C. 7104(e)), I am pleased to transmit the 
Nineteenth Annual Report of the Federal Labor Relations Authority for 
Fiscal Year 1997.
    The report includes information on the cases heard and decisions 
rendered by the Federal Labor Relations Authority, the General Counsel 
of the Authority, and the Federal Service Impasses Panel.
                                            William J. Clinton
The White House,
March 2, 1999.


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[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents]
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[Page 337-338]
 
Monday, March 8, 1999
 
Volume 35--Number 9
Pages 329-376
 
Week Ending Friday, March 5, 1999
 
Message to the Senate Transmitting the Republic of Korea-United States 
Extradition Treaty With Documentation

March 2, 1999

To the Senate of the United States:

    With a view to receiving the advice and consent of the Senate to 
ratification, I transmit herewith the Extradition Treaty Between the 
Government of the United States of America and the Government of the 
Republic of Korea, signed at Washington on June 9, 1998 (hereinafter the 
``Treaty'').
    In addition, I transmit for the information of the Senate, the 
report of the Department of State with respect to the Treaty. The Treaty 
will not require implementing legislation.

[[Page 338]]

    The Treaty will, upon entry into force, enhance cooperation between 
the law enforcement communities of the United States and Korea. It will 
provide, for the first time, a framework and basic protections for 
extraditions between Korea and the United States, thereby making a 
significant contribution to international law enforcement efforts.
    The provisions in this Treaty follow generally the form and content 
of extradition treaties recently concluded by the United States.
    I recommend that the Senate give early and favorable consideration 
to the Treaty and give its advice and consent to ratification.
                                            William J. Clinton
The White House,
March 2, 1999.


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[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents]
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[Page 338-341]
 
Monday, March 8, 1999
 
Volume 35--Number 9
Pages 329-376
 
Week Ending Friday, March 5, 1999
 
Remarks at a Unity Meeting With Democratic Congressional Leaders

March 3, 1999

    Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. This has been a wonderful 
morning for me. When I listened to Maureen Marshall and Edwin Beale and 
Michael Saylor speak, I was again confirmed in my conviction that our 
principal responsibility here is to give the American people the tools 
and create the conditions within which they can make the most of their 
own lives. And if we do that, they will do it every time. These 3 people 
represent more than 200 million Americans who deserve our best efforts.
    I want to thank Senator Daschle and Congressman Gephardt for their 
truly outstanding leadership, for their personal friendship, and for 
their honest commitment to the cause that we meet to discuss today.
    I thank the Vice President for being the best partner and friend, 
adviser and prodder any President could ever have. I can't believe he 
passed up a chance to remind us all today that in 1993, he cast the 
decisive vote on the budget plan, and whenever he votes, we win. 
[Laughter]
    You know the real, sort of political story out of this meeting today 
may be that we will have to retire that famous old Will Rogers quip, ``I 
don't belong to an organized political party. I'm a Democrat.'' The fact 
is we are organized, and we are united. And we are united around an 
agenda for America's future: to meet the long-term challenges of this 
country at the edge of a new century and new millennium; to build on 
what we have done for the last 6 years.
    The new agenda is rooted in the same ideals with which we began in 
1993, to bring opportunity to every American, to challenge every 
American to be a responsible citizen, and to build a community of all 
American citizens.
    When you look around at this Democratic caucus, the Members of the 
House and the Senate, as the speakers were speaking, I had the 
opportunity to just scan both sides of this wonderful room today. You 
all really do look like America. You think like America, and you reflect 
America. As perhaps the only one of you who is term-limited, and 
therefore, faces the prospect of making the most of this next 2 years 
and leaving the rest to you, I felt enormously good, not just for my 
party but for my country, to look at all of you, to know what I know 
about all of you, to know about your backgrounds and your perspectives 
and your experience and your commitment, and to see how in this caucus 
we have bridged every divide of America that will help us to bring our 
country together and go forward. And I'm very proud to be here with you 
today.
    Let me say that when I ran for President in 1991 and 1992, I used to 
say something that seems almost strange today. I said one of the reasons 
that I left a job at home that I loved and undertook this campaign is 
that I didn't want to see my daughter's generation grow up to be the 
first generation of Americans not to do as well economically or in terms 
of quality of life as their parents had done. Nobody worries about that 
anymore, but we did then.
    And what we had before that was more than a decade in which the 
leaders of the other party talked tough but took the easy way out. We 
were unashamed to be compassionate, unashamed that we cared about those 
who needed a hand up in life. But we were unafraid, when it came down to 
it, to take the tough decisions that cost many of our fellow Democrats 
their seats in Congress but gave the American economy and the

[[Page 339]]

American people a new lease on the 21st century.
    So what we came here today to talk about builds on what has happened 
in the last 6 years. It builds on our way of approaching our political 
responsibilities here, to put people ahead of partisanship and common 
sense ahead of ideology. Now, we've already talked about how we turned 
the red ink to black--that that helped to produce the longest peacetime 
expansion in our history, the lowest peacetime unemployment since 1957.
    We ought to point out that we did it in a way that looked to the 
future, not only reducing the deficit but doubling our investment in 
education and training, putting 100,000 more police on our streets, 
making dramatic increases in medical research, immunizing 90 percent of 
our children from basic childhood diseases for the first time ever, 
providing millions and millions of people with the benefit of the family 
and medical leave law, and making our environment cleaner. We showed, in 
other words, that we could balance the budget and honor our common 
values as Americans.
    Now that, to use Senator Daschle's phrase, America is working again, 
the question is: What shall we do? And we're here to say that, as proud 
as we are of the record of the last 6 years, this is not a time to boast 
about the past but to fulfill our solemn duty to the next generation, to 
meet the long-term challenges our Nation faces.
    We're for stronger families, with our child care program and our 
after-school learning, for a strong, enforceable Patients' Bill of 
Rights, for the bipartisan legislation to help people with disabilities 
move into the workplace, for tax relief to help families provide long-
term care, for an increase in the minimum wage and equal pay for men and 
women, and more free enterprise in our poorest inner-city and rural 
communities. We're for 50,000 more police on the street and better 
technology for police, especially in the areas where crime is still too 
high. We stand together to pass the Earth on to our children with our 
livability initiative for less traffic congestion and more green space. 
We stand together, as the Vice President has said, for strong, modern, 
more accountable schools, for giving teachers like Maureen the support 
they need to do even better.
    Last winter, as has already been said, we issued our call, for the 
first time, for 100,000 more highly trained teachers, to bring class 
size down in the early grades. And last fall the Republicans in Congress 
finally agreed to make a significant downpayment toward that goal. Now, 
in the next few days, the Senate will vote on whether to finish the job 
of hiring 100,000 new teachers to reduce class size. It will be our 
first big chance this year to prove to the American people that we are 
prepared to put people over party. Let's say politics stops at the 
schoolhouse door.
    Now, I'd also like to ask that politics stop and that the Republican 
majority in Congress stand with us in meeting the greatest challenge we 
face, the aging of America. Life expectancy is rising; the number of 
older Americans will double by the year 2030. There will be only two 
people working for one person drawing Social Security by that time. Even 
before then, because people over 80 are the fastest growing group of 
Americans as a percentage of our country, Medicare will run out of money 
within 9 years.
    Now, I particularly appreciated what Edwin Beale said about this 
being an issue facing younger, as well as older, Americans and not only 
because younger Americans would like to know they will have health care 
in retirement when they reach their retirement years, but also because 
the quality of life of the children of people on Medicare and Social 
Security and their ability to raise their grandchildren will be directly 
dependent upon whether they had to take needed resources away from their 
own family to care for their parents in ways that previous generations 
have not. This is a big issue.
    But I want to say again--and I feel this with greater conviction as 
I grow older by the day--this is a high-class problem. We face this 
challenge because we're living longer. We face this challenge because of 
the fruits of the medical research that the Congress has funded. We 
should not be hand-wringing here. We should be embracing this with joy. 
This is the inevitable result of our efforts to not only lengthen life 
but to improve its quality. And because the Democrats took the lead so 
many years ago, first in Social

[[Page 340]]

Security and then in Medicare, we have a special responsibility to the 
American people to take the lead in resolving this.
    Now, let me restate clearly our principles and where I think we are 
in this debate now because how we resolve these issues will shape how we 
resolve the other issues in this session of Congress. First, we should 
devote 62 percent of the surplus for the next 15 years to saving Social 
Security, to guarantee the soundness of Social Security for the next 55 
years, and to enable us to make further choices, some of which will be 
difficult, to extend Social Security for 75 years, provide help for 
elderly women, too many of whom are in poverty, and lift the earnings 
limit on people on Social Security.
    Second, we should devote another 15 percent of the surplus to 
Medicare, to secure that vital program until the year 2020. And again, I 
believe we should go further, with broader reforms to strengthen and 
improve Medicare and to meet the greatest growing need of our seniors, 
affordable prescription drugs.
    If we do this, that will still leave funds for other investments or 
for tax reduction. I believe we should devote over $500 billion of this 
surplus to give working families tax relief, creating universal savings 
accounts, USA accounts, that will help all Americans share in the 
Nation's wealth and build nest eggs for retirement. If we do these 
things--saving Social Security, saving Medicare, empowering more 
Americans to save for their own retirement--we will fulfill our historic 
challenge to meet the difficulties and the opportunities of the aging of 
America in a way that provides a stronger economy and more stable 
families for our children.
    If we use the surplus to save Social Security and strengthen 
Medicare, we will for the next 15 years and beyond, be paying down the 
national debt, if we follow the proposal that we have made. We can 
reduce publicly held debt to its lowest level since 1917, before we 
moved into World War I.
    Let me say, for a Member of Congress what that means is, 15 years 
from now, Congress will be allocating only 2 cents of every tax dollar 
to pay interest on the debt, instead of the 13 cents you have to take 
off the top today, before you can pass another bill to do another thing. 

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