President Clinton's State of the Union address included a plug for his plan to increase drug treatment and testing in prisons, and the speech also touched on tobacco control and gun violence. And even as Clinton was outlining his agenda for 1999 and beyond, Congressional Republicans and Democrats were unveiling their legislative priorities for the coming year, with anti-crime and anti-drug programs high on both lists.
Making communities "safer, more livable, more united" was one of Clinton's major themes, and he touted his program to put 100,000 police officers on the streets, the success of the Brady gun-control law, and the recent decline in crime. He said his budget plan for FY2000 will include funding for 50,000 more police officers.
We must break the deadly cycle of drugs and crime," added Clinton. "My budget expands support for drug testing and treatment. It says to prisoners: If you stay on drugs, you stay behind bars. And it says to those on parole: To keep your freedom, keep free of drugs."
As his administration mulled the idea of suing the tobacco industry to recoup the costs of tobacco addiction on the Medicaid system, Clinton told lawmakers, "As everyone knows, our children are targets of a massive media campaign to hook them on cigarettes. I ask this Congress to resist the tobacco lobby. Together, let's reaffirm the FDA's authority to protect children from tobacco, hold the tobacco companies accountable, and protect tobacco farmers."
Clinton also called on Congress to restore the Brady law's five-day waiting period for handgun purchases, which was replaced last fall with an instant background-check system. "And you should extend the Brady Bill to prevent juveniles who commit violent crimes from buying a gun," he added.
Suzann Wilson, the mother of Brittheny Wilson, who was killed in the Jonesboro, Ark., school massacre, was one of 10 people invited to sit with First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton as she watched the State of the Union address. "Last year, we were horrified and heartbroken by the tragic killings in Jonesboro, Paducah, Pearl, Edinboro, Springfield," said Clinton. "We are deeply moved by the courageous parents who are working to keep guns out of the hands of children –- so that other parents don't have to live through their loss."
Of Wilson, Clinton said, "After she lost her daughter, she came to the White House with a powerful plea: "Please, please, for the sake of your children, lock up your guns ... Don't let what happened in Jonesboro happen in your town." She is here tonight with the First Lady, and we thank her for her courage and commitment. In memory of all the children who lost their lives to school violence, let's strengthen the Safe and Drug-Free School Act . . . let's pass legislation to require child trigger locks . . . let's keep our children safe."
Children's safety was also at the heart of another project highlighted during the speech -- Clinton's plan to boost spending on after-school programs to help fight drugs and crime. "My balanced budget triples the funding for summer school and after-school programs," he said. "We can keep one million students learning beyond regular school hours, when parents work and juvenile crime soars." Finally, Clinton called on Congress to pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and the Hate Crimes Prevention Act. "Discrimination or violence because of race or religion, ancestry or gender, disability or sexual orientation, is wrong," he said. "It should be illegal."
Field reaction to the State of the Union speech was mixed. Richard McCain, executive director of the Substance Abuse Initiative of Greater Cleveland, praised Clinton for his program to put additional police officers on the beat in troubled communities, and for his after-school initiative.
McCain said that his group is working with Cleveland's new police chief, Martin Flask, to have officers assigned to work with local community coalitions. Community leaders will work with residents to report crime and drug activity, while officers will assist with prevention efforts, said McCain, a 1995 Join Together Fellow.
However, Judy Cushing, president of the National Family Partnership and executive director of The Oregon Partnership, was troubled that Clinton did not emphasize the role that parents play in substance-abuse prevention. "I was disappointed that -- with the leadership this administration has in place, with General McCaffrey and others -- the president did not have anything of much substance to say about the substance-abuse issue," she said.
Cushing, a 1994 Join Together Fellow, added that while treatment in prison is important, it should not be the administration's top priority. "We have to have more of an effort toward educating parents and getting them involved in prevention," she said. "Prevention starts at home. We have a new generation of parents now; if we don't motivate them, we're going to have a generation of kids who don't have any boundaries and norms around substance abuse."
While Clinton used his State of the Union address to discuss a laundry list of programs and priorities, Republicans and Democrats also offered sometimes conflicting priorities for the post-impeachment session of Congress.
Both parties agreed that crime and drugs should be near the top of the legislative agenda, but both focused their remedies on law enforcement, not prevention or treatment. Republicans, for example, proposed legislation to fight international and domestic drug trafficking (by improving extradition procedures and seizing assets of international traffickers), and equalizing the penalties for crack and powder cocaine use by increasing the latter.
Democrats want to target violence in school, improve the juvenile-justice system, crack down on drug use and sales, fight domestic violence, and lower the national drunk-driving standard from .10 percent to .08 percent blood-alcohol content.
COMMENTS ON THIS ARTICLE: