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Burrill Lumber Company 9/14/92 [OA 5812]
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This is not a textual record. This is used as an
administrative marker by the George Bush Presidential
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Record Group/Collection:
George H.W. Bush Presidential Records
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Speechwriting, White House Office of
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Speech File Draft Files
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13641-006
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Burrill Lumber Company 9/14/92 [OA 5812]
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26
18
4
7
VISIT TO BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY
MEDFORD, OREGON
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1992
6:00 P.M.
THANK YOU, MIKE, FOR THAT INTRODUCTION. AND THANKS
TO THE ENTIRE BURRILL FAMILY AND ALL OF YOU FOR LETTING
ME VISIT TODAY. LAST WEEK IN DETROIT, I RELEASED MY
AGENDA FOR AMERICAN RENEWAL. THE AGENDA WAS BASED ON A
FUNDAMENTAL PREMISE: THAT THE CHALLENGES AMERICA FACES
-- FOREIGN, DOMESTIC, ECONOMIC, AND, YES, ENVIRONMENTAL
-- ARE CONNECTED. THE SOLUTION TO ONE CANNOT BE
DIVORCED FROM THE SOLUTION TO THE OTHER. WE NEED AN
INTEGRATED APPROACH.
WE NEED TO BRING THIS INTEGRATED APPROACH TO THE
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE ECONOMY AND THE ENVIRONMENT,
TOO. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AND ECONOMIC GROWTH MUST
GO HAND IN HAND, THEY CANNOT BE DIVORCED FROM EACH
OTHER. THIS MORNING, I SPOKE IN CALIFORNIA ABOUT WAYS
TO BRING THEM TOGETHER. BUT FRANKLY, I BELIEVE THAT
WHEN IT COMES TO THE ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT AND ITS
APPLICATION HERE IN THE NORTHWEST, THE BALANCE HAS BEEN
LOST.
- 2 -
LIKE MANY OF YOU, I LOVE TO HIKE AND HUNT AND FISH.
AND LIKE YOU, I HAVE LEARNED THROUGH A LIFETIME OF
EXPERIENCE TO APPRECIATE AND RESPECT THE WILDERNESS.
I KNOW THAT YOU -- YOU WHO HAVE CHOSEN TO LIVE IN
THESE WOODS -- RESPECT AND REVERE THESE FORESTS AS
OTHERS NEVER CAN. AND YOU RESENT THE IMPLICATION THAT
EARNING YOUR LIVELIHOOD HERE -- WITH SOUND MANAGEMENT
OF THE FOREST -- MAKES YOU LESS OF A CONSERVATIONIST
THAN THE CITY DWELLER OR THE SUBURBANITE.
FOR THE PAST FOUR YEARS, WE HAVE WORKED HARD TO
PROTECT THE ENVIRONMENT -- AND WE HAVE ACCOMPLISHED A
GREAT DEAL.
FOUR YEARS AGO, I PROMISED AMERICANS A NEW CLEAN
AIR ACT. FOR OVER A DECADE, NO ONE COULD GET IT DONE.
BUT WE DID IT. MY CLEAN AIR ACT REDUCES SMOG IN OUR
CITIES, GETS TOXIC POLLUTANTS OUT OF THE AIR AND WILL
CUT ACID RAIN IN HALF.
- 3 -
FOUR YEARS AGO, I PROMISED THAT I WOULD PROTECT THE
ENVIRONMENTALLY SENSITIVE AREAS OF OUR COASTS FROM
OFFSHORE DRILLING. AND TODAY, THERE WILL BE NO
DRILLING OFF THE COAST OF CALIFORNIA, OFF THE COASTS OF
WASHINGTON AND OREGON NOT FAR FROM HERE, OFF THE
FLORIDA KEYS, OFF THE NEW ENGLAND COAST. WE HAVE
BANNED OCEAN DRILLING UNTIL THE YEAR 2000.//
FOUR YEARS AGO, I PROMISED TO BE A GOOD STEWARD OF
OUR PUBLIC LANDS. AND WE HAVE ADDED THOUSANDS OF MILES
OF TRAILS FOR AMERICANS LIKE YOU WHO LOVE THE OUTDOORS;
WE ARE REOPENING AND UPGRADING CAMPSITES ALL ACROSS
AMERICA; AND WE HAVE ADDED A MILLION AND A HALF ACRES
TO OUR NATIONAL PARKS, WILDLIFE AREAS, FORESTS AND
RECREATION LANDS.
- 4 -
THE FACT IS THAT EVERY AMERICAN CARES ABOUT THE
ENVIRONMENT -- AND MOST CONSIDER THEMSELVES
ENVIRONMENTALISTS. THAT IS PARTICULARLY TRUE HERE IN
THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST. YET AMERICANS TODAY REALIZE
THAT WE CAN PROTECT OUR LANDS WHILE ALSO USING THEM FOR
THE PEOPLE'S BENEFIT. THEY UNDERSTAND THE NEED FOR
WILDERNESS AND RECREATION AREAS, AS WELL AS THE NEED
FOR PAPER FOR OUR SCHOOLS AND OFFICES AND TIMBER FOR
NEW HOMES.
BEING OUT HERE IN THE GREAT PACIFIC NORTHWEST, I AM
REMINDED OF TEDDY ROOSEVELT -- THE VERY FIRST PRESIDENT
TO FOCUS THE ATTENTION OF THE NATION ON THE CONDITION
OF OUR NATURAL RESOURCES. TEDDY ROOSEVELT ONCE SAID:
"WISE FOREST PROTECTION DOES NOT MEAN THE WITHDRAWAL OF
FOREST RESOURCES.
FROM CONTRIBUTING THEIR FULL SHARE
TO THE WELFARE OF THE PEOPLE " WHAT PRESIDENT
ROOSEVELT HAD IN MIND, AND WHAT THE AMERICAN PEOPLE
HAVE ALWAYS WANTED, IS BALANCE.
- 5 -
NOT FAR FROM HERE, IN THE STATE OF WASHINGTON, IS A
TIMBER TOWN CALLED FORKS. FORKS SUPPORTED A MILL, AND
THE MILL SUPPORTED A COMMUNITY. BECAUSE OF A LACK OF
TIMBER, THE MILL HAD TO CLOSE. TODAY UNEMPLOYMENT IN
FORKS IS AT 20 PERCENT. THE CAR DEALERSHIP HAS CLOSED.
THE CLOTHING STORE IS GONE. THE MOVIE THEATER -- SHUT
DOWN. DOMESTIC VIOLENCE COMPLAINTS HAVE DOUBLED, JUST
IN THE PAST YEAR.
FORKS IS IN CRISIS FOR A SIMPLE REASON: THE
BALANCE HAS BEEN LOST. I HAVE COME HERE BECAUSE WE
MUST RESTORE THE BALANCE.
LISTEN TO OREGON'S OWN SENATOR MARK HATFIELD, WHO
WAS A COSPONSOR OF THE ORIGINAL ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT
BACK IN 1972. THIS YEAR, HE WROTE: "THERE IS NO
QUESTION THAT THE ACT IS BEING APPLIED IN A MANNER FAR
BEYOND WHAT ANY OF US ENVISIONED WHEN WE WROTE IT
TWENTY YEARS AGO."
- 6 -
THE ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT WAS INTENDED AS A SHIELD
FOR SPECIES AGAINST THE EFFECTS OF MAJOR CONSTRUCTION
PROJECTS LIKE HIGHWAYS AND DAMS -- NOT A SWORD AIMED AT
THE JOBS, FAMILIES, AND COMMUNITIES OF ENTIRE REGIONS
LIKE THE NORTHWEST.
BUT TODAY, WHEN HARVESTING ON FEDERAL TIMBERLAND IS
STOPPED OUTRIGHT BY 13 DIFFERENT LAWSUITS -- UNDER 7
DIFFERENT STATUTES, EACH INCONSISTENT WITH THE OTHER -
- THE BALANCE HAS BEEN LOST. IT'S TIME TO FIGHT FOR
JOBS, FAMILIES AND COMMUNITIES.
WHEN HUNDREDS OF MILLS HAVE BEEN SHUT DOWN,
THOUSANDS OF TIMBER WORKERS THROWN OUT OF WORK, AND
REVENUES FOR SCHOOLS AND OTHER LOCAL SERVICES HAVE BEEN
SLASHED, THE BALANCE HAS BEEN LOST. IT'S TIME TO FIGHT
FOR JOBS, FAMILIES, AND COMMUNITIES.
THE TIME HAS COME TO TALK SENSE ABOUT THE
ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT, ABOUT THE SPOTTED OWL, AND
ABOUT THE MANAGEMENT OF OUR FORESTS. BECAUSE IT'S MY
FIRM BELIEF THAT PEOPLE AND THEIR JOBS DESERVE
PROTECTION TOO.
- 7 -
LET ME BE CLEAR: THE BASIC PURPOSE OF THE
ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT IS GOOD AND NOBLE -- TO SAVE THE
RARE AND THREATENED SPECIES OF THIS COUNTRY.
BUT TODAY, THE ACT AND OTHER LAWS ARE BEING USED BY
PEOPLE WITH EXTREME VIEWS, PARTICULARLY HERE IN
WASHINGTON AND OREGON, TO ACHIEVE IN THE COURTS WHAT NO
SANE ELECTED OFFICIAL WOULD EVER VOTE FOR -- THE
COMPLETE LOCK-UP OF THE MOST PRODUCTIVE FORESTS IN THE
ENTIRE UNITED STATES. 11
THE ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT, AS RIGIDLY INTERPRETED
BY SOME COURTS AND AS DRIVEN BY THE CONGRESS, HAS
FORCED AN EXTREME APPROACH AND CREATED AN UNNECESSARILY
TRAGIC SITUATION HERE IN THE NORTHWEST. MASSIVE AREAS
OF FEDERAL LAND ARE BEING SET ASIDE FOR THE OWL --
VIRTUALLY IGNORING THE FACT THAT TWO-THIRDS OF THE
NORTHWEST'S OLD GROWTH FORESTS ARE ALREADY DESIGNATED
AS PARKS, WILDERNESS, OR OTHER CLASSIFICATIONS THAT
PREVENT HARVESTING. EACH PAIR OF OWLS GETS 3,500 ACRES
TO ITSELF! MEANWHILE, JOBS, FAMILIES AND COMMUNITIES
ARE BEING WIPED OUT IN THE PROCESS.
- 8 -
THE OTHER SIDE HAS BEEN TALKING ABOUT A "FALSE
CHOICE." THEY CLAIM THAT THIS TIMBER CRISIS IS JUST
POLITICS. THE SIMPLE FACT IS THIS: THE FALSE CHOICE
IS BEING DRIVEN BY EXTREMISTS WHO ARE TWISTING THE
ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT AND ITS APPLICATION TO THE
NORTHERN SPOTTED OWL.
NOW LET'S SET THE RECORD STRAIGHT. WE HAVE ALWAYS
WORKED WITHIN THE PARAMETERS OF THE LAW TO ADDRESS THIS
PROBLEM -- BUT I CAN TELL YOU THIS. THE LAW IS BROKEN,
AND IT MUST BE FIXED.
WE HAVE ASKED CONGRESS FOR FUNDS TO CUT ENOUGH
TIMBER IN THIS REGION TO KEEP PEOPLE EMPLOYED. BUT
THESE CONFLICTING LAWS ALLOW CHALLENGE AFTER CHALLENGE.
WE CONVENED THE GOD SQUAD TO EXEMPT 13 TIMBER SALES
HERE IN SOUTHERN OREGON FROM JEOPARDY OPINIONS FROM THE
FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE. AND EVERY ONE OF THOSE
SALES IS NOW ENJOINED.
- 9 -
SO THIS YEAR, WE SENT CONGRESS AN ALTERNATIVE PLAN:
A PRESERVATION PLAN THAT WOULD SAVE 17,000 JOBS
COMPARED TO THE RECOVERY PLAN REQUIRED BY THE ACT.
CONGRESS HAS FAILED TO ACT.
MY FRIENDS, IT IS TIME TO CONSIDER THE HUMAN FACTOR
IN THE SPOTTED OWL EQUATION. MY OPPONENT TALKS ABOUT
"PUTTING PEOPLE FIRST" -- WELL, WE CAN START RIGHT HERE
IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST.
SO HERE IS WHAT I PROPOSE:
FIRST, I WILL NOT SIGN AN EXTENSION OF THE
ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT UNLESS IT GIVES GREATER
CONSIDERATION TO JOBS, FAMILIES, AND COMMUNITIES. AND
I WILL NOT SIGN IT WITHOUT A SPECIFIC PLAN IN PLACE TO
HARVEST ENOUGH TIMBER TO KEEP TIMBER FAMILIES WORKING
IN 1993 AND BEYOND. IT'S TIME TO MAKE PEOPLE MORE
IMPORTANT THAN OWLS.
- 10 -
SECOND, I WILL FIGHT TO END THE INJUNCTIONS THAT
HAVE PUT AN ECONOMIC STRANGLE-HOLD ON THE NORTHWEST, IN
ORDER TO FREE UP THE TIMBER THAT WE NEED TODAY --
BECAUSE THE FAMILIES AND THE TIMBER COMMUNITIES OF THE
PACIFIC NORTHWEST NEED RELIEF NOW.
I CALL UPON CONGRESS TO PASS MY PLAN TO PRODUCE 2.6
BILLION BOARD FEET OF TIMBER FROM FOREST SERVICE LANDS
IN THE NORTHWEST REGION NEXT YEAR -- AND AT LEAST 500
MILLION BOARD FEET ON B.L.M. LAND. AND I ASK CONGRESS
TO TIE THAT PLAN TO LANGUAGE THAT PREVENTS LAWSUITS
FROM STOPPING REASONABLE HARVESTS WITH REASONABLE
SPECIES PROTECTION. IT'S TIME TO PUT PEOPLE AHEAD OF
PROCESS.
- 11 -
THIRD, MY ADMINISTRATION WILL SPEED THE HARVESTING
OF DEAD OR DYING TIMBER THAT HAS BEEN DANGEROUSLY
BUILDING UP DURING A 7 YEAR DROUGHT. ONE STEP IS OUR
NEW RULE TO ALLOW MORE TIMBER SALVAGE OPERATIONS TO
OCCUR WITHOUT TRIGGERING SOME OF THE TIME-CONSUMING
REQUIREMENTS THAT ARE BLOCKING PROGRESS. THIS WILL
REDUCE THE RISK OF FIRE, AND IT WILL PROVIDE UP TO 450
MILLION BOARD FEET OF TIMBER FOR THE MILLS IN THE NEAR
TERM. IT'S TIME TO PROTECT JOBS WITH TIMBER THAT'S
AVAILABLE NOW AND PUT THE MILLS BACK TO WORK. //
FINALLY, I CALL UPON CONGRESS TODAY TO PASS THE
SPOTTED OWL PRESERVATION PLAN -- THE BILL SPONSORED BY
SENATOR PACKWOOD, SENATOR HATFIELD, AND SENATOR GORTON
WHICH THEY CALL "THE NORTHERN SPOTTED OWN PRESERVATION
AND NORTHWEST ECONOMIC STABILIZATION ACT OF 1992".
IT'S TIME TO PRESERVE BOTH OWLS AND JOBS, JOBS IN THE
TIMBER INDUSTRY AND IN AGRICULTURE, IN TRANSPORTATION
AND IN RECREATION AS WELL, WHERE THEY TOO ARE
THREATENED BY THE ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT.
- 12 -
NOW, MY OPPONENTS' APPROACH TO THIS PROBLEM -- TO
YOUR JOBS -- IS DOUBLESPEAK. WHEN BILL CLINTON SPOKE
IN PENNSYLVANIA, HE SAID WHAT THE SIERRA CLUB WANTED TO
HEAR. THEY CONCLUDED THAT GOVERNOR CLINTON WAS --
QUOTE -- "PROMISING THE PROTECTION OF OLD GROWTH
FORESTS IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST." THEN, WHEN HE HEARD
I WAS COMING HERE, MR. CLINTON CYNICALLY HELD OUT FALSE
HOPE TO TIMBER FAMILIES BY PROMISING ANOTHER MEETING.
THERE HAVE ALREADY BEEN MORE THAN 40 BIPARTISAN
MEETINGS OF THE NORTHWEST CONGRESSIONAL DELEGATION ON
THIS ISSUE FOR THREE YEARS. CHOLD UP STUDIES.] WE'VE
PRODUCED A PILE OF STUDIES AND PROPOSALS THIS HIGH.
THE ONLY GOOD REASON FOR THE TIMBER INDUSTRY IS ALL THE
TREES IN TOOK TO PRINT ALL THESE REPORTS. NO MORE
STUDIES, LET'S CHANGE THE LAW.
AND THE DIFFERENCE ON THIS IS CLEAR: I WILL. ITS
AS SIMPLE AS THIS: MY OPPONENT WILL NOT FIGHT TO
CHANGE THE LAW TO RESTORE BALANCE.
- 13 -
NOW I KNOW THAT MR. CLINTON, GOVERNOR DOUBLESPEAK,
IS GETTING FAMOUS FOR BEING ON BOTH SIDES OF EVERY
ISSUE.
DO YOU WANT TO KNOW THE REAL VIEWS OF THE OTHER
TICKET? SENATOR GORE WROTE IT IN BLACK AND WHITE IN
HIS BOOK, BEFORE HE KNEW HE'D BE PANDERING FOR VOTES.
IN HIS BOOK, SENATOR GORE SAID THIS, AND I QUOTE:
"I HELPED LEAD THE SUCCESSFUL FIGHT TO PREVENT THE
OVERTURNING OF PROTECTIONS FOR THE SPOTTED OWL."
SENATOR GORE WROTE, AND I QUOTE: THE JOBS WILL BE
LOST ANYWAY." I CHALLENGE GOVERNOR CLINTON -- DO YOU
AGREE WITH YOUR RUNNING MATE? DO YOU ENDORSE THE BOOK
THAT YOU ONCE CALLED "MAGNIFICENT"?
IT'S TIME WE WORRIED NOT ONLY ABOUT ENDANGERED
SPECIES -- BUT ABOUT ENDANGERED JOBS.
I HAVE COME HERE TO TELL YOU THAT I AM THE
CANDIDATE WHO WILL RESPECT WILDLIFE, YES -- BUT WHO
WILL ALSO FIGHT FOR JOBS, FAMILIES, AND COMMUNITIES.
- 14 -
I HAVE COME HERE TO TELL YOU THAT I WILL NOT STAND
FOR A SOLUTION THAT PUTS AT LEAST 32,000 PEOPLE OUT OF
WORK. IT WILL NOT STAND.
I HAVE COME HERE TO TELL YOU THAT WE HAVEN'T
FORGOTTEN ABOUT THE HUMAN FACTOR -- BECAUSE, IN THE
END, THAT'S THE MOST IMPORTANT FACTOR OF ALL.
I HAVE COME HERE TODAY TO TELL YOU THAT WE CAN
RESTORE THE BALANCE, WE MUST RESTORE THE BALANCE, AND
WITH YOUR HELP, WE WILL RESTORE THE BALANCE.
THANK YOU, GOD BLESS YOU, AND MAY GOD BLESS THE
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
#
#
#
THE WHITE HOUSE
Grady Grady/bouth bouth
WASHINGTON
02 SEP 12 P9: 14
September 12, 1992
MEMORANDUM FOR THE PRESIDENT
THROUGH:
STEVEN PROVOST SP
FROM:
BOB GRADY he
SUBJECT:
REMARKS IN MEDFORD, OREGON
On Monday, September 14 at 6:10 p.m., you will address an
audience of 2,000, which includes lumber workers and their
families at the Burrill Lumber Company. Your remarks are twenty
minutes in length and will be on teleprompter.
fifteen!
Kauffman (?) Herter
some
nonessing
((Grady))
PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS: VISIT TO BURRILL LUMBER 9/12/92 COMPANY
MEDFORD, OREGON
OLT 12 P8:54
Monday, September 14, 1992
Thank you, Senator Bob Packwood, for that introduction. And
thanks to Mike Burrill and all of you for letting me visit today.
Last week in Detroit, I released my Agenda for American
Renewal. hope you 11 call us and ask for a copy The agenda
was based on a fundamental premise: that the challenges America
faces -- foreign, domestic, economic, and, yes, environmental --
are connected. The solution to one cannot be divorced from the
solution to the other. We need an integrated approach.
We need to bring this integrated approach to the
relationship between the economy and the environment, too.
Environmental protection and economic growth must go hand in
hand, they cannot be divorced from each other. This morning, I
spoke in California about ways to bring them together --
partnerships, market mechanisms, and new technology, instead of
regulation, litigation, and paralysis. But frankly, I believe
that when it comes to the Endangered Species Act and its
application here in the Northwest, the balance has been lost.
hike
Like many of you, I love to camp and hunt and fish. And
like you, I have learned through a lifetime of experience to
appreciate and respect the wilderness.
I know that you -- you who have chosen to live in these
woods -- respect and revere these forests as others never can.
And you resent the implication that earning your livelihood
here -- with sound management of the forest -- makes you less of
2
an of conservationist than the city dweller or the suburbanite.
For the last four years, we have worked hard to protect the
environment -- and we have accomplished a great deal.
Four years ago, I promised Americans a new Clean Air Act.
we did
For over a decade, no one could get it done. But got it done.
My Clean Air Act will cut acid rain in half reduce smog in our
cities, and get toxic pollutants out of the air.
stat
Four years ago, I promised that I would protect the
environmentally sensitive areas of our coasts from offshore
drilling. And today, there will be no drilling off the coast of
California, off the coasts of Washington and Oregon not far from
here, off the Florida Keys, off the New England coast because we
3 cenned ocean drillng
have placed those areas under a moratorium until the year 2000.
Four years ago, I promised to be a good steward of our
public lands. And we have added thousands of miles of trails for
Americans like you who love the outdoors; we are reopening and
a
upgrading campsites all across America; and we have added
1-1/2
andahalf
million acres to our National Parks, Wildlife Areas, Forests and
recreation lands.
people's
The fact is that every American cares about the
environment -- and most consider themselves environmentalists.
That is particularly true here in the Pacific Northwest. Yet
Americans today realize that we can protect our lands while also
?
using them for the benefit of the people. They understand the
number
need for wild areas and recreation areas, as well as the need for
wildines
paper for our schools and offices and timber for new homes.
nerness
Being out here in the great Pacific fiver Northwest, I companined
3
but think of Teddy Roosevelt -- the first President to focus the
attention of the Nation on the condition of our natural
resources. Teddy Roosevelt once said: "wise forest protection
does not mean the withdrawal of forest resources... from
contributing their full share to the welfare of the people... "
What President Roosevelt had in mind, and what the American
people have always wanted, is balance.
Not far from here, in the state of Washington, is a timber
town called Forks. Forks supported a mill, and the mill
supported a community. Because of a lack of timber, the mill had
to close. Today unemployment in Forks is at 20 percent. The car
dealership has closed. The clothing store is gone. The movie
theater -- shut down. Domestic violence complaints have doubled,
just in the last year. The community has been ravaged.
Forks is in crisis for a simple reason: the balance has
been lost. My friends, I have come here because we must restore
the balance.
Listu to
I want to quote you a statement from Oregon's own Senator
Mark Hatfield, who was a cosponsor of the original Endangered
This year
Species Act back in 1972. Not long ago, he wrote: "There is no
question that the Act is being applied in a manner far beyond
what any of us envisioned when we wrote it twenty years ago."
The fact is that the Endangered Species Act was intended as
a shield for species against the effects of major construction
4
projects like highways and dams -- not a sword aimed at the jobs,
families, and communities of entire regions like the Northwest.
But today, when harvesting on Federal timberland is stopped
outright by 11 different lawsuits -- under 5 different statutes,
each inconsistent with the other -- the balance has been lost.
It's time to fight for jobs, families and communities.
When hundreds of mills have been shut down, thousands of
timber workers have been thrown out of work, and revenues to
communities for schools and other local services have been
slashed, the balance has been lost. It's time to fight for jobs,
families, and communities.
When a class project at a small college in Connecticut can
mail in appeals to stop people from earning a living in the
Northwest when students get college credit for playing games
with people's lives the balance has been lost. It's time to
fight for jobs, families, and communities.
It's gone too far
The time has come to talk sense about the Endangered Species
Act, about the spotted owl, and about the management of our
its is mg term belief Units
forests. Because after all, people and their jobs deserve some
protection too.
Let me be clear: the basic purpose of the Endangered
Species Act is & good and noble one -- to save the rare and
threatened species of this country.
But today, the Act and other laws are being used by people
with extreme views, particularly here in Washington and Oregon,
5
to achieve in the courts what no sane elected official would ever
vote for -- the complete lock-up of the most productive forests
in the entire United States.
The Endangered Species Act, as rigidly interpreted by some
courts and as driven by the Congress, has forced an extreme
approach and created an unnecessarily tragic situation here in
the Northwest. Massive areas of Federal land are being set aside
for the owl -- virtually ignoring the fact that two-thirds of the
Northwest's old growth forests are already designated as parks,
wilderness, or other classifications that prevent harvesting.
Each pair of owls gets 3,500 acres to itself! Meanwhile, jobs,
families and communities are being wiped out in the process.
The other side has been talking about a "false choice."
They claim that this timber crisis is just politics. The simple
fact is this: the false choice is being driven by extremists who
are twisting the Endangered Species Act and its application to
the Northern Spotted Owl.
Now let's set the record straight. We have always worked
within the parameters of the law to address this problem -- but I
can tell you this. The law is broken, and it must be fixed.
We have asked Congress for funds to cut enough timber in
this region to keep people employed. But these conflicting laws
allow challenge after challenge.
We convened the God Squad to exempt 13 timber sales here in
southern Oregon from jeopardy opinions from the Fish and Wildlife
Service. And every one of those sales is now enjoined.
6
So this year, we sent Congress an alternative plan: a
preservation plan that would save 17,000 jobs compared to the
recovery plan required by the Act. Congress has failed to act.
My friends, it is time to consider the human factor in the
spotted owl equation. My opponent talks about "putting people
first" -- well, we can start right here in the Pacific Northwest.
Today, it's time to face one fact: the situation is out of
control and it must be addressed --- because the balance must be
restored.
So here is what I propose:
First, I will not sign an extension of the Endangered
Species Act unless it gives greater consideration to jobs,
families, and communities. And I. will not sign it without a
specific plan in place to harvest enough timber to keep timber
families working in 1993 and beyond. It's time to make people
just as important as owls.
Second, I will fight to end the injunctions that have put an
economic strangle-hold on the Northwest, in order to free up the
timber that we need today -- because the families and the timber
communities of the Pacific Northwest need relief now.
I call upon Congress to pass my plan to produce 2.6 billion
board feet of timber from Forest Service lands in the Northwest
Region next year -- and at least 500 million board feet on BLM
land. And I ask Congress to tie that plan to language that
prevents procedural lawsuits from stopping reasonable harvests
7
with reasonable species protection. It's time to put people
ahead of process.
Third, my Administration will speed the harvesting of
dead or dying timber that has been dangerously building up during
a 7- year drought. One step is our new rule to allow more timber
salvage operations to occur without triggering some of the time-
consuming requirements that are blocking progress. This will
reduce the risk of fire, and it will provide up to 450 million
board feet of timber for the mills in the near term. It's time
to protect jobs with timber that's available now and put the
mills back to work.
Finally, I call upon Congress today to pass the Spotted Owl
Preservation Plan -- the bill sponsored by Senator Gorton,
Senator Packwood, and Senator Hatfield. It's time to preserve
both owls and jobs.
Now, my opponents' approach to this problem -- to your
jobs -- is doublespeak. When Bill Clinton spoke in Pennsylvania,
said what
he pandered to the Sierra Club, which concluded that he was
(wanted to hear They Coymon Claton
quote -- "promising the protection of old growth forests in the
Pacific Northwest." Then, when he heard I was coming here, Mr.
Clinton cynically held another out false hope to timber families by
promising, get this, a meeting. That's doublespeak.
effecty
There have been more than 40 bipartisan meetings of the
Northwest Congressional delegation on this issue for three years.
[We've produced a pile of studies and proposals this high.] The
conclusion is the same: we need a change in He law.
No mor studies, lets
thealy
forthe timer gardnews
Schooler Ir P.Thichas
8
Its this
And the difference on this is clear: I will, fight to change
the law to restore balance. My opponent will not fight to change the
Now I know that Mr. Clinton, Governor Doublespeak, is
luw to
a With
restor
getting famous for being on both sides of every issue.
bulan
Do you want to know the real views of the other ticket?
Senator Gore wrote it in black and white in his book, before he
knew he'd be pandering 100 mg for yes votes.
In his book, Senator Gore said this, and I quote: "I helped
lead the successful fight to prevent the overturning of
protections for the spotted owl." Senator Gore wrote, and
\I
challenge
quote:
"
the jobs will be lost anyway."
It's time we worried not only about endangered species
but about endangered jobs.
on Nothe study on
I have come here to tell you that I am the candidate
hoth "
who will respect wildlife, yes -- but who will also fight for
been he
4nth
jobs, families, and communities. attecat
I have come here to tell you that I will not stand for a
and form
solution that puts 32,000 people out of work. It will not stand.
which
I have come here to tell you that we haven't forgotten about
the human factor -- because, in the end, that's the most
important factor of all.
I have come here today to tell you that we can restore the
balance, we must restore the balance, and with your help, we will
restore the balance.
Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United
States of America
I challenge challege Guerne Clinta do you
direcmith you munihg make Oo
classe the bouth that you one
Document No.
WHITE HOUSE STAFFING MEMORANDUM
---
DATE:
9/12/92
ACTION/CONCURRENCE/COMMENT DUE BY:
PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS: VISIT TO BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY
SUBJECT:
MEDFORD, OREGON - MONDAY, 9/14/92
ACTION FYI
ACTION FYI
VICE PRESIDENT
MCBRIDE
BAKER
MOORE
SCOWCROFT
MULLINS
DARMAN
PETERSMEYER
BATES
PORTER
BRADY
PROVOST
BROMLEY
ROSS
CALIO
SMITH
DEMAREST
TUTWILER
FITZWATER
ZOELLICK
GRAY
DELAND
HOLIDAY
KAUFMAN
HORNER
GROOMES
MCGROARTY
REMARKS:
The attached has been forwarded to the President.
RESPONSE:
PHILLIP D. BRADY
Assistant to the President
and Staff Secretary
Ext. 2702
((Grady))
9/12/92
PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS:
VISIT TO BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY
MEDFORD, OREGON
12 P8:54
Monday, September 14, 1992
Thank you, Senator Bob Packwood, for that introduction. And
thanks to Mike Burrill and all of you for letting me visit today.
Last week in Detroit, I released my Agenda for American
Renewal. I hope you'll call us and ask for a copy. The agenda
was based on a fundamental premise: that the challenges America
faces -- foreign, domestic, economic, and, yes, environmental --
are connected. The solution to one cannot be divorced from the
solution to the other. We need an integrated approach.
We need to bring this integrated approach to the
relationship between the economy and the environment, too.
Environmental protection and economic growth must go hand in
hand, they cannot be divorced from each other. This morning, I
spoke in California about ways to bring them together --
partnerships, market mechanisms, and new technology, instead of
regulation, litigation, and paralysis. But frankly, I believe
that when it comes to the Endangered Species Act and its
application here in the Northwest, the balance has been lost.
Like many of you, I love to camp and hunt and fish. And
like you, I have learned through a lifetime of experience to
appreciate and respect the wilderness.
I know that you -- you who have chosen to live in these
woods -- respect and revere these forests as others never can.
And you resent the implication that earning your livelihood
here -- with sound management of the forest -- makes you less of
2
an conservationist than the city dweller or the suburbanite.
For the last four years, we have worked hard to protect the
environment -- and we have accomplished a great deal.
Four years ago, I promised Americans a new Clean Air Act.
For over a decade, no one could get it done. But I got it done.
My Clean Air Act will cut acid rain in half, reduce smog in our
cities, and get toxic pollutants out of the air.
Four years ago, I promised that I would protect the
environmentally sensitive areas of our coasts from offshore
drilling. And today, there will be no drilling off the coast of
California, off the coasts of Washington and Oregon not far from
here, off the Florida Keys, off the New England coast, because we
have placed those areas under a moratorium until the year 2000.
Four years ago, I promised to be a good steward of our
public lands. And we have added thousands of miles of trails for
Americans like you who love the outdoors; we are reopening and
upgrading campsites all across America; and we have added 1 1/2
million acres to our National Parks, Wildlife Areas, Forests and
recreation lands.
The fact is that every American cares about the
environment -- and most consider themselves environmentalists.
That is particularly true here in the Pacific Northwest. Yet
Americans today realize that we can protect our lands while also
using them for the benefit of the people. They understand the
need for wild areas and recreation areas, as well as the need for
paper for our schools and offices and timber for new homes.
3
Being out here in the great Pacific Northwest, I cannot help
but think of Teddy Roosevelt -- the first President to focus the
attention of the Nation on the condition of our natural
resources. Teddy Roosevelt once said: "wise forest protection
does not mean the withdrawal of forest resources
from
contributing their full share to the welfare of the people
"
What President Roosevelt had in mind, and what the American
people have always wanted, is balance.
Not far from here, in the state of Washington, is a timber
town called Forks. Forks supported a mill, and the mill
supported a community. Because of a lack of timber, the mill had
to close. Today unemployment in Forks is at 20 percent. The car
dealership has closed. The clothing store is gone. The movie
theater -- shut down. Domestic violence complaints have doubled,
just in the last year. The community has been ravaged.
Forks is in crisis for a simple reason: the balance has
been lost. My friends, I have come here because we must restore
the balance.
I want to quote you a statement from Oregon's own Senator
Mark Hatfield, who was a cosponsor of the original Endangered
Species Act back in 1972. Not long ago, he wrote: "There is no
question that the Act is being applied in a manner far beyond
what any of us envisioned when we wrote it twenty years ago." "
The fact is that the Endangered Species Act was intended as
a shield for species against the effects of major construction
4
projects like highways and dams -- not a sword aimed at the jobs,
families, and communities of entire regions like the Northwest.
But today, when harvesting on Federal timberland is stopped
outright by 11 different lawsuits -- under 5 different statutes,
each inconsistent with the other -- the balance has been lost.
It's time to fight for jobs, families and communities.
When hundreds of mills have been shut down, thousands of
timber workers have been thrown out of work, and revenues to
communities for schools and other local services have been
slashed, the balance has been lost. It's time to fight for jobs,
families, and communities.
When a class project at a small college in Connecticut can
mail in appeals to stop people from earning a living in the
Northwest -- when students get college credit for playing games
with people's lives -- the balance has been lost. It's time to
fight for jobs, families, and communities.
It's gone too far.
The time has come to talk sense about the Endangered Species
Act, about the spotted owl, and about the management of our
forests. Because after all, people and their jobs deserve some
protection too.
Let me be clear: the basic purpose of the Endangered
Species Act is a good and noble one -- to save the rare and
threatened species of this country.
But today, the Act and other laws are being used by people
with extreme views, particularly here in Washington and Oregon,
5
to achieve in the courts what no sane elected official would ever
vote for -- the complete lock-up of the most productive forests
in the entire United States.
The Endangered Species Act, as rigidly interpreted by some
courts and as driven by the Congress, has forced an extreme
approach and created an unnecessarily tragic situation here in
the Northwest. Massive areas of Federal land are being set aside
for the owl -- virtually ignoring the fact that two-thirds of the
Northwest's old growth forests are already designated as parks,
wilderness, or other classifications that prevent harvesting.
Each pair of owls gets 3,500 acres to itself! Meanwhile, jobs,
families and communities are being wiped out in the process.
The other side has been talking about a "false choice."
They claim that this timber crisis is just politics. The simple
fact is this: the false choice is being driven by extremists who
are twisting the Endangered Species Act and its application to
the Northern Spotted Owl.
Now let's set the record straight. We have always worked
within the parameters of the law to address this problem -- but I
can tell you this. The law is broken, and it must be fixed.
We have asked Congress for funds to cut enough timber in
this region to keep people employed. But these conflicting laws
allow challenge after challenge.
We convened the God Squad to exempt 13 timber sales here in
southern Oregon from jeopardy opinions from the Fish and Wildlife
Service. And every one of those sales is now enjoined.
6
So this year, we sent Congress an alternative plan: a
preservation plan that would save 17,000 jobs compared to the
recovery plan required by the Act. Congress has failed to act.
My friends, it is time to consider the human factor in the
spotted owl equation. My opponent talks about "putting people
first" -- well, we can start right here in the Pacific Northwest.
Today, it's time to face one fact: the situation is out of
control, and it must be addressed -- because the balance must be
restored.
So here is what I propose:
First, I will not sign an extension of the Endangered
Species Act unless it gives greater consideration to jobs,
families, and communities. And I will not sign it without a
specific plan in place to harvest enough timber to keep timber
families working in 1993 and beyond. It's time to make people
just as important as owls.
Second, I will fight to end the injunctions that have put an
economic strangle-hold on the Northwest, in order to free up the
timber that we need today -- because the families and the timber
communities of the Pacific Northwest need relief now.
I call upon Congress to pass my plan to produce 2.6 billion
board feet of timber from Forest Service lands in the Northwest
Region next year -- and at least 500 million board feet on BLM
land. And I ask Congress to tie that plan to language that
prevents procedural lawsuits from stopping reasonable harvests
7
with reasonable species protection. It's time to put people
ahead of process.
Third, my Administration will speed up the harvesting of
dead or dying timber that has been dangerously building up during
a 7 year drought. One step is our new rule to allow more timber
salvage operations to occur without triggering some of the time-
consuming requirements that are blocking progress. This will
reduce the risk of fire, and it will provide up to 450 million
board feet of timber for the mills in the near term. It's time
to protect jobs with timber that's available now and put the
mills back to work.
Finally, I call upon Congress today to pass the Spotted Owl
Preservation Plan -- the bill sponsored by Senator Gorton,
Senator Packwood, and Senator Hatfield. It's time to preserve
both owls and jobs.
Now, my opponents' approach to this problem -- to your
jobs -- is doublespeak. When Bill Clinton spoke in Pennsylvania,
he pandered to the Sierra Club, which concluded that he was --
quote -- "promising the protection of old growth forests in the
Pacific Northwest." Then, when he heard I was coming here, Mr.
Clinton cynically held out false hope to timber families by
promising, get this, a meeting. That's doublespeak.
There have been more than 40 bipartisan meetings of the
Northwest Congressional delegation on this issue for three years.
[We've produced a pile of studies and proposals this high.] The
conclusion is the same: we need a change in law.
8
And the difference on this is clear: I will fight to change
the law to restore balance. My opponent will not.
Now I know that Mr. Clinton, Governor Doublespeak, is
getting famous for being on both sides of every issue.
Do you want to know the real views of the other ticket?
Senator Gore wrote it in black and white in his book, before he
knew he'd be pandering for votes.
In his book, Senator Gore said this, and I quote: "I helped
lead the successful fight to prevent the overturning of
protections for the spotted owl." Senator Gore wrote, and I
quote:
"
the jobs will be lost anyway.' "
It's time we worried not only about endangered species --
but about endangered jobs.
I have come here to tell you that I am the candidate
who will respect wildlife, yes -- but who will also fight for
jobs, families, and communities.
I have come here to tell you that I will not stand for a
solution that puts 32,000 people out of work. It will not stand.
I have come here to tell you that we haven't forgotten about
the human factor -- because, in the end, that's the most
important factor of all.
I have come here today to tell you that we can restore the
balance, we must restore the balance, and with your help, we will
restore the balance.
Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United
States of America.
Document No. 349775
WHITE HOUSE STAFFING MEMORANDUM
DATE: 9/11/92
A.S.A.P.
ACTION/CONCURRENCE/COMMENT DUE BY:
SUBJECT: PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS: BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY, MEDFORD OREGON
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1992
ACTION FYI
ACTION FYI
VICE PRESIDENT
MCBRIDE
BAKER
MOORE
SCOWCROFT
MULLINS
DARMAN
PETERSMEYER
BATES
PORTER
BRADY
PROVOST
BROMLEY
ROSS
CALIO
SMITH
DEMAREST
TUTWILER
FITZWATER
ZOELLICK
GRAY
MCGROARTY
HOLIDAY
KAUFMAN
HORNER
GROOMES
BOSKIN
DELAND
REMARKS:
Please forward comments directly to Dan McGroarty, Rm. 122, x2930, A.S.A.P.,
with a copy to this office.
Also, these remarks are similar to the ones staffed for the Colville, WA
event. Thank you.
21 J3S 26
RESPONSE:
PHILLIP D. BRADY
Assistant to the President
and Staff Secretary
Ext. 2702
9/11/92
PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS:
BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY
MEDFORD, OREGON
Monday, September 14, 1992
Thank you, Senator Bob Packwood, for that introduction. And
thanks to all of you for letting me visit with you today. Being
out here in the great Pacific Northwest, I cannot help but think
of Teddy Roosevelt.
He was the first President to really focus the attention of
the Nation on the condition of our natural resources and the need
to manage these treasures for the benefit of future generations.
He said: "Neither man nor nation can prosper unless, in dealing
with the present, thought is steadily taken for the future." And
he was right.
But Teddy Roosevelt said something else: "In the West, " he
said, "the forests should be so handled as to be in the interests
of the actual home-maker. He should be encouraged to use them at
once, but in such a way as to preserve and not exhaust them. "
For the past four years, my Administration had devoted a
great deal of thought and effort to protecting our environment.
Like many of you, I love the outdoors and love to hunt and fish,
And like you, I have learned through a lifetime of experience to
appreciate and respect the beauty of the wilderness.
I know that you -- you who have chosen to live in these
woods -- respect and revere these forests as others cannot. And
you resent the implication that earning your livelihood here --
with sound management of the forest -- makes you less of an
2
environmentalist than the city dweller or the suburbanite. I
have come here today because I understand.
For the last four years, we have worked to protect the
environment -- and we have accomplished a great deal.
Four years ago, I promised Americans a new Clean Air Act.
For 13 years, the Congress was stuck in gridlock and had passed
no clean air law. But we proposed a new one, we negotiated it
through a divided Congress, and I proudly signed it into law.
That law will cut acid rain in half, reduce smog in our cities,
and get toxic pollutants out of the air.
Four years ago, I promised that I would protect the
environmentally sensitive areas of our coasts from offshore
drilling. And today, there will be no drilling off the coast of
California, off the coasts of Washington and Oregon not far from
here, off the Florida Keys, off the New England coast, because we
have placed those areas under a moratorium until the year 2000.
Four years ago, I promised to be a good steward of our
public lands. And we have added thousands of miles of trails for
Americans like you who love the outdoors, we are reopening and
upgrading campsites all across America, and we have added over a
million and half acres to our National Parks and Wildlife Refuges
and Forests and recreation lands.
The fact is that every American cares about the
environment -- and most consider themselves environmentalists.
That is particularly true here in the Pacific Northwest. But
Americans today, like Teddy Roosevelt three quarters of a century
3
ago, realize that the protection of our lands is not inconsistent
with their use. They care about the growth of our country, and
about the ability of Americans to make a living. They
understand, that stewardship does not mean stopping all progress.
As Teddy Roosevelt said: "wise protection of resources does
not mean the withdrawal of those resources from contributing
their full share to the welfare of the people."
What President Roosevelt had in mind, and what the American
people have always wanted, is balance. But in these ancient
forests, the balance has been lost.
Not far from here, in the state of Washington, is a timber
town called Forks. Forks supported a mill, and the mill
supported the town. And the town gave life to a community.
Today, unemployment in Forks is at 20 percent -- more than double
what it was just two years ago. The car dealership has closed.
The clothing store is gone. The movie theatre -- shut down.
Domestic violence complaints have doubled, just in the last year.
The community has been ravaged.
Forks is in crisis for a simple reason: the balance has
been lost.
My friends, I have come here because we must restore the
balance.
I want to quote you something from Oregon's own Senator Mark
Hatfield, who has served in the Senate long enough to remember
the creation of the Endangered Species Act. Not long ago, he
wrote: "There is no question that the Act is being applied in
4
manner far beyond what any of us envisioned when we wrote it
twenty years ago. "
The application of the Endangered Species Act to these
forests has gone far beyond what the drafters intended. The
balance has been lost.
The fact is that the Endangered Species Act was intended as
a shield for species against the effects of major Federal
projects like highways and dams -- not a sword aimed at the jobs,
families, and communities of the Northwest.
But today, when all harvesting on Federal timberland is
stopped outright by 11 different lawsuits, the balance has been
lost. It's time factor in the worries about jobs, families and
communities.
When hundreds of mills have been shut down, thousands of
timber workers thrown out of work, and revenues to communities
for schools and other local services slashed as a result, the
balance has been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families,
and communities.
Today, when interest groups can tie our Federal agencies up.
in knots by suing them under five different statutes enacted by
Congress -- each inconsistent with the other -- the balance has
been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families, and
communities.
Today, when a class project at Wesleyan University in
Connecticut is to come up with lawsuits to stop people from
earning a living in the Northwest -- when students can play games
5
with people's lives -- the balance has been lost. It's time to
worry about jobs families and communities.
I have come to this great Pacific Northwest, to these
beautiful and productive forests, to join you in saying: we must
restore the balance. We must worry about jobs, families and
communities. Enough is enough.
The time has come to talk sense about the Endangered Species
Act, about the spotted owl, and about the management of our
forests. Because after all, people and their jobs deserve some
protection too.
Let me be clear: I care about protecting the environment.
The basic purpose of the Endangered Species Act is a good and
noble one: to save the species of this country.
But today, the Act is being used, particularly here in
Washington and Oregon, to achieve in the courts what can't be
achieved through legislation or adminsitrative procedure -- the
complete lock-up of the most productive forests in the entire
United States.
The Endangered Species Act, in its current form as
interpreted by some courts and as driven by the Democrats in
Congress, has forced a radical approach and created an
unnecessarily tragic situation here in the Northwest. Massive
and unnecessarily large areas of Federal land are being set aside
for the owl. And jobs, families and communities are being wiped
out in the process.
6
You know, the other side has been talking lately about a
"false choice." They claim that this timber crisis is just
politics. The simple fact is this: the false choice is being
driven by the Endangered Species Act and its application to the
Northern Spotted Owl. It is being driven by those in Congress
who have permitted this crisis to go unresolved.
The simple fact is that when it comes to the Owl, the Act is
too rigid -- and Congress is too timid.
Now let's set the record straight. We have always worked
within the paramaters of the law to address this problem -- but I
can tell you this. The law is broken, and it must be fixed.
We have asked Congress for funds to cut enough timber in
this region to keep people employed. But these conflicting laws
allow challenge after challenge.
I endorsed and signed into law a provision which would ban
the export of raw logs taken from Federal land. This will mean
more work in Oregon's mills.
This year, we asked Congress to make a choice. We showed
them the Spotted Owl Recovery Plan, as required by the Endangered
Species Act -- a plan that would cost this region 30,000 jobs.
And, because that plan imposes too great a cost on the families
and communities of the Pacific Northwest, we asked them to
consider instead an alternative: a preservation plan that would
cut that job loss in half.
We sent Congress a bill that would help save 15,000 jobs.
And Congress has failed to act. So while the gridlock Congress
7
stalls, no timber is being cut -- and your jobs are disappearing
alot faster than the owl.
I spoke before about balance.
It is not balance when mills that have operated responsibly
for generations are threatened with extinction because of a lack
of fiber from our public lands.
It is not balance when the Act prevents the mere
consideration, at key points in the process, of costs that
directly affect people and their livelihood -- of the human
factor.
My friends, it is time to consider the human factor in the
spotted owl equation. My opponent talks about "putting people
first" -- well, we can start right here in the Pacific Northwest.
Today, it's time to face one fact: the situation is out of
control -- and it must be addressed
because the balance must be
restored.
So let me say this:
I will not sign an extension of the Endangered Species Act
that does not allow economics to be considered [in the listing
process], and that is not accompanied buy a specific plan to
harvest enough timber to keep timber families working in 1993 and
beyond. It's time to make people just as important as owls.
I call upon Congress to pass my plan to cut 2.6 billion
board feet in the Forest Service Pacific Northwest region next
year -- and at least 500 million board feet on BLM land. And I
ask Congress to tie that plan to language which makes sure that a
8
reasonable cut that provides protection for species cannot be
blocked on procedural grounds. It's time to put people ahead of
process.
My Administration has recently announced several steps to
speed up the harvesting of dead or dying timber. We will shortly
issue a rule to allow these timber salvage operations to occur
without triggering some of the restrictive and time-consuming
laws that are disrupting the balance today.
This will help in two ways: by reducing the risk of fire
from the large volume of dead or dying trees on our forest floor;
and by providing up to 450 million board feet of timber for the
mills in the near term. It's time to protect jobs and put people
back to work.
I will fight for legislative language to end the injunctions
that have put an economic strangle-hold on hte Northwest, in
order to free up the timber that we need today -- because the
families and the timber communities of the Pacific Northwest need
relief now.
And I call upon Congress today to pass the Spotted Owl
Preservation Plan -- Senator Slade Gorton's bill -- because we
must preserve the owl; we must preserve the livelihood of the
Pacific Northwest; and we must preserve the jobs of the American
people.
Now, my opponents would have you believe that they, too are
in favor of balance. They won't commit to any specific action to
9
solve the problem. Their idea of balance is doublespeak --
promise both sides exactly what they want to hear.
When Bill Clinton spoke on Earth Day back in Pennsylvania,
he earned the praise of the Sierra Club for "promising the
protection of Old Growth forests in the Pacific Northwest." He
wanted their endorsement, and he got it.
Now, just recently, with the election nearing, he has come
to Oregon to hold out false hope to timber families by promising
a meeting. Classic doublespeak. But we should face one fact.
This problem isn't going to be solved with one meeting. We've
had enough meetings, it's time for action.
Bill Clinton says that he'll have his meeting within 100
days. Well, we've been meeting for two years. What's needed is
a change in law. I will fight for it. Bill Clinton will not.
Now I know that the Governor of Arkansas is famous for being
on both sides of every issue. But I hope you'll ask him -- for
once -- to stop the rhetoric and take a stand. Families are in
the Northwest are at risk. So this is one issue where sincerity
would be better than slickness.
The plain truth is that the other ticket is on the record on
this problem, and here is what they have said.
In his book, Senator Gore said this, and I quote: "I helped
lead the successful fight to prevent the overturning of
protections for the spotted owl." The reasoning offered was
simple. The Senator said: "The jobs will be lost anyway. The
10
only question is whether the effort to create new jobs will begin
now or later."
Senator Gore and Governor Clinton don't realize that
generation after generation of families -- families like Mike
Burrill's -- have made a living for their family, for their
neighbors, and for their community -- not by locking these
forests up, but by managing them wisely. By restoring what they
take, so that the land can sustain the next generation and the
one after that. After all, it's no mistake that America today is
home to more forest land than it was when Teddy Roosevelt was
President.
The other side doesn't understand that leading the fight
against any change in the tangled web of conflicting laws means
leading the fight against your job and your family and your
community and your way of life.
or maybe they do understand. But I ask you only to do this:
let them know that you understand, too. And do not be fooled by
this doublespeak.
It's time we worried not only about endangered species --
but about endangered jobs.
You know, the father of our national forest system, and one
of America's great conservationists, Gifford Pinchot, once
defined conservation this way: "Conservation means the wise use
of the earth and its resources for the lasting good of men. "
I have come here today to tell you that I am the candidate
who will worry about jobs, families, and communities.
11
I have come here today to tell you that I will not stand for
a solution that puts 30,000 people out of work. That is a non-
solution. And on my watch, it will not stand.
I have come here to tell you that we haven't forgotten about
the human factor -- because in the end, that's the most important
factor of all.
I have come here today to tell you that we can restore the
balance, we must restore the balance, and with your help, we will
restore the balance.
Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United
States of America.
#
#
#
#
J.D. Foster
CEA
92 SEP 14 A10: 37
Burill Lumber
p.l 4th 41
had, has
p.u 3rd A
add we
p.7
to
jobs, families + commun
P.8
3rd DA htc
the
theme 2nd half
Bill to kill only 15,000
too much emphasis
Document No. 349775
WHITE HOUSE STAFFING MEMORANDUM
DATE: 9/11/92
A.S.A.P.
ACTION/CONCURRENCE/COMMENT DUE BY:
SUBJECT: PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS: BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY, MEDFORD OREGON
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1992
ACTION FYI
ACTION FYI
VICE PRESIDENT
MCBRIDE
BAKER
MOORE
SCOWCROFT
MULLINS
DARMAN
PETERSMEYER
BATES
PORTER
BRADY
PROVOST
BROMLEY
ROSS
CALIO
SMITH
DEMAREST
TUTWILER
FITZWATER
ZOELLICK
GRAY
MCGROARTY
HOLIDAY
KAUFMAN
HORNER
GROOMES
BOSKIN
DELAND
REMARKS:
Please forward comments directly to Dan McGroarty, Rm. 122, x2930, A.S.A.P.,
with a copy to this office.
Also, these remarks are similar to the ones staffed for the Colville, WA
event. Thank you.
RESPONSE:
PHILLIP D. BRADY
OBE
Assistant to the President
rec'd 9/[email protected]
and Staff Secretary
AM
Ext. 2702
9/11/92
PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS:
BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY
MEDFORD, OREGON
Monday, September 14, 1992
Thank you, Senator Bob Packwood, for that introduction. And
thanks to all of you for letting me visit with you today. Being
out here in the great Pacific Northwest, I cannot help but think
of Teddy Roosevelt.
He was the first President to really focus the attention of
the Nation on the condition of our natural resources and the need
to manage these treasures for the benefit of future generations.
He said: "Neither man nor nation can prosper unless, in dealing
with the present, thought is steadily taken for the future." " And
he was right.
But Teddy Roosevelt said something else: "In the West, " he
said, "the forests should be so handled as to be in the interests
of the actual home-maker. He should be encouraged to use them at
once, but in such a way as to preserve and not exhaust them. "
For the past four years, my Administration had devoted a
great deal of thought and effort to protecting our environment.
Like many of you, I love the outdoors and love to hunt and fish,
And like you, I have learned through a lifetime of experience to
appreciate and respect the beauty of the wilderness.
I know that you -- you who have chosen to live in these
woods -- respect and revere these forests as others cannot. And
you resent the implication that earning your livelihood here --
with sound management of the forest -- makes you less of an
2
environmentalist than the city dweller or the suburbanite. I
have come here today because I understand.
For the last four years, we have worked to protect the
environment -- and we have accomplished a great deal.
Four years ago, I promised Americans a new Clean Air Act.
For 13 years, the Congress was stuck in gridlock and had passed
no clean air law. But we proposed a new one, we negotiated it
through a divided Congress, and I proudly signed it into law.
That law will cut acid rain in half, reduce smog in our cities,
and get toxic pollutants out of the air.
Four years ago, I promised that I would protect the
environmentally sensitive areas of our coasts from offshore
drilling. And today, there will be no drilling off the coast of
California, off the coasts of Washington and Oregon not far from
here, off the Florida Keys, off the New England coast, because we
have placed those areas under a moratorium until the year 2000.
Four years ago, I promised to be a good steward of our
public lands. And we have added thousands of miles of trails for
Americans like you who love the outdoors, we are reopening and
upgrading campsites all across America, and we have added over a
million and half acres to our National Parks and Wildlife Refuges
and Forests and recreation lands.
The fact is that every American cares about the
environment -- and most consider themselves environmentalists.
That is particularly true here in the Pacific Northwest. But
Americans today, like Teddy Roosevelt three quarters of a century
3
ago, realize that the protection of our lands is not inconsistent
with their use. They care about the growth of our country, and
about the ability of Americans to make a living. They
understand, that stewardship does not mean stopping all progress.
As Teddy Roosevelt said: "wise protection of resources does
not mean the withdrawal of those resources from contributing
their full share to the welfare of the people."
What President Roosevelt had in mind, and what the American
people have always wanted, is balance. But in these ancient
forests, the balance has been lost.
Not far from here, in the state of Washington, is a timber
town called Forks. Forks supported a mill, and the mill
supported the town. And the town gave life to a community.
Today, unemployment in Forks is at 20 percent -- more than double
what it was just two years ago. The car dealership has closed.
The clothing store is gone. The movie theatre -- shut down.
Domestic violence complaints have doubled, just in the last year.
The community has been ravaged.
Forks is in crisis for a simple reason: the balance has
been lost.
My friends, I have come here because we must restore the
balance.
I want to quote you something from Oregon's own Senator Mark
Hatfield, who has served in the Senate long enough to remember
the creation of the Endangered Species Act. Not long ago, he
wrote: "There is no question that the Act is being applied in
4
manner far beyond what any of us envisioned when we wrote it
twenty years ago."
The application of the Endangered Species Act to these
forests has gone far beyond what the drafters intended. The
balance has been lost.
The fact is that the Endangered Species Act was intended as
a shield for species against the effects of major Federal
projects like highways and dams -- not a sword aimed at the jobs,
families, and communities of the Northwest.
But today, when all harvesting on Federal timberland is
stopped outright by 11 different lawsuits, the balance has been
lost. It's time factor in the worries about jobs, families and
communities.
When hundreds of mills have been shut down, thousands of
timber workers thrown out of work, and revenues to communities
for schools and other local services slashed as a result, the
balance has been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families,
and communities.
Today, when interest groups can tie our Federal agencies up
in knots by suing them under five different statutes enacted by
Congress -- each inconsistent with the other -- the balance has
been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families, and
communities.
Today, when a class project at Wesleyan University in
Connecticut is to come up with lawsuits to stop people from
earning a living in the Northwest -- when students can play games
5
with people's lives -- the balance has been lost. It's time to
worry about jobs families and communities.
I have come to this great Pacific Northwest, to these
beautiful and productive forests, to join you in saying: we must
restore the balance. We must worry about jobs, families and
communities. Enough is enough.
The time has come to talk sense about the Endangered Species
Act, about the spotted owl, and about the management of our
forests. Because after all, people and their jobs deserve some
protection too.
Let me be clear: I care about protecting the environment.
The basic purpose of the Endangered Species Act is a good and
noble one: to save the species of this country.
But today, the Act is being used, particularly here in
Washington and Oregon, to achieve in the courts what can't be
achieved through legislation or adminsitrative procedure -- the
complete lock-up of the most productive forests in the entire
United States.
The Endangered Species Act, in its current form as
interpreted by some courts and as driven by the Democrats in
Congress, has forced a radical approach and created an
unnecessarily tragic situation here in the Northwest. Massive
and unnecessarily large areas of Federal land are being set aside
for the owl. And jobs, families and communities are being wiped
out in the process.
6
You know, the other side has been talking lately about a
"false choice." They claim that this timber crisis is just
politics. The simple fact is this: the false choice is being
driven by the Endangered Species Act and its application to the
Northern Spotted Owl. It is being driven by those in Congress
who have permitted this crisis to go unresolved.
The simple fact is that when it comes to the Owl, the Act is
too rigid -- and Congress is too timid.
Now let's set the record straight. We have always worked
within the paramaters of the law to address this problem -- but I
can tell you this. The law is broken, and it must be fixed.
We have asked Congress for funds to cut enough timber in
this region to keep people employed. But these conflicting laws
allow challenge after challenge.
I endorsed and signed into law a provision which would ban
the export of raw logs taken from Federal land. This will mean
more work in Oregon's mills.
This year, we asked Congress to make a choice. We showed
them the Spotted Owl Recovery Plan, as required by the Endangered
Species Act -- a plan that would cost this region 30,000 jobs.
And, because that plan imposes too great a cost on the families
and communities of the Pacific Northwest, we asked them to
consider instead an alternative: a preservation plan that would
cut that job loss in half.
We sent Congress a bill that would help save 15,000 jobs.
And Congress has failed to act. So while the gridlock Congress
7
stalls, no timber is being cut -- and your jobs are disappearing
alot faster than the owl.
I spoke before about balance.
It is not balance when mills that have operated responsibly
for generations are threatened with extinction because of a lack
of fiber from our public lands.
It is not balance when the Act prevents the mere
consideration, at key points in the process, of costs that
directly affect people and their livelihood -- of the human
factor.
My friends, it is time to consider the human factor in the
spotted owl equation. My opponent talks about "putting people
first" -- well, we can start right here in the Pacific Northwest.
Today, it's time to face one fact: the situation is out of
control -- and it must be addressed because the balance must be
restored.
So let me say this:
I will not sign an extension of the Endangered Species Act
that does not allow economics to be considered [in the listing
process], and that is not accompanied buy a specific plan to
harvest enough timber to keep timber families working in 1993 and
beyond. It's time to make people just as important as owls.
I call upon Congress to pass my plan to cut 2.6 billion
board feet in the Forest Service Pacific Northwest region next
year --- and at least 500 million board feet on BLM land. And I
ask Congress to tie that plan to language which makes sure that a
8
reasonable cut that provides protection for species cannot be
blocked on procedural grounds. It's time to put people ahead of
process.
My Administration has recently announced several steps to
speed up the harvesting of dead or dying timber. We will shortly
issue a rule to allow these timber salvage operations to occur
without triggering some of the restrictive and time-consuming
laws that are disrupting the balance today.
This will help in two ways: by reducing the risk of fire
from the large volume of dead or dying trees on our forest floor;
and by providing up to 450 million board feet of timber for the
mills in the near term. It's time to protect jobs and put people
back to work.
I will fight for legislative language to end the injunctions
that have put an economic strangle-hold on hte Northwest, in
order to free up the timber that we need today --- because the
families and the timber communities of the Pacific Northwest need
relief now.
And I call upon Congress today to pass the Spotted Owl
Preservation Plan -- Senator Slade Gorton's bill -- because we
must preserve the owl; we must preserve the livelihood of the
Pacific Northwest; and we must preserve the jobs of the American
people.
Now, my opponents would have you believe that they, too are
in favor of balance. They won't commit to any specific action to
9
solve the problem. Their idea of balance is doublespeak --
promise both sides exactly what they want to hear.
When Bill Clinton spoke on Earth Day back in Pennsylvania,
he earned the praise of the Sierra Club for "promising the
protection of Old Growth forests in the Pacific Northwest." He
wanted their endorsement, and he got it.
Now, just recently, with the election nearing, he has come
to Oregon to hold out false hope to timber families by promising
a meeting. Classic doublespeak. But we should face one fact.
This problem isn't going to be solved with one meeting. We've
had enough meetings, it's time for action.
Bill Clinton says that he'll have his meeting within 100
days. Well, we've been meeting for two years. What's needed is
a change in law. I will fight for it. Bill Clinton will not.
Now I know that the Governor of Arkansas is famous for being
on both sides of every issue. But I hope you'll ask him -- for
once -- to stop the rhetoric and take a stand. Families are in
the Northwest are at risk. So this is one issue where sincerity
would be better than slickness.
The plain truth is that the other ticket is on the record on
this problem, and here is what they have said.
In his book, Senator Gore said this, and I quote: "I helped
lead the successful fight to prevent the overturning of
protections for the spotted owl." The reasoning offered was
simple. The Senator said: "The jobs will be lost anyway. The
10
only question is whether the effort to create new jobs will begin
now or later. "
Senator Gore and Governor Clinton don't realize that
generation after generation of families -- families like Mike
Burrill's -- have made a living for their family, for their
neighbors, and for their community -- not by locking these
forests up, but by managing them wisely. By restoring what they
take, so that the land can sustain the next generation and the
one after that. After all, it's no mistake that America today is
home to more forest land than it was when Teddy Roosevelt was
President.
The other side doesn't understand that leading the fight
against any change in the tangled web of conflicting laws means
leading the fight against your job and your family and your
community and your way of life.
or maybe they do understand. But I ask you only to do this:
let them know that you understand, too. And do not be fooled by
this doublespeak.
It's time we worried not only about endangered species --
but about endangered jobs.
You know, the father of our national forest system, and one
of America's great conservationists, Gifford Pinchot, once
defined conservation this way: "Conservation means the wise use
of the earth and its resources for the lasting good of men."
I have come here today to tell you that I am the candidate
who will worry about jobs, families, and communities.
11
I have come here today to tell you that I will not stand for
a solution that puts 30,000 people out of work. That is a non-
solution. And on my watch, it will not stand.
I have come here to tell you that we haven't forgotten about
the human factor -- because in the end, that's the most important
factor of all.
I have come here today to tell you that we can restore the
balance, we must restore the balance, and with your help, we will
restore the balance.
Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United
States of America.
#
#
#
#
Document No. 349775
WHITE HOUSE STAFFING MEMORANDUM
DATE: 9/11/92
ACTION/CONCURRENCE/COMMENT DUE BY: A.S.A.P.
SUBJECT: PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS: BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY, MEDFORD OREGON
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1992
ACTION FYI
ACTION FYI
VICE PRESIDENT
MCBRIDE
BAKER
MOORE
SCOWCROFT
MULLINS
DARMAN
PETERSMEYER
BATES
PORTER
BRADY
PROVOST
BROMLEY
ROSS
CALIO
SMITH
DEMAREST
TUTWILER
FITZWATER
ZOELLICK
GRAY
MCGROARTY
HOLIDAY
KAUFMAN
HORNER
GROOMES
BOSKIN
DELAND
REMARKS:
Please forward comments directly to Dan McGroarty, Rm. 122, x2930, A.S.A.P.,
with a copy to this office.
Also, these remarks are similar to the ones staffed for the Colville, WA
event. Thank you.
85 212 Pl PEP 26
RESPONSE:
PHILLIP D. BRADY
Assistant to the President
and Staff Secretary
Ext. 2702
9/11/92
PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS:
BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY
MEDFORD, OREGON
Monday, September 14, 1992
Thank you, Senator Bob Packwood, for that introduction. And
thanks to all of you for letting me visit with you today. Being
out here in the great Pacific Northwest, I cannot help but think
of Teddy Roosevelt.
He was the first President to really focus the attention of
the Nation on the condition of our natural resources and the need
to manage these treasures for the benefit of future generations.
He said: "Neither man nor nation can prosper unless, in dealing
with the present, thought is steadily taken for the future.' And
he was right.
But Teddy Roosevelt said something else: "In the West," he
said, "the forests should be so handled as to be in the interests
of the actual home-maker. He should be encouraged to use them at
once, but in such a way as to preserve and not exhaust them.'
For the past four years, my Administration had devoted a
great deal of thought and effort to protecting our environment.
Like many of you, I love the outdoors and love to hunt and fish,
And like you, I have learned through a lifetime of experience to
appreciate and respect the beauty of the wilderness.
I know that you -- you who have chosen to live in these
woods -- respect and revere these forests as others cannot. And
you resent the implication that earning your livelihood here --
with sound management of the forest -- makes you less of an
2
environmentalist than the city dweller or the suburbanite. I
have come here today because I understand.
For the last four years, we have worked to protect the
environment -- and we have accomplished a great deal.
Four years ago, I promised Americans a new Clean Air Act.
For 13 years, the Congress was stuck in gridlock and had passed
no clean air law. But we proposed a new one, we negotiated it
through a divided Congress, and I proudly signed it into law.
That law will cut acid rain in half, reduce smog in our cities,
and get toxic pollutants out of the air.
Four years ago, I promised that I would protect the
environmentally sensitive areas of our coasts from offshore
drilling. And today, there will be no drilling off the coast of
California, off the coasts of Washington and Oregon not far from
here, off the Florida Keys, off the New England coast, because we
have placed those areas under a moratorium until the year 2000.
Four years ago, I promised to be a good steward of our
public lands. And we have added thousands of miles of trails for
Americans like you who love the outdoors, we are reopening and
upgrading campsites all across America, and we have added over a
million and half acres to our National Parks and Wildlife Refuges
and Forests and recreation lands.
The fact is that every American cares about the
environment -- and most consider themselves environmentalists.
That is particularly true here in the Pacific Northwest. But
Americans today, like Teddy Roosevelt three quarters of a century
3
ago, realize that the protection of our lands is not inconsistent
with their use. They care about the growth of our country, and
about the ability of Americans to make a living. They
understand, that stewardship does not mean stopping all progress.
As Teddy Roosevelt said: "wise protection of resources does
not mean the withdrawal of those resources from contributing
their full share to the welfare of the people."
What President Roosevelt had in mind, and what the American
people have always wanted, is balance. But in these ancient
forests, the balance has been lost.
Not far from here, in the state of Washington, is a timber
town called Forks. Forks supported a mill, and the mill
supported the town. And the town gave life to a community.
Today, unemployment in Forks is at 20 percent -- more than double
what it was just two years ago. The car dealership has closed.
The clothing store is gone. The movie theatre -- shut down.
Domestic violence complaints have doubled, just in the last year.
The community has been ravaged.
Forks is in crisis for a simple reason: the balance has
been lost.
My friends, I have come here because we must restore the
balance.
I want to quote you something from Oregon's own Senator Mark
Hatfield, who has served in the Senate long enough to remember
the creation of the Endangered Species Act. Not long ago, he
wrote: "There is no question that the Act is being applied in
4
manner far beyond what any of us envisioned when we wrote it
twenty years ago. "
The application of the Endangered Species Act to these
forests has gone far beyond what the drafters intended. The
balance has been lost.
The fact is that the Endangered Species Act was intended as
a shield for species against the effects of major Federal
projects like highways and dams -- not a sword aimed at the jobs,
families, and communities of the Northwest.
But today, when all harvesting on Federal timberland is
about
stopped outright by 11 different lawsuits, the balance has been
lost. It's time factor in the worries about jobs, families and
communities.
When hundreds of mills have been shut down, thousands of
timber workers thrown out of work, and revenues to communities
for schools and other local services slashed as a result, the
balance has been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families,
and communities.
Today, when interest groups can tie our Federal agencies up
in knots by suing them under five different statutes enacted by
Congress -- each inconsistent with the other -- the balance has
been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families, and
communities.
Today, when a class project at Wesleyan University in
Connecticut is to come up with lawsuits to stop people from
earning a living in the Northwest -- when students can play games
5
with people's lives -- the balance has been lost. It's time to
worry about jobs families and communities.
I have come to this great Pacific Northwest, to these
beautiful and productive forests, to join you in saying: we must
restore the balance. We must worry about jobs, families and
communities. Enough is enough.
The time has come to talk sense about the Endangered Species
Act, about the spotted owl, and about the management of our
forests. Because after all, people and their jobs deserve some
protection too.
Let me be clear: I care about protecting the environment.
The basic purpose of the Endangered Species Act is a good and
noble one: to save the species of this country.
But today, the Act is being used, particularly here in
World
Washington and Oregon, to achieve in the courts what can't be
achieved through legislation or adminsitrative procedure the
complete lock-up of the most productive forests in the entire
United States.
The Endangered Species Act, in its current form as
interpreted by some courts and as driven by the Democrats in
Congress, has forced a radical approach and created an
unnecessarily tragic situation here in the Northwest. Massive
and unnecessarily large areas of Federal land are being set aside
for the owl. And jobs, families and communities are being wiped
out in the process.
6
You know, the other side has been talking lately about a
"false choice." They claim that this timber crisis is just
politics. The simple fact is this: the false choice is being
driven by the Endangered Species Act and its application to the
Northern Spotted Owl. It is being driven by those in Congress
who have permitted this crisis to go unresolved.
But The simple fact is that when it comes to the Owl, the Act is
possion
too rigid -- and Congress is too timid.
tried
everything
to
work
Now let's set the record straight. We have always worked
within the paramaters of the law to address this problem -- but I
can tell you this. The law is broken, and it must be fixed.
We have asked Congress for funds to cut enough timber in
this region to keep people employed. But these conflicting laws
allow challenge after challenge.
NOW,
I, endorsed and signed into law a provision which would ban
the export of raw logs taken from Federal land. This will mean
more work in Oregon's mills.
This year, we asked Congress to make a choice. We showed
them the Spotted Owl Recovery Plan, as required by the Endangered
Species Act -- a plan that would cost this region 30,000 jobs.
And, because that plan imposes too great a cost on the families
enact
and communities of the Pacific Northwest, we asked them to
consider instead an alternative: a preservation plan that would
cut that job loss in half.
We sent Congress a bill that would help save 15,000 jobs.
And Congress has failed to act. So while the gridlock Congress
7
stalls, no timber is being cut -- and your jobs are disappearing
alot faster than the owl.
I spoke before about balance.
It is not balance when mills that have operated responsibly
for generations are threatened with extinction because of a lack
of fiber from our public lands.
It is not balance when the Act prevents the mere
consideration, at key points in the process, of costs that
directly affect people and their livelihood -- of the human
factor.
My friends, it is time to consider the human factor in the
spotted owl equation. My opponent talks about "putting people
first" -- well, we can start right here in the Pacific Northwest.
Today, it's time to face one fact: the situation is out of
control -- and it must be addressed because the balance must be
restored.
So let me say this:
I will not sign an extension of the Endangered Species Act
that does not allow economics to be considered [in the listing
process], and that is not accompanied buy a specific plan to
harvest enough timber to keep timber families working in 1993 and
beyond. It's time to make people just as important as owls.
I call upon Congress to pass my plan to cut 2.6 billion
board feet in the Forest Service Pacific Northwest region next
year -- and at least 500 million board feet on BLM land. And I
ask Congress to tie that plan to language which makes sure that a
8
reasonable cut that provides protection for species cannot be
blocked on procedural grounds. It's time to put people ahead of
process.
My Administration has recently announced several steps to
speed up the harvesting of dead or dying timber. We will shortly
issue a rule to allow these timber salvage operations to occur
without triggering some of the restrictive and time-consuming
laws that are disrupting the balance today.
This will help in two ways: by reducing the risk of fire
from the large volume of dead or dying trees on our forest floor;
and by providing up to 450 million board feet of timber for the
mills in the near term. It's time to protect jobs and put people
back to work.
I will fight for legislative language to end the injunctions
that have put an economic strangle-hold on hte Northwest, in
order to free up the timber that we need today -- because the
families and the timber communities of the Pacific Northwest need
relief now.
And I call upon Congress today to pass the Spotted Owl
Preservation Plan Senator Slade Gorton's bill -- because we
must preserve the owl; we must preserve the livelihood of the
Pacific Northwest; and we must preserve the jobs of the American
people.
Now, my opponents would have you believe that they, too are
in favor of balance. They won't commit to any specific action to
9
solve the problem. Their idea of balance is doublespeak --
promise both sides exactly what they want to hear.
When Bill Clinton spoke on Earth Day back in Pennsylvania,
he earned the praise of the Sierra Club for "promising the
protection of Old Growth forests in the Pacific Northwest." He
wanted their endorsement, and he got it.
Now, just recently, with the election nearing, he has come
to Oregon to hold out false hope to timber families by promising
a meeting. Classic doublespeak. But we should face one fact.
This problem isn't going to be solved with one meeting. We've
had enough meetings, it's time for action.
Bill Clinton says that he'll have his meeting within 100
days. Well, we've been meeting for two years. What's needed is
a change in law. I will fight for it. Bill Clinton will not.
Now I know that the Governor of Arkansas is famous for being
on both sides of every issue. But I hope you'll ask him -- for
once -- to stop the rhetoric and take a stand. Families are
in
the Northwest are at risk. So this is one issue where sincerity
would be better than slickness.
The plain truth is that the other ticket is on the record on
this problem, and here is what they have said.
In his book, Senator Gore said this, and I quote: "I helped
lead the successful fight to prevent the overturning of
protections for the spotted owl." The reasoning offered was
simple. The Senator said: "The jobs will be lost anyway. The
10
only question is whether the effort to create new jobs will begin
now or later."
Senator Gore and Governor Clinton don't realize that
generation after generation of families -- families like Mike
Burrill's -- have made a living for their family, for their
neighbors, and for their community -- not by locking these
forests up, but by managing them wisely. By restoring what they
take, so that the land can sustain the next generation and the
one after that. After all, it's no mistake that America today is
home to more forest land than it was when Teddy Roosevelt was
President.
The other side doesn't understand that leading the fight
against any change in the tangled web of conflicting laws means
leading the fight against your job and your family and your
community and your way of life.
Or maybe they do understand. But I ask you only to do this:
let them know that you understand, too. And do not be fooled by
this doublespeak.
It's time we worried not only about endangered species --
but about endangered jobs.
You know, the father of our national forest system, and one
of America's great conservationists, Gifford Pinchot, once
defined conservation this way: "Conservation means the wise use
of the earth and its resources for the lasting good of men."
I have come here today to tell you that I am the candidate
who will worry about jobs, families, and communities.
11
I have come here today to tell you that I will not stand for
a solution that puts 30,000 people out of work. That is a non-
solution. And on my watch, it will not stand.
I have come here to tell you that we haven't forgotten about
the human factor -- because in the end, that's the most important
factor of all.
I have come here today to tell you that we can restore the
balance, we must restore the balance, and with your help, we will
restore the balance.
Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United
States of America.
#
#
#
#
Document No. 349775
WHITE HOUSE STAFFING MEMORANDUM
DATE: 9/11/92
ACTION/CONCURRENCE/COMMENT DUE BY: A.S.A.P.
SUBJECT: PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS: BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY, MEDFORD OREGON
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1992
ACTION FYI
ACTION FYI
VICE PRESIDENT
MCBRIDE
BAKER
MOORE
SCOWCROFT
MULLINS
DARMAN
PETERSMEYER
BATES
PORTER
BRADY
PROVOST
BROMLEY
ROSS
CALIO
SMITH
DEMAREST
TUTWILER
FITZWATER
ZOELLICK
GRAY
MCGROARTY
HOLIDAY
KAUFMAN
HORNER
GROOMES
BOSKIN
DELAND
REMARKS:
Please forward comments directly to Dan McGroarty, Rm. 122, x2930, A.S.A.P.,
with a copy to this office.
Also, these remarks are similar to the ones staffed for the Colville, WA
event. Thank you.
RESPONSE:
The
PHILLIP D. BRADY
Assistant to the President
and Staff Secretary
Ext. 2702
9/11/92
PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS:
BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY
MEDFORD, OREGON
Monday, September 14, 1992
Thank you, Senator Bob Packwood, for that introduction. And
thanks to all of you for letting me visit with you today. Being
out here in the great Pacific Northwest, I cannot help but think
of Teddy Roosevelt.
He was the first President to really focus the attention of
the Nation on the condition of our natural resources and the need
to manage these treasures for the benefit of future generations.
He said: "Neither man nor nation can prosper unless, in dealing
with the present, thought is steadily taken for the future." And
he was right.
But Teddy Roosevelt said something else: "In the West," he
said, "the forests should be so handled as to be in the interests
of the actual home-maker. He should be encouraged to use them at
once, but in such a way as to preserve and not exhaust them."
For the past four years, my Administration had devoted a
great deal of thought and effort to protecting our environment.
Like many of you, I love the outdoors and love to hunt and fish,
And like you, I have learned through a lifetime of experience to
appreciate and respect the beauty of the wilderness.
I know that you -- you who have chosen to live in these
woods -- respect and revere these forests as others cannot. And
you resent the implication that earning your livelihood here --
with sound management of the forest -- makes you less of an
2
environmentalist than the city dweller or the suburbanite. I
have come here today because I understand.
For the last four years, we have worked to protect the
environment -- and we have accomplished a great deal.
Four years ago, I promised Americans a new Clean Air Act.
For 13 years, the Congress was stuck in gridlock and had passed
no clean air law. But we proposed a new one, we negotiated it
through a divided Congress, and I proudly signed it into law.
That law will cut acid rain in half, reduce smog in our cities,
and get toxic pollutants out of the air.
Four years ago, I promised that I would protect the
environmentally sensitive areas of our coasts from offshore
drilling. And today, there will be no drilling off the coast of
California, off the coasts of Washington and Oregon not far from
here, off the Florida Keys, off the New England coast, because we
have placed those areas under a moratorium until the year 2000.
Four years ago, I promised to be a good steward of our
public lands. And we have added thousands of miles of trails for
Americans like you who love the outdoors, we are reopening and
upgrading campsites all across America, and we have added over a
million and half acres to our National Parks and Wildlife Refuges
and Forests and recreation lands.
The fact is that every American cares about the
environment -- and most consider themselves environmentalists.
That is particularly true here in the Pacific Northwest. But
Americans today, like Teddy Roosevelt three quarters of a century
3
ago, realize that the protection of our lands is not inconsistent
with their use. They care about the growth of our country, and
about the ability of Americans to make a living. They
understand, that stewardship does not mean stopping all progress.
As Teddy Roosevelt said: "wise protection of resources does
not mean the withdrawal of those resources from contributing
their full share to the welfare of the people."
What President Roosevelt had in mind, and what the American
people have always wanted, is balance. But in these ancient
forests, the balance has been lost.
Not far from here, in the state of Washington, is a timber
town called Forks. Forks supported a mill, and the mill
supported the town. And the town gave life to a community.
Today, unemployment in Forks is at 20 percent -- more than double
what it was just two years ago. The car dealership has closed.
The clothing store is gone. The movie theatre -- shut down.
Domestic violence complaints have doubled, just in the last year.
The community has been ravaged.
Forks is in crisis for a simple reason: the balance has
been lost.
My friends, I have come here because we must restore the
balance.
I want to quote you something from Oregon's own Senator Mark
Hatfield, who has served in the Senate long enough to remember
the creation of the Endangered Species Act. Not long ago, he
wrote: "There is no question that the Act is being applied in
4
manner far beyond what any of us envisioned when we wrote it
twenty years ago."
The application of the Endangered Species Act to these
forests has gone far beyond what the drafters intended. The
balance has been lost.
The fact is that the Endangered Species Act was intended as
a shield for species against the effects of major Federal
projects like highways and dams -- not a sword aimed at the jobs,
families, and communities of the Northwest.
But today, when all harvesting on Federal timberland is
stopped outright by 11 different lawsuits, the balance has been
lost. It's time factor in the worries about jobs, families and
communities.
When hundreds of mills have been shut down, thousands of
timber workers thrown out of work, and revenues to communities
for schools and other local services slashed as a result, the
balance has been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families,
and communities.
Today, when interest groups can tie our Federal agencies up
in knots by suing them under five different statutes enacted by
Congress -- each inconsistent with the other -- the balance has
been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families, and
communities.
Today, when a class project at Wesleyan University in
Connecticut is to come up with lawsuits to stop people from
earning a living in the Northwest -- when students can play games
5
with people's lives -- the balance has been lost. It's time to
worry about jobs families and communities.
I have come to this great Pacific Northwest, to these
beautiful and productive forests, to join you in saying: we must
restore the balance. We must worry about jobs, families and
communities. Enough is enough.
The time has come to talk sense about the Endangered Species
Act, about the spotted owl, and about the management of our
forests. Because after all, people and their jobs deserve some
protection too.
Let me be clear: I care about protecting the environment.
The basic purpose of the Endangered Species Act is a good and
noble one: to save the species of this country.
But today, the Act is being used', particularly here in
Washington and Oregon, to achieve in the courts what can't be
achieved through legislation or adminsitrative procedure -- the
complete lock-up of the most productive forests in the entire
United States.
The Endangered Species Act, in its current form as
interpreted by some courts and as driven by the Democrats in
Congress, has forced a radical approach and created an
unnecessarily tragic situation here in the Northwest. Massive
and unnecessarily large areas of Federal land are being set aside
for the owl. And jobs, families and communities are being wiped
out in the process.
6
You know, the other side has been talking lately about a
"false choice." They claim that this timber crisis is just
politics. The simple fact is this: the false choice is being
driven by the Endangered Species Act and its application to the
Northern Spotted Owl. It is being driven by those in Congress
who have permitted this crisis to go unresolved.
The simple fact is that when it comes to the Owl, the Act is
too rigid -- and Congress is too timid.
Now let's set the record straight. We have always worked
within the paramaters of the law to address this problem -- but I
can tell you this. The law is broken, and it must be fixed.
We have asked Congress for funds to cut enough timber in
this region to keep people employed. But these conflicting laws
allow challenge after challenge.
I endorsed and signed into law a provision which would ban
the export of raw logs taken from Federal land. This will mean
more work in Oregon's mills.
This year, we asked Congress to make a choice. We showed
them the Spotted Owl Recovery Plan, as required by the Endangered
Species Act -- a plan that would cost this region 30,000 jobs.
And, because that plan imposes too great a cost on the families
and communities of the Pacific Northwest, we asked them to
consider instead an alternative: a preservation plan that would
cut that job loss in half.
We sent Congress a bill that would help save 15,000 jobs.
And Congress has failed to act. So while the gridlock Congress
7
stalls, no timber is being cut -- and your jobs are disappearing
alot faster than the owl.
I spoke before about balance.
It is not balance when mills that have operated responsibly
for generations are threatened with extinction because of a lack
of fiber from our public lands.
It is not balance when the Act prevents the mere
consideration, at key points in the process, of costs that
directly affect people and their livelihood -- of the human
factor.
My friends, it is time to consider the human factor in the
spotted owl equation. My opponent talks about "putting people
first" -- well, we can start right here in the Pacific Northwest.
Today, it's time to face one fact: the situation is out of
control -- and it must be addressed because the balance must be
restored.
So let me say this:
I will not sign an extension of the Endangered Species Act
that does not allow economics to be considered [in the listing
process], and that is not accompanied buy a specific plan to
harvest enough timber to keep timber families working in 1993 and
beyond. It's time to make people just as important as owls.
I call upon Congress to pass my plan to cut 2.6 billion
board feet in the Forest Service Pacific Northwest region next
year -- and at least 500 million board feet on BLM land. And I
ask Congress to tie that plan to language which makes sure that a
8
reasonable cut that provides protection for species cannot be
blocked on procedural grounds. It's time to put people ahead of
process.
My Administration has recently announced several steps to
speed up the harvesting of dead or dying timber. We will shortly
issue a rule to allow these timber salvage operations to occur
without triggering some of the restrictive and time-consuming
laws that are disrupting the balance today.
This will help in two ways: by reducing the risk of fire
from the large volume of dead or dying trees on our forest floor;
and by providing up to 450 million board feet of timber for the
mills in the near term. It's time to protect jobs and put people
back to work.
I will fight for legislative language to end the injunctions
that have put an economic strangle-hold on hte Northwest, in
order to free up the timber that we need today -- because the
families and the timber communities of the Pacific Northwest need
relief now.
And I call upon Congress today to pass the Spotted Owl
Preservation Plan -- Senator Slade Gorton's bill -- because we
must preserve the owl; we must preserve the livelihood of the
Pacific Northwest; and we must preserve the jobs of the American
people.
Now, my opponents would have you believe that they, too are
in favor of balance. They won't commit to any specific action to
9
solve the problem. Their idea of balance is doublespeak --
promise both sides exactly what they want to hear.
When Bill Clinton spoke on Earth Day back in Pennsylvania,
he earned the praise of the Sierra Club for "promising the
protection of Old Growth forests in the Pacific Northwest." He
wanted their endorsement, and he got it.
Now, just recently, with the election nearing, he has come
to Oregon to hold out false hope to timber families by promising
a meeting. Classic doublespeak. But we should face one fact.
This problem isn't going to be solved with one meeting. We've
had enough meetings, it's time for action.
Bill Clinton says that he'll have his meeting within 100
days. Well, we've been meeting for two years. What's needed is
a change in law. I will fight for it. Bill Clinton will not.
Now I know that the Governor of Arkansas is famous for being
on both sides of every issue. But I hope you'll ask him -- for
once -- to stop the rhetoric and take a stand. Families are in
the Northwest are at risk. So this is one issue where sincerity
would be better than slickness.
The plain truth is that the other ticket is on the record on
this problem, and here is what they have said.
In his book, Senator Gore said this, and I quote: "I helped
lead the successful fight to prevent the overturning of
protections for the spotted owl." The reasoning offered was
simple. The Senator said: "The jobs will be lost anyway. The
10
only question is whether the effort to create new jobs will begin
now or later."
Senator Gore and Governor Clinton don't realize that
generation after generation of families -- families like Mike
Burrill's -- have made a living for their family, for their
neighbors, and for their community -- not by locking these
forests up, but by managing them wisely. By restoring what they
take, so that the land can sustain the next generation and the
one after that. After all, it's no mistake that America today is
home to more forest land than it was when Teddy Roosevelt was
President.
The other side doesn't understand that leading the fight
against any change in the tangled web of conflicting laws means
leading the fight against your job and your family and your
community and your way of life.
Or maybe they do understand. But I ask you only to do this:
let them know that you understand, too. And do not be fooled by
this doublespeak.
It's time we worried not only about endangered species --
but about endangered jobs.
You know, the father of our national forest system, and one
of America's great conservationists, Gifford Pinchot, once
defined conservation this way: "Conservation means the wise use
of the earth and its resources for the lasting good of men."
I have come here today to tell you that I am the candidate
who will worry about jobs, families, and communities.
11
I have come here today to tell you that I will not stand for
a solution that puts 30,000 people out of work. That is a non-
solution. And on my watch, it will not stand.
I have come here to tell you that we haven't forgotten about
the human factor -- because in the end, that's the most important
factor of all.
I have come here today to tell you that we can restore the
balance, we must restore the balance, and with your help, we will
restore the balance.
Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United
States of America.
#
#
#
#
Oh u/chay~ Ae
Document No. 349775
WHITE HOUSE STAFFING MEMORANDUM
DATE: 9/11/92
A.S.A.P.
ACTION/CONCURRENCE/COMMENT DUE BY:
SUBJECT: PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS: BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY, MEDFORD OREGON
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1992
ACTION FYI
ACTION FYI
VICE PRESIDENT
MCBRIDE
BAKER
MOORE
SCOWCROFT
MULLINS
DARMAN
PETERSMEYER
BATES
PORTER
BRADY
PROVOST
BROMLEY
ROSS
CALIO
SMITH
DEMAREST
TUTWILER
FITZWATER
ZOELLICK
GRAY
MCGROARTY
HOLIDAY
KAUFMAN
HORNER
GROOMES
BOSKIN
DELAND
REMARKS:
Please forward comments directly to Dan McGroarty, Rm. 122, x2930, A.S.A.P.,
with a copy to this office.
Also, these remarks are similar to the ones staffed for the Colville, WA
event. Thank you.
RESPONSE:
PHILLIP D. BRADY
Assistant to the President
and Staff Secretary
Ext. 2702
9/11/92
PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS:
BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY
MEDFORD, OREGON
Monday, September 14, 1992
Thank you, Senator Bob Packwood, for that introduction. And
thanks to all of you for letting me visit with you today. Being
out here in the great Pacific Northwest, I cannot help but think
of Teddy Roosevelt.
He was the first President to really focus the attention of
the Nation on the condition of our natural resources and the need
to manage these treasures for the benefit of future generations.
He said: "Neither man nor nation can prosper unless, in dealing
with the present, thought is steadily taken for the future." And
he was right.
But Teddy Roosevelt said something else: "In the West," he
said, "the forests should be so handled as to be in the interests
of the actual home-maker. He should be encouraged to use them at
once, but in such a way as to preserve and not exhaust them.' "
For the past four years, my Administration had devoted a
great deal of thought and effort to protecting our environment.
Like many of you, I love the outdoors and love to hunt and fish,
And like you, I have learned through a lifetime of experience to
appreciate and respect the beauty of the wilderness.
I know that you -- you who have chosen to live in these
woods -- respect and revere these forests as others cannot. And
you resent the implication that earning your livelihood here --
with sound management of the forest -- makes you less of an
2
environmentalist than the city dweller or the suburbanite. I
have come here today because I understand.
For the last four years, we have worked to protect the
environment -- and we have accomplished a great deal.
Four years ago, I promised Americans a new Clean Air Act.
For 13 years, the Congress was stuck in gridlock and had passed
no clean air law. But we proposed a new one, we negotiated it
through a divided Congress, and I proudly signed it into law.
That law will cut acid rain in half, reduce smog in our cities,
and get toxic pollutants out of the air.
Four years ago, I promised that I would protect the
environmentally sensitive areas of our coasts from offshore
drilling. And today, there will be no drilling off the coast of
California, off the coasts of Washington and Oregon not far from
here, off the Florida Keys, off the New England coast, because we
have placed those areas under a moratorium until the year 2000.
Four years ago, I promised to be a good steward of our
public lands. And we have added thousands of miles of trails for
Americans like you who love the outdoors, we are reopening and
upgrading campsites all across America, and we have added over a
million and half acres to our National Parks and Wildlife Refuges
and Forests and recreation lands.
The fact is that every American cares about the
environment -- and most consider themselves environmentalists.
That is particularly true here in the Pacific Northwest. But
Americans today, like Teddy Roosevelt three quarters of a century
3
ago, realize that the protection of our lands is not inconsistent
with their use. They care about the growth of our country, and
about the ability of Americans to make a living. They
understand, that stewardship does not mean stopping all progress.
As Teddy Roosevelt said: "wise protection of resources does
not mean the withdrawal of those resources from contributing
their full share to the welfare of the people."
What President Roosevelt had in mind, and what the American
people have always wanted, is balance. But in these ancient
forests, the balance has been lost.
Not far from here, in the state of Washington, is a timber
town called Forks. Forks supported a mill, and the mill
supported the town. And the town gave life to a community.
Today, unemployment in Forks is at 20 percent -- more than double
what it was just two years ago. The car dealership has closed.
The clothing store is gone. The movie theatre -- shut down.
Domestic violence complaints have doubled, just in the last year.
The community has been ravaged.
Forks is in crisis for a simple reason: the balance has
been lost.
My friends, I have come here because we must restore the
balance.
I want to quote you something from Oregon's own Senator Mark
Hatfield, who has served in the Senate long enough to remember
the creation of the Endangered Species Act. Not long ago, he
wrote: "There is no question that the Act is being applied in
4
manner far beyond what any of us envisioned when we wrote it
twenty years ago."
The application of the Endangered Species Act to these
forests has gone far beyond what the drafters intended. The
balance has been lost.
The fact is that the Endangered Species Act was intended as
a shield for species against the effects of major Federal
projects like highways and dams -- not a sword aimed at the jobs,
families, and communities of the Northwest.
But today, when all harvesting on Federal timberland is
stopped outright by 11 different lawsuits, the balance has been
lost. It's time to factor in the worries about jobs, families and
communities.
When hundreds of mills have been shut down, thousands of
timber workers thrown out of work, and revenues to communities
for schools and other local services slashed as a result, the
balance has been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families,
and communities.
Today, when interest groups can tie our Federal agencies up
in knots by suing them under five different statutes enacted by
Congress -- each inconsistent with the other -- the balance has
been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families, and
communities.
Today, when a class project at Wesleyan University in
Connecticut is to come up with lawsuits to stop people from
earning a living in the Northwest -- when students can play, games
5
with people's lives -- the balance has been lost. It's time to
worry about jobs families and communities.
I have come to this great Pacific Northwest, to these
beautiful and productive forests, to join you in saying: we must
restore the balance. We must worry about jobs, families and
communities. Enough is enough.
P
The time has come to talk sense about the Endangered Species
Act, about the spotted owl, and about the management of our
forests. Because after all, people and their jobs deserve some
protection too.
Let me be clear: I care about protecting the environment.
The basic purpose of the Endangered Species Act is a good and
noble one: to save the species of this country.
But today, the Act is being used, particularly here in
Washington and Oregon, to achieve in the courts what can't be
achieved through legislation or adminsitrative procedure -- the
complete lock-up of the most productive forests in the entire
United States.
The Endangered Species Act, in its current form as
interpreted by some courts and as driven by the Democrats in
Congress, has forced a radical approach and created an
unnecessarily tragic situation here in the Northwest. Massive
and unnecessarily large areas of Federal land are being set aside
for the owl. And jobs, families and communities are being wiped
out in the process.
6
You know, the other side has been talking lately about a
"false choice." They claim that this timber crisis is just
politics. The simple fact is this: the false choice is being
driven by the Endangered Species Act and its application to the
Northern Spotted Owl. It is being driven by those in Congress
who have permitted this crisis to go unresolved.
The simple fact is that when it comes to the Owl, the Act is
too rigid -- and Congress is too timid.
Now let's set the record straight. We have always worked
within the paramaters of the law to address this problem -- but I
can tell you this. The law is broken, and it must be fixed.
We have asked Congress for funds to cut enough timber in
this region to keep people employed. But these conflicting laws
allow challenge after challenge.
I endorsed and signed into law a provision which would ban
the export of raw logs taken from Federal land. This will mean
more work in Oregon's mills.
This year, we asked Congress to make a choice. We showed
them the Spotted Owl Recovery Plan, as required by the Endangered
Species Act -- a plan that would cost this region 30,000 jobs.
And, because that plan imposes too great a cost on the families
and communities of the Pacific Northwest, we asked them to
consider instead an alternative: a preservation plan that would
cut that job loss in half.
We sent Congress a bill that would help save 15,000 jobs.
And Congress has failed to act. So while the gridlock Congress
7
stalls, no timber is being cut -- and your jobs are disappearing
alot faster than the owl.
I spoke before about balance.
It is not balance when mills that have operated responsibly
for generations are threatened with extinction because of a lack
of fiber from our public lands.
It is not balance when the Act prevents the mere
consideration, at key points in the process, of costs that
directly affect people and their livelihood -- of the human
factor.
My friends, it is time to consider the human factor in the
spotted owl equation. My opponent talks about "putting people
first" -- well, we can start right here in the Pacific Northwest.
Today, it's time to face one fact: the situation is out of
control -- and it must be addressed
because the balance must be
restored.
So let me say this:
I will not sign an extension of the Endangered Species Act
that does not allow economics to be considered [in the listing
process], and that is not accompanied buy a specific plan to
harvest enough timber to keep timber families working in 1993 and
beyond. It's time to make people just as important as owls.
I call upon Congress to pass my plan to cut 2.6 billion
board feet in the Forest Service Pacific Northwest region next
year -- and at least 500 million board feet on BLM land. And I
ask Congress to tie that plan to language which makes sure that a
8
reasonable cut that provides protection for species cannot be
blocked on procedural grounds. It's time to put people ahead of
process.
My Administration has recently announced several steps to
speed up the harvesting of dead or dying timber. We will shortly
issue a rule to allow these timber salvage operations to occur
without triggering some of the restrictive and time-consuming
laws that are disrupting the balance today.
This will help in two ways: by reducing the risk of fire
from the large volume of dead or dying trees on our forest floor;
and by providing up to 450 million board feet of timber for the
mills in the near term. It's time to protect jobs and put people
back to work.
I will fight for legislative language to end the injunctions
that have put an economic strangle-hold on hte Northwest, in
order to free up the timber that we need today -- because the
families and the timber communities of the Pacific Northwest need
relief now.
And I call upon Congress today to pass the Spotted Owl
Preservation Plan -- Senator Slade Gorton's bill -- because we
must preserve the owl; we must preserve the livelihood of the
Pacific Northwest; and we must preserve the jobs of the American
people.
Now, my opponents would have you believe that they, too are
in favor of balance. They won't commit to any specific action to
His try wy to punt
this issue down the
poad to have his
9
lake and eat it, too,
solve the problem. Their idea of balance is doublespeak -- Until
promise both sides exactly what they want to hear.
electron
any.
When Bill Clinton spoke on Earth Day back in Pennsylvania,
he earned the praise of the Sierra Club for "promising the
protection of Old Growth forests in the Pacific Northwest." He
wanted their endorsement, and he got. it.
Now, just recently, with the election nearing, he has come
to Oregon to hold out false hope to timber families by promising
a meeting. Classic doublespeak. But we should face one fact.
This problem isn't going to be solved with one meeting. We've
had enough meetings, it's time for action.
Bill Clinton says that he'll have his meeting within 100
days. Well, we've been meeting for two years.
What's needed is
a change in law. I will fight for it. Bill Clinton will not
Now I know that the Governor of Arkansas is famous for being
on both sides of every issue. But I hope you'll ask him -- for
once -- to stop the rhetoric and take a stand. Families are in
the Northwest are at risk. So this is one issue where sincerity
would be better than slickness.
The plain truth is that the other ticket is on the record on
this problem, and here is what they have said.
In his book, Senator Gore said this, and I quote: "I helped
lead the successful fight to prevent the overturning of
protections for the spotted owl." The reasoning offered was
simple. The Senator said: "The jobs will be lost anyway. The
10
only question is whether the effort to create new jobs will begin
now or later."
Senator Gore and Governor Clinton don't realize that
generation after generation of families -- families like Mike
Burrill's -- have made a living for their family, for their
neighbors, and for their community -- not by locking these
forests up, but by managing them wisely. By restoring what they
take, so that the land can sustain the next generation and the
one after that. After all, it's no mistake that America today is
home to more forest land than it was when Teddy Roosevelt was
President.
The other side doesn't understand that leading the fight
against any change in the tangled web of conflicting laws means
leading the fight against your job and your family and your
community and your way of life.
or maybe they do understand. But I ask you only to do this:
let them know that you understand, too. And do not be fooled by
this doublespeak.
It's time we worried not only about endangered species --
but about endangered jobs.
You know, the father of our national forest system, and one
of America's great conservationists, Gifford Pinchot, once
defined conservation this way: "Conservation means the wise use
of the earth and its resources for the lasting good of men."
I have come here today to tell you that I am the candidate
who will worry about jobs, families, and communities.
11
I have come here today to tell you that I will not stand for
a solution that puts 30,000 people out of work. That is a non-
solution.
And
watch
will
not
stand.
I have come here to tell you that we haven't forgotten about
the human factor -- because in the end, that's the most important
factor of all.
I have come here today to tell you that we can restore the
balance, we must restore the balance, and with your help, we will
restore the balance.
Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United
States of America.
#
#
#
#
9/11/92
PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS:
BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY
MEDFORD, OREGON
Monday, September 14, 1992
Thank you, Senator Bob Packwood, for that introduction. And
thanks to all of you for letting me visit with you today. Being
out here in the great Pacific Northwest, I cannot help but think
of Teddy Roosevelt.
He was the first President to really focus the attention of
the Nation on the condition of our natural resources and the need
to manage these treasures for the benefit of future generations.
He said: "Neither man nor nation can prosper unless, in dealing
with the present, thought is steadily taken for the future." And
he was right.
But Teddy Roosevelt said something else: "In the West," he
said, "the forests should be so handled as to be in the interests
of the actual home-maker. He should be encouraged to use them at
once, but in such a way as to preserve and not exhaust them. "
For the past four years, my Administration had devoted a
great deal of thought and effort to protecting our environment.
Like many of you, I love the outdoors and love to hunt and fish,
And like you, I have learned through a lifetime of experience to
appreciate and respect the beauty of the wilderness.
I know that you -- you who have chosen to live in these
woods -- respect and revere these forests as others cannot. And
you resent the implication that earning your livelihood here --
with sound management of the forest -- makes you less of an
2
environmentalist than the city dweller or the suburbanite. I
have come here today because I understand.
For the last four years, we have worked to protect the
environment -- and we have accomplished a great deal.
Four years ago, I promised Americans a new Clean Air Act.
For 13 years, the Congress was stuck in gridlock and had passed
no clean air law. But we proposed a new one, we negotiated it
through a divided Congress, and I proudly signed it into law.
That law will cut acid rain in half, reduce smog in our cities,
and get toxic pollutants out of the air.
Four years ago, I promised that I would protect the
environmentally sensitive areas of our coasts from offshore
drilling. And today, there will be no drilling off the coast of
California, off the coasts of Washington and Oregon not far from
here, off the Florida Keys, off the New England coast, because we
have placed those areas under a moratorium until the year 2000.
Four years ago, I promised to be a good steward of our
public lands. And we have added thousands of miles of trails for
Americans like you who love the outdoors, we are reopening and
upgrading campsites all across America, and we have added over a
million and half acres to our National Parks and Wildlife Refuges
and Forests and recreation lands.
The fact is that every American cares about the
environment -- and most consider themselves environmentalists.
That is particularly true here in the Pacific Northwest. But
Americans today, like Teddy Roosevelt three quarters of a century
3
ago, realize that the protection of our lands is not inconsistent
with their use. They care about the growth of our country, and
about the ability of Americans to make a living. They
understand, that stewardship does not mean stopping all progress.
As Teddy Roosevelt said: "wise protection of resources does
not mean the withdrawal of those resources from contributing
their full share to the welfare of the people."
What President Roosevelt had in mind, and what the American
people have always wanted, is balance. But in these ancient
forests, the balance has been lost.
Not far from here, in the state of Washington, is a timber
town called Forks. Forks supported a mill, and the mill
supported the town. And the town gave life to a community.
Today, unemployment in Forks is at 20 percent -- more than double
what it was just two years ago. The car dealership has closed.
The clothing store is gone. The movie theatre -- shut down.
Domestic violence complaints have doubled, just in the last year.
The community has been ravaged.
Forks is in crisis for a simple reason: the balance has
been lost.
My friends, I have come here because we must restore the
balance.
I want to quote you something from Oregon's own Senator Mark
Hatfield, who has served in the Senate long enough to remember
the creation of the Endangered Species Act. Not long ago, he
wrote: "There is no question that the Act is being applied in
4
manner far beyond what any of us envisioned when we wrote it
twenty years ago."
The application of the Endangered Species Act to these
forests has gone far beyond what the drafters intended. The
balance has been lost.
The fact is that the Endangered Species Act was intended as
a shield for species against the effects of major Federal
projects like highways and dams -- not a sword aimed at the jobs,
families, and communities of the Northwest.
But today, when all harvesting on Federal timberland is
stopped outright by 11 different lawsuits, the balance has been
lost. It's time factor in the worries about jobs, families and
communities.
When hundreds of mills have been shut down, thousands of
timber workers thrown out of work, and revenues to communities
for schools and other local services slashed as a result, the
balance has been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families,
and communities.
Today, when interest groups can tie our Federal agencies up
in knots by suing them under five different statutes enacted by
Congress -- each inconsistent with the other -- the balance has
been lost. It's time to worry about jobs, families, and
communities.
Today, when a class project at Wesleyan University in
Connecticut is to come up with lawsuits to stop people from
earning a living in the Northwest -- when students can play games
7
5
with people's lives -- the balance has been lost. It's time to
worry about jobs families and communities.
I have come to this great Pacific Northwest, to these
beautiful and productive forests, to join you in saying: we must
restore the balance. We must worry about jobs, families and
communities. Enough is enough.
The time has come to talk sense about the Endangered Species
Act, about the spotted owl, and about the management of our
forests. Because after all, people and their jobs deserve some
protection too.
Let me be clear: I care about protecting the environment.
The basic purpose of the Endangered Species Act is a good and
noble one: to save the species of this country.
But today, the Act is being used, particularly here in
Washington and Oregon, to achieve in the courts what can't be
achieved through legislation or adminsitrative procedure -- the
complete lock-up of the most productive forests in the entire
United States.
The Endangered Species Act, in its current form as
interpreted by some courts and as driven by the Democrats in
Congress, has forced a radical approach and created an
unnecessarily tragic situation here in the Northwest. Massive
and unnecessarily large areas of Federal land are being set aside
for the owl. And jobs, families and communities are being wiped
out in the process.
6
You know, the other side has been talking lately about a
"false choice." They claim that this timber crisis is just
politics. The simple fact is this: the false choice is being
driven by the Endangered Species Act and its application to the
Northern Spotted Owl. It is being driven by those in Congress
who have permitted this crisis to go unresolved.
The simple fact is that when it comes to the Owl, the Act is
too rigid -- and Congress is too timid.
Now let's set the record straight. We have always worked
within the paramaters of the law to address this problem -- but I
can tell you this. The law is broken, and it must be fixed.
We have asked Congress for funds to cut enough timber in
this region to keep people employed. But these conflicting laws
allow challenge after challenge.
I endorsed and signed into law a provision which would ban
the export of raw logs taken from Federal land. This will mean
more work in Oregon's mills.
This year, we asked Congress to make a choice. We showed
them the Spotted Owl Recovery Plan, as required by the Endangered
Species Act -- a plan that would cost this region 30,000 jobs.
And, because that plan imposes too great a cost on the families
and communities of the Pacific Northwest, we asked them to
consider instead an alternative: a preservation plan that would
cut that job loss in half.
We sent Congress a bill that would help save 15,000 jobs.
And Congress has failed to act. \So while the gridlock Congress
7
stalls, no timber is being cut -- and your jobs are disappearing
alot faster than the owl.
I spoke before about balance.
It is not balance when mills that have operated responsibly
for generations are threatened with extinction because of a lack
of fiber from our public lands.
It is not balance when the Act prevents the mere
consideration, at key points in the process, of costs that
directly affect people and their livelihood -- of the human
factor.
My friends, it is time to consider the human factor in the
spotted owl equation. My opponent talks about "putting people
first" -- well, we can start right here in the Pacific Northwest.
Today, it's time to face one fact: the situation is out of
control -- and it must be addressed because the balance must be
restored.
So let me say this:
I will not sign an extension of the Endangered Species Act
that does not allow economics to be considered [in the listing
process], and that is not accompanied buy a specific plan to
harvest enough timber to keep timber families working in 1993 and
beyond. It's time to make people just as important as owls.
I call upon Congress to pass my plan to cut 2.6 billion
board feet in the Forest Service Pacific Northwest region next
year -- and at least 500 million board feet on BLM land. And I
ask Congress to tie that plan to language which makes sure that a
8
reasonable cut that provides protection for species cannot be
blocked on procedural grounds. It's time to put people ahead of
process.
My Administration has recently announced several steps to
speed up the harvesting of dead or dying timber. We will shortly
issue a rule to allow these timber salvage operations to occur
without triggering some of the restrictive and time-consuming
laws that are disrupting the balance today.
This will help in two ways: by reducing the risk of fire
from the large volume of dead or dying trees on our forest floor;
and by providing up to 450 million board feet of timber for the
mills in the near term. It's time to protect jobs and put people
back to work.
I will fight for legislative language to end the injunctions
that have put an economic strangle-hold on hte Northwest, in
order to free up the timber that we need today -- because the
families and the timber communities of the Pacific Northwest need
relief now.
And I call upon Congress today to pass the Spotted Owl
Preservation Plan -- Senator Slade Gorton's bill -- because we
must preserve the owl; we must preserve the livelihood of the
Pacific Northwest; and we must preserve the jobs of the American
people.
Now, my opponents would have you believe that they, too are
in favor of balance. They won't commit to any specific action to
9
solve the problem. Their idea of balance is doublespeak --
promise both sides exactly what they want to hear.
When Bill Clinton spoke on Earth Day back in Pennsylvania,
he earned the praise of the Sierra Club for "promising the
protection of old Growth forests in the Pacific Northwest." He
wanted their endorsement, and he got it.
Now, just recently, with the election nearing, he has come
to Oregon to hold out false hope to timber families by promising
a meeting. Classic doublespeak. But we should face one fact.
This problem isn't going to be solved with one meeting. We've
had enough meetings, it's time for action.
Bill Clinton says that he'll have his meeting within 100
days. Well, we've been meeting for two years. What's needed is
a change in law. I will fight for it. Bill Clinton will not.
Now I know that the Governor of Arkansas is famous for being
on both sides of every issue. But I hope you'll ask him -- for
once -- to stop the rhetoric and take a stand. Families are in
the Northwest are at risk. So this is one issue where sincerity
would be better than slickness.
The plain truth is that the other ticket is on the record on
this problem, and here is what they have said.
In his book, Senator Gore said this, and I quote: "I helped
lead the successful fight to prevent the overturning of
protections for the spotted owl." The reasoning offered was
simple. The Senator said: "The jobs will be lost anyway. The
10
only question is whether the effort to create new jobs will begin
now or later."
Senator Gore and Governor Clinton don't realize that
generation after generation of families -- families like Mike
Burrill's -- have made a living for their family, for their
neighbors, and for their community -- not by locking these
forests up, but by managing them wisely. By restoring what they
take, so that the land can sustain the next generation and the
one after that. After all, it's no mistake that America today is
home to more forest land than it was when Teddy Roosevelt was
President.
The other side doesn't understand that leading the fight
against any change in the tangled web of conflicting laws means
leading the fight against your job and your family and your
community and your way of life.
Or maybe they do understand. But I ask you only to do this:
let them know that you understand, too. And do not be fooled by
this doublespeak.
It's time we worried not only about endangered species --
but about endangered jobs.
You know, the father of our national forest system, and one
of America's great conservationists, Gifford Pinchot, once
defined conservation this way: "Conservation means the wise use
of the earth and its resources for the lasting good of men."
I have come here today to tell you that I am the candidate
who will worry about jobs, families, and communities.
11
I have come here today to tell you that I will not stand for
a solution that puts 30,000 people out of work. That is a non-
solution. And on my watch, it will not stand.
I have come here to tell you that we haven't forgotten about
the human factor -- because in the end, that's the most important
factor of all.
I have come here today to tell you that we can restore the
balance, we must restore the balance, and with your help, we will
restore the balance.
Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United
States of America.
#
#
#
#
THE WHITE HOUSE
office of the Press Secretary
(Medford, Oregon)
For Immediate Release
September 14, 1992
REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
TO EMPLOYEES OF BURRILL LUMBER COMPANY
Burrill Lumber Company
Medford, oregon
6:30 P.M. PDT
THE PRESIDENT: Mike, thank you, sir. Thank you very
-- he's getting our props ready for this presentation. (Laughter.)
Now, thank you so much, Mike, for the introduction. Thanks to your
wonderful dad and to the entire Burrill family, and all of you for
letting me visit here today.
Last week in Detroit, I released my Agenda for American
Renewal. And the agenda was based on a fundamental premise: that
the challenges that America faces -- foreign, domestic, economic and,
yes, environmental ** are connected. And the solution to one cannot
be divorced from the solution to the other. And we need an
integrated approach.
And we need to bring this integrated approach to the
relationship between the economy and the environment, too. And
environmental protection and economic growth must go hand in hand,
and they cannot be divorced from each other. And this morning, I
spoke in California, down in San Diego, about ways to bring them
together. But, frankly, I believe that when it comes to the
Endangered Species Act and its application here in the Northwest, the
balance has been lost. (Applause.)
Like many of you, I love to hunt and hike and to fish.
And like you, I have learned through a lifetime of experience to
appreciate and respect the great outdoors -- the wilderness.
And I know that you -- you particularly who have chosen
to live in these marvelous parts of the woods -- respect and revere
these forests as others never can. And you resent the implication
that earning your livelihood here -- with sound management of the
forest -- makes you less of a conservationist than the city dweller
or the suburbanite.
(Applause.)
And for the past four years, my administration and I
have worked hard to protect the environment -- and we've accomplished
a great deal. Four years ago, I promised Americans a new Clean Air
Act. For over a decade, no one could get it done, but we did it.
And our Clean Air Act reduces smog in our cities and gets toxic
pollutants out of the air and will cut acid rain in half.
And four years ago, I promised that I would protect the
environmentally sensitive areas of our coasts from the offshore
drilling. And today, there will be no drilling off the coast of
California, off the coasts of Washington and Oregon and off the
Florida Keys and off the New England coast. And we banned that ocean
drilling until the year 2000.
And then, four years ago, I promised to be a good
steward of our public lands. AndMORE have added thousands of miles of
trails for Americans like you who love the outdoors; and we're
- 2 -
reopening and upgrading campsites all across this great country; and
we've added a million and a half acres to our national parks and
wildlife areas and forests and recreation lands.
But the fact is that every American cares about the
environment -- and most consider themselves environmentalists. And
that is particularly true here in the Pacific Northwest. And yet
Americans today realize that we can protect our lands while also
using them for the people's benefit. They understand the need for
wilderness and recreation areas, as well as the need for paper for
our schools and offices and timber for new homes. (Applause.)
And being out here in the great Pacific -- the
Northwest, I'm reminded of Teddy Roosevelt -- the very first
President who focused the attention of the entire nation on the
condition of our natural resources. And Teddy Roosevelt once said:
"Wise forest protection does not mean the withdrawal of forest
resources from contributing their full share to the welfare of the
people." What President Roosevelt had in mind, and what the
American people have always wanted, is balance.
And not far from here, in the state of Washington, is a
timber town called Forks. And Forks supported a mill, and the mill
supported a community. And because of the lack of timber, the mill
had to close. Today unemployment in Forks is at 20 percent. The car
dealership is closed. The clothing store is gone. The movie theater
-- shut down. Domestic violence complaints have doubled, just in the
past year.
Now, Forks is in crisis for a simple reason: the
balance has been lost. And I've come here because we must restore
the balance. (Applause.)
Listen to one of the senators -- Senator Mark Hatfield,
from here, who was a cosponsor of the original Endangered Species Act
back in '72. And this year, he wrote: "There is no question that
the act is being applied in a manner far beyond what any of us
envisioned when we wrote it 20 ago."
The Endangered Species Act was intended as a shield for
species against the effects of major construction projects like
highways and dams -- not a sword aimed at jobs, families and
communities of entire regions like the Northwest.
But today, when harvesting on federal timberland is
stopped outright by 13 different lawsuits, under seven different
statutes, each inconsistent with the other -- the balance has been
lost. (Applause.) And it's time to fight for jobs, for families and
for communities.
And when hundreds of mills have been shut down,
thousands of timber workers thrown out of work, and revenues for
schools and other local services have been slashed, the balance has
been lost. And it's time to fight for jobs, families, and
communities. (Applause.)
And so the time has come to talk sense about the
Endangered Species Act, about the spotted owl, and about the
management of our forests. Because it is my firm belief that people
and their jobs deserve protection, too. (Applause.)
Let me be clear: The basic purpose of the Endangered
Species Act is good and noble -- save the rare and threatened species
of this country. But today, the act and other laws are being used by
people with extreme views, particularly here in this state, here in
Oregon, to achieve in the courts what no sane elected official would
ever vote for -- the complete lock-up of the most productive forests
in the entire United States. (Applause.)
MORE
- 3 -
The entire Endangered Species Act, as rigidly
interpreted by some courts and as driven by the Congress, has forced
an extreme approach and created an unnecessarily tragic situation
here in the Northwest. Massive areas of federal land are being set
aside for the owl -- virtually ignoring the fact that two-thirds of
the Northwest's old-growth forests are already designated as parks,
wilderness, or other classifications that prevent harvesting. Each
pair of owls gets 3,500 acres to itself. And meanwhile, jobs and
families and communities are being wiped out in the process.
And the other side has been talking about a "false
choice." And they claim that this timber crisis is just politics.
And the simple fact is this: The false choice is being driven by
extremists who are twisting the Endangered Species Act and its
application to the Northern Spotted Owl. (Applause.)
And now let's set the record straight. We've always
worked within the parameters of the law to address this problem. But
I can tell you this. The law is broken, and it must be fixed.
And we have asked the Congress for funds to cut enough
timber in this region to keep people employed. But these conflicting
laws allow challenge after challenge.
We convened the God squad to exempt 13 timber sales here
in southern Oregon from jeopardy opinions from the Fish and Wildlife
Service. And every one of those sales is now enjoined.
And so this year, we sent Congress an alternative plan,
a preservation plan, if you will, that would save 17,000 jobs
compared to the recovery plan required by the act. And Congress has
failed to act on my plan.
My friends, it is time to consider the human factor in
the Spotted Owl equation. My opponent talks about putting people
first --- well, we can start right here in the Pacific Northwest.
(Applause.)
so here is what I propose:
First, I will not sign an extension of the Endangered
Species Act unless it gives greater consideration to jobs, to
families, and to communities. (Applause.) And I will not sign it
without a specific plan in place to harvest enough timber to keep
timber families working in 1993 and beyond. It is time to make
people more important than owls. (Applause.)
And second, I will fight to end the injunctions that
have put an economic strangle hold on the Northwest, in order to free
up the timber that we need today, because the families and the timber
communities of the Pacific Northwest need relief and they need it
now.
And I call upon the United States Congress to pass my
plan to produce 2.6 billion board feet of timber from Forest Service
lands in the Northwest region next year, and at least 500 million
board feet on BLM land. And I ask Congress to tie that plan to
language that prevents lawsuits from stopping reasonable harvests
with reasonable species protection. (Applause.) It is time to put
people ahead of process. And the Congress must understand that.
And third, my administration will speed the harvesting
of dead or dying timber that has been dangerously building up during
a seven-year drought. One step is our new rule to allow more timber
salvage operations to occur without triggering some of the time-
consuming requirements that are blocking progress. This will reduce
the risk of fire, and it will provide up to 450 million board feet of
timber for the mills in the near term. And in other words, it's time
MORE
to protect jobs with timber that's available now and put the mills
back to work. (Applause.)
And finally, I call upon Congress today to pass the
spotted Owl Preservation Plan -- that's the bill sponsored by
Senators Packwood and Hatfield and slade Gorton, which they call "The
Northern Spotted Own Preservation and Northwest Economic
stabilization Act of 1992". It's a long name, but it's a good bill.
And it's time to preserve both owls and jobs -- jobs in the timber
industry and in agriculture, transportation and in recreation as
well, where they, too, are threatened by this Endangered Species Act.
And now a word about my opponent. My opponent's
approach to this problem -- and I'll try to be fair -- no, but his
approach to this problem, to your jobs, really is -- and look at the
record -- doublespeak. When he spoke in Pennsylvania -- Governor
Clinton spoke in Pennsylvania -- he said what the Sierra Club wanted
to hear. They concluded that Governor Clinton was -- quote --
"promising the protection of old-growth forests in the Pacific
Northwest." And then, when he heard I was coming here, Mr. Clinton
cynically held out false hope to timber families by promising another
meeting.
There have already been more than 40 bipartisan meetings
of the Northwest congressional delegation on this issue for three
years. NOW, look, here are the studies. We've produced a pile of
studies and proposals this high. And the only good reason for the
timber industry -- the only good news is all the trees in took to
print all these darn reports. (Applause.) Look at them. And so I
say to Governor Clinton, no more studies. Help me change the law.
That's what needs to happen. (Applause.)
And the difference on this is clear: I will. I will
change it. And it's as simple as this: My opponent will not fight
to change the law to restore balance.
And now I know that Mr. Clinton -- and Governor
Doublespeak I call him (laughter) -- but, nevertheless, is getting
famous -- getting famous for being on both sides of these issues.
But do you want to know the real views of the other ticket? I hate
to bring this word up, but Senator Gore --
AUDIENCE: B000 --
THE PRESIDENT: He wrote it in black and white in his
book before he knew that he'd be out there pandering for votes. And
in his book, Senator Gore said this -- and I quote: "I helped lead"
-- I want to get it right here -- "I helped lead the successful fight
to prevent the overturning of protections for the Spotted Owl." And
he wrote -- and this is an exact quote -- "the jobs will be lost
anyway." I challenge Governor Clinton -- do you agree with your
running mate? DO you endorse the book that you once called
"magnificent"? It is time we worried not only about endangered
species, but about endangered jobs. (Applause.)
And I am here to tell you that I'm the one who will
respect the wildlife, yes. I think we all do. we all agree. But
I'm also the one who will also fight for jobs, for families, and for
communities.
I have come here to tell you that I will not stand for a
solution that puts at least 32,000 people out of work. It will not
stand. I mean it. (Applause.)
And I've come here to tell you that we haven't forgotten
about the human factor; because in the end, in the final analysis
when all the campaigns are over and all the charge and countercharge
takes place, the human factor, that is the most important factor of
all.
MORE
- $ -
And I've come here today to tell you that we can restore
the balance. we must restore the balance. And with your help, we
will restore the balance.
May God bless your families, your jobs, your hopes for
our great country. And may God bless the United States of America.
Thank you all very, very much. Thank you. (Applause.) Thank you
all. (Applause.)
END
6:47 P.M. PDT