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Housing Event - St. Louis, Missouri 5/3/91 [OA 8322] [3]
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Housing Event - St. Louis, Missouri 5/3/91 [OA 8322] [3]
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Speech Backup Chronological Files
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MARKER
This is not a textual record. This is used as an
administrative marker by the George Bush Presidential
Library Staff.
Record Group/Collection:
George H.W. Bush Presidential Records
Collection/Office of Origin:
Speechwriting, White House Office of
Series:
Speech File Backup Files
Subseries:
Chron File, 1989-1993
OA/ID Number:
13753
Folder ID Number:
13753-013
Folder Title:
Housing Event - St. Louis, Missouri 5/3/91 [OA 8322] [3]
Stack:
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Section:
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G
26
21
3
6
E Earo
(Smith/Grossman)
April 27, 1991
10:30 A.M.
Draft One
PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS:
HOUSING EVENT
COCHRAN GARDENS, ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI
Friday, May 3, 1991
Secretary Kemp, Bertha Gilkey, head of the National Tenant Union.
(acknowlegments) Residents and homeowners of Cochran Gardens. (I
speak to you today as a resident of public housing. I tried to
get some troublemakers evicted from my block too -- but I'm told
it's freedom of the press.)
You know your state used to be called the "Show Me" state.
With what I've seen today it's not hard to understand why.
You've shown everyone what happens when people are empowered to
take control of their community -- they take it from a haven for
drug dealers to a harbor for children, from the failures of
neglect to the victories of volunteerism, from the despair of
dependency to the pride of self-reliance. They take it from
project / to neighborhood. I've just seen a new pre-school
playground. I can't describe how wonderful it is to see an area
once called Little Nam replaced by an environment where children
are safe to play, to learn, to grow.
Contrast this success story with the failure of projects
like the Pruitt-Igoe. Crime-ridden, It was torn down almost two
decades ago. To me, to many of us here, that vacant lot
am
is
symbolizes the empty promises of public-housing policy.
victors
To more and more Americans it is becoming clear that the
those it help saught
solutions of the past are insufficient to the challenges of the
to losis and
present. The safety-net that should have helped people bounce
back only served to trap them in perpetual poverty, dependence,
and despair. Some, like Bertha Gilkey, are saying "enough is
enough.' They are lifting their voices to demand: if the
system's not creating a better life, then we must create a better
system.
It's time to make good on the promise of opportunity for all
our citizens. Because as we enter the next American century, we
need everyone on board. That's why this Administration is
committed to break the logjam that's choking the progress of the
poor -- broadening access to homeownership, jobs, and quality
education.
Last November we moved towards those goals with the signing
of the National Affordable Housing Act -- the most radical
departure in Federal housing policy in two decades. It's core is
HOPE, Homeownership and Opportunity for People Everywhere, a
revolutionary initiative that strikes out in a dramatically new
direction, enabling public housing residents to manage and
ultimately own their own homes.
Bertha Gilkey once said, "We don't want to be taken care of,
we want to be trained how to take care of ourselves." She has
taken that mission across America, lighting the fires in our
battle to revolutionize public housing. She knows we can allow
no pause in this crusade. When I took office, there were only 13
resident groups training to become resident managers. Today
there are 100. With full congressional funding, there could be
40,000 residents in some 400 public housing communities launched
towards homeownership by the end of 1992.
But we cannot conquer poverty if our foot soldiers can't
afford the ammunition. That's why Congress must move swiftly to
pass our Enterprise Zone and Jobs-Creation Act. By attracting
new seed capital for small business start-ups, creating new
incentives for entrepreneurial risk-taking, and reducing high
effective tax rates on those who want work not welfare --
Enterprise Zones can turn poverty into potential, potential into
prosperity.
But as we bring back the life to these areas' economies, we
must restore the soul to their communities. That's why we need
the Community Opportunity Act of 1991. This legislation should
empower communities to find ways to make Federal programs more
responsive to individual, family, and community needs. It will
help provide the means to shift power out of the heavy hand of
the state, and into the hands that run the home.
It was once said that "destiny is not a matter of chance, it
is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is
a thing to be achieved." The people of Cochran Gardens have made
their choice. Now, they're making history. Thank you all very
much for being here. God bless Cochran Gardens, and God bless
the United States of America.
(Smith/Grossman)
April 27, 1991
10:30 A.M.
Draft One
PRESIDENTIAL REMARKS:
HOUSING EVENT
COCHRAN GARDENS, ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI
Friday, May 3, 1991
Secretary Kemp, Bertha Gilkey, head of the National Tenant Union.
(acknowlegments) Residents and homeowners of Cochran Gardens. (I
speak to you today as a resident of public housing. I tried to
get some troublemakers evicted from my block too -- but I'm told
it's freedom of the press.)
You know your state used to be called the "Show Me" state.
With what I've seen today it's not hard to understand why.
You've shown everyone what happens when people are empowered to
take control of their community -- they take it from a haven for
drug dealers to a harbor for children, from the failures of
neglect to the victories of volunteerism, from the despair of
dependency to the pride of self-reliance. They take it from
project / to neighborhood. I've just seen a new pre-school
playground. I can't describe how wonderful it is to see an area
once called Little Nam replaced by an environment where children
are safe to play, to learn, to grow.
Contrast this success story with the failure of projects
like the Pruitt-Igoe. Crime-ridden, It was torn down almost two
decades ago. To me, to many of us here, that vacant lot
symbolizes the empty promises of public-housing policy.
To more and more Americans it is becoming clear that the
solutions of the past are insufficient to the challenges of the
present. The safety-net that should have helped people bounce
back only served to trap them in perpetual poverty, dependence,
and despair. Some, like Bertha Gilkey, are saying "enough is
enough." They are lifting their voices to demand: if the
system's not creating a better life, then we must create a better
system.
It's time to make good on the promise of opportunity for all
our citizens. Because as we enter the next American century, we
need everyone on board. That's why this Administration is
committed to break the logjam that's choking the progress of the
poor -- broadening access to homeownership, jobs, and quality
education.
Last November we moved towards those goals with the signing
of the National Affordable Housing Act -- the most radical
departure in Federal housing policy in two decades. It's core is
HOPE, Homeownership and Opportunity for People Everywhere, a
revolutionary initiative that strikes out in a dramatically new
direction, enabling public housing residents to manage and
ultimately own their own homes.
Bertha Gilkey once said, "We don't want to be taken care of,
we want to be trained how to take care of ourselves." She has
taken that mission across America, lighting the fires in our
battle to revolutionize public housing. She knows we can allow
no pause in this crusade. When I took office, there were only 13
resident groups training to become resident managers. Today
there are 100. With full congressional funding, there could be
40,000 residents in some 400 public housing communities launched
towards homeownership by the end of 1992.
But we cannot conquer poverty if our foot soldiers can't
afford the ammunition. That's why Congress must move swiftly to
pass our Enterprise Zone and Jobs-Creation Act. By attracting
new seed capital for small business start-ups, creating new
incentives for entrepreneurial risk-taking, and reducing high
effective tax rates on those who want work not welfare --
Enterprise Zones can turn poverty into potential, potential into
prosperity.
But as we bring back the life to these areas' economies, we
must restore the soul to their communities. That's why we need
the Community Opportunity Act of 1991. This legislation should
empower communities to find ways to make Federal programs more
responsive to individual, family, and community needs. It will
help provide the means to shift power out of the heavy hand of
the state, and into the hands that run the home.
It was once said that "destiny is not a matter of chance, it
is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is
a thing to be achieved." The people of Cochran Gardens have made
their choice. Now, they're making history. Thank you all very
much for being here. God bless Cochran Gardens, and God bless
the United States of America.
4
CREATING JOBS IN ENTERPRISE ZONES:
Enterprise zones will attack poverty by promoting investment
in economically distressed neighborhoods. Enterprise zones will
attract new seed capital for small business start-ups, create new
incentives for entrepreneurial risk-taking, and reduce high
effective tax rates on those moving to work from welfare.
The Enterprise Zone and Jobs-Creation Act of 1991 will
target tax incentives and regulatory relief to some of our
nation's most economically depressed areas.
The Secretary of Housing and Urban Development would
designate up to 50 (urban, rural, and Indian) enterprise
zones over a four year period. Designation will be based on
the level of distress, as well as on the nature and extent
of State and local efforts to improve living conditions and
to eliminate government burdens to economic activity.
Designation will be for a maximum of 24 years.
The legislation will provide tax incentives to attract seed
capital, stimulate employment, and increase the economic
return from work for the working poor:
--
Workers will be eligible for a 5 percent refundable tax
credit for the first $10,500 of wages earned in an
enterprise zone business. This will put up to $525
more income in the pockets of low-income workers. The
credit phases out between $20,000 and $25,000 of total
annual wages.
--
To spur investment, capital gains taxes will be
eliminated for gains on investment in tangible property
(e.g., buildings and equipment) used in a business
located in an enterprise zone for at least two years.
--
To encourage entrepreneurial risk-taking, individuals
will be permitted to expense investments in the capital
of corporations engaged in enterprise zone businesses.
This essentially provides an immediate write-off for
investments in enterprise zone businesses.
Corporations must have less than $5 million of total
assets. Expensing will be permitted up to $50,000
annually per investor, with a $250,000 lifetime limit.
The legislation would also give enterprise zone communities
priority for free trade area status. Such status would, for
example, allow a business in an enterprise zone to import
materials duty-free if the materials are used to manufacture
products for export to other countries.
- more -
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
Embargoed for Release
February 27, 1991
Until 11:05 a.m. EST
Wednesday, February 27, 1991
FACT SHEET
EXPANDING CHOICE AND OPPORTUNITY
FOR INDIVIDUALS, FAMILIES, AND COMMUNITIES
In his State of the Union Address, the President said: "The
strength of democracy is not in bureaucracy. It is in the people
and their communities We must return to families, communities,
counties, cities, states and institutions of every kind the power
to chart their own destiny, and the freedom and opportunity
provided by strong economic growth.'
The Administration is committed to strengthening the power
and opportunity of individuals and families, to breaking down
barriers to independence and self-reliance wherever they exist,
and to providing hope to distressed communities.
This means giving people access to jobs and the ability to
make choices that will better their lives and the lives of their
families. People with access to housing, jobs, and quality
education have a stake in their community, and a greater
incentive to lead productive lives. More important, people with
economic opportunity have hope for the future -- an important and
powerful weapon against poverty and despair.
The Administration seeks to use numerous administrative,
regulatory, and budgetary means to expand economic opportunity
for low-income individuals. In addition to these continuing
efforts, the President today announced that he will seek
Congressional action to promote choice and opportunity on several
fronts:
1. educational choice;
2. educational flexibility;
3. homeownership for low-income persons;
4. enterprise zones;
5. anti-discrimination laws;
6. community opportunity areas;
7. the social security earnings test; and
8. anti-crime efforts.
Legislation, where required, will be transmitted to Congress in
the next several weeks to implement these proposals.
- more -
AMERICA THE
QUOTABLE
Mike Edelhart and
James Tinen
Facts On File Publications
460 Park Avenue South
New York, N.Y. 10016
MISSOURI
orer's account of the Mississippi
tions; and in less than 30 more it was dead! A
we are, then, on this so renowned
strangely short life for so majestic a creature."
Entered the union (with rank): Aug. 10, 1821 (24)
State motto: Sallus populi suprema lex esto (The
ose peculiar features I have endeav-
Mark Twain
welfare of the people shall be the supreme law)
fully. The Mississippi River takes its
Life on the Mississippi
State flower: Hawthorn
lakes in the country of the northern
1874
State bird: Bluebird
***
arrow at the place where Miskous
State song: "Missouri Waltz"
ent, which flows southward, is slow
"When I was a boy [mid-18th century], there was
State tree: Dogwood
he right is a large chain of very high
but one permanent ambition among my comrades in
Nickname: Show Me State
to the left are beautiful lands; in
our village on the west bank of the Mississippi River.
Origin of state name: Named after Missouri Indians,
the stream is divided by islands. On
That was, to be a steamboatman. We had transient
who lived there; the tribal name means "town of
und 10 brasses of water. Its width is
ambitions of other sorts, but they were only tran-
the large canoes"
sometimes it is three-quarters of a
sient. When a circus came and went, it left us all
netimes it narrows to three arpents.
burning to become clowns; the first Negro minstrel
Missouri got its nickname when Congressman Wil-
/ deer and cattle, bustards, and swans
show that ever came to our section left us all suffer-
liard D. "Doubting Williard" Vandiver said to an
because they drop their plumage in
ing to try that kind of life; now and then we had a
Iowa representative during heated debate: "I'm from
From time to time, we came upon
hope that, if we lived and were good, God would
Missouri. You'll have to show me."
one of which struck our boat with
permit us to be pirates. These ambitions faded out,
The Show Me State has actually shown the country
at I thought it was a great tree, about
each in its turn; but the ambition to be a steamboat-
a good deal. Mark Twain showed Americans how
noe to pieces. On another occasion,
man always remained."
laughable and wise they were. Harry Truman showed
water a monster with the head of a
Mark Twain
them how a president was supposed to act. At the
nose like that of a wildcat, with
Life on the Mississippi
same time, it is perfectly true that Missourians by
traight, erect ears."
1874
and large are a stubborn lot. They don't change
Father Marquette
***
easily; they don't cotton to fads. They really do
Jesuit Relations
"The Mississippi was left unvisited by whites during
demand to be shown before they accept new ideas.
17th century
a term of years which seems incredible in our ener-
Missouri's entrance into the Union, in fact, forced
***
getic days. One may 'sense' the interval to his mind,
the country to face up to hard questions it had been
pi has served the nation as a highway,
after a fashion, by dividing it up in this way: after
studiously avoiding for some time. When Missouri
ground; it has been a road to opportu-
DeSoto [first European explorer] glimpsed the river,
came aboard in 1820, the clash over slave and free
ier to religion and the law; an interna-
a fraction short of a quarter of a century elapsed, and
states boiled over, resulting in the slapdash Missouri
1, and a unifying force. It still remains
then Shakespeare was born; lived a trifle more than
Compromise-which let Missouri become a slave
ine between "back East" and "out
half a century, then died; and when he had been in
state but banned slavery elsewhere in the upper
his grave considerably more than half a century, the
Louisiana Purchase area. This allowed the national
Perry T. Rathbone
second white man saw the Mississippi. In our day we
schizophrenia to devolve onto the state, which felt
Mississippi Panorama
don't allow 130 years to elapse between glimpses of
southern but had a decidely northern economy. An
1950
a marvel."
embattled government managed to get the state se-
***
Mark Twain
ceded by 1861, but another administration hauled it
ago the Mississippi was a presence, a
Life on the Mississippi
back into the Union in 1864. Some of the state's
could flood cities, tear away bridges,
1874
skepticism may grow from its early life as a political
ly alter individual lives. Living on the
pinball.
vas like living under a volcano. For
MISSOURI
Missouri is divided into a northwestern prairie and
in some places that fact hasn't changed.
a Mississippi flatland by the rugged, but gorgeous,
the great forces are now those that
Ozark Mountains. The Missouri prairies were, in the
le outside: the factory that moves in or
1850s, America's launching point for trips westward
that moves away; wars in distant places;
toward the promised lands of Oregon and California.
d social dislocations that may hit home
The banks of the Mississippi became a place of
nate not only in the distance but often in
riverboat towns and mercantile depots for the bus-
I
forces that cannot even be conceived."
tling river trade. Today, along the river in St. Louis,
+
Peter Schrag
the magnificent Jefferson National Expansion Me-
Saturday Review
morial Arch, designed by Eero Saarinen, serves as a
Dec: 12, 1970
soaring symbol of the state's gateway status.
OILAHOMA
Today Missouri's automotive industry is second
***
only to Michigan's. Kansas City is a major meat
i
steamboating was born about 1812; at
Capital: Jefferson City
0 years it had grown to mighty propor-
Became a territory: June 4, 1812
processing center. McDonnell-Douglas has impor-
tant aerospace facilities outside of St. Louis.
291
MISSOURI
THE STATE
'They're against everybody but themselves!' I asked
Mr. Truman what they were for. 'Missouri!' "
John Gunther
"This state [Missouri] is a melange of peoples,
occupations and resources. It would be difficult to
Inside USA
pinpoint it, except to say that, in general, it is
1947
southern."
*
Pearl S. Buck
"Missouri would lose something if the Civil War
America
were ever entirely settled."
1971
Kansas City Star
Quoted by John Gunther
"Missouri is the abolitionist North with its belief in
Inside USA
equal rights for all men and women. It is the planta-
1947
tion South with its old ideas of a leisure society. It is
*
the industrial East, busy, noisy, mechanical, com-
"That peppery, independent spirit, not entirely for-
mercial. It is the grazing West, miles and miles of
eign to the ornery mules who helped make Missouri
pasture and prize livestock in every direction."
famous, has surfaced again and again in Missouri
Irving Dilliard
history, recent decades not excepted."
I'm From Missouri
Neal R. Peirce
1952
The Great Plains States of America
*
1973
"Illinois may have a richer soil and a more prosper-
ous people; Iowa may have a better organized com-
munity life; and Kansas, a quicker sense of civic
responsibility and political opportunity. But Missouri
CITIES, TOWNS
doesn't want to hear about it. Missourians are satis-
AND REGIONS
fied with here, and she is satisfied with herself.
Besides, who can say that Arkansas excels her in
Kansas City
anything?"
Manley O. Hudson
"People in Kansas City are tormented by the fact that
These United States
they live here
'Kansas City' sounds so bad. It
1924
commends itself to a nasal tone of voice."
Giles Fowler, Kansas City drama critic
"I come from a state that raises corn and cotton and
Quoted by Richard Rhodes
cockleburs and Democrats, and frothy eloquence
The Inland Ground
neither convinces nor satisfies me. I am from Mis-
1970
souri. You have got to show me."
* *
Williard Vandiver, congressman
"Busy, boasting, and Babbitt-ful, Kansas City holds
Speech in Philadelphia
a key position in the American system of interstate
1899
commerce
It has life but it lacks character."
Manley G. Hudson
PEOPLE
These United States
1924
[Obituary of Kansas City man who killed himself
* *
three months after moving to New York]: "He hated
"Kansas City stands at the eastern edge of the wheat
New York. He wanted to come home."
belt, at the western edge of the corn belt, and at the
Kansas City Star
northern limit of the white belt. This is not a racial
1966
remark. I am talking about the white belt, which men
in Kansas City have taken to wearing with red
WAY OF LIFE
pants."
Charles Kuralt
"He [Vice-President Harry Truman] talked about
Dateline America
friends I should call on, who were the apple of his
1979
eye. 'They're ornery, mean folk!' he chuckled.
292
MISSOURI
/ but themselves!' I asked
"Who in Europe, or in America for that matter,
*
re for. 'Missouri!'
knows that Kansas City is one of the loveliest cities
"Since [cowtown days,] various self-appointed coro-
John Gunther
on earth?"
ners have declared Kansas City dead just from its
Inside USA
Andre Maurois
past reputation, then from being in a location remote
1947
Journal of his stay in Kansas City
from the two coasts, where every good and perfect
1946
thing must be; to some it seemed for years to be dead
nething if the Civil War
of an overdose of civic righteousness and business
"There are no more Babbitts in Kansas City than in
conservatism."
New York."
Kansas City Star
Tracy Thomas and Walt Bodine
Andre Maurois
Quoted by John Gunther
Right Here in River City
Inside USA
Journal of his stay in Kansas City
1976
1946
1947
*
*
*
"Some say that Kansas City is still a lazy city,
"Kansas City has suffered from being ignored coast
nt spirit, not entirely for-
happier with cookouts on the patio than with intellec-
to coast-from being immaterial to any discussion of
ho helped make Missouri
tual stimulation."
anything. Like a Russian politician who falls from
in and again in Missouri
Richard Rhodes
grace and becomes a nonperson, Kansas City has
: excepted."
The Inland Ground
really suffered from being a nonplace."
Neal R. Peirce
1970
Tracy Thomas and Walt Bodine
Plains States of America
Right Here in River City
1973
"Kansas City has a certain complex about being the
1976
gizzard of America."
Richard Rhodes
S
"But more likely, if you leave Kansas City in de-
The Inland Ground
spair, it will not be because you ran into a wall of
1970
repression or a flame of resentment. It will be be-
cause you shouted and shouted and there wasn't
[On a 'miracle cure']: "I will admit that these waters
much coming back to you but an echo. The audience
have quite a peculiar odor as they have a proportion
is not sullenly unresponsive. It sits out there and
= tormented by the fact that
of Sulphur and other unknown ingredients, but visi-
looks pleasant enough. But it doesn't really do any-
tors from Kansas City, who are used to a Stock Yard
S City' sounds so bad. It
thing pro or con. It does the most damnable thing of
breeze, take this wonderful water home as a Per-
1 tone of voice."
all to the rabble-rouser; it regards him or her as
fume."
, Kansas City drama critic
interesting. Some call it apathy; some call it Mid-
Quoted by Richard Rhodes
Will Rogers
western conservatism. But Kansas Citians call it a
The Inland Ground
The Illiterate Digest
very healthy kind of live-and-let-live spirit."
1970
1924
Tracy Thomas and Walt Bodine
*
Right Here in River City
bitt-ful, Kansas City holds
"Of course it's not just a cow town. It's not a cow
1976
erican system of interstate
town at all. The stockyards are all but gone, just like
*
but it lacks character."
Chicago and all the other places with cow town
Manley G. Hudson
image problems. Kansas City's a grain town."
"The truth is that Kansas City nationally for many
These United States
Kansas City woman at dinner party
years had the pale image of a great-aunt; not much
1924
Quoted by Tom Stites
known about her, and no great urgency about finding
New York Times
out. Today the young are more likely to be interested
e eastern edge of the wheat
Nov. 14, 1981
in what Great-Auntie was like, and to be delighted if
*
of the corn belt, and at the
they find out she was quite a magnificent old party
te belt. This is not a racial
"The future looks rosy [in Kansas City]. Detroit and
with just a touch of indiscretion in her past-and a
t the white belt, which men
Youngstown seem on another planet. There is little
certain free and open style in her manner."
ken to wearing with red
chance that the city's [agrarian-centered] economy
Tracy Thomas and Walt Bodine
will be devastated because Americans develop a
Right Here in River City
Charles Kuralt
preference for Japanese bread."
1976
Dateline America
Tom Stites
*
*
*
1979
New York Times
"Kansas City has been counted out time after time.
Nov. 14, 1981
In its earliest years, it was counted out as a presump-
293
MISSOURI
tuous upstart by the much more promising cities of
Independence, St. Joseph, Leavenworth, and Atchi-
"The jet fighter, rocket, and spacecraft, not the
son. Later it had to survive outbreaks of cholera and
towboat, have replaced the steamboat as the glamour
being torn apart by the Civil War-the very rope
craft of St. Louis."
itself in a life-and-death tug o'war. Later it was
Bern Keating
written off as a wild, rude cattle town whose idea of
The Mighty Mississippi
culture was a piano in a whorehouse."
1971
Tracy Thomas and Walt Bodine
*
Right Here in River City
"Towboats bring far more tonnage to St. Louis than
1976
the steamboats ever did, pushing up to 40 steel
St. Louis
barges lashed together in a five-acre platform, but
they tie up at docks so scattered that many of the
"The abuses which are daily creeping in through the
2,500,000 people of metropolitan St. Louis scarcely
unruly conduct of the slaves at this post of St. Louis,
know a river runs by their door."
owing to the criminal tolerance in some masters who
Bern Keating
are so careless of their authority and of public
The Mighty Mississippi
welfare-in which they ought to feel an interest, as
1971
members of the same body-oblige us, notwithstand-
***
ing the orders previously published on this subject,
"On Saturday evenings the street life is as animated
again to prohibit the slaves, under penalty of 50
as that of an [sic] European city. In the populous
lashes of the whip, to hold any assembly at night, in
quarters the Irish and Germans throng the sidewalks,
the cabins or elsewhere, and they will incur a more
marketing and amusing themselves until midnight;
severe punishment according to the result of their
and in the fashionable sections the ladies, seated in
said assemblies."
porches and on the front doorsteps of their mansions,
Don Francisco Cruzat
receive the visits of their friends.
At
the
more
General Ordinances for St. Louis
aristocratic and elegant of the German beer gardens,
1781
such as "Uhrig's" and "Schneider's" the represent-
* *
atives of many prominent American families may be
"It [St. Louis] serves Missouri chiefly as a sieve for
seen on the concert evenings, drinking the amber
Eastern money and Eastern manners
It once had
fluid, and listening to the music of Strauss, of Gungl,
a Fair which made it great, and the laurel has been
or Meyerbeer. Groups of elegantly dressed ladies and
borne in slumber these 20 years since
It forms no
gentlemen resort to the gardens in the same manner
part of Missouri. Even the postal clerks know it as
as do the denizens of Dresden and Berlin, and no
St. Louis, U.S.A."
longer regard the custom as a dangerous German
Manley O. Hudson
innovation. The German element in St. Louis is
These United States
powerful and has for the last 30 years been merging
1924
in [sic] the American, giving to it many of the hearty
***
features and graces of European life, which have
"Only from the air can today's traveler fully under-
been emphatically rejected by the native population
stand the tremendous power of the site of St. Louis,
of the more austere Eastern states."
which Twain saw as 'a great and prosperous and
Edward King
advancing
city.
,
From the west the Missouri
Scribner's Monthly
snakes in, a mud-laden watercourse that rises 2,533
July, 1874
miles upstream in far-off Montana and brings to-
* * *
gether the waters of tributaries that drain the north-
"I have found a situation where I intend establishing
eastern slopes of the Rockies and the northern Great
a settlement which in the future, shall become one of
Plains. From the east comes the Illinois River bear-
the most beautiful cities in the world."
ing the commerce of Chicago and the industrial cities
Pierre Laclede, French fur trapper
of the Illinois hinterland, giving access to the Great
Written upon discovery of the site of St. Louis
Lakes and ultimately to the Atlantic Ocean via the St.
1763
Lawrence Seaway."
* *
Bern Keating
"Even the gleaming Arch can be part of a very
The Mighty Mississippi
disturbing experience in St. Louis today. It is possi-
1971
ble to ride one of the eerie half-train, half-elevator
294
MISSOURI
capsules that creep up inside the legs of the Archway
had been built was grotesquely diseased."
nd spacecraft, not the
to the top, where one can peer out through narrow slit
Jonathan Raban
eamboat as the glamour
windows to the terrain below. To the east, directly
Old Glory
below, there is the silt-laden Mississippi, and just
1981
Bern Keating
beyond it the industrial nothingsville called East St.
***
The Mighty Mississippi
Louis. To the west, there is the sprinkling of fine
1971
"Old, genteel St. Louis-T.S. Eliot's city-thought
new and old civic buildings-but then the vast ex-
of itself as a slice of cultivated Europe. It seemed
panses of uninspired urban terrain."
mystified as to how it had landed here, stranded on
nnage to St. Louis than
Neal R. Peirce
the wrong side of the big American river."
ushing up to 40 steel
The Great Plains States of America
Jonathan Raban
five-acre platform, but
1973
Old Glory
tered that many of the
***
1981
litan St. Louis scarcely
"Even the most callous observer, standing at ground
or."
zero below the Arch [in St. Louis] and looking
***
Bern Keating
upward to see its flanks brushed diagonally by the
"It [the Gateway Arch] recalls most specifically a
The Mighty Mississippi
sun and then following with the eye as the clear,
woman's legs and pelvis."
1971
cutting lines of the great arms soar upward to a
Richard Rhodes
delicate, perfect juncture at an apex so far above,
The Inland Ground
treet life is as animated
must be awed by what has been wrought."
1970
I city. In the populous
Neal R. Peirce
IS throng the sidewalks,
The Great Plains States of America
***
nselves until midnight;
1973
"It is good business that causes bad government in
ns the ladies, seated in
* * *
St. Louis."
steps of their mansions,
"St. Louis is still not exactly a swinging town;
A district attorney, speaking in 1902
riends At the more
her German ancestry, plus wealth and maturity, have
Quoted by William Shannon
: German beer gardens,
often led to complacency."
American Heritage
neider's" the represent-
Neal R. Peirce
June, 1969
herican families may be
The Great Plains States of America
***
;s, drinking the amber
1973
sic of Strauss, of Gungl,
"Go to St. Louis and you will find the habit of civic
***
antly dressed ladies and
[View from Gateway Arch]: "Pushing one's face
pride in them; they still boast. The visitor is told of
ens in the same manner
against the glass, one could see all that any human
the wealth of the residents, of the financial strength
len and Berlin, and no
being could reasonably bear of St. Louis: mile after
of the banks, and of the growing importance of the
$ a dangerous German
mile of biscuit-colored housing projects, torn up
industries, yet he sees poorly paved, refuse-burdened
ement in St. Louis is
streets, blackened Victorian factories and the pur-
streets, and dusty or mud-covered alleys; he passes a
30 years been merging
plish urban scar tissue of vacant lots and pits in the
ramshackle firetrap crowded with the sick, and learns
to it many of the hearty
ground. It was The Waste Land."
that it is the City Hospital; he enters the "Four
pean life, which have
Courts" and his nostrils are greeted by the odor of
Jonathan Raban
y the native population
Old Glory
formaldehyde used as a disinfectant, and insect pow-
states."
1981
der spread to destory vermin; he calls at the new City
Edward King
Hall, and find half the entrance boarded with pine
* * *
Scribner's Monthly
planks to cover up the unfinished interior. Finally, he
[The base of the Gateway Arch]: "Most of the mud,
July, 1874
turns a tap in the hotel, to see liquid mud flow into
though, had been coated with some kind of bilious
wash-basin or bathtub."
green slime. Its texture was thickly fungoid, its
Lincoln Steffens and Claude H. Wetmore
ere I intend establishing
purpose quite inscrutable. A gardener might well
McClure's Magazine
ire, shall become one of
have recognized it as the best and latest form of soil
October, 1902
e world."
nutrient. My own guess was that the city of St. Louis
ede, French fur trapper
had run out of funds, was unable to plant grass on its
***
of the site of St. Louis
artificial hill, and had decided that the only afforda-
"The corruption of St. Louis came from the top.
1763
ble solution was to spray the whole thing with the
Taking but slight and always selfish interest in the
cheapest and nastiest green paint it could find. The
public councils, the big men misused politics. The
can be part of a very
coating might at least deceive a few inattentive pas-
riffraff, catching the smell of corruption, rushed into
Louis today. It is possi-
sengers in high-altitude jets. At ground level, it gave
half-train, half-elevator
the Municipal Assembly, drove out the remaining
the impression that the very earth on which St. Louis
respectable men, and sold the city-its streets, its
295
MISSOURI
wharves, its markets, and all that it had-to the now
races, rough and tumble fights; and shooting at a
greedy businessmen and bribers."
target was one of their occupations while in port."
Lincoln Steffens and Claude H. Wetmore
James Healey White
McClure's Magazine
Early Days in St. Louis
October, 1902
1819
[A grand jury's report on St. Louis's Municipal
Assembly]: "Our investigation, covering more or
less fully a period of 10 years, shows that, with few
Other Cities, Towns and Regions
exceptions, no ordinance has been passed wherein
valuable privileges or franchises are granted until
Hannibal:
those interested have paid the legislators the money
demanded for action in the particular case."
"In 1884, Twain described Huck Finn as 'the pariah
Quoted by Lincoln Steffens and Claude H.
of the village.' Poor Huck. He had made horribly
Wetmore
good. A hundred years later, he was Hannibal's
McClure's Magazine
darling."
October, 1902
Jonathan Raban
Old Glory
***
1981
"St. Louis is a great and prosperous and advancing
city; but the river-edge of it seems dead past resur-
Independence:
rection."
Mark Twain
"Independence, Missouri, the 'jumping-off place' to
Life on the Mississippi
the Wild West. Now it is a suburb of Kansas City;
1874
then, it was the last outpost of civilization."
Cecil Dryden
[On returning to St. Louis after absence]: "The city
Give All To Oregon
seemed but little changed. It was greatly changed,
1968
but it did not seem so; because in St. Louis, as in
*
*
*
London and Pittsburgh, you can't persuade a new
"The town could not then have been more Midwest-
thing to look new; the coal smoke turns it into an
em as my adolescence meant the word, rural and
antiquity the moment you take your hand off it."
shaded and slow, withdrawn behind closed windows
Mark Twain
and cautious minds."
Life on the Mississippi
Richard Rhodes
1874
The Inland Ground
1970
*
*
[Huck Finn, Mark Twain's fictional character]:
The Ozarks:
"The fifth night we passed St. Louis, and it was like
the whole world lit up. In St. Petersburg they used to
"Under the Ozarks, domed by Iron Mountain,
say there was 20,000 or 30,000 people in St. Louis,
The old gods of the rain lie wrapped in pools."
but I never believed it till I saw that wonderful spread
Hart Crane
of lights at two o'clock that still night. There wasn't
The Bridge
a sound there; everybody was asleep."
1930
Mark Twain
Huckleberry Finn
Springfield:
1885
"The Paris and Gomorrah of the Ozarks."
***
H.L. Mencken
"The appearance of St. Louis was not calculated to
Heathen Days
make a favorable impression upon the first visit, with
1943
its long dirty and quicksand beach, numbers of long,
* *
empty keelboats tied to stakes driven in the sand,
"One seems to reach the bottom [in race relations] at
squads of idle boatmen passing to and fro, here and
Springfield, Missouri, which is a county seat with a
there numbers pitching quoits; others running foot
college, an academy, a high school, and a zoological
296
MONTANA
ghts; and shooting at a
garden. There the exemplary method reaches the
Sioux managed to trap George C. Custer and his
pations while in port."
nadir. Last April three unfortunate Negroes were
troops at Little Big Horn. The death of Custer and
James Healey White
burned to death, apparently because they were Ne-
some 200 soldiers at this last stand represented the
Early Days in St. Louis
groes, and as a general corrective of impertinence.
final important triumph by the Indians against the
1819
They seem to have been innocent of any particular
U.S. Army.
offense. It was a sort of racial sacrament."
Montana was, and remains, the genuine American
H.G. Wells
West in all aspects of its life and work.
"The Future in America"
ns and Regions
1906
*
THE STATE
Huck Finn as 'the pariah
"Montana has a spell on me. It is grandeur and
He had made horribly
MONTANA
warmth. If Montana had a seacoast, or if I could live
ter, he was Hannibal's
away from the sea, I would instantly move there and
petition for admission. Of all the states it is my
Jonathan Raban
favorite and my love."
Old Glory
John Steinbeck
1981
Travels with Charley
1962
* *
"Montana is a great splash of grandeur."
he 'jumping-off place' to
John Steinbeck
suburb of Kansas City;
Travels with Charley
of civilization."
Capital: Helena
1962
Cecil Dryden
Became a territory: May 26, 1864
Give All To Oregon
Entered the union (with rank): Nov. 8, 1889
"
State motto: Oro y plata (Gold and silver)
this 'entity,' this 'thing,' this 'place' called
1968
State flower: Bitterroot
Montana has been cyclically beaten, battered, and
*
State bird: Western meadowlark
bruised. It has often been misgoverned, exploited,
ave been more Midwest-
State song: "Montana"
lied to, and lied about. It has suffered as 'an outpost
ant the word, rural and
State tree: Ponderosa pine
of feudal journalism'-the only state in the nation
n behind closed windows
Nicknames: Land of the Big Sky, Treasure State.
without an essentially free press. It has been visited
Origin of state name: Chosen from a Latin dictio-
by awesome drought, withering poverty, and genuine
Richard Rhodes
nary by J.M. Ashley
suppression of civil rights, riots, and lynchings. (It
The Inland Ground
has been notable for legislative incompetence of
1970
The sky really does seem bigger in Montana, as Edna
lowest order, corporate arrogance of the highest
Ferber once claimed in her novels. The state's plain
order, corruptions, and cynicism.) Now (in the
is so vast it seems to reveal the curve of the earth,
1970's), in the midst of the most affluent period in
with the sky sweeping round the horizons in all
the history of America, we have shared in that
1 by Iron Mountain,
directions. Montana affords a greater sense of space,
affluence only marginally, and there is abundant
e wrapped in pools."
of the sheer vastness of the land's expanse than any
evidence that even that share will diminish."
Hart Crane
other state. In a belt running along the far western
K. Ross Toole
The Bridge
1930
edge of the state the spines of the Rocky Mountains
Twentieth-Century Montana
reinforce the sense of omnipresent nature.
1972
In this enormous natural expanse the principal
activities are, fittingly, tied to the land. Ranching and
of the Ozarks."
dry land farming spread across the plains, with
THE LANDSCAPE
H.L. Mencken
barley, wheat and sugar beets the major crops. Butte
Heathen Days
sits on the so-called richest hill in the world, a copper
"In some respects, Montana, among all the states
1943
lode that once supplied half the U.S. production;
remains the closest to basic nature."
*
mining remains an important activity in Montana.
Pearl S. Buck
ottom [in race relations] at
Once some of the most infamous encounters of
America
ich is a county seat with a
America's Indian wars raged across Montana. In
1971
h school, and a zoological
1876 the harassed and infuriated Cheyenne and
* *
297
6
The Administration is committed to strengthening the strong
employment discrimination laws that now exist. These
improvements will remove consideration of factors such as sex,
race, religion, or national origin from employment decisions.
This can be done without encouraging the use of quotas or
preferential treatment, without departing from the fundamental
principles of fairness that apply throughout our legal system,
and without creating a litigation bonanza that brings more
benefits to lawyers than to victims.
O
A major objective of the Administration is to ensure that
Federal law provides strong new remedies for harassment
based on sex, race, color, religion, or national origin.
The Administration will propose to codify a cause of action
for "disparate impact," involving employment practices that
unintentionally exclude disproportionate numbers of certain
groups from some jobs. The burden of proof will be shifted
to the employer on the issue of business necessity."
The time has come for Congress to bring itself under the
same anti-discrimination requirements it prescribes for
others.
Other improvements, including changes in certain provisions
affecting statutes of limitations and encouragement for the
use of alternative dispute resolution mechanisms, will also
enhance the administration of our comprehensive civil rights
laws.
REDUCING FEDERAL BUREAUCRACY AND ESTABLISHING OPPORTUNITY AREAS:
Programs providing social, welfare, health, education, and
nutritional services are often delivered in fragmented ways.
Allowing services to be integrated will better serve the
recipients of these programs and promote self-sufficiency and
opportunity.
The Community Opportunity Act of 1991 will enable local
communities to develop "community opportunity systems" and
allow them to restructure Federal programs to provide
services and benefits in the way the community deems best to
meet the needs of the individuals and families served.
- more -
7
The legislation would allow a Federal administrator
designated by the President to recommend a budget-neutral
waiver of most Federal statutory and regulatory requirements
for any Federally funded program to be included in the
community's opportunity delivery system. The Federal
administrator will make recommendations regarding the waiver
requests to the relevant Federal agency heads.
Communities will be able to develop community opportunity
systems in which:
services and benefits can be integrated, combined, and
restructured at the community level;
the system is neighborhood- or community-based, with a
specified target group of beneficiaries;
--
the individuals and families served can participate in
the design of the system; and
--
the delivery system offers individuals and families in
the target group of beneficiaries the maximum choice
and control over the range, source, and objectives of
the services and benefits to be provided.
Each community opportunity system will have clear and
measurable goals and will be evaluated with regard to both
the short- and long-term outcomes.
EXPANDING JOB OPPORTUNITIES FOR OLDER AMERICANS BY LIBERALIZING
THE SOCIAL SECURITY EARNINGS TEST:
If social security recipients aged 65 to 69 wish to.
supplement their benefits with earnings, they may earn only up to
$9,720 this year before their social security benefits are.
reduced. Beyond $9,720, each three dollars of earnings reduces
their social security benefits by one dollar.
For retirees with sources of income other than earnings,
such as private pensions and investment income, this limitation
on allowable earnings may have little effect on their lives.
Presently, the earnings test falls most heavily on elderly
persons who do not have significant savings or income from
pension plans, and can seriously constrain their choices of
employment.
- more -
Ref.
F351
.C27
WH
The
Encyclopedia
of the Midwest
by Allan Carpenter
Editorial Assistant
Carl Provorse
Contributor
Randy Lyon
Facts On File
New York Oxford
416
Saint Louis
Allied Health Professions, Social Services, and
miles downstream from its confluence with the
Business Administration. Undergraduate ma-
MISSOURI RIVER. One of the great economic
jors include meteorology, geophysics, anthro-
centers of the Mississippi basin, St. Louis is the
pology, communicative disorders, and geogra-
heart of a metropolitan area of 2.3 million
phy. A church-related institution, the univer-
Missouri and Illinois residents. It developed as
sity requires all students to take a total of nine
the principal point of departure for Western
hours of theology during their undergraduate
settlers, and its role as gateway to the West is
tenure. Enrollment: 10,712. Faculty: 2,237.
now commemorated by the 630-foot-high
stainless steel Gateway Arch that towers over
SAINT LOUIS, MISSOURI
the downtown riverfront in JEFFERSON NATIONAL
EXPANSION MEMORIAL.
Name: From Louis IX of France who was
The city's origins are French, and they can be
canonized in 1297, patron saint of Louis
traced to a grant in 1764 of exclusive trading
XV of France.
rights with the local Indians issued to the New
Nickname: Gateway City
Orleans merchant Pierre LACLEDE (1724?-1778).
Laclede immediately traveled upriver to take
Area: 61.4 square miles
possession of his grant, and on February 14,
1764, he landed on the present site of the city
Elevation: 616 feet
with a party of 30 men that included his
Population:
stepson Auguste CHOUTEAU (1749-1829). It was
Laclede who named the new settlement after
1984: 429,296
the patron saint of Louis XV of France.
Rank: 29th
The early history of the settlement is one of
Percent change (1980-1984): minus 5.2%
shifting colonial allegiances. By the time
Density (city): 7,427 per sq. mi.
Laclede arrived, the French had already ceded
Metropolitan Population: 2,398,000
lands on the east bank of the Mississippi to the
Percent change (1980-1984): .88%
British. This brought a migration of French
settlers from that region to St. Louis on the
Racial and Ethnic Makeup (1980):
river's west bank.
White: 53.6%
In 1770 the Spanish took control of St. Louis
Black: 45.6%
under the terms of the earlier Treaty of
Fountainebleu (1762) and made the settlement
Hispanic origin: 5,380 persons
the governmental center of the Upper Louis-
Indian: 679 persons
iana territory. St. Louis was thus a Spanish
Asian: 2,214 persons
possession during the American Revolution and
Other: 1,034 persons
so remained virtually untouched by the war.
St. Louis came under French possession
Age:
again in 1800 by the terms of the San Ildefonso
18 and under: 26.1%
Treaty, but the French were by that time
65 and over: 17.6%
already negotiating the LOUISIANA PURCHASE with
the U.S. The U.S. took formal possession of the
TV Stations: 6
Louisiana Territory on March 9, 1804, with St.
Radio Stations: 35
Louis again serving as the seat of government
for the entire territory.
Hospitals: 65
Incorporated in 1808, St. Louis was also the
Sports Teams:
capital of the Missouri Territory (1812-21)
until Missouri became a state.
Cardinals (baseball)
U.S. possession of the area brought a great
Cardinals (football)
influx of pioneers from eastern states to St.
Blues (hockey)
Louis, which jumped in population from 1,000
in 1800 to 5,600 in 1821. Until that time fur
Further Information: St. Louis Conven-
trading was the basis of the economy, but the
tion and Visitors Bureau, 500 N. Broadway,
first river steamboat reached St. Louis in 1817,
St. Louis, MO 63101
and, from that point on, its economy was based
on shipping and transportation. Steamboat
SAINT LOUIS, Missouri. Independent city,
traffic operated on both the Mississippi and
not in any county, on the MISSISSIPPI RIVER 20
Missouri rivers, bringing settlers to the begin-
Saint Louis
417
ence with the
at economic
t. Louis is the
f 2.3 million
developed as
for Western
) the West is
330-foot-high
towers over
SON NATIONAL
1 they can be
Isive trading
I to the New
1724?-1778).
iver to take
'ebruary 14,
: of the city
ncluded his
Gateway Arch frames St. Louis, Missouri.
129). It was
ement after
ning of the OREGON and SANTA FE trails there.
exurban migration brought about a 2.7%
France.
Another leap in transportation came in 1851,
decline in metropolitan population during the
nt is one of
when the Pacific Railnad Company began
1970s. To counteract the effects of this
the time
construction both east and west from St. Louis.
population shift, the city began a series of bond
eady ceded
The route east to the Atlantic coast was
issues for physical improvements in 1955 and
sippi to the
completed in 1863, opening the city to German
an effort to attract federal funding that has
of French
and Irish immigrants, who by 1870 represented
produced significant interstate highway
uis on the
more than one-third of the total population.
projects.
The growth of the city was unaffected by the
The city nevertheless remains the principal
f St. Louis
CIVIL WAR, which had a devastating impact on
industrial hub of the Mississippi basin. It is
Treaty of
other parts of Missouri.
second only to DETROIT in automobile manufac-
settlement
By the end of the 19th century St. Louis'
ture, is the headquarters of aerospace indus-
per Louis-
economic prosperity brought about a cultural
tries, the home of the world's largest beer
a Spanish
renaissance. Its primary intellectual body was
brewer, Anheuser-Busch, and the location of
lution and
the St. Louis Philosophical Society, which was
numerous food processing plants and textile
the war.
founded in 1866 by William T. Harris and
manufacturers of national importance. It is also
possession
Henry C. Brockmeyer and published The
the largest inland freight port in the U.S., and
Ildefonso
Journal of Specultive Philosophy (1867-93). In
the second largest rail center in the country.
hat time
1878 Joseph PULITZER (1847-1911) began publi-
St. Louis is the home of WASHINGTON
HASE with
caton of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
UNIVERSITY, a branch of the University of
ion of the
Another indication of the city's cultural
MISSOURI, and ST. LOUIS UNIVERSITY.
with St.
atmosphere was the flourishing there of the
Its principal cultural facilities include the St.
vernment
poets T. S. Eliot, Sara TRASDALE (1884-1933)
Louis Art Museum, the Museum of Science and
and Eugene FIELD (1850-1895). By the 20th
Natural History, the ST. LOUIS SYMPHONY and St.
also the
century, St. Louis was prominent enough to
Louis Opera Theatre. Among the most recent
1812-21)
host the LOUISIANA PURCHASE EXHIBITION of 1904,
signs of progress, St. Louis has transformed its
a centennial celebration that was at the time
enormous railroad station into a hotel-shopping
a great
the largest world's fair in history.
center complex which has been praised as one
S to St.
Following WORLD WAR II. however, the city
of the finest of its type. There is also a vast
m 1,000
underwent a period of urban decline, exacer-
modern downtown mall connected to two major
time fur
bated by the flight of its population to the
department stores, and much additional mod-
but the
suburbs. The city's population in 1950 was
ernization has helped to maintain civic interest.
in 1817,
856,796, but by 1980 it had fallen 47% to
The JEFFERSON NATIONAL EXPANSION MEMORIAL
as based
453,085. By 1984 KANSAS crry had surpassed St.
with Eero Saarinen's soaring GATEWAY ARCH is
amboat
Louis in population. For a time, the St. Louis
the focal point of the huge riverfront area, the
opi and
metropolitan area expanded by this shift,
west end of Eads Bridge, Laclede's Landing,
begin-
growing 11% in the 1960s. but a further
several dining, dancing and excursion boats, the
418
Saint Mary's - Saint Paul
Old Courthouse, the Old Cathedral, St. Louis
SAINT PAUL, MINNESOTA
Sports Hall of Fame, the National Bowling Hall
of Fame and Museum, St. Louis Cathedral and
Name: For the Christian Apostle Paul "the
many other points of interest. Vast Busch
apostle of nations."
Stadium is located near the riverfront.
Nickname: Along with Minneapolis, the
two are known as the "Twin cities."
SAINT MARY'S COLLEGE. Roseland,
Indiana, Roman Catholic institution of higher
Area: 55.4 square miles
learning for girls. St. Mary's was founded in
Elevation: 687 feet
1855 as a result of a request from Father
Edward SORIN, president and founder of NOTRE
Population:
DAME. Sister Angela (Eliza Maria Gillespie) led
1984: 265,903
twenty-five nuns from the Bertrand Mission in
Rank: 57
Bertrand, Michigan, to the present site to form
an academy. During the 1985-1986 academic
Percent change (1980-1984): minus 1.6%
year, St. Mary's enrolled 1,770 students and
Density (city): 4,800 per sq. mi.
had 172 faculty members.
Metropolitan Population: 2,114,256
Percent change (1980-1984): 1%
SAINT MARYS RIVER (Michigan). Inter-
national boundary waterway between Lake
Racial and Ethnic Makeup (1980):
SUPERIOR and Lake HURON which flows past
White: 90%
SAULT STE. MARIE. Because it provides the only
Black: 5%
water route between Lake Superior, with its
Hispanic origin: 7,864 persons
wealthy region of minerals and crops, and the
Indian: 2,538 persons
lower GREAT LAKES and then through the ST.
LAWRENCE SEAWAY to the sea, the St. Marys is
Asian: 5,345 persons
considered one of the world's most strategic
Other: 3,514 persons
waterways. Technically, it should be called a
Age:
strait rather than a river. It has been made
18 and under: 24.1%
navigable between the lakes by the S00 CANAL.
65 and over: 15%
SAINT MARY'S RIVER (Ohio-Indiana).
TV Stations: 5
The source of the St. Marys is found near the
Radio Stations: 36
Ohio town of the same name. It flows north
then northwest, crossing the Ohio-Indiana
Hospitals: 14
border near Decatur, Indiana. It turns almost
directly north to FORT WAYNE, where it joins the
Sports Teams:
ST. JOSEPH to form the MAUMEE, which then flows
Minnesota Twins (baseball)
almost directly eastward, then northeast, to
Minnesota Vikings (football)
empty into Lake ERIE at TOLEDO.
Minnesota North Stars (hockey)
SAINT OLAF COLLEGE. Privately sup-
Further Information: Chamber of Com-
ported liberal arts college established in NORTH-
merce, 701 North Central Tower, 445
FIELD, Minnesota, in 1874 and affiliated with the
Minnesota Street, Saint Paul, MN 55101
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
Located on a three-hundred-acre campus with
SAINT PAUL, Minnesota. City, capital of
thirty buildings. Approximately sixty percent of
Minnesota and seat of Ramsey County, lies on
the students participate in the overseas pro-
the bluffs of the MISSISSIPPI RIVER, contiguous
grams available through the college. Saint Olaf
with MINNEAPOLIS, with which it is generally
offers preparation for the Minnesota teaching
linked as the Twin Cities. St. Paul lies at a
certificate. Tutoring programs for all students
great bend of the river, at the head of
are available. Foreign language and religion
navigation, point of debarkation for river traffic
classes are required. It is particularly well-
and a rail center. The city covers 52.4 square
known for its music program. During the 1985-
miles in area.
1986 academic year Saint Olaf enrolled 3,029
Neighboring communities on the south are
students and had 318 faculty members.
South St. Paul and West St. Paul. To the north
THE
SMITHSONIAN
GUIDE TO
HISTORIC AMERICA
THE PLAINS STATES
TEXT BY
SUZANNE WINCKLER
SPECIAL PHOTOGRAPHY BY
JONATHAN WALLEN
TIM THOMPSON
EDITORIAL DIRECTOR
ROGER G. KENNEDY
DIRECTOR OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM
OF AMERICAN HISTORY
OF THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION
Stewart, Tabori & Chang
NEW YORK
SAINT LOUIS
42
SAINT
LOUIS
In the summer of 1763, Jean Jacques Blaise d'Abbadie, commander
of the province of Louisiana, arrived in New Orleans and proceeded
to grant a number of commercial monopolies in the hopes of
shoring up the economy of Louisiana, which had been severely dam-
P
aged during the struggle of France and Spain against England in
the Seven Years' War. To Gilbert Antoine Maxent and his partner,
Pierre Laclède, he granted exclusive trading privileges with the
P
tribes along the Missouri River and west of the Mississippi. It was this
d
trade arrangement that stimulated the growth of Saint Louis. Two
months later Pierre Laclède left New Orleans to reconnoiter this
newly acquired trading domain and to select a site for a future out-
post. Traveling with the group was Laclède's young lieutenant, 13-
year-old Auguste Chouteau, eldest son of Madame Marie Thérèse
R
Bourgeois Chouteau, who was estranged from her husband and had
ol
taken up with Laclède. Marie Thérèse later became the matriarch of
the French village, and her offspring would reign as Saint Louis's
St
first dynasty.
In December, while on this reconnaissance, Laclède selected a
spot for his trading post on the side of a high hill on the west bank
of the Mississippi, about twenty. miles below the river's confluence
SM
with the Missouri. The crest of the hill above the site offered com-
manding views of the Mississippi Valley, but more important, it was
relatively safe from flooding. In February 1764 Auguste Chouteau
returned with thirty woodsmen, who began clearing the bluff for the
outpost. The village was laid out in a linear grid along the river, and
resembled the plan of New Orleans and other French colonial garri-
son-towns. In the spring Laclède named the site Saint Louis after
Louis IX, thirteenth-century Crusader king of France and patron
saint of Louis XV, reigning monarch in 1764. A large commons was
established to provide grazing land and timber for building and
fuel; it extended seven miles southward to the River des Pères.
Within a few years, five common fields had been set aside for cultiva-
tion of food.
Many of Saint Louis's earliest settlers were French families living
on the east bank of the Mississippi who simply ferried across the
OPPOSITE: An allegorical representation of Saint Louis as a lovely young
woman-one of the stained-glass windows created by Conrad Schmidt for Union
Station.
44
SAINT LOUIS
SAINT LOUIS
45
river in 1764 when news arrived that France had ceded to England
ern fur-trade network controlled by a few men, among them
its lands east of the Mississippi in the treaty at the end of the Seven
Laclède (until his death in 1778), Auguste Chouteau, his half-
Years' War. Unbeknownst to them, Louis XV had already given
brother Pierre Chouteau, and their rival, the trader Manuel Lisa.
France's vast Louisiana holdings to Spain. But Spanish administra-
These wealthy merchants brought refined taste to the wilderness
tors did not take charge in Saint Louis until 1770, and even after
village, and they and their wives established a reputation for charm
they did, Saint Louis remained a French colonial village in culture
and style. Visiting Saint Louis in 1804, William Henry Harrison
and spirit until the Louisiana Purchase by the United States.
compared it favorably to Philadelphia and New York. Harrison was
Thereafter it was engulfed by an invasion of westward-bound
not an acute observer, but the circle about the Chouteaus was cos-
American pioneers and entrepreneurs. Only pen-and-ink drawings
mopolitan and hospitable. With the Louisiana Purchase in 1803,
by Clarence Hoblitzelle, commissioned in the late nineteenth centu-
Saint Louis was well positioned to become a hub of exploration,
ry by Pierre Chouteau, Jr., give clues to the original French architec-
commerce, and military operations. In the following year,
ture of the city. A prominent feature of the village was a mill pond,
Meriwether Lewis and William Clark embarked on their expedition
owned by Auguste Chouteau, which stretched two miles west of pre-
from nearby Saint Charles. In 1805 and 1806, Zebulon Pike depart-
sent-day 9th and Poplar streets.
ed Saint Louis on two important exploratory missions, one to find
During the colonial period, Saint Louis grew from a population
the source of the Mississippi, the other to penetrate the Rocky
of forty in 1764 to about a thousand. It became the center of a west-
Mountains.
Thomas Jefferson named Lewis governor of the Louisiana
Territory in 1807. During his short-lived tenure, Lewis demonstrat-
ed scant ability as an administrator; he died, apparently at his own
hand, in 1809. Lewis's co-captain and friend, William Clark, was
named territorial governor of Missouri in 1813, a position he held
until statehood in 1821. He and his wife, Julia, were major figures
in Saint Louis's social, business, and political realms. Clark was one
of the investors, along with the Chouteaus, Manuel Lisa, and
Sylvestre Labadie, in the Missouri Fur Company, which was orga-
nized in 1809. In 1817 the steamboat Zebulon Pike docked at Saint
Louis, bringing a new era in commerce to the town. When Henry
Shaw, founder of the Missouri Botanical Garden, arrived via steam-
boat in 1819, Saint Louis's riverfront was still a parklike expanse,
but the levee eventually became crowded with the commercial
buildings, warehouses, and foundries that characterized the area
until the 1930s and 1940s. Then much of the riverfront was
returned to greensward, and it was used as a parking lot until the
Jefferson National Expansion Memorial was constructed.
Saint Louis took its place as the gateway to the West after the
War of 1812, when the mass westward emigration began. Its loca-
tion on the Mississippi (on a high bluff untouched by the river's
periodic floods) just twenty miles from the mouth of the Missouri
made it the ideal site for a center of trade, transportation, manufac-
Barge traffic on the Mississippi River, passing the Gateway Arch.
turing, and finance. Shops and factories in Saint Louis provided fur
SAINT LOUIS
SAINT LOUIS
47
46
Courthouse, a serenely poised Greek Revival edifice in the heart of
downtown. Across the street once stood the equally venerable
Planters Hotel, which rivaled the Saint Charles in New Orleans and
Astor House in New York. In the 1830s, 5,000 Germans immigrated
to Saint Louis; by the 1840s, 6,000 on average were arriving each
year. To these immigrant ranks were added large numbers of Irish.
By 1850 Saint Louis's foreign-born settlers, edging out American-
born residents, constituted 52 percent of the population. Until
Prohibition, the city's breweries were the most visible commercial
indication of its strong Germanic traditions.
Saint Louis suffered during the national economic downturns
in 1819, 1837, 1857, and 1873, but its blackest year was 1849, when a
cholera epidemic spread through the city, killing 8,000 people.
Then, on May 17, a fire spread from the docked steamboat White
Cloud and destroyed much of the commercial center of the city.
After the fire, many new buildings in Saint Louis were faced with
cast-iron fronts, and the city's foundries became major suppliers of
architectural ironwork. Having surpassed Cincinnati in steamboat
tonnage by 1850, Saint Louis emerged as the leading city along the
Ohio-Mississippi axis.
Saint Louis's large German-American population played an
Firmly in the control of Federal forces, Saint Louis passed through the Civil War
important role early in the Civil War. Staunch Unionists, the
unscathed, as evidenced by this view of the city from Lucas Place made in 1865. The
artist who made the lithograph took some liberties with the facts-the large convent
Germans formed military units named the Home Guard, which
in the foreground was not on Lucas Place.
were called into Federal service by the local commander, Captain
Nathaniel Lyon, when the secessionist state militia threatened to
traders, explorers, and emigrants with virtually everything they
seize the U.S. arsenal in Saint Louis. The militia had been called
needed, from wagons to cooking stoves. In return, the goods of the
out by Governor Claiborne Fox Jackson, who had been frustrated
West, such as furs, hides, lumber, meat, and grain, were sold in
in his effort to bring Missouri into the Confederacy (although the
Saint Louis or at least shipped through it. From the 1820s through
legislature was pro-South, delegates to a special state convention
the 1860s, Saint Louis entrepreneurs virtually controlled the econo-
voted to remain in the Union). Disguised as a woman, Captain
my of the West from the Mississippi to the Rockies.
Lyon entered the camp of the militia and found the men drilling
Until 1830 French was still the prevailing language in Saint
with weapons and artillery smuggled into the city from Baton
Louis, but in the ensuing decades English speakers flooded in-the
Rouge. On May 10, 1861, Lyon deployed six regiments of the
population of the city mushroomed from about 5,900 in 1830 to
Home Guard and regular soldiers-as many as 7,000 men-around
16,700 in 1840, and then to 78,000 in 1850. English became the
the camp and forced the militia (about 700 men) to surrender
common language, while the old French colonial architectural style,
peacefully. As they marched their prisoners through Saint Louis,
with high-pitched roofs and galleries, was abandoned in favor of
the victors were jeered and stoned by a mob whose sentiments were
London- and Philadelphia-derived rowhouses and Greek Revival
not only pro-South but anti-German. A shot fired from the crowd
mansions, even by the old French-American families. The building
that best embodies the confidence of the era-and the expense to
OVERLEAF: A portion of the 1904 Saint Louis Exposition, held on the centennial of
which boosters would go to express that optimism-is the Old
the Louisiana Purchase. At left is the Palace of Liberal Arts.
CO
<<<<<<<<<<<<
<<<<<<<<<<
<<<<<<<<<<<00
SAINT LOUIS
51
SAINT LOUIS
50
provoked a fusillade from the soldiers. Some twenty-eight civilians
endowment to award prizes for journalism and other publishing
and two soldiers died in the melee, followed by a night of rioting in
endeavors. The Pulitzer Prizes commenced in 1917. Although he
which several German-Americans were murdered. On the day after
later became a naturalized citizen of England, the eminent poet T.
the "Saint Louis Massacre," the Home Guard and soldiers firmly
S. Eliot was born in Saint Louis in 1888. The poet Eugene Field was
restored order (with another six deaths). Many secessionists fled
also born in Saint Louis in 1850 and spent much of his writing
the city. In 1862 and 1864, Confederate campaigns made Saint
career here. Scott Joplin, the king of ragtime, made his home in
Saint Louis in the early 1900s.
Louis an objective, but neither got close to the city.
Although it did not physically damage Saint Louis appreciably,
JEFFERSON NATIONAL
the Civil War cut the city off from its traditional southern markets.
EXPANSION MEMORIAL
The development of Chicago as a railroad center drew trade from
Saint Louis. Yet by the late nineteenth century, Saint Louis was the
This gracious green esplanade overlooking the Mississippi River
commemorates the key role played by Saint Louis in the nation's
nation's second-largest grain market, the largest inland cotton mar-
ket, a major meat-packing center, and a leading manufacturer of
westward expansion. The riverfront vista is dominated by the
shoes and beer. The city's chemical industry developed, especially
Gateway Arch, one of America's most familiar landmarks. In 1948
the Finnish-born architect Eero Saarinen won the memorial com-
after 1899, when John Queeny opened Monsanto and began manu-
facturing saccharin, formerly a German monopoly. In 1899, when
petition with his design for a stainless-steel arch. The 630-foot-high
Saint Louis was chosen as the site for the Louisiana Purchase
structure was completed in 1965. Space-capsule-sized elevators rise
Exposition, the city was given an opportunity for a civic rejoinder to
to porthole windows at the peak of the arch, providing splendid
its rival, Chicago (Chicago had been selected to host the World's
views of Saint Louis and the Mississippi River. Beneath the arch is
Columbian Exposition in 1893). The exposition's planners spared
the Museum of Westward Expansion. Through the use of maps,
no effort. When the World's Fair opened in 1904 in Forest Park, it
paintings, documentary photographs, and Indian and pioneer arti-
surpassed in size not only the Chicago exposition but also those
facts, the museum broadly surveys a hundred years of American his-
that had been held in the intervening years in Atlanta, Nashville,
tory: the western exploration of Lewis and Clark in 1804, the Civil
Omaha, Buffalo, and Charleston. Participating states and countries
War, the spread of the railroads, the conquest of the Indians, and
erected almost 1,600 buildings, and 19 million people visited the
Wilbur and Orville Wright's first airplane flight in 1903. An adja-
fair. "Meet me in Saint Louie, Louie" became a national refrain.
cent auditorium offers a documentary film on the construction of
(Some historians credit a food vendor at the Saint Louis World's
the Gateway Arch.
Fair with the invention of the ice-cream cone, but ices in edible
On a knoll, facing east toward the river and the Gateway Arch,
is the Old Courthouse (1839-1862). With its cruciform floor plan,
containers date back to the 1790s.)
Saint Louis claims a diverse roster of literary and musical per-
columned porticos, and massive dome, the stately Greek Revival
sonalities. In 1859 Samuel Clemens received his river pilot's certifi-
building is a typical nineteenth-century temple of justice. The ini-
cate from the Saint Louis inspectors and embarked on the career
tial design was by Henry Singleton, but progress was excruciatingly
on the Mississippi that later inspired his writings under the pen
slow, and several architects had a hand in the project. It was not
name Mark Twain. In 1865 the Hungarian immigrant Joseph
completed until 1862, when William Rumbold's Renaissance dome
Pulitzer arrived in Saint Louis, where he embarked on his journal-
was erected atop the building, despite a prolonged controversy in
ism career and business enterprises. He purchased and eventually
which some engineers offered the opinion that the cast-iron dome
consolidated the Saint Louis Post Dispatch and the German-language
would collapse the structure. The Old Courthouse was the scene of
Westliche Post newspapers in 1878, forming the Saint Louis Post-
the first Dred Scott trials in 1847 and 1850, which led to the
Dispatch, the first of the properties in the Pulitzer publishing
Supreme Court decision in 1857 that blacks were not "persons" or
empire. In 1903 Pulitzer announced that he would bequeath an
citizens and therefore had no right to sue in federal court. The rul-
SAINT LOUIS
SAINT LOUIS
53
52
ing helped precipitate the Civil War. Exhibits in the Old Courthouse
50,000 people came out for its dedication in 1874-and it ranks with
explain the early history of Saint Louis and of western expansion.
the Brooklyn Bridge as one of America's most celebrated achieve-
ments in engineering. Building the span required a feat of persua-
LOCATION: 11 North 4th Street. HOURS: Gateway Arch and Museum of
sion as well. The bridge's designer and promoter was Captain James
Westward Expansion: June through August: 8-10 Daily; September
B. Eads, who first convinced Saint Louis of the need for a railroad
through May: 9-6 Daily. Old Courthouse: 8-4:30 Daily. FEE: Yes. TELE-
bridge and then met the criticisms of colleagues who felt his design
PHONE: 314-425-4465.
for the massive three-span steel and wrought-iron cantilever bridge
was preposterous. Eads orchestrated the construction of the struc-
Basilica of Saint Louis, the King (The Old Cathedral)
ture between 1868 and 1874. When completed, it was unequaled in
The Basilica of Saint Louis is the oldest cathedral west of the
span in America. Eads made early use of steel in the design and
Mississippi and the only structure in the area that was not razed to in
employed pneumatic caissons in the construction of the masonry
make for the Jefferson Memorial. On this site the first mass
abutments and piers. Eads was particularly well equipped to deter-
Saint Louis way was said in 1764. A series of churches have stood here,
mine the proper placement and depth of the piers, the deepest of
beginning with a log chapel constructed in 1770. The present cathe- the
which is 123 feet below water level, for his former career was as a sal-
dral, a handsome Greek Revival structure, was begun in 1831, unfin- at
vager, retrieving cargo from sunken ships in the Mississippi. He
urging of Bishop Joseph Rosati, who noted that the previous the
understood the hazards of the river's silty, shifting floor. Though the
ished church was a "hay barn." The church was designed by
bridge has withstood the test of time as a marvel of engineering, it
Saint Louis architects George Morton and Joseph Laveille. When
was an immediate economic failure. Rail traffic deteriorated, and
completed in 1834, it was the most expensive structure in the city. Its
without tolls, the Illinois and Saint Louis Bridge Company went
rubble limestone walls are faced with cut sandstone. Especially
bankrupt. Today the bridge carries only vehicular traffic.
impressive are the large arched and Venetian windows paned with
clear glass, which pass beautiful light into the sanctuary. A museum bell
LACLEDE'S LANDING
the east side of the cathedral contains the original church
on (1772), eighteenth- and nineteenth-century religious art, and mem-
North of Eads Bridge, Laclède's Landing is a precinct of renovated
orabilia associated with the history of the church.
nineteenth-century warehouses that line the only surviving grid
from Auguste Chouteau's original 1760s survey for the French vil-
LOCATION: Jefferson Expansion Memorial, 209 Walnut. HOURS:
lage he helped to found. American-style buildings began to replace
Museum: 10-6 Monday-Friday, 10-7 Saturday-Sunday. FEE: For
the French colonial structures along the riverfront by the 1820s.
museum. TELEPHONE: 314-231-3250.
After the Civil War, as Saint Louis became a major trade center,
more and more warehouses, factories, foundries, and businesses
Docked on the Mississippi just below the Jefferson Expansion
elbowed their way onto the waterfront, which by 1880 extended
Memorial, is the USS Inaugural (400 Leonor K. Sullivan Boulevard,
from Biddle Street on the north to Chouteau Avenue on the south.
314-771-9911), a World War II minesweeper. All of its fixtures are
Laclède's Landing preserves the last stand of these nineteenth-cen-
intact. Commissioned in October 1944, the Inaugural saw action in
the invasion of Okinawa, defending the fleet from air attacks. It also
tury wharves, warehouses, and commercial buildings.
A few remaining commercial signs, such as those for Bronson
may have sunk a Japanese submarine.
Hide Company, Christian Peper Tobacco, and Switzer Licorice
Company, hint at the diversity of commerce in this district. The
EADS BRIDGE
structures themselves range from the simple brick antebellum build-
Just north of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, the Louis- Eads
ings at 801-805 North 2d Street to the richly ornamented edifices of
Bridge was the first bridge to cross the Mississippi at Saint
the Bronson Hide Company Warehouse (806-808. North 1st Street).
SAINT LOUIS
54
Laclède's Landing is noted for the number of its buildings with cast-
iron ornamentation. Close to the iron mines of southeastern
Missouri, Saint Louis emerged as a major center for the production
of architectural ironwork in the nineteenth century. The facade of
the Raeder Building (721-727 North 1st Street) is the finest cast-
iron facade in Saint Louis.
DOWNTOWN
With its wide boulevards and well-placed pocket parks, downtown
Saint Louis invites pedestrians. The central business district stretches
west from the Mississippi River to Jefferson Avenue and is bounded
on the south by Interstate 40/64 and on the north by O'Fallon
Street. As with every large American city, Saint Louis has lost its share
of architectural landmarks, a recently mourned forfeiture being the
opulent interior of the Ambassador Theatre of 1926. The future of
some buildings is in doubt, for example, Eames & Young's Gothic
Revival Wright Building of 1918. But many fine structures remain.
One of the most important buildings in American architecture is the
Wainwright Building (101 North 7th Street), a steel-frame proto-
skyscraper designed in 1890-1891 by the eminent Chicago team of
Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan. The cinnabar-red, sandstone
facade, embellished with brick and terra-cotta botanical and abstract
motifs, is notable as an early example of Sullivan's classical discipline
and poetic ornament. His architectural ideals were set forth in such
writings as the Tall Office Building Artistically Considered. Two blocks to
the north, Adler and Sullivan's Union Trust Building (705 Olive
Street) was the tallest building in Saint Louis when it was completed
in 1892. It too was adorned with Sullivan's terra-cotta designs. Sadly,
much of the ornamentation on the lower levels has been removed.
Union Station
Saint Louis's magnificent Union Station is a memorial to the heyday
of the railroad and a tribute to late-twentieth-century preservationist
zeal. After two decades of arbitration, the terminal and twelve-acre
train shed have been converted into a commercial complex. The
many-turreted castle, built in the Richardsonian Romanesque style,
OPPOSITE: Turreted, arched, and capped with pyramids, Saint Louis's Union Station
is a bold statement of the power and prosperity of the railroads in the 1890s.
SAINT LOUIS
57
was the largest railroad terminal in the world when it opened in
1894. Theodore C. Link is the architect of record, but the design was
probably largely the work of Harvey Ellis, an itinerant draftsman who
was also responsible for the magnificent entryway to Washington
Place, which anticipated the ornament of Louis Sullivan's
Wainwright Building. The waiting room, or Grand Hall, is a barrel-
vaulted lobby profusely decorated with mosaics, marble, stenciling,
gold leaf, and stained-glass windows by Conrad Schmidt. The train
shed, engineered by George Pegram, sheltered thirty-one tracks and
the loading platforms, an area that handled 300 trains and 100,000
people a day in the 1940s.
LOCATION: Market Street between 18th and 20th streets. HOURS:
10-9 Monday-Thursday, 10-10 Friday-Saturday, 11-7 Sunday. FEE:
For tours. TELEPHONE: 314-421-6655.
On Market Street across from Union Station in Aloe Plaza is
Meeting of the Waters, a fountain of mythical figures and aquatic
creatures, all spouting water. Designed by the Swedish-born sculptor
Carl Milles, the ensemble represents allegorically the marriage of
the Mississippi and Missouri rivers, which meet twenty miles north
of Saint Louis. The unclad bronze figures caused a sensation when
the fountain was installed in 1940, but it has since become a cher-
ished city landmark. The Soldiers' Memorial Military Museum (1315
Chestnut Street, 314-622-4550) has two floors of exhibits of uni-
forms, weaponry, photographs, and military memorabilia. The col-
lection ranges from the Spanish-American War to the Vietnam War.
Campbell House
The Campbell House is the lone survivor of Lucas Place, where
Saint Louis's affluent merchants and professionals lived from 1850
to 1880. The Irish-born Robert Campbell came to Saint Louis in
1824 and embarked on a lucrative career as a fur trader. His firm,
the Rocky Mountain Fur Company, became a rival of the Chouteau-
Astor interests, and Campbell established the trading post that
became Fort Laramie in present-day Wyoming. He returned to settle
in Saint Louis in 1836. In 1854 he purchased this handsome three-
OPPOSITE: A parlor in the Campbell House reflects the Victorian taste for strong col-
ors and for filling a room with a variety of decorative objects.
SAINT LOUIS
SAINT LOUIS
59
58
story Greek Revival townhouse, which had been built in 1851. He
districts lay along Washington Avenue and the parallel Lucas Avenue,
lived here with his wife, Virginia Jane Kyle, and their three sons until
Saint Charles Street, and Locust Street. These thoroughfares,
his death in 1879. The Campbells' reclusive bachelor sons, two of
between 9th and 18th streets, remain a virtual museum of the turn-
whom lived in the house until the 1930s, preserved a virtual muse-
of-the-century mercantile designs of Saint Louis's leading architects.
um of nineteenth-century upper-class domestic life. The house con-
One of the most prominent firms, that of William S. Eames and
tains its original Victorian furnishings, much of them bearing hand-
Thomas Young, designed the Lammert Building (911 Washington
carved Rococo Revival motifs.
Avenue) in 1898 for the oldest dry-goods company in Saint Louis.
The venerable Renaissance Revival structure is named for the
LOCATION: 1508 Locust Street. HOURS: March through December:
furniture company that occupied the building from 1924 to 1981;
10-4 Tuesday-Saturday, 12-5 Sunday. FEE: Yes. TELEPHONE:
one of the current occupants is the Saint Louis chapter of the
314-421-0325.
American Institute of Architects (Suite 225, 314-621-3484), which
has periodic exhibits pertaining to Saint Louis's architectural history.
Within a few blocks of the Campbell house are three churches
The Scott Joplin House State Historic Site (2658 Delmar
whose congregations figured prominently in the religious fabric of
Boulevard, 314-533-1003), scheduled to open in 1990, celebrates
nineteenth-century Saint Louis. Centenary United Methodist (16th
the king of ragtime, who lived in Saint Louis in the early 1900s, dur-
and Pine streets) is a limestone Gothic Revival structure of 1869. It
ing which time he wrote some of his best-known works, including
was built to serve the oldest (1839) Methodist congregation in the
"The Entertainer." The child of a former slave and a free black
city. Saint John the Apostle and Evangelist Catholic Church (16th
woman, Scott Joplin was born in 1868 in Texarkana, on the Texas-
and Chestnut streets) is a twin-towered Romanesque Revival sanctu-
Arkansas border. As a teenager, he joined with other itinerant rag-
ary built from 1859 to 1860 to serve a parish founded in 1848.
time musicians, performing in New Orleans, Nashville, Louisville,
Christ Church Episcopal Cathedral (1210 Locust Street) is a hand-
Saint Louis, and Chicago. In 1902 he lived in this modest Victorian
some Gothic Revival structure dedicated in 1867, noted for its
flat with his wife, Belle Hayden, whom he had married in Sedalia,
C
carved stone altar and reredos. Established in 1819, it is the oldest
Missouri, after the success of his composition "Maple Leaf Rag."
Episcopal congregation west of the Mississippi.
S
The Central Public Library (1301 Olive Street) is an imposing
NORTH SAINT LOUIS
Renaissance Revival granite structure (1912) designed by Cass
Gilbert of Saint Paul and New York, who a few years previously had
The area stretching north along the Mississippi began to be settled
been a principal designer at the Saint Louis World's Fair; the very
in the 1840s. The first wave of newcomers were Germans, then Irish
ornate interior is splendid. City Hall (Market Street at Tucker
and Poles. In the 1910s and 1920s, the prospect of finding work
Boulevard) is a gargantuan Renaissance Revival civic castle modeled
brought an influx of rural people, black and white, mainly from the
after Paris's city hall and constructed between 1891 and 1904.
South and generally poor, to both North and South Saint Louis.
Crouching on an entire city block, the Old Post Office and
With World War II, which created even more employment, the
Customs House (815 Olive Streets) is a fortress of granite designed
rural-to-urban inrush became greater.
in 1872 by Alfred B. Mullett, supervising architect for the U.S.
The town of North Saint Louis (vicinity of North Florissant
Treasury Department. The building, though long in coming (it was
Avenue and Palm Street) was founded by Kentuckians in 1816, but
finally completed in 1884, after much legal wrangling and the
by the 1850s it had become overwhelmingly German. In 1844 a
expenditure of $6 million), is one of the best interpretations of the
group of Germans founded Bremen, which grew rapidly into a
Second Empire style in the country.
bustling manufacturing town; it was incorporated into Saint Louis
During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the
in 1855. Hyde Park (Salisbury and North 20th streets) stands in the
heart of Saint Louis's wholesale, light manufacturing, and garment
heart of old Bremen, and many of the handsome middle-class
SAINT LOUIS
61
SAINT LOUIS
60
who founded this parish in 1855. Saint Stanislaus Kostka Church
townhouses surrounding the park were built between 1850 and
1900. The rich ethnic complexion of North Saint Louis is borne
(1413 North 20th Street) is a Romanesque Revival church (1891)
that served the first Polish parish in Saint Louis, founded in 1880.
out by the wealth of its ecclesiastical architecture. The red-brick
Gothic Revival Bethlehem Lutheran Church (2153 Salisbury Street)
The Holy Cross Catholic Church (8121-8129 Church Road) is a
was dedicated in 1893 (and rebuilt in 1894 after a fire) to serve
red-brick Gothic Revival church (1909) serving a parish founded in
Bremen's German-speaking congregation. Now the Historical
the 1860s by German and Irish immigrants.
Christ Baptist Church (3114 Lismore Street), the former Saint
The largely Protestant Bellefontaine Cemetery (4947 West
Augustine's Roman Catholic Church is a Gothic Revival structure
Florissant Avenue) and its adjacent Catholic counterpart, Calvary
built in 1896 by its German immigrant congregation. The Saints
Cemetery (5239 West Florissant Avenue), have commodious, park-
like aspects. Many famous Saint Louisans are buried here, includ-
Cyril and Methodius Polish National Catholic Church (2005 North
11th Street) was built in 1857 for a Presbyterian congregation-it is
ing Auguste Chouteau, Manuel Lisa, William Clark, the
one of the oldest surviving churches in Saint Louis-but in 1908 it
Confederate general Sterling Price, the Union general William
became home to one of the Polish congregations that had split
Tecumseh Sherman, Senator Thomas Hart Benton, and the bridge
from the Roman Catholic church. Saint Liborius Catholic Church
engineer James B. Eads. The Wainwright Tomb (Prospect Avenue,
(1835 North 18th Street) is a red-brick Gothic Revival sanctuary
in the southeast corner of Bellefontaine Cemetery) was designed in
1891 by Louis Sullivan and is one of his finest works. The Saint
and rectory built from 1888 to 1889 for its German parishioners,
Louis Sullivan designed this mausoleum for Charlotte Dickson Wainwright in 1891.
The Busch mausoleum, in the Gothic Revival style, in Bellefontaine Cemetery.
SAINT LOUIS
SAINT LOUIS
63
62
Louis promoter Ellis Wainwright commissioned the tomb for his
of New York's Radio City Music Hall. The building that best captures
young wife, Charlotte Dickson Wainwright. He was interred here
the spirit of this era is the Fox Theatre (527 North Grand Avenue,
314-534-1678), a 4,500-seat hall promoted by William Fox, founder
thirty-three years later.
The Bissell Mansion, now a restaurant (4426 Randall Place,
of 20th Century-Fox. C. Howard Crane of Detroit designed the exot-
314-533-9830), is a red-brick Greek Revival home built in 1830 on
ic structure, which is encrusted with Moorish and Indian motifs;
the 1,500-acre plantation of Captain Lewis Bissell; it may be the old-
Fox's wife, Eve Leo Fox, created the interior. The theater has been
est extant brick house in Saint Louis. Much of the interior wood-
lavishly restored. Next door, the Vaughn Cultural Center (525 North
work is intact. Captain Bissell, born in Connecticut, served in the
Grand Boulevard, 314-535-9227) has regular exhibits focusing on
War of 1812, commanded Fort Clark in Illinois, and explored the
black history and culture.
Missouri River with the Yellowstone Expedition of 1818-1819.
A prominent businessman and philanthropist, Samuel Cupples
Shortly thereafter he began acquiring 1,500 acres of land for real
made a fortune selling broom and ax handles and other woodware.
estate development in Saint Louis. He died in this house in 1868.
His firm was the largest such company in the world. Now owned by
As early as 1911, a number of white Saint Louisans began draw-
Saint Louis University, the Samuel Cupples House (3673 West Pine
ing up covenants to restrict the sale of domestic property to blacks,
Boulevard, 314-658-3025) is a Richardsonian Romanesque struc-
who were moving into the city in increasing numbers. A house on
ture (1890) noted for its sandstone carvings. The interior is appoint-
Labadie Street became the center of controversy in 1945 when a
ed with twenty fireplaces, extensive carved woodwork, stained glass,
black man, J. D. Shelley, was refused the title to it because the for-
Saint Louis-manufactured ironwork, and period furnishings. It also
mer owners had signed a covenant with a race clause in 1911. In
houses an art gallery in the former bowling alley.
1948 these covenants were declared unenforcable by the U.S.
Cupples Station (South 10th and Spruce streets) comprises ten
Supreme Court in the case of Shelley U. Kraemer. One of the black
warehouses, built between 1894 and 1917, that were linked to the
enclaves to spring up as a result of this de facto policy of segrega-
nearby railroads by an underground system of spur lines. The struc-
tion was the middle-class neighborhood known as the Ville (rough-
tures were designed by Eames & Young and represent an important
ly bounded by Martin Luther King Boulevard, Sarah Street, Saint
grouping of turn-of-the-century commercial building.
Louis Avenue, and Newstead Avenue). Parents in the Ville lobbied
for the relocation of Sumner High School (4248 West Cottage
With its huge, glittering green-tile dome, the Cathedral of Saint
Avenue) to their neighborhood. The red-brick Georgian Revival
Louis (Lindell Boulevard and Newstead Avenue) is one of Saint
structure was completed in 1908; it was designed by a Saint Louis
Louis's landmarks. The immense Byzantine Revival structure takes its
School Board architect, William B. Ittner. The original Sumner
inspiration from the Church of Hagia Sophia in Istanbul. Designed
High School, which dates from 1875, was the first black high school
by the Saint Louis firm of Barnett, Haynes & Barnett, it was built
west of the Mississippi, the result of long battles to obtain public
between 1907 and 1914, although installation of its many mosaics,
education for Saint Louis blacks.
which cover domes, arches, ceilings, and walls, continued until 1989.
MIDTOWN
FOREST PARK AND THE 1904
LOUISIANA PURCHASE EXPOSITION
In the 1880s a mixed-use area of businesses and residences began to
spring up along Lindell Boulevard about three miles west of the
The biggest park in Saint Louis and one of the largest urban pre-
river. By the 1920s the neighborhood comprised affluent homes,
serve-parks in the nation, 1,300-acre Forest Park opened in 1876. It
sophisticated residential hotels, fashionable shops, and glittering the-
was designed by the German-trained landscape architect Maximilian
aters and entertainment houses, One playhouse billed a precision
Kern. The only extant nineteenth-century building in the park is
chorus line called the Rockets, which later evolved into the Rockettes
the Cabanne House (115 Union Avenue), a Second Empire struc-
SAINT LOUIS
65
ture built in 1875 as the park headquarters. By the 1890s large num-
bers of Saint Louisans were taking advantage of this pleasant
expanse, while many of the city's wealthier citizens were settling into
quiet, deed-restricted neighborhoods on the northeastern edges of
the park. Portland and Westmoreland places, where development
began in 1888, are lined with well-shaded mansions, a trove of late-
nineteenth-century opulence along private streets with guarded
entrances. In Fullerton's Westminster Place (4300 and 4400 blocks
of Westminster), another handsome residential area, houses date
from 1892 to 1909 and were designed by Barnett, Haynes & Barnett
and the other leading Saint Louis architectural firms of the period.
At 4446 Westminster Place was the residence of Henry Ware and
Charlotte Stearns Eliot, whose son, the poet T.S. Eliot, intermittent-
ly resided here. Henry Ware Eliot, president of Hydraulic Press
Brick Company, was the son of the Reverend William Greenleaf
Eliot, founder of Washington University. The Second Presbyterian
The Romanesque exterior of the Cupples House (above) features a profusion of
carved faces, animals, flowers, and geometric designs. The main entrance (opposite)
is not at the center of a wall but on a corner, reflecting the assymetrical character of
Romanesque architecture.
SAINT LOUIS
SAINT LOUIS
67
66
Church (4501 Westminster Place), with a congregation that dates
American-naturalized architect, Emmanuel Masqueray, was the
from 1838, is an impressive compound of Romanesque Revival archi-
exposition's chief designer; a Kansas City parks planner, George E.
tecture; the chapel (1896) was designed by the Boston firm of
Kessler, was chief landscape architect. Cass Gilbert, of Saint Paul and
Shepley, Rutan & Coolidge, while the sanctuary (1900) was con-
New York, imposed his grand Beaux-Arts scheme on the fair and
ceived by the Saint Louis architect Theodore C. Link. At the conflu-
emerged as the most dominant of the exposition's several architects.
ence of North Kingshighway, McPherson, and Washington Boulevard
Gilbert's fantastic French Baroque Festival Hall was dismantled after
is the Holy Corners District, an imposing area of turn-of-the-century
the fair, as were all exposition buildings with the exception of his
religious and institutional structures in an array of noble styles.
Palace of Arts, which was planned from the first as a permanent
In 1899, when Saint Louis was chosen as the site for the
facility for the Saint Louis Art Museum (314-721-0067). Gilbert's
Louisiana Purchase Exposition, exposition planners selected Forest
serene and stately Classic Revival structure commands a knoll with a
Park, then on the western edge of Saint Louis and well removed
sweeping view of Forest Park. The museum's American holdings
from the conspicuous industrial squalor of the central city, as the
range from colonial times to the present, with paintings by John
fair site. Development of the 1,200-acre grounds necessitated clear-
Singleton Copley, Winslow Homer, Georgia O'Keefe, and Thomas
ing a section of the park called the Wilderness, which at that time
Hart Benton, and sculptures by Augustus Saint-Gaudens. The muse-
still encompassed a stand of virgin woodland. A French-born,
um has the nation's largest collection of paintings by George Caleb
Bingham, who chronicled antebellum life along the Missouri River.
There are also works by modern American artists such as Mark
Rothko and Frank Stella. In front of the museum is the Apotheosis of
Saint Louis, a bronze equestrian statue of Louis IX by Charles
Niehaus, which was presented to the city in 1906 as part of the post-
exposition restoration of Forest Park.
History Museum
The Missouri Historical Society's History Museum is housed in the
Jefferson Memorial Building, built in 1911 on the site of the main
entrance to the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. The granite-and-
limestone Beaux-Arts structure was designed by the firm of Isaac
Taylor, a Saint Louis architect who served as director of works for
DEDICATED TO APT AND Tr,
the 1904 fair. The museum's exhibits focus on the history and devel-
opment of Saint Louis. The society's collection includes many docu-
ments and personal effects associated with Pierre Laclède, the
Chouteau family, William and Julia Clark, and other men and
women involved in the early growth of Saint Louis. There is also a
photographic exhibit of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition and a
display of memorabilia from Charles Lindbergh's pioneering
transatlantic flight in the Spirit of Saint Louis in 1927.
The Saint Louis Art Museum, designed by Cass Gilbert as part of the 1904 world's
LOCATION: Lindell Boulevard and De Baliviere. HOURS: 9:30-4:45
fair, is noted for its collections of pre-Columbian and German Expressionist art.
Tuesday-Sunday. FEE: None. TELEPHONE: 314-361-1424.
SAINT LOUIS
SAINT LOUIS
69
68
MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN
Under the indefatigable Henry Shaw, a wealthy merchant turned
passionate horticulturist, the Missouri Botanical Garden began to
sprout from a treeless expanse of prairie in the mid-1850s. Opened
to the public in 1859, it not only has beautiful public gardens but
also serves as one of the world's leading botanical research institu-
tions, particularly in the study of endangered tropical flora. Shaw
drew his inspiration from gardens in England and Europe, which he
intended to emulate on the edge of the American wilderness. The
result has become ever more Edenic as modern Saint Louis has
enveloped this serene pocket of towering trees and gardens. Shaw
sought advice from the world's eminent horticulturists, including
Asa Gray of Harvard, the most respected American botanist of the
period, and Sir William Jackson Hooker, director of Kew Garden in
England. In 1866 he hired James Gurney from London's Royal
Botanical Garden at Kew to become chief gardener at both the
Missouri Botanical Garden and Tower Grove Park.
Shaw commissioned the architect George I. Barnett to design
two dwellings and several garden buildings. Tower Grove, Shaw's
country home, is a gracious Italianate structure now surrounded by
The Linnean House at the Missouri Botanical Garden. Built by Henry Shaw and
luxuriant gardens and old trees. His palazzo-style townhouse, which
dedicated to the botanist Carl Linnaeus, the Linnean is the country's oldest public
originally stood in downtown Saint Louis at 7th and Locust streets,
greenhouse in continuous operation.
was dismantled and reconstructed on the garden grounds at Shaw's
behest. Both houses were completed in 1851. Tower Grove contains
carriage entrances, and the sham ruins that were typical of eigh-
Victorian furnishings, some of which belonged to Shaw. The
teenth- and nineteenth-century landscape design. One of these
Linnean House (1882) is the only extant greenhouse dating to the
charming fixtures, the Arsenal Street Gatehouse (4255 Arsenal
Shaw era. The building was originally used for winter storage of
Street, 314-771-2679), designed by George I. Barnett in 1888, now
Shaw's potted palms. Barnett's classically inspired red-brick building
serves as the park headquarters and visitor center.
is a counterpoint to the botanical garden's most famous twentieth-
century structure, the geodesic-domed Climatron, a greenhouse for
SOUTHEAST SAINT LOUIS
tropical plantings completed in 1960 and rebuilt in 1988-1989.
The wedge of Saint Louis along the Mississippi River south of down-
LOCATION: 4344 Shaw Boulevard. HOURS: Memorial Day through
town and Interstate 64 has served as home for wave after wave of
Labor Day: 9-8 Daily; Labor Day through Memorial Day: 9-5 Daily.
immigrants who found work in neighborhood factories or in the
FEE: Yes. TELEPHONE: 314-577-5100.
nearby riverfront district. While the patterns of succession are com-
plex and discrete for each area, it is generally correct to say that
Henry Shaw's other gift to Saint Louis was Tower Grove Park, a pub-
early French settlers and free blacks were followed by Germans and
lic preserve adjoining the Missouri Botanical Garden. Shaw donated
Central and Eastern Europeans, who in turn were replaced by rural
the land to the city in 1868. In the following years, he oversaw the
white migrants. This part of Saint Louis is characterized by brick
planting of 20,000 trees and shrubs and the construction of gazebos,
rowhouses arranged in compact neighborhoods that often center
SAINT LOUIS
70
around a park. These residential pockets are interspersed with mod-
est storefront businesses and the churches erected in the nineteenth
and early twentieth centuries by devout ethnic congregations.
Founded in 1836, Lafayette Square (Park Avenue between
Mississippi and Missouri avenues) was the city's first public park. It
was developed from the common fields where the early French set-
tlers from Laclède's village farmed. After the Civil War, the park was
landscaped by Maximilian Kern (designer of Forest Park), and the
surrounding area became a fashionable residential neighborhood of
handsome stone townhouses in Second Empire, Queen Anne,
Romanesque Revival, and other nineteenth-century styles.
Anheuser-Busch Brewery
The Anheuser-Busch Company is the largest beer maker in the
world. Its headquarters compound contains many nineteenth-centu-
ry brick structures, including the administration building (1868), an
octagonal stable (1885), and the six-story brew house built in 1892.
These structures are elaborately ornamented inside and out. In
1861 Eberhard Anheuser, principal creditor of Schneider Brewery,
took over the small, faltering brewery on this site, which his son-in-
law, Adolphus Busch, parlayed into an industrial giant. Busch mar-
ried into the family in 1861 and joined the firm as a salesman. He
had a knack for promotion and pioneered the refrigeration and pas-
teurization of beer. Anheuser-Busch weathered Prohibition by man-
ufacturing baker's yeast and a nonalcoholic malt drink called Bevo.
LOCATION: 13th and Lynch streets. HOURS: June through August:
9-4 Monday-Saturday; September through May: 9:30-4
Monday-Saturday. FEE: None. TELEPHONE: 314-577-2153.
Chatillon-DeMenil Mansion
This farmhouse (ca. 1849) was expanded into a stately Greek Revival
structure in 1863. The first owners were Henri and Odile DeLor
Chatillon. She was the granddaughter of Clement DeLor Treget, the
Frenchman who founded Carondelet in 1767; Henri was a guide on
Francis Parkman's Oregon Trail expedition. Dr. Nicholas DeMenil
OPPOSITE: Copper kettles, each having a capacity of more than 20,000 gallons, in the
1892 Anheuser-Busch brew house. The brewing process used today is largely the
same as it was in the nineteenth century.
SAINT LOUIS
SAINT LOUIS
73
72
purchased the house in 1856 with a partner, whom he bought the out struc- in
joined by other French settlers from nearby Cahokia and Kaskaskia
1861, after which he arranged for altering and enlarging Emilie
on the east bank of the Mississippi, as well as Creole, French, and
for his family. A Frenchman, DeMenil was married to
Canadian farmers and mountain men. Carondelet lay along the
ture Sophie Chouteau, great-granddaughter of Marie Thérèse Bourgeois until
Mississippi south of Saint Louis, an area that is now roughly bound-
Chouteau. Three generations of DeMenils lived in the house,
ed by Delor Street on the north, the River des Pères Drainage
1928, when industrial pollution from nearby factories prompted
Channel on the south, and Route I-55 on the west. All vestiges of the
George and Ida DeMenil to leave the neighborhood. The house two
early French colonial village are gone, but there are several hand-
contains lavish period furnishings and decorative art, including and
some limestone structures built by the German immigrants who
1837 portraits by George Caleb Bingham. The crystal and china
made Carondelet their home in the 1840s, including the Jacob
a few items of furniture are original DeMenil pieces.
Steins House (Steins and Reilly streets, private), the Charles
Schlichtig House (300 Marceau Street, private), and the Henry Zeiss
LOCATION: 3352 DeMenil Place. HOURS: February through
House (7707-7713 Vulcan Street, private).
December: 10-4 Tuesday-Saturday. FEE: Yes. TELEPHONE:
314-771-5828.
Jefferson Barracks Historical Park
The historic Saint Louis Arsenal (2d and Arsenal streets), which now
lies within the U.S. Aerospace Center, was established in 1830. It
Overlooking the Mississippi River, this bluff-top military post was
carved out of the common fields of Carondelet in 1826, the year
supplied ordinance for the Black Hawk and Mexican wars but was to
that its namesake, Thomas Jefferson, died. Jefferson Barracks
especially important during the Civil War as a major supplier an
Union troops in the Mississippi Valley. The old armory comprises date
served as a crucial military outfitting and training center during
the era of westward expansion. In 1832 the Sauk leader Black Hawk
of handsome limestone buildings and warehouses, which
was brought to Jefferson Barracks after the Black Hawk War, and
array to the 1830s. The Saint Louis architects George Morton and Joseph
during his incarceration George Catlin painted his portrait. Many
Laveille had a hand in the early planning of the arsenal.
men who served here became prominent figures in the Civil War,
including Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, Braxton Bragg, Ulysses S.
Eugene Field House and Toy Museum
Grant, William Tecumseh Sherman, and Philip Sheridan. Four of
"Wynken, Blynken, and Nod" and "Little Boy Blue" are perhaps also the
the stone-and-brick buildings dating from the 1850s have been
famous of Eugene Field's verses for children. He was this a
restored, and a museum in the old powder magazine contains perti-
most prolific newspaper columnist in the 1880s. Field was born in in
nent maps, photographs, weapons, uniforms, and flags.
brick house in 1850 and lived here until 1864; he died in Chicago
1895. Built as part of a row in 1845, the house contains period fur-
LOCATION: 533 Grant Road, at the end of South Broadway. HOURS:
nishings, a large collection of antique toys and dolls, and memora- Field, a
10-5 Wednesday-Saturday, 12-5 Sunday. FEE: None. TELEPHONE:
314-544-5714.
bilia of Eugene Field. Field was the son of Roswell Martin
lawyer for Dred Scott.
The Provincial House of the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Carondelet
LOCATION: 634 South Broadway. HOURS: 10-4 Tuesday-Saturday,
Convent (6400 Minnesota Avenue) is the oldest foundation of the
12-4 Sunday. FEE: Yes. TELEPHONE: 314-421-4689.
Sisters of Saint Joseph in America. The order of nuns came from
Lyons, France, to Saint Louis in 1836, to teach the deaf. In 1845
CARONDELET
they started a school for the daughters of free blacks. The construc-
Carondelet was founded in 1767 by the Frenchman Clement DeLor
tion of the convent's compound began in 1841. The Quinn Chapel
Treget, who came here from nearby Sainte Genevieve. He was soon
A.M.E. Church (227 Bowen Street) is a Greek Revival brick structure
REMARKS BY
JACK KEMP
SECRETARY
IDEPARTMENT AND U.S. URBAN * DEVELOPMENT OFFICUSING
at the
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF HOMEBUILDERS
ANNUAL CONFERENCE
ATLANTA, GEORGIA
JANUARY 21, 1991
Good morning, and thank you for that kind introduction,
Martin Perlman. Mark Tipton, members of the Board, ladies and
gentlemen, thank you for inviting me to the 47th annual
convention of the National Association of Home Builders, and I
hope I'm around for the 50th!
I am delighted to be here with you once again, and it's a
special honor to be in Atlanta on this holiday dedicated to Dr.
Martin Luther King, who fought so hard to extend the promise of
our American democracy and equality of opportunity to all people.
I want to congratulate Martin Perlman on his leadership --
through some difficult days -- of the NAHB. I'm pleased that
we've forged a strong alliance and partnership between HUD and
NAHB, committed to a single goal: expanding the dream of
homeownership and affordable housing to all American families.
And, Marty, while we'll all miss your leadership, I am confident
that incoming President Mark Tipton will guide NAHB into the
90's, and help make this a decade of affordable housing for
people everywhere.
Two years ago, when I first spoke to you as HUD Secretary, I
shared my sense of hope and optimism about the future. And while
homebuilding has been through "the valley of the shadow," our
legislative goals were realized when President Bush signed the
National Affordable Housing Act last November -- the first major
piece of housing legislation in over a decade.
I am proud of this landmark bill, our HUD management reform,
and our other accomplishments, but I also recognize the serious
problems that exist in the homebuilding industry today. Since we
2
first met, the Nation's economy has slipped into recession after
eight years of unprecedented non-inflationary growth.
No sector of our economy is feeling the effects more
severely than the homebuilding and real estate construction
industry. I don't need to remind you that housing starts have
plummeted: last month, single-family construction fell to an
annual rate of 755,000 homes, the lowest rate since October of
1982. For the year, actual multifamily starts dropped to the
lowest level since 1975.
While I remain confident about the long-term prospects for
restoring growth to the economy and to the housing market, I want
you to know that President Bush and I share your deep concern
about the severe problems facing the homebuilding industry today.
We know that many of you have been unable to get the credit you
need to invest, to build, and to grow. Tightened regulatory
policies resulting from the S&L crisis and FIRREA (Financial
Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act) have created
a credit crunch that makes it difficult -- and sometimes
impossible -- for you to get the credit facilities you need to
finance new housing construction. In fact, President Bush spoke
to us about this problem at the White House the day he signed the
new housing bill.
A Chamber of Commerce study reports that businesses in three
out of four regions of the Nation are having difficulty obtaining
credit. Real estate and construction firms have been
particularly hard hit. Small and medium-sized firms of less than
3
500 employees --- almost all of you here fit that category --
account for over 40 percent of those having the greatest
difficulty obtaining credit.
We don't need statistics to tell us about this problem --
I've talked to builders all over the country. From Massachusetts
and New England to Florida, and from New York to California,
regulatory takeover of banks and thrifts has cut off lines of
credit and existing loans, forcing foreclosures and
bankruptcies.
The savings and loan crisis has created what I've called
almost a "regulatory reign of terror." Overly cautious
government regulators and bank examiners are scaring thrifts and
banks away from prudent and legitimate loans and investments. In
response to regulatory pressures, lenders have been tightening
their standards for construction and development loans since at
least May, according to Federal Reserve Board surveys. Some
lenders became so cautious that they tightened credit more than
once during the year.
The restrictions placed by FIRREA -- such as the loan-to-
one-borrower rule and risk-based capital requirements -- have had
a particularly negative effect on smaller banks and S&Ls,
effectively drying up the financing available for acquisition,
development, and construction -- ADC loans. HUD's own data shows
that construction lending has dropped since FIRREA was passed.
But there is good news, too. The Fed has eased interest
rates. Recently, HUD joined with Fannie Mae in a unique
4
partnership to assist the homeless -- and, last Friday, I
approved and am glad to announce today a new partnership between
Fannie Mae and HUD to conduct the pilot construction loan program
that I've talked about with NAHB. Fannie Mae and HUD will
participate in $100 million worth of construction loans, working
with banks and S&Ls that are hamstrung by the FIRREA rule on
loans-to-one-borrower. NAHB's Martin, Kent, Bob, and Mark worked
with Fannie Mae to develop this program, and I hope and believe
that it will help meet the problems faced by builders who are
being hurt through no fault of their own.
I think you'll also be interested to know that the
Resolution Trust Corporation has been authorized by the Oversight
Board, which I serve on, to provide seller financing for assets,
including real estate, that can't be sold at acceptable prices
because of the lack of available commercial financing. This
serves the government's interest in getting better prices for RTC
properties, including land, and in moving these properties to
private ownership. And it helps you by making these properties
available for building or rehab on terms that should make good
business sense for all concerned.
The problem with the thrifts is compounded by the trouble in
the banking system as a whole. Declining real estate values have
triggered a regional recession and significant bank problems in
the northeast. More and more capital is being set aside in
reserves to cover losses on real estate loans, further
constricting the lending activities of banks.
5
I want to assure you that President Bush is deeply concerned
and committed to increasing the flow of credit. As Treasury
Secretary Brady has said, we need a banking system willing to
take reasonable risks in lending to good creditors.
While there is room for cautious optimism, there is no
denying the fact that the credit crunch and the problems in the
banking system are exacerbating the homebuilding slump. As a
result of these factors, commercial and residential construction
has fallen 40 percent below the 1986 level. Multi-family
construction has plunged by more than 55 percent from 1986. But
something else occurred in 1986 which I believe is also having a
damaging effect on the housing industry -- the 1986 Tax Reform
Act was passed.
When I was in Congress, I voted enthusiastically for the
1986 tax rate reduction and reform bill because I supported the
dramatic reductions in marginal income tax rates for individuals
and businesses. Unfortunately, the "liberal left" extracted too
high a price for this growth-oriented measure -- a 65-percent
increase in the maximum capital gains tax rate -- and, at the
same time, with little thought of sufficient transition rules,
made the mistake of eliminating many real estate tax incentives
which boosted construction of commercial, low-income, and multi-
family projects.
The highest effective capital gains tax in history is
eroding the value of real estate and other financial assets. In
the past five years -- since the capital gains tax was increased
6
-- the Standard & Poor's Real Estate Investment Trust Index has
tumbled by about 70 percent.
Let's look back to the period of 1978 to 1986 when the Index
skyrocketed by 110 percent. What was the difference? The
capital gains tax was cut twice during this period -- in 1978 and
again in 1981 with the Reagan-Kemp-Roth tax rate cuts.
I believe that many of the problems facing the economy and
the homebuilding and real estate industries could have been
avoided if Congress had reduced the capital gains tax to 15
percent and indexed it as President Bush repeatedly called upon
Congress to support.
I recently met with Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan
Greenspan, and he agrees that cutting or eliminating the capital
gains tax will help restore value to real estate and other
financial assets, increasing revenues to all levels of
government. All of us were thrilled when Governor Sununu spoke
so favorably about this in his recent speech to the National
Press Club.
If Congress had cut the capital gains tax when President
Bush first proposed it two years ago, the value of all financial
assets -- including real estate -- would be significantly higher
than it is today. Higher real estate values would mean fewer
thrift failures and less pressure on banks from failing real
estate loans. The cost of the savings and loan bailout would
also have been reduced, because the government's portfolio of
property would also increase in value. The Chamber of Commerce
7
has estimated the potential savings at nearly $20 billion, and I
think it would be even more.
In my opinion and that of our President, the best thing we
can do for the homebuilding industry is to get the Nation back on
the track of non-inflationary economic growth, as we had
throughout the 1980s.
As the world moves to democratic capitalism, it's ironic
that some here in our own country want to move in the opposite
direction. Senators Bill Bradley and George Mitchell say that
their proudest moment was defeating the President's capital gains
tax reductions. Congressmen Gephardt and Rostenkowski want to
raise taxes on millionaires to "soak the rich" and redistribute
income and wealth.
Ladies and gentlemen, you can't have entrepreneurial
capitalism without venture capital; and you can't get people to
put capital at risk without a dramatic cut or elimination of the
capital gains tax.
Some liberal Democrats seem to be more concerned that
someone might get rich in America, than that many poor people are
falling deeper into poverty as a result of their anti-growth
policies of envy and class warfare.
President Bush believes in a different course when he calls
for a lower capital gains tax for the Nation and elimination of
the capital gains tax in those pockets of poverty we would
designate as enterprise zones to help increase minority job
opportunities and broaden the base of capitalism in our inner
8
cities.
According to a recent study by David Goldman at
Polyconomics, capital gains taxes could reach 75 percent or more
for long-term assets purchased during the inflation of the
seventies. This is the highest effective capital gains tax in
American history. Faced with a 75-percent effective tax bite,
most people simply will not sell their assets, thereby locking up
capital in status quo investment and forcing down the value of
real estate, homeownership, farms, and our equity markets.
No one needs new capital more than minorities, who own such
a tiny portion of America's total capital stock. Cutting capital
gains would help free up existing capital to help fund high-risk
new enterprises. These businesses create most of the new jobs
and business opportunities for low-income and minority Americans.
The dynamic consequences of cutting capital gains taxes go
beyond the short-term unlocking. There is also a boost to asset
values and a permanent boost to the economy by reducing people's
preferences for debt and consumption, and thus increasing the
demand for stocks and bonds, farms, factories, real estate, and
other investments. This is the essence of a more broadly based
system of capitalism and private property rights so vital to the
Bush Administration's strategy of combatting poverty and despair.
Astonishingly, the revenue estimators in the Joint Committee
on Taxation and the Congressional Budget Office don't take these
dynamic consequences into account -- not the higher asset values;
not the reduced budget outlays for the S&L bailout; not the
9
stronger tax collections from Federal, State, and local income
taxes; not the higher stock prices and real estate values; not
even, except in the most understated way, the unlocking of
trillions of dollars in unrealized capital gains. They
particularly ignore the stimulating impact it would have on
entrepreneurship.
No wonder the Joint Committee on Taxation calls the capital
gains tax a revenue loser. Others, not so tunnel-visioned, say
just the opposite -- that it raises revenue. Fiscal Associates,
a Washington economics firm, estimates that cutting capital gains
would generate anywhere between $25 and $65 billion over four
years. Even Economist Allen Sinai -- never a strong proponent of
tax cuts -- has concluded that cutting the capital gains tax
would raise Federal revenue by $30-40 billion between 1990 and
1995. Economists from Henry Kaufman to the highly respected Wall
Street financier, Ted Forstmann, want to eliminate the capital
gains tax on assets held for three years to spur economic growth
and foster entrepreneurship.
I know many of you are encouraged by the recent efforts of
the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates. Let me suggest that
if the capital gains tax were cut, the subsequent growth in the
economy would leave ample room for monetary easing without
risking inflation. Cutting capital gains rates would also coax
funds out of tax-exempt securities, further increasing the
available pool of risk-capital.
President Bush's recent decision to nominate economist
10
Lawrence Lindsey to the Federal Reserve Board is to be highly
commended. Larry will be a strong voice for non-inflationary
economic growth. He understands that growth does not cause
inflation and that people building homes and buying homes is not
inflationary -- as we were told by members of the Federal Reserve
in both the late 70's and early 80's.
The housing industry enjoyed explosive growth in the mid-
80's as inflation came down, held down, and I'm proud to say that
the Federal Housing Administration was a major contributor to
that growth. Unfortunately, when I came to HUD, I discovered
that the FHA -- which has helped house millions of American
families, including the Kemp family (we bought our first home
with an FHA-insured mortgage when I was a young San Diego Charger
quarterback in the 60's) -- was threatened with insolvency within
just a few years. I knew we had to take immediate action for
reform.
We made FHA reform an important part of the National
Affordable Housing Act. I know some preferred different options
than the eventual solution; but I appreciate NAHB's recognition
of the basic problem and your support for efforts to rebuild the
FHA fund, even though we disagreed on exactly how to do it.
The reforms will reduce defaults and allow us to increase
FHA's capital reserves. With a comptroller conducting oversight
of its management and accounting procedures, and with whatever
further actions are necessary, we're going to ensure that FHA
remains financially secure and continues to meet the important
11
social goals of helping low- and moderate-income people get their
first home.
These are major steps in returning the FHA fund to actuarial
soundness. As long as I am HUD Secretary, I will fight to assure
that FHA mortgage insurance will be available for future
generations of homebuyers and that the mortgage interest
deduction will not be tampered with.
We're moving ahead with our new Delegated Processing Program
for multifamily housing which will make FHA mortgage insurance
more readily available. Under the program, HUD-approved lenders
will process mortgage insurance applications for multifamily
housing development. This new program will speed up processing
and help you expand affordable housing opportunities by providing
a steady supply of multifamily rental housing.
When I say the program will speed up processing, I expect
our field offices to respond to Site Acquisition and Market
Analysis applications within 45 days, to Conditional Commitment
applications within 45 days, and to Firm Commitment applications
within 45 days.
Starting February 1st, we'll launch Delegated Processing as
a pilot program for new construction in Illinois, Minnesota,
North Carolina, and Florida.
Then, by mid-April, we'll introduce the program nationally,
throughout the 50 States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto
Rico. The national Delegated Processing Program will extend FHA
mortgage insurance for multifamily housing development, not just
12
for new construction, but also for substantial rehabilitation,
refinancing, and -- in some cases -- acquisition. It also will
apply to nursing homes and SRO facilities.
Finally, I want to acknowledge your cooperation with our
efforts to make housing more affordable for the American people.
NAHB is well represented on the Commission President Bush asked
me to establish on Regulatory Barriers to Affordable Housing.
Such leaders as Roger Glunt from Pittsburgh and Jay Buchert from
Cincinnati are playing an important role in shaping the
Commission's recommendations.
The Commission has heard witnesses from all across the
country testify on how regulatory barriers, red tape,
exclusionary zoning, rent controls, and conflicting policies add
to the cost of housing. One of the worst examples I've heard of
is the homeless shelter in Juneau, Alaska, where the St. Vincent
de Paul Society wasn't allowed to open the shelter they built
without a parking lot, and they couldn't pave the parking lot
because it was a wetland -- the Army Corps of Engineers wouldn't
let them. It took a year before the Society could open the
shelter and serve homeless families and battered women.
The Commission wants to change that. I have attended their
meetings and have been impressed with the caliber of debate and
with the breadth of issues they are tackling. The Commission
believes that we need to find incentives for State and local
governments to remove their barriers to affordable housing, so we
can at last begin to make real progress on this issue.
13
We need to work together -- HUD, builders, State and local
governments, concerned citizens -- to remove these barriers.
I'll do my part. Early in this Administration, I announced
that HUD would no longer do subdivision approvals and burden
development with time-consuming and costly NEPA (National
Environmental Policy Act) compliance. A change of our practice
is underway, and I'm not squeamish about it. I am unambiguously
pro-growth, while recognizing we need to preserve our earth and
environment. One-third of the land area of the United States is
already government-owned, and unbridled application of
suffocating environmental and land use laws could place more than
two-thirds of America's private property in jeopardy. That's not
good for people, and that's not good for housing.
To reach our goals, our top domestic priority must be to
reinvigorate the national economy -- with the housing industry
helping lead the way. That's what we did in the early 1980s,
when America's economy was mired down by high taxes, regulations,
and high interest rates. It was the housing and construction
industry that helped lead us out of the recession.
I know we can do it again. We need to get housing costs
down. We need to remove barriers to housing affordability. And,
most of all, we need a capital gains tax cut that can help make
possible the strong and growing economy with lower interest rates
that all of us want and President Bush is working for.
Ladies and gentlemen, many of our relatives and friends are
at war in the Middle East, fighting for the cause of freedom.
14
President Bush has acted forcefully to show Saddam Hussein that
the international community will not allow aggression to be
rewarded. Our prayers go out to our military forces -- they have
the support of the President and the Congress, of the American
people, and of the entire international community.
As President Bush has said in Churchillian fashion, our
cause is just and we will prevail!
Thank you, Godspeed, and God Bless America.
# # #
13 January 1991
MEMORANDUM FOR MARK LANGE
FROM:
JENNIFER GROSSMAN
SUBJECT:
QUOTES FOR S.O.U.
1)
"Voice of America: Ronald Reagan and the American Rhetorical
Tradition" (article):
"Americans tend to respond more to what is said than to how
it is said. And it is here that Ronald Reagan's genius
lies. He conveys a message of native optimism and hope for
the future which is deeply rooted in the American character
and in American history."
R.R.:
"Let me tell you something of the American
character. You might think that with such a varied nation
there couldn't be any one character, but in many fundamental
ways there is We're idealists We're a compassionate
people
We're an optimistic people. Like you, we inherited
a vast land of endless skies, tall mountains, rich fields,
and open prairies. It made us see the possibilities in
everything. It made us hopeful. And we devised an economic
system that rewarded individual efforts, that gave us good
reason for hope. "
"As early as 1964, in his famous speech for Barry Goldwater,
he spoke of America's 'rendezvous with destiny
=
Sometimes people call me an idealist,' Woodrow Wilson once
said. 'That is why I know I am an American. "
"
John Stuart Mill, who said: 'a state which dwarfs
men
will find that with small men no great thin can really
be accomplished. "
"
Franklin Roosevelt, who told Congress in 1935,
Continued dependence on relief induces a spiritual and
moral disintegration fundamentally destructive to the
national fiber. To dole our relief in this way is to
administer a narcotic, a subtle destroyer of the human
spirit.
" 'Freedom is not the sole prerogative of a chosen few, 1 Mr.
Reagan has stressed. 'It is the universal right of all God's
children.'
" (Luigi Barzini said that) America is 'alarmingly
optimistic, compassionate, incredibly generous
It was a
spiritual wind that drove Americans irresistibly ahead from
the beginning. II
2)
SACRIFICES MADE FOR THE NEW WORLD ORDER:
"Those who expect
to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the
fatigues of supporting it."
--Thomas Paine
3)
"The ball of liberty, I believe most piously, is now so well
in motion that it will roll around the globe for light and
liberty go together."
-Thomas Jefferson
4)
"Think of your forefathers and of your posterity. "
--John Quincy Adams (1802)
5)
ON EDUCATION: "Mind is the great leveler of all things."
--Daniel Webster (1825)
6)
"With malice toward none, with charity for all, with
firmness in the right. "
--Abraham Lincoln (1865)
7)
"Hold each other in true fellowship."
--Henry Ward Beecher (1869)
8)
"Peace upon any other basis than national independence
is
fit only for slaves. "
--William Edgar Borah (1919)
9)
"A new integrity of human life. "
--Frank Lloyd Wright (1939)
10)
"Americans fight joyously in a just cause. "
--Harold L. Ickes (1941)
11) "We are going to win the war and we are going to win the
peace that follows. "
--Franklin D. Roosevelt (1941)
12)
"What we have done so far are but small building blocks in a
huge pyramid to come. "
--John H. Glenn, Jr. (1962)
13)
"We cannot learn from one another until we stop shouting at
one another. "
--Richard M. Nixon (1969)
14)
"
out of the midst of the fire, of the cloud, and of the
thick darkness."
--Moses proclaims the Ten Commandments
15) "I see the ardor for liberty catching and spreading."
--Dr. Richard Price, in London, hails the French
Revolution (November 4, 1789)
16) "Events, which are the arguments of God, are stronger than
words, which are the arguments of men."
--"Beveridge the Brilliant" takes up the White
Man's Burden (April 27, 1898)
17) "It is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people
into a war. "
--President Wilson asks Congress to Declare war
against Germany (April 2, 1917)
18) POSSIBLE PARALLELS WITH GULF SITUATION: "When we consider
these things, then the valley of the Thames draws closer to
the farms of Kansas."
--General Eisenhower conquers London (June 12,
1945)
19) ENVIRO:
"
Nature never did betray The heart that loved
her. "
--William Wordsworth
20) ENVIRO:
" Content to breathe his native air. "
--Alexander Pope: Ode on Solitude
21)
ENVIRO:
"Our Union is river, lake, ocean and sky. "
--O.W. Holmes, Brother Jonathan's Lament for
Sister Caroline
22) THE VISION THING: "A vision without a task is but a dream,
a task without a vision is drudgery, a vision with a task is
the hope of the world."
--Inscription on a church in Sussex, England, 1730
23) "Opportunity doesn't necessarily knock on the door; it may
be leaning against the wall waiting to be noticed."
--anonymous aphorism
24) "To look up and not down,
To look forward and not back,
To look out and not in, and
To lend a hand."
--E.E. Hale: Ten Times One Is Ten, 1870
25) "Laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the
progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed,
more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths
disclosed, and manners and opinions change with the change
of circumstances, institutions must advance also, and keep
pace with the times."
--Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Samuel Kercheval,
July 12, 1816.
26) "The Ship of Democracy =
--Grover Cleveland, in a letter to Wilson S.
Bissell, February 15, 1894.
27) CONCILIATORY RETRO ON GULF DEBATE: "If our democracy is to
flourish, it must have criticism; if our government is to
function it must have dissent."
--Henry Steele Commager, Freedom, Loyalty,
Dissent, 1954.
28) EMPOWERMENT: "[The people] are the only sure reliance for
the preservation of our liberty."
-Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to James Madison,
December 20, 1787.
29) EMPOWERMENT: "Every government degenerates when trusted to
the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves
therefore are its only safe depositories."
-Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to Abbe Arnoud,
July 19, 1789.
30) "A democracy is peaceloving. It does not like to go to war.
It is slow to rise to provocation. When it, has once been
provoked to the point where it must grasp the sword, it does
not easily forgive its adversary for having produced the
situation Democracy fights in anger--it fights for the
very reason that is was forced to go to war."
--George F. Kennan, American Diplomacy, 1900-
1950, 1951.
31) "One has the right to be wrong in a democracy."
--Claude Pepper, in the Congressional Record, May
27, 1946.
32) "The first requisite of a good citizen in this Republic of
our is that he shall be able and willing to pull his
weight."
--Theodore Roosevelt, in a speech in New York
City, November 11, 1902.
33) EMPOWERMENT: "All the ills of democracy can be cured by
more democracy."
--Alfred E. Smith, in a speech in Albany, New
York, June 27, 1933.
34) ****EMPOWERMENT: "Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is
a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it
is a thing to be achieved."
--William Jennings Bryan, in a speech in
Washington, D.C., February 22, 1899.
35) HOPE: "The longest day must have its close--the gloomiest
night will wear on to a morning."
--Harriet Beecher Stowe, Uncle Tom's Cabin, 1852.
36) "This day we fashion Destiny, our web of Fate we spin."
--John Greenleaf Whittier, "The Crisis," 1848.
37) WE MUST THINK MORE ABOUT X, NOT Y: "If more politicians in
this country were thinking about the next generation instead
of the next election, it might be better for the United
States and the world."
--Claude Pepper, quoted in the Orlando Sentinel-
Star, December 29, 1946.
38) "There are always two parties, the party of the Past and the
party of the Future; the Establishment and the Movement."
--Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Life and Letters in New
England,' Lectures and Biographical Sketches,
1883.
39) "A politician thinks of the next election; a statesman
thinks of the next generation."
--Attributed to James Freeman Clarke.
40) "My affections were first for my own country, and then,
generally, for all mankind."
-Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to Thomas Law,
January 15, 1811.
41) "The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every
battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and
hearthstone all over this broad land."
--Abraham Lincoln, in his first inaugural address,
March 4, 1861.
42) "Patriotism is just loyalty to friends, people, families."
--Robert Santos, quoted in Al Santoli, Everything
We Had: An Oral History of the Vietnam War by
Thirty-three American Soldiers Who Fought It,
1981.
43) LITERACY: "Books are not lumps of lifeless paper but minds
alive on the shelves."
--Gilbert Highet
44) When asked his secret, Wayne Gretsky replied:
"I skate to where to puck is going to be, not where it has
been."
45) "The game is well worth the candle that may have to be
burned far into the night. There is no feeling like the
feeling of success."
--J. Paul Getty
46) EDUCATION: "Every child is an artist. The problem is how
to remain an artist once he grows up."
--Pablo Picasso
47) FACTOID: In 1914, the first year income tax was collected,
Americans paid an average per capita tax of 41 cents--and
only one percent of the population was obligated to pay
taxes at all.
48) EDUCATION: "A book must be the axe for the frozen sea
inside us. "
--Franz Kafka, Letter to Oskar Pollak, January 27,
1904.
49) "The war will continue to be prosecuted with vigor, as the
best means of securing peace."
-James K. Polk, Second Annual Message to
Congress, December 8, 1846.
50)
****
"
let every man stand to his post, and let
posterity find our skeleton and armor on the spot where
duty required us to stand."
--Millard Fillmore, Speech at Buffalo, N.Y., April
16, 1861.
51)
"We accepted war for humanity. We can accept no terms of
peace which shall not be in the interest of humanity."
--William McKinley, At Cedar Rapids, IA, October
11, 1906.
52)
'[war is a] dramatic symbol of a thousand forms of duty. "
--Woodrow Wilson, Speech at Brooklyn, NY, May 11,
1914.
53) "We cannot accept the doctrine that war must be forever a
part of man's destiny."
--Franklin D. Roosevelt, Campaign address at
Cleveland, Ohio, November 2, 1940.
54)
"
victory required a mighty manifestation of the most
ennobling of the virtues of man--faith, courage, fortitude,
sacrifice!"
-Dwight Eisenhower, Address in Ottawa, Canada,
January 10, 1946.
55) "Out of rubble heaps, willing hand can rebuild a better
city; but out of freedom lost can stem only generations of
hate and bitter struggle an brutal oppression
"
-Dwight Eisenhower, Address at Columbia
University, March 23, 1950.
51) "Conquest is not in our principles; it is inconsistent with
our government."
Republican State Governors Speech
How Cutting Capital Gains Taxes Empowers the Poor and Enriches the States
by Secretary Jack Kemp
Department of Housing and Urban Development
A great political party must have a great purpose. Abraham
Lincoln helped found the Republican party nearly one hundred and
forty years ago upon the greatest idea in all human history, the
idea of the Declaration of Independence: equal rights, equal
opportunity and equal access to property for every human being.
That cause must remain our party's vital center if we are going
to lead American democracy into a promising new century.
I was thrilled when President Bush invoked these Republican
roots at the ceremony for our new housing bill. As he signed the
law to empower public housing residents with the opportunity to
manage and own their own housing, he recalled Lincoln's
Homestead Act of 1862, which gave 160 acres to any family who
wanted to make a go of it in the wilderness.
Lincoln's homestead Act of 1862, President Bush reminded the
East Room audience, was "one of the most successful endeavors in
American history -- causing the great land rush to the Wild West
and forming the vision for a new homesteading program in urban
American today
Because Abraham Lincoln's Homestead Act
empowered people," he said, "it freed people from the burden of
poverty, it freed them to control their own destinies, to create
their own opportunities, and to live the vision of the American
dream."
This vision is not unique to Americans. In the first decade
of the twentieth century, Pyotr Stolypin, the Russian Premier,
distributed millions of acres of cold, unused Siberian land to
the landless, impoverished, oppressed peasants. Stolypin's goal
-- so similar to Lincoln's -- was, in his own words, "to offer
the peasant a way out of poverty to enable every hardworking
tiller of the soil to farm on his own account, applying his own
labor without encroaching on the rights of others."
From the Czars until Brezhnev, Siberia's only use seemed to
be as a gigantic prison. Yet within five years, over four
million persons moved to Siberia when offered the chance to
become homesteaders -- more than in the three hundred previous
years. All Russia prospered as Siberia went from a deserted
wasteland to a bountiful land full of thriving farms and
flourishing villages. Russia's budget was balanced. "After
three years,' writes Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, "these people could
scarcely believe that they had once lived in penury, and wondered
why they had not set out for Siberia long ago."
The radical reform movment in Russia today, lead by such
democratic capitalists as Yeltsin, Popov, and Shatalin, is
Republican State Governors
PAGE 2
beginning to recognize, once again, the value of private property
and actually give people title to their own apartments and homes.
Imagine -- Stolypin's pre-Soviet reform movement has become the
model for post-Soviet perestroika!
Whether in Russian Siberia, the American West, or the urban
ghettoes, the idea of opening access to property and economic
opportunity, giving people a chance to better their lives and
achieve their dreams will work anywhere, anytime it is tried.
As the world moves to democratic freedom, it's ironic that
some here in our own country want to move in the opposite
direction. Senators Bill Bradley and George Mitchell say that
their proudest moment was defeating the President's capital gains
CAP
tax reductions. Congressmen Gephardt and Rostenkowski want to
raise taxes on millionaries to "soak the rich" and massively
GAINS
redistribute income.
Democrats seem to be more concerned that some people are
getting rich in America, than that poor people are falling deeper
into poverty as a result of their anti-growth policies.
Like Mr. Lincoln, President Bush believes in a different
course when he calls for a lower capital gains tax for the
nation and elimination of the capital gains tax in pockets of
poverty we would designate as Enterprise Zones.
Some claim that Democrats will beat Republicans mercilessly
with the dreaded "fairness" argument. I say bring it on. As
Lincoln taught us, fairness does not tear down the rich, it
forges stronger links between individual human effort and reward;
it does not quarrel about dividing old wealth, it concentrates on
creating new wealth; it doesn't recognize limits to growth and
life as a static, zero sum condition, it expands opportunities
for all people of any color, condition, or background to reach
their God-given potential.
Take the Democrats' notion of "fairness" as equality of
result and match it against the Republican principle of equality
of opportunity. I have no doubt that Republicans will be
overwhelmingly elected today just as Lincoln's party won
virtually every election from 1860 to 1932 by drawing a clear
dividing line over fairness -- rightly understood!
But we've got to do a better job not just describing but
advancing our principles. The capital gains tax cut is truly
fair because of what it will do for the poor, indeed for everyone
in the country.
Contrary to the Democrats' hysterical claims, cutting the
capital gains tax is an overwhelming incentive for small
Republican State Governors
PAGE 3
businessmen and women -- especially in our inner cities and among
minority entrepreneurs -- who seek opportunities to become rich.
Between 1977 and 1982, when the Steiger Amendment cut the
Haves
capital gains tax from 49 percent to 28 percent, the number of
black-owned businesses exploded by nearly 50 percent -- one of
the largest gains on record. We need to at least double the
number of minority-owned businesses in the next few years. But
it can't be done under the current high capital gains tax rate.
Capital gains taxes could reach 75 percent or more for long
term assets purchased during the inflation of the seventies.
This is the highest capital gains tax in American history.
Faced with a 75 percent effective tax bite, most people simply
will not sell their assets, thereby locking up capital in status
quo companies and current investments.
No one needs new capital more than minorities, who own a tiny
portion of American's total assets. Cutting capital gains would
help free up existing capital to fund high risk new enterprises.
These businesses create most of the new jobs and business
opportunities for poor and minority Americans.
For most of American history a low or non-existent capital
gains tax opened opportunity for millions of immigrants to join
bain
the mainstream of society. Tragically, just as legal and racial
barriers to millions of poor and minority Americans have come
S
down, another wall, the high capital gains tax rate, may condemn
caft
today's minorities and poor to yet another chapter of denied
its
opportunity and economic despair. Cutting capital gains is
civil
issul
today's pressing civil rights issue.
The Democratic leadership rejects this tax rate reduction
because they say it would help the rich and lose revenue. That's
not surprising. The Democrat-dominated Congressional Committees
who control the revenue "black box" always tell us that our tax
reductions are costly and unfair and their own special interest
programs and budget gimmicks are equitable and beneficial to
the Treasury.
But static revenue estimates have been repeatedly proven
false. The truth is that the capital gains tax is largely a
voluntary tax for the wealthy. They can avoid paying it simply
a aser rec
by not selling their assets. By lowering the capital gains tax,
upper-income earners will be more willing to sell their assets
and realize their accumulated gains. As such, the government
will collect far more taxes from the wealthy and lift the tax
burden proportionately from the poor and working Americans.
If revenue gurus took account of this "unlocking effect"
Republican State Governors
PAGE 4
fully, the government would gain revenue from cutting the tax in
the short run and upper income earners would contribute more to
the U.S. Treasury. But "unlocking of assets" is only a one-
time phenomenon, the critics counter, and in the long run,
revenues would fall.
The dynamic consequences of cutting capital gains taxes go
beyond the short term unlocking. There is also a boost to asset
values and a permanent boost to the economy by reducing people's
preferences for consumption and increasing their demand for
stocks and bonds, farms, factories, real estate, and other
investments.
S & L bailout costs would also be reduced, because cutting
capital gains taxes would raise the value of the government's
hilto
real estate holdings. And by helping the real estate and
financial industries, a reduction in the capital gains tax would
boost those economic regions and coastal areas which are
experiencing severe economic problems.
dear
Astonishingly, the Congressional revenue estimators in the
estalets
Joint Committee on Taxation don't take these dynamic consequences
into account -- not the higher assets values, not the reduced
budget outlays for the S & L bailout, not the stronger tax
collections from federal income or payroll taxes, not the higher
stock prices or real estate values, not even -- except in the
tiniest, most understated way -- the unlocking of trillions of
dollars in unrealized capital gains.
No wonder the Joint Committee on Taxation calls the capital
gains tax a revenue loser. Others, not so tunnel-visioned say
just the opposite -- that it raises revenue. Fiscal Associates,
a Washington economics firm, estimates that cutting capital gains
expots
would generate anywhere between $25 and $65 billion over four
years. Even economist Allen Sinai -- never a strong proponent of
tax cuts -- has concluded that cutting the capital gains tax
would raise federal revenue by $30-40 billion between 1990 and
1995,
Our economic future must not be determined by the folks who
told us that the Reagan/Bush tax cuts of the eighties were a give
away to the rich, and should not have been passed -- the same
folks who lost the debate when Jimmy Carter lost the White House.
Because President Reagan and then Vice-President Bush had the
courage to tell the zero sum thinkers to go back to their
computers, tax rates were cut, the eighties economy boomed,
inflation came down, and -- despite the naysayers -- the higher
income earners pulled out of tax loopholes, tax shelters, and tax
exempt bonds and put their money into new taxable investments.
Republican State Governors
PAGE 5
The result: the rich shouldered a higher portion of the
total income tax load; the poor and middle class less.
According to recent IRS statistics, between 1981 and 1987, the
Preb
tax burden on the top 1 percent of taxpayers shot up by nearly 40
percent; the top 5 percent pay a 23 percent greater share; and
the top 10 percent of income earners saw their share jump by over
15 percent. Meanwhile, the lower half of income earners saw
their income tax burden fall by about 19 percent.
Parts
Many middle and lower income families saw their total tax
bill go up because the payroll tax rose. We can and should
remedy that payroll tax hike, and also give the economy the
tritt
stimulus it needs now by cutting capital gains. Allen Sinai
estimates that cutting capital gains would increase GNP by almost
first
3% or over $150 billion, create 2.5 million new jobs, and boost
business capital spending by 1.3%.
Minorities and the poor have the most to lose from the
liberal left's anti-growth campaign. The poor most need the
jobs, higher incomes, and business opportunities that the capital
gains cut would help guarantee.
But it's not the poor alone who would benefit by cutting
capital gains taxes. Localities and the states most of you
govern have an enormous stake in this capital gains debate; and
we need your help to get this tax cut at the top of our
party's national agenda and passed through Congress.
It's no secret that the states experiencing the greatest
budget difficulties and electoral discontent are those which
passed major new tax increases. Massachusetts, New York, and New
Jersey, just to name three, are obvious and dramatic
demonstrations that popular tax revolt is alive and well. As
soon as he was elected, Governor Jim Florio carried out a "tax
the rich" agenda which created a backlash that nearly cost
Senator Bill Bradley his reelection.
Unfortunately, so many States have raised taxes recently
that a national recession may be resulting as much from State as
federal policy developments.
It's also no coincidence that the fiscal condition of many
states began to deteriorate steadily after the 1986 law which
raised federal capital gains taxes. In the eighties states
enjoyed cumulative surpluses of $10 to $30 billion. Today, two-
thirds of states are in the red. New York and California, which
were in large surplus in 1986, are both facing an estimated $1
billion budget deficit in the current fiscal year.
Ways and Means Chairman Rostenkowski has warned governors
and mayors not to expect any additional help from the federal
Republican State Governors
PAGE 6
government in balancing your budgets. "You can't get something
from us that we haven't got," Rep. Rostenkowski was quoted as
saying in the Washington Post.
Well, there is such a thing as a free lunch! We need a
Bush/Quayle tax cut that will do for the state economies in the
nineties what the Reagan/Bush tax cuts did in the eighties. If
the capital gains tax is cut, not only would the federal
government gain greater revenues, but states and localities will
also reap revenue windfalls, since the new asset sales pass
through state and local "tax gates" as well as federal ones. One
economic group with a good track record estimates states would
enjoy between a $15 and $40 billion windfall from cutting capital
gains taxes.
This is not an inside-the-beltway accountants' squabble.
There is a struggle going on here for the heart and soul of the
Republican party, and it can be stated simply: Are we going to
be the party of economic growth, expanding opportunity,
entrepreneurial capitalism, and free market solutions to poverty?
Or are we going to be the status quo party that regards all
wealth as fixed, static, and immutable?
The truth is that the 1980s were not built on credit cards,
but on record private sector investment in plant, equipment,
jobs, and new businesses. The President's policies of tax
reduction, sound money, and less regulation generated the
80 is
strongest peacetime expansion on record, created over 21 million
growth
new jobs during the past eight years, launched over 4 million new
businesses, and generated record increases in real after tax
income for all income groups and all sectors of our society.
While the Nation's gross national product grew by 26.3 percent
between 1983 and 1989, federal tax revenues expanded by 35.7
percent, twice as fast as they did in the 1970's.
The Republican party's legacy of economic expansion is not
the only thing under attack. Empowerment ideas to fight poverty
are being challenged as new and untried. These ideas are no more
untried than Lincoln's homestead act or Stolypin's land
privatization was. There really is no such thing as the "New
Paradigm." There's only the tried and true paradigm of democratic
capitalism -- the ideas of private property, free markets, and
individual incentive on which America was built.
George Bush said it well, "we know what works
freedom
works." I think it was audacious for President Bush to say that
-- one of this Administration's defining moments.
The President has appointed me to head up his Economic
Opportunity and Empowerment Task Force. He charged our Task
Force with coordinating and outlining a far-reaching agenda to
Republican State Governors
PAGE 7
fight poverty using the principles of markets, choice, and
incentive.
I want to recommend some ideas that I would put forward for
consideration in that agenda.
First, we've got to create growth and jobs. The debate
creat
over getting this economy moving again is just getting started.
tobst
In my view, we need tax rate reductions on labor, capital, and
the family to spark a prairie fire of new job creation and
and
entrepreneurial risktaking all across America, especially in
America's inner cities. Cutting capital gains tax for the
nation, eliminating capital gains taxes on assets held for more
than three years, and abolishing them in distressed areas are
crucial priorities. But so are reducing the payroll tax and
expanding the personal and children's exemption.
yourshy
Second, we've got to expand access to homeownership and
property, and create more affordable housing. While HOPE has
home
been authorized, we've got to get funding in 1991 and 1992. If
we can get that funding, poor people will be given a chance to
own more than 2 million government housing units -- an estimated
$100 billion in public property. More than 250 housing projects
will be in resident management by the end of 1992, and we are
targeting more than 1 million new first-time homeowners by 1992
through all programs of the Department of Housing and Urban
Development, including HOPE.
seduel
Third, we've got to improve the quality of education and
job training. Our nation's primary and secondary schools have
been the traditional route for enterprising poor people to move
up and out of poverty. Yet, far too often, these inner city
schools are providing disgracefully poor education. I believe
the Republican party should foster quality education by expanding
educational choice. Along with such champions as Wisconsin's
Polly Williams and Detroit Councilman Keith Butler, I think that
choice expanding options like magnet schools, tuition tax
credits, and educational vouchers can help open up new paths of
opportunity to our nations poor.
Fourth, we must help welfare recipients move to economic
welfers
independence by reducing effective tax rates on persons trying to
leave welfare and take jobs. A woman on welfare, with a couple
of children, struggling to make it, faces the highest marginal
income tax in the United States of America, higher than any man
or woman in this room. Whether she takes a job at McDonald's or
McDonnell Doughlas, the government takes away the welfare and
taxes her income. I believe we should eliminate the tax on the
first two, three, or four rungs of the ladder so that the
incentive for work is greater than the reward for not working.
Republican State Governors
PAGE 8
social)
Fifth, we must strengthen the family. Every social and
economic thinker today recognizes that one-parent families with
children are far more likely to be in poverty, remain in poverty,
and perpetuate poverty, than families in which both a father and
mother are present. Part of the reason for the upsurge in family
breakup is escalating taxation of the intact family. Adjusted
for the rise of inflation and incomes since World War II, the
personal and children's exemption would have to be over $6,000,
rather than about $2,000 as it is today. I think we should raise
that exemption to give families more after-tax income in order to
reduce financial pressures, to help families keep more of their
own resources to take care of their children, and to help them
break free from government assistance.
These ideas should be opening shots in a war on poverty. We
must become the party that awakens, liberates, and emancipates
the talent of people who've been left out and left behind.
No one said it better than Mr. Lincoln. He was attacked by
his opponents and he had to defend Republican views of equality
of opportunity: "I don't believe in a law to prevent a man from
getting rich," he responded, "It would do more harm than good
I want every man to have the chance -- and I believe a black man
is entitled to it -- in which he can better his condition -- when
he may look forward and hope to be a hired laborer this year and
the next, work for himself afterward, and finally to hire men to
work for him! That is the true system."
Our party must rededicate itself to Lincoln's vision of
democracy -- creating new wealth, empowering the poor, and
opening access to property and homeownership. Thank you very
much.
#
WAGING WAR ON POVERTY
HO
OF
H
P
E
A
HOMEOWNERSHIP AND OPPORTUNITY FOR PEOPLE EVERYWHERE
URBAN DEVELOPM OPN
Public and Indian Housing Homeownership
Multifamily Homeownership
Single-Family Homeownership
Family Self-Sufficiency
Preservation of Affordable Housing
Elderly Independence
Shelter Plus Care for the Homeless
PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH and SECRETARY JACK KEMP
HOPE will do what traditional programs have not done: empower low-
income families to achieve self-sufficiency and to have a stake in their
communities by promoting resident management as well as other forms of
homeownership.
President George Bush
From remarks by the President
in Signing Ceremony for
National Affordable Housing Act
The White House
November 28, 1990
This agenda is the most dramatic, far-reaching, incentive-oriented ap-
proach to fighting poverty in the last 25 years. It will tear down the walls
that come between people and their self respect that prevent people from
exercising their talents and reaching their potential.
Jack Kemp
Secretary of Housing
and Urban Development
HOPE
Homeownership and
Opportunity for
People Everywhere
Table of Contents
Introduction
1
HOPE Grants
3
Public and Indian Housing Homeownership
4
Multifamily Homeownership
6
Single Family Homeownership
8
/
Shelter Plus Care for the Homeless
10
Family Self-Sufficiency
12
Preservation of Affordable Housing
14
Elderly Independence
16
Summary Table
18
Introduction
On November 28, 1990, President Bush signed into law a set of new ini-
tiatives called HOPE-Homeownership and Opportunity for People
Everywhere. This program is the first stage of a new and successful war
against poverty, deploying the forces of private-sector entrepreneurship
and economic incentive to create opportunity, jobs, and affordable hous-
ing.
Offering seven new initiatives, the HOPE agenda amounts to more than
$3.1 billion in total resources over 2 years, including more than $2.5
billion in authorized budget authority and over $630 million in State/local
and nonprofit matching funds. Together, these initiatives will dramatically
expand homeownership and affordable housing opportunities to help low-
income families achieve self-sufficiency.
But affordable housing and homeownership must be coupled with jobs and
entrepreneurial opportunities to make self-sufficiency a rewarding alterna-
tive to dependence. While Congress has passed most of the HOPE hous-
ing initiatives, other HOPE programs to expand economic opportunity,
jobs, and entrepreneurship were not passed into law. These include: the
Administration's Enterprise Zone legislation, which eliminates capital
gains taxes in depressed communities; the Housing Opportunity Zones
proposal to encourage State and local regulatory relief for affordable
housing; Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs) for first-time homebuy-
ers to help finance homeownership; and extension of the Low-Income
Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) to create and rehabilitate affordable housing
for low-income families and the working poor. If affordable housing
opportunities are combined with powerful entrepreneurial incentives,
poverty can be fought with a comprehensive strategy that attacks despair
on all fronts and replaces powerlessness with hope and opportunity for a
better future.
Instead of simply ameliorating the symptoms of poverty, HOPE builds a
ladder of opportunity so that poor people will be better able to pull them-
selves out of the poverty trap to live a life of dignity, independence, and
self-sufficiency. If there is one overriding theme of the HOPE initiatives,
it is to empower people to take control of their lives, their homes, and their
destinies.
2
Empowerment is a radical departure from the past because it attacks the
disincentives at the root of America's poverty problems rather than accept-
ing poverty as a long-term and intractable condition. In this respect, it
means incentivizing our housing and economic systems so that everyone
has the chance to reach as high as their aspirations and abilities will take
them. In short, HOPE promises to help Americans overcome the barriers
that stand between themselves and their full potential. Empowerment is
furthered through HOPE initiatives in two principal ways:
Empowering people with the opportunity to manage and own their
own homes and apartments
The Administration's HOPE homeownership grant programs and the
preservation initiative are based on turning renters into homeowners and
property managers. Broadening ownership of private property improves
maintenance and upkeep of housing, increases pride of ownership, and
gives low-income people reasons to save, invest, and plan for the future.
Empowering low-income people to live in dignity and independ-
ence by offering necessary support services
Poverty is not simply a housing problem, it is a multifaceted human
problem as well. The Administration's "Shelter Plus Care" program
provides the homeless who are seriously mentally ill or substance abusers
(over one-half of the homeless population) with the necessary support
services to live dignified lives. Family Self-Sufficiency ties vouchers and
certificates to comprehensive services-including child care, job training,
and transportation-to make shelter a platform for self-sufficiency. HOPE
also targets support services to the elderly to help them enjoy independent
lives.
In short, HOPE ambitiously offers not a Band-aid for poverty, but a
beginning effort at a cure. By strengthening the link between effort and
reward, by increasing equity stakes in homes and neighborhoods, by
expanding job creation and enterprise, the Administration's HOPE pro-
grams are opening a path of opportunity out of poverty and beginning to
recapture the American dream for millions who have been left behind.
Most importantly, President Bush's initiative offers hope-hope for
economic opportunity and better housing, hope for a better life for more
Americans, hope for the future.
3
HOPE Grants
The HOPE grants program is a multifaceted initiative created to increase
homeownership for low-income and working poor families. Authorized at
$1.0 billion over 1991 and 1992, HOPE grants are provided for:
Public and Indian Housing Homeownership ($448 million)
Multifamily Homeownership ($331 million)
Single Family Homeownership ($231 million)
Empowering the poor through resident management and homeownership
are two of the Administration's most important housing policy goals.
HOPE grants fund new programs to meet these housing goals.
The HOPE grants program enables public housing residents to purchase
their homes; it capitalizes on existing strengths and abilities of nonprofit
organizations and community-based housing development organizations;
and it increases the housing resources of the Nation's poor.
Grants can be used for public housing; properties financed or owned by
Federal, State, or local governments; and distressed properties in the
Federal Housing Administration (FHA) portfolio.
Recipients are required to match Federal HOPE grant funds with State,
local, or private funds.
Grants can be used for acquisition, rehabilitation, technical assistance,
counseling, and operating and replacement reserves.
HOPE grants provide initial and short-term subsidies for the promotion of
homeownership and other self-sufficiency opportunities.
4
Public and Indian Housing Homeownership
HUD is authorized to provide $448 million in grants over 2 years to fund
activities needed to develop and implement a successful homeownership
program for public and Indian housing residents.
Purpose
Homeownership is superior to rental housing in cost effectiveness and in
resident satisfaction. Homeownership instills pride, improves neighbor-
hoods, enhances independence, and encourages stable and intact families.
Many Public Housing Agencies (PHAs), Indian Housing Authorities
(IHAs), and resident organizations have been involved in providing
homeownership opportunities to public and Indian housing residents
through Federal programs, as well as through their own initiatives. Until
now, there has been no national program to guarantee all residents of
public and Indian housing the right to manage and own their residences.
Highlights
Assistance is available through national competitions to resident manage-
ment corporations, resident councils, cooperative associations, nonprofit
organizations, and public agencies (including PHAs and IHAs). This
assistance is available for two kinds of grants:
1. Planning and technical assistance grants to assess viability and
prepare residents for homeownership. Planning grants are limited
to $200,000 per project.
2. Implementation grants for the rehabilitation of developments, as
well as for counseling and training, economic development
activities, capital reserves, operating expenses and reserves, and
transaction costs.
Applicants are required to provide $1 for every $4 in Federal HOPE
implementation grant funds, except for funding for operating expenses and
for planning grants, which do not require matching funds. The match can
be provided through: Community Development Block Grants (CDBG) for
administrative expenses; taxes; fees or other charges waived for the
5
development; the donation of real property; and in-kind contributions,
including sweat equity by the purchasers.
Both multifamily and contiguous single-family public and Indian housing
units can be acquired. Multifamily developments can be sold as condo-
miniums, cooperatives, or other ownership arrangements approved by
HUD.
Families will not be required to pay more than 30 percent of their adjusted
income to purchase a residence.
Recipients are required to protect the rights of non-purchasing tenants by
allowing them to remain as renters after the development is sold, or by
giving them Section 8 certificates or vouchers to move into private hous-
ing.
Applicants must replace any housing sold on a one-for-one basis.
6
Multifamily Homeownership
HUD is authorized to provide $331 million in grants over 2 years to help
residents in government-insured or -owned, or FHA distressed multifamily
buildings to purchase and maintain their properties.
Purpose
There is a large stock of existing multifamily housing that has been in-
sured by Federal, State, or local governments. In addition, many FHA-
insured multifamily properties are in financial or physical distress or have
been foreclosed. This available and affordable housing represents another
potential homeownership resource.
Restoring these properties to good condition offers a major opportunity to
extend the benefits of homeownership to low-income families across the
country.
Owners who have mismanaged their rental properties should be replaced
with resident owners committed to their homes and their neighborhoods.
Subsidies which had been given to owners will be replaced with subsidies
targeted directly to residents, offering them greater control over their
housing.
Highlights
Assistance is available through national competitions to resident manage-
ment corporations, resident councils, cooperative associations, nonprofit
organizations, and public agencies (including PHAs and IHAs) for two
kinds of grants:
1. Planning grants to assess viability and prepare residents for
homeownership. Planning grants are limited to $200,000 per
project.
2. Implementation grants for acquisition, rehabilitation, technical as-
sistance, counseling and training, economic development activi-
ties, capital reserves, operating expenses and reserves, and trans-
7
action costs. Implementation grants are limited to the present
value of 10 years' worth of Section 8 Existing fair market rents.
Applicants are required to provide $1 for every $3 in Federal HOPE im-
plementation grant funds, except for funding for operating expenses and
for planning grants, which do not require matching funds. The match can
be provided through: CDBG for administrative expenses; taxes, fees or
other charges waived for the development; the donation of real property;
and in-kind contributions, including sweat equity by the purchasers.
Multifamily properties that are financed or insured by HUD; owned by
HUD, Farmers Home Administration, Resolution Trust Corporation, or a
State or local government; or HUD properties in serious physical or
financial distress can be purchased under this program.
Multifamily projects can be sold as condominiums, cooperatives, or other
ownership arrangements approved by HUD.
Families will not be required to pay more than 30 percent of their adjusted
income to purchase a residence.
Recipients are required to protect the rights of non-purchasing tenants
after the development is sold by giving them Section 8 certificates or
vouchers to use as a subsidy to remain in the development or to move into
other private housing.
8
Single Family Homeownership
HUD is authorized to provide $231 million in grants over 2 years to
promote low-income homeownership in publicly held single-family
properties.
Purpose
Single-family properties owned by Federal, State, or local agencies repre-
sent a significant potential resource for homeownership for low-income
families.
Scattered-site, single-family public and Indian housing units are also
suitable for conversion to homeownership.
Nonprofit organizations are another vast, untapped resource in many com-
munities. They are in an ideal position to develop homeownership pro-
grams because of their strong ties to the communities and neighborhoods
where low-income families live.
Highlights
Two kinds of grants are available through national competitions to non-
profit organizations or to public agencies (including PHAs and IHAs) in
cooperation with nonprofits:
1. Planning grants to assess viability and prepare families for home-
ownership. Planning grants are limited to $200,000 per applicant.
No planning grants will be funded for Fiscal Year 1991.
2. Implementation grants for acquisition, rehabilitation, counseling
and training, and transaction costs. While an applicant may be
approved for multiple projects in multiple neighborhoods, it may
not receive more than $1 million a year for implementation grants
in any one HUD Region.
Single-family properties with one to four units owned by HUD, the De-
partment of Veterans Affairs, Farmers Home Administration, Resolution
Trust Corporation, or a State or local government; or scattered-site, single-
family public and Indian housing can be purchased under the program.
9
Applicants are required to provide $1 for every $3 in Federal HOPE im-
plementation grant funds. The match can be provided through: CDBG for
administrative expenses; taxes, fees or other charges waived for the devel-
opment; the donation of real property; and in-kind contributions, including
sweat equity by the purchasers.
Families must be first-time homebuyers.
Families will not be required to pay more than 30 percent of their adjusted
income to purchase a residence.
8
10
Shelter Plus Care for the Homeless
Shelter Plus Care is authorized to provide $382 million over 2 years for a
program that combines housing with supportive services for the homeless
who are most difficult to serve-primarily those who are seriously men-
tally ill and substance abusers.
Purpose
Ending homelessness is a national priority. In Fiscal Year 1991, HUD
McKinney Act homelessness assistance will increase by more than 60
percent.
Over half of the homeless are seriously mentally ill or have problems with
alcohol or other drugs. McKinney Act programs do not provide the kind
of comprehensive approach needed to address the problems of many of
these people.
The complete answer to getting people off the streets is permanent hous-
ing supplemented by the necessary supportive services that will help them
to return to the economic mainstream.
Highlights
Assistance will be made available only to States and cities that demon-
strate vigorous outreach to the homeless street population as part of their
program plan.
The Shelter Plus Care program has three types of housing options:
1. Five-year flexible rental assistance; up to 1 year of this assistance
may be used in designated buildings, followed by assistance for
the remainder of the term in more independent living situations.
2. Five-year rental assistance in housing owned or leased by non-
profits under the Section 202 program.
3. Ten-year housing assistance for the moderate rehabilitation of
single-room occupancy dwellings.
11
The creation of three program choices allows recipients to provide a
continuum of housing options ranging from transitional to permanent
housing, with the emphasis on creating permanent housing arrangements.
Recipients are required to match each dollar of Federal housing assistance
with a dollar of supportive services.
Projects must serve homeless persons with disabilities (primarily persons
who are seriously mentally ill; have chronic problems with alcohol, drugs,
or both; or have Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome or related dis-
eases) and their families. HUD must ensure that at least 50 percent of the
program's funds are awarded to projects that will serve homeless individu-
als with these three disabilities.
Services expected to be provided through matching funds include health
care, mental health treatment, detoxification, case management, education,
job training, and other services essential for independent living.
Linking housing with services will mean that the full range of needs for
the homeless are addressed in a coordinated and comprehensive way.
12
Family Self-Sufficiency
Families eligible for, or participating in, the Section 8 certificate or
voucher programs or public housing will be provided an opportunity to
achieve self-sufficiency and economic independence. Family Self-Suffi-
ciency is a comprehensive program that combines housing assistance with
appropriate services such as job training, child care and transportation to
help families become self-sufficient and economically independent.
Purpose
The Family Self-Sufficiency program promotes the development of local
strategies to coordinate the use of HUD housing programs with public and
private resources.
Coordination with the Job Opportunity and Basic Skills training programs
and Job Training Partnership Act programs will be especially important in
arranging the delivery of services that participating families will need to
climb a ladder of opportunity out of poverty and into self-sufficiency.
Highlights
In Fiscal Years 1991 and 1992 the program is voluntary, though a compe-
tition for incentive units will be held to encourage and reward successful
Family Self-Sufficiency programs. Twelve thousand Section 8 rental
certificates and rental vouchers and up to 1,000 units of public housing
development funds will be awarded through this competition.
Beginning in Fiscal Year 1993, PHAs must operate Family Self-Suffi-
ciency programs. The size of the local program will be determined by the
increase in the number of certificates, vouchers, and public housing units
made available in the community.
Participation in the program by eligible families is voluntary.
Each participating family will negotiate a contract of participation with the
sponsoring PHA. The contract will spell out the provisions of the local
program, the services and resources to be provided to the family, and the
13
responsibilities that the family accepts in entering the program. The
contract will also specify the conditions under which the PHA may with-
hold or terminate services if the family fails to comply with contract
requirements.
Local Coordinating Committees, comprised of residents, local community
leaders, and government officials, will guide the operation of the Family
Self-Sufficiency programs. They are responsible for overseeing develop-
ment of an action plan, commitment of resources, and delivery of services.
14
Preservation of Affordable Housing
HUD is authorized to provide more than $1 billion in assistance over 2
years to help preserve the stock of Federally assisted housing as affordable
rental housing, provide homeownership opportunities for tenants, fairly
compensate owners, and protect tenants in the few cases where owners
will prepay their mortgages.
Purpose
Over the next 15 years, owners of nearly 360,000 units of FHA-insured
multifamily housing will become eligible to prepay their mortgages,
eliminate low-income use restrictions, and convert these properties to
market-rate uses.
It is essential that low-income families continue to have access to afford-
able housing and opportunities for homeownership. At the same time, it is
necessary to fairly compensate owners seeking to prepay their mortgages.
Highlights
Owners eligible to prepay will have three options under this strategy; each
option potects current tenants. The owners' options are:
1. Owners may seek financial incentives from HUD in order to re-
ceive a fair rate of return on their investment. Owners who re-
ceive these incentives must agree to maintain their properties as
affordable rental housing for at least 50 more years.
2. Owners may seek to sell their properties, and tenants will have a
"right of first refusal" to purchase them for resident homeowner-
ship programs. HUD will provide grants to resident councils to
acquire and rehabilitate properties as well as to support home-
ownership counseling and related activities.
If tenants decide not to pursue a resident homeownership pro-
gram, nonprofits, public agencies, and for-profit entities will also
have a "right" to purchase a property in order to maintain it as
affordable rental housing. HUD will provide insured acquisition
15
and rehabilitation loans and other financial incentives in order to
maintain properties as affordable housing. For nonprofit and
public agency purchasers, HUD can also provide assistance in the
form of grants.
If owners receive no bona fide offers within specified time peri-
ods, they may prepay their mortgages and eliminate the low-
income, rental-use restrictions.
3. In limited circumstances, owners may seek to prepay their mort-
gages and end affordability restrictions. In order to do this,
owners must demonstrate that: current tenants will not be ad-
versely affected economically; the supply of vacant, affordable
housing in the area will not be affected; the ability of low-income
residents to find decent, safe, and sanitary housing near jobs will
not be adversely affected; the housing opportunities of minorities
will not be adversely affected.
Protections for current tenants are dependent upon the option chosen. For
projects that will continue as affordable rental housing, lower income
tenants will receive Section 8 rental assistance and the rent payments of
moderate-income families will not exceed 30 percent of their income.
In other situations, i.e., under owner prepayment and for non-purchasing
families in a project with a resident homeownership program, lower
income tenants will be eligible for Section 8 vouchers and certificates,
relocation payments, and/or other forms of assistance. Moderate-income
tenants will be eligible for relocation payments and other types of protec-
tion.
16
Elderly Independence
HOPE for Elderly Independence is a 2-year, $90-million demonstration
program to provide service-supported housing for the elderly, enabling
them to live more independent and dignified lives.
Purpose
The elderly, who are the fastest-growing segment of our Nation's popula-
tion, are often frail and in need of supportive services to help them stay in
their homes and avoid institutionalization.
HOPE for Elderly Independence combines housing assistance with the
minimum package of services required to help each frail elderly partici-
pant remain independent.
Highlights
Services funding, linked with 5-year Section 8 rental housing vouchers or
rental certificates, is authorized over 2 years, to be awarded competitively
to PHAs in order to help up to 3,000 elderly persons not currently receiv-
ing housing assistance.
Services funding of $10 million in 1991 and $10.4 million in 1992 can be
used for a wide range of services. Program funds can be used to pay for
the employment of a case manager/services coordinator to ensure that the
services the elderly receive meet their needs. Services funded under the
program may include personal care, case management, transportation,
meal services, and other services essential for achieving and maintaining
independent living.
Housing assistance funding of $34 million in 1991 and $36 million in
1992 will allow frail elderly individuals to choose housing suitable to their
needs, including the option to remain in their current homes.
HUD services funding covers 40 percent of the total cost of services.
Tenants provide 10 percent of the cost, and PHAs are required to provide
50 percent, which they may secure from other Federal, State, local, or
17
private sources. This co-payment encourages the efficient use of compre-
hensive services.
PHAs are required to use a local volunteer Professional Assessment
Committee to identify the eligible elderly and to develop individualized
service plans for them.
18
HOPE Initiatives
(Dollars in Millions)
FEDERAL FUNDING RESOURCES:
FY 1991
FY 1992
2-Year Total
HOPE Grants
$165
$ 865
$1,030
Public and Indian Housing Homeownership
68
38
448
Multifamily Homeownership
51
280
331
Single Family Homeownership
36
195
231
Elderly Independence Services
10
10
20
Replacement/Nonpurchaser Assistance*
42
270
312
Elderly Independence
34
36
70
Shelter Plus Care for the Homeless
133
258
391
Family Self-Sufficiency
**
**
**
Preservation of Affordable Housing*
0
718
718
Total Federal Funding Resources:
374
2,147
2,521
MATCHING RESOURCES:
HOPE Grants Match
47
195
242
(including Elderly Independence)
Match for Shelter Plus Care for the Homeless
133
258
391
TOTAL RESOURCES
554
2,600
3,154
*
Authorized in Housing Act; figures represent budget request
** At least 10 percent of incremental Section 8 vouchers and certificates and public housing develop-
ment funds must be set aside for Family Self-Sufficiency.
t
Provided in conjunction with Elderly Independence. Total funding for the program is $90 million.
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
Office of Policy Development and Research
Washington, D.C. 20410-6000
April 1991
HUD-PDR-1246-1