This is the second in a series. Part 1 discussed the failure of John Kerry in 2004 and Al Gore in 2000 to tackle the issue of values.
In the summer of 1992 an ambitious young man from Arkansas spoke these words to the delegates who had gathered to nominate him for President:
We offer people a new choice based on old values. We offer opportunity. We demand responsibility. We will build an American community again.
These three words -- opportunity, responsibility, community -- were the theme around which Bill Clinton's entire campaign was based.
Sure, we all heard about the famous sign in the war room,
It's the economy, stupid, and it's true that many people voted with their pocketbooks in 1992. But the reason Clinton needed the sign was to remind him to connect his message to the issues. Clinton's natural inclination was to talk about values -- because he understood that that's what elections are all about.
Clinton's line about opportunity, responsibility, and community was not an isolated statement buried in the middle of a policy speech. It was the centerpiece of a speech outlining his values and explaining how they shaped his policies.
Clinton took on politicians who tried to use values as a wedge issue:
Frankly, I am fed up with politicians in Washington lecturing the rest of us about family values. Our families have values. But our government doesn't.
He pressed the point:
I want an America where family values live in our actions, not just in our speeches. An America that includes every family. Every traditional family and every extended family. Every two parent family. Every single-parent family. And every foster family. Every family.
And just in case someone missed it:
The thing that makes me angriest about what has gone wrong in the last 12 years is that our government has lost touch with our values, while our politicians countinue to shout about them. I'm tired of it!
But Bill Clinton also used his convention speech to display the values that shaped his life.
Speaking of his mother, and the sacrifices she made as a young widow trying to raise a small child by herself:
She endured that pain because she knew her sacrifice was the only way she could support me and give me a better life. My mother taught me. She taught me about family and hard work and sacrifice.
And later:
As an adult, I watched her fight off breast cancer, and again she has taught me a lesson in courage. And always, always, always she taught me to fight.
And this is what it meant to him as a public servant:
That's why I'll fight to create high-paying jobs so that parents can afford to raise their children today.
That's why I'm so committed to make sure every American gets the health care that saved my mother's life and that women's health care gets the same attention as men's.
That's why I'll fight to make sure women in this country receive respect and dignity, whether they work in the home, out of the home, or both.
Clinton learned about race relations from his grandfather, who ran a country store and sold food on credit to customers whether they were black or white:
My grandfather just had a high school education -- a grade school education -- but in that country store he taught me more about equality in the eyes of the Lord than all my professors at Georgetown, more about the intrinsic worth of every individual than all the professors at Oxford, more about the need for equal justice under the law than all the jurists at Yale Law School.
He also spoke of new initiatives in terms of values. To introduce what would become Americorps:
An America in which the doors of colleges are thrown open once again to the sons and daughters of stenographers and steelworkers. We will say: Everybody can borrow money to go to college. But you must do your part. You must pay it back, from your paychecks or, better yet, by going back home and serving your communities.
Just think of it. Think of it. Millions of energetic young men and women serving their country by policing the streets or teaching the children or caring for the sick. Or working with the elderly and people with disabilities. Or helping young people to stay off drugs and out of gangs, giving us all a sense of new hope and limitless possibilities.
Opportunity, responsibility, and community. Explicitly or not, Clinton tied everything back to these three values. That was the core of his campaign.
A Southern Baptist, Clinton even knew how to quote scripture to make his point:
Of all the things that George Bush has ever said that I disagree with, perhaps the thing that bothers me most is how he derides and degrades the American tradition of seeing and seeking a better future. He mocks it as the "vision thing."
But just remember what the Scripture says: "Where there is no vision, the people perish."
And the result of this lack of vision:
One of the reasons we have so many children in so much trouble in so many places in this nation is because they have seen so little opportunity, so little responsibility, so little loving, caring community, that they literally cannot imagine the life we are calling them to lead.
Opportunity, responsibility, and community. Those are the values that made this nation strong, and those are the values that won Bill Clinton the presidency.
Bill Clinton knew how to talk to voters in red states. Eleven states supported Clinton in 1992 that would not support either Kerry or Gore -- Arkansas, Louisiana, Georgia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri, Nevada, Ohio, West Virginia, Colorado, and Montana. He added Arizona in 1996. Much has been made of Clinton's southern roots, but many of these states are not in the south. Clearly, values was a winning issue for Democrats in 1992 and 1996.
In part 3, I'll show how the values of opportunity, responsibility, and community still win elections in a post-9/11 world.
