Living History Unknown (best books to read fiction .txt) 📖

was a critical first step to reforming our nation’s welfare system. I agreed that he should sign it and worked hard to round up votes for its passage―though he and the legislation were roundly criticized by some liberals, advocacy groups for immigrants and most people who worked with the welfare system. Bill vowed to fight to restore immigrant benefits and, by 1998, had made some limited progress by working with Congress to reinstate Social Security and food stamp benefits for certain classes of legal immigrants, including children, the elderly and the disabled. Block granting welfare funds was acceptable to both of us, since states, which set the benefit levels anyway, would be receiving significantly more money to help move people from welfare to work. I was most concerned with the five-year lifetime limit, because it applied whether the economy was up or down, whether jobs were available or not, but I felt, on balance, that this was a historic opportunity to change a system oriented toward dependence to one that encouraged independence.

The legislation was far from perfect, which is where pragmatic politics entered in. It was preferable to sign the measure knowing that a Democratic administration was in place to implement it humanely. If he vetoed welfare reform a third time, Bill would be handing the Republicans a potential political windfall. In the wake of the disastrous 1994

elections, he was concerned about further Democratic electoral losses that would jeopardize his leverage to protect social policies in the future.

Bill’s decision, and my endorsement of it, outraged some of our most loyal supporters, including longtime friends Marian Wright Edelman and her husband, Peter Edelman, an Assistant Secretary for Health and Human Services. Because of my history with the Children’s Defense Fund, they hoped I would oppose the measure and couldn’t understand my support. They genuinely believed the legislation was shameful, impractical and harmful to children, which Marian conveyed in “An Open Letter to the President” published in The Washington Post.

In the painful aftermath, I realized that I had crossed the line from advocate to policy maker. I hadn’t altered my beliefs, but I respectfully disagreed with the convictions and passion of the Edelmans and others who objected to the legislation. As advocates, they were not bound to compromise, and unlike Bill, they didn’t have to negotiate with Newt Gingrich and Bob Dole or worry about maintaining a political balance in Congress. I remembered all too well the defeat of our health care reform effort, which may have happened in part because of a lack of give-and-take. Principles and values in politics should not be compromised, but strategies and tactics must be flexible enough to make progress possible, especially under the difficult political conditions we faced. We wanted to pass a welfare plan that would motivate and equip women to obtain a better life for themselves and their children. We also hoped to persuade the American public, now that the old welfare system had been replaced, to address the greater problem of poverty and its consequences: one-parent and no-parent families, inadequate housing, poor schools and lack of health care. I hoped welfare reform would be the beginning, not the end, of our concern for the poor.

Weeks after Bill signed the law, Peter Edelman and Mary Jo Bane, another friend and Assistant Secretary at HHS who had worked on welfare reform, resigned in protest.

These were principled decisions, which I accepted and even admired, despite my very different view of the merits and promise of the legislation. I still saw Marian and Peter socially from time to time, and I was thrilled when Bill awarded Marian the Medal of Freedom for her lifetime commitment to civil rights and children on August 9, 2000. She was an important mentor in my life, and our rift over welfare was sad and difficult.

By the time Bill and I left the White House, welfare rolls had dropped 60 percent from 14.1 million to 5.8 million, and millions of parents had gone to work. States had supported part-time and low wage work by continuing to provide medical benefits and food stamps for these workers. By January 2001, child poverty had decreased by over 25

percent and was at its lowest rate since 1979. Welfare reform, the increase in the minimum wage, the reduction in taxes on low-income workers and the booming economy had moved almost eight million people out of poverty―one hundred times the number of people who left the poverty rolls during the Reagan years.

A significant contributor to the success of reform was the Welfare to Work Partnership, which Bill had asked one of his longtime friends, Eli Segal, to launch as a means of encouraging employers to hire former welfare recipients. Eli, a successful businessman, had worked with Bill in the McGovern campaign and served as Chief of Staff in the 1992

campaign. As an assistant to the President, he was charged with creating the National Service Corporation and AmeriCorps. Eli worked closely with Shirley Sagawa, a policy aide on my staff, to draft the legislation that set up the program, and he became the corporation’s first CEO. AmeriCorps provided community service opportunities and college scholarships to more than 200,000 young people between 1994 and 2000, working in partnerships with businesses and communities. Eli followed the same model for the Welfare to Work Partnership, which enlisted employers to hire and train former welfare recipients.

Under his leadership, the Partnership flourished, with over 20,000 businesses providing 1.1 million welfare recipients with skills, jobs and independence.

Welfare reform was implemented during good economic times. The real test will occur when the economy is down and welfare rolls rise again. The legislation is due to be reauthorized, and as a Senator, I intend to work to build on its successes and fix its deficiencies.

Benefits for legal immigrants who work and pay more than $5 billion in taxes should be restored completely. The five-year limits for lifetime benefits should be waived for people who lose jobs in a jobless economy. More money should be spent on