Bill Clinton: “Thank you so much. If you've been listening to the news the last few days, you know that the President has had his…”

“Thank you so much. If you've been listening to the news the last few days, you know that the President has had his annual loss of voice. [Laughter] But when I heard the choir today I kind of got my voice back. First, Pastor and Mrs. Cherry, on behalf of my wife, my daughter, and all of our company here, thank you so much for making us feel at home today. This was a beautiful, wonderful day for us. We've brought some old friends of ours that we've known for many years and several members of our White House staff. Our good friend Congressman Albert Wynn joined us; we're glad to see you. Thank you so much, sir. I came here today of two minds. Usually, on summer Sundays like this, Hillary and Chelsea and I go up to Camp David, and we go to the beautiful little chapel in the woods there. And instead of being in a vast church, we worship at 9 o'clock on Sunday morning with about 50 people and about six or seven people singing in the choir including the President, who gets to sightread the music when he can talk. [Laughter] I wanted to come here today for two reasons. First of all, because, as it turned out, I needed to hear the sermon. [Laughter] Next week, Pastor, I'll try to be a little more like Jehoshaphat. Maybe I won't have to ask you to face all our enemies all at once. [Laughter] The second reason I wanted to be here is that this church to me symbolizes what America should be all about right now. And it also, I believe, came about because of all the things that America should not be about right now. I mean, let me ask you, how is it that a church in 1981 could start with 24 members and in 1994 could have 16,000 members? How could an African-American church, with all of the cliches people say about the black community in America, have 16,000 members and over 40 percent of them be males? God has worked through this pastor and his wife and his family and all of you. But why did you have to come into being? Because of this great hole that's in our country now. Because of the breakdown of the families and the communities and the loss of the things which hold people together inside and out, not just the spiritual problems but the jobs, too, and the opportunities and the things which make people believe in the future on this Earth. And in that great vacuum, look what has usually happened, when people lose hope and lose their families and lose their communities and lose their sense of right and wrong, what has so often happened: 70 percent increase in America in 10 years in the number of children being born out of wedlock. And let's get the whole record on, today the fastest growth is among young white women giving birth out of wedlock. Soon, if we don't do something about it, we'll all be equal--too high. In 10 years, a doubling of the rate of murder among teenage young people--65 people in America get killed every day. While we've been in church, another teenager has been murdered. Every 2 hours a teenager gets murdered in America. And in this great vacuum, you have teen pregnancy and drugs and crime and, worst of all, violence. I wanted to come here because you are filling that void from the ground up and from the inside out. And I believe that this church could never have come into existence and exploded the way it has if everybody had been in a church, in a family, in a community, in a job and had hope and direction, inside and outside, and structure. You've filled a vacuum with something good and pure and wonderful. And I thank you for it. It's beyond the reach of any President to do. It is God's work through a religious ministry. But the Bible says that the rest of us have ministries, too. Do you remember when Martin Luther King said if you're just a streetsweeper, just sweep the streets as if you were Michelangelo painting the Sistine Chapel? Everybody has a job to do. And today, I don't think we have a bigger job than trying to keep our children alive and rebuild our families and rebuild our communities and to try to communicate some sense of right and wrong and to give our kids something to say yes to as well as something to say no to. It's two sides of the same coin. And I'll tell you, before I got here, I've been pretty down the last 2 or 3 days because the Congress voted that crime bill down, not because it's the answer to all life's problems, here is the answer to all life's problems, but because this country is literally coming apart at the seams for millions of our young people and because there are too many streets where old folks are afraid to sit and talk and children are afraid to play, because we're not really free anymore and people aren't free to pursue the American dream anymore as long as we feel like we can just tear each other apart, because our police officers go out on the streets where the gangs are better armed than they are, and things are all mixed up now in our country. And so often it seems that petty political things or superficial divisions keep us from doing what in our heart we know is right. And I have been so troubled at the thought that at least those of us who have been given this authority by you, the President, the Congress-- the least we can do is to help you to save the lives of your children. There are children in this church who have been gunned down; I know it. The least we can do is to help you to be protected. The least we can do is to put people on the streets who cannot only catch criminals but prevent crime as good law enforcement officers. The least we can do if people are totally hopeless is to get them out of your hair so they won't be bothering you. And the least we can do is to, yes, give your children more things they can say yes to, not just things they can say no to. That's what all that debate was about in the crime bill. It really wasn't about whether if you had written the crime bill or I had or anybody else, it would have been just the way it turned out to be. What is a democracy, after all, but people getting together and putting their different ideas and then arguing it out and having a bunch of votes and a majority rules? Alexis de Tocqueville said many years ago, this was a good country, and as long as it was a good country it could be a great country. We're around after 218 years because more than half the time more than half the people have been right, and God has permitted us to stay and go and flourish. I believe that. Do you? Audience members. Yes.”