








linton? Early on, as White House negotiators worked with congressional staff, they considered listing "diversity" as a criterion when giving out money; programs that sought to mix whites and blacks would be more likely to get funding than those that didn't. But the staff of the House Education and Labor Committee feared that such a preference might sink the all-minority programs popular with black and Hispanic members of the committee. After all, if the government funds a program with 50 blacks and 50 whites, it has less money to fund the program with 100 blacks. "Every time 'diversity' would come up [in legislative negotiations, the committee's staff] would say, 'Well, the House is going to have some problems with that' and we'd say, 'OK, OK, we'll take it out'," one White House official said. The White House did not put up much of a fight, severely underestimating how hard it will be to produce mixed programs. They even casually agreed to set aside at least one third of the money for programs that recruit mostly "disadvantaged" youths, further reducing the pot of money that will go to truly diverse programs.
There were other ways of encouraging race- and classmixing without requiring it but these methods threatened to alienate key interest groups. Clinton believed that if he offered to wipe out large chunks of college-loan debt, the service program could attract white middle-class kids. In a Feb. 24 meeting, he argued that college graduates had genuinely greater skills and could therefore contribute more than a 17-year-old just out of high school. And, he told aides, the college grad would be making a sacrifice by taking two years to teach, "a real gift to society." Seventeen-year-olds, on the other hand, have fewer skills and expenses, since many live at home Clinton decided to offer a $10,000 benefit to college graduates and $5,000 in aid to those who serve before college or don't intend to go to college.
But advocates for the non-college-bound hated ton's idea. "The whole message is we value peopl< go to college more than those who don't," longtim income advocate Sam Halperin told While House ol at a private meeting sponsored by the umbrella Youth Service America. Clinton couldn't bear unde ing the non-college-bound. He agreed to have one s benefit of $6,500, which seemed to settle the issue, other group could possibly object? April 28, twc before they were scheduled to unveil their plan found out who.
Veterans. These were the men who did serv Vietnam, who really don't much like this gays-i military idea the last group in America with Clinton could pick a fight just then. The veterans a: using some slightly deceptive arithmetic, that the benefit was more than GIs get as college aid. House staff at first debated how hard to fight, b debate came to an abrupt close when top adviser C Stephanopoulos entered the discussion, incredul the political naivete of his colleagues. He knew tl erans could sink the entire bill, shaky statistics < Segal's staff cut the benefit to $5,000 faster than y say "political viability." Clinton lost what he consic key tool for luring a broad range of young peop service, but at least he seemed to have cleared the n ing obstacles to swift legislative passage.
Republicans in Congress were not about to make easy. As the legislation journeyed through Congres proposed a series of changes that struck the Dem Party's exposed nerves. In both the Senate and the they offered killer "trigger" amendments forbiddi government to spend a penny on national service had first boosted Pell grants. One by one, Repu rose to accuse Clinton of insensitivity to the pool want to help young kids, then double and triple t grants. Reach out to millions!" Sen. Al D'Amato si on the floor of the Senate. "This bill is a turk should shoot, kill it, now!" This Republican rigl ness was too much for Sen. Edward M. Kennedj national service advocate. "Tonight at 8 o'clock v how some are absolutely indignant about what pening to these programs. Where were they wl appropriations were coming out over the last 12 Where were they?"
Behind the scenes, though, Kennedy himself i rious about the administration's other student-ai "This is crazy!" he wrote in thick marker atop a from a staffer. Although much of the Republicar was cynical posturing, critics had a legitimate national service did pose a threat to Pell grants am based financial aid. If national service continues t it will be very difficult to increase grant aid.
Clinton was partly to blame for the Rep attack. For all his criticism of the P  entitlement," he could not resist pitching
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50.  Ask N
Give Up the 'Self-Centered' Life
President Clinton discussed service [August 1993] in the Oval Office with Newsweek's Steven Waldman:
NEWSWEEK: Looking back on your own life, what made you interested in service?
CLINTON: When 1 became governor I saw all kinds of unmet needs in every community that, hell, we simply couldn't raise the taxes to pay for. I also became convinced that a lot of problems in this country were highly personal in nature that the culture had changed in ways that broke down the traditional bonds of community. They suffered internally not just economically, but emotionally from having insufficient order and emotional support and role models.
You really think [a national service program] can address that?
I think it can make a huge difference ... I watched how the systematic attempt to affect people individually was making a difference in [schools] far beyond what could otherwise be predicted. Then I started seeing the same sort of potential happening in service projects.
The Summer of Service program had about 75 percent minorities. Would you be disappointed if that was the makeup of the rest of the program?
I would be disappointed if we didn't have a lot of white kids, middle-class white kids, in there, too. And I think we will. I fought very hard to keep the means testing [which targets aid toward the needy] out of the program because I want all kinds of people.
In a time of scarce resources, you're giving educa tional benefits, potentially, to the son of a millionaire.
Only if they really do something for their country. You know, wealthy people may go into the military, u if they do they're entitled to the GI Bill.
Some Republicans attacked comparisons between domestic service and military service. Imcurio , about your reaction. On a personal level, i t ere been a civilian-service option available during i nam, would you have chosen that?
Probably.
I mean, who knows what I would have dorii . always thought I was going to be dra te . u
ward college benefits more than the sncrifice.
national setvice as a student-aid
forced the comparison with Pell grants. ,. jneffi-
student-aid program, national
C1ent roughly $1,300 per person for	of
to $22,000 per person for service. Longtime supp
that most people would like the feeling of serving their country.
I think all these kids doing drugs, shooting guns, dropping out of school, going to jail, changing the culture of life in a destructive way and losing then-opportunity to have a good life I see that as a nationalsecurity issue.
You often speak about the plan as opening access to college. Yet the loan forgiveness will affect a very, very small percentage of people with loans. Isn't it misleading to talk about it that way?
No, because when I was in the campaign I always . . . saw reformation of the student-loan program as an important part of this, too. This income-contingent loan business [in which people can repay loans in small installments as a percentage of their income] is, I think, very important. It is my belief that if you know that the burden of repaying your loans is not a problem, then you are free to take a job that might pay somewhat less but be somewhat more rewarding. I talked to a young couple that had a combmed collegeloan repayment schedule of $1,000 a month. Both of them said they would like to have been domg something a little bit more community oriented than what they were doing. But it's all they could do to scramble and put together $1,000 a month.
During the campaign, you promised that anyone could wipe out their loans with service. Obviously, the [law] is to from that. Wasn't that really a pretty unrealistic campaign promise to make.
Well I don't think you can do it overnight. There was a limit' to how fast you could start and expand a program effectively.
How do you respond to the argument that you're not asfongmudi of young people if you're offering them a Zend and a generous college benefit-that it s al.
asking peo-nie to give up what in almost every case will be ar easier life and a more self-centered one to devote ; significant period of their lives to primarily helpm] otoer people their problems. You're reward n; them for serving their country, for doing somethin, that most people their age wont do, don t do.
national service such as Sen. Harris Wofford pnv< pleaded ^th Clinton to stress the benefits to com   nt service Sen. David Durenberger, a Repub "hoVongly supported Clinton's legislation, feared the president's hyperbole would jeopardize the entire "Everything the president has done and said is an (
9. UNDERSTANDING CULTURAL PLURALISM
geration," he complained as other Senate Republicans mounted a brief but aggressive filibuster in July. "The rhetoric is destroying the reality and the Republicans took advantage of it."
But Clinton's political advisers such as Mandy Grunwald and pollster Stan Greenberg still believed that lofty service rhetoric wouldn't win over middle-class voters  and Clinton sided with them. "I want my national service plan to pass; that will open the doors of college education to millions of Americans," Clinton said in a staggeringly misleading statement on "Larry King Live" the same week the Senate was considering his legislation.
The White House was able to defeat the lethal "trigger" amendments by restoring some of the money that had been cut from student aid and promising future generosity to Pell grants. It avoided a rift the old-fashioned way papering it over with money.
But the Republicans weren't done. They launched another attack from the left, this time proposing to forbid rich kids from receiving national service benefits. Again, they were trying to drive a wedge through the Democratic coalition with an argument designed to appeal to liberals: shouldn't money for national service scholarships be given according to need? The notion had some immediate appeal particularly to members of the House Education and Labor Committee, which is, in the words of one staff member, so far to the political left it "would pass the Communist Manifesto if it had jurisdiction." The committee's chairman, Bill Ford of Michigan, was a Lyndon Johnson protege who had disliked national service in past years and always fought hard for targeting aid to the poor.
This time was different. Ford had decided to help Clinton out. In part, it was out of personal affection. Clinton had helped Ford wi
