Thank you. Thank you so very much, ladies and gentlemen.
Thank you so very much, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you, Al, for that most generous introduction. Your Eminence Cardinal Egan, Your Eminence Tim Russert -- (laughter) --Your Eminence Tom Brokaw. (Laughter.) I know how to suck up on Sundays, let me tell you. I know what I'm doing here. (Laughter.) Governor Pataki, Mayor Bloomberg, Senator Schumer, and we hope Senator Clinton has now joined us. (Applause.) Honored dais guests, good evening.
I am very pleased, so very pleased, to be the guest speaker for this 57th Annual Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner. I am especially pleased to have with me this evening my beloved wife of 40 years, Alma Powell. (Applause.)
I couldn't help but notice in looking at the history of this dinner that I am the first Secretary of State that you have had here in almost 30 years. The last one was Henry Kissinger back in 1974 -- which probably explains why you put it off for another thirty years. (Laughter.) No, I didn't mean anything by that.
In fact, Henry is a grand old statesman, he is a dear friend of mine, a tremendous mentor. And when I learned of this dinner I called him for advice, and he just simply said, "Colin, just be humble, it works for me." (Laughter.)
In fact, the reason I am your speaker this evening is because Al and the good Cardinal asked Karl Rove, the President’s political adviser -- (laughter) -- you all know General Rove -- (laughter) -- but they asked Karl Rove to find a speaker, and I was very, very pleased to accept.
Now, two days ago, on Tuesday -- and this is a true story, so help me -- I was heading into the Oval Office to see President Bush and Karl Rove was on the way out. So I stopped him and said, "Karl, wow, you really got me into something with this Al Smith dinner. What a heck of an event." And Karl says, "Yeah, and I’ve been getting calls from all over the country telling me what a terrific job you did. You were marvelous." (Laughter.) Karl's off in New Jersey somewhere tonight. I don't know what he's doing. (Laughter.)
I am so pleased to see so many honored guests up on the dais. I'm sorry that one of my good friends, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan hasn't arrived yet. He'll be here soon. I just saw him outside getting ready to tow Mike Bloomberg's car. (Laughter.)
I'm the Secretary of State of the United States. I've got a lot of things to worry about. And one morning, I find myself on the telephone with Mike Bloomberg arguing about diplomats' cars. (Laughter.) "Colin, they owe me $21 million in back fines." I said, "Mike, give me a break. Write a check to yourself. You can afford it." (Laughter and Applause.)
So many distinguished people up here today, yes we have. (Laughter.) So much material, so little time. (Laughter.)
New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer is with us tonight. (Laughter.) Eliot's up on the dais because we couldn't get him a seat at a corporate table. (Laughter and Applause.) He's opening up a Arthur Murray studio to teach the "Perp Walk" to everybody who might need to know it. (Laughter.)
But because this is election season in the metropolitan area, and I am the Secretary of State, I've got to be careful and not get into any partisan politics. But, you know, it's election season not just here in the United States, but around the world. We're having elections in Brazil, in Germany, in Bosnia. They even had an election in Iraq earlier this week. (Laughter.) Saddam Hussein won -- (laughter) -- with 99.999% of the vote. And Saddam Hussein asked his prime minister, "What about the rest?" (Laughter.) The prime minister said, "Supreme leader, what more could you want?" "Their names!" (Laughter.) In Baghdad, they don't have hanging chads, they just have hangings. (Laughter.)
As you know, the other reason I'm here is because it is political season and they were looking for somebody who would not rub one side or the other, so the call went down to the White House and said, "There must be somebody in your Administration who could fit the bill that we have for this evening, so why don't you send up one of your moderates?" (Laughter.) Well, here I am. (Applause.) I have this reputation of being such a moderate. I'm not sure I know why. My favorite color is khaki. (Laughter.) I like my steaks medium. (Laughter.) Someone said to me the other day, "On a scale of one to ten, how moderate are you?" I said, "Five." (Laughter.)
But because I have this moderate reputation, I get hit from all sides all the time, and it can be a little debilitating after a while, always being hit from the left, hit from the right. In fact, I was feeling a little blue the other day and I went into the Oval Office and I was commiserating with the President, just the two of us alone in the office. I said, "Mr. President, I don't know how to handle it. It's so hard. The New York Times wants me to quit, the Washington Times wants you to fire me." (Laughter.) And he said, "Colin, that's right where I want you to be." (Laughter and Applause.)
I just want to say to you that as someone who grew up on the sidewalks of New York, it is, indeed, a great privilege to take part in this famous gathering honoring one of New York's most favorite sons, Alfred Emanuel Smith.
It is even more of an honor to be associated with the wonderful work that the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation is doing every day for the people of my native city, my native state. While Al Smith lived, the least of God's children knew they were never completely alone. And to this day, long after he has met his maker, thanks to the many charitable efforts of the Memorial Foundation, the poor, the sick, and the underprivileged of New York know they can still count on Al Smith as a faithful friend.
Monsignor Murray, you have given so many years of service to this city, and I join with all others here in saluting you for your efforts. (Applause.)
Although I never knew him, I feel a special kinship with Al Smith.
For Al Smith and me, the lodestars of our youth were our parents and the parish church. We are both the children of blue-collar parents who possessed little more than a will to work and a dream -- the American dream. And we, their children, lived it.
Al Smith grew up in the Battery. I hail from the Bronx. As boys, we both knew each square inch of our neighborhoods. Our everyday world was inhabited by the most marvelous collection of nationalities and smells and religions and cultures and wonderful characters -- a world that we would carry with us for the rest of our lives, however far we traveled, however high we rose, and whatever fancy company we would end up keeping.
At the 1924 Democratic Convention, in his speech nominating Al Smith for President of the United States, Franklin Roosevelt dubbed him "The Happy Warrior" -- a reference to a Wordsworth poem then familiar to every schoolchild.
I have been a warrior for most of my life. But it is "The Happy Warrior" of Al Smith and Wordworth's poem whom I admire most. The poem's opening lines begin:
"Who is the happy Warrior? Who is he
That every man in arms should wish to be?
It is the generous Spirit, who, when brought
Among the tasks of real life, hath wrought
Upon the plan that pleased his boyhood thought…"
As was true of Al Smith, my heart, my mind, my very soul was shaped in boyhood on the sidewalks of New York. And I feel this powerful tug to my native city to this day.
Nowadays, when I come back home, I arrive at LaGuardia in a Gulfstream. A limousine picks me up with police escort, takes me across the Tri-Boro Bridge and down the FDR Drive heading either to the United Nations or perhaps here to the Waldorf. It's pretty heady stuff from the days when I made that same trip with a half gallon of gas and my last quarter for the toll.
But, even now, even today as we speed down FDR Drive, instinctively my head turns to the left and I look out the window across the river until my eyes catch the Pepsi Cola sign at the bottling plant in Long Island City. The decades slip away and I am once again and a 17-year-old porter mopping the floors of that plant, mopping up spilt Pepsi Cola. Being a porter was what the black kids did at the plant in those days. There was no way to imagine what the future would hold for me.
Interviewers are forever asking me if as a young black kid in New York City I ever dreamed I would be either Chairman of the Joint Chiefs or Secretary of State. And I always smile and answer back, "Yeah, there I was -- " (laughter and applause) -- "there I was standing at the corner of 163rd Street and Southern Boulevard watching the trolleys go by, saying, `Ya know, I believe I'm gonna grow up and become Secretary of State.'" (Laughter.)
But it happened and New York made it happen. (Applause.)
Last month, I visited my high school, Morris High, in the Bronx. Governor Pataki presented to me and to Rudy Giuliani the Jackie Robinson Empire State Freedom Medal.
I told the students a little about my time at Morris. That I had come there from PS 52 and PS 39. And while I was saying this -- and George will attest to this -- some kid in the audience yelled out, "No way, man! No way!" I said, "Yeah, it’s true. I did." (Laughter.)
And then I told them how I went on to the City College of New York. And upon graduation -- 4 ½ years later -- (laughter) -- I went right into the Army, with a great sigh of relief on the part of the CCNY faculty. (Laughter.) Of course, they now welcome me back warmly for fundraising events as a Great Son of CCNY. (Laughter and Applause.)
I told those youngsters that they should be proud to live in a city and a state where citizens care about the education of their young people. I am one example but there are millions -- so many in the room here this evening. I went from elementary school all the way through college without paying anything, because the citizens of New York believed in me, as they now believe in those young people at Morris High School. (Applause.) And I stand here tonight because of my fellow citizens of so long ago.
The same generous civic spirit that made my education and success possible animated the life and work of Al Smith. And to this very day, it gives this teeming multi-cultural metropolis the feeling of a small town. And this spirit is especially strong in time of crisis.
Al Smith and his fellow New Yorkers felt it and saw it back in 1911 when they witnessed the tragedy of the Triangle Shirtwaist fire. It seared Al Smith's social consciousness and led him to champion a host of path-breaking measures to protect working people.
Some 150 young women perished in that blaze, the blaze that engulfed the factory in which they toiled under horrible conditions. Many of them leapt to their deaths rather than be consumed by the flames.
We witnessed similar horrors on September 11th, 2001.
On that day, all New Yorkers, our entire nation, and the whole world, saw and felt the shining soul of this city.
We saw heroism in the face of horror, kindness in the face of cruelty. We saw ordinary men and women performing extraordinary acts of courage without regard to color or creed or country of origin. We saw people from every conceivable background and from every station reaching out to one another in compassion and consolation.
In those transcendent acts of humanity, again and again I was reminded as I watched, as we all experienced this, of my old neighborhood in the Bronx -- of neighbor helping neighbor in times of trouble, in times of the deepest kind of sorrow.
America's response to September 11 speaks powerfully to the fundamental decency and fairness of the American people. Americans overwhelmingly refused to scapegoat any people of a particular faith or ethnicity for this. And to their everlasting credit, President Bush, Governor Pataki, Mayor Giuliani, all the other leaders of the city and state, and leaders throughout the country resisted the impulse to lash out in blind rage. Instead, all of our leaders came together to make sure that our nation stayed on the path of principled action.
Yes, it happened in America, but it was a crime against the world. Citizens from 90 countries lost their lives at the World Trade Center that day. And people of goodwill all around the globe streamed to our embassies to leave flowers, to leave cards, to pay their respects, to pledge their support, to be in solidarity with us. The world's civilized nations recognized the terrorists for what they are: international criminals, not victims of poverty, not victims of any other problem; they were international criminals, murderers to be dealt with, nothing more, nothing less. And that's how they will be dealt with. (Applause.)
Last October soon after the attacks, my good friend Vice President Cheney was the guest speaker at your 56th Dinner. He eloquently expressed the resolve of President Bush to marshal a great global coalition to eradicate the evil of terrorism throughout the world.
A year has now passed. A full cycle of seasons has come and gone. The great extended family of New York is healing. The mountain of twisted girders, shattered glass and broken concrete has been painstakingly removed from the World Trade Center, now sacred ground to the loved ones of the nearly 3,000 souls who perished there.
The Pentagon has been rebuilt. Nature has begun to mend the scars in that Pennsylvania field. And New York and our nation have emerged from the horror and the pain stronger than ever, with a spine of steel and the heart of a lion. Did they not know what we are made of? Did they actually think that they could break our spirit? Never, never, never! We're stronger than ever. (Applause.)
The international coalition that President Bush launched and leads has liberated the people of Afghanistan from the dual tyranny of al-Qaida and the Taliban.
Today, Afghanistan has a new government -- the most broadly representative in the history of that country.
The world community is coming together to help President Karzai meet the needs of his people. Two million refugees -- imagine that -- in the last roughly nine months, two million Afghans have come back into their country because of what we did for their country.
Boys and girls have returned to school. Women who one year ago were prisoners in their homes are now pursuing their professions as judges, as educators, broadcasters, economists, businesswomen, government ministers. (Applause.)
For the first time in over two decades, the men and women of Afghanistan can look to a future of hope.
Yes, there are still dangers ahead. Our troops will be there until those dangers are passed and until the situation is stabilized. But we have made a solemn commitment to the Afghan people: We will not turn away from them. We will not let them down. We will stay the course in Afghanistan. (Applause.)
And every day around the globe, we're going to make it harder, harder by the day, for terrorists to support their operations, to move around, to find sanctuary.
Thanks to concerted international efforts, every day, somewhere in the world, a terrorist is being arrested, their cells are being broken up, their financial bloodlines are being severed, their plans are being disrupted and their attacks are being foiled.
But we know that long after the void in New York’s skyline has been filled by a fitting memorial, America and her coalition partners must remain vigilant and resolute against terrorism. The assassination of the brave American Marine in Kuwait last week and the tragic bombing in Bali, Indonesia remind us of the challenges that lay ahead.
September 11th taught us that threats gathering in distant places like Afghanistan or North Korea or Iraq can pose very real and present dangers. And in an age where terrorists and tyrants try in every way to acquire weapons of mass destruction, we must do all that we can to confront them decisively before catastrophe strikes.
We must not, we will not, allow terrorists to acquire weapons of mass destruction. (Applause.)
We are now engaged in a great debate about Iraq -- Iraq, a country that is a state sponsor of terrorism and in possession of weapons of mass destruction. It is an unholy combination.
The President came to New York and went before the United Nations on September 12th, the day after the anniversary of 9/11, and he laid out the case. He reminded the world that Saddam Hussein already has used weapons of mass destruction against his own citizens and against his neighbors. He has not abandoned such weapons or his intention to acquire more, including nuclear weapons.
The President presented on the 12th of September here an unassailable indictment of Saddam Hussein's flagrant violation of all 16 United Nations resolutions. The President also described Saddam Hussein's history of threatening his neighbors and repressing his own citizens.
He has gotten away with it for eleven years. We are determined, once and for all, that he will not get away with it any longer. (Applause.)
The President came to the United Nations not to make a declaration of war, but to make a declaration of purpose. He came to rally the United Nations to deal with Saddam Hussein's blatant disregard of the United Nations' solemn authority. He also described what can be done to disarm Iraq without resorting to war.
We need a tough new resolution that will send the inspectors back in with the authority to do their job and disarm Iraq. And it is not for Iraq to dictate the conditions to the United Nations, but for the United Nations to dictate the conditions to Iraq. (Applause.)
The plain truth, however, is that the inspectors won't be able to do their jobs unless Iraq cooperates. This time, Iraq must face consequences for continued failure to disarm.
The United States Congress last week passed a strong resolution authorizing the President to impose those consequences. The resolution supports and encourages action within the UN. It recognizes, however, that the world faces a real and present danger and if the United Nations does not act, the United States, joined by other nations, willing nations, must act, and we will act. (Applause.)
I also know that Iraq will not have a single defender among the circle of civilized nations. Not one. Nor are Saddam and his regime likely to have very many defenders among their own people.
As President Bush has said, our objective in the war against terrorism and in confronting Iraq is not just a safer, but a better, world. Our goal is not just to free the people from fear, but to create fresh hope in the process.
In the challenging months ahead, the men and women that I lead in the Department of State will be proud to do their part.
As Secretary of State, I must look at the world through clear eyes. Much of what I see is troubling, but I also see much that is encouraging.
I see nations coming together as never before to confront the terrorists and the proliferators.
I see a growing global effort to stem the spread of HIV/AIDS and reach out with compassion to the men, women and children living with the disease.
I see leaders trying to get beyond hostilities of the past and working with one another to resolve regional conflicts, as we are now working with Russia and China in their parts of the world.
I see democracy taking root on every continent -- societies striving to create representative institutions that truly serve all of their people.
I see science and technology helping once-isolated populations broaden their horizons and enter a dynamic, global marketplace.
I see a deepening consensus on how to help poor nations find firm footing on the road to development through good governance, sound economic and trade policies, and wise stewardship of the environment.
In short, I see a world of promise, a world of opportunity. And I will always be optimistic about this world as I do my daily work in the State Department.
That isn’t surprising, because I look at the world through the eyes of a kid from Kelly Street whose boyhood pals were a marvelous mix of backgrounds and beliefs, and whose families gave me my first window on a wide, wonderful world full of people with the same high hopes and dreams for their children as my parents had for my sister and for me.
I see this world through the eyes of a kid from the Bronx who was given a good start by the people of New York and afforded the chance to serve his country and to serve the world.
The generous spirit of Al Smith and "The Happy Warrior" is the spirit of New York City, the spirit of America -- united in its diversity, all-embracing in its humanity, and so full of possibility. That generous spirit has always been our country's greatest strength. It remains our greatest hope. And it continues to be our greatest gift to the world.
Al Smith knew it a century ago. We know it now. And we need to pass on "The Happy Warrior's" generous spirit, that generous spirit of hope and freedom to the young generation coming up now to whom we will bequeath this city and bequeath the world.
And as long as that spirit is with us, I have no doubt that East Side, West Side, all around the town, Al Smith and his beloved wife Catherine -- his own dear Mamie O’Rourke -- will be out there somewhere "tripping the light fantastic" on the sidewalks of New York.
Thank you. (Applause.)
[End]