Clinton Tells of His Vision for His Library

President Clinton said Friday that he hopes his presidential library will attract corporate leaders interested in responsive government and diplomats interested in resolving international conflicts.

Though he is an avowed technology klutz, Clinton said that he intends his library to be equipped with the latest in interactive technology--as a way to help visitors “understand the kinds of forces that took me to the White House and that I tried to shape . . . and how that relates to tomorrow. I want this to be a museum but not a mausoleum.”

In the end, Clinton said, he wants visitors “to believe, when they walk out of there, based on the story of my life . . . , that everyone also has the chance to make their own history.”

The lame-duck president discussed his vision for the library--to be built on a downtown bluff here overlooking the Arkansas River--during a nostalgic, daylong tour of the state he led as governor for a dozen years that spanned three decades.

From Little Rock, Clinton then toured the impoverished Mississippi Delta region of eastern Arkansas to promote his “new markets” initiative, which would offer businesses tax incentives to invest in regions that remain largely untouched by the current economic prosperity.

Clinton spoke expansively, if not in great detail, about his library during a breakfast meeting with about 2,000 members of the Greater Little Rock Chamber of Commerce, which has pledged to come up with at least 1% of the library’s projected $125-million price tag.

This capital city has experienced an economic boom during the Clinton presidency and last year alone saw $200 million in construction projects, according to Shelby Woods, chairman of the chamber.

That may have explained, at least in part, the warm welcome that chamber members accorded Clinton.

His presidency, including the library to come, has “put Little Rock and central Arkansas on the map,” Woods said, as the audience rose in enthusiastic applause.

After a full day in his native state, the president turned his attention to Campaign 2000 and flew to Florida, where today he is to speak to a convention of Florida Democrats and then attend several fund-raising events.

In Little Rock, Clinton said at the chamber breakfast that he intended all along to locate his library here--as a way to “give something back to this state, to this community that has given so much to me.”

The president said that he hopes the center will attract not only tourists but also people from all professions. Clinton said he has conferred with University of Arkansas officials about establishing a graduate program in public policy at the library.

In addition, Clinton said, he hopes to forge a partnership with corporate America to bring to the center young business executives to study government and policymaking.

The cross-fertilization of sound business practices with good government, the president said, can “change the nature of government . . . and we can end a lot of the kinds of battles that we’ve seen . . . over too many decades.”

In many of his recent speeches, Clinton has said that his one remaining and overarching wish in life is to help end prejudice and hatred.

And one way to do so, he said here, is to attract to the library people who have fought against one another since time immemorial.

His library can be “a beacon of hope for those kinds of people,” Clinton said. “I want to bring here people from Northern Ireland, the Middle East, Bosnia and Kosovo.”