Former president speaks at Class Day ceremony
By: Hilary Parker
Offering a globalized echo of former President John F. Kennedy’s famous words "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country" former President Bill Clinton posed a question to the Princeton University Class of 2006 at Monday’s Class Day ceremony on Cannon Green: "How will you be of service to your nation and the world?"
Citing the world’s evermore interdependent nature as a defining characteristic of the 21st century, a characteristic with both positive and negative effects, Mr. Clinton told the graduating seniors they possess more power as private citizens than ever before, due to three main factors.
The first, he said, is the growth of democracy throughout the world. Second, the growth of the Internet gives "ordinary people unprecedented power to change the course of events," he said, citing the outpouring of contributions sent electronically to aid victims of the tsunami in southern Asia in late 2004. Noting that there was not a single non-governmental organization in Russia which now boasts 63,000 such groups at the time of his election, Mr. Clinton said the third element empowering private citizens is the growth of the power and reach of non-governmental organizations throughout the world.
"You leave here with knowledge, a honed capacity for lifelong learning and, frankly, your contacts with each other, which together give you an enormous amount of personal power in an interdependent world," the former president said. "How will you use it?"
While Mr. Clinton’s address was largely serious, it wasn’t devoid of humorous interjections. After Lauren Bush, President George W. Bush’s niece and a member of the graduating class, began her introduction with a joke that when the Class Day chairs met to discuss potential speakers, "Clinton’s name immediately came up, but then we thought Hillary would probably be busy," the former president didn’t miss a beat.
He thought his wife was busy, too, he explained, saying that she told him she had to be at the Senate. "And then I see Sen. Frist here, putting parenthood ahead of the public trust," he joked, with a nod in the Tennessee senator and Senate majority leader’s direction. Sen. Frist’s son, Harrison, will graduate from Princeton today and co-chaired Class Day with Ms. Bush and Shaun Callaghan.
While he was serious as he lauded the class’s diversity it contains members from 48 states and 41 nations he found room for a little humor in his compliment. The class is far better than it would have been 100 years ago, he told them, when "it would have been a bunch of boring white guys like me." Boring or not, the class now claims Mr. Clinton among its ranks, having inducted him into the Class of 2006 as an honorary member following his address.
All joking was set aside, though, as the former president answered the questions he posed to the class about those changes the world needs, and how to effect them.
"I would like us to move from unstable, unequal interdependence to more integrated communities," he said. Enhanced cooperation and a shared sense of responsibility will be necessary to handle everything from the immigration debate to terrorism to climate change, he said, emphasizing that there remains much "home improvement" to be done in America.
Although he offered possible answers to the questions posed, Mr. Clinton told the class they needn’t subscribe to his proposals. The important thing is that they have a solution, he said, given the power they possess to change the world.
"The important thing is not that you agree with me, but that you have an answer," he said.