The 1996 State of the Union address

State of the Union Address

The State of the Union is an annual address presented by the President of the United States to the United States Congress. The address not only reports on the condition of the nation but also allows the president to outline his legislative agenda and his national priorities.The practice arises...

was given by President Bill Clinton

Bill Clinton

William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...

 to a joint session

Joint session of the United States Congress

Joint sessions of the United States Congress are the gatherings together of both houses of the United States Congress...

 of the 104th United States Congress

104th United States Congress

The One Hundred Fourth United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, composed of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It met in Washington, DC from January 3, 1995 to January 3, 1997, during the third and...

 on January 23, 1996. The speech was the last State of the Union address of President Clinton's first term.

President Clinton discussed the economy and declared that the "era of big government is over." The president discussed welfare reform

Welfare reform

Welfare reform refers to the process of reforming the framework of social security and welfare provisions, but what is considered reform is a matter of opinion. The term was used in the United States to support the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act...

, the V-chip

V-chip

V-chip is a generic term for technology used in television set receivers in the USA, Canada, and Brazil which allows the blocking of programs based on their ratings category. It is intended for use by parents to manage their children's television viewing...

, education, community policing, crime and the environment. The president also discussed foreign relations and the federal budget. This speech occurred shortly after the federal government shutdown of 1995 and 1996.

The Republican Party

Republican Party (United States)

The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...

 response was delivered by Senator Bob Dole

Bob Dole

Robert Joseph "Bob" Dole is an American attorney and politician. Dole represented Kansas in the United States Senate from 1969 to 1996, was Gerald Ford's Vice Presidential running mate in the 1976 presidential election, and was Senate Majority Leader from 1985 to 1987 and in 1995 and 1996...

 of Kansas

Kansas

Kansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...

.

Donna Shalala

Donna Shalala

Donna Edna Shalala served for eight years as Secretary of Health and Human Services under President Bill Clinton and has been president of the University of Miami, a private university in Coral Gables, Florida, since 2001. She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest...

, the Secretary of Health and Human Services

United States Secretary of Health and Human Services

The United States Secretary of Health and Human Services is the head of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, concerned with health matters. The Secretary is a member of the President's Cabinet...

, served as the designated survivor

Designated survivor

A designated survivor is a member of the United States Cabinet who is appointed to be at a physically distant, secure, and undisclosed location when the president and the country's other top leaders are gathered at a single location, such as during State of the Union addresses and presidential...

.

External links

• http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=53091(full transcript), The American Presidency Project, UC Santa Barbara
  University of California, Santa Barbara
  The University of California, Santa Barbara, commonly known as UCSB or UC Santa Barbara, is a public research university and one of the 10 general campuses of the University of California system. The main campus is located on a site in Goleta, California, from Santa Barbara and northwest of Los...
  
  .]
• 1996 State of the Union Address (video) at C-SPAN