FROM THE OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS

Thank you all so very much for selecting me to receive your award. I want to say to my wife, Fran, that the sacrifice you have made while I essentially have held two jobs, is something I shall always cherish. You, along with our children Jay and Jessica, who are here, and Brian and Erin, should really be co-recipients of this award, because I never could have done this work without your support.

I am honored to receive this award because I have always held the work of B'nai B'rith in high esteem. I grew up in Atlanta, and in my house the mob lynching of Leo Franks, who had been President of the local chapter of B'nai B'rith, was still a chilling memory even though it had happened years before. That was the hate crime that led directly to the creation of the American Defamation League (ADL) in order to combat anti-Semitism in America. Now ADL stands alert for anti-Semitic outbreaks in all countries. I am gratified that funds from this dinner will be used by the new Center for Public Policy, for finding and prosecuting other Nazi war criminals -- as you did with Dinko Sakic of Croatia, for aiding restitution, and for assisting isolated Jewish communities around the world.

I am gratified to see so many good friends, people who, by their own strong commitment to B'nai B'rith and to the greater Washington Jewish community, have served as role models for me and for Fran in our own involvement. It is wonderful to see so many members of the new generation who are taking leadership roles in our congregations, our day schools and the other institutions of the community. It is a magnificent Jewish generation. Their energy, their activism, their commitment makes me confident that the future will be secure in their hands.

Secretary Summers, you were more than generous in your remarks tonight. When the late President Kennedy spoke about the need bring into government outstanding academics who could also move effectively in Washington and on the world stage, he was talking about people your with qualities. Secretary Summers, you lead the new generation of scholar-statesmen and it has been a privilege to work you. You have been a great Secretary of the Treasury, a true friend, and a great supporter of my work. I want to thank you in front of this audience for taking additional burdens on your own shoulders so I could continue with my assignment as Special Representative for Holocaust issues.

What I have been doing on behalf of Holocaust survivors and their families has been my most challenging and most satisfying responsibility. To watch the moral conscience of the world stir and come to focus on these issues, so long forgotten; to try to translate that awareness into concrete action on behalf of survivors themselves, has been an unforgettable experience. I am grateful to President Clinton and Secretary Albright for giving me this opportunity, and for their support and active involvement at key moments.

Over the last five years, with the cooperation of many other governments and the strong support of organizations such as B'nai Brith, we have been able to produce a $1.25 billion Swiss bank settlement; a $5 billion agreement for slave and forced laborers and others injured by German industry. We have worked for the return of important works of stolen art and seen the beginnings of research by museums the world over, by which many more works can be identified and returned. We have been able to produce two massive U.S. government studies on Nazi gold and the role of neutral countries in supporting the German war effort and secured commitments by several governments to return confiscated communal and religious property to the reviving Jewish communities in Central and Eastern Europe. Our work has stimulated the creation of an International Commission to process insurance claims of victims and their families, historical commissions in 17 countries exploring their role in World War II and in dealing with Holocaust-related assets. Later this week, I shall be in Vienna at the signing of an agreement to pay $400million to survivors who performed slave and forced labor in that country. And we now have a framework for settling the claims of Austrian Jews who were forced to give up their homes and other property to get exit visas from Austria after the Anschluss in 1938.

At a ceremony at the United States Holocaust Museum two years ago, Elie Wiesel asked this question: "Why so late? Why has it taken so long in fulfilling the biblical command that stolen property must be returned to its owners?" It is hard to explain and impossible to justify why people who had been deprived of their most precious possessions had to wait most of their lives -and until many had passed away-for some measure of justice to be achieved. But we do know some of the reasons why there has been such a surge of action in recent years -- the advanced age of survivors, the end of the Cold War, a desire to attend to the unfinished business of World War II at the end of the Twentieth century, and the globalization of commerce making business firms in one country subject to the courts of other countries.

I would like to focus tonight on another reason. The fifty years following the Holocaust have seen the gradual development of an international consensus for justice and human rights that did not exist before World War II. It was first applied in the Nuremberg trials, was carried to the Helsinki Declaration in the 1970s, and can be seen in the war crimes trials that have recently been conducted by an international court in The Hague. It was on display in the worldwide revulsion over ethnic cleansing in Bosnia; summary executions at pistol point in Viet Nam; massacres in Chile, Somalia and Indonesia; apartheid in South Africa and the use of police dogs against demonstrators in Birmingham. It shows its force every time an unjust execution is stopped because of worldwide demonstrations and pleas from religious leaders. It has played a part in the progress the United States and many other nations have made in the advance of civil rights, the defense of human rights, and the improvement of the status of women. This higher moral standard explains the increasing appreciation in the non-Jewish community of the moral dimensions of the Holocaust, and the hold that terrible crime still has on the conscience of the world. Over fourteen million people, the great majority of them non-Jewish, have visited the Holocaust Museum since it opened its doors. The efforts to compensate for stolen Holocaust assets has received strong and continued media attention, not only in Europe where the crimes took place, but around the world.

As the facts were revealed through historical studies and elsewhere about the complicity of neutral nations in the disposition of Nazi gold, the extent of the theft of art and communal property, the unconscionable refusal of insurance companies to make good on the policies taken out by those who died in the Holocaust, and the conditions under which 13 million people were put to work as slave and forced workers, a powerful moral force arose to demand justice. Time and again, just as it looked as if our talks were breaking down, that force came to bear upon participants. It made them focus on the historic nature of what we were doing. It reminded them of the sacrifices that had been made by the victims. It swept smaller considerations aside, brought negotiations to a higher ground and paved the way for breakthroughs.

It is critical to remember that the vast majority of those who will benefit from the German and Austrian agreements are non-Jews, who also suffered, and who have received so little in compensation since the end of World War II. It is imperfect and belated justice, for Jews and non-Jews alike, because millions who did survive the war died before they could receive payments or restitution. But it is justice nonetheless.

We still have not closed the moral circle that began in those dark days when Jews throughout Europe were robbed, on their way to the death pits and the crematoria, robbed not only of their precious possessions, but of the clothes on their back and any distinguishing sign of their human image. I have every confidence that the next Administration and the next Congress, no matter what their political complexion, will carry on this work with the same high degree of commitment.

But the final chapter of the Holocaust should not be about money, but about memory. It should give those who perished their rightful place among the Jewish martyrs and preserve their stories. It should teach the story of the Holocaust in schools throughout the world to promote tolerance and justice in our own times, by breaking down religious stereotypes and helping young people appreciate the common humanity that underlies differences in religions and race. That is why 46 nations signed a Declaration in Stockholm last January, and why we have organized a ten-nation Task Force to devise practical ways to make this a reality.

There is a passage in the Psalms which says "the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day." By undertaking a moral accounting, by completing the historical record, by providing restitution to the living and honoring the memory of the dead, and by educating future generations, we can strengthen the world's consensus for justice and walk together on the path to that perfect day.