Well, we did.  We replaced drift and deadlock with renewal and reform.  And I want to thank every one of you here who heard the American people, who broke gridlock, who gave them the most successful teamwork between a president and a Congress in 30 years.

Accomplishments

This Congress produced a budget that cut the deficit by half a trillion dollars, cut spending and raised income taxes on only the wealthiest Americans.  This Congress produced tax relief for millions of low-income workers to reward work over welfare.  It produced NAFTA.  It produced the Brady bill, now the Brady law.

And thank you, Jim Brady, for being here, and God bless you, Sarah.  This Congress produced tax cuts to reduce the taxes of nine out of 10 small businesses who use the money to invest more and create more jobs.  It produced more research and treatment for aids, more childhood immunizations, more support for women’s health research, more affordable college loans for the middle class, a new national service program for those who want to give something back to their country and their communities for higher education, a dramatic increase in high-tech investments to move us from a defense to a domestic high-tech economy.  This Congress produced a new law—­the motor voter bill—­to help millions of people register to vote.  It produced family and medical leave—­all passed, all signed into law, with not one single veto.

These accomplishments were all commitments I made when I sought this office, and in fairness, they all had to be passed by you in this Congress.  But I am persuaded that the real credit belongs to the people who sent us here, who pay our salaries, who hold our feet to the fire.  But what we do here is really beginning to change lives.  Let me just give you one example.

Family And Medical Leave

I will never forget what the family and medical leave law meant to just one father I met early one Sunday morning in the White House.  It was unusual to see a family there touring early Sunday morning, but he had his wife and his three children there, one of them in a wheelchair.  And I came up, and after we had our picture taken and had a little visit, I was walking off, and that man grabbed me by the arm and he said, “Mr. President, let me tell you something.  My little girl here is desperately ill.  She’s probably not going to make it.  But because of the family leave law, I was able to take time off to spend with her, the most important I ever spent in my life, without losing my job and hurting the rest of my family.  It means more to me than I will ever be able to say.  Don’t you people up here ever think what you do doesn’t make a difference.  It does.”

Though we are making a difference, our work has just begun.  Many Americans still haven’t felt the impact of what we’ve done.  The recovery still hasn’t touched every community or created enough jobs.  Incomes are still stagnant.  There’s still too much violence and not enough hope in too many places.