Well, as I spelled out in my last fireside chat to the American people, there 'are three basic elements that I would require: One is fairness in deal… - Jimmy Carter

Do you think we are making some progress now? Do you think we have a long way to go? Do you think we are going to get there? Right on. I'm very proud to be here tonight in what I think is an historic occasion that will perhaps go down in the history of our country as a turning point in the minds and hearts of the American people in their long overdue concern about a large group of Americans, about 36 million, who in the past have too often been ignored. This is the first White House Conference on the Handicapped. I know that this is a tremendous assembly of leaders who have fought a long and sometimes discouraging battle to arrive here in Washington tonight. But this is not the first meeting. There have been dozens and dozens of meetings, attended by thousands of people in the 50 States of our country, and you have already brought to the consciousness of local and State officials an awareness of potential change 'for the better and many improvements that have already been made. Labor, industry can work together with government to make sure that, jointly, our efforts are successful. There is hardly a national leader on Earth in all the 150 nations that span the globe, who are not now thinking about two words: human rights. And now we in our own country are applying those two words to the handicapped people of our country. It's long overdue.

It violates the essence of what made America a great country in its political system. Now it’s just an oligarchy with unlimited political bribery being the essence of getting the nominations for president or being elected president. And the same thing applies to governors, and U.S. Senators and congress members. So, now we’ve just seen a subversion of our political system as a payoff to major contributors, who want and expect, and sometimes get, favors for themselves after the election is over. ... At the present time the incumbents, Democrats and Republicans, look upon this unlimited money as a great benefit to themselves. Somebody that is already in Congress has a great deal more to sell, to an avid contributor.

We didn't consider it to fall in the legal definition of a disaster area. Those definitions are established very clearly in the Federal law. And the department leaders involved, Patricia Harris in HUD and others, analyzed the situation in New York as best we could, analyzed the definition of a disaster area in the law, and found out that it didn't match. We did make a special allocation through Housing and Urban Development, Commerce, EDA, Labor, and other departments--including the Justice Department, to expedite the hearings on those that were accused of looting--I think a total package of about $11.4 million. I doubt that any more money would have been allocated to the city if it had received an official declaration. So we did all we could within the bounds of the law to recognize the problem in New York.