[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 31, Number 46 (Monday, November 20, 1995)]
[Page 2028]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Proclamation 6852--National Family Week, 1995

November 15, 1995

By the President of the United States

of America

A Proclamation

    Blessed with an extraordinary diversity of people from every culture 
and nation around the globe, the United States has always drawn strength 
from our citizens' shared commitment to the importance of family life. 
The family is society's most basic unit, daily providing the acceptance, 
love, and reassurance that enable each of us to flourish and succeed. It 
creates the earliest and strongest bonds between individuals--bonds that 
we seek to build upon to improve our Nation as a whole.
    Families are where we first learn important lessons about 
responsibility and where we absorb the ideals and traditions that define 
our unique American character. Yet we must do more to address the 
variety of troubles, such as substance abuse, domestic violence, and 
teenage pregnancy that have placed strains on the American family and 
threaten the well-being of our young people. At the same time, our 
efforts to combat crime and poverty cannot fully succeed until we 
rebuild our families and renew our commitment to their progress. A 
strong network of community, State, and national partnerships can also 
help families to face the challenges of everyday life.
    This week, as young and old gather around the Thanksgiving table, it 
is crucial that we embrace and empower American families, offering them 
the opportunities they need to thrive and grow. Let us each take time to 
appreciate the value of our family relationships and rededicate 
ourselves to building essential ties of kinship among all people.
    Now, Therefore, I, William J. Clinton, President of the United 
States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the 
Constitution and laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim November 
19 through November 25, 1995, as National Family Week. I call upon 
Federal, State, and local officials to honor American families with 
appropriate ceremonies and programs; I encourage educators, community 
organizations, and religious leaders to celebrate the moral and 
spiritual strength to be drawn from family relationships; and I urge all 
the people of the United States to reaffirm their own familial bonds and 
to reach out to others in friendship and goodwill.
    In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this fifteenth day 
of November, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and ninety-five, 
and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred 
and twentieth.
                                            William J. Clinton

[Filed with the Office of the Federal Register, 11:48 a.m., November 20, 
1995]

Note: This proclamation was published in the Federal Register on 
November 21.