Presidents’ Summit Draws Protest ‘Volunteering Is Not Enough,’ Can’t Undo Welfare Reform, Critics Say

With President Clinton and three of his predecessors in town Sunday, along with scores of celebrities and corporate executives, it was hard to escape the spirit of volunteerism emanating from the start of the Presidents’ Summit for America’s Future.

Yet, here in the Judge Lewis Quadrangle, a block from the Liberty Bell, several thousand protesters tried.

“The summit is all hoopla and propaganda, a great photo op,” said Brian Becker, a coordinator of the National People’s Campaign, a kind of counter-conference held to protest the notion that volunteerism can replace policies that help the poor.

Becker added, “Charity and volunteerism, however noble, can’t make up the difference in damage caused by the new welfare legislation.”

One sign, summing up the mindset toward the summit, read, “We’ve volunteered enough to know volunteering is not enough.”

For a topic as politically neutral as volunteerism would seem, it has touched a nerve among people here and elsewhere who interpret the three-day conference as a fig leaf for a federal government that is cutting back entitlement programs and for corporations that are downsizing.

Conference organizers and leading political figures involved with it disagree, insisting that charitable acts and contributions are worthy supplements to government policies.

Mayor Edward Rendell of Philadelphia, who welcomed Clinton, George Bush, Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford in opening ceremonies Sunday morning, initially was hesitant to offer the city as host if mass do-gooding was promoted as a remedy for changes in the welfare law.

“It’s not a panacea,” Rendell said. “It’s not an answer to the new welfare system. Look, I’m sympathetic with the demonstrators. But they ought to be demonstrating in Washington.”