[Federal Register Volume 59, Number 82 (Friday, April 29, 1994)]
[Presidential Documents]
[Pages 22123-22124]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 94-10479]
[[Page Unknown]]
[Federal Register: April 29, 1994]
Presidential Documents
Federal Register
Vol. 59, No. 82
Friday, April 29, 1994
____________________________________________________________________
Title 3--
The President
Proclamation 6678 of April 25, 1994
National Crime Victims' Rights Week, 1994
By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation
Every day, our Nation's peace is shattered by crime.
Violent crime and the fear it provokes are crippling
our society, limiting our personal freedom, and fraying
the ties that bind us. No corner of America, it often
seems, is safe from increasing levels of criminal
violence. And more and more, the victims of these
crimes are random targets of assaults stemming from a
serious breakdown of values in our families and our
communities.
National Crime Victims' Rights Week is a time when our
Nation pauses to seriously reflect on these innocent
victims of crime and on those who are working all
across this country in their behalf. Thousands of
people--many of them volunteers who have been victims
themselves--are tirelessly striving at the Federal,
State, and local levels to provide emotional support,
guidance, and financial assistance to help crime
victims recover from their trauma and to ensure that
they are treated equitably and sensitively as their
cases progress through the criminal justice system.
My Administration is working to stop the violence today
to ensure fewer victims tomorrow. The pending crime
bill is tough and smart and fair, with victims'
concerns as its centerpiece. It will strengthen
programs that combat violence against women, it will
impose a life sentence--without possibility of parole--
on repeat, violent offenders, and it will amend the
Victims of Crime Act to expand Federal resources
available for crime victims' services, and it will
promote the development of State registries for child
abusers. We are encouraging citizens to assume personal
responsibility for improving their neighborhoods and to
get involved in finding solutions to the violence in
their communities.
Those who give of themselves to assist victims are
helping immeasurably in this effort. They are there for
their neighbors. They are there to provide comfort when
someone has lost a child to random gunfire, when the
sanctity of someone's home has been invaded by an
intruder, when someone has been robbed, brutalized, or
beaten. National Crime Victims' Rights Week affords us
the opportunity to express our appreciation to these
``good neighbors'' and to renew our commitment to
meeting the needs and ensuring the rights of crime
victims.
I encourage communities across the Nation to facilitate
the restorative process. Offenders must take
responsibility and be held accountable for what they
have done. We must encourage victims to cooperate with
law enforcement agencies and help them to rebuild their
lives and their communities through volunteer efforts
and community service projects. And community
institutions must afford the same rights to the victim
as those given to the accused and to the offender. This
includes initiatives such as community policing,
community prosecutors, and community action advocates.
Members of AmeriCorps promise a source of untapped
potential for even more victim service agencies in our
cities and towns. In fact, thousands will be making
their presence felt this summer in our national service
Summer of Safety programs. The problem of violence is a
problem for all Americans. It is not a partisan issue.
Strong pro-victim measures must be enacted in order to
give our children a brighter future.
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 the week of April 24 through
April 30, 1994, as National Crime Victims' Rights Week.
I urge all Americans to join in remembering the
innocent victims of crime and in honoring those who
labor selflessly in behalf of these victims and their
families. We must recommit ourselves to working with
our neighbors to stop the violence and to ensure safer
streets, schools, and playgrounds for our Nation's
children and for all of our citizens.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
twenty-fifth day of April, in the year of our Lord
nineteen hundred and ninety-four, and of the
Independence of the United States of America the two
hundred and eighteenth.
(Presidential Sig.)>
[FR Doc. 94-10479
Filed 4-26-94; 4:27 pm]
Billing code 3195-01-P
