Answering America's challenge. Today, after his State of the Union challenge to Congress to pass the Telecommunications Reform Act of 1996, President Clinton will sign the bill into law. With the help of a digital pen, it will then become the first bill ever signed into cyberspace. This reform will stimulate private investment, promote competition, provide families with technologies to help them control the kinds of television programs that come into their homes, protect diversity of viewpoints and voices among the media, and strengthen and improve universal service so that all Americans can have access to the benefits of the information superhighway.

" Our first challenge is to cherish our children and strengthen America's families. Family is the foundation of American life. If we have stronger families, we will have a stronger America. . . I call on Congress to pass the requirement for a V-chip in TV sets . . . [as] part of the important telecommunications bill now pending in this Congress."
--President Clinton, State of the Union Address,
January 23, 1996

Meeting the challenge on families. In his very first challenge in the State of the Union, President Clinton called on Congress to give parents the tools to protect their children from TV violence.

• V-Chip. The Act includes a provision calling for a computer chip, called the Violence Chip or V-Chip, to be installed in every new television set. By helping parents screen out programs they believe are inappropriate for their children, the V-Chip will help parents to assume more personal responsibility for their children's upbringing.

• Television violence. In his State of the Union address, President Clinton challenged the media to create shows and CDs they would have their own children and grandchildren enjoy, and challenged the broadcast industry to identify programming in ways that help parents to protect their children.

  This need was underscored yesterday by "a year long study of television programming, conducted by researchers at four universities, [which] concludes that 'psychologically harmful' violence is pervasive on broadcast and cable TV programs." The Washington Post, February 6, 1996

• Historic reform. There have been few times in our nation's history when such strong, bipartisan reforms have opened such significant gateways to the future. In 1957, President Eisenhower signed into law the Interstate Highway Act, legislation that literally brought Americans closer together. During the signing, he gave one of the pens to Senator Albert Gore, Sr., the father of that legislation. President Clinton will use that pen to sign today's law, which was conceived in the same spirit of connection and communication by Senator Gore's son, the Vice President, who is in many ways the father of this legislation.

• Universal service. The Act ensures that schools, libraries, hospitals and clinics have access to advanced telecommunications services, and calls for them to be connected to the information superhighway by the year 2000, opening up worlds of knowledge in rural and low-income areas.

• Media ownership. To preserve the diversity of voices and viewpoints which is critical to our democracy, the Act will prevent undue concentration of television and radio ownership, limiting the number of stations one entity can own to stations that reach up to 35 percent of all national TV viewers.

• Phone service. The Act breaks down the walls of regulation that previously kept local Bell Telephone companies and long-distance telephone companies from competing with each other, while keeping safeguards in place to ensure competition and serve the public interest.