THE WHITE HOUSE

                     Office of the Press Secretary
                        (Tegucigalpa, Honduras)
________________________________________________________________________
For Immediate Release                                      March 9, 1999

STATEMENT BY THE PRESIDENT

For the second day in a row, the Republican Leadership has continued its efforts to stand in the way of voting on an amendment to finish the job of hiring 100,000 teachers to reduce class size. Communities across the country need to know that Congress will live up to the bipartisan commitment we made last fall to fund this effort. The American people expect us to work together to improve the education of our students. I call on the Republican Leadership to allow an up-or-down vote on more teachers and smaller classes, and I call on every Senator to support the Murray-Kennedy measure to reduce class size and hire well-prepared teachers across the nation.

30-30-30