Clinton urges states to step up

Former President Clinton kicked off the centennial gathering of the National Governors Assn. on Saturday with a challenge to the states to reassert themselves to help the country combat what he called the profound challenges of globalization and interdependency.

Returning to an organization that helped launch him to the White House, Clinton urged states to again become incubators for experimentation and innovation to reduce income inequality, resolve growing tensions over immigration and confront the threat of global climate change.

“The Founders were right,” he said. “You have to be laboratories of democracy. The [association] gives the governors a forum to do that. We have to deal with inequality. We have to deal with identity. We have to deal with energy. If we do, we’re about to go into the most exciting period in human history. If we don’t, in the words of President [Theodore] Roosevelt, dark will be the future. I’m betting on light.”

It was Roosevelt who convened the first gathering of the nation’s governors in 1908, and this weekend’s celebration brought together more than 50 current and former state executives for what turned into a debate on issues including education, healthcare and whether term limits have weakened state legislatures.

Clinton rose through the gubernatorial ranks in the 1970s and ‘80s as an energetic policy activist. “I used to tell people I loved going to the governors association,” he said, “because it was the ‘center of wonkdom.’ ”

There were light moments. When the talk moved to healthcare, one governor after another claimed to have the state with the healthiest population.

At another point, moderator Cokie Roberts asked the governors what it would mean if they were all separate countries. What would you do if you were a country? she asked Democratic Gov. Edward G. Rendell of Pennsylvania.

“I’d invade Ohio,” he said.