In the presidential campaign of 1992, the Demo-
cratic candidate for president, Governor Bill Clin-
ton of Arkansas, promised that together with his
wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, voters would get “two
for the price of one.” Even though that statement
led to attacks from opponents that the future First
Lady would have too much influence on her hus-
band, she was widely admired by most Americans
and most people around the world by the end of the
1990’s.
Health Care Plan The fears of many critics were re-
inforced when, on January 25, 1993, President
Clinton named his wife chair of the President’s Task
Force on National Health Care Reform. Ira Maga-
ziner’s corporate consulting firm had conducted an
exhaustive study of America’s health care system,
and he served on the task force along with the cabi-
net secretaries of commerce, defense, health and
human services, labor, and veterans affairs. Senior
staff at the White House and Office of Management
and Budget rounded out the membership of the
task force. Health care reform seemed from the out-
set to be an almost impossible venture, but both
Clintons thought it a worthy cause; as of 1992, health
care was costing the United States more than any
other industrialized nation in the world at 14 per-
cent of the gross domestic product. Hillary Clinton
felt it unacceptable that the United States spends so
much on health care yet does not offer universal cov-
erage.
President Clinton told Magaziner that the task
force had to complete its work within the first year of
his presidency, as Clinton had promised during the
election campaign to make health care a priority.
The First Lady and Magaziner went to the Congress
and met with all the influential members; they soon
realized that passing health care legislation by the
spring of 1993 was an impossible task. The adminis-
tration was working hard to get the president’s eco-
nomic package through the Congress, and many felt
that a battle for health care reform would seriously
hinder that effort.
Finally, the long-awaited moment for the task
force came on September 22, 1993, when President
Clinton introduced his administration’s plan for
universal health care during a speech before a joint
session of Congress, with the First Lady sitting in the
gallery. She listened as her many months of plan-
ning policy, traveling around the country, and study-
ing the current health care system culminated in ac-
tual legislation. She then set out lobbying members
of Congress for passage of the plan, becoming the
first presidential wife to testify in front of the House
Ways and Means Committee on such a major piece
of legislation. However, the legislation stalled in
both houses of Congress because of the highly
charged political atmosphere. That the bill was
1,342 pages long only complicated matters. Many in
Congress feared that the government was simply tak-
ing over the health care system rather than drasti-
cally reforming the current system to reduce costs
and provide coverage for all Americans. Many Re-
publicans feared that a major victory such as passage
of a universal health care plan would ensure contin-
ued Democratic control of Congress in the 1994
midterm elections and help the president cruise to a
reelection victory in 1996.Human Rights Advocate, Supportive Spouse Long
before the 1990’s, Hillary Clinton had supported
women’s rights and fought for policies to better the
lives of women and children the world over. She fi-
nally had a global stage on which to serve as an advo-192 Clinton, Hillary Rodham The Nineties in America
Hillary Rodham Clinton.(Library of Congress)