Bill Clinton spoke at USC on Monday. Here’s what he said

When Bill Clinton grows up, he wants to be just like former S.C. Gov. Dick Riley.

That’s what the former U.S. president signed in Riley’s 85th birthday card in January, Clinton told a crowd of about 400 on Monday. The occasion was a ceremony at the University of South Carolina’s Alumni Center where Riley donated his personal artifacts to the university’s library.

“These papers reflect the man who had the single greatest quality of public service,” Clinton said of Riley, who served as South Carolina’s governor from 1979 to 1987. “And that is he kept score in the right way.”

That criteria, Clinton elaborated, was whether the constituents he served were better off after Riley left office than before.

Riley, 85, and Clinton, 71, were elected to their respective states’ governorships on the same day in 1978 and have known each other for decades. When Clinton ran for president in 1992, Riley served as his South Carolina campaign chairman. And when Clinton was elected president in 1993, he appointed Riley his U.S. secretary of education.

“I’m humbled to have Bill Clinton here,” said Riley, whose gubernatorial accomplishments included better funding the state’s public schools. “It really means a lot to me.”

Perhaps Riley’s most notable artifact is the pair of cowboy boots he wore when he was elected governor. He vowed he would wear them every day until the state reformed education.

Riley, himself an alumnus of USC’s law school, will also be donating the following personal artifacts, according to a USC news release:

• More than 3,000 photographs, thousands of speeches with Riley’s handwritten edits as well as extensive research notes on policy development.
• Interviews with Riley, his wife, Tunky Riley, their son, Ted, and Dick Riley’s father, Edward P. ‘Ted’ Riley.
  
  
• Printed campaign materials from Riley’s candidacies and his efforts for others, including former presidents Clinton, Jimmy Carter and former Vice President Al Gore.
  
  

Riley, a Greenville native, has been donating artifacts to USC since the 1990s, according to the release.

“This is one of the greatest days at our university,” said Thomas McNally, dean of the school’s libraries.

USC President Harris Pastides, who spoke at the event, called Riley one of the “most principled men in public life” and “the finest secretary of education this country ever had.”

Though the Clintons are known for making large sums of money for speaking arrangements — $153 million since 2001, according to CNN — USC said neither it nor any affiliated entities paid the former president for his speech. Clinton did not take any questions after the speech.

Known as an unflappable statesman, Riley shepherded through the South Carolina Education Improvement Act of 1984, which increased teacher pay and accountability for schools, paid partly by raising the state sales tax by by one cent.

Riley said the education reforms he spearheaded — specifically the S.C. Education Improvement Act of 1984 — are the “highlight” of his career.

Riley called for a new “movement” to prioritize education, but did not elaborate when asked for specifics as to how it should be fixed.

“What we need, now more than ever, is to come together,” Riley said.

This story was originally published August 6, 2018 at 5:26 PM.