Clinton talks tobacco during Phila. visit

As part of his visit to Philadelphia Friday, the president advocated a tobacco tax hike in a speech to scientists. Warning that one million children's lives are at stake, President Clinton called on Congress to pass new legislation ending "the deadly epidemic of teen smoking" Friday during a speech in Philadelphia. The remarks came during a speech Clinton gave before 3,000 scientists gathered in Philadelphia for the annual convention of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The speech was the first of three stops Clinton made during his whirlwind one-day visit to Philadelphia, a city that gave him three-fourths of its votes in the 1996 election. After the address, the presidential motorcade passed through the Penn campus en route to a luncheon with Philadephia Mayor Ed Rendell and other city leaders at Big George's Stop-N-Dine, a Southern food restaurant at 52nd and Spruce streets. The president also attended an evening fundraiser at a private residence in Rittenhouse Square. Clinton's address came on the occasion of the Association's 150th birthday. The group -- which was founded in Philadelphia -- is the nation's largest professional organization for scientists, boasting 143,000 members. Clinton became the first president to address the group since Harry Truman spoke in 1948. In his 30-minute speech at the Marriott Hotel in Center City, smoking was the target of Clinton's strongest rhetoric, as he characterized tobacco as a threat to America's children. The centerpiece of the president's proposal to cut teen smoking is a $1.50 increase in the federal tax on tobacco over the next 10 years. He said the tax was designed to "change forever the way the tobacco companies do business." He called on the gathered scientists to "speak with a very loud voice" in favor of the legislation. Throughout the speech, Clinton mixed praise for scientific progress with calls for caution in the face of rapid advances. "We must always marry our newest idea with our oldest values," he said. The remarks came as part of a veiled reference to Richard Seed, a Chicago doctor who has announced plans to clone a human being. The president denounced any such attempt as "untested, unsafe and morally unacceptable." That was the extent of any critical remarks toward the scientific community, which the president otherwise praised and promised increased funding. "Our nation has always believed that what you do would transform our nation for the better," he said. But while Clinton acknowledged the portrayal of a future where science has run amok in movies such as Mad Max, the president told the audience that "I don't think you believe that's what it's going to be like." Instead, he called on the gathered scientists to "accept the responsibility to imagine and invent a different kind of future." Clinton went on to describe a future president addressing the Association's 200th convention -- in 2048 -- in a world free of cancer, AIDS and "climatic disruption." That vision of the future is one that Americans have the responsibility to create, Clinton said. "Speak loudly for our children," he said. "Tell people there will be miracles they cannot imagine in the 21st century. But tell them they must take responsibility for [the future]." The convention, which will continue through February 17, will feature speeches by 21 Penn professors on topics ranging from "Chocolate Craving" to "The Rights and Wrongs of Cloning." Penn President Judith Rodin is a co-chairperson of the local host committee for the convention.