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Bella Abzug was a prominent liberal activist and politician in the 1960s and 1970s who championed women’s rights, human rights and the environment.

This speech, delivered by then-President Bill Clinton, recognized and apologized for the study conducted by the United States government on more than 500 unknowing African-American soldiers at Tuskegee for untreated syphilis.

“The desert-dwelling Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians were uprooted from their ancestral lands. For decades, they were cheated of the property rights deeded to them by the U.S. government, and then subject to restrictive deed provisions. Not until the 1980s were they able to develop their own land in Palm Springs, and only recently have they begun to restore the springs revered by their ancestors. Tribal council member Anthony J. Andreas III battles the severe mental health problems that afflict the traumatized tribe by reviving ancestral practices. Traditional Bird Songs and pottery help today’s youth draw strength from the tribe’s sources of spiritual resilience.”