CLINTON ADDRESSES SLAVERY IN U.S.

Byline: James Bennet The New York Times

President Clinton expressed regret Tuesday for the American role in African slavery, as he reeled off a list of errors in U.S. policy toward this continent that included turning to ruthless dictators as allies during the Cold War.

Clinton has been under some pressure at home to issue a formal apology for slavery, but he stopped well short of such an explicit statement.

``Going back to the time before we were even a nation, European-Americans received the fruits of the slave trade and we were wrong in that,'' he said in what his aides called an impromptu remark, which strayed into a political territory that the White House has been trying to avoid for months.

The president's remarks seemed addressed as much to his audience back home as to those who heard him speak Tuesday in a region that was not a major source for the slave trade in the 18th and 19th centuries.

In raising the subject of slavery on what the White House is billing as the most ambitious African tour ever undertaken by a U.S. president, Clinton chose to elevate an issue that he has largely avoided, except when questioned by reporters.

He made his comment while speaking before more than a thousand children in a meadow by a school in this rural hamlet. Under a brilliant sun, the president and Hillary Rodham Clinton toured the school, then sat as the children danced and sang before briefly joining in the dancing themselves, bouncing and swaying to the drums, the rattles and the bright, high voices.

In his 13-minute speech, Clinton gave the children a brief history lesson. ``It is well not to dwell too much on the past,'' he said, ``but I think it is worth pointing out that the United States has not always done the right thing by Africa.''

Uganda suffered during the 1970s under the brutal regime of Idi Amin, who ruled for years unchallenged by the United States. Without referring specifically to Uganda or any other country, Clinton said Tuesday that during the Cold War, ``very often we dealt with countries in Africa and in other parts of the world based more on how they stood in the struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union than how they stood in the struggle for their own people's aspirations to live up to the fullest of their God-given abilities.''

But in keeping with the themes of his trip, Clinton went on to say that ``perhaps the worst sin America ever committed about Africa was the sin of neglect and ignorance.''

While trying to encourage democracy and open markets, Clinton also is trying to alert Americans to hopeful changes in Africa and to direct more investment here. ``I came here to listen and to learn,'' Clinton said, ``to offer my help and friendship and partnership.''

Administration officials criticized reporters Tuesday evening for focusing on the president's remarks about history, saying Clinton's purpose in Africa was to envision the future, not exhume the past.

Clinton, who has been trying to encourage Americans to discuss race for the past nine months, appointed a commission that has been traveling the country for a series of public discussions on the issue.

But he has tried to prevent that discussion from dwelling on slavery and its legacies, an issue that created a small political storm when Clinton created the commission.

At the time, Rep. Tony Hall, D-Ohio, called for an official government apology to Americans whose ancestors were slaves. The idea gained some currency when Clinton did not quickly rule it out as a goal of the commission.

He later did so, after some of his political advisers argued that an official apology, while seemingly uncontroversial more than a century after slavery was outlawed in the United States, would have run the risk of reigniting tensions over the issue. In the view of some analysts, it also might have needlessly angered some centrist white voters who have been dependable supporters of Clinton.

Moreover, an official apology for slavery never received a push from the Congressional Black Caucus or from major civil rights groups.

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Photo: (Color) In Uganda, President Clinton holds a 2-day-old baby who was named Bill Clinton.

Greg Gibson/Associated Press