[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 2 (Wednesday, January 26, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: January 26, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
               SUPPORT FOR THE STATE OF THE UNION MESSAGE

  Mr. MATHEWS. Mr. President, I do not know when we Americans have had 
a better occasion or an opportunity to be more proud of a President of 
our country than last evening as he addressed the Nation about those 
ills and those opportunities that are before us.
  Mr. President, this morning I join my colleagues in welcoming the new 
day and in saluting the continuing direction that President Clinton 
presented in last night's State of the Union Message.
  It was a message marked by determination and a sense of new 
possibilities. And we as a nation are discovering more of both because 
of Bill Clinton's leadership.
  The President's remarks last night confirmed that the United States 
has passed the torch to a new generation. It is a generation defined 
not by age but by shared resolve--in many cases bipartisan resolve--to 
do what needs doing. The President's message reinforced that resolve 
and invited more of us to join the company who share it.
  The first year of a new administration and the first session of the 
103d Congress took beginning steps in the right direction.
  We reduced our deficit by $500 billion and restored equity in the Tax 
Code, especially for middle- and low-income Americans. We acted to tap 
the energies of our most committed young people by offering them money 
for college in exchange for an investment of their time in American 
communities. We acted to make Americans safer by passing aggressive 
anticrime legislation that keeps firearms away from children, criminals 
behind bars and bystanders out of the crossfire. Our vote to approve 
the North American Free-Trade Agreement announced that America would 
lead a new international era.
  President Clinton committed himself to all of this as a candidate, 
and as Chief Executive he accomplished all this without a single veto.
  In the first year of a new administration and in the first session of 
a new Congress, we found our feet. As the President starts the second 
year of this administration--and as we reconvene for the second session 
of the 103d Congress--we are ready for giant strides.
  As President Clinton rightly said in my home State of Tennessee a few 
weeks ago--and as he said again last night--our communities deserve 
more of our attention. The President's position is clear: Accept no 
truce in the fight against violent crime, drugs, and gangs. His charge 
to Congress is equally clear: Bring last session's crime bill out of 
committee, pass it into law with its teeth intact, and add to it this 
year with measures that are smart as well as tough.
  As a Congress, we know that the greatest good we can do for homes, 
families, and communities is to reward work. There is no greater source 
of pride and self-respect than being able to pay your own way in this 
world. Yet we have a welfare system which perpetuates its recipients in 
lives of subsistence and despair.
  That has to change. As President Clinton said last night, we must 
revolutionize a system that makes welfare more attractive than work. No 
one wants us to succeed more than the people who are on welfare and 
want to join the ranks of working Americans.
  President Clinton has integrated American trade policy and American 
foreign policy in unprecedented ways. For the rest of this century, 
domestic economic policy will be inseparable from global economic 
policy. We in Congress can face that fact with confidence in what we 
have already accomplished. As the President said, ``In 1 year with 
NAFTA, GATT, our efforts in Asia, and the National Export Strategy, we 
did more to open world markets to American products than at any time in 
the last two generations.''
  Yet as the president also said, ``There's much more to do.''
  Especially with the enormous challenge of health care reform. We must 
strengthen what is best in our health care system. But we cannot 
continue to pay more money for less care, to swamp health care 
providers under paperwork, and to tolerate a system that creates so 
much insecurity and leaves so many out in the cold. Our only course is 
to assure health security that can never be taken away--and to assure 
that health reform is fully and fairly funded. We are ready to do just 
that.
  As someone who spent 40 years of public service in finance and 
administration, I especially applaud the President's pledge to submit 
one of the toughest budgets ever presented to Congress.
  He says he will cut spending on 300 programs, eliminate 100 domestic 
programs, and reform the way Government buys goods and services. I say 
that is a good start. But Congress will never get that start under way 
until we realize that fiscal integrity means having a brain connected 
to a backbone. We have got plenty of brains working on the budget and 
the deficit. But only Congress can supply the backbone. This year we 
have to make the hard choices, live within our means, and honor the 
spending ceilings we have set.
  The President's State of the Union was hailed for its new approaches 
and its new direction. But as I see it, the President spoke about basic 
and fundamental things--health, safety, jobs, dignity, self-
determination. These are the most fundamental things of all, as the 
President has reminded us with his message.
  The President deserves the highest marks for his ambitious agenda and 
for his focus on basic things that matter to all Americans.
  He is providing us leadership, and he has invited Congress to become 
a full partner in building a stable, prosperous, and forward-looking 
America.
  I, for one, am eager to accept his invitation and to realize his goal 
of an America brimming with opportunity and brightened by a higher 
quality of life.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. DOLE addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The minority leader, Mr. Dole, is recognized.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, is leader time reserved?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is correct.

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