[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 17 (Thursday, February 24, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: February 24, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                       BALANCED BUDGET AMENDMENT

  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Oregon [Mr. 
Smith] for an announcement.
  Mr. SMITH of Oregon. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, you and I and many have been working for a very long 
time, many years in fact, on a balanced budget amendment to the 
Constitution. It has come to votes here in the House several times 
falling very narrowly short. But again today, Mr. Speaker, with your 
help and the help of the gentleman in the well, we now have 218 
signatures on a discharge petition, which means that the balanced 
budget amendment to the Constitution will be debated and voted upon 
probably by mid-March.
  I am delighted that we have all worked so closely together. I think 
the American people want a balanced budget amendment to the 
Constitution. And I want to thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania and 
the gentleman from Texas for their outstanding support.
  Mr. WALKER. I thank the gentleman very much
  I too would like to add my congratulations to the gentleman in the 
chair, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm], the Speaker pro tempore 
at the moment, for all of the hard work he has done on this, as well as 
the gentleman from Oregon [Mr. Smith] for months and months of hard 
work. I really do believe at this time getting it to the floor and 
bringing up a balanced budget amendment may well be the time when we 
pass it and send it to the country for approval. And the gentleman is 
to be congratulated.
  We will all be better off and future generations will be better off 
if we can bring this about.
  I thank the gentleman.

                          ____________________