[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 86 (Thursday, June 30, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: June 30, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
          IS CONGRESS IRRESPONSIBLE? YOU BE THE JUDGE OF THAT

  Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, the incredibly enormous Federal debt is 
like the weather--everybody talks about it but nobody does anything 
about it. Congress talks a good game about bringing Federal deficits 
and the Federal debt under control, but there are too many Senators and 
Members of the House of Representatives who unfailingly find all manner 
of excuses for voting against a constitutional amendment to require a 
balanced Federal budget.
  As of Wednesday, June 29, at the close of business, the Federal debt 
stood--down to the penny--at exactly $4,604,969,673,918.82. This debt, 
mind you, was run up by the Congress of the United States; the big-
spending bureaucrats in the executive branch of the U.S. Government, 
you see, cannot spend a dime that has not first been authorized and 
appropriated by the U.S. Congress. The U.S. Constitution is quite 
specific about that, as every school boy is supposed to know.
  So pay no attention to the nonsense from politicians that the Federal 
debt was run up by one President or another, depending on party 
affiliation. Sometimes they say Ronald Reagan ran it up; sometimes they 
say George Bush. I even heard that Jimmy Carter helped run it up. All 
such suggestions are false--the Congress of the United States is the 
villain.
  Most people cannot conceive of a billion of anything, let alone a 
trillion. It may provide a bit of perspective to bear in mind that a 
billion seconds ago, Mr. President the Cuban Missile Crisis was going 
on. A billion minutes ago, not many years had elapsed since Christ was 
crucified.
  That sort of puts it in perspective, does it not, that Congress has 
run up a Federal debt of 4,604 of those billions--of dollars. In other 
words, the Federal debt, as I said earlier, stands today at 
$4,604,969,673,918.82.

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