[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 106 (Thursday, August 4, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: August 4, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                    CRIME BILL A SOCIAL WELFARE BILL

  (Mr. WALKER asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, the Democratic leadership is having a hard 
time rounding up votes to pass the rule on the crime bill. Some people 
might wonder why that is the case when the President of the United 
States said last night this is such a great crime bill.
  Well, the problem with the crime bill is it is not a crime bill, it 
is a social welfare bill, and it is a social welfare bill that has bad 
crime consequences.
  For example, up to 10,000 drug criminals are going to be released 
from jail almost immediately as a result of this crime bill. What it 
does is it retroactively reduces the sentences of people who are now 
behind bars and puts them back out on the street.
  Having done so, what is that going to do to crime in most of our 
communities? It is going to increase crime, not reduce crime.
  Now, what was the alternative? The alternative was to build enough 
prison space so we could keep drug criminals behind bars and at the 
same time put some other criminals out there on the streets right now 
into jail. What was done in the crime bill? The amount of money that 
the House put in for prisons, $13 billion, was cut in half back to $6.5 
billion in this crime bill. This is not a crime bill. This is a bill 
that will in fact make our streets less safe rather than more safe.

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