[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 24 (Tuesday, February 7, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H1294]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    PUT TEETH BACK IN THE CRIME BILL

  (Mr. HOKE asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. HOKE. Mr. Speaker, when the Democrats passed their soft-on-crime 
bill last year, we were assured that it would be tough on criminals and 
attack crime's root causes. But once the American people learned what 
it was--dance classes and midnight basketball, what they called hugs 
for thugs--they issued a very different verdict at the polls. They said 
the Democrat crime bill was guilty of being pollyannaish, that it 
coddled criminals instead of incarcerating them, and they said, ``We 
want our streets back. We want the criminal justice system to act as a 
deterrent. We believe that you have got to catch, convict, and confine. 
That is what criminal justice is all about.''
  When we take up the crime bill today, we are going to put some real 
teeth back into it and give our police and prosecutors the tools that 
they need to do their job effectively. We are going to stop frivolous 
appeals. We are going to end the practice of letting criminals off on 
technicalities and build more prisons to keep them off the streets.
  Our Constitution demands that we ensure domestic tranquility, a duty 
that we have been failing at recently. That changes, starting today.

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