[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 31 (Thursday, February 16, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H1897-H1903]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF THE 104TH CONGRESS
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 4, 1995, the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Scarborough] is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. SCARBOROUGH. Mr. Speaker, it is certainly exciting to see what
has been happening in this town since January 4. It seems for the past
40 or so years we have had an institution in Congress that was not
responsive to the needs of Americans across the country; that did not
seem to care about what was going on in the lives of middle class
Americans, from Maine to California, from Florida to Washington State.
In fact, things had gotten so bad that just a few months back only 18
percent of Americans thought Congress was doing a good job.
Today, only a month and a half after the 104th Congress convened on
January 4th, almost 50 percent of Americans now believe Congress is
doing a good job and we are on the right track. And for good reason.
Look what has happened.
Of course, there are things we have not addressed yet. There are
problems we have not had time to work out. But let us look at what we
have done in just a few short weeks.
We have undertaken real institutional reform, reform that all
Americans are in favor of, even the most simple basic reform that
Congresses in the past have ignored. They have not listened to what
Americans have wanted.
We started with the Shays Act. The first day it was passed, and it is
an act that makes Congress abide by the same rules and regulations that
they force on individuals, on families, on businesses, on States, on
the rest of America. I cannot tell you how many times I heard people
across my district and across the country pound their fist into their
hands, angry, saying why can they pass laws, and then conveniently
exempt themselves from it? What makes Congress and the Members of
Congress feel so arrogant that they somehow believe that they are above
the law? Why does Congress not do what the overwhelming majority of the
American people want them to do. Is this not a representative
democracy?
[[Page H1898]] Well, the 104th Congress answered the call quickly,
and before we were out the first day, we passed the Shays Act, which
pushed forward a very simple proposition, and that is Congress abides
by the same laws that the rest of us have to abide by. That was a great
first day.
But if that was the only thing we had done the first day, it would
have been an unqualified success. But we went further. We also cut
staff by one-third. Committee staff was cut by one-third. And we did
more than that. We cut congressional staff. Members now were restricted
by the number of staff they had working in their offices and back in
their individual districts.
We have recently passed regulations that will cut franking by one-
third. It is a reform that Americans have called for, for years, and it
is a reform that the 104th Congress answered.
We also finally put term limits on committee chairmen. So many people
were disgusted with what they saw in the last few Congresses, by the
power amassed by the Dan Rostenkowskis of the House, and the people
said enough is enough. And once again the 104th Congress answered the
people's call and put term limits on committee chairmanships.
But they went a step further. They even put term limits on the
Speaker of the House, something that is absolutely unprecedented.
You hear so much from the other side of the aisle, trying to build up
these monsters and trying to vilify Members of the 104th Congress. Some
have even suggested that our Speaker is setting up this strong Sam
Rayburn style speakership, as if he is power hungry. The fact of the
matter is Sam Rayburn would have never agreed to put term limits on
himself. We have leadership that is moving forward, we have got Members
on both sides of the aisle that are moving forward toward institutional
reform. And I for one say it is about time.
I know, because this time last year, I was not a Congressman, I was
not a State senator, I was not in the State legislature, I was not a
county commissioner or a city councilman. I was a citizen. I was a
citizen who decided I was sick and tired of what was going on in
Washington, DC, and I wanted to be part of a real and dramatic change.
As the election returns came in November 8, 1994, it became clear to
every body across the country that there were a lot of citizens like
myself that had gotten off the couch. They did not have special
interests behind them; they did not have power brokers behind them;
they did not have powerful party leadership behind them. They only had
simple ideas behind them. They only had reform on their side. And in
1994 when all Americans got up off the couch and said enough is enough,
the ideals that we put forward in our campaign was enough. People
called for reform, we got elected, we came to this Congress, and we
have put forward great reform.
We also passed a limitation on tax increases. We have to have a
three-fifths supermajority now to pass any tax increases on middle
class citizens across this country. Let me tell you something: That is
incredibly important, when you consider that in 1993 the 103d Congress
ignored their constituents and ignored Americans from coast to coast
and passed the largest tax increase in the history of this country by
one vote.
We now require a supermajority, and because of it, the taxpayers have
received what I call a taxpayer protection plan, to make sure that
Congress stops stealing money from citizens across the country to feed
their own special interest pork-barrel projects. And that was a great
step forward, when you consider that the average American spends 50
percent of his or her time working to pay off taxes, fees and
regulations imposed on them by Government.
Think about that. When you go to work on Monday morning, you are
going to work for the Government to pay off taxes, fees and
regulations. When you go to work Tuesday morning, you are still working
for the Government.
{time} 1530
When you go to work Wednesday morning, you are still working to pay
off taxes, fees and regulations put on you by the Government. It is not
until you come back from lunch on Wednesday afternoon that you actually
start putting money into your own pocket, into your own savings account
for what you need to get by.
Let's put it another way. None of us will be working for ourselves
until July 1. We will be working to pay off taxes, fees and regulation
put on us by the Government until July 1. That means we all have more
months to work to pay off taxes, fees and regulations put on us by the
Government. Before we are able to put aside 1 cent for ourselves,
before we are able to put aside money to pay off our cars, or to pay
off our mortgage, or to put money aside for our children's educational
plans or, heaven forbid, until we can put aside any money for
retirement.
Our tax system is a system that punishes productivity. It is a system
that tells individuals and businesses and families, ``The harder you
work, the more you're going to be punished.''
We finally put in a taxpayers' protection plan. Our leader now is
talking about a flat tax that will tax all Americans evenly and fairly
at the same percentage rate to make sure that you are not punished,
that you do not pay at a higher percentage if you dare to be
productive, if you dare to invest, if you dare to do things that this
country was founded upon.
We are finally moving toward encouraging hard work and productivity
and personal sacrifice. I say it is about time, and I am honored to be
a part of that process. Again, it is something that we have already
passed in this 104th Congress.
We passed a line-item veto. That is something that President Ronald
Reagan had been calling for for years. That is semething that the
American people have been calling for for years. Look at the polls in
the USA Today and in Time and Newsweek and these other magazines. They
all say an overwhelming majority of Americans have supported a line-
item veto so the President can look through these huge budgets filled
with pork and be responsible and cut out line items of wasteful
spending. It is about time.
Again, it is something Americans have wanted this Congress to do for
a long time, and yet it is something that was ignored until the 104th
Congress came to town and we have passed it.
Some people have said, ``Well, a line-item veto is great, I was for
it when Ronald Reagan was President, I was for it when George Bush was
President. But now that Bill Clinton is President, I don't know if I'm
for the line-item veto anymore or not.''
Let me tell you something. It does not matter who the President is.
It finally brings accountability to the process.
For too long we have had people on both sides of Pennsylvania Avenue
pointing at each other. We have had people from the White House blaming
the Congress, saying, ``Hey, they've never sent us a balanced budget.''
The same thing was argued the other way around.
Finally the buck stops at the White House, and we have something in
place where the President will finally not be able to blame Congress or
blame anybody else if these pork-barrel projects go through. He simply
takes out his pen, lines through the appropriation, and we have
accountability in the budget process, and we have it because the 104th
Congress also passed it.
We have a balanced budget amendment that is passed from this House
and is now over in the Senate. That is another thing that Americans
have been for for years and another thing that Congress has ignored.
I have got to tell you when you start lining up all these things that
Americans have been for and you start realizing that Congresses in the
years past have covered their ears and shut their eyes and pretended
that Americans did not count, that they were above the law, that they
were above public opinion, that they were above being in a
representative democracy, a constitutional republic, you can now see
why the revolution took place.
People demanded accountability. Republicans and Democrats and
Independents demanded accountability. The Republican Party has come to
town and with the help of people on both sides of the aisle and
Independents across the country, we have passed these reforms
[[Page H1899]] through. But this is not simply a Republican revolution.
In my district, 60 percent of the people who voted in the 1994
election were Democrats. Sixty percent. I am a Republican. Yet I
received 62 percent of the total vote. That is overwhelming. It is
overwhelming because it shows that the issues that unite Americans are
not about whether you are Republican or Democrat or conservative or
liberal or independent. It is about accountability. It is about
listening to Americans and voting your conscience and voting the way
Americans want you to vote, the way that our Founding Fathers wanted us
to vote. We have done it. We did it today on H.R. 7. We have taken a
crucial step forward in once again making our shores safe and our
military strong.
There is no doubt we have had the strongest military in the history
of the world. But unfortunately we have continued cutbacks. Many
believe now that we are close to having a hollow force. Beyond that,
there has been another danger. There has been a danger of shifting
control from U.S. military men and women, from our generals and
admirals and our Commander in Chief to the U.N.
Just think about it. Think about the fact that we have men and women
who may go into combat, and when they go into combat, they will not be
fighting under American generals or American admirals.
Is there a problem with having them under the U.N. flag? Is there a
problem with our service men and women serving under foreign leaders?
Yeah, there is.
Our troops fight to protect and defend the Constitution of the United
States of America. There is a real problem when the Constitution is
bypassed in military exercises. I want to point out what happened in
Haiti a few months back.
We had a President who wanted to push for an invasion of Haiti, but
he could not get it passed through Congress. He could not garner the
sufficient support in this constitutionally elected body to have
support to send men and women, mothers and fathers to Haiti into a
conflict where they could die.
Our Founding Fathers knew how important it was that our President
could not sent Americans into war without approval of this Congress.
But what did the President of the United States do when he could not do
it through constitutional channels, through the Congress? He went to
the United Nations. There is a real problem with that as far as I am
concerned. It usurps essential powers that were given to this Congress
over 200 years ago by the Founders of this great Republic.
You need to go through a democratically elected body if you are going
to put Americans' lives at risk. H.R. 7 finally steps up to the plate
and puts an end to some of this madness. It is a first step down a road
where we will finally consolidate power where it needs to be, and, that
is, with American generals, admirals and our Commander in Chief.
But there is more than the U.N. We have the Mexico problem. It does
not matter where you stand on Mexico, you have got to look and see what
the President did, and it has to cause you a great deal of concern.
Because just like in Haiti, when he could not get approval in Congress,
he wanted to push this Mexican bailout plan, this loan guarantee. He
said he was going to get it approved in Congress. He could not get it
approved in Congress, so what did he do? He bypassed Congress again, as
if we do not matter, as if the 250 million or so Americans that this
institution represents are somehow irrelevant. Instead he turned and
used a fund that was set up to keep the dollar strong across the world.
{time} 1540
But he did not use it for the dollar. He used it to prop up the peso.
It certainly violated the spirit, if not the actual letter of the law,
and I would encourage the President of the United States to read his
Constitution and once again bring these matters to an elected body so
they can be debated and discussed the way they need to, before they are
implemented.
H.R. 7 also helps answer a big lie that has been spread, and let me
tell you what the big lie is. The big lie has been spread over the past
5 years that somehow this country is safer today than it was before the
collapse of the Soviet empire. Even though it sounds great, even though
we hear about the demise of the Evil Empire and that somehow is
supposed to make us feel that we are in a safer world today, the facts
point out something very different.
The fact of the matter is there are still nuclear missiles in Russia,
they are still pointed our way, but there is a big difference between
now and 5 years ago. Now we have madmen like Zhirinovsky, a neo-Nazi
ascending to power in the former Soviet Union. He is a man who is so
unstable that he threatened to nuke Germany after he ascended to power
because they would not let him in their country.
We have got economic and political and military and social chaos in
the Soviet Union, the former Soviet Union. We cannot afford to let down
our defenses because Boris Yeltsin may be in power today, but all
indications show that a very powerful totalitarian force could easily
overtake the former Soviet Union again and launch us into another cold
war.
It is constitutionally our first responsibility as a Government, as a
Federal Government, to protect the men and women and children in this
country from foreign attack. And that is what H.R. 7 does.
Another fact that concerns all of us, or should concern all of us, is
the growth of China. In the 1980's, China was the second fastest
growing economy in all of Asia, a region that is booming economically.
In fact, last year China's economic growth grew at a staggering 19-
percent clip, and make no mistake of it, China is using this new-found
economic prowess to develop, build, and export weapons technology to
Third World countries. We have got to keep our guard up.
And we have got to keep our guard up because a recent Foreign Affairs
article, which I do not subscribe to everything I read in Foreign
Affairs, that is for sure, but a recent Foreign Affairs article stated
that in 5 years over 20 countries are going to have intermediate
missile range capability, and they are not going to be the select
nuclear club that we used to have: the United States, England, France,
China, India; it is going to expand and all of a sudden we might find 5
years down the road that people like Saddam Hussein and Qadhafi and our
North Korean leaders will have this weapons technology and the ability
to launch those weapons across continents.
Let me tell you something. The world is more dangerous today than it
was 5 years ago, and anybody who tells you anything different is either
ignorant of the facts that are out there to be read and studied or else
they are glossing over the truth for their own political reasons.
We live in a dangerous world, and H.R. 7 was the first step to answer
the call of all Americans across this country who said do not let our
forces become hallow like they were in the late 1970's.
We are rebuilding this country because our children's lives are at
stake. We have welfare reform
coming up, something that all Americans or a majority of Americans
have supported for a long time. And more importantly, we are not only
talking about these basic reforms in the Contract With America, we are
talking about moving beyond those reforms and restructuring the way
this government works.
But I want to ask before we talk about our next step, let us examine
what we have done in 50 days. Let me read through this again because it
is absolutely incredible. In 50 days or less we have made Congress
accountable by making them abide by the same laws that all Americans
have to abide by. We have cut committee staff by one-third. We have cut
congressional staff. We have cut franking by one-third. We have put
term limits on committee chairmen, we have put term limits on the
Speaker of the House. Actually the Speaker put term limits on himself
and adopted that.
We have passed three-fifths tax limitation. I call it the taxpayer
protection plan. I do not care what you call it; what it does is it
guarantees this Federal Government is not going to be reaching in your
pocket for the next 2 years, and when we pass the rest of the three-
fifths balanced budget amendment next year we will be protected for
years to come.
[[Page H1900]] We have passed line-item veto, we have passed a
balanced budget amendment, and we have passed H.R. 7, an act that will
once again keep our military strong and guarantee us that we will be
able to answer the challenges that are facing us in this extremely
dangerous world.
This past week Members of the freshman class stepped forward, some
have called us new Federalists and they have called us new Federalists
because we have read the Federalist Papers. We have read the writings
of James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay and other Founding
Fathers, and we are committed to return this government to be the type
of government our Founding Fathers intended it to be.
I am moved by the words of James Madison who over 200 years ago as he
was framing this Constitution wrote, ``We have staked the entire future
of the American civilization not upon the power of government.'' Did
you hear that? ``We have staked the entire future of American
civilization not upon the power of government, but upon the capacity of
each of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, and sustain
ourselves, according to the Ten Commandments of God.'' That was James
Madison, a man who helped frame the Constitution. And it was Thomas
Jefferson who wrote the government that governs least governs best.
And our own tenth amendment, our own tenth amendment, the poor,
forgotten tenth amendment says all powers not specifically given to the
Federal Government are reserved to the States and to the people. Think
about that. Read through your Constitution, I urge all of you. I carry
a Constitution. Get a hand copy of the Constitution. If you do not have
it call my office, again Congressman Joe Scarborough. We will get you a
copy of the Constitution. Read through it and read the 10th amendment
and circle it and look through that Constitution and see what the
Federal power is empowered to do and what it is not empowered to do.
And if you force your representative to live by the words of the 10th
amendment, to live by the constraints of the 10th amendment, then this
Federal Government will once again be accountable.
We have started down that path. We need to continue. We need to be
constitutionally accountable, and that is what the new Federalists,
that is what freshmen reformers have been intending to do this past
week when we announced bold proposals to move this Congress forward
towards a 10th amendment vision.
I would like to recognize for a few minutes a man who helped lead a
very critical portion of the new Federalists agenda, and that is the
Honorable Sam Brownback from Kansas. Sam.
Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman yielding to me
for a moment. I would just like to talk to Members, the Chamber and
those listening about what we did this past week. It was on Wednesday
we came forward with a proposal announcing task forces that would
develop the proposals to eliminate 4 Cabinet-level agencies, the
agencies of Commerce, Education, Energy, and HUD.
{time} 1550
And the proposals are that we would look at these agencies and we
would ask the questions: Do they perform essential functions? And if
not, can they be eliminated? Can we get many of these solutions and
these issues back to the people? Can we give these things back to the
people, back to local units of government? Can we consolidate some of
these functions? Can we eliminate others? And getting back to what the
Founding Fathers had envisioned for our Nation.
It is interesting to me to note Alice Rivlin, the current Director of
the Office of Management and Budget, in a 1992 book, said she does not
think the Federal Government ought to be involved in education. It
should not be involved in economic development. It should not be
involved in some of these centralized planning functions that are
taking place. And that is what we are talking about here.
You know, most of these Cabinet agencies, three of the four, were
created since 1965. Housing and Urban Development was created in 1965.
Energy and Education were created in the late 1970's. They were created
at a time when we had a crisis. In the urban areas in the mid-1960's,
we had a crisis in urban America.
What was our solution in that time period? Our solution was let us
build a government bureaucracy. We built one. In the late 1970's we
said we have a crisis in energy. What is the solution? Let us build a
government bureaucracy. We have a crisis in education. What was the
solution? Let us build a government bureaucracy.
So we focused centrally in Washington for all the solutions to these
problems, and we put our energy and our focus and our efforts and
intensity here when the problem was out there, and our urban cities
were decaying in New York and in Washington, DC, as the city, not the
capital, and in Los Angeles and in our classrooms is where the problem
was. It was not we needed more bureaucracy. It is we needed more help
in the classroom, and we needed to liberate and free people.
In housing areas, the problem was not the need for a centralized
planning agency. The need was for more housing in communities and to
free people up to be able to deal with the problems they had in their
communities.
We say these experiments have not worked, that centralized planning,
whether in the former Soviet Union or in the United States of America,
does not work in a large, diverse nation like the United States.
We think that these agencies, that four things will guide our
purposes in developing the proposals to eliminate these four agencies.
No. 1 will be to privatize. Wherever we can privatize functions and get
them out to the private sector, we will do that in the efficiency of
the private sector.
Second will be localize. Anytime we can send these issues to the
States or local units of government to handle, closer to the people,
closer to the people, that is what we will do.
We will consolidate. Where two agencies grew that we will have one in
the future so we can consolidate a number of these functions and that
we can eliminate whatever functions are outmoded, outdated, or
antiquated, that those would be eliminated.
So at the end of the day that we empower people, we empower
communities, we empower the States to be able to really deal with these
issues, and we think that is where actual solutions will occur. That is
where homes are built. They are built across this Nation. They are not
built in bureaucracies in Washington. Kids are taught in classrooms
across this Nation. They are not taught in a bureaucracy in Washington.
Energy is dealt with in the marketplace and by individual decisions, by
250 million Americans. They are not dealt with by a bureaucracy in
Washington.
We will free and liberate people. We will be realigning the
relationship of the Federal Government to the people, and it will be a
very powerful thing for growth and for actually dealing with our
problems, for actually accomplishing solutions to our problems, and it
is desperately needed.
You quote one of the early Federalists. I quote Thomas Jefferson.
Thomas Jefferson was quoted a saying that moments for great innovation
in history are few and far between. We stand at one of those moments of
great innovation in the history of this country, of the ability to
realign the relationship of the Federal Government to the people, of
making the Federal Government the servant once again and not the master
of the people. We are supposed to be able to help and encourage, not to
direct, command, and control, and that is what we seek to do, and we
will
be a better country, and we will be a growth country. It will be a
better society. It will be a government for the people, not commander
of the people. And that is what we seek to do. We will be developing
our plans and proposals, bringing those out sometime in the springtime.
I would encourage the American people to contact their Congressmen if
they are interested and encouraged about that. It has been interesting
to me, the early feedback we have received has not been you cannot do
that; it has been, ``Well, would you look at the other agencies? What
about the Department of Labor? What about some of the other agencies?''
I think that is very encouraging to open the floodgate of ideas and
liberation for the people in this country and get the Federal
Government back to its core
[[Page H1901]] functions that it should do rather than all the far-
flung areas.
Mr. SCARBOROUGH. You mentioned something very interesting. You kept
talking about these different agencies and you kept saying it does not
work. I never heard you say it is about ideology or some right-wing
radical philosophy. I did not hear that at all.
It reminds me of when I wanted to get involved with this. It was not
about any deep-seated philosophy or any philosophical ax I had to
grind. It was about what works and what does not work.
I have got a 7-year-old boy that is in public schools, and I am very
concerned about what type of educational system he is going to be
growing up in. You look at the statistics of what has happened since
the Department of Education was established in 1979, and every single
statistic points to a decay in educational standards across this
country. The Department of Education has been an absolute and total
abject failure.
You know, they only provide 8 percent of funding to local schools,
and yet they dump on them 55 percent of their paperwork. And people
talk about, well, what is the problem with having this bureaucracy;
gee, it is a great symbolic gesture. It is robbing money from my child,
from your children, and from children all across the country.
A perfect example I read on the front of USA Today about a week ago
the Department of Education has cut funding by $100 million for the
upkeep of public schools to make them safe across the country, by $100
million, and yet at the same time, they are increasing funding on their
own infrastructure, their own bureaucracy down the road by $20 million.
So let us get this straight, they take your money and my money and
our constituent's money, tax money, they send it up to Washington, they
put a brokerage fee on it. Of course, everybody takes their little
chunk of the pie out of the brokerage fee, and then they claim to send
it back to the States.
But now it has gotten so bad they say, ``We are not even sending the
$100 million to the States for upkeep of schools to make them safe.
Instead, we are cutting that out, and we are going to spend $20 million
of those dollars fixing up our bureaucracy in Washington, DC.''
Now, that is a sham. That does not work, and it is about what does
not work.
You know, Peggy Noonan, who was Ronald Reagan's speech writer, talked
about an encounter she had with the President in the early seventies
when he was then Governor of California, and she asked the President,
she said, ``How could you be a conservative?'' because she had just
gotten out of college, and she was a liberal. I do not know if you
would call Peggy Noonan a hippie. I do not know if she is ever capable
of being a hippie. Peggy Noonan said, ``Mr. Reagan, how can you be a
conservative? Why aren't you a liberal?'' And Ronald Reagan said,
``Because it doesn't work.'' And that is the truth. It does not work.
This is not about ideology. It is about what works.
Mr. BROWNBACK. If the gentleman will yield further, and that is
absolutely what it is. It is not about the ideology or the left or
right or center or the middle or whatever the case might be. What this
is about is what has failed.
I do not think that we can stand here and at all say to the American
people, ``Look, we have not tried this. We have not tried centralized
planning from Washington on these areas.'' We have. We have tried it up
to 30 years in HUD. We tried it for 15 years in these other agencies.
It has not worked. It does not work.
The American people want to be liberated, and I will tell you what
will happen when that does occur. If we say, as far as the Department
of Housing and Urban Development, look, we are not going to do this in
Washington anymore. We have got some funds we are going to block grant
to the States, local units of government. We want it generally used for
housing, ``but you figure out your problems.'' There will be thousands
of different solutions that will come forward because we have millions
of different people and thousands of different ideas and how we solve
it; Topeka, KS, is different than they solve it in New York City or
Austin, TX. It is just we are different people in a different nation, a
diverse nation, and will come up with different solutions, because one
size does not fit all in America, and the same will work in education.
People were saying, well, if we do not have somebody in Washington
looking out for our children, well, what is going to happen to them in
education. I think what will happen to them in education is things will
get better, because parents care more for their children than somebody
running a government agency does, and people on a local school board
know those families much more than somebody working in a government
office building in Washington.
One final point, and then I will yield back the rest of the time.
{time} 1600
The final point is that there are a number of good people that work
in government, and that is what Jack Kemp said at our press conference,
who was the former Secretary of HUD, who is also on board in supporting
us. We have former cabinet secretaries of all these agencies working
with us to dismantle all these agencies. They run them. They know they
do not work.
Jack was saying, ``Well, these are good people; there's just too many
of them, and we shouldn't be doing this. It should be happening out in
the communities and the individuals,'' and that is what we are about,
having people doing these things to where the answers really occur and
not just command and control out of Washington.
Mr. SCARBOROUGH. You know, again you talked about Jack Kemp and
saying that they are good people. I have been asked the question of
what is going to happen to all these good workers, especially in the
education field because that is what I do. That is a task force I am
heading up, the education task force.
I was also struck by Jack Kemp's comments, and I thought, and again
getting back to the fact this is not ideological, this is not a battle
over ideology. It is a battle over what works and what does not work.
Well, Mr. Kemp's comments remind me of the Alice Rivlin book you
cite, and I read the book and I know you have, and I certainly hope the
President of the United States reads Ms. Rivlin's book and follows her
suggestions because they are great suggestions. But Ms. Rivlin talked
about the drain, the talent drain, the brain drain, that this huge
bureaucracy has caused, that from 1932 to 1980, when we had this
explosion of growth in the government, not only does that suck up all
the money across the country to Washington, it also sucked up all the
talent we have, extremely talented people working in Washington, DC.
So what happens when we downsize these agencies, when we do away with
these bureaucracies that are preventing them even from showing their
true talents, stifling them, that are handcuffing them? What happens?
They go home, and they enrich their communities, and they enrich the
neighborhoods from whence they came. Washington, DC, does not need
another bureaucrat, but that bureaucrat in Washington, DC will be a
productive member of the community, and that is something Alice Rivlin
wrote about in her book. She said, ``So much of the talent is now
concentrated in Washington, we need to spread it across the country,
just like we need to spread the money back across the country and send
it back to the people, send it back to the communities, because our
Founding Fathers intended us to be a Nation of communities and not a
Nation of bureaucracies.''
And I am just struck. Let us talk about some of the people briefly
that are supporting this. The gentleman mentioned Jack Kemp. We have
mentioned Alice Rivlin. I know Leon Panetta once endorsed abolishing
some of these agencies.
Who are some of the others?
Mr. BROWNBACK. Secretary Mossbacher that used to run the Department
of Commerce was there at the press conference endorsing this. Don
Hodel, who used to run the Department of Energy I talked to today is
strongly supporting us. Henson Moore that used to be the secretary in
command at the Department on Energy, I visited with him today and
working with him on this particular project as
[[Page H1902]] well. Those are people both at HUD and Energy. At
Education, Dr. Bennett and Lamar Alexander have publicly endorsed doing
away with the Department of Education as a way we can create better
education and innovation across the country. They both have publicly
endorsed this as well in that field.
So, you have got secretaries in Commerce, in HUD, in Energy, in
Education, all saying ``Look, folks. We tried it. We tried it hard. We
tried it with billions and trillions of dollars. Centralized planing in
the Soviet Union, former Soviet Union or the United States, doesn't
work. You got to get it back home, and this is the way you do it.''
And we are just starting, and I hope the American people lean in
toward this concept and help us move this on forward to get the
government back out to the people.
Mr. SCARBOROUGH. If I could, and I know the gentleman needs to be
going on, but could you just tell me if your experience coming to
Washington, DC was the same as mine because I know we were both
citizens and removed from this process, but were you not filled with
the sense of awe when you came up here and saw freshmen, and
sophomores, and so-called old bulls that all want to move in this
direction of reform and bringing power back to the States? I never in a
million years expected to find so many allies in
this cause to downsize the Federal Government, and it just amazes me
that we have done more in 50 days than the past Congresses have been
able to do in the past 50 years as far as institutional reform, and I
yield to the gentleman.
Mr. BROWNBACK. That is obviously the case, and that is what I am
getting as well, and we had at that same press conference the chairman
of the Committee on Appropriations, the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr.
Livingston], the chairman of the Committee on the Budget, the gentleman
from Ohio [Mr. Kasich], the chairman of the Committee on Rules, the
gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon], all of which acted as if their
soul was having a chorus of angels singing to it, but they were
ecstatic that here were people willing to stand up and say, ``Enough is
enough. We tried it. It doesn't work. It's time to try something
else.''
And then they were all saying that, and that is what I continue to
get from people all across the Government and across the Nation. Look,
we have tried it, and we have really tried it. It is time to move on,
and let us try something different that we think really can work and
can be liberating to the people across the country, and you are seeing
it take place from this freshman reform group, 73 of us coming in
strong at this time, many of us elected on the type of agenda I was,
reduce the Federal Government, reform the Congress, return to the basic
values that built the country, those being the watch words for us.
And I cannot help but think the original Federalists are saying,
``It's about time.''
Mr. SCARBOROUGH. It is about time, and I thank the gentleman from
Kansas [Mr. Brownback] for his leadership in this area because it is
long overdue, and I hope this Congress will move forward, and more than
that I hope that the American people that stood up and said, ``Enough
is enough,'' on November 8 will continue to take a proactive role and
say, ``We're not going to sit back anymore; we are going to change this
Government,'' and they will continue to use whatever means possible,
whether it is the fax machine, or talk radio, or mail, or e-mail, or
the town hall meetings that we are all doing. I hope they will continue
to use that and put external pressure on this institution and their own
Representative to say enough is enough.
I yield to the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Foley].
Mr. FOLEY. I wanted to jump in the conversation for a moment because
you are hitting on, I think, a nerve out in America. What I found when
I went home, the average citizen, not the political pundit, not the
editorial writer, the citizen I saw at the south Florida fair came up
to me and said, ``Keep doing what you're doing. Make Government more
accountable.'' They had their little children with them, and the
detailed stories of trying to get information out of the school board
or trying to call Tallahassee for information about their student's
performance, their child's performance. It was unavailable.
So what I am hearing from the citizenry out there:
It's not about being a Republican or Democrat. It is about being
American, about making a Government work.
I served with you both on the restructuring, if you will, of some of
these agencies; I am on the Energy Committee, the subcommittee, working
on reform. It is ironic in one of the committees the other day I am
reading the material about the Energy Department and how they have a
clean coal study, and this clean coal study is to allow us to use a
variety of fossil fuels to diversify away from just gas, and oil,
petroleum, to use coal. Well, clean coal, we are spending millions of
dollars on technology to make it available and efficient. At the same
time in my district in Florida Carol Browner, who is at EPA, has
canceled the program to build a clean coal facility in Okeechobee, so
you have one agency making rules saying, ``We want to have this
technology,'' and one agency of the same branch of the Government
appointed by the same President of the United States and saying, ``No,
but we don't want to do that.''
So the dilemma here for all of us as new Representatives, as freshmen
of the 104th Congress, is to figure out how we break down the
difficulty that every American faces when they approach Government.
I did not know this job when I came was about running interference
for constituents and problems that they were having with agencies
regarding laws that we have created. That was not the job that I ran
for, to really be a clerk, if you will, of taking their complaints, and
running to an agency and saying, ``The law that was passed in the 103d,
102d, 101st Congress is now having this onerous burden on business, on
the human race.''
{time} 1610
That is what it has become. So the effort amongst us as freshmen and
sophomores and all the Members of the 104th Congress is really about
making Government more efficient.
I want to make one other comment, because the gentleman from Florida
[Mr. Scarborough] did such a tremendous job in explaining the issue
that is so important on national security. I think probably one of the
most passionate speeches I heard on this floor was Mr. Dellums from
California, about ideas, about making America work, about making our
interest, our national interest a priority to this Congress. So I thank
the gentleman from Florida, because I think he has capsulized what the
debate on national security was about. That is what we are here for in
the 104th Congress.
Mr. SCARBOROUGH. You bring up Mr. Dellums. You talked about your
surprises when coming to Congress. I am going to tell you one of my
surprises coming to Congress. I had campaigned, I am from northwest
Florida, we believe in a very strong national defense down there, and
Ron Dellums has been perceived as a super liberal. And somebody during
the campaign, quite frankly I heard a lot of questions about it. People
said what is the deal with this Ron Dellums guy? When I came up and
started talking to people on the Committee on National Security, I
would be talking about him, and I was amazed that these hawks that were
always on the opposite side of Ron Dellums it seemed like on every
issue, spoke in the most glowing terms of Mr. Dellums because he is a
very articulate speaker, he has very deep convictions, and he says what
he means.
That is what I was alluding to before, we can have disagreements on
issues, we can disagree on the best way to have welfare reform, we can
have disagreements on what is the best way to protect our shores. As
long as we keep the debate at the level that Mr. Dellums always keeps
the debate and other Members on our side of the aisle always keep the
debate, we will be fine. Because in the end it is not about an
ideological argument. It is not about who is going to win, whether Bill
Buckley or Mike Kinsley or whoever is on whatever side of what issue as
a commentator. They can do that on TV and they can yell at each other
and get
[[Page H1903]] high ratings. But we have to hold ourselves to a higher
standard. We need to be interested in what works.
Let me tell you, the reforms we have undertaken in the first 50 days
have worked, and have put this country back on track for the first time
in a very long time. I am hearing that where I am going, and you have
alluded to the fact that you are hearing about that where you are
going. Are all the constituents you talk to, are they all in one accord
about that?
Mr. FOLEY. I don't know if they agree philosophically on everything
we are doing, but they agree there is a serious problem. On welfare,
they know there is a problem. They know it is not working. They know if
you spent $5 trillion and the poverty level is higher than it was when
the war on poverty was enacted, they know there is a significant
difficulty.
You were talking about education with the gentleman from Kansas [Mr.
Brownback]. In Tallahassee, as the gentleman knows, we have a 17-story
building designed by I.M. Pei, the internationally renowned architect.
That building is as out of character with the landscape of Tallahassee
as anything I have seen. It is not about ideas, it is people in that
building who have never taught a classroom. That is a fundamental
problem with the Department of Education in our State, that people are
processing papers about our children. But the results never change for
our children. The hands-on experience of the classroom will never get
any better if we run it from our capitals of Tallahassee and
Washington.
What I am hearing from people again is the fact that they feel that
this is the greatest Nation on Earth, but they want to have pride in
the people they have sent here. They do not want us yelling across the
aisle and screaming at a Democrat. As Mr. Dellums said, it is about
ideas. I will challenge you on your ideas, on your convictions, on what
matters for this Government, but I will not challenge you personally.
What I am hearing when people call when we have been on C-SPAN and
have been talking about the very issue of the day, they are delighted
we are responding to what is their opinion. Mr. Scarborough, as you
know, we have been accused with the contract of propaganda, of
Republican streamrolling everybody on ideas.
The premises of the contract, the 10 points of the contract were
designed from surveys throughout America of what people were asking
for, about term limits, about a balanced budget. These are not ideas we
sat around at Republican party headquarters and thought up ourselves.
This is the American public saying these are the changes we want. We
are acting. We are working on an agenda. There is considerable reason
for disagreement on some of the premises, but we are working in a
collegial body that makes this body so effective and efficient.
Mr. SCARBOROUGH. Reclaiming the time, anybody who has seen the
Department of Education in Tallahassee, as I know you have, knows that
that is enough of a bureaucracy for our children in the State of
Florida, and I have got to tell you it is a duplication of services,
not only in Florida, but all across the country.
It is the same thing with a lot of other departments. We do not need
two departments of education to teach our children. We need to free up
tax dollars for individuals across this country that educate their
children and once again give them choice and give them freedom to have
their children taught in the way that they want to have them be taught.
And if we listen to the ideas of Madison and Jefferson and the Founders
of this great Republic, and if we once again look at the 10th amendment
that once again says all powers not specifically given to the Federal
Government in the Constitution are reserved to States and citizens, if
we follow that path, we will once again become the type of nation we
were intended to be, and that is a nation of communities, a nation of
families, and a nation of individuals who once again take control of
their own lives and can decide the way they want their community to be
run, the way they want their family to be protected and taught, and the
way they want their own life to be run.
It is a very constitutional premise, and I for one am honored and
fell very privileged to be part of this process and to be part of the
104th Congress that actually dares to debate the great issues of the
day. If we continue to do this, the second 50 days of our 100-day plan,
and of the next 2 years, then this country will see change like it has
never seen change before, and citizens across this country, men and
women, will be empowered, and once again will have confidence in their
country and believe that their elected leaders came here for a reason,
and that reason was to serve.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
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