[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 116 (Tuesday, July 18, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H7078]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


          AMERICANS WANT LESS GOVERN-MENT AND LESS REGULATION
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Florida [Mr. Scarborough] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. Mr. Speaker, you know, last November the American 
people delivered a mandate to this institution, a supposed mandate as 
we heard from a previous speaker. The fact of the matter is not a 
single Republican Governor, Senator, or Congressman was defeated in 
that election.
  Why did Americans vote Republican? It is because they wanted less 
government. They wanted less regulation. They wanted to get government, 
in the words of Ronald Reagan, off the people's back.
  That is what we are starting to do. Now, it is going to be a long, 
hard, drawn out process, but, you know, a year ago when I was 
campaigning, I was talking about how the American hour was upon us, 
about how Americans had to decide once and for all whether we were 
going to go back and repeat the same mistakes that we have been making 
for the past 40 years, or whether we are, instead, going to turn back 
to those basic simple truths that our Founding Fathers laid as the 
foundation of this great country.
  James Madison said that we have staked the entire future of American 
civilization on the power of the individual, not on the power of 
government. Thomas Jefferson said that the government that governs 
least governs best.
  Yet in this time of the American people's call for less government 
intrusion in their lives, an ominous trend is developing, and we have 
seen it develop since the Oklahoma City bombing.
  Now, the Oklahoma City bombing was an absolute tragedy. I do not 
think anyone in this Chamber could have looked at those pictures and 
not been absolutely horrified by what went on in Oklahoma City and the 
lives that were lost. But the fact of the matter is this: We do not 
prevent Oklahoma Cities in the future by eviscerating our fourth 
amendment rights. There is a counterterrorism bill that is coming to 
the floor in the near future, and some Members have openly said that 
Americans are going to have to get used to living with less freedoms 
for more safety.
  Well, that is very ironic when you consider what Benjamin Franklin 
said over 200 years ago. It is almost as if he anticipated an event 
like this and the gut reaction that it would cause. Ben Franklin said 
those Americans who are willing to give up freedoms for a little bit of 
temporary safety deserve neither safety nor freedom.
  That is something that we need to remember as we rush quickly toward 
passing a bill that is going to increase the Federal Government's power 
to wiretap, to conduct warrantless searches, and to basically give the 
Federal Government more police power than it has ever had.
  Let us take a couple of steps back here and again listen to what the 
American people were saying last November. They were not saying we are 
electing Republicans because we like the name ``Republican'' in front 
of the candidate. They voted in one of the most historic congressional 
landslides in recent history for the party they believed was going to 
represent less government intrusion in their personal lives.
  I believe this is a step in the wrong direction, and I believe you 
are going to see Republicans and Democrats alike coming together and 
doing what they can to make sure that the American people's will is 
heard; more importantly, that our fourth amendment rights and our 
constitutional rights are protected through this time.
  You know, anybody that speaks out against the Federal Government's 
involvement in Waco or Ruby Ridge or some of these other incidents are 
considered crazies, right wing fanatics. But the fact of the matter is 
we are finally shining a little bit of light on what happened in Waco 
and Ruby Ridge, and we have already seen that the No. 2 man at the FBI 
has had to be demoted because the FBI messed up. At Ruby Ridge they 
shot an innocent woman and a man's son, and they did so without proper 
reason. Then they went back behind there and destroyed documents to 
hide what they were doing.
  Let me tell you something, that is not what the American people voted 
for last November. They voted for less government. They voted also, I 
might say in conclusion, for honesty and integrity.
  As I close, Mr. Speaker, I just have to respond very briefly to what 
the gentleman from New Jersey said and the gentleman from Michigan. 
They talked about how much they cared about Medicare. They said they 
cared abut Medicare so much they were going to allow it to go bankrupt 
in the year 2002. I think I care about it a little more and the rest of 
the Members here do, too. We are going to save Medicare.


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