[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 184 (Saturday, November 18, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Page S17423]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




            THE MOST SIGNIFICANT BILL PASSED BY THE CONGRESS

  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, last evening the Senate passed what the 
majority leader described as the most significant bill passed by the 
Congress during his long and distinguished tenure in this body. I 
should like to express my agreement with the majority leader's 
characterization.
  That Balanced Budget Act of 1995, which will undoubtedly be passed by 
the House of Representatives today because of the minor changes made in 
the Senate, represents a degree of responsibility, of fiscal 
responsibility unmatched by that of any Congress, at least since the 
end of World War II.
  That degree of fiscal responsibility, of course, has been required by 
the habit of huge multi-hundreds of billions of dollars in deficits 
over the course of the last several years, and, most particularly, it 
has been required because of the nature of the budget submissions of 
this President of the United States who, while he was a candidate for 
the Presidency, claimed that he could and would balance the budget in 5 
years, but who, in January of this year, proposed a budget which would 
never, ever lead the United States to a budget deficit significantly 
lower than $200 billion.
  The course of action since 1969, the last year in which there was a 
balanced budget in this country, has created a debt on our shoulders 
and on the shoulders of our children and grandchildren of almost $5 
trillion. That means, Mr. President, that a child born today inherits a 
debt, or a bill, of some $187,000 during his or her life, simply to pay 
interest on the national debt. That statistic alone starkly illustrates 
not just the fiscal and financial necessity, but the moral necessity of 
a sharp change in direction.
  This country can no longer go on providing goods and services for 
which it is unwilling to pay and sending the bill to our children and 
grandchildren. Such a change is significant. Such a change does demand 
dramatic changes in many of our financial priorities. But such a change 
carries with it great rewards.
  The Congressional Budget Office tell us that simply by passing this 
bill, the Government of the United States will gain a fiscal dividend 
of $170 billion in more taxes and lower interest payments, a $170 
billion dividend matched by a dividend of three or four times that 
size, more than half a trillion dollars to the people of the United 
States in the form of better jobs, higher wages, lower interest rates 
on their mortgages and on their car loans.
  That is the tangible dividend for our having passed this bill if, and 
only if, the President of the United States signs it.
  At this point, he has said he will not. At this point, he has said he 
will veto even the continuing resolution passed by this body two 
evenings ago which would allow all of the Government workers to go back 
to work, all of the activities of Government to continue until some 
time in December, merely in an exchange for a promise on the part of 
the President that he will agree to a budget that is balanced by the 
year 2002 by the honest figures and statistics of the Congressional 
Budget Office.
  The President, in spite of his promise in 1993 to use just those 
figures, has refused, prefers to keep the Government out of operation 
to making that pledge.
  Now, Mr. President, nothing in that pledge requires him to accept the 
precise numbers and priorities of our budget. He can insist on more in 
the way of taxes than we call for and more in the way of spending than 
we call for, or a different balance of spending. We may or may not 
agree, but that can be negotiated. What we will not negotiate, Mr. 
President, is the proposition that the budget will be balanced by the 
end of 7 years, with firm statutes in place that will assure that 
balance, and that the figures we will use to determine whether or not 
that balance is reached are honest figures, not figures cooked up in 
the White House.
  At this point, we understand the President wants us simply to say we 
will have the goal of balancing the budget in 2002 and maybe the goal 
of using Congressional Budget Office figures. Well, Mr. President, that 
just does not work. We know, regrettably, that this White House has a 
different goal every day of the week.
  In fact, this President has talked about a balanced budget in 5 
years, 7 years, 8 years, 9 years, 10 years, and never, and he has used 
at least two different sources of statistics for each of those 
promises. So we have to nail down the proposition that the budget will 
be balanced in 7 years under honest statistics. That is all we ask for. 
But we can ask for no less because nothing less will result in the 
people of the United States having this wonderful fiscal dividend for 
them in the form of better job opportunities and higher wages and lower 
interest rates, and we will also say that we have been wrong in the 
past in spending what we would not pay for and sending the bill to 
someone else, and that we are not going to do it anymore.
  Mr. ASHCROFT addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri is recognized.
  Mr. ASHCROFT. Thank you, Mr. President.

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