[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 205 (Wednesday, December 20, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H15275]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   BUDGET IMPASSE REQUIRES COMPROMISE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Kanjorski] is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. KANJORSKI. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas, Mr. 
de la Garza.
  Mr. de la GARZA. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding 
briefly to me. The previous speaker, I guess, inadvertently mentioned 
that the President said that 29 years ago, and he meant 29 days. But 
the one that introduced a balanced budget amendment 31 years ago was 
this gentleman from Texas. So it is not new. Everyone is climbing on 
board now. I did it 31 years ago.
  Mr. HOKE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, the gentleman 
from Texas [Mr. de la Garza] should be commended for that. We 
appreciate it and we appreciate his support working for a balanced 
budget now. But the fact remains, we have got this agreement and the 
President should honor his word. That is all we are saying.
  Mr. de la GARZA. Mr. Speaker, I think we ought to bring Sister Rosa 
into the picture. She has got better figures than OMB and CBO.
  Mr. KANJORSKI. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I enjoy the fact that 
we can sit here particularly with the Members of the freshman and 
sophomore class, and participate in this open discussion. It is 
worthwhile for those individuals across America who may be bored with 
Christmas shopping and watching C-SPAN, or perhaps going through some 
therapy that they are undergoing trying to understand what is going on 
down here in the asylum.
  Mr. Speaker, the fact of the matter is that probably for the first 
time in the history of the United States, we have extreme polarization 
of positions on the passage of the budget. A lot of people who are not 
necessarily informed with the process may think that we are indeed 
insane, or that what the House of Representatives of the Congress or 
the entire Federal Government is going through right now is a form of 
insanity, but in reality we all know that it is a very serious thing 
and it has to do with very honest and real differences of my friends on 
the Republican side and our side.
  Mr. Speaker, if I could just address for a few moments what those 
differences are and maybe encourage some of my friends on the other 
side to talk about it.
  Mr. Speaker, the previous speaker talked about some contract. Having 
been a lawyer, particularly having dealt with Philadelphia lawyers, 
although not claiming to be a Philadelphia lawyer myself, there is a 
great deal of respect paid to contracts; that supposedly any time we 
have a contract, that says something that in reality will take place in 
accordance with the word of the contract, or that that has some 
superforce above and beyond anything else.
  Well, there are several ways to interpret contracts and I think we 
have to accept that as a given. Very clearly in the situation of the 
President and whatever contract is interpreted by the majority party of 
the House, there is a definitely wide distinction as to how they 
interpret the meaning of what was agreed to some 29 days ago.
  Second, just because we have the Contract for America, or on America, 
I am never sure, but just because we have that, that does not pass the 
value of the Constitution and how we interpret that, nor does it pass 
good sense for what we do this year, next year, for the next 7 years of 
this Republic, and for as long as this Republic endures under this 
Constitution.
  The one certainly that we have is that government in a democracy is 
very expensive; it takes a great deal of time; it is very inefficient, 
because there is the necessity that if 250 million people are to exist 
in this world with different thoughts and philosophies, different 
political positions, different social positions, and coming from 
different cultural backgrounds, it takes a requirement of that ugly 
word which some of my younger friends on the other side of the aisle 
seem to find a great deal of distaste for and that is the word called 
``compromise.''
  I have heard the Speaker talk much earlier, I think maybe as long as 
6 months ago, that with the new revolution that occurred in the House 
of Representatives, that there would be cooperation but not compromise. 
If my colleagues have extreme views, I do not know how we get to a 
final solution without compromise.
  Mr. Speaker, let me talk about what those extreme views are. We can 
all write a budget that will balance in 7 years, which is a projection 
of time with no certainty, all dependent on variables that are so 
complicated and uncertain in their nature that at best it is a 
guesstimation. We could arrive at a balanced budget in 7 years under 
the numbers scored by the CBO, the Office of Management and Budget, 
Morgan and Stanley, the Harvard Business School, the Wharton School, we 
could find any number of people who would be willing to score it and we 
could agree that it should be CBO.

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