[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 77 (Thursday, May 30, 1996)]
[House]
[Page H5737]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




          WHAT THE 104TH CONGRESS HAS BEEN DOING FOR CHILDREN

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas [Mr. DeLay] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Speaker, as we know, this Saturday, Washington will be 
the site of a rally for children, called the Stand for Children.
  I commend the organizers of this rally for their commitment to 
helping children. I hope this rally will be a balanced presentation on 
how best the Federal Government can help our children, and more 
importantly, make our children's future brighter.
  I am taking this special order tonight to let the American people 
know what the Congress has been doing for children.
  The truth is that the 104th Congress is the most prochild Congress in 
the last 40 years.
  What is a prochild Congress? What does that mean for people outside 
the beltway, people who struggle to raise a family, people who want to 
pass on a better America to their children?
  A prochild Congress must meet three tests.
  First, it must be fiscally responsible.
  Passing on a bankrupt nation is the surest way to undermine our 
children's future.
  This Congress passed the first balanced budget in a generation. It 
tried to restrain the growth of entitlement programs that will bankrupt 
the country in 10 years unless action is taken now.
  Our children, individually, already owe hundreds of thousands of 
dollars in debt, because of the profligate spending habits of past 
Congresses.
  We must stop spending our children's futures. This Congress has 
succeeded in reigning in wasteful Washington spending, and that is 
probably the best thing we could do, to stand for children.
  Second, a prochild Congress works to strengthen the family.
  Villages do not make the best parents. Parents make the best parents. 
It does not take a village to raise a child. It takes a family. It 
takes parents.
  Allowing parents to keep more of their money to spend on their 
children is the quickest way to take the strain off the family 
structure.
  Our $500-per-child tax credit is real relief for parents to help them 
meet the higher costs of raising children.
  Welfare reform is another way we have worked to strengthen the 
family. Our current welfare system has destroyed too many families. It 
has actually made it harder for two-parent families to stay together.
  We have worked to change that system, by requiring work, by removing 
the disincentives for marriage, and by making it harder for fathers to 
abandon their kids.
  A prochild Congress also promotes adoption.
  I read with interest the First Lady's recent discussions of adoption, 
and the President's endorsement of our adoption reform bills.
  Getting children into safe, loving, and permanent homes should be the 
paramount concern, not political correctness.
  I hope the President's words match his deeds and that he continues to 
support our efforts to promote adoption and remove the barriers to 
adoption.
  Finally, a prochild Congress is a prolife Congress.
  We have been the most prolife Congress in the last 20 years.
  Some on the liberal left will make the argument that you can be both 
prochild and proabortion.
  I disagree. You cannot speak on behalf of children on one hand wile 
promoting policies that kill them on the other.
  I am proud of the work of this Congress, and I am proud of the work 
they have done to help children have a brighter and more prosperous 
future.
  The 104th Congress does stand for children and for that we should all 
be proud.

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