[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 109 (Tuesday, July 23, 1996)]
[House]
[Page H8106]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             REFORM WELFARE

  (Mr. CHABOT asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. CHABOT. Mr. Speaker, last week this House once again passed 
historic welfare reform legislation. Twice before we have passed 
welfare reform, but twice the President has blocked that reform with 
his veto pen, even though candidate Clinton said he wanted to end 
welfare as we know it. Remember that? Mr. President, please tear down 
this wall to full participation in our society.
  Seldom has a government devised a program which has devastated so 
many lives in this country and only very, very rarely has the law of 
unintended consequences been so brutally applied. Families have been 
ripped apart. Attempts to work and save have been penalized, and 
generation after generation of children have grown up without seeing an 
adult go to work. This miserable welfare system must not continue. Let 
us replace welfare with work. Let us replace rigid bureaucracy with 
community and compassion, and let us replace vetoes with a signing 
ceremony.

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