[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 42 (Thursday, April 10, 1997)]
[House]
[Page H1412]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       A NATIONAL CONSUMPTION TAX

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Colorado, Mr. Dan Schaefer, is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DAN SCHAEFER of Colorado. Mr. Speaker, it is very difficult to 
try and go through this entire subject matter over just a period of 5 
minutes. I am going to yield shortly to the gentleman from Louisiana.

                              {time}  1230

  I can recall that the 1986 tax bill was first started as a flat tax. 
Now, a flat tax, if we adhere to it, is better than what we have but it 
is not the final answer.
  Why do we not take away the power of taxation from the Federal 
Government and from Congress and give it to the American people and let 
them decide on how they are going to pay their taxation? I think this 
is the correct way to go and the right way to go.
  That flat tax, started back in 1985, turned out to be a Christmas 
tree by 1986, in which we passed that final bill, which I was very, 
very proud to have voted against.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Louisiana.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I 
think it will surprise the American public to learn that since 1986, 
when we adopted in this Congress tax simplification, a flatter tax 
base, that not only have the rates now continued to go up, we have five 
different rates today again, but since 1986 this Congress has made 
4,000 individual changes in the Tax Code. It just does not stop. Flat 
taxes become fat taxes.
  We are suggesting it is time to get rid of the entire income Tax Code 
and go to a simple retail sales tax, and we are asking sons and 
daughters of liberty to join us in Boston Harbor, not only Members of 
this Congress but citizens of this country, to come meet us in Boston 
Harbor on April 15 and join us in the beginning of this great national 
debate. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. DAN SCHAEFER of Colorado. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman very 
much, and he has been an instrumental part in this whole debate.
  And as we move on, if we go to the American people and we say to them 
in town meetings, or any kind of a meeting, that we want to abolish the 
IRS, we want to take the IRS and eliminate it and to transfer over the 
power of taxation to them, the American people in this country, they 
love it. And they should love it because we are eliminating April 15. 
We are eliminating keeping all those records and receipts and 
everything else that we have to do to try to substantiate the fact that 
we are following the law.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will continue to yield, I 
think it is important to point out that the IRS is the only agency of 
the Federal Government where we are guilty until we prove our 
innocence. We can get a better deal in Federal Court after indictment 
than we can before the IRS.
  It is time for us to consider whether this agency, this structure of 
taxation, this agency that has such power over our lives ought to be 
abolished in favor of a simple sales tax collection system where we 
decide how much taxes we pay by deciding how much we spend or how much 
instead that we save and invest in our society and in American jobs.
  Mr. DAN SCHAEFER of Colorado. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I 
would just say that the people have to understand, and the one thing 
that the gentleman from Louisiana and I have been doing is being on 
numerous talk shows, radio shows, TV shows over the last year, and the 
one thing I always say to the American public, to our listeners, is 
they should just imagine their last paycheck and think about the amount 
of money that the Federal Government withheld and that they can now put 
that in their pocket. They can save it, they can consume with it or 
whatever they wish. That is the key.
  We are taking this power of taxation away from the Federal Government 
and giving it to the American people.
  Mr. TAUZIN. I think our time is about up, Mr. Speaker, and I simply 
wanted, in the short time we have left, to again invite Americans to 
begin this debate. The debate will be whether to keep the current 
system, with all its problems, with all its costs. It costs American 
citizens $4 for every dollar they send to the Federal Government in 
taxes. Do we keep this awful system that taxes Americans twice, three 
times, and four times on the same money; that only taxes American 
products and jobs and not foreign products. Do we want to keep this 
system or do we want to go to a flat tax system, which is a better 
alternative or, better yet, pull this system out by its roots and 
replace it with a simple straightforward sales tax, that taxes for the 
first time foreign products and American products on the same basis and 
taxes American income only once, when you spend money, not when you 
earn it.
  If that national debate is not worth having, then I will be greatly 
surprised. Join us on April 15 as we begin this debate in this historic 
reenactment of the Boston Tea Party, when we will dump the U.S. Tax 
Code into that harbor as new sons and daughters of liberty who believe 
that liberty and freedom is so important in this country that we ought 
never to surrender it to an agency where we are guilty until we prove 
ourselves innocent. That is so un-American. Join us in this national 
debate.

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