[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 86 (Thursday, June 19, 1997)]
[House]
[Page H4075]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           MORE ON TAX RELIEF

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Colorado [Mr. Bob Schaffer], is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. BOB SCHAFFER of Colorado. Mr. Speaker, I would like to continue 
on with the discussion that we had a few minutes ago just about this 
notion of the Federal Government, in fact, confiscating the wealth of 
American families through our excessive tax policy, bringing those 
dollars here to Washington and redirecting them to the charity of 
politicians' choices.
  We hear all day long the discussions about whether we should spend 
money on one charity or another charity. These are all fine things. But 
the Republican vision and the Republican value, when it comes to this 
whole debate about taxation, is that we are the ones who fundamentally 
believe that every taxpayer, every family, every wage earner is 
eminently more capable of deciding how to spend those dollars in a free 
market economy than the government is.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Fox].
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to 
expand upon what the gentleman just said. The American people not only 
send their tax dollars here. We want to make it sure they get more of 
it back so they can use it for their families.
  They also want a new IRS, one that is more taxpayer friendly, one 
that we would have under a taxpayer Bill of Rights 3 where we change 
the burden of proof. Instead of the taxpayer presumed to be guilty and 
the IRS commissioner presumed to be correct, let us switch those 
burdens and stop the abuses that have existed in the IRS so we make 
sure that we have not only fairness in our tax policy but fairness by 
the IRS.
  Mr. BOB SCHAFFER of Colorado. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman 
from New Jersey [Mr. Pappas].
  Mr. PAPPAS. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for continuing this debate 
or this discussion about tax relief, which I believe is what the 
American people are crying out for. Most of the relief in this bill 
that we are speaking of is in the form of tax cuts directed at middle 
income wage earners, which includes families which earn between $20,000 
and $70,000 a year.

                              {time}  2215

  Lots of folks talk about how this is a tax cut for the rich. That is 
not the case. It is for middle class working men and women.
  I see my friend from South Dakota is here, and would like to yield to 
him for any comments he might want to make.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey for 
yielding, and to my colleagues on the floor this evening, we are 
talking about something that is very important to the future of this 
country, and that is what we can do to balance this country's budget 
and to lower the tax burdens in America.
  One of the things I think we are witnessing, and hopefully, if we do 
our job correctly, in the next couple of weeks, come the 4th of July we 
will truly have an Independence Day in this country because we will be 
witnessing a couple of historic firsts.
  For the first time in 40 years we will have balanced this Federal 
Government's budget. That is a significant first. Very important, I 
think, to most of us who have kids and are concerned about the next 
generation. We will for the first time in 16 years have brought tax 
relief to the American families and the working American women of this 
country.
  I think rather than have this debate become a focus of, and we will 
hear this, a lot of rhetoric over the course of the next several weeks 
about the politics of class warfare and the politics of division, the 
politics of despair and the politics of fear, that is not at all what 
this debate is about. This is about improving the quality of life for 
all Americans.
  I think if we look at any objective standard and any objective 
measure about the benefits of this tax package and who really receives 
those benefits, we will find that 75 percent of the tax relief in this 
package goes to those who make less than $75,000 a year, by any 
objective standard.
  There will be a lot of juicing of numbers by opponents of this, and 
we are already seeing evidence of that, of padding the numbers and 
trying to create the perception that, in fact, this is an issue of 
class warfare, but it is not. It is about improving the quality of life 
for all Americans.
  I think it is perfectly consistent with everything that we came here 
to do. So when we look at the Independence Day that is ahead of us and, 
hopefully, we will have completed work on this important project, but 
two important firsts: balancing the budget for the first time in 40 
years, lowering taxes for the first time in 16 years, and saving 
Medicare for another 10 years and, hopefully, into the next generation.
  Those are priorities that I will tell all my distinguished friends 
and colleagues who are here this evening that I came here to be about, 
and I think it is an incredibly historic day.
  There is always room for improvement in any of these packages, and I 
would certainly hope that as we go through this process we will be able 
to address an issue that is important to my home State. There is a tax 
incentive in the law today that promotes ethanol, and that is something 
that I think is a good return for the taxpayer, and that is something I 
hope we can resolve and make this package better.
  But in any case, there are so many provisions in here that benefit 
middle class families, I think really that is consistent with the 
values, the philosophy, and with the beliefs and the convictions that 
most of us in the Chamber this evening hold.
  Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield to one of my friends, any of whom 
is at a microphone right now.

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