[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 109 (Tuesday, July 29, 1997)]
[House]
[Page H5928]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                IN SUPPORT OF BALANCED BUDGET AGREEMENT

  (Ms. STABENOW asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Ms. STABENOW. Madam Speaker, it is my pleasure today to rise in 
support of the balanced budget agreement that we will be voting on 
later this week.
  Before I entered the House in January, we had a Congress that was 
shutting the Government down, not once but twice. We now have new 
faces. We now have the President's leadership in bringing together 
people on both sides to create a bipartisan agreement. This is an 
agreement that when it first came before the House I could not support 
because it very much gave relief to those at the top, hoping that those 
at the middle somehow would receive it through trickle-down economics.
  But what we have now is very different. The efforts, the hard work of 
the last few weeks have made a tremendous difference. We now see 
middle-class families, small businesses, family-owned farms receiving 
the kind of relief that we have been fighting for. Education is now a 
top priority; children's health care for families that work but do not 
have insurance.
  This is a dramatically different proposal than the one that passed a 
few weeks ago. The hard work paid off. The folks that have been 
communicating their concerns for middle-class America have made a 
difference.

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