[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 79 (Wednesday, June 17, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H4641-H4643]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
WAIVING POINTS OF ORDER AGAINST CONFERENCE REPORT ON H.R. 2646,
EDUCATION SAVINGS AND SCHOOL EXCELLENCE ACT OF 1998
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I
call up House Resolution 471 and ask for its immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:
H. Res. 471
Resolved, That upon adoption of this resolution it shall be
in order to consider the conference report to accompany the
bill (H.R. 2646) to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986
to allow tax-free expenditures from education individual
retirement accounts for elementary and secondary school
expenses, to increase the maximum annual amount of
contributions to such accounts, and for other purposes. All
points of order against the conference report and against its
consideration are waived. The conference report shall be
considered as read.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Oxley). The gentlewoman from North
Carolina (Mrs. Myrick) is recognized for 1 hour.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield the
customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter),
pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During
consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purposes
of debate only.
Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Committee on Rules met and granted a rule
to provide for the consideration of the conference report accompanying
H.R. 2646, the Education Savings and School Excellence Act of 1998.
The rule waives all points of order against the conference report and
against its consideration. In addition, the rule provides that the
conference report shall be considered as read.
Mr. Speaker, every child in this country deserves the best education
possible and every parent knows what school will best suit their
children. Here in Congress, it is our duty to get out of the way and
empower all Americans to follow through on their educational choices.
We will do just that tomorrow when we approve the conference report to
the Education Savings Act of 1998.
Simply put, the Education Savings Act will allow caring fathers and
mothers, as well as concerned charities, corporations, friends or
grandparents, to save more for their children's education. By
permitting parents to deposit up to $2,000 per year in a tax-free
education savings account from 1999 through 2002, the bill will help
parents pay for elementary school, secondary school, and college
tuition.
Not all parents need to save for private school tuition though. Often
the local public school is clearly the best option. H.R. 2646
recognizes that, even before they send their children to college, the
parents and friends and relatives of public schoolchildren deserve tax-
free education savings too. The bill permits all young families to save
tax-free for tutoring expenses, computers, books, special needs
services, and extended day program fees.
Mr. Speaker, all too often young parents are unable to give their
children the very best. Every year rent, mortgage payments, grocery
bills and, yes, taxes limit the educational choices of American
families. A select few wealthy parents have no problem paying for
tuition, if necessary, as well as for tutors and computer equipment.
But the rest of us, we could use real help. Americans should be able to
keep a little more of what they earn to pay for education.
In addition to tax-free education savings accounts, H.R. 2646 expands
government efforts to teach our children
[[Page H4642]]
to read. The bill authorizes the Secretary of Education to spend $210
million per year from 1999 through 2001 to support State and local
child literacy efforts.
There is a sense of the Senate in this bill on Dollars to the
Classroom. The sense of the Senate resolution says that 95 percent of
every Federal education dollar should end up in the classroom.
Mr. Speaker, this is a good bill. Teachers' unions and advocates of
public school bureaucracy may balk at our efforts to expand the
educational choice of American parents while we work to improve our
public schools, but this bill is a sincere effort to throw politics
aside and to help children and families who need help most.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this rule and to support
the underlying legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from North
Carolina (Mrs. Myrick) for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I
yield myself such time as I may consume.
(Ms. SLAUGHTER asked and was given permission to revise and extend
her remarks.)
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, H. Res. 471 waives all points of order
against the conference report on H.R. 2646 and against its
consideration. While I will not actively oppose the rule, I rise in
strong opposition to the underlying bill.
We all know that we need to improve our public schools to give our
children the education they need to reach their full potential.
Educators agree that we need to target our assistance to schools and
students who do not have the resources needed to have an equal
opportunity to succeed.
Our limited Federal education programs should target those most in
need and support efforts that we know have a proven record in improving
educational achievement.
For example, research has shown that smaller class size in grades K
through 3 has a positive effect on students for their entire lives. The
improved classroom discipline and reading and math skills provide a
solid base for the child's continued education achievement.
Research has also shown the benefits of after-school programs that
promote safe and nurturing activities for young people during nonschool
hours. These programs provide positive alternatives for kids who would
otherwise be on the streets or alone with only the television set for
company.
After-school tutoring offers young people the extra help they may
require to succeed in their classes. Organized sports allow the young
people to expend their energy in a positive setting, building physical
skills and endurance.
Our schools also need help to improve teacher training, to modernize
the school buildings which are in crying bad shape, to promote safe
schools, and to challenge students to meet higher standards. But,
unfortunately, this bill does not do any of that.
Mr. Speaker, instead, H.R. 2646, at a cost of $2.2 billion over 5
years, will provide a taxpayer subsidy to the Nation's most privileged;
70 percent of its benefits will go to families with incomes in the top
20 percent. Under H.R. 2646, families will get a significant benefit
only if they have enough disposable income to contribute $2,000 per
child per year to an education savings account. Families struggling
just to put food on the table and buy school shoes for their kids will
receive nothing from this bill.
The Joint Committee on Taxation, with a majority of Republican
members, estimates that the benefit for an average family would be only
$37 a year if they have children in private schools and even less, $7 a
year, for families with children in public schools. The $2.2 billion
would be more usefully spent to improve our public schools.
This bill is a favorite of some because it provides a foot in the
door for public subsidy for nonpublic schools. In fact, more than 50
percent of its benefits would go to the 7 percent of families who send
their children to private and religious schools. That is only 7 percent
of America's families.
Public funds should be used to improve public schools which serve all
students. We should not ask families struggling from paycheck to
paycheck, those in the lower- and middle-income brackets, to subsidize
families in the upper 20 percent income bracket. Taxpayer subsidies for
private school education will lead to fewer available resources for the
public schools which serve the 93 percent of our families.
Mr. Speaker, in my district both the Monroe County School Board
Association and the Rochester City Schools oppose this plan to shift
public funding to private schools and parochial education. The National
PTA, the National Education Association, the American Federation of
Teachers, and the Council of Chief State School Officers all oppose
H.R. 2646 because it will create taxpayer-financed subsidies for
private and religious schools, while doing virtually nothing to improve
America's public schools.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the motion to recommit
the conference report with instructions to substitute H.R. 3320, the
Public School Modernization Act. H.R. 3320 would pay the interest on
$22 billion in local school bonds so that we could make sure our public
schools are safe, have up-to-date equipment and facilities, and have
enough classrooms for all their students.
Mr. Speaker, America's public schools have been a model for the whole
world, and we should work to strengthen them, not abandon them.
Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to support the Rangel motion to
recommit, and if that fails, to oppose the conference report.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, just a point of clarification. This bill does not take
away any current education dollars. This is over and above what we are
currently spending, so nothing is being taken away.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to
the gentleman from California (Mr. STARK).
(Mr. STARK asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
{time} 1045
Mr. STARK. Mr. Speaker, I had intended to speak later today on an
issue of professionalism in the House of Representatives. It has seemed
to have departed in 1994. The House is now, unfortunately, being run by
amateurs who have really no concept of what legislation does in its
far-reaching effects.
A perfectly good example is this bill before us. While I happen to
differ with the distinguished gentlewoman about the best way to support
education, I respect her right to her opinions as to what will increase
benefits to our children. The fact is that the gentlewoman's leadership
has got this place so convoluted that her distinguished efforts today
will not make any difference.
My chairman of my subcommittee on which I serve, the gentleman from
California (Mr. Thomas), recently referred to a lot of Republican
legislation as asinine. He was not just whistling Dixie.
I want to suggest to the gentlewoman that a little later today, the
gentlewoman is going to vote for a bill which will absolutely negate
this bill that she is now proposing. Which does the gentlewoman want to
do?
Would she like to help parents with their savings account, as she so
eloquently purports to do? Then I propose that the gentlewoman would
join me in opposing the bill that her party will bring to the floor
today, which will absolutely suspend the entire income tax system in
2002 and, therefore, make her bill useless, meaningless.
Not only will it make the gentlewoman's bill useless, she will
probably not have any schools, because not only will sunsetting the
income Tax Code mean that no longer will the public be willing to buy
tax exempt bonds, because who knows whether, in fact, they will be tax
exempt or taxed or how high they will be taxed; no longer will the
public be willing to give, to donate to their church, because they are
not sure whether that will be taxed or not.
As a practical matter, we had better hurry up and die before the year
2002 or our wills will not be any good. All of the plans that the
financial markets
[[Page H4643]]
make, and I do not know if there are any Republicans who deal with the
financial markets, I think these tax plans have all been designed in
football huddles. But aside from that, had any of them studied
economics and had any of them had any awareness of the implications of
what abolishing the Tax Code would do?
I have no quarrel that some people may pay too much tax; some people
may pay too little in tax. Some people may not like cigarette taxes.
Some people may not like gasoline taxes. All of those things can be
debated. They can be debated in the context of what it will do to our
country's economy.
But the sheer lunacy, the absolute sophomoric inanity of taking and
saying we are going to abolish the Tax Code, I would suggest that you
might as well, while you are at it, abolish the Criminal Code. That
would give some Members of Congress, and particularly on the Republican
side, relief from some fines and some jail terms. But other than that,
why not abolish it and say, well, in the year 2002, we will write a new
Criminal Code, but in the meantime, go do what you want.
So as we are sitting here debating a bill that might at the outset
make some reasonable sense to people who want to support private
schools at the expense of destroying public education, a reasonable
debate that has been going on for some time, we are getting prepared,
as we sit here this morning, to bring to the House of Representatives a
bill that would, in effect, end the Tax Code.
I understand that there are a great number of modern-day Pharisees
who reside here in the House of Representatives and other types of
conservatives who believe that we should have no income tax. Again, the
most sensible of those who purport to do that have a replacement. They
would suggest a value-added tax or a sales tax or a whole host of
revenue raising. But none have been so lunatic in their approach as to
say we should raise no revenue.
It would be interesting to talk to the members of our fighting
forces. The gentlewoman from New York and I just returned from Bosnia
where we were proud to see our forces keeping peace. They might want,
as well, to throw up their hands and go home. How do they know that
they will get paid at the end of the 3 years if the Republican mind-set
were to continue to control this Congress?
This is the most amateurish approach. It is pandering, pandering in
the worst conceivable way for a few votes in an election year,
pandering about something which some people does not understand.
It is clear that whoever drafted and will support this legislation to
sunset the Tax Code has no idea of what they are doing. They are not
qualified. There are not many qualifications to membership in this
body, but I will tell you one of them ought to be to be able to count
to 20 with your shoes and socks on. I am not sure that many of my
Republican colleagues could pass that test when it comes to the
economics of dealing with the Tax Code.
So as we sit here in all solemn splendor and discuss whether we are
going to help our children, we are just waiting for an hour or two, and
we will be in this Chamber saying, let us vote to sunset the Tax Code.
Can you imagine what is happening in Jakarta which is a result of
basically a king destroying the economic system in Indonesia? This is
exactly what will happen in the United States if this Republican
provision prevails. The financial markets will suddenly awaken and
realize that none of the contracts, none of our pensions can be
depended upon. The very basis of all of our retirement income will
collapse. The stock market will be in shambles.
I want to suggest to you that if you want to create financial anarchy
in this country, follow the Republican lead. There is a Republican-
mandated commission now that is talking about the future of Medicare,
the future of Medicare. From where will the income come? From where
will the taxes come? From where will the deductions come for the
employers who are paying those taxes? This all disappears under this
marvelous Republican leadership.
What we are getting here is Dial-A-Prayer in the House of
Representatives. Dial-A-Vote. Dial-A-Special-Interest. Dial-A-Special-
Interest and ask them what they would like to hear the government do,
and we will bring it to the floor of the House without regard to the
effect on the United States, on its children, on its families.
Family values? Let me ask the gentlewoman how she would expect any
person in the United States could sell their home in the next 3 years,
realizing that the homeowner's interest deduction will disappear in
2002.
One of the mainstays of the American family is the right to buy and
own a home. The value of homes will plummet as a result of this
Republican-contrived cockamamy scheme to buy some attention from the
right-wing wackos in this country who would say abolish the income Tax
Code.
So I say to my colleagues, while it may be of some interest to
discuss, in all seriousness, how we can help our children get educated,
we had better worry about whether our children will be able to sell
apples on the street corner as children did in the bowels of the
Depression, because with the Republicans in leadership, having no
understanding of the basic tenets of economics, and leading this House
in the most amateurish, asinine way, we will destroy this economy,
destroy the values upon which the families are based, and lead us into
a confused and distraught and archaic state in the United States.
I urge my colleagues, please, to treat the upcoming tax sunset bill
with all of the derision and scorn that it deserves. It is an
amateurish bill, written and drafted by people who have not the
foggiest concept of government, of how to govern, of economics, led by
a leadership who is led around by the nose by extreme right-wing
religious groups and right-wing wacko groups, and getting a vote a day
on issues that some of their Members may have to run on in their
districts.
But I urge my colleagues to disdain any more of this foolishness in
the House of Representatives. It brings discredit to this House. It
brings discredit to those who would like, in all seriousness, to
improve the lot of families, as the Democrats have been struggling to
do.
I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the rule, vote ``no'' on this
bill, and vote absolutely, absolutely ``no'' on the rule on the income
tax sunset and, by all means, just vote ``no'' on sunsetting the income
tax.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding to me.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I would just like to say I believe that the
gentleman from California's remarks were a little below the decorum of
this House in making accusations.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the
previous question on the resolution.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Oxley). The question is on the
resolution.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a
quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not
present.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 5 of rule I, further
proceedings on the resolution are postponed.
The point of no quorum is considered withdrawn.
____________________