[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 143 (Sunday, October 11, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H10516-H10517]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 DEMOCRATS OFFER EDUCATION INITIATIVES

  (Mr. PALLONE asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I had the opportunity last night to go back 
to my district in New Jersey and I explained to my constituents that I 
saw at a function last evening how this do-nothing Congress was looking 
to adjourn and go home as quickly as possible because the Republican 
leadership refused to address education initiatives, refused to address 
the need for HMO reform and was talking about a tax break for the 
wealthy at the expense of Social Security. We need to save Social 
Security for future generations. But I was told by my constituents that 
the one thing that was the most important, that they did not want to 
see this Congress adjourn until we addressed it, was education, and the 
Democrats have two initiatives. One is to hire 100,000 teachers, new 
teachers across the country with Federal dollars that would reduce the 
size of the classroom, and the second one was to try to provide some 
funding to help local school districts to modernize their schools, to 
either build new schools or additions or to upgrade the schools that 
need to be restored. We are going to make sure that that happens here. 
We are telling the Republican leadership and our colleagues on the 
other side we are not going to run out of this place quickly. This has 
been a do-nothing Congress but at least before you go home, try to do 
something, put some sort of down payment on these education initiatives 
that are so important, not to Democrats, not to Republicans but to the 
American people.
  These are the kids. We have to think about the future of this 
country. The future of this country is in its children and in public 
education, not vouchers

[[Page H10517]]

for private schools but public education, and doing things to upgrade 
public education, doing things to help in the classroom, doing things 
that make it possible to have safer and smarter schools. That is what 
the Democrats are all about. We have been talking about this for a long 
time. President Clinton brought it up in his State of the Union 
address. Now is the time to do something about it.

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