[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 19 (Wednesday, February 3, 1999)]
[House]
[Page H386]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




    LET US KEEP OUR SENIOR CITIZENS FROM POVERTY AND SUPPORT SOCIAL 
                                SECURITY

  (Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas asked and was given permission to address 
the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Madam Speaker, before the implementation of 
social security, so many of our senior citizens in America simply died 
in poverty. Let me make myself perfectly clear. Before we had social 
security, so many of our senior citizens died in poverty. Yet, our 
Republican friends choose to give away tax dollars, if you will, 
without realizing the importance of saving social security as the most 
successful anti-poverty legislation ever passed into law by Congress.
  Social security is not broken. For millions of Americans, it is the 
only means of sustenance that is available to them. For millions of 
others, it is a necessary supplement to their pension plans and 
retirement funds. Without social security, I have no doubt that the 
life of older Americans and the disabled will be stark and unforgiving.
  That is why we must reinvest our budget surplus into social security, 
to make sure they will be there for our future. Under the President's 
budget for the next fiscal year, we will take 62 percent of our budget 
surplus and put it back into social security, helping extend the life 
of the program decades beyond 2032.
  Madam Speaker, let us take our senior citizens out of poverty and 
support the continuation of social security.

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