[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 112 (Tuesday, August 3, 1999)]
[House]
[Page H6951]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            REVISING HISTORY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mrs. Northup). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer) is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. HOYER. Madam Speaker, I was constrained to rise and respond to my 
friend, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay). The gentleman revises 
history. On a normal night, perhaps no one would rise to say that it 
was revisionist history at best, or at worst, depending upon one's 
perspective.
  In 1992, Bill Clinton ran for President of the United States, and he 
put forward a document called The New Covenant. Not a contract on 
America, a new covenant, a new promise, a new commitment, a new 
cooperation, a new working arrangement with America. And in that new 
covenant he said that, yes, we expect government to do good things for 
people.
  Government, in my perspective, is our community at large trying to 
work together trying to make lives better. But in that new covenant, 
that my Republican friends so quickly forget, I am sure, Bill Clinton 
said that we need to expect of each American personal responsibility; 
that they will commit themselves to use their best talents to enhance 
their own lives because that, in turn, would enhance the lives of our 
community, if each and every one of us carried our share of the load.
  It was the President, in 1992, who said that personal responsibility 
ought to be a key word for America's revival. America heard that, and 
America elected him. And in that new covenant as well, when he talked 
about personal responsibility, he said we need welfare reform. I guess 
the Republicans forget that.
  They chuckle, Madam Speaker, but I will remind my colleagues of some 
history, for those who were not here, when every Democrat voted for a 
welfare reform bill sponsored by Nathan Deal. Does that name ring a 
bell? He was a Democrat at that time, but he had a bill that we worked 
on that demanded personal responsibility; the expectation that if we 
could, we would be expected to work, because the work ethic is critical 
to the success of a family, of a community, and of a society. That bill 
did not become law, but we had other bills.
  Now, my colleagues, how many times have we all heard it complained, 
oh, if the President would only let us do this, we could have done 
great things? They know that they could not possibly have overridden 
the veto of the President of the United States. If he had not been 
committed, and if he had not led the fight for welfare reform, the 
Republicans could not have done it. And they know that. Period.
  My friend, the majority whip, likes to say we did it, we get the 
credit. Very frankly, everybody in this House deserves the credit, and 
Americans deserve the credit, and governors deserve the credit, and 
State legislators deserve the credit. Why? Because we all perceived 
that there was a system that existed which did not encourage and have 
the expectation of work. But for the fact that Bill Clinton was 
president and led that effort, it would not have happened because he 
could have vetoed it. And all of my colleagues know that his veto would 
have been sustained because there were more than 146 Democrats in this 
House and more than 40 Democrats in the United States Senate.
  Now, let me go on to balancing the budget. Frankly, my colleagues, 
what the Republican Party has been responsible for since I have been in 
Congress, since 1981, is the gargantuan deficits and debt that 
confronts our country. Period. Why? Because Ronald Reagan and George 
Bush proposed in their budgets those deficits.
  Now, my Republican colleagues may say it is absurd that the gentleman 
from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer) would say that. Well, look at the budgets. 
Presidents Reagan and Bush asked for more spending in those 12 years 
than the Congress appropriated. Now, if they did, obviously they 
planned for those deficits.
  Now, were the priorities slightly different? They were. But the fact 
of the matter is Ronald Reagan never vetoed a bill for spending too 
much that was not sustained by the Congress. In other words, not a 
nickel could have been spent in this country that Ronald Reagan did not 
put his signature on. Not a nickel.
  So the budget balancing came at the hands of Bill Clinton, when for 7 
years in a row now the budget deficit has decreased, for the first time 
in this century.

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