[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 39 (Thursday, March 22, 2001)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2720-S2722]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           BUDGET RESOLUTION

  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, a little earlier in the day, a very 
distinguished Senator from West Virginia and a very good friend--and I 
say that in all honesty--came to the floor and talked a little bit--
more than a little bit--about the budget resolution and the current 
chairman of the Budget Committee. Not in negative terms. I happen to be 
that person. They were not negative at all.
  There were a few things the distinguished Senator said that I seek to 
clarify. I did not do this without telling him. I sent him a copy of 
the budget schedule for the winter-spring of 1993 because one of the 
points the Senator from West Virginia made was we are moving ahead to 
bring a budget resolution up on April 1 or April 2.
  I believe one of his major points was we do not yet have a detailed 
budget from the President of the United States, George W. Bush.
  I will soon put this schedule in the Record, but here is what 
happened in 1993 when President Clinton was elected President. One of 
the big differences was they had 54 votes on that side, and we had 45 
votes on our side. Understand, they could do what they wanted with the 
budget resolution with or without a President's budget. They could 
order reconciliation instructions to increase taxes with or without 
Republican support.
  This Senator finds himself in a very different position. We have 11 
Republicans and 11 Democrats, and they just happen to call me chairman, 
but I do not have any votes. I am one of the 11 Republicans and there 
are 11 Democrats.
  The distinguished Senator said we were proceeding even without a 
detailed final budget from the new President of the United States. Here 
is the budget schedule for the winter-spring of 1993:
  February 17, the President issues a preliminary budget overview 
called a ``Vision of Change for America.'' We looked at that. It is 
very much like what George W. Bush sent us maybe a month ago. It was a 
very minor document when it comes to detailed budget documents.
  On March 3, the CBO gave some preliminary estimates on that. Just 
look at this schedule: On February 17, the President sends us this 
vision, this document of a few pages, and by March 12, less than 1 
month, the Senate Budget Committee, on partisan lines--namely, they had 
the majority, we had the minority--guess what. They reported out a 
budget resolution.
  Then the House Budget Committee did that by March 15, less than a 
month.
  Then on March 18, 1 month after the issuance of the ``Vision of 
Change for America'' proposal--and I call it a proposal--the conference 
report was filed on the 1994 budget resolution. The House agreed to the 
conference report, and on April 1 the Senate agreed to a conference 
report on the 1994 budget resolution.
  Guess when the Senate in 1993 got the budget of the President of the 
United States. On April 8, 8 days after they had already approved 
everything, including a budget resolution.
  I only state that because it was suggested that it was sort of 
untoward and maybe not the best thing for us to do the budget 
resolution before we have the President's final documents, the detailed 
documents.
  President Bill Clinton asked his democratically controlled Congress 
that they approve a budget resolution before he sent them the budget, 
and they did. That is all right with me. I was a member of the 
opposition. I argued as much as I could against what I thought was not 
the right thing to do, but understand that by April 1 everything was 
finished in both Houses on a budget resolution aspect, following on 
with the President's plans, and the President had not yet put his 
budget together in detail.

  We have as much detail today, I assure you, Mr. President, as the 
Senate and House Budget Committees had when they produced budget 
resolutions less than 1 month after the President issued his vision 
plan, a rather flimsy

[[Page S2721]]

document, not much of a budget document, much like our President 
produced. We do not call that little vision document a budget; they are 
still working on it.
  I want everyone to know it will not be untoward. It will be very much 
in accord with the way we have done things, to follow our Democratic 
brethren and do the very same thing. The President will not have his 
budget in detail. We will have a budget resolution. It is not a 
detailed budget either, if anybody thinks it is.
  People say: You must know about every program in the Federal budget, 
as if in every budget document we deal with every program in the 
Federal Government. It will come as a shock, but we do not. We deal in 
large functions, large pieces of the budget, because that is all we 
have jurisdiction over. Nobody gave us jurisdiction over the details.
  I sent this to Senator Byrd since he spoke about the chairman of the 
Budget Committee and wondered why we could do a budget resolution 
before we had a budget.
  I repeat--they are pretty good role models on the other side of the 
aisle--that is what they did for their President. We are going to try 
very hard to do that for our President. The only difference is we do 
not have 54 votes that carry ``R'' after the name; we have 50. We are 
trying very hard to ask our Democratic friends--some of them--to help 
us do for our President what the Congress did for their President when 
he was first elected to the Presidency; that is, help us get a budget 
resolution out and not just wait around for a budget; do it quickly; do 
it as fast as we can.
  I have a commitment from the leadership that we are going to take 
this budget resolution up as quickly as we can under the very rigorous 
schedule we now have. I know we are not going to get huge cooperation 
on the other side, although I hope a couple Senators will help us, 
because it still has to be filled in by the committees. We just want to 
lay the groundwork that President Bush deserves to get his budget 
considered in exactly the same way President Clinton did. The only 
thing he can hope for is that he have 54 votes as President Clinton 
had. Then he would get his plans adopted in both bodies in less than 1 
month from the time he issued just his few pages of ``here is what I 
want to do in the future.'' It wasn't a budget. It wasn't a budget by 
either President.

  With this budget resolution, we want to do it as quickly as possible, 
April 1 or April 2, for 4 or 5 days.
  In addition, we want a big piece of that budget to be economic 
recovery. That means we are going to propose, hopefully--I haven't 
worked it out with everybody yet--$60 billion of the 2001 surplus; 
there is a big surplus sitting there this year. That $60 billion will 
be allowed in a bill, in a composite bill, to give back to the 
taxpayers because it is surplus that we ought to return to them. I 
don't know what way to return it to them. That can be debated. I don't 
think there can be any debate with what we see in the American economy. 
Expediency is a rule. Economic recovery ought to be our first venture 
and our paramount venture going in.
  We will propose a $60 billion surplus be given back to the American 
people in the most judicious and prudent way possible. And we pass the 
President's marginal tax cut along with it. We won't ask for all the 
rest of the taxes in that first round. People are worried about it 
being too big. This will be a package made up just of the marginal 
rates and the $60 billion this year.
  It will send a signal, if we can get cooperation to do this. It will 
not only send a signal that we are responding to the economic 
conditions, whatever plant closures, whatever responses there are out 
there, and the marketplace.
  The business executives are thinking, at least we can act quickly, 
and we have an economic recovery part of this plan which is pretty 
good. I say to any person who thinks the marginal rate reduction should 
not be part of whatever return of surplus we have for this year, they 
just ought to ask those who really know about what will send a positive 
signal to the American economy as nothing else. That is in addition to 
the refund, rebate, tax cut, whatever you want to call it, giving back 
$60 billion. If you reduce the marginal rates permanently and tell the 
American people it is done, they will say, for once they did something 
quickly, they did something right, and our hats are off to them. That 
will be their hats off to us.
  If we can't do that and somebody thinks we can fix it all with a $60 
billion return of surplus and put off the rest, you can't do that and 
have any big impact on this economy.
  Let me repeat, if the only package is to return a portion of this 
year's 2001 surplus, you cannot have an impact on the American economy. 
It is not big enough, even though it is $60 billion. And you get no 
permanency built into the notion that the marginal rates for the 
American taxpayers--that means everybody's tax rate--should be reduced 
from the top brackets to the lowest brackets.
  That is about the way things are today. I am very pleased the 
Republican leadership, at least as I read them, as I made this 
presentation to a group of Republican Senators--not everyone; some 
Senators were busy on the floor--I saw a willingness to move, to do 
something, to let the tax-writing committee quickly sit down and decide 
to do this. We will say you have free reign to do this in these 
particular dimensions I have just described.
  I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the budget 
schedule for winter/spring, 1993.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                  Budget Schedule--Winter/Spring 1993

       February 17, 1993: President issues preliminary budget 
     overview, A Vision of Change for America.
       March 3, 1993: CBO issues Preliminary CBO Estimates of the 
     Administration's Budgetary Proposals (5 pages of text, 
     double-spaced, and 3 tables); includes minor revisions to 
     January baseline, netting out to several billion dollars over 
     six years, almost entirely for deposit insurance. (The 
     baseline was next updated in The Economic and Budget Outlook 
     issued in September 1993.)
       March 12, 1993: Senate Budget Committee reports 1994 budget 
     resolution.
       March 15, 1993: House Budget Committee reports 1994 budget 
     resolution.
       March 16, 1993: CBO testifies before Ways and Means 
     Committee.
       Sometime after March 16: CBO issues An Analysis of the 
     President's February Budgetary Proposals (about 60 pages), 
     providing more detail on CBO's economic assumptions, 
     reestimates, and baseline revisions. On page A-3, it notes 
     that ``the notion that the deficit will simply fade with time 
     and continuing economic growth has largely been punctured.''
       March 18, 1993: House passes 1994 budget resolution.
       March 25, 1993: Senate passes 1994 budget resolution.
       March 31, 1993: Conference report filed on 1994 budget 
     resolution; House agrees to conference report.
       April 1, 1993: Senate agrees to conference report on 1994 
     budget resolution.
       April 8, 1993: President issues detailed budget documents.

  Mr. DOMENICI. If we can do it as quickly as this bill, but I don't 
think we can.
  Wherever I said 54 Senators, my friend says it is 56. I just come 
from little old New Mexico. I thought it was 54. But in any event, they 
had good majority and proceeded with great dispatch. I will try to do 
that, although we only have 50/50. I will ask the American people, and 
I will have the President ask them, do you want to get this done or 
dillydally? Do you want to get both pieces done, give the public back 
$60 billion and cut the marginal rates, or wait around?
  Wait around until when? I am not answering the question.
  It is so obvious that a markup will do no good; as this Senator sees 
it, it will split every vote, 11-11. I am not willing to say we will do 
that before we put this package before the American people. I just 
don't think that is what we have to do.
  So nobody will be confused, the other side of the aisle says the 
public ought to have a chance to participate in this committee 
deliberation. That is a wonderful thought. It is probably what all of 
us would like to think about our committees when they work, but I think 
the American people will get a real version of this when they get 5 
days on the floor of the Senate. When you can offer all kinds of 
amendments, you can offer three budget resolutions if you like. We 
offer the President's as a starting point. If the other side would like 
to offer theirs, that is different; they can. If they amend the one we 
can produce, whenever it is, they can do that. It will be full, hour to 
hour,

[[Page S2722]]

minute to minute, on TV. It is not assured that will occur with a 
markup in committee, but we will have it, full time, every moment we 
speak.
  Having said that, we will put together this budget as quickly as we 
can. We will try to share it with all the Members and eventually, as 
soon as we can, we will share it with the other side of the aisle. But 
essentially, they will have ample time in the 5 days we debate this, 50 
hours. Do you know how long that is? We won't get out of here before 
Easter. We might meet through the night one of those nights and we will 
get out of here before Easter.

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