[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 77 (Wednesday, June 12, 2002)]
[Senate]
[Page S5393]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                               ESTATE TAX

  Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. President, I also wish to say a few words about the 
estate tax debate we are having right now.
  With all due respect for my colleagues, I think this debate shows 
that a lot of people in Washington are totally out of touch with 
regular people back at home. I think we should step back and take stock 
of where we are right now.
  No. 1, as all of us know, we are in the middle of fighting a war 
against terrorism, and we do not know when that war will end. Our young 
men and women are in harm's way overseas as I speak.
  Here at home, we have very serious homeland security needs that the 
administration is struggling to meet. It is no exaggeration to say that 
Americans' lives depend on the success of those efforts. That is No. 1.
  No. 2: We have a whole raft of serious needs in our country. I have 
been talking about the rising crime rate, but that is just the 
beginning. We have seniors who cannot pay for the medicine they need to 
live. We have parents who cannot afford to send their kids to college. 
We have children who go to school every day in crowded classrooms with 
leaky roofs, even as this administration cuts funding for education. 
That list goes on and on.
  No. 3: We have a coming challenge in Social Security. We are going to 
have baby boomers retiring in huge numbers, and we are going to have to 
find a way to keep our social contract with them.
  No. 1, we have a costly war against terrorism to fight abroad and at 
home. No. 2, we have deep problems with crime and education and health 
care that we are not addressing. No. 3, we have a coming crisis in 
Social Security.
  And here is No. 4. Right now we cannot afford to address a lot of our 
serious needs--and in fact, our economy continues to sputter after a 
decade of extraordinary growth--because the country has gone from a 
multitrillion dollar surplus to a deficit in barely a year. That is 
very largely because of the tax cuts targeted to the wealthy this 
Congress already passed. It is a breathtaking fiscal turnaround.
  With terrorism, with crime and education and health care needs, with 
a Social Security crisis, with massive fiscal hemorrhaging, what are we 
talking about here today?
  We are not talking about reforming the estate tax to eliminate unfair 
burdens on farmers and small businesses, something I support. I very 
strongly believe that farmers and small businesses have to be protected 
from estate taxes.
  We are talking about whether to blow another massive hole in the 
budget to pay for a tax cut that mostly benefits about 3,000 of the 
wealthiest families each year. In a country of over 275 million people, 
many of them struggling to pay their mortgages and send their kids to 
college, we are talking about multimillion dollar windfalls for about 
three thousand fortunate families.
  I have only one question. Is this really why the American people send 
us here, to massively cut taxes on a very fortunate few while we are 
fighting terrorism and Social Security is in trouble and millions of 
middle class people are struggling? I do not think that is why people 
send us here.
  What my colleagues are trying to do today on the estate tax is wrong 
from a national security perspective. It is wrong from a Social 
Security perspective. It is wrong from an economic perspective. And 
most important of all, it is wrong from a moral perspective.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from New Jersey.
  Mr. CORZINE. Mr. President, I commend the Senator from North Carolina 
for his remarks with regard to his views on probation and the 
deteriorating situation with regard to how we are moving and 
progressing with regard to crime. I am also glad to hear the Senator 
from North Carolina speak about estate tax in the context of Social 
Security. In fact, I will be speaking in a minute with regard to the 
Social Security issue.
  It seems inconceivable to me that the roughly 3,000 people the 
Senator is talking about in our Nation, those who have benefited most 
from the power and the success of our Nation economically and done so 
well, should put at jeopardy the universal program that is such an 
important part of retirement security for so many Americans. It does 
not seem right in the context of the national security, but truly it 
seems misplaced when one thinks about Social Security for the breadth 
of Americans.
  So I commend the Senator for his remarks, and particularly the tying 
together and juxtaposition of those efforts.

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