[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 42 (Tuesday, April 12, 2005)]
[House]
[Page H1857]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  IT IS TIME TO END THE DEATH TAX NOW

  (Mr. SAM JOHNSON of Texas asked and was given permission to address 
the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. SAM JOHNSON of Texas. Madam Speaker, the gibberish my colleagues 
just heard about is the President says everything's on the table. We 
can reform Social Security.
  Madam Speaker, this week the United States House will vote to 
eliminate the unfair death tax.
  Believe it or not, the government gives you a certificate at birth, a 
license when you marry and a tax bill when you die. Is that not a 
shame?
  Taxing people when they die smacks of all the things that are wrong 
with the government and Washington.
  The death tax was created to target people like the Vanderbilts and 
the Rockefellers, with the original intent of paying and winning World 
War I. This bill hits hardworking Americans. The death tax hurts the 
mom-and-pop shops on Main Street, and that is just not fair.
  Sadly, now if a person saved for the future, put some money away, 
built a business, ran a farm or achieved the American Dream in other 
ways, the death tax punishes them.
  That is just wrong, and it is time to end the death tax now.

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