[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 149 (Wednesday, October 23, 2013)]
[House]
[Page H6690]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     THE CONSTITUTION AND OBAMACARE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Hall) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. HALL. Madam Speaker, in 1776, with only 1,458 words, our Founding 
Fathers declared our Nation's independence from an overreaching 
government that had limited individual freedom. A year later, in 1787, 
with 4,543 words, our Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution that 
established our representative democracy, protecting individual rights, 
and set in places roles for states' rights and a limited Federal 
Government based on enumerated powers.
  Fast-forward to 2010, from 1776 to 2010, and the President and 
Democratic-controlled House and Senate established ObamaCare without a 
single Republican vote. This government takeover of health care is so 
overreaching. The law contains 381,517 words. That is over 83 times as 
many words as the Constitution, which only had 4,543 words.
  In addition to the law, the administration has published 109 
regulations to implement the law, regulations not voted on by the 
Congress, which contain a massive 11,588,500 words, according to 
ENSnews.com. According to Forbes, the average adult reads about 300 
words a minute. That means it would take the average person 38,628 
minutes just to read the regulations. If someone read 8 hours a day, it 
would take them 80 days to read all of the regulations, let alone 
understand them.
  We are just beginning to see the negative consequences of this 
Federal outreach in all Americans' health care decisions. My 
constituents remain adamantly opposed to ObamaCare. They continue to 
write and call my offices, asking me to destroy as much of this law as 
possible because it is raising premiums, copays, and deductibles. Many 
small business owners also tell me they have stopped hiring workers and 
are in the difficult position of cutting hours or employees due to the 
uncertainty with the law and its regulations.
  In closing, let me just say that we will continue to see the negative 
impacts of ObamaCare as more of this law is implemented in the coming 
months. The President needs to recognize how harmful the health care 
law is and help us craft better and more responsible health care 
reform.

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