[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 18]
[House]
[Pages 26661-26662]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                REPUBLICAN CONGRESSIONAL ACCOMPLISHMENTS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 19, 1999, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Weller) is 
recognized during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. WELLER. Madam Speaker, I have the privilege of representing one 
of America's most diverse Congressional districts, representing the 
South Side of Chicago and the South Bushes, Cook and Will Counties, 
bedroom communities as well as farm towns and corn fields. When you 
represent such a diverse district as city and suburbs and country, you 
learn to listen. You listen to the common message. One common message 
that we are hearing from back home is that we should be working 
together to solve the challenges that we face. As I look back as one of 
those who was elected in 1994 to come to Washington to change how 
Washington works, I am proud to say we have listened to that message 
and we have held together and we have held firm even those who said 
that we should not be doing what we are doing, those who opposed our 
efforts to balance the budget and cut taxes for the middle class, to 
reform the welfare system and also to restructure the IRS.
  I am proud to say in the last 4\1/2\ years, this Republican Congress 
has made a big difference. Balancing the budget for the first time in 
28 years, cutting taxes for the middle class for the first time in 16 
years, reforming our welfare system for the first time in a generation, 
and for the first time ever, taming the tax collector by restructuring 
the IRS. Those are big accomplishments and much appreciated by the 
folks back home in Illinois but they tell me that's history now, what 
are you going to do next? They ask us to respond to the questions, the 
common concerns that we are often asked.
  While Republicans are committed to strengthening our schools and 
strengthening Medicare and Social Security and paying down the national 
debt and, of course, lowering the tax burden, we also want to respond 
to some of those big concerns and big questions that I hear, whether at 
the union hall or the VFW, the Chamber of Commerce or down at a coffee 
shop on Main Street or a local grain elevator. That is one of those 
questions that the first question I often hear is a pretty basic one 
and, that is, when are you folks in Washington going to stop raiding 
the Social Security trust fund, when are you going to stop dipping into 
Social Security and spending Social Security on other things?
  I am proud to say, Madam Speaker, that the Republicans in this 
Congress have made a commitment that for the first time since the 1960s 
when LBJ, President Johnson, began a bad habit that is hard to break in 
Washington, we are walling off the Social Security trust fund. This 
year is the first year that our budget has been balanced without 
dipping into Social Security. We want to continue that. That is why I 
am proud to say the Congressional Budget Office on September 30 of this 
year stated in a letter to Speaker Hastert that the Republican balanced 
budget does not spend one dime of the Social Security trust fund. We 
are committed to stopping the raid on the Social Security trust fund.
  I would also point out that with the Social Security Medicare lockbox 
that Republicans are proposing, we set aside $200 billion more for 
Social Security and Medicare than the President's budget alone.
  I would also point out, Madam Speaker, that we are responding to 
another important question that we hear from folks back home in the 
south side of Chicago and the south suburbs, and that is how come 
nobody ever talks about the national debt, how come no one ever talks 
about the need to pay town that national debt that ran up all those 
years that Washington had deficit spending? I am proud to say that last 
year we paid down $50 billion of the national debt, this year we are 
going to pay down a hundred billion dollars, and under the Republican 
budget plan we paid down almost $2.2 trillion of the national debt, 
over two-thirds of our national debt over the next 10 years.
  Madam Speaker, the third question that I often hear back home is when 
are we going to do something about taxes. People tell me their taxes 
are too high, they are too complicated, they are unfair. They are 
frustrated that our tax burden on American today is at its highest 
level in peace time history. Forty percent of the average family's 
income goes to government. In fact, 21 percent of our gross domestic 
product, 21 percent of our economy, goes to Federal Government and 
taxes, and that is too high.
  We passed earlier this year a measure to address the need to lower 
taxes, particularly for the middle class, and we had legislation which 
would have eliminated the marriage tax penalty

[[Page 26662]]

for the majority of those who suffer, that would have eliminated the 
death tax on small businesses and family farmers, that would have 
rewarded those who save for retirement, those who save for their 
children's and college education and also would have rewarded providing 
health care coverage for one's employees as well as their family, and 
unfortunately President Clinton vetoed that effort to help families by 
bringing fairness to the Tax Code, and he stated, and he was very 
blunt; he said he vetoed this tax cut because he wanted to spend that 
money instead.
  That is really what this is all about over the next week or so as we 
wrap up this legislative session. President Clinton has made it very 
clear he wants to spend a lot more money than Republicans do, and he 
says that we can do it if we increase taxes, and the President says we 
could do it if we raid the Social Security Trust Fund.
  Madam Speaker, I very proud last week when this House of 
Representatives cast a vote 419 to 0, which means that every member who 
cast a vote voted in opposition to the President's proposal for $238 
billion in tax increases. That is a very clear message to the President 
that we oppose his tax increases, and I also want to point out that 
this House also went on record in opposition to the President's plan to 
raid Social Security. We need to oppose his tax increases, we need to 
stop the raid on Social Security, but we can balance the budget without 
those.

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