[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 4]
[House]
[Page 5277]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           MICROSOFT BREAK-UP

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. LaTourette). Under a previous order of 
the House, the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Baird) is recognized for 
5 minutes.
  Mr. BAIRD. Mr. Speaker, we are a Nation of laws. Without a codified, 
uniform, and fairly administered systems of laws, American society 
would be harmed, lives would be ruined and businesses would falter and 
fail.
  I also know that our system is not perfect. Sometimes it is possible 
for existing laws to be misapplied or misinterpreted. Sometimes it is 
possible for reasonable men and women to look at the same set of facts 
and to simply draw different conclusions. And sometimes our very human 
and very American desire to side with the little guy overwhelms our 
objectivity and colors our view of the facts; that I believe is 
happening in the case of Microsoft versus the Department of Justice.
  Mr. Speaker, I believe that Microsoft is being unfairly judged, not 
only in the federal courtroom, but also in the court of public opinion, 
and I believe this good company stands a chance of being unfairly 
punished. That is why I am here today to do what I can to stop an 
injustice from occurring.
  Microsoft is the great American success story. Today, it is a company 
whose products have increased the efficiency of our work force 
immeasurably. It is a company whose products are used and respected 
worldwide. It is a company who has shared more of its wealth creation 
with its workers than any other business in this country. It is a 
company whose founder has made more charitable contributions than any 
other business leader in the entire world.
  And this American success story is under attack today, because it 
wanted to offer better products to its customers in order to stay 
competitive. That seems absurd to me. Even more absurd is the precedent 
that this decision would set for all of American business, because the 
attack on Microsoft is not simply an attack on a single very successful 
company.
  It is an attack on the very principles of business competition and 
technological innovation. It is an attack that threatens to undermine 
one of the most successful engines of economic growth and technological 
innovation in our Nation.
  One of the first rules of business is to anticipate changing markets, 
to predict what competitors will do, and try to do better. The way to 
win in a competitive marketplace is to produce better products more 
quickly and more economically. That is the basis of our free enterprise 
system. It is why our economy leads the world, and it is why we are the 
envy of the rest of the world.
  It is a terribly, terribly serious matter for the government to 
intrude in that process of healthy competition. And it is simply not 
acceptable or reasonable for our government to seek to destroy a 
fundamental engine of our economy.
  Microsoft is a generous and responsible corporate citizen, one of the 
most innovative and creative success stories in American history. 
Microsoft should not be attacked simply because they sought to provide 
more integrated, advanced, and efficient products to the marketplace, 
that is what consumers want companies to do. Far from harming 
consumers, that is what consumers want from products that and the 
companies that make them.
  The theory behind antitrust actions is to prevent monopolistic or 
anticompetitive practices that could stifle development or competition 
and thereby hurt the consumer.
  I understand that principle, but the key phrase is thereby hurt the 
consumer. And what is most important to consider here is not whether 
there is a specific level of competition, but whether consumers have, 
in fact, been harmed.
  It is equally important that we carefully, very carefully, examine 
the possibility that a proposed response, a proposed response could be 
more harmful to consumers, more harmful to competition. Let us be clear 
about something. It is perfectly acceptable to ensure the competition 
is not unfairly restrained by monopolistic entities. But it is not 
acceptable, it is not reasonable to use the antitrust process to 
penalize companies for trying to improve their products for the sake of 
competitive advantage.
  If protecting the consumer is the guiding principle behind antitrust 
proceedings, it is only fair to ask where the consumers have been in 
all of this. From the time this process began, right up to the present, 
there has not been an uprising of consumers demanding Microsoft being 
prosecuted or penalized.
  In fact, consumers use and benefit from Microsoft products every day. 
And when it comes to choices, consumers have a multitude of choices of 
various software systems and operating systems.
  Competition is alive and well in the software industry. Beyond the 
matter of choice in consumer satisfaction, it would be difficult to 
argue that prices have been driven up by Microsoft because every day 
the price of computer systems and more powerful systems are actually 
going down.
  What is really going on? The case against Microsoft is not 
fundamentally about protecting consumers, it is really about competing 
businesses in the States in which those businesses reside seeking to 
get the upper hand on one another by using litigation where innovation 
has failed, by using the power of the government to usurp the power of 
the marketplace.
  Our Federal Government should not be party to this, and our 
government must not stifle competition in the name of protecting 
consumers. Break up should not be an option.
  Mr. Speaker, I have visited Microsoft. I know well the fine work they 
do, and I know how essential it is for the success of that company that 
products be integrated. We must not allow break up to harm consumers in 
the name of protecting them.

                          ____________________