[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 148 (2002), Part 8]
[House]
[Page 11035]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              FARM POLICY

  (Mr. SMITH of Michigan asked and was given permission to address the 
House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. SMITH of Michigan. Mr. Speaker, I would like to call to my 
colleagues' attention to a meeting I had yesterday with Senator 
Grassley. We talked about the fact that there is no limitation on 
payments in the farm bill. We talked about the danger and the 
inappropriate farm policy, the inappropriate public policy for this 
Congress to give most of the farm support benefits to a very small 
percentage of the farmers. We are now, because there is no real limit 
on those price subsidy payments, giving millions of dollars of payments 
to the very biggest farmers.
  I think it is going to be bad for farmers in the long run, and what 
we are doing is we are giving larger advantage to those great 
superfarms at the sacrifice of the traditional family farms. Work with 
us as we look for ways in the appropriation bills or elsewhere to have 
some kind of limit on farm payments so that we bring back and support 
what should be in farm policy, and that is supporting the traditional 
family farm.

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