[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 14]
[House]
[Page 18779]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                               TEN YEARS

  Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Speaker, this week the Republican congressional 
majority will celebrate the 10th anniversary of the legislative agenda 
that helped win our majority in the 1994 elections. There will be both 
praise and criticism of our tenure in the majority, though on the 
whole, the record shows the benefits our stewardship has brought the 
Nation in the last decade.
  In the last decade, welfare has been reformed, taxes have been cut 
four times, Medicare has been secured and our health care system 
strengthened, our military has been restored to its rightful place atop 
our national agenda, the budget came into balance, public schools have 
been called to account for decades of underachievement, and our economy 
has grown 69 percent.
  It was doubted so much could be accomplished in 20 years, let alone 
10. But while many will seek to argue over our accomplishments of the 
last decade, the responsibility of those of us in the majority is to 
focus on the next decade. If the last 10 years have shown the American 
people that Republicans can govern, the next 10 years must show them 
that Republicans should govern. So, rather than looking back on an old 
agenda, we must look forward to a new one, of equal principle and 
utility, an agenda not just of words but deeds, to protect and defend 
the security, prosperity and families of the United States.
  An agenda not just of tax relief but of fundamental, national tax 
reform. Not just of preserving our health care and retirement systems 
for the greatest generation, but of fundamentally rethinking those 
systems for all generations. Not just of helping small businesses 
succeed, but of passing sweeping lawsuit abuse reform and universal 
regulatory reform to get predatory lawyers and busybody bureaucrats off 
small businesses' backs once and for all. Not just of bandaging over 
the social wounds inflicted by a culture of death, but of taking up the 
cause of America's armies of compassion and our Nation's emerging 
culture of life. Not just of defending our Nation, but of proudly 
fighting for it, and the ideals upon which it was founded, anywhere and 
everywhere they are threatened.
  It has been a good 10 years, Mr. Speaker. But the celebrations this 
week do not mark an end, but a new beginning, and a new era of ever 
more ambitious and worthy ideas, so that we may leave our Nation better 
than we found it.
  That is the purpose of this institution, the goal of this Republican 
majority, and the driving force behind our agenda for the next 10 
years.

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