[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 10]
[House]
[Page 15286]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                      WORDS TO WHICH WE CAN ASPIRE

  (Mr. BURGESS asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, what is going on in the House of 
Representatives right now actually is about the debt. You can look back 
17 years when Speaker Gingrich was Speaker of this House.
  What was gained by the Republican majority during that time?
  If you just look at it from a purely political lens, actually, the 
Republican majority was reelected for the first time in 68 years after 
that last government slowdown, the last time being 1928.
  This House passed welfare reform and passed welfare reform and passed 
welfare reform until President Clinton signed the bill. The largest 
capital gains tax reduction in the history of this country was passed 
after the last government slowdown, and the first overall reduction in 
taxes in 17 years occurred after the last government slowdown. Four 
consecutive balanced budgets came out of that activity. Probably the 
only balanced budgets in my lifetime occurred after Speaker Gingrich 
had the courage to do what he did 17 years ago.
  Mr. Speaker, perhaps most telling, in the State of the Union Address 
that followed the government slowdown the last time, President Clinton 
stood in this House and announced that the era of Big Government is 
over.
  Those are words we can aspire to.

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