[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 7]
[House]
[Pages 9263-9269]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                REGULATORY REFORM AND REGULATORY RELIEF

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2013, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Collins) is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.


                             General Leave

  Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. I ask unanimous consent that all Members may 
have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks 
and include extraneous materials on the subject of my Special Order.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Georgia?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I rise in another of a series of 
Republican freshman class Special Orders, this time to focus on our 
Nation's need for regulatory reform and regulatory relief.
  As an American and a parent, I value the role of responsible 
regulations. Many regulations were designed with personal safety in 
mind, and these regulations make our workforce stronger. All too often, 
however, the Federal Government designs regulations that are often 
unnecessary and achieve little or no benefit at a very high cost. These 
regulations directly impact the hardworking men and women of northeast 
Georgia and across the Nation. Over the next hour, my colleagues and I 
will discuss the growing problem of regulation and why our Nation's 
economy so desperately needs regulatory relief.
  I am pleased to yield 5 minutes to the president of our freshman 
class, my dear friend and a tireless worker on this issue as well, the 
gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Messer).
  Mr. MESSER. I want to thank my good friend from Georgia (Mr. Collins) 
for recognizing me and for leading this Republican freshman class 
Special Order on the need for regulatory reform.
  I also want to commend him and the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Yoho) 
for their initiative in creating the Freshman Regulatory Reform Working 
Group, of which I am pleased to be a member.
  A recent editorial written by George Washington University Professor 
Jonathan Turley declared that:

       Our carefully constructed system of checks and balances is 
     being negated by the rise of a fourth branch, an 
     administrative state of sprawling departments and agencies 
     that govern with increasing autonomy and decreasing 
     transparency.

  The voice of the American people is marginalized when this so-called 
fourth state of government, our Federal agencies, fail to follow the 
wishes of their elected representatives or make policy in the absence 
of direction by Congress. And the American people are paying the price 
of this regulatory maze created by this unelected government.
  For example, the Heritage Foundation has found that annual regulatory 
costs increased by more than $23.5 billion during President Obama's 
fourth year in office. The total cost of regulations during the 
President's first term were nearly $70 billion, a level unmatched by 
any previous administration.
  It's time to unshackle America from the stranglehold these 
regulations have on our economy.
  I again want to thank Mr. Collins and Mr. Yoho for leading efforts 
among the freshman Republicans to eliminate and streamline burdensome 
Federal regulations. I look forward to working with them and all 
Members of the House to help create jobs by allowing America's 
businesses to grow and innovate by reining in the unelected bureaucracy 
standing in their way.
  Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. I thank the gentleman from Indiana.
  I think you bring up a great point, and that's the issue of an 
unelected bureaucracy that is forcing sometimes businesses who just 
want to create, want to expand, and want to do those things. I 
appreciate your interest in this, and we are going to continue this 
fight because this matters to real people. This matters to Main Street. 
And when we matter to Main Street, then people understand what we're 
trying to do up here, and I think they then begin to have confidence 
that Washington has their best interest at heart.
  Mr. MESSER. I would just add, sometimes I think this comes from both 
sides. In other words, there are times when laws passed by Congress are 
intentionally vague so that the bureaucracy steps in and leaders are 
able to say, Hey, blame it on those regulators.
  I think we have a responsibility to make sure that we're making laws 
specific enough and simple enough to be understood by the American 
people.
  Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. I agree with that, and I thank the gentleman 
from Indiana. I appreciate his work on this.
  It's now my pleasure to introduce someone who not only has come to 
Congress fired up about the issues that are going on, but has become my 
cochair on this regulatory working group and bringing forth, I believe, 
a fresh perspective from Florida.
  It is now my pleasure to yield to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. 
Yoho).
  Mr. YOHO. I thank my good friend from Georgia for yielding, and I 
appreciate the comments.
  I'd like to title this talk, ``Burdensome Regulations: The 
Dysfunctional Government Tax.''
  More than $14,000 every year, that's what the average American family 
loses out on because of Federal regulations either in taxes or lower 
wages because their employers are carrying that burden.

[[Page 9264]]

  How do we even get all these regulations, more than 6,000 regulations 
just this year? It happens when the executive branch goes around 
Congress to create their own policies. Some people call this 
``legislation through regulation.'' I call it the ``dysfunctional 
government tax.'' It's the $40 a day every American has to pay because 
the executive branch won't go through Congress. It won't work with 
those of us who are here tonight because we were sent here by the 
people.
  In more places in my district, you could take your spouse out for a 
nice dinner for $40. A person could fill up their gas tank and a 
minivan for about $40, or you could take your children to a matinee 
movie on the weekends for $40.
  When I'm at home in my district, I hear from people who own their own 
business and from people who just care about their work, about how 
Federal regulations are making it harder to make ends meet. We're going 
to talk about a few of these regulations tonight, but let me tell you 
about a few stories from north central Florida.
  There's a lumber company in my district that has to aim lower. By 
that I mean versus aiming higher to expand their business. This is 
because of the burden of the Affordable Care Act. It's too great to 
bear. They would love nothing more than to hire more people, more 
workers, or buy that extra piece of equipment, but there's no telling 
what the compliance cost of the ACA will be.
  Not only that, these poor folks are subject to the rules and perhaps 
fines based on the discretion or interpretation of whatever inspector 
happens upon them that day. There is no certainty. And I think that's 
one of the biggest roles that we have to do is create certainty in the 
environment of the workplace so that businesses can go forward and 
expand their businesses. To create a stable economy, we need a stable 
environment for businesses to work in. The overregulation we've seen in 
recent years creates neither.
  Yet another example comes from a watermelon grower in my district and 
an interpretation of a rule from the Food Safety Modernization Act, 
commonly called FSMA. This rule says that the use of water bottles 
cannot be used by workers in the field when they are picking the 
melons. I don't know if words can describe just how hot and humid it 
gets in Florida during this time of year, but it gets pretty darn hot. 
Not allowing water in the fields is tantamount to cruel and unusual 
punishment.
  Even more ridiculous are the posters that have to be placed on site 
that talk about the risk of heat stroke. What you see here is a poster 
that's put up by one of the regulatory agencies warning people about 
heat stroke, but yet they won't let you take water into the field to 
pick watermelons.
  These are some of the regulations that don't make any sense, and it 
causes confusion in the workplace.

                              {time}  1940

  Another example that comes from Florida has to do with the poultry 
recycling program. This act was amended in 1997 to include new 
definitions; poultry products that have been below 26 degrees 
Fahrenheit may not be labeled as ``fresh.'' Such labeled product is 
considered ``misbranded.'' A company I know had a USDA inspection and 
identified poultry labeled as ``fresh,'' and they said the product was 
frozen below 26 degrees Fahrenheit. Due to the rule, the product was 
detained. Keep in mind that, as a veterinarian, this poses no safety 
risk to the average consumer, to any consumer. After 4 months of 
engaging the agency with time and money spent on litigation, the USDA 
changed the rule to allow poultry frozen below 26 Fahrenheit to be 
labeled as fresh as long as they sold the product to end users like 
hospitals and restaurants. Precisely. This is the business that this 
company was selling their product to all along.
  The bottom line is that it wound up costing them 4 months of lost 
revenue, and the rule cost this business $681,000. And they had 
absolutely no way to recoup their losses.
  These things have to change because they wind up stifling the 
entrepreneur. What we have is a regulatory agency that starts out to 
make the public safer, whether on the job or on the highways or the 
foods we eat. And it's a good thing. But what happens is they often 
overstep their authority, and often it is the interpretation of that 
rule by the inspector that gets the misinterpretation. And the end 
result is the owner gets fined and sometimes has to shut down until the 
situation gets resolved.
  Yes, we want safer workplaces, safer highways, and cleaner air and 
water; but we shouldn't impede the very people trying to create jobs. 
Our government agencies should be a facilitator to our businesses, not 
a debilitator to these businesses. After all, with the lack of the 
extra regulations up to this point in our history, I think it has 
worked pretty good, and we shouldn't overstep that boundary, and we 
need to have commonsense regulations.
  Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. I appreciate the gentleman from Florida's 
comments. It is amazing some of the things we're hearing and the 
examples, simply by putting it out there. I want to extend an 
invitation to our freshman class and others who may want to join us in 
this regulatory working group. Contact our offices; we would love to 
hear your input as we go forward.
  It is now my pleasure to welcome and I yield to the gentlewoman from 
Missouri (Mrs. Wagner).
  Mrs. WAGNER. I thank the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Collins) for 
putting this Special Order together.
  Mr. Speaker, in his time served in office thus far, President Obama 
has said he's for the reduction of government red tape that places an 
unnecessary burden on government people. Again and again, he has 
extolled the virtues of transparency and bipartisanship in an effort to 
put people back to work; but if we look at his track record, this has 
simply turned out to be yet another string of broken promises and a 
failure of leadership.
  In his first term alone, President Obama has finalized 130 major 
rules, a shocking 160 percent increase over the previous term under 
President George W. Bush. This alarming growth in government is an 
assault on our free enterprise system and on our individual liberties. 
Either the President is not interested in keeping the American people's 
trust, or he simply does not have a handle on his own Federal agencies. 
Given recent events, either of these could very well be true.
  The truth, however, Mr. Speaker, is that cost from new regulatory 
burdens on Americans increased by nearly $70 billion during President 
Obama's first term in office, which is based on his own agency's 
estimates. It is very possible that the real costs far exceed this 
number. With major regulations in Dodd-Frank and ObamaCare still yet to 
be implemented, these burdens on small businesses and the American 
people will only skyrocket.
  Dodd-Frank alone required government bureaucrats to write nearly 400 
new rules, and yet 3 years later we have barely completed a third of 
them. Most of the laws' provisions have little or no connection to the 
financial crisis that prompted their creation in the first place. As a 
member of the Financial Services Committee, I have witnessed firsthand 
how arbitrary and irrelevant these rules can be, and how they cost the 
American people jobs and their hard-earned savings.
  We can and must do more to hold these agencies accountable and stop 
this governance by fiat and the bypassing of Congress--we the people. 
This is why we must have the REINS Act, which I am proud to cosponsor. 
This legislation would rein in the Federal agencies and would require 
Congress to approve every new major rule proposed by the executive 
branch having an annual economic impact of $100 million or more. It 
would allow Congress to regain our constitutional authority by limiting 
the size and scope of the rulemaking powers of government bureaucrats 
who were not elected.
  Mr. Speaker, the American people are fed up with this Big Government 
agenda. It's time to hold this administration accountable for the gross 
overreach of their power, whether it's regulation from the EPA or 
regulations implementing Dodd-Frank or ObamaCare.

[[Page 9265]]

Enough is enough. The American people are tired of this government 
overstepping their constitutional authority.
  Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. I appreciate the gentlewoman from Missouri. 
She's right. That's the anger we feel and we hear from our constituents 
when they just don't understand what's going on here, and we need to 
continue that. I appreciate those words.
  It's now my pleasure to yield to the gentleman from Kentucky to 
provide an insight into what we're seeing right now of a regulatory 
environment gone amuck in a lot of ways.
  Mr. BARR. I appreciate the opportunity to participate in this Special 
Order this evening. This is a very important topic, and I applaud Mr. 
Collins and Mr. Yoho for forming the Freshman Working Group on 
Regulatory Reform. Regulatory reform is desperately needed in this 
country to get our economy back on track.
  We have seen persistent high unemployment in our country for the last 
5 years. We got another bad jobs report just last week: 7.6 percent is 
the unemployment rate. But even more alarming than our persistent high 
unemployment rate is the fact that we have underemployment in this 
country. Only 58 percent of the American people who are eligible for 
employment who are of working-age population are actually employed. 
Only 58 percent.
  Yes, we have a high unemployment rate. Yes, it has been persistently 
over 7.5 percent for the last 5 years. But even more troubling is the 
fact that only 58 percent of working-age people in this country are 
employed. That is 5 percent below the average employment rate for 
working-age people prior to the recession, and that number has been 
static for the last 5 years. So the question we have to ask ourselves 
is why is this happening; why are the American people not getting back 
to work.
  Well, one of the primary impediments to economic recovery, to job 
growth, and job creation is the avalanche of new rules, regulations, 
and red tape coming out of Washington, all of which impose huge costs 
on businesses and create a destructive environment of uncertainty in 
the private sector. And it affects virtually every sector of our 
economy. It affects the health care sector with ObamaCare and the reams 
of regulations coming out of HHS. It affects the financial services 
industry with Dodd-Frank and all of the rulemakings. You know, Dodd-
Frank authorizes over 400 new rules and regulations. A little more than 
half of those have been issued. According to certain estimates, 
compliance with those regulations equals about 24 million hours 
annually in man-hours to comply with the Dodd-Frank rules and 
regulations. To put that in perspective, 20 million man-hours was what 
was required to build the Panama Canal. This is literally an avalanche 
of rules and regulations crushing our financial institutions and 
impeding access to credit for entrepreneurs and small businesses. It's 
affecting the energy sector where environmental regulations are 
destroying jobs.
  In my home State, the coal industry has been devastated by the EPA's 
assault on the coal industry through over-regulation of the energy 
sector. In most countries that conduct mining activities, about 2 years 
is the average length of time for a regulator to review an application 
for mining. In the United States today, it takes 7 years for EPA 
regulators just to review and approve a surface mining permit.

                              {time}  1950

  So this backlog and this overregulation of mining activities is 
resulting in massive layoffs. Mining in central Appalachia is at its 
lowest production level since 1965. We've lost 4,000 coal mining jobs 
in just the last couple of years in eastern Kentucky as a result of the 
EPA's overzealous overregulation of the coal industry.
  Yes, it's driving utility rates higher. Yes, it is certainly bad in 
terms of low-cost electricity for our manufacturers and small 
businesses and our seniors on fixed income, but it's also costing jobs. 
And it's having a negative impact on all of those people whose 
paychecks take care of their families.
  We talked about the impact on health care. I had an administrator of 
a local small hospital in central Kentucky tell me that it used to be 
that they took care of patients. Today they take care of paper.
  A small banker, community banker in eastern Kentucky told me that it 
used to be, in the community banking business, that they would provide 
loans and make a business decision based on the creditworthiness of the 
borrower, whether it was a farmer or a small business owner or an 
entrepreneur. Today, this banker says that the government makes that 
decision for them because of the avalanche of new rules and 
regulations.
  There's another important dimension to this in addition to impeding 
economic recovery, and that's our Constitution. For the last 80 years, 
the growth of the administrative state has been a huge detractor from 
the original meaning of our Constitution. It has been offensive to the 
separation of powers doctrine. And one need only look to article I, 
section 1 of the U.S. Constitution, which simply reads:

       All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a 
     Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a 
     Senate and House of Representatives.

  Mr. Speaker, the word ``all'' should be recognized as granting the 
Congress exclusive legislative power. And yet, for the last 80 years, 
as the administrative state has grown in Washington, the Congress has 
delegated its lawmaking powers to unaccountable, unelected bureaucrats 
in the executive branch. And so what we need to do in Congress is we 
need to rehabilitate what's known as the nondelegation doctrine, the 
idea that Congress shouldn't delegate away its lawmaking powers to 
another branch of the government.
  In the last several years, we've seen a dramatic growth in the 
regulatory burden on the private economy. The pages in the Code of 
Federal Regulations hit an all-time high of 174,000 pages in 2012. 
That's an increase of more than 21 percent during the last decade.
  In 2012, the cost of Federal rules exceeded $1.8 trillion, roughly 
equal to the gross domestic product of Canada, which is about $1.81 
trillion, and India, $1.82 trillion.
  The regulatory burden cost each U.S. household approximately $14,768, 
meaning that red tape is now the second largest item in the typical 
family budget after housing.
  And in 2012, 4,062 Federal regulations were at various stages of 
implementation. The government completed work on 1,172, an increase of 
16 percent over the 1,010 that the Feds imposed in 2011, which was a 40 
percent increase over the 722 in 2010.
  And another measure of the regulatory burden, the pages in the 
Federal Register. By that measure, the Obama administration did not 
break the all-time record of 81,405 pages it set in 2010. But the 
78,961 pages it churned out in 2012 mean that the President has posted 
three of the four greatest paperwork years on record.
  Mr. Speaker, this avalanche of red tape is strangling American 
economic recovery. It is an offense to the Constitution of the United 
States, and it lacks all common sense. For the sake of the U.S. 
Constitution, for the sake of economic recovery, for the sake of common 
sense, and for the sake of the American people who are suffering in one 
of the worst economic downturns since the Great Depression, we need to 
rein in burdensome regulations.
  Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. I appreciate the gentleman from Kentucky. He 
brings a good point. I think it would behoove all of us--we hear often 
on this floor we need to talk about jobs, we need to talk about job 
creation; and what we're finding right here is the very thing that is 
coming out of this bureaucracy, and this red tape is job-killing. And I 
think this is something we could find common ground on. I think it's a 
little bit of an agenda issue here, though.
  When you come to Congress, you look for those who've stood the fight 
before you, and I am pleased tonight to yield some time to the 
gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Young), sponsor of the REINS Act, who has 
fought this fight

[[Page 9266]]

before we got here. And I am pleased to welcome him as an honorary 
freshman tonight, as part of the sophomore class, because you've led 
the way, and I appreciate that, and I am happy to yield time to you 
tonight.
  Mr. YOUNG of Indiana. I thank so much the gentleman from Georgia for 
his hard work on this issue, working with our colleague, Mr. Yoho of 
Florida, and organizing this freshman initiative designed to tackle 
overly burdensome regulations, ensure that we produce smart regulations 
here at the Federal level and alleviate some of the pain during this 
very down economy that so many Americans are facing.
  You know, when you talk about regulations, this is not some arcane 
issue. These are the rules we live by, just like the legislation that 
emerges out of this body. It impacts our jobs, our economic growth, the 
level of personal income that Americans enjoy. It impacts the number of 
long-term unemployed we have in this country, and right now we're at a 
historic low. It impacts these things and so many others.
  People have too many hassles, too many burdens, too many anxieties, 
and regulations are a big part of the reason why. There are direct 
costs of regulations that come out of the alphabet soup agencies that 
populate Washington, D.C.
  There are compliance costs that our small businesses, in particular, 
must contend with. There's a great deal of uncertainty associated with 
the regulations being developed in the buildings around Washington, 
D.C.; and regulations lead to an increase in the costs of our goods and 
services produced, thus making us less competitive economically vis-a-
vis our international competitors. Regulations reduce, oftentimes, the 
productivity of our workers, which drives down their wages, which hurts 
our competitiveness once again.
  So what's the solution to this?
  Well, we here in Congress, especially folks on this side of the 
aisle--although, I have to say, this doesn't have to be a partisan 
issue, and, historically, it has not always been. I think that's a good 
thing. But we on this side of the aisle have been trying to alleviate 
the pain that many businesses and Americans feel by the costliest 
regulations coming out of Washington, D.C. I think that is proper, and 
I think we should continue to do so.
  But I also believe it's time for us to consider a comprehensive 
approach to improving the entire regulatory process, and so that's why 
I have introduced, in this 113th Congress, the REINS Act.
  Now, what the REINS Act does is it establishes a $100 million 
threshold. This is the threshold established historically by our Office 
of Management and Budget for a so-called major regulation. And every 
major regulation, after it goes through the public hearing process, 
under the REINS Act, it has to go before Congress for an up-or-down 
vote before it can become the law of the land.
  This would improve immeasurably the quality of regulations that come 
out of Washington, D.C. It would slow down the regulatory process, to 
be sure. But let's remember, our Founding Fathers devised a system 
where they wanted people in Washington to deliberate before we acted. 
This would lead to more deliberation, wiser judgment.
  This would also allow the American people, the citizens of this great 
country, to weigh in on given regulations, ones they feel passionately 
about.
  And, most importantly, the REINS Act would hold Members of Congress 
accountable for the regulations that come out of Washington.
  You know, of course it would allow us to tame some of the executive 
agencies that have gone rogue from time to time, that pass unwise 
regulations. But I think, more importantly, it would allow those who 
elect us to bodies like this to hold us accountable for the things that 
cause pain to them, those imperial regulations that are promulgated 
from a distant Capitol, which our Founding Fathers were so upset about 
when this Nation was founded.

                              {time}  2000

  To the issue of congressional accountability, too many vague laws are 
made in this body--Dodd-Frank, the Affordable Care Act. I could go on 
and on. We pass and we kick the can down the road, as is often heard, 
on sticky issues, politically sensitive issues that politicians don't 
want to deal with because we know ultimately there will be regulators 
to fill in the gaps of our vague laws.
  Well, the REINS Act would prevent that. It would incentivize Members 
of Congress to take on the hard issues in the beginning because they'd 
know that in the end those issues are going to come back and have to be 
resolved in this body.
  When I go home and meet with small business people and individual 
constituents and they speak to me about specific regulations that are 
causing them pain, oftentimes, the best I can do and my colleagues can 
do is say, Listen, we'll try and repeal that particular regulation by 
preventing it from being implemented at the agency and by impacting the 
funding of that agency. These are very difficult things to do, and it's 
so incredibly difficult to identify all the bad regulations that are 
out there. But under the REINS Act, that would no longer be an 
acceptable excuse to my constituents. Unelected bureaucrats, in the 
end, would not be accountable; Members of Congress would. And that is 
the intent, in the end, of the REINS Act.
  Now, I believe in regulations, smart regulations, and this bill is 
about improving the regulatory process so that here in the United 
States of America this remains a vibrant place to live with a growing 
economy. Our rules must be balanced against economic concerns. The 
American people must have a voice about what those rules will be, and 
Congress cannot skirt responsibility to legislate.
  Again, I'd like to close here by thanking those who led this effort--
Mr. Collins, in particular, for leading the floor conversation this 
evening. He's shown some great leadership as a freshman. He's working 
very hard. I know he came here, as did other Members, the freshman 
class of the 113th Congress, to make a difference. By supporting the 
REINS Act, I think you will help advance that cause in a very big way.
  Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. Well, I appreciate it.
  It's always easy to follow in the footsteps of those who fought the 
fight before us, and I appreciate what you've done and what others have 
done. We're going to continue that fight, because this matters to 
Americans, and that's what we've got to continue on. So I thank you for 
being here tonight.
  It is now with great pleasure, another freshman who has come from 
just north of me in North Carolina, who has passionately fought for his 
constituents but also sees this from a different perspective, at this 
time, I want to yield to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. 
Holding).
  Mr. HOLDING. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Georgia for the 
opportunity to discuss this administration's excessive regulation.
  We know the harmful effect that overregulation has had on the 
economy. And since taking office, President Obama and his 
administration have continuously burdened the American people with an 
exceptional number of regulations, harming businesses and the economy.
  Mr. Speaker, small businesses in this country are essential to our 
economic stability. Small businesses encourage innovation and hard 
work. It's the American Dream to have a unique idea and build something 
from scratch--and that, Mr. Speaker, is exactly what small businesses 
do.
  Mr. Speaker, small businesses have created 64 percent of net new jobs 
over the past 15 years and employed just over half of all private 
sector employees. In this stalled economy, small businesses are already 
struggling to be successful, and we need to take some of the current 
regulatory weight off their shoulders.
  Recently, back home, I spent the week going around to different 
chambers of commerce in my district. I went to Wake Forest. I went to 
Fuquay-Varina. I went to Apex. I went to Nashville and Rocky Mount and 
met with several hundred small business owners

[[Page 9267]]

and folks who work in small businesses. Of course, I have the constant 
complaint of overregulation. I started asking the question. I said, Has 
the government done anything that you know of in the last 5 years which 
would make your life as a small business person better? I got no 
positive responses, Mr. Speaker. That's stunning.
  New regulations are complicated, and compliance is time consuming and 
expensive; and sometimes, job creators aren't informed of new 
regulations in a timely manner, giving them little time to prepare to 
comply with them. Business owners and their employees are now facing a 
time of uncertainty due to regulations. They're not confident in 
government policy coming out of Washington, and they have no trust in 
the ability of Washington to do things that are in their better 
interest.
  This sense of uncertainty, Mr. Speaker, may prevent an employer from 
hiring more people or force them to let go of current employees. As Mr. 
Yoho said earlier in his comments, he has small businesses in his 
district that are having to shoot lower rather than shoot higher. Small 
businesses may have to reevaluate how and when they do business, and 
that is unfortunate. Small businesses have no confidence in their 
government to give them pro-growth policy.
  Excessive regulation harms not only individual small businesses but 
our country's growth as a whole. The Small Business Office of Advocacy 
has reported that Federal rulemaking has imposed a cumulative burden of 
$1.75 trillion on our economy. Earlier this year in the Judiciary 
Committee, on which I serve, we heard testimony that, in the past 4 
years alone, the cumulative cost burden has increased by $520 billion.
  Mr. Speaker, I'm not only concerned about the negative effect of 
regulations on our overall economy, but also the administration's abuse 
of power. President Obama has been encouraged by regulatory advocates 
to circumvent regular order and impose his climate change agenda 
through regulations, and he made it clear in his State of the Union 
speech earlier this year his intent to do so.
  I'm also concerned with the fact that the administration has 
repeatedly missed its required deadline for releasing a Unified Agenda 
of Federal Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions twice a year. This 
agenda lays out each governmental agency's proposed regulation and 
annual regulatory plan, and businesses need to know this information so 
they can anticipate how forthcoming regulations will affect them. And 
this administration needs to have more accountability and more 
transparency about the harmful effects of these abundant--may I say, 
excessive--regulations.
  Mr. Speaker, in my district in North Carolina, many of the towns rely 
on small businesses. That's all that's there is small businesses. And 
whether it's a local restaurant owned by the same family for 
generations or an accounting firm or a clothing store or the town 
doctor, regulations are a major concern for them. We should be doing 
what we can do to encourage small businesses, not to deter them with 
strenuous and excessive regulations.
  Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. I thank the gentleman from North Carolina.
  What we're dealing with here is dealing with jobs. And I think what 
you shared in your time back in the district is small businesses, as 
we've seen, small business persons comprise 44 percent of the total 
U.S. private payroll and create more than half of the nonfarm jobs in 
the gross domestic product here.
  We've got to look at this. This is something that I think we can all 
come together, as the gentleman from Indiana stated just a few moments 
ago, this could be a bipartisan issue as we look to jobs and things we 
can bring to the floor. I know in talking to you and your passion about 
this, we came up here to try and help. We came up here to bring the 
voices of those who could not be up here on a given day to help them in 
their businesses and work hard.
  I appreciate you so much for sharing your experiences in North 
Carolina. Really, what we're doing is fighting hard against these 
regulations so that we can see more jobs created.
  Mr. HOLDING. As my friend from Georgia knows, numbers don't lie; and 
when we're spending $1.75 trillion a year complying with regulations, 
that's a lot of money.
  Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. It is that.
  I appreciate the gentleman for being here tonight. I think this is 
something that we all see. In fact, in the 2011 speech, President 
Barack Obama stated that ``rules have gotten out of balance,'' and the 
result is ``a chilling effect on growth and jobs.'' I believe the 
President is correct about that. The rules have become so skewed that 
our Nation's regulatory system is at war with America's businesses.
  In fact, he went ahead and even, in an executive order, stated that:

       The last barriers we're trying to remove are outdated and 
     unnecessary regulations. I've ordered a government-wide 
     review, and if there are rules on the books that are 
     needlessly stifling job creation and economic growth, we will 
     fix them.

  I'll tell you what. I will agree with the President on this. And I 
want to say this is something we can move forward with, and it's 
something that has an effect, because right now these burdens are 
killing American industry and American jobs.
  When businesses are more concerned--right now, 40 percent is what 
I've seen in the latest survey from Morgan Stanley, said 40 percent of 
companies say policy uncertainty in Washington is preventing them from 
putting investments and job creation to work. This is something we've 
got to be a part of fixing because it matters, and it matters for jobs.
  Industries such as manufacturing and technology are fighting to 
compete in a global market, but they first must survive the regulatory 
beast that is strangling innovation and growth.

                              {time}  2010

  Congress should be encouraging innovation to make it easier for 
businesses to bring new products or processes to the market. Outdated 
regulations should be cleared off the books--especially those created 
by unelected bureaucrats.
  Let's go back to the basics of regulatory overhaul and restore a 
commonsense approach to regulations that encourage innovation and allow 
job creators to thrive.
  I wrote to all the businesses in northeast Georgia and asked them to 
tell me how regulations are impacting their ability to grow and create 
jobs. Here are some of the responses that we received back:

       Due to the new regulations that require businesses to issue 
     1099s to virtually everyone that we write a check to, we have 
     to be more selective when we consider a new hire. I no longer 
     have the opportunity to give unemployed folks a shot at a job 
     to see how they are going to do. We have to make them full 
     regular employees right out of the chute so we just don't 
     look at hiring as many people, we look at other employees to 
     work more hours.

  Another of my constituents said that ``the biggest issue we face from 
the Federal Government is the EPA's lack of approval of products in a 
timely manner, and their removal of excellent, safe products from the 
market altogether.''
  Unfortunately, regulatory burdens created by the EPA are an all too 
common story. A business owner in northeast Georgia wrote to me:

       Currently the EPA is requiring off-road diesel engines to 
     meet new tiers, or levels, of exhaust emission standards. 
     These new standards are changing every 1 to 2 years. The 
     final (we hope) regulations will be in place in 2015.
       The result of the dramatic and frequent changes in 
     regulations is the complete redesign of our products, which 
     would allow us to retool and move manufacturing to the U.S., 
     cannot happen cost effectively until 2015. At that time, we 
     hope to move manufacturing of our products to Georgia.
       I say hope to, because the rapid rise in regulations under 
     the current administration may cause us to not move 
     production at all.
       We are all for protecting the environment and being good 
     corporate citizens. However, the new regulations are 
     burdensome, costly and add no value to the productivity of 
     the product or the marketplace.

  I couldn't have said that better myself. Regulations should be 
expedient and unambiguous, minimizing the uncertainty facing industries 
and businesses. This is how the government can

[[Page 9268]]

facilitate, and no longer debilitate, economic growth.
  I appreciate the comments from my colleagues tonight. It is clear 
that the need for regulatory relief is greater now than ever. As we've 
heard tonight, for the first time in history, the estimated cost of 
regulations is more than half the Federal budget itself. Let me just 
stop right there. For the first time in history, the estimated cost of 
regulations is more than half the Federal budget itself.
  And we wonder why we're struggling with jobs right now. We wonder why 
our businesses are struggling with what they're going to do and how 
they're going to manage. I'm a firm believer, and it's been spoken of 
here tonight, there's many times we come to this House floor and we 
talk about things in ambiguous terms. We talk about the big picture. We 
talk about the process. People hear those conversations, they hear 
these words, but they're not really sure how it affects them. I'm a 
firm believer, both from a Democrat perspective, a Republican 
perspective, how we can best lead is by understanding and giving people 
information on why this matters to them.
  I'm just going to spend a few minutes here tonight talking about 
that. It is troubling in a time where families are struggling to make 
ends meet, American families are paying almost $15,000 per year in 
hidden regulatory taxes. They are paying $14,678 in hidden regulatory 
taxes. You want to know how that affects you. That's going on and you 
want to know how we're causing people to spend and we're also at the 
same time saying we want to create new jobs, we want to create new 
opportunities.
  Well, here's what happens. Instead of paying a hidden regulatory tax, 
American families could, one, buy a new car. A 2013 Ford Fiesta, 
$13,200; a 2013 Chevrolet Sonic, $14,185. We hear it all the time how 
manufacturing creates jobs on all levels, starting from the 
manufacturing, from the parts and the dealers and the auto parts that 
come into this, how they all work together.
  Well, instead of paying these regulatory costs, why don't we get them 
to buy a new car? I mean, I think that's what the American people would 
like. I think that's what our auto dealers would like. That's what the 
others in the chain of automotive supply would like. But, instead, 
they're trapped and they're bound.
  Another constituent writes:

       Most of the rules and regulations that are preventing our 
     business from growing are a result of ObamaCare. Many of the 
     provisions in this legislation are counterproductive to the 
     growth of a medical practice.

  I want to go back to what it means to the person sitting around the 
table tonight who may have just somehow turned over here and said, what 
are they talking about in our nation's Capitol? What we're talking 
about is your pocketbook. What we're talking about is regulations that 
can help you spend money the way you want to, spend money for your 
family's future, spend money that revives our economy and strengthens 
us as a nation.
  This is what we're talking about. You can send their child to 
college. One year of tuition and fees at the University of Georgia is 
$10,262. One year of tuition and fees at the University of Florida is 
$6,150. Instead, they're trapped paying almost $15,000 in hidden 
regulatory tax that comes through every year.
  We all know the need for some rules for everyone to abide by. Make 
the regulations where they're simple to understand and inexpensive to 
comply with.
  One of the problems I also see in Washington sometimes is we come to 
the floor and we talk about problems, but we never provide an answer. 
We never provide an answer on what can actually be done. As my 
colleagues and I have demonstrated, we are committed to providing 
regulatory relief to businesses and families.
  There are several key pieces of legislation that are first and 
important steps in alleviating the regulatory burden. The first bill I 
introduced in Congress was H.R. 1493, the Sunshine for Regulatory 
Decrees and Settlements Act of 2013. This legislation ensures the EPA 
cannot continue to enter into closed-door agreements with environmental 
groups without transparency and public participation. It does not 
affect the ability to bring suits. It just makes them clearer. Many of 
the costly rules and regulations that have impacted businesses and 
industries across the Nation have resulted from these backroom consent 
decrees. It's time we bring transparency and public participation back 
into the rulemaking process.
  What else can we do? H.R. 367: require congressional approval for all 
major rules. We end the sue and settle EPA settlements--that's the one 
I just mentioned, H.R. 1493. We can require Federal agencies to choose 
the lowest-cost rulemaking alternative, H.R. 2122.
  There are things that we can do. I believe the American public is 
looking to this place. They're looking to their Capitol for real 
solutions. They're looking to their Capitol for hope. They're looking 
for relief.
  Every day, men and women get up and they wake their children up as I 
did this morning and they go to work and they go to make a better life. 
Many of those are small business owners wanting to add jobs, wanting to 
add to their businesses, but these regulations are killing that 
possibility right now. I believe when you look at what we've talked 
about here and my colleagues have talked about here on the floor, and I 
appreciate all of them being here, we bring to light what is really 
happening, and that is that regulations are not adding anything except 
government jobs. It's time we get back out and add jobs on Main Street, 
and when we add jobs on Main Street, everybody is impacted.
  I want to thank my colleagues for joining me tonight and highlighting 
why American families and businesses so desperately need regulatory 
relief. Our freshmen are going to continue to do this, highlighting the 
real work that we believe matters to families and matters to Americans. 
Because when we're up here, we're up here doing your work. The thing 
that you sent us here to do was to work for you, and that's what we're 
going to continue to do and the freshman class are going to continue to 
do just that.
  As we have mentioned tonight, not only are we talking about 
overregulation, we're going to be talking about many things in the 
weeks to come, and we're just letting the people know that we are here 
because we believe we can make a difference along with both sides of 
the aisle. Let's come together and see what we can do to make sure that 
not only regulations but other things get done so this government helps 
the businesses in our communities get back to work. That's what I want 
to be about, and I'm glad that we were here tonight to do that.
  Before I close out, I do see a friend on the floor, the gentleman 
from Arizona (Mr. Franks). As we're through with our regulation part, I 
noticed that you had asked for time and I'm going to at this time yield 
to the gentleman from Arizona, my friend, Mr. Franks.
  Mr. FRANKS of Arizona. Mr. Speaker, I just want to thank the 
distinguished gentleman from Georgia for yielding this time. One of the 
great hopes that I see that portends for a better future for America is 
to see men like Doug Collins join this group and this Congress.
  Mr. Speaker, it seems like we are never quite so eloquent as when we 
are decrying the crimes of a past generation, while we oftentimes 
remain as staggering blind as some of our most intellectually sightless 
predecessors when it comes to facing and rejecting atrocities in our 
own time. Whether it was slavery, or the many human genocides across 
history, the patterns were the same.

                              {time}  2020

  Mr. Speaker, innocent human beings, children of God all, were 
systematically dehumanized and then subjected to the most horrifying 
inhumanity. All the while, human society as a whole at first hardened 
their hearts and turned away.
  But, Mr. Speaker, truth and time travel on the same road; and though 
it was often agonizingly slow, the truth of these tragic inhumanities 
in our past began to dawn on the people of

[[Page 9269]]

reason and goodwill. Their hearts first, and then their minds, began to 
change.
  Mr. Speaker, I have often asked myself, what was it--what was it that 
changed their minds? What changed the minds of those who had previously 
embraced an almost invincible ignorance to hide from themselves the 
horror of what was happening to their innocent fellow human beings? I 
so wish I knew that answer, Mr. Speaker.
  Because you see, today, such a conundrum looms before humanity again, 
the most glaring recent example of which are the gut-wrenching 
revelations surrounding the trial and conviction in Philadelphia of Dr. 
Kermit Gosnell. In the words of the grand jury report:

       Gosnell had a simple solution for unwanted babies: he 
     killed them. He didn't call it that. He called it ``ensuring 
     fetal demise.'' The way he ensured fetal demise was by 
     sticking open scissors in the back of the baby's neck and 
     cutting the spinal cord. He called it ``snipping.'' Over the 
     years, there were hundreds of ``snippings.''
       When authorities entered the clinic of Dr. Gosnell, they 
     found a torture chamber for little babies that I do not have 
     the words or the stomach to adequately describe. Suffice it 
     to say, Dr. Gosnell ran a systematic practice in his late-
     term abortion clinic to cut the spines of those babies who 
     had survived his attempt to abort them.
       Ashley Baldwin, one of Dr. Gosnell's employees, said she 
     saw babies breathing, and she described one as 2 feet long 
     that no longer had eyes or a mouth, but, in her words, was 
     making this ``screeching'' sound, and it ``sounded like a 
     little alien.''

  For God's sake, Mr. Speaker, we are better than that. America is 
better than that. And yet if Kermit Gosnell had killed these children 
he now stands convicted of murdering before they had passed through the 
birth canal only a few moments earlier, it would have all been 
perfectly legal in many States, in this the land of the free and the 
home of the brave.
  Mr. Speaker, more than 325 late-term unborn babies were torturously 
killed without anesthesia in America just yesterday. Many of them--so 
many of them cried and screamed as they died. But because it was 
amniotic fluid going over the vocal cords instead of air, we couldn't 
hear them.
  All of them had at least four things in common. First, they were just 
little babies who had done nothing wrong to anyone on Earth. And each 
one of them died a nameless, lonely, and agonizing death. And each one 
of their mothers was callously abandoned to deal with the emotional 
results that will inevitably follow. And all the gifts that these 
children might have brought to humanity, Mr. Speaker, are lost forever.
  So if there is one thing we must not miss about this unspeakably evil 
episode, it is that Kermit Gosnell is not an anomaly; he is the face of 
this murderous Fortune 500 enterprise of killing helpless unborn 
children in the United States of America. With all of the distortions 
and the bait-and-switch tactics opponents have hurdled at the Pain-
Capable Unborn Child Protection Act leading up to this historic floor 
debate, the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act is very truly and 
simply a deeply sincere effort to protect both mothers and their pain-
capable unborn babies entering their sixth month of gestation from 
heartless monsters like Kermit Gosnell.
  Given the cataclysmic implications, Mr. Speaker, for any society who 
turns a blind eye to atrocities truly forced upon the most innocent and 
helpless of its members, would it be too much to hope for that Members 
of this body and Americans in general might research this issue and 
learn the truth of it for themselves?
  Because you see, Mr. Speaker, the real question in the debate before 
us is not whether these unborn children entering their sixth month of 
gestation are capable of feeling pain. The real question is: Are we?
  If our society is to survive with our humanity intact, our human 
compassion toward our fellow human beings must first survive. Fifty 
million children--50 million dead children are enough. That is why it 
is so important for people to see for themselves the humanity of these 
little victims and the inhumanity of what is being done to them.
  Now, maybe it won't change everyone's mind, but it has changed so 
many minds; and most of these changed minds share a common thread. They 
were confronted with the brutal reality of abortion on demand, and 
something inside them could no longer deny the truth, or they could no 
longer condone the murder of a defenseless child.
  What changed their minds? Perhaps I will really never understand what 
sparked that change in their hearts, Mr. Speaker. But I am convinced of 
one thing: that it is the same spark in the human soul that has turned 
the tide of blood and tragedy and hatred and inhumanity throughout 
human history. And whatever else it is, Mr. Speaker, it is mankind's 
only hope.
  Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my 
time.

                          ____________________