macleginn/stanford_congress_record_longer_speeches huggingface dataset:
Date: 1995-02-22
Speaker: EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Mr. Speaker. in the last few days I have gotten a tremendous number of calls from people concerned about what might happen to the minimum wage. One of the reasons why much of that concern is coming is because I represent a district right next to one of our leaders here. Mr. ARMEY. who has been talking about doing away with the minimum wage altogether and talks about Charlie. who lost his job because of an increase in the minimum wage back in 1977. Well. they tell me Lhat is not true. and I saw in the Washington Post yesLerday that it was provcn that was not a true story. I simply ask. Mr. Speaker. that when our leaders get up to attempt to talk about why they want certain policies. they should just tell the truth. No one has lost a job because of an increase in the minimum wage. Mr. Speaker. I would ask all of us to look very closely at what we pledge when we say. "with liberty and justice for all." "Our working poor have to be considered. We cannot expect that all of us will know how to make decisions if we do not have at least a minimum truth in our support of the minimum wage
Date: 1995-02-22
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Mr. Chairman. I voted for this bill in committee. and this amendment corrects one of the oversights that I noticed in the bill that we lost on it in committee. I support the amendment offered by my distinguished ranking member. the gentlewoman from Illinois [Mrs.
Date: 1995-02-22
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Madam Speaker. I take the floor to continue the discussion about the Personal Responsibility. Act. The Goodling substitute of the Personal Responsibility Act which will be taken up in the Economic and Educational Opportunities Committee tomorrow will cut funding. for child care in the State of Texas from fiscal year 1996 through 2000 over $485 million. The Personal Responsibility Act will repeal all Federal programs that deal with nutrition. including the school breakfast and lunch programs. and restrict nutrition programs under the Older Americans Act. I am happy that the Republicans realized that being "penny wise and pound foolish" with the cuts in senior nutrition programs was not good policy and were simply unworkable. However. senior nutrition programs are not the only programs which should be taken out of the Personal Responsibility Act. I suggest that all nutrition programs be withdrawn from the Personal Responsibility Act and discussed in the context of the people participating in the programs. For example. school breakfast and lunch programs should be discussed in education or health reform along with nutrition programs for women. infants. and children. Not simply in terms of reforming welfare. School nutrition programs provide food assistance in a school setting. such as the Port Houston Elementary School with Principal Maria Sierra. February 22. 1995 CONGRE and not cash paid directly to any individual person. Recently. I had a town hall meeting at Port Houston Elementary. Feeding hungry children is not welfare when it is at school and providing a nutrition meal to start the day. Studies show that hungry children cannot learn. We are endangering our future by not providing nutrition to children. We should be using nutrition programs to encourage children to learn. Again. I suggest to my colleagues on the other side that all nutrition pograms which do not go directly to individuals should be taken out of this act. Finally. under summaries provided by the Republicans of the Goodling substitute. several references are made to the funds being increased. However. estimates provided to my office by the State of Texas show the states school nutrition programs taking a 6.5 percent cut in funding. This is when we have more children every year needing food. I leave on this last note. Do we wish to be the Congress which cuts funds to feed even one hungry child? This may be reform but at what cost. Are we hard hearted enough to deny food to children?
Date: 1995-02-23
Speaker: DE LA GARZA (democrat)
Chamber: H

Mr. Chairman. I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman. and my colleagues. I rise in order that if the distinguished chairman would engage in a colloquy with me about definitions and applications of this legislation. Mr. Chairman. I have an amendment that I was going to offer to exempt regulations of the Department of Agriculture for the moratorium. Although I .support a moratorium on regulations. I have discussed the specific provisions of this bill with the Department and have concerns that the exceptions contains in the bill are too narrow to prevent disruptions of USDA programs and operations that benefit consumers. farmers. ranchers. agribusiness. and our Nation as a whole. As you know. during the 103d Congress. the Committee on Agriculture led the way in reforming the bureaucracy by reorganizing the Department of Agriculture. The reorganization of the Department included the establishment of an Office of Risk Assessment and CostBenefit Analysis to review all major regulations of the Department affecting human health. human safety. or the environment. This is the first such established in any major department of the Federal Government. I look forward to seeing the regulations promulgated by all Federal agencies made subject to riskassessment and costbenefit analysis. I woula like to ask the distinguished gentleman if I am correct in stating that the regulatory moratorium contained in this bill is not intended to affect regulations implementing the provisions establishing the Office of Risk Assessment and the regulations undergoing such risk assessment and costbenefit analysis.
Date: 1995-02-23
Speaker: DE LA GARZA (democrat)
Chamber: H

I thank the gentleman. I also thank the gentleman for the clarification and would like to include in the RECORD an analysis prepared by the Department of Agriculture listing the regulations that may be affected by the moratorium. and I will ask for such permission in the House. I want to be sure that the Department will be able to continue to help farmers. ranchers. exporters. and the food service industry to supply agricultural products for our Nations consumers and consumers around the world. I also want to be sure that the agency charged with implementing and enforcing animal and plant quarantine laws is able to carry out its charge to protect against longterm hazards associated with animal and plant diseases. Finally. I want to be sure the Forest Service is able to manage our National Forest System lands for the benefit of recreational users. timber industry. ranchers. and the wildlife in our forests and rangelands. I would also like to ask the gentleman if I am correct in stating the bill before us is not intended to affect regulations making routine adjustments to USDA activities or programs including the following: establishing industry selfhelp and promotion programs for port. beef. milk. fruit. vegetables. and specialty crops. commodity grading programs. animalplant health programs. adjustments in agriculture under article 28 associated with GATT. timbersale contracting. animal damage control programs. labeling of meat and poultry products. and internal USDA regulatory streamlining and reform. I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania.
Date: 1995-02-23
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Mr. Speaker. Members. in response to the last 1 minute. let me talk about what the school lunch and breakfast program really does. We heard. and we are in markup in the Committee on Education and Economic Opportunity. we heard there are not cuts. Let me tell you what I have from the State of Texas Department of Education agency. but also from Houston Independent School District. That shows that the Republican majority is cutting the school lunch and breakfast program. The President is right and we need to be honest with the American people. We need to reform welfare. but we do not need to take it out of the mouths of the children and their breakfast or lunch program. The Republican majority here in the House and the talking heads I see on TV say they are actually providing more funds. But in the State of Texas we would see a 4percent cut in the school lunch and breakfast program. and that is one we grow every year. So we are cutting 4 percent right now. Again. we should reform welfare. but not out of the mouths of our children and not out ofAmericas future.
Date: 1995-02-24
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Reclaiming my time. Mr. Chairman. the small business I worked in was established in 1878. and it was never going to be a large business. So I do not know if even 6 months more would have helped us. but the gentleman is right. There are differences that we apply Federal law -to and to safeguard small business. and the gentleman used a great example. the ADA and the Family Leave Act. and I have an amendment in a few minutes on family leave that will impact that and help us with that. But again. what you are doing is just putting off 6 months for small business. You are not alleviating the regulations as much. You are maybe giving small businesses more time to comply. But I would hope that we would still see some differentiation through the agencies. and maybe we ought to look when we pass statutes. whether it be the EPA or anyone else. and again as an example is printing companies. or small dry cleaners. if you have experiences like I have in my district where because of the EPA regulations in our cities and States. those small dry cleaning operations have so few employees. yet they have to go through some of the things my chemical plants have to. I sympathize and empathize with you. but I do not know whether the next 6 months would do anything but cause confusion. Mr. Chairman. I yield back the balance of my time.
Date: 1995-02-24
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Mr. Chairman. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman. let me respond to some of the speakers. Again. I am very sympathetic to small business. because that is where for many years I earned my living. But a couple of the speakers just recently talked about President Clinton and big government. The examples that I was using during the 1980s. it was not President Clintons big government. it was the EPA under the Reagan and Bush administrations that was the one. I do not think President Clinton has any claim on big government. Big government.did not start in 1992 and did not end November 8. 1994. It has been a problem for a number of years. To foist this off on President Clinton I think is wrong and even mean spirited. � Let me talk about the gentlewoman who talked about the young man that cleaned the store. In Houston. TX. a person cleaned the store of a small business. He was also locked in that store overnight because they did not trust him with a key. So obviously that was in violation of the Occupational Safety Act and also hopefully human decency. That person also died in a fire because they could not get out. So there are reasons why we are concerned about this amendment. one. causing more confusion to small businesses. but also recognizing that those Federal regulations are sometimes there for a purpose. Even though it is a small businessman. I want them to be explained to me and I want them to be reasonable. But. again. putting a 6month extension on it may help on a momentary basis. but hopefully we are not promising the moon and the stars when all we are giving them is 6 months reprieve. Mr. Chairman. I reserve the balance of the time.
Date: 1995-02-24
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

I Chairman.. I yield myself such time I may consume. Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the portunity to close. Let me say ti what the amendment would do is ] off for small business 6 months of rei lation. so a business may be able to in business another 6 months. But t] is what we would be allowing them. Let me say again I came out of sm business. 23 years both working E helping manage it. Our job here Washington is not only to. try to move the impediments of small bt ness. but also to come up with regu tions that small business can und stand that it is important to. And me give you some examples. For example. the FCC does not is: one set of regulations for the TV s Mr. tion in New York City and another set for a smaller business in Texas with less than 100 employees. Food safety e a regulations. do we differentiate between a meat and poultry processor will with 99 employees compared to one with 101? has I think we are adding more confusion to small business. The small business nan -that exists would sometimes be denied ger. opportunities under this amendment. For example. the FCC spectrum allocaMr. tion rules to be issued would deny emose ployers with less than 100 employees the opportunity to bid on some of these ny- FCC licenses. Again. I understand the concern of b of the gentleman. and I philosophically Ltes support him. but with his amendment I ne- think he may be causing more probnce lems. Like a lot of.things we see in the re- first 100. days. we are causing more en- problems for small business and people the trying to create jobs than people tryare ing to help him. ief. Mr. WILLIAMS. Mr. Chairman. will ost the gentleman yield? ins. Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. I yield -an to the gentleman from Montana.
Date: 1995-02-24
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Mr. M4r. Chairman. reclaiming my time. let me as say I think the gentleman has pointed out the correct concern. Again. we are op- not in the business of making blame. iat we are in the business of trying to put make sure America works. I think by gu- adopting this amendment we may end be up very well having two sets of regulahat tions. and that stack of regulations over there could actually get doubled all because we would have some for 6 Lnd months and some for after 6 months. in That is why I urgemy colleagues to re- vote against the amendment. isi- Mr. ROTH. Mr. Chairman. will the .la- gentleman yield? ler- Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. I yield let to the gentleman from Wisconsin.
Date: 1995-02-24
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

That is what I understand in the final rules of the clarifications that were requested byfor definitions. for example. for serious health condition.
Date: 1995-02-24
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Essentially the same. but again they are trying to define some of the terms so businesses and employees would have that as definitive instead of depending on the original rule.
Date: 1995-02-24
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Mr. Chairman. I yield 1 minute and 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from Illinois . the ranking member of our committee.
Date: 1995-02-24
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Mr. Chairman. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman. let me say in response to both the gentleman from Indiana . and my chairman of the Committee on Education and Economic Opportunities. again my concern is the delay because of the need for clarification on the rules. that if this is not exempted from the bill. we would see additional delay for businesses who need thesi definitions. The definitions include health care provider. to include them so they would know what type of health care provider would actually be responsible for that. The other definition here is .health condition. to clarify the circumstances for employees. The bill that we are talking about has been amended already with certain exceptions. Again. we have a law that was passed in 1993 that businesses have already waited 18 months. Again. to be able to have some clarification. they should not have to wait again another 6 months. . Mr. Chairman. again. what we have is an effort to try and make sure government works. and that is what I think we are all here for. Again. a law that was passed in 1993 that we have a delay in the regulations. because of the 6month time frame for the input from our constituents and our businesses. and yet because. they may get caught up in this. and as my colleague from Montana said. the Senate will very well correct this. I have some concern about the effective date of this act. In fact. I was hoping as a member of this committee I could support this. I went to the markup with the hope to be able to support it if we could have picked another date other than November 20. We should pick a date for a moratorium that is much later so people can plan and have some kind of idea on both their business decisions and everything else they do. This amendment would just address one small facet of it. Obviously if we were able to make the deadline or the effective date of the act. instead of November 20. with whatever date we pass this. or some date even this year. businesses could make that decision. But without doing that and going back to November 20. it is necessitating the number of amendments we see to say okay. there are regulations that are so close to being in place that unless we exempt it. you are going to cause more confusion out there in the marketplace. and that is not what we need to do. and this Congress has caused more confusion for business. That is why this amendment is needed. so we will continue with the efforts. so people will know how to enforce the Family and Medical Leave Act. because it did pass overwhelmingly here in 1993. and I hope that we could clarify. it. and if not today. then maybe the other body will be able to do that. Mr. Chairman. I yield back the balance of my time.
Date: 1995-02-24
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the opportunity to address the house this afternoon. I was so ecstatic this morning. when I came in because I am only a secondterm Member but I found out I had arrived. I found out that last night I was called by name on Rush Limbaugh. but the only thing he missed. he did not say I was GENE GREEN. he called me Mr. Green Jeans. and I am glad for that recognition even though he did transpose the names. .The reason he talked about it though was because I talked about how the breakfast and lunch program will cut children in Texas by 4 percent. and yesterday the House majority Republicans on the Economic and Educational Opportunity Committee voted to deny thousands of school children in the State of Texas their breakfast and their lunches. Last year during the fall when people asked me what I thought a Republican majority would be in Congress I jokingly describ ed it as nuclear winter. Well. if it is. then we are subjecting ourselves to the fallout now. The Committee - on Appropriations yesterday cut $17 billion out of many programs.. Safe and Drug free schools cut by $481 million. SchooltoWork cut by $24 million. Displaced Workers was cut by $99 million. In nondefense rescission bill this week job training was cut by $200 million. Veterans Administration will be cut .by $206 million. NASA reduced by $66 million. Federal Highway Administration cut by $421 million.
Date: 1995-02-27
Speaker: EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

I thank the gentleman for yielding this time to me. Mr. Chairman. I. like everyone else. say we need to deal -with this kind of legislation. but this piece of legislation goes too far. It is too extreme. Title II of H.R. 1022 provides new decisional criteria that elevate flexibility for industry and cost reduction above public health and safety. The bill rescinds the decisional criteria for balancing harms and benefits. both public and private. both .known and unknown. that have been built into the Federal environmental protection -legislation over the past 25 years. It requires EPA to bear the burden of proof that the benefits of regulatory actions are worth it. What this means in real terms is that the -vulnerable Americans--the sick. the elderly. the newborncan no longer be protected because their protection is too expensive. This also means that EPA would not be able to take any action that addresses many current health hazards. such as preventing the reoccurrence in the Nations water supply of various bacterial diseases like the one that killed numerous people in Milwaukee and caused 400.000 illnesses. preventing the 70.000 deaths estimated to be caused each year by breathing air laden with fine particles or reducing airborne emission dioxin from waste incinerators located in residential communities. Mr. Chairman. I know firsthand about many of these kinds of conditions. This puts peoples lives at risk. Mr. Chairman. title II of H.R. 1022 provides new decisional criteria that elevate flexibility for industry and cost reduction above public health and safety. The bill rescinds the decisional criteria for balancing harms and benefits. both public and private. both known and unknown. that have been built into all Federal environmental protection legislation over the past 25 years. It requires EPA to bear the burden of proof that the benefits of regulatory action are worth it. What this means in real terms is that vulnerable Americansthe sick. the elderly. the newborncan no longer be protected because their protection is too expensive. This also means that EPA would not be able to take any action to address many current health hazards. such as preventing the recurrence in the Nations water supply of microbial diseases like the one that killed numerous people in Milwaukee and caused 400.000 illnesses. preventing the 70.000 deaths estimated to be caused each year by breathing air laden with fine particles. or reducing the airborne emissions of dioxin from waste incinerators located near residential communities.