Date: 1984-05-16
Speaker: ROBERT F. SMITH (republican)
Chamber: H

I thank the gentleman from Idaho for yielding and I want to commend him. as others have. for this opportunity to discuss what I consider to be likely the most important issue facing this Nation. and that is the issue of a constitutional amendment to balance the budget of this country. I do not want to discuss at great length the connection between defici:a of $200 billion and the high and ever growing higher interest rates in this country. but I think others will. and the connection obviously is there. for the people in this country believe. as I believe. that deficits are crucial to the question of higher interest rates. I I come to support the balanced budget issue as a result of eliminating all the alternatives that seem to be present. or at least have been discussed by this Congress. Let me go through them with you just to show you that the alternatives to this issue are certainly not apparent to me. First of all. there is the myth and misconception about how we might grow out of this predicament that we are in. how the country might grow. For instance. given these very conservative scenarios of 8 percent interest rates for the next 5 yesrs. of 7 percent unemployment for the next 5 years and of a growth of 6 to 8 percent in the gross national product for the next 5 years. we find we are still facing deficits of nearly $600 billion in that time. Obviously. we are not going to grow out of -it. Therefore. doing nothing about the economy. doing nothing about spending. means that we will be in the predicament from now on. What about some of the other alternatives? We have discussed the freeze on many occasions. freezing the budget. That has failed in this Congress. We have discussed the pay as you go plan. That has failed in this Congress. We have discussed the Roemer plan and eight other plans that were discussed when we had the downpayment on the deficit discussion here on the floor and. by the way. the downpayment idea of $150 billion is a charade in my opinion. Any time that you have to combine 3 years of savings and spending into a 1year identity. you know it is a charade. Therefore. the downpayment. I think. does very little to correct the problem of the huge deficits we are facing in the next 3 years. Well. Congress did not implement any of these alternative plans and. of course. those are the alternatives that are available to a balanced budget. However. some believe that we can change the composition of the Congress and. therefore. provided some sort of control on spending. . Well. I suggest practically that I think we can all agree that the Senate likely is not going to change composition. likely the House is not going to change composition. or for that matter leadership. Therefore. we can expect the same philosophies to continue on next year and the year after likely as we have this year. Well. I think there is a mind set that has developed over the past 50 years in the Members of Congress. certainly. and that simply is that if you wnat to be reelected to this place. and by the way. the most important issue to me and to the Members of the Congress is to be reelected. the country will fail unless we are returned to office. the most important issue is to be sure that we are reelected and to do that I must dig in the pocket of Uncle Sam as deeply as I can to find enough money to send to my district In Oregon so the people will Pat me on the back and say. "Bob. you have done a nice job. Congratulations. We are going to return you to Congress." That mind set for the past 50 years has worked and that is the old spend. spend. elect. and elect philosophy. Now. unfortunately. that has worked and the Congress today is operating under that mind set. I suggest that rather than people thinking that the Congress is not responsive. I suggest that the Congress is too responsive. I think it is so responsive to peoples needs that at any time a person in my district or any other district in this country has a problem. the Congress corrects it. We spend money. That Is why we are in trouble. That is why we have a $200 billion deficit. Well. it is not an easy problem. Certainly with the fact that within the budget 42 percent of this total budget is involved in entitlements. 29 percent of the budget is involved in defense. If you would eliminate the rest of the budget. protecting entitlements and defense. you would have a little more than necessary to correct the $200 billion deficit. Therefore. unless we address these issues of entitlements and defense in the total scenario. we are never going to get to the area of reducing deficits in this country. I do not mean to say that is easy. It is not easy. That is why I think that rather than allowing Democrats to blame Republicans or allowing Republicans to blame Democrats. the President blames the Congress. the Congress blames the President and we go on and on chasing our tail. everybody hiding. everybody blaming someone else and the deficits rise. I suggest that we need a higher goal. a higher goal for all of us in the Congress. rather than just the sensitive II 4049 area of speclatities of electing Bob Smit h to the Congress. I think we ought to go for a constitutlonal amendmient which will require the first duty of a Congressman is to balance the budget and to follow the Constitution of this country. If that were true. I blieve in the nrxt few years we would b gin a trend toward a balanced budget. and upon the passage of a constitutional amendment to balice the budget. we would have reduced impact vii shortterm and longterin interest rates. the markets would respond. the country would see a light at Ihe end of the tunnel and I think we would bepin to move this economy. I do not believe the great enemy of this Nation lies across the borders or across the ocuan. I believe the great enemy of this country lies with the insat lable desire of the Congress to spend money for its own constituency and I sugget a hipher goal would be the passage of a constitutional amendment to balance the budget.