Date: 1997-09-03
Speaker: BOB SCHAFFER (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Colorado

I thank the gentleman from Missouri for yielding. It was a great month out in Colorado. Colorado. of course. being a western State with our sense of rugged individualism. we do not like Washington all that much. I have to admit. and I am afraid to say. and for good reason in many cases. Since being elected to Congress. hardly a day has gone by when somebody does not run up to me at the grocery store or the post office and say. "Congressman. Ive been working harder. Ive been working longer and it seems like I take less and less home." and that perception is in fact the reality over the years. and it is one that has really been the source of frustration for people throughout the country and it is the message that I think inspired many of us to run for office in the first place. Fortunately with the Republican majority. we are able to go to work on those very issues right here on this floor. The package that we constructed a month ago. the tax cut package. is something that changed the message that I heard this last month being back home. Rather than the consistent complaints that we have always heard about high and excessive taxation here in Washington. I began to hear people at the grocery store and the post office coming up and thanking me for pushing and helping to support the Republican tax reform message again that we constructed a month ago. Let me suggest that it is a good first step and it is welcome news. but it is not the full measure of tax relief. We are going to come back and try to push for more at another point in time. But for the first time in 16 years. the American public has received a tax cut package. The first time in 16 years. Let me just go through some of the numbers on this and tell about what I heard back home in response. Over 10 years. $260 billion in taxes. that is what we will pay. fewer taxes that we will pay as opposed to the plan that was constructed when the Democrats were in charge of the Congress. That includes a $500 per child tax credit. the capital gains tax cuts. the estate tax relief. education tax credit. expanded IRAs. Those individuals who understand that they have been paying more and more and more to the Federal Government and working harder and harder are exactly right. Let me direct my colleagues attention to the chart here at my left. Back in 1950. the Federal tax burden was 6 percent of the family budget. In 1994. the Federal tax burden jumped to 23 percent. That is a remarkable escalation in the tax bite that this Federal Government has taken away from American families. When we consider all taxes. State. local and Federal taxes. the total tax burden is almost 40 percent of a family budget. The farmers and ranchers and small business owners and the heads of families that I met with tell me that that 40 percent is far too excessive. I was in a Labor Day parade on Monday in the small town of Windsor in Colorado. Windsor is one of those towns that is just your typical American small town. Great patriotic families. people who love their work. love their community. will stand up for the flag and love their country. a town that has sent many. many war heroes to do battle to defend freedom and liberty. After that parade we held a little barbecue and the numbers of individuals who came up and said thank you for cutting the capital gains taxes because that has real implications on running a capital intensive operation like a farm. thank you for cutting the estate taxes. the inheritance tax blcause now after working 30 years and putting all of my hard work and assets into a farm that produces and is successful. I finally know that I am going to be able to hand that farm over to my children. Think about that for a moment. Having the prospect of working so many years and putting so much into the ground and into the soil and into the family farm. that farm is more than just an economic enterprise. It is the definition of the character of many in the West and many in my State. most people in my State. The very notion that upon your death the Federal Government will get there first before your children do is something that just frightens the daylights out of many people. We are finally providing real hope. real opportunity. The suggestion that we have changed Washington as a Republican Party. that we have come here and have decided that the estate taxes must end. that we at our first step will reduce the effect of estate taxation. eventually getting to the point of abolishing them. I hope. That is a message that was just embraced throughout the district. and it was a delight to go home and hear that. I also attended a conference sponsored by the Independence Institute. and the Independence Institute is a free market organization. and the topic they were discussing was welfare reform. because last year the Republican Congress totally revised the welfare system in the United States and moved welfare authority out of Washington and pushed it back to the States in block grant fashion. Let me tell you. it was truly exciting to go to these meetings with State legislators. with county commissioners. with local welfare workers. and hear them talk about the remarkable things that they are coming up with to reform the welfare system. to actually create systems on a countybycounty basis where people can make the transition from dependency on the Federal Government to total selfsufficiency. And the numbers were remarkable as well. The numbers of people that are making that transition and finding the absolute joy of honest hard work and selfsufficiency is one of the most exciting things. I think. that I could have heard. and again thanking the Republicah Congress for changing the way the government thinks about how we organize our society. We are no longer looking to Washington and people here in the city of big government to organize and manage our lives. We have discovered. we have decided. and we have fought very hard for and passionately for a government that believes we can trust citizens. we can trust taxpayers. we can trust them to spend the dollars that the government used to take from them and allow them to put it toward the things that they believe to be important. They are small businesses. they are farms. they are child health care. the charity of their choice. their church. their synagogue. their community. And we have also decided that within that framework we are going to create more opportunity in a way that frees people from the burden of an oppressive welfare state and instead rewards honest hard work. real opportunity. and makes Americans free again. That is the real difference that we have made here in Washington. and I can tell you it is not just talk after 1 month being back in the district and talking with constituents and being in your district. too. by the way. Mr. THUNE from South Dakota spent a little time. a couple days. traveling through South Dakota. It is a consistent message: The work that we have accomplished here in Washington is hitting home. it is making a big difference. and the American public is responding very favorably.