Date: 1998-02-04
Speaker: BOB SCHAFFER (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Colorado

Mr. Speaker. this evening I wanted to come before the.body tonight and talk a little bit about the freshman Republican class. that group which was elected in 1996 and has now finished 1 year serving here in Congress and is embarking on the second year. I recently became elected President by that body. and tonight is one of those opportunities where I wanted to talk about our agenda and some of the things we are trying to accomplish here in Washington as a new freshman body. This group is 34 Members strong. and over the 3month break that we took receritly. from which we just returned. the 34 Members of the Republican freshman class endeavored to spread out across the country in our respective districts holding a number of town meetings and visits and so on. I wanted to talk about some that I had occasion to conduct and also those that had been reported back to me. and other Members perhaps will be here. The 34 Members also have been involved in putting together a number of projects and proposals that we are trying to push through this Congress. One of those which we unveiled just 3 weeks ago entails a Republican freshman tax relief package. It is spearheaded by the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Pr.rrs). and this package has four basic provisions that I would suggest that the House ought to consider quite seriously. and in fact these proposals are becoming the basis for further discussions of tax relief that are occurring in the Committee on Ways and Means. by the chairman. and being supported with the effort of our Speaker and other Members of leadership. The first of those provisions is a provision that involves 100 percent deductibility of health care programs or the benefits that small employers provide for their employees. Under todays current tax structure. section 106 of the Internal Revenue Service code. section 106 provides for a 100 percent deductibility of health insurance benefits for large employers. but small employers. the small entrepreneurs. those individuals who provide the majority of jobs and entrepreneurial spirit of our country. have not achieved that parity yet. That has been a longterm stated goal. but at this particular point in time. again taking a look at where the real strength of our economy comes from and where the expected growth is likely to occur. it is quite clear that this benefit. this tax advantage. ought to occur to all entrepreneurs in America. all those who would propose to create economic activity. create opportunity to create jobs in fact for our country. This second provision of the bill is the elimination of the marriage tax penalty. The notion that families should suffer additional tax burdens simply due to their decision to become married is one that is particularly onerous and seems in many ways to be unAmerican certainly and really violates our strong regard for the strength of the American family as the most basic central and essential social unit in our Nation. Eliminating the marriage tax penalty is a goal and an objective that we take quite seriously. and we will be pushing for it quite vigorously in the coming months until we achieve success in arriving at moving the legislation forward and eventually putting it on the Presidents desk. The third provision is one that involves education. Currently. there are many States throughout the country that are setting up educational accounts where parents are able to prepay college tuition for children. Now. on a State level. and certainly at the Federal level there are significant number of advantages that are companion with that goal and objective. too. but in many cases seems to be isolated. This provision is one that. in fact. broadens the number of choices Of educational institutions that families might choose for their children in setting dollars aside now while their children are very young and allowing these funds to grow in a way that is unmolested by our tax code to that point in time when they would decide to go ahead and go to college and get accepted at the school of their choice. That is an important provision of the overall tax bill that we have moved forward. The fourth provision is one that really moves us toward our goal of encouraging savings and investment. The Republican Congress last year provided significant advantages for those who do save money and savings on earnings. but the tax on interest earnings still. in our opinion. is prohibitive. And there is a lot more that this Congress can do to relieve the tax burden on savings and investments and the earnings of those investments in a way that will allow our economy to grow. to encourage more and more people to put more money into savings. and to providing capital for other entrepreneurs and others who are in the business of creating wealth. creating jobs and moving our country forward economically. Those four provisions outline the proposal that we have put forward and is one that has been warmly received here in Washington but. more importantly. has been warmly received by the taxpayers throughout the country and throughout the districts that are represented by those Members who have put the plan forward and others who have joined us in the effort. I want to tell my colleagues about some of the things that I had heard over the three months that I traveled throughout my district in the eastern plains of Colorado. There were a number of news stories that occurred over that time period suggesting that. it was some polling data actually. that revealed that young people in America have somehow lost interest in citizenship and the whole concept of their role as citizens in our country. Here are some articles I brought with me. one from the Washington Times that says that college freshmen have the blahs. survey indicates. Academic civic apathy reached record levels. Student poll finds soaring apathy levels. College freshmen aiming high for marks in income but developing a philosophy of life can wait. This article in The New York Times. The National Report further highlights this apparent trend that some pollsters seem to have found that young people are interested in other things but not civic virtue in contemplating their roles as actual leaders of our country. USA Today reports that money. not learning. is freshmens top goal. a freshman in college. And it talks about how the research again confirms. according to USA Today. that young people are not focusing on their eventual roles as leaders of the country and do not think in patriotic terms. Los Angeles Times. freshmen get high marks in apathy and so on. And there are several more here too from Boston. Boston Globe. college freshmen called more detached. I have to tell my colleagues that I found just the opposite in my travels. to the places I went. I spent a lot of time visiting local schools and talking with lots of young people. I want to talk about one person in particular. who I have had a chance to get to know. She lives in Limon. Colorado. which is a small town out in the eastern plains of my State. Amanda King is her name. She is 16 years old. I had a chance to go visit her school and spoke with a number of her classmates and acquaintances and teachers as well. They are very proud of her. She is one who has been involved very directly in the political process and one who does take her role as citizen quite seriously. Her goal is to go on to college and. in fact. to learn about government. to learn about political science. and to learn about the political system that allows each and every individual. including individuals her age. to play a meaningful role in moving our country forward. When I asked her what her goals and objectives are. what she wants to do with this degree at some point in time and how she wants to serve the country. she said she just generally wanted to help make government better. to make life in America a little more positive than it is today. She said that she believes that there are great opportunities for young people to be involved in the political process and to set high standards for themselves and establish ambitious dreams and to achieve them. I asked her what motivated her in that regard. what gave her the interest and how was she inspired in such a way to think in such terms about her country. She credited her teacher. Mr. Fiedler. who was the 7th grade teacher. at Limon High School. Now. Mr. Fiedler is no longer the 7th grade teacher. he has become the principal. And it is teachers like that. I have met several of them over the course of the several years I have been privileged to serve in public office. to meet individuals like this who have inspired young people. who have found ways to use the lecture forum of their classrooms to talk about our great country. to talk about how academic success in a classroom leads to economic success for the country over time. Several other places that I visited. a lot of other classrooms that I visited in Fort Collins and Loveland and Greeley. Colorado. out in Sterling and Flagler. in Limon. down in the town of Las Animas. in the southern part of my district in Colorado. had similar experiences with many of these young people. And it was. in fact. refreshing. It was something that suggests that these polls. while they may be true in some qubrters and some segments of the country are certainly not true in rural America. Again. indeed it was very gratifying. People are concerned about taxes. Mr. Speaker. Most of the town meetings .that I attended and the people that I spoke with believe that at a point in time when our economy seems to be most productive and our economy seems to be very good. that this is the time we ought to consider not only reforming our prohibitive Tax Code. one that is a confiscatory strategy that. from the regulatory perspective. treats taxpayers as though they are guilty until they prove their innocence. if they are questioned and audited on tax matters. but also. again. in addition to reining in the abuses that seem to occur at the Internal Revenue Service on the enforcement side. was a call for wide scale reform of our income Tax Code. The graduated system of income tax collection that we have today and income tax assessment is one that punishes hard work and punishes those who seek to achieve more economically in our country. And those who have been confronted with that kind of a tax system for so long are crying for relief and demanding that politicians take them quite seriously and commit themselves to devoting the time and the attention and the energy to reforming the tax system. As the Speaker knows. we have two prevailing proposals for wholescale reform of the income tax structures. a national consumption tax that has been supported by the other gentleman from Colorado . another SCHAEFER from Colorado. and promoted primarily by the gentleman from Texas . the Committee on Ways and Means chairman. here in the House. and also a competing version of tax reform pushed primarily by another gentleman from Texas . our majority leader. and that provision calls for a flat tax. That tax would flatten out the graduated nature of our income Tax Code as we know it today and eventually arrive at one low. flat. fair rate which would treat all taxpayers equally and begin to reward entrepreneurial success. reward investment and so on. Both tax proposals try to achieve the same thing in that regard. and it is a matter of strategy and tactics as to how we move them forward and which seems to be the most successful in earning overall support here in the Congress and throughout the country. These discussions ought to take place right now. especially when we have headlines that we have seen about a supposed budget surplus that we are anticipating and expecting. Over the 10month period from November of 1996 until November of 1997. we actually accumulated an approximately $2.4 billion surplus. This is the first time this has occurred in many years. certainly in the length of time that I have been involved in the political process and following politics. And so the question occurs as to whether this is the right time to strike. while the iron. as they say. is hot. Sustaining our economic growth seems to me to be the most important thing that we as Americans can do to move toward not only balancing the budget but getting us toward real debt relief. Resolving our question of a mounting Federal national debt is a far bigger problem that looms over us and costs us more than anything else in terms of jobs and in terms of economic growth. Sustaining the level of economic growth that the American taxpayers have been able to achieve and the American entrepreneurs have been able to sustain in spite of poor tax policy that we maintain right now is an objective of a* very high order. in my estimation. The fact of the matter is that the impact of high Federal debt is no different than high Federal taxation. With the debtbased currency that we have in the United States. high debt effectively reduces the value of every single dollar that every American carries around with them today. And manipulating the management of that debt has the ability to effectively tax citizens to higher or lesser degrees. depending on decisions that are made. in many cases. without any scrutiny of elected officials or Members of Congress or people in the White House. for that matter. But there is a very positive side to strong economic growth that we see right now. I want to share with Members who may be Watching a few comments that appeared in our local papers. There was an article back at the end of December how economic success in America today is filtering its way down to local charities. There was a man named Jerry Langley. who is vice president of a McDonalds corporation. this is in Illinois. and he said he helped soften the tax bite on his investments by donating shares of stocks to selected charities. Now. his business seems to be doing fairly well at the present time and he is finding that his ability to engage in charitable contributions is better now than it has been in some years. For instance. here is another example. The American Red Cross said that contributions were up 120 percent to that organization over the previous year. And the United Way noted that they had realized a 17 percent growth in gifts of more than $1.000. Don Struke. who was a spokesman for the United Way Foundation. says what we are seeing is definitely an upturn in giving. Now. I would point out. Mr. Speaker. that when it comes to real humanitarian and compassionate concern that we have and that we express here on the floor of the House from time to time. that this is real charity. When individuals are able to put the fruits of their economic growth. their productivity toward the chafities of their choice. a number of things occur. One is there is no bureaucracy. When Mr. Langley here makes a contribution directly to the American Red Cross. these dollars are not filtered through Washington. they are not filtered through various State capitals. they are not filtered through various bureaucracies that are involved in the distribution of public funds for government charities. No. these dollars go directly from charitable donor to charitable organization and make their way directly to the individual who is in need. the poor person who is the beneficiary of some of these organizations or those who are confronted with the tragedy in the case of the Red Cross. It is without question a time in which we are able to help more people with fewer dollars and less government. That ought to be our message that we move forward in this C6ngress when it comes to how we deal with budget surpluses. how we deal with a huge bureaucracy that still needs to be dealt with. and a strategy toward shrinking the size of Washingtons influence in the lives of Americans. Here is another story. Workers coming off welfare to get job help. Volunteers in new county program to provide circles of support for 2 years. This is a story out of Larimer County. Colorado. There is a program that has been established by county commissioners at a local level called Larimer County Builds Community. and it will match former recipients of welfare with advocates from local faithbased organizations. service groups. and help these recipients make the transition into sustaining employment. Now imagine that. Mr. Speaker. Imagine a welfare system that utilizes faithbased and spiritual organizations and charitable groups in a way that is helping people come off of welfare and achieve selfsufficiency. A strong economy is certainly making this possible. Individual contributions and donations that come directly from these groups and organizations is adding to the momentum that welfare reform has established in the country. But. more than anything else. the message that the Republican Congress has sent by crafting a responsible welfare reform provision is this. that selfsufficiency makes more sense. it is more rewarding. it is by far a better way to achieve a high degree of human dignity than any more levels of government spending. higher levels of spending. or greater degrees of bureaucratic management of the way in which people live. This isa great story. This is an American success story. This is a real testimonial to the strength of local governments and local entities getting involved in welfare reform that they were never allowed to do previous to welfare reform coming out of Congress. By providing that level of freedom and liberty at the local level. we are helping real people get on their feet. helping them reenter the job market. helping them become selfsufficient. helping them enjoy life in America as Americans ought to be able to. It is a real cause for celebration. not only by those that are associated with welfare programs and with these charities but for the actual individuals themselves who are no longer dependent on bureaucrats. no longer dependent on taxpayer subsidies. no longer are dependent on a welfare system that over the last several years has been so cruel and so heartless. A strong economy. a compassionate welfare reform program is by far more humanitarian. more charitable. more compassionate than large government and the solutions of big bureaucracy. "Consumers Are Upbeat" is another news story that many people in my district were talking about. "Consumers were upbeat so much so that it is a high." the article says. This is an Associated Press story that made big news out in Colorado. Consumer confidence surged to a 28year high In December. a milestone for an economy embarking on its eighth year of expansion. Growth is up. People are employed. We are competitive with the rest of the world. Whats not to be confident about? That is again something that we had. heard repeated over and over again at our various town meetings and voiced as a strong indicator of why we ought to move forward on further tax relief for our country and do so in a way that will sustain economic growth and allow us to bring down our looming debt that looms over us even today. Here is another one. Mr. Speaker. Today Colorado income studies shows that the poor did better. Did you hear that. that the poor did better? What a strong economy does In a capitalist society like ours is allows those who have been struggling for years and years to move from one income category to another. a final chance to actually achieve that. The average Income of Colorados poorest families Increased faster than the average income of the States richest family over the last decade. a new study says. Now. this is a national study that focused on every State and highlighted the particular features of this study in all States. But in Colorado. where we have enjoyed wonderful economic growth for a number of years. we have seen that this has not been something that only benefits the rich. as we will sometimes hear the left and the Democrats here in Congress suiggest. but a strong. vibrant economy and. in this case. actually raised the income of the poor faster and more conclusively than income levels for the rich. The average income for the poorest 20 percent of Colorado families increased by $4.050. from $10.280 to $14.330. or a 39percent increase in income for the poorest 20 percent of Colorado families. Average income for the middle 20 percent increased by $5.150. from $42.650 to $47.800. or a 12percent increase. And average income for the top 20 percent increased again over this 10year period by $17.860. from $113.510 to $131.370. or 16 percent. Again. the wealthiest and middleincome families saw income increases over the last 10 years between 12 and 16 percent. but the poorest 20 percent of our economy in my State realized income growth of 39 percent. Once again. when we think of how this Government and this Congress can exercise real compassion. can exercise real humanitarianism. can exercise real concern for those that we care most about. our friends and our neighbors. those who are in need. those who face certain unfortunate occasions in their life that make economic participation difficult. the best way to assist those individuals and to be concerned about them is by fighting for a strong eQonomy. by fighting to remove the impediment to economic growth. by fighting to remove the tax disadvantages toward job creation and instead replace them with advantages that motivate and move job creation forward. In response to all of this. of course. over at the White House they suggested that no tax cuts will be considered. that providing additional tax relief for American families is something that they are not interested in discussing. We suggest that we can expect a vigorous debate and ensuing battle that will take place over whether we ought to continue to tax the American people at high rates. tax American job producers at high rates and continue to force the jobs overseas in a way that does not allow us as a country to achieve the economic progression parity that we ought to. to the degree that we ought to. Failure by this Government and our Congress to move forward on tax relief and relieving debt will erase stories like this. It will in the end be cruel to individuals who are today realizing greater income. It will be cruel to those who are presently upbeat and excited about our economic promise. It would be cruel and heartless whether it comes to those who are leaving the welfare roles. finding jobs on their own. It will be cruel to those charities who are finding great economic success because of that certain amount of progress that we have made. What we need is more economic growth. What we need are lower levels of tax rates. What we need are more provisions in our business laws and regulatory laws that make entrepreneurism more within the grasp of more and more Americans. People out West are also very concerned. Mr. Speaker. about an executive order that has been put forward by the Clinton administration called the American Heritage Rivers Initiative. This is an initiative that is established by executive order without the consent. without the review of the Congress. Water in the West is one of the most precious natural resources that we have. If you take my State. Colorado. for example. it is one of two headwater States in the entire country. All of our water. all of our usable water and that which has been appropriated flows out of our State. The other one is Hawaii. by the way. Managing. reusing. conserving water is something we know an awful lot about in the West. Colorados water law has been developed over the entire history of our State. It is a model that the rest of the country has used in developing their water law. It is based on the notion that water and a water right is a property right and that if you want to acquire water or purchase one of those rights you need to stand in line and purchase it from a willing seller. The Federal Government does not understand that. Mr. Speaker. when it comes right down to it. The United States Forest Service. other Federal agencies. are very envious of the precious resources that are held in many cases by private owners. by ranchers and farmers. by private conservationists. by foresters. by municipalities. by industry and by other private water users. The Federal Government would like to have their hands on that water. and they try with a voracious thirst to try to acquire it. They do not understand that you have to stand in line like everyone else. that you have to put up the cash to purchase water rights like everybody else. They have devised many ingenious strategies to impede the ability of water rights owners. water: users. to use their own water in a way that they see fit and that is of beneficial use for their economic activities. The American Heritage Rivers Initiative put forward by the Clinton administration is one more example of this lack of understanding that we see coming out of Washington and threatening the West.. It is the next stage being waged in the war on the West. It is one that makes people in the West quite nervous. in fact quite angry. and we do not intend to sit by and watch the administration by executive order. I remind my colleagues again. to move forward in a way that will only constitute confiscation potentially of such a precious resource. The American Heritage Rivers Initiative would establish 10 rivers per year that would be designated by the Federal Government as Heritage Rivers. and that sounds lake a nice thing. But it is not. I assure you. once you get into the details and review the testimony that was given by the Clinton administration in front of the Committee on Resources and in other correspondence that took place between various members of the Congress and the administration itself. Certainly it sounds like the American Heritage Rivers Initiative suggests that we are going to feature and preserve some unique quality of river systems throughout the country. perhaps clean up river front. perhaps remove various levels of pollution or degradation in streams. And some of that. in fact. may occur. That is a very positive thing. The fact of the matter is that all of those can occur today. There is no need for this initiative being put forward by the Clinton administration unless you buy their silly notion that there is so much regulation that their agencies. their Federal Government. their bureaucracy has created that we need to hire more bureaucrats to help local communities untangle all that red tape and assist them in that way. Well. we are concerned about a number of things. first and foremost that this initiative seems to have gone forward without any level of meaningful scrutiny by the United States Congress. An executive order is not a law. it is not a law suggested. as the Constitution lays out. that is to be estab-. lished by the Congress on such an important topic. An executive order is a set of instructions to the executive branch. its bureaucracies. and its agents to behave in a certain way. in this case to behave in a way that has the ability in a way that enables these agencies to restrict not only water rights but property rights. usages and to elevate priorities in the distribution of these assets through a certain level of Federal meddling and intervention. What the Clinton administration is proposing is not only to designate these rivers but to hire somebody called a river navigator. that would be their job title. have a river navigator actually move into your State. move on your river system and manage the resources associated with river management and water management. This person would be employed at a cost of approximately $120.000 per year. and I assume there will be staff associated with that. There is a pending proposal here in the Congress that has made its way right here to the floor that would pull the cash out from underneath this expenditure. again bearing in mind that this new function of government has not been approved by Congress ever. The attempts in the White House to direct the taxpayers cash towards this new activity is inappropriate. That proposal ought to be taken up swiftly on the House floor and hopefully passed. But. in the meantime. I would suggest that we ought to be charged. as a conscientious body. with seeing to it that the administration is not permitted through "the appropriations process to draw funds from the various and several agencies associated with water management in order to implement the American Heritage Rivers Initiative. We ought to make absolutely certain that no dollars are appropriated by this Congress unless we first of all approve of the activity that is taking place and upon which those dollars would be spent. Western states. most States. Colorado in particular. understand very well how to manage water in our State. Our law is good. It has a long tradition of working well. We secure agreements with neighboring States through interstate compacts on the distribution of water and the allocation of shares. Those agreements are negotiated at the State level. under Federal guidelines. and insured through a Federal water court system. But they are devised by States. nonetheless. by Governors and their agents. who sit down and negotiate these agreements. sometimes at great cost. Then they are signed. they are approved by States. and they become effectively the law. a contract on how water ought to be distributed. The very notion that the Federal Government will elevate its level of meddling in that ageold traditional process is one that Westerners are not willing to stand for. Time after time after time. when I asked constituents in my district what they really care about and what they want to be addressed here by this Congress. over the last 3 months that I conducted these kinds of hearings and these kinds of meetings. maintaining and preservingand protecting Colorado water was always high on thelist. There are four Members of Congress. myself included. who have chosen to file a lawsuit against the President himself as a defendant over the American Heritage Rivers Initiative. That lawsuit has been filed in the District of Columbia Federal Court. We also filed an injunction recently and in fact expect a judgment to be rendered within days on an injunction. It is hopeful that that injunction will allow Colorados water rights laws and history to stand while the lawsuit that is pending is considered. We also have a big crisis out in the State when it comes to forestry and forest health. People are very concerned about what would happen if we have another dry summer. as some suggest we may. The level of forest fire potential in Western States is higher than it has ever been before. The state of forest health is very poor. There are large problems with infestations and disease that are spreading across -western forests. and this is no accident of. nature. In fact. it is a very understandable response. when you take into account the poor management strategies that the Forest Service has been responsible for over the last several years. In fact. there is a great battle going on internally within the Forest Service presently. where foresters are quite concerned. Their ability to apply accurate scientific data and knowledge about how to manage our National Forests is something that the Forest Service here in Washington. D.C. seems to be disinterested in. There is another agenda that seems to be driven by economic goals and objectives that would suggest to the White House and the people here in the Clinton Administration that forests should not be managed. that they should be allowed to be confronted with infestation. with continued disease. When this occurs and when overgrowth occurs as well. another big problem. forests are not properly thinned and cared for. these trees become stressed. They run out of water. they compete for nutrients. they compete for water resources. They do get stressed. they do get infested and get dis6ased. They become brittle. they become very dry. and all it takes is one flash.of lightning or one careless activity of a camper or somebody watching wildlife or a hunter or somebody along those lines. or somebody who happens to be living in a forested area. and these fires burn far more intensely. and they burn with such intensity. as a matter of fact. that they effectively sterilize the soil. These are forests that have a much more difficult time recovering and coming back from. these kinds of devastating fires. It is much different than the natural fires that occurred long before humans showed up. These are fires that burn far more intensely. precisely because they have been poorly managed and poorly treated by our Forest Service when it comes to public lands. That is another big problem that I had heard of. another big concern that people suggested to me over the months that I was able to travel throughout the district. Mr. Speaker. let me conclude once again by talking about the freshman class. When I first got elected to Congress. I had heard a little bit about this class status. I heard a little bit about the freshman class. the sophomore class and so on. It works almost like high school. Those that got elected in a certain year. they would come here and have to go through the orientation process. learn about the institution at the same pace and learn about it together. But they are also elected under the pretense of a certain set of issues. Every election year seems to define for itself a certain mood that is prevalent throughout the country. What we discovered is that 34 Members came here from throughout the country. unified in our belief that the American people are taxed in excess. that our government at the Federal level is far too big. and. as such. threatens real freedom and real liberty throughout the country. and that the best way to ensure real freedom and real liberty and real participation. economically and politically. is not through bigger Federal involvement and a bigger Federal Government. but by a smaller one. one which defers to the wisdom of states. all 50 of them. including territories. and local governments. and. even more so. defers to the people themselves. We are unified in our vision that the size of the Federal Government needs to be contained. it needs to be reduced. and that we do need to empower people back home in ways that historically and traditionally we know leads to more prosperity in the country. Those are the issues that define our class. the 34 Members that got elected in 1996. Those are the issues that define the projects that we are moving forward on. that define the issues that we fight for passionately here on the House floor. and it defines the issues that we speak about frequently and that we discuss often. Our agenda is one that we are very committed to. It is an agenda that we believe is playing a primary role in driving the overall message we are sending as a majority Republican party here in Washington. and it is one that we look forward to engaging in vigorously with those on the left side. the Democratic side of the floor. who would disagree.