Jim DeMint

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, on May 20th, I missed rollcall vote No. 144 due to my daughter's graduation. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yes'' on agreeing to the Senate amendments to H.R. 4.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall no. 128, I was unavoidably detained. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yes.''

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, each year working moms and dads face more and more stress over paying their tax bill. This year the average taxpayer must give up nearly 5 months of paychecks just to pay their share of local, State and federal taxes. Those of us in the majority believe our constituents should keep more of their hard earned money. We know that they are spending more hours at work and less time at home. That is why we are going to eliminate our burdensome Tax Code and replace it with a new tax system that rewards work and sacrifice, a tax system that makes dreams of a new home, a secure retirement or a better life for their children a reality. They should be able to spend their paycheck before Washington does. Mr. Speaker, that is why we are working to make sure every day is Tax Freedom Day, where one can wake up knowing that there is more money in their pocket and more freedom to pursue their dreams.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support today of this resolution honoring the nearly 3 million teachers across America that work every day to secure the future of our children. Yesterday I had the opportunity to visit two of Mrs. Becham's classes at East Side High School in Greenville, South Carolina. These were two hour-and-a-half-long government classes, and these students wore me out with questions, and it reminded me of the incredible energy it takes every day, day in and day out, for these teachers to open the minds and to fill these minds with the knowledge that will help these students be successful in life. I thank Mrs. Becham, and I thank her that she wanted her students not only to hear about Congress, but she persisted until she got the Congressman right there in her room. I am thankful myself for teachers because my wife and I have four children from junior high through college. I am thankful for all the teachers that helped to shape their lives. I am thankful for the teachers, so many good ones, that when I was not such a good student did so much for me, particularly Mrs. Humphries in the 9th grade, when she handed me back one paper with red marks all over it and I expected to hear how bad it was, when she said: ``Jim, you're a good writer. You've got a lot of good ideas.'' Mr. Speaker, I ignored the red marks, and I took it to heart that I was a good writer, and that is what I made as my profession, and I thank Mrs. Humphries. Today is a good day to honor all of teachers. We need to treat them as the professionals that they are. We have given them almost an impossible job to do. We have given them so much of the blame that they are not responsible for, and I am thankful today that we are giving them a little bit of the credit that they so richly deserve. General Leave

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, I recently received a letter from Tori Smith, a senior at Dorman High School in Spartanburg, South Carolina. She wrote: I think you take out entirely too much money for tax. That is my dad's money. He worked for it, not you, he should keep it all for himself. Also, young teenagers who have part-time jobs, trying to make a little spending money pay taxes too. I do not think you should take taxes from us until we are 18. That is my opinion, which should count. Well, Tori, your opinion does count. And Mr. Speaker, she is exactly right. That is their money and they deserve to keep a lot more of it. They should not be punished for working hard for some extra money or saving for college. On behalf of young women like Tori and the students at Dorman High School, I ask my colleagues to find the courage to reduce taxes and get rid of the oppressive Tax Code. Let us say, enough is enough. Let us replace it with a national sales tax that rewards hard work and allows these young people to make their dreams come true. Mr. Speaker, I thank Tori for writing me. I believe we are on the way to giving her a more secure future.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Madam Speaker, on a more positive note, the upstate region of South Carolina is home to Spartanburg High School, a four- time winner of the National Blue Ribbon Award. It is the only school in our Nation to achieve this honor four times. Why Spartanburg High so successful? Caring parents, quality students, committed teachers, creative administrators, an active school board and encouraging community. The people have taken control of their school and have succeeded in spite of misguided federal programs and paperwork. Do not just take my word for it. Yesterday the Spartanburg Herald Journal wrote an editorial praising Congress for passing legislation to give schools more flexibility. It read: Federal lawmakers need to do more to free state and local educators so they can run their schools as they see fit. Education is a State and local matter. I could not have said it better myself.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, my wife and I have four children who are all in different schools everyday. As we grieve for the parents of the children killed in Colorado, we also join every parent in America as we fear for the safety of our own children. Congress must be a part of eliminating this danger, because one of the most important roles of government is to keep our citizens safe, especially our children. We must do more to protect Americans against senseless violence. But our goal to make America safer cannot be achieved with knee-jerk solutions that are blurted out in haste every time there is a tragedy. So as we condemn this horrible act, let us also commit as a Congress and as a Nation to seriously study and seek to understand the causes of this violence and to develop a comprehensive plan to make our children safer and more secure in their schools. But to get the right answers, we have to ask the right questions. And I hope one of the questions will be, have we created a spiritual void in our schools which is now being filled with drugs and sex and violence? It is clear there were very deep spiritual problems in this case. Yet, we prohibit the free participation in spiritual and religious activities in our schools. The sad fact is if a teacher had recognized these troubled youths and tried to counsel them with positive, life-oriented religious principles, that this teacher could very likely lose their job or end up in court. Let us ask the right questions. Let us commit as a Nation to make our schools safer, and we can find the right answers.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, I want to reassure my colleagues that a lot of progress is being made on tax reform, and in case my colleagues have not had a chance to keep up this week, we have passed a budget that protects Social Security and Medicare better than the President, continues funding for education programs and promises to return over $800 billion of hard-earned dollars to the American taxpayers. So we are making a lot of progress, and there will be real tax reform. The question is when today when I leave this meeting to introduce one tax reform proposal, and my colleagues will see several from the leadership over the next couple of weeks, will our colleagues join in the debate to truly reform this Tax Code? We will have to wait and see. But in the meantime, Mr. Speaker, all of us need to recognize that history has confirmed, and all of us know it, that the temptation to spend money in this Congress is too great for this body to resist. We know that over the last 86 years this government has asked the American people to sacrifice their income and their prosperity to make government more prosperous. Today all we are doing is asking the government to sacrifice its income to make the American people more prosperous. We have got to make it harder for Congress to spend the money, the hard-earned money, of the American taxpayers. Mr. Speaker, there are so many good things to do that come up every day that we want to help with, good causes that sound so good when they are presented. But every little good thing that we try to do, in spite of evidence over the years that we cannot do it nearly as well as individuals and communities, every time we spend money, we take that money out of the pockets of the American taxpayers. We have got to make it harder to spend money. We have got to stop making it harder for Americans to live their lives the way they want, to keep what they earn, to spend it and make decisions in their own lives. Mr. Speaker, all this amendment will do will make it a little harder for this Congress to spend the money of the American people. It does not cut one program, it does not give one penny to the rich, it takes nothing away. All it does is force us to make it a little harder to spend the hard-earned money of the American people. I support the amendment, and I hope all of my colleagues will join me.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Chairman, as a new Member of Congress, it is refreshing today to hear some honesty. I have heard the Members of the President's own party call his budget a straw dog that we are embarrassed to even talk about. It is embarrassing when the President talks about saving Social Security yet continues to spend the Social Security Trust Fund. It is embarrassing when he talks about saving Medicare when he cuts the Medicare budget. It is embarrassing when he raises taxes and makes promises he cannot keep. Now, I know this does not represent the values of my colleagues. It does not represent our values. We need to call this budget what it is. Vote it down and move on to some honest debate with their budget and ours on the table.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, in the next 5 minutes, I want to ask my House colleagues and the people watching at home to help me write a new chapter in the American story. Over the next years, we will be the authors of this new chapter. Tomorrow our children will live this story. As a father of four, nothing could make me feel more secure than knowing that this story includes my children pursuing their dreams and living a life free from dependency on government. Surely, all of us want our children and grandchildren to live in a place where freedom's lamp shines brightly for all people. This is how the American story is read for nearly three centuries. This story began with a band of freedom-loving people who escaped oppression to form a new land of liberty. It is a story of exploration and new beginnings, a story of faith, enterprise, tragedy, and success. Its pages are filled with the names of heroic men and women like Patrick Henry, Frederick Douglas, Susan B. Anthony, and others. It is also filled with lesser known names but no less special: The mothers, fathers, grandparents, teachers, coaches, doctors. We, in every line, in every chapter, the American story is filled with a Nation defined by its people, governed by its citizens, and preserved by those who love freedom. But too many are still uneasy about our future. We lie awake at night worrying about tomorrow. Will our paychecks be enough to cover the bills? Will Social Security be around when we retire? Will we be able to provide the health care our elderly parents need and deserve? Will our children get the education they need to succeed in the next century? We have the ability to give every American more security. But we will have no security, no hope, no opportunity if we trade away our liberty to achieve that security. I believe the gravest threat to our country is from those who promise security in return for our freedom. They promise security in exchange for more of our money and more control of our lives. Some of those in government even act as if they were elected to manage our lives. I believe we were elected to provide a framework of freedom so Americans can manage their own lives. We were also elected to provide a safety net for those in need when families, communities and States are unable to help. But the need for this safety net does not require the confiscation of our freedoms. We must remember that in America, we are most secure when we are most free, when we are in control of our lives. Many believe that the debates in Congress are about which party is for Social Security, Medicare, education and the environment. The fact is we are all for these things. Every Member of the House wants to provide a strong and bright future for our country. The real debate in this Congress day in and day out is about who is going to control your life, you or the government. Many of us here who call ourselves the GOP believe in a government of the people. This means, as it has for three centuries, that the government is controlled by you and your family, not the other way around. We believe in the GOP that we can secure the future for every child when we have an education system that is controlled by parents, teachers and local communities. And we will secure the future for every senior when we guarantee their Social Security benefits today and move towards giving their grandkids a choice to own and control their own Social Security accounts. We believe that we will secure the future for every older American when they have even greater access to quality health care and can choose their own doctors and make their own health care decisions. We will secure the future for our Nation when we rebuild our national defense and can control our borders and live free of the fear of missile attacks. And we will secure the future for every working American when we let them keep more of what they earn, a lot more. Now is the time for us to write our chapter about America, an America that is free and secure and controlled by its people. Let no one edit the American story in a way that makes us dependent on the government or politicians. Let us write about a people that can overcome every challenge, education, jobs, health care, retirement, whatever we face. May our families live freer today than they did yesterday, and may we sustain a Nation that is dependent only upon God and the blessings of freedom. Mr. Speaker, that is my prayer for this Congress and that is my prayer for this Nation.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, on March 10, 1999 I was unavoidably detained and was not present for rollcall vote No. 35. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.''

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.

Mr. DeMINT. I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania.

Mr. DeMINT. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Chairman, I rise to speak against the amendment as well. Ed-Flex is a great bill, and the amendment takes the flex out of the whole bill. This bill does what I think we have been talking about for years. It begins to take dollars, decisions and freedom out of this House and moves it back to houses in our districts. It restores freedom. To me, this bill, flexibility, means more freedom, and I believe that the true accountability comes to teachers and parents and local communities. Last week I had the opportunity to help present an unprecedented fourth national blue ribbon award to Spartanburg High School in South Carolina. This is the only school in America that has won this four times. So my discussions with the principal, administrators and teachers were very interesting to me, because it seems the Federal regulations that we think are helping to build our schools are, to them, just obstacles that they have to dance around to do what they know really works. When I talked to the superintendent, he said, quit funding 5 percent of these programs and demanding 100 percent of the control. We have talked about the fact that it is just 10 percent, and that is right, over 90 percent of the funding for these schools comes from local school districts. But when we tie them up with the type of amendment we are talking about today, this type of control invades all aspects of our public school system. I had a chance to visit Berea Elementary School in Greenville, South Carolina. They had a brand new school. They do not want the Federal Government to build them a new school; they want some new technology. But we will not know what they need from here. I had a chance to walk up the steps with the class from Berea on my way in here today. They are probably watching what we are doing right now. They know that we cannot manage their school from here, and after meeting their principal, I am glad that Ed-Flex will help to keep us from trying. I also visited an elementary school that had an old building but plenty of teachers. We cannot decide for them that they need more teachers when they need something else. I have a son who was playing on a JV basketball team in a public high school. They practiced for about 2 months, but then they had to cancel their game because the girls JV team had not been able to schedule enough games to match theirs and they were afraid of Federal regulation. It is just a little bit, but it invades every aspect of management. I have learned as a quality consultant that one of the biggest obstacles to quality improvement, that we talk about here for education, comes from multiple levels of authority. There is no way we will ever have quality education in America with local control, State control, and Federal control. This bill recognizes that we need to send dollars, decisions and freedom back to the people who are truly accountable. It is really a little insulting, I think, to think that we are more accountable here than governors and mayors and county councils and school boards. Actually, we are a lot less accountable because we can hide here away from them and they cannot blame any one of us. We are not talking about accountability with this amendment, we are talking about control, control that we need to relinquish. I have to take special exception to this idea that our local governments and our States have not done a good job with education. If we track education and our test scores since the Federal Government got involved in the 1970s, there is a direct relationship to the fall of our test scores and the increase in funding from the Federal Government. With every dollar we send them, we send more control. In my State, about 50 percent of the paperwork has to match only about 5 to 7 percent of the funding.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Chairman, in my State they tell me, with only about 6 to 7 percent of their funding coming from the Federal Government, that the Federal regulations count for about 50 percent of the paperwork. This is what we are trying to do away with, and adding regulation, restrictions and more reports to this bill is not going to help. The real threat to our education system is coming from us, because the innovation, the trials are being hindered by them trying to keep up with our paperwork and our regulation. I believe that we can secure the future of every child in America if we recognize that freedom does work when it is in the hands of parents and teachers and local communities; when we give more local control. This bill has the accountability that we need to make sure that we have the plans to match the Federal dollars, but it does not have control that is out of proportion to the funding that we are sending back to the States. I hope all of us will think and vote against this amendment.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of my fellow freshmen Republicans to thank the leadership for recognizing our ideas and allowing us to quickly turn our campaign promises into action. Yesterday the House passed a resolution that directs this body towards real social security reform. That bill was sponsored by a freshman, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Paul Ryan). The gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Lee Terry) has already introduced a bill to eliminate a tax on international home pages, and the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Mark Green) is heading up a project for the freshman class that will reduce Federal mandates on our State governments. We believe local people can best secure our Nation's future: parents, teachers, pastors, small business owners, and civic leaders. These are not only the heroes of our home towns, they are the heroes of our country. The answers to our problems are seldom found here in Washington. They are found on Main Street, in board rooms and community centers, in church sanctuaries and classrooms, and in family rooms all across our Nation. Freshmen Republicans are working to return dollars, decisions, and freedom back home.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate and honor a young South Carolinian from my district who has achieved national recognition for exemplary volunteer service in his community. Benjamin Womick of Spartanburg has just been named one of my state's top honorees in The 1999 Prudential Spirit of Community Awards program, an annual honor conferred on the most impressive student volunteers in the nation. Ben, a senior at Daniel Morgan Vocational Center, is the youngest commissioned state fire marshal in South Carolina history. He has helped to save three houses from destruction, aided in medical assistance calls, and helped many people injured in accidents as a firefighter with a volunteer fire department. Since joining the department at age 17, he has dedicated an average of 2 hours a day to his responsibilities, recruited five friends to become firefighters, and signed up for nearly 350 hours of training. In light of numerous statistics that indicate Americans today are less involved in their communities than they once were, I believe it's vital that we encourage and support the kind of selfless contribution this young citizen has made. People of all ages need to think more about how we, as individual citizens, can work together at the local level to ensure the health and vitality of our towns and neighborhoods. Young volunteers like Ben are inspiring examples to all of us, and are among our brightest hope for a better tomorrow. The program that brought this young role model to our attention--The Prudential Spirit of Community Awards--was created by The Prudential Insurance Corporation of America in partnership with the National Association of Secondary School Principals in 1995 to impress upon all youth volunteers that their contributions are critically important and highly valued, and to inspire other young people to follow their example. In only 4 years, the program has become the nation's largest youth recognition effort based solely on community service, with more than 50,000 youngsters participating. Ben should be extremely proud to have been singled out from such a large group of dedicated volunteers. I heartily applaud Ben for his initiative in seeking to make his community a better place to live, and for the positive impact he has had on the lives of others. He has demonstrated a level of commitment and accomplishment that is truly extraordinary in today's world, and deserves our sincere admiration and respect. His actions show that young Americans can--and do--play important roles in our communities, and that America's community spirit continues to hold tremendous promise for the future.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commend the founding members of the Vision 2020 Initiative and their efforts to eliminate avoidable blindness around the world. These members include Christian Blind Mission International, Inc., located in my Congressional District in South Carolina, Helen Keller International, the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness, ORBIS International, Sight-Savers International and the World Health Organization. On February 18, 1999, these founding members, along with other like- minded organizations, will launch Vision 2020 to eradicate avoidable blindness throughout the world by the year 2020. The Initiative will bring together government leaders, charitable organizations, business leaders and volunteers around the world to form a coalition united in a global fight against preventable blindness. Vision 2020 will focus on controlling disease, developing human resources and producing the infrastructure and technology necessary to eliminate avoidable blindness. The combined effort of every Vision 2020 organization is essential to this unprecedented endeavor. For this reason, I want to also pay tribute to the supporting members of the Vision 2020 Initiative: Al Noor Foundation, Asian Foundation for the Prevention of Blindness, Foundation Dark & Light, The International Eye Foundation, Lighthouse International, Nadi Al Bassar: North African Center for Sight and Visual Science, Operation Eyesight Universal, Organization Pour La Prevention De La Cecite, Perkins School for the Blind, SEVA Foundation, SIMAVI, World Blind Union and The American Academy of Ophthamlology. Mr. Speaker, I applaud Vision 2020 and the impact it will have on the lives of millions of blind, visually impaired, and disabled people, and I congratulate the Vision 2020 members for the monumental nature of their charitable work.