Gil Gutknecht

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. I am glad that you made that point. I certainly did not want to suggest that we are going to eliminate important programs that Americans count on. But I do want to make the point that there is an enormous amount of duplication, and there are a lot of programs that the Federal Government funds even today that are not necessarily effective. We have so much duplication, overlap between the States, the Feds, and so forth. I think you also make a very good point about whether or not we should tamper with the CPI for political or budget reasons. If we are going to change the CPI, it ought to be done by professionals, and it ought to be done for the right reasons, not simply just to balance our budget.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. I might just point out, too, that I was with some school kids yesterday. One of the things, when I am with school kids, I show them my congressional pin and this nice little card case and this voting card, which one of our colleagues, I think 2 years ago, reminded me is the most expensive credit card ever invented in the history of human beings. And it is on this credit card that previous Congresses have run up about $5.3 trillion worth of debt on those schoolchildren. I think it is very graphic when you explain this to schoolchildren. I think most Americans can relate to credit card debt. Every so often we read about someone or we hear about a friend or a neighbor or maybe it is us where we get into trouble with our credit cards, where we are charging more and we have reached a point where we are having more and more difficulty just making the monthly minimum and paying the interest. The Federal Government in some respects is like that person who is having some problems with their credit card debt. They are having more and more difficulty just making the interest payments. If you had a person like that, the last thing you would do for that person, the last thing you would do is say, why do you not start out by going up and running up another $24 billion worth of debt on that credit card. No, I think the American people say, the first thing you ought to do is cut out the credit card. Stop spending more than you take in and do it quickly. Do not do it 5 years from now; do not do it 3 years from now. Do it this year and next year, because every dollar that we can save this year begins to multiply in the outyears. One of reasons we are doing as well as we are, and they were modest changes but I think they will have a profound impact long-term, are the cuts that were made in the last Congress where we eliminated some 289 different programs. Some of them were not great big programs but when you pull a program out by the roots, you do not have to feed it year after year. So the savings actually multiply as you go forward. This is the number that concerns me, and I think it concerns the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Kasich] and the Committee on the Budget and, frankly, should be of concern to all the Members of Congress and the American people, because you do not start out going on a diet by gaining 10 pounds. That is just not good. And you do not try to solve your credit card debt problems by running up even more debt on your credit card in the very first year of the budget.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I yield to my colleague, the gentleman from the great State of New Jersey [Mike Pappas] who has joined the discussion tonight to talk a little bit about the budget and balancing the budget and from his perspective as a new Member of this body. We welcome him to this special order tonight and hope it will not be the last time he will join us.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. If I could, gentlemen, our time is just about expired. We will have to wrap it up here, but I do want to thank my colleagues for participating tonight. I want to say, in part, with the spirit of what transpired in Hershey, PA, that we do look forward to an honest and civil debate about the great issues facing this country, and nothing can be more important than stopping the business of mortgaging our children's future and, in the end, it provides real benefits. Not only is it the morally right thing to do to balance the budget, but it is the economically smart thing to do. I think if we work together and have a civil debate, then I think we ultimately can succeed in that. Important now is that we all begin to speak the same language. If the President is speaking OMB and we are speaking CBO, it is going to make that job even more difficult. So in the next several weeks, what we hope to do is try to get the White House and the Congress to at least be speaking the same language. Then we can have that civil debate and, ultimately, I think we can reach an agreement during this Congress which will be historic, which will leave a legacy that we can all be proud of and ultimately lead to a stronger economic growth, more jobs, better jobs, and the ability of more American families to have the American dream. So again I want to thank my colleagues for joining me.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. We only have about 10 minutes left, but we have been joined by our distinguished colleague from Georgia [Mr. Kingston], if he wishes to grace us with some of his thoughts relative to the budget.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. The other gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pappas], any other closing thoughts?

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Well, I would have to say it this way, that I was one of those who was not all that eager to go along, and it was guilt that got me to go to Hershey, PA. It may have been the chocolate that kept me there after the first several hours. But I must tell you as the weekend went along it was a very valuable experience, not only for me, but I hope for my colleagues and, most importantly, I think, for the American people. I think that the American people sent us sort of a message in the last congressional elections. What they said in effect was that we want the Republicans to continue to control the House of Representatives and the Senate, but we want President Clinton, the Democrat, to run the executive branch of Government, and we want there to be some checks and balances, but what they also said is they want us to work together as much as we possibly can. And one of the valuable things, I think, that came out of Hershey is we now, all of us who were there at least, have a little better understanding of a sense of history, and if you look at this institution, the House of Representatives, there have been some rather bloody fights on this House floor. I mean there have been Members who have been caned, there have been fist fights, there have been arguments----

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, under both sets of scoring, and I think that is an accurate point, both the Congressional Budget Office and OMB acknowledge that in the first year, and this is really the only budget that counts for this Congress, is the budget we are going to debate for fiscal year 1998, both would agree that the deficit actually goes up this year, which in the view of some of us is a step in the wrong direction, because we have been moving in the right direction. Partly, and let us give some credit, we want to give credit to the White House and to the economy and other things, but part of it is that the 104th Congress did confront some of those spending issues. Mr. Speaker, we did make some real reductions in discretionary domestic spending, and it is showing some impact. The deficit now is about half of what it was when Congressman Fox and I first came to Washington. As a matter of fact, it is less than half of what it was when we first came to Washington. I would point out this other chart. This again is according to the Congressional Budget Office, which is the official scorekeeper for the House and the Senate, that the deficit will be about $69 billion in the year 2002. To get to the other point that the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Saxton] made, 98 percent of the deficit reduction comes in the last 2 years of the President's budget plan. That is one of the concerns we have that is entirely too heavily what we call backend-loaded. Actually, according to the CBO, the increase in the deficit will be about $24 billion more than it would have been if this Congress did nothing.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman. As I said earlier, we need to have an honest debate about the numbers. Before we can have an honest and civil debate about the budget, we have to be speaking the same language. We cannot have a debate where I am speaking in German and someone else is speaking in French and someone else is speaking in another language altogether. One of the problems we have in terms of our debate about the budget is we tend to be speaking in Congressional Budget Office terms, and the President this year is speaking in terms of the Office of Management and Budget. They take different assumptions. Right now the Congressional Budget Office has gone through the budget that the President submitted, and what they have told us is that actually total deficit goes up under the President's plan in the first couple of years and then begins to come down; but even in the last year of the President's budget, the year 2002, he is still about $69 billion short. Now, we do not really want to have a debate about the Congressional Budget Office, who is more accurate, the CBO or the OMB or whomever, because I think sometimes the American people do not understand that. But what I hope they will understand is that, before we can have a debate about the budget, we all have to be speaking the same language. So one of the things I think we need to get in agreement with the White House on over the next couple of weeks is what are the assumptions we are going to use. One of the things we could do, and I learned this when I was in the State legislature and served on the Pension Commission, is that assumptions are everything. If we assume an economic growth rate, for example, of 3.5 percent over the next 5 years, frankly you do not have to make much in terms of budget changes in terms of the spending side, because the economic growth will solve it. If we assume a very low interest rate, it has a dramatic impact on the deficit. As a matter of fact, we were told by the Congressional Budget Office in the Committee on the Budget a couple of weeks ago that, if interest rates change by one-quarter of 1 percent, either up or down, it changes the deficit by $50 billion over the next 5 years. So one of the things we want to do is hopefully get the White House and the Congress to at least be using the same assumptions so that we are speaking the same language. As I say, then we can have a civil and honest debate about which items we are going to increase and which ones we are going to reduce. I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. But we have had more than our share of fisticuffs that were associated with the debate here on the floor. We have also had periods where there was consensus building, cooperation, and much more agreement and ability to work together in a civilized way. I think what will happen as a result of what we saw in Hershey is hopefully both sides will begin to reach out to the other side. I think in the end what we really need to do is agree where we can agree, have honest debate where we disagree. And I think the American people expect that, but I think they also expect us to compromise where we can. Mr. Speaker, I would hope that over the next several months and over the balance of this 105th Congress we will see more civilized debate. There has been entirely too much trivializing, too much demonizing, too much personalizing the debate that occurs on the floor of this House. We are going to have an honest discussion tonight about the budget. We obviously have a somewhat different view of the President's budget and the need to balance the budget perhaps than some of our colleagues. I brought with me some charts, and I am going to walk down there in a few minutes, and we are going to talk about what the President has proposed, what we might dispose. But I think most importantly we need to talk about, what does this mean to the average American family? What is this balancing the budget all about? Is it just some kind of an accounting exercise, or does it really ultimately impact real families and real Americans in homes and in the neighborhoods where they live? Mr. Speaker, I think as we go through and talk a little bit about this, I think we can demonstrate that this really does have a dramatic impact not only on Americans today but, more importantly, on Americans in the future. We have some very serious problems, but I think, if we approach them in a cooperative relationship, a respectful relationship where we can have a civil and honest debate about the great issues facing our country today, then I think both the Congress and the American people will have been well served by what transpired up in Hershey, PA. I would just say publicly for the benefit of those who may be watching back in Pennsylvania, I know we cannot refer to them, but I would like to thank them and all the folks from Pennsylvania for everything that they put into the weekend, because they really did a wonderful job and showed us tremendous hospitality. It was a beautiful setting, wonderful people. I think I gained about 4 pounds in 3 days, but it was just fantastic. I would also just share one more thing that relates to Pennsylvania. I reminded some of the folks who were in my group, and I intend to do a 1-minute tomorrow morning and talk about, among other things, one of the things that Benjamin Franklin said. During the Continental Congress, there were some rather bitter and vicious debates that took place on the floor of those meetings. And after several days of very bitter rancor, debate going on in the Continental Congress, one morning Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania rose slowly at the back of the House Chambers and he said, ``Let us for a moment, Mr. Speaker, contemplate our own fallibility.'' Mr. Speaker, one of the things that we discussed in some of our sessions in Hershey was that there are two things that I think we need more of in this body. One is a little more humility, and second is a little more humor. Hopefully, we can bring that about in the coming days and weeks of this debate. Tonight we want to talk about the budget, what it means to average Americans; talk a little bit about why the President's budget leaves a little to be desired. It is a starting point but something we have to work on with our colleagues here in the Congress and with the folks down at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. I am going to move down here and turn it back to the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Fox].

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to a very special man, a man who loves his family and loves his country, my friend Steve Korpf. Steve Korpf and I have been friends for about 10 years. He exemplifies what all of us cherish: faith, character, and courage. During our 10-year friendship Steve has been battling various forms of cancer. He is now in a fight that the doctors tell him he is not going to win. His friends in Mankato, MN, are organizing a tribute and benefit on February 22 to help defray the cost of his long battle. I am pleased to support their efforts and will hopefully be able to be present that evening to honor a truly special American. My prayers are with Steve and his wife Dorothy as well as his family. I know that my life has been enriched for having known him. Thank you, Steve, for being one of my heroes.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey for yielding me time. Mr. Speaker, today, I am pleased that the House is giving final consideration to a H.R. 3068, a bill to repeal the corporate charter of the Prairie Island Dakota Community in Minnesota. The Senate added two noncontroversal amendments to this bill which extend the deadline to complete water rights settlements for tribes in New Mexico and Arizona. The Prairie Island Tribe contacted me last June requesting revocation of their 1934 charter. By law, revoking this 62-year-old document can only be done by an act of Congress. In its entire tribal government history, Prairie Island has never used its corporate charter in the management of its enterprises. H.R. 3068 passed the House and Senate by voice vote. The bill acknowledges that the people of Prairie Island know best how to handle their business activities. It is another example of this Congress sending control back to local communities, and I am proud to be part of that process.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. I would like to thank my colleague from Mississippi and I am delighted we have a good turnout tonight of some of our fellow freshmen. I would like to talk a little bit first of all about the revisionist history. I think it was Mark Twain who said, ``Truth is incontrovertible. Ignorance may deride it, jealousy may attack it, but in the end there it is.'' I think if the American people will take just a few minutes to examine what we promised 2 years ago tomorrow, and what this Congress actually delivered for the American people, I think they will come to the conclusion that first of all we meant what we said, we said what we meant, and that in the end I think their will has been done by this Congress. For the first time in 40 years, we have a Congress that not only has listened to the American people but has responded as well. I don't want to take too much time tonight, but I do want to share a couple of observations and memories of those days, and those days that I remember, the most remarkable days of all, were those glorious days and the first was on September 27, 1994 when we signed the contract. It was a glorious day. In fact, if you recall, it was kind of cloudy early in the morning but as we approached the Capitol steps, and there were over 300 of us there, the sun began to shine and it was almost like it was providence or prophetic that the sun came out on America again and that there was going to come a day when the sun would shine here on this Capitol and inside this Capitol building as well. The other day that I remember that was so glorious was election day. I don't know if ever I told this story or not, but when we were watching the returns back in Rochester, Minnesota, I think it was Dan Rather, he announced that it appeared that I was going to win the 1st Congressional District seat, a seat that had been held by the Democrats for 12 years, and in the next breath, he said, ``It now appears that the Republicans will have enough votes to control the United States House of Representatives and that Newt Gingrich will be the next Speaker of the House.'' Well, that was certainly a glorious day for me and I think for all of us here. But again I think it was a glorious day for all Americans. And then of course the other glorious day was the day that we were all sworn in and for the first time in 40 years the power of the United States House of Representatives changed hands. I will never forget the very next day, Dick Armey, our majority leader, I was standing behind him and he was interviewed by a reporter, I think, from the New York Times, and the reporter asked our majority leader, the reporter asked, ``How does it feel now that the American people have given you this power?'' And he said something incredibly important then. He said, ``The American people haven't given us power. They loaned us power. They gave us responsibility.'' And so we began on the Contract With America and on that very first day, I remember 2 days before, I was called by the leadership and I was asked if I would take the leadership role on the adoption of the rule for the very first bill, H.R. 1, the Congressional Accountability Act. I sort of thought about it a minute and I said, Well, I'm not certain that I can handle that much responsibility on my very first day on the job but I said yes. And the interesting thing was that the leadership had enough confidence in this freshman class that they let us take the lead on the adoption of every rule of the first 10 items of changing the rules of the House the very first day on the job here in the House of Representatives. We marched through it that night, we passed the Congressional Accountability Act, we passed the Congressional Audit Act, we made, as I say, the House live by the same laws as everybody else. We ended the idea that chairmen of committees could serve forever. We put term limits on chairmen. We opened up the committee process. We eliminated proxy voting. All of that happened on the very first day and what a glorious day it was. And it was as if almost that the dam had broken and we had begun to change the course of history. And then we marched on down through the rest of the contract and again I was very proud of this House, because every day, I will never forget as well when we started the House sessions, we would read the Contract With America and it kept us on message, it kept us in focus, it kept us doing what we said we were going to do. So it was a very positive time in American history and I was very proud to have played a part of it. I know we have got other freshman colleagues and I know they have got a lot of other observations, but I thank the gentleman from Mississippi for asking for this special order and I am thankful that I have had an opportunity to participate.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. I thank the gentleman. I think sometimes our critics here in the House, and some of the folks in the media, sometimes have tended to say that, well, we cannot balance the budget and provide tax relief at the same time. And I think the beauty of the budget plan that was put together by the gentleman from Ohio, Mr. Kasich, and others, was that it demonstrated that if we do it over 7 years and we limit the growth in entitlements and make some cuts in domestic discretionary spending while we freeze defense spending that we can balance the budget in 7 years and allow American families to keep a little more of what they work for and what they earn. Sometimes we do have to bring this all back. What does it mean? What does a balanced budget and reduced taxes mean to the working families of Minnesota? What does that really mean to them? Well, it means that more of the power is being returned to them. As Senator Phil Gramm says, I know the family and I know the Federal Government and I know the difference. And every Sunday American families sit around their kitchen tables or their coffee tables and they clip 120 million coupons from their newspapers worth an average of 63 cents. That is how families balance their budget every single week. Now, when is the last time my colleagues saw a Federal bureaucracy clipping coupons? As a matter of fact, what happens at the end of their budget cycle is they try to figure out how to spend every last penny so they will not be cut next year. Let me just say that it ultimately means a balanced budget and tax relief for working families so that they can afford new homes and new cars, and so that there will be more jobs for the folks who need them. It means more security for our seniors and it ultimately means more opportunity for our kids. I think, in the end, that is really what this debate is all about, it is about more accountability in Washington and more responsibility and authority and resources being returned to the American families. And that is where it should be, because they know how to balance the budget, they know how to get the job done. It is not a decision about whether we are going to have more money for children or their nutrition or their education, it is a debate about who gets to do the spending, and we believe in families.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, in November 1994 the American people sent a very clear message and Republicans were elected to restore the bonds of trust between the American people and their Government. We have cut spending and are continuing on the path to a balanced budget. We are returning power and decisionmaking ability to States and local governments. We are eliminating the failed welfare state that has entrapped fellow Americans in poverty and despair. We passed health care reform legislation to make it easier for people to have insurance. Rather than impose government mandates and create more bureaucracy, Republicans are getting government out of Americans' lives so they can do more for their families, children, and communities. This Republican Congress is historic because we are keeping our commitments to the American people to end business as usual in Washington.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the House for the opportunity to spend some time tonight to talk about an issue that has probably generated more mail and more phone calls and more responses from our constituents than virtually any issue since I joined the Congress just 18 months ago. I speak tonight about the issue of partial birth abortions. I think we need to first of all talk a little bit about what in fact a partial birth abortion is. I had hoped to have some charts to show to my colleagues and those who may be watching on cable TV tonight what exactly a partial birth abortion is. But let me just say that in many respects it is a late term abortion in which the baby is virtually completely delivered and only the head of the baby is allowed to remain inside the womb, and then the doctor, the abortionist I think is a more accurate term, the abortionist takes a scissors and inserts that scissors into the back of the baby's brain, then using a very powerful suction device actually sucks out the brains of the baby. Then the baby is delivered. Of course, the baby is delivered dead. It is true that in many respects in some of the abortions that are performed using this procedure, the babies are badly deformed and they have very little chance of surviving. I think we have to be honest and say that in some respects that is true. But in many respects, that is not true. Many times this is used just as a simple late term, what I would describe as a late term version of protracted birth control, where the baby is actually being destroyed simply because the baby is inconvenient to the mother at that particular point in her life. On April 10, 1996, President Bill Clinton used his veto pen to perpetuate a tragedy that results in the destruction of innocent babies. It was on that date that the President vetoed H.R. 1833, the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act. I believe that every abortion actually involves two victims, both the baby and the mother, and I believe that every abortion sadly takes the life of an innocent child. I do understand politically that the American people and the Nation has not yet reached a consensus on saying that all abortions should be banned in this country. But I do believe that in late term abortions like this, particularly when they are performed with this grisly procedure, that I think most Americans are prepared to say that this procedure ought to be outlawed and we ought to say that this is one procedure that is not legal under our system of laws. As I said, in most respects the baby is pulled from the mother's womb legs first, and then a scissors is inserted in the baby's skull, opening them to enlarge a hole so that a suction catheter can then be inserted and the baby's brains are sucked out, causing the skull to collapse. The difference between this heinous procedure and homicide is literally only a matter of inches. Regardless of one's position on abortion, and I do understand and I try to be empathetic and sympathetic to those who have different views than mine about the whole system of abortion and what should be legal and what should not be legal in this United States, it is clear that a vast majority of Americans supporting banning this particular procedure. In fact, I think the more that the American people learn about this particular procedure, the more that they say that we cannot be a society that tolerates this. If you look back to our history in our earlier discussions about the budget and other issues, there was some reference to our Founding Fathers. I would like to share with you a couple of things that our Founding Fathers said that I think in some respects reflect upon this particular issue. Thomas Jefferson said that if you give the American people the truth, the Republic will be saved. I think the more that the American people learn about this particular procedure, the more they learn the truth about this procedure, the more that they will demand that public policymakers take the correct action and make it illegal. Jefferson also wrote these immortal words when he talked about we the people, he said that we were endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights and that among those are the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I for one do not believe that it was purely coincidence that he listed the right to life as chief among them. And I think that he understood, the Founding Fathers understood and, frankly, I think if Americans are honest with themselves they understand, that life is something more than just a biological accident, that it is a gift from a power greater than that of any government. While I have already admitted that we probably do not have the political consensus to eliminate abortion from our American system today, I think that there is a growing consensus that this particular procedure can be and should be outlawed. It is not really surprising that the American Medical Association's legislative counsel, a panel consisting of 12 doctors, unanimously voted last year to recommend banning this procedure. One of the doctors, the AMA counsel, described the partial birth abortion procedure as ``basically repulsive.'' Proponents of this heinous partial birth abortion procedure, including President Clinton, contend that there are legitimate reasons for doctors to use it. But under closer scrutiny, it is clear that their defense of this procedure is akin to infanticide and is based on inaccurate or false information. First, Mr. Speaker, let me say that partial birth abortion proponents contend that this procedure is primarily used on babies with abnormalities or deformities. Well, Dr. Martin Haskell, who has performed more than 1,000 partial birth abortions told the American Medical News that 80 percent of the partial birth abortions he performed between 20 and 25 weeks, or about 4\1/2\ to 5\1/2\ months of gestation, were ``purely elective.'' Second, partial birth abortion proponents claim that babies die in the womb as a result of the anesthesia administered to the mother and therefore they do not feel any pain from the procedure. The American Society of Anesthesiologists set the record straight. When its president, Dr. Norig Ellison, said that those claims have ``absolutely no basis in scientific fact.'' Third, partial birth abortion proponents argue that this procedure is often necessary to protect the health of the mother. But again, Dr. Pamela Smith, director of medical education in the department of obstetrics and gynecology at Mt. Sinai Hospital in Chicago, says ``there are absolutely no obstetrical situations encountered in this country which require a partially delivered human fetus to be destroyed to preserve the life or health of the mother.'' I might add, Mr. Speaker, that in the bill that was drafted and sent to the President, we made certain allowances where if in fact the health or the life of the mother was at stake, that these procedures could go forward. Moreover, though, Dr. Smith says that the partial birth abortion itself poses maternal health risks. Because the procedure involves 3 days of forceful dilation to the cervix, the mother risks damaging her reproductive organs. Uterine rupture is also a documented complication associated with this procedure. Opponents of the partial birth abortion ban advocate including an exception to the ban of the health of the mother, as I said. Why? Because the ban opponents know that the exception would render these bills meaningless. The U.S. Supreme Court has defined health as including ``all factors--physical, psychological, familial, and the women's age--relevant to the well-being of the patient.'' Therefore, the health exception would allow abortionists to continue to perform these partial birth abortions for reasons such as depression or youth of the mother. Despite the misinformation campaign being waged by the proponents of this violent procedure, President Clinton and the abortion advocates have placed themselves outside the mainstream of American thinking. In fact, the Roman Catholic Church and the leaders of that church are so upset with the President's veto that they held a press conference to denounce his decision. They also recently distributed over 27 million postcards at churches all across the Nation. They have been mobilizing their parishioners to bombard Congress with one message: ``Override the President's veto and outlaw certain late-term abortions.'' We checked with the post office here at the U.S. House of Representatives today, and they tell us there is a backlog of over 1.1 million of these cards which are coming to Members of Congress. I want to talk also tonight a little bit about one particular hero, a gentleman by the name of John Joyce who is the president of the International Union of Bricklayers and Allied Craftsmen. He is one person who broke ranks with the AFL-CIO and rejected its endorsement of President Clinton because of President's veto of partial birth abortions. I want to talk a little bit about that. This is a gentleman I think some Members will remember. We have probably remembered the book that was written by John Kennedy called ``Profiles in Courage.'' And I would say that if a new version of that book were being written, certainly John Joyce, the president of the International Union of Bricklayers and Allied Craftsmen would certainly deserve a chapter because it took an enormous amount of courage for him to stand up and say that President Clinton was wrong because of his veto of partial birth abortions and that he could not support him. Joyce said that the veto is so, and I quote, he said: It so outraged him that he could not support President Clinton even though he thought the President would be much better for working people than would Bob Dole. I could only go so far as my mind and conscience are willing to take me. This is one example, and I think there are many examples, of Americans across the country who have said that enough is enough. This is one area where I think the President has gone too far. John Joyce, as I say, should find himself a chapter in the next version of ``Profiles in Courage'' because he had the courage to stand up and say this is wrong and, despite what my union says, despite what the members say, despite what the labor bosses in Washington say, I cannot support President Clinton because of this particular issue. I am pleased to have with me tonight and join with me someone who has been a longtime advocate for the rights of the unborn and someone who particularly understands the whole issue of partial birth abortions, probably is much more of an expert in Roman Catholic teaching than I have ever been. I am pleased to have join me tonight the gentleman from Orange County, CA, the Honorable Robert K. Dornan. I would yield to him for a few moments to talk a little bit about this issue, what we can do, where we stand and perhaps where we can go from here.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Karol Wojtyla.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. There are only about four or five of some of the most despicable people in the world.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I would say to the gentleman from California [Mr. Dornan], I am afraid I cannot explain that. It is one of the most troubling things we have confronted in this Congress, that we have watched the unraveling of our moral fabric. And somehow the media, and I am not one to point fingers or point blame, because I am not a fault-finder. The bad news is that I think the American people have somewhat become numbed to this kind of thing. I think there needs to be a reawakening. When the Pope and the Catholic Church, and there have only been a handful of people who have received official condemnation of this Vatican, of the Vatican in general. It is a very short list. It is a rather infamous list. Yet, he now finds himself on that list.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Are not they Irish? Is that not the ultimate Irish organization?

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Absolutely, and the world is full of them. But I just want to bring to your attention a quote also from one of the Framers of our Constitution. John Adams said that our Constitution was intended for a moral and religious people. It would be wholly inadequate for any other. I think they understood, and I think we understand, and I think the American people understand the morality, principles, values; you cannot separate them from our Constitution or even from our codified law. In fact, I think many Americans forget sometimes that the Founding Fathers believed that the law, the body of law, was the bare minimum of expectation from moral behavior, that there ought to be actually a higher standard, and yet somehow we have been reduced to the lowest common denominator. And I think one of the reasons this whole issue of the partial-birth abortion, the reason I think it cuts so many people right down to the bone and the reason it has generated so much interest and so many letters and so many calls and so many postcards from our constituents is because I think they begin to understand that there is something happening in this country, and it is not just partial-birth abortion. It is about the basic unraveling of the moral fiber of this culture, and our Constitution was intended for a moral and religious people. It would be wholly inadequate for any other. Those words were true when John Adams said them almost 200 years ago. They are absolutely true today, and I think--so in many respects partial-birth abortion and the unraveling of our society, the unraveling of the moral fabric, are all sort of symptoms of a greater disease. That is not to say that I think the American people are turning to the Congress or they are turning to politicians to become the keepers of the moral flame, but I do think that they expect us to be a good example, and I think they do expect us to set certain standards and certain minimum standards, and whether or not we can totally make all abortions illegal or whether we even should, I think is a separate question. We certainly can, and I think the American people are saying loudly and clearly we can and we should make this particular grisly procedure illegal here in the United States.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Bricklayers.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Was not that long ago.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. I will never forget, and I think the American People and the American press did not really pick up on this, but there was a particular pint in history when there was a lot of fear that the Soviets were going to--when Lech Walesa was leading the Solidarity movement in Poland, there was a lot of belief that the Soviets were going to move in with tanks to reoccupy Poland. There was one particular moment in history where a man of enormous courage literally sent a message to the Soviets that if you come to Poland, I will be there to meet you. That is the kind of courage that it took.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. And it was based on the basic notion that families can spend this money far more efficiently than the Federal bureaucracy. And I doubt if there is anybody in this room or anybody in Congress or anybody who is watching this at home who doubts the basic wisdom of that. Families are very responsible for the resources that they have. Let me tell a quick personal story. We have just a couple of minutes and I will close with this. I was raised in a family with three boys. My dad was a life-long member of the AFL-CIO. He worked in a factory. The largest single payment that my family made when I was growing up was their house payment. But for the average family today, the largest payment they make is to the government. The average family trying to raise three kids today spends more for taxes than for food, clothing, and shelter combined, and we believe that they ought to have some tax relief.