Billy Tauzin

Mr. TAUZIN

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. In response to my friend, let me point out, this amendment does not establish guilt or innocence. It does not say after 6 months one is either guilty or innocent. That is why the provisions of dismissal without prejudice are included in this amendment. Without prejudice means the committee makes no decision of guilt or innocence. It says, ``We are deadlocked, we cannot decide.'' Unless one is really serious about this complaint and refiles it, we cannot handle it. Let me make this simple statement and I hope my colleagues take it to heart. Dishonest, politically motivated complaints brought before our Committee on Standards of Official Conduct do as much damage to the integrity of this House and the political process in America as do honest complaints that are not properly handled. Dishonest, politically motivated complaints brought before our Committee on Standards of Official Conduct that hang out there, undecided, with no message coming out of the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct about what is going on, do more damage to the integrity of our process than an honest complaint that is mishandled. I believe that is true. If we have any doubts about how ugly and how awful our politics have gotten, go back and read, I think it was a Time Magazine essay several years ago which talked about the nature of our politics in America today. It said, in effect, that if we have spent all of these years on television and all of these years on 1-minutes denigrating one another personally, talking about each other's motives, talking about how awful we personally are in this process, then we have done a great job because Americans tend not to believe us all. I used to joke when the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Livingston] and I ran for Governor of Louisiana, that he went around the State for a year telling people how I would make a terrible Governor, and I went around the State for a year telling them what a terrible Governor he would make, and they ended up believing both of us and they elected Buddy Roemer. The fact of the matter is that as Democrats and Republicans talk so evil about each other, as our campaigns and our ethics complaints become so politically motivated, we destroy not just the person we attack, we destroy the entire process and the integrity of our institutions. The Time Magazine article went on to say that if Burger King and McDonald's had spent 10 years on television not telling us about how good their hamburgers were, but if they had spent 10 years on television telling us how the other guy's hamburgers were going to kill us, we would not stop eating the other guy's hamburgers, we would not eat hamburgers anymore. That is what is happening in the American political process. Americans are convinced by Democrats that Republicans are rotten and convinced by Republicans that Democrats are rotten, and we wonder why more people are registering independent, and we wonder why only 49 percent of Americans even chose to vote in the last Presidential election. We wonder why Americans are turned off. It is because our processes promote the kind of ugly political slander that so many of these charges before the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct have now come to represent. All I am saying is that after 6 months the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct cannot even decide to go forward or backward on a complaint, it ought to issue this letter, not of guilt or innocence, a simple letter saying that, without prejudice, we no longer consider this complaint before us, unless somebody re-brings it because they really think it is serious. That is the least we ought to do to begin cleaning up this process, depoliticizing it, and returning to some kind of comity and respect for one another, not only as human beings but as people who dedicate their lives and their careers to public service. I happen to enjoy my service here not just because of what I do. I happen to enjoy it because I am able to work with some of the best people I know in this country, people who sacrifice their families, their time, their money, their possibilities of great careers in other adventures in this country to spend time here in Washington debating the great issues of the day. I am proud of the great majority of my colleagues for that. I am proud and, indeed, I am excited about getting to know my colleagues and having shared this experience in public service. Why do we keep denigrating this House? Why do we allow our ethics process to become a political process instead? Do we not have enough ugly politics in America that we have to bring it into the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct in this House? Can we not end it? Can we not adopt this little amendment that says after 6 months, if we are tied up politically over an ethics complaint, that somebody ought to get a letter saying we are tied up politically and we cannot move forward or backward and we dismiss it, without prejudice, until and unless somebody brings it forward with credible evidence, for somebody on one side or the other to agree to move forward or backward on the complaint. This is just one small effort to bring some sense, some common sense and some dignity back into our process. Please take this amendment seriously. Please consider voting for it. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, let me first congratulate the House on the last vote, and also simultaneously congratulate the committee on the fine work it did in bringing this package to the floor. I believe the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Livingston] and the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Cardin] have done this House a great service, and all committee members, in the work they have done. However, the last vote points out that the House Members do see a need to make additional improvements in the package, and the strong vote just occurred to make sure that this process is as depoliticized as possible is an indication that Members in fact have that intent today. I hope Members have the same intent as you examine the next issue that is embodied in this amendment. Mr. Chairman, I think it is time we faced an ugly fact, and that ugly fact is that the ethics process over the last several Congresses, perhaps reaching back even beyond the last several, has become heavily politicized. It is one thing for honest ethics complaints to be made and addressed by our Committee on Standards of Official Conduct and eventually by the Members on this floor; it is another thing for ethics complaints to be filed purely for political purposes, meant to discredit and disarm and to take away people's credibility in this Chamber as we try to debate the issues of national import. The ethics process is supposed to be an internal process whereby we honestly in a bipartisan manner examine the complaints that are honestly raised about Members' conduct in order to serve ethically in this Chamber. When that process is politicized, as it has been over the last several Congresses, and I say perhaps even beyond that, to the point that ethics complaints amount to tens, and even sometimes multiples of tens complaints against Members, most of which are found to have no merit, many of which just hang around with the tie vote of Democrats and Republicans on the committee, never having that ethics complaint resolved because in fact it is tied up as a political complaint, that I think you get the picture of how badly the process dissolves into anarchy. If we want to make this process secure, we have to reach some balances in it. We have to ensure that honest ethical complaints do in fact have time to mature at the committee, that the committee has a chance to investigate them, that information can flow in, to either decide for the committee that it must move forward on that complaint, or that it should reject it as a frivolous or political charge. That time necessary for this to happen is debatable, but this amendment speaks of it in about a 6-month time period. It says in effect that after over 6 months of hearings or intense examination by the committee, if an ethics complaint is still deadlocked, something ought to be done. If it is clearly a real and substantial complaint, that 6-month time period will not stop its refiling nor stop its consideration by the committee. But if it is a frivolous one, tied up on a tie vote based upon politics, Democrats voting one way, Republicans voting the other way, because it is a political complaint, then it seems to many of us in this Chamber that after 6 months something ought to happen. Now, what ought to happen? I want to point out, I did not enter this debate because I am a member of the committee. I got involved because many Members have expressed concerns about this package and have asked us to try to work to perfect it even more. I would urge Members to please follow this debate, because it is critical to the integrity of this institution and our ethics process. Mr. Chairman, what should happen after 6 months? Should a complaint be automatically dismissed with prejudice because it is tied up on a tie vote politically? The answer is no, it should not be automatically dismissed with prejudice, because in fact it may be a good complaint. It may be that we simply cannot get past our partisan nature to deal with it, to move forward on it. So dismissing it with prejudice is, I think, a wrong option, and I have not chosen that option in this amendment. What we have suggested in this amendment is that after 6 months, if a complaint is tied up on a tie vote, the committee cannot move forward nor backwards on it, something ought to happen. What we suggest is that it ought to be dismissed without prejudice, that a letter ought to go out to the person who is accused saying we cannot go forward or backwards; we are dismissing it without prejudice. What happens then? If it is a frivolous complaint, it is very likely it will not get refiled the next day. If it is a serious complaint, it is very likely somebody will refile it the next day and insist that the committee take it up, and perhaps provide additional information to make sure the committee can possibly break this political deadlock. If it is a frivolous complaint and one is the subject of that frivolous complaint, at least he will have a letter saying that after 6 months the committee could not decide to move forward or backwards on it. He has something in his hand to say that this is likely politics. If it is filed again the next day because somebody believes it is serious enough, he is going to have to deal with it again, and rightly so. It is simply an attempt to set some time limits on these deadlocked ethics complaints that hang over one like the sword of Damocles, constantly reminding people that you perhaps may not be ethical, constantly shadowing and overshadowing your efforts to have a credible debate in this House. I suggest there is no better way to discredit someone in politics today than to discredit them personally. That is the subject of our campaigns lately. We do not argue ideas any more. We do not argue how good we might serve in public office. Too often our campaigns are how bad the other person is and how rotten they are personally. The ethics process has now become a part of that. We ought to deplore that trend in our ethics system in this body, because it denigrates from the integrity of this body itself. What we are saying is if this thing is going to continue to be politicized, if frivolous political complaints are going to continue to be filed, they ought not hang out over people indefinitely. Someone in this Chamber ought to eventually get a letter saying we cannot break the deadlock, it is tied up politically at the committee, and unless someone is willing again to refile and reinstitute it, that you at least have a letter saying so, so you can properly deal with it and move on with your life and public service. Now, is that a protection for the Member alone? The last amendment and this amendment that Members are suggesting to this package are not just designed to protect a Member against frivolously or politically motivated attacks or charges. This amendment is designed to protect this institution, because as the ethics process itself is supposed to weed out those unethical characters who arrive here, it is also designed and it is supposed to protect this institution from the political processes that have become so ugly in America, that tend to destroy the integrity and the credibility of all of us who try to work in the interests of our constituents and the national good. I suggest to you this is a very modest amendment. It does not end a complaint that is valid. It simply after 6 months sends a letter out to the person saying at this point we are dismissing it without prejudice so that you and everybody else can know that the committee has deadlocked, it has not moved forwards or backwards. I suggest this is a good, valid improvement on the package, and I urge the adoption of this amendment. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania for yielding me the time. Mr. Chairman, I rise not in defense of any one of my colleagues who might be charged with an ethics complaint, certainly not in defense of myself should I ever suffer that fate. I rise in defense of this institution. If my colleagues think this institution already belongs to special-interest groups because of the money that flows into politics, then dare they turn this institution to outside groups, who can hold each one of them hostage with a threat of an ethics complaint in order to get their way on this House floor? If they want to turn this body over to the outside groups, vote against the Murtha amendment. That will do it. If they want to preserve in this House our own obligation to police ourselves, then vote for the Murtha amendment.

Mr. TAUZIN

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to explore the issues presented by H.R. 1903, the Computer Security Enhancement Act of 1997, some of which are within the jurisdiction of the Committee on Commerce. The main purpose of H.R. 1903 appears to be to update the Computer Security Act of 1987 to improve computer security for Federal civilian agencies. This is a laudable goal. However, certain provisions of the bill before us today are not limited to issues within the purview of the National Institute of Standards and Technology [NIST], or to the improvement of computer security for Federal civilian agencies. Therefore, I must make note of the fact that the House Committee on Commerce maintains a strong jurisdictional interest in the telecommunications and commerce issues addressed in H.R. 1903. For example, the findings listed in section 2 of H.R. 1903 include language asserting that the development and use of encryption should not be driven by Government requirements, and that export policy should be determined in light of the public availability of comparable encryption products outside the United States. Neither of these findings, nor policies to promote the findings, are within the scope of the Computer Security Act of 1987, or the authority of NIST. Several provisions of H.R. 1903 address the use and development of a public key management infrastructure. Public key management infrastructure is an issue between private entities and law enforcement officials. Such infrastructure does not currently exist and is not part of the administrative question of how to improve computer security for Federal civilian agencies. In addition, H.R. 1903 calls for the establishment of a national panel on digital signatures. While the formation of a panel may or my not be the right course of action, the issue is a question of electronic commerce that is completely outside the scope of this legislation. Finally, H.R. 1903, as reported by the Committee on Science, included language that would have transferred authority currently vested in the Bureau of Export Administration to NIST. I understand this language regarding the determination of whether a product is generally available abroad has been removed from the bill before us today. However, the existence of the provision illustrates how far afield from the issue of computer security for Federal civilian agencies H.R. 1903 has traveled. I will not plow through a provision-by-provision analysis of H.R. 1903 in my statement today. For the record, however, I must point out that H.R. 1903 seeks to establish encryption, telecommunications, and commerce policy far beyond the reach of the authority of either NIST or the Computer Security Act of 1987.

Mr. TAUZIN

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate a constituent of mine, MIchelle Fortier, who won the Veterans of Foreign Wars 1997 Voice of Democracy broadcast scriptwriting contest for Louisiana. This is tremendous accomplishment which deserves recognition. I applaud Michelle for her hard work and wish her all the best in future endeavors. I am happy to share with my colleagues Michelle's outstanding winning script by entering it into the Congressional Record: Democracy--Above and Beyond (By Michelle Fortier) Ever since I was a little girl, I can remember being told exciting accounts in American history, but it wasn't until recently that I began contemplating how these long and inevitable struggles have influenced my own life. Democracy must be the most powerful word in the English language, and so often I have taken it for granted. This word affects everything that I do, but I hardly ever noticed it. To the citizens of these United States, democracy is a way of life, but to people of foreign lands, it is a hope, a dream. Now that I've almost reached voting age, I realize how much Democracy has meant to my life. In just one short year, I will take on the awesome responsibility of making decisions affecting my country. That is truly a wondrous privilege. I used to wonder why people would be willing to fight and die for the principles we hold so dear today. It wasn't until I was older that I realized exactly what those people had been fighting for. Those early Americans were fighting for the nights of future generations to not have to live in fear. They fought for me, and I realized how much I had not acknowledged. All the choices and privileges I have came with a price, and it was paid through the blood and sweet of Americans, past and present. Americans who have gone above and beyond the call to duty. This preservation of rights has been the basis for all of America's conflicts ever since the footprints of pilgrims imprinted the sandy shores of Plymouth, Massachusetts because democracy is a never-ending process. Every decision we make or every right we engage in is a continuation of the ideals expressed so long ago. Every time I turn on the news I hear stories of people of foreign nations struggling to gain their independence or even a single basic right, and I think, ``Would I be willing to die for the sake of freedom for future generations? Would I fight to keep my country free? Would I go above and beyond what was dutifully expected of me? I'm sure all Americans who have seen war or conflicting times, such as depression or civil strife, have contemplated these questions. But to live in a country whose basis was founded on the dreams and visions of the brave men and women who came searching for more than their own personal gain and has been kept alive through the sacrifices of those willing to risk life and limb to preserve our nation's freedom is to have a proud heritage. We've seen endless accounts of this throughout this great nation's history. The horrors of Gettysburg, the friendlessness of the World Wars, to the struggles of the immigrants who came to America searching for opportunity and independence. They have all contributed to the dignified heritage I display as my own. It is truly an honor to have been born in a land that serves as a beacon of moderm democracy. From the recent free elections in Bosnia to the new democratic societies of the former, Soviet Union, we can see that democracy is growing like a virus. It infiltrates a group of people with such fury that it spreads to anyone close enough to experience it. More and more each day I realize that the voice of democracy can be silenced no longer. It screams in the souls of imprisoned people, and it's echoes can be heard all over the earth. People are standing up for their inalienable right to be free. People are finally going above and beyond.

Mr. TAUZIN

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, let me again thank the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations and beg the House their attention, because I believe we have begun in this appropriations process a very important debate on the nature of commercial broadcasting and public broadcasting in our society, a debate that we will have to have on this floor in a much more protracted way, in a much more detailed way, and a much more substantive way than we can have in these 30 minutes. Let me first concede that we have a confusion of purpose among the law and the regulators in commercial and public broadcasting. As we speak, the Gore commission is right now debating what recommendations it wants to make to this body in terms of imposing new public mandates upon commercial broadcasters. To do what? To do public broadcasting. To do more educational programming, more free time for public debates by candidates or more coverage of governmental operations. On what? On commercial broadcasting, a function you would think would be designated to public broadcasting interests in this country, to public radio and public television. On the other hand, because we have gone through a period where we seem to think that public broadcasting ought to be funded by private interests, we have more and more pushed public broadcasting to a point where they have had to go to sell commercials, to actually try to get programming on that is commercially viable, that will attract a large audience, things we never intended for public broadcasting. We intended public broadcasting to be something different than commercial broadcasting, something very special and unique in our society, that would do educational and public-type programming in arts and culture and history and learning and what have you. We have confused the two missions. So it is important we begin this debate today. But let me say to my friend who offered this amendment, I must rise in opposition to the amendment. I think we went in the wrong direction when we pushed public broadcasting more and more to look like commercial broadcasting, and I think the Gore commission will be wrong when it tries to demand of commercial broadcasters that they look more and more like public broadcasters. It is time we began to really draw the lines of distinction. It seems to me that the best solution is to set up public broadcasting in the way we intended it, separately funded by a trust fund mechanism that does not necessarily rely upon so much commercial commercialization of the public broadcasting interests in America. Second, we ought to allow commercial broadcasters to do what we authorized them to do, and that is to go out and commercially broadcast, to make a profit and to provide entertainment, sports and information and other programming to us, recreational programming, on the basis of a profit motive. Now, how do we do that? We do that by reforming public broadcasting and setting up an appropriate trust fund for that purpose. I am going to suggest that our committee is doing just that. We are prepared now and are beginning to actually draft legislation that will reform public broadcasting and some of these duopolies that so many people complain about. Help public broadcasting enter the digital age, as we are instructing commercial broadcasters to do. If commercial broadcasters want to use their digital licenses to do more than one program of HDTV, and in fact get into other lines of business with those digital licenses, there will be, I suggest, a source of funding for a trust fund mechanism to make sure that public broadcasting remains, in fact, public broadcasting, less dependent upon taxpayers' support, but also less dependent upon the commercial world for the support of its initiatives, as this Congress declares public broadcasting's initiatives to be defined. Let me say, I think America appreciates its public broadcasting. America, in the most recent poll, lists public television and public radio as two of the top three best dollar expenditures of the Federal Government. As it was pointed out earlier, 93 percent of the money is shared with the local stations. A 6-to-1 return in other support for the Federal dollars we put into it indicate a great public interest and support for public broadcasting. This amendment, I think, takes us in the wrong direction. I am urging this House to reject it, give the authorizing committee a chance to reform it, and then let us begin the good debate.

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman of the appropriations subcommittee for yielding me this time. Let me first of all concede that the authors of the amendment have made some valid points, that public broadcasting is indeed in need of reform. Duopolies exist that spending the kind of money that we are going to need to move public broadcasting into the digital age will be a very expensive proposition and that we will need to reform the whole concept of public broadcasting to make it work in the digital age. Let me also concede that there is something wrong in public broadcasting, and I think part of it is our own fault because we have chartered public broadcasting as a public entity to do public-type broadcasting and yet condemned it to act like commercial broadcasters, to go out into the private sector and seek commercial-like advertising for its products and to compete with commercial broadcasters for commercially viable products. That was not the concept behind public broadcasting. We need to return to the right concept. We need to fund public broadcasting correctly. We need to reform out the duopolies, move it into the digital age and make this thing work, but let me urge my colleagues to resist this amendment, as the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Markey] and I have urged them in a ``Dear Colleague'' letter this week. We are currently working on those reforms at the subcommittee level. The Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade, and Consumer Protection is right now drafting a set of reforms to make public broadcasting indeed public broadcasting and to set up a trust funding mechanism for the exercise of the public broadcasting function. We will be resisting the efforts of some to make commercial broadcasters look like public broadcasters, just as we will be resisting the effort to eliminate public broadcasting or to make it look like commercial broadcasting. It is time we have this debate, but to simply cut the funding now when we are in the process of actually enacting these reforms, devising them and setting out the proper funding mechanism for public broadcasting is a severe mistake. Public broadcasting is very sacred to America. We need to preserve it. But we need to reform it. The place to do it is at the authorizing committee. I urge Members to reject this amendment.

Mr. TAUZIN

Mr. TAUZIN. I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I would say to the members of the committee, there is no more sacred obligation of this House when it makes a promise to citizens of this country than to keep those promises. The previous speakers are exactly right. In the 1996 bill we set the course for the farm communities of America for the next 7 years. The sugar program was the only one where we said nonrecourse loans would not be available to farmers once import levels exceeded 1.5 million tons. We made that commitment in that agreement in 1996. I urge Members to keep that agreement. If they adopt this amendment, they are saying to American sugar farmers that one bad season means the Government comes and takes their farm, takes their equipment, and they are out of business. That is not the way this Government ought to work. It certainly is not a thing this Congress ought to do. The bill we passed with over 3,300 votes last year sets the stage for the farm communities for the next 7 years. We ought to keep our word, keep our promise, defeat this Miller-Schumer amendment.

Mr. TAUZIN

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, today in the Cannon Caucus Room, the third floor of the Cannon Building, all of the various technologies of the satellite industry are on display. These demonstrations will give Members a great look at the world of communications, of satellite technologies in the developing world and in the developed world, and will give a great insight as to what is coming in terms of technology for our own country in communications. I urge Members to stop by before 3 o'clock and just take a look at the future in the Cannon Caucus Room on the third floor.

Mr. TAUZIN

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, let me first tell my colleagues that the Committee on Commerce had an awesome task. Assigned to us in the budget agreement was $2.2 trillion of budget savings over the period of time that this budget agreement is to operate. That was a huge undertaking. I think the gentleman has correctly pointed with pride to the work of every member of our committee in developing for the Committee on Rules in this package with the help of the Committee on the Budget a package of reforms that does in fact honorably meet those goals. On the Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade, and Consumer Protection, we had a particularly arduous task of writing a section that would meet the Committee on the Budget's requirements of spectrum auctions and revenues to the government over the next 5 years in the face of some very disturbing recent trends, the most recent of which was an auction in April that yielded only one-half of 1 percent of the amount of money that the Committee on the Budget had earlier predicted that auction would yield for the Treasury. Let me at first compliment the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Kasich] and the members of the Committee on the Budget for working so carefully with the members of the Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade, and Consumer Protection in trying to resolve that arduous task and those numbers. What has been accomplished in the course of the last few days through negotiations with the Committee on Rules are provisions to help ensure that the next round of spectrum auctions are conducted much more responsibly. Number one, it is clear from the language that we are going to vote on today that spectrum auctions of additional spectrum made available over the next 5 years for public use will be conducted with several new directions: No. 1, those spectrum auctions will be conducted after a time has been allowed for the current round of spectrum sales to clear the financial markets. As my colleagues know in the last successful auction, whereas we received bids of $23 billion, only about $11 billion was actually paid in because of difficulties in getting that spectrum out. The new bill provides, in effect, that the new auctions will give enough time for bidders to know what is coming down the pike and will give enough time for the market to clear. The new provisions require in fact the FCC to examine new computer models for auctioning, such as the ones carried out in California where block auctioning is actually attempted to yield higher results for the Treasury. In short, those improvements have been added to the bill. We have retained in this bill the committee's mark that specifies that the FCC can permit the continued analog broadcast as long as more than 5 percent of a community have not yet switched over to digital as this digital transformation occurs. We have retained the committee language that there must be minimum bids in these auctions. No more should we have bids on auction of a dollar at the marketplace. In short this is a good package. I urge its adoption and commend the committee for its fine work.

Mr. TAUZIN

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, the amendment I offer today is an amendment to provide authority for up to $3 million of the amount that may be available for competitive grants for university research on oyster diseases and oyster-related human health risks. Oysters are an important national resource in America. They are a safe and nutritional meat protein that provides many benefits to those who enjoy eating them. Of course, millions are consumed each year. But research into health-related aspects of oyster growing and harvesting and sales and consumption in America is very important. Earlier this year the President called for the national food safety initiative. The proposal we make today is consistent with the President's approach of developing positive and practical solutions to improve food safety. The program brings the Sea Grant scientists and the oyster industry together to find solutions to concerns related to oysters' health and particularly to diseases that might be related to humans, who enjoy eating oysters in America. This amendment provides for an increased authorization of $1 million in each of the fiscal years 1998, 1999, and the year 2000, and the authority to make available those moneys for competitive grants at Sea Grant universities around the country. Sea Grant universities are currently in fact doing a great deal of work in this area. This amendment is meant to make sure that not only the oyster diseases are studied but oyster-related health concerns to humans who enjoy oyster products in America are also studied and, indeed, identified, and taken care of in this country. I urge the committee to adopt this amendment. It is very much in line with the excellent work the Sea Grant College Program authorization has already accomplished in many areas, and will compliment the work already being done by many Sea Grant universities in this country in this important health and food safety area.

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. TAUZIN

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to acknowledge the stellar work of Dick Carlson, who within the near future will complete 5 years as president of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Dick Carlson headed CPB during a time of turbulence and challenge, and has proven to be a steady guide. People in my part of the country can tell you that a Louisiana bayou is both a beautiful and dangerous place. The same might be said of the job Dick Carlson has filled for the last 5 years. Fortunately for all of us who love public broadcasting, Dick brought the experience to know when to wade in, and when to stay in the boat. His communications skills and instincts are honed and have benefited the corporation. Dick is an award-winning print and television journalist and anchor who served as director of the Voice of America for many years, as Ambassador to the Republic of Seychelles, and as an executive in the banking industry before taking over CPB. He's been a champion of commonsense reform, and we in Congress appreciated his strong leadership at a time when the very existence of publicly funded television and radio was under attack. Those challenges will continue to arise. So, it is with sadness that we congratulate Dick Carlson for a job well done. And we wish him every success in his new endeavors.

Mr. TAUZIN

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, I represent the State of Louisiana, which drains about 43 States. The district I represent sees the water coming through every year. Every year the water in the Mississippi River alone rises above the level of the inhabitants of the city of New Orleans by about 17 feet, 17 feet below sea level. In the case of a hard flood, hurricane conditions, we are told we could expect 27 feet of water in New Orleans if we do not protect our levees. The choice you will face today will be a choice between making sure that the very precious funds available for the reconstruction, maintenance, and repair of existing levees and facilities designed to protect human lives, that those precious funds are in fact spent to do that. Or the choice will be to adopt the California solution. This is the California problem. This is the set of regulations that levee maintenance people have to undergo in California in order to repair a levee. Testimony after testimony was heard at our committee of levee managers, both those who represent the State and local levee boards and those on Federal projects, who tell us that time and time again the precious dollars available to repair those levees had to be spent on mitigation projects demanded by the Fish and Wildlife Service and the Interior Department, projects that took those precious dollars away and, more important, took the time away from those necessary repairs. The gentleman from California [Mr. Herger] read us the results: human lives lost, massive flooding. Let me put it as clearly as I can to my colleagues. We will have a choice between an amendment that seeks to give America the California problem, the Boehlert amendment will simply codify this Federal solution in California and give it to Louisiana and the rest of the Nation, or a choice to say very simply that endangered species, yes, ought to be protected but not with levee board funds, not with funds designed to repair and rebuild and fit levees to protect human lives. Whether we are for protecting animals and plants and the endangered species or not, and I think we all are, we ought to be for the proposition that when precious dollars and time is available to save precious human lives, that it ought not be spent on other worthwhile things. That money ought to go to build levees and repair them and keep people safe. If we vote today to put this California problem in place for the rest of America, we will be condemning citizens of this country to death and property to destruction all over this country. We in Louisiana depend upon levees. Every Member of our delegation, Democrat and Republican, has signed onto the Pombo bill. Every member of our delegation, Democrat and Republican, urban and rural, understands how critical maintenance of levee construction projects, maintenance of levee facilities are to the health and safety of our communities. The city of New Orleans today is protected by something called a Bonne Carre spillway. It is a set of gates that open up water from the Mississippi River and spills it out into Lake Pontchartrain. Do we like doing that to the lake? No. We do it to keep the water levels down because in New Orleans today, if you go to our fair city, you will see ships plying the Mississippi above the level that people live. We need to pass the Pombo bill, defeat the Boehlert amendment.

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I think it is appropriate, as we discuss this amendment, to consider what is happening in California as repairs to levees are proposed. We heard the testimony of flood managers and levee managers from California before this bill was passed through our committee. I want to give an example of what happened, as the chairman of our committee just alluded to. A repair was requested to a project in California on the west bank of the Mokelumna River that would involve approximately .37 of an acre, one-third of an acre. This is what the Interior Department required in a letter of instruction to those wanting to repair the levee. First, they would have to find every single elderberry bush in that one-third of an acre and transplant it. They would have to transplant it to an acreage five times as big. They would have to plant new elderberry bushes, five times as many as they transplanted from the old site. In addition, biologists had to be on site to monitor the transplanting of these elderberry bushes. Second, they had to provide to a resource agency or a private conservation organization fee title. They had to buy the land and give it to this organization to maintain these elderberry bushes. It had to be maintained, and money had to be provided to maintain it in perpetuity. Understand, the levee may not be maintained in perpetuity, but the elderberry bushes will be. Third, the qualified biologists had to be on site managing everything that was done. There had to be written documentation that all conditions would be carried out in perpetuity. There had to be an annual assessment of the facility to mechanically pull out any weeds. Biologists and law enforcement agencies had to have full access to the project at all times to monitor it. Permanent fencing had to go up. Every five elderberry seedlings had to have two other types of species planted next to it, because apparently the beatles like other species. Every year for a period of 10 years, qualified biologists had to come in, assess the elderberry bushes, and make reports. Maps showing where every individual adult beatle was and the exit holes that were observed in each elderberry plant had to be analyzed, the survival rates of the plants and the beatles had to be reported on. Get this, the on-site personnel, who were supposed to be repairing the levee, had to go to school for instructions regarding the presence of elderberry beatles. They had to go to beatle school. Mr. Chairman, all of this was done for one-third of an acre. I have showed Members the large book. The bill we are debating today does not say you cannot protect these beatles. It does not say you cannot have sites to put elderberry bushes and raise beatles on if you want to do that. It simply says that the money that was to be spent on this one- third acre to construct the repairs to this levee should be spent to repair this levee, and not to do this beatle protection program. It simply says that when this levee was in dire need of repair, we should have done it. We should have done it on time. We should have saved those five lives that were lost in California because levees like this failed. It says that across America we ought to recognize that the good environmental things we do to protect beatles are fine, and we ought to find the money and fund it to do that if they are important to us, but we ought not to take it out of funds necessary to repair bridges and levees. The Boehlert amendment says, in effect, that this California system ought to be the system we use across America. In Louisiana, when the Mississippi levee, as it is in north Louisiana, is 6 feet too short, we are in serious trouble and we have to do a mitigation program, too, like the California program. Unless the flood is imminent and we are about to be flooded, the Boehlert amendment gives us no relief. In fact, the Boehlert amendment says if we do not build the repairs before a certain date, forget it; we still have to go through the beetle program of California. The Boehlert amendment says, in effect, that in Louisiana and every State, we are going to get letters like this compelling our levee managers to do what they had to do in California. The Boehlert amendment says that we are going to see loss of lives in our State like we saw in California. We maintain levees all over my State. Levee managers try to do a good job. When the Federal Government contributes a dime to that levee construction, when it contributes one dime, it requires the State manager of the levee or the local manager to assume full liability if the levee fails. Here is the situation. The Federal Government says: You are fully liable if the levee fails; but, by the way, if you try to fix it, we are going to put you in a beetle protection program instead, and you cannot fix the levee. When it fails and people flood and lives are lost, it is on your nickel; it is your responsibility. The Boehlert amendment, Mr. Chairman, is a phoney solution. If we want to solve this problem, if we want to make sure that in Louisiana and every State we fix levees, then we need to vote for the Pombo bill.

Mr. TAUZIN

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I will give my friend a better reason why the Income Tax Code that we run this Government with is lousy for every working American. The Income Tax Code that we run this Government with, that only taxes your income, it taxes your spending, it taxes your saving, it taxes your investments. It taxes your gifts to your children, whether you are alive, or if you are trying to give it to them when you die through inheritance. It taxes you on the same money over and over and over again. Now, why does it tax you more than once? Let me explain that. It taxes you more than once because once you paid your taxes, once they have been withheld from your paycheck and you go out into the marketplace and try to buy something in this society, if you dare to buy anything made in America, if you can find anything made in America on the shelves of the store in your town, you are going to pay an IRS premium on that purchase. How much? Economists tell us that the cost of the IRS system, the cost of all of this filing of all of this paper, all of these manhours, all the taxes that are paid by the farmer, the miner, the forester, the manufacturer, the shipper, the wholesaler, the retailer, by the time that box of cereal reaches you at home, so much taxes and cost to the IRS have been applied to the manufacturer of that product that you paid 10 percent to 15 percent more as a hidden IRS cost in everything made in America. Now, here is the real tragedy. If you buy something made foreign, if you buy an imported product, you do not pay that tax. So guess why we buy so many foreign products in America? Those foreign products coming in in a free trade GATT society come into America without having to pay the income tax load, because the countries where they are shipped exempt them from the VAT taxes they impose at home. Those taxes come in untaxed to America and compete on the shelf with a product made by American labor that bears a 10 to 15 percent hidden IRS tax on it. We wonder why so many jobs are leaving America. We wonder why so many Americans are buying foreign products, why so many retailers are reaching out across the globe to find products to bring into this country instead of manufacturing them here. We wonder why Pat Buchanan stirred up America, the peasants with pitchforks, to complain about the GATT Treaty. It was not the treaty that was at fault, it was our Tax Code that said in America we are only going to tax American labor, we are only going to tax American products, we will not tax foreign products coming in. How do we change that? We cannot change that with an Income Tax Code under the GATT Treaty. We can only change it if we get rid of the income tax and impose a common tax on the purchase of goods made in America and goods brought in, imported into this country. How serious is it? For every $1 billion that we lose in export trade, 19,000 American jobs are lost; 19,000 Americans are out of work, because our Income Tax Code, for every $1 billion of foreign trade that we lose. How many of those billions could we attract back to home if we suddenly ended this 10 to 15 percent IRS cost on the products we make in America? How many families could have a job again? How many people could be productive again in this society? How many manufacturers could be hiring people instead of laying people off if we simply had a Tax Code that treated people fairly in America? In short, we are talking about an Income Tax Code that taxes us when we earn money; it punishes us when we save money, because it taxes our interest earnings; it punishes us when we invest, because it taxes our investment earnings and our capital gains; it punishes us if we buy America; and it rewards us only if we buy something imported into this country, manufactured in some foreign country. What a lousy Tax Code. Who would want to keep such a Tax Code? Who in this body, given a choice to substitute that Tax Code for one that treated American labor and American products fairly, that taxed both the import and the domestic product equally, like most other countries do, and that send our exports into the world without the cost of the IRS on their back? Who, given that choice, would not vote for it tonight, today? Well, the truth is, we have a lot of educating to do. We have a big job, starting this day, starting in that Boston Harbor to educate Americans about just how lousy this Income Tax Code is, how depressing it is to the U.S. economy, how it damages American workers, how it literally discriminates against American products, not only in our own market, but all over the world. A Tax Code like that deserves to get ripped out by its roots, it deserves to get dumped in Boston Harbor, and it deserves to get abolished by this Chamber. I yield to my friend from Georgia.

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman. I want to thank him for accompanying me and our colleagues to Boston and for being such a great voice on this issue tonight and, I am sure, as we go into future debates on it. I think you have really set the tone for us to conclude this special order because you talked about personal freedoms and liberty. That is what Boston Harbor was all about, and that is what this debate is all about. Congress is not going to repeal the income Tax Code easily. The income Tax Code is where the power in this place exists. It is where we reward our friends, punish our enemies, play the class warfare games. Give a tax credit to this group and take it away from this group. Reward you today; take it away from you tomorrow, 4,000 changes since 1986 alone. Congress is not going to give up this power easily. What we are talking about is giving power back to the American people by abandoning this system where Government in Washington tells us how to live and where you instead would make the decisions in your own life by deciding how much taxes you pay dependent on how much you spend as opposed to how much you save and invest. And I think it is important, as we think about that notion of freedom and liberty, to again remember the contributions of those early patriots. Paul Revere met the night before the Boston Tea Party at the Green Dragon with his friends. He met knowing that what he was going to do the next day would be considered treason by the British. I want to tell you what that meant for these men. For treason a man could be hanged and then revived, this is awful, have his guts drawn from him like a chicken's and be cut into four quarters to be hung in the drying wind and sun. This is awful but I quote it only because that is the risk those patriots took in Boston Harbor, December 16, 1773. They risked their lives, their liberty, their personal fortunes to make a statement that this place, which eventually became America, was a very special place on earth where people counted first, where they were the masters and government was the servant, where a taxing authority had to answer to them, where their family and their futures were more important than the wishes and whims of a government authority somewhere far away. So they entered those ships that next day and dumped that tea into the harbor, covered with paint and war paint, dressed like Mohawk Indians. They did it to protect themselves from discovery. We found out later who many of them were. Today, as we met in Boston Harbor, we did not have to put on war paint and dress up like Mohawk Indians. We went as citizens of this country, some of us Members of this Congress. We went as citizens in front of the cameras, proud to show who we were in a country where our freedoms and liberty have already been protected for us by so many who have given their lives for us to have that chance today to stand in Boston Harbor and to demonstrate against this Tax Code. And today I think it only fitting that we remember them, that we were able to stand in that harbor and stand on that boat and throw the U.S. income Tax Code into the Boston Harbor in our protest today without having to be covered with war paint because we have inherited a country of freedoms and liberty. If we are true stewards of that wonderful inheritance, if we are true sons and daughters of freedom in this country, do we dare less than enter this debate with the same kind of fervor and commitment that those early patriots gave to the effort? Do we do less than preserve for every American that sacred gift of freedom and liberty handed down to us? Can we do less than urge Americans to join with us in a new revolutionary spirit to become new sons and daughters of liberty in this great society and to demand that this Government in Washington stop its burdensome tax practices that hurt so many American workers and so many American families and abolish an income tax system that is not right for this country, that is abundantly wrong for us, and to substitute in its place a simple, fair, flat rate that Americans can live with and that we can grow with and that we can expand our personal freedoms and liberties rather than seeing them constantly contracted by constant revisions and adaptations of that awful code? Tonight on this tax day, we call upon this body to begin the deliberation, to begin the discussion and to take on the task of preserving and enlarging those liberties and freedoms that those men and women in Boston Harbor put on the line for the rest of us who have followed them. Earlier tonight we heard a special order about Jackie Robinson and the enormous contributions he made to opening up this country. It is fitting that we always look back at those who sacrificed for the rest of us. For every American tonight suffering under this income tax system that is oppressing this Nation and oppressing every job and every worker in this country and every family who is struggling to survive as jobs continue to leave our society to go to foreign shores, for every one of us, we look back upon those patriots with admiration. And we look upon their efforts as in some way urging ourselves to begin to emulate them, thinking of how we can perfect those liberties and those freedoms. I suggest to you tonight the most important contribution we can make to the continued success of this country and to the enlargement of those freedoms and liberties would be to do in legal terms what we did physically today. We would dump that Tax Code into Boston Harbor. Yes, we had to retrieve it back because to leave it down there would be awful pollution of that harbor. We had to pick it back up. But we dumped it symbolically in that harbor today as we asked Congress to consider to begin the debate on realistically passing a bill to dump the U.S. income Tax Code and the IRS in favor of something that is fairer and better for our country. We start this debate on tax day, but this is not the last my colleagues have heard of us. Americans are going to rally across this country, I predict. There will be tea parties across America before we finish, and there will be citizens organized as sons and daughters of liberty in this modern age who will assist us, and eventually we will have that vote. We will have that chance to speak for those patriots and for every American patriot who believes that it is time for us to end this awful and oppressive tax system.

Mr. TAUZIN. Even if the cost did not come down, Americans would come out better. I am often asked, what about Americans who are not earning an income? What about Americans who are retired? First of all, most retired Americans are earning an income. They are collecting money that taxes were delayed upon and later on taxes are collected upon, pension incomes, what have you. All those taxes on that income are repealed under our bill. So that seniors who have taxes due on money that have not paid taxes yet, that are scheduled to pay taxes later, those taxes are repealed under our bill. The Social Security tax, the tax on Social Security earnings is repealed under our bill. The taxes earned in money markets or investments made by seniors for their later years are repealed under this bill. Most importantly, most seniors who are under Social Security or other subsidy programs, pensions, have COLA adjustments to protect them against any impacts this tax may have upon the price of anything. We think prices are going to go down but if they do not, CPI adjustments take care of that. In short, we think every income category from those who retire all the way to those who are earning in our society at full levels are going to be better off under this bill. And I invite Americans to do the exercise you talked about, look at what taxes you paid this year. Look at what taxes you paid under this income tax system. And look at what happens under this bill. If you need a copy of the bill, call our office or contact us here, we will make sure you get a copy. Examine it to see whether or not you are not better off under this bill. My idea is that you are going to find out you are not only better off, you are much better off. You do not have to keep forms anymore. You do not have to keep records anymore. You do not have to worry about the IRS audits anymore. You do not have to worry about April 15 anymore. You do not have to file any forms. You decide how much taxes you pay by deciding how much spending you do above poverty for things you want. You decide how much taxes you will not pay by deciding to save or invest instead that money. You are masters of your own fate. This Government, this Congress is no longer telling you how to live, what to save, how to spend. It is not saying who is going to get a tax break and who will not. From now on under this proposal there is a simple rate. You decide how much you want to pay by deciding how much you want to spend instead of saving or investing above that poverty line. If you live below the poverty line, the bill protects you from the effects of this tax. You get all the benefits of lower prices and no income tax and you are protected from the effects of the sales tax. You are much better off if you are retired, as explained. I think you are better off, too. Let me tell you why America is better off. We are down to three people working in this country for every two people who are retired under Social Security. You wonder why Social Security is looking like it is going to be in trouble as we turn the century? You wonder why Medicare is going bankrupt in this society? We have got fewer and fewer workers supporting an aging population. That is a prescription for problems. That is a prescription for disaster. How do you change that? You change that by having more workers in your society, by encouraging jobs back into your country. How do you do it with an income Tax Code that breaks the back of anyone who wants to make anything in this country, that penalizes you at 10 or 15 percent against any product imported into this country? You change it by repealing that Tax Code and by substituting in its place a Tax Code that gives American products not a disadvantage but a real advantage in our marketplace and every export marketplace. Do you know what you do then? You start creating three and four and five workers for every retired American. And do you know what you do then? You stabilize Social Security and Medicare. You protect seniors in the future in a way that we cannot even think about protecting them today as we squabble over trying to balance the budget and save Medicare from bankruptcy. In short, changing the Tax Code is the best prescription for putting this country back on a growth economy where workers are protecting their seniors with contributions to pension funds and Social Security systems and Medicare trust funds. In short, this is the best medicine I know for America. On April 15, when we are all suffering because of this income tax system, when we are all suffering through having to meet these deadlines, this is the best prescription to make us well again. This is the best prescription to make this country strong again, to grow it again, to create the jobs every day we are sending overseas and to bring them back to America where this country can be strong. Is this worth debating? You betcha. Are we serious? You betcha. Do not dare not take us seriously. We are finally in this Chamber debating the real question of whether or not we are going to keep this income Tax Code or repeal it. What a wonderful day. What a wonderful start in Boston Harbor. What a wonderful night it will be when we stand in this Chamber one day and we get a chance to put our cards into those voting machines and actually vote on repealing the IRS and abolishing the income Tax Code for America and giving us a Tax Code that works for us instead of against us. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Norwood).

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman left one thing out, the thing we just talked about, the fact that not only will that tax bill come down, every American at every income level does better under this plan, but the fact that the cost of American products also come down simultaneously.

Mr. TAUZIN. Well, let us start out with the notion, Charlie, that every citizen that buys that loaf of bread suddenly has more money to buy it with. I want you to look at your tax statement or look at your pay stub this week. Look at how much money is taken out in withholding taxes from your pay stub. I would like everyone in the chamber to do that. Look at the amount of money that you finally got as your salary. Look at how much money the Government took before you even saw your salary in the form of withholdings, and imagine tonight that instead of the Government withholding that money from you, imagine it all came to you, that you had all those withholding taxes now to spend to buy that loaf of bread. You would have a lot more disposable income in your pocket as a family to buy that loaf of bread. Second, the gentleman is right, when we repeal the income tax effect on products produced in America, we reduce that cost significantly. And if the cost of the income tax system is 15 or 30 percent of that loaf of bread, in a competitive marketplace, what quickly happens is that bread competitors, all of whom want you to buy their bread, start competing against one another; and because they have a big margin now with profit to work with, they tend to lower their prices to attract customers away from one another. So, in the normal course of events in the competitive marketplace, prices begin to fall, prices of American products begin to come down in our society. And as those prices come down, you have more money to buy those products with and you pay that 15 percent sales tax when you consume it, you are much better off than in this current system where you are paying taxes on your incomes paying for much higher products in the marketplace, and then also having to pay taxes on the interest earnings or the gifts or inheritance taxes that may come from whatever money you have left after you get through saving what little you can save in this society. In short, prices under our bill are likely to come down, are likely to moderate as competition weeds out this excess profit and as consumers take advantage of prices and competitors in a marketplace where costs are coming down instead of going up.

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman is abundantly correct. Let us talk about this alternative now. Let us talk about several alternatives that people have talked about to the United States Income Tax Code. We have heard a lot about the flat tax. It was proposed, of course, in the Presidential campaign by Mr. Forbes, and our colleague, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Armey] has a flat tax proposal before this body. The flat tax is simply a flattening of all the IRS rates, the five rates we currently have, into a single flat rate. It also imposes a single flat rate on all businesses. I think it is a 17 percent, in that bill, on individuals, a 20 percent on businesses. So it is a vast improvement upon the current complex code. Is there a problem with that alternative? Yes; the problem with that alternative is that the 17-percent rate has to go up considerably when we start providing the necessary deductions for the home mortgage interest, perhaps for medicine and other things. The bottom line is that the real problem with the flat rate proposal is that it is still an income tax, and an income tax is an income tax is an income tax. It can become a fat, complicated tax after a few congressional sessions. Most importantly, it is still a double taxation system. It taxes personal income once when you earn it, and it taxes your spending on American products again, because it includes that 20 percent tax on American manufacturing and business. It is not a tax that is equally applied to foreign imported products. So it again discriminates against the American workers and the American product. So while it is an improvement over the current tax and the current income tax structure, it is not yet the best answer. So what is the best answer? I am not sure what the best answer is yet, but I will tell the Members what the best answer we have come up with so far, in my opinion, is: It is the Schaefer-Tauzin bill. What we have proposed in this bill is the complete elimination of the income tax, both on individuals and on businesses; the complete elimination of income taxes on savings accounts; the complete elimination of income taxes on capital gains and other investments; the complete elimination of taxes on gifts to our children, to charities, to anything; the complete elimination of taxes on inheritance, the kind of gifts we make to our children when we eventually pass away and want to leave them something which we have tried to build for them during our lifetime; and, finally, it is a tax that will apply to both domestic and foreign products. How do we do it? We do it by substituting all of those taxes that we repeal with a simple 15-percent tax on the final purchase for consumption in America of products and services. How does that work, and why did we come up with 15? We came up with 15 percent because, according to the National Taxpayers Union, 12.9 percent on goods and services consumed in America produces the same amount of money that the current income tax code produces, along with gift and inheritance taxes and a host of excise taxes, which we also repeal. At 12.9 percent, in other words, we could make this Government whole. It would be revenue-neutral. A 12.9-percent retail consumption tax would produce the same amount of money that the current taxes that I have described produce as a group. Why have we chosen 15 percent? We chose 15 percent because we thought it was important in a national retail consumption tax to do several things which were critical to our society. First, we wanted to make sure that no one who earned income below the poverty line would be adversely affected by a retail sales tax. So at 15 percent, we have enough money collected so we can reduce FICA taxes for all citizens on their earnings up to and including the poverty line for their family. In short, we have taken the regressivity argument away. We have taken away the argument that this sales tax proposal will adversely affect those who earn below the poverty line. In fact, we hold people below the poverty line, in fact, all the earners, completely harmless from the effect of the tax on poverty-earned income. Second, the 15 percent helps us to fund two important features of the bill. One is a continuation of the exemption of the home mortgage interest deduction, critical to a society that favors the purchasing and ownership of homes, in a society where family life and families are critical. We have also continued in this bill the exemption for moneys spent to purchase an education, for training and education, because we consider this just as we would consider purchases made to produce products, as part of the cost of being productive in our society. So at 15 percent we take care of the educational expenses of being a productive society, we take care of the home mortgage interest deduction, and we protect income below the poverty line, and yet we still produce, with the retail consumption tax, the same amount of money that the current income tax system produces to run this government, along with all the other taxes I mentioned: taxes on gifts and taxes on inheritance, taxes on capital gains and corporations in America. In short, we provide in this bill, which will become, very soon, H.R. 2001, we provide the complete elimination of this income tax which so burdens America tonight, the abolishment of the IRS, and a simple, flat retail consumption tax that is fair to all Americans and that will increase the productivity of this country, and create for the first time parity, equal treatment, for American jobs, American labor, and American products in this import-export free market world. Is that a better alternative? I suggest it definitely is, but if Members have a better one, if they have an alternative that is even better than this one, we are anxious to hear it. What we wanted to do in Boston Harbor today, Charlie, was to begin this debate; to get Americans to focus tonight, on this awful day the tax man cometh, on whether or not we, as sons and daughters who have inherited this enormous land of liberty and freedom, are willing, indeed, to tackle the difficult job of dumping this American income tax system and replacing it with one that is fairer and better for our country and better for our economy. Is that worthwhile? Is that worth doing? I suggest to the Members that it is. I suggest that this alternative, the Schaefer-Tauzin retail consumption tax for America, is a much better alternative than any one you will hear about, any one you will read about, that I know of. If there is a better one out there, I am anxious to find it. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I think we have concluded and we should all conclude that the American income tax system is far more complicated than we could understand. Even Albert Einstein could not understand it. But it has reached a point in this historical setting where it has been amended and tinkered with so many times that it gets more complicated every time we see it; that it has become so incomprehensible that Americans tonight, I am sure, are struggling to fill out all those forms, as we struggle every year; that April 15 has become a day of tyranny in this country, a day in which we indeed wanted to celebrate the birth of our Nation's freedom in Boston Harbor by declaring that today we begin the process of educating Americans and the Members of this body on why the income tax is terrible for this country, and why we ought to seriously consider repealing it, removing it, and substituting an alternative in its place. We are not alone. We are not alone. There are many others who are joining in as cosponsors. Let me tell the Members the wonderful truth. The wonderful truth is that the person in this House most responsible for writing tax policy, the chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means, the honorable gentleman from Texas, [Mr. Bill Archer] is a supporter of this concept. He is a driving force behind all of our efforts to talk about repealing the United States Income Tax Code and the IRS and replacing it with a better model, one that works better for America and for every worker in this country, every family, every income earner. The gentleman from Texas, the chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means, today has started that process of examination. We hope that over time, as more and more Members become knowledgeable about how rotten this system is, and how there are better alternatives out there, then perhaps one day we can have a vote in this Chamber, the kind of vote I earlier described, where as patriots, new sons and daughters of liberty, we do in this Chamber what we illustrated could be done in Boston Harbor, we dump this income tax system and replace it with a much better, simpler, flatter rate system that Americans can live under with dignity and pride and a full exercise of the freedoms that those patriots so dearly fought for way back when our country was first thought of. Mr. Speaker, I yield to my friend, the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Norwood].

Mr. TAUZIN. The gentleman forgot a step. It is hard-earned money that they have already paid taxes on.

Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman is right. We do not have to penalize ourselves in a free trade global environment. What we ought to do is treat ourselves as well as we treat any foreign product, but we do not. We penalize ourselves at home, and then we penalize our products when we sell them abroad, and the penalty is 20- to 30- percent. Now, I would ask my colleague to tell me how, with a 20 or 30 percent penalty, America cannot see its jobs continue to fly overseas and why, if we could get rid of that penalty, those jobs would come back home. I yield to my friend from Colorado.