Increasing The Statutory Limit On The Public Debt
Floor Speech
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Ms. PELOSI. I thank the gentleman for yielding. I thank him for his extraordinary leadership on this important issue, an issue of importance to our country, to our economic stability, to our fiscal soundness, and to our children and our grandchildren.
This is an issue, pay-as-you-go, who could oppose this great idea? It has a provenance in the Democratic Party that goes back over 30 years, but it has been in practice in a bipartisan way over time. To my progressive friends, I say that Congressman George Miller of California introduced a resolution in 1982 at the Democratic convention, mid term convention in Philadelphia, calling for pay-as-you-go. It was passed and adopted as part of the Democratic platform, a measure for fiscal soundness, recognizing that even those of us who see a role in government, a limited role in government and investments in our children's future know that it must be paid for or else we are heaping debt onto our children. That was in '82.
It wasn't until later, with a Republican President, President Bush, and a Democratic Congress, that PAYGO was implemented. Then later, under a Democratic President, President Clinton, and a Republican Congress, PAYGO was implemented. All of those times it brought down the deficit and, in the case of President Clinton, it led to a path, a trajectory of $5.6 trillion in surplus.
It hit, I wouldn't say a bump in the road, I would say a giant mogul when President Bush came in with a Republican Congress and the Republican President abandoned PAYGO. And now for the past 8 years, up until 2009, January, we have had these growing deficits. Here we are again sweeping up behind to get rid of the trajectory that we are on of increasing the deficit.
So here it is. It is an historic day. I am so very happy. When I became Speaker of the House, the very first day we passed legislation that made PAYGO the rule of the House. Today we will make it the law of the land. I talked about the progressive provenance of this idea, but because of the extraordinary leadership of the Blue Dog coalition in the Congress, this pay-as-you-go is part of a blueprint for fiscal responsibility that has been their mantra and which they have made the mantra of the House Democrats, and I hope today in a bipartisan way of the House of Representatives.
I commend Mr. Boyd for his relentless leadership on this subject; Baron Hill, author of the legislation; Jim Matheson, Stephanie Herseth Sandlin, the leadership of the Blue Dog coalition; and a person who has been a relentless and articulate spokesperson on this issue, John Tanner, zwhom I had the honor of following in this debate. As I say, the Blue Dogs have made this a priority.
But it is out there also with subjecting spending to the harshest scrutiny. Every Federal dollar that is spent must be subjected to scrutiny to make sure the taxpayer gets his or her money's worth. Subject the spending to scrutiny. And that is what President Obama is proposing with his freeze and cuts.
Pay-as-you-go. This largely applies to the entitlements, which are the largest part, biggest increases in the deficit. And third, the commission to review the entitlements and how we can control cost. This is an obligation that we have to our children. It is an important part of the work that we do, to be able to make difficult, difficult choices on how we make investments, understanding that they must be paid for.
So the luxury of just heaping bills with projects or whatever, or in terms of new entitlements especially in terms of PAYGO, that day is over unless it is paid for. So how is it a reflection of the values of our country; how important it is to meeting the needs of the American people. Would we put it before something else? That is what this is about, about prioritizing so that we can get on a path of deficit reduction, reducing the national debt, reducing the debt service, hundreds of billions of dollars of interest on the debt, which gets us really nothing in return.
So the time is long overdue for this to be taken for granted that the Federal Government will pay as it goes, that we will be on a path of deficit reduction, and that every action that we take in any bill that we take will have to meet the test. Does this reduce the deficit? Does this create jobs? Does this grow our economy? Does this stabilize our economy well into the future? Central to all of that, and a very strong pillar of fiscal responsibility, is this PAYGO legislation that we have here today.
I couldn't be more thrilled for what this means about the fundamentals of how we govern, how we choose, and how we honor our responsibility to future generations to reduce the deficit. With all the respect and admiration and gratitude to our Blue Dog coalition for being so persistent in passing this, and my congratulations, if I may, to the Senate for passing the bill. It has taken a while, but they are there, and now after this and it goes to the President, it will be the law of the land. I think this is cause for celebration.
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