Political Quotes

“I rise to revisit an issue that I addressed in the last Congress, the problem of unfunded Federal mandates on State and local governments. I have always been generally opposed to unfunded Federal mandates on States and localities, and I introduced a bill in the last Congress to address this problem, Senate Resolution 69. Revenue sharing, in my judgment, was an excellent program. Unfortunately, it was terminated. But nevertheless it provided funds to local and State governments to carry out mandates that were imposed on the States and local governments by the Federal Government. This is not to say that all the mandates have been bad. I think there have been a number that have been good. We have generally followed the carrot approach relative to mandates by saying that if certain programs were adopted, then the Federal Government would come forward with revenues to assist them. The November Elections have given advocates of ending unfunded mandates momentum, so I am confident that Congress will soon pass legislation addressing this issue once and for all. I believe the proper vehicle for achieving this goal at this time is the bill that we are now debating, S.1, the Unfunded Mandate Reform Act of 1995, of which I am an original cosponsor.”