E. Clay Shaw, Jr.: “candidate Clinton came out very, very vividly, and I say very intelligently, outlined a new approach to welfare, welfare…”

“candidate Clinton came out very, very vividly, and I say very intelligently, outlined a new approach to welfare, welfare reform. We are going to change welfare as we know it today. I applauded him for that move, because he adopted the Republican plan that has been out there, that I filed 3 to 4 years ago with Vin Weber, a former Member of this body. Then in his first State of the Union address, and then again the other night, President Clinton talked about welfare reform, how he was going to change it and what he was going to call for. We are still waiting for his bill. There is not one thing that the President has said in either one of his State of the Union addresses pertaining to welfare reform that is not already drafted in a plan that has been filed by the Republicans and is sitting there and beginning to accumulate dust. I ask my colleagues, let us go forward. Let us go forward with welfare reform. Let us not politicize it. The President has embraced what is already in the Republican plan. There are Democrats, our colleagues right here in the House, who are supporting that and want to move the ball forward. We have 162 cosponsors on the Republican plan. We are ready to move. We can show the President that he has the votes. Just give us a few good Democrat votes, and we will pass it and we will change welfare, and we will make productive human beings out of people who now have nothing but a welfare trap to rely upon.”