Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, I want to thank the ranking member for her cooperation and opportunity to have this debate, and I will just address it briefly. In 1977, Congress established what is known as the dual mandate. The dual mandate set the goals of the Federal Reserve System and the Federal Open Market Committee to include goals of maximum employment and stable prices. There has been a lot of debate about whether the tension of those two issues has brought about decisions of the Fed that might have otherwise been different, and so this amendment requires a study to be done in order to take a look at the effects of the dual mandate. It is pretty simple that way, and I urge its support and adoption. I circle back then to the transcripts. And in response to the gentlewoman's comments, I would just remind Members of Congress that we do keep records in all of our proceedings. There is a transcript taking place right now of these proceedings, of each of our committees and subcommittees. They are available to the public, and, in fact, we are on C-SPAN with almost all of our subcommittees and committees today. We are open. We are open records, and there is much sunlight on what we do. And yet, many of the decisions that we make here have far less impact on the American citizen than the decisions made by the Fed. So, again, I urge the adoption of this modified amendment. I reserve the balance of my time.”