Political Quotes

“we now have before us Senate bill No. 1, our efforts to curb unfunded Federal mandates. This begins now the sixth day of debate on this bill. During the course of the debate, we had concerns that were expressed because committee reports were not available. That has been rectified. So all Members of the Senate now have committee reports in their possession, which they have had the opportunity to read. It is, through the process, necessary for us to deal with any committee amendments that were added in through either the Governmental Affairs Committee or the Budget Committee. We have taken those. Whereas, in some instances, committee amendments will be agreed to, en bloc, with this particular bill, it was necessary because of concerns expressed by Members of the Senate that we take them one at a time. We have now dealt with all of those committee amendments, so that we now have the actual language of the bill before us and we can begin discussing the amendments that Members of the Senate would like to suggest be made part of this bill. There are something like 60 amendments that we have been notified may be brought forward. We talk about an unfunded mandate, but what does that really mean? Well, the definition is that it is an enforced, nonvoluntary duty imposed by the Federal Government on State and local governments, tribal governments, or the private sector. Enforced, nonvoluntary.…”