Duncan Faircloth: “I reluctantly have to rise in opposition to this balanced budget agreement. Mr. President, this agreement will balance…”

“I reluctantly have to rise in opposition to this balanced budget agreement. Mr. President, this agreement will balance the budget in 5 years. But, we are already $5 trillion in debt. We can't wait 5 years. We can't go deeper into debt, just to spend more on domestic programs. In the last 40 years, the Government has grown too big--it is time for our national debt to get smaller. In fact, this budget could actually be balanced by the year 2000 rather than 2002, and still provide tax relief for working families, were it not for the first 3 years of higher spending which the President insisted upon. I want to commend my colleagues who negotiated with the President, and I have no doubt it was difficult to persuade the President to agree to a budget that ever achieves balance. But I simply cannot support the spending increases and tax increases in this budget. If this budget resolution is enacted, spending will grow--that's right, grow--by $267 billion over 5 years, rising from $1.622 trillion this year to $1.692 trillion in 1998, $1.753 trillion in 1999, $1.809 trillion in 2001, and $1.889 trillion in 2002. Under this budget deal, deficits will grow next year alone by 35 percent, from $67.2 billion to $90.4 billion. In fact, deficits will be above this year's level for each of the next 3 years.”