G. K. Butterfield: “For the past 12 to 14 months, I have watched you as you have worked tirelessly to get a finished product that we can all…”

“For the past 12 to 14 months, I have watched you as you have worked tirelessly to get a finished product that we can all be proud of. And so I want to thank you on behalf of the 600,000 people that I represent in the First Congressional District of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, every President in this country for the past 50 years or more has tried to reform health care. Unfortunately, all of them have failed, both Democrat and Republican. We have a health care system in this country that is in serious need of reforming. And President Barack Obama, during the Presidential campaign of 2008, campaigned on the platform that if elected, he would bring health care reform to the American people and for the American people. It was a hotly contested campaign, as we can all remember, but he was victorious because the American people had confidence that President Obama had the ability and the vision to bring people together to enact this worthwhile legislation and to do other great things for our country.”