Political Quotes

“I come from America's Sun Belt, with a strong belief in sunshine for our Government and a commitment to sunset for new Government initiatives, including even the most well-intentioned and appealing reforms, such as that provided us today by the distinguished authors of H.R. No. 5, a measure that I personally support. Too often this Congress has embarked on ventures that were undoubtedly very well motivated by the very best of intentions, and they sounded great when they were presented in this Hall, but somewhere between the beltway and the back roads of America, somewhere between what was happening in this great building and the bureaucracies that implemented that legislation, a great new statutory scheme, beginning as a bright, beamy, sunshiny idea, left many people in America with simply a bad burn. In Texas, when we get too much government sun, we have got a solution. I am not talking about an extra application of coppertone. Rather, Mr. Chairman, we force periodic review of new government initiatives through a systematic sunset process. Government statutes simply should not have a claim to immortality.”