Jay Rockefeller: “I wish we could solve all of our problems with a button; it would make it a lot better. What interests me about this…”

“I wish we could solve all of our problems with a button; it would make it a lot better. What interests me about this amendment, Mr. President, in a sense, it may be the most important amendment we are making to this bill and yet it has such an awkward title, maintenance of effort, that vast numbers of folks who might be listening or watching do not know what we are talking about. The Breaux amendment has to pass if welfare reform is going to work. It absolutely has to pass. A welfare reform bill with this name should free up States to do all kinds of things with new flexibility, without micromanagement from the Government. But welfare reform should not encourage States, or in fact even egg them on, to back out of their commitment to poor children. If you look around now at State legislatures, what is it they are discussing? Their woes with Medicaid and the temptation--believe me, if they are not required to participate in welfare reform, a number of them will not. They simply will not. To me, the Breaux amendment is the answer. It very clearly says to the States, you keep your end of the bargain, and we at the Federal level are going to keep our end of the bargain, just as we have always done on both sides.”