I would like to use just a couple of minutes in morning business to comment on a very important vote that the Senate will engage in, sometime around noon today. That is on the motion which I guess will be made to table the right-to-know amendment or to send it back to committee, and why I think it is very important that this body adopt a right-to-know amendment so that the people back in the respective States, when their legislators have to vote on this very important balanced budget amendment, will know what they are voting on.<p>
I support a balanced budget amendment. I have supported it in the past. I have voted for it in the past. I hope to be able to vote for it again.<p>
The thing that really concerns me is that we would expect that someone who proposes a balanced budget amendment, like our colleagues on the other side of the aisle, one would expect if they propose this, they would have an idea about how they will do it; that they have a plan that allows them to get, in the year 2002, to a balanced budget. Surely, they are not just proposing a balanced budget amendment without any plan, or without any idea as to how they are going to get there.<p>
I have not seen the plan. That is what I think the American people are entitled to. Is there a secret plan on how to balance the budget that they do not want to share with the American people, that they do not want to share with the Governors of the respective States who will have to live by it, as well as us? Is there a secret plan they do not want to tell the members of the legislatures about, because if they see it, it may be so devastating they will not vote for it? Is there a secret plan to reach the year 2002 that cuts Social Security, slashes spending on Medicare, health programs for the elderly? Is there a secret plan, for instance, which wipes out State highway programs?<p>
I do not know. I do not think anybody knows. Surely those who propose a balanced budget must have in their heads an idea of how to get there. The only thing that we are suggesting is that before we send the balanced budget amendment to the States and say, `Vote on it,' that we share with them the secret plan. If there is a plan that proposes how we get there, let Members see it.<p>
What is wrong with it? If the balanced budget amendment is a good thing, and I think it is, certainly how we get to that balanced budget is something that is equally important. It may be that there is a golden secret plan that does not cut defense, that does not have any tax increases, that does not cut Social Security, that does not cut Medicare, that does not cut highway programs, and yet gets to a balanced budget by the year 2002. If there is such a plan, let me see it. Let me show it to the States so that when they vote on it they will know exactly what they are voting on.<p>
I think the bottom line, Mr. President and my colleagues, is that the American people not only have a right to know, but in the real world, they have a need to know. I want my legislators in Louisiana, when they vote on this balanced budget, to say, `Now we know how it will be achieved. Here is what we have to do as a State in order to make it work.'<p>
This is a partnership, I say to my colleagues. We are not doing this by ourselves. This is a partnership arrangement between the Congress, the Federal Government, and the States. We all will have to share in it. Maybe States will have to increase taxes. It might be they will have to slash State programs that the Federal Government cannot assist, as in the past, with many of these programs. But the bottom line is that the only protection the American people have is the right to know what we are talking about.<p>
I will say, once again, that surely the people who have proposed a balanced budget have a plan. It should not be a secret plan, it should be a public plan. The only thing that we are asking is that it should be made part of this effort so that when the States are called upon to act on this, they will be able to do it intelligently, and not have to do it in the dark.</body>
