[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 75 (Wednesday, June 15, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: June 15, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                    REFORMING THE RULES OF THE HOUSE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
February 11, 1994, and June 10, 1994, the gentleman from New York [Mr. 
Solomon] is recognized, until midnight, as the designee of the minority 
leader.
  Mr. SOLOMON. I thank the Speaker, and I deeply apologize to you and 
to the loyal staff that we have, and other Members, for keeping you all 
here until midnight. But I feel compelled to do so after the spectacle 
that we have seen on the floor for the last 12 hours, when there has 
been, in my opinion, a very flagrant abuse of the rules of the House. 
It will continue tomorrow when we take up yet another bill where we are 
going to see further flagrant abuses of the rules of this House.
  Mr. Speaker, our colleague from Washington [Mr. Swift], recently 
charged that the Joint Committee on the Reorganization of Congress, of 
which we were both members, never discussed or set any goals for 
its effort to reform Congress. I must respectfully disagree with him. I 
would hasten to add that the joint committee did not go far enough in 
addressing those goals.

  At this point, Mr. Speaker, let me yield to one of the very 
distinguished Members of this House. I am pleased to yield at this time 
to the hardworking and very valued member of the joint committee, who 
has also done yeoman work on the Committee on Agriculture and the 
Committee on Public Works and Transportation, the gentleman from Cape 
Girardeau, MO [Mr. Emerson].
  Mr. EMERSON. I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I commend him 
for the very valuable service that he is rendering in fostering this 
discussion here this evening.
  Mr. Speaker, I too regret that the hour is late, but I want to say 
that I think when we contemplate reforming this institution of 
Congress, somehow we have the feeling that it is such a monumental task 
that it cannot possibly be undertaken. I want to say I think there are 
so many things that we could do that would simplify and make more 
meaningful to the American people what it is that we do here, more 
understandable to them, that we should be about the business.
  I regret that our committee, having met all of last year, all of 
1993, and last November having made its recommendations to the House, I 
regret that the recommendations of the committee have not yet been 
seriously considered and presented to the House to be acted upon.
  I would hope that this may occur soon. We know that in our 
deliberations the gentleman from Indiana, Chairman Hamilton, told us 
that he would try to see that the recommendations were presented to the 
Congress with--he did not use the term--open rule, but it was a very 
generous rule. And I would hope that we may see some progress.
  There is a very strong bipartisan fervor for reforming this 
institution. I think if we can get the fundamental document out on the 
floor under a generous rule, that the House could work its will and we 
could make some very substantial improvement.
  So, I commend the gentleman for his service here this evening in 
calling attention to the fact that our proposal has not yet been acted 
upon.
  I look forward to further discussions of this sort with the gentleman 
and thank him for yielding to me at this time.
  Mr. SOLOMON. I certainly thank the gentleman for his cogent remarks. 
The gentleman has been a very valued member of this joint committee.
  Mr. Speaker, at this time let me say that when our colleague, the 
gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Gradison], retired from the Congress and the 
vice chairmanship of the joint committee at the beginning of this 
Congress, our Republican leader made an excellent choice in picking our 
next speaker to fill that vacancy. Although she is a first-termer new 
to this whole process, she mastered the details of her new 
responsibilities very, very quickly, while also serving as the ranking 
Republican in her very first year on the House Administration 
Subcommittee as well as the Committee on Science, Space, and 
Technology, and the Committee on Public Works and Transportation on 
which I served when I first came to this body 16 years ago.

                              {time}  2330

  Mr. Speaker, I am please to yield to the gentlewoman from Bellevue, 
WA [Ms. Dunn].
  Ms. DUNN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York [Mr. 
Solomon] for taking the initiative to coordinate this special order so 
we can let the American public really know what has been going on in 
the area of congressional reform.
  Mr. Speaker, I just would like to observe that during the next few 
speakers it will become very clear that there are great bipartisan 
ideas that truly could improve the deliberative nature and the 
responsiveness of the Congress, but the bottom line, the message, must 
be that we must move forward with congressional reform. I would like to 
share some bipartisan ideas that I believe would serve to make the 
House more accountable to the taxpayers we represent. First of all, 
sunshine:
  In 1976, Mr. Speaker, the Congress passed what is know as the 
Government in Sunshine Act. Passage of that act reflected the belief 
that there would be greater accountability if the public's access to 
information gathered by the Federal agencies were increased. This 
concept greatly paralleled similar laws that exist in all 50 States. In 
fact, in my State of Washington we were one of the very pioneers on 
this area about 20 years ago.
  Well, as a result of the Congress' Government in Sunshine Act, 
citizens today enjoy greater access to Federal agencies. Sadly, 
however, the taxpayers have less access here in the House than they do 
in those Federal agencies.
  Taxpayers pay for this process, Mr. Speaker, and thus they should 
have every right to see the process in action. Committee meetings 
should never be closed to the tax-paying public unless there is a 
legitimate issue of national security or the potential defamation of 
somebody's character, and if taxpayers cannot personally be there in 
the meetings, then they have a right to be represented at those 
hearings by the free press.
  Yet today a congressional committee may vote to close it doors, to 
kick the public out. Mr. Speaker, and to remove the free press with a 
simple majority vote of the Members present, and very rarely is it 
today for reasons as noble as national security.
  This is a fundamental reform that must be made to House Rules. If we 
are to be the ``People's House'' then the people have to know what we 
are doing. Yet, somewhat arrogantly in my view, our House Rules 
currently state that press coverage of our committee meetings around 
here is a privilege extended by the House.
  Let me read from current Rules: ``The coverage of committee hearings 
and meetings by television broadcast, radio broadcast, or still 
photography is a privilege made available by the House . . .''
  Ths is fundamentally wrong, Mr. Speaker. Let me offer an example:
  Last year the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Rostenkowski] and the 
Committee on Ways and Means crafted legislative language that ended up 
being the largest tax increase in American history. Somebody thought 
that might be an embarrassing moment, so the press and the American 
public were escorted out of the room. Despite opposition from all the 
Republican members of that committee, the doors were closed. The taxes 
went up. And the American people were left in the dark.
  My strong belief is that Members of Congress will be more accountable 
if and when they realize that the press and the public are watching. 
Counter-arguments about decisions being best made in private are wrong. 
If our decisions cannot stand public scrutiny, something is very wrong 
with those decisions, Mr. Speaker.
  So, the first and most fundamental thing I believe we can do to make 
this institution and its Members more accountable to the taxpayers we 
represent is this: let the taxpayers watch. Let the sun shine in.
  This goal would be included in any reform package forwarded by 
Members on this side of the aisle. Indeed it is already formal policy 
of the House Republican Conference.
  There are some other things that we can do to increase accountability 
of Members. They all revolve around this simple concept: let the people 
know what their elected Representatives are doing. I truly believe that 
is how basic the reforms must be if we are ever going to address the 
growing cynicism of taxpayers in our great country.
  So, let us make sure that voters are informed about votes cast in 
committees and subcommittees and which Members actually showed up for 
this vital part of the legislative process. We should be able to make 
that information available to the public the very next day. And the 
press should have free and virtually immediate access to that 
information.
  We made a small step forward in this regard in the markup done by the 
Joint Committee. The House markup approved an amendment of mine to 
require that committee attendance and votes be published at least twice 
a year in the Congressional Record.
  That is a first step, but we can, and we should, go much farther to 
make Members accountable to the taxpayers. Let us let them know how we 
are voting in committee. Let us let them know who is showing up to vote 
in committees, and who is not showing up, and whose votes are being 
cast through proxies.
  I think there's another step that can be taken to make us more 
accountable: let us try to establish a more understandable schedule 
that allows Members to be home for predictable, regular and substantial 
periods of time.
  The Senate endeavors to work here for 3 weeks, then allow Members to 
return to their States for a full week. That is one approach, Mr. 
Speaker, one that you, yourself, have taken a great leadership role in 
and have done a superb job in advocating. Regardless of the specifics 
though, we need more time at home listening to the real problems, the 
problems of our constituents, problems that often are starkly different 
from the problems that we find ourselves enmeshed in here in 
Washington, DC.
  As a West Coast Member, I am often able to get back home to the 
Seattle area only for Saturday and Sunday before I have to return here 
to the House for votes. I cannot meet with the Chambers of Commerce or 
the Rotary Clubs. I cannot visit schools or drop in on businesses and 
meet with their employees. They simply are not around on weekends.
  Mr. Speaker, we would all be more accountable to the people who elect 
us if we spent more time at home with our constituents, listening to 
them and pledging to them to address the problems they talked to us 
about.
  Once again I thank the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] for his 
leadership. There is much on congressional reform that we can do, and 
these basic notions, letting some sunshine in so the taxpayers can see 
what their Congress is doing and spending more time with the folks back 
home, these basic notions are two necessary components to the kind of 
congressional reform the taxpayers thought they were voting for in 
1992.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I certainly thank the gentlewoman for, 
first of all, her input to this joint committee. I know that this 
committee met almost daily for an entire year, and the gentlewoman from 
Washington [Ms. Dunn] certainly attended every one of those meetings 
and did yeoman work, and we really do appreciate that, Mr. Speaker.
  At this time I am pleased to yield to the most knowledgeable House 
Member from either party when it comes to House rules and procedures, 
our Republican chief deputy whip and Republican chairman of the 
Committee on Science, Space, and Technology who also found time to 
serve with us on the joint committee, the gentleman from East 
Petersburg, PA, [Mr. Walker].
  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding and thank 
him for taking this special order and giving us a chance to talk 
briefly this evening about the House rules and about reforming some of 
those rules and making this a more productive body. My concern this 
evening is going to center on one particular rule that I think needs to 
be dramatically changed in order to make this body more worthy of 
public respect, and that is the practice of proxy voting in committees. 
In my view the situation that we now have is entirely unacceptable.
  When men and women run for Congress, they certainly do not go to 
their district and suggest:
  ``If you send me to Congress, I will go there and cast a vote, but I 
won't necessarily cast the vote myself. I, on occasion, will turn it 
over to someone else and allow them to cast the vote for me.''
  When the American public understands that that goes on in the 
Congress, they become extremely disturbed, and they should.

                              {time}  2340

  Yet, in committee after committee, that happens regularly, where 
Members of Congress, instead of being there voting themselves, have 
their vote cast by what we call proxy. That is a practice has then 
caused this body not to practice the right kind of legislative 
behavior.
  We have expanded committees and committee staffs largely because if 
no one is going to show up and all the votes are cast by proxy, you can 
do nearly anything, and you can do it on nearly any schedule.
  We would in fact be a more productive body, we would do it in a more 
compact way, if everybody had to show up and actually be there present 
and voting. What we find in committees that do not allow proxy votes is 
the Members do come, and those committees tend to work more efficiently 
and the product of their labors is often more in tune with the House 
than what we have typically had on committees that allow the problems I 
votes.
  Mr. DREIER. If the gentleman will yield, I would just like to comment 
on this issue of proxy voting. I appreciate the hard work that my 
friend from East Petersburg has done on this particular issue.
  The issue of proxy voting I think hits near and dear to this issue of 
showing up for work, frankly. I think the average American can relate 
to the fact when they get up in the morning they do in fact have to 
show up for work. This argument there are so many committees and 
subcommittees is used as an excuse. But, quite frankly, it is used in a 
very arrogant manner, in most cases by the majority, to defeat 
amendments that are offered by Members of the minority.
  In fact, the entire minority caucus of a committee could be sitting 
in that committee offering thoughtful amendments, and the only majority 
Member, the only Democrat in the room, could conceivably be the 
chairman, who could defeat those amendments by simply reaching into his 
desk and bringing out the proxies of other Members, who do not even 
know how their votes are being cast. That kind of arrogance shows again 
the majority has hegemony, jeopardizing the rights of the Members 
sitting in the room.
  Mr. WALKER. I thank the gentleman for pointing that out. It has 
happened to me on several occasions, where we have been in the room and 
often won the vote by the Members voting, often on a bipartisan basis. 
We win the vote by the people who sat and listened to the debate, only 
to have the proxies pulled out and have the vote go the other way as a 
result of the proxies. And I think the American people get cheated, and 
I think the legislative process gets cheated at that point, because the 
fact is, that then that legislation comes to the floor, having been not 
a product of a working committee, but being a product of votes that 
were not even in the room when the action took place.
  Those kinds of issues then get raised on the House floor, and often 
cause a lot of controversy on the House floor, needlessly, because they 
might have been rejected or approved by the committee, depending upon 
where you were headed, if the committees simply stuck with what was 
actually going on and stuck with the votes of people who were there. 
Instead they come to the floor, we create a lot of controversy, and it 
is just bad practice.
  Ultimately the real issue here is whether or not the American people 
don't get cheated by sending people to Congress, who then do not cast 
their own vote in one of the most important functions of Congress, the 
committee deliberations.
  Mr. SOLOMON. The gentleman brings up such a good point. There are two 
committees that don't allow proxy voting. I happen to have served as 
the ranking Republican on the Committee on Veterans' Affairs for many, 
many years, and the Democrat chairman of that committee did not allow 
proxy voting. I commend him for it, the gentleman from Mississippi [Mr. 
Montgomery]. We also do not allow it in the Committee on Rules.
  It is a Federal offense if you allow someone else to vote for you on 
the floor of this House. Yet you can just carte blanche give your vote 
without having exercised your constitutional authority to represent 
your 600,000 people or however many you represent. That is a shame, and 
it should not be allowed. Under our Congressional reform program, we 
would do away with all proxy voting.
  Mr. WALKER. The gentleman raises an interesting point. Isn't it 
interesting in Veterans' Affairs, where they do not allow proxy votes, 
nearly every bill brought out of that committee is brought under the 
suspension calendar. The things are worked out where they are brought 
to the floor in such a non-controversial manner where they can be 
considered under the suspension calendar and moved expeditiously 
through the House.
  Where we run into problems is in those committees where people are 
not present and voting, have given their vote to someone else, and it 
creates all kinds of problems for the system. This is one where if you 
want to truly reform the Congress, we have to end the practice of proxy 
voting. There is no way that you can call a reform real if we have not 
abolished proxy voting in the House of Representatives, and said to the 
American people that when you send a Member of Congress to this body, 
that their vote is going to be cast not only on the floor, but it is 
going to be cast in committee, by them personally being there to cast 
it. I thank the gentleman very much for yielding.
  Mr. SOLOMON. I thank the gentleman for all his hard work as a Member 
of that joint committee. He has been invaluable.
  At this time let me yield, Mr. Speaker, to our next speaker. We were 
very fortunate to have him as a Member of the joint committee, someone 
as bright and diligent as our next speaker. He also serves on the 
Committee on Agriculture, the Committee on the Budget, and the 
Committee on Natural Resources. And I am pleased at this time to yield 
to the gentleman from Loveland, CO [Mr. Allard].
  Mr. ALLARD. Thank you very much. I would like to thank the gentleman 
from New York for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, I came to this committee and came to the Congress as 
somebody who had served in a state legislature, a state legislature 
from a state that is very progressive. We had done a lot of reforms in 
our own legislative process so it was more accountable, and we did a 
lot of things to hold down costs.
  So I was absolutely delighted when I had an opportunity to serve on 
this Committee on the Organization of Congress, because I could begin 
to talk about those things that I did as a legislator in my own state, 
and how successful they were and how we should begin to apply them to 
the Congress, and particularly to the House of Representatives.
  I came to this body with the concept of a citizen legislator, that 
is, somebody who had to live under the very laws that they passed. In 
the Colorado State Senate I carried a piece of legislation that limited 
our session to 120 days, because it felt like the members from that 
legislative body had to go back and spend some time at home, and not 
spend a whole year in session. Because of that experience at home, they 
would be better legislators.
  Today the issue I frequently hear from local communities, is we 
continually are being flooded with mandates. I say look, you know, 
there is a fundamental problem there about Congress being able to 
understand your problems. Your elected representative, your elected 
representative to the school board, your elected representative to the 
county commissioners, or your elected representative to the city 
council, or even you state legislators, have to live under a set of 
laws where Congress has exempted itself from.
  This has created a fundamental problem. It is a problem that just has 
not been recently recognized. It was recognized as far back as James 
Madison, who in so many words stated that if you have a legislative 
body that exempts itself from the same laws everybody else has to live 
under, you in effect have created an elite body.
  So I saw some very fundamental changes that had to occur in a way 
that we did business here. And I have had an opportunity to talk about 
many of those and work with many of the Members that are here tonight 
that are talking about a lot of change that needs to occur in the 
Congress.
  It has been a pleasure to work with those Members, because they are 
very sincere in their efforts. They truly believe that change has to 
occur in the House of Representatives, as I do.
  So I feel like I have aligned myself with a very distinguished group 
as far as the House of Representatives is concerned.
  I spent a good deal of time looking at how we could make the 
Congress, that is, the House and the Senate, more efficient in the way 
they did business. In the legislative body that I came from, we, for 
example, had a joint administrative body that looked at the general 
business in that body, and said look, when we get to issues like 
printing, the Senate and House should not have separate printing 
offices, that these efforts can be combined, and by combining them you 
make the administrative process much more accountable and you also 
reduce the number of employees that you have that manage your 
particular institution.
  So I have seen today a real need to do some consolidating between 
both the House and the Senate, to have this joint effort come together 
with some kind of committee that is going to make some decisions so 
that we see administrative policies that are carried on the same in 
both the House and the Senate.
  By the way, we would reduce the number of employees we have. We have 
tight budgets, and I think we should be prepared to deal with those 
right budgets. One way we can do it is by consolidating services.

                              {time}  1150

  Areas that I saw and we actually included in the report that we got 
from the organization of the committee were, we were going to set up a 
committee. We set up a committee to look seriously at these areas. I 
would have wished that the committee itself would have taken even more 
direct action on these areas, but I will accept the fact that perhaps 
they need studying because they are very complicated. But there are 
certain areas where I think we could so some consolidation.
  One of them, as I alluded to earlier, was printing. I think we can 
look to recording issues, where we have a recording studio on one side 
and a recording studio on the other. No reason why we cannot combine 
some of those facilities. Photography and guide services and folding 
and packaging services, the Chaplain's and the flag office and the 
parking permits and security and the Congressional Budget Office and 
disbursements and receipts and the Architect of the Capitol, 
maintenance and grounds and the buildings, the library and drafting 
services, research and computer services are all areas that we need to 
look at so that we can begin to consolidate services and set up a 
process where you have clear administrative decisions being made so the 
person in charge has to be accountable and so he can hold those 
agencies underneath him accountable.
  The way the system works today, we do not have that accountability. 
It is something that I saw happening in the Colorado State Legislature. 
It is something that I know happens in many legislatures all over the 
United States. I think there is a lesson to be learned, but the 
Congress needs to take the time to find out what other legislators are 
doing and helping to manage their body in the various state legislative 
bodies and bring those concepts in here. And it is my hope that perhaps 
maybe that study will begin to accomplish some of those things and 
bring some common sense, bring some real management decisions that can 
make a difference in the way that we do business.
  I was joked at occasionally from some of my constituents, you know, 
Congressman, we see a lot of problems with the House. And here you are, 
you have set up another committee within the House of Representatives 
and the Senate to try and address some of these problems. All we need 
is another committee.
  I said, look, I really believe that this committee is made up of some 
Members who sincerely want to have change as I do. I think that it is a 
good place to start, and I think that if we get something out of there 
that the leadership will treat that recommendation seriously. I have to 
report back in a somewhat embarrassed situation, back to my 
constituents and say what I see happening. The report that came out of 
that committee is virtually being ignored by the leadership in the 
House and the Senate. We are not getting our recommendations, some of 
which I seriously brought up here today, talked about. And we need to 
bring these issues to the floor, and we need to have some serious 
debate on the House floor by the Members that were elected by their 
constituents and get them brought before the American public.
  I think that we will find that many Members of this House will vote 
for a lot of the changes that we talked about in that committee. I am 
very disappointed that it has become bogged down and has not been 
brought forward as I would have hoped that it would have been. We took 
a lot of time. We had more than 36 days of testimony on the committee 
itself to organize Congress. And this made up hours and hours of 
testimony. I am not sure that in recent history there has ever been a 
committee that took as much time as we did on that committee to talk 
about the problems facing Congress.
  I would just like to thank the gentleman from New York for his 
leadership. I think there is a lot that needs to be done and can be 
done by this body. All we need to do is open the gates, and I think 
that the American people will respond. I think the Members of this 
House will respond.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I certainly thank the gentleman for his 
very, very telling remarks.
  Mr. Speaker, our colleague from Washington [Mr. Swift], recently 
charged that the Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress, of 
which we were both members, never discussed or set any goals for its 
efforts to reform Congress.
  I must respectfully disagree with him, though I would hasten to add 
that the joint committee did not go far enough in addressing those 
goals.
  Our goals were actually set out for us in House Concurrent Resolution 
192 which established the joint committee back in 1992.
  We were mandated by that resolution ``to recommend improvements in 
the organization and operation of the Congress with a view to 
strengthening the effectiveness of the Congress, simplifying its 
operations, improving its relationships with and oversight of other 
branches of the U.S. Government, and improving the orderly 
consideration of legislation.''
  In short, the joint committee was charged with making recommendations 
to simplify and improve our existing structures and procedures so that 
we can do a more effective job of legislating and overseeing the 
executive branch.
  Implicit in this stated goal is the assumption that the Congress is 
not now properly organized or operated to effectively carry out our 
constitutional responsibilities to make the laws and monitor their 
implementation. If this were not the case, we would not have gone to 
all the trouble to create a joint committee to make recommended 
improvements.
  Indeed, the validity of that assumption was confirmed by the Members 
and public witnesses appearing before the joint committee during the 
course of its 6 months of hearings. It was also evident in the results 
of a survey of Members conducted for the joint committee.
  In response to the question, Are major procedural or organizational 
improvements needed in the way Congress conducts its legislative 
business? 91.2 percent of the House respondents said yes. That includes 
77.7 percent of the Democratic respondents and 96.4 percent of the 
Republican respondents.
  Mr. Speaker, we don't get such overwhelming, bipartisan agreement on 
much else around here; but, when it comes to the need to reform this 
institution, there is presumably near unanimous support for major 
improvements in the way we conduct our legislative business.
  So there's our goal, I would say to Mr. Swift: Improve the way we 
conduct our legislative business!
  It's in our authorizing resolution; it's in our hearing record; it's 
in the Member survey results; and it's in our final report.
  The final report, after repeating the authorizing resolution's 
mandate that we recommend improvements to strengthen the effectiveness 
of Congress simplify its operations, and improve its oversight and the 
orderly consideration of legislation, then goes on to say, and I quote: 
``In short, the joint committee was formed to address how to make 
Congress more effective, accountable, and credible.''
  Mr. Speaker, Mr. Swift argues that many of the goals cited by 
reformers are directly contradictory. He would argue that you cannot be 
more democratic, more representative, more responsive, more accountable 
and more deliberative, on the one hand, and more efficient, decisive, 
orderly, and productive on the other.
  Well, Mr. Speaker, it must be conceded that democracy is inherently 
inefficient and even messy at times, and that the single-minded pursuit 
of efficiency and order can only diminish our democratic character. 
But, as far as I know, no true reformers are urging us to commit 
democracide for the sake of making the trains run on time.
  But, I would argue that true reformers can have it both ways--that 
they can make this institution more efficient while also making it more 
open, accountable, responsive and deliberative. These goals are not 
contradictory or mutually exclusive.
  Mr. Speaker, one of the greatest inefficiencies of this institution 
is the duplication of effort that goes on in our 22 standing committees 
and scores of subcommittees--all because of something called multiple 
referrals. That was an innovation of the 1974 Bolling reforms. Before 
that, any bill could be referred to only one committee.
  But, the part of the Bolling committee reform package that was not 
enacted, was the realignment of committee jurisdictions along more 
rational and functional lines. So what we ended up with was pretty much 
the same tangle of jurisdictional responsibilities as before, combined 
for the first time with the possibility that bills could be referred to 
two or more committees at a time, or in sequence.
  And the multiple referral authority, which was mandated on the 
Speaker, encouraged committees to fight to broaden their jurisdictions 
even further into the territories of other committees.
  So what we have ended-up with is a double inefficiency: two or more 
committees holding hearings and markups on the same bills, and also 
expending time and resources in constant jurisdictional turf battles to 
preserve, protect and expand their own legislative authority.
  What we have proposed in the alternative on the Republican side is 
that:
  First, we reduce the number of committees and subcommittees;
  Second, realign and consolidate jurisdictions where possible;
  Third, eliminate joint bill referrals, require the designation of a 
principal committee for each bill, and keep sequential referrals as 
discretionary with the Speaker, subject to time limits for reporting; 
and
  Fourth, place strict limits on the number of committee and 
subcommittee assignments a Member may serve on.
  All these reforms are designed to make our legislative process more 
efficient by eliminating duplication of effort and maximizing the 
amount of time and effort a Member may devote to each assignment.
  Moreover, by pinpointing responsibility for each bill in a single, 
primary or principal committee, we will restore the kind of 
accountability which has been lacking since the institution of multiple 
referrals back in 1974.
  At the same time, the implementation of these reforms should help to 
make the process more representative and deliberative. With Members 
having fewer committee and subcommittee assignments, there should be 
greater Member participation in hearings and bill markups, meaning that 
the legislative products of these subcommittees and committees will 
receive fuller and more representative participation, deliberation and 
results.
  In short, in the case of these reforms, efficiency and deliberative 
democracy are not contradictory--they are mutually complementary.
  And Mr. Speaker, with fewer committees, subcommittees and Member 
assignments, it should also be feasible to eliminate the practice of 
proxy voting.
  Now Mr. Speaker, some Democrats argue that proxy voting is more 
efficient since it does not require the presence of Members for their 
votes to be recorded on amendments and reporting bills. But it is 
clearly an efficiency that runs directly contrary to deliberative and 
participatory democracy, and certainly contradictory to a Members 
constitutional obligation to responsibly represent his or her 
constituents.
  Because by giving away a proxy vote, Members do not know what 
specific amendments will be offered, or hear the arguments for or 
against them, when they entrust their proxy to another Member and the 
resulting decisions will not necessarily reflect the true sentiments of 
a committee majority, and the constituents they represent.
  By the same token, one-third committee quorums for amending bills and 
a new rule allowing so-called rolling quorums for reporting them, 
whereby Members can drop by and vote after the deliberative process is 
completed, are absolutely contrary to majority rule and deliberative 
decision making.
  Mr. Speaker, the principle for committee action enunciated by 
Jefferson in his Manual should apply with the same force today as it 
did in his time, and that is that a majority of the committee 
constitutes a quorum for business, they can only act when together, and 
not by separate consultation and consent--absolutely nothing being in 
the report of the committee but what has been agreed to in committee 
actually assembled.
  Mr. Speaker, and Members, when one looks at the way we handle major 
legislation on the House floor, we are again confronted with a system 
that increasingly embraces undemocratic procedures in the name of 
efficiency at the expense of deliberative and representative 
government.
  In this Congress, 80 percent of the bills brought through the Rules 
Committee have been considered on this floor under a process that 
restricts the full and free right of Members to offer amendments.
  The survey of House Members taken for the joint committee reveals 
that this is not merely a complaint or concern of the minority party. 
It is a very legitimate concern. When House Members were asked whether 
they agree or disagree that there have been too many limitations on 
debates and amendments on the House floor this year, 68 percent of the 
respondents agreed, including 41 percent of the Democrats and 98 
percent of the Republicans.
  It is ironic, but sadly true, that the inefficiencies of our current 
committee system are being compensated for, by an overly efficient 
House floor system that reduces, rather than improves, our chances of 
improving upon the legislative products of those committees. Is it any 
wonder the people have less respect for the laws we enact, when they 
see how undemocratically we conduct our business around here.
  We have squeezed out representative and deliberative democracy at 
both ends of the process through a combination of inefficiency and 
efficiency. Both the committee process and the House floor process have 
increasingly denied us the opportunity to be representative and 
responsive legislators.
  In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I must respectfully disagree with my 
colleague from Washington [Mr. Swift] on both of his charges that the 
joint committee never had any agreed upon goals, and that the goals of 
reformers are contradictory.
  The recommendations of the joint committee, while not going far 
enough, reflect the consensus, not only of the joint committee members, 
but of other House Members who testified and responded to the Member 
survey.
  And that consensus is that the existing legislative structure and 
process are not sufficiently rational, responsive, representative or 
deliberative. Members are being asked to do more than they can 
responsibly and conscientiously manage at the committee level, and then 
are being prevented from doing what they were elected to do, when a 
bill reaches the House floor.
  There are reforms that can be instituted that are both internally 
consistent and which promote the fulfillment of those goals. We can 
again make the committee system a more efficient and participatory 
policy process.
  And, if committees once again produce legislation that is more 
representative and responsive to problems and our constituents, we have 
less to fear about an open amendment process on the House floor.
  Mr. Speaker, as with any genuine and bold reform effort, the major 
obstacle to its success is the resistance of some powerful Members who 
are wedded to the status quo out of personal power considerations, in 
clear defiance of what is in the best interests of improving the 
organization and operation of the institution as a whole.
  In the meantime, public respect, confidence and job approval ratings 
of the Congress continue to decline to dangerously low levels. The 
question confronting us is whether we will have the courage and 
foresight to reform ourselves now, in a rational way, before this tidal 
wave of sentiment engulfs us and imposes on us more extreme and 
irrational changes?
  We must act now to bring the recommendations of the joint committee 
on congressional reform to the House floor as a single bill, and 
consider them under an open amendment process that will enable us to 
further strengthen them, and make the changes that are necessary in our 
organization and operations. Time is running out.
  Mr. Speaker, at this time I want to yield to a very, very important 
person in the reform of this Congress. When our colleague, again from 
Ohio [Mr. Gradison], retired from the Congress and the vice 
chairmanship of this joint committee at the beginning of this Congress, 
our Republican leader made another outstanding choice in picking our 
next Speaker to become vice chairman of the joint committee.
  Mr. Speaker, I am referring to and yield to the very distinguished 
and hard-working vice chairman of the Joint Committee on the 
Organization of Congress and my colleague on the Rules Committee, the 
gentleman from La Verne, CA [Mr. Dreier].
  Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for yielding.
  I include for the Record a statement from our distinguished 
Republican leader, Mr. Michel.
  Mr. MICHEL. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleagues, especially Jerry 
Solomon and David Dreier, for taking this important special order.
  Why reform Congress? to most people in the country, that is like 
asking the question: Why breathe? It simply must be done if we want to 
survive.
  My comments today are directed not at the reform process for this 
year. The Democratic leadership has already demonstrated that real 
reform, for all intents and purposes, is dead in this Congress. No, my 
comments go to my Republican colleagues, once they take control of this 
institution.
  In 1780, Abigall Adams wrote to her young son about the nature of 
virtue: ``It is not in the still calm of life or in the repose of a 
pacific situation, that great challenges are formed * * * Great 
necessities call out great virtues * * *''
  As I near the end of 38 years of public service in the House of 
Representatives, I believe the words of Abigail Adams to her young son 
(who in later years would be elected to the House after his presidency) 
must be heeded by Congress today. The institution is in a time of 
``great necessities,'' its credibility torn to shreds by repeated 
scandals, its ability to do the people's work in serious doubt after 
forty years of total control by one party, its image tarnished by the 
Democrats' refusal to reform. Only the heroic exercise of great 
legislative virtues--fairness, accountability, thrift honesty, 
efficiency, humility and courage--can save the reputation of the House.
  The end of the 103d Congress will mark the beginning of a new stage 
in my life (a more upbeat way of saying ``I'm retiring.''), so I will 
not be a Member of Congress on the inevitable--and, in my view fast-
approaching--day when a House Republican is once again honored with the 
proud title of ``Mr. Speaker.'' But nearly four decades of service have 
taught me some lessons. Perhaps the following ideas on House reform can 
be of help as our great party prepares itself for the responsibilities 
of leadership in every committee, subcommittee, and legislative aspect 
of the people's House. Let me explain how each great virtue can 
manifest itself in specific reforms for the House:
  Fairness: Fairness means different things to different people. In 
Congress, it should mean--at a minimum--an equal ability to represent 
your constituents. This is a basic right, not a privilege granted or 
denied by a whim of the majority, and the refusal to recognize that 
right is a direct attack on the very idea of representative government. 
By taking away a Member's right to amend legislation and to make the 
case for that amendment, the majority in effect takes away the right of 
Members to represent their constituents. Since each district has equal 
importance in the eyes of the law, each Member theoretically should 
have equal opportunity to craft legislation according to his or her 
principles and judgment. By this I do not mean you always get the 
legislative result you desire, but you get the opportunity to let all 
of your colleagues see what you have to offer and vote on it. Whether 
it concerns offering amendments, equal access to staff and resources, 
or an equal ability to gather necessary documents, a little fairness 
goes a long way in improving comity, cooperation and courtesy and would 
help the House improve its legislative product and its reputation in 
the eyes of the public.
  Unfortunately, the House has become increasingly unfair over the last 
decade in several respects. For instance, the Rules Committee--
controlled by Democrats--has clamped down on the granting of open 
rules, making it more and more difficult for Members to offer 
amendments to legislation. In fact, the open rule, once a fairly common 
aspect of legislative life, has become one of the most endangered 
species in the political landscape, a kind of spotted owl of 
parliamentary procedure. To restore fairness, the House should make it 
more difficult for the Rules Committee to issue closed rules that 
strictly limit the number of amendments to be offered by the minority 
party. I would also guarantee the right of the minority party to offer 
a last chance to recommit a bill with instructions.

  Of course, there is also a problem with the unfair division of 
resources. Some committee chairmen over the years have come to believe 
the committees they head are quite literally their committees, personal 
fiefdoms over which they wield absolute power, while everyone else is 
treated as an underling. With the arrogance of a titled lord of the 
manor, these committee chieftains refuse to give the minority adequate 
staff resources, while hiring more than enough staff for their own 
uses. While I believe that the taxpayers would be better served by a 
large reduction in overall staff (see below, under ``Thrift''), the 
minority cannot be further penalized by denying them the staff they 
need to begin to overcome the advantages of majority power.
  Accountability: The dictum that power tends to corrupt is overused, 
but also instructive when it comes to the Congress. It is only to be 
expected that forty consecutive years in total power have aggrandized 
some of the less attractive aspects of political life and sometimes 
clouded the ethical prudential judgment of those who have wielded such 
power. One party is not more virtuous than the other, but common sense 
tells us that forty years of uninterrupted power has a corrosive effect 
on the ability to perceive accurately one's shortcomings and scrutinize 
one's motives.
  Fiscal, political and ethical accountability are now desperately 
needed because the House is in a period of decline in public popularity 
unparalleled in my years as a member. One way to impose accountability 
is to overhaul our campaign finance laws. There is a huge imbalance in 
favor of incumbents over challengers in House elections. I support 
three critical reforms of our campaign finance system:
  First, we should require that most of the money raised in campaigns 
come from the constituents of the districts. The people being 
represented in the district--not the elite from New York or Hollywood--
should have the greatest say in who is elected.
  Second, I would ban PACs. PACs were initially created as a reform in 
the 1970's, but it is time for us to admit that they have not only 
failed to reform the system, but have created new problems. PACs can 
give undue influence to special interest groups to control the 
legislative agenda--or at the very least they give the perception of 
doing so. Let's get rid of them, as quickly as possible.
  Third, we need to ban the use of soft money in elections. Soft money 
gives campaigns resources, such as phone banks, without the risk of 
disclosure. By using such resources, powerful special interests have a 
profound impact on elections without the voters ever knowing about 
their role. We should ban these kinds of contributions, or at least 
require their full disclosure.
  Of course, accountability is not only a problem with the Congress. It 
is also a problem with the executive branch. When the administration is 
of one party and the Congress is of another, executive branch 
accountability becomes much easier. In fact, during the Reagan and Bush 
years, the Democrats in the Congress were zealous in making the 
Administration accountable. It seemed at times that not a week went by 
without the Democratic pit bulls of oversight snarling and yapping at 
one Republican appointee or another.
  But like the dog that didn't bark in the Sherlock Holmes' story, the 
Democrat guard dogs have been strangely silent during the Clinton 
administration despite a number of scandals, near-scandals, and abuses 
by Clinton appointees. Of course, it is more difficult to fully conduct 
oversight on members of your own party, to put it in the mildest 
possible terms. That is why I have urged that we put control of the 
Government Operations Committee into the hands of the minority when the 
majority in the Congress and the executive branch are of the same 
party. This simple change will give the minority party the resources 
and power to investigate wrongdoing while giving the Government greater 
credibility in pursuit of accountability. Again, I favor such a reform 
even when we gain majority status.
  Thrift: If the Congress wants to regain the goodwill of the 
taxpayers, it must exhibit thrift, that most exemplary of the virtues 
of governance. I am reminded of the example of that great and recently 
decreased Congressman, Bill Natcher. Bill, to his last days in the 
House, exemplified the best qualities of thrift. He realized that his 
personal example mattered. He kept his office staff small, he rarely 
spent half of his office allowance, and his campaigns were inexpensive 
and simple. He knew the value of the taxpayer's dollar.
  That is why I have long supported measures that cut spending in the 
legislative branch, and other measures that allow for deficit reduction 
in appropriation bills and entitlement spending. For instance, I 
proposed that Republicans, if they controlled the 103d Congress, would 
cut committee staffs in half.
  I also support other efforts to cut waste in spending. We should give 
the President line item veto authority. We need to pass the balanced 
budget amendment to the Constitution. And we need to make it easier in 
the House rules to move money in appropriations bills from pork barrel 
projects to deficit reduction. In short, the rules of the House are 
currently stacked against efforts to cut spending. We need to change 
those rules to make it easier to cut spending and harder to spend more.
  Honesty: Perhaps the biggest complaint that the voters have with 
their elected officials in Washington concerns the basic virtue of 
honesty. Official Washington is simply not honest enough with the 
American people. Whether it is sugar coating the truth or generating 
artificial ``crises'' to push political agendas, we have created the 
perception--and, more often than we care to admit, the reality--of 
being participants in an endless game of rhetorical sleight-of-hand and 
media manipulation. There are certain things that can be done to 
restore a sense of truth to our process, and since we deal so often 
with numbers, reform should begin with how Congress creates its budget 
baseline numbers.
  Baseline budgeting allows the Congress to fudge the numbers by 
including the expected rise in spending as part of the calculations. 
That means when the President or the Congress say they are cutting 
spending, they mostly are really just slowing the growth of spending. I 
believe we should go back to the old method of zero-based budgeting, so 
that every year we reexamine the assumptions made in the first funding 
resolution.

  Another budget reform also involved deficit reduction. Most cutting 
amendments to appropriations bill do not actually cut the deficit. 
Instead, they are reprogrammed for spending on other projects. For 
example, when Members voted to kill the Superconducting Supercollider, 
the money saved did not go to deficit reduction as all the supporters 
of the amendment promised but instead to other programs like public 
housing within that appropriation bill. If we are going to be honest 
with the American people, we should make certain that a deficit 
reduction amendment actually reduced the deficit.
  Efficiency: When hearings for the creation of the Joint Committee on 
the Organization of the Congress initially were held, the majority 
leader and the Speaker stressed the need for great efficiency while I 
stressed the need for greater fairness. After watching the committee 
system's handling of the health care issue, I am beginning to come 
around to the efficiency argument.
  We have seen three committees in the House and two committees in the 
Senate develop different and often contradictory health care reform 
plans, and at this moment, it is still doubtful that those differences 
will ever be worked out. These jurisdictional battles and redundant 
efforts are an inefficient use of the Congress' time and the taxpayer's 
money. We need a complete restructuring of the committee system to make 
these battles less common. The House should also examine a mechanism to 
create temporary committees for issues that are too big for one 
committee to handle.
  Efficiency can also be achieved by the creation of a more orderly and 
``family friendly'' schedule. We in the House spend so much of our time 
in the early months doing too little, while spending so little of our 
time in the later months doing too much. We need to regularize our 
schedule to make a more efficient use of our time.
  Another important way to create more efficiency in the House is to 
eliminated the patronage system. Forty years of single party control of 
this institution has eroded many checks and balances, but perhaps the 
most blatant abuse is the system of patronage. We tried in the 102d 
Congress to change it all by creating the office of Director of Non-
Legislative Affairs to handle many of the operations of the House. 
Unfortunately, our first director resigned in disgust because the 
majority would not allow him the necessary powers to complete his 
mission. We need reform that will eliminate the cronyism and the lack 
of professionalism which hurt the House in so many ways.

  Humility: The most common criticism of the Members of the U.S. 
Congress comes from voters who are struck by the arrogance of power, 
powerfully exemplified by the debate over congressional coverage under 
laws we impose on all other Americans.
  As the House and Senate work on legislation that affects small 
businesses and private citizens, they often see fit to exempt the 
Congress from those laws. Compliance with OSHA is but one example. If 
the Congress were forced to comply with the myriad of safety rules and 
regulations they pass on to small businesses, the legislative branch 
would close down. In fact, that is one reason why the Congress gave 
itself an exemption from OSHA regulations. But the question we should 
ask ourselves before we pass these burdensome mandates is this: If we 
can't handle these laws, how can we expect the private sector to handle 
them?
  This double standard understandably outrages the American public. If, 
in constitutional theory, no one is above the law, how can the Congress 
work out a private exemption for itself? The feeble response, based on 
the constitutional checks and balances argument, frankly doesn't mean 
much to taxpayers who have to obey laws from which their elected 
representatives exempt themselves. That is why I strongly support a 
requirement that all laws the Congress passes, the Congress must obey.
  There's another way to assert some humility in the House: impose term 
limits on committee chairmen and ranking members. I originally proposed 
this change in the rules of the House as a way to break up much of the 
institutional gridlock that haunted the House during the Bush 
administration. Arrogance comes from power, and power comes from an 
unyielding, and seemingly eternal, grip on the levers of the 
committees. By loosening that grip and giving Members a time limit to 
serve as head of a committee, we may be able to do two things. First, 
give other important reforms such as a full committee restructuring a 
chance to survive. And two, give these chairs a taste of humility.

  Courage: None of the virtues listed above are possible without 
courage. And courage comes in many forms. There is the courage to face 
down a committee chairman in the face of threats and intimidation, the 
courage to tell the voters they are wrong when you believe they are 
wrong, and to stand up to threats from powerful colleagues when you 
think you are right. There must be the courage to listen to all sides 
of a debate and admit when you are wrong, to be accountable to the 
taxpayers, and to deal with budget challenges honestly. and if we are 
to achieve true reform, there must be the courage to give up some power 
for the better operation of the House. None of the other virtues is 
possible unless Members are informed and inspired by the courage that 
comes only with the belief that a Member of the House is here to serve 
the people--not his party or his committee chairman or some special 
interest or the various and assorted pundits, prophets, and polemicists 
of the media.
  ``And your Children shall wander in the wilderness for forty years.'' 
Scripture describes a situation very familiar to House Republicans. For 
40 years, we have been wandering in the political wilderness as the 
minority party in U.S. House of Representatives,
  I have been here for 38 of those long years. Elections have come and 
gone, but for almost half a century, no Republican has chaired a 
committee, or wielded the gavel on the House floor.
  But as I look to the future, I can see the promised land of a 
Republican majority. I will not be the Republican who finally regains 
the Speaker's chair, but I am glad to know the principles we have all 
fought for during the years in the wilderness will soon triumph in the 
House and in the Nation.
  For all the faults of its individual Members, for all the real 
grievances that have accumulated during forty years of one-power 
control, the United States House of Representatives remains the 
greatest representative legislative body in the world. Our system is 
emulated and admired in many nations and for good reason. Admittedly, 
we have hit some rough spots over the last several years, and I must 
confess that there have been days when in the face of some new scandal 
it was not easy going to work each morning. It is clear we live in a 
time when those great necessities of congressional reform must be 
addressed directly, forcefully and quickly.
  One final word to my Republican friends and colleagues in the House: 
I know that after 38 years of minority status, it would be all too 
human to want to wreak revenge on the Democrats when we become the 
majority and do unto them as they have been doing unto us for so long. 
The temptation is great and understandable, but in my view it is 
precisely because we Republicans know from bitter experience the 
arrogance of unchecked power, the abuse of the system, and the 
unfairness of rules that stifle open debate, that we should as a 
majority do all we can to make the process work fairly. We are going to 
be judged by the people not on how often we can stick it to those who 
have stuck it to us, but on how close we come to running the House in 
the best interests of the Nation. To paraphrase an old saying, 
governing well is the best revenge.
  Reform of the House is coming. As my Republican colleagues take over 
the Congress, I hope they remember those who, during the years in the 
wilderness, tried our best to make this great House work for the 
people. And I hope they keep in mind these seven virtues of reform on 
that great day in January, when a Democrat stands near the Speaker's 
chair on the House floor, hands the gavel to a Republican and says, 
``Congratulations, Mr. Speaker!''
  Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I have just a very few minutes. I wanted to 
talk specifically about the issue of committee reform.
  I would like to thank my colleagues, the gentleman from New York [Mr. 
Solomon] and the gentleman from Colorado [Mr. Allard], both of whom are 
still here in the Chamber; our colleagues, the gentleman from Missouri 
[Mr. Emerson] and the gentlewoman from Washington [Ms. Dunn] and the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Walker], all of whom worked very 
closely with me as we tried in a bipartisan way to deal with issue of 
reform of the institution.
  This committee came about because of the many crises that this 
institution faced: the House Bank, the Post Office, the restaurant, and 
a wide range of other concerns, many of which still remain today in the 
eyes of the American people.
  On the issue of committee reform, Mr. Speaker, if you look at the 
early history of this country, virtually every decade, when the census 
was taken, the Congress brought about a change in the structure of the 
committee system in the Congress. Clearly, the committee system is, I 
believe, the most important aspect. In fact, our friend, Norm Ornstein, 
at the American Enterprise Interstate, said, in one of the many 
opportunities he had to testify before our joint committee and then 
again before the Rules Committee, he said that the committee system is 
the linchpin in the deliberative process. That clearly is the case.
  We have 266 committees and subcommittees here in the Congress. The 
unfortunate thing is that we have observed really the development of 
fiefdoms, if you will, and it seems to me that we have a responsibility 
to try and reduce that so that one of the issues that was mentioned 
earlier by our friend from Pennsylvania, Mr. Walker, that issue being 
proxy voting, can in fact be addressed.
  If we can reduce the number of committees and subcommittees, Members 
will in fact be able to show up to do their committee work. If you look 
at the jurisdictional overlap that exists today, there are 52 
committees and subcommittees that have responsibility over programs for 
children and families. The Environmental Protection Agency answers to 
90 committees and subcommittees. There are 107 committees and 
subcommittees that claim some oversight role over the Pentagon, and 
there are more than 40 subcommittees and committees that have 
jurisdiction over surface transportation.

  If you look at that king of jurisdictional overlap, it creates 
gridlock here in the Congress and at the same time it says to members 
in the executive branch, Cabinet Secretaries, Undersecretaries, they 
have to often come before the Congress and provide virtually identical 
testimony time after time after time, often to the same Members who sit 
on several different panels, jeopardizing their ability to effectively 
do their job at the executive branch.
  Recognizing that an important part of that is reporting here, but the 
kind of duplication that we see through the present committee structure 
is unfortunately, I believe, a very bad thing. So it seems to me that 
what we should do, as we look at this question, is we should have an 
opportunity to bring about meaningful reform of the committee structure 
as we know it.
  Last fall, just before we adjourned at Thanksgiving, we had the 
markup of this committee. I offered the one plan calling for major 
committee reform. we now have 22 standing committees here. My plan 
called for reducing that to 16 standing committees. Unfortunately, the 
plan I offered was defeated on a 6-6 tie vote.
  One of the things about this committee, it is the first time in 
nearly half a century that a joint House/Senate committee, made up of 
an equal number of Republicans and an equal number of Democrats, has 
been put into place. One of the great things was its bipartisanship.

                              {time}  2359

  Yet, not a single Democrat joined in support of the package that I 
offered, making an attempt to bring about some kind of change in the 
committee structure.
  Mr. Speaker, I believe that virtually everyone recognizes the very 
important need to deal with this kind of reform, and I hope very much 
that as we move ahead with this bill, and it is now pending before the 
Committee on Rules and pending before the Committee on House 
Administration, I hope that we will be able to get what my counterpart, 
the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Hamilton], described as a generous rule 
that will allow for deliberation over this issue of committee structure 
reform.
  Mr. Speaker, I think it is that important, and I think that it is 
something that we must get to if we are going to bring about any kind 
of meaningful reform of this institution.
  Mr. Speaker, I see that we are about to embark on the bewitching hour 
of midnight. The Speaker has the gavel in his hand. I suspect that 
under this new structure that we have here, once we reach midnight, 
everything comes to a close. I thank the Chair for the kindness of the 
staff members here, and our colleagues, and again, I thank the 
gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] and the gentleman from Colorado 
[Mr. Allard] for staying here, and the other members of the joint 
committee who have worked so diligently to ensure that we can bring 
about meaningful reform of the U.S. Congress.

                          ____________________