[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 91 (Thursday, July 14, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: July 14, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                   EXPEDITED RESCISSIONS ACT OF 1994

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 467 and rule 
XXIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House 
on the State of the Union for the consideration of the bill, H.R. 4600.

                              {time}  1529


                     in the committee of the whole

  Accordingly the House resolved itself into the Committee of the Whole 
House on the State of the Union for the consideration of the bill (H.R. 
4600) to amend the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 
1974 to provide for the expedited consideration of certain proposed 
rescissions of budget authority, with Mr. De la Garza in the chair.

                              {time}  1530

  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The CHAIRMAN. Pursuant to the rule, the bill is considered as having 
been read the first time.
  Under the rule, the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Derrick] will 
be recognized for 15 minutes; the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] 
will be recognized for 15 minutes; the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. 
Conyers] will be recognized for 15 minutes; and the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania [Mr. Clinger] will be recognized for 15 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers].
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 3 minutes.
  (Mr. CONYERS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, today, the House considers H.R. 4600, 
legislation to provide expedited rescission authority for the 
President, a matter under the jurisdiction of the Committee on 
Government Operations.
  The Government Operations Legislation Subcommittee has held numerous 
and wideranging hearings on budget reform issues. The committee has 
heard the testimony of the administration, the leadership and rank and 
file Members of both parties in Congress, as well as experts at the 
Congressional Budget Office, the General Accounting Office, and 
academia. Earlier, we received the testimony of our former colleague, 
Leon Panetta, who repeated President Clinton's call for the adoption of 
expedited rescission authority.
  The Committee on Government Operations has worked diligently with the 
administration and committed Members of Congress to strengthen our 
budget process. I would particularly like to thank Congressman John 
Spratt, one of the Government Operations Subcommittee chairmen, for his 
work on these issues. Congressman Spratt deserves great credit for his 
strong and continuing contribution in helping to forge consensus where, 
previously, there has been gridlock.
  All of us are committed to eliminating wasteful and unproductive 
spending. The Committee on Government Operations has vigorously 
exercised its oversight function, holding a series of hearings to 
address fraud, waste, and other abuses throughout the Federal 
Government. Through these hearings, we have identified Government 
waste, ranging from massive contract overruns on the Seawolf submarine 
and C-17 airlifter contracts, to outright theft of Government funds at 
the United States Embassy in Mexico City.
  Historically, one tool to cut wasteful Federal spending has been 
rescission authority. Since the adoption of the Impoundment Control Act 
of 1974, Congress has rescinded approximately $90 billion in 
unnecessary budget authority, nearly 25 percent more than proposed by 
the President.
  As attractive and successful as rescission authority has been, I want 
to clarify its limitations. Rescission authority is not a panacea or 
cure all for the Federal deficit. During our Government Operations 
hearing, the GAO testified that total enacted rescissions since 1974 
have never exceeded 23 percent of any single year's deficit. However, 
to reduce the current deficit by 23 percent would require rescinding 
more than $50 billion, the equivalent of rescinding the entire 1995 
budget for the Departments of Education, Energy and Commerce. Clearly, 
rescission authority cannot solve the deficit problem on its own.
  I am troubled by the potential for abuse and many of the concerns you 
have heard or will hear today reflect congressional concern fueled by 
administrative abuses of the 1970's. In fact, Congress adopted the 
Impoundment Control Act to address the misuse of an administration's 
impoundment authority to unilaterally and indefinitely cancel spending 
for selected programs. Consequently, this expedited rescission 
authority carefully provides for a trial run and the authority expires 
following the 103d Congress.
  The legislation before the House is a good effort to create an 
additional deficit reduction tool for the President. The legislation 
provides the President with a certainty of a vote on the President's 
rescission proposals, guaranteeing an accelerated, expedited process 
through Congress. The bill would permit the President to submit 
rescissions to Congress within 3 days of signing an appropriations bill 
and Congress must vote on these rescissions within 10 legislative days.
  If the Appropriations Committee believes they can draft a better 
rescission package, they are free to report an alternative rescission 
proposal as well, provided it rescinds an equal or greater amount of 
money. If the President's rescissions are defeated, this alternative 
proposal is automatically brought before the House for a vote. This 
alternative makes sure Congress is not just debating whether to cut 
spending, but also, of equal importance, where to cut spending.
  Additionally, nothing prohibits or impedes Congress from reporting 
additional rescissions under our constitutional power of the purse. 
This bill won't impede our authority to reconsider programs and rescind 
spending that fails to match with Federal priorities.
  President Clinton's budget moves the country forward, addressing both 
the budget deficit and our national investment deficit, reinvesting in 
critical spending priorities such as education and health. Earlier this 
week, our former colleague Leon Panetta announced the budget deficit is 
lower than previously forecast--President Clinton has reduced the 
budget deficit he inherited by $85 billion for this year and $135 
billion for the next fiscal year, keeping his promise to cut the budget 
deficit in half when measured as a percentage of our Nation's economy.
  While this administration has been aggressive, the President would 
benefit from additional, stronger deficit reduction tools to rein in 
unnecessary Federal spending. Consequently, I support H.R. 4600 and 
urge its adoption.
  Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 4 minutes.
  I am delighted today to bring to the floor H.R. 4600, the Expedited 
Rescissions Act of 1994.
  The legislation before us is a key aspect of the President's program: 
a modified line-item vote.
  As did his predecessors, upon taking office President Clinton asked 
Congress to give him the ability to sort wasteful items out of 
appropriations bills and send those items back to Congress for separate 
votes. Last year the House passed an identical bill, H.R. 1578, to give 
him such power. That bill went over to the Senate, which has not acted 
as of today. The time has come to give this power to the President. 
Frankly, our hope is that if we pass another bill the Senators will get 
the message.
  The legislation before the House is actually very simple. After the 
President signs an appropriations act he may, within 3 days, send the 
House a special message proposing to cancel spending items in the bill 
which he might oppose.
  Within 2 days of receipt of the President's message, either the 
majority or minority leader would introduce the President's bill. If 
neither leader introduced it, then on the third day any Member could do 
so.
  The bill would be referred to the Committee on Appropriations, which 
would have 7 legislative days to report it out.
  The committee could not propose changes to the President's bill, but 
it could report an alternative bill if it chose. An alternative bill 
would have to rescind at least as much as the President's bill, and 
draw its rescissions from the same appropriations act as the President.
  The President's package would come to a vote in the House within 10 
days of its introduction, and would not be subject to amendment. The 
House would have to vote, up or down, on the President's package as he 
submitted it.
  If approved by a majority, the bill would go to the Senate which 
would consider it under similar, expedited procedures and constraints. 
If the legislation passed the Senate by majority vote, it would go to 
the President, who would presumably sign it into law since it was his 
proposal. Appropriations would be canceled and the deficit would fall.
  If the House rejected the President's bill and instead passed the 
alternative bill, that bill would go to the Senate. The Senate 
Appropriations Committee could report the alternative bill with or 
without change, but for any alternative to be in order in the Senate, 
the Senate would first have to reject the President's bill. If both 
Houses ultimately passed an alternative to the President, then that 
bill would go to the President. If he signed it, those appropriations 
would be canceled and the deficit reduced. Either way, American 
taxpayers would be the big winners.
  Mr. Chairman, H.R. 4600 would set up an historic experiment with a 
modified line-item veto. After the experiment, Congress would review 
the results and decide whether to extend the experiment or make it 
permanent with or without change.
  If H.R. 4600 were the law, no longer could a President sign an 
appropriations act including wasteful line items, like grants to 
renovate Lawrence Welk's birthplace, or money to build schools for 
North Africans in France, and claim he was powerless to block them.
  No longer could Congress force upon the President the dilemma of 
vetoing an entire appropriations act and shutting down the Government, 
or signing the whole thing, pork and all. Accountability is what we 
need, and accountability is what this bill will provide. This bill will 
strengthen accountability in the appropriations process without 
transferring vast power from Congress to the Presidency, and without 
advantaging the President's fiscal priorities over those of Congress.
  I urge all Members to support the bill.
  Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Chairman, the Expedited Rescissions Act of 1994 is identical to 
H.R. 1578, which passed this House last year. I opposed it at that 
time, and I oppose it today, because it is not a true line-item veto.
  Mr. Chairman, anyone who thinks they can support this and get away 
with claiming they have voted for a line-item-veto bill had better have 
another thought coming.
  The gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm], who helped originate this 
expedited-rescission approach, made it quite clear again in the 
Committee on Rules this year, just the other day, that this bill and 
his substitute for it are not a real line-item veto he said he is 
opposed to the real thing because he thinks it give the President too 
much power.

                              {time}  1540

  Now, Mr. Chairman, I respect that point of view though I do not agree 
with it. I also respect the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm], the 
gentleman from Minnesota [Mr. Penny], and the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. 
Kasich], who are up front and honest about what this is and what this 
is not--and they have been. So we do not have any argument there.
  H.R. 4600 provides that for the remainder of the 103d Congress the 
President would have some additional authority to cancel spending in 
appropriation bills, subject to the approval of both houses. It 
basically differs from the current rescission approach by accelerating 
the time frame for considering rescissions and forcing votes in both 
Houses on the President's proposals.
  Well, what is wrong with this, you might ask? The answer is that H.R. 
4600 suffers from many of the same problems as the current rescission 
process does, which does not work. First, a simple majority of either 
house could block the President's spending cuts and force the money to 
be spent simply by voting them down. So we are talking about the same 
majority that passed these pork-barrel projects in the first place 
being able to stop the President from terminating them. It's just the 
same old log-rolling methods they have used all long. Second, the bill, 
if enacted, would be subject to the rulemaking authority of the House 
and the Senate. That means that the rules could be changed at any time 
to provide for other procedures. So we really are doing nothing.
  The Committee on Rules is going to do what it does every week waive 
the rules.
  For instance, nothing in this bill would prevent the Committee on 
Rules from suspending the whole expedited process on a particular 
presidential rescission package, just as they have done before, and 
then schedule the appropriations alternative in its place.
  Third, there is no penalty in H.R. 4600 for not acting. After the 20-
legislative-day review period, the money will be released and spent if 
neither house has acted. That is the interpretation by our 
parliamentarian on last year's identical bill.
  So, nothing has changed. The fact is, Mr. Chairman, that while the 
intentions in H.R. 4600 are good do expedite things and force votes on 
the President's cuts, there are no guarantees, especially for as long 
as this process is subject to the whims of the Democrat leadership and 
the Committee on Rules where I serve.
  The Stenholm substitute, on the other hand--and I give credit to the 
gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm] because his approach is 
meaningful--the Stenholm substitute is a stronger expedited rescission 
approach in many respects. Instead of applying to this 103rd Congress 
only, he does give the President permanent rescission authority. And 
that is good. His substitute completely replaces the current rescission 
process. And that is good. He extends the process to targeted tax 
benefits. And that is good. He allows the President to designate 
rescissions for deficit reduction. So there are all positive things.
  In short, it does correct--that is, the Stenholm substitute does 
correct--some of the criticisms leveled in last year's bill. I commend 
the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm], for making these improvements, 
but his approach is still subject to being circumvented by a special 
rule, which means his approach ultimately has no teeth. There still is 
no penalty if the Congress does not act. The money will be released 
after the review period.
  So, here again we have no deficit reduction. Moreover, the Stenholm 
substitute contains one new provision which actually weakens its 
purpose. It allows for separate amendments on individual rescissions or 
tax break repeals if supported by 50 House Members or 15 Senators. Only 
15 Senators. That means the package can be picked apart in both bodies 
in different ways, forcing a conference that is unlikely to resolve the 
differences before the 20 legislative days are up.
  What it all boils down to, Mr. Chairman, is that there is no real 
substitute for a true legislative line-item veto that is subject to 
congressional disapproval rather than approval. All Members know that. 
We need to make it difficult to override the President by requiring the 
ultimate two-thirds' super majority to force the money to be spent. 
That is a true line-item veto. That is the only way we can begin to get 
a handle on some of this wasteful pork-barrel spending that is 
contributing to the sea of red ink engulfing us.
  Mr. Chairman, I would urge my colleagues to send the strongest 
possible message today that we want something more than just an 
expedited rescissions process. Tell the President, tell the Senate, 
tell the American people that we are ready to lay down the line, we are 
ready to do what we go home and brag about, vote for a line-item veto. 
Vote for the Solomon amendment when it comes up, and then you will be 
doing the right thing for the American people.
  Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from South Dakota [Mr. Johnson].
  (Mr. JOHNSON of South Dakota asked and was given permission to revise 
and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. JOHNSON of South Dakota. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this 
legislation. There is no doubt about it that if we were to eliminate 
every ounce of pork-barrel spending in the Federal budget, it would go 
only a limited way toward eliminating the Federal budget deficit. We 
all understand that.
  I think we all understand that and give a lot of credit to the 
Committee on Appropriations, the budget leaders in the House, on both 
sides, for the progress we have made in the past year in reducing the 
annual Federal deficit by 40 percent in the past 15 months by cutting 
the share of the deficit relative to the economy in half to the lowest 
point it has been since 1979. That is all to the good.
  Nevertheless, there remain two reasons to pursue a line item 
rescission legislation. The rule we have here permits debate on the 
traditional line-item veto on two versions of the line-item rescission.
  That is, one, where we can save a dime, obviously we need to save a 
dime. Second, we need to restore greater public confidence in the 
budget process to make sure that we do not in fact have items or 
expenditures that could not stand on their own merits.
  And that is the key target for line-item rescission.
  I do not support the traditional line-item veto, the two-thirds' vote 
requirement. Used as it is in the States around the country, it is not 
used to save money; more often than not it is used simply to enforce 
the executive's legislative agenda. President Bush saying, ``Support 
more foreign aid, or I will eliminate all the housing in your 
district,'' President Clinton presumably saying, ``Support my health 
care plan, or I will eliminate all the water projects or whatever in 
your district.'' That is extortion, that is coercion, that is not the 
democratic process.
  But everybody who supports a nickel's worth of expenditure in this 
body ought to be in a position to stand up and say, ``Yes, I support 
that expenditure.'' There ought to be accountability, there ought to be 
a recorded rollcall vote on controversial spending items, and that is 
what the enhanced line item rescission legislation does in fact. So we 
restore public confidence to the process. In so doing, we also save 
some dollars, which contributes in a small way toward further progress 
on the Federal budget deficit reduction. That is what the public 
is demanding. They are demanding accountability within the context of 
our democratic--small ``d''--process in the capital. This finally gives 
us an opportunity to send that kind of legislation to the other body 
and to again make that kind of progress. So I think that we need to 
pass in this body today--my preference is the Stenholm version--but in 
any event, one of the versions of line-item rescission.

  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Appleton, WI [Mr. Roth] one of the hardest-working Members of this 
body, who represents the district in which is located the Green Bay 
Packers.
  Mr. ROTH. I thank my friend from New York for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, I am very much in favor of the Michel-Solomon 
substitute amendment for this reason: 75 percent of the Americans 
support of the line-item veto in every poll that has been taken. In the 
mid-1980's, the last time we did a study on the line-item veto, the 
study showed that we could save as much as $12 billion a year if the 
President had the line-item veto. When the people in America talk about 
change, this is the type of change they are talking about, giving the 
President the line-item veto.
  I do not mean to be polemical in this debate on the floor here today, 
but I think it is important we take a look at the paper trail of some 
of the history of this legislation.
  On November 19, 1992, long before Bill Clinton was sworn in, a number 
of people sent a letter to Bill Clinton, and it said, basically:

       We members of Congress are writing to offer our assistance 
     on a matter on which we mutually agree, the need to give the 
     President the line-item veto.
       We strongly support giving the President the line-item veto 
     power which 43 Governors currently hold. This tool can 
     eliminate billions of dollars of wasteful spending tucked 
     away in appropriations bills and can help balance the budget. 
     Giving the President the line-item veto will help bring 
     fiscal responsibility to the federal budget.
       This is an issue of good fiscal policy and protecting the 
     taxpayers. We support giving the line-item veto to both 
     Republican and Democratic presidents, because we put fiscal 
     responsibility above partisan politics.
       We urge you to make passage of the line-item veto part of 
     your agenda for the first 100 days of your administration. We 
     will work with you for Congressional passage of the line-item 
     veto. Signed by a large number of congressmen, mostly from 
     our side of the aisle.

                              {time}  1550

  I think it is important for us, when we are having this debate, to go 
back and see that we, whether it is a Democrat President or a 
Republican President, want the President to have the line-item veto 
because with the line-item veto the President can do effectively what 
43 governors are now doing, and we have to give the President this 
power so that we can bring about the change the American people are 
demanding.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from Minnesota [Mr. Sabo].
  Mr. SABO. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the base bill, and 
the various substitutes, in my judgment, to varying degrees, and, if 
one should pass, and I expect the base will, which has passed before, 
and it will pass again. It clearly is preferable to have this 
experiment done on a limited time basis.
  But what we have before us today are proposals that do not relate to 
spending. They relate to transfer of powers from the legislative branch 
to the executive, and I would argue, and it cannot be argued in a 30-
second sound bite, that, if anything, that would increase spending 
rather than decrease spending because the reality is that, whether the 
President was Ronald Reagan, or whether the President was George Bush, 
or whether the President is Bill Clinton, in all three cases they 
wanted more discretionary spending than what the Congress has approved. 
In all three cases the Congress has modified their requests. They have 
changed them. But they have lowered them for all three administrations.
  What do these proposals do in varying fashion? They increase the 
power of the Executive to subtly use their power to achieve their own 
agenda. It would have meant, I expect under Reagan and Bush, 
more difficult-to-moderate requests for such programs as star wars, or 
to modify aid to Nicaragua when that was a hot battle, or in the 
current administration I expect they would use that additional leverage 
for the President's investment program, much of which I agree with but 
which, I think, should be subject to the normal course of discussion, 
and deliberation, and compromise within the legislative branch.

  The new power might be occasionally used, and so someone could say 
occasionally it saved some money, but the power would be unused most 
times. But maybe this is a persuasive tool to get some Members of this 
Congress to vote with the President, on their agenda, which in all 
three cases has involved more discretionary spending than what the 
Congress has approved.
  The other thing which concerns me as we deal with this proposal is 
the degree that we seem to have lack of self-respect for ourselves as 
elected Members. We structure programs in a variety of ways. We 
structure some as formula programs where we appropriate so much money, 
and it flows by formula to the States or to other units of governments. 
Sometimes those formulas are done well, sometimes poorly, and impacted 
by the politics and the geography of this institution and the 
President. However I find that administrations, whether they be 
Republican or Democrat, like to have programs where the money is spent 
at the discretion of the executive branch, and many times that makes 
sense. Occasionally we designate it in Congress. But administrations 
like to have programs with flexibility so they can announce where the 
money is flowing.
  Who are those programs run by? People appointed by the President, 
confirmed by the Senate, often our former colleagues. We have had three 
that served as Cabinet members in this current administration. 
Virtually half of the Bush Cabinet was former House Members. We somehow 
have this perception that when they were in the House, elected by their 
constituencies, they lacked judgment individually and collectively. But 
when they were nominated by the President, confirmed by the Senate, 
suddenly they become saintly and wise.
  Well all of these people that have been appointed I think have been 
good Members from both parties, but their judgment, their wisdom, 
really did not change. They had different and newer responsibilities, 
answerable to the President rather than their constituents in dealing 
with the collective judgment of the Congress. But they did not become 
different. We do not make perfect judgments here, but neither does the 
Executive.
  So, Mr. Chairman, I would ask the Members to vote no on these 
proposals for a variety of reasons, but most fundamentally it will cost 
money, not save money.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I would say to the gentleman from 
Minnesota [Mr. Sabo] maybe we need a President like Gerry Solomon that 
will offer a balanced budget, get a vote on it, and then go down in 
defeat, but nevertheless we tried.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Roanoke, VA [Mr. 
Goodlatte].
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Chairman, the American people overwhelmingly want 
to give the President of the United States a real line-item veto. They 
have good reason to do so. They expect our Government to be run in a 
businesslike fashion, but what chief executive of any business in this 
country could operate when presented with expenditures sometimes in the 
hundreds of billions of dollars in these appropriations packages, and 
they have to take the entire package or leave the entire package?
  I am not going to agree with every line-item veto that President 
Clinton will impose, but I do think that he should have the same power 
that 43 State Governors have, and I think it is important that we have 
this mechanism to break up the way this Congress does business. It will 
be a lot less likely that we will have pork-barrel legislation, that we 
will have log rolling, if we do not know which Member's package is 
going to be vetoed by the President. I think it is a lot less likely we 
are going to vote for these enormous packages if we have a situation 
where the President has an opportunity to veto and we do not know whose 
particular item he is going to pick out to veto.
  So, I would urge the Members to vote for the Michel-Solomon 
amendment. It is the only amendment that is a real line-item veto.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
Arizona [Mr. Coppersmith].
  (Mr. COPPERSMITH asked and was given permission to revise and extend 
his remarks.)
  Mr. COPPERSMITH. Mr. Chairman, again this year, I rise in strong 
support of the line-item veto, a tool to discipline the Federal budget.
  Last April, the House also considered three different proposals for a 
line-item veto, adopting one. Unfortunately, the other body has failed 
to act. I hope today's vote will help stir its members to adopt this 
powerful budget-cutting tool.
  By allowing the President to strike individual spending and tax 
expenditure items, the line-item veto can cut wasteful pork barrel 
projects or special interest tax breaks. It will illuminate our budget 
priorities, helping us to select from those programs that are merely 
good, those that are good enough.
  Today, we will debate the various forms of line-item veto, and others 
will speak to their merits and demerits. Whichever alternative carries 
today, however, I think a majority will agree that we need the line-
item veto.
  Even the base bill, which I hope we will strengthen and which I will 
vote to strengthen, will shine the spotlight of publicity on 
irresponsible Federal spending; as Louis Brandeis once said, ``Sunlight 
is the best of disinfectants.'' By helping to expose and eliminate 
wasteful spending or tax benefits, any line-item veto represents a 
great improvement over what we have now.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Tennessee [Mr. Duncan], and, Mr. Chairman, the previous speaker voted 
for the true line-item veto the last time, and we appreciate his 
support this time, but this gentleman came here in 1989, and he has 
been a leader on line-item veto ever since he succeeded his father.
  Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of the Michel-
Solomon substitute, and I thank the gentleman from New York for 
yielding and for his outstanding leadership on this very important 
issue.
  The last time we dealt with this issue, the Wall Street Journal ran a 
lead editorial entitled ``Voodoo Line Item Veto,'' describing basically 
the committee bill we have today.
  The American people, Mr. Chairman, do not want voodoo; they do not 
want a watered-down version. They want real reform, they want a real 
line item veto, and that is what the Michel-Solomon substitute is.
  The American people, Mr. Chairman, are angry. They are angry because 
government at all levels is taking almost half of the average person's 
income in taxes of all types. But they are especially angry because 
they feel that so much of their hard-earned tax money is being wasted. 
They do not feel they are getting their money's worth, and, 
unfortunately, too often they are right. They want us to stop the 
hemorrhaging. They wanted us to balance the budget and start paying off 
some of our horrendous national debt. They do not want us to mortgage 
the future of our children. They want us to do more than just pay lip 
service to bringing spending under control.
  Mr. Chairman, in this week's Christian Science Monitor, former 
Senator Paul Tsongas, and Jonathan Karl, a reporter for the New York 
Post, said this.

       If you think sending a chunk of your hard-earned income to 
     the Internal Revenue Service was tough this year, imagine the 
     responses of future taxpayers who will face average lifetime 
     tax rates of an incredible 82 percent.
       Confronted with the burdens of a monstrous national debt, 
     an aging population, and runaway Federal entitlement 
     programs, tomorrow's Americans will be turned into a 
     generation of indentured servants. They won't stand for it. 
     Without action today, we are likely to see generational 
     political wars by the end of the decade.

  Those are the words of a former Democratic Senator, Paul Tsongas, and 
this reporter from the New York Post, Jonathan Karl. The people of this 
country are demanding action. They want real reform. They want what the 
Governors of 43 States have. Every poll, every single survey, shows 75 
to 80 percent of the people want us to pass a line item veto.
  Mr. Chairman I urge support for the Michel-Solomon substitute.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
Texas [Mr. Stenholm].
  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman 
from Texas [Mr. Stenholm].
  The Chairman pro tempore (Mr. de la Garza). The gentleman from Texas 
[Mr. Stenholm] is recognized for 2\1/2\ minutes.
  (Mr. STENHOLM asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to come to the floor today 
to debate proposals to strengthen the ability of Presidents to identify 
and eliminate low-priority budget items. The Members of the House will 
have the opportunity to consider three different proposals on this 
issue, including a substitute which I will be offering along with Tim 
Penny and John Kasich. This substitute strikes a balance which grants 
the President the authority to force votes on individual tax and 
spending items without disrupting the constitutional balance of power.
  Expedited rescission legislation embodies an idea which many Members, 
both Democrats and Republicans, have fought hard for. Dan Quayle first 
introduced expedited recession legislation in 1985. Tom Carper and Dick 
Armey did yeomen's work in pushing this legislation. On the Democratic 
side, Tim Johnson, Dan Glickman, Tim Penny, and L.F. Payne have spent 
the past several years as particularly effective advocates of this 
legislation. Numerous Republicans, including Lynn Martin, Bill Frenzel, 
Gerald Solomon, Harris Fawell, and others have made meaningful 
contributions to expedited rescission legislation as it has developed. 
Thanks to the efforts of these and other members, the House 
overwhelming passed expedited rescission legislation in the 102d 
Congress. Last April, John Spratt and Butler Derrick worked diligently 
to help pass legislation virtually identical to the base bill before us 
today.

  We need to bring greater accountability to the appropriations process 
so that individual appropriations may be considered on their individual 
merits. The current rescission process does not make the President or 
Congress accountable. Congress can ignore the President's rescissions, 
and the President can blame Congress for ignoring his rescissions. I 
believe that it is appropriate to strengthen the President's ability to 
force votes on individual budgetary items.
  The current discharge process for forcing a floor vote on the 
President's rescissions is cumbersome and has never been used. The 
President is required to spend the money if Congress has not enacted 
the rescissions within 45 days. In other words, Congress can reject the 
spending cuts proposed by the President through inaction.
  According to data compiled by the General Accounting Office, Congress 
has approved barely one-third of the individual rescissions submitted 
by Presidents of both parties since 1974. Congress has ignored $48 
billion in rescissions submitted by Presidents under the existing 
process without any vote at all on the merits of the rescissions.
  My colleagues on the Appropriations Committee correctly point out 
that Congress has passed more than $60 billion in rescissions of its 
own since 1974, but I do not believe that the fact that Congress has 
approved more spending cuts than the President has submitted is a 
justification for not voting on the President's rescission proposals. 
The public is fed up with the finger-pointing in which each side argues 
that the problem is really the other side's fault. Constituents do not 
consider doing better than the other side to be a substitute for 
actually dealing with a problem. When we are faced with deficits in the 
$200 billion range, we cannot afford to ignore any proposals to cut 
spending.
  Forcing votes on individual items in tax and spending bills will have 
a very real cleansing effect on the legislative process and will take a 
step toward reducing the public cynicism about the political process. I 
urge my colleagues to strengthen the rescission process by voting for 
the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich amendment.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
San Diego, CA [Mr. Cunningham], a very distinguished member of the 
Committee on Armed Services, but one who contributes on many issues on 
this floor.
  (Mr. CUNNINGHAM asked and was given permission to revise and extend 
his remarks.)
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Chairman, the President and the line-item veto. 
There is not a bill that would go through this House that if any of us 
were President, that we would not veto some of those items in those 
bills. Every single bill. And I have heard colleagues on both sides of 
the aisle say, ``I would really like to support this bill, but it has 
got a bunch of pork in it,'' or it has got this or that.
  I think the President needs that same responsibility, and I agree to 
do that.
  I have heard that, yes, we are elected as Members of this House, and 
we work either for or with, however you want to define it, the 
President. But the President does not always agree with the basics of 
this House or the other body as well.
  By having a line-item veto, it would be difficult at times for the 
President to make those hard decisions. Why? Because he is responsible 
to the American public for each of those items that he vetoes. He may 
not want that responsibility, but the American people want it. And I 
know if it was president, which will never come, but I would want that 
power.
  Fact: The majority is not going to do anything that takes away power 
from the majority. The line-item veto, the discharge petition, a 
balanced budget amendment, are ways to take that power away from this 
House. And that is why they are fighting this line-item veto, a true 
line-item veto, so much.
  A good case in point: We thank the gentleman from Oklahoma [Mr. 
Inhofe] for filing a discharge petition. It is driving the majority 
nuts. Why? Because the Committee on Rules, made up of nine Members from 
the majority of four Members from the minority, controls every single 
piece of legislation that comes to this floor; not only controls what 
legislation, if any, but they control the content with restrictive 
controls on it to determine its outcome. A discharge petition changes 
all of that, and they do not like that.
  A line-item veto would do the same thing.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from 
Wisconsin [Mr. Barca].
  (Mr. BARCA of Wisconsin asked and was given permission to revise and 
extend his remarks.)
  Mr. BARCA of Wisconsin. Mr. Chairman, the President needs desperately 
the authority that is contained in the bills that we are taking up 
today. When he is presented with an appropriation bill with billions of 
dollars of spending and thousands of discrete items, a President is 
left virtually powerless and almost without any options when it comes 
time for a veto. Hopefully we will pass a meaningful and strong bill 
today. We need to send the message to the Senate that this is a bill 
that must be taken up this session.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  Mr. Chairman, let me just say to the body that I know we are all 
sincere in what we are trying to do here. But the truth of the matter 
is, there is only going to be one vote on this floor which is going to 
deal with a true line item veto, and that is the Solomon substitute.

                              {time}  1610

  Mr. Chairman, we can talk about which President did this and which 
President did not do that. The American people do not really care about 
all that. The American people do care about this $4.5 trillion debt 
that is ruining our country. It is turning us for the first time into a 
debtor nation.
  We come up with a new budget gimmick every year. Some Members brag, 
well, the deficit is only $165 billion this year, or it was only $190 
billion last year. We reduced it by this tremendous amount, so they 
say.
  The truth of the matter is, we have not done anything. I am not 
trying to be critical of this body or to disparage it in any way. The 
truth of the matter is, we just do not deal with the deficit. I do not 
think we are going to until we put legislation in place that is going 
to allow us to deal with it. That means true line item veto. President 
Clinton has said he wanted it. President Bush and President Reagan and 
President Carter all wanted the line item veto and they all deserved 
it, just like the 43 Governors of this great country of ours who have 
it. They have never abused it, not in any case that I have ever heard 
of. Even Governor Cuomo in my State has never abused it.
  That is why we ought to pass it at the Federal level. We ought to put 
it on the books and then we can hold the President or this Congress 
responsible. As it stands now, we just do on and on and on. The debt 
goes up and up and up, and nothing is ever done about it.
  Mr. Chairman, when the votes do take place, the first vote is going 
to be on the true line item veto in the Solomon amendment. Please vote 
``yes'' on that. If that passes, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. 
Stenholm] has said he would not even pursue his amendment. That means 
that the final bill would then have a true line-item veto.
  Vote ``yes'' on the Solomon amendment in about 45 minutes when it 
comes up for a vote.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  The modified line-item veto is a good idea. I am going to support it. 
I supported it last time.
  But, let us not try to fool ourselves or the American people. Over 
the years people in public office have sought many, many gimmicks to 
avoid having to make the hard decisions themselves. I have heard a 
number of members refer to the fact that 43 Governors have some form of 
line-item veto.
  They should go one step further and tell Members that very, very 
seldom, do Governors use it to cut spending. They use it more than 
anything else to get their pet projects through and ultimately to 
increase spending.
  I agree, it is unfair to ask a President either to veto or sign a 
multi-billion dollar appropriations bill and not have an opportunity to 
line-out some of the items in there. I am going to vote for a way to 
let them do this. But let us not think that the Presidents, whether it 
be President Reagan, or President Solomon, or President Bush, or 
President Clinton, are going to use this to cut the deficit. It is just 
not going to happen.
  The CHAIRMAN. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from South Carolina 
[Mr. Spratt] will be recognized for 15 minutes, and the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania [Mr. Clinger] will be recognized for 15 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Spratt].
  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 4\1/2\ minutes.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the expedited recission bill, H.R. 
4600. This bill passed the House last year by a vote of 258 to 157 and 
comes to the floor today as the first in a series of budget process 
reforms that the House will be taking up.
  Let me review briefly the mechanics of this bill, because I think it 
is important to emphasize them, particularly when they are called 
voodoo by some of the opponents.
  After the President signs an appropriation bill under this particular 
procedure allowed by H.R. 4600, the President would have 3 days to send 
Congress a message proposing to rescind any budget authority that is 
included in the bill. Before the close of the second legislative day, 
after the President's message has been received, the majority leader 
and the minority leader would have to introduce by request this bill. 
If they fail to do that, any Member on the third day could do so. Once 
the President's recission bill was introduced, it would then be 
automatically referred to the Committee on Appropriations and they 
would have 7 days on which to act upon it and report it out without 
substantive revision.
  The House would then have to vote on the President's package within 
10 days of the date it was introduced in the House of Representatives. 
It would then be sent to the Senate, and they would consider the 
package under the same series of expedited procedures, acting within 10 
days.
  Pending the resolution of this bill, as long as it is still in play, 
the money proposed for recission by the President could not be 
obligated by either House or could not be obligated until one of the 
Houses had defeated the bill and taken the issue out of play.
  This is a carefully, very, very precisely crafted bill. And yet we 
hear today that it could all be undone, all of these procedures where 
there are guarantees at every turn could be undone and what we could do 
today could be undone tomorrow just by adopting a rule. That may be a 
parliamentary possibility. I do not even want to debate it because it 
is too farfetched. I do not think it would even come to pass as a 
political possibility.
  First of all, the leadership of this House would have to go to the 
Committee on Rules and, having set up this institutional procedure, 
this structure, proffered this series of steps to the President for 
rescinding spending, would have to retract it, would have to pull the 
rug out from under the President of the United States and say, ``What 
we offered you in the form of legislation and put in statute last year 
we are undoing by this rule today.''
  I do not think the leadership is likely to do that. Even if the 
leadership tried and even if the Committee on Rules went along, the 
Members of this House would have to pass such an extraordinary rule, 
and I do not think it would be passed here in the House of 
Representatives for several reasons.
  One is the very basic nature of this bill. The purpose of this bill 
is to shine a spotlight, to concentrate attention, to focus upon 
specific elements of bills that sometimes frequently get lost in the 
fray as they are pushed through this place, to bring them back here in 
the well of the House with the public looking, the media looking, with 
the President concentrating his focus upon them to make Members stand 
up and be accounted for on specific items. I do not think in that 
context many Members would want to vote against a rule because 
everybody would immediately translate that to the general public.

  They would know that a rule like that that undercut this procedure 
was a rule for pork-barrel spending, for unwarranted, wasteful spending 
I do not think we would be able to muster a majority to do it, even if 
it were proposed.
  There is another reason on this bill, because there is a good reason 
to believe, good reason to construe this language to mean that as long 
as the President's proposal for rescission is still pending and has not 
been acted upon, voted upon in this House, as long as it is still 
pending and still in play then the rescission is still effective. It 
suspends the obligational authority of the executive branch.
  I do not think it is likely to happen for all those reasons. I think 
this is a good law and, when it goes on the books, it will be an 
effective procedure that will assure accountability and will give a way 
to guarantee the President the authority to sort through and cull out 
unwarranted, wasteful, parochial spending and send it back to us and 
make us be accountable for it.
  Let me tell Members something that is likely to happen if by some 
unlikely means the statutory line-item veto were to pass. It will be 
challenged in court because it is of doubtful constitutional validity. 
I guarantee Members, it will be suspended and joined until the courts 
have upheld it. We could go 2 to 3 years and get what I think is an 
inevitable decision of the Supreme Court, which is that it is 
unconstitutional. Then what will we have. Two years with no line-item 
rescission authority and an opportunity to start all over again. That 
is why the effective, efficacious thing to do is to pass this bill, if 
we can pass it again, send it to the Senate, tell them we are serious, 
underscore it, emphasize it and adopt it as part of this year's budget 
reform.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the expedited rescission bill, 
H.R. 4600. This bill passed the House last year by a vote of 258 to 
157. It comes to the floor today as the first in a series of budget 
process reforms that the House will consider. Next week, the House is 
to vote on H.R. 4604, the entitlement review bill. And before we 
adjourn in August, the House is to devote another day to consideration 
of other entitlement reforms and budget process reforms.
  The President, of course, can propose today that any item or part of 
an appropriation bill be rescinded. He has that authority under section 
1012 of the Budget Act of 1974, but he has no assurance that Congress 
will act on what he proposes. H.R. 4600 gives the President that 
assurance. It requires Congress, on an expedited basis, to vote on the 
President's proposal. It also gives the Appropriations Committee the 
right to offer an alternative rescission package, which the House can 
consider if the President's package is voted down.
  This bill makes it easier to cull out spending projects that are 
opposed by the President and by majorities in the House and Senate. 
Under this bill, the only way budget authority can be rescinded is if 
the President proposed the rescission and majorities in both the House 
and Senate approve the President's request. If the President opposes a 
particular project and majorities in both Houses agree with him, the 
spending should be eliminated. Congress has been subject to public 
ridicule when individual Members add projects to spending bills which 
few Members know of and few would support. H.R. 4600 gives us the 
chance to kill those programs.
  Before discussing details of the bill, I would like to take up two 
concerns that have been raised about this bill. First, some question 
why we need to bring up a bill that the House has already passed. There 
are several good reasons:
  First, passage of this bill will be an impetus to the other body to 
do the same. If we pass this bill again, we can underscore its 
importance to us, and send the other body a blunt message: the House 
wants to reform the budget process and we want to act this year.
  Second, H.R. 4600 is a baseline bill. By bringing it up, we open the 
opportunity to consider alternatives. We will take up, for example, the 
Stenholm-Penny-Kasich substitute, which was not before the House in the 
last debate. Stenholm-Penny-Kasich would allow the President to rescind 
targeted tax benefits as well as appropriated items. This substitute 
would also allow 50 Members the right to break out individual items in 
a rescission proposal and have separate votes on separate items. In 
addition, the substitute would make expedited rescission permanent law. 
H.R. 4600 expires at the end of the 103d Congress, because it is 
offered as a trial procedure. I will ask unanimous consent to amend it 
and extend it to the 104th Congress.

  We will also be giving the House another opportunity to consider the 
Solomon substitute, which grants the President a traditional type of 
veto, but by statute rather than by constitutional amendment. It begs, 
of course, the important question of whether we can grant such a veto 
without amending the Constitution. I believe that we cannot.
  Let me review briefly the mechanics of H.R. 4600. After the President 
signs an appropriations bill into law, under this bill, he will have 3 
days to send Congress a message proposing to rescind any budget 
authority included in that bill. Before the close of the second 
legislative day after receiving the President's message, the majority 
or minority leader of the House shall introduce the draft bill. If 
neither decides to introduce the package, then on the third legislative 
day, any Member may introduce it. Once the President's rescission bill 
is introduced in the House, it is sent to the House Appropriations 
Committee which has 7 days to report the bill without substantive 
revision. The House must vote on the President's package within 10 days 
of the date the proposal is introduced in the House. The package is 
then sent to the Senate which will consider the package under the same 
expedited procedure. The money proposed for rescission cannot be 
obligated until either the House or Senate defeats the bill.
  To deal with concerns that appropriators raised last year, the bill 
gives the Appropriations Committee the power to report an alternative 
rescission bill. But any alternative rescission bill reported by the 
Appropriations Committee could only be considered by the House 
immediately after voting on the President's unamended proposal. 
Basically, what this bill does is to guarantee the President a fast 
track for a clear up-or-down vote on his own proposal.
  Because this bill is straightforward, it is clearly constitutional, 
and CRS has written a memorandum passing judgment on it, which 
concludes that it complies with the Constitution. Nevertheless, for any 
who may have doubts, we have language in the bill borrowed from Gramm-
Rudman-Hollings which provides for an expedited judicial review of the 
constitutionality of the bill.
  Mr. Chairman, I make no extravagant claims for this bill, but I do 
believe that it adds an important step to the budget process. I believe 
that it will add also to public accountability. And I believe that if 
it is passed, it will become a significant restraint on spending. I 
urge the House to support H.R. 4600.
  Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

                              {time}  1620

  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 2\1/2\ minutes.
  (Mr. CLINGER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to H.R. 4600. Let me 
begin by explaining what H.R. 4600 is not.
  H.R. 4600 is not the A-to-Z spending cut proposal. It never has been 
and it never will be. Nor is H.R. 4600 adequate political cover for 
Members who vote ``yea'' on this bill to then turn their backs on the 
A-to-Z proposal. The American people are not fools and will surely 
recognize this effort as a pale imitation of real deficit reduction. 
Members cannot prove their man or womanhood on deficit reduction by 
voting in favor of this bill, which is going nowhere, and rejecting the 
A-to-Z spending cut plan, which could result in significantly less 
Federal spending.
  Finally, H.R. 4600 is not a serious effort to reform the Federal 
budget process and reduce the deficit. On April 29, 1993, we all stood 
on this floor debating H.R. 1578, also introduced by my honorable 
friend, John Spratt, and also called the Expedited Rescission Act. In 
fact, H.R. 1578 was the same exact bill as the one before the House 
today. It was approved by a vote of 258 to 157, yet it has gone nowhere 
for the same exact reason that H.R. 4600 will go nowhere if it is 
approved today. Namely, it was not meant to go anywhere. Our colleagues 
in the other body have had well over a year to act on enhanced 
rescission authority. Yet, they have turned a deaf ear.
  What H.R. 4600 is, is disappointing. The bill is called expedited 
rescission because like many things in Washington, it asks those of us 
who are concerned about reducing the deficit to simply hurry up and 
wait. So, I rise today, along with many of my colleagues, in opposition 
to the Expedited Rescissions Act of 1994 and I do so for the same 
reasons I opposed the Expedited Rescissions Act of 1993 and perhaps may 
be obliged to oppose the Expedited Rescissions Act of 1995 and 1996.
  I oppose this measure with great reluctance, however, because in the 
past, and indeed in the present, I have admired and supported budget 
process proposals from the gentleman from South Carolina. But in this 
case, there are a lot of very significant things at stake here and I am 
not willing to jeopardize those for the sake of political cover. We 
risk, with the vote we cast today, losing an opportunity to get a real 
tool to do something about a deficit which is still eating us alive.

  As I did last year, I am opposing this bill for two major reasons. 
One is based on procedural grounds and the other is based on the 
fundamental weaknesses associated with the bill.
  First, I oppose this proposal due to the expedited means by which it 
was brought to the floor. Unfortunately, the Government Operations 
Committee has all too frequently waived its jurisdiction over budget 
process issues, as we did in this instance. Although we have held 
hearings on budget reform proposals, the Government Operations 
Committee time and time again refuses to mark up budget reform 
legislation. That practice, coupled with efforts to restrict the 
ability of Republican Members to offer amendments on the House floor, 
is a slap in the face of minority rights.
  Because H.R. 1600 is identical to the bill we passed through this 
body a year ago, it has identical flaws. I have already mentioned that 
this bill is simply designed to give Members on the other side of the 
aisle political cover to argue that they voted to speed up the 
rescission process and appear through smoke and mirrors as though they 
are supporting the line-item veto. That contention is simply not true. 
If this bill had been considered in the committee of appropriate 
jurisdiction, Government Operations, I am confident that it would have 
been improved to provide the President with a true line-item veto.
  Mr. Chairman, I am including in the record a copy of a letter sent to 
Chairman Conyers, and signed by each Republican on the Government 
Operations Committee, protesting the waiver of our committee's 
jurisdiction on this bill. This letter supports my belief that had we 
had the opportunity to amend this bill in committee, the House would 
pass today a strong anti-deficit measure.
  Second, I oppose this bill because by making the President, the House 
and the Senate all approve rescission legislation before any cuts are 
made, this bill gives Congress dictatorial power to block attempts to 
reduce porkbarrel, special-interest spending. If my colleagues on the 
other side of the aisle trust the President, elected from their own 
political party, they would truly trust him with unfettered authority 
to cut wasteful spending. If Congress wants some of the useless 
spending items included in nearly every appropriation bill, let them 
come here to the floor and defend them individually.
  Finally, as compared to a true line-item veto, this bill gives the 
President weak authority to make rescissions. Under this proposal, the 
President's rescissions will not take effect until Congress takes 
affirmative action to approve them. In effect, this allows Congress to 
veto the President's rescissions by doing nothing at all.
  It was President Clinton who stated during the Presidential campaign 
that he wanted a true line-item veto. Let us end gridlock and give him 
what he wants! Vote ``no'' on H.R. 4600.
  The letter referred to is as follows:

                                     House of Representatives,    
                                                      Committee on


                                        Government Operations,

                                    Washington, DC, June 22, 1994.
     Hon. John Conyers,
     Chairman, Committee on Government Operations, Rayburn House 
         Office Building, Washington, DC.
       Dear Mr. Chairman: We are writing to express our strong 
     objection to your recent waiver of Government Operations 
     Committee jurisdiction over H.R. 4600 and H.R. 4604, the 
     expedited rescissions and entitlement spending reform 
     proposals now pending in the House. Although these matters 
     are central to Government Operations' budget process 
     authority and could, if responsibly crafted, offer much-
     needed opportunities for federal deficit reduction, for the 
     second time in two years our Members have been denied the 
     opportunity to act on both expedited rescissions and 
     entitlement review.
       Last April, Government Operations discharged without 
     consideration H.R. 1578, Congressman Spratt's rescission 
     bill. That legislation, which is identical to H.R. 4600, has 
     since been languishing before the Senate Budget and 
     Governmental Affairs Committees with no action scheduled. 
     Similarly, the Spratt entitlement review proposal contained 
     in H.R. 4604 is identical to language discharged from 
     Government Operations and self-executed into the 1993 House 
     Reconciliation bill. That language was later dropped in 
     conference. Clearly, the Senate has recognized the flaws in 
     both proposals, and yet this committee continues to deny our 
     Members the chance to improve them.
       Your latest decision to discharge is particularly 
     disturbing in light of your earlier commitment to ensure 
     Government Operations Committee consideration of H.R. 3801's 
     budget process reforms, which include the very entitlement 
     reforms just waived. The members of this committee were 
     promised the chance to work their will in strengthening the 
     federal budget process and improving federal deficit control. 
     That commitment has now gone by the wayside. We urge you to 
     restore your promise by reasserting this committee's 
     jurisdiction and protecting our members' right to 
     consideration of true budget process reform. As we have 
     repeatedly noted, for Government Operations to maintain its 
     jurisdiction, it must exert its jurisdiction. Now is the time 
     to do so.
           Sincerely,
         Rob Portman, Stephen Horn, Deborah Pryce, Craig Thomas, 
           Steve Schiff, J. Dennis Hastert, Jon Kyl, Dick Zimmer, 
           William F. Clinger, Al McCandless, Christopher Cox, 
           William Zeliff, Frank Lucas, John Mica, Christopher 
           Shays, John McHugh.

  Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New 
Jersey [Mr. Klein].
  Mr. KLEIN. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of the Expedited 
Rescissions Act and the Stenholm substitute.
  Mr. Chairman, I voted for H.R. 1578 last year, but unfortunately the 
Senate has not acted on it. Nevertheless, the time has come for 
Congress to make the hard choices needed to substantially reduce the 
deficit. Because the deficit problem is so compelling, we must give the 
President additional powers to cut spending and we must make Congress 
accountable to these cuts.
  For far too long, Congress has been able to avoid making the 
difficult decisions regarding spending cuts that the President has 
proposed by hiding behind current law which does not require a vote on 
rescissions. This bill will ensure that Congress makes these decisions. 
Most importantly, it will also give the President the power to cut 
wasteful and unnecessary items out of appropriations bills to cut the 
pork out of the budget.
  Congress should be forced to go on the record and register its views 
on the President's proposed cuts. We have already gone a long way 
toward real deficit reduction and fiscal sanity. We have made progress, 
but we can and must do more. This bill will provide the tools to make a 
giant leap forward.
  I have urged that we have an early vote on the lock box bill so that 
rescission cuts will go to deficit reduction and I understand that we 
will soon have that opportunity. In the meantime, we can give the 
President that option now by supporting the Stenholm substitute which 
includes such a provision. These two measures are critical to achieving 
further deficit reduction and I will continue to fight hard to have 
them become law.
  My friends, it is time to pay the piper. I urge my colleagues to 
support the Expedited Rescissions Act and require real congressional 
accountability. Let us show the American people that we can and will 
make the tough choices in the deficit reduction process.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 4 minutes to the 
gentleman from California [Mr. McCandless], the ranking member on the 
Subcommittee on Legislation and National Security of the Committee on 
Government Operations, and a very active member of that committee.
  Mr. McCANDLESS. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding time 
to me.
  Mr. Chairman, for the second time this Congress, I rise in strong 
opposition to this bill, and I urge my colleagues to finally, once and 
for all, do what is right. I urge you to vote against both H.R. 4600 
and the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich substitute, and to vote instead for a 
chance at real deficit reduction. Join me in support of the Michel-
Solomon amendment to give our President a true line-item veto.
  Mr. Chairman, H.R. 4600, the Spratt expedited rescission bill, is 
fatally flawed.
  H.R. 4600, applies only to this year's appropriations bills. It has 
no effect on next year's appropriations or on those of any subsequent 
year.
  The legislation permits any rescission to be unilaterally killed by a 
simple majority of either House of Congress.

  It permits the Rules Committee to waive any or every provision in the 
bill and thereby prevent consideration of any rescission package at 
all.
  And finally, as if that were not enough, this exact same bill has 
been languishing in the Senate for over a year, and has no chance 
whatsoever of ever becoming law.
  Given the enormity of its defects, I doubt any Member can be fooled 
by how little cover this transparent fig leaf of reform really 
provides.
  Similar problems exist in the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich substitute. 
Although their proposal extends beyond this Congress and provides the 
President with rescission authority over targeted tax preferences, the 
Stenholm substitute still permits either House to unilaterally kill any 
rescission, and it still allows the Rules Committee to waive any and 
all provisions of the bill. Neither Members nor taxpayers looking for 
true deficit reduction will be succored by this weak plan.
  Of the three proposals pending before the House, only the Michel-
Solomon approach ensures real reform and accountability by both 
Congress and the President. The Michel-Solomon amendment forces Members 
to vote on rescission proposals and guarantees that rescissions will 
take effect unless a majority of both Houses vote to override them. In 
addition, Michel-Solomon will permit the President to take aim at the 
special tax benefits afforded a few privileged corporations and special 
friends.
  Under Michel-Solomon, the President will no longer be able to blame 
Congress for forcing him to choose between wasteful spending or 
shutting down the Government. The President will be able to make 
reasonable rescission recommendations which must be voted on by both 
Houses of Congress. Congress, in turn, will be required to vote on 
questionable spending items which are buried in massive appropriations 
bills. In addition, we will be able to cancel unfair tax breaks for 
targeted special interests.
  The Michel/Solomon amendment will allow both the President and 
Congress to more effectively do their jobs, and the American people 
will undoubtedly benefit.
  Mr. Chairman, the U.S. Government is currently $4.6 trillion in debt. 
If left unchanged, that debt will mount to more than $7 trillion in 
just another 10 years, and on it goes. Clearly, we must change the way 
we do business, and that change must be real and substantive. The 
Michel-Solomon amendment provides that type of change and offers a 
honest opportunity for deficit reduction. I, for one, would hate to go 
home having voted for less. I urge my colleagues to do the right thing 
and support the Michel-Solomon plan.
  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
California [Ms. Harman].
  (Ms. HARMAN asked and was given permission to revise and extend her 
remarks.)
  Ms. HARMAN. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this legislation and 
the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich substitute. I do so because I believe the 
line item veto is a proven and effective procedure to curtail wasteful 
spending. It is not a gimmick. Rather, it is a serious means to restore 
fiscal responsibility to the spending process, and is employed by 
virtually all States, including my State of California.
  Currently, Mr. Chairman, House procedures allow two main vehicles for 
pork: Tax bills and appropriations. Once inserted into an omnibus tax 
bill, inappropriate tax breaks, and subsidies are impossible to remove 
without defeating the bill.
  Second, even when the House votes to terminate a wasteful project 
from an appropriation bill, the intended savings may be respent by 
appropriators on other pet projects.

                              {time}  1630

  The Stenholm-Penny-Kasich substitute amendment not only provides for 
a Presidential line-item veto of appropriations, it also remedies the 
procedures that shelter pork-barrel projects. This legislation would 
allow the President to single out both special tax benefits and 
wasteful projects in appropriations bills. Most importantly, it will 
establish a separate account in each rescission bill for deficit 
reduction. This will enable the President to set aside saving from any 
rescission to preserve spending cuts. As an original cosponsor of the 
Deficit Reduction Trust Fund and the Deficit Reduction Lock Box, I know 
this concept can work.
  This year's deficit is expected to be about $220 billion--an 
improvement over prior years with better news to come. But to assure 
the trend continue downward we need to give the President this effect 
tool to cut fat from appropriations bills and to reduce the national 
deficit. I urge my colleagues to help restore fiscal responsibility to 
Congress by passing this measure and the Stenholm substitute.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from 
California [Mr. Cox], a very valuable member of the committee.
  Mr. COX. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the line-item veto. The 
line-item veto unfortunately is not before us today. Instead, H.R. 4600 
is best described as pointing a garden hose at a forest fire. It is not 
a bad bill. It moves us a tiny step in the right direction. But we have 
a much better opportunity in the form of the Michel-Solomon substitute 
which is closest among our alternatives to the real line-item veto.
  Mr. Chairman, there are opponents to the line-item veto certainly in 
the House. We have debated before the constitutional reasons that 
people have to oppose a line-item veto. These consist largely in 
concerns about shifting power from the legislature to the executive. 
Those arguments have been heard by the American people and the verdict 
is in. The American people in large numbers want a real line-item veto. 
That is why this President campaigned for one.
  Mr. Chairman, certainly no one can suspect partisan politics in this 
since I as a Republican want to give Democratic President Bill Clinton 
a line-item veto. That is why we should vote in favor of the Michel-
Solomon substitute.
  Mr. Chairman, our deficit spending crisis has been building now for 
over 20 years. It threatens now to overwhelm our entire economy. H.R. 
4600, the bill before us just now, would cause only the most marginal 
change in the budget act. It would not in any way enhance the 
President's weak existing power. It would only affect the timing of its 
use. A line-item veto should encourage budget savings by letting a 
President cut spending unless both Houses of Congress vote him down. 
This bill would perpetuate the current bias in favor of spending. It 
would let either House kill a spending cut simply by failing to vote on 
it. Worse yet, it is temporary. It applies only for this Congress. We 
are about to adjourn in 3 months. Worst of all, it does not even let 
the President channel any savings to deficit reduction, so the Congress 
is free to spend the found money on something else. This bill forces 
the President to propose rescissions within 3 days of receiving one of 
our mammoth appropriations bills. That is unworkable. A real line-item 
veto, like the Michel-Solomon substitute, would let the President 
exercise his rescission authority at any time during the fiscal year.
  Finally, this bill, H.R. 4600, could be waived at any time by this 
House. Of course we have seen how over half of the budget measures 
considered in this House during the last Congress came to us under a 
rule that waived the Budget Act in its entirety. The Michel-Solomon 
substitute will not permit that.
  Mr. Chairman, it is now too late for toothless tinkering. Before 
sundown today, our Government will lose $1 billion. We will lose over 
$1 billion every day that our Government is open for business this 
year. We will spend according to President Clinton's budget $1.5 
trillion, that is $1,500 billion in the next year. In the next 3 years, 
we will go to $1.6 trillion, $1.7 trillion, and finally in 1998 $1.8 
trillion in spending.
  Mr. Chairman, our children's jobs are literally vanishing before our 
eyes, pawned by all of this deficit spending so that Congress and the 
President can stave off real reform for a few more years. Now we are 
being offered a bit of camouflage, so-called expedited rescission this 
week, so-called entitlement caps next week, a legislative costume party 
where congressional spendthrifts can play Scrooge for a day.
  Mr. Chairman, this is an unworthy response to a profound crisis. The 
American people have told us in no uncertain terms that they demand 
real change, a real line-item veto, the Michel-Solomon substitute.
  Mr. Chairman, I should say a word about the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich 
amendment. It, too, is worthy of consideration, but the best 
alternative is the Michel-Solomon substitute.
  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
California [Mr. Fazio].
  (Mr. FAZIO asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. FAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I think the debate has left the impression 
that somehow Congress has not fulfilled its responsibilities on 
recission of line items appropriations. Historically I think we have 
done far better than most people realize.
  Mr. Chairman, I would like to read into the Record the summary of 
material that I will place in the Record about just what has happened 
in the last 20 years since the modern Budget Act was enacted.
  We have had the Presidents who served during that period ask us 1,084 
times to rescind spending. That spending reduction requested of us 
would total just under $73 billion. We have agreed to about $23 billion 
of the Presidents' requests, but more important we have gone beyond the 
Presidents' requests and reduced additionally appropriations by almost 
$70 billion more during that 20-year period.
  In other words, Congress has actually rescinded almost $20 billion 
more than we have been asked for by the Presidents who served between 
1974 and the present time. In other words, Congress has exceeded the 
requests by $20 billion while not agreeing exactly with the priorities 
of the administrations that have served during this period.
  Mr. Chairman, I think it would also be important to point out that 
the Congress has in 43 of the last 49 years appropriated less money 
than we were requested to by the various Presidents who served during 
that period. In fact, we have given the President, in a generic sense, 
$73 billion less than requested in the last decade; $73 billion less 
than we were asked to spend in the budgets submitted to us by the two 
Presidents who served during the last decade.
  Mr. Chairman, if we are somehow derelict in our duty to cut spending 
in the appropriations process in the line items that come to us in the 
President's budget, I am at a loss to know what more we could have 
done. We have set an example.
  Mr. Chairman, I include the document referred to in my remarks, as 
follows:

                                                                SUMMARY OF PROPOSED AND ENACTED RESCISSIONS, FISCAL YEARS 1974-94                                                               
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                             Dollar amount                                                             Dollar amount of                          Total dollar   
                                            Rescissions       proposed by        Proposals     Dollar amount of       Rescissions         rescissions      Total rescissions   amount of budget 
               Fiscal year                  proposed by      President for      accepted by    proposals enacted     initiated by        initiated by           enacted            authority    
                                             President        rescission         Congress         by Congress          Congress            Congress                                rescinded    
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1994....................................              65      $3,172,180,000              45      $1,293,478,546                  81      $2,374,416,284                 126      $3,667,894,830
1993....................................               7         356,000,000               4         206,250,000                  74       2,205,336,643                  78       2,411,586,643
1992....................................             128       7,879,473,690              26       2,067,546,000                 131      22,526,953,054                 157      24,594,499,054
1991....................................              30       4,859,251,000               8         286,419,000                  26       1,420,467,000               \1\34       1,706,886,000
1990....................................              11         554,258,000               0                   0                  71       2,304,986,000                  71       2,304,986,000
1989....................................               6         143,100,000               1           2,053,000                  11         325,913,000                  12         327,966,000
1988....................................               0                   0               0                   0                  61       3,888,663,000                  61       3,888,663,000
1987....................................              73       5,835,800,000               2          36,000,000                  52      12,359,390,675                  54      12,395,390,675
1986....................................              83      10,126,900,000               4         143,210,000                   7       5,409,410,000                  11       5,552,620,000
1985....................................             245       1,856,087,000              98         173,699,000                  12       5,458,621,000                 110       5,632,320,000
1984....................................               9         636,400,000               3          55,375,000                   7       2,188,689,000                  10       2,244,064,000
1983....................................              21       1,569,000,000               0                   0                  11         310,605,000                  11         310,605,000
1982....................................              32       7,907,400,000               5       4,365,486,000                   5          48,432,000                  10       4,413,918,000
1981....................................             133      15,361,900,000          \2\101      10,880,935,550                  43       3,736,490,600                 144      14,617,426,150
1980....................................              59       1,618,100,000              34         777,696,446                  33       3,238,206,100                  67       4,015,902,546
1979....................................              11         908,700,000               9         723,609,000                   1          47,500,000                  10         771,109,000
1978....................................              12       1,290,100,000               5         518,655,000                   4          67,164,000                   9         585,819,000
1977....................................              20       1,926,930,000               9         813,690,000                   3         172,722,943                  12         986,412,934
1976....................................              50       3,582,000,000               7         148,331,000                   0                   0                   7         148,331,000
1975....................................              87       2,722,000,000              38         386,295,370                   1           4,999,704                  39         391,295,074
1974....................................               2         495,635,000               0                   0                   3       1,400,412,000                   3       1,400,412,000
                                         -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
      Total: 1974-1994..................           1,084      72,801,214,690             399      22,878,728,912                 637      69,489,378,003               1,036  \3\92,368,106,915 
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\The Military Construction Appropriations Act of 1991 approved certain rescissions proposed by the President in 1990 41 days after the funds were released for obligation under the           
  impoundment Control Act Presidential rescission proposals R90-4, R90-5, and R90.                                                                                                              
\2\Thirty-three rescissions proposed by President Carter and totalling over $1.1 billion are not included in this table These rescission proposals were converted to deferrals by President     
  Reagan in his Fifth Special Message for Fiscal Year 1981 dated February 13.                                                                                                                   
\3\The total estimate of budget authority rescinded is understated. This table does not include rescissions which eliminate an indefinite amount of budget authority.                           

  But the truly troublesome facet of the Stenholm proposal is that the 
President does not have to identify objectionable areas of spending or 
taxation in the time frame he signs a bill. He can hold those issues 
back until he needs the vote or votes of the members in question. 
Perhaps he expects problems on the passage of next year's budget. 
Perhaps there will be a war powers issue. No President with the 
political sense to hold the office would send one of these recisions up 
until the affected member or members crossed the line. What we are 
doing to our forefathers carefully crafted notion of checks and 
balances is to hand the branch of Government whose authority has grown 
most rapidly in recent times, a permanent form of political blackmail 
to insure our submission. The difference between having a 3-day period 
in which a recission would receive expedited procedure and an 
indefinite period might well prove to be the difference between having 
a President and a king. George Washington helped our Nation avoid a 
monarchy. Let us not impose one over 200 years later.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Oklahoma [Mr. Lucas], the newest member of the Committee on Government 
Operations.
  (Mr. LUCAS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. LUCAS. Mr. Chairman, I thank my ranking Member, Mr. Clinger, for 
yielding me this time.
  Mr. Chairman, I am happy the House today will have opportunity to 
pass a true line item veto, a desperately needed reform to get our 
fiscal house in order. Republicans in Congress have been fighting for 
the line-item veto for over a decade. We agree with candidate Bill 
Clinton who, during the 1992 presidential campaign, endorsed the line-
item veto to eliminate pork-barrel projects and cut Government waste.
  Unfortunately, H.R. 4600 will not give the President what he claims 
he wants. H.R. 4600 is but a subterfuge, a sad imposter of the true 
line-item veto. A genuine item veto allows the President to cancel 
wasteful spending items unless both houses of Congress override the 
veto by a two-thirds vote. This bill, however, would allow a bare 
majority of either house of Congress to block any rescission. Even 
worse, this bill would only apply to this year's appropriations bills, 
all of which the House has already passed. In short, Mr. Speaker, H.R. 
4600 is business as usual, and business as usual is what got us into 
this budgetary mess in the first place.
  In fact, H.R. 4600 is so weak that we must ask why we are even 
bothering to consider it now. On April 29, 1993, the House passed 
another measure identical to this one. Why pass the same bill twice? 
Will that in any way improve its chances of becoming law? Of course 
not. It seems the only reason for debating this issue again is to give 
political cover to those Democrats who will be forced by their liberal 
leadership into withdrawing support for the ``A to Z'' spending cuts 
plan, the only opportunity for cutting spending we will have this year. 
As a proud new member of the Government Operations Committee, I note 
that all these problems with H.R. 4600 could have been remedied in 
committee had our chairman not inexplicability waived jurisdiction over 
this bill.
  Despite the weaknesses of H.R. 4600, we will yet have opportunity to 
enact a true line-item veto. The Michel-Solomon substitute amendment 
will grant the President permanent authority to veto items in 
appropriations bills and targeted tax benefits in revenue bills. It 
requires both the President and Congress to act within 20 days, and 
provides for a vote on the entire package of rescissions. Most 
importantly, it requires a two-thirds majority of both houses to 
override the veto or rescission. While the Stenholm substitute may be 
an acceptable improvement over H.R. 4600, the Michel-Solomon substitute 
is preferable because it will genuinely reform the rescission process 
in order to protect the American taxpayer from wasteful spending.
  During my tenure as an Oklahoma State legislator, I witnessed 
firsthand how the line-item veto helped to restrain excessive spending. 
Here in Congress, the line-item veto will be an effective check on 
Congress's unfettered power of the purse, and a good way to counter the 
pressure special interests place on Congress to hike spending higher 
and higher. In the name of meaningful budget reform to protect 
generations of American taxpayers, I urge my colleagues to support the 
Michel-Solomon amendment.

                              {time}  1640

  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Illinois [Mr. Fawell].
  Mr. FAWELL. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this 
time.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Solomon-Michel substitute to 
the expedited rescissions act.
  Let there be no mistake about the series of votes we will have today. 
The Solomon-Michel substitute is the only true line-item veto proposal 
before us. If you campaigned for the line-item veto you vote for the 
Solomon-Michel substitute. Accept no substitutes. The Solomon-Michel 
proposal is the real thing, because it gives the President the 
authority to not spend money for a project unless Congress passes a 
bill disapproving the rescission, thus requiring Congress to act to 
stop the rescission. Then the President could veto the disapproval, and 
Congress could only force the expenditure of the line item by a two-
thirds vote overriding the veto.
  The other proposal before us, the Spratt proposal, is not a line-item 
veto bill. And it is only a temporary provision at best and, of course, 
it has all of those provisions that allows the Committee on Rules to 
waive and dismiss the rules.
  Our Committee on Rules has sometimes been described as a committee 
that has a plethora of waivers and then once in a while will enforce 
the rule.
  If we are going to blame the President for not controlling spending, 
and we like to do that, but we know Congress is in control, then let us 
at least give him coequal power to do something about it. Give him the 
real line-item veto.
  I urge my colleagues to support the Solomon-Michel substitute, the 
real thing, the real line-item veto.
  Should this substitute fail, I then will support the Stenholm-Penny-
Kasich substitute, because it is a vast improvement over the enhanced 
rescission power we presently have.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute, the remainder of 
my time.
  Mr. Chairman, in closing, I would just urge a vote for the Michel-
Solomon substitute, because as has been indicated here, it is the only 
true line-item veto.
  We are engaged here in, I think, an exercise of futility if we were 
to pass 4600. It has not been dealt with by the other body in an entire 
year. I think we need to go on record here today as supporting a true 
line-item veto.
  We may not achieve the goal in this Congress, but we certainly can 
send a signal that this is what this body supports, not smoke and 
mirrors, but true deficit reduction which would be represented by a 
plus vote, an aye vote, for the Michel-Solomon substitute.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. ZELIFF. Mr. Chairman, due to the funeral service of a close, 
personal friend of mine, Mike Tinios, I was unable to vote on the 
amendments and final passage of H.R. 4600, Expedited Rescissions Act of 
1994. Had I been present, I would have voted to oppose the Spratt-
Derrick amendment and supported both the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich 
amendment and the Michel-Solomon amendment.
  Budget process reform is important. Reducing the deficit is vital. If 
we are ever going to make any progress to cut spending and begin to dig 
ourselves out from under the staggering debt that we have accumulated 
over years--a debt which costs the taxpayer over $212 billion a year in 
interest alone--we must take spending cut action now. That is why Rob 
Andrews and I launched the A-to-Z spending cuts plan, to start a 
process that will result in real spending cuts, real deficit reduction. 
We cannot continue spending taxpayer dollars with reckless abandon and, 
in the process, saddle our children and grandchildren with greater and 
greater debt.
  Make no mistake, Mr. Chairman, the so-called expedited rescissions 
bill is a transparent political move aimed at derailing the A-to-Z 
train. 204 members have already signed our discharge petition. It has 
been no secret that the leadership is terrified at the prospect of 
returning the power of the purse to the rank and file members of the 
House. Rather than continuing the status quo, where a few powerful 
committee chairman dictate our funding priorities, A to Z opens the 
process to all Members of Congress.
  A to Z provides a 56-hour session devoted exclusively to cutting the 
budget. Everything is on the table, entitlements, discretionary 
programs, everything. Any Member may offer an amendment to cut 
spending--no restrictive rules. Programs that stand on their merits 
will be funded; those that don't will be cut. It's just that simple.
  The American people mistakenly believe that Congress follows this 
process already. We do not, and this must change. The Spratt version of 
the Expedited Rescissions Act does not give us the reforms that are so 
desperately needed to cut spending and balance the budget. We need real 
spending cuts an real deficit reduction now, not the weak process 
changes called for in H.R. 4600.
  For the sake of future generations, we must do better. I hope the 
House leadership will listen to the people and let the A-to-Z plan move 
forward. We should support the Stenholm and Solomon budget process 
reforms. They improve the process, but they don't provide spending cuts 
now. We need both real budget process reform and we need real A-to-Z 
spending cuts now.
  If the Stenholm or Solomon amendments pass, I would support final 
passage of H.R. 4600. If both of these amendment fail, then I would 
vote to oppose final passage.
  Finally, Mr. Chairman, had I been present, I would have voted to 
oppose the rule of H.R. 3937, the Export Administration Act.
  Mr. FRANKS of Connecticut. Mr. Chairman, this exact same rescissions 
bill was considered by the House last year. Here it is again for our 
consideration. How many more times will the fiscally irresponsible 
majority in Congress pretend to be fiscally responsible before the 
public catches on?
  The bill that the Democrats have brought up today is not a real line-
item veto. It is deceptive to say that it is. A Presidential veto 
requires Congress to get a two-thirds majority to overrule it. This 
bill only requires a majority vote. In addition, this bill does not 
even provide an actual veto. A veto majority overrules a presidential 
decision. In this bill a majority vote is needed, not to reject the 
President's request to delete spending, but to approve it. Anything 
less keeps that wasteful spending in the bill for the rest of the year.
  I will support two amendments to this bill to make it more 
meaningful. The bipartisan Kasich substitute would allow the President 
the option to put savings from a rescission into an account dedicated 
for deficit reduction. It would also force Congress to defeat a 
presidential veto in order to keep spending in a bill.
  My first choice for passage would be the Michel substitute, which 
would give the President a line-item veto as powerful as the one held 
by Governors of 43 States. For those Americans, such as those in 
Connecticut, who are not represented by a Governor with a line-item 
veto, let me explain this substitute. It would allow the President to 
reject spending projects unless Congress overruled the rescission with 
a two-thirds majority vote. This is a true line-item veto. As a sponsor 
of a constitutional amendment giving the President a line-item veto, I 
would be very pleased to see the Michel amendment become law.
  Mr. LAZIO. Mr. Chairman, like many of us who were elected to the 103d 
Congress, I was sent to Washington with a mandate for change. For the 
past 19 months my highest priorities have been reducing the Federal 
debt and the deficit. Several times in those 19 months I have been 
faced with challenges to carry out this mandate. Today is another such 
occasion.
  Today, while I voted for the Expedited Rescission Act of 1994, I have 
to say this Congress could do better for the American people. This bill 
is a step in the right direction. The existing rescission process is a 
joke, and makes it harder to cut wasteful spending instead of easier. 
We have significantly strengthened the process by adopting the Penny-
Kasich-Stenholm amendment, for which I voted. However, we could have 
improved it even more by adopting the Michel-Solomon amendment, which I 
also supported. Congress needs to deal with the debt and deficit right 
now. We need to go further and adopt a line-item veto. I will continue 
to work for opportunities to make the line-item veto a reality.
  The Expedited Rescission Act of 1994 should not be considered a 
replacement for the line-item veto or the A-to-Z spending cuts package. 
As a cosponsor of the A to Z proposal, and a signer of the discharge 
petition. I urge the leadership on the other side of the aisle to move 
A-to-Z to the floor. We must not sit back and point to our minor 
successes, but must directly deal with America's problems. Our work is 
just beginning. Let's also enact a line-item veto and the A-to-Z 
proposal.
  Mr. HUGHES. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of H.R. 4600, the 
Expedited Rescissions Act of 1994.
  At the outset it is significant to note that H.R. 4600 is identical 
to a bill which just last year passed the House with strong support, 
yet received no further legislative action. In this regard, it is 
incumbent upon us to pass this measure in order to once again drive 
home the importance of achieving real budget process reform.
  We are all well aware of the current practice in Congress of bundling 
the thousands of Federal spending programs we oversee into the 13 
appropriations bills. While this process helps to assure that Federal 
funds are distributed equitably, it is clear that this process has been 
abused. By passing H.R. 4600 we have the opportunity to prevent further 
abuse.
  All too often we hear reports of errant projects slipped into 
appropriations bills thereby circumventing the required scrutiny of the 
authorization process. In other instances, our fiscal needs simply 
change over the course of the year and we find there is room to reduce 
substantially, or totally eliminate funding which has been included in 
appropriations bills.
  H.R. 4600 recognizes these possibilities and provides a mechanism to 
effectuate such spending reductions while still maintaining the 
constitutionally mandated balance of power between the Congress and the 
President with respect to the appropriation of funds.
  Pursuant to H.R. 4600, the Congressional Budget and Impoundment 
Control Act of 1974 would be amended to provide for a fast-track 
process for considering and voting on Presidential proposals embodied 
in a bill to rescind budget authority provided for in an appropriations 
measure. The bill also provides for a procedure for the Congress to 
consider an alternative rescissions package drafted by the House or 
Senate Appropriations Committees.
  Specifically the bill will give the President the authority to pick 
out of appropriations bills which he signs those items which he feels 
are wasteful or which should not have been included in the bill in the 
first place. If the President submits his rescission proposal within 3 
days after signing an appropriations bill, a legislative process is 
automatically triggered whereby a House floor vote on the President's 
rescissions package must take place within 10 legislative days of 
introduction.
  If the President's rescissions proposal is rejected by the House, a 
vote on an alternative rescissions bill reported by the House 
Appropriations Committee must be taken by the close of business on the 
11th day following introduction of the President's rescission package. 
If the House does not pass either the President's rescissions package 
or the Appropriation Committee's alternative measure, the Senate would 
not act.
  However, if the House passes either the President's rescission 
proposal or the Appropriations Committee's alternative bill, the Senate 
would have the opportunity to vote on the President's package. As in 
the House, if the Senate rejects the President's proposal, the Senate 
may consider an alternative rescissions package reported by the Senate 
Appropriations Committee. The Senate would only have 10 legislative 
days within which to consider the President's proposal and the 
Appropriations Committee's alternative.
  In this regard, H.R. 4600 is similar to the line-item veto authority 
which many of my colleagues have advocated. However the major 
difference is that this measure will maintain Congress' Constitutional 
prerogative to appropriate funds without unduly shifting power to the 
executive branch.
  I strongly support the expedited rescissions process. However, it 
would be a myopic view of the deficit problem we currently face to 
assume that merely passing H.R. 4600 will resolve this comprehensive 
fiscal dilemma.
  Rather, the expedited rescissions process is a good step in the right 
direction toward restoring real discipline to the Budget Process. In 
addition to this initiative, we must continue to carefully scrutinize 
appropriations bills in order to identify spending programs which we 
don't need or can't afford. Moreover, we must follow up on that 
scrutiny by continuing to make the tough choices to cut programs, 
regardless of their popularity or political appeal.
  H.R. 4600 will not only help us tighten the reins on Government 
spending, but also it will restore a sense of accountability to the 
appropriations process, and I would urge my colleagues to join me in 
support of this legislation.
  Mr. KYL. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Michel-Solomon 
substitute, which comes closest to a true line-item veto for the 
President. I will also support the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich substitute as 
the next best alternative to the base bill, H.R. 4600.
  If the House is serious about a line-item veto bill, it will approve 
one of the two alternatives, preferably Michel-Solomon, because H.R. 
4600 will just not do the job. H.R. 4600 is identical to the weak 
substitute for a line-item veto that the House passed early last year, 
and which is still pending in the Senate without action.
  If H.R. 4600 passes in its current form, it's noting more than cover 
for those Members of the House who won't cosign the discharge petition 
to ensure action on the A-to-Z spending cut proposal. The National 
Taxpayers Union--the respected, nonpartisan organization dedicated to 
protecting taxpayers' interests, first and foremost--has even urged a 
no vote on the base bill, recognizing it's a fraud.
  It won't give the President real line-item veto authority. It won't 
even ensure that Congress will actually vote on the budget rescissions 
that the President might propose. The proposed new rescissions process 
in H.R. 4600 can be set aside, waived or suspended by a special rule of 
the House. It won't even apply beyond the 3\1/2\ months left in the 
103d Congress.
  Michel-Solomon, by contrast, would provide permanent authority for 
the President to propose rescissions in spending bills and targeted tax 
benefits in revenue bills. And unlike the current process whereby 
Congress can kill the President's proposed spending cuts by doing 
nothing at all, Michel-Solomon would ensure that the cuts proposed by 
the President would become effective unless Congress actually votes to 
reject them.
  Mr. Chairman, a vote for H.R. 4600 in its current form is a vote for 
the status quo, something to make the people back home think the House 
is supporting budget reform when it's really not. Well I have news for 
those of our colleagues looking for cover: The American people aren't 
going to be fooled. They know the real thing when they see it.
  I urge a ``yes'' vote on Stenholm-Penny-Kasich amendment, and another 
``yes'' on the Michel-Solomon substitute. Anything less is nothing at 
all.
  Mr. PORTER. Mr. Chairman, the national debt and the yearly deficits 
which enlarge it are our Nation's most serious problems. They are 
nothing less than cancers devouring the economic core of this Nation. 
Every dollar added to the debt makes us that much more dependent on 
foreign lenders and condemns another one of our children to a life of 
diminished economic opportunity. The American people deserve better 
than what this Congress and the Clinton administration have given them 
in terms of deficit reduction.
  Mr. Chairman, with the economy in recovery, we have a unique 
opportunity to make further spending cuts to better address our fiscal 
problems. Unfortunately, the President and the Democratic leadership of 
this House don't want to do that. They don't want to reduce this 
bloated Federal Government further and stem the tide of red ink flowing 
from Washington. Last year, they pulled out all the stops to defeat the 
Penny-Kasich amendment which would have cut Federal spending by just 1 
percent over 5 years and lowered the deficit by $90 billion. Earlier 
this year, they fought a proposed balanced budget amendment to the 
Constitution. Today, they have brought this modest rescission 
improvement proposal to the floor not because they care about 
eliminating wasteful Federal spending, but instead as part of an effort 
to undermine support for the A-to-Z spending cuts plan, a plan which I 
support. Had the leadership run this House with a modicum of openness 
and fairness, A to Z would never have come to life.
  Mr. Chairman, the House last year debated and passed legislation 
identical to H.R. 4600. I supported passage of that legislation which 
today finds itself languishing in the Senate as the clock ticks down 
the final weeks of this 103d Congress. H.R. 4600 is an improvement over 
the current rescission process, but debating and passing it when we 
have effectively already done so is a questionable exercise. If the 
leadership really cared about eliminating waste in Government, if it 
was truly concerned about reducing the deficit, if it really wanted to 
strengthen America's economy, it wouldn't have fought Penny-Kasich, 
wouldn't have opposed the balanced budget amendment, and wouldn't try 
to undercut the A-to-Z plan by bringing up the same modest rescission 
bill twice. We can do better, Mr. Chairman. We have to if this Nation 
wants any kind of prosperity in its future.
  Mrs. LLOYD. Mr. Chairman, the news on the economy is good. Job 
creation, economic growth, consumer confidence are all up. Inflation is 
holding steady. The deficit is going down, and in fact, more so than 
originally predicted with passage of last year's reconciliation act. 
All of these are indeed excellent signs, but Congress should not be 
content to rest on our laurels. If we want to continue these positive 
trends, we must find ways to cut spending and reduce the deficit even 
further.
  Toward that end, I rise in strong support of H.R. 4600, major budget 
reform legislation that will increase congressional accountability in 
the spending process.
  While much of the country's attention has been focused on the health 
care debate, the calls and letters continue to flow into my office 
regarding the need to cut spending and reduce the deficit. I could not 
agree with them more. But we must not only cut spending, we need to 
institute reforms in the budget process itself.
  H.R. 4600, the expedited rescission bill is exemplary of the budget 
process reforms required for responsible spending. Forcing Congress to 
vote on rescissions submitted by the President puts every Member on 
record in support of or opposed to spending on a variety of programs. 
And the new process demands timely action--the rescission bill must be 
voted on within 10 days of its receipt in Congress.
  I believe H.R. 4600 could be made even stronger if we adopt the 
Stenholm substitute. Expedited rescission procedures should be made a 
permanent part of the budget process. I also believe the President 
should have the authority to reject targeted tax benefits. And Congress 
should have the right to vote on an individual rescission contained 
within the package. All of the improvements are contained in the 
Stenholm substitute.
  Mr. Chairman, passage of H.R. 4600 is one step in many that we must 
take to increase our accountability and credibility with the voters. I 
urge its unanimous adoption.
  The CHAIRMAN. All time for general debate has expired.
  Pursuant to the rule, the bill is considered as read for amendment 
under the 5-minute rule.
  The text of H.R. 4600 is as follows:

                               H.R. 4600

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Expedited Rescissions Act of 
     1994''.

     SEC. 2. EXPEDITED CONSIDERATION OF CERTAIN PROPOSED 
                   RESCISSIONS.

       (a) In General.--Part B of title X of the Congressional 
     Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 681 et 
     seq.) is amended by redesignating sections 1013 through 1017 
     as sections 1014 through 1018, respectively, and inserting 
     after section 1012 the following new section:


       ``expedited consideration of certain proposed rescissions

       ``Sec. 1013. (a) Proposed Rescission of Budget Authority.--
     In addition to the method of rescinding budget authority 
     specified in section 1012, the President may propose, at the 
     time and in the manner provided in subsection (b), the 
     rescission of any budget authority provided in an 
     appropriation Act. Funds made available for obligation under 
     this procedure may not be proposed for rescission again under 
     this section or section 1012.
       ``(b) Transmittal of Special Message.--
       ``(1) Not later than 3 calendar days after the date of 
     enactment of an appropriation Act, the President may transmit 
     to Congress one special message proposing to rescind amounts 
     of budget authority provided in that Act and include with 
     that special message a draft bill that, if enacted, would 
     only rescind that budget authority. That bill shall clearly 
     identify the amount of budget authority that is proposed to 
     be rescinded for each program, project, or activity to which 
     that budget authority relates.
       ``(2) In the case of an appropriation Act that includes 
     accounts within the jurisdiction of more than one 
     subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, the 
     President in proposing to rescind budget authority under this 
     section shall send a separate special message and 
     accompanying draft bill for accounts within the jurisdiction 
     of each such subcommittee.
       ``(3) Each special message shall specify, with respect to 
     the budget authority proposed to be rescinded, the matters 
     referred to in paragraphs (1) through (5) of section 1012(a).
       ``(c) Procedures for Expedited Consideration.--
       ``(1)(A) Before the close of the second legislative day of 
     the House of Representatives after the date of receipt of a 
     special message transmitted to Congress under subsection (b), 
     the majority leader or minority leader of the House of 
     Representaitves shall introduce (by request) the draft bill 
     accompanying that special message. If the bill is not 
     introduced as provided in the preceding sentence, then, on 
     the third legislative day of the House of Representatives 
     after the date of receipt of that special message, any Member 
     of that House may introduce the bill.
       ``(B)(i) The bill shall be referred to the Committee on 
     Appropriations of the House of Representatives. The committee 
     shall report the bill without substantive revision, and with 
     or without recommendation. The bill shall be reported not 
     later than the seventh legislative day of that House after 
     the date of receipt of that special message. If the Committee 
     on Appropriations fails to report the bill within that 
     period, that committee shall be automatically discharged from 
     consideration of the bill, and the bill shall be placed on 
     the appropriate calendar.
       ``(ii) The Committee on Appropriations may report to the 
     House, within the 7-legislative day period described in 
     clause (i), an alternative bill which--
       ``(I) contains only rescissions to the same appropriation 
     Act as the bill for which it is an alternative; and
       ``(II) which rescinds an aggregate amount of budget 
     authority equal to or greater than the aggregate amount of 
     budget authority rescinded in the bill for which it is an 
     alternative.
       ``(C) A vote on final passage of the bill referred to in 
     subparagraph (B)(i) shall be taken in the House of 
     Representatives on or before the close of the 10th 
     legislative day of that House after the date of the 
     introduction of the bill in that House. If the bill is 
     passed, the Clerk of the House of Representatives shall cause 
     the bill to be engrossed, certified, and transmitted to the 
     Senate within one calendar day of the day on which the bill 
     is passed.
       ``(D) Upon rejection of the bill described in subparagraph 
     (B)(i) on final passage, a motion in the House to proceed to 
     consideration of the alternative bill reported from the 
     Committee on Appropriations under subparagraph (B)(ii) shall 
     be highly privileged and not debatable.
       ``(E) A vote on final passage of the bill referred to in 
     subparagraph (B)(ii) shall be taken in the House of 
     Representatives on or before the close of the 11th 
     legislative day of that House after the date of the 
     introduction of the bill in that House for which it is an 
     alternative. If the bill is passed, the Clerk of the House of 
     Representatives shall cause the bill to be engrossed, 
     certified, and transmitted to the Senate within one calendar 
     day of the day on which the bill is passed.
       ``(2)(A) A motion in the House of Representatives to 
     proceed to the consideration of a bill under this section 
     shall be highly privileged and not debatable. An amendment to 
     the motion shall not be in order, nor shall it be in order to 
     move to reconsider the vote by which the motion is agreed to 
     or disagreed to.
       ``(B) Debate in the House of Representatives on a bill 
     under this section shall not exceed 4 hours, which shall be 
     divided equally between those favoring and those opposing the 
     bill. A motion further to limit debate shall not be 
     debatable. It shall not be in order to move to recommit a 
     bill under this section or to move to reconsider the vote by 
     which the bill is agreed to or disagreed to.
       ``(C) Appeals from decisions of the Chair relating to the 
     application of the Rules of the House of Representatives to 
     the procedure relating to a bill under this section shall be 
     decided without debate.
       ``(3)(A) A bill transmitted to the Senate pursuant to 
     paragraph (1) (C) or (E) shall be referred to its Committee 
     on Appropriations. The committee shall report the bill either 
     without substantive revision or with an amendment in the 
     nature of a substitute, and with or without recommendation. 
     The bill shall be reported not later than the seventh 
     legislative day of the Senate after it receives the bill. A 
     committee failing to report the bill within such period shall 
     be automatically discharged from consideration of the bill, 
     and the bill shall be placed upon the appropriate calendar.
       ``(B) A vote on final passage of a bill transmitted to the 
     Senate shall be taken on or before the close of the 10th 
     legislative day of the Senate after the date on which the 
     bill is transmitted.
       ``(4)(A) A motion in the Senate to proceed to the 
     consideration of a bill under this section shall be 
     privileged and not debatable. An amendment to the motion 
     shall not be in order, nor shall it be in order to move to 
     reconsider the vote by which the motion is agreed to or 
     disagreed to.
       ``(B) Debate in the Senate on a bill under this section, 
     and all amendments thereto and all debatable motions and 
     appeals in connection therewith, shall not exceed 10 hours. 
     The time shall be equally divided between, and controlled by, 
     the majority leader and the minority leader or their 
     designees.
       ``(C) Debate in the Senate on any debatable motion or 
     appeal in connection with a bill under this section shall be 
     limited to not more than 1 hour, to be equally divided 
     between, and controlled by, the mover and the manager of the 
     bill, except that in the event the manager of the bill is in 
     favor of any such motion or appeal, the time in opposition 
     thereto, shall be controlled by the minority leader or his 
     designee. Such leaders, or either of them, may, from time 
     under their control on the passage of a bill, allot 
     additional time to any Senator during the consideration of 
     any debatable motion or appeal.
       ``(D) A motion in the Senate to further limit debate on a 
     bill under this section is not debatable. A motion to 
     recommit a bill under this section is not in order.
       ``(d) Amendments and Divisions Generally Prohibited.--(1) 
     Except as provided by paragraph (2), no amendment to a bill 
     considered under this section or to a substitute amendment 
     referred to in paragraph (2) shall be in order in either the 
     House of Representatives or the Senate. It shall not be in 
     order to demand a division of the question in the House of 
     Representatives (or in a Committee of the Whole) or in the 
     Senate. No motion to suspend the application of this 
     subsection shall be in order in either House, nor shall it be 
     in order in either House to suspend the application of this 
     subsection by unanimous consent.
       ``(2)(A) It shall be in order in the Senate to consider an 
     amendment in the nature of a substitute reported by the 
     Committee on Appropriations under subsection (c)(3)(A) that 
     complies with subparagraph (B).
       ``(B) It shall only be in order in the Senate to consider 
     any amendment described in subparagraph (A) if--
       ``(i) the amendment contains only rescissions to the same 
     appropriation Act as the bill that it is amending contained; 
     and
       ``(ii) the aggregate amount of budget authority rescinded 
     equals or exceeds the aggregate amount of budget authority 
     rescinded in the bill that it is amending;

     unless that amendment consists solely of the text of the bill 
     as introduced in the House of Representatives that makes 
     rescissions to carry out the applicable special message of 
     the President.
       ``(C) It shall not be in order in the Senate to consider a 
     bill or an amendment in the nature of a substitute reported 
     by the Committee on Appropriations under subsection (c)(3)(A) 
     unless the Senate has voted upon and rejected an amendment in 
     the nature of a substitute consisting solely of the text of 
     the bill as introduced in the House of Representatives that 
     makes rescissions to carry out the applicable special message 
     of the President.
       ``(e) Requirement To Make Available for Obligation.--Any 
     amount of budget authority proposed to be rescinded in a 
     special message transmitted to Congress under subsection (b) 
     shall be made available for obligation on the earlier of--
       ``(1) the day after the date upon which the House of 
     Representatives defeats the text of the bill transmitted with 
     that special message rescinding the amount proposed to be 
     rescinded and (if reported by the Committee on 
     Appropriations) the alternative bill; or
       ``(2) the day after the date upon which the Senate rejects 
     a bill or amendment in the nature of a substitute consisting 
     solely of the text of the bill as introduced in the House of 
     Representatives that makes rescissions to carry out the 
     applicable special message of the President.
       ``(f) Definitions.--For purposes of this section--
       ``(1) the term `appropriation Act' means any general or 
     special appropriation Act, and any Act or joint resolution 
     making supplemental, deficiency, or continuing 
     appropriations; and
       ``(2) the term `legislative day' means, with respect to 
     either House of Congress, any calendar day during which that 
     House is in session.''.
       (b) Exercise of Rulemaking Powers.--Section 904 of such Act 
     (2 U.S.C. 621 note) is amended--
       (1) by striking ``and 1017'' in subsection (a) and 
     inserting ``1013, and 1018''; and
       (2) by striking ``section 1017'' in subsection (d) and 
     inserting ``sections 1013 and 1018''; and
       (c) Conforming Amendments.--
       (1) Section 1011 of such Act (2 U.S.C. 682(5)) is amended--
       (A) in paragraph (4), by striking ``1013'' and inserting 
     ``1014''; and
       (B) in paragraph (5)--
       (i) by striking ``1016'' and inserting ``1017''; and
       (ii) by striking ``1017(b)(1)'' and inserting 
     ``1018(b)(1)''.
       (2) Section 1015 of such Act (2 U.S.C. 685) (as 
     redesignated by section 2(a)) is amended--
       (A) by striking ``1012 or 1013'' each place it appears and 
     inserting ``1012, 1013, or 1014'';
       (B) in subsection (b)(1), by striking ``1012'' and 
     inserting ``1012 or 1013'';
       (C) in subsection (b)(2), by striking ``1013'' and 
     inserting ``1014''; and
       (D) in subsection (e)(2)--
       (i) by striking ``and'' at the end of subparagraph (A);
       (ii) by redesignating subparagraph (B) as subparagraph (C);
       (iii) by striking ``1013'' in subparagraph (C) (as so 
     redesignated) and inserting ``1014''; and
       (iv) by inserting after subparagraph (A) the following new 
     subparagraph:
       ``(B) he has transmitted a special message under section 
     1013 with respect to a proposed rescission; and''.
       (3) Section 1016 of such Act (2 U.S.C. 686) (as 
     redesignated by section 2(a)) is amended by striking ``1012 
     or 1013'' each place it appears and inserting ``1012, 1013, 
     or 1014''.
       (d) Clerical Amendments.--The table of sections for subpart 
     B of title X of such Act is amended--
       (1) by redesignating the items relating to sections 1013 
     through 1017 as items relating to sections 1014 through 1018; 
     and
       (2) by inserting after the item relating to section 1012 
     the following new item:

``Sec. 1013. Expedited consideration of certain proposed 
              rescissions.''.

     SEC. 3. APPLICATION.

       (a) In General.--Section 1013 of the Congressional Budget 
     and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (as added by section 2) 
     shall apply to amounts of budget authority provided by 
     appropriation Acts (as defined in subsection (f) of such 
     section) that are enacted during the One Hundred Third 
     Congress.
       (b) Special Transition Rule.--Within 3 calendar days after 
     the beginning of the One Hundred Fourth Congress, the 
     President may retransmit a special message, in the manner 
     provided in section 1013(b) of the Congressional Budget and 
     Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (as added by section 2), 
     proposing to rescind only those amounts of budget authority 
     that were contained in any special message to the One Hundred 
     Third Congress which that Congress failed to consider because 
     of its sine die adjournment before the close of the time 
     period set forth in such section 1013 for consideration of 
     those proposed rescissions. A draft bill shall accompany that 
     special message that, if enacted, would only rescind that 
     budget authority. Before the close of the second legislative 
     day of the House of Representatives after the date of receipt 
     of that special message, the majority leader or minority 
     leader of the House of Representatives shall introduce (by 
     request) the draft bill accompanying that special message. If 
     the bill is not introduced as provided in the preceding 
     sentence, then, on the third legislative day of the House of 
     Representatives after the date of receipt of that special 
     message, any Member of that House may introduce the bill. The 
     House of Representatives and the Senate shall proceed to 
     consider that bill in the manner provided in such section 
     1013.

     SEC. 4. TERMINATION.

       The authority provided by section 1013 of the Congressional 
     Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (as added by 
     section 2) shall terminate 2 years after the date of 
     enactment of this Act.

     SEC. 5. JUDICIAL REVIEW.

       (a) Expedited Review.--
       (1) Any Member of Congress may bring an action, in the 
     United States District Court for the District of Columbia, 
     for declaratory judgment and injunctive relief on the ground 
     that any provision of section 1013 (as added by section 2) 
     violates the Constitution.
       (2) A copy of any complaint in an action brought under 
     paragraph (1) shall be promptly delivered to the Secretary of 
     the Senate and the Clerk of the House of Representatives, and 
     each House of Congress shall have the right to intervene in 
     such action.
       (3) Any action brought under paragraph (1) shall be heard 
     and determined by a three-judge court in accordance with 
     section 2284 of title 28, United States Code.

     Nothing in this section or in any other law shall infringe 
     upon the right of the House of Representatives to intervene 
     in an action brought under paragraph (1) without the 
     necessity of adopting a resolution to authorize such 
     intervention.
       (b) Appeal to Supreme Court.--Notwithstanding any other 
     provision of law, any order of the United States District 
     Court for the District of Columbia which is issued pursuant 
     to an action brought under paragraph (1) of subsection (a) 
     shall be reviewable by appeal directly to the Supreme Court 
     of the United States. Any such appeal shall be taken by a 
     notice of appeal filed within 10 days after such order is 
     entered; and the jurisdictional statement shall be filed 
     within 30 days after such order is entered. No stay of an 
     order issued pursuant to an action brought under paragraph 
     (1) of subsection (a) shall be issued by a single Justice of 
     the Supreme Court.
       (c) Expedited Consideration.--It shall be the duty of the 
     District Court for the District of Columbia and the Supreme 
     Court of the United States to advance on the docket and to 
     expedite to the greatest possible extent the disposition of 
     any matter brought under subsection (a).

  The CHAIRMAN. No amendment shall be in order except the amendments 
printed in House Report 103-565, which may be offered only in the order 
printed and by the Member designated in the report, shall be considered 
as read, shall not be subject to amendment except as specified in the 
report, and shall not be subject to a demand for division of the 
question.
  Debate on each amendment will be equally divided and controlled by 
the proponent and an opponent of the amendment.


                    amendment offered by mr. derrick

  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
  The text of the amendment is as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. Derrick: Page 10, line 17, insert 
     ``, unless the House has passed the text of the President's 
     bill transmitted with that special message and the Senate 
     passes an amendment in the nature of a substitute reported by 
     its Committee on Appropriations'' before the period.
       Page 11, line 21, insert ``and by striking `1012 and 1013' 
     and inserting `1012, 1013, and 1014''' before the semicolon.
       Page 12, line 1, strike ``(2)'' and insert ``(1)''.
       Page 14, strike lines 7 through 11 and on line 12, strike 
     ``5'' and insert ``4''.

  The CHAIRMAN. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from South Carolina 
will be recognized for 5 minutes, and a Member opposed will be 
recognized for 5 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Derrick].
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 90 seconds.
  Mr. Chairman, this technical amendment would make three 
clarifications and corrections to the bill. First, the amendment would 
clarify that the funds proposed to be rescinded remain unavailable for 
obligation so long as approval legislation remains viable. Under the 
bill as reported, funds would be released after Senate rejection of the 
President's rescission bill even if the Senate instead passed an 
alternative measure.
  Second, the amendment corrects two simple drafting errors in the 
conforming amendments subsection.
  Finally, the amendment deletes section 4 of the bill, which conflicts 
with subsection 3(a), to clarify that the new procedure applies only to 
budget authority enacted during the 103d Congress.
  Mr. Chairman, I know of no objection to this amendment.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I would not seek time in opposition, but I 
would ask if the gentleman will yield to me for a question.
  Mr. DERRICK. I yield to the gentleman from New York.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, the technical amendment we are about to 
vote on is the amendment that is printed in the Record and has not been 
changed in any way? Is that correct?
  Mr. DERRICK. That is correct.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, we certainly have no objection. We would 
support that amendment.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3\1/2\ minutes, the balance of my 
time, to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Durbin].
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. Chairman, we will hear many speeches during the 
course of this afternoon about the determination of Members of Congress 
to cut spending and to reduce the budget deficit. In order that this be 
kept in perspective, I think we should recall that many of the 
Democrats who spoke, and all of the Republicans who will speak, voted 
against President Clinton's effort to reduce the deficit with his 
budget deficit reduction plan of last year. That plan has resulted in 
the greatest reduction in the Federal deficit that we have seen at any 
time since the tenure of President Truman. It is anticipated that we 
will cut almost $700 billion from that deficit.
  It must strike many people listening as curious that we find 
ourselves wrapped in this conversation and dialog about budget deficit 
reduction, and yet when it came down to an actual vote to reduce the 
deficit, so many of the Members who stand here proclaiming their 
personal allegiance to deficit reduction were nowhere to be found.
  But let me give you another example closer to home. June 17, almost a 
month ago, I brought to this floor an appropriation bill, the gentleman 
can probably recall, for the agencies of the Department of Agriculture, 
Food and Drug Administration, and several related agencies. This bill 
reflected what we will see for years to come, because of the Clinton 
deficit reduction plan, a dramatic cut in spending.
  Let me tell you specifically what I am saying: Of the $13 billion in 
discretionary spending in that bill in last year's appropriation, our 
subcommittee was forced to cut 10 percent, $1.3 billion. Anyone running 
a business or managing an agency of Government can tell you that a cut 
in an appropriation of 10 percent in 1 year is a tough cut. It goes way 
beyond any cosmetic cut. It is a cut that is part of real deficit 
reduction.
  What I found curious, as a Democrat, when I brought this bill to the 
floor, was a Member of the Republican side circulated a letter saying 
these cuts were too deep, that Members on his side of the aisle should 
vote against my appropriation because we cut too much from programs 
that he favored, in fact, programs I favored too.
  But it is part of the harsh reality of real deficit reduction that we 
have to face these things. If we are going to reduce the deficit, we 
must reduce spending.
  When that bill was called for final passage, 127 Members of this 
House of Representatives voted against my bill which cut 10 percent in 
discretionary spending, cut $1.3 billion from last year's bill, and if 
you take a look at the 127 Members of the House who voted against my 
bill, a real budget, guess what, 120 of these are people who have 
walked up here and ceremoniously signed the A to Z petition saying they 
want to really cut spending. They would not cut it when I called my 
bill.
  One hundred twenty-two of them are balanced-budget amendment 
sponsors, people who wear the bumper stickers and make the speeches at 
home about balancing budgets and come here to the floor and refuse to 
vote for a appropriation bill that really cuts spending.
  One hundred fifteen of them voted for the Kasich budget plan which 
would have cut even more for agriculture, and yet the Kasich plan was a 
theory.

                              {time}  1650

  The bill I called up was a fact. But what I am saying to the Members 
of the House and all those who are listening is that the real test of 
cutting a budget is whether you will vote for an appropriation bill 
that cuts spending. When it came to the time for that test, a lot of 
the people making the greatest speeches today failed.
  The CHAIRMAN pro tempore (Mr. de la Garza). Does any Member rise in 
opposition to the amendment?
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I would rise in opposition, reserving the 
right to change my mind.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield to a member of the Committee on Agriculture, 
the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Gunderson].
  Mr. GUNDERSON. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, I think it is important that everyone understand 
exactly the misrepresentation which just occurred about the vote on the 
agriculture appropriation bill.
  Mr. Chairman, I cannot help it if the 602(b) allocation that Mr. 
Durbin was able to get for his agriculture appropriation was less than 
he wanted. Everybody knows it was not reflective of the budget 
agreement per se, No. 1. No. 2, the reason we all voted and led the 
fight against the agriculture appropriation, as he well knows, is 
because it cut funding for production agriculture at the very same time 
it increased funding for the social programs. That was the fight. There 
was no money in there for crop insurance, he knows that; there was an 
18-percent drop in the Commodity Credit Corporation farm support 
program.
  Now, what the fight about the agriculture appropriation bill was the 
allocation of the money as it occurred. Many of us are happy to take 
the bottom-line cuts, but if we are going to take the bottom-line cuts, 
we are not going to increase food stamps, WIC, all those programs, 
while we cut agriculture, which is the whole purpose of the agriculture 
appropriation bill.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, I will take some 
exception to what the gentleman has said. He has been critical of 
Members who have taken to the well and supported either the Stenholm 
approach or the Solomon approach. All of those Members have the highest 
ratings by the National Taxpayers Union year in and year out. That is 
how people tell whether we are a big spender or not.
  When it comes to deficit reduction and the President's plan, yes, 
those of us who voted against it did so because it was the biggest tax 
increase in the history of this entire Congress. It took $120 million 
out of the pockets of the Social Security recipients in my district 
alone. So, yes, I offered a balanced budget amendment; Mr. Penny and a 
lot of others voted for that balanced budget. It was not an amendment, 
it was a true balanced budget scored by the Congressional Budget 
Office. That is what we ought to be supporting on this floor. That is 
real deficit reduction.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield to my friend on the Committee on 
Appropriations, the gentleman from Arizona [Mr. Kolbe].
  (Mr. KOLBE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. KOLBE. I thank the gentleman for yielding to me.
  Mr. Chairman, I concur with the gentleman's remarks and rise in 
support of the Solomon amendment, which will be considered shortly.
  Mr. Chairman, for weeks we have been anticipating this day, a day 
which the Democratic leadership would have preferred to avoid. Why? 
Because their hand has been forced to respond to the drive to 218--the 
all important milestone in the discharge petition process.
  We have watched the Democratic leadership pursue a torturous path in 
an attempt to derail the A-to-Z spending cut plan because--simply put--
it knocks holes in their ability to control the agenda and the purse 
strings of the Federal Government. And just look at where it has gotten 
us today.
  Even more astounding is what the Democratic leadership has proposed 
as a substitute to A to Z to provide cover for those who have not 
signed the discharge petition. H.R. 4600, offered up as the tough 
budget lion, is nothing but a sacrificial lamb. H.R. 4600 is nothing 
more than recycled budget process reform. It is a sham and the American 
public has seen through this ploy.
  Instead of a bill that would allow for 56 hours of debate on specific 
spending cuts that would be directed toward deficit reduction, we have 
H.R. 4600. Recall that H.R. 4600 came before the House a year ago. It 
was touted to be a tough new approach to the budget process. It would 
enhance the current rescission authority. Yet even then it did not 
enhance. And its toughness could not measure up against a true-line 
item veto. It is recycled. It is a sham.
  Unlike a real line-item veto, which will be offered as a substitute 
amendment later in the debate, and allows the president to cancel 
wasteful spending items, subject to override by two-thirds of both 
Houses, H.R. 4600 requires that a majority of both Houses approve any 
veto of appropriations items. In other words, a majority of either 
House can block the President's proposed spending cuts by doing 
nothing. And there are no penalties or disincentives for inaction. The 
only change to last year's bill is a stepped-up timetable for 
consideration. There is no question, the Solomon substitute is the real 
line-item veto which I will throw my support behind today.
  Fortunately, there is still another option available to us today to 
show the America people we won't be fooled by the H.R. 4600 tactic. The 
Stenholm-Penny-Kasich amendment has been crafted to strengthen the 
recycled H.R. 4600.
  The objectives of this amendment are the same as the A-to-Z spending 
cut plan--to provide opportunities for Congress to vote on spending 
cuts.
  The Stenholm-Penny-Kasich amendment provides the President the 
authority to designate some portion of the savings from a rescission or 
repealing targeted tax benefits to a deficit reduction account. It 
would expand rescission authority to targeted tax benefits as well as 
appropriations. The President could use expedited rescission authority 
any time--not just during a narrow window of opportunity. And the 
amendment makes it permanent not just during the 103d Congress.
  Let us not let the opportunity to support tough budget reform slip 
away again. Support the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich amendment to H.R. 4600. 
And support the Solomon substitute which would provide real line-item 
veto authority.
  It will not solve all our fiscal problems, but it will help--if the 
improvements are real--and these are.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I respectfully yield back the balance of 
my time and indicate that I have changed my mind. I am going to support 
the technical amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN pro tempore. The question is on the amendment offered by 
the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Derrick].
  The amendment was agreed to.
  The CHAIRMAN pro tempore. It is now in order to consider amendment 
No. 2, printed in House Report 103-565.


    amendment in the nature of a substitute offered by mr. stenholm

  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, pursuant to the rule, I offer an 
amendment in the nature of a substitute.
  The CHAIRMAN pro tempore. The Clerk will designate the amendment in 
the nature of a substitute.
  The text of the amendment in the nature of a substitute is as 
follows:

       Amendment in the nature of a substitute offered by Mr. 
     Stenholm: Strike all after the enacting clause and insert the 
     following:

     SECTION 1. EXPEDITED CONSIDERATION OF CERTAIN PROPOSED 
                   RESCISSIONS AND TARGETED TAX BENEFITS.

       (a) In General.--Section 1012 of the Congressional Budget 
     and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 683) is amended 
     to read as follows:


       ``expedited consideration of certain proposed rescissions

       Sec. 1012. (a) Proposed Rescission of Budget Authority or 
     Repeal of Targeted Tax Benefits.--The President may propose, 
     at the time and in the manner provided in subsection (b), the 
     rescission of any budget authority provided in an 
     appropriation Act or repeal of any targeted tax benefit 
     provided in any revenue Act. Funds made available for 
     obligation under this procedure may not be proposed for 
     rescission again under this section.
       ``(b) Transmittal of Special Message.--
       (1) The President may transmit to Congress a special 
     message proposing to rescind amounts of budget authority or 
     to repeal any targeted tax benefit and include with that 
     special message a draft bill that, if enacted, would only 
     rescind that budget authority or repeal that targeted tax 
     benefit. That bill shall clearly identify the amount of 
     budget authority that is proposed to be rescinded for each 
     program, project, or activity to which that budget authority 
     relates or the targeted tax benefit proposed to be repealed, 
     as the case may be. It shall include a Deficit Reduction 
     Account. The President may place in the Deficit Reduction 
     Account an amount not to exceed the total rescissions in that 
     bill. A targeted tax benefit may only be proposed to be 
     repealed under this section during the 20-calendar-day period 
     (excluding Saturdays, Sundays, and legal holidays) commencing 
     on the day after the date of enactment of the provision 
     proposed to be repealed.
       ``(2) In the case of an appropriation Act that includes 
     accounts within the jurisdiction of more than one 
     subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, the 
     President in proposing to rescind budget authority under this 
     section shall send a separate special message and 
     accompanying draft bill for accounts within the jurisdiction 
     of each such subcommittee.
       ``(3) Each special message shall specify, with respect to 
     the budget authority proposed to be rescinded, the 
     following--
       ``(A) the amount of budget authority which he proposes to 
     be rescinded;
       ``(B) any account, department, or establishment of the 
     Government to which such budget authority is available for 
     obligation, and the specific project or governmental 
     functions involved;
       ``(C) the reasons why the budget authority should be 
     rescinded;
       ``(D) to the maximum extent practicable, the estimated 
     fiscal, economic, and budgetary effect (including the effect 
     on outlays and receipts in each fiscal year) of the proposed 
     rescission; and
       ``(E) all facts, circumstances, and considerations relating 
     to or bearing upon the proposed rescission and the decision 
     to effect the proposed rescission, and to the maximum extent 
     practicable, the estimated effect of the proposed rescission 
     upon the objects, purposes, and programs for which the budget 
     authority is provided.

     Each special message shall specify, with respect to the 
     proposed repeal of targeted tax benefits, the information 
     required by subparagraphs (C), (D), and (E), as it relates to 
     the proposed repeal.
       ``(c) Procedures for Expedited Consideration.--
       ``(1)(A) Before the close of the second legislative day of 
     the House of Representatives after the date of receipt of a 
     special message transmitted to Congress under subsection (b), 
     the majority leader or minority leader of the House of 
     Representatives shall introduce (by request) the draft bill 
     accompanying that special message. If the bill is not 
     introduced as provided in the preceding sentence, then, on 
     the third legislative day of the House of Representatives 
     after the date of receipt of that special message, any Member 
     of that House may introduce the bill.
       ``(B) The bill shall be referred to the Committee on 
     Appropriations or the Committee on Ways and Means of the 
     House of Representatives, as applicable. The committee shall 
     report the bill without substantive revision and with or 
     without recommendation. The bill shall be reported not later 
     than the seventh legislative day of that House after the date 
     of receipt of that special message. If that committee fails 
     to report the bill within that period, that committee shall 
     be automatically discharged from consideration of the bill, 
     and the bill shall be placed on the appropriate calendar.
       ``(C)(i) During consideration under this paragraph, any 
     Member of the House of Representatives may move to strike any 
     proposed rescission or rescissions of budget authority or any 
     proposed repeal of a targeted tax benefit, as applicable, if 
     supported by 49 other Members.
       ``(ii) It shall not be in order for a Member of the House 
     of Representatives to move to strike any proposed rescission 
     under clause (i) unless the amendment reduces the appropriate 
     Deficit Reduction Account if the program, project, or account 
     to which the proposed rescission applies was identified in 
     the Deficit Reduction Account in the special message under 
     subsection (b).
       ``(D) A vote on final passage of the bill shall be taken in 
     the House of Representatives on or before the close of the 
     10th legislative day of that House after the date of the 
     introduction of the bill in that House. If the bill is 
     passed, the Clerk of the House of Representatives shall cause 
     the bill to be engrossed, certified, and transmitted to the 
     Senate within one calendar day of the day on which the bill 
     is passed.
       ``(2)(A) A motion in the House of Representatives to 
     proceed to the consideration of a bill under this section 
     shall be highly privileged and not debatable. An amendment to 
     the motion shall not be in order, nor shall it be in order to 
     move to reconsider the vote by which the motion is agreed to 
     or disagreed to.
       ``(B) Debate in the House of Representatives on a bill 
     under this section shall not exceed 4 hours, which shall be 
     divided equally between those favoring and those opposing the 
     bill. A motion further to limit debate shall not be 
     debatable. It shall not be in order to move to recommit a 
     bill under this section or to move to reconsider the vote by 
     which the bill is agreed to or disagreed to.
       ``(C) Appeals from decisions of the Chair relating to the 
     application of the Rules of the House of Representatives to 
     the procedure relating to a bill under this section shall be 
     decided without debate.
       ``(D) Except to the extent specifically provided in the 
     preceding provisions of this subsection, consideration of a 
     bill under this section shall be governed by the Rules of the 
     House of Representatives. It shall not be in order in the 
     House of Representatives to consider any rescission bill 
     introduced pursuant to the provisions of this section under a 
     suspension of the rules or under a special rule.
       ``(3)(A) A bill transmitted to the Senate pursuant to 
     paragraph (1)(D) shall be referred to its Committee on 
     Appropriations or Committee on Finance, as applicable. That 
     committee shall report the bill without substantive revision 
     and with or without recommendation. The bill shall be 
     reported not later than the seventh legislative day of the 
     Senate after it receives the bill. A committee failing to 
     report the bill within such period shall be automatically 
     discharged from consideration of the bill, and the bill shall 
     be placed upon the appropriate calendar.
       ``(B)(i) During consideration under this paragraph, any 
     Member of the Senate may move to strike any proposed 
     rescission or rescissions of budget authority or any proposed 
     repeal of a targeted tax benefit, as applicable, if supported 
     by 14 other Members.
       ``(ii) It shall not be in order for a Member of the House 
     or Senate to move to strike any proposed rescission under 
     clause (i) unless the amendment reduces the appropriate 
     Deficit Reduction Account (pursuant to section 314) if the 
     program, project, or account to which the proposed rescission 
     applies was identified in the Deficit Reduction Account in 
     the special message under subsection (b).
       ``(4)(A) A motion in the Senate to proceed to the 
     consideration of a bill under this section shall be 
     privileged and not debatable. An amendment to the motion 
     shall not be in order, nor shall it be in order to move to 
     reconsider the vote by which the motion is agreed to or 
     disagreed to.
       ``(B) Debate in the Senate on a bill under this section, 
     and all debatable motions and appeals in connection therewith 
     (including debate pursuant to subparagraph (C)), shall not 
     exceed 10 hours. The time shall be equally divided between, 
     and controlled by, the majority leader and the minority 
     leader or their designees.
       ``(C) Debate in the Senate on any debatable motion or 
     appeal in connection with a bill under this section shall be 
     limited to not more than 1 hour, to be equally divided 
     between, and controlled by, the mover and the manager of the 
     bill, except that in the event the manager of the bill is in 
     favor of any such motion or appeal, the time in opposition 
     thereto, shall be controlled by the minority leader or his 
     designee. Such leaders, or either of them, may, from time 
     under their control on the passage of a bill, allot 
     additional time to any Senator during the consideration of 
     any debatable motion or appeal.
       ``(D) A motion in the Senate to further limit debate on a 
     bill under this section is not debatable. A motion to 
     recommit a bill under this section is not in order.
       ``(d) Amendments and Divisions Prohibited.--Except as 
     otherwise provided by this section, no amendment to a bill 
     considered under this section shall be in order in either the 
     House of Representatives or the Senate. It shall not be in 
     order to demand a division of the question in the House of 
     Representatives (or in a Committee of the Whole) or in the 
     Senate. No motion to suspend the application of this 
     subsection shall be in order in either House, nor shall it be 
     in order in either House to suspend the application of this 
     subsection by unanimous consent.
       ``(e) Requirement To Make Available for Obligation.--(1) 
     Any amount of budget authority proposed to be rescinded in a 
     special message transmitted to Congress under subsection (b) 
     shall be made available for obligation on the day after the 
     date on which either House rejects the bill transmitted with 
     that special message.
       ``(2) Any targeted tax benefit proposed to be repealed 
     under this section as set forth in a special message 
     transmitted to Congress under subsection (b) shall be deemed 
     repealed unless, during the period described in that 
     subsection, either House rejects the bill transmitted with 
     that special message.
       ``(f) Definitions.--For purposes of this section--
       ``(1) the term `appropriation Act' means any general or 
     special appropriation Act, and any Act or joint resolution 
     making supplemental, deficiency, or continuing 
     appropriations;
       ``(2) the term `legislative day' means, with respect to 
     either House of Congress, any day of session; and
       ``(3) The term ``targeted tax benefit'' means any provision 
     which has the practical effect of providing a benefit in the 
     form of a differential treatment to a particular taxpayer or 
     a limited class of taxpayers, whether or not such provision 
     is limited by its terms to a particular taxpayer or a class 
     of taxpayers. Such term does not include any benefit provided 
     to a class of taxpayers distinguished on the basis of general 
     demographic conditions such as income, number of dependents, 
     or marital status.''.
       (b) Exercise of Rulemaking Powers.--Section 904 of the 
     Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 621 note) is 
     amended--
       (1) in subsection (a), by striking ``and 1017'' and 
     inserting ``1012, and 1017''; and
       (2) in subsection (d), by striking ``section 1017'' and 
     inserting ``sections 1012 and 1017''.
       (c) Conforming Amendments.--
       (1) Section 1011 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 
     U.S.C. 682(5)) is amended by repealing paragraphs (3) and (5) 
     and by redesignating paragraph (4) as paragraph (3).
       (2) Section 1014 of such Act (2 U.S.C. 685) is amended--
       (A) in subsection (b)(1), by striking ``or the 
     reservation''; and
       (B) in subsection (e)(1), by striking ``or a reservation'' 
     and by striking ``or each such reservation''.
       (3) Section 1015(a) of such Act (2 U.S.C. 686) is amended 
     by striking ``is to establish a reserve or'', by striking 
     ``the establishment of such a reserve or'', and by striking 
     ``reserve or'' each other place it appears.
       (4) Section 1017 of such Act (2 U.S.C. 687) is amended--
       (A) in subsection (a), by striking ``rescission bill 
     introduced with respect to a special message or'';
       (B) in subsection (b)(1), by striking ``rescission bill 
     or'', by striking ``bill or'' the second place it appears, by 
     striking ``rescission bill with respect to the same special 
     message or'', and by striking ``, and the case may be,'';
       (C) in subsection (b)(2), by striking ``bill or'' each 
     place it appears;
       (D) in subsection (c), by striking ``rescission'' each 
     place it appears and by striking ``bill or'' each place it 
     appears;
       (E) in subsection (d)(1), by striking ``rescission bill 
     or'' and by striking ``, and all amendments thereto (in the 
     case of a rescission bill)'';
       (F) in subsection (d)(2)--
       (i) by striking the first sentence;
       (ii) by amending the second sentence to read as follows: 
     ``Debate on any debatable motion or appeal in connection with 
     an impoundment resolution shall be limited to 1 hour, to be 
     equally divided between, and controlled by, the mover and the 
     manager of the resolution, except that in the event that the 
     manager of the resolution is in favor of any such motion or 
     appeal, the time in opposition thereto shall be controlled by 
     the minority leader or his designee.'';
       (iii) by striking the third sentence; and
       (iv) in the fourth sentence, by striking ``rescission bill 
     or'' and by striking ``amendment, debatable motion,'' and by 
     inserting ``debatable motion'';
       (G) in paragraph (d)(3), by striking the second and third 
     sentences; and
       (H) by striking paragraphs (4), (5), (6), and (7) of 
     paragraph (d).
       (d) Clerical Amendments.--The item relating to section 1012 
     in the table of sections for subpart B of title X of the 
     Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 is 
     amended to read as follows:

``Sec. 1012. Expedited consideration of certain proposed rescissions 
              and targeted tax benefits.''.

  The CHAIRMAN pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
Texas [Mr. Stenholm] will be recognized for 15 minutes, and a Member 
opposed will be recognized for 15 minutes.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment in 
the nature of a substitute.
  The CHAIRMAN pro tempore. The gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. 
Derrick] will be recognized for 15 minutes in opposition.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm].
  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 4 minutes.
  Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to come to the floor with Tim Penny 
and John Kasich to offer this substitute amendment to H.R. 4600, the 
Expedited Rescissions Act of 1994.
  Our amendment would allow the President to propose to cut or 
eliminate individual spending items in appropriations bills throughout 
the year. The President could place some or all of the savings from 
proposed rescissions in a deficit reduction account. In addition, the 
President would be able to propose to repeal targeted tax breaks which 
benefit a particular taxpayer or class of taxpayers within 10 days of 
signing a tax bill.
  Within 10 legislative days after the President sends a rescission 
package to Congress, a vote shall be taken on the rescission bill. The 
bill may not be amended on the floor, except that 50 House Members can 
request a vote on a motion to strike an individual rescission from the 
package. If a majority of Members voted in favor of the individual 
item, it would be struck from the bill. If approved by a simple 
majority of the House, the bill would be sent to the Senate for 
consideration under the same expedited procedure.
  Any appropriations or tax item that was submitted by the President 
would be in effect suspended until Congress acts on the President's 
package. If Congress avoids a vote, the funds would continue to be 
withheld from obligation or the tax provision would continue to be 
deemed to be repealed. Unlike current law, Congress could not force the 
President to spend the money by ignoring the rescissions. If a simple 
majority in either the House or Senate defeats a rescission proposal, 
the funds for programs covered by the proposal would be released for 
obligation in accordance with the previously enacted appropriation, or 
the tax provision would take effect. If a bill rescinding spending or 
repealing tax benefits is approved by the House and Senate, it would be 
sent to the President for his signature.
  While I believe that the base bill introduced by John Spratt is a 
clear improvement over current law, and I commend my friend from South 
Carolina for the leadership he has shown on this issue, I believe there 
are several areas in which this legislation can be improved. It is in 
this spirit the three of us are offering our substitute. Our amendment 
would improve the base text in several ways:
  First, the President would have the option of earmarking savings from 
proposed rescissions to deficit reduction in anticipation of lockbox 
legislation which this body will consider later this year. Under the 
base bill, the savings from rescissions automatically would be 
available to be spent on other programs;
  Second, the President would be able to single out narrowly drawn 
provisions in tax bills which are added to tax bills at the behest of 
large corporations or wealthy taxpayers. Congress would have to vote on 
these rifle shot tax provisions on their merits.
  Third, the President would be able to submit a rescission package for 
expedited consideration at any point in the year. The base bill would 
restrict the President to submitting rescissions during a limited 
window after signing an appropriations bill.
  Fourth, the new expedited rescission authority would be established 
permanently instead of being limited to the few remaining months of the 
103d Congress as the base bill would do.
  Fifth, if 50 members of the House or 15 members of the Senate request 
a separate vote on an individual item, they would have the opportunity 
to convince a majority of the House to strike that item project from 
the package before the vote on the overall package. Under the base 
bill, Members could be placed in a position of being compelled to 
oppose the entire package because of one item included in the package 
even though they supported virtually all rescissions in the package.
  Sixth, our substitute would not lay out a cumbersome new procedure 
for consideration of an Appropriations Committee alternative as the 
base bill does. Contrary to some suggestions, our substitute does not 
prevent Congress from considering an alternative rescission package.
  Mr. Chairman, this amendment will give Congress and the President an 
additional tool for fiscal responsibility and improve accountability in 
taxing and spending legislation without disrupting the constitutional 
balance of power. I urge the House to vote for the Stenholm-Penny-
Kasich expedited rescission substitute.
  Mr. Chairman, I offer a series of questions and answers with respect 
to our amendment:

  Questions and Answers Stenholm-Penny-Kasich Substitute to H.R. 4600

       How does the substitute differ from legislation which was 
     passed by the House last year?
       The Stenholm-Penny-Kasich substitute makes several changes 
     to the legislation passed by the House last year to respond 
     to concerns raised by many members and significantly 
     strengthen the legislation. The President would be able to 
     single out newly enacted targeted tax benefits as well as 
     appropriated items for individual votes. Unlike the 
     legislation passed last year, which required the President to 
     submit rescissions within a three-day window after signing an 
     appropriations bill, the President would be able to submit a 
     rescission package for expedited consideration at any point 
     in the year. The President would have the option of 
     earmarking savings from proposed rescissions to deficit 
     reduction in anticipation of lockbox legislation, which no 
     other expedited rescission or line-item veto proposal would 
     permit. The new expedited rescission authority would be 
     established permanently instead of being sunsetted after two 
     years. Members would have the ability to obtain separate 
     votes on individual items in a rescission package that have 
     significant support. The substitute explicitly prevents the 
     President's rescissions from being considered under a special 
     rule which would waive the requirements of the section. 
     Finally, the prerogative of the Appropriations Committee to 
     move their own rescission bill would be preserved without 
     creating a cumbersome new procedure.
       How is the procedure under the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich 
     expedited rescission legislation different from the existing 
     procedure for considering Presidential rescissions under 
     Title X of the Budget Control and Impoundment Act?
       Under Title X of the Budget Control and Impoundment Act, 
     the President may propose to rescind all or part of any item 
     at any time during the fiscal year. If Congress does not take 
     action on the proposed rescission within 45 days of 
     continuous session, the funds must be released for 
     obligation. Congress routinely ignores Presidential 
     rescissions. The discharge procedure for forcing a floor vote 
     on Presidential rescissions is cumbersome and has never been 
     used. Most Presidential rescission messages have died without 
     a floor vote.
       Congress has approved just 34.5% of the individual 
     rescissions proposed by the President since 1974 (350 of 1012 
     rescissions submitted), representing slightly more than 30% 
     of the dollar volume of proposed rescissions. Nearly a third 
     of the Presidential rescissions approved came in 1981. 
     Excluding 1981, Congress has approved less than 20% of the 
     dollar volume in Presidential rescissions. Although Congress 
     has initiated $65 billion in rescissions on its own, it has 
     ignored nearly $48 billion in Presidential rescissions 
     submitted under Title X of the Budget Control and Impoundment 
     Act without any vote at all on the merits of the rescissions.
       In 1992, the threat that there would be an attempt to 
     utilize the Title X discharge procedure to force votes on 128 
     rescissions submitted by President Bush provided the impetus 
     for the Appropriations Committee to report a bill rescinding 
     more than $8 billion. However, this was an exception. Most 
     rescission messages are ignored. The Stenholm-Penny-Kasich 
     substitute would change that and force Congress to react to 
     Presidential messages and vote on them, increasing the 
     likelihood that unnecessary spending would be eliminated.
       Could Congress thwart the provisions of the Stenholm-Penny-
     Kasich expedited rescission legislation by reporting a rule 
     that waives the requirements of this proposal?
       No. The substitute specifically states that ``It shall not 
     be in order in the House of Representatives to consider any 
     rescission bill introduced pursuant to the provisions of this 
     section . . . under a special rule.'' Furthermore, OMB could 
     continue to withhold the funds from obligation until the 
     President's plan was voted on as required by this legislation 
     regardless of any attempts by Congress to waive its internal 
     rules. If Congress used its Constitutional authority to set 
     its own rules to avoid a vote on the President's rescissions, 
     it would give the President the ability to indefinitely 
     impound the funds.
       How does expedited rescission legislation ensure that a 
     Presidential rescission is voted on by Congress?
       Expedited rescission legislation establishes several 
     procedural requirements ensuring that Congress cannot simply 
     ignore a rescission massage. A rescission bill would be 
     introduced by request by either the Majority or Minority 
     Leader. If the Appropriations Committee does not report out 
     the rescission bill as required within ten days, the bill is 
     automatically discharged from the committee and placed on the 
     appropriate calendar. Once the bill is either reported by or 
     discharged from the Appropriations Committee, any individual 
     member may make a highly privileged motion to proceed to 
     consideration of the bill. Although a motion to adjourn would 
     take precedence, the House could not prevent a vote on a 
     rescission message by adjourning because only legislative 
     days are counted toward the ten day clock. By providing for a 
     highly privileged motion to proceed to consideration and 
     limiting debate and preventing amendments to a rescission 
     bill. This proposal ensures that there will be a vote on a 
     rescission bill so long as one member is willing to stand up 
     on the House floor and make a motion to proceed.
       The substitute includes language to discourage the House 
     from avoiding a vote on the President's package, by making 
     the release of funds by OMB contingent on Congress voting on 
     and defeating the President's package.
       Under current law, OMB withholds funds from apportionment 
     until Congress acts on a rescission message. Funds included 
     in a rescission message would be frozen in the pipeline until 
     Congress either votes to rescind them or to release them for 
     obligation. The substitute provides that the funds must be 
     released for obligation upon defeat of the President's 
     rescission bill in either House. This is different from the 
     requirement in Section 1012 of the Impoundment Control Act of 
     1974, which states ``Any among of budget authority proposed 
     to be rescinded . . . shall be made available for obligation, 
     unless, within the prescribed 45 day period, the Congress has 
     completed action on a rescission bill rescinding all or part 
     of the amount proposed to be rescinded.'' By specifically 
     providing that the funds would be released upon defeat of the 
     President's package and not providing for any other 
     circumstances in which OMB must release the funds, the 
     language of the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich substitute clearly 
     provides that OMB will be required to release the funds only 
     when Congress votes on and rejects the rescission bill.
       Similarly, the amendment provides that any tax benefits 
     proposed to be repealed be ``deemed to have been repealed 
     unless . . . either House rejects the bill transmitted with 
     that special message.
       How would the motion to strike individual items from a 
     package of rescissions work?
       A member would be able to make a motion to strike an 
     individual item in the rescission bill if 49 members support 
     the motion. This procedure would be similar to existing 
     procedures to call for recorded votes or the procedure for 
     discharging rescission bills under Title X of the Impoundment 
     Control Act in which the members supporting the motion would 
     stand and be counted. If the requisite number of members 
     supported a motion to strike, the motion would be debated 
     under the five minute rule and the House would vote on the 
     motion. If the motion was supported by a majority of members, 
     the item would be struck from the bill. The House would vote 
     on final passage of the rescission bill after disposing of 
     any motion to strike.
       If 50 members feel strongly about an individual item to 
     coordinate the actions necessary to obtain a motion to 
     strike, they deserve to have the opportunity to make their 
     case to the full House. They would still have to convince a 
     majority of the House that their project was justified.
       Wouldn't the motion to strike deprive the President of a 
     vote on his rescissions?
       No. Congress would vote on the merits of each rescission 
     either as part of the overall package or on a motion to 
     strike. While there might not be one vote on the entire 
     package if a motion to strike succeeded, Congress would have 
     voted on the merits of individual rescissions when it voted 
     on the motions to strike items from the package.
       The motion to strike increases the chance of passing 
     rescissions submitted by the President by providing a safety 
     valve to take ``killer'' items out of a rescission package to 
     avoid the entire package from being defeated because of one 
     item with strong support. If there is a strong core of 
     support within Congress for an individual item, there would 
     be a high likelihood that the supporters of that item could 
     form an alliance to defeat the entire bill. Although the 
     President would presumably make political judgements to avoid 
     including items that would sink the entire package, the 
     administration will not always be aware of all traps that may 
     lie with an individual spending program or tax provision. 
     This safety valve would prevent a political miscalculation 
     from sinking the entire bill.
       What types of tax provisions would be subject to the new 
     rescission process?
       The provision for expedited consideration of proposal to 
     repeal tax items would be restricted to targeted tax 
     benefits. ``Targeted tax benefits'' are defined as provisions 
     in a tax bill which provide benefits to a particular taxpayer 
     or limited class of taxpayer. The rescission authority would 
     apply to narrowly drawn tax items, the so-called ``tax 
     pork'', which are slipped into tax bills to benefit special 
     interests. It will not apply to tax provisions based on 
     general demographic conditions or marital status, such as the 
     earned income tax credit or the personal exemption.
       Wouldn't the ability to repeal tax items create uncertainty 
     in the tax code?
       No. The substitute provides for swift consideration of 
     proposals to repeal tax provisions so that taxpayers would 
     know the final disposition of any tax provision within a 
     reasonable period of time following the passage of a tax 
     bill. The President must submit a proposal to repeal a tax 
     provision within ten business days after signing a tax bill. 
     Both Houses of Congress would be required to act within 
     twenty legislative days.
       Could the President propose to rewrite tax provisions?
       No. The President would only be able to propose legislative 
     language necessary to repeal individual tax provisions for 
     expedited consideration. Legislation submitted by the 
     President to rewrite a tax provision would not be subject to 
     the expedited procedures of this amendment.
       Doesn't this legislation constitute an unconstitutional 
     legislative veto?
       No. This legislation was carefully crafted to comply with 
     the Constitutional requirements established by the courts by 
     I.N.S. v. Chada 462, U.S. 919 (1983), the case that declared 
     legislative veto provisions unconstitutional. Legislative 
     vetoes allow one or both Houses of Congress (or a 
     Congressional committee) to stop executive actions by passing 
     a resolution that is not presented to the President. The 
     Chada court held that legislative vetoes are unconstitutional 
     because they allow Congress to exercise legislative power 
     without complying with Constitutional requirements for 
     bicameral passage of legislation and presentment of 
     legislation to the President for signature or veto. For 
     example, allowing the House (or Congress as a whole) to block 
     a Presidential rescission by passing a motion of disapproval 
     without sending the bill to the President for signature or 
     veto would violate the Chada test. This substitute meets the 
     Chada tests of bicameralism and presentment by requiring that 
     both chambers of Congress pass a motion enacting the 
     rescission and send it to the President for signature or 
     veto, before the funds are rescinded. The substitute does not 
     provide for legislative review of a preceding executive 
     action, but expedited consideration of an executive proposal. 
     Thus, it represents a so-called ``report and wait'' provision 
     that the court approved in Sibbach v. Wilson and Co., 312 
     U.S. 1 (1941) and reaffirmed in Chada.
       If a majority of Congress has voted for items as part of an 
     appropriations or tax bill, wouldn't the same majority vote 
     to preserve the items when they were rescinded?
       Just as President's often sign appropriations bill (or 
     other bills for that matter) that includes individual items 
     that he does not support, Congress often passes 
     appropriations bills without passing judgement on individual 
     items. Expedited rescission legislation would force the 
     President and Congress to examine spending items on their 
     individual merit and not as part of an overall package. Many 
     items included in omnibus appropriations bill would not be 
     able to receive majority support in Congress if they were 
     forced to stand on their own individual merits. Members who 
     voted for an appropriations or tax bill may be willing to 
     vote to eliminate individual items that had been in the 
     omnibus bill.
       Isn't requiring an additional vote on items that have 
     already been approved by Congress a waste of time?
       As was stated above, the fact that an item was included in 
     an omnibus appropriations or tax bill does not necessary 
     imply that a majority of Congress supported that individual 
     item. For example, when Congress passed the Agricultural 
     Appropriations Bill in 1990, the majority of the members did 
     not endorse spending on Lawrence Welk's home. Requiring a 
     second vote on individual items included in an omnibus 
     appropriation bill is not an unreasonable response to 
     realities of the legislative process.
       Doesn't providing the President expedited rescission 
     authority alter the balance of power between Congress and the 
     President?
       No. The approach of expedited rescission legislation 
     strikes a balance between protecting Congress' control of the 
     purse and providing the accountability in the appropriations 
     process. Unlike line-item veto legislation, this substitute 
     would preserve the Constitutional power of Congressional 
     majorities to control spending decisions. Expedited 
     rescission authority increases the accountability of both 
     sides, but does not give the President undue leverage in the 
     appropriations process because funding for a program will 
     continue if a majority of either House disagree with him.
       Since the rescission process would only apply to the 
     relatively small amount of spending in discretionary programs 
     and a limited number of small tax breaks, isn't this just a 
     political gimmick that won't have a significant impact on the 
     deficit?
       The authors of this proposal have never claimed that this 
     proposal would balance the budget or even make a substantial 
     dent in the budget deficit. However, it will be a useful tool 
     in helping the President and Congress identify and eliminate 
     as much as $10 billion in wasteful or low-priority spending 
     each year. Many of the special interest tax provisions that 
     would be subject to expedited rescission have a considerable 
     cost. It will help ensure that the federal government spends 
     its scarce resources in the most effective way possible and 
     does not divert resources to low-priority programs. Perhaps 
     most importantly, by increasing the accountability of the 
     budget process, it will help restore some credibility to the 
     federal government's handling of taxpayer money with the 
     public. This credibility is necessary if Congress and the 
     President are to gain public support for the tough choices of 
     cutting benefits or raising taxes necessary to balance the 
     budget.
       Would this proposal apply to entitlement programs funded 
     through the appropriations process such as unemployment 
     insurance and food stamps?
       No. Although other versions of expedited rescission 
     legislation would have allowed a President to propose to 
     rescind spending for entitlement programs funded through the 
     regular appropriations bills (as is the case with 
     unemployment insurance and other income support programs), 
     this was changed to clarify that the expedited rescission 
     process does not apply to any entitlement programs.
       Doesn't expedited rescission violate the legislative 
     prerogative by requiring action under a specific timetable 
     and preventing amendments to a rescission bill?
       The expedited procedure for consideration of rescission 
     messages in this substitute is similar to fast track 
     procedures for trade agreements or for base closure reports, 
     which have worked relatively well. In fact, the scope of the 
     legislation that would be subject to expedited consideration 
     is much more confined under this procedure than in either 
     trade agreements or base closings.
       Wouldn't allowing the President to submit rescissions 
     throughout the year give the President undue ability to 
     dictate the legislative calendar?
       The substitute preserves the flexibility of Congressional 
     leaders to develop the legislative schedule while ensuring 
     that the President's package is voted on in a timely fashion. 
     It provides that the time allowed for consideration of the 
     bill before a vote is required be counted in legislative days 
     instead of calendar days, ensuring that the House will be in 
     session for ten days after receiving the message before a 
     vote is required. The House could vote on the package at any 
     point within the ten legislative days for consideration.
       Could the President propose to lower the spending level of 
     an item, or would he have to eliminate the entire item?
       The President could propose to rescind the budget authority 
     for all or part of any program in an appropriations bill. 
     Consequently the President could, if he so chose, submit a 
     rescission that simply lowered the budget authority for a 
     certain program without eliminating it entirely. In 
     comparison, most line-item veto proposals require the 
     President to propose to eliminate an entire line item in an 
     appropriations bill.
       Would this proposal allow the President to strike 
     legislative language from appropriations bills?
       No. It specifically allows a President to rescind only 
     budget authority provided in an appropriations act and 
     requires that the draft bill submitted by the President have 
     only the effect of canceling budget authority. Legislative 
     language, including limitation riders, would not be subject 
     to this procedure.
       Could the President propose to increase budget authority 
     for a program?
       No. The substitute specifically provides that the President 
     may propose to eliminate or reduce budget authority provided 
     in an appropriations bill. It does not allow the President to 
     propose an increase in budget authority.
       What happens if the President submits a rescission message 
     after Congress recesses for the year?
       The House has ten legislative days to consider the 
     rescission message. Since the time allowed for consideration 
     of the rescission message only counts days that Congress is 
     in session, Congress would not be required to vote on a 
     rescission message until after it returns from recess. 
     However, the funds would not be released for apportionment 
     for proposed rescissions until Congress votes on and defeats 
     a Presidential rescission bill. Congressional leaders would 
     have to decide whether to reconvene Congress to consider the 
     rescission message or to leave the message pending while 
     Congress is in recess. Congress could delay adjourning sine 
     die until the time period in which the President could submit 
     a rescission has expired so that it can reconvene to consider 
     a rescission message if it is submitted after Congress 
     completes all other business. If the funds included in a 
     rescission message are considered by Congress to be 
     important, Congress would have to return to session to vote 
     on the message. If a rescission message is submitted after 
     the first session of the 103rd Congress has adjourned for the 
     year, or if Congress adjourns before the period for 
     consideration of a rescission message expires, the rescission 
     message would remain pending at the beginning of the second 
     session of the 103rd Congress. The House would still be 
     required to vote on the rescission message by the tenth 
     legislative day after the rescission package was submitted.


 Amendment Offered by Mr. Solomon as a Substitute for the Amendment in 
           the Nature of a Substitute Offered by Mr. Stenholm

  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, pursuant to the rule, I offer an amendment 
as a substitute for the amendment in the nature of a substitute offered 
by Mr. Stenholm.
  The CHAIRMAN pro tempore. The Clerk will designate the amendment 
offered as a substitute.
  The text of the amendment offered by Mr. Solomon to the amendment in 
the nature of a substitute offered by Mr. Stenholm is as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. Solomon as a substitute for the 
     amendment in the nature of a substitute offered by Mr. 
     Stenholm: In lieu of the matter proposed to be inserted by 
     the amendment in the nature of a substitute by Mr. Stenholm, 
     insert the following:

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``The Enhanced Rescission/
     Receipts Act of 1994''.

     SEC. 2. LEGISLATIVE LINE-ITEM VETO RESCISSION AUTHORITY.

       (a) In General.--Notwithstanding the provisions of part B 
     of title X of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment 
     Control Act of 1974, and subject to the provisions of this 
     section, the President may rescind all or part of any 
     discretionary budget authority or veto any targeted tax 
     benefit within any revenue bill which is subject to the terms 
     of this Act if the President--
       (1) determines that--
       (A) such recession or veto would help reduce the Federal 
     budget deficit;
       (B) such rescission or veto will not impair any essential 
     Government functions; and
       (C) such rescission or veto will not harm the national 
     interest; and
       (2) notifies the Congress of such rescission or veto by a 
     special message not later than twenty calendar days (not 
     including Saturdays, Sundays, or holidays) after the date of 
     enactment of a regular or supplemental appropriation act or a 
     joint resolution making continuing appropriations providing 
     such budget authority or a revenue bill containing a targeted 
     tax benefit.

     The President shall submit a separate rescission message for 
     each appropriation bill and for each revenue bill under this 
     paragraph.

     SEC. 3. RESCISSION EFFECTIVE UNLESS DISAPPROVED.

       (a)(1) Any amount of budget authority rescinded under this 
     Act as set forth in a special message by the President shall 
     be deemed canceled unless, during the period described in 
     subsection (b), a rescission/receipts disapproval bill making 
     available all of the amount rescinded is enacted into law.
  (2) Any provision of law vetoed under this Act as set forth in a 
special message by the President shall be deemed repealed unless, 
during the period described in subsection (b), a rescission/receipts 
disapproval bill restoring that provision is enacted into law.
       (b) The period referred to in subsection (a) is--
       (1) a congressional review period of twenty calendar days 
     of session during which Congress must complete action on the 
     rescission/receipts disapproval bill and present such bill to 
     the President for approval or disapproval;
       (2) after the period provided in paragraph (1), an 
     additional ten days (not including Sundays) during which the 
     President may exercise his authority to sign or veto the 
     rescission/receipts disapproval bill; and
       (3) if the President vetoes the rescission/receipts 
     disapproval bill during the period provided in paragraph (2), 
     an additional five calendar days of session after the date of 
     the veto.
       (c) If a special message is transmitted by the President 
     under this Act and the last session of the Congress adjourns 
     sine die before the expiration of the period described in 
     subsection (b), the rescission or veto, as the case may be, 
     shall not take effect. The message shall be deemed to have 
     been retransmitted on the first day of the succeeding 
     Congress and the review period referred to in subsection (b) 
     (with respect to such message) shall run beginning after such 
     first day.

     SEC. 4. DEFINITIONS.

       As used in this Act:
       (1) The term ``rescission/receipts disapproval bill'' means 
     a bill or joint resolution which--
       (A) only disapproves a rescission of budget authority, in 
     whole, rescinded, or
       (B) only disapproves a veto of any provision of law that 
     would decrease receipts,

     in a special message transmitted by the President under this 
     Act.
       (2) The term ``calendar days of session'' shall mean only 
     those days on which both Houses of Congress are in session.
       (3) The term ``targeted tax benefit'' means any provision 
     which has the practical effect of providing a benefit in the 
     form of a differential treatment to a particular taxpayer or 
     a limited class of taxpayers, whether or not such provision 
     is limited by its terms to a particular taxpayer or a class 
     of taxpayers. Such term does not include any benefit provided 
     to a class of taxpayers distinguished on the basis of general 
     demographic conditions such as income, number of dependents, 
     or marital status.

     SEC. 5. CONGRESSIONAL CONSIDERATION OF LEGISLATIVE LINE ITEM 
                   VETO RESCISSIONS.

       (a) Presidential Special Message.--Whenever the President 
     rescinds any budget authority as provided in this Act or 
     vetoes any provision of law as provided in this Act, the 
     President shall transmit to both Houses of Congress a special 
     message specifying--
       (1) the amount of budget authority rescinded or the 
     provision vetoed;
       (2) any account, department, or establishment of the 
     Government to which such budget authority is available for 
     obligation, and the specific project or governmental 
     functions involved;
       (3) the reasons and justifications for the determination to 
     rescind budget authority or veto any provision pursuant to 
     this Act;
       (4) to the maximum extent practicable, the estimated 
     fiscal, economic, and budgetary effect of the rescission or 
     veto; and
       (5) all factions, circumstances, and considerations 
     relating to or bearing upon the rescission or veto and the 
     decision to effect the rescission or veto, and to the maximum 
     extent practicable, the estimated effect of the rescission 
     upon the objects, purposes, and programs for which the budget 
     authority is provided.
       (b) Transmission of Messages to House and Senate.--
       (1) Each special message transmitted under this Act shall 
     be transmitted to the House of Representatives and the Senate 
     on the same day, and shall be delivered to the Clerk of the 
     House of Representatives if the House is not in session, and 
     to the Secretary of the Senate if the Senate is not in 
     session. Each special message so transmitted shall be 
     referred to the appropriate committees of the House of 
     Representatives and the Senate. Each such message shall be 
     printed as a document of each House.
       (2) Any special message transmitted under this Act shall be 
     printed in the first issue of the Federal Register published 
     after such transmittal.
       (c) Referral of Rescission/Receipts Disapproval Bills.--Any 
     rescission/receipts disapproval bill introduced with respect 
     to a special message shall be referred to the appropriate 
     committees of the House of Representatives or the Senate, as 
     the case may be.
       (d) Consideration in the Senate.--
       (1) Any rescission/receipts disapproval bill received in 
     the Senate from the House shall be considered in the Senate 
     pursuant to the provisions of this Act.
       (2) Debate in the Senate on any rescission/receipts 
     disapproval bill and debatable motions and appeals in 
     connection therewith, shall be limited to not more than ten 
     hours. The time shall be equally divided between, and 
     controlled by, the majority leader and the minority leader on 
     their designees.
       (3) Debate in the Senate on any debatable motions or appeal 
     in connection with such bill shall be limited to one hour, to 
     be equally divided between, and controlled by the mover and 
     the manager of the bill, except that in the event the manager 
     of the bill is in favor of any such motion or appeal, the 
     time in opposition thereto shall be controlled by the 
     minority leader or his designee. Such leaders, or either of 
     them, may, from the time under their control on the passage 
     of the bill, allot additional time to any Senator during the 
     consideration of any debatable motion or appeal.
       (4) A motion to further limit debate is not debatable. A 
     motion to recommit (except a motion to recommit with 
     instructions to report back within a specified number of days 
     not to exceed one, not counting any day on which the Senate 
     is not in session) is not in order.
       (e) Points of Order.--
       (1) It shall not be in order in the Senate or the House of 
     Representatives to consider any rescission/receipts 
     disapproval bill that relates to any matter other than the 
     rescission of budget authority or veto of the provision of 
     law transmitted by the President under this Act.
       (2) it shall not be in order in the Senate or the House of 
     Representatives to consider any amendment to a rescission/
     receipts disapproval bill.
       (3) Paragraphs (1) and (2) may be waived or suspended in 
     the Senate only by a vote of three-fifths of the members duly 
     chosen and sworn.

  The CHAIRMAN pro tempore. The gentleman from New York will be 
recognized for 15 minutes, and a Member opposed will be recognized for 
15 minutes.


                         Parliamentary Inquiry

  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I have a parliamentary inquiry.
  The CHAIRMAN pro tempore. The gentleman will state it.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I understand the gentleman from South 
Carolina [Mr. Derrick], was recognized in opposition to the Stenholm 
amendment. Who is recognized in opposition to my amendment offered as a 
substitute for the amendment?
  The CHAIRMAN pro tempore. The Chair is about to inquire.
  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the Solomon 
amendment and Mr. Derrick is willing to rise in opposition to the 
Solomon amendment. We will divide the time or we will share it.

                              {time}  1700

  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Derrick] has 
time in opposition to the amendment offered by the gentleman from Texas 
[Mr. Stenholm]. He may also be assigned the time in opposition to the 
amendment offered by the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon].
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the Solomon 
amendment as well.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from South Carolina rises in opposition 
to the amendment offered by the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon].
  Mr. SOLOMON. Everybody is so hesitant to rise in opposition to my 
amendment. That is nice.
  The CHAIRMAN. Therefore, the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] 
has 15 minutes in support of his amendment. The gentleman from South 
Carolina [Mr. Derrick] has 15 minutes in opposition to the amendment 
offered by the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon]. In addition, the 
gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Derrick] still has the time in 
opposition to the amendment offered by the gentleman from Texas [Mr. 
Stenholm], and Mr. Stenholm has 11 minutes remaining to him in support 
of his amendment.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Would the gentleman from South Carolina reserve his time 
and allow me to make an opening statement in the time that he has 
remaining in opposition to both of our amendments?
  Mr. DERRICK. Yes, Mr. Chairman, that is fine.
  The CHAIRMAN. Does the gentleman from South Carolina yield time to 
the gentleman from New York?
  Mr. SOLOMON. No, Mr. Chairman. He reserves his time.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr.Chairman, I reserve my time. Let the gentleman from 
New York [Mr. Solomon] proceed.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Derrick] 
reserves his time. Therefore, the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] 
on his own time will be recognized for whatever time he designates 
within 15 minutes.
  Mr. SOLOMON. I appreciate having this all straightened out, Mr. 
Chairman.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  (Mr. SOLOMON asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I offer the Solomon substitute for the 
Stenholm amendment made in order pursuant to the rule.
  Mr. Chairman, the amendment I have offered is quite simple and yet 
fundamentally different from either H.R. 4600 or the Stenholm 
substitute. This is the real line-item veto. What it says is that a 
President's cancellation of a spending item or a special interest tax 
break will take effect unless it is disapproved by a majority of both 
Houses of Congress within 20 days.
  Since the President would likely veto a disapproval bill, it would 
then require two-thirds of both Houses, under the Constitution, to 
override the President's veto and force the money to be spent or the 
tax break to take effect.
  Mr. Chairman, that's the kind of line-item veto most Governors have. 
It is what President Clinton said he wanted during the 1992 campaign, 
though he has since bought off on these watered-down expedited 
rescission bills.
  We all know that it is not enough to require that both Houses of 
Congress approve the President's proposed cuts in wasteful spending, 
since it is the same majority that log-rolled those pork-barrel 
projects down to the White House in the first place.
  If the President's proposals are meritorious, we should be willing to 
say that they will stick unless a supermajority of Congress is willing 
to override him.
  Mr. Chairman, public support for the real line-item veto has always 
been over 60 percent. The people understand this issue. They've seen it 
work in their own States. They've seen how we sometimes lard these 
spending bills with special projects that don't have merit but are 
purely political pork.
  Mr. Chairman, I don't think anyone has suggested that the line-item 
veto is the total answer to our deficit problem. But it would certainly 
contribute to reducing that deficit.
  In the first place, we would be more careful about putting things in 
appropriations bills that we know don't belong there. We wouldn't want 
to be embarrassed by having the President single them out for a line-
item veto.
  In the second place, even when we do slip them in, we know that the 
chances are very slim they will survive this tough process that will 
require that they repass by a two-thirds vote of both Houses.
  As Members have testified of their own State experiences, this is not 
a power the Executive abuses. It is used frugally and wisely and 
selectively. But it is a useful fiscal tool in discouraging and 
restraining wasteful spending to begin with, and in extracting it if 
need be.
  Mr. Chairman, before I close, I want to pay tribute to our Republican 
leader, Bob Michel, whose bill, H.R. 493, this substitute is based on. 
It was he who extended this veto concept and expedited process into the 
area of special interest tax breaks, and I think that is a very 
valuable contribution.
  And let me hasten to add this is a bipartisan substitute. It got the 
votes of 33 Democrats last year and I hope it will get even more today.
  I am especially grateful to the leadership of Jim Cooper, Jimmy 
Hayes, Gary Condit, and Billy Tauzin for sponsoring this amendment.
  On our side we again have the strong leadership on the line-item veto 
from three outstanding freshmen: Mike Castle, Peter Blute, and Jack 
Quinn.
  I strongly urge my colleagues to vote for this only true line-item 
veto we will have before us this year. Let's start to do things right 
around here and give the President special authority in partnership 
with the Congress to curb wasteful spending. Vote ``yes'' on the 
Solomon line-item veto substitute.
  Mr. HUTTO. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. SOLOMON. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.
  Mr. HUTTO. Mr. Chairman, as the gentleman knows, he and I often vote 
together, and we believe in doing something about the deficit. But I am 
on the other side of this issue. I am surprised that the gentleman 
feels that we can turn the Government over to the bureaucracy of the 
OMB instead of letting the Congress do this. And, as the gentleman 
knows, we have had, through the years we have had, rescissions, but the 
Committee on Appropriations has not seen fit to bring it. What we are 
trying to do with the enhanced rescission is to make sure it comes.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, let me reclaim my time because I have deep 
respect for my great friend who is retiring. I am going to miss him 
dearly. He is wrong on this issue, I say respectfully.
  Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 5 minutes.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, would the gentleman from South Carolina 
[Mr. Derrick] be good enough to yield a little time to the gentleman 
from Florida [Mr. Hutto]?
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
Florida [Mr. Hutto].
  Mr. HUTTO. Mr. Chairman, getting back to what I was saying a while 
ago, I believe that, if we had the line item veto that is being talked 
about, we would have constant conflict between the executive and 
legislative branches. I think that we ought to rule in this House and 
this Congress, and, if we have enhanced rescission where the Committee 
on Appropriations has to bring these rescissions here, we can vote on 
it, simple majority, and take care of it.
  So, I just want to say to the gentleman that I hope we do not turn 
our government over to the bureaucracy.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, the Solomon amendment does not improve the 
bill, and Members ought to reject it for one simple reason: the 
amendment would enable a one-third-plus-one minority in either House to 
join with a President to dictate the fiscal priorities of this country.
  Under this amendment, a President could within 20 days of signing a 
revenue or tax bill, propose rescissions of budget authority or the 
repeal of targeted tax benefits, and they would take effect permanently 
unless Congress voted to disapprove them within a specified time. Since 
a President would veto any bill to disapprove his proposals, for 
Congress' priorities to prevail would require a two-thirds vote in both 
Houses. Conversely, for the President to prevail, he need convince only 
one-third plus one of either House to sustain his veto.
  Mr. Chairman, the principle which underlies our democratic system of 
government is majority rule. I do not believe it wise for Congress to 
create a rescission process in which a President, with the support of 
only 34 Senators or 146 Representatives, could dictate fiscal or tax 
policy, on a line-by-line basis, to majorities in both the House and 
Senate. We should not tilt the balance of the power of the purse so 
dramatically in the President's favor, no matter who he is or what 
political party he belongs to.
  What reason have we to believe the President's fiscal priorities are 
inherently better than ours? What reason have we to believe the 
Executive branch institutionally favors less spending than Congress? 
None. In fact, there is considerable evidence to the contrary.
  Since 1945 Congress has appropriated billions less than the various 
Presidents have requested. Moreover, since 1974 Congress has actually 
rescinded more spending than the Presidents have proposed to rescind.
  According to the General Accounting Office, from 1974 through last 
September 20, Presidents have proposed to rescind $69.6 billion in 
spending, an impressive sum. But during that time Congress has actually 
rescinded $88.7 billion in spending. In other words, Mr. Chairman, 
Congress has since 1974 rescinded 27 percent more spending than 
Presidents have proposed to rescind. That is not widely understood, or 
something for which Congress receives the credit it deserves.
  Mr. Chairman, the goal of the underlying bill, and indeed this whole 
exercise, is to add accountability for spending decisions to the 
appropriations process. The goal is not merely to advance and promote 
the President's brand of spending over Congress' brand of spending, 
which is what the Solomon amendment would do.
  We are dealing with the fundamental relationship between the two 
political branches. We must not give any President even more power than 
he already has to shove his priorities down Congress' throat. We have 
no idea what his priorities might be; we know only they will probably 
be different. If the President can convince a majority of each House to 
reject the items he has identified as wasteful and proposed to repeal, 
then he ought to prevail. But he ought not prevail with only minority 
support. If he lacks majority support for his position, then he can 
still use his regular veto; nothing in the bill affects that.
  Mr. Chairman, the bill is designed to give the President the 
responsibility to ferret out arguably wasteful items in appropriations 
acts and force Congress to approve them again if it wishes. I believe 
the bill will achieve the desired effect without disrupting the balance 
of power so carefully created by our Founding Fathers.
  The Solomon amendment, on the other hand, would enable the President 
and a minority in one House to dictate his priorities to majorities in 
both Houses. In my opinion, the Solomon amendment would also make 
getting the bill through the Senate tougher, if not impossible. I urge 
all Members to reject the Solomon amendment, and I reserve the balance 
of my time.

                              {time}  1710

  Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Georgia [Mr. Deal].
  (Mr. DEAL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. DEAL. Mr. Chairman, last year I joined the gentleman from 
Minnesota [Mr. Minge] and 11 other freshmen Democrats in introducing an 
enhanced revision provision which is very similar to the amendment 
being offered by the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm] this year. I 
am pleased that he has improved on the base text of the amendment to 
the bill that is being offered today by incorporating many of those 
suggestions that we had last year.
  Now, I have listened with interest to the argument that we should not 
pass either of these provisions because we must guard the prerogative 
of the legislative branch of government over the budgetary process. And 
I understand that. For after all, we have done a great job, right by 
ourselves. Our debt is only $4.6 trillion. Maybe we just need a little 
more time. For after all, it has only been 25 years since we were able 
to balance the budget. And maybe we should not put anymore power into 
the hands of someone who would use that power to leverage votes on 
other legislative issues, for such a concept is obviously an abuse that 
is foreign to this body.
  Well, I am willing to take the chance. I think our debt is too big. I 
think 25 years of trying is too long. I am willing to put the 
President, any President, in the caldron with us, to try to make it 
better.
  Now, if the real concern about this proposal is the loss of 
legislative prerogative, then I, and I am sure many others, would 
suggest that let us limit it to only those occasions when the budget is 
out of balance. That might put some incentive on us to do a better job 
as well.
  In conclusion, I am one of those freshmen Democrats who last year 
supported the Solomon proposal, and intend to do so today. And, if it 
fails, I intend to vote for the Stenholm amendment. I would urge others 
to do the same.

                                   Congressional Research Service;


                                      The Library of Congress;

                                   Washington, DC, March 30, 1993.
     To: Hon. Charles Stenholm. Attention: Ed Lorenzen.
     From: American Law Division.
     Subject: Application of rescission authority to tax 
         expenditures.
       This memorandum provides, at your request, quick analysis 
     of whether the same constitutional principles that govern 
     application of rescission authority to appropriated funds 
     apply as well to rescission of ``tax expenditures.'' We 
     understand as well that the requested context for analysis is 
     H.R. 1013, a bill entitled ``Expedited Consideration of 
     Proposed Rescissions Act of 1993.'' It is proposed that 
     language be added to that bill adding ``tax expenditures'' as 
     a category within which the President may trigger expedited 
     congressional consideration of proposed rescission 
     legislation.
       Some background may be helpful. The same constitutional 
     principles govern application of rescission authority to 
     ``appropriations'' and to ``tax expenditures.'' These 
     governing principles are set out in previously prepared 
     memoranda enclosed for your review: ``Constitutionality of 
     Granting President Enhanced Budget Rescission Authority,'' 
     June 27, 1989; and ``Adequacy of Standards in Bill Granting 
     President Enhanced Budget Rescission Authority,'' July 21, 
     1989, both by Johnny H. Killian, Senior Specialist in 
     American Constitutional Law, CRS. The basic issue raised by 
     actual conferral of rescission authority on the President 
     involves delegation of legislative authority, and whether 
     there are adequate standards set forth in the law so that it 
     can be determined whether the executive has complied with the 
     legislative will. In 1989 the Supreme Court held in Skinner 
     v. Mid-America Pipeline Co., 490 U.S. 212, 223, that the same 
     principles govern delegation of taxing authority that govern 
     delegation of Congress' other authority.
       [T]he delegation of discretionary authority under Congress' 
     taxing power is subject to no constitutional scrutiny greater 
     than that we have applied to other nondelegation challenges. 
     Congress may wisely choose to be more circumspect in 
     delegating authority under the Taxing Clause than under other 
     of its enumerated powers, but this is not a heightened degree 
     of prudence required by the Constitution.
       We note, however, that no constitutional delegation issues 
     are posed by H.R. 1013 or the proposed amendment. Instead, 
     the bill merely provides for expedited congressional 
     consideration of presidential proposals that Congress enact 
     legislation authorizing rescission of ``any budget authority 
     provided in an appropriations Act.'' No authority to 
     effectuate a rescission, to exercise a line-item veto, or 
     otherwise to nullify statutory enactments would be conferred 
     on the President by the bill. Inclusion of ``tax 
     expenditures'' along with budget authority as a category 
     about which the President may propose legislation that will 
     receive expedited consideration does nothing to change this 
     basic fact that the bill contains no delegation of rescission 
     or taxing authority.
       With or without a delegation of authority, the principal 
     constitutional distinction between the categories of budget 
     authority and tax expenditures is the requirement of Art. I, 
     Sec. 7, cl. 1 that all bills for raising revenue shall 
     originate in the House of Representatives. A bill providing 
     for ``tax expenditures'' (currently defined in 2 U.S.C. 
     Sec. 622(3) as ``revenue losses attributable to provisions of 
     the Federal tax laws which allow a special exclusion, 
     exemption, or deduction ... or which provide a special 
     credit, a preferential rate of tax, or a deferral of tax 
     liability'') might also include measures for raising 
     revenues, and a bill providing for repeal of tax expenditures 
     could be considered to be a bill for raising revenues.
       A further point. The President has the power conferred by 
     Art. II, Sec. 3 of the Constitution to ``recommend to 
     [Congress'] consideration such measures as he shall judge 
     necessary and expedient,'' and Congress of course cannot 
     prevent the President from proposing consideration of 
     legislation, including legislation that would rescind budget 
     authority or repeal tax expenditures. In conferring authority 
     to propose rescissions that will be subject to expedited 
     consideration by the Congress, the bill also restricts the 
     President's authority to make a second such request and does 
     not explicitly tie that restriction to operation of the 
     expedited procedures. The bill would add a new section 1013 
     to the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 
     1974, and subsection (a) would provide in part that ``[f]unds 
     made available for obligation under this procedure may not be 
     proposed for rescission again under this section or section 
     1012.'' A reasonable implication of ``proposed ... under this 
     section or section 1012'' is that a proposal may be submitted 
     independently of the cited authority, and that the only 
     restriction is that the expedited procedures authorized by 
     the new section or in connection with existing section 1012 
     would not be operative. Thus, while the language can and 
     should be interpreted to avoid any constitutional issue that 
     would be created by interference with the President's 
     authority under the Constitution to make recommendations to 
     Congress, a more direct statement tying the restriction to 
     operation of the expedited procedures could eliminate any 
     basis for question.
                                                  George Costello,
                      Legislative Attorney, American Law Division.

  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from York, SC [Mr. Spratt].
  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Edgefield for 
yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, for those who support a statutory line item veto, Judge 
Robert Bork, who is an imminent conservative and a Republican, I 
believe, has written a recent Law Journal article, and it bears 
citation. He says:

       In particular, the solution of the line-item veto appears 
     dubious, at best. A solution nobody thought of for 200 years 
     has the burden of persuasion in constitutional matters. And 
     the case for the line-item veto seems less than completely 
     persuasive. That is not to say the idea of line-item vetoes 
     should be dismissed out of hand. It is only to say that it is 
     highly unlikely that the courts would be inclined to find 
     such a power in the Constitution as written and ratified. It 
     would probably require a constitutional amendment.

  So the first argument you meet, if you want to propose a statutory 
line-item veto, is that why has no Congress, why has no President, for 
over 200 years, noticed that the Constitution claimed this? Those who 
claim that they can find the authority in the Constitution have to 
answer this question. They have to answer the question why George 
Washington, who presided over the Constitutional Convention, did not 
notice it himself, did not know it himself. He said about the 
Constitution,

       From the nature of the Constitution, I must approve all 
     parts of a bill, or reject it in toto.

  William Howard Taft, another reputable President, Republican, he was 
both President and Chief Justice, said:

       The President has no power to veto parts of the bill and to 
     allow the rest to become law. He must accept it or reject it.

  But where Judge Bork and General Washington, President Washington, 
and Chief Justice Taft have refused to tread, those who want a line-
item veto have rushed in. Essentially what they say is maybe the 
Constitution does not give this power to the President, but maybe we 
can confer upon him even this broad power. Maybe we can give it to him 
even though it is not in the Constitution. Maybe we can amend the 
Constitution by statute.

  The gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] does not use the term, but 
as I read his bill, it appears to me the device he is using is 
delegation. He is suggesting that we can delegate to the President the 
power to veto items in the bill in lieu of vetoing the entire bill 
itself.
  That is a giant step. We are changing the Constitution by statute, 
and we are giving the President some broad powers, as everybody here 
would acknowledge. Powers as broad as the budget we pass every year. 
Thirteen appropriations bills, with billions of dollars of appropriated 
money in it, year in and year out, a power so broad, so unique, so 
unusual, that it has to beg the question, is it constitutional to 
delegate power so broadly.
  Fifty years ago the Supreme Court said sweeping delegations of 
legislative power are unconstitutional. For a long time that was 
bedrock constitutional law. It has been eroded by lots of delegations 
we have given to the executive branch, but it is still on the book.
  A lot of water has flowed over the dam at the Supreme Court since 
that was said, but 7 years ago, in a case dealing with the budget 
authority of the Congress, the Synar case, challenging the authority of 
Gramm-Rudman-Hollings, Judge Scalia said the ultimate judgment 
regarding the Constitutionality of a delegation must not be made on the 
basis of the scope of the power alone, but on the basis of its scope, 
plus the specificity of the standards that govern its exercise.
  So the broader the scope, the more specific the standards must be, 
the more precise and rational they may be.
  There is no question here that the scope of delegation is immense. It 
is huge. So the guidelines have to be fairly precise. So let us ask 
ourselves then what guidelines, what conditions, do we impose, would 
the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon], impose upon the President 
when he chooses to use this power that he would give the President.
  First of all, his bill says that the rescission must reduce the 
deficit or must reduce the debt or limit discretionary spending. That 
is tautological. Any sort of cut is going to reduce the deficit or 
reduce spending. So this is not a standard at all.

                              {time}  1720

  That is not a standard because any kind of cut will result in a 
deficit reduction or a reduction in discretionary spending. Then he 
says, the rescission must not impair essential governmental functions 
or harm the national interest. We all know those standards are so broad 
that they are literally empty, totally subjective. And the President 
can fill them out any way he chooses to. So this is not, consequently, 
a delegation. It is an abdication. It is an abdication of power to the 
President and an abdication, in my opinion, of our duty to uphold and 
defend the Constitution.
  If we want to add a line-item veto to the President's powers, this 
broad, enormous grant of authority, then there is a way to do it, a 
right way to do it: Amend the Constitution. Let us not pass a bill that 
will not pass constitutional muster.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I wish I had time to tell the gentleman 
why the American law division does not agree with him. Ours is 
constitutional.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. 
Michel], who Members on both sides of the aisle agree is one of the 
most respected Members ever to serve in this body. We are going to miss 
you, Bob.
  (Mr. MICHEL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. MICHEL. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in strong support of the 
amendment before us to H.R. 4600, cosponsored by the gentleman from New 
York and myself, the only legislative line item veto proposal that will 
be voted on today.
  Masters of redundancy that we are, we are being asked to vote on the 
base proposal which is identical to legislation that was debated on 
April 28 and 29 last year and has received no action in the other body. 
This exercise in congressional deja vu comes down to one question: Do 
we really want a true legislative line-item veto. If we do, we must 
support the proposal offered by the gentleman from New York [Mr. 
Solomon] and myself.
  Our substitute calls for two-thirds of those Houses to override the 
President's decision to rescind wasteful and unnecessary spending. H.R. 
4600, on the other hand, only speeds up the process that is already in 
current law. Furthermore, it limits this additional rescission 
procedure to the 103d Congress. What a farce.
  Supporters of H.R. 4600 argue that their approach provides an 
ironclad up or down vote on the Presidential rescissions sent to 
Congress under this procedure. That sounds very inspiring. I am really 
deeply moved, but let us face it, folks. We all know that a special 
rule can be adopted by the House to preempt that rescission procedure. 
And if such a rule can be adopted, it will be adopted.
  Let me also mention that H.R. 4600 does not contain my proposal that 
allows the President to veto special interest tax breaks in large 
revenue measures. But remember, the House overwhelmingly approved my 
provision to deal with that problem by a vote of 257 to 157 during our 
first debate on the issue, by 100 votes. At that time, due to 
procedural maneuvering, I was allowed to offer my tax amendment only to 
the Republican substitute line-item veto and not to the base bill.
  This year both the Solomon-Michel and Stenholm amendments have 
incorporated this tax proposal.
  In conclusion, let me just remind Members that Mark Twain once said, 
``Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the 
rest.''
  So let us gratify the people and astonish ourselves by doing the 
right thing by voting for the Solomon-Michel substitute. It allows the 
President to rescind unnecessary and wasteful spending and to veto 
targeted tax benefits that benefit only a particular taxpayer or 
limited class of taxpayers. The rescissions and vetoes stand unless 
overridden by two-thirds majority in each House.
  This is a substantial and useful tool to control spending. Many 
Governors have it in one form or another today.
  Let us give this same tool to the President. It will be a step in 
restoring the confidence of the people in this institution.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 4 minutes.
  The committee ought to reject the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich amendment, 
for several reasons. First, it is simply too broad in terms of timing. 
The amendment would allow a President potentially to set our agenda by 
letting him propose rescissions subject to expedited consideration at 
any time, not just within 3 days after signing an appropriations act.
  Mr. Chairman, do we really want to give a President the power to 
force us to set aside other legislation to consider and vote on his 
rescission proposals, on a timetable selected by him? Under the 
Stenholm amendment it would be possible for a President to inundate us 
with rescissions so as to force us to vote on rescissions, day after 
day. As long as he did not re-use a rescission, he could literally 
submit one a day all year long.
  By comparison, the committee bill requires a President to decide, 
within 3 days of signing an appropriations bill, what items in each 
bill he wanted to rescind, and submit those items to Congress as a 
package for an up-or-down vote.
  This is certainly more akin to a true line-item veto than the 
Stenholm amendment, under which a President could tie up the 
appropriations committees and the House and Senate to his heart's 
content.
  Second, and just as disturbing, by allowing the President to propose 
rescissions for expedited consideration at any time, Congress would 
give the President a very powerful weapon to use against individual 
Members to extort votes for more spending, or other concessions, that 
might not well serve the public interest.
  For example, the President could threaten to rescind key spending 
projects in a Member's district, meritorious or not, unless the member 
voted for the President's favorite project or program.
  A President could say to a Member ``I'll send up a bill to rescind 
your new $20 million courthouse unless you vote for my $20 billion 
space station.''
  We heard testimony in my subcommittee in the last Congress that 
Governors can use a line-item veto power not only to reduce spending, 
but also to increase spending when it suits them. Clearly the Stenholm 
amendment offers that potential much more so than the committee bill.
  Third, unlike the committee bill, the Stenholm amendment contains no 
expedited procedures for the consideration of a congressional 
alternative to the President's rescissions. These procedures were 
devised last year to ensure that giving a President a modified line-
item veto will not just give him another tool with which to promote his 
brand of spending over ours.
  Of course, the Rules Committee could always report a rule to provide 
for the separate consideration of an alternative rescission bill. But 
under the committee bill the alternative could be considered along with 
the President's bill in an efficient, orderly process. Under the 
Stenholm amendment, it could not.
  Finally, the Stenholm amendment would make the new procedure 
permanent. Even if the Stenholm amendment did not have these other 
flaws, it ought to be temporary rather than permanent. The committee 
bill is temporary to force Congress to review the experiment and 
decide, consciously, if it wants it to endure. The same principles that 
make a sunset provision on a new or existing Federal program attractive 
and desirable certainly apply here, and for the same reasons.
  Mr. Chairman, I urge all Members to oppose the Stenholm amendment and 
support the committee bill. The committee bill will give the President 
the tools he needs to sift out low-priority spending without giving him 
the power to dictate our agenda or to pressure Members to vote for 
other initiatives. It does the greatest amount of good for the least 
amount of harm, and it deserves our support.

                              {time}  1730

  Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Wilmington, DE [Mr. Castle], an outstanding example of a Governor who 
did not abuse the line-item veto.
  Mr. CASTLE. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from New York [Mr. 
Solomon] for yielding time to me, and for his balanced energy on this 
issue, and on the issue in the Committee on Rules as well.
  Mr. Chairman, I have never been involved in anything quite like this 
in my history of involvement in government. I do not know if it is 
unique here. It is pretty rare, at least, that we are considering the 
same legislation that we have passed which has not been considered by 
the Senate.
  If I have to pick one thing we have done in this body in the last 2 
years that I would say we should do again, it is this particular bill 
with these particular amendments, because I do not think there is 
anything that could help balance our budget faster, and I do not think 
there is anything on which I would like to see more votes than on this. 
I basically, as a matter of fact, am going to be able to vote yes on 
budget items right down the line here, probably, maybe for the first 
time I have been here.
  The original H.R. 4600 of the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. 
Spratt] is watered down, but I think, nonetheless, can be supported. 
The document of the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm] is remarkably 
improved in the enhanced expedited rescissions, but it is true that the 
Solomon-Michel amendment is the one that I think we should support, the 
true line-item veto.
  Mr. Chairman, budgeting at the Federal Government level is 
extraordinarily complex. We authorize, we appropriate, we use base 
lines, we use budget caps. We have an entitlement commission. it is 
very hard to figure out everything that we are doing. It is as complex 
as anybody has ever dealt with.
  The simplicity of the line-item veto I think is clear to every 
American who has ever paid any attention to budgets. It is so simple 
that the President will take a pen and draw a line through it and 
initial it and return it to this body. When this body has to override 
it, then it goes back to the President again for a vote, and then it 
would take a two-thirds vote, so essentially the burden would be upon 
this body to do this.
  This has worked. It has worked throughout the United States of 
America, and I think that it can work here. Unfortunately, Mr. 
Chairman, the Stenholm amendment and the Spratt resolution, the 
original bills, would allow the House to operate and the Senate to 
operate with doing very little. The line-item veto would force us to 
step forward.
  Forty-three Governors have a line-item veto. I have never heard a 
complaint from any State about that line-item veto. In fact, more and 
more States keep adopting it. I would encourage all of us to adopt the 
line-item veto, to vote for that if we vote for nothing else today.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, there are six cosponsors of this 
amendment, and we have heard from one, the former Governor of Delaware.
  I yield 2 minutes to another, the gentleman from Hamburg, NY, [Mr. 
Jack Quinn] who is very out front with his support of this amendment.
  Mr. QUINN. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from New York for 
yielding time to me.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support today for the Michel-Solomon 
substitute amendment--the real line-item veto.
  One year ago, this House considered H.R. 1578 the same expedited 
rescission bill. One year ago, I joined with my colleagues, Mr. Blute 
and Mr. Castle, to try and give President Clinton what he asked for in 
his campaign: the real line-item veto. On April 29, 1992, Bill Clinton 
said ``I strongly support the line-item veto because I believe we need 
to get Federal spending under control.''
  What he got last year, Mr. Chairman, was a watered down substitute. 
Today the Michel-Solomon amendment is very similar to the amendment we 
offered a year ago--but with improvements. It is the real thing, Mr. 
Chairman.
  Eighty percent of the people in this country want a line item veto. 
Forty three of our Nation's Governors have it--and the President should 
have it too. This is not a political issue--it is a budget issue, and, 
it is and, should be, a bipartisan issue.
  I stand here today with my colleagues as a freshman from the minority 
party. We joined together to give the President, who is from the 
majority party, this much needed fiscal reform. It does not matter if 
you have a ``D,'' ``R,'' or an ``I'' next to your name. If you support 
fiscal responsibility and real reform of Congress you should vote for 
the line item veto.

  I understand that the House is trying to send a message to the Senate 
on the importance of this legislation. I would like to remind all the 
members of the message the American people sent to both bodies of 
Congress in the Fall of 1992.
  The message was change. We may have heard the cries for reform--but 
have we listened?
  The choice we have before us today is clear. A line-item veto that 
represents real reform. Or, this Congress can once again pass a 
toothless reform bill that cheats the American people who desperately 
want reform.
  I urge my colleagues to choose the real thing. Choose the line-item 
veto and support the Michel-Solomon amendment. Let us get wasteful 
Federal spending under control, let us help the President, and let us 
make Congress balance its checkbook.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Shrewsbury, MA [Mr. Blute], one of the six cosponsors of this 
amendment.
  Mr. BLUTE. Mr. Chairman, I thank my friend and colleague, the 
gentleman from New York, for yielding time to me.
  Mr. Chairman, today we revisit an issue that should have been decided 
long ago, giving the President of the United States a true line-item 
veto authority.
  Mr. Chairman, as I stand here today it seems like deja vu, in that we 
had almost the exact same debate last year. But I welcome this 
opportunity to again debate--and hopefully this time, pass--the true 
line-item veto.
  The Solomon/Michel substitute is the proposal that we will vote on 
here today which will have the most impact on out-of-control Federal 
spending--because, unlike the other amendments, it gives the President 
the ability to maintain cuts without the approval of Congress. This is 
the key element to the success of the line-item veto, because it is 
unlikely that Congress will vote to override unless the President 
proposes a truly egregious cut. Mr. Chairman, this may put some Members 
of Congress in an uncomfortable position, but frankly, Congress 
deserves to be in that position, because it has put America under a 
mountain of debt and shown no significant signs of dealing with the 
huge yearly deficits that are slowly but surely weakening our economy.
  We all know that the need for permanent reform is clear. In 1960 our 
total Federal budget comprised 18 percent of our gross national 
product. By 1990 that percentage had risen to 23 percent. This trend is 
truly ominous, especially in light of our $4.6 trillion debt, and the 
true line-item veto is one way to help reverse this trend.
  If anyone has doubts about the efficacy of a line-item veto let me 
just cite a few facts. In the 10 States that have an item-reduction 
veto, which allows the reduction of a line item and not strictly the 
elimination, Governors were able to cut the rate of spending by 2.7 
percent every 2 years. Also, spending in those 10 States was found to 
be 14 percent lower than in the States that do not have any line item 
authority.
  Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to support the Solomon-Michel 
amendment, the true line-item veto.
  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to 
the gentleman from Utah [Mr. Orton].
  (Mr. ORTON asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. ORTON. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of the Stenholm-
Penny-Kasich amendment to the Expedited Rescissions Act of 1994.
  First, I would like to commend the House leadership for bringing this 
important legislation to the floor of the House. I have supported 
expedited rescission since coming to Congress. In fact, a very similar 
proposal is included in title V of my ``Comprehensive Budget Process 
Reform Act,'' which I introduced in the 102d Congress and at the 
beginning of the 103d Congress.
  There has been a great deal of publicity recently about the A to Z 
proposal. The goal of A-to-Z is to open up the budget process, to allow 
unlimited opportunities to offer spending cut amendments. With respect 
to discretionary spending, I would like to commend the House leadership 
for recently allowing an open rule on spending cut amendments for the 
last 11 appropriations bills. This far exceeded the thrust of the A-to-
Z petition, which was limited to cutting fiscal 1994 spending.
  I believe that not only should each Member of Congress have and 
opportunity to propose spending cuts, but the President should also 
have such an opportunity to propose reductions in spending. The 
Expedited Rescissions Act which we are voting on today would be a 
significant step forward in this regard. Quite simply, it would force 
the House and Senate to vote on Presidential requests to rescind 
specific items of spending.
  I also commend my colleagues, Representatives Stenholm, Penny, and 
Kasich, for offering their amendment. This is a bipartisan effort to 
improve and perfect the bill before us. Let me explain these 
improvements.
  First, this amendment would make the expedited rescission procedure 
permanent. Expedited rescission is a much needed change, and should not 
be limited to the current Congress, as H.R. 4600 does.
  Second, the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich amendment allows Presidential 
rescission messages to be sent at any time during the year, rather than 
only allowing them immediately after the signing of appropriations 
bills. This ensures that the administration will be able to make a more 
careful evaluation of spending that has been approved by Congress, 
prior to any proposals to rescind.
  Third, the amendment makes a number of more technical changes. For 
example, the amendment allows 50 House Members or 15 Senators to 
request a vote to strike an individual rescission from the President's 
proposed rescission package.
  Finally, the amendment extends the special rescission procedures to 
allow Presidential proposals to repeal targeted tax benefits in revenue 
bills. This is a very important change, allowing consideration of 
special interest provisions inserted in large revenue bills. I would 
even suggest that we also include contracting authority within the 
enhanced rescission authority to be given the President under this 
bill. If the President had authority to request rescission of 
appropriations, tax expenditures, and contracting authority, he would 
have the mechanism to request reduction of all types of Government 
spending.
  In conclusion, I believe these changes are important modifications to 
the bill on the floor. I urge this body to approve the Stenholm/Penny/
Kasich amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] has 2 minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I guess we are being charged for a minute 
of time that my good friend, the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Hutto] had 
used.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I would be delighted to yield an 
additional minute to the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon].
  Mr. SOLOMON. If the gentleman is so good as to do that, I yield the 
remainder of our time, my 2 minutes plus the 1 minute given by the 
gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Derrick], to one of the most 
distinguished Members of the House, the gentleman from Shelbyville, TN 
[Mr. Cooper], who is a strong supporter and cosponsor of the true line-
item veto, to sum up for our side.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from Tennessee [Mr. Cooper] is recognized 
for 3 minutes.
  (Mr. COOPER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)

                              {time}  1740

  Mr. COOPER. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the 
time.
  Mr. Chairman, today the House of Representatives has for the second 
time in this Congress the opportunity to consider fundamental and far-
reaching budget reform, the real line-item veto. The Michel-Solomon 
amendment should be passed by this House. This is not and should not be 
a partisan issue. It is ironic that many of my colleagues on the 
Republican side of the aisle who often criticize our President today 
want to give him more power. It is also ironic that many of my friends 
on the Democratic side who praise our President are keeping his hands 
tied. As has been noted, 43 Governors have this power. It works. It 
works well. Our President needs this power.
  When Governor Clinton campaigned for office, he asked for this power. 
One quotation has already been read from his remarks, but in his book 
``Putting People First,'' on page 25, which is widely circulated around 
the Nation, it said, ``Line-item veto. To eliminate pork-barrel 
projects and to cut Government waste, we will ask Congress to give the 
President the line-item veto.''
  Mr. Chairman, that book did not say expedited rescission, it did not 
say modified line-item veto. It said line-item veto. Candidate Clinton 
was right. Presidents do need this power. Presidents get the blame. 
Presidents need the power to do something about it.
  Mr. Chairman, having served under three Presidents, Presidents 
Reagan, Bush, and Clinton, I have felt that all three Presidents needed 
and deserved this power. I am for the real line-item veto because the 
President with the aid of only one-third plus one in the House can 
uphold the cut. That is maximum cutting power. That is a very sharp 
blade when it comes to cutting.
  Under the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich expedited-rescission approach, the 
President would need a simple majority, a half plus one of either 
House, to uphold a cut. That is still new cutting power, but it is a 
much duller blade. We have had decades of bias in this country in favor 
of pork-barrel spending. I think it is high time that the bias should 
be against pork-barrel spending. The sad fact is that it is so easy to 
load up a bill with pork. It is relatively easy to get majority 
support, but it is hard to load it up so high that it can get 
supermajority support. Our President needs the power to root out pork, 
he needs the power to stop logrolling. Forty-three Governors know that 
it works, including former Governor Clinton.
  The mere threat of a line-item veto can keep pork out of a bill. The 
GAO has estimated that as much as $12 billion could be saved annually 
using this device. There is no estimate so far as I know as to what the 
expedited rescission would do. My guess is it would be less, far less 
in cutting power.
  The House should pass the real line-item veto tonight and force the 
Senate to act.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] as a substitute for the amendment 
in the nature of a substitute offered by the gentleman from Texas [Mr. 
Stenholm].
  The question was taken; and the Chairman announced that the ayes 
appeared to have it.


                             recorded vote

  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
  A recorded vote was ordered.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 205, 
noes 218, not voting 16, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 327]

                               AYES--205

     Allard
     Andrews (NJ)
     Archer
     Armey
     Bacchus (FL)
     Bachus (AL)
     Baesler
     Baker (CA)
     Baker (LA)
     Ballenger
     Barca
     Barcia
     Barrett (NE)
     Barrett (WI)
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bateman
     Bentley
     Bereuter
     Bilirakis
     Bliley
     Blute
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Bunning
     Burton
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Canady
     Cantwell
     Castle
     Clinger
     Coble
     Collins (GA)
     Combest
     Condit
     Cooper
     Coppersmith
     Cox
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cunningham
     Deal
     DeLay
     Deutsch
     Diaz-Balart
     Dickey
     Doolittle
     Dornan
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Ehlers
     Emerson
     Everett
     Ewing
     Fawell
     Fingerhut
     Fish
     Fowler
     Franks (CT)
     Franks (NJ)
     Gallegly
     Gekas
     Geren
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Gilman
     Gingrich
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Goss
     Grams
     Grandy
     Greenwood
     Gunderson
     Hall (TX)
     Hancock
     Hansen
     Hastert
     Hayes
     Hefley
     Herger
     Hobson
     Hoekstra
     Hoke
     Holden
     Horn
     Houghton
     Huffington
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Inhofe
     Istook
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson, Sam
     Kasich
     Kim
     King
     Kingston
     Klug
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     Kyl
     Lazio
     Leach
     Levy
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (FL)
     Lewis (KY)
     Lightfoot
     Linder
     Livingston
     Lucas
     Machtley
     Mann
     Manzullo
     Mazzoli
     McCandless
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McDade
     McHale
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McKeon
     McMillan
     Meehan
     Meyers
     Mica
     Michel
     Miller (FL)
     Minge
     Molinari
     Moorhead
     Morella
     Myers
     Nussle
     Orton
     Oxley
     Packard
     Pallone
     Parker
     Paxon
     Penny
     Peterson (MN)
     Petri
     Pombo
     Porter
     Portman
     Poshard
     Pryce (OH)
     Quinn
     Ramstad
     Ravenel
     Regula
     Ridge
     Roberts
     Rogers
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Roth
     Roukema
     Royce
     Santorum
     Saxton
     Schaefer
     Schenk
     Schiff
     Sensenbrenner
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shuster
     Skeen
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (OR)
     Smith (TX)
     Snowe
     Solomon
     Spence
     Stearns
     Stump
     Sundquist
     Swett
     Talent
     Tauzin
     Taylor (NC)
     Thomas (CA)
     Torkildsen
     Upton
     Vucanovich
     Walker
     Walsh
     Weldon
     Wilson
     Wolf
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)
     Zimmer

                               NOES--218

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Andrews (ME)
     Andrews (TX)
     Applegate
     Barlow
     Becerra
     Beilenson
     Bevill
     Bilbray
     Blackwell
     Bonior
     Borski
     Boucher
     Brewster
     Brooks
     Browder
     Brown (CA)
     Brown (FL)
     Brown (OH)
     Bryant
     Byrne
     Cardin
     Chapman
     Clay
     Clayton
     Clement
     Clyburn
     Coleman
     Collins (IL)
     Collins (MI)
     Conyers
     Costello
     Coyne
     Cramer
     Danner
     Darden
     de la Garza
     de Lugo (VI)
     DeFazio
     DeLauro
     Dellums
     Derrick
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Dixon
     Dooley
     Durbin
     Edwards (CA)
     Edwards (TX)
     Engel
     English
     Eshoo
     Evans
     Farr
     Fazio
     Fields (LA)
     Filner
     Flake
     Foglietta
     Ford (TN)
     Frank (MA)
     Frost
     Furse
     Gejdenson
     Gephardt
     Gibbons
     Glickman
     Gonzalez
     Gordon
     Green
     Gutierrez
     Hall (OH)
     Hamburg
     Hamilton
     Harman
     Hastings
     Hilliard
     Hinchey
     Hoagland
     Hochbrueckner
     Hoyer
     Hughes
     Hutto
     Inslee
     Jacobs
     Jefferson
     Johnson (GA)
     Johnson (SD)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Johnston
     Kanjorski
     Kaptur
     Kennedy
     Kennelly
     Kildee
     Kleczka
     Klein
     Klink
     Kopetski
     Kreidler
     LaFalce
     Lambert
     Lancaster
     Lantos
     LaRocco
     Laughlin
     Lehman
     Levin
     Lewis (GA)
     Lipinski
     Lloyd
     Long
     Lowey
     Maloney
     Manton
     Margolies-Mezvinsky
     Markey
     Martinez
     Matsui
     McCloskey
     McDermott
     McKinney
     McNulty
     Meek
     Menendez
     Mfume
     Miller (CA)
     Mineta
     Mink
     Moakley
     Mollohan
     Montgomery
     Moran
     Murphy
     Murtha
     Nadler
     Neal (MA)
     Neal (NC)
     Norton (DC)
     Oberstar
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Owens
     Pastor
     Payne (NJ)
     Payne (VA)
     Pelosi
     Peterson (FL)
     Pickett
     Pickle
     Pomeroy
     Price (NC)
     Rahall
     Rangel
     Reed
     Reynolds
     Richardson
     Roemer
     Romero-Barcelo (PR)
     Rose
     Rostenkowski
     Rowland
     Roybal-Allard
     Rush
     Sabo
     Sanders
     Sangmeister
     Sarpalius
     Sawyer
     Schroeder
     Schumer
     Scott
     Serrano
     Sharp
     Shepherd
     Sisisky
     Skaggs
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Smith (IA)
     Spratt
     Stark
     Stenholm
     Stokes
     Strickland
     Studds
     Stupak
     Swift
     Synar
     Tanner
     Taylor (MS)
     Tejeda
     Thompson
     Thornton
     Thurman
     Torres
     Torricelli
     Towns
     Traficant
     Tucker
     Unsoeld
     Valentine
     Velazquez
     Vento
     Visclosky
     Volkmer
     Waters
     Watt
     Waxman
     Wheat
     Whitten
     Williams
     Wise
     Woolsey
     Wyden
     Wynn
     Yates

                             NOT VOTING--16

     Berman
     Bishop
     Carr
     Faleomavaega (AS)
     Fields (TX)
     Ford (MI)
     Gallo
     Hefner
     McCurdy
     Obey
     Quillen
     Slattery
     Thomas (WY)
     Underwood (GU)
     Washington
     Zeliff

                              {time}  1803

  Mrs. ROUKEMA changed her vote from ``no'' to ``aye.''
  So the amendment offered as a substitute for the amendment in the 
nature of a substitute was rejected.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  The CHAIRMAN pro tempore (Mr. de la Garza). The Chair would like to 
advise Members of the further proceedings.
  The pending business is the amendment in the nature of a substitute 
offered by the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm]. The gentleman from 
Texas has 9 minutes remaining, and the opposition, controlled by the 
gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Derrick], has 14 minutes remaining.
  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
Illinois [Mr. Fawell].
  Mr. FAWELL. I thank the gentleman for yielding this time to me.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich 
substitute to the expedited Rescission Act. While I prefer the Solomon-
Michel substitute, the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich proposal is an improvement 
over current law and is a better proposal than the Spratt bill, in my 
view.
  The sponsors of this amendment have been leaders in this House on the 
important issue of budget reform.
  Mr. Chairman, the Stenholm proposal contains a number of improvements 
over the Spratt bill. First, the Stenholm proposal grants permanent 
authority for the President to submit rescissions to Congress. The 
authority under the Spratt bill would vanish in just a few months.
  Second, the Stenholm bill allows the President to devote the savings 
to deficit reduction and prevents Congress from reallocating the 
funding.
  Third, the Stenholm bill allows for votes on individual rescissions 
rather than bundling all of the rescissions into one all-or-nothing 
vote on the entire package of rescissions.
  Fourth, the Stenholm bill allows the President to submit rescissions 
any time after an appropriation bill is enacted rather than limiting 
the President's timeframe to 3 days.
  I hope the people will join with me and vote for the Stenholm 
amendment.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
Connecticut [Mrs. Kennelly].
  (Mrs. KENNELLY asked and was given permission to revise and extend 
her remarks.)

                              {time}  1810

  Mrs. KENNELLY. Mr. Chairman, I rise in very strong opposition to the 
amendment offered by the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm], the 
Stenholm substitute. The notion of expending rescission authority on 
targeted tax benefits is misguided, to say the least, in my opinion. 
While the opponents of this amendment talk about giving the President 
the ability to strike favors for individual taxpayers, the impact of 
this amendment--the opponents of this bill talk about this substitute 
as having the ability to give the President the power to strike 
individual tax favors to people across these United States. As a 
member, a 10-year member, of the Committee on Ways and Means, I have 
not seen too many of those individual amendments in the last 2 to 3 
years, and I have to tell the Members and be very clear with the 
Members that this amendment is actually far broader than is being 
proposed.
  What is a targeted tax benefit? I say to my colleagues, ``Well, when 
you think about it, a targeted tax benefit is virtually every provision 
in the code with the exception of tax rates. Every other provision in 
the Internal Revenue Code which does not apply to all taxpayers across 
the board is a targeted tax benefit. Therefore, any change to the tax 
code can be construed as being a targeted tax credit and would be 
subject to rescission under the substitute.''
  For example, Mr. Chairman, would my colleagues say that in the home 
mortgage interest deduction, a deduction very important to the people 
of these United States and, in fact, very important to the homeowners 
of the people of the United States, is a targeted tax benefit because 
it does not benefit all Americans? Let us remember many people are 
renters, and they would not be eligible.
  Would my colleagues say that the earned income tax credit that some 
of us are very proud of that passed in the last budget resolution is a 
targeted tax benefit? After all, only the working poor, those of 
moderate income, qualify.
  Are these provisions abusive? I certainly do not think so, and I do 
not think many of the Members of this body think so. This provision is 
nothing more than flatly an abrogation of congressional authority to 
the executive branch.
  As I serve here in this body and am so proud to serve here, we have 
some very difficult days, but what I always hand on to, what I always 
can believe in, is that we are the body of the people, and the 
Constitution made us the body of the people. Our forefathers said we 
are the ones who will represent the people of these United States. And 
this substitute takes away power from the body of the people and gives 
it to the executive branch.
  I know this provision only applies to tax bills sent to the 
President, but that does not mitigate the delegation of authority to 
the executive branch. I believe the only thing that will be achieved by 
the passage of this amendment is increased taxpayers' cynicism, and 
that is something we certainly do not need any more of.
  When we make a mistake, and there has been occasion when the 
Committee on Ways and Means has made a mistake in drafting a provision, 
people expect us to fix it, and when we find a program that is not 
working or a program that encourages fraud, people expect us to fix it, 
and we have an obligation to correct the code under the Constitution of 
the United States. This provision will make these kinds of changes much 
more difficult.
  When the Committee on Ways and Means contemplates tax policy changes, 
we establish an effective date. That is so all taxpayers will notice 
and will not be caught in the middle of a transaction. We still are a 
capitalist government that does rely on business transactions. To the 
extent these dates can be deleted or rescinded as a result of this 
provision, we are going to see an amazing increase in litigation as 
taxpayers argue about whether transactions are governed by old and new 
law.
  Mr. Chairman, I can understand that because of the lateness of the 
day Members do not understand the importance of this. I only hope they 
look at it and vote ``no'' on this substitute.
  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
New York [Mr. Solomon], a most able and capable advocate of the last 
amendment.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the amendment offered 
by the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm]. And I want to thank the 205 
Members of the House, including 32 good Democrats, who supported the 
Solomon amendment a few minutes ago. I want to thank the gentleman from 
Texas [Mr. Stenholm] because he promised a fair fight. It was a fair 
fight. My side lost by a swing vote of only 6 votes. Next year we are 
going to win it. But this year the only major differences between us is 
this:
  I require a two-thirds vote in Congress. That is true line-item veto. 
The Stenholm substitute requires a majority vote to override the 
President. That is the real difference. Either way it is going to 
result in some deficit reduction because the savings, if any, will go 
to deficit reduction, not new spending.
  Mr. Chairman, that is why I am going to support the amendment offered 
by the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm], and I hope everybody else 
here does.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from 
Minnesota [Mr. Penny], an original cosponsor and author of this 
amendment.
  (Mr. PENNY asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. PENNY. Mr. Chairman, I strongly urge support for the Stenholm-
Penny-Kasich substitute. This substitute represents several 
improvements over the Spratt bill.
  First of all, Mr. Chairman, our proposal applies to both 
appropriations and targeted tax benefits while the Spratt bill is 
restricted only to appropriations. In addition, the President and 
Congress under our approach would be able to designate the savings from 
the rescinded funds to deficit reduction. Third, our proposal allows 
expedited rescission to occur at any time instead of just the 3-day 
window after an appropriations bill is passed. Finally, our proposal 
permanently strengthens the rescission process instead of extending it 
only through the end of this legislative session, as is the case with 
the Spratt proposal. It is also important to stress that, unlike the 
amendment offered by the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] which 
was just rejected by the Congress, we do not require a situation in 
which the President would be successful unless there is a two-thirds 
override within the Congress. We allow the President's proposed 
rescissions to be accepted or rejected by a majority vote.
  The bottom line, however, is that we require a vote within a 
relatively limited timeframe. We require that the President's 
rescission package, having been sent to committee, would be then 
brought back to the House floor and voted up or down in a limited 
timeframe.
  There are reasons for strengthening the rescission process. Expedited 
rescission authority would certainly provide the President and the 
Congress with a stronger tool to reduce the budget deficit. According 
to a 1992 GAO report, Mr. Chairman, another $70 billion could have been 
rescinded between 1984 and 1989 if Congress had approved all of the 
rescissions submitted by the President. Under current law Congress can 
kill a rescission by simply refusing to bring it to a vote. The 
magnitude of the deficit crisis should compel us to at least consider 
every option for cuts that is presented to us by the President.
  Under the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich plan, Mr. Chairman, we guarantee that 
that vote will occur. In addition, expedited rescission authority has 
greater potential for significant deficit reduction if it is expanded 
to also include targeted benefits. One of the biggest criticisms of the 
current expedited rescission process is that it does not include these 
tax expenditures. Under the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich plan tax items would 
be included.
  Fundamentally we need common sense budget reform at the national 
level. It is absurd to the American public that in Congress baselines 
do not represent a freeze on spending. Baselines allow for continuing 
increases in spending levels. It is nonsense to the American public 
that in Congress cuts are not cuts. We kill a program, but the money 
stays in the budget to be spent somewhere else.

                              {time}  1820

  It is nonsense to the American public that in Congress cuts are not 
cuts. We kill a program, but the money stays in the program to be spent 
somewhere else. It is nonsense to the American public that emergencies 
are not emergencies. Every time we pass a bill to deal with a natural 
disaster for one portion or another, we lard it up with pork-barrel 
spending, and that does not make sense to the American public.
  We want to take the budgeting nonsense out of the way we do work in 
Washington. We want cuts to be cuts. We want the process to make sense. 
We want to give the President the authority to succeed when he suggests 
rescissions to the Congress. We want to end the spending bias and put 
the bias in favor of reducing the deficit.
  Under current law, dating from the creation of the Budget Act in 
1974, Presidential rescissions automatically expire unless approved by 
Congress. Like the Spratt bill, our amendment establishes an expedited 
rescission process whereby the Congress must vote on rescissions 
submitted by the President. However, we propose a number of changes to 
the Spratt bill to strengthen this new enhanced rescission process.
  First, our amendment grants the President the option of earmarking 
savings from proposed rescissions to deficit reduction rather than new 
spending. Second, the President would be able to single out newly 
enacted targeted tax benefits as well as appropriated items. Third, the 
amendment allows the President to submit a rescission package for 
expedited consideration at any point in the year. Fourth, unlike the 
Spratt bill which establishes enhanced rescission authority for just 
the remainder of the 103d Congress, the Stenholm-Penny-Kasich amendment 
permanently extends this new rescission authority. Finally, our 
amendment provides for separate votes on individual items in a 
rescission package.
  In part, what we attempt to accomplish with this amendment is to 
alter the prospending bias that exists today in the Congress. According 
to the General Accounting Office [GAO], just one in three individual 
rescissions, representing only 30 percent of the total dollar volume of 
all rescissions, submitted by Presidents since the creation of the 
Budget Act in 1974 has been enacted. If Presidential rescission 
messages must be voted on rather than ignored, more wasteful spending 
will be identified and ultimately extracted from the Federal budget.
  The amendment we offer today is a well crafted and modest attempt to 
inject accountability into the budget process while making the current 
Presidential rescission authority meaningful. The changes our amendment 
makes to the underlying bill strengthen and enhance the objective of 
the author, Mr. Spratt, and I urge a strong and overwhelmingly vote in 
support of the amendment.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Hawaii [Mr. Abercrombie].
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Mr. Chairman, I would like to follow up on what the 
gentlewoman from Connecticut [Mrs. Kennelly] had to say. Just to give 
you an example, it is very, very difficult for me to believe how the 
people's House, a body of legislators constitued against the king, this 
is the commons against the king, and you want to side with the 
royalists. We have fought since the Magna Carta, from the time of the 
Magna Carta, to increase the power of the people, and we sit here in 
1994 and say we are going to give it back to the royalists? We are 
going to give it back to the king?
  In the last Congress we balanced the request by the executive branch 
to extend the research development tax credit for major corporations 
with the provision for low-income-housing tax credit. If you pass this, 
you allow the royalists to take care of the corporations and take the 
benefit away from the poor. This is a matter of the commons versus the 
king. It is a matter of the people of the United States, the people we 
represent, against the new royalists. Defeat this amendment.
  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I yield the balance of our time, 4 
minutes, to the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Kasich], another original 
cosponsor and hard worker on this approach.
  Mr. KASICH. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank the gentleman from Texas 
for yielding, and say that this, we think is the start of good things 
to come with the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm] and the gentleman 
from Minnesota [Mr. Penny] in a true bipartisan effort, to bring some 
dramatic change to the way things are done in this country.
  Initially, I want to direct my comments to my Republican colleagues 
who have been very frustrated with the fact that for the past 2 years 
we have been voting on enhanced rescission bills that we have felt have 
been toothless.
  In fact, last year we made a number of arguments that we said 
represented a toothless bill on this House floor. They were essentially 
four in nature.
  One was we said that the expedited rescission authority, in other 
words, the nearly line-item veto, will only last for 6 months. We 
permanently extend the authority in this provision.
  We said it only applies to appropriation bills, unlike the Solomon-
Michel bill. We have now included the tax benefits that we read about 
the next day after the Committee on Ways and Means brings a foot high 
bill to this floor that has a lot of sweeteners for people to vote for.
  We said there was no guarantee that the savings would go to deficit 
reduction. Under this bill, the President can designate the savings for 
deficit reduction.
  Finally, it has such a limited window for cuts. Under this bill, the 
expedited rescission, or the essential line-item veto, can be used at 
any time.
  This, ladies and gentleman of the House, represents the most 
significant movement on trying to control the deficit through the use 
of the line-item veto that we have voted on and have a chance to pass 
in this House since I have been a Member of this House. This is 
precisely what the American people have been calling for, and under 
this provision, If the President wants to slice the pork out of a bill, 
he sends that bill up here to the House of Representatives and we must 
vote. And if at least 50 plus 1 Member say we agree with you, it is 
pork, we zero out that program. And if in fact these provisions had 
been made into law starting all the way back in 1984, between 1984 and 
1989, we could have cut $70 billion worth of programs that the 
Presidents of both parties have felt do not make sense.
  I would suggest to those people who have fought long and hard for the 
line-item veto, a constitutional line-item veto, we should still push 
for it. We should still work for it. But this comes as close as any 
bill that has been voted on this floor that has an excellent chance of 
passing, that gives us something right along the lines of the line-item 
veto, that will permit the President to make cuts in programs, within 
categories of programs, to send those targeted cuts to this House 
floor, and we then must vote. And if 50 plus 1 Member agrees, we get 
rid of the pork.
  The gentleman from Minnesota [Mr. Penny] referred to the pork that is 
put in these emergency appropriation bills. If we can find that pork, 
if the President agrees, if he sends it up here, we will vote on it. 
Under current law, we do not vote. The way in which they let the pork 
flow through is we just never have a vote. This will force a vote. It 
will bring real change.
  Finally, as you can see, in absence of this kind of legislation, only 
31 percent of the rescission requests, only 31 percent of the cuts that 
the Executive has made since 1984, have been enacted. Sixty-nine 
percent of them have never been acted upon. And if this House of 
Representatives was forced to vote on the President's reductions in 
spending, if in fact we only needed 50 percent plus 1 Member, we would 
be in a position of having the opportunity to pass 69 percent more in 
cuts.
  I urge the Members to send the message across this country that we 
want a line-item veto, that we want to control spending, and that 
Stenholm, Penny, and Kasich are on the right track. Let us give a giant 
vote and send a message to the other body that we want some fiscal 
responsibility in this country.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished 
gentleman from California [Mr. Fazio].
  Mr. FAZIO. The gentleman's comments would lead you to believe that we 
were derelict in our responsibilities. In fact, we did not rescind 
every dime requested of us by the President, but we actually rescinded 
more than we were asked to, by $20 billion, since the Budget Act of 
1974 was enacted.
  The gentleman would have us believe that the only way we could 
accommodate the need to rescind spending or use the euphemism we use 
for line-item veto, is to accommodate the executive branch. The point 
is, we went beyond the executive branch. We rescinded more money by 
some $20 billion during that time frame.
  This is not a question of whether we save money. It is a question of 
whether the Congress reasserts its priorities under the Constitution.
  The bottom line is the public has been served. We have rescinded some 
$92 billion. We were asked to rescind $72 billion.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished 
gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Spratt].
  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Let me follow up on what the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Kasich] just 
said by saying first of all, there are parts of this amendment that I 
support, I like, and I think they are improvements upon the base bill 
that I sponsored. But there is one particular part that I particularly 
disagree with, and it cuts against the grain of the gentleman's 
argument.
  The gentleman says with this bill, with this amendment, we are going 
to be able to do a great deal more on the rescission requests sent up 
here by the President.
  One of the things this bill opens up is the opportunity for us to 
unpack the package that the President sends down here. Because whereas 
in our bill, the base bill, you would have to vote on the President's 
request as he sends it, in your bill, on the petition of 15 Members, 
you can break out individual items. That means Members from large 
States and powerful members of powerful committees will be able to pick 
pieces out of this and ensure the President does not get a full all-up 
vote on the proposal or package he sends up here, and I think that is a 
weakness in this proposal.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Chairman, I have a great deal of respect for the gentleman from 
Texas [Mr. Stenholm].
  We all want to cut the budget, at least we think we do, and the 
American people certainly want it cut.

                              {time}  1830

  I have heard mentioned all afternoon that 43 Governors have some form 
of line-item veto. My Governor of South Carolina is one of them. Very 
seldom does a Governor of one of these States use a line-item veto to 
reduce spending. Most of the time they use it for their own pet 
projects.
  When Presidents complain that their vetoes are not strong enough, 
they forget that 93 percent of all Presidential vetoes in history have 
been sustained. So neither one of these arguments holds water; we are 
not going to see some miraculous cutting of the deficit if we pass the 
Stenholm amendment or the bill.
  There is only one way we are going to do what the gentleman from 
Texas [Mr. Stenholm] ultimately wants to do and what we all want to do. 
We either spend less or take in more. That is how to balance a budget. 
There are no quick fixes. This will not be a quick fix.
  Mr. Chairman, the Stenholm amendment has serious flaws. The committee 
bill is a better product, for the reasons I stated earlier. I ask the 
Members to vote against the Stenholm amendment and support the 
committee bill.
  The CHAIRMAN. All time has expired. The question is on the amendment 
in the nature of a substitute offered by the gentleman from Texas [Mr. 
Stenholm].
  The question was taken; and the Chairman announced that the noes 
appeared to have it.


                             recorded vote

  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
  A recorded vote was ordered.
  The vote was taken by electronic device and there were--ayes 298, 
noes 121, not voting 20, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 328]

                               AYES--298

     Allard
     Andrews (ME)
     Andrews (NJ)
     Andrews (TX)
     Archer
     Armey
     Bacchus (FL)
     Bachus (AL)
     Baesler
     Baker (CA)
     Baker (LA)
     Ballenger
     Barca
     Barcia
     Barlow
     Barrett (NE)
     Barrett (WI)
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bateman
     Bentley
     Bereuter
     Bilbray
     Bilirakis
     Bishop
     Bliley
     Blute
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Browder
     Bryant
     Bunning
     Buyer
     Byrne
     Callahan
     Camp
     Canady
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Castle
     Chapman
     Clement
     Clinger
     Coble
     Coleman
     Collins (GA)
     Combest
     Condit
     Cooper
     Coppersmith
     Costello
     Cox
     Cramer
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cunningham
     Danner
     Darden
     de la Garza
     Deal
     DeFazio
     DeLay
     Deutsch
     Diaz-Balart
     Dickey
     Dicks
     Dooley
     Doolittle
     Dornan
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Edwards (TX)
     Ehlers
     Emerson
     English
     Everett
     Ewing
     Fawell
     Fingerhut
     Ford (TN)
     Fowler
     Franks (CT)
     Franks (NJ)
     Frost
     Furse
     Gallegly
     Gekas
     Geren
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Gilman
     Gingrich
     Glickman
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Gordon
     Goss
     Grams
     Grandy
     Green
     Greenwood
     Gunderson
     Gutierrez
     Hall (TX)
     Hamilton
     Hancock
     Hansen
     Harman
     Hastert
     Hayes
     Hefley
     Herger
     Hoagland
     Hobson
     Hochbrueckner
     Hoekstra
     Hoke
     Holden
     Horn
     Houghton
     Huffington
     Hughes
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hutto
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Inhofe
     Inslee
     Istook
     Jacobs
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson (GA)
     Johnson (SD)
     Johnson, Sam
     Johnston
     Kaptur
     Kasich
     Kennedy
     Kildee
     Kim
     King
     Kingston
     Kleczka
     Klein
     Klug
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     Kreidler
     Kyl
     LaFalce
     Lambert
     Lancaster
     Lantos
     LaRocco
     Laughlin
     Lazio
     Leach
     Lehman
     Levin
     Levy
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (FL)
     Lewis (KY)
     Lightfoot
     Linder
     Livingston
     Lloyd
     Long
     Lucas
     Machtley
     Maloney
     Mann
     Manzullo
     Margolies-Mezvinsky
     Martinez
     Mazzoli
     McCandless
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McDade
     McHale
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McKeon
     McMillan
     Meehan
     Meyers
     Mica
     Michel
     Miller (FL)
     Minge
     Molinari
     Montgomery
     Moorhead
     Morella
     Murphy
     Myers
     Neal (NC)
     Nussle
     Orton
     Oxley
     Packard
     Pallone
     Parker
     Paxon
     Payne (VA)
     Penny
     Peterson (FL)
     Peterson (MN)
     Petri
     Pickett
     Pombo
     Pomeroy
     Porter
     Portman
     Poshard
     Price (NC)
     Pryce (OH)
     Quinn
     Ramstad
     Ravenel
     Regula
     Richardson
     Ridge
     Roberts
     Roemer
     Rogers
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Rose
     Roth
     Roukema
     Rowland
     Royce
     Sangmeister
     Santorum
     Saxton
     Schaefer
     Schenk
     Schiff
     Schroeder
     Schumer
     Sensenbrenner
     Sharp
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shepherd
     Shuster
     Sisisky
     Skaggs
     Skeen
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (OR)
     Smith (TX)
     Snowe
     Solomon
     Spence
     Spratt
     Stearns
     Stenholm
     Strickland
     Stump
     Stupak
     Sundquist
     Swett
     Talent
     Tanner
     Tauzin
     Taylor (MS)
     Taylor (NC)
     Thomas (CA)
     Thornton
     Thurman
     Torkildsen
     Torricelli
     Upton
     Valentine
     Visclosky
     Volkmer
     Vucanovich
     Walker
     Walsh
     Weldon
     Williams
     Wilson
     Wise
     Wolf
     Wyden
     Wynn
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)
     Zimmer

                               NOES--121

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Applegate
     Becerra
     Beilenson
     Bevill
     Blackwell
     Bonior
     Borski
     Boucher
     Brewster
     Brooks
     Brown (CA)
     Brown (FL)
     Brown (OH)
     Clay
     Clayton
     Clyburn
     Collins (IL)
     Collins (MI)
     Conyers
     Coyne
     de Lugo (VI)
     DeLauro
     Dellums
     Derrick
     Dingell
     Dixon
     Durbin
     Edwards (CA)
     Engel
     Eshoo
     Evans
     Farr
     Fazio
     Fields (LA)
     Filner
     Flake
     Foglietta
     Frank (MA)
     Gejdenson
     Gephardt
     Gibbons
     Gonzalez
     Hall (OH)
     Hamburg
     Hastings
     Hilliard
     Hinchey
     Hoyer
     Jefferson
     Johnson, E. B.
     Kanjorski
     Kennelly
     Klink
     Kopetski
     Lewis (GA)
     Lipinski
     Lowey
     Manton
     Markey
     Matsui
     McCloskey
     McDermott
     McKinney
     McNulty
     Meek
     Menendez
     Mfume
     Miller (CA)
     Mineta
     Mink
     Moakley
     Mollohan
     Moran
     Nadler
     Neal (MA)
     Norton (DC)
     Oberstar
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Owens
     Pastor
     Payne (NJ)
     Pelosi
     Pickle
     Rahall
     Rangel
     Reed
     Reynolds
     Romero-Barcelo (PR)
     Rostenkowski
     Roybal-Allard
     Rush
     Sabo
     Sanders
     Sarpalius
     Sawyer
     Scott
     Serrano
     Smith (IA)
     Stark
     Stokes
     Studds
     Swift
     Synar
     Tejeda
     Thompson
     Torres
     Towns
     Traficant
     Tucker
     Unsoeld
     Velazquez
     Vento
     Waters
     Watt
     Waxman
     Whitten
     Woolsey
     Yates

                             NOT VOTING--20

     Berman
     Burton
     Calvert
     Carr
     Faleomavaega (AS)
     Fields (TX)
     Fish
     Ford (MI)
     Gallo
     Hefner
     McCurdy
     Murtha
     Obey
     Quillen
     Slattery
     Thomas (WY)
     Underwood (GU)
     Washington
     Wheat
     Zeliff

                              {time}  1851

  Messrs. BREWSTER, RANGEL, and HINCHEY, and Mrs. LOWEY changed their 
vote from ``aye'' to ``no.''
  Ms. SLAUGHTER and Messrs. DICKS, PETERSON of Florida, RICHARDSON, and 
COX changed their vote from ``no'' to ``aye.''
  So the amendment in the nature of a substitute was agreed to.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  The CHAIRMAN. Under the rule, the Committee rises.
  Accordingly, the Committee rose; and the Speaker pro tempore (Mr. 
Swift) having assumed the chair, Mr. de la Garza, Chairman of the 
Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union, reported that 
that Committee, having had under consideration the bill (H.R. 4600) to 
amend the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 to 
provide for the expedited consideration of certain proposed rescissions 
of budget authority, pursuant to House Resolution 467, he reported the 
bill back to the House with an amendment adopted by the Committee of 
the Whole.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the rule, the previous question is 
ordered.
  The question is on the amendment.
  The amendment was agreed to.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the engrossment and third 
reading of the bill.
  The bill was ordered to be engrossed and read a third time, and was 
read the third time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the passage of the bill.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the ayes appeared to have it.


                             recorded vote

  Mr. GIBBONS. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.
  A recorded vote was ordered.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 342, 
noes 69, not voting 23, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 329]

                               AYES--342

     Ackerman
     Allard
     Andrews (ME)
     Andrews (NJ)
     Andrews (TX)
     Archer
     Armey
     Bacchus (FL)
     Bachus (AL)
     Baesler
     Baker (CA)
     Baker (LA)
     Ballenger
     Barca
     Barcia
     Barlow
     Barrett (NE)
     Barrett (WI)
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bateman
     Bentley
     Bereuter
     Bilbray
     Bilirakis
     Bishop
     Bliley
     Blute
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Boucher
     Brewster
     Brooks
     Browder
     Brown (CA)
     Brown (OH)
     Bryant
     Bunning
     Buyer
     Byrne
     Callahan
     Camp
     Canady
     Cantwell
     Castle
     Chapman
     Clement
     Clinger
     Clyburn
     Coble
     Coleman
     Collins (GA)
     Combest
     Condit
     Cooper
     Coppersmith
     Costello
     Cox
     Coyne
     Cramer
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cunningham
     Danner
     Darden
     de la Garza
     Deal
     DeFazio
     DeLauro
     DeLay
     Derrick
     Deutsch
     Diaz-Balart
     Dickey
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Dooley
     Doolittle
     Dornan
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Durbin
     Edwards (TX)
     Ehlers
     Emerson
     English
     Eshoo
     Everett
     Ewing
     Farr
     Fawell
     Fazio
     Fields (LA)
     Fingerhut
     Flake
     Foglietta
     Frank (MA)
     Franks (CT)
     Franks (NJ)
     Frost
     Furse
     Gallegly
     Gejdenson
     Gekas
     Geren
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Gilman
     Gingrich
     Glickman
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Gordon
     Goss
     Grams
     Grandy
     Green
     Greenwood
     Gunderson
     Gutierrez
     Hall (OH)
     Hall (TX)
     Hamilton
     Hancock
     Hansen
     Harman
     Hastert
     Hayes
     Hefley
     Herger
     Hinchey
     Hoagland
     Hobson
     Hochbrueckner
     Hoekstra
     Hoke
     Holden
     Horn
     Houghton
     Hoyer
     Huffington
     Hughes
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hutto
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Inhofe
     Inslee
     Istook
     Jacobs
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson (GA)
     Johnson (SD)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Johnson, Sam
     Johnston
     Kaptur
     Kasich
     Kennedy
     Kildee
     Kim
     King
     Kingston
     Kleczka
     Klein
     Klug
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     Kreidler
     Kyl
     LaFalce
     Lambert
     Lancaster
     Lantos
     LaRocco
     Laughlin
     Lazio
     Leach
     Lehman
     Levin
     Levy
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (FL)
     Lewis (KY)
     Lightfoot
     Linder
     Lipinski
     Livingston
     Lloyd
     Long
     Lowey
     Lucas
     Machtley
     Maloney
     Mann
     Manton
     Manzullo
     Margolies-Mezvinsky
     Markey
     Martinez
     Mazzoli
     McCandless
     McCloskey
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McDade
     McHale
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McKeon
     McMillan
     McNulty
     Meehan
     Meyers
     Mica
     Michel
     Miller (CA)
     Miller (FL)
     Mineta
     Minge
     Moakley
     Molinari
     Montgomery
     Moorhead
     Morella
     Murphy
     Myers
     Neal (MA)
     Neal (NC)
     Nussle
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Orton
     Oxley
     Packard
     Pallone
     Parker
     Pastor
     Paxon
     Payne (VA)
     Penny
     Peterson (FL)
     Peterson (MN)
     Petri
     Pickett
     Pickle
     Pombo
     Pomeroy
     Porter
     Portman
     Poshard
     Price (NC)
     Pryce (OH)
     Quinn
     Ramstad
     Ravenel
     Regula
     Reynolds
     Richardson
     Ridge
     Roberts
     Roemer
     Rogers
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Rose
     Roth
     Roukema
     Rowland
     Royce
     Sangmeister
     Santorum
     Sarpalius
     Sawyer
     Saxton
     Schaefer
     Schenk
     Schiff
     Schroeder
     Schumer
     Sensenbrenner
     Sharp
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shepherd
     Shuster
     Sisisky
     Skaggs
     Skeen
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (OR)
     Smith (TX)
     Snowe
     Solomon
     Spence
     Spratt
     Stearns
     Stenholm
     Stokes
     Strickland
     Studds
     Stump
     Stupak
     Sundquist
     Swett
     Talent
     Tanner
     Tauzin
     Taylor (MS)
     Taylor (NC)
     Tejeda
     Thomas (CA)
     Thompson
     Thornton
     Thurman
     Torkildsen
     Torricelli
     Tucker
     Upton
     Valentine
     Visclosky
     Volkmer
     Vucanovich
     Walker
     Walsh
     Weldon
     Whitten
     Williams
     Wilson
     Wise
     Wolf
     Wyden
     Wynn
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)
     Zimmer

                                NOES--69

     Abercrombie
     Applegate
     Becerra
     Beilenson
     Bevill
     Borski
     Brown (FL)
     Clay
     Clayton
     Collins (IL)
     Collins (MI)
     Conyers
     Dellums
     Dixon
     Edwards (CA)
     Engel
     Evans
     Filner
     Gephardt
     Gibbons
     Gonzalez
     Hamburg
     Hastings
     Hilliard
     Jefferson
     Kanjorski
     Kennelly
     Klink
     Kopetski
     Lewis (GA)
     Matsui
     McDermott
     McKinney
     Meek
     Menendez
     Mfume
     Mink
     Mollohan
     Moran
     Nadler
     Oberstar
     Owens
     Payne (NJ)
     Pelosi
     Rahall
     Rangel
     Reed
     Rostenkowski
     Roybal-Allard
     Rush
     Sabo
     Sanders
     Scott
     Serrano
     Smith (IA)
     Stark
     Swift
     Synar
     Torres
     Towns
     Traficant
     Unsoeld
     Velazquez
     Vento
     Waters
     Watt
     Waxman
     Woolsey
     Yates

                             NOT VOTING--23

     Berman
     Blackwell
     Bonior
     Burton
     Calvert
     Cardin
     Carr
     Fields (TX)
     Fish
     Ford (MI)
     Ford (TN)
     Fowler
     Gallo
     Hefner
     McCurdy
     Murtha
     Obey
     Quillen
     Slattery
     Thomas (WY)
     Washington
     Wheat
     Zeliff

                              {time}  1911

  Mrs. KENNELLY, Mr. RUSH, and Mr. DIXON changed their vote from 
``aye'' to ``no.''
  Mr. OLVER changed his vote from ``no'' to ``aye.''
  So the bill was passed.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________