[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 109 (Tuesday, August 9, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: August 9, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                    DON'T RUSH THE HEALTH CARE BILL

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Poshard). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of February 11, 1994, and June 10, 1994, the gentleman from 
Michigan [Mr. Knollenberg] is recognized for 40 minutes as the minority 
leader's designee.
  Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Mr. Speaker, this evening I am joined by a number of 
my colleagues, all of whom are freshmen Republicans, to talk about and 
participate in some dialogue over the sense of urgency that seems to 
have gripped the administration and the majority leadership in terms of 
the health care bill by providing very little time at all for any 
discussion or any kind of debate or dialogue, and frankly for very 
little communication at all with our constituents back home.
  Mr. Speaker, in less than 240 hours, or 9 days, the leadership will 
ask us to vote on a measure that will literally shape the lives of over 
a quarter of a million people, that is the American people, and help 
determine our economic vitality. With all this at stake, why should we 
rush?
  The American people, by a margin of nearly 2 to 1, want a quality 
product, not a politically motivated measure. And in some districts, 
that can range as high as 9 to 1. The American public deserves to 
review all the measures that we will be voting on. These plans have 
long-term ramifications which should not be taken lightly or glossed 
over with political rhetoric.
  Over 200 years ago, this country's founders decided that the lack of 
informed consent was more than worth the price of war with England. 
Today the congressional leadership failed to heed this lesson. Members 
of Congress are obligated to their constituents to be sure we maintain 
the nature and spirit of our representative democracy. Congressional 
leaders have already missed 2 of their own deadlines. Yet they balk at 
our opposition to the rush and the press of the process. We all need to 
slow things down, thoroughly examine the proposals and make sure that 
in our rush to solve our health care problems, we do not create 
economic disaster.
  When communities make major economic decisions, these are communities 
back home, cities and towns that we all come from, decisions such as 
rezoning or bond offerings, the city leaders give the people several 
weeks to review the plan and then there is a public hearing. So when a 
measure that impacts one seventh of the American economy comes to a 
final decision, it is only logical for all Americans to want to read 
the fine print. We must give everyone time to review, discuss, and 
comment on these health care reform proposals.
  With the flurry of health care reform measures introduced in this 
session of Congress, the CBO, the Congressional Budget Office, has 
certainly had its hands full in making sure that all the numbers were 
sound. Yet after nearly a year of health care reform that saw CBO 
producing reports on only 7 proposals, the congressional leadership now 
expects them to produce accurate numbers on three 1,000-plus-page bills 
in less than a 3-week period.
  So I ask, why the rush? Why jump into this? Why slam-dunk it? Why not 
provide some time for Members of Congress and the constituents around 
the country to make some decisions about this bill?
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California [Mr. Horn].
  Mr. HORN. I thank the gentleman from Michigan.
  Mr. Speaker, when a family in Long Beach buys a car or a young man in 
Des Moines thinks about joining the Marines or a single mother in 
Tupelo decides to remarry, they know the choice they make will affect 
them for years to come.

                              {time}  2100

  Therefore, like most other Americans who face difficult decisions 
with long term ramifications, they follow a thoughtful, careful 
process, they study the options, they think through the consequences, 
maybe even they get advice from a few experts and talk it over with 
friends, or even everyone they run into. So when the Members of the 
House of Representatives, the people's House, are making a decision 
which will alter one-seventh of the American economy, should we not 
follow the same process?
  Faced with a House Democratic leadership which appears to have 
forgotten the way most Americans live, the House Republican freshmen 
are asking that leadership to do what the people they represent do: 
apply a thoughtful, deliberate decisionmaking process to the health 
care debate. The House Republican freshmen urge that the Democratic 
leadership call a halt to its demands for a rapid, come hell or high 
water passage of the health care bill, a bill we have not even seen, 
that they cease their emotional exploitation of the fear of being 
uninsured, a fear that many of us can agree with and share, and stop 
ramming through health care legislation which as of now has not even 
been drafted, has certainly not been printed, and most certainly not 
carefully studied. We House Republicans freshmen want the Congress to 
follow a simple but necessary process in deciding legislation which 
will affect most Americans for decades to come.
  We seek three simple things. Time for adequate staff work by our own 
staff, the committee staff, particularly the House legislative counsel 
which is working all hours of the night now to draft some of the 
various options which we hope will be before us. And may I say at that 
point we hope we are not precluded from options by the House Committee 
on Rules which loves to limit our choices. Even when the American 
people that sent us here think we can make real choices, we cannot when 
the majority party stifles options and prevents us from acting as we 
really should act as legislators who have the range of options before 
them.
  We also want time for the Congressional Budget Office to analyze each 
proposal, to make a recommendation, a statement if you will to the 
House by a professional staff as to what the impact of that proposal 
will be on the annual deficit, on the annual government revenue and 
expenditures. That is certainly the least that can be done to cast an 
intelligent vote.
  We want time to understand exactly what we are voting upon, and with 
the bills, as my colleagues from Michigan has noted, over a thousand 
pages apiece, the fact is under the current schedule that no one will 
have had time to read those bills, not even the people whose names are 
on them. Staff might have read portions, the paste pot and the stapling 
machine might have put the portions together, but certainly the average 
Member has not read them since we still do not have them.
  But most important what we want, and why we are here tonight is we 
want time to discuss the options with the people that sent us here. The 
people have a right to hear from their representatives what faces them, 
what those options are, and we want to let them know so we can hear 
from them what they want us to do in particular cases. This cry for 
fairness and prudence by the House Republican freshmen is not based on 
partisan political gridlock. Indeed we do not have that gridlock. We 
notice recently there is quite a bit of it in the majority. But it is 
rather a desire to do the best job possible for the people who elected 
us. We want no hidden surprises, as we have in many bills that come 
before us. We want a chance to look at the citations to the code so 
that we can see what is being slipped in that no one ever says. We want 
no unintended consequences. We want no last-minute insertions by the 
special interests. We simply want to make the right decision. Is that 
unreasonable?
  The House Republican freshmen urge all Americans who want a fair and 
deliberate process in the health care debate to contact the House 
Democratic leadership, call Speaker Thomas S. Foley, say you think the 
people have a right to hear from the Representatives in their districts 
after a few weeks of debate of the health care bill and before the 
final vote are cast. Tell him that the Representatives ought to be 
given enough time to study the options, to read the bills and to make 
the best choice.
  Whatever decisions are made about health care for Americans will be 
with us for a very long time. Those decisions deserve the best 
judgment, the judgments that caused us to be sent here and others not 
to be sent here. Our people expect no less.
  The request we make is reasonable. We simply want to take a little 
more time to read the 1,000-page bills which will be before us and to 
discuss them intelligently with our constituents before we vote. We 
simply want to make the best decision.
  Mr. LaROCCO. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. KNOLLENBERG. I yield to the gentleman from Idaho.
  Mr. LaROCCO. Mr. Speaker, are the Republican freshmen supporting any 
bill? Are you endorsing any bill, and if so when are you considering 
that bill, and have you had any town meetings like the gentleman from 
Hawaii [Mr. Abercrombie], and I have had when we were new Members all 
during our term?
  Mr. HORN. I will be glad to respond, and each of my colleagues would 
be glad I am sure.
  No. 1, we have held town meetings. Health care has been a part of 
those. We are sponsors of different bills. I happen to be involved with 
the two bipartisan bills. I am not on the so-called Republican bill or 
the so-called Democratic bill or the single-payer bill. I happen to 
have been on the Medicare drafting committee 30 years ago as a Senate 
staff member. A lot of us have spent a lot of time on this issue.
  What we want to see are the specifics before we vote.
  Mr. KNOLLENBERG. I want to reclaim the time, and I want to suggest to 
the gentleman from California that I thank him very kindly for those 
comments. Certainly in speaking to that question we all support some 
concepts and we do support a bill.
  I think tonight in order to give everybody a chance in the Republican 
freshman group to respond from their particular point of view, from 
their constituency and from their district, I am going to turn, as I 
mentioned previously, to a number of Members on this issue that, by the 
way, more than any other issue that has probably come before Congress 
in the last two or three decades affects every man, woman and child. So 
to continue that process, I am now going to turn to the gentleman from 
Savannah, GA, Mr. Jack Kingston.
  Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Michigan. I 
want to thank also our Democrat colleague for bringing that up. I think 
it is important to say there is no reluctance by the group of freshmen 
Republicans to act. We are not afraid of it. We have, many of us have 
cosponsored the bipartisan Rowland-Bilirakis bill, which I think is 
excellent. I am ready right now to vote on either one of them.
  The Rowland-Bilirakis bill probably, if we put all of the health care 
bills up on the screen tomorrow, the Rowland-Bilirakis bill would pass 
with the most votes, and probably have just as many votes from the 
Democrat side of the aisle as the Republican side of the aisle. I think 
it is important for us to know that.
  I am holding here the original Clinton bill. This bill was introduced 
last year, and we have had many, many town meetings on that, on the 
Clinton bill, and at the same time bringing up the Michel alternative, 
which is the Republican alternative, and then the bipartisan Rowland-
Bilirakis alternative. I in my own district had three debates with 
designated hitters sent down from Washington, the Clinton plan, who 
were on the health care task force, who came down to actually debate 
the Clinton's first version of the bill. So we had that time, and it 
was a healthy time, it was a good debate for the American people.
  Here is the new bill which Clinton has introduced in the other body. 
This one Mr. Mitchell is carrying for Mr. Clinton, Mr. Mitchell, and 
Mr. Kennedy. This one is actually fatter than the original bill by 
maybe 100 pages, but this is the bill our Senators and the gentlemen 
and gentlewomen in the other body have to be working on in the next 10 
days. Tonight they went into session at 6 p.m. for an 8-hour debate on 
this.
  It is ridiculous that the people in the other body think that they 
are super-men and super-women anyhow, but to think that they are going 
to be able to read this, on top of crime, on top of GATT, on top of 
everything else they have to do is absurd. But they have a bill. We in 
the House do not even have a bill yet. I understand there is a drum 
roll that keeps getting louder and louder in the background, but I 
understand we are going to have a bill tomorrow. Well, I hope we do. 
That gives us I guess 10 days, and we are going to all say then forget 
the crime bill, which has not been printed yet, as we all know because 
there are deals still being cut on that. And in my area crime is a very 
important issue. I want to be able to read that crime bill, but we have 
this bill.
  Let me say this: I am not afraid of the debate whatsoever. I am 
afraid of a time limit for the American people, to let the American 
people, the doctors and the nurses, the health care providers, everyone 
back home, I think they have just as much of a right to read this bill 
and the other Clinton-Gephardt bill that is coming out as we do as 
Members of Congress, and I look forward to that.

                              {time}  2110

  Mr. KNOLLENBERG. I thank the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Kingston].
  Just, for example, in dealing with things that we all ran on, the 
business of taxes, this whole thing about spending, Government spending 
and regulations, and all three of those ingredients are wrapped into 
all of these various bills that we are going to have to deal with. That 
takes time. It takes discussion, and it takes debate.
  Frankly, the American people should have a right for us to 
communicate what we know here so they can make some judgments and 
inform us about what they would like to see in a health care product.
  I next want to swing across the country to California and bring on 
the President of the freshman class, the Republican side of the 
freshman class, from canyon country, Santa Clarita, CA [Mr. McKeon].
  Mr. McKEON. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  I want to thank my colleagues here tonight for taking the leadership 
to bring this effort to the floor.
  You know, 2 years ago I was a business man, as you said, from canyon 
country, from Santa Clarita, CA, and really knew nothing about the 
political process. I had served for a number of years on a school 
board. I had served as mayor of a new city and a member of the city 
council for a number of years, but that is a totally different process 
when you are working with five people trying to resolve something 
versus coming here to this great body and trying to work something 
through with 435 people.
  I went through the campaign process and was elected and came here and 
began to learn how legislation works. I was appointed to the Committee 
on Education and Labor, and I was appointed to the Labor Management 
Subcommittee, and right away we began to hold hearings on different 
bills, and somewhere, oh, maybe 6-8 months ago, I do not remember the 
exact time now, the President gave a speech on health care, and Mrs. 
Clinton, Secretary Reich, Secretary Shalala came and testified before 
our Committee on Education and Labor, and we did not have the bill. The 
bill that the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Kingston] referred to had not 
yet come out.
  So it was different than the normal process. You normally have 
somebody who comes up with an idea. They go to legislative counsel. 
They write it up. They try to go out and get cosponsors, try to develop 
support for their bill. Then they come here and they drop it in the box 
over there, and it gets appointed to a committee. Then the committee 
chairman appoints it to a subcommittee, and then somewhere down the 
line it gets appointed to hearings, and then people come in and testify 
on that bill, on that measure. Somewhere down the line it is brought to 
the committee for what we call markup where we each get a chance to 
amend and change that bill, and then finally to a final vote in the 
subcommittee.
  This, for health care in our subcommittee, took over a month, with 
the really extensive process of markup. Then it went to the full 
committee. We worked long hours. We have good leadership that really 
tried to let us debate the process. I did not agree with the other side 
most of the time, but at least we did have a full, open process, and 
finally, after a few weeks, voted out our bill.
  Then the process is it goes to the Committee on Rules, undergoes 
changes there, and then finally, at some point, arrives at the floor of 
the House where we can, the full House, debate that bill.
  Well, health care has not followed that process, and understand now 
that, I guess, the bill that we did in Education and Labor and the bill 
that was done in the Committee on Ways and Means have been kind of set 
aside, and the majority leader is now writing a bill. We have heard 
that it was going to be presented Monday, and now we understand that 
that has slid to possibly Wednesday, and then that bill, when it gets 
here, I am sure, it will have some things that we worked on in other 
committees, but it will have some new things none of us have had a 
chance to study. Then it goes to the Committee on Rules, and we 
understand it is supposed to come to us next Monday, and that, plus a 
Republican bill plus 1 or 2 bipartisan bills, plus the single-payer 
bill, and I add those up to probably 5,000 or 6,000 pages will be 
dropped in our laps, and we have a couple of days to finally vote on 
that.

  I hope the people in America that are listening understand how this 
process works better than I did when I first came here, and I hope they 
want to participate. I think they do. I think they have the 
opportunity. They should have it to do.
  I ask the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Hoekstra], you know, we worked 
together on this Committee on Education and Labor, and I know you came 
from a background similar to mine, a business background, not having 
been in a legislative body before, how has this process seemed to you?
  Mr. HOEKSTRA. If the gentleman will yield, it is kind of interesting. 
I had the opportunity Monday morning to go back to my former employer. 
We did a press conference, and perhaps on the last piece of legislation 
that was passed without the Members of this body having read it, which 
was the Clean Air Act, which is now wreaking havoc on a number of 
different parts of the country. But, you know, here is the process we 
are looking at: Comparing the 8 weeks that we spent on markup in our 
subcommittee and in full committee, that is 8 weeks of, I think, in 
full committee, we went through, what, 99 amendments, something like 99 
amendments. There were 44 amendments, Democratic amendments, that were 
accepted. There were 11 Republican amendments that were accepted, so 55 
improvements to the President's bill were accepted through that 
process, and now, you know, it was laid out by the Democratic 
leadership, what, 3 weeks ago, they said, ``On August 3 we are going to 
have the new bills ready.''
  Let us take a look at why having the bills available is so critical. 
Of course, we missed that deadline. We said August 3, and we missed 
that deadline, and yesterday at 6 o'clock, we were waiting to see if 
the bills would be ready. They were not ready, because the legislative 
counsel is writing all of these bills. Now, maybe tomorrow, August 10 
at 6 o'clock, we are going to have these bills.
  Why is this important? What are we talking about literally? I 
borrowed by colleagues' examples. Remember, right now as our other 
colleague from Michigan has described it, we have a vapor bill. There 
is no bill. This is the bill right here. This is all that we have to 
look at, the vapor bill. But this is what we are waiting for. Remember, 
these are just kind of a symbol for what we hope to get sometime soon. 
This is the Clinton-Gephardt bill, or a facsimile thereof, 1,300-1,400 
pages. Who knows what the single-payer system is going to look like? 
That is 1,400 pages.
  Then if we go on, we are looking at another 1,400 pages perhaps of a 
bipartisan bill, and I will be a little fair. I also ran out of bills. 
But, you know, the Republicans, we are going for less bureaucracy and 
less new taxes, so ours is only half as thick. Ours is only 720 pages.

  But one of these days we are going to be handed this much paper and 
say, ``Here is health care reform, four different versions,'' and by 
the way, that is, if we get these, if these bills are turned in 
tomorrow, then the congressional printing office is going to go busily 
to work, and maybe we will have these on Thursday morning, and they are 
going to say, ``Here they are.''
  I think it would be great if the American people called the Capitol 
on Thursday morning and asked for their own copies to see if they are 
actually available. They can do that. All they have to do is call (202) 
224-3121, and they can ask a simple question: Can I have a copy of the 
bill? Or, ``Do you have copies of these bills available for my 
Congressman to read today and to go through?''
  Mr. KNOLLENBERG. I just wanted to go back over some things that you 
said.
  It occurs to me that you mentioned that you spent 8 weeks in 
committee, in your own committee, Labor and Ed, just coming up with one 
of those bills that came out of the House, your committee, not to 
mention the full committee, but the subcommittee, which spent a period 
of time, the full committee spent obviously the balance of that time 
which totaled 8 weeks. It took 8 weeks, is that what you are saying, to 
get a bill out of the committee?
  Mr. HOEKSTRA. It took exactly 8 weeks. That is after we had had the 
bill, after we had had hearings, OK, and after we had had an 
understanding of the bill, it took 8 weeks to mark it up and improve 
it. Now, we are going to go and start from scratch with four new bills, 
and we are going to be given 8 days.
  Mr. KINGSTON. If the gentleman will yield, could you hold that up a 
minute, please, so I could see it?
  Mr. HOEKSTRA. I have to hold it again? It is kind of heavy.
  Mr. KINGSTON. You might join the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Oxley] with 
another broken arm. That really represents 4,000 to 6,000 pages which 
has to be done in 8 days. No doubt it is fascinating reading, a Tom 
Clancy type of gripping novel or Michael Crichton that we do not want 
to put down, but in all reality, how many Members on either side of the 
aisle will be able to read that on top of the other duties of being a 
Representative?
  Mr. HOEKSTRA. I think with my staff, as we were talking about this, 
talking about health care reform and reading the health care 
legislation, it would be like reading ``War and Peace'' four or five 
times in one week. It is physically, literally not possible to go 
through all of this legislation in the time that we have been given, 
and, you know, that is just to read it. That does not talk about 
comprehension, because this is legalese.
  Mr. KINGSTON. It would be like reading ``War and Peace'' without the 
war?
  Mr. HOEKSTRA. Without the war.

                              {time}  2120

  No comprehension and with all the legalese. We have 8 days. 
Unbelievable.
  Mr. McKEON. The gentleman mentioned you have 8 days, but as the 
gentleman mentioned, you still have the crime bill. Remember that was 
passed a few months ago. I did not go into one more process.
  After we pass a bill here in this House, there also has to be a bill 
passed in the Senate, and then assuming they are not exactly the same--
which they will not be--a conference must be called, and they will have 
to work out the details. You remember, how many months ago did we pass 
a crime bill? The conference has been meeting, and they have not 
finished that bill. We have been told that in a couple of weeks it will 
be brought to the floor for a vote. We have not had a chance to look at 
that to see that final bill presented.
  So we have to work that into that 8 days too. We are also trying to 
work this. There are still some other things on the calendar.
  So it is not just reading that. If we had the time to spend just 
reading that, we probably could do it. But there are other things. I am 
not even sure, but that probably will not be done tomorrow. From the 
latest thing I have heard, it is that because of the legislative 
counsel being so busy they have not had time to get these done plus get 
it to the printer. So they probably will slip that date tomorrow.
  Mr. HORN. May I ask you gentleman, can any of you think of any, 
remember any other situation in the year and a half that we have been 
here where we have had suddenly a bill drafted in the back rooms of the 
majority leader of the majority party, dumped on the Chamber, and we 
have to go from scratch as opposed to extensive committee hearings, as 
all of you have described? Can you think of one other example of where 
something has been dumped on us, where something has been completely 
rewritten and we know not what is in it or out of it?
  Mr. McKEON. Not only do I not think of any instance like that, but I 
cannot think of any instance of anything that we have been involved 
in--we have been told that NAFTA would be our toughest vote. We have 
been told the budget would be a tough vote. But there is probably not a 
vote that we have made or will make probably in the time we are in the 
House that has as much importance, that reaches every citizen of this 
country, that has as great an importance as this does, and we are 
having it shoved down.
  Mr. KINGSTON. Is it not true that that huge volume, if it does get 
printed tomorrow, if it is so good, most Members of Congress would want 
to go home and brag about it? They would really want to tell the people 
how great it is, how great a bill it is, how great the crime bill is, 
and so forth?
  So I do not see why we are rushing that particular piece of 
legislation when, in my opinion, and I think the majority of Democrats 
and Republicans, the Rowland/Bilirakis bill addresses the emergencies. 
We can pass health care peacefully with a bipartisan bill, just in the 
spirit of some of the other bills that did pass by a bipartisan basis 
around here.
  Mr. HORN. It seems to me, listening to you gentlemen, not only has 
the fact of the voters being insulted by not being consulted because we 
still do not know what the choices are here--and as my colleague said, 
one-seventh of the American economy is involved in this decision--this 
will affect the Nation for a century, perhaps, if it is passed. But the 
House has been insulted because its normal processes of considering 
legislation have been violated. We have had no hearings, as the 
gentleman from Michigan noted, we have had no extensive consultation. 
We are operating in the blind, we are being told, ``Take it or leave 
it. If you don't like it, that is tough. We have got the votes, and we 
will override you.''

  Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Reclaiming my time, I will not yield because we have 
an order that we would like to continue and only have so many minutes.
  I would like to at this point bring on somebody from the heartland 
who is, additionally, a Persian war veteran, Steve Buyer, who would 
like to comment on the process.
  Mr. BUYER. Let me just comment on the process. The process, ladies 
and gentlemen of America, is that this Congress, this body, has become 
an undemocratic institution. That is the simple fact. So you are 
talking about here tonight why is it being rushed?
  You know, I remember sitting on the Armed Services Committee, going 
through the ``don't ask, don't tell'' gay policy. That is what I think 
is about to be applied to this one.
  We are sending the message out to the American people, ``Don't ask,'' 
and to the Democrats, ``Don't tell,'' because we want to bring this 
bill in and we want to rush it through and cram it down the throats of 
everyone because if we had hearings, if we let everybody know what is 
in these six bills, the American people will not like it.'' To quote 
Senator Jay Rockefeller, ``We are going to give the American people 
health care reform whether they want it or not,'' which means, ``Sit 
back, here it comes.''
  There are some of us who do not believe that that is the right path.
  I respect other Members in this body that come forward and say, ``I 
believe what America needs is a single-payer system.''
  I respect you because you are honest, you stand up, you step right up 
and stand up and say, ``We need that for America.'' The ones in America 
who should scare you to death are those who finesse it, who wiggle it, 
who wobble it and who will not come out and say it.
  And what they want is they want to build America, turn to the left, 
into a malaise where by the year 2002 they can then say, ``See, we 
couldn't achieve the 95-percent universal coverage. We must now 
have Government control or a Government takeover of medicine.''

  As long as I am in this body, I will fight that process. I applaud 
the leadership of the freshmen here tonight to step up against the 
leadership in this body who want to cram it down the throats of 
America. You are serving all your constituents justly and well.
  Mr. KNOLLENBERG. I want to thank the gentleman for his comments. I 
would like to come across town to the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. 
Hoekstra].
  Mr. HOEKSTRA. We need to make it extremely clear we are not against 
health care reform. We want to go through a good process and solve the 
problems of health care. That is why last Friday we got together as a 
group of freshmen and we laid out a rational process that says if we go 
through this process we will feel better about the end result.
  It is very, very possible to have health care reform this year and to 
do it in a rational way if only some other Members would actually 
listen to freshmen. We do have some good ideas.
  If we would have met the deadline for introducing the bills, we would 
have had them yesterday. We could have spent the balance of this week 
going through a walkthrough of each of the bills, having the sponsors 
outline the bill segment by segment what they did. We could have done 
it Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. We could have debated a rule and 
said this will be the process by which we will debate and decide this 
issue when we come back.
  We then could have gone back to our constituents for 2\1/2\ to 3 
weeks and walked them through each one of the 4 bills because we would 
have been walked through it here on the floor of the House. We could 
have explained it to them very clearly. We could have gotten their 
input and we could have then come back, we could have been here 
September 6, September 8, we could have had our amendments prepared, 
and 3 weeks to prepare amendments.
  Now the bills are going to be due Wednesday noon, and by Thursday--
Wednesday at 6 at night the bills are going to be done, and we may not 
have a copy. Thursday at noon we have to have our amendments in place. 
Unbelievable.
  Mr. KINGSTON. What occurs to me as I am listening to this is that 
since people will be voting on the bill which most people have not 
read, then will they be voting not on the merits of the bill but 
perhaps on a deal like the many deals that were passed on NAFTA? Will 
they vote on health care because of a road in their district, because 
of a bridge, because of a judgeship or a major contributor? Is that 
what you think will happen? I have that cynical suspicion.
  Mr. HOEKSTRA. I am not sure why they are going to be voting on the 
bill, but I know one thing: It will not be informed consent that they 
really understand.
  Let me finish the process. September 6 to 8 we could be back here 
with amendments, we could begin debate on September 9.
  We could debate the bill for more than a week, 8 to 10 days, debating 
the bill, debating the amendments, have a final vote somewhere around 
September 19. The other body could finish their work, allow a week to 
10 days for a conference report, and that would still allow us another 
week to come back here for final passage. If we are going to stay in 
session extra, let us stay at the end of the process in October.

                              {time}  2130

  There is plenty of time to do this right. There is no reason why we 
have to wait to struggle through this much material in 8 days, and that 
is only true if by Thursday morning this stuff is actually printed. I 
bet we will not have this stuff in our offices until Monday or Tuesday 
of next week.
  Mr. KNOLLENBERG. Reclaiming my time for a moment, Mr. Speaker, I want 
to refer to something that has, I do not think, been spoken of yet. Mr. 
Hoekstra, even you mentioned amendments. It occurs to me that there may 
or may not be amendments, and, if there are amendments, they will be 
very limited, and we are talking about something that the American 
people probably have very little knowledge of or any understanding of, 
and that is the proposed rule, and I know that the gentleman from 
California [Mr. Horn] has written, and talked about and debated this 
for any number of times.
  I ask, ``Why don't you give us a little quick picture in the closing 
moments we have here of what is a closed rule? How does it limit the 
process? How does it limit our----
  Mr. HORN. The word the gentleman forgot to use is I have suffered 
under a closed rule.
  I mentioned 30 years ago I had been involved with Medicare on the 
Senate side. As I looked over at the House, I swore I would never run 
for this place. They had many problems. But one problem they did not 
have that we have now is in those days only 15 percent of the bills 
came through the Committee on Rules to the floor with a closed rule, 
and what that means is none of us can get up and offer an amendment 
unless it has been pre-cleared by the Committee on Rules where the 
majority, the Democratic Party, has nine appointees, personal 
appointees of the Speaker. The Republican Party has four appointees.
  Now, what is worse of the last few years is we have gone from 15 
percent closed rules to last year between January and May 100 percent 
closed rules, and they average 79 percent for the year, which means 
hundreds of amendments that people have creatively worked on, would 
like to offer to improve legislation, we cannot vote them up or down.
  I think all any of us ask is, if we have a good idea, let us get it 
voted up or down, but we cannot even have it considered in this 
Chamber.
  Over the crime bill there were 109 Members that testified before the 
Committee on Rules. I can tell my colleagues there were not 109 
amendments offered on this floor, and a lot of things just went on what 
we call the cutting room floor.
  So, the Committee on Rules at the direction of the leadership of this 
House simply limits the freedom of the House to function.
  Mr. KNOLLENBERG. I yield to the gentleman from Indiana.
  Mr. BUYER. The closed rules stifle exchange of ideas in the 
betterment of legislation?
  Mr. HORN. Absolutely.
  Mr. BUYER. The creation of state craft must be based upon the 
intellect. That is why the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Hoekstra] is 
asking to read the bill. That is all we want to do, is the opportunity 
for us to take this and to be responsive to those that sent us here, to 
take these bills back to our districts and say:
  ``What do you think?''
  ``How do you feel?''
  We are not going to have that opportunity. That is what is sad.
  So, when the gentleman talked about the closed rules, he is 
absolutely right. The Committee on Rules, that is right up here, is 
going to stack the deck against us.
  When we talked about the Rowland-Bilirakis, the bipartisan bill, they 
may allow us to vote on it, but they stack the deck in such a way that, 
whatever bill in whatever order they vote on, which is last will pass, 
so they are trying to structure this in such a way that they cram this 
down America.
  Mr. HORN. On the point that the gentleman makes Rowland-Bilirakis can 
pass 435 to nothing, all the votes in this Chamber, and the way they 
stack it with, I swear, unconstitutional process, but nobody has 
challenged it yet, is the so-called king-of-the-hill rule. Kids played 
the game: ``If you are the last one on the hill, you win.'' So, 
whatever proposal, as the gentleman said, comes last, even if it wins 
217 to 215 or whatever, that wins.
  Mr. BUYER. What it is we crave here----
  Mr. HORN. Sheer power, not intellect----
  Mr. BUYER. Is this for the exchange of ideas in the open debate of 
this arena, and that is what should be done, and I salute the gentleman 
from Michigan [Mr. Knollenberg] for this special order.
  Mr. KNOLLENBERG. If I could just interrupt at this point, I thank the 
gentleman from Indiana at this point, and I thank the entire group here 
this evening.
  The gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Kingston] has about 15 seconds before 
we close down.
  Mr. KINGSTON. Today we gave a medal to the gentleman from Illinois 
[Mr. Michel], or the President did. We did that in the name, or the 
President did, of bipartisan spirit of cooperation.
  The gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Michel] challenged us all, said 
there were so many good things that can become of Democrats and 
Republicans working together. Let us do that. Let us try it out on 
health care.
  Mr. KNOLLENBERG. I think the bipartisan idea is great, and I think it 
is something that has not been explored although in this Chamber.
  I would conclude this night's special order again. I want to thank 
everybody for their participation. We have a long way to go, and, if my 
colleagues look at those four bills totaling some 1,200 pages each or 
thereabouts. I believe we are at a point where we can, with the 
American people's judgment and with the American people behind us on 
this thing, we just give them a opportunity to hear what it is Congress 
is talking about, and that takes time. It does not have to be in a 
hurry. There is no sense of urgency here.
  Mr. Speaker, let us do it right. Let us fix what is wrong with what 
is right, and I think that is what all America wants.

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