[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 120 (Sunday, August 21, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: August 21, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
 FURTHER CONFERENCE REPORT ON H.R. 3355, VIOLENT CRIME CONTROL AND LAW 
                        ENFORCEMENT ACT OF 1993

  Mr. DERRICK, from the Committee on Rules, reported the following 
privileged resolution (H. Res. 526, Rept. No. 103-713), which was 
referred to the House Calendar and ordered to be printed.

                              H. Res. 526

       Resolved, That upon adoption of this resolution it shall be 
     in order to consider a further conference report to accompany 
     the bill (H.R. 3355) to amend the Omnibus Crime Control and 
     Safe Streets Act of 1968 to allow grants to increase police 
     presence, to expand and improve cooperative efforts between 
     law enforcement agencies and members of the community to 
     address crime and disorder problems, and otherwise to enhance 
     public safety. All points of order against the conference 
     report and against its consideration are waived. The 
     conference report shall be considered as read. The conference 
     report shall be debatable for 80 minutes, with 20 minutes 
     controlled by the chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary, 
     40 minutes controlled by the ranking minority member of the 
     Committee on the Judiciary, and 20 minutes controlled by 
     Representative Castle of Delaware. The previous question 
     shall be considered as ordered on the conference report to 
     final adoption without intervening motion except one motion 
     to recommit, which may contain instructions only if offered 
     by Representative Michel of Illinois or his designee.

  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I 
call up House Resolution 526 and ask for its immediate consideration.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Clerk will report the resolution.
  The Clerk read the resolution.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. 
Derrick] is recognized for 1 hour.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield the 
customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Goss], pending 
which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration 
of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.
  (Mr. DERRICK asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 526 waives all points of 
order against the conference report on H.R. 3355, the Violent Crime 
Control and Law Enforcement Act, and against its consideration. The 
rule further provides that the conference report shall be considered as 
read.
  This rule will allow the House to consider the conference report for 
H.R. 3355, the omnibus crime control bill. The rule also allows for one 
motion to recommit. The motion to recommit may contain instructions, 
but only if offered by Representative Michel or his designee. The 
motion to recommit may not contain instructions under any circumstances 
unless offered by Representative Michel or his designee.
  Mr. Speaker, the conferees have worked diligently over the past 
several days--almost nonstop--to craft what is truly a compromise 
anticrime package. The American people have demanded that we take tough 
action against this Nation's growing crime problem.
  The conference report will do just that. It is time we respond to the 
American people, and bring this legislation to a conclusion.
  The anticrime package is tough, smart, and comprehensive. The crime 
measure includes provisions and programs that have been long supported 
by Members on both sides of the aisle. The conference report is a 
carefully crafted measure that balances more police and stronger 
punishment with needed prevention programs.
  This conference report also reflects a good faith effort at 
compromise. The compromise agreement reduces spending authorization in 
the bill by $3.3 billion. Thirteen individual grant programs have been 
consolidated into a $379.7 million local crime prevention block grant.
  The requirements for community notification of sexual offenders and 
those who commit certain crimes against children have been 
strengthened.
  The measure's prison funding provisions have also been revised. Under 
the agreement, 50 percent of the funding will be reserved for states 
that have implemented truth-in-sentencing laws. The remaining 50 
percent of the prison funds will be set aside for discretionary grants 
to the States.
  Let there be no mistake. The heart of this crime control bill 
strengthens law enforcement efforts. The package embraces such popular 
goals as 100,000 new police officers on the streets; a police corps and 
law enforcement scholarship program; the three-strikes-and-you're-out 
law to put repeat violent offenders behind bars for life; more Border 
Patrol, drug enforcement, and FBI agents; more prison space for violent 
criminals; boot camps for youthful offenders and prevention programs to 
combat violence against women.
  Another essential provision in the crime package is the ban on 19 
specified types of military-style assault weapons. Gun violence 
continues to be a growing problem.
  More law enforcement and punishment will not control crime if we 
continue to ignore the easy accessibility to dangerous firearms. 
Weapons of war have no place in a civilized society. They serve no 
purpose but to kill as many people as quickly as possible.
  Members of this body should not sacrifice an entire bill of crime-
fighting provisions in order to defeat the ban on assault weapons. The 
gun proponents wrongly believe that no firearm is bad--even weapons 
that outgun law enforcement officials and threaten the safety of our 
communities. The will of the American people should not be averted by 
shooting down responsible anticrime legislation.
  Mr. Speaker, previous debate and recent Charlton Heston TV ads left 
many Members and voters with the wrong impression that the entire crime 
bill is some new social giveaway program when in fact less than one-
sixth of the crime bill is aimed at the youth crime prevention 
programs.
  But I ask the House to consider this fact. The United States has the 
highest incarceration rate and the highest crime rate in the 
industrialized world. We are only kidding ourselves if efforts are not 
made to prevent future crime now.
  What is wrong with providing afterschool, weekend and summer programs 
for young people? What is wrong with supporting youth education, 
employment, training and recreation activities? Absolutely nothing. 
Youth crime prevention is just law enforcement on the front end.
  The anticrime conference report combines police, punishment and 
prevention into one responsible, and workable measure. No one part of 
this formula can be surrendered. Otherwise, all we would have is a 
band-aid approach.
  Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 526 is a fair rule that will allow this 
House to consider the most sweeping Federal anticrime bill in U.S. 
history. I urge my colleagues to support the rule and conference 
report.

                              {time}  1530

  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  (Mr. GOSS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks and include extraneous material.)
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, we have got a bad rule here. We are waiving 
all points of order again.
  We do not know what has been left out. We do not know what has been 
left in. We do not know what has been left over.
  Even Chairman Brooks could not provide us a list of all the things we 
are protecting here. So nobody really knows. Chairman Brooks testified 
that he wants every waiver he can get to protect everything he can. 
Unfortunately, when we do that kind of thing, it gives the perception 
that we are trying to hide something from the American people, maybe 
even hide something from ourselves, and that gets us into trouble.
  Look what happened last week. After we had a chance to read the 
conference report, we found lots of things. Some of those things have 
actually been fixed. But we all have to say it was a rather distasteful 
experience, and it has been a tough week.
  So I think by going into these waivers we are making a mistake. We 
are waiving the 3-day-layover rule. Frankly, the way this thing has 
been handled, we would have had to waive the 3-minute-layover rule.
  The Committee on Rules was supposed to meet at noon today. The 
report, the documents, came in at 12:32. Obviously, we did not have the 
documents for the appointed time of the Rules meeting, and, in fact, we 
did take a few minutes to digest them, a few minutes, but we certainly 
cannot say that we have read the conference report.

  How many Members of this body can say, ``Yes, I have read it?'' How 
many can pass that test and say, ``I am making my vote after I have 
read this conference report''?
  This is a report we know has got budget problems in it, scope 
problems, germaneness problems. I have got a partial list of things 
being protected here. We do not know exactly what it is.
  Second problem: This is a complicated bill. There is a lot in it. We 
do not have a lot of time to debate this. Members are going to be shut 
out from debate on both sides. This is a strangulated procedure.
  We should go back and start again and give it what it needs.
  Where are we on merit? We are going to hear in the debate ahead a 
little bit of the merit, the problems we have got. The big problem is 
this: We have got a surrealistic atmosphere here. White House rhetoric 
has way raised expectations, raised up promises this bill cannot meet 
or no bill could probably meet.
  We are going to hear there are some things that have been fixed. We 
are going to hear what I think is the truth, that what was a terrible 
and very counterproductive bill is now a bad bill that is moderately 
counterproductive, but it is still full of fat, and it is still full of 
false promise. We cannot pay for it even though we have cut some of the 
pork out. We have canceled some of the ``Get out of jail free'' cards, 
but we have not at this point given it the full real ``third strike and 
you are in jail'' process, because we have got a foul ball with a third 
felony problem.
  We do not have real truth in sentencing, and we do not have enough 
money for prisons.
  Those are just a few of the problems we are going to hear about.

Rollcall Votes in the Rules Committee on Rules for the Crime Conference 
                                 Report


                       Wednesday, August 10, 1994

       1. Solomon Motion on Three-Day Layover Waiver--A motion not 
     to waive the requirement that conference reports be available 
     to Members for three-days before they are voted on. Rejected: 
     4-6. Yeas: Solomon, Quillen, Dreier and Goss. Nays: Moakley, 
     Derrick, Frost, Bonior, Wheat and Slaughter. Not Voting: 
     Beilenson, Hall and Gordon.
       2. Derrick Motion to Report the Rule--A motion to report 
     the rule that waives all points of order against the 
     conference report and its consideration and dispenses with 
     the reading of the report. Adopted: 6-4. Yeas: Moakley, 
     Derrick, Frost, Bonior, Wheat and Slaughter Nays: Solomon, 
     Quillen, Dreier and Goss. Not Voting: Beilenson, Hall and 
     Gordon.


                        Tuesday, August 16, 1994

       1. Solomon Substitute Rule--A substitute rule to recommit 
     the conference report to conference with instructions to make 
     changes necessary to bring the conference report back within 
     scope, in place of the rule moved by Rep. Derrick waiving the 
     two-thirds vote requirement for the same day consideration of 
     a rule for the consideration or disposition of the crime 
     conference report. Rejected: 3-6. Yeas: Solomon, Quillen and 
     Goss. Nays: Moakley, Derrick, Beilenson, Frost, Wheat and 
     Slaughter. Not Voting: Bonior, Hall, Gordon and Dreier.


                        Sunday, August 21, 1994

       1. Derrick Motion to Report Rule--A motion to report a rule 
     waiving all points of order against the conference report and 
     against its consideration, providing for 80 minutes of 
     debate, and one motion to recommit which may contain 
     instructions if offered by Rep. Michel or a designee. 
     Adopted: 6-4 Yeas: Moakley, Derrick, Beilenson, Frost, Wheat 
     and Slaughter. Nays: Solomon, Quillen, Dreier and Goss. Not 
     Voting: Bonior, Hall and Gordon.

  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, let me just reply to what the previous gentleman has 
said and say that, you know, the chairman of the Committee on the 
Judiciary made the statement that this bill, or various parts of it, 
have been around for 4 years. It has certainly been before this 
Congress since the beginning of this Congress, and it has certainly 
been before this House, and we have been concentrating on it for the 
last week.
  The conference report has been out for several hours, and we on this 
side have yet to see the motion to recommit. So I do not think that is 
a reasonable position to take.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. DERRICK. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, briefly, I agree. I am arguing for more time 
and a more deliberative process. I would love for you to have more time 
to think about the motion to recommit, and I think we should have more 
time to debate what is on the floor, which is the conference report 
which nobody has read.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1\1/2\ 
minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Traficant].
  (Mr. TRAFICANT asked and was given permission to revise and extend 
his remarks.)
  Mr. TRAFICANT. Mr. Speaker, today's debate is good. Division in the 
House is good.
  The problem in America is both parties have gotten so much alike the 
American people cannot tell them apart. Maybe today they can.
  Today's debate is not about pork. Today's debate is not about 
basketball. Today's debate is about guns, and a Congress that cannot 
tackle the politics of guns in America is a Congress that cannot tackle 
the crime problem in America, and also a Congress that cannot govern.
  Ladies and gentlemen, it is very simple. I own a gun. I own a 
semiautomatic weapon. I am a former sheriff. I am against any more 
inroads, but the firepower on the streets is so great, it is greater 
than our own police departments.
  Today and last week we had calls from all over. The NRA called you. 
The police called you. The people who did not make any phone calls, 
though, are buried in graves 6 feet underground. No one got a phone 
call from any of those victims.
  I say today, let us vote for the rule. Let us vote for the bill. Let 
us stand for something.
  And one last thing: When your constituents dial 911, they sure as 
hell do not want to get Charlton Heston on the phone. Think about it.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes, with great pleasure, to the 
distinguished gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Gingrich].
  Mr. Speaker, we are a little bit at odds here. He needed to have a 
copy of the conference report. It turns out we do not have one.
  Mr. GINGRICH. Mr. Speaker, if I could ask the Democratic managers of 
the bill if they could give me, loan me, just for a minute, I will give 
it back immediately, a copy of the conference report. I want to make 
the point to Members we literally on our side of the aisle at this 
moment do not have a copy, which I am told is 7\1/2\ inches thick, I 
mean, the full conference report. I do not mean the amendments. Is that 
the full report?
  I want to start with why Members might be a little reluctant on the 
rule. This is this current conference report, just so the American 
people understand; there is no reason to rush this through except the 
public relations needs of the White House.
  This is the current conference report, done late last night, not 
available. No Member has had a chance to read it through. It is a 
little strange, just as an approach, as a way of governing; it is not 
what they teach.
  I am going to give it back right now to a Democratic staffer so there 
will be no question we on the Republican side would have stolen one of 
the rare copies available right now. Thank you, Jerry, give it back 
over there, and he is temporarily a staffer. We will get him back to 
our side in a minute.
  Let me just share with our colleagues where we are and what has 
happened. Ten days ago the rule was defeated on a very bad bill. The 
rule was defeated because the crime bill written in a secret 
conference, brought to the floor at 7 o'clock at night after Members 
had voted, rushed to the Committee on Rules at 8 o'clock at night, was 
then brought up the next day exactly like today with nobody knowing 
what is in it, and the House said, ``No, we will not take it up,'' and 
it was sent back.

                              {time}  1540

  In the intervening 10 days a lot of negotiations have gone on. I was 
here until 6 a.m. On Saturday morning. I was here until after 2:30 last 
night. And a lot of honest and fair negotiations have gone on. I want 
to frankly praise, maybe at the risk of hurting him in his own caucus, 
but I want to praise Dick Gephardt, who stayed here endlessly, trying 
to find a positive solution. And I want to praise Leon Panetta, who 
came up from the White House and worked tirelessly. I must say that 
people like Mike Castle, John Kasich, Susan Molinari, Rick Lazio, 
Jennifer Dunn, Dick Zimmer, Peter Torkildsen, a lot of people worked 
very hard.
  I have to admit they have improved the bill. Compared to the terrible 
bill that came out 10 days ago, we are up to a sort of bad bill. But it 
is improved. The improvements tell you how terrible the other bill was.
  They have stopped the liberal Democrats' effort to release 16,000 
convicted drug dealers. They have made sure that communities will be 
notified if sexual predators are released from jail. They have added a 
provision for full information about rapists and child molesters in 
cases where the judge determines it is both relevant and reliable.
  They have insisted on block grants. They have cut out $3.3 billion in 
spending. Now, that tells you how terrible the original bill was, that 
with all of that effort they are only about one-third of the way 
through the bill. The truth is the Democratic leadership got exhausted.
  Members who have worked on that and gotten their commitments I think 
have an obligation to help and work on the bill that they worked on so 
hard. But other Members have an equal obligation, which is to read the 
bill carefully, to recognize as George Gekas tells you, that this bill 
in its current form is worse on the death penalty, and if you believe 
in the death penalty it makes it procedurally less likely to be 
sustained than current law.
  To listen to Alan Simpson, he will tell you they knocked out and 
refused to put back in the judge's right to order deportation of 
criminal aliens, convicted criminal aliens. Under this bill, a judge 
will not be able to order the deportation at the time of sentencing. 
Instead they will get out of jail. Armed robbers or rapists, a 
murderer, a drug dealer, will get out of jail as an illegal--convicted 
alien who is now a felon, has to get out of jail before we start the 
deportation process. As a result of which they go on and hide.

  The Democrats would not allow us to put that in the bill to give the 
judge the power to order deportation for convicted criminals.
  This bill still has, as John Manzullo points out, terrible standards 
under community policing, where nonpolice groups are going to define--
community groups will define for the police what police are and whether 
or not they get any money, which is a transfer of power away from the 
police, not to it.
  This bill still has Federal control of prisons in a way that is 
almost goofy.
  Finally, this is, as Bill Goodling has pointed out, the 226th current 
existing Federal juvenile delinquency program. There is another series 
of books on the 150 job training programs.
  We are not against prevention. We just think that prevention done by 
the Federal Government by Federal bureaucrats in Washington, DC, has 
not worked. If it had worked, Lyndon Johnson's Great Society would have 
led to a crime-free society in America.
  We do not particularly want to be browbeat about our lack of concern 
because you are going to have more bureaucrats filling out more 
paperwork to have Washington control more of America.
  I would urge my colleagues, resist the rule and vote ``no.'' If the 
rule does pass, I think there is a good motion to recommit you should 
vote ``yes'' on.
  Reluctantly, I have to say this bill is still not worthy of our vote 
and should not get it on final passage.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, let me say this: That the prior speaker has 
waved around our report. We have had that available for several hours. 
The motion to recommit that he has just suggested we still do not have 
in any printed form. Let me tell you he is asking you to vote for a 
motion to recommit that takes all of the assault weapons out, the 
assault weapons that are killing people on the streets of this country. 
It does away with all for the three-Strikes-and-you're-out, something 
that the people of this country want very much. It does away with the 
death penalty, which the people of this country believe in very 
strongly.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Nevada, [Mr. 
Bilbray].
  Mr. BILBRAY. I thank the gentleman for yielding this time to me.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise because, you know, I voted against the Brady 
bill, I voted against the assault ban because I believe in the second 
amendment. And I know that many feel that this is the No. 1 issue. But 
the No. 1 issue is not the Brady bill, it is not the assault ban issue; 
it is: crime.
  That is why I have been contacted by the Las Vegas Metropolitan 
Police, the largest police agency in the State of Nevada, asking me to 
support this crime bill.
  I have been called by numerous other law enforcement officials, 
D.A.'s, A.G.'s, saying this bill is not perfect and we recognize it is 
not perfect, but we need this bill because 39 percent of the people in 
my district recognize that crime is the No. 1 issue.
  I recognize and support the second amendment, but I realize it is not 
all-encompassing. It is not the biggest issue in the world.
  Fighting crime.
  What is the motion that is going to be made to recommit? It takes out 
the death penalty for cop-killers, it takes out the death penalty for 
drug kingpins, it takes out the death penalty for terrorist murderers.
  We need to pass this bill. We need to turn down the motion to 
recommit and get on with the rest of the business facing Congress in 
this session.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. (Mr. Hoyer). The Chair would advise the 
gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Derrick] has 19\1/2\ minutes 
remaining and the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Goss] has 22 minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished member 
of the Committee on the Judiciary, the gentleman from Florida [Mr. 
McCollum].
  (Mr. McCOLLUM asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. McCOLLUM. I thank the gentleman for yielding this time to me.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to make a point that there were some very well-
intentioned efforts by some Members on my side of the aisle working 
with the majority to try to improve this particular product out here 
today. We started with a bad bill. They improved it some. But 
unfortunately it is still a bad bill.
  The amount of improvement does not justify, in my judgment, and I 
think the majority of my side and quite a number on that side, voting 
for this bill today.
  Let me go through exactly--and I spent hours and hours and hours 
sitting in on all these discussions. I have a pretty good idea of what 
is in here, what exactly we have in the final product and how it is 
different or is not.
  First of all, on the cops on the streets, it is exactly the same as 
came out of the conference committee the last time we had the vote out 
here when we voted the rule down. It was a sham then, it is still a 
sham now. We do not have 100,000 cops in this provision, we have, as 
Professor Emilio says, we have perhaps 20,000 at most, maybe 2,000, 
depending on how you calculate it, the money for it. It is an unfunded 
mandate. We are only paying for a fifth of the cost of these cops. The 
States would have to pay for the other four-fifths.
  It is a very bad provision, as far as police are concerned. And that 
is a third of the $30 billion bill, or almost that.
  Yes, they knocked out $3 billion, but where did they whack it off? 
Prisons. There is less money, no matter how you look at this 
realistically, for prisons on this bill: $7.9 billion for new prison 
construction in this versus $8.5 billion in the original bill of the 
$33 billion amount.
  You will have people arguing about how that is funded or is not 
funded, but it is less money for prisons; $1.8 billion, by the way, is 
still in here for criminal aliens, I will not argue that. But that is 
not for prison construction. But that is less money than the $13 
billion that the House passed; it is less money by far that the Bureau 
of Prisons says is necessary, $10.5 billion to $12 billion for us to 
give to the States so they can build the prison beds necessary to take 
those violent offenders off the streets, lock them up and throw away 
the keys.

  In the prevention area, the Great Society social welfare programs are 
still here. We had a $9 billion amount, roughly, that was in that 
original proposal that we voted the rule down on. We now have somewhere 
in the neighborhood of $7 billion. So they changed it by $2 billion, 
but there is still $7 billion.
  You still have model-intensive grants at $625 million, without any 
definition of what you are going to use the money for; 15 cities get 
this divided up however the Attorney General wants. And you still have 
$567 million for the so-called community schools for teaching art 
classes, dance lessons, and community involvement money here that is a 
little bit less than before, but it is still there. It should be in the 
HUD program. On and on.
  Local Partnership Act might be improved around the edges, $1.6 
billion still.
  What is not in this bill? There has never been in this bill any 
reform that would end the endless appeals of death row inmates; there 
has never been a bill out here that the public wants with respect to 
changing the laws of search and seizure so that the rules of evidence 
would permit us to get the evidence in to convict where people are 
getting off on technicalities.
  And we did not do anything, as Mr. Gingrich said, that should have 
been done to allow the expediting, getting rid of criminal aliens who 
have been convicted. We could have done it. It was a Simpson provision 
in the Senate bill. They had already passed that in the Immigration 
Subcommittee in its form. It is beyond me why we do not address 
criminal aliens.

                              {time}  1550

  And there is nothing in here we did not accept even though the motion 
to instruct was out here on the floor.
  There is nothing in here that will make it a Federal law to commit a 
crime across this country using a gun. The gun itself, the use of the 
gun, should be a crime with a minimum mandatory penalty for that, was 
in the Senate bill, something we passed on the floor; it is not in 
here.
  And, as has been said, there is nothing in here of the Gekas 
provision that would really make the death penalty provisions work 
where the aggravating factors outweigh the mitigating factors. By golly 
there ought to be a death penalty for sure when that is decided.
  This is a weak bill. It was a bad bill, as I said, to begin with when 
it came out. It is still a bad bill now. It has been modestly improved; 
I give credit for those who did it, but the fact of the matter is this 
bill is still a very bad bill, and the rule should be voted down, and 
this thing should be sent back to conference to get rid of the Great 
Society social welfare programs and put some money in prisons and law 
enforcement, where it should be.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 2 
minutes to the distinguished chairman of the Committee on the 
Judiciary, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Brooks].
  Mr. BROOKS. Mr. Speaker, I want to say that it is kind of difficult 
to believe that for the last 10 days what has held this crime bill up 
is not whether one is for or against the legislation, whether one even 
wants the House to vote on it at all. I say to my colleagues, ``Don't 
delude yourself into thinking the American public is impressed with 
this maneuver. No, the procedural vote isn't about whether to gut 2 
years of work; it's about throwing away almost 4 years of work.''
  As the American people continue to live in constant fear in their 
workplace, in their neighborhoods, yes, even in their very homes, many 
Members have had their share of disappointments in the process of 
crafting this rather historic bill. Most of my colleagues are keenly 
aware of my own profound disappointment at the inclusion of what I call 
the ill-conceived ban on assault weapons so broadly cast as to insult 
the dignity and the good name of legitimate law-abiding gun owners all 
across the country. I was outvoted by both sides in the conference in 
attempting to strip out this punitive ban. An amendment to bring some 
sanity to the ban was rejected by the U.S. Senate conferees, and to 
this day I say plainly that the assault ban provision should never, 
never have been included in a crime bill. It was not in the crime bill 
we passed in the House.
  Two hurricanes in one bill spawns a lot of tornadoes, but now should 
we vote to prevent Congress from even voting on whether to put a 
hundred thousand cops on the streets of our towns and cities or to deny 
consideration of funds for our States to build prisons so they can put 
away violent offenders for good? No, I am not going to do that on a 
procedural vote, and I say, ``If you want to go back home, say you 
voted for gridlock and against the crime bill, here is your chance. 
Vote against the rule.'' I urge my colleagues to support this rule.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker I yield such time as he may consume to the 
distinguished gentleman from Colorado [Mr. Allard].
  (Mr. ALLARD asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. ALLARD. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the rule and the 
same old soft-shoe solutions in the crime bill. I support the bill with 
real solutions--the Brewster-Hunter alternative bill.
  Mr. Speaker, for the first time in several months we finally have 
before us a bare-bones, back to basics, honest-to-gosh, crime bill. Why 
can not the President and House leadership acknowledge that the 
Brewster-Hunter crime bill addresses the problem in a way that the 
American people can support?
  I have said for months, to those who would listen, that I want to do 
something about crime and that I will vote for a bill that gets tough 
on criminals, cuts down on legal loopholes for sharp defense lawyers, 
and helps State and local police departments.
  In the Brewster-Hunter crime bill you will find a lot of things 
designed to punish criminals and cut down on crime. But more important 
is what you will not find. You will not find close to $8 billion in new 
social spending for things like midnight basketball, dance lessons, and 
art classes.
  But perhaps most importantly, the Brewster-Hunter bill does not 
contain a host of new, unfunded Federal mandates to State and local 
governments. You will find a bunch of new mandates in the President's 
package--requiring local governments to spend more without having a 
means to pay for them.
  Lastly, what you will not find in the Brewster-Hunter bill are a 
bunch of last minute, Christmas tree ornaments that have nothing to do 
with crime. You will not find an earmark for a $10 million new building 
on a college campus--like you will find in the President's bill.
  The crime bill should not be about gun control--the House has dealt 
with that issue in separate legislation. Neither should the debate be 
about establishing new racial quotas for administering the death 
penalty.

  The Duncan-Brewster bill is 100 percent fat-free. Instead of mandates 
it provides grants for building new prisons and hiring additional 
police officers. The bill also provides funding to border patrols to 
crack down on illegal aliens. It stiffens penalties on sex offenders, 
reforms the excruciatingly slow habeas corpus appeals process, and 
provides a good faith exception to the exclusionary rule, which now 
allows critical evidence to be tossed out on a technicality.
  In summary, Mr. Speaker, what you do not find in the Brewster-Hunter 
bill is just as important as what you do find. And what I do find, and 
what the American people will find, is that this is the kind of crime 
bill worthy of support. Therefore, I oppose the rule and H.R. 3355 
provided for in this resolution.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Sensenbrenner], a member of the 
committee.
  (Mr. SENSENBRENNER asked and was given permission to revise and 
extend his remarks.)
  Mr. SENSENBRENNER. Mr. Speaker, this is not a question of gridlock. 
This is a question of doing it right. And this bill is not right. I 
would like to address the funding fraud in this bill.
  The first conference committee report that was not considered 
contained a total authorization of about $33\1/2\ billion and contained 
a trust fund of approximately $30.2 to $30.4 billion. We call the 
difference between the total authorized amount and the actual real 
money contained in this bill funny money because everybody in the 
conference committee knew that, while we authorized these programs, the 
Congress would not appropriate the money to fund them. So, after the 
rule was voted down, the President said, ``Well, let's have a 10-
percent cut, and let's bring the total cost of this bill down to about 
$30.2 billion.'' That really did not save the American taxpayers much 
money, if any, at all, and here is why:
  Because most of the cut was in funny money, money that never would 
have been spent, money that never would have been appropriated. So, as 
a result, the port, the fat, the amount of money that is taken out of 
the hide of the taxpayers of the United States of America, really is 
reduced by, at most, $200 million under the most generous estimate, 
and, at least, by nothing at all. This is the type of charade that the 
American people do not like, and it seems to me that, if we are to cut 
the fat out of this bill, and we are to pass a lean and mean bill that 
the American taxpayers cannot support, let us talk about cutting real 
money rather than talking about funding money.
  Mr. Speaker, the bill that is behind the motion to recommit does 
that, and I would urge the Congress to support it. Failing that, I 
would urge that this bill be rejected and the rule be voted down.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1\1/2\ 
minutes to the gentleman from New Mexico [Mr. Richardson].
  (Mr. RICHARDSON asked and was given permission to revise and extend 
his remarks.)
  Mr. RICHARDSON. Mr. Speaker, the greatest opponent we have is 
gridlock, and the lesson of this bipartisan compromise on crime is that 
Democrats and Republicans can work together despite all the histrionics 
of the last week. If we put the people above special interests and 
partisanship, we can get things done.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask, ``Why can't we do the same thing on health care 
before it's too late, or welfare reform, or Haiti, or Bosnia, or the 
present crisis in Cuba?''
  Mr. Speaker, the Gingrich-Hunter bill, this is what it does: No death 
penalty, no three strikes you're out, no Violence Against Women Act, no 
pawnbroker Brady exemption, no police score, no criminal alien 
reimbursement, no Molinari provision, no crime prevention money, no 
funding for Federal law enforcement, no funding for Federal or State 
prosecutors, no Byrne grant funding, and no rural crime control.
  Mr. Speaker, we have a chance to end gridlock. Let us go home and 
pass a crime bill.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hyde].
  Mr. HYDE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. HYDE. Mr. Speaker, my colleagues, I just wonder when that myth is 
going to be put to rest that there are a 100,000 cops in this bill. 
Anybody who can add and subtract and is willing to do so can figure out 
there are 20,000 cops in this bill, and spread that out across the 
country, and it will not make much of a dent in crime.
  Now the problem with this bill is there is $7 billion still in there 
for social welfare spending, and I do not think it is cynical of us to 
say we do not object to the programs, we object to the redundancy. 
There are 266 programs now out there, funded and being operated, 
targeted to youth. I have got the book here, my colleagues. It is a 
telephone book of existing programs at $25 billion a year.
  Now what we are doing is proliferating, not consolidating. We should 
consolidate, make them more efficient, simplify them, make them 
effective. Instead we just spray them out like a hose. Is that being 
cynical?
  I ask my colleagues, ``Why is it wrong to take seriously your solemn 
pledge to your constituents that you are going to fight unnecessary 
wasteful spending?'' That is all we are doing.
  The programs were for prevention, and I say to my colleagues, ``I'm 
for arts and crafts and learning how to crochet, if that's your thing, 
but I will say this: You'll never learn the difference between right 
from wrong, shooting a free throw. It just won't happen.''
  Now liberals who have dominated this country since the great days of 
FDR are bewildered by the unexpected explosion of criminality.

                              {time}  1600

  They believe that if they level incomes, if they take care of you 
from cradle to grave, if they give you health care, you are going to be 
a fine person and the criminal impulses will just go away. And they 
cannot understand why that has not worked out.
  Their answers to the social pathologies that are the direct result of 
the excesses of the liberal welfare state is more of the same. Have you 
forgotten Lyndon Johnson's Great Society, the omnibus crime bill, and 
Straight Streets Act of 1968? It, too, was this thick; millions of 
dollars for the same programs, and the statistics keep mounting.
  The scientific method is as you look at something, you observe it, 
you see how it works, and then you alter your approach according to the 
results. We just keep sending the programs out. You wonder why.
  We live in a society where the only sin is smoking; it may be 
despoiling the environment; in high schools, where condoms are more 
available than anything else in the buildings; and if you flash a copy 
of the Ten Commandments, you get sued or arrested. That is what is 
wrong with society. And you have no answer to that.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 2 
minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Delaware [Mr. Castle].
  Mr. CASTLE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, we all are coming at this from our own perspective. My 
perspective is having gone home last week after having voted no on the 
rule, and I sat down, and for the first time I was able to read through 
the entire conference report. In that conference report I saw the 
nuggets of what could be a good crime bill for the entire United States 
of America. Not Republicans, not Democrats, not Delaware, not 
California, but everybody in the United States of America.
  I came to the realization if we sat down and worked together, that we 
could make the changes which are necessary in order to put together a 
package which is going to benefit those people even more.
  A group of us, some on the Republican side and some on the Democratic 
side, have reached out and joined hands in an effort to improve this 
piece of legislation. We decided that if we were able to work together, 
that we could do this.
  I come from a background of having been a Governor, of having been 
involved in the execution of prisoners, having dealt with truth in 
sentencing coming into effect when I was Governor of the State of 
Delaware, with expanding our police.
  But I also dealt with the areas of prevention. I realized in the so-
called prevention programs, which are such a problem for everybody, we 
have a program called dealing with women in violence. I do not think 
any of us can be against trying to help with that particular problem in 
this country. We have drug treatment for criminals in that area. Do we 
want people still using narcotics to get out of our prisons? I think 
that is a very dangerous thing as well.
  We realized where we would have to give in certain different areas in 
order to make this work, but we would have to gain things back. Yes, I 
believe there was too much pork, there were too many social programs. 
And we went in and negotiated out about 25 percent of those programs, 
or some $2 billion, in order to make it better from that perspective as 
well.
  Should we give money to the States? We have made the decision to do 
that. This bill has in it police, it has in it prisons, it has in it 
efforts for us as a group to reach back into our communities and to 
help people prevent the ravages of what can happen to them if crimes 
are committed against them.
  It is a good piece of legislation. There are other good pieces of 
legislation. There may be alternatives to this, I do not know. But we 
have looked at this carefully and it is indeed a piece of legislation 
which has a bipartisan effort in it. That is significant as well. It 
has shown by working together we can take a bill that maybe one side 
will not like or the other side will not like, and we can put the 
elements together, which can make a difference, so that we can come 
back and say to everybody in this country, this is a bill which 
represents all those best interests.
  Yes, there may be some things we would criticize, but this is a bill 
we should support. So I would urge all of us to support the rule and 
support the crime bill conference report.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, a member of the 
committee, Mr. Gekas.
  (Mr. GEKAS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. GEKAS. Mr. Speaker, if I did not know better, I would believe 
that the author of this bill was David Copperfield, the magician-
illusionist. Because by one wave of the wand, an anti-crime bill is 
turned into a massive spending bill. A crime bill that does not address 
death row appeals, where Americans see people lined up on death row 
filing appeal after appeal for years, avoiding the final penalty, for a 
vicious killing perpetrated by one of these convicted killers. This 
bill has not even addressed that, or begun to address that serious 
problem.
  Here is a bill, a fighting crime bill, that does not in the least 
address the problem of the exclusionary rule, where a convict caught 
redhanded in the perpetration of a crime goes in front of a judge, and 
because of some technicality, the judge dismisses the case, and the 
criminal leaves the courtroom laughing at the judge, laughing at the 
system of justice, and laughing at everybody in the country.
  This crime bill does not address that serious problem. Ask the 
American people. Are they concerned about it? They certainly are.
  Then you take the insult that was perpetrated by the framing of the 
rule and the final action of the conference, where this House adopted 
overwhelmingly the Gekas amendments to the death penalty. What are 
they? Are they just something that I dreamed up?
  I took the language from the various States where the death penalty 
has been approved constitutionally and simply transformed that into the 
pending legislation for the death penalty which we are considering.
  Is that not the right thing to do? If the Supreme Court has said that 
Pennsylvania and Texas and X and Y States in their instructions to the 
jury on the death penalty using this particular format is 
constitutional, the Supreme Court says so, why not lift that language 
and put it in our death penalty bill?
  The House agreed with that. We adopted the Gekas amendments for that 
very same purpose. Then what happens? The leaders of the Committee on 
the Judiciary on the House side, the conferees, rejected it, rebuked 
the action by the full House, and did not even offer to consider it in 
conference. So now we have a death penalty that takes a great gamble, a 
great chance, as to whether or not it is constitutional.
  Mr. Speaker, this rule should be defeated until we do things right.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1 
minute to the gentleman from California [Mr. Edwards], the chairman of 
the Subcommittee on Civil and Constitutional Rights of the Committee on 
the Judiciary.
  Mr. EDWARDS of California. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for 
yielding me this time.
  Mr. Speaker, perhaps one would think that I would be against this 
bill because two of the important portions of the bill that did not 
make it that were reported from my subcommittee, racial justice and 
habeas corpus, lost. They did not make it; they are not a part of the 
bill. Both of them should be in the bill. Racial discrimination in 
sentencing is a national disgrace.
  However, I think that in the last 30 years I have never voted for one 
of these bills before. But I am going to vote for this bill. I am going 
to support the rule, and I am going to support the bill.
  Why? Because for the first time in a crime bill, we are reaching down 
in our society for the roots to cure the problems in our society that 
result in all of this crime. All of the other bills have been more 
prisons, more punishments. For the first time, we have a preventive 
program. My colleagues, they will work. They will work, because they 
will go into the drug problem in this country. The drug problem in this 
country is filling our jails. Sixty percent of the prisoners in Federal 
penitentiaries today are drug problems. Seventy percent next year.
  Mr. Speaker, support the rule, support the bill.
  Mr. Speaker, as a member of the conference committee, I would like to 
explain the intent of the conferees with respect to several provisions 
in the conference report that arose out of, or directly concern, 
matters within the jurisdiction of my subcommittee.
  First, driver privacy.--The conference report includes a provision 
establishing certain protections for information supplied to State 
motor vehicle departments by motor vehicle registrants or drivers. 
Mechanisms have been provided for individuals to be made aware of their 
right to restrict access to this information about themselves. Where a 
State establishes an opt-out mechanism and individuals do not act to 
limit access to this information, a procedure has been put in place for 
the disclosure of this information to a variety of users, including 
bulk users for marketing purposes.
  As I explained when the House originally approved this provision on 
April 20 of this year, our intent is to give the States flexibility in 
administering, implementing and operating an opt-out mechanism. The 
conferees have made it abundantly clear that individuals must be made 
aware ``in a clear and conspicuous manner'' of the right to restrict 
access to information about themselves. This notice may be provided in 
accompanying materials the State provides for the individuals to fill 
out with whatever form the State uses for issuance or renewal of 
operator's permits, title, registrations, etc. Use by the State of a 
clear and conspicuous accompanying form would be appropriate where the 
actual form for issuance or renewal does not have enough space to set 
forth the opt-out.
  It should be noted that the ability to restrict access to personal 
information from State motor vehicle records is not intended to impede 
those States that choose to implement opt-out systems from funding 
``flagged'' lists to multipurpose users. Additionally, States would not 
be restricted from utilizing third party service providers for this 
purpose.
  I also want to make it very clear that this legislation should not be 
seen in any way as a precedent for limiting open access to other public 
records. An individual cannot conceal a license plate when traveling by 
automobile. In the case of other records, those concerned about their 
privacy may be able to take reasonable steps to withhold their name and 
address from strangers and thus limit access to personally identifiable 
information. Therefore, this legislation has been crafted to apply only 
to specific personal information contained in motor vehicle records. It 
does not apply to any other system of public records maintained by 
State and local governments, nor is it intended to provide any 
inference or precedent for limiting access to such open, public 
records.
  Second, material support for terrorism.--I would also like to take 
this opportunity to discuss the section on material support for 
terrorism contained in this bill. The intent of the conferees is to 
provide a very narrow criminal statute for a very specifically defined 
category of acts in support of terrorism. This provision is not 
intended to authorize wide-ranging investigations of groups of 
activists in this country.
  During the Gulf war, the FBI conducted a number of inappropriate 
interviews of leading members of the Arab-American community. Without 
any basis other than their ethnic background, Arab-Americans were asked 
about their political beliefs and whether they knew any terrorists or 
anyone who wanted to blow up a Federal building. These interviews cast 
a cloud of suspicion over the entire community. I want it to be 
perfectly clear that the material support provision in the conference 
report should not be viewed as providing any authority for such 
interviews in the future.
  I would also like to make clear that the conferees do not intend 
these provisions to be read in any way as supporting the Government's 
position in the deportation case against Palestinians in Los Angeles, 
which has become known as the ``LA Eight'' case. In that case, the 
defendants provided support for the legal, humanitarian and political 
activities of a group that also committed terrorist acts. They are not 
accused of ``knowing or intending'' that their support be used in the 
preparation or carrying out of a crime as required by this bill.
  Nonetheless, the INS is perusing the deportations based on what I 
believe is an erroneous interpretation of the Immigration Act. Nothing 
in the conference report should be read as providing support for the 
Government's interpretation of the immigration laws in the LA Eight 
case. To the contrary, the conference report indicates that political 
and fund-raising activities are not to be considered support for 
terrorism.
  Third, registration of sex offenders.--Finally, I would like to 
explain the provision to encourage the States to adopt registration 
programs for certain sex offenders. The conference report language is 
modeled in some respects after the Washington State statute on sex 
offender registration. In particular, the community notification 
provision in the conference report is drawn from the Washington State 
law. The conferees intend that the community registration provision in 
the conference report be given the same interpretation that the 
Washington Supreme Court gave to the community notification provision 
in the Washington State law. In State v. Ward, 123 Wash. 2d 488, 869 P. 
2d 1062 (1994), the State Supreme Court held that the language in the 
Washington statute authorizing the release of ``relevant'' information 
when ``necessary for public protection'' ``placed significant limits on 
first, whether an agency may disclose registrant information, second, 
what the agency may disclose, and third, where it may disclose the 
information.''
  The conferees intend, as the Washington State legislature intended, 
to limit the disclosure of relevant information to the public to those 
circumstances which present a threat to public safety. As the 
Washington State Supreme Court held, ``We note that the statute, on its 
face, requires the disclosing agency to have some evidence that the 
offender poses a threat to the community. Absent evidence of such a 
threat, disclosure would serve no legitimate purpose.''
  We disclosure is appropriate, the Washington court noted, ``the 
statute also limits what a public warning may disclose.'' The 
``relevant and necessary'' standard ``imposes an obligation to release 
registrant information reasonably necessary to counteract the danger 
created by the particular offender.''
  Finally, the conferees intend, as did the Washington State 
legislature, that the disclosure must be rationally related to the 
furtherance of the goal of public safety. ``Accordingly,'' the court 
held, ``the geographic scope of dissemination must rationally relate to 
the threat posed by the registered offender. Depending on the 
particular methods of an offender, an agency might decide to limit 
disclosure only to the surrounding neighborhood, or to schools and day 
care centers, or, in cases of immediate or imminent risk of harm, the 
public at large.''
  The provision in the conference report also allows dissemination to 
governmental agencies conducting background checks for employment and 
screening purposes. The provision is not intended to preempt the rules 
that individual States may have for conducting such checks. 
Specifically, the provision does not preempt State requirements that 
applicants be fingerprinted or that a fee be paid for employment or 
licensing checks.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished 
gentleman from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania [Mr. Goodling], a 
member of the conference committee.
  (Mr. GOODLING asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. GOODLING. I thank the gentleman for yielding. I think the 
greatest disservice we may have done to this institution during this 
last week, both in 1-minutes and in special orders and also in our 
debate last week, is to somehow or other indicate to the American 
public that we in this Congress in the last 30 years have had no 
concern about preventive efforts as far as young people at risk.

                              {time}  1610

  I happen to be a former teacher, counselor, coach, principal, and I 
know all about the need for preventive efforts.
  What we have done is we have overdone, overkilled the whole 
preventive business and, therefore, get nothing for our buck.
  At it was mentioned, there are 266 programs on the books. Later on, I 
will enumerate that everyone that was in the program that we had before 
us last week is already on the books.
  I have been down here pleading for the last 2 years, every time 
somebody comes up they want to get their name on a new program.
  I come down and I say, ``Do you realize it is already authorized? Do 
you realize it is already appropriated?''
  They are very kind, very nice. ``Yes, we realize that.'' And there is 
another one on the book.
  So they make an application for everyone. They cannot commingle any 
funds or they will probably be in jail and, therefore, there is no 
effective program out there, even though we spend billions.
  Let us consolidate once and for all.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Coyne].
  (Mr. COYNE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. COYNE. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the rule and the bill.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1 
minute to the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Torricelli].
  Mr. TORRICELLI. Mr. Speaker, at some point in this debate no matter 
on which side we find ourselves, we must ask, what is wrong with us? 
What is wrong with a society with such decent people to achieve such an 
extraordinary standard of living that we not only commit more robberies 
than any other country but more than most in the industrialized world 
combined. Not simply kill more of our federal citizens but more than 
all of our allies combined.
  I know too many of my colleagues, they believe that the answer is 
more jails. This bill builds more jails. It hires more police. It 
provides for death penalties. But in fact, we must admit to ourselves, 
if these were the answers, we would not have more, we would have less. 
Because we already have more police and more jails. There is something 
much more fundamentally wrong.
  Certainly, that something is American life, the providing of boys 
clubs, of recreational opportunities, summer jobs, some training goes 
to the essential truth that people with options, people with choices in 
life, people who live decent lives do not commit crimes.
  This bill does both. It deserves our support.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished 
gentleman from California [Mr. Cox].
  Mr. COX. Mr. Speaker, I would like to address my colleague's 
question, what is wrong with this bill?
  It brings to mind George Kennedy and Paul Newman in that movie ``Cool 
Hand Luke'', when they stood in the chain gang and the boss man said, 
``What we have here is a failure to communicate.''
  The American people have said, we are made as hell and we are not 
going to take it anymore. And Congress is about to deliver a crime bill 
that says, we are miffed and annoyed and we really do not stand for 
anything anymore.
  We have got to get tough with the problem of crime, and that is why a 
bipartisan group, substantial group of our membership here have put 
together elements of the Hunter-Brewster bill that we would like the 
conference committee to consider for inclusion.
  A motion to recommit will not pass Hunter-Brewster. It will give the 
conference committee the opportunity to include the following 
provisions, all of which are missing from the bill that is before us 
now:
  Eliminate the enormous legal loophole called the exclusionary rule, a 
criminal trial should not be a game. It should be a deadly serious 
effort to find out the truth.
  Second, let us eliminate the endless appeals through the reform of 
what we call habeas corpus.
  Third, let us cut the Federal strings on local control of justice.
  Fourth, let us support strengthening the Border Patrol to deal with 
the problem of criminal aliens. Let us replace the expansive parole 
system we have got with truth-in-sentencing.
  These are some of the most important elements of Hunter-Brewster. The 
American people have said they want a crime bill with teeth in it. Let 
us not given them polygrip.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1 
minute to the distinguished gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Kasich].
  Mr. KASICH. Mr. Speaker, we will come back to do this in greater 
detail later. Last week we defeated the conference report because we 
said there was too much spending, too little for prisons, not enough 
for police. And we needed to cut social spending.
  And what was the bipartisan compromise that we have reached? We have 
decreased the total cost of this bill from $33.5 down to $30.2 billion. 
We thought there was too much spending. We have reduced it. The trust 
fund spending for prisons and incarcerated aliens has gone up from $8.3 
to $9.7 billion. We said we did not spend enough on prisons. We have 
increased prisons.
  We said that there was not enough money for police. There was a 
proposal to cut police. That proposal was rejected, and we will spend 
$8.8 billion to put police on the street.
  We said there was too much spending for social programs. We went in 
and we negotiated the social spending programs and forced the Democrats 
to concede to us. And we reduced the total amount of social spending 
from $5.9 billion to $4.3 billion. We cut total social spending by $2.5 
billion, $2.5 billion in this House.
  My colleagues, this is what the folks at home have been asking for. 
We will come back in greater detail to explain this, but we achieved 
what it was that kept us from passing the conference report last week. 
We made the fixes. We made the changes.
  This ought to be passed.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished 
gentlewoman from Washington [Ms. Dunn].
  Ms. DUNN. Mr. Speaker, 10 days ago a bipartisan majority decided that 
we were rushing to consider a crime bill that was costly and misguided. 
Let's talk about what's has changed.
  The bill we were given 10 days ago was being rammed through the House 
without time for review. Nothing's changed. We are trying to ram 
another bill through that no Member has read. This rule is no 
different.
  My constituents and my crime control advisors have been clear; they 
want more police, more prisons, community notification when violent sex 
offenders are released--and beyond that they want the Federal 
Government to get out of the way.
  Ten days ago, many of us complained that the conference report had 
cut prison funding below the level of the House bill. Nothing has 
changed. The House bill had $13.5 billion for prisons, this one has 
$9.7 billion.
  We said then that the claim of funding 100,000 police was a sham. It 
is still a sham. Just 20,000 police--not 100,000--are fully funded. It 
is still a hoax.
  Ten days ago a bipartisan majority decided that the crime bill had $7 
billion for social programs that would not reduce crime. Two-thirds of 
that money remains.
  Ten days ago I rose to complain about bogus language that supposedly 
allowed local police to notify a community when a sexual predator was 
released into their midst. After nearly 4 hours of tough negotiations, 
we conferees finally succeeded in reinserting true community 
notification language that should have been there in the first place--
language that had been approved by 407 Members of the House, and 
unanimously accepted in the Senate. No question, this is one small 
victory for the women and families in this nation.
  But, Mr. Speaker, the bill we are considering is a massive bill that 
still misrepresents the number of police it funds, that still 
underfunds prisons, and that still overfunds 266 duplicative social 
programs that don't stop crime!
  The American people deserve better. Defeat this rule, and give 
America a serious crime bill.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1 
minute to the gentleman from New York [Mr. Flake].
  (Mr. FLAKE asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. FLAKE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today as a clergyman. And one would 
ask the question, where do I stand on this bill because it has death 
penalty provisions in it?
  I answer the question simply that the reality is when we talk about 
the death penalty, on the one hand we talk about those who are on death 
row. But on the other hand we talk about those who are in the 
communities who are dying every day.
  As a clergyman, I stand beside the coffins of young people who have 
not been given an opportunity to live.
  Given that juxtaposition, it makes sense to me that we start dealing 
with the reality of the problems faced by people in those communities.
  Additionally, for those who talk about social programing, we need 
more cops, we need more jails simply because the recidivism rate is so 
high. Too many young people go into jail and come out without any 
rehabilitation. Come to the streets where there are no programs for 
them.
  The programs are designed so that they might be able to get the 
skills so they do not keep coming back to jail. If we could keep them 
out of jail, we do not need the cops. We do not need the jails.

                              {time}  1620

  We can create a society where everybody understands the kind of 
values that are just for each and every citizen of this country. I ask 
that we support both the rule and the bill today, because I think it is 
important that we now have an equal balance that gives an opportunity 
to rehabilitate, while at the same time creating an opportunity for 
those who do not have it.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1 
minute to the distinguished gentleman from New York [Mr. Schumer].
  (Mr. SCHUMER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. Speaker, the vote on this rule is the gridlock-
buster. There are no excuses left, no cover to hide behind. We have 
negotiated around the clock in a very arduous process with all sides 
from both parties. Every issue and every program in the bill has been 
gone over with a microscope. There are no excuses left. We know, and 
the American people know, that a vote against this rule can only be a 
vote for gridlock and a vote against good government, a vote for 
partisan politics and against public interest, and worst of all, a vote 
against this rule will be a vote against the tens and thousands of men, 
women, and children whose lives will be saved by the measures, both 
punishment and prevention, that are in this bill.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished 
gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Manzullo].
  Mr. MANZULLO. Mr. Speaker, envision the Attorney General being in 
charge of State prisons, not only as to the manner of operation of 
them, but with regard to the construction materials and architectural 
plans. Under sections 20101(b)(4) and 20406(c)(1), those are exactly 
the powers that are given.
  This bill is fatally flawed, because any Governor who accepts funds 
for prisons under this bill must accede to the fact that the Attorney 
General knows better than that Governor with regard to how to run that 
prison.
  Mr. Speaker, that is why this bill must be defeated. That is why this 
rule must be defeated, because what the plain language of the bill says 
is the Attorney General must have assurances of a comprehensive 
correctional plan on how to manage and operate a correctional facility. 
That literally means the federalization of the State prison system in 
this country.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1 
minute to the gentlewoman from Connecticut [Mrs. Kennelly].
  (Mrs. KENNELLY asked and was given permission to revise and extend 
her remarks.)
  Mrs. KENNELLY. Mr. Speaker, today we again debate the crime bill. 
Much we agree upon. Violent criminals belong in jail. Assault weapons 
should not be in the hands of gang members. We need more police.
  However, Mr. Speaker, as this debate goes on, we have much 
disagreement. It is very clear that we are far apart, so I ask my 
colleagues to remember one meeting among the many meetings that were 
held last week, the meeting where we met with the police chiefs and 
mayors from across this country.
  Mr. Speaker, mayors have the hardest job in this United States. They 
want to do their job, and they said to us, ``We need help,'' 
Republicans and Democratic mayors.
  To be a police chief, you had to have been a tough cop. You had to be 
able to understand crime. These police chiefs asked us, in fact, they 
literally pleaded with us, to give them help. They had run out of their 
assets.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues today to pass this bill, to send 
help to those that need it in fighting crime, the good people of this 
country.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished 
gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Hoke].
  Mr. HOKE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me.
  Mr. Speaker, a remarkable thing happened after we defeated the rule 
on this bill a week and a half ago. That was that many of us went home 
and read it.
  Members heard the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Manzullo] say that he 
has read it; they heard the gentleman from Delaware [Mr. Castle] say 
that he has read it; and I have read it. An amazing thing, we all got 
to read the bill.
  Some of us came up with one set of conclusions, others came up with a 
different set of conclusions. The fact is that without reading the 
bill, we cannot know what it in it. When we do read the bill, we find 
out that maybe there are things we like, maybe there are things we do 
not like.
  Mr. Speaker, what we have done with this rule that is so bad, and the 
reason that I am going to vote against it, is that we have once again 
waived the 3-legislative-day requirement that must take place before we 
can actually vote on a conference report. Why do we do that?
  Mr. Speaker, we waived the requirement that there be 3 legislative 
days between the publishing of the conference report and the voting on 
that report. The reason we made these House rules in the first place is 
so that not only us, not only these Members in this House, but also the 
public and the media have the opportunity to find out what is in the 
bill. If we know what is in the bill, then we can, in the case of this 
particular bill, defeat it.
  Mr. Speaker, I am opposed to it. I do not want it. It is social 
spending. It should not be there. However, without knowing--and let me 
finish by saying one final thing, that the chairman, the distinguished 
chairman, challenged me. He said, ``If in fact that waiver is restored, 
will you vote for the rule?'' I said, ``If you will commit to giving me 
that restoration of the waiver, then I will vote for the rule.'' He 
refused to make that commitment.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, 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. Speaker, after many days and nights of hard work 
by Members of both parties, we can do the right thing today. We can 
vote for the safety of our families and against partisan politics and 
special interests. Let us give ordinary citizens, people more concerned 
about their family's safety than with scoring political points, what 
they want, what they deserve, and what they need--this crime bill.
  For example, Mr. Speaker, look at just one provision on the 
prevention side of this bill. Some $1.6 billion out of $6.9 billion, 
almost one-quarter of the total, is devoted to fighting violence 
against women. Social spending? Pork? No way. States and local 
governments can use these funds to hire new police officers and 
prosecutors, or to train existing cops and prosecutors, not social 
workers. If you are serious about fighting domestic violence, you must 
support this bill.
  Finally, Mr. Speaker, after all this debate, all the objections to 
this bill--racial justice, death penalties, three strikes, habeas, 
sexual predators, whatever--it has come down to the fight to ban 
assault weapons.
  Today, Mr. Speaker, we should say ``no'' to those who traffic in fear 
and misinformation and weapons of war. Vote ``yes'' for the rule, vote 
``yes'' for the bill.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from Texas [Mr. Armey], the conference chairman for our 
party.
  Mr. ARMEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to 
me.
  Mr. Speaker, this is not a good crime bill.
  Last week, we stopped a bill from coming to the floor that spent $33 
billion and would have made the Nation less safe, and we did the right 
thing.
  Today, we are back with a still inadequate bill, made less bad 
because some Republicans were finally allowed to have some input.
  I appreciate the changes made by my Republican colleagues, but their 
input, as good as it is, is still too little, too late, and not enough 
to make this a good crime bill.
  What we now have is a $30 billion bill that does some good things and 
uses a waiver of the Budget Act, in this rule, to get to the floor.
  We should not waive the Budget Act to deficit spend $30 billion and 
do so little to make America safe.
  Vote ``no'' on the rule.
  Vote ``yes'' on the motion to recommit. And I ask my Republican 
colleagues who will support the rule to support the bipartisan motion 
to recommit as well, because while you have helped make the crime bill 
less bad, we still can do better.
  Failing that, vote ``no'' on final passage. Those are good tough-on-
crime votes.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1 
minute to the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Hughes].
  (Mr. HUGHES asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. HUGHES. Mr. Speaker, I do not think the American public is 
confused about what is going on. One week ago, two weeks ago, the hue 
and cry around here was we need a bipartisan bill. We spent the last 2 
nights working with Republicans in developing a bipartisan bill. Who 
did we not satisfy? We did not satisfy the NRA. Have Members been back 
to look at their faxes, been answering the telephone? It is the NRA 
again. They now have another one, their last hurrah. They now have 
another one. The next one is a motion to recommit. That is the new 
diversion.
  Let me tell you, folks, it is an improved bill in many respects, and 
we also took out some awful provisions in my judgment in the 
negotiations. One of them was a sexual predator provision, which is 
unworkable. I have been in contact with the attorney general's office 
in Washington State, where this is borrowed from. They tell us that it 
is unworkable, a hodgepodge of inconsistent provisions. It is limited 
to attacks upon strangers--listen to this--strangers and those who have 
developed a relationship for the primary purpose of victimization, two 
categories. If it is a neighbor, they do not have to register. If it is 
a relative, they do not have to register. How in the world is any 
prosecutor going to show that anybody developed a relationship for the 
primary purpose of victimization?
  I support notification. We are not going to have it with the 
Washington State approach that has been developed.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1 
minute to the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Eshoo].
  Ms. ESHOO. Mr. Speaker, I rise to urge my colleagues to support this 
rule to allow the House to pass the crime bill.
  Last week women Senators and House Members held a press conference to 
support the assault weapons ban and we heard stories from constituents 
who have lost their spouses as a result of deadly assault weapons.
  I wish the NRA had been there. I wish they could have stepped up to 
the microphone, looked these people in the eye, and explained why they 
will not relent.
  This legislation puts more police on our streets, more prison 
capacity in our States, more prevention programs in our communities, 
and more stringent penalties in our judicial system. And we finally 
address violence against women.
  The NRA has repeatedly tried to kill the assault weapons ban by 
defeating the crime bill, and we cannot let them get away with it. The 
ban belongs in the bill, and the bill belongs on the President's desk 
to be signed into law.
  I urge Members to support this rule and pass H.R. 3355, the Omnibus 
Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1 
minute to the gentlewoman from Washington [Ms. Cantwell].
  Ms. CANTWELL. Mr. Speaker, I rise today today to urge my colleagues 
to preserve the integrity of the conference report on the crime bill. 
In the last week since the House failed to act on a crime bill, some of 
our colleagues have tried to dismiss this bill's prevention programs as 
nothing more than congressional pork but yet during the same week five 
people were shot to death in my district, including a deputy sheriff 
and a 7-year-old girl. At least three of them were killed with an 
assault weapon. Prevention programs are not a substitute for tougher 
prison sentences but they are just as important. Ask any mother who has 
lost a child to violence whether she would rather punish the child's 
murder or prevent the child's death. Punishment may stop criminals from 
committing their third or fourth crime. Prevention programs can stop 
children from committing their first. But let me say this. I do believe 
it is truly disingenuous to negotiate on this bill, make changes, get 
them accepted, and then say no. We do not allow bait-and-switch tactics 
on the consumers. We should not allow Congresspeople to do it to our 
constituents. If we want to claim victory for these improvements, then 
say we still support the bill. Let us not say inside the Beltway. 
``It's my way or no way.
  Please support the conference report and the rule.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania [Mr. Walker].
  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the 
time.
  Mr. Speaker, we have been told consistently today that one of the 
reasons why we ought to approve this rule and waive all points of order 
against majors in the bill is because this is a tough crime bill and we 
need to waive these points of order so that we can get these tough 
provisions accepted. Well, I went down through and looked at some of 
the waivers and guess what, I found a tough waiver. It is the ``Hawaii 
Five-0'' waiver. You remember the old TV show of tough people doing 
tough things to fight crime. Well, here is the ``Hawaii Five-0'' 
waiver. It authorizes the establishment of a task force in Hawaii to 
facilitate the prosecution of violations of Federal laws and the laws 
of the State of Hawaii relating to the wrongdoing, conveyance, sale or 
introduction of--get this--nonindigenous plant and animal species.
  The nonindigenous plant and animal species have risen up. Their lobby 
has put this in the bill. Gangs across the country, criminal gangs in 
the city streets are terror stricken about this particular provision. 
We have got to waive all points of order in order to get that provision 
approved yet today in this tough crime bill.
  I would suggest that maybe when you hear about some of the things 
that are in this bill, it is time to get back to the basics. Let us put 
money for police, for prisons, for Border Patrol, for real, tough law 
enforcement. That is what we will get in the motion to recommit. Put 
the money in the right place.
  The trust fund money in here, which is actually I will tell my 
colleagues who are concerned about the budget, is actually more than it 
was in the first conference report, the trust fund money ought to go 
for police, prisons, and for Border Patrol. It ought not go for task 
forces that are trying to keep us from having problems with 
nonindigenous plant and animal species. Vote against this rule. Waiving 
points of order against this kind of nonsense makes no sense. Let us 
turn down the rule.
  If we cannot turn down the rule, let us at least vote for a back-to-
the-basics approach in the motion to recommit, and if we cannot get 
that, vote against the bill.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield 1 
minute to the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. McCloskey].
  Mr. McCLOSKEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the distinguished chairman for 
yielding me the time.
  Mr. Speaker, as a sincere opponent of the so-called weapons ban, I 
would like to urge a yes vote on the rule, a definite no on the motion 
to recommit and yes on final passage. Accommodating the NRA, 
particularly on the motion to recommit, is not worth the lives lost 
because of the zeroing out of the so-called social programs. Drug 
prevention and education and violence against women and like programs 
are important.
  I disagree vehemently with Charlton Heston. He is not Moses, he is a 
mouthpiece.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  The gentleman from Texas [Mr. Brooks] pointed out that there is not 
enough money to keep the convicted felons that we have in this country 
in jail because there are not enough jails. I have to ask the question, 
why then are we putting $6 billion into programs that are duplicative 
of social programs we already have? That is the essence of what is 
wrong. That plus the fact we have got a bill here that we cannot pay 
for. Finally, it only deals with 5 percent of the crime problem in this 
country, and we have raised expectations, if we pass something that is 
here today, that crime is going to go away. I think that is a bit of a 
cruel hoax.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield the balance of my time to the distinguished 
gentleman from California [Mr. Dreier].
  Mr. DREIER. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend, the gentleman from 
Sanibel, FL for yielding me this time.
  Mr. Speaker, we are regularly asking the question, why is it that we 
have such a serious crime problem in this country?

                              {time}  1640

  Everyone is analyzing it. We have listened to all kinds of 
specialists looking at the problem.
  Well I happen to believe very strongly that it is due to a lack of 
individual responsibility, and quite frankly, violating the rules. 
There is an arrogance toward the law in this country, and tragically as 
we look at this rule there is an arrogance toward the rules of the 
House. And it is for that reason that I believe we should do everything 
that we can to defeat this rule.
  If Members look at the work of the conference committee, they have 
worked diligently. But quite frankly, contrary to the reports that we 
have gotten from this well, trust fund spending increases by over $1 
million. And as the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] has pointed 
out, when we look at the issue of prison spending, which is critically 
important, it is cut by $800 million, and that is at a time when we are 
trying to deal with truth in sentencing, and three strikes you are out. 
The resources are not there.
  This rule is unfair. It waives points of order, it waives that very 
important 3-day layover provision which should allow members time to 
look at this legislation which has, in fact, changed.
  Defeat this rule and come back with a balanced, fair bill that the 
American people and this Congress can support.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. (Mr. Hoyer). The gentleman from South 
Carolina [Mr. Derrick] is recognized for a 3 minutes.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, we claim to be the greatest Nation in the 
world. We claim to be one of the greatest civilizations that the world 
has ever known. Yet we murder more people, we burglarize more, we have 
more crime in this country than any other industrialized nation in the 
world.
  Here we are standing this afternoon talking about whether we are 
going to ban assault weapons. There are more men and women killed on 
the streets of this country every year on an annualized basis than we 
killed in Vietnam.
  We are not talking about denying the right of our citizens to own a 
shotgun to hunt with or a pistol to keep in their house. We are talking 
about denying them something they can go ``bzzz'' and kill 20 or 30 or 
100 people, just like that. That is what we are talking about.
  But yet because of the special interests, because of the special 
interests in this country, we are scared to do that, because we are 
scared that we are going to lose a few votes in the next election, or 
that we might not even come back.
  I have heard a lot of high talk about pork and about this reason and 
that reason for this. There is not but one reason, and that reason is 
guns. That is the only reason that we are having difficulty in getting 
this bill passed, because of the special interests in this country that 
unfortunately many of our Members cannot seem to deal with.
  I ask Members to support the rule, which is a fair rule, which will 
allow Members to vote on guns. They can vote for the substitute and say 
to the American people that even though 80 percent of them believe that 
we should do away with assault weapons we are going to let them do it. 
We are going to let them keep them so they will no longer be safe on 
the streets, in their neighborhoods, and in their automobiles in this 
country.
  We are also going to let Members vote for the substitute and say that 
three strikes and you are out, you are not going to have that even 
though the great majority of the American people want it.
  We are also going to say do away with the death penalty in this 
motion to recommit. So the rule is going to let Members have their 
vote.
  I ask Members to vote for the rule, to vote against the motion to 
recommit and to vote for the crime bill and let us go home and say to 
the American people that we understand what they are telling us, we 
support them and we are going to have a strong crime bill.
  Mrs. UNSOELD. Mr. Speaker, for weeks the attention of the media, and 
consequently the nation, has focused on the maneuvering and posturing 
in Washington DC regarding this strange collection of conflicting 
legislative agendas we refer to today as the crime bill. Yet, just last 
Thursday far from the media glare, this Congress approved and sent to 
the President for his signature a real crime bill: the 1995 
appropriations for Commerce, Justice, State, and Judiciary.
  This legislation puts real money next year where it will do the most 
good--in the hands of local law enforcement agencies. It includes new 
money for drug courts--$29 million; community policing--$1.3 billion; 
boot camps--$24.5 million; $100 million to upgrade the instant check 
systems established by the Brady Act, and $26 million for a vital new 
program to stem violence against women. We also approved $280 million 
for prison construction and we put $450 million into the Byrne Formula 
Grant Program, a program which funds local law enforcement efforts. In 
my state of Washington these grants support programs such as DARE [Drug 
Awareness Resistance Education] and multijurisdictional crime fighting 
task forces in many of our counties. These are some of the things that 
Sheriffs Bill Logan and Jerry Benning and other law enforcement 
officers tell me is what they really need--not election-year symbolism.
  But today, Mr. Speaker, we are here to act on this crime bill.
  Repeatedly, I seem to find myself defending individual freedoms that 
are misunderstood and maligned. And today, once again, I find myself 
having to cast a vote before, when I voted to support gays and lesbians 
in the military, the rights of responsible users of firearms, artistic 
freedom, a woman's right to decide, and the free speech of despicable 
bigots whose words make my skin crawl.
  Neither my vote last week nor this vote today gives me any pleasure. 
Oh, I have cast difficult votes before, and will again, but the tragedy 
now is that this vote was not necessary.
  ``A rule is only a procedural vote, how could you oppose it?'' I have 
heard it a hundred times. I have also asked myself that same question a 
hundred times.
  But life is complex, and this crime bill is too complex to be only a 
single up or down vote. I cannot cast a procedural vote that would 
force me later to vote for expansion of the death penalty as the price 
of voting for those positive programs designed to prevent crime and 
violence. I cannot vote to erode the constitutional rights of 
responsible users of firearms as the price of voting for programs 
designed to build alternatives for our youth.
  To vote for this rule would require us later to vote on the many 
deeply conflicting pieces of the crime bill as a single package. It 
would prevent me as well as others from voting separately our deeply 
held convictions on these matters of great conscience.
  In April I voted for a crime bill that enabled minority death row 
inmates to seek reduction of their death sentences in certain 
circumstances by citing statistical data to show that death sentences 
for similar crimes in that jurisdiction were disproportionately imposed 
on minorities. This provision, which sought to address a shameful 
aspect of our Nation's legal history, was omitted from the present 
crime package. That's wrong.
  I understand and I appreciate that there are some who believe that 
the mere possession of a firearm is an act of violence and who would 
dismiss any other view as ``just the NRA.'' Unfortunately, their use of 
such a label prevents them from seeing the individual men and women to 
whom the label is being attached. Their lack of personal knowledge 
renders them unable to relate to or understand the many law-abiding 
citizens who are not only responsible users of firearms, but also 
loving fathers and mothers, aunts and uncles, teachers, and law 
enforcement officers--loving and concerned citizens who deplore as much 
as any individual on this floor the senseless acts of violence that 
threaten the very fabric of our Nation.
  The difference between these citizens and many of my colleagues is 
that these citizens fear that some new attempts to control violence are 
only an excuse to come one step closer to denying them legal ownership 
of firearms. They resent being a misunderstood and maligned minority. 
And these loyal Americans are deeply offended by the notion of some 
that the gun industry--by definition--endorses and promotes criminal 
violence.
  Mr. Speaker, to many of my colleagues, laws that attempt to restrict 
the firearms themselves seem only sensible. To many others, such laws 
make them feel as though they are being directly assaulted, not because 
of anything they have done, but rather because of what they believe. I 
find bridging this chasm of differences in beliefs just as difficult as 
trying to explain that cherishing the first amendment may mean 
protecting hurtful, ugly, vile speech.
  Mr. Speaker, I cannot support this rule and I beg that in the future, 
procedural votes do not cram us into a single up or down vote on 
contradictory votes of conscience. Allow us to vote our deeply held 
convictions before we must decide aye or nay on the overall merits of 
omnibus legislation.
  Mr. DERRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I 
move the previous question on the resolution.
  The previous question was ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the resolution.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the ayes appeared to have it.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a 
quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not 
present.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Evidently a quorum is not present.
  The Sergeant at Arms will notify absent Members.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 239, 
nays 189, not voting 7, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 414]

                               YEAS--239

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Andrews (ME)
     Andrews (NJ)
     Andrews (TX)
     Applegate
     Bacchus (FL)
     Baesler
     Barca
     Barlow
     Barrett (WI)
     Becerra
     Beilenson
     Berman
     Bevill
     Bilbray
     Bishop
     Blackwell
     Blute
     Boehlert
     Bonior
     Borski
     Brooks
     Brown (CA)
     Brown (FL)
     Brown (OH)
     Bryant
     Byrne
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carr
     Castle
     Clayton
     Clement
     Clyburn
     Coleman
     Collins (IL)
     Collins (MI)
     Condit
     Conyers
     Coppersmith
     Coyne
     Cramer
     Darden
     DeLauro
     Dellums
     Derrick
     Deutsch
     Diaz-Balart
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Dixon
     Dooley
     Durbin
     Edwards (CA)
     Edwards (TX)
     Engel
     English
     Eshoo
     Evans
     Farr
     Fazio
     Fields (LA)
     Filner
     Fingerhut
     Flake
     Foglietta
     Foley
     Ford (MI)
     Ford (TN)
     Frank (MA)
     Franks (CT)
     Franks (NJ)
     Frost
     Furse
     Gejdenson
     Gephardt
     Gibbons
     Gilchrest
     Glickman
     Gonzalez
     Gordon
     Grandy
     Green
     Greenwood
     Gutierrez
     Hall (OH)
     Hamburg
     Harman
     Hastings
     Hefner
     Hinchey
     Hoagland
     Hobson
     Hochbrueckner
     Horn
     Houghton
     Hoyer
     Huffington
     Hughes
     Inslee
     Jacobs
     Jefferson
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson (GA)
     Johnson (SD)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Johnston
     Kanjorski
     Kaptur
     Kasich
     Kennedy
     Kennelly
     Kildee
     King
     Kleczka
     Klein
     Klug
     Kopetski
     Kreidler
     LaFalce
     Lambert
     Lantos
     Lazio
     Leach
     Lehman
     Levin
     Levy
     Lewis (GA)
     Lipinski
     Lloyd
     Long
     Lowey
     Machtley
     Maloney
     Mann
     Manton
     Margolies-Mezvinsky
     Markey
     Martinez
     Matsui
     Mazzoli
     McCloskey
     McCurdy
     McDermott
     McHale
     McKinney
     McMillan
     McNulty
     Meehan
     Meek
     Menendez
     Meyers
     Mfume
     Michel
     Miller (CA)
     Mineta
     Minge
     Mink
     Moakley
     Molinari
     Montgomery
     Moran
     Morella
     Murtha
     Nadler
     Neal (MA)
     Neal (NC)
     Oberstar
     Obey
     Olver
     Owens
     Pallone
     Pastor
     Payne (NJ)
     Pelosi
     Penny
     Pickle
     Pomeroy
     Porter
     Price (NC)
     Pryce (OH)
     Quinn
     Ramstad
     Rangel
     Reed
     Richardson
     Ridge
     Roemer
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Rose
     Rostenkowski
     Roukema
     Roybal-Allard
     Rush
     Sabo
     Sanders
     Sangmeister
     Sawyer
     Saxton
     Schenk
     Schroeder
     Schumer
     Serrano
     Sharp
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shepherd
     Skaggs
     Slattery
     Slaughter
     Smith (IA)
     Smith (NJ)
     Snowe
     Spratt
     Stark
     Studds
     Swett
     Swift
     Thompson
     Thornton
     Torkildsen
     Torres
     Torricelli
     Towns
     Traficant
     Velazquez
     Vento
     Visclosky
     Walsh
     Waxman
     Weldon
     Wheat
     Whitten
     Woolsey
     Wyden
     Wynn
     Yates
     Zimmer

                               NAYS--189

     Allard
     Archer
     Armey
     Bachus (AL)
     Baker (CA)
     Baker (LA)
     Ballenger
     Barcia
     Barrett (NE)
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bateman
     Bentley
     Bereuter
     Bilirakis
     Bliley
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Boucher
     Brewster
     Browder
     Bunning
     Burton
     Buyer
     Calvert
     Camp
     Canady
     Chapman
     Clay
     Clinger
     Coble
     Collins (GA)
     Combest
     Cooper
     Costello
     Cox
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cunningham
     Danner
     de la Garza
     Deal
     DeFazio
     DeLay
     Dickey
     Doolittle
     Dornan
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Ehlers
     Emerson
     Everett
     Ewing
     Fawell
     Fields (TX)
     Fish
     Fowler
     Gallegly
     Gekas
     Geren
     Gillmor
     Gilman
     Gingrich
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Goss
     Grams
     Gunderson
     Hall (TX)
     Hamilton
     Hancock
     Hansen
     Hastert
     Hayes
     Hefley
     Herger
     Hilliard
     Hoekstra
     Hoke
     Holden
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hutto
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Inhofe
     Istook
     Johnson, Sam
     Kim
     Kingston
     Klink
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     Kyl
     Lancaster
     LaRocco
     Laughlin
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (FL)
     Lewis (KY)
     Lightfoot
     Linder
     Livingston
     Lucas
     Manzullo
     McCandless
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McDade
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McKeon
     Mica
     Miller (FL)
     Mollohan
     Moorhead
     Murphy
     Myers
     Nussle
     Ortiz
     Orton
     Oxley
     Packard
     Parker
     Paxon
     Payne (VA)
     Peterson (FL)
     Peterson (MN)
     Petri
     Pickett
     Pombo
     Portman
     Poshard
     Quillen
     Rahall
     Ravenel
     Regula
     Roberts
     Rogers
     Rohrabacher
     Roth
     Royce
     Santorum
     Sarpalius
     Schaefer
     Schiff
     Scott
     Sensenbrenner
     Shuster
     Sisisky
     Skeen
     Skelton
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (OR)
     Smith (TX)
     Solomon
     Spence
     Stearns
     Stenholm
     Stokes
     Strickland
     Stump
     Stupak
     Sundquist
     Synar
     Talent
     Tanner
     Tauzin
     Taylor (MS)
     Taylor (NC)
     Tejeda
     Thomas (CA)
     Thomas (WY)
     Thurman
     Unsoeld
     Upton
     Volkmer
     Vucanovich
     Walker
     Waters
     Watt
     Williams
     Wilson
     Wise
     Wolf
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)
     Zeliff

                             NOT VOTING--7

     Callahan
     Gallo
     Reynolds
     Rowland
     Tucker
     Valentine
     Washington

                              {time}  1701

  So the resolution was agreed to.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________