[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 124 (Thursday, August 25, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: August 25, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
   VIOLENT CRIME CONTROL AND LAW ENFORCEMENT ACT OF 1994--CONFERENCE 
                                 REPORT

  The Senate continued with the consideration of the conference report.
  Mr. CRAIG. Madam President, we have just in the last half-hour taken 
a procedural vote that largely speaks to how the final vote and outcome 
on the crime conference will appear, a debate that has now occurred for 
nearly 3\1/2\ days on the conference report to H.R. 3355.
  While those who may be observing the Senate recognize that it is a 
procedural vote, it is a most important vote in how the Senate will 
ultimately deal with this very important issue. During the course of 
that debate, a great deal has been said about all parts, all sections 
and subsections of this conference report and what it may or may not do 
for the American people.
  Many have argued that it is the most sweeping realignment of our 
criminal justice system and that it will cause America to begin a new 
direction and a new path in crime control. Others have said that it is 
a $30 billion-plus piece of pork; that it has become not a crime-
fighting measure but, in fact, a welfare measure to deal with 
everything from midnight basketball to grants to States to do largely 
what they wish with them if they meet the rather broad definition of 
crime control.
  When this provision left the Senate some months ago it had been 
thoroughly debated, as the chairman of the Judiciary Committee said, 
and it had been amended many, many times. It was a provision that many 
of us voted for. I was one of them. I voted for it even against my 
better judgment, because there was a provision in it that was very 
onerous to me and to my colleague from Alaska and a good many others. 
And that was a provision that actually, for the first time in our 
history since 1934, banned a firearm. I voted against the ban itself, 
better known as the Feinstein amendment, and the Senator from 
California is with us on the floor this evening.
  But I had voted for the crime bill because I thought there were some 
very good provisions in it that would actually reach out and grab the 
criminal and jerk them back into confinement and out of harm's way, the 
harm of the free citizen. Those provisions that left the Senate are now 
largely gone, and we have seen returned to us a bill that is very 
different in many respects from the one that had left the Senate. But 
there still remains in it a gun ban. There are those of us, like 
myself, who would say that that is a direct hit against the rights of 
free citizens under our Constitution. And I believe that to be very 
much the case.
  I have refrained from coming to the floor these last 3 days because I 
wanted other issues to be part of the total debate. I wanted the 
American people to hear, as they heard so clearly from our side, that 
this was a massive, sweeping new spending program, largely unpaid for, 
but one in which the majority thought, once again, if you just throw a 
little money at the problem, somehow the problem gets a little better.
  I am going to be around long enough, if I stay healthy, and I suspect 
many others in this Senate will be, to watch the statistics, to watch 
those numbers that represent free citizens who will be violated by 
deviants of this society and robbed of their rights, or their property, 
or maybe their life, over the course of the next few years. And as we 
watch those statistics, I hope the American people take stock and take 
count of the debate that occurred largely on the other side of this 
room by the other party as they perpetrated an image that H.R. 3355 was 
going to make the streets of America safer.
  I wager very directly and in front of those who are here this evening 
and the public that might be watching that this will not reduce crime; 
that it is merely another way to drive up our deficit and to go home 
offering the American people a political placebo that somehow suggests 
that life will be just a little better if you trust and rely on your 
politician, and the Federal Government that he or she supposedly 
directs and on some occasions administers. I believe that is the 
contest of the whole issue. I believe that is the important part of 
some of the debate.
  But for the next few minutes this evening let me talk about another 
very important aspect that some have come to the floor to suggest I 
really do not have a right to talk about; that somehow I am almost 
sinister in my intent, if I would suggest that the second amendment of 
our Constitution means that the citizen has the right to own and bear 
an arm not for sporting purposes, not for hunting purposes, but in the 
right of self-defense, in the right of the protection of one's self and 
one's property as our Founding Fathers so clearly spelled out.
  We have another colleague on the floor tonight. He probably will be 
debating some. He has talked about the NRA as some evil, sinister group 
who would like to suggest to society that everybody ought to own a gun 
and walk the streets and use it freely and uninhibited.
  Well, the NRA is an old organization, been around over 100 years, who 
believes as fervently as my colleague from Ohio does in certain things. 
The one thing they believe in is the right of the citizen under the 
second amendment. They are not tightly organized. They are not all-
powerful. They are a grassroots organization quite typical of a lot of 
organizations in this country of citizens who come together under a 
common and oftentimes single interest. Are they strong? Well, they have 
over 3 million members now.
  I must say in all good humor to my colleague from Ohio that every 
time he stands up, they get a little stronger. They are running now--
the organization itself, I am told, since President Clinton came to 
town picks up about 10,000 new members a month. Why? Many of those 
members do not even own a gun. But they are very fearful that this 
President and some in this Congress somehow want to reach out and rob 
them of their rights under the Constitution.
  So they come together in organization and they give of their time and 
of their resource to try to protect those rights. And they do what 
every other good interest group does. They pick up their phone and they 
call their Senator or their Representative, and they say, ``Please, 
please, do something about House Resolution 3355 because it takes away 
from me the rights that my Founding Fathers gave me under the 
Constitution.''
  Madam President, yesterday I went out on the lawn in front of this 
Capitol building to join with a group of veterans and some 60 other 
organizations as we introduce a new movement in our country to create 
an organization to propose to us here in the Senate a constitutional 
amendment to protect the American flag.
  I heard veterans say very important things yesterday. But one of the 
most significant things that was said, I think, was spoken of our 
country in general, that we are a very unique country in the sense that 
we are not all tall and not all short and not all black and not all 
white; that we are Christians, Jews, atheists, Bhudists, Hindus and 
people of many other faiths. But for some reason we came together in a 
country called America. And we came together in this great country of 
ours under a common set of beliefs: first of all, that we were all free 
persons; second, that there were certain rights that we just simply 
would not violate and that had become a collection of human rights that 
had been treaded upon by other countries, monarchies, authoritarian 
governments; that amongst those rights were those delineated by the 
Bill of Rights and the first 10 amendments; and, of course, one of 
those was the right to bear arms, again, not for sporting purposes. Our 
Founding Fathers were not interested in that. That was a foregone 
conclusion. But it was to create a militia of citizens well armed to 
rise up when necessary and so organized in protection of themselves, 
their families, their property, their community, and, if need be, their 
Nation, and, as it was in the Revolutionary War, their Government or 
their sense of what a government ought to be.
  Is that simply historical hokum? Is that something that a Senator 
ought to come to the floor today and say that our life is so suppressed 
today and so maligned that we somehow have to give up our rights for 
the sake of a better day somewhere and someday when they might then be 
reinstated if we all become good little people again? Well, I hope that 
is not what they are saying. But I have a sense that is what is being 
said--that things are so bad in our country today that we have to reach 
out and take rights away from free citizens for the common good.
  That was not the intent of our Founding Fathers. It was to assure 
that the rights of the individual were protected, oftentimes against 
the common good, that these individuals' rights were so specified in 
our Constitution and embodied in what we are today.
  So I do believe it is a legitimate debate. I know some shun from it 
and some run from it because the American people are frustrated. They 
say, yes. Many say, get the guns off the streets; people are being 
killed by the use of a firearm in a criminal act by an individual. And 
they are frustrated and they are angered, and they should be. But what 
we also understand here is sometimes we have to stand just a little bit 
beyond the current or the popular idea and say that there is a bigger 
and a more important issue here; that is, to protect the rights under 
the Constitution of the free citizen. I firmly believe that is the crux 
of a very important debate on this whole issue.
  There were some who would have been willing even to accept a ban on 
guns--I am not among those--but who would, if we could, have put tough 
penalties into this crime bill that said that a criminal would be 
punished if he or she used a gun in the commission of a crime. You 
know, somehow it would seem fair, if you reach out and take something 
away from the free citizen, should you not reach out and take something 
away from the deviant, the criminal? We said that here in the U.S. 
Senate some months ago. But when it got over to the House, somehow that 
all was taken out. Somehow they still wanted to reach out and grab away 
from the free citizen his or her rights. But they wanted to say to the 
criminal, well, you are a bad boy or a bad girl and we are going to 
pamper you and slap you around and put you in prison, but we are not 
going to make it extraordinarily tough on you if you happen to use a 
gun in the commission of a crime.
  For the life of me--and I think the Senator from Alaska expressed it, 
too--why is it that somehow the fuzzy liberal mentality says those poor 
deviants are a product of society, they got misaligned in the 
socialization process, and we have to reach out and cuddle them; we 
cannot discipline them and say there are rules and there are lines and 
you ought to stay in them for the sake of a free civil society? I am 
confused.
  I think the American people are very confused as to why a Senate, 
Senators, and a House, the House Members, will not stand up and say to 
the criminal element of this society, you are out; you no longer get to 
play on the streets. But somehow, no; we will reach out, and in our 
fright and in our frustration we will take away the right of the free 
citizen, and we will continue to suggest that the criminal element 
ought to perform better. Certainly they ought to. But we are not going 
to be really all that tough on them when it comes to these very 
important issues of the taking of life and the taking of property.
  My guess is that someday in the not-too-distant future after the 
American people have seen what is embodied in this crime bill, they are 
going to say to this Congress, ``Oh, no, you don't.''
  That is not what we meant at all. What we meant is for you to get 
tough on criminals and stay tough on criminals and not to take away our 
rights or misalign our free citizenship. I think that day will come, 
and it may be sooner rather than later. But I think that is where I 
understand the American people are headed.
  Now, with that in mind, let me then for the next few minutes talk 
about an issue that I think is extremely important and how it fits into 
the whole of all of this debate. But let me say at the first instance 
there were some things said in the Chamber about rights under the 
Constitution and what the second amendment does or does not mean.
  What I would like to do then is to move from my own words to a book 
that is currently on the market and selling very well in our country. 
It is a book that goes through this whole argument in a very methodical 
and well documented way. It is a book called ``Guns, Crime, and 
Freedom,'' a book by Wayne LaPierre. I know Wayne personally. He is the 
head of the National Rifle Association. But several months ago, because 
of his frustration as to the lack of understanding on the part of this 
Government and this Congress, especially as it relates to what all of 
this means, he set out with a group of scholars to put together a total 
statement about the second amendment and the right of our free citizens 
to own and bear arms. And so for the next few minutes, I would like to 
read directly from that book certain quotes, and one whole chapter, 
that I think are so profound in what they say and so clear in refuting 
a variety of the arguments that have been placed here.
  I came to the floor the other evening when the Senator from Delaware 
was debating, and he turned to me and he said, ``Oh, there's that gun 
nut from Idaho.''
  Now, I know he meant that in good humor. I smiled and he smiled. I 
did not take it in any way as a misalignment. He said, ``I bet he would 
even support the right of somebody to own a bazooka.'' Now, that is how 
silly this debate got. That is why I did not engage in it, because that 
is foolishness in the first degree, and we all know that. And here is 
why it is foolish.
  Artillery pieces, tanks, nuclear devices, and other heavy ordnances--
and you have heard these kinds of things talked about here--are not 
constitutionally protected.
  And nobody has ever stood on this floor and attempted to argue that 
they ought to be.
  The second amendment does not provide that any citizen should own a 
military-type device like a grenade, a bomb, a bazooka, or other 
devices. But we know under the law, and we know under the Constitution, 
that the right to bear arms does protect the ordinary small arms--
handguns, rifles, shotguns, yes, and even those that we now, under this 
bill, call assault weapons. They are the semiautos. A Rutgers law 
professor, Robert Katroll, said it this way:

       It has been argued that assault weapons are far more deadly 
     than 18th century arms.

  You have heard the debate here. You have heard of these weapons that 
spray bullets and mow down children. The Senator from Alaska cleared 
that one up, I hope. They are not automatic. We know that. But then 
again, what the heck with truth. Let us go for image. That is, go for 
the politically correct issue here. And if it brings about a little 
drama, then so be it.
  Interestingly enough, the old blunderbuss of the 18th century was a 
far more lethal weapon than any semiauto that was ever designed because 
of the volume and the impact, and if you know firearms, then you know 
exactly what I am saying.
  Well, those are the issues that I think are important here and that 
deserve to be debated as we wrestle with all of these difficult kinds 
of things that have been talked about over the last good number of 
days.
  I would now, for the balance of my time, like to talk about crime in 
the context of the right of the free citizen to own a handgun or a 
firearm in the protection of themselves. And so what I plan to do for 
the next few minutes is, by reading it, put an entire chapter of Wayne 
LaPierre's book in the Record. I think it is important because I think 
it makes a very bold statement about what is going on in America today 
outside the beltway, that we somehow seem to be sheltered and immune 
from, because it is of concern to all of us. The chapter I am talking 
about is called ``Arming Against Crime.''
  Let me read a quote from Neal Shulman, Los Angeles Times, 1992.

       Gun control advocates need to realize that passing laws 
     that honest gun owners will not obey is a self-defeating 
     strategy. Gun owners are not about to surrender their rights 
     and only the most foolish of politicians would risk the 
     stability of the Government by trying to use the force of the 
     State to disarm the people.

  So for the next few minutes, the words that I am to speak are not 
mine. I am quoting directly from the book of Wayne LaPierre. And I 
think it is important for my colleagues to hear them, and it is 
important that they be spread upon the Record of the Senate as we 
debate the crime bill and as we discuss the semiauto ban that is within 
the body of that crime bill. Now, I have just quoted Neal Shulman.

       Writer Neal Shulman must have looked into a crystal ball to 
     have reached the same conclusion found in a public opinion 
     survey conducted by the National Law Journal in March of 
     1994.

  That is the opening paragraph of chapter 11.
  Roy Sherman, staff reporter for the National Law Journal, reported 
the results in the April 18, 1994, issue of the National Law Journal, 
and I quote:

       It is a time of unparalleled desperation about crime.

  I think that is exactly what you have heard here in the Chamber of 
the Senate, a frustration as the Senate has tried to reach out to the 
American people and work with them in the correction of this sense of 
desperation. But he said in the poll that was taken in April:

       The mood of the people is decidedly ``I will do it myself, 
     and don't get in my way.'' Today's citizens believe people 
     must take more responsibility for their own protection. They 
     reject Government intrusion on basic civil rights, gun 
     ownership, and the media's display of violence. There is a 
     pervasive willingness to forgive those who commit serious 
     crimes motivated by the preservation of children or self, yet 
     for the lawless who lack compelling excuses, this poll 
     demonstrates literally no mercy at all.

  Conducted by Penn and Shulman Associates, Inc., the National Law 
Journal's second comprehensive survey of public attitudes toward crime 
in the past 5 years demonstrated this.
  Americans made it clear they are not willing to sit back and become 
victims or allow Government to tamper with their civil liberties. Here 
is what some of that poll reflected:
  Seventy-five percent agreed that police and the justice system cannot 
protect them and said people have to take on more responsibility for 
safeguarding themselves.
  That is a pretty profound statement. I wonder why they would say 
that. Well, anybody living in California would know what happened in 
the Los Angeles riots. When the police came to law-abiding citizens and 
property owners and said, ``We cannot protect you, please get out of 
the way,'' many of those folks said, ``We will protect ourselves,'' and 
they did because they owned a gun and they were willing to stand, as 
our Founding Fathers would have expected them to, to defend their 
personal property and their personal rights.
  The poll also went on to say that as many as 85 percent said they 
were unwilling to forfeit basic civil liberties even if it could 
enhance personal safety.
  That says something very loudly about our American people, that while 
they view personal safety as very important, they are not about to give 
up their freedoms for that personal safety.
  Our majority leader said tonight that it was the responsibility of 
society to assume the personal safety of all of its citizens. I think 
what this poll said, or what our citizens said was: While we understand 
that our Government ought to help us, we really agree with our Founding 
Fathers. Our real personal safety is our responsibility, and it is the 
responsibility of every citizen, and 85 percent of the American people 
said so. Sixty-two percent said the need for guns is increasing. These 
are free citizens who said the need for guns is increasing, and a 
majority is unwilling to accept laws that restrict gun ownership 
greatly.
  Eighty-nine percent subscribe to the mother lion defense--we all know 
what that one is--saying that they would find it compelling if a mother 
tried to excuse a serious criminal by saying she was trying to protect 
her children from an abusive father. Again, the right of defending.
  More than 75 percent supported the three-strikes-and-you-are-out 
provision. That provision is here now. And they wanted violent three-
time offenders behind bars for life. Why do they say that? Because they 
know instinctively that as our country began to flush its criminals 
back onto the streets, nearly 80 percent of the crimes that occur on 
those streets today are perpetrated by repeat offenders. Instinctively, 
Americans know if you get them off the streets there is a greater 
chance that America is not going to be just a little bit safer, but 
maybe just a lot safer.
  Respondents were unmoved by criticisms that older criminals would be 
kept behind bars at taxpayers' expense. Many of them said--or at least 
the criminal officials said--that once they get older, they are simply 
harmless, and the American public said: We do not care. If they are 
violent then, they are more than likely violent now. Keep them off our 
streets and keep them out of our neighborhoods. So that is what the 
American people were talking about.
  The bottom line: Americans are upset about crime and soundly reject 
Government solutions which further infringe upon their rights and their 
liberties.
  This is not me speaking. This is not the NRA speaking. This is the 
National Law Journal speaking. Clearly, people recognize that 
legislative and administrative infringement upon their liberties are 
designed to convenience Government--I thought that was an intriguing 
word, to ``convenience'' Government--rather than to solve or curb 
violent crime.
  I think the American public is way out in front of us on this issue, 
and they said so in this poll taken early this spring. When the public 
loses faith in the ability or willingness of Government to protect it, 
people rely more heavily on self-protection. This involves the purchase 
of firearms and protection devices. They hire security guards, they 
build walls, they install security systems.
  In 1993, $65 billion was spent on private security in this country. 
All Americans wanted to be protected against crime, not just those who 
can afford it.
  I suspect that is why the Congress has acted in the best way they 
think they know how. But this document says that the American people 
are not buying it.
  The American Bar Association does not seem to be listening to the 
American people either. In fact, these lawyers were working against 
strong crime-fighting measures. They were here in February this year, 
and the ABA testified before the U.S. House of Representatives, 
Subcommittee on Crime and Criminal Justice that the criminal justice 
policy is inordinately tight and tilted toward law enforcement and 
corrections, and they ought to be weakened. And now you want to know 
why some of these tough provisions got pulled out. It is because the 
ABA came and argued that they were too tough. A rather incredible 
statement, I thought, perhaps self-serving, when today prison is the 
sentence alternative least used throughout America. And Americans are 
paying for it with their lives.
  Every day in America, hundreds of people are attacked by violent 
criminals who have been caught and convicted and returned to the 
streets on probation or early parole. And that was why we finally 
struggled to get three-strikes-and-you-are-out in this piece of 
legislation. That is why it has passed several other States. The ABA 
also testified against mandatory minimum sentences, and against three-
strikes-and-you-are-out. But Americans want measures such as these, and 
the National Law Review survey just flat confirms it.
  The Washington Citizens for Justice and the National Rifle 
Association have been working hard for three-strikes-and-you-are-out on 
the ballot for years. I think it is a little surprising that the Senate 
of the United States tonight may adopt a measure that was originally 
proposed by this ``evil'' lobby known as the National Rifle 
Association, because when three-strikes-and-you-are-out came to the 
ballot in California and in the State of Washington, it was the 
National Rifle Association and their members who came forward with 
their money and their votes and pushed it there. Why? Because they were 
fearful that if we did not ultimately go after the criminal, then 
politicians would go after the gun. That is exactly what happened.
  Out of the desperation of the American people against the current 
crime wave in America, politicians wanting to answer to the call of 
Americans are saying we will take these guns off the streets in the 
name of criminal justice. Yet, Americans know it will not work. That is 
why groups and organizations who support the second amendment early on 
went out and began to push issues like three-strikes-and-you-are-out.
  In the State of Washington, it was once defeated and put back on the 
ballot. The National Rifle Association got aggressively behind it. They 
did so in the State of California. The measure was also included in the 
crime bill that we passed in the Senate that is now in the final 
passage. But, interestingly enough, the American Bar Association came 
and testified against them.
  Not only is the ABA at odds with public attitudes, it is out of touch 
with the reality of America today. In the fall of 1963, the progun 
forces tried unsuccessfully to block the release of Oregon's Russell 
Oberminsky. Why would I mention Russell Oberminsky? The reason I am 
tonight is because he was a multiple killer who was nearly 50 years 
old. Soon after his release--and he was released because he was nearly 
50 and he had repented--the folks in Oregon said it was the wrong thing 
to do, but it was done.
  (Ms. MIKULSKI assumed the chair.)
  Mr. CRAIG. This gentleman was arrested for sodomizing a 4-year-old 
little girl. Perhaps the American Bar Association will send an emissary 
to that child's family to explain how criminal activities diminish 
markedly the older you get.
  Let me go on to quote from Wayne LaPierre's book.

       In July 1990 a study by a U.S. Department of Justice, 
     Bureau of Justice Statistics, of the 245,650 offenders 
     serving time in State prisons in 1986 for crimes of violence, 
     found that they had victimized an estimated 409,000 persons 
     about 97,300 victims were killed, 51 victims assaulted, and 
     20,400 others of violent activities. The criminals in prison 
     in the year 1986 alone had killed nearly 50 percent more 
     Americans than died in the Vietnam war.

  When is America going to wake up? Or should I rephrase that --when is 
this Congress going to wake up? America has awakened. That is why they 
are so concerned about their safety and why they are so concerned that 
political America will not address their real concern, and that is the 
control of the criminal.

       As we witness the carnage on the streets perpetrated by 
     criminals released early by parole boards, we are forced to 
     ask would members of parole boards make that gamble if they 
     knew that their lives or the lives of their loved ones 
     depended on that decision? Do they know what the rate of 
     recidivism of violent offenders is?

  I have just given you some dramatic statistics. The public has the 
right to ask the tough questions of the parole boards that release 
violent criminals before they have served 85 percent of their sentence.
  This very important chapter goes on.

       But here are some more important statistics. Doug Bando 
     from Cato Institute was quoted in the Washington Post in 1989 
     as saying:
       Gun control has proved to be a grievous failure, a means of 
     disarming honest citizens without limiting firepower 
     available to those who prey on law-abiding citizens, 
     attempting to use the legal system to punish the weapon 
     rather than the person misusing the weapon is similarly 
     doomed to fail.

  We know, as Senators, when we become honest with ourselves, that that 
is exactly what has happened in every State or every municipality that 
has in any way ever attempted to control guns.

       Antigun politicians fail to heed such warning and further 
     exacerbate the problem by wasting tax dollars--

  And that is what we are about to do tonight.

       --and precious time to pursue nonsensible gun control 
     measures, and all the while the toll of victims continues to 
     mount.

  The National Law Journal survey that I have been quoting--or I should 
say Wayne LaPierre has been quoting--throughout this chapter speaks so 
clearly to that.
  Fifty-three percent of Americans are not satisfied with President 
Clinton's crime fighting measures, and yet we are saying tonight this 
is what the President wants. But by recent polls 53 percent of the 
Americans say this is not going to change crime in America. Fifty-two 
percent of Americans are not satisfied with the job Janet Reno is doing 
because they do not think she is tough enough. And 62 percent of 
Americans said instead of more law enforcement there is increasing need 
for firearms for personal protection.
  Is not it unique that it appears the Congress is going in the 
opposite direction this evening from the direction the American people 
want to go?

       While 62 percent overall see the need for firearms for 
     personal protection, 72 percent of blacks now hold that view 
     right along with whites. Blacks consistently have the highest 
     victimized rates and do not believe that gun control measures 
     are the solution to crime.

  Let me read that again. That is worth reading. I understand that part 
of the reason we are doing this tonight is to bring some kind of 
control to inner-city America where many of its citizens--and many of 
them black--are being victimized, and yet 73 percent of the blacks are 
saying do not lock away our guns. The reason they are saying that is 
because they do not believe this will work and they want to be able to 
protect themselves.
  I think an even stronger message about civil liberty was reflected in 
that National Law Journal survey. I quote.

       Despite intense concern about crime, losing basic civil 
     liberties will not be tolerated by the American people. Even 
     if doing so might enhance safety, a full 85 percent say they 
     are unwilling to allow police to wiretap phones without prior 
     court approval, and 82 percent say police should not be 
     allowed to randomly search without probable cause.

  Here is an important part of this chapter that is worth reading and 
sharing with you, because I think it shows you the frustration I have 
with this President and how he treats crime in this country, but more 
important, how he treats our civil liberties.
  We all remember the issue of Chicago's public housing. President 
Clinton acted almost alarmingly in respect to the residents' fourth 
amendment privacy protection.

       The Chicago Housing Authority authorized random searches of 
     apartments in Chicago's public housing without warrants or 
     probable cause in clear violation of the Constitution. In a 
     class action suit brought to halt the searches, U.S. District 
     Judge Wayne Anderson stopped the searches in February of this 
     year saying that random searches without probable cause are a 
     greater evil than the danger of criminal activity.

  What did our President respond? How did he respond? He instructed 
``the Justice Department staff to find a way around the 
Constitution,''--
  And that was his quotes, and I quote that.

       A shocking directive for United States President who was 
     sworn to uphold the Constitution.

  Is there any reason free citizens are a little worried tonight about 
a President who says that ``This is the most comprehensive and valuable 
crime measure ever passed by Congress, and I support it?'' I think they 
have reason.

       After the President responded by that kind of shocking 
     directive, the President soon announced his administration's 
     way around the Constitution, adding language to apartment 
     leases that required residents in public housing to waive 
     their rights and grant permission for random searches of 
     their homes.

  In other words, if the Constitution will not allow those rights to be 
taken away, the President would condone forcing the poor to give up 
their rights or give up their house. The message of the National Law 
Review survey, which condemns trampling on civil liberties, apparently 
that survey did not reach the White House.
  Eroding civil liberties by door-to-door searches to confiscate guns 
in public housing sets a dangerous precedent, and this Senate spoke to 
that. But let me talk about another one.
  Carl Day, a West Point graduate and a Vietnam veteran, writing in the 
Washington Times on February 2 of this year spoke for most Americans 
who rejected door-to-door searches as crime-fighting tactics when he 
said, and the chapter quotes:

       All we have to do is tear up the Bill of Rights, shred the 
     Constitution, call out the National Guard, and starting with 
     high-crime areas if this is not perceived to be racist, 
     commence house-to-house searches, seizing all of the guns and 
     other contraband. Roving police and National Guard patrols 
     could set up random roadblocks, stop-and-search vehicles, 
     seize guns, arrest those who possess them. Citizens could be 
     stopped at random and frisked for weapons.

  Sound like the America you would like to live in?
  Well, he said: ``It certainly is not the one that I fought for,'' 
meaning Carl Day, West Point graduate and Vietnam veteran.

       Jess McNamara, former chief of police, San Jose, CA, 
     although well known throughout America as a gun hater--and I 
     use that word because that is his word--waded into the gun 
     search controversy in defense of the Constitution protection 
     against search and seizure in the Los Angeles Times on April 
     17, 1994, and again I quote this chief of police's words.
       President Clinton recently asked Attorney General Janet 
     Reno to find ways to circumvent a Federal judge's injunction 
     forbidding random police searches of apartments in a Federal 
     housing development in Chicago. Clinton should have assured 
     tenants that the Federal Government would do all it could to 
     provide whatever level of policing was needed to stop the 
     violence in the complex. Instead, the President pandered to 
     police and the public impatient with rising crime. He urged 
     the department to respond by prosecuting officers who 
     violated people's constitutional rights to assist police in 
     invading those constitutionally protected housing 
     areas. There is no need for any dilution of individual 
     rights that took a century to achieve.
  This chief of police went on to talk about the murders, striking the 
most terror in the hearts of people during this century, have not been 
serial killers like Ted Bundy, they been Governments that have killed 
millions of their citizens in the name of social order.
  Now I want to make sure that you understand where that statement came 
from. That came from a former chief of police of San Jose, CA. And he 
goes on to say, ``The authors of the Bill of Rights knew the danger and 
drafted a document for our protection. We should not let panic erode 
that protection.''
  Judging from responses to questions, specifically from the survey 
that has been quoted extensively in this chapter, it is clear that the 
American people are sometimes slow to realize what is really going on 
or are willing to give up benefits and give others the benefit of the 
doubt, but they are not--let me repeat--but they are not stupid.
  The survey shows that since passage of the Brady bill, support for 
the waiting period on gun legislation has dropped to nearly 58 percent, 
from the high of 80 percent at the time of its passage. Indeed, support 
for restricting gun sales has dropped nearly 22 percent. Reacting to 
the survey's results, the National District Attorneys Association 
president, William O'Malley, said the interpretation that somebody puts 
on those statistics is important. ``I do not think it is vigilantism or 
hostility to police or prosecutors or the courts. It is more a 
recognition that the system is powerless without the support of the 
community and its participation.''
  And we all know that. And yet, largely, we have taken away, or are 
attempting to take away, the right of the ultimate community, and that 
is the individual citizen working together to protect themselves and 
their property. O'Malley's interpretation of the National Law Journal 
data may be skewed a bit. When he suggested a lack of public hostility 
toward the criminal justice system and instead sees public recognition 
for the need for community support and participation, he downplays the 
message Americans are sending in the rest of the poll. People are angry 
and frustrated with the criminal justice system, and they have said so. 
Unless, by participation, he means people that intend to protect 
themselves, he has, I think, misread a portion of the message.
  The National Law Journal survey data did not need interpreting or 
spin doctoring, as might have been attempted here. It is very 
straightforward and it is very unambiguous. For years, Americans have 
been attempting to participate in criminal justice reform, and their 
message has been crystal clear--it was 5 years ago, it is today--get 
tough on criminals, quit gratuitous plea bargaining, make our streets 
safe by keeping criminals locked up for their full sentence, and stop 
probation and parole of violent criminals.
  Now that is just one simple sentence and one simple directive from 
the American people--get tough on crime and get tough on the criminal. 
The message has far too long fallen on deaf ears.
  Citizens, and victims in particular, have been treated as mettlesome 
and have been shooed away, as one would a small child under our feet. 
People are saying, enough is enough. The criminal justice system has 
shifted its focus from protecting the rights of the victims to 
protecting the rights of the criminal.
  Maybe tonight I ought to give just a little credit to this piece of 
legislation. Maybe we have edged it back ever so slightly in that 
direction, even though the House and the conference struck out a lot of 
those get-tough-on-criminal provisions.
  We have all heard of the castle doctrine. The castle doctrine is an 
ancient common law doctrine with origins going back at least to Roman 
law. It proclaims that one's home is a castle and hence an inhabitant 
may use all manner of force, including deadly force, to protect it and 
its inhabitants from attack. Further, the Constitution guarantees basic 
rights to all persons, including the right to defend life and to 
protect property. Citizens have a right to expect safety within their 
homes or vehicles. And I think the criminal justice system has to be 
refocused to recognize that it must protect victims by keeping 
criminals behind bars and restoring the absolute rights of law-abiding 
people to protect themselves, their families, and their property from 
unlawful intruders and violent attackers without fear of prosecution or 
civil action.
  And yet tonight, we are saying that if you were to acquire, after 
this becomes law, one of these semiautos and you used it to defend your 
property and the police discovered that you had used it to defend your 
property, you would be violating the law.
  A person who has unlawfully entered or attempted to enter any 
person's home, dwelling, residence, or occupied vehicle should be 
presumed to be entering or attempting to enter with the intent to 
commit an unlawful act involving force or violence. Thus, any manner of 
force may be employed in self-defense. That is the castle doctrine. 
There should be absolutely no duty to retreat from anyplace where a 
law-abiding person has a right to be.
  Citizens support the castle doctrine initiative and other proposals 
to correct the failure of lawmakers to address the real criminal 
justice system. A citizens movement to put a three-strikes-and-you're-
out initiative on the ballot in the State of Washington, as I mention, 
failed in 1992. It was not until that currently much-maligned National 
Rifle Association and a Washington citizens justice group stepped up 
and said, ``We will put it back on the ballot and we will use our 
resources to tell the people of Washington what it is all about'' that, 
on election day, 1993, it did become law. The people did not wait for 
the sluggish government of the State of Washington to take back their 
streets. They did it.
  And that is part of the message that gets missed in all of this 
debate around here. Somehow we think the citizens are only the victims, 
that they do not have the right of self-defense or we are beginning to 
progressively take away from them their right to defend themselves or 
we are suggesting or implying, in a criminal provision like this one, 
that it will be a safer world and therefore they need not worry as 
much.
  In Texas, the people voted an overwhelming 89 percent to deny bail to 
career criminals and sex offenders and voted by 62 percent to 38 
percent to put up $1 billion to increase prison capacity substantially.
  They knew in their hearts what researchers have proven. States that 
increase imprisonment drive down criminal activity and violent crime. 
The result: A people's victory; a defeat of get-soft-on-criminal 
politics.
  We were tough in the Senate provision. We put up money to build the 
prisons. What have we got back? Well, we have a document that says we 
are going to build prisons or we can use the money for other purposes.
  Not a mandate, not a direct prescription. It does not fit with three 
strikes and you are out. You see, the hoax being perpetrated on the 
floor of the U.S. Senate tonight is simply this. We are going to get 
tough because three strikes and you are out is in here. But it does not 
work if you do not build prison capacity to put them back in prison. It 
just does not work. You are going to shove out all the other prisoners 
to put these back in? The American people know that. The people of 
Texas know that. And that is why they voted as they voted, and they 
voted with their pocketbooks and they got $1 million and they built 
prison capacity.
  So we ban guns. We say to the criminal, we are going to be tough but 
we are not going to be quite that tough. And we are given some 
arbitrary language on how the money gets directed for the construction 
of penal institutions. And it may or may not get used, depending on how 
it gets directed or how the Attorney General wishes to hand it out. And 
then we put three strikes and you are out in here? And somehow there is 
a schism as to how you deal with three strikes and you are out, and you 
put people away but you have no place to put them. So you shift and you 
put less violent criminals on the streets? Is that what we are doing 
here? Yes. In my opinion, that is what we are doing here.
  On November 2, 1993, the real leadership in America, the people, 
spoke to the need for criminal justice reform. Wherever there was an 
anticrime platform the results showed stunning losses for criminals. In 
many States the American people have voted for real solutions: Tougher 
prison sentences and the abolishment of parole in Virginia and Arizona, 
double prison sentences in Texas, the passage of victims' rights 
amendments in Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, and New Mexico, and 
a crackdown on gang crime in Arizona, Colorado, Florida, and Utah.
  As the Wall Street Journal editorialized in November of last year, 
under the head, ``Criminal Control Beats Gun Control'':

       If indeed crime is one of the deciding electoral issues of 
     our era, the adherence to gun control won't be deciding much 
     of anything until they figure out a way to talk in public and 
     creditably about how to control criminals.

  In other words, what they are saying to you Senators who want to 
control guns and you want to take free citizens' rights tonight, is 
that you will not have credit--or you will not have credibility until 
you have figured out a way to control the criminal. It just does not 
work. Let me assure you, we will have time to calculate the statistics 
to prove that this document will not work, either.
  Americans are using the power of their votes to defend their very 
lives. They know that each year, 60,000 criminals are convicted of 
serious crimes and they never see prison. And those who do are released 
after serving an average of a third of their sentence.
  I know the chairman tonight said we have gotten a little tougher in 
those areas. I hope, for the sake of law-abiding citizens, we have. But 
as is typical, enough loopholes and enough hurdles were provided here 
to never really see some of these tough criminal provisions get to the 
streets of America.
  We do not have a gun problem in America, Madam President. We have a 
law enforcement problem. Tough laws are already on the books to remove 
criminals from society, but they simply have to be used. Existing 
Federal and State laws must be applied to criminals who use guns, drug 
users, drug dealers, and other lawbreakers. The laws are already on the 
books.
  Under the Gun Control Act of 1968, as amended in 1968, it is 
presently--let me repeat this--``It is presently a Federal felony 
punishable by a 5-year prison term and a quarter of a million dollar 
fine for a convicted felon to be in possession of an assault weapon.'' 
That is the law now. Why, then, are we piling on? Is it because of what 
I said earlier, the need for a political placebo, the need to go home 
in an election year and say, ``See what I did for you; I took away your 
rights and I made you safer''? I am fearful it is. Because the 1968 law 
says you cannot do it now, criminal. If you own an assault weapon, you 
go to jail.
  But what we have found is that our judges say ``But pass go. Go 
through the front door and out the back door. And be a good little boy 
or a good little girl until you commit another crime, and then we will 
let you pass through again.''
  This 1968 Gun Control Act covers firearms that anyone could find 
possibly defined as an assault weapon. It covers guns with large 
magazine capacities, pistol grips, flash suppressors; it even covers a 
single shot .22 rifle. That is the law now on the books, 1968.
  Why, then, do these Senators rush to the floor to ban 19 more --maybe 
really 180--different models of other semiautomatic that they choose to 
call assault weapons? The reason they call them assault weapons is the 
cosmetics; it is the pistol grip, the flash suppressor, the magazine. 
That is already in the law. Why are we piling on? Why are we taking 
away citizens' rights at this moment? Oh, yes; it is the eve of an 
election year. I must have forgotten. Could it be there is a bit of 
politics here?
  This article goes on--or this chapter goes on to say:

       In addition, other prohibitions with the same or greater 
     penalties include the use of a firearm in any crime. Selling 
     of a firearm by a convicted felon, alteration of any firearm 
     to a fully automatic firearm, and the use of a firearm during 
     a drug trade.

  New law? No. Old law, 1968 law. But the tragedy is, in America today, 
it is unenforced law. We remember all these criminal activities should 
result in long, hard jail time for criminals or drug users or drug 
dealers with assault weapons or any other kind of firearm, shotgun, 
rifle, pistol, revolver, single shot, machinegun. Why are they not 
used? Why are we tonight having to defend the right of free citizens 
when this law is already on the books?
  Every victim of every violent crime in which a gun is used ought to 
demand an answer to this question. And in their own very real and very 
frustrated way, Americans are doing just that now. They are saying: 
Give us real crime control, Mr. and Mrs. Politician; and if you do not, 
we will get us a politician who will.
  If Federal law enforcement agents did their job with respect to guns 
and convicted violent felons, using only the 1968 act as reformed, the 
gun control that we talk about tonight would not be an issue. We would 
be a long way toward the solving of violent crime in America. We would 
be getting the criminals off the streets and into the jail.
  Welling up out of my thoughts and my comments tonight comes the 
obvious question. Senator Craig, if you say these laws are already on 
the books, and that is since 1968, and now we are putting them on the 
books again, what is our assurance that if they did not work then, they 
will work now? Guarantee us, Mr. and Mrs. Politician, that what you did 
in 1968 but you did not back up from 1968, you will back up today.
  America and our citizens have a right to be angered. They have a 
right to ask that question. And they have the right to ask why, if in 
1968 this became the law, are we now the victims of violent criminals 
using guns time and time again? And most importantly, if it is the 
violent criminal that uses the gun, why tonight do you choose to take 
the gun away from me, the free citizen?
  Think about that. Every convicted criminal in America who picks up a 
gun could now be in a Federal prison. More importantly, under the 1968 
act, they should be in a Federal prison. That is the law. Do you not 
remember that old television show, ``That is the Law''? That is the 
law, Madam President. But it is not working because it is not enforced. 
And so, they pass through on their way out to commit another crime.
  But other than these existing few statutes, why then are we moving to 
control guns in this measure tonight? It is a hoax; it is a hoax. If 
all the gun control proposals now pending before Congress, and there 
are many others, are the targets of real criminals, why did 68 not 
work? The answer is that gun control measures are not the targets to go 
after criminals. They are the targets to go after or restrict free 
citizens.
  Since it is already criminal to purchase and possess even one gun if 
you are a criminal, why limit the number of guns or types to honest 
people? The answer: Arresting violent criminals is dangerous; arresting 
nice, peaceful citizens is safe.
  Forcing gun control laws on decent citizens is comparable to Congress 
passing a law to eradicate cancer by forcing an elderly healthy person 
to undergo chemotherapy and radiation. It might cure cancer, but it 
might also kill most of us in the process.
  Gun ban laws have accomplished one thing: massive civil disobedience 
by peaceful, formerly law-abiding citizens. If I have heard it once in 
the last year, I have heard it a hundred times from my citizens in 
Idaho, and that is:

       Senator, don't make me a violator of the law. Don't force 
     me to be a lawbreaker in my own land simply because I want 
     the right to own a gun, as my Founding Fathers assured me I 
     would have. Don't pass laws that I can't live by as a free 
     citizen in this country and as a law-abiding citizen.

  So let me close, Madam President, because the vote has already been 
taken, and while it will occur at least twice again tonight, it is very 
profound what we are about to do. We are about to pass a new crime 
control measure that puts billions of unpaid, foreign, uncollected 
dollars out somewhere on the streets of America in the guise that 
somehow the criminal will become less violent and the world will become 
a safer place. And we are passing a law tonight that says to the free 
citizen of our country: You will be just a little less freer tomorrow. 
And will it change America distinctively tomorrow? No, it will not.
  That free citizen will be a little less freer, but what that free 
citizen is worried about is that the little less freedom becomes a 
collective kind of thing; that it accumulates and they become a little 
less freer over time; and that a generation or two from now, because it 
happened so easily in this country, then we may be increasingly 
restricted.
  So tonight those few who drone on about gun bans, I hope, ultimately 
get drowned out by angry voices of voters who are rebelling against 
America's catch-and-release criminal justice system and beginning, as I 
think they will, to flex their muscles at the ballot box.
  Politicians should take note of what people are trying to tell them. 
It has been a very loud and very audible cry for the last good many 
months. America is not in control of itself, but you do not make 
America a safer place by making Americans less free.
  Mr. STEVENS addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alaska.
  Mr. STEVENS. Madam President, I see there are others going to speak, 
and I have spoken. I want to get back to the one concept that is here, 
and that is these semiautomatic weapons. As I thought about that 
subject, I thought about a comment that one of our colleagues on the 
floor said to me today: ``Stevens, why do you get so uptight about 
guns?''
  So I have decided to take just a few minutes to tell the Senate why I 
am so uptight about the provisions in this bill.
  I want to take you back to the twenties and the early thirties in 
Indiana. That was a time of the beginning of the Great Depression, at 
the end of the twenties and on into the thirties, and I lived in 
Indianapolis. I was living with my grandmother and grandfather. We were 
what people would call today below the minimum level of income by a 
long ways. I was about 8 when a World War I vet let me use his .22 
rifle and taught me to hunt just a few blocks from our house. Across 
the railroad tracks, there were some places where there were rabbits. 
And quite often I learned in the wintertime to go out and shoot 
rabbits, and I shot them to bring them home. It was not sport, it was 
for food.
  By the time I got into the late thirties, I moved to California, 
living with my aunt and uncle. My uncle was a World War I vet. He 
worked very hard as a tool and die maker but he only got 2 weeks 
vacation a year. One of those 2 weeks we spent hunting and the other of 
the 2 weeks we spent with my aunt visiting a national park or 
recreational-type area in California.
  But the 1 week of hunting was usually up in northern California. We 
drove up to an old fort, and I remember so well those days when we were 
hunting then, because we used the old World War I little pup tents to 
sleep in, and we had some equipment that we had put together to cook, 
and we hunted in the rain or we fixed our food in the rain. It did not 
matter what it was, it was a vacation, but it also was a time we were 
going for food. We went after the mule tail deer of northern 
California, and I learned to hunt larger game in northern California.
  I did not own a rifle then. I really did not acquire a rifle that I 
really owned until I moved to Fairbanks in the period following World 
War II. I graduated from law school and went to Fairbanks. By that 
time, I was a young attorney. I did not own a handgun, but I did buy a 
bolt-action rifle. It was a hand-moved bolt action.
  But I formed great friendships up there in the hunting expeditions 
that I had with either shotguns or with my rifle.
  Later, when I moved to Anchorage, I bought my first handgun, a .357 
Magnum, and I bought a series of shotguns and rifles. As my boys came 
along, I gave each one of them a gun when they were 13. Again, it would 
not have been a violation of this, but it was what we call an over-and-
under--a .22 rifle on the top and single-shot 20-gauge shotgun below 
it.
  I can remember the days, again, when I had vacations, and they were 
not often. Year by year, I would take my boys out into the little 
Susitna country, going out toward Glennallen. It is going eastward from 
Anchorage. We used pack horses, and a couple of friends would go along. 
We would hunt one boy with one adult. We took pack horses and went into 
the wild. That area is now in the national park. In 1980, Congress made 
that not available to those of us who are not subsistence hunters, and 
I always regretted the loss of that area because we had a very rustic 
camp out there.
  We took our pack horses out. We had mountains to go up and mountains 
to come down. We taught our boys how to hang onto the tail of a horse 
to go up a mountain and how they restrained a horse so it would not 
break a leg coming down a mountain. We forded streams, and we went 
hunting.
  We, by that time, were after moose. I also hunted for moose in 
Fairbanks, but the moose hunting trips I remember mostly were with my 
boys. My first wife, my late wife, Ann, used to say that these were our 
male bonding sessions, and she approved of them very much.
  When you look at what we did over that period of time, first myself 
as a very young boy and then with my uncle in California, through high 
school and college ages, those were the times we sat together around 
the campfire and talked about really what we should be as men.
  What bothers me about the semiautomatic provision is that every gun I 
own today is semiautomatic, with the exception of the handguns. And 
even one of them is semiautomatic. Why should I not be feeling exactly 
as the Senator from Idaho says so many of us feel, that this is just 
the first step? We know this will not work. This will not take riot 
guns from criminals. They do not get them legally anyway. They do not 
use them legally.

  We tried to put into law tougher provisions for the police to enforce 
that would make it a serious crime to misuse guns. I spoke earlier 
about the silencers in particular. I think anyone who uses a silencer 
is a would-be murderer, and there ought to be appropriate treatment for 
anyone that has a silencer that is not part of a law-enforcement 
mechanism.
  I do believe the great problem is most people do not understand us. 
They do not understand us. I was brought up to believe in the right of 
an individual, particularly a young boy, or a father and a son to have 
guns and to be able to use them, use them lawfully. We taught our 
sons--and still the NRA teaches them now--how to use weapons, how to 
respect them, what our duties are if we have a gun, how we prevent 
accidents.
  But the real problem is I still believe we have those rights. When 
this law does not work, as the ones that the Senator from Idaho has 
been speaking of that are on the books do not work because they are not 
enforced and cannot be enforced, what is next? The ultimate we feel, 
the ultimate is some sort of restriction on our rights, some further 
restrictions on our rights.
  This bill defines semiautomatic weapons by listing specific weapons, 
and the Senate is about ready to pass that bill that will confiscate in 
effect our right to have those weapons and to use them lawfully. The 
real problem about this as far as I am concerned is not what this bill 
does so much as the progression it continues.
  This Congress has already passed the Brady bill. Four years ago, I 
suggested a system, and discussed it with the then FBI Director, of 
using mechanisms similar to the credit card checks when we go into 
retail stores of every person having a gun card, and we would be 
required to have this card that would go into a mechanism, would 
automatically check out whether we have been convicted of any crime. 
The dealers selling weapons would have a similar concept. Before they 
even think about selling a weapon, they would have to get information 
and put it into a national registration of past crimes, particularly 
those involving firearms.
  We could have done that, and it could have been law by now. It would 
have stopped many people who are not qualified, ought not to have guns, 
from purchasing guns in the interim period. That was not accepted. 
Instead, we fought and fought and fought over the Brady bill waiting 
period, which again has brought nothing but a problem to people who 
live in rural areas.
  But the main point I am making is the progression from the Brady bill 
which was fashioned in a way that is not going to prevent people who 
really should not have guns from getting them. It mandated local 
actions, and court after court across the country has said the States 
do not have to follow that mandate. It was not funded, and it is not 
practical.
  But beyond that, we come to the definition of these semiautomatic 
weapons, and again we are not going to take weapons from any criminal. 
There is no mechanism to prevent a criminal from getting any 
semiautomatic weapon.
  What does it do? It defines a proposition that weapons that have that 
capability of being transformed into a banned semiautomatic ought to be 
banned as well. How far is that from my shotgun? How far is that from 
my automatic rifle? How far is that from my automatic pistol?
  I am trying to make this point, too. Are these people really serious 
that that is the direction they are going? Are they going to tell me 
that future generations of young fathers in this country are not going 
to have that experience with their sons, that they cannot, cannot 
possess semiautomatic hunting rifles?
  We believe that is where they are going, and that is where I am 
coming from. I know that is where they are coming from now because they 
took out of this bill the provisions we put in it to make it a serious 
crime to misuse a weapon, particularly to misuse a weapon by a felon.
  As the Senator from Idaho says, there has been a law that they cannot 
even possess a weapon. But to misuse it in connection with a crime 
ought to intensify the punishment. And we ought to send out the word 
very strongly that the Congress of the United States expects those laws 
to be enforced and take action to make certain that they are. The 
difficulty is those of us who have this kind of background, who believe 
in guns, love to use guns, who have lived with guns all our lives are 
now somehow chastised because we are worried about the procedure that 
is being followed in order to put before the Congress a bill that is 
just one more step in the progression to take guns away from us.
  Now, I think our people are legitimately worried. I am legitimately 
worried about the effectiveness of the second amendment with this 
continued erosion of the right to keep and bear arms.
  Mr. KEMPTHORNE addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho.
  Mr. KEMPTHORNE. Madam President, during debate on the original Senate 
crime bill, I said it was one of the most important crime bills in 
American history. When the Senate passed its version of the crime bill, 
I complimented my colleagues for doing a great service for the American 
people. I truly believed we had approved a crime bill that was--tough 
on crime. I remember saying that the trust the American people had 
placed in Congress had been greatly justified. I regret to say that I 
cannot repeat those words here today.
  The crime bill conference report which has returned from the House is 
much improved over the bill rejected by the House last week. For 
example, I am pleased that $3.7 billion was bundled together and is 
being allocated to the States for block grant programs to combat crime. 
States and local communities must be given the opportunity to use 
scarce resources in targeted manners to address particular crime 
situations, not as bureaucrats in Washington decide.
  I am pleased that the House majority has recognized a simple fact--
even though they now possess the White House, and a majority in both 
Houses of Congress, they cannot dictate terms to the minority and 
expect to have their actions accepted by the American people. 
Nevertheless, while the original conference report was totally 
unacceptable; this new version is also out of step with what the 
American people want from a crime bill.
  The crime bill that came back from conference is just that; it is a 
crime what Congress has done to the bill. It has now gone from a crime 
bill to a criminal's bill. Much of the good that I supported in the 
original bill has been dropped.
  I must admit I am not an expert in criminal law or procedure. Unlike 
many of my colleagues, I am not an attorney. However, before coming to 
this body, I was mayor of Idaho's capital city. As Boise's chief 
executive, I worked with public safety personnel. I have seen, 
firsthand, the problems our officers face every day. I have ridden in 
the patrol cars and walked the beat. I have never met a more committed 
and honorable group of men and women. What they want from the 
politicians and the policymakers is to be given the tools to do the 
job--and then for us to get the heck out of the way.

  It is in the State capitols and city halls of America that crime must 
be fought: 96 percent of the crime in America is committed at the local 
level. Only 4 percent of all crime is under the Federal jurisdiction. 
Yet Congress has attempted to represent to the American people we are 
providing a solution to crime in America. We cannot continue to 
federalize American law enforcement. During debate on the Senate crime 
bill, I introduced and had accepted by the majority a sense-of-the-
Senate resolution that said that, ``local law enforcement must remain 
the sole prerogative of local government under their respective 
jurisdictions and authorities.'' Unfortunately that provision, an 
acknowledgement of the preeminence of State and local law enforcement, 
did not survive the conference report.
  In my State there is a saying, ``Idaho is what America was.'' But as 
we look around the country and see the threat of urban crime now 
creeping into rural communities, my constituents are concerned that 
instead of Idaho being what America was, Idaho will become what America 
is.
  If we are going to have a crime bill that is tough on crime, why has 
it been stripped of the tools, and the teeth necessary to get the job 
done.
  This crime bill no longer includes 13 billion real dollars for States 
to build new prisons. This crime bill erased tough Federal penalties 
for violent juvenile gang offenses, and mandatory minimum sentencing 
for use of a firearm in the commission of a crime.

  This crime bill eliminated mandatory minimum sentencing for selling 
drugs to minors or employing minors in a drug crime. This crime bill no 
longer allows for the prosecution of violent juveniles over the age of 
13 as adults. And Mr. President, this crime bill prohibits deporting 
criminal aliens after they have served their sentence.
  In its place the new crime bill is just a collection of dressed up 
social programs. In some cases they simply substitute the phrase ``for 
crime prevention'' for action to prevent crime.
  The new Crime bill will:
  Increase the deficit by $13 billion.
  The Local Partnership Act and the National Community Economic 
Partnerships Act together add $1.8 billion in jobs programs, and 
loosely controlled educational and substance abuse programs.
  The Model Intensive Grant Program is a $625 million giveaway to 15 
urban cities with virtually no controls on how the administration will 
spend the money.
  The Community Based Justice Program will require social workers to be 
involved in criminal cases to assure that prosecutors focus on what is 
good for the criminals--not the victims. Yes, and all we have to pay 
for this is just $50 million.
  The conferees claim that $9.8 billion is provided for prisons. But of 
that amount, $1.8 billion is given to the Attorney General to hand out 
to the States to help pay the cost of incarcerating criminal aliens. Of 
the $7.9 billion in prison grants remaining, there is no guarantee that 
the money will be spent to build prisons. Furthermore, the 
bill requires costly State mandates for a comprehensive correctional 
plan which represents an integrated approach to the management and 
operation of correctional facilities. Mr. President, apparently 
Congress just does not get it. The American people do not want a feel-
good approach to prisons. They want to give police, prosecutors, and 
judges the resources to jail violators and they want prisons available 
to house them to serve their sentences. They do not want to hire 
bureaucrats to write regulations on the meaning of a qualifying Federal 
diversion, rehabilitation, or jobs programs.

  I believe we should address the State's needs for prisons and provide 
alternatives for young people to crime. But the GAO reported that this 
country now has 266 prevention programs currently serving delinquent 
and at-risk youth. Of these 266 programs, 31 are run by the Department 
of Education, 92 by HHS, 117 by the Justice Department and 26-odd 
programs scattered elsewhere about the executive branch. The GAO found 
that we have already mounted a massive Federal effort on behalf of 
troubled youth to the tune of $3 billion a year. Yet, here we go again 
throwing money at the problem for the sake of saying we have 
accomplished something. We have no clear idea how we will pay for the 
programs we have got much less the ones we are adding. What we need is 
to reassess these programs and coordinate our efforts and our dollars.
  The provisions included in this crime bill repeat the same vague 
social programs over and over again. What we have here is the same jobs 
bill Congress killed last year rising from the grave. Jobula, the 
social program vampire, sucking the blood out of our economy to feed 
its fiendish lust for cash,
  When we considered the Brady bill, I spoke to my concern that when we 
began the process of passing gun control legislation that we would be 
opening a Pandora's box of legislation limiting the rights of gun 
owners. During debate of the original Senate bill, I strenuously 
objected to the ban on semiautomatic firearms, and voted against the 
measure three times. In the end, however, I supported the bill, as did 
other of my colleagues, for the following reason: I knew we would have 
additional opportunities to delete the semiautomatic weapons ban while 
still producing a strong anticrime package. However, I fear that 
instead of achieving a strong anticrime package we have produced a 
budget-busting social programs bill which will continue the process of 
reducing the rights of law-abiding citizens.

  Unfortunately, the conference committee which reconciled the House 
and Senate versions of the crime bill ultimately failed to produce 
legislation which will have any serious impact on crime. The committee 
retained the needless semiautomatic firearm ban and added millions of 
dollars in pork-barrel spending to the bill. Not only will the crime 
bill infringe on the rights of gun owners, it will also create several 
new social programs which will increase the Federal deficit by $13 
billion.
  Mr. President, I appeal to my colleagues instead of the bill before 
us let us pass a crime bill that will make our streets, our 
neighborhoods, and our communities safe again.
  It is truly a crime against the American people for congress to 
masquerade a jobs bill, new social programs, and pork as a crime bill. 
We have more important needs in this country than make work programs. 
We need to get tough on crime, and I am sorry that the efforts we made 
earlier this year to do just that have been wiped out. It is a crime.
  I ask unanimous consent that several letters be printed in the 
Record.
  There being no objection, the letters were ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:
                                                 Soda Springs, ID.
     Senator Dirk Kempthorne,
     Federal Building
     Pocatello, ID.

     Re: Crime Bill.

       Dear Senator Kempthorne: The Clinton Crime Bill is another 
     blatant infringement on our Constitutional rights and 
     individual freedom. The Omnibus Crime Bill creates an 
     enormous Federal Police Force with the power to exercise 
     infinite control over the people. A Gestapo, under control of 
     one person who will not hestitate to use it to force his will 
     on the people. I was relieved to see it killed in the House.
       Any bill that imposes gun control of any kind is un-
     Constitutional. There is no doubt that gun control will have 
     little impact on crime as a whole. Outlaw guns so only 
     criminals have guns. If private ownership of guns is the 
     problem, why do states with no anti-gun laws have the least 
     crime? It is because a potential criminal cannot be sure he 
     is the only one with a gun.
       The same as with Health Care, a Federal Crime Bill 
     increases the size and scope of federal control over our 
     everyday lives. It will do little to curtail crime, but will 
     give even more un-controlled power to non-elected government 
     officials. All agencies impose rules that are then enforced 
     the same as laws passed by the House and Senate. I.e., The 
     rules the Forest Service tried to slip in un-noticed.
       Both President Clinton and her husband are pushing to gain 
     more individual power over every aspect of our daily lives. 
     They want to be the dictators over a socialistic police 
     state. Clinton was elected on the promise of change. The only 
     change we are getting is a rapidly growing federal 
     bureaucracy, increasing taxes and a loss of our rights, at an 
     execrated rate. Do not vote for any program that increases 
     his power and authority, he already has far too much.
       Regardless of when it happened, Whitewater is a very 
     important issue. It is more important and has implications 
     more far reaching than watergate even could. To anyone who 
     has been paying attention, the Clinton's are involved in a 
     massive cover-up, which could even involve murder. Were they 
     ordinary citizens, there is no doubt they would be charged 
     and held without bail. Please keep pushing for an 
     investigation into the whole affair. If you really want to do 
     something about crime, that is a good place to start.
           Thank you,
                                                    Jared P. Lowe.
                                  ____

                                   Blackfoot, ID, August 24, 1994.
       Dear Senator Kempthorne: I am writing to express serious 
     concerns in regard to passage of the Omnibus Crime Bill. As 
     an American citizen and veteran I ask that you consider my 
     opinion, and also that you do your duty to support and defend 
     the Constitution of the United States of America. My primary 
     concern is the gun ban and the greater constitutional issue 
     that surrounds it. I believe that there are elements within 
     our society and without, internationalists and social 
     engineers, who openly and defiantly vow to disarm the 
     American people. Allow me to inject something here that 
     illustrates my point. I watched Senator Diane Feinstein 
     respond to the question ``does your assault rifle ban violate 
     the second amendment to the Constitution?'' Her response was 
     ``SO WHAT!'' I am alarmed with the ease that someone sworn by 
     oath to defend and support our Constitution, can show such 
     utter contempt for it. There are millions of Americans who 
     are sickened by such arrogance. Why wasn't this woman 
     censured? This is a law that will surely not prevent the 
     criminal element from obtaining banned guns, any moor than 
     drug laws keep people from getting drugs. It is an 
     unconstitutional INFRINGEMENT upon law abiding Americans. Why 
     should our government act as though it fears its citizens 
     armed? Crime has been used to scare the American people into 
     accepting something most politicians know, will do precious 
     little to solve our problems, but buys votes for them, at too 
     great a cost.
       When Charles Manson was 12 years old he killed his first 
     man, he used a knife. During the next few years he killed 29 
     others by most accounts, all with knives. According to 
     prosecuting attorney Bugliosi Manson boasted to prison 
     officials after begging them to not let him go, ``I'll commit 
     a crime so bad you have to lock me up and never let me go.'' 
     John Wayne Gasey killed 40 he used the knife. James Wood used 
     a knife to rape, molest, terrorize and murder 15 people we 
     know of. My point is simple, gun bans will not solve the 
     crime problem. Americans have had guns for over 200 years, 
     why are they now the scapegoat? Idaho has one of the highest 
     guns per capita of any state, yes we have crime but not to 
     the extent some of those promoting gun control would lead us 
     to believe we should have. The Federal Prisons Board and the 
     FBI claim 90% of the crimes are committed by 10% of the 
     criminals. If the crime bill is to do anything lasting and 
     meaningful it needs to address the problem of overcrowding, 
     plea-bargaining and lenient judges, the problem does not 
     appear to me to be one of apprehension or a lack of 
     sufficient laws, but rather one of detention. Why turn these 
     menaces to society loose because we don't have room for them 
     in the prison system or enough money to keep them locked up. 
     What good is three strikes if we don't have the money or the 
     room?
       One more interesting and very important statistic we never 
     seem to hear about is that although in 1993 13,000 murders 
     were committed in the U.S. in that same year it is estimated 
     that approximately 300,000 murders, robberies, rapes and 
     other assaults were prevented by someone with a gun. To 
     disarm the American people leaving only law enforcement, 
     Federal Para-Military Agencies, etc. and the military with 
     guns sounds like a Police State to me. Our Founding Fathers 
     wisely foresaw this danger and we seem to be oblivious to it. 
     Recognizing the natural tendencies of those in power to 
     dominate and control others, a system of checks and balances 
     was devised to keep the real power in the people, one 
     manifestation of this was the recognization that the God 
     given right to defend oneselves and ones property should 
     always be the primary responsibility of the individual. This 
     right is not granted by the 2nd amendment; it is simply 
     reiterated and reaffirmed by it, and wisely so. Again the 
     intent was to guarantee and protect the ability of the people 
     to defend themselves from tyranny, foreign and domestic. 
     Those willing to give up this right and in-trust their 
     liberties to a ruling elite, the United Nations, Nato or some 
     other New World Order entity made up of non-constitutional, 
     non-elected, non-Americans are in my opinion flirting with 
     slavery.
       Please, Mr. Kempthorne, I implore you to utilize the full 
     force of your office and calling to do everything humanly and 
     legally possible to kill this flawed and dangerous 
     legislation. I hope that Mr. Gramm, Mr. Wallop, and 
     particularly Mr. Dole and others will lend their full support 
     to defeat this bill. Regardless of their actions I must ask 
     you again because you are my Senator: I am trusting in you to 
     do the right thing no matter what. If necessary, please 
     filibuster this bill.
           Thank you,
                                                   Charles Kotter.
                                  ____

       My name is Ray L. Johnson. I am a retired Chief of Police. 
     I belong to The National Assn. of Retired Chiefs of Police. I 
     am writing this letter to voice my concerns about the (crime 
     bill) that is now being considered in the Senate. Myself and 
     several other retired Chiefs that I have talked with, believe 
     that this bill does nothing to curb crime. It will do nothing 
     for all the small rural cities and towns where 95% of the 
     police work is done. It will fund about 20,000, not 100,000 
     new police to work in some police departments in big cities, 
     for about two years at most. Then they will be left with the 
     responsibility of funding those officers and in all 
     probability they won't have the funds. The money that is to 
     be spent for new prisons, will be for Federal prisons, not 
     for State run institutions. And does nothing for the over 
     crowding in the state institutions, as the states will be 
     charged about three times what it would cost them to house a 
     prisoner in state institution, as versed to what the cost 
     would be to house the same prisoner in a federal institution. 
     The ban on assault type weapons, and the almost six thousand 
     per cent tax on various types of ammunition. All this will do 
     is stop law-abiding people from owning certain types of 
     weapons. ``It will not'' stop any criminal from getting, or 
     using these types of weapons in crimes. They will steal them, 
     or smuggle them in from other countries, or make them. As for 
     the ammunition tax. Criminals don't care how big a tax you 
     put on ammunition, why, because they will ``steel'' what they 
     need. We don't need 30 more do nothing social programs to add 
     to the approximately 240 do nothing programs we have that 
     don't work. If you want to stop crime? First you reform the 
     juvenile justice system. Kids learn at very early age that 
     the juvenile justice system is a joke. Instead of having kids 
     play ping pong, shuffle board, and have social awareness 
     class. Have the centers run like mini boot camps, give them 
     some discipline, selfasteam, and some direction. Next you 
     make it a capital offense for any crime committed with a gun, 
     also for the sale or possession of (1) ounce or more of any 
     class one substance. Instead allowing endless appeals they 
     would get one, and that would be a review. Any death sentence 
     would be carried out within 30 days of the sentencing. Make 
     all sentences fixed without parole. And run the prison like 
     boot camps. Take out all the T.V.s, all the basketball 
     courts. Stop building country clubs and build prison. Give 
     the military the job of stopping illegal smuggling and 
     immigration. Thus allowing for more cops on the streets. This 
     may not stop crime but it will do more than midnight basket 
     ball will.
           Sincerely,
                                                   Ray L. Johnson.
                                  ____

                                 Idaho Falls, ID, August 18, 1994.
       Dear Senator Kempthorne: I am writing to you to express my 
     opposition on some pending legislation. I urge you to vote 
     against the so-called ``Crime Bill''. My major objections 
     concerns bans on so-called ``assault weapons'' which includes 
     high capacity magazines, etc. but I also feel other 
     provisions of this legislation are also ill-advised, 
     including federalization of many crimes formerly under the 
     jurisdiction of state and local municipalities. Based on 
     relatively recent US Marshall/FBI/BATF showing in such 
     incidents as the Randy Weaver case in northern Idaho and the 
     Branch Davidian fiasco in Waco, Texas, I do not feel that the 
     country needs any more such ``federal law enforcement'' 
     incidents. (I do believe and hope that these were unusual 
     incidents atypical of these agencies, but they did occur in 
     the recent past.) I am skeptical of ``3 strikes and you're 
     out'' legislation which may be passed without further thought 
     to modifying current prison construction requirements to 
     control costs. Here in Bonneville County, a referendum was 
     recently defeated for an $8 million bond for a new county 
     jail facility mainly because the amount seemed exorbitant and 
     the cost would have to be borne by the taxpayers. I have 
     similar reservations about the funding for the ``100,000 new 
     police'' clauses of the crime bill.
       It would appear to me that a better way to combat crime is 
     for the people to regain control of the judicial system in 
     this country.
       I also urge honest consideration of the real costs for 
     proposed ``national health care'' legislation pending. I have 
     not read enough specifics in the newspaper to be aware of 
     many details concerning a proposed health care reform but 
     previous projections concerning costs given by the President 
     seem ridiculously optimistic to me, and it must be remembered 
     that the costs will be passed on to the business or taxpayers 
     in one way or another. I don't say that some of the proposals 
     have no merit, but I do urge that costs for such ``reform'' 
     be forecast as accurately as possible prior to any vote by 
     the Congress.
       Thank you for considering my opinion in these matters.
           Very truly yours.
                                                    Dale A. Jolly.

  Mr. KEMPTHORNE. Madam President, in January of this year, I went to 
Mogadishu as a member of the Armed Services Committee. I went to a ship 
off the shore of Bosnia. On each of those occasions, I met with 
military personnel, with the young sailors and marines and the 
soldiers. I just allowed them to ask me any question they wished. 
Without exception, those young military soldiers said to me, ``Don't 
let them take our guns away.'' I said, ``Well, what do you mean?''
  They said, ``We mean when we're back home as citizens with our 
families and our friends, don't let them take our guns from us.'' And I 
said, ``Why is that a concern of yours?'' And they said, ``Because we 
are well aware of the history of those nations that did not have the 
right to keep and bear arms; that we're in that business to protect 
nations like that, that can't protect themselves.''
  And they said, ``We took an oath to protect this Constitution.'' They 
said, ``And you took an oath to protect the Constitution. And included 
in there is the second amendment rights. So, Senator, please, remember 
the oath and don't let them take our guns from us.''
  Any one of us here, if we met those individuals, would be so proud of 
them because of their service to the Nation and because of what they 
were saying. They believe it with all their heart.
  I can tell you that in the State of Idaho we have a fierce belief in 
the Constitution of the United States, and I can say that Idahoans 
would defend that Constitution with our lives if necessary.
  Included in that Constitution, of course, are the second amendment 
rights, the right to keep and bear arms. Now, there has been much said 
about these assault weapons. Why in the world would you need them for 
hunting? Why in the world would you need these assault weapons?
  In Idaho, there is a great deal of hunting that takes place, a number 
of great gun collections in the State of Idaho. But do Idahoans, when 
they are hunting, empty a clip into an animal that they are hunting?
  Of course not. When they are hunting for the sake of food, that would 
be ridiculous because of the destruction it would cause. You do not do 
that if you are a hunter. You do not do that if you are a sportsman. 
You do not do that if you are a marksman because you have much greater 
respect for that weapon than that.
  People say, ``But the only way to stop this crime, the only way to 
stop people from using guns which murder people, is you have to ban 
guns.'' That is what this is about, is to totally ban guns.
  So what examples can we look to? What about this city of Washington, 
DC? You should know that Washington, DC has the toughest, or one of the 
toughest, gun control laws of any city in the country, right here in 
Washington, DC, since 1977. And handguns are prohibited. You can have a 
rifle, but it has to be registered. Yet, Washington, DC has one of the 
highest murder rates of any city in the country. Yet, it has the 
toughest gun control law on the books. It has been there for years.
  Between 1980 and 1993, 4,200 homicides were committed in the District 
of Columbia. Of those 4,200 homicides, which is an appalling figure, 4 
were committed with the use of a rifle. It is allowed in the District 
of Columbia to have a rifle as long as it is registered. Yes.
  Other forms were used in bringing about these homicides--fists, 
clubs, et cetera, but those handguns that were used in these homicides, 
guess what? They are illegal. It is against the law to have a handgun 
in Washington, DC. Yet, they use those to commit a murder.
  Where is the logic? Can you tell me that banning those handguns would 
stop those murders from happening? No. You cannot because that is not 
the fact. The fact is that gun control legislation does not work.
  So then I have to conclude, as do many Idahoans, that you do not need 
gun control. You need crime control. That is what we are trying to 
craft in this crime bill. So can you tell me the logic then of when we 
had language in that bill that said if you use a handgun, if you use a 
gun in the commission of a crime, there are going to be mandatory 
minimum sentences that are going to be tough--why were they stricken? 
Why is that language now out? We have the ban in place, but the law 
that was going to be tough on the use of those guns, if you use them in 
a crime, are out. It does not make sense.
  Madam President, I submit that we are undermining our second 
amendment rights with this action in this crime bill, with this ban 
that is in place. And I have to say to all of the country that this 
will not be the last assault on our second amendment rights. This will 
be a continuing effort that will be made ultimately to ban guns in 
America.
  There is another right that I want to mention; that is, the right of 
local law enforcement. That is the prerogative of local government. You 
do not want that to be nationalized. It should be handled at the local 
level.
  Well, I offered an amendment that just clarified that. The amendment 
said--and it was made part of the managers' report, it was accepted by 
this body--it just said that when we provide these funds that will now 
put what was to be 100,000 police officers on the street--but it is now 
closer to 20,000--that when we provide the Federal dollars to do that, 
that is not to become the federalization, or the first steps toward the 
federalization, of law enforcement. It also made the strong suggestion 
that we ought to leave the money at home in the first place, because if 
a mayor or city council or county commissioners need to have more 
police officers at home, if the money is left there in the first place, 
they can use it best rather than to have it go through the Federal 
Government as the middleman because that is expensive.
  As you know, in this formula, the first year that you utilize this, 
if you do acquire some of these Federal funds, the local community has 
to pay 25 percent. The next year they have to pay 50 percent. The third 
year they have to pay 75 percent, and the next year 100 percent, until 
you have the 6 years that has been acquired. The communities do not 
have those funds.
  I would suggest that it will not surprise me that in a couple of 
years when the cities now say we do not have the funds, that we are 
about ready to lose these police officers, the Federal Government will 
say, we have an idea. We will just provide you the money. We will just 
crank up that old printing press. But of course, you will have to 
comply with some more of our Federal regulations. These are the steps 
for the federalization of local law enforcement.
  I say this, Madam President, because we need to point out that 
language which was added, an amendment that I had submitted that was 
accepted, is gone. It has been stripped out of this bill. It is not 
there. I do not understand that. I do not understand it.
  We have seen different press conferences where victims have been 
asked to come forward to talk about their situation. I have met some of 
the parents of those children that were murdered. Some people would try 
to suggest that if you are not totally in favor of everything in this 
crime bill, you are insensitive. Do not tell me I am insensitive. When 
I see those parents, I cannot help but think about the loss of those 
children, and I cannot help but think about the loss of the future for 
those children.
  I think about Geraldene Underwood, that little girl from Idaho who 
was murdered by a fellow that has been in and out of prison, because it 
is a revolving door. Yet we do not want the tough language that says we 
are going to keep you there, and, if we have to, we are going to build 
prisons to keep you there.
  So please do not tell me I am insensitive, because I do want a crime 
bill. But I want a tough crime bill.
  This crime bill, as has been pointed out, has taken 6 years to get to 
this point. And it is no wonder because this seems to be how Congress 
operates. It takes 6 years. It takes years to do anything because you 
fill it with pork and just strip it of any meaningful language. And 
then you try, through rhetoric, to say that this is the answer. This is 
the tough bill.
  Well, this is a tough bill. This bill will be tough on the taxpayers 
of America. This bill will be tough on those that believe with all 
their might in our second amendment rights, and this will be tough to 
explain a few years from now when we realize it did not work.
  That is why, Madam President, I am prepared and will vote against 
this bill, because this is not the answer. Much of the answer, 
unfortunately, was stripped from the bill, and in its place were put 
dollar signs. It is very unfortunate.
  Thank you Madam President.
  Several Senators addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
  Mr. DANFORTH. Madam President, I supported the motion to waive the 
Budget Act and I would like to state my reasons for doing so.
  First, in many ways I believe that this legislation represents a 
victory, not a defeat, for principles that have been set forth by 
Members of my own party. It does provide funds for prisons and for law 
enforcement. In many ways, the administration and the majority party in 
Congress have adopted provisions and principles that have been 
expressed by Republicans for a long period of time. My own view is that 
in such circumstances Members of my party should claim victory, not 
defeat.
  But I believe that it is very unlikely that any crime bill that can 
be passed by Congress is going to end up curing the problem of crime. I 
really do not believe that there is any legislation, however tough, 
that is going to end the crime problem in America.
  I am all for hiring more policemen. I am all for building prisons. I 
am all for having tough law enforcement and tough laws. And insofar as 
this legislation provided for that, I think that is fine. But law 
enforcement itself is not going to make for a lawful society. I wish 
that it would. I wish that we in government could just snap our fingers 
and everything would be fine.
  We could have prisons that are doubled in size every decade, and we 
are not going to have a safe society in America. We can have policemen 
on every corner, and we are not going to have a safe society in 
America, because much of the problem that we have in this country is 
with young people. Most people who are in our prisons are under the age 
of 21. It is amazing. But you call up prison officials and ask the 
median age of inmates, and the median age will be 21, 22 years old.
  Crime oftentimes--most of the time--is the business of young men. And 
I wish it were the case that young men were going to modify their 
behavior because they were afraid of the policemen. But I do not think 
that the basic problem is a law enforcement problem. I think the basic 
problem is the fundamental breakdown of values in the society, and a 
breakdown of the family. How is a policeman going to supplant an absent 
father? If parents do not care what happens to their kids, how is any 
prison space going to take care of that? If children are released out 
of school at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, if they have gone to school in 
the first place, and there are no parents at home, if there is no 
father to control a son, law enforcement is not going to do the job, no 
matter how good law enforcement is.
  So I support good law enforcement, but I believe that the problem is 
more deeply rooted in our society than a lack of good law enforcement. 
I think it is lack of families. I think it is a breakdown of basic 
institutions in our society. I think it is a weakening of the role of 
the church. And I think it is kids that are just allowed to run loose.
  So what I liked most in this legislation was the prevention. What I 
liked most in this legislation was that which was so casually labeled 
pork. I am not saying that all the spending in this legislation was 
great. It was not, I am sure. However, there is at least a recognition 
that we have to pay attention to kids. The parents are not going to do 
it, and I do not know any way of making parents do it. Let us try to 
figure out some sort of semi-adequate surrogate for families. That was 
the community school provision in this legislation, to keep schools 
open, to keep school buildings open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. I 
think that is a great idea, because in some of our communities, 
especially the inner cities, there are precious few resources in those 
communities outside of the school building. And in some of our 
communities--I am thinking, for example, of Kansas City, MO, which has 
been under a court order--the school buildings are just terrific. Why 
not use them?
  A lot of people have taken the floor and belittled midnight 
basketball. What is wrong with basketball for kids? Why should kids not 
be using the gyms in school buildings? Why shut the schools down at 3 
o'clock and send the kids out on the streets? So I thought that the 
prevention aspect of this legislation was important--not to say that it 
was perfect. I am sure any time you try anything, even prevention 
programs, some of them are going to be successes and some are going to 
be failures. But I think that the emphasis on prevention was correct in 
this legislation.
  Another reason I supported it was exactly what has been attacked by 
the previous few speakers, and that is the assault weapons ban. Again, 
I do not believe that passing the law is going to make everything 
right. I know that. I know that we are not going to pass a law and 
suddenly recapture every gun that is loose in society. Of course, we 
are not going to do that. But I think the time has come for a degree of 
seriousness in this country. The wheels have come off. What do I mean 
by the wheels coming off? I mean an 11-year-old boy in St. Louis, MO, 
who carries an assault weapon on a school bus.
  So I think we should ban assault weapons. I think it is the right 
thing to do.
  (Mr. FEINGOLD assumed the chair.)
  Mr. DANFORTH. Mr. President, I want to talk about politics, because a 
number of people in the media have asked me how did I feel about my 
vote; how did I feel about being one of a handful of Republicans; how 
have I felt about this last week. The answer is: Lousy, just terrible. 
Why is that? Because the Senate is a club, in a way, and we all know 
each other. We talk to each other; we get along with each other; we 
break bread together on a daily basis. The people who serve with us in 
the Senate over a period of years become our friends. And those of us 
who are in politics have a sense of loyalty and belief in our political 
parties, and it is a serious matter.
  For 26 years, I have been in elected politics. I never thought it 
would be that long when I got into it. I have been a Republican, and I 
am proud to be a Republican. So how do I feel about voting against my 
leader? Lousy. How do I feel about voting against a majority of my own 
party? Lousy. I do not enjoy that. But I thought that this bill was 
right.
  I also believe that the issue as it was presented by many of my 
colleagues in my party was just not right, because they said that this 
is a matter of defining the fundamental difference between a Republican 
and a Democrat.
  Mr. President, that is not this issue. Surely, it is not this issue. 
Surely, the fundamental issue that defines the difference between a 
Republican and a Democrat cannot be this crime bill. There are plenty 
of issues that define the difference between us on this side of the 
aisle and President Clinton.
  It is as easy as falling off a log. We do not have to strain for 
points of difference. President Clinton found them for us last year 
with his economic program. We believed it was more taxes and more 
spending. We thought that it was fundamentally bad economics. That 
brought all Republicans together. We had no problem in uniting against 
his tax program and against his stimulus package, no problem at all.
  Do we have a difference within our party on health care? Yes. We have 
several bills that have been offered by Republicans, but they are not 
that far apart, and they are certainly a long way from the Clinton 
health care program. We do not have the heavy Government hand, the 
massive approach to health care, the extremism.
  President Clinton has made it easy for us to define ourselves. I did 
not think that was going to be the case. He was supposed to be the 
centrist President to run as a centrist. Some centrist. He has found 
the left. That is fine, but that helps us define ourselves as a 
political party.
  There is national defense and all kinds of things. But a crime bill, 
this a crime bill? Not in the mind of this Senator.
  I do not think, Mr. President, that the business of trying to define 
the differences between Republicans and Democrats or between 
Republicans in the Senate and the Democratic President means that on 
each and every issue we have to take to the trenches. It is simple to 
define the defining issues, but that does not mean that everything has 
to be trench warfare. It does not mean that we have to fight 
everything, that we have to defeat everything, that we have to go to 
battle on every single cause. I do not think so.
  So, no, I did not enjoy it, believe me. This has been a tough week 
for this Senator. I will be glad when the weekend comes. I am going to 
go fishing.
  But it does not have anything to do with the difference between 
Republicans and Democrats, at least in my mind. I think that we have to 
try to figure out some ways to function as a country and find some sort 
of bipartisan consensus on something or other. I mean, it just is not 
true that the whole fate of America depends on slugging it out day to 
day in partisan warfare between Republicans and Democrats on each and 
every issue. That is an exaggeration. It is not each and every issue. 
It just seems that way.
  One of the great things I have experienced in this so-called 
mainstream coalition effort on health care is that for weeks Democrats 
and Republicans who have occupied somewhere on the center of the 
political spectrum have met together virtually every day usually for 
hours every day in a spirit of collegiality to seek the common ground 
on one of the most complex issues, maybe the most complex issue ever to 
face our Government, and that is health care. There are opportunities 
to work together. I think we should seek them.
  It certainly was not my idea, when I entered into public life 26 
years ago, that everything, everything, had to be a knock-down, drag-
out fight.
  So one of the thoughts that was in my mind was if there is some area 
where it resonates with me I should try to be someone who at least 
sought some common points across the aisle.
  The bill that is before us is not perfect. It is a compromise. That 
is the legislative process. And that is the reason I think we are here 
to legislate. This compromise happens to have a number of Republican 
ideas in it, and I think the bill should be passed.
  The point of order on the budget would have resulted, I think, in the 
death of yet another crime bill, and I could not support that.
  For those reasons, Mr. President, I voted to waive the Budget Act.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Mr. SMITH. Mr. President, I might, in opening, say to the Senator 
from Missouri that the comments made by the President of the United 
States after the initial defeat of the crime bill rule in the House of 
Representatives and indeed the statements made by the majority leader 
on the floor of the Senate today hardly encompassed anything in terms 
of collegiality or bipartisanship. So I might just state that for the 
Record.
  I would like to start, Mr. President, by first of all acknowledging 
that the votes are cast here. The die has been cast. No one is going to 
change any votes. We are now going to vote to bring cloture to this 
issue and resolve it once and for all. The crime bill will be passed. 
There is not any question about that. That decision was made when the 
point of order was not sustained about an hour or so ago. I regret that 
very much.
  I do not know what the American people think as they watch the debate 
here among us. They hear it is a tough crime bill. It is a weak crime 
bill. It is pork. It is not pork. Senators of excellent reputation say 
exactly the opposite. Someone must surely be wrong.
  So I do not know what the American people think, frankly, of how we 
conduct our business, although I think I can get a pretty good idea 
based on the letters, correspondence, and polls that I have seen. I 
think they are frustrated with us, with good reason. I think they are 
angry with us, with good reason, because we cannot seem, it seems to 
me, to at least stand up here on principle often enough to make 
anything happen. We are always looking for some way to adjust and 
compromise and wheel and deal, to take something that was once good and 
weaken it in the name of bipartisanship or something else.
  If it is good, I do not care which party it is or how many people are 
involved or who they are. If it is good, let us pass it. If it is not 
good, then bipartisanship or collegiality is irrelevant. We should 
stand for principle and let the chips fall where they may.
  That is what it is all about. That is what it was all about with our 
Founding Fathers when they wrote the Constitution when they set up this 
Republic. I have said before on the floor of this Senate there were 
one-third of the people who fought the Revolutionary War. There were 
one-third of the people that stayed with the king, and one-third of the 
people that played on both sides to try to get the best deal they 
could.
  It is the same today. It has not changed a bit. It is exactly how it 
was 215 years ago.
  But the situation stands now that we have not sustained this point of 
order; therefore, we now are not going to have the opportunity to amend 
this crime bill, and when I say ``amend this crime bill'' I am 
basically taking some liberty because all we are trying to do is get 
some of the provisions back in this crime bill that we passed several 
weeks ago on the floor of the Senate.
  We passed it, and it was a tough crime bill when it passed. But 
despite all the rhetoric and all of the things you have been hearing 
for the last 3.5 days, I tell you ``Folks, it hain't as tough as it was 
when it left here--no way.'' And not only that, it is weaker, very much 
weaker than it was when it left here.
  Now, I heard all these statements about how it is not weaker and it 
is stronger and tougher, and all that. I hear some of my colleagues 
say, ``But we are now going to send to the President a crime bill that 
is what everybody wants.'' They wanted a crime bill, good or bad. We 
have to give the President a crime bill. That is what he wants. Never 
mind the fact that it raises the national debt, that it does a lot of 
social welfare spending and it has nothing to do with crime. Never mind 
the fact that it weakened many of the provisions that we tried to put 
in the law as it left the Senate. Never mind all that. But we have to 
have a crime bill. It does not matter whether it helps the police or 
whether the police want it. It does not matter whether it helps the 
American people. But the Senate has to pass a crime bill. The House has 
to pass a crime bill. It has to go to the President. He has to sign it.
  So that happened. That is what is going to happen very shortly. And 
the President will get his wish and he will get his bill and he will 
sign it.
  Take a look at in the next 3 or 4 years and just see how much crime 
goes down in America as a result of this monumental piece of 
legislation which we have now passed.
  I have heard all the rhetoric. Let me just give you a few facts.
  When we sent this crime bill out of the Senate, it had a provision in 
there to deny benefits to illegal aliens--illegal aliens getting 
benefits from the taxpayers of America. It was dropped. It is out. That 
is a fact.
  Benefits to criminals--this tough crime bill--dropped. We are going 
to have benefits now. Benefits for criminals stay. We tried to take it 
out. Back. This tough crime bill has that in there.
  Handguns in schools. We had a provision in our bill which dealt with 
that matter in a very straightforward and tough way that would make it 
pretty sure that students would have to think twice before they brought 
a handgun to school. Dropped. It is out. This tough crime bill that you 
have been hearing about on the other side and that has been praised. 
Dropped.
  I ask the American people how they feel about that. Would you like to 
have a provision that stops a kid from bringing a handgun to school; 
especially since I have three kids in school? Dropped. It is gone.
  How about prisoners working? We had a provision in our bill that said 
they ought to work. It was dropped. It is out. This tough crime bill 
took it out. That is a real tough. Oh, the people of the United States 
of America would be opposed to any of those provisions I just 
mentioned, not to mention three or four others that are weakening 
provisions in this crime bill. Every one of them--I am not going to 
read them all, but some are there.
  Death penalty for drug kingpins. Weakened. Anybody opposed to that? 
The people in the Senate are. They wanted it in this crime bill. They 
wanted to weaken it.
  We did all we could do on this side. All we wanted to do, why we 
wanted this point of order, was to be able to amend this bill to put 
those provisions back in. That is all we wanted. We did not need to 
have it passed, necessarily. We wanted to have the opportunity to have 
this passed, to vote to put these provisions back, because these 
provisions were in the bill and they were passed by a majority in this 
body. That is all we were asking. We were denied the opportunity to do 
it.
  Death penalty for the attempted assassination of the President of the 
United States. We had it in the bill. Dropped. Dropped. Out.
  I could go on and on and on.
  The Dole-Hatch provision on gangs. Dropped. Serious juvenile drug 
offenses; armed career criminals. Dropped. Additional prosecutors for 
gang prosecution. Dropped. Gone. Tough crime bill, is it not? Terrorist 
Alien Removal Act. Dropped. Gone. Out. Material support for terrorism. 
Weakened. Enhanced penalties for terrorism. Dropped. Prisons, truth-in-
sentencing incentives grants. Weakened. Prison construction operation. 
Dropped. The primary purpose of the grants, prison construction 
operation, that is what we had. Dropped.
  On and on and on. I am not going to read them all.
  So when you hear that we passed a tough crime bill, it is not true. 
Period. We had a tough crime bill. We passed it and we sent it to the 
House. They weakened it and they weakened it further in the conference 
and they sent it back here and here is what we have.
  And all we wanted to do--and Senator Dole fought hard, very hard, for 
the past several days and weeks simply to give us that opportunity, and 
he was denied it. That is a fact. And Senator Dole deserves a lot of 
credit, a lot of credit, for what he attempted to do. He should have 
succeeded. He would have, had it not been for a few votes that were 
changed.
  But we all are accountable for our actions. The American people know 
where the votes were. They know what is in this bill. And they know 
what was in it before it left the Senate. They know. They know.
  As Senator Dole said today in his remarks--you could just feel his 
frustration, and I do not blame him--maybe what we need around here are 
a few more Republican Senators. And I will tell you, I do not normally 
make partisan remarks on the floor of the Senate, but I will tell that 
statement is absolutely right. Do you want to change America? Do you 
want to get a tough crime bill? Let us get a few more Republican 
Senators here, or at least folks on the other side of the aisle who 
want to get tough on crime.
  It has taken us 6 years to get this weak bill, because the folks on 
the other side did not want a tough bill for the past 6 years. That is 
why we have not had a tough bill and that is why we do not have one 
now. That is a fact.
  There has been a lot of talk about the pork in this bill. I heard 
Senator Bumpers on the floor today talking about midnight basketball 
and how important it is to Little Rock. My response to my colleague is: 
I think that is wonderful. I hope the people in Little Rock will set up 
25 basketball leagues and maybe some football and soccer, maybe 
handball, I could care less. But pay for it yourselves. Do not ask the 
taxpayers of America who want a tough crime bill to pay for midnight 
basketball in Little Rock or anyplace else. It is not right. They do 
not want that. They want those tough provisions that I just outlined 
here that were weakened. That is what they wanted; $625 million for a 
model intensive grant program; $1.6 billion for the Local Partnership 
Act.
  Senator Danforth just said a few moments ago on the floor that he was 
against the stimulus package, and he stayed with us on the stimulus 
package. The point is, the $1.6 billion for the Local Partnership Act 
is right out of the stimulus package; right smack out of it. There is 
nothing new here.
  When we were talking about it in those days, it was a stimulus 
package. That is what the Local Partnership Act was supposed to be.
  This Local Partnership Act was born in 1992 when Congressman John 
Conyers of Detroit, MI, introduced a bill to spend $5.4 billion on 
local governments in 1992 and 1993. The bill was dressed up and slimmed 
down and later reduced to about $3 billion. And in both bills, 
congressional findings concluded that the United States was in a 
recession. It said, in the midst of a recession, they need these local 
services.
  Well, we are not in a recession now, most people would say, so now we 
are going to call it crime prevention. It is not a stimulus; it is not 
economic any more. Now it is crime. The same thing. It is the same 
language; exactly the same.
  So, now the only difference is the stimulus package wears a badge. It 
is a cop now. It is a policeman now. It is crime now.
  It is the same language, same money, same locations, same recipients, 
just wears a badge and carries a baton. Same old stimulus and same old 
formula--the U.S. Congress taking your money as if we are taking it out 
of the air and sending it down to some district someplace, some 
locality, telling them what to do, how to spend it, so they can spend 
it on midnight basketball or something else.
  They claim that is tough on crime. That is a crime, just to call it 
tough on crime, as the Wall Street Journal said.
  Mr. President, this bill is absolutely loaded with pork.
  Now, everybody that has taken the floor in defense of this, they say, 
``Oh, these are worthwhile programs. They are so wonderful.''
  Many of them are. As I said, I would like to see the midnight 
basketball programs happen and if the local people want to pay for it, 
good. But should the United States Congress do it in its tough crime 
bill? Not hardly.
  There is so much pork in this bill that it defies even talking about 
it. It has been outlined a thousand times on the floor of the Senate, 
and I am not going to go through it again.
  But we know that we have increased this bill. We have put money in 
here in the name of crime prevention. And it is a huge amount of money. 
It is in the billions of dollars and everybody knows it, and it is not 
crime prevention.
  We are talking about prison construction. We had $13 billion in the 
Senate bill. That is what passed. In this bill, we have $7.9 and 
everybody thinks that is pretty nice. We have $7.9 billion to build 
prisons. Yes, we do. But do you know what, there is a loophole in it. 
They do not have to build prisons. They can build prisons but they do 
not have to build prisons.
  Here is what is going to happen. They are going to probably rent some 
apartments, maybe some buildings somewhere, and try to figure out how 
they can get a prisoner out of jail for a weekend pass or work release 
or something, some way they can get him out so he does not have to 
serve in prison. He will be in the apartment. They can do that under 
this bill and call it prison, as long as he is still a prisoner. They 
can do that.
  There are all kinds of alternatives to free up prison space. Anything 
they can do to free up space, that is what it says. It does not say 
they have to build prisons. It says they have to free up prison space. 
OK, we can do it that way. We can house them in a halfway house. There 
are all kinds of provisions here. We can have a number of halfway 
houses built with the $6.9 billion to deal with drugs and other 
problems. They are not necessarily prisons. We will see how many 
prisons are built out of the $6.9 billion and we will see where they 
are built. It will be interesting to see where they are built, too.
  There are a couple of other things I want to talk about. One that was 
very close to me was one on alien terrorists. Senator Simpson had a 
provision that passed this Senate overwhelmingly, and it was dropped in 
this conference. It was dropped from this bill. It provided for the 
expedited deportation of nonresident criminal aliens convicted of 
violent felonies upon completion of their prison sentence.
  If you had a violent felon who is an alien who commits a crime and 
serves his time, the Simpson amendment would have said: Let us get him 
out of here; send him back home; we do not want to spend another nickel 
on him. That is what it would have done. It would allow the Federal 
judges to enter these deportation orders at the time of sentencing, so 
once the sentence is served the criminal is out, gone. What happened? 
They dropped it. We ought to protect these people, right? That is a 
good, tough crime bill, to protect somebody who is trying to blow up a 
building in the United States, or commits murder of a U.S. citizen, 
somebody who is an alien. But for goodness sake, let us not deport him 
after he completes his prison term. Let us try to keep him here a 
little longer. Maybe he can beat the system, get out, still be an 
illegal alien, and commit another crime so we can lock him up again and 
pay for him again. We wanted an amendment to put that language back in 
there so we can deport him. It is gone; we cannot do it.
  I had one, as well, on alien terrorists, an amendment that passed the 
Senate overwhelmingly. It may have been unanimously, I am not certain, 
but I know it was overwhelmingly. This amendment would have created a 
new procedure under which the Justice Department could use classified 
information related to national security to secure the deportation of 
terrorist aliens. Under current law, such classified material cannot be 
used--believe it or not--cannot be used to establish the deportability 
of such terrorists. You cannot use it. So if you know somebody is a 
terrorist, if you know somebody has the capability of committing a 
crime like the World Trade Center explosion in New York--you know they 
are going to do it, you know they have the capability to do it--they 
have not done it yet. The FBI has the information. So they come and 
say: Let us deport him. ``No, we cannot do that. We have to wait until 
they blow up the building. After they blow up the building, after we 
try them, after they serve their time, and after they fool around with 
the judge a little bit and see if they can beat the system, then we can 
deport them.''
  My amendment called for the establishment of a new court comprised of 
sitting Federal judges to be designated by the Chief Justice, and this 
special court was modeled on the special court created by the Foreign 
Intelligence Surveillance Act. This amendment would have relied on the 
existing statutory definition of a terrorist. It was based on 
comprehensive legislation that was formulated in the Reagan years, and 
into the Bush administration as well, in the wake of that World Trade 
Center bombing, which was committed by terrorist aliens.
  I believe this amendment represented a particularly urgent and 
necessary revision of the law. And so did the Senate, overwhelmingly. 
That language is taken out. Gone. Taken out. Tough crime bill.
  So when I hear all this talk about how tough the crime bill is, it 
does not do much for this Senator.
  There is another one, mandatory restitution to victims of violent 
crimes. The Senate bill provided for mandatory restitution in Federal 
court to victims of violent crime. There is not much in here for 
victims. We have a lot in here to help those poor people who had such 
difficult childhoods and have all these social problems, who committed 
these crimes. We are going to give them a lot of help. But there is not 
too much for the victims.
  The conference report, although providing for mandatory restitution 
to women victims and victims of child molestation, fails to include the 
broader victims' rights reform that Senator Nickles was trying to 
accomplish. It did strengthen some of it, but not enough. So all we 
wanted, again, was the opportunity to vote; just to offer an amendment 
to put back what the Senate wanted in in the first place. No, we cannot 
do it.
  You are going to hear and you have heard about this alleged deal here 
that was offered by the majority side, saying we could have our 
amendments. The amendments dealt with only budgetary matters. They did 
not deal with the crime-fighting amendments. Why not? Because they knew 
that they would pass, because they passed when they left the Senate. 
They passed in the Senate before, and they knew they would pass again 
and they did not want it. The liberals in this body did not want it to 
pass and they knew when they voted for it, when it left the Senate, 
that it would not pass. They knew it would be taken out in conference 
or in the House. They knew it all along, and the game plan all along 
was to do exactly what they did, and they won by two votes on the floor 
of the Senate today. They won. Two votes.
  You think your vote does not count? Two votes would have changed it, 
and we would have had the opportunity to amend. And those amendments 
would have passed, every one I mentioned would have passed and would 
have become law, and the President would have signed the bill. They 
knew it. That is why the fight was so bitter. It was so bitter on this 
point of order.
  Mr. President, I could go on and on on this. I am not going to. The 
100,000 cops issue, which is not 100,000 cops. Everybody knows it. The 
local communities are picking up at least 80,000, in essence 80,000 of 
those police officers, by picking up a larger percentage of the costs 
than we are being told. It is not 100,000 policemen, at least not paid 
for by the Federal Government.
  I do not know why we do not listen to the people who are out there 
who work in law enforcement. What do they say about it? What do they 
say will work? The Law Enforcement Alliance of America, which is the 
Nation's largest coalition of law enforcement, crime victims, and 
concerned citizens dedicated to making America safer--here is what they 
say. Here is what they wanted in this bill.
  Increase the prison inmate capacity. We did not do it. No 
guarantees--we might. If those Good Samaritans out there who are going 
to watch these moneys and see where they go--if they decide, whoever 
they are, to build these prisons, we will get about 6.9 billion 
dollars' worth of prisons built. But that is not going to happen. We 
are going to see halfway houses; we will see little rooms where people 
can be housed so they do not have to go back to jail and serve in those 
horrible places. That is what they wanted.
  Increase the prison capacity. Do you know what they said? Hire the 
requisite personnel to operate them. Eliminate the luxuries inside so 
life in prison is a heck of a lot less attractive than it is now. That 
is what they said. We did not listen to them.
  There is a second point they make. Ban from prisons all weight 
lifting equipment, martial arts, boxing, and hand-to-hand fighting 
training used to disarm and kill 20 to 25 percent of all police 
officers killed in the line of duty. Replace that with calisthenics and 
reading and writing and basic arithmetic: Job skills. We did not do 
that.
  Federal legislation they would like to see: To provide for the 
authorization for qualified police officers to carry their sidearm 
throughout the United States, which will increase police presence by 
over 600,000 officers. They did not do that.
  More prosecutors and judges for localities with case backlogs and 
reduction of plea bargaining in violent crime, truth in sentencing, 
exclusionary rule reform to provide good-faith exceptions. We did not 
do that.
  Habeas corpus reform to stop endless appeals in capital punishment 
cases. We did not do that. This is a tough crime bill though, is it 
not?
  There were dozens of law enforcement organizations and agencies 
opposing this crime bill from all over America.
  The Wall Street Journal, as I said, had an editorial a short time ago 
that said ``This bill is a crime.'' I do not think you can say it much 
better than that, because it is. It is a crime. This bill is going to 
take billions of dollars from the taxpayers of America and send them 
back into communities, spending the money on things that are not 
anticrime that we ought not to be spending Federal dollars on.
  It is not tightening up the tough provisions that we want and the 
American people want--habeas corpus, exclusionary rule, truth in 
sentencing, mandates for people who commit crimes with guns, on and on 
and on. We are not doing it.
  So it is a crime. The Wall Street Journal is absolutely right. The 
FBI chief--and I think it has already been said on the floor in 
previous debate--he himself criticized this bill. He criticized it, and 
he was reined in, it says, in the Washington Times.
  He suggested to a newspaper interviewer that mayors and police 
officers across the country do not like the bill, and then he was 
``reined in'' by the Clinton administration. I bet he was reined in for 
speaking out. He is only the No. 1 law enforcement person, with the 
exception of the Attorney General, in the country. So I suppose he 
should be reined in if he says he does not like the bill that his 
President is pushing.

       He said,
       From a Federal law enforcement point of view, the one great 
     concern I had is for the funding for the 100,000 police 
     officers which comes from downsizing the Federal Government 
     and specifically the FBI and the DEA.

  That is what the point is on all of this money for police officers. 
We are going to downsize the Federal Government and provide these 
police officers. Who is going to get downsized? You can bet it will not 
be the bureaucrats in HUD. You can bet on that. It is going to probably 
be FBI people.
  So he has spoken out.
  Mr. President, I want to conclude on another item that was in the 
bill that really is the purpose of my rising today, which is the issue 
of gun control and the issue of whether or not it is appropriate to 
basically ignore the second amendment to the Constitution. And we are 
ignoring the second amendment to the Constitution. Not only are we 
ignoring it, we are stepping on it.
  I have heard a lot of debate in the last 3 or 4 days about what the 
Founding Fathers meant about the second amendment. You all know what 
the second amendment says:

       A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security 
     of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear 
     Arms, shall not be infringed.

  Shall not be infringed. That is all it says. I do not know where we 
get in there that certain types of guns can be banned, waiting periods, 
all of these things. Where does that come from? How do you get that out 
of the second amendment?
  I can guarantee you that some of our liberal colleagues who have 
ranted and raved against the second amendment all these years, if it 
was the first amendment, oh, boy, we would sure be hearing a different 
tune then.
  I have heard all the interpretations of what the Founding Fathers 
meant. I have heard plenty of it from especially those who supported 
the Feinstein amendment on the banning of so-called assault weapons.
  Let me quote you what the Founding Fathers said. No exaggeration, no 
focus on my words, their words, period.
  Thomas Jefferson:

       No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms.

  So do not anybody try to tell me what he meant. Maybe somebody else's 
interpretation of what he meant. You heard what he said.
  How about John Adams?

       Arms in the hands of citizens may be used at individual 
     discretion * * * in private self-defense.

  That is pretty clear. It does not talk anything about hunting or 
sport. He is talking about self-defense. That is what the second 
amendment is there for.
  James Madison, fairly well known, helped write the Constitution:

       [The Constitution preserves] the advantage of being armed 
     which Americans possess over the people of almost every other 
     nation * * * [where] the governments are afraid to trust the 
     people with arms.

  James Madison.
  Thomas Payne:

       * * * arms discourage and keep the invader and the 
     plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as 
     property * * * Horrid mischief would ensue were [the law 
     abiding] citizens deprived of the use of them.

  Anything in there about gun control or registration or waiting 
periods or banning any particular type of weapon? Not that I can find.
  Jefferson again:

       Laws that forbid the carrying of arms * * * disarm only 
     those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit 
     crimes * * * Such laws make things worse for the assaulted 
     and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage 
     than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked 
     with greater confidence than an armed man.

  Thomas Jefferson.
  Richard Henry Lee:

       A militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people 
     themselves * * * and include all men capable of bearing arms 
     * * * To preserve liberty it is essential that the whole body 
     of the people always possess arms and be taught alike * * * 
     how to use them.

  Sam Adams:

       The Constitution shall never be construed to prevent the 
     people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from 
     keeping their own arms.

  Finally, George Mason:

       I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people * * 
     * To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to 
     enslave them * * *

  They are all pretty clear to me. I am hearing the most unbelievably 
wild interpretations of what these men meant. You can tell what they 
meant because the second amendment is as clear and as concise as any 
amendment or any language in the Constitution of the United States. 
There is no doubt about what they meant.
  And it is absolutely incredible to me that anybody could believe that 
banning anything is going to stop the criminal from getting it. We have 
the toughest gun control law in the world in this city, and when you 
get home tonight and turn on your radio or pick up the newspaper in the 
morning, there will be a couple more people murdered with a gun. It 
happens every day here. You all know that.
  So what is the point? Where is this working? Where is the proof here? 
You are going to deny the private citizen the liberty that he has under 
this Constitution: The right to keep and bear arms. I hear all this 
stuff about we cannot use semiautomatic weapons for hunting. I do not 
want anybody to use a semiautomatic to kill somebody. Who in the world 
would want that? And very few people do.
  So for that, one-half of 1 percent or less, we are going to deny 
everybody, all the honest law-abiding citizens.
  In the Police Magazine in June 1994, there was an editorial written 
by Dan Burger, who is the editor. I want to quote from that:

       The violent crime problem goes beyond guns. It is deep 
     rooted in our culture. Numerous indicators in our society 
     demonstrate that violence has become an acceptable, even 
     fashionable way, to resolve conflict and solve problems. 
     Innovative methods to address the problem of violent crime 
     need to be pursued. The arguments about gun control need to 
     be separated from crime control so that it becomes clear that 
     it will take more than gun control to effect change.

  Continuing:

       This country does not need to abolish guns in order to 
     control crime. Keeping track of firearms through better 
     registration records may benefit investigations of gun-
     related crime, but stiffer penalties for gun-related crime 
     will carry the message that solving problems with a gun is 
     unacceptable behavior.

  This issue is the kind of issue that sounds wonderful on the surface. 
A majority of the American people probably think it is a good idea. But 
it is a false issue. It is not the issue. You are not going to deny 
somebody the opportunity to get one of those weapons if he or she 
wishes to use it in the commission of a violent crime.
  You cannot trample on the Constitution for the sake of .008 percent 
of the population who will do something that despicable. We should make 
certain that that individual never, ever walks the streets of society 
again.
  But we do not have the provisions that are tough enough to do that in 
this bill. They can get out. They can get out. And they will. And they 
do. And they commit crimes over and over and over again.
  But we have to talk about how difficult their childhood was or what 
social problems they have, or maybe their parents did not treat them 
right. That is all we hear.
  Put them away. That is what the American people want. I support the 
death penalty, if they are convicted. But even if you do not, if you 
want to, leave it to the option of the jury, to give them life, and 
mean life, not 15 years good behavior, with a color TV and a college 
education and law books.
  I am sorry; you sacrifice your right to ever walk the streets of 
society again when you commit a crime like that.
  So what do we do? Instead of doing that so they cannot walk the 
streets of society again, we go after the innocent, law-abiding 
citizens who want to have a gun for target practice or even just to sit 
on the mantel. We have to go after them because they might--because 
they have one--do it.
  It is a typical example of the feel-good, false, phony issue that 
will not resolve the problems, the same reason it has not resolved them 
here in Washington, DC, the same reason that, unfortunately, people 
will be killed, probably this evening, unfortunately, with a gun in a 
city that bans them.
  I read in the paper the other day that a Member of our body, who 
claims to own one of these weapons, happens to live in Washington, DC. 
Very interesting.
  There was a survey done again in Police Magazine. I do not know how 
scientific it was, but it was simply a message to their readers. These 
are police officers. They asked the police officers to respond. Do you 
support any assault weapons bill that would ban importation and U.S. 
manufacture of specific semiautomatic assault weapons? Eighty-five 
percent of the police officers responded and said No.
  Does gun ownership by citizens increase public safety? Eighty-five 
percent said Yes.
  Does gun ownership by citizens decrease public safety? Ninety percent 
said No.
  Does gun ownership by citizens negatively affect your job? Ninety 
percent said No.
  Should training or certification of gun owners be required by law? 
And it was essentially 50-50.
  Well, the issue of gun control is again on the forefront. It is in 
this bill. We were accused as Republicans of wanting to stop the bill 
only because that was in there, which is not true. Part of it, not 
true. Many Senators, I am sure, felt that way, including myself. I 
wanted the language out. However, there were many who wanted the 
opportunity to vote on other things--to vote on the pork, to vote on 
toughening the provisions of crime.
  I wish that just once this Senate and the Congress could pass a tough 
crime bill that puts the mandates on the violent criminal, on the 
commission of Federal crimes, and establishes the guidelines for those 
who commit crimes that are not Federal crimes to put these people away. 
Three strikes and you are out. I go for one strike and you are out. You 
commit a violent crime like this, you are gone. You do not get a second 
chance.
  How many times, if you are in a grocery store, do you let the person 
who is your cashier steal money from you? Once? If you give them a 
second chance, you are probably crazy. You are not going to give them a 
third chance.
  We do it all the time. All the time. Michael Jordan's father, repeat 
offender. You name them, violent crime after violent crime. Very seldom 
is it the case where it is the first time. It is the repeat offenders, 
over and over and over again. And we have not dealt with it in this 
bill. I do not care what anybody tells you. Read it. We have not done 
it. It is not tough enough. Put them away. That is what the American 
people want you to do. And we did not do it. We did not even have the 
opportunity to strengthen it. That is all we wanted to do.
  Mr. President, I think I have made my point, but I would just 
conclude by saying I think, to be very candid, the American people have 
been cheated by the actions of this Congress on this bill. It is going 
to be passed. It is going to be signed with a lot of fanfare. The 
President is going to have a big ceremony. He will be passing out pens 
and you should all go to sleep when he signs the bill--you will hear 
the press conference. You will all go to sleep and you will say, Gosh, 
all the crime is now going to be eliminated in this country. It is just 
going to drop down like a thermometer mercury when it drops from 80 
degrees to 50 degrees in an hour. It is just going to shoot right down, 
right?
  Are you kidding? Come on. It is not going to happen. This is a pork 
bill. We have spent billions and billions, trillions since the Great 
Society on exactly this kind of stuff, and what have we got for it? 
More crime. More drugs. More problems. More inner city problems. 
Dumping money at problems like this does not work. Having the Federal 
Government dictate does not work.
  Senator Danforth mentioned it a little while ago. We are always 
looking for somebody else to cast blame--it is the family; it is the 
break up of the family; if a kid gets in trouble, it is not his fault. 
I guess I have to have--if those doggone guys down there in the Federal 
Government would just give us midnight basketball, my kid would not 
have gotten into drugs.
  When are we going to assume our responsibility as citizens? I will 
tell you something. I travel around my State a lot and I meet a lot of 
people. We all do in our job. But I will tell you, some of the things 
that this Congress is doing to the American people--we threw tea into 
Boston Harbor 200 years ago for a lot less, a lot less. The American 
people are getting fed up with it. I am getting fed up with it. I hope 
that 3, 4, 5 years from now, when there are those out here saying what 
a wonderful deal this crime bill was, when we see that the crime does 
go up, not down, we see these problems are still there, we will get 
serious. And I hope it will be long before 5 years, hopefully next 
year, when we get serious and pass a real tough crime bill.
  Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.
  Mr. COCHRAN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Mathews). The Senator from Mississippi.
  Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, the vote today left us too short of 
victory in an effort to win the right to offer amendments to this 
conference report. That was a very close vote. Many of us worked very 
hard to put together the needed votes to win that right. But we lost.
  I must say that our leader on this side of the aisle, Senator Dole, 
exerted a tremendous amount of leadership to try to get the number of 
votes that were required under our rules to offer a series of 
amendments to cut out $5 billion of pork barrel spending that will add 
to the deficit, to toughen up some of the sentencing and the punishment 
provisions that are aimed at the violent criminals in our society that 
would do more to punish those who use guns in the commission of violent 
crimes, and to strengthen the provisions that would ensure that local 
jurisdictions would have more money to build prisons. But there will be 
other opportunities to work on those issues later.
  I am reminded of something President Lincoln said, I think it was in 
his second inaugural address following the defeat of the South in the 
Civil War, that there should be malice toward none and charity for all.
  I feel that tonight toward all in the Senate, whether on our side of 
the aisle or the other side of the aisle, on this issue that came down 
to such a close vote today. There is no doubt that this problem is 
going to continue to be a serious problem.
  Over the last 30 years, we have seen a dramatic increase in criminal 
activity in our country but particularly in the commission of violent 
crimes. Over the last 30 years, the crime rate has gone up 200 percent 
according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics. At the same time, the 
rate of violent crime, which the bureau classifies as murder--forcible 
rape, robbery and aggravated assault--increased 377 percent. This 
indicates that the rate for violent crime has increased at almost twice 
that for the overall crime rate. While all crime has doubled over the 
last 3 decades, violent crime has almost quadrupled. The American 
people are demanding that these violent criminals be locked up. But 
this conference report fails to do what needs to be done, and I plan to 
vote against cloture on the conference report. We should kill this bill 
and start over, in my opinion.

  Last month George Will said in a July 14 article that appeared in the 
Washington Post, and I am going to quote:

       This bill may not be the worst legislation Congress has 
     ever cobbled together from trendy intellectual fads and 
     traditional pork, but it is so bad that sensible Senators and 
     Representatives will vote against it for the right reasons, 
     which include respect for federalism--and for the public's 
     intelligence.

  Some of the bill's problems, which were described in the article by 
George Will as ``touchy-feely'' solutions to crime include funding for 
recreation; creation of new Federal task forces and councils; and arts, 
crafts, and dance programs.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Washington Post 
article be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Mathews). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  (See Exhibit 1.)
  Mr. COCHRAN. Mr. President, the American people are looking to their 
local and State law enforcement officials to protect them from this 
growing wave of crime and violence. They expect the Federal Government 
to help with resources and financing to support those in local law 
enforcement who are on the front lines at the street level--not by 
creating and funding a new bunch of Federal social programs.
  I had the pleasure, Mr. President, last April--as a matter of fact, 
it was on April 4--of traveling around in the city of Jackson and in 
Hinds County with the local sheriff, Malcolm McMillan, and talking with 
him about the problems that are encountered by his office on a day-to-
day basis dealing with the criminal element in central Mississippi.
  He told me a number of things which helped me to better understand 
what life is like in the real world of crime and law enforcement. One 
thing he said that I remember was that public enemy number one in 
Jackson, MS, is crack cocaine. I challenge you to find anything in this 
conference report that does anything effective about that problem that 
is public enemy number one. And it is no different in that place than 
any other city or town in America.
  We have to do more about what is really wrong and what is really 
happening out there and why we have such a wave of violent crime 
throughout America.
  He also pointed out that what they need is jail space. We hear a lot 
about new prisons, and that is in this bill. That is important. But he 
is talking about space to lock somebody up who is a threat at that 
moment to the people in that town, and there is a shortage of jail 
space. That may be addressed to some extent with the matching funds 
here. But if you look at those programs in this conference report, they 
fall far short of what is needed, a small contribution toward the cost 
of hiring some policemen for some cities and some States. And I 
challenge you to conclude that this is going to have much of a benefit 
throughout the country.
  Most Americans understand that the violent street crime is committed 
by a small percentage of the criminal population on a repeat basis. 
They also understand that more police power, more prison space, more 
jail space, and tougher sentencing--not arts, crafts, basketball 
programs, and a new Federal bureaucracy to manage it--are what is 
really needed to get the criminals off the streets and into jail where 
they belong.
  Under the guise of fighting crime, this legislation creates a whole 
new panoply of Federal programs which will bring with them new Federal 
guidelines, rules, and regulations, and a bigger Federal deficit. This 
is not the kind of crime fighting assistance that America wants or 
needs.
  Mr. President, the citizens of my State have not asked Congress to 
attack violent crime by creating more Federal social programs, nor do 
they see the need for more street crimes to be classified as Federal 
crimes to be prosecuted by the Department of Justice in Washington in 
an already crowded Federal judiciary. But like many of its recent 
predecessors, this crime bill takes that approach. It further expands 
Federal jurisdiction over criminal matters that properly are the 
responsibility of State and local governments.
  The effects of this trend were discussed by the Chief Justice of the 
United States, who recently said:

       The continuation of the past decade's trend toward large-
     scale federalization of the criminal law has the enormous 
     potential of changing the character of the Federal judiciary.

  His comments were included in a recent publication of the Federal 
Judicial Center entitled, ``On the Federalization of the Administration 
of Civil and Criminal Justice.'' That was published by the Federal 
Judicial Center in 1994.
  The article is written by William Schwarzer and Russell Wheeler. I 
will not ask that the entire article be printed in the Record. But I 
call attention to it because it very persuasively argues that we are 
going down the wrong track by continually expanding the 
responsibilities of the Federal law enforcement and judiciary system at 
a time when State courts have the primary responsibility, State law 
enforcement and local law enforcement officials have the primary day-
to-day responsibility of apprehending the criminals, bringing them to 
justice, and seeing that the laws are enforced and that the streets are 
safe.
  Just by making a State crime a Federal crime does not solve our crime 
problem. The center's report notes that the September 1991 meeting of 
the Judicial Conference of the United States reaffirmed a long-standing 
position that Federal prosecutions should be limited to charges that 
cannot or should not be prosecuted in State courts.
  Federalization is not a recent concern, but it is now out of control. 
Congress cannot solve the crime problem by making State crimes Federal 
crimes.
  The trend in federalization has been accompanied by a rise in the 
overall volume of criminal filings and appeals in the Federal courts. 
According to the Federal Judicial Center, from 1980 to 1992, annual 
criminal case filings per sitting judge increased from 58 to 84 cases, 
as did the proportion of complex and burdensome drug and fraud cases.
  Mr. President, we all recognize that the Constitution gives to 
Congress the power to determine what should and should not be subject 
to Federal, civil, and criminal jurisdiction. However, we ought also 
recognize that this power should be exercised with an awareness of its 
consequences for law enforcement and the administration of justice. It 
would serve the public interest if we consider more carefully the views 
of the Constitution's framers that criminal law and its enforcement in 
our society is primarily a State responsibility, rather than a Federal 
responsibility.
  While the authority to pay part of the costs to help hire more 
policemen will help in some areas, it will not be a major benefit 
across the country.
  The expensive package of Federal social programs in this bill will 
have little, if any, real effect on violent crime.
  The American people recognize these programs for what they are--an 
ineffective response that offers little in the way of real solutions to 
the problem.
  Mr. President, I conclude by saying let us put this conference report 
in the wastebasket where it belongs, and elect some new Congressmen and 
Senators in November who will be committed to striking out on a new 
course, taking a different approach and solving the problems that we 
really have, and not creating a huge $30-plus billion spending bill and 
claiming that it is going to solve the problem, which it really is not.

                               Exhibit 1

               [From the Washington Post, July 14, 1994]

                        Touchy-Feely Crime Bill

       Have a care, criminals. Congress's crime bill contains 
     severities such as these:
       Regarding ``midnight sports leagues,'' which have done 
     nicely without federal supervision, the government shall make 
     grants to leagues in which ``not less than 50 percent of the 
     players'' are ``residents of federally assisted low-income 
     housing'' and which serve neighborhoods or communities whose 
     populations have ``not less than two percent'' of various 
     characteristics, such as ``a high incidence of persons 
     infected with the human immunodeficiency virus.''
       There shall be an ``interagency Task Force to be known as 
     the Ounce of Prevention Council,'' chaired by the attorney 
     general and including the secretaries of housing and urban 
     development, health and human services, labor, agriculture 
     and interior and the drug czar. It shall spend millions on 
     this and that, including arts, crafts and dance programs.
       There shall be ``partnerships'' between law enforcement 
     agencies and groups providing ``child and family services.'' 
     The partnerships' many functions shall include training 
     police ``regarding behavior, psychology, family systems, and 
     community culture and attitudes'' that are ``relevant to 
     dealing with'' children who are or might become violent.
       The attorney general shall make grants to organizations 
     dealing with ``delinquent and at-risk youth'' through 
     programs designed to do many things, including ``increase the 
     self-esteem'' of such youth. Drug dealers may be led into new 
     lines of work by grants funding ``mediation and other 
     conflict resolution methods, treatment, counseling, 
     educational and recreational programs that create 
     alternatives to criminal activity.''
       And so the crime bill goes, through hundreds of pages and 
     billions of dollars--more than $30 billion over six years. 
     This bill is probably not the worst legislation Congress has 
     ever cobbled together from trendy intellectual fads and 
     traditional pork. But it is so bad that some sensible 
     representatives and senators will vote against it for the 
     right reasons, which include respect for federalism--and for 
     the public's intelligence.
       Stephen Moore and the Cato Institute, a libertarian think 
     tank, says that a year after a Republican filibuster stopped 
     the president's $16 billion ``stimulus'' package, the crime 
     bill is ``the largest urban cash program to come through 
     Congress since Richard Nixon invented revenue sharing.'' But 
     of course it is not just urban cash.
       Legislators representing rural areas could not allow such a 
     gravy train to roll through the country-side without strewing 
     cash along the way. Hence there is ``Title XXV--Rural 
     Crime.'' And Washington accepts a new challenge: ``Subtitle 
     B--Drug-Free Truck Stops and Safety Rest Areas.''
       This crime bill is a bipartisan boondoggle because of the 
     cachet that currently accrues to any legislation with an 
     ``anti-crime'' label. But the bill sprays money most 
     promiscuously at Democratic constituencies, the so-called (by 
     themselves) ``caring professions''--social workers, 
     psychologists and others who do the work of therapeutic 
     government.
       To help with the grandstanding about ``toughness,'' the 
     bill creates scores of new federal death penalty crimes. But 
     it also still contains (as this is written) the ``Racial 
     Justice Act'' which is designed to end capital punishment. It 
     would do so by allowing appeals based on statistical showings 
     of racial disparities in capital punishment, appeals that 
     would put immobilizing sand in the gears of the government's 
     prosecutorial machinery.
       The ``Violence Against Women Act'' genuflects at every 
     altar in the feminist church. For example, it funds ``gender 
     sensitivity'' training for judges. And the federal government 
     is going to matriculate: It is off to college to conduct a 
     ``campus sexual assault study,'' a monument to the feminist 
     fiction that in a world infested with predatory males, women 
     students risk life and limb just walking from dorms to 
     libraries, not to mention the terrors of dating.
       The current faith is that the sovereign remedy for what 
     ails the nation is yet another crime bill that further 
     federalizes what properly is a state and local 
     responsibility--keeping people safe. So it is no wonder that 
     few politicians pause to wonder about the wisdom of piling 
     federal punishments on acts already heavily punished by state 
     laws.
       This accelerating trend contributes to the collapse of 
     self-government as communities slough of responsibilities, 
     even for hiring police and building prisons, onto a distant 
     federal government. And the suggestion that the federal 
     government can produce safe streets accelerates the 
     evaporation of the federal government's prestige because the 
     result will mock the expectations so improvidently raised.
       Supposedly ``ambitious'' bills like the crime bill actually 
     are acts of legislative laziness, a slothful refusal to think 
     and discriminate concerning federal responsibilities and 
     competencies. The crowning irony is that the crime bill will 
     increase contempt for law--and lawmakers.
  Several Senators addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.
  Mr. BURNS. Thank you Mr. President. It will not take long for me to 
summarize my remarks on the events of the day.
  I want to associate myself with my friend from Mississippi. I can 
remember about 3 years ago or 4 years ago when I first came to this 
body. There was a big debate on this particular piece of legislation, 
on a crime bill.
  Then the Senator from New Hampshire, Mr. Rudman, came into the 
cloakroom. He said: You know, I just read an interesting article that 
says 95 percent of the drug busts in America are done by local police 
or local sheriffs. And here we are trying to put into a crime bill a 
whole bunch of money for interdiction in the gulf, and for ATF and for 
DEA and FBI. Why do we not take some of that money out of there and 
send it to local police forces, whether it be city, county, or State, 
for that matter, to their board of crime control and let those folks 
make the decision on how they want to spend their money to deal with 
this very, very serious situation? Well, that sounds like a pretty good 
idea to me. Extra uniform policemen, maybe a new car, maybe some 
communication equipment. I come out of county government. I know what 
we do with their money. We buy cars, radios and re-equip our people who 
are on the front line of crime, and that is our police officers, the 
people on the beat. That sounds like a pretty good idea to me.
  We offered that as an amendment, and do you know what? We got beat 
right down party line. We see some people sitting around here sort of 
smiling tonight, but never ceases to amaze me--the new folks on the 
beat, especially on the scene--the liberal mind, the confidence it puts 
in big bloated central Government, located on the banks of the Potomac 
in this 13 square miles of logic-free environment to deal with the 
problems in Billings, MT. It never ceases to amaze me the confidence 
they have in that. It is unreal. I see why folks scratched their way 
over these mountains to the West of us to go on the other side so they 
can go down the Ohio River; and once they got to the Midwest, I can see 
why they kept right on going, because probably we can say it is a 
mindset.
  Thirty cents of every dollar we appropriate in these programs that 
was passed here today, and our welfare programs, get to the people we 
want to help. So why would the Government bureaucracy not lobby this 
hard to pass this bill? This is full employment for a bureaucrat. That 
is what it is. It is to set somebody up and tell them to go down there 
for $8 or $9 an hour. You can go down and watch them play basketball at 
midnight. Two kids might show up. But the bureaucrat is going to get 
paid, and it is going to be your tax dollars. That is who will pay it. 
That is instead of YMCA's and Boys and Girls Clubs and volunteers that 
come out of the community. You know what these people are telling us? 
We want our communities back. Get these people out of our communities, 
and we can take our communities back. That is what they are telling us. 
This bill does not do it.
  Just think about that. Only 30 cents out of every $1 we appropriate 
gets to the people we want to help. Since 1965, we have spent $5 
trillion. That is the amount of the national debt or will be pretty 
darned quick--$5 trillion on crime prevention programs. You all heard 
what my friend from Mississippi said, how the crime rate continues to 
go. It does not start here, folks; it starts in the neighborhoods. That 
is where it starts.
  This bill just does not do it. When it left here, it was paid for. 
But basically that was kind of a funny situation. But I think it is a 
good idea, if they follow through on it, and that was a trust fund to 
pay for it, without raising taxes when it left here. When it came back, 
only 57 percent of this bill is paid for. The rest of it goes on your 
national debt and deficit spending.
  Let us talk about the guns end of it. I do not like gun control 
either. I will tell you this: Some of the guns that you have in your 
house right now that you think you are very comfortable with, under 
this language you might not think you are so comfortable. They may be 
illegal. The old M-l I carried in the U.S. Marine Corps--there are a 
lot of them in the private sector--could be classified as an assault 
weapon. No. one, it is a military type and, No. 2, it is a 
semiautomatic. Which definition are we going to use whenever we start 
talking about the kind of firearm you have in your house?
  I can remember when they got to talking about revolvers, and I owned 
one of those. I went home to see if I could find it. That is No. 1. I 
found it, but I could not find the cylinder because we store the 
cylinder somewhere else other than in the revolver. I found it the 
other day, though. If somebody invaded my house, I will probably have 
to beat the guy to death with it, because I could never get it in a 
position to use it.
  That is not the point here. The forefathers--as quoted from my friend 
from New Hampshire a while ago, I think when they wrote the 
Constitution, I do not think they really knew what they wanted. But 
they knew what they did not want. All of these people were born out of 
feudal systems, so to speak. Private land ownership was important to 
them, and personal rights, property rights. And the ability to defend 
oneself. You know what? If you look at all of the countries of the 
world that have had gun control, do we not learn anything from history? 
Let us say that even history that I remember as young as I am--I am 60, 
and that is young; it sounds younger every day--do we not learn 
anything from history? Every country or society or nation who has had 
strict gun control has been run over how many times by the tyranny of 
war and a tyrannical government. Do we not learn anything?
  Folks say it cannot happen today. Folks, you are dead wrong, it can 
happen today. It can happen today. And we will get to a point in this 
society when, sad to say--and I hope I am gone--but I think our 
children may see some very tough times ahead.
  The liberal mind is a wonderful thing. When they start talking about 
we can be cute and politically correct and go to our parties where the 
Grey Poupon set is and think we have done something for America, do not 
try to sell that to the people in my State of Montana. Do not try to 
sell that to the people of very many States around here. I heard the 
statement the other day even on health care when they said, ``We are 
going to have health care reform whether the American people want it or 
not.'' Whenever this body or anybody elected at any level of 
government, whether a county commissioner or a State representative, 
Governor, Senator, or a President, thinks that they are smarter and 
wiser and make better decisions than the people, then we are in big, 
big political trouble. I do not think they are asking us to take care 
of them.
  The provision of the ban on assault weapons is so broad and so 
unclear that this is a wonderful field of dreams for lawyers. And they 
will do very well under this language.

  I am not real sure the way it is written whether it would stand 
constitutional scrutiny or whether it would even stand scrutiny under 
its definition.
  So I will vote against cloture and I will vote against this bill. And 
I will go home, and I will tell my police chiefs that I was not 
successful or we were not successful in stopping this thing because I 
do not have one police chief, not one sheriff, not one county 
commissioner that says they want this bill.
  There was talk about 100,000 cops. I stood over there and listened to 
that today, the 100,000 cops. And there is no more truth in it than you 
could fly to the moon in a bucket. I doubt if you could get 20,000. It 
is on a cost share basis, 75-25 the first year, 50-50 the second year, 
and 25-75 the third year, and then after that you are on your own. The 
folks in Texas are going to have to pick up that bill after that.
  And then I can see maybe the League of Cities and Towns coming in, 
and they will say: ``Well, we ran out of money after the third year. We 
need a little help here.'' And then next year on appropriations I can 
hear it all now. Here they come. Let us fund these programs, and there 
is no money in the well. We have already gone to the well too many 
times.
  So, just for the firearms, and because this bill is a terrible hoax 
on the American people, on the people who really want a strong crime 
bill--we built a new jail in Yellowstone County when I was elected 
commissioner, and we just finished it during my term there. I know what 
we need in detention facilities and how we handle our youth. I know it 
is important. But nothing in this bill guarantees that there will be 
one brick laid or one steel door built to hold hardened criminals and 
keep them away from society, whom they are bent on harming.
  So, put it altogether. My vote is ``no.'' I wish it would have been 
different this afternoon where we could have offered some amendments 
and made it stronger and made it more like when it left here. I 
supported it then, but I cannot now.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, I speak to the Senate this evening with an 
overwhelming sense of disappointment, disappointment because after 
years of work on behalf of the great majority of the Members of the 
Senate we came so close and have fallen so far by reason of the failure 
of this present bill to meet the requirements of the Budget Act.
  We were given an opportunity earlier today to cast a vote which would 
have permitted Members of this body to remove from this bill some 5 
billion dollars' worth of social programs that can properly, in the 
context of these debates, be called pork and at the same time restore 
to the bill six significant antiviolence law enforcement amendments 
which had been adopted either unanimously or by large affirmative votes 
by the Members of the Senate during our extended debate last year.
  The Members of the Senate by a narrow margin refused to avail 
themselves of that opportunity, preferring to deal with a murky whole 
rather than to separate it into its constituent parts, allow votes on 
the weakest and most questionable portions of the bill, and then go 
forward with what could have been at least a significant contribution 
to the fight against crime and violence in the United States of 
America.
  Having failed to avail ourselves of that opportunity, however, we are 
now faced with a bill which will submit to the people of the United 
States a bill, a large bill, a bill for some $30 billion in spending, a 
bill submitted to the American people by a Congress which, combined 
with the actions of its predecessors, is responsible for budget 
deficits well up into twelve digits for as far in the future as we can 
possibly see.
  But perhaps worse than the raw number, $30 billion, is the fact that 
it is not directed primarily at the fight against violent crime. Much 
of it goes to social programs which are the first cousins, perhaps the 
siblings, of a wide range of hundreds of social programs, spending on 
which has increased over the course of the last 20 years at a rate 
remarkably parallel to the rate by which violent crime has increased in 
the United States.
  It would, of course, have been inappropriate to say that that social 
spending was the cause of the rise in the crime rate, but it certainly 
accompanied it and has not in the past succeeded in reducing it, nor 
will the similar social spending in this bill.
  So the bill spends too much on programs unrelated to our crime rate, 
but even that which is related to law enforcement is misspent. The 
terribly false promise of 100,000 new police officers when the money in 
this bill will pay barely 20 percent of the cost of such new officers 
has resulted in rejection from cities from one coast to another saying 
that if we had all that free money, that 80 percent to spend on new 
police officers, we already would have done so. We cannot responsibly 
take a short, declining 3-year subsidy when it will take us that long 
to train an effective police officer. So much of that money will be 
either unspent or spent for nonpolice purposes.
  Another large chunk of the criminal justice spending is for new 
incarceration facilities defined so broadly that much of it will not be 
spent on such facilities and all of it that will be, will be subject to 
minute controls by the Federal Government, by the Department of 
Justice, over the way in which our State prisons are operated, the 
rules under which they are operated, the benefits to inmates which must 
be provided, in a fashion which I suspect will cause many States simply 
to reject that so-called gift of Federal money.
  At the same time that this measure spends or sets its spending 
priorities in a mistaken fashion, it omits a wide range of true 
anticrime measures which were agreed to by the Senate during the course 
of its debate last year.
  What explanation is there, Mr. President, for the failure to include 
a better, more efficient and quicker system for causing the deportation 
of criminal illegal aliens immediately upon their release from prison? 
What explanation there is for that omission has never been made, to the 
knowledge of this Senator, in this body or the other body because it 
could not be made. But our vote this afternoon prevents us from voting 
on that as a separate issue.
  Tougher penalties for gun crimes, tougher penalties for crimes 
relating to drugs and minors is omitted from this bill, though voted 
for by the Senate, strengthening provisions which cannot be restored by 
reason of this afternoon's vote and others as well.
  A balance which may have had too much spending when it left the 
Senate but at least had strong law enforcement provisions has now moved 
overwhelmingly the other way, far too much misdirected spending and far 
too little in the way of law enforcement itself.
  In addition, of course, there are omissions which were omissions at 
the time of our debate last fall: no reform of the habeas corpus system 
of endless appeals of criminal convictions, the type of appeals that 
caused most capital punishment sentences to be dragged out over 8, 10, 
or 12 years.
  I think, in summary, that it may well properly be said that this bill 
does as much for convicted criminals as it does to them, and far more 
than it does for the victims and potential victims of those violent 
criminals.
  Far better, Mr. President, that we should defeat this bill and start 
all over again, in spite of the amount of work that we have done on it, 
than we congratulate ourselves on the passage of a flawed and 
ineffective proposal, thus slowing down our own and the President's 
resolve and dedication to doing it right.
  So, Mr. President, to return to my first remark, I must vote against 
invoking cloture. I must vote against this bill. I do so with sorrow 
and disappointment. I do so because of a magnificent opportunity--a 
magnificent opportunity--lost.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record 
various news clippings pertaining to this subject and a letter to me 
from the Washington State Council of Police Officers.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                  Washington State


                                   Council of Police Officers,

                                     Olympia, WA, August 25, 1994.
      Hon Slade Gorton,
      U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
       Dear Slade: The Washington State Council of Police 
     Officers, representing approximately 92 percent of all line 
     officers in the state of Washington, would like Congress to 
     pass a crime bill that can make a difference. We believe, 
     however, that the current proposal before the United States 
     Senate should be improved before final passage and support 
     your efforts to re-open the measure.
       As law enforcement officers and taxpayers we would like to 
     see less wasteful spending and tougher provisions against 
     violent criminals. Specifically, we believe you should strip 
     some of the social welfare spending that was added in the 
     House of Representatives and restore the truth in sentencing 
     and expedited deportation of criminal aliens measures that 
     were in the original Senate crime bill. While we fully 
     support effective crime prevention programs, this bill is 
     full of suspicious spending items that may lead to more open-
     ended spending with no real impact on fighting crime.
       As you know, our organization believes that the bill has 
     many positive elements, but on balance, the present proposal 
     has too many negatives to gain our support. We hope that the 
     Senate will work to improve this measure and not pass 
     symbolic election year legislation designed for the 
     newspapers, not the streets. Please stand up to political 
     pressure to pass ``any'' crime bill.
       With a little more work and effort, Congress can create a 
     bill that will make a difference, a bill that will get 
     violent criminals off our streets, and a bill that can help 
     make the people of this state feel safer.
       That's our goal, and that's our job. That should be 
     Congress' goal as well.
       Please do whatever you can do to improve this crime bill. 
     Thanks again for listening to those on the front line.
            Sincere Regards,
                                     James C. Mattheis. President,
                      Washington State Council of Police Officers.
                                  ____


                [From the Seattle Times, Aug. 11, 1994]

               How the Crime Bill Became a Fiscal Felony

       The crime bill has something for everyone--100,000 new 
     cops, new prisons, prevention programs, drug courts, assault-
     weapon ban. Never mind the budget deficit. The White House 
     and Congress are driven by a more urgent reality: Americans 
     are frightened and angry about crime, and there is an 
     election coming up.
       Sen. Slade Gorton is right. A well-intended response to a 
     serious national problem has been turned into a $33 billion 
     budget-buster. Responsible lawmakers should stiffen up and 
     vote ``no.''
       That vote may be politically risky. Voters are demanding 
     that their government do something about crime. Alas, the 
     nation can't agree on a strategy. Some want more police and 
     prisons and a federal three-strikes-you're-out law. Others 
     urge tougher gun controls, early intervention and prevention 
     programs.
       Some parts of the bill make sense, especially banning 
     assault weapons. There is no reason to keep manufacturing or 
     importing guns whose only purpose is to kill people. And it's 
     certainly time to begin experimenting with programs that 
     attempt to prevent kids from becoming gangsters.
       But how do we do that? And at what cost?
       The 100,000 cops are a costly illusion. Spread across the 
     country, they hardly will be noticed--particularly by the 
     crooks. Big-city mayors like Seattle's Norm Rice are 
     reluctant to hire more police officers without knowing how 
     they will keep them on the job when the federal money runs 
     out in just four years.
       New schools are a far better investment than new prisons. 
     Yet the bill allocates $10.5 billion for prisons while a 
     piddling $400 million school-construction bill is mired in 
     the congressional logjam.
       Most lawmakers now agree that you can't end poverty by 
     throwing money at the problem. But the same legislators are 
     now being asked to shovel $33 billion at crime, with little 
     or no promise of making a dent.
       Defeat this bill, use the savings to reduce the deficit, 
     and get back to the drawing boards. Take a separate vote on 
     assault weapons; this is not a costly item. Help states that 
     can't afford to build needed prisons on their own. And invest 
     carefully in innovative crime-prevention programs that are 
     either proven or warrant a controlled test. Done this way, 
     Clinton and the Congress can make a difference at a fraction 
     of the cost.
                                  ____


                [From the Seattle Times, Aug. 23, 1994]

                Senate Can Improve on Flawed Crime Bill

       The crime bill that passed the House is a $30 billion 
     reminder that Americans are determined to combat crime on 
     their streets, but are nowhere close to a national consensus 
     as to what will work.
       The resulting legislation contains some much-needed 
     reforms, particularly the long-overdue ban on military-style 
     assault weapons. But the price is billions of dollars in new 
     spending, approved with an eye toward electoral safety, not 
     safe streets.
       It's up to the Senate to trim away some of the 
     ornamentation and politics and provide a sharper, strategic 
     focus. The original bill was deeply flawed--to expensive and 
     weighted toward federalizing more crimes and building more 
     prisons. There was too little targeting of community policing 
     and other longer-range strategies that each community can 
     customize to its particular needs. That bill failed, sending 
     the White House into a tizzy.
       The new version--the result of a genuine bipartisan 
     coalition--drew 46 Republican votes, about the margin of 
     victory. But it still spends too much on prisons and grossly 
     exaggerates the number of new police officers to be put on 
     the streets. The real number is probably closer to 40,000, 
     not the much-touted 100,000.
       Beefing up urban police is important, but federal funds are 
     largely wasted if they can't be targeted at those cities most 
     in need. The process of compromise diminishes the targeting.
       Washington State presents eloquent testimony to the failure 
     of prisons as a crime-fighting strategy. This state has 
     cracked down on criminals, imposing quicker and longer 
     sentences and building prisons to house them. But who feels 
     safer on the streets?
       The lack of a clear anti-crime policy reflects the simple 
     fact that political leaders are no more certain than their 
     constituents on how to curb violent crime.''
       There is enough smart thinking left in this bill to give 
     the Senate something to work with. Senators, most of whom do 
     not face re-election, should trim down the spending on new 
     lock-ups, and make more crime-prevention money available to 
     local and state officials who can tailor programs to the 
     particular needs of their communities.
       Keep the weapons ban, an important step toward getting the 
     most-deadly firepower off the streets and the one public-
     safety measure that is more effective when done by the 
     federal government than city-by-city or state-by-state. But 
     beware of federalizing serious crimes that can best be 
     deterred by local government.
       If the House can agree on a mediocre crime bill, certainly 
     a sedate Senate can agree on a smarter one.
                                  ____


                               Pork Plus

                            (By Ted M. Natt)

       President Clinton loves to surround himself with police 
     officers and then stage one of his made-for-television events 
     where he thumps hard for the toughest crime bill ever enacted 
     by Congress.
       Well the crime bill that is wired to pass the Congress is 
     so larded with pork and welfare programs dreamed up by goofy 
     liberals that it waddles. The bill has $33 billion in 
     spending in it.
       Remember this is supposed to be a crime bill.
       So why is there $1.8 billion for local governments to 
     augment existing federal programs such as aid to the 
     homeless, education to prevent crime, jobs programs to 
     prevent crime, and substance abuse treatment to prevent 
     crime? Those sound more like social welfare programs.
       Why is there $895 million for ``Model intensive grants'' 
     for 15 high crime areas chosen by the attorney general for 
     programs that ``provide meaningful and lasting alternatives 
     to crime''--whatever that means?
       Why is there $40 million to run midnight basketball and 
     other sports leagues? You know what you need to qualify for 
     federally sponsored hoop leagues? Half the players must live 
     in public housing. And communities getting the grants must 
     have two of the following characteristics, high crime rates, 
     high drug use, high dropout rates, high pregnancy rates, high 
     rates of HIV infection or high unemployment.
       Why is $50 million for youth violence prevention to design 
     programs that should include ``alternatives to school 
     suspension * * * and other innovative projects''?
       What is the $279 million for something called Family and 
     Community Endeavor Schools? Its stated purpose is ``to 
     improve academic and social development by instituting a 
     collaborative structure that trains and coordinates efforts 
     of (public school) teachers, administrators, social workers, 
     guidance counselors * * *.'' What the dickens does that mean?
       Why is 75 percent of the money for hiring new police 
     officers to be spent completely at the discretion of the 
     Clinton administration? The Justice Department knows where 
     more police officers are needed better than local communities 
     do? Since when? It looks more like pork to be doled out by 
     the president's minions.
       One of the best ideas in the bill is a Police Corps. It 
     would trade college education scholarships for four years of 
     police work. While the idea is authorized, not a dime of the 
     $25 million earmarked for it is appropriated. It is an 
     unfulfilled promise.
       This crime bill runs to 1,400 pages. It is eight inches 
     thick. Can you see 535 congressmen and senators reading all 
     of it before they vote on it? No Democrats can't wait to vote 
     for it because it has $9 billion in social program spending 
     in it.
       They want to be able to go home and tell the voters they 
     struck a blow for cracking down on criminals. They will point 
     to the ``three strikes, you're out'' life sentence provisions 
     (which apply to 1 percent of all crimes).
       They won't point to the Hope in Youth program that provides 
     $20 million to fund ``advisory organizations in low income 
     communities . . . (to do) strategic planning and evaluate 
     service programs.'' Now there is a real crime-busting 
     endeavor for sure.


                               NO ID CARD

       One solution proposed for the flood of illegal immigrants 
     in the United States is to issue each U.S. citizen an 
     employment registry card that would be presented to 
     prospective employers.
       People with cards could be safely hired. Those without them 
     could not.
       The idea sounds an awful lot like a national ID card that 
     would be linked to a huge computer database containing lots 
     of personal information and allowing the government to track 
     each working citizen's whereabouts.
       No thank you. America does not need or want national ID 
     cards.
       Besides, illegal immigrants would find ways to buy phony ID 
     cards, just as they are able to purchase phony Social 
     Security and Immigration and Naturalization Service ``green 
     cards'' today.
       In a country of 255 million people, somewhere around 2 
     million are illegal immigrants. If the way to identify those 
     illegal immigrants is to impose a national ID system on the 
     other 99 percent of the population, then you have the tail 
     wagging the dog.
                                  ____


              [From the Valley Daily News, Aug. 25, 1994]

                 Crime Bill Maintains `Pork' Tendencies

       A side from the rhetoric and the power brokering 
     surrounding the federal crime bill, there remains an overly 
     fat package of pork that needs considerable trimming.
       The bill that is now before the Senate and that passed the 
     House 235-195 on Sunday continues the Democrats' penchant for 
     repetitious social programs, too much federal interference in 
     local law enforcement, and too little emphasis on tough 
     crime-fighting.
       Senate Republicans should continue to rail against the 
     bill's social service excesses and fight for tough provisions 
     that will get criminals off the streets.
       The bill would authorize $13.45 billion for law 
     enforcement, including an $8.8 billion contribution to a 
     program with the goal of putting 100,000 more police on the 
     streets; $9.85 billion for prisons and $6.9 billion for crime 
     prevention, including drug courts. The balance is nearly 45 
     percent for law enforcement, almost 33 percent for prisons 
     and 23 percent for crime prevention and drug courts.
       However, there are so many Catch 22s in these programs, 
     many local jurisdictions say they will be wary of 
     participating. For example, while the bill authorizes 100,000 
     new police officers, it only funds about 20,000. Cash-
     strapped cities and counties would have to cough up the 
     matching grants and many will be reluctant to do so.
       There are so many federal strings attached to the bill's 
     crime-fighting components, the state's law enforcement 
     associations of officers, and police chiefs and sheriffs have 
     come out against it.
       The bill adds numerous social service programs that 
     duplicate many of the 266 federal programs already on the 
     books that aid at-risk youth, at a cost of nearly $25 
     billion.
       The bill also federalizes numerous crimes that have been 
     and should continue under the purview of local law 
     enforcement. While the bill's funding of prisons was 
     increased from $8.3 billion to $9.7 billion in conference 
     committee, the conference weakened the truth-in-sentencing 
     provisions that would have guaranteed prisoners serve at 
     least 85 percent of their sentences.
       It still expands the federal death penalty to about 60 new 
     offenses, a move that would further clog the federal courts.
       Senate Republicans should stick to their guns by demanding 
     a shift of emphasis from social services to anti-crime 
     provisions, and less emphasis on federalizing local crime, in 
     exchange for their support. As written, the bill doesn't 
     deserve to pass.
                                  ____


                    Same Crime Bill, New Demagoguery

       Some members of Congress are inclined to hold off on health 
     care reform until the current paroxysm of election-year 
     hyperbole has run its course. Any chance they might do the 
     same for the crime bill?
       This $30 billion behemoth has now gotten so tangled up in 
     pre-election posturing and the president's political fortunes 
     that its actual merits have taken a back seat to silly 
     rhetorical excess.
       To such rock-ribbed conservatives as Sen. Phil Gramm, every 
     penny in the bill spent on pre-emptive social intervention 
     instead of law enforcement is now ``pork''--despite the fact 
     that he and like-minded Republicans voted for a variety of 
     crime-prevention provisions in earlier versions of the 
     measure.
       Democratic leaders, anxious to chalk up a win for their 
     beleaguered president, are laying it on just as thick. Sen. 
     Joe Biden's paean to the bill is a case in point: ``As much 
     as anything I have ever voted on, passage of this legislation 
     will make a difference in the lives of the American people,'' 
     he said Monday, after the bill cleared the House and landed 
     in his chamber.
       ``Fewer people will be murdered. Fewer people will be 
     victims. Fewer women will be senselessly beaten. Fewer people 
     criminals.'' To hear Biden talk, the peaceable kingdom is 
     only a floor vote and a presidential signature away.
       Yet the bill in question is still what it's always been. A 
     Christmas tree festooned with shiny, hollow, crowd-pleasing 
     nostrums, some hung by conservatives, others by liberals. 
     Despite the minor redecorating it got in the House, it still 
     makes a grand show of federalizing a long list of felonies 
     that traditionally have been handled in state courts.
       It still expands the federal death penalty to nearly 60 new 
     offenses--a move that threatens to overwhelm the federal 
     judiciary. It would still try to micromanage community crime-
     fighting strategies, imposing absurdly detailed restrictions 
     on billions of federal dollars disbursed to state and local 
     governments.
       Not that the states couldn't use some help from Washington, 
     D.C. A well-crafted crime bill, stripped of hero provisions 
     and grandstanding mandates, would indeed be something to brag 
     about. But that would require Republicans and Democrats to 
     agree that the safety of America's streets is far too serious 
     an issue to exploit for partisan advantage. Don't hold your 
     breath.
                                  ____


               [From the Federal Way News, Aug. 23, 1994]

       Take, Kreidler Cross Swords Again Over Revised Crime Bill

                           (By Christy True)

       Congressman Mike Kreidler (D-9th) hailed the passage of a 
     newer, slimmer crime bill Sunday night as a ``hugh victory 
     for the American people in the fight against crime.''
       Republican Randy Tate, who is challenging Kreidler for his 
     seat in Congress, said the bill still has too much ``social 
     spending'' at the expense of law enforcement.
       ``The best prevention is requiring criminals to actually 
     serve time for crimes they commit.'' Tate said ``The lack of 
     respect for the law is the primary root cause of our crime 
     problem.''
       The bill, a $30 billion package of police officers, prisons 
     and prevention measures, passed the House 235-195. House 
     Democratic leaders succeeded in winning over more Republican 
     votes after $3 billion worth of the prevention measures were 
     cut.
       Last week, a $33 billion crime bill was defeated in a 
     procedural vote before it reached the House floor. Critics 
     said the bill had too many expensive prevention measures.
       The revised bill, now headed for another battle in the 
     Senate, passed despite the inclusion of a ban on many types 
     of semi-automatic assault weapons, a controversial provision 
     that caused the gun rights lobby to work hard to defeat it.
       Kreidler appeared especially pleased that the assault 
     weapon ban survived.
       ``Today, the House of Representatives stood up for the 
     American people and against the powerful gun lobby that 
     opposes any sensible restrictions on deadly assault 
     weapons,'' he said in a press release.
       Tate said he would have opposed the ban on assault weapons 
     because gun restrictions do nothing to curb crime.
       ``The criminals are going to break the gun laws anyway. We 
     need laws that are more strict for those who misuse them,'' 
     he said.
       Kreidler also defended the 23 percent of the bill's funding 
     that remained for prevention programs.
       ``All the talk about too much prevention and pork is just a 
     smokescreen for the real reason some people oppose this 
     bill--people on both sides of the aisle. And that's the gun 
     lobby,'' his statement and said. ``I don't thing rape 
     prevention battered women's shelters, counselors for abused 
     women and children, and more prosecutors and police to go 
     after sex offenders constitute `pork'.''
       Tate doesn't have a problem with programs to help battered 
     women and other victims, he said, but they don't belong in a 
     crime bill. Some of the programs also duplicate services 
     already available, he said.
                                  ____


                [From the Seattle Times, Aug. 23, 1994]

       Bill Won't Do Much to Solve Problems of Crime, Experts say

                           (By Angie Cannon)

       Washington.--For all that Congress and the president are 
     going through to get a crime bill passed, you would almost 
     think it was going to make a big difference in the country's 
     crime problem.
       But as the Senate wrestles with the bill this week after 
     House approval over the weekend, experts on crime and 
     prevention say there is more politics than problem-solving in 
     what lawmakers are doing.
       ``Hiring more cops to solve the crime problem is like 
     hiring more ambulance drivers to cure cancer,'' said Robert 
     Kahle, co-director of the Urban Safety Program at Wayne State 
     University in Detroit. ``It's after the fact.''
       Expanding from two to 60 the number of federal crimes 
     punishable by death ``is largely irrelevant to street crime 
     in American cities'' said James Q. Wilson, a UCLA management 
     and public-policy professor who has written several books on 
     crime.
       And banning assault weapons ``could have an effect on these 
     episode occasions when a gunman goes on a shooting spree on a 
     commuter train,'' said Marvin Wolfgang a criminology expert 
     at the University of Pennsylvania.
       James Fyfe, a criminal-justice professor at Temple 
     University in Philadelphia, said the bottom line is: ``I 
     don't think anything the federal government can do will make 
     the streets safer in the short term.''
       Still, the crime rhetoric continued yesterday as debate 
     began in the Senate, where Judiciary Committee Chairman 
     Joseph Biden, D-Del, said the $30 billion crime bill was just 
     ``one step away'' from President Clinton's desk.


                          republican strategy

       Republicans, however, were maneuvering to make that a tough 
     step. Sen. Phil Gramm R-Texas, who opposes the assault-
     weapons ban said he planned to use a Senate procedure that 
     would require the bill's supporters to muster 60 votes.
       If he succeeds, that would spell the demise of the package 
     that passed the House on Sunday, 235-195, with the help of 46 
     Republicans, giving Clinton a much-needed political victory.
       Clinton launched a full-court press for another victory by 
     lobbying senators yesterday afternoon, just as he and other 
     top aides did with House members all weekend.
       But as the political maneuvering continued, some experts 
     questioned an important aspect of the six-year crime bill--
     and a key campaign promise of Clinton's spending $8.8 billion 
     to put 100,000 more police officers on the streets.
       ``The emphasis on more law-enforcement officers in many 
     ways is misdirected,'' Kahle said.
       The presence of extra police officers might reduce the fear 
     of crime, ``but to think we will have fewer aggravated 
     assaults is a leap of faith,'' Kahle said. ``Whether it will 
     reduce this amount of crime is questionable.''
       Crime experts also say they fear that cities will get stuck 
     picking up the tab for the additional police officers once 
     the federal grants run out.
       Wilson said the 100,000 officers are to be phased in over 
     five or six years, with half going to cities with less than 
     100,000 people. ``That's politics, but it's not where the 
     crime problem is,'' he said. ``Many cities, like Los Angeles 
     and Detroit, need the officers very much, but we shouldn't 
     expect it to make a big difference. The police component is 
     much less than advertised.''


                         semiautomatic weapons

       Another big feature of the crime bill is the banning of 19 
     types of semiautomatic weapons, but some experts say that 
     won't have much effect on the crime rate either.
       Although they applaud banning assault weapons as a step in 
     the right direction, experts point out that very few people 
     are killed annually by them. Instead, most homicides are 
     committed by handguns, experts say.
       Experts also criticize the expansion of the federal death 
     penalty to cover nearly 60 crimes, including fatal drive-by 
     shootings, carjacking deaths and major drug trafficking, even 
     when the defendant is not directly linked to any specific 
     death.
       ``It's so silly,'' said Fyfe. ``Most crimes are state 
     crimes. All the federal government can do is legislate for 
     federal offenses. It is absolutely smoke and mirrors.''
       Joe McNamara, the former police chief in San Jose, Calif., 
     and Kansas City, said the death-penalty provisions is ``the 
     most disastrous'' part of the crime bill because it will 
     overburden an already clogged federal judiciary.
       ``It's pure political demagoguery,'' said McNamara, a 
     research fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. 
     ``This is the final nail in the coffin of the federal 
     courts.''


                       `a few hundred prisoners'

       Experts say the three-strikes-and-you're-out provision also 
     amounts to little. That should require life in prison for 
     three-time felons whose last conviction was for violent or 
     drug-related federal crime. But experts say that will affect 
     ``at most, a few hundred prisoners.''
       Crime experts are most optimistic about a portion of the 
     bill that some Republicans have resisted the most--the $6.9 
     billion in so-called ``pork.'' That money would provide 
     grants for recreation, education and other programs to steer 
     young people away from crime. It also would create special 
     courts to provide treatment and monitoring of first-time non-
     violent drug offenders.
       ``There are some respectable and decent things in there 
     dealing with prevention, and an effort to pay attention to 
     things like domestic violence,'' said Wolfgang.
       But as Wolfgang and others conclude, in essence the crime 
     bill ``is a symbolic gesture of Congress, trying to say to 
     the American people that they are concerned about crime.''
                                  ____


               [From the Journal American, Aug. 24, 1994]

                    View Crime Bill With Skepticism

       City officials are right to be concerned about the amount 
     of help available in the federal crime bill now under review 
     in the U.S. Senate. Don't look for any help in the future.
       While the federal legislation would provide money for more 
     cops on the beat, it comes in the form of matching grants. 
     That means cities must put up some of the cost. Worse, the 
     federal portion runs out in five years leaving local 
     taxpayers with the full bill for salaries and benefits 
     forever, or lay the officers off.
       As Bellevue city manager Phil Kushlan rightly noted, the 
     federal proposal is not a panacea.''
       As Kushlan and others have sadly learned, partnerships with 
     the federal government often fall short of expectations. The 
     result often falls on the head, and pocketbooks, of local 
     taxpayers. With a program such as police, the pressure would 
     be to keep them on and slash other city services.
       If the program becomes law, city officials could and should 
     investigate the particulars. But any investigation must 
     project the pluses and minuses now--and five years into the 
     future.
  Mr. WARNER addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Virginia.
  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I would like to pick up on the last phrase 
of my distinguished colleague from Washington, because I had that in my 
notes.
  We have lost a magnificent opportunity, an opportunity that the 
American public wanted; an opportunity that the American public called 
every switchboard in this Senate for the last week and pleaded that we 
seize this opportunity, Mr. President.
  The House voted against this bill and then tried to do some repair 
work. They eliminated $3 billion. Why could this Chamber not have 
likewise eliminated $3 billion? That is the problem I have with this 
bill, and regrettably that is the reason, coupled with its weak 
provisions on law enforcement, that I will cast a vote against this 
bill.
  There is a silence in this Chamber tonight, for the battle in the 
Congress this year is over. The battle is over in the Congress, Mr. 
President, but the battle is not over on the streets of the USA. In the 
cities, small towns, and rural areas, the battle rages on.
  What we have to ask ourselves is: Is this piece of legislation going 
to help? Regrettably, Mr. President, having missed the opportunity to 
strengthen those provisions, the very provisions that this Chamber 
voted on with strong majorities and put in the bill that we sent 
forward last fall in November--those are the provisions that I and 
others wish to restore now--we have missed an opportunity. And whether 
there are parts of this bill which are worthwhile, indeed there are, 
particularly those portions relating to the Violence Against Women Act, 
which I strongly support. I strongly support helping the States to 
build prisons. There are features in this bill that I strongly support. 
Let us hope that there is some help from this bill. But it is a 
question mark as to how much.
  The two things that trouble America most today--putting aside 
momentarily the street crime--the two things that concern this country 
are the increased deficit, and unfunded mandates.
  This bill, in a sense, contains an unfunded mandate. We offer in this 
bill to help put additional police on the streets. Mind you, those are 
not Federal police officers. Those will be police officers hired by the 
sheriff's department, hired by the cities. We simply offer to pay a 
part of their salary in each year. That part coming from this bill, 
assuming there will be sufficient funds in the trust fund--and that 
indeed is a question mark--those funds drop off. And if those police 
officers are to stay, there is an unfunded mandate on that small 
community, on that sheriff's department, on that city, that has to be 
picked up through property taxes and local taxes.
  We have talked about the additional police. But the paycheck is not 
following. That is an unfunded mandate.
  Unfunded mandates and increased deficit spending are two of the major 
problems facing this country today. This bill could add as much as $12 
billion or $13 billion over its life to the national deficit. We have 
to answer for that problem.
  That is why I feel, while the battle is over today, I predict it will 
be back, perhaps as early as next year, perhaps as early next year 
after there has been a trial period for this bill to work or not work. 
You will receive the calls from those mayors today saying, ``Oh, please 
vote for it,'' they will be calling next year: ``Where is the money? We 
are broke. Should I hire the 10, the 20 police officers that are 
offered by this bill and then have to fire them in a year or 2 because 
the funds are inadequate? I cannot raise taxes locally anymore. I 
simply do not have the money, Mr. Congress.''
  Yes, we will be back. Only time will tell.
  Mr. President, I have had the privilege--and I say it has been a 
privilege--to work very closely with leader Dole, the distinguished 
Republican leader from Kansas, the minority whip Mr. Simpson, the 
ranking minority member, Mr. Hatch, and many others that have worked 
actively, worked to try and let the U.S. Senate have a voice in this 
legislation. That was a challenge. It was a reasonable task. Under the 
leadership of Senator Dole, we fought a hard battle.
  We have a letter. I had a hand in working up the concept of that 
letter, along with others. Forty Senators signed it and leader Dole 
made the 41st. We stood as brothers and sisters. For 2 days, for 2 
days, leader Dole tried to negotiate what I believe was a very 
reasonable concept: Let us remove amounts of social spending, perhaps 
as much as the House removed, the $3 billion-plus, and let us 
strengthen certain provisions, just those primarily that were voted on 
by this Chamber last November. We had already decided that issue.
  But the offer was rejected and today we fell short of the mark of the 
necessary votes to let the U.S. Senate leave its imprint on this piece 
of legislation.
  I had the opportunity to consult with those--I say consult--visit, 
talk through that period of time with the Senator from Rhode Island, 
the Senator from Missouri, the Senator from Kansas, and others. They 
are people of integrity, people of courage, people of conviction. They 
voted their consciences, and each of us from time to time in this 
Chamber must vote our conscience.
  I am hopeful that we have not misled the American public with this 
piece of legislation; portrayed it as something that is going to come 
and help, to a great extent, their States, cities, small towns, and 
urban areas. I hope we have not misled them.
  But we have fought the good fight on this side. Never once did this 
Senator try to participate in any dilatory tactics. Never once did this 
Senator support the Republican leader with the idea that we are trying 
to just delay the bill or to kill the bill. That was the most specious 
of all arguments: Kill the bill.
  If the House could invoke some changes in the bill, $3 billion, why 
could the Senate not do likewise? And the hue and cry, ``Well, it has 
to go back to the House.'' Of course, it has to go back to the House. 
And who controls the House? The Democratic Party. Not just by a narrow 
margin but by a very large margin. The leadership of the House could 
have taken this bill and accepted it, convinced the colleagues to 
accept that bill, and then it would become law. It would have become 
law with the action of both Chambers of the U.S. Congress, as laid down 
by our Founding Fathers, in two Chambers. Not a unicameral legislature, 
but two Chambers--for a very specific purpose. Unfortunately the U.S. 
Senate was barred from fulfilling its role in our legislative process.
  Momentarily, there will be a vote on cloture. I am going to vote for 
cloture even though I am dissatisfied with this bill, and even though I 
will vote against this bill, because it is clear that we have exhausted 
every single opportunity left to work our will as a U.S. Senate and I 
have followed that credo in my Senate career that when you have fought 
the battle and the battle is over, let the Senate go on with its 
business. But I shall, with a very heavy heart and a very sad heart, 
cast a vote against this bill because I think we have failed to seize 
an opportunity, failed to have lived up to our responsibility as a 
body, and we have failed, as of now, to represent our constituents and, 
indeed, the American people.
  Mr. President, crime remains the No. 1 national issue in the United 
States today. The Senate in its bill, took action to assist the States 
with some of the problems confronting their local cities and towns.
  But the problem confronting the Senate today is that the legislation 
before us is not the tough law enforcement bill which was adopted by 
the Senate in November of 1993.
  The legislation now before us has been crafted to meet the wants of 
many organizations but not the needs of our citizens, or in plain 
words, the bill is loaded with programs which do not have a direct 
relationship to fighting crime. I have received over 3,500 telephone 
calls this week to my office from my constituents. The majority of the 
callers voiced their opposition to this bill.
  Mr. President, our cities and towns need the legal tools and 
personnel to prosecute effectively and to make sentences tougher so 
convicted criminals cannot avoid serving their sentences.
  The legislation before the Senate today is structured more around 
creating new social programs as opposed to establishing and enforcing 
new penalties for acts of violence. People need consequences for their 
acts and to be held accountable for their crimes.
  Mr. President, I cannot support legislation which grew in cost at 
each step of the legislative process. First, the bill passed the Senate 
at a cost of $22 billion. The House of Representatives considered their 
own version of the bill at a cost of $28 billion. Then the conference 
committee of the House and Senate added spending to reach an incredible 
figure of $33 billion. No wonder the House of Representatives properly 
rejected the bill. A bipartisan group of Representatives made a very 
modest trimming of $3 billion in social programs spending, but failed 
to restore tough provisions on crime.
  The bill was then sent to the U.S. Senate. The Republican Senators 
made a stand for 2 days to try and further reduce the social programs 
and toughen the provisions.
  Forty Republican Senators then signed a letter, which was my idea, to 
their Republican leader, Senator Bob Dole. The letter expressed a 
unified position in order the achieve changes in the bill. For 2 days 
leader Dole tried hard to negotiate constructive changes in this bill. 
When the time came to vote, the Republicans were not able to attain the 
votes necessary to make and changes to the crime bill. I believe the 
Senate missed an opportunity to strengthen this bill.
  Mr. President, this legislation as crafted will increase the deficit 
of this country by another $13 billion if all the programs are fully 
funded in the legislation.
  This brings me to a second vital point concerning the funding of this 
legislation.
  Mr. President, a trust fund was created by the Senate to fund this 
legislation when the Senate passed its version of the bill. The violent 
crime reduction trust fund was created to fund the provisions 
originally passed by the Senate and not all the provisions which are 
contained in the new conference report pending before the Senate.
  The bill passed by the Senate was to be funded for the years 1995, 
1996, 1997, and 1998. The bill provided for $22 billion dollars to fund 
the programs in the legislation. The trust fund was established for 4 
years. The new conference report has been expanded to cover 6 years at 
a cost of $30 billion.
  Mr. President, I do not believe this trust fund will ever contain the 
full funding necessary to provide the resources needed by the numerous 
programs in the legislation. This legislation could well mislead the 
States, cities, and towns for the funding may never come.
  Mr. President, the Senate should not create more unfunded mandates to 
the States. If Federal dollars are going to be directed at law 
enforcement. I support efforts to reduce the cost of this legislation 
by another $3 to $5 billion dollars. A few of the programs I would like 
to see eliminated are the Local Partnership Act and the Model Intensive 
Grants Program.
  Mr. President, I support tougher crime legislation than the 
legislation which is pending before the Senate. I would support the 
inclusion in the conference report a number of amendments which where 
originally in the Senate bill but removed during the conference on the 
legislation.
  Mr. President, a tougher crime bill should include stronger truth-in-
sentencing provisions, funding for the building of more prisons, 
tougher mandatory minimum sentences for adults who use firearms during 
the commission of a violent crime, and tougher sentences for adults who 
are convicted for selling drugs to minors or using minors to sell 
illegal drugs.
  Mr. President, these are some of the tough provisions which are 
missing from the bill before the Senate today. My constituents support 
a crime bill which contains provisions to combat the rising crime rate 
and not a bill which will spend more money on numerous social programs.
  Mr. DURENBERGER. Mr. President, I rise to express my opposition to 
this crime bill. I hope to sound a small warning to the U.S. Senate 
about the price that it will pay for this kind of legislation.
  I am leaving the Senate at the end of this year and I am reminded 
that I seem to be leaving at about the same point that I came in. This 
bill that we vote on today represents the business as usual approach to 
policymaking that got me elected to this body --to try to make a 
difference 16 years ago. It is the approach to policymaking that made 
Washington the butt of a national joke about Members of Congress 
running around the country throwing money at problems, then moving on 
to the next place, leaving the money and the problems behind.
  While we were at it, we competed with one another to spend the money 
in our own State so that at election time we can show that we brought 
home the bacon.
  In the early years of my time in the Senate, we followed this course 
on a wide variety of issues. In 1982, we started down this road on 
anticrime legislation. In 1982, we did an anticrime bill. In 1986, we 
did a crime bill that spent $1.7 billion. It was an election year. I 
remember it well. We lost control of the Senate and the Democrats took 
over.
  Two years later, another election year, we did $2.8 billion, but 
crime kept going on up.
  So in 1990, we threw a lot more money at the problem: $8 billion in 
1990, another election year. But still, crime went up.
  In 1992, we had another election and we had another crime bill. That 
one was killed by a filibuster, and guess what happened--crime went 
down. The fact of the matter is we have crime on a slight--and I 
emphasize slight--downhill trend. Maybe we ought to quit passing crime 
bills right here and now.
  But of course we did not and we will not. Along we came in 1993 and 
1994 with the granddaddy of all crime bills. The Senate passed $22 
billion and the House passed $27 billion, and the conference committee 
got together and they compromised at $33 billion. We just could not get 
enough of the anticrime enthusiasm of an election year.
  Earlier this month we ran into a little bump in the road. The House 
of Representatives inadvertently failed to pass the rule and the 
American public started to pay attention to what was the crime bill. 
And the more they found out about it, the madder they got. The phones 
started ringing off the hook. As if this way of doing business was not 
maddening enough, the American people also woke up to the fact we were 
spending money we do not have. Let us face it, even if we were really 
buying crime protection, which we are not, we are not paying for it. We 
are buying it with our children's money and their children's money.
  Early in my time in the Senate, I had occasion to visit the State of 
Texas to make a speech. I asked people what is a good joke to tell in 
Texas, and I was told: Ask them why there were so many heroes at the 
Alamo. The answer was because there was no back door.
  The reality is--and I remember using this as an analogy--the 
difference between the Congress and the Alamo is there is a back door. 
And every even-numbered year, a third of the Senate and all of the 
House troops out the back door, goes home, and tells everybody how 
great they are and how great they could be if it were not for all the 
folks back at the Alamo.
  Either that story has been told long enough or people have seen 
enough, but I have to tell you they are not going to stand it any 
longer. In the 1970's, about the time I was elected, Jimmy Carter took 
the Nation's mood for a national malaise, he called it. But what it 
really was, in a phrase made popular in a movie of that time, was a lot 
of American people leaning out of the windows of their homes, breaking 
their pencils, and screaming, ``I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to 
take it anymore.''
  That mood is back with us today. The feelings of the 1970's and the 
1980's have now turned into the cynicism. We see it in low voter 
turnout, decreasing respect to the point of no respect for the Nation's 
institutions and leaders, popular candidacies by sloganeering 
politicians taking advantage of the public's dismay but falling right 
back into ``business as usual'' when they get to Congress. It is 
eroding our ability to self-govern and increasing the problems it 
purports to solve.
  I have opposed this bill from the start. I was one of only four 
Senators who voted against it the first time through. So at the risk of 
saying I told you so, I just want to reiterate why this bill is not a 
crime bill. And it is not in the best interests of the United States of 
America.
  We have heard a lot of talk here about the pork in this bill. The 
Republicans want to take out $5 billion, calling it pork. The Democrats 
defended that pork as good pork. Everyone seems to agree the other $25 
billion is lean meat, not fat.
  Mr. President, the American people have caught on to the fact that it 
is all pork, all $30 billion of it. And we all know it. All you have to 
do is pick up your telephone back in your office. I do not mean just 
the 2,000 people who have gotten through to me this week to tell me to 
oppose this bill. I can tell it by the calls I get in support of this 
bill. The mayors all over the country, chiefs of police, county 
commissioners--they have been calling for a week. They are not calling 
me to tell me we need a weapons ban or we need stiffer sentences or we 
need new Federal crimes. No, what they want is the money.
  They want the grants, the pilot programs, the prison construction, 
the subsidized police force. They are working on ``business as usual,'' 
just as we are. And they know that when the pork is being sliced in 
Washington, you have to make yourself heard to ensure you get your 
slab, so they call and call again. The city and county officials did 
not tell me they had planned to hire more police anyway but could not 
afford it. They did not tell me they could not afford to build any more 
prisons. I do not think they even know whether they can put the money 
to good use. They just know that they can get some money, and to them 
any money is better than no money, so they call. And call again.
  With all due respect to my colleagues in the Senate, I do not believe 
we are making an informed decision about how many police officers we 
need in this country, about how many prisons we need, or how best to 
prevent crime in our cities. I still do not know if there are 20,000 
cops in this bill or 100,000. I have heard debate back and forth.
  But, frankly, I am not sure it makes any difference. Whatever the 
number is, I know it was arrived at in a wholly arbitrary way. It is 
not related in any way to the need. Do we really think 20,000 is 
enough? Is 100,000 too many? What if it was 200,000? Would it be twice? 
Would we be twice as safe?
  It is all pork. It is all bringing home the bacon, and it has nothing 
to do with crime prevention. We will spread the arbitrary number of 
cops all over the country and the cities will be there to take the 
money regardless of the need, because to them, it is business as usual 
as well.
  Well, Mr. President, thanks to this way of doing business, we are $4 
trillion in debt in this country. It was $800 billion when I got here. 
It is $4 trillion today, and the debt is going up, not down. This bill 
piles $30 billion more on top of that mountain of debt. We are already 
paying $300 billion a year on interest, and that, too, is going up, not 
down. That mountain of debt was built over the years by those of us in 
Washington who make every problem a Federal problem and every solution 
the infusion of Federal money.
  Mr. President, crime will not abate after we pass this bill. It never 
has as a result of a Federal crime bill, and there is no reason to 
think this barrel of pork is any different. The American people, if 
they believe the promises of the promoters of this bill, will be 
further frustrated and turned off by this Government. And future 
generations will be further weighed down with the cost of our folly. I 
have not even touched on my objections to the death penalties in this 
bill, to the load we are putting on an already overburdened Federal 
court system, or the waste of time and money in the Justice Department 
pursuing ever more Federal criminal behavior.
  Mr. President, this bill is a waste of money through and through. It 
was a waste last November when 95 of my colleagues supported it. It is 
a bigger waste today.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. MURKOWSKI addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Daschle). The Senator from Alaska Mr. 
[Murkowski], is recognized.
  Mr. MURKOWSKI. I thank the Chair and wish the President a good 
evening.
  Mr. President, I, too, rise in opposition to the conference report 
and will be voting against it.
  I think as we reflect on what has happened here in the last several 
days as we have debated the crime bill, we should recognize the 
realistic differences between us. There are philosophical differences, 
Mr. President.
  I think it is fair to say on our side, for the most part, we are 
committed to a philosophy of bringing about control of criminal 
activity through tough sentencing, new prisons, mandatory jail 
sentences, ensuring that someone who contemplates committing a crime 
knows in advance what is before him or her.
  I think our friends on the other side look at the criminal activity 
with the idea of how can we bring about corrections through social 
reform. In other words, what more can government do? What kind of 
programs can be initiated to address the criminal element?
  Both have merit, Mr. President. And time will tell whether the 
correct course of action prevailed here, as we recognize that, indeed, 
those who support corrections by social programs have prevailed in this 
body.
  I find it rather curious to reflect on the action in the House where, 
through a bipartisan effort, with a number of Republicans, they were 
able to bring about some positive changes in the crime bill. That was 
worthwhile. We attempted to do that as a minority in the Senate. 
Unfortunately, that opportunity did not avail itself.
  There has been a great deal of conversation here about funding. It is 
rather interesting to reflect very briefly that when this bill left the 
Senate, it was about a $22 billion bill. It went over to the House and 
increased to $27 billion, then up to $33 billion, then came back at $31 
billion.
  That in itself is significant. We have debated the issue of whether 
the pork is in reality another way of bringing about reform through 
responsible social programs or whether it is unnecessary. But in any 
event, it is something that we should reflect on and my good friend 
from New Mexico commented on it at some length yesterday in explaining 
the unfunded difference of about $13 billion.
  So I challenge my colleagues on the other side who say this is 
fiscally responsible. We are expending $13 billion and simply adding it 
to the deficit of this country. We are already spending some 14 to 15 
percent of our total budget on interest on our accumulated debt. This 
is going to add to that, Mr. President, and that is irresponsible. It 
is irresponsible of every Member who supports that funding without 
identifying a source other than adding to the deficit.
  I want to commend the Democrats and the leadership. They stuck 
together. We got beat. We lost six Republicans. It is going to be very 
hard for this Senator from Alaska to go back and explain to his 
constituents why we did not stick together, but I respect the rights of 
each individual. However, I am disappointed because to me, had we 
prevailed, we would have had a better crime bill. We had something very 
positive to contribute.
  But perhaps the explanation is that we are on different wavelengths. 
Perhaps those who saw fit to leave the Republican fold were motivated 
by the philosophical difference that they perhaps do not support strong 
criminal penalties but rather reform through social programs. That is 
an honest difference of opinion and, perhaps that is the best 
explanation the Senator from Alaska is going to have to offer to his 
constituents.
  However, Mr. President, as a lifelong Alaskan and one who has been 
raised to respect guns, as I respect all dangerous things of any type, 
whether it be knives or individuals or animals that occasionally come 
looking for not just politicians but constituents of mine.
  As a young boy, I was given a gun by my father, a .22. It was not a 
semiautomatic. I learned to shoot. Prior to that, I had a BB gun. I 
recall one day the BB gun got a little out of control. I was perhaps 
winging something, and it hit the corner of a plate-glass window of a 
house across the street.
  That evening, it was drawn to my attention that perhaps that was my 
BB gun that had clipped that plate-glass window. My father confronted 
me, and I acknowledged that might have been the case but I rather 
doubted it. He suggested we take a walk, and he invited me to bring my 
BB gun with me. We walked down to the dock, looked at the water and he 
said, ``Now you know where to put that BB gun,'' and with great 
reluctance, I was obliged to throw that BB gun in the bay.
  The point is, I was fortunate enough to have someone who cared to 
advise me on how to handle guns properly. Clearly, if that advice is 
lacking with many Members in this body and their own personal 
relationships with their children, that is a situation that is a 
personal one and I respect it. Obviously, we know what happens to guns 
that are in the hands of irresponsible people.
  But, Mr. President, in my State, guns are very much a part of our 
lifestyle. I am going to be returning to Alaska tomorrow, I hope, and 
on the first of September, I am going to take my boys out. We are going 
to duck hunt. Our season opens the first of September. We have about a 
6-week season, then it freezes up and the ducks fly south. They fly a 
little faster in Alaska because they have not flown so far yet. They 
are hatched up there. But in any event, we are going to take our 
shotguns out and, hopefully, get a few ducks. For years before I joined 
this body and for some years after, I would go sheep hunting with my 
boys and my daughter, Dall sheep hunting. It is a very, very 
extraordinary experience--a tough climb 8,000 or 9,000 feet up on top 
of the mountains. You can only take a full-curl ram. That is a mature, 
male sheep, at least 7 years old or older.

  I tell you, you get to know your sons pretty well when you go through 
that type of experience. I recognize everybody cannot have that type of 
experience; they are not fortunate enough. But the point is we use 
those guns in a responsible manner, and when we see criminals using 
guns, we are as frustrated as any other person.
  The reality is, what do we do about it? Well, there has been an awful 
lot of conversation and alarm associated with the assault weapons 
issue. Unfortunately, very few Members of this body understand what an 
assault weapon is. They are of the opinion that if we take this action, 
we are going to do something positive about criminals--stop 
irresponsible people having assault weapons.
  I refer to an article in the Wall Street Journal of August 25, which 
I ask be printed in the Record.
  It is entitled, ``What Is an Assault Weapon?'' It is very 
interesting, and I would encourage my colleagues to reflect on it, 
because there is a presumption out there among the public that we are 
talking about automatic weapons.
  There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                       What Is an Assault Weapon?

       The World's Greatest Deliberative Body has tied itself in 
     knots over the crime bill. The bill's opponents worry about 
     the $33 billion costs, but its defenders say that's all a 
     smoke screen for the National Rifle Association. The most 
     important business of the Republic, they say, is banning 
     assault weapons. So it might be fair to ask, what's an 
     ``assault weapon,'' anyway?
       Now, the weapons in question are not machine guns; 
     automatic weapons have been illegal in this country since 
     1934. Rather, they are semi-automatics, capable of firing 
     shots as fast as the shooter can pull the trigger. But most 
     modern rifles are semi-automatics, and no one yet admits a 
     desire to confiscate hunting rifles. So someone has to decide 
     which semi-automatics are dreaded assault weapons. They tell 
     by looking at the weapon; an assault weapon is in the eye of 
     the beholder.
       If you think we jest, we refer you to Senator Dianne 
     Feinstein, the WGDB's leading expert on aesthetics and 
     semantics. The Feinstein amendment, passed by the Senate last 
     November and now part of the pending legislation, spelled out 
     which weapons to ban. She and her aides riffled through their 
     picture albums, picked out 19 weapons they especially didn't 
     like and banned them by name.
       One is the Colt AR-15, pictured here along with the Ruger 
     Mini-14, which would remain legal. The two are both semi-
     automatics firing the same 5.56 mm ammunition. In the hands 
     of a criminal, they could each do the same damage; no more, 
     no less. The difference between the two? The AR-15 looks more 
     menacing because it has a plastic stocks and a pistol grip; 
     that's it.
       After listing the 19 aesthetic offenders, the Feinstein 
     brain trust apparently cross-tabulated its critical judgments 
     to draw up a checklist of five aesthetic markets; a folding 
     stock, too large a pistol grip, a bayonet mount, a flash 
     suppressor and a grenade launcher. Two strikes's and it's an 
     assault weapon, the WGDB decided; either a grenade launcher 
     or a bayonet mount is OK, but not both.
       Now, we'd agree that ordinary citizens don't have much need 
     for bayonet mounts, but on the other hand, do you know anyone 
     who was mugged with a grenade launcher? Statistics from 
     around the country suggest that few criminals are deranged or 
     dimwitted enough to call attention to themselves by lugging 
     around military looking paraphernalia.
       So-called assault weapons are used in only a tiny, tiny 
     fraction of the violent crimes. In 1990, Florida's Commission 
     on Assault Weapons reported that over the previous three-year 
     period, assault weapons were used in 0.14% of violent crimes. 
     In New York City, police confiscated 16,378 firearms in 1988, 
     only 80 of which could be called assault weapons. Even a 
     liberal such as Richard Cohen pointed out in a recent 
     Washington Post column that according to the 1992 Uniform 
     Crime Report. ``more people were beaten to death that year 
     (1,114) than were killed by rifles of any kind (698).''
       But perhaps the best commentary came from Joseph Constance, 
     deputy chief of police in Trenton, New Jersey. He told the 
     Senate Judiciary Committee last August: ``since police 
     started keeping statistics, we now know that assault weapons 
     are/were used in an underwhelming 0.026 of 1% of crimes in 
     New Jersey. This means that my officers are more likely to 
     confront an escaped tiger from the local zoo than to confront 
     an assault rifle in the hands of a drug-crazed killer on the 
     streets.''
       The real question is why the Senate wants to tie itself 
     into knots over so frivolous an issue. Both sides of the gun-
     control debate see an assault-weapons ban as the first step 
     toward confiscating all firearms, we suppose, and that in 
     turn evokes the ultimate liberal-conservative division over 
     whether the root cause of crime is original sin. This remains 
     in the realm of symbolism, and perhaps the WGDB wants to 
     spend its August evenings striking postures. but in 
     protecting the public from crime, it could scarcely be 
     clearer, the assault-weapons ban would fire a blank.

  Mr. MURKOWSKI. Now, a machine-gun is an automatic weapon. But 
automatic weapons have been banned in this country by law since 1934. 
Rather, what we are talking about are semiautomatic weapons. That is a 
weapon that is capable of firing shots just as fast as you can pull the 
trigger, as opposed to a fully automatic where you pull the trigger and 
it continues to fire.
  So what is an ``assault weapon''?
  Well, as I said, they are semiautomatic weapons capable of firing 
shots as fast as the shooter can pull the trigger. But most modern 
rifles are semiautomatic and no one yet admits to a desire to 
confiscate hunting rifles or shotguns, many of which are automatic.
  I own an automatic shotgun. I own a pump shotgun. There is a 
difference. The difference is you have to operate the receiver on one 
and the other is gas operated, that is, semiautomatic.
  Now, we can reflect on what happened to distinguish assault weapons 
from other semiautomatics. It happened in this body through the efforts 
of the Senator from California who identified in her amendment what 
would be considered an assault weapon. And it is really in the eyes of 
the beholder. The editorial I have shows it in pictures. One weapon 
shown is the Colt AR-15, And beneath it is a picture of a Ruger Mini 
14.
  Now, only one would remain legal. However, the two are both 
semiautomatics firing the same 5-millimeter ammunition. In the hands of 
a criminal, they could each do the same thing--no more, no less. The 
difference between the two is the AR looks more menacing--it really 
does--because it has a plastic stock and a pistol grip. That is the 
difference. That is all. One is classified as an assault weapon and the 
other is not.
  So after listing some 19 esthetic offenders, the Senator from 
California cross-tabulated somehow and came up with a checklist of five 
esthetic markers to classify what an assault weapon is. It has a 
folding stock; it has a pistol grip, neither of which have been known 
to harm anybody. It has a bayonet mount, and it has a flash suppressor.
  Now, I do not know anyone who is mugged with a grenade launcher. It 
is rather interesting to look at some of the statistics. So-called 
assault weapons, we are told, are only used in a tiny fraction of 
violent crimes. In 1990, Florida's Commission on Assault Weapons 
reported that over the previous 3-year period, assault weapons were 
used in four-tenths of 1 percent of violent crimes in New York City--
four-tenths of 1 percent.
  Now, consider the action that we have taken in this body. It is 
interesting to note that in Trenton, NJ, one Joseph Constance, deputy 
chief of police, told the Senate Judiciary Committee last August:

       Since police started keeping statistics, we now know that 
     assault weapons are or were used in an underwhelming twenty-
     six one-hundredths of 1 percent of crimes in New Jersey.

  He went on to further say that:

       This means that my officers in New Jersey are more likely 
     to confront an escaped tiger from the local zoo than to 
     confront an assault rifle in the hands of a drug-crazed 
     killer on the street.

  Now, this is reality, Mr. President. This is the terrible problem we 
have taken on in this crime bill. What we have not done is to ban those 
criminals that have weapons. What I fear and I want to alert my Alaskan 
constituents to, is that this is the first step. The assault weapons 
ban is not going to have a measurable--a measurable--effect on criminal 
activity. The next effort we are going to see in this body is to ban 
all semiautomatic weapons, hunting rifles, shotguns. We all thought we 
were protected by the Constitution, but we are not protected by the 
mania to do something about crime.
  Now, I know how the people in my State feel about the right to bear 
arms, the right to have their guns and use them in a responsible 
manner. As long as I am in the Senate, and as long as I am on my two 
feet, I am going to support the guarantees under the Constitution.
  But I warn those responsible gun owners in my State and throughout 
the United States to beware of what has happened here today under the 
guise of an assault weapons ban. We are making steps that will threaten 
sports gun owners, responsible hunters, those who use guns in target 
practice, the sport-based sporting goods stores, manufacturers, and the 
National Rifle Association.
  We are going to have to maintain a greater vigilance. We are going to 
have to reflect on the debate that has occurred on this floor in the 
last several days because those Members of this body who feel we are 
going to initiate corrective action through social reform are going to 
have an opportunity to prove their case, to some extent, if they can 
and if most of the money is not used for administrative purposes. We 
will see how successful social reform programs are going to be to 
combat crime as opposed to more prisons, harsher penalties, and 
mandatory sentencing.
  I would hope that the public out there would reflect on the 
amendments that were offered under the Republican proposal. We wanted 
to strike some $1.62 billion from the Local Partnership Act and apply 
it to the Edward Byrne Memorial Law Enforcement Program, a very 
worthwhile program. But the Partnership Act was a social program.
  We want to be tough on crime. Our friends on the other side said no, 
we want the Model Cities Intensive Grant program at $625 million. We 
said no, we want to be tough on crime.
  We wanted an amendment which will allow us to deport criminal aliens. 
We did not get it. The Republicans lost on that one.
  We wanted mandatory minimum for gun crimes, mandatory minimums so 
criminals using guns in crimes would know what was going to happen to 
them for using guns associated with selling drugs, or crimes involving 
minors. We wanted mandatory minimum reforms.
  We wanted a tough crime bill. And our philosophy on the Republican 
side is you do it by passing harsh legislation that discourages 
criminal activity. Unfortunately, in my opinion, the opinion of the 
Senator from Alaska, is that the other side prevailed, and said no, we 
are going to achieve the same objective but we are going to do it 
through social programs.
  I hope that every one will reflect back on these days because one of 
us is wrong, very wrong, Mr. President.
  Finally, let me again warn responsible owners of guns that a major 
step backward has been taken today on the right to bear arms. I would 
hope that those on the other side would reflect on the real difference 
between what they classify as an assault weapon, which has a horrifying 
name, and a legitimate semiautomatic shotgun, which I am going to be 
carrying in my hand on September 1.


                        Assault Rifle Provisions

  Despite the pressure on Congress to act on gun violence, and the 
media's loud support, the semiautomatic ban is just not good policy 
from any number of aspects.
  It's also clear that supporters don't see this as a compromise to end 
debate. They will simply pursue more controls.
  The conference report bans 19 types of semiauto rifles, handguns and 
shotguns by name, and all ``look-alikes''--reaching totals in the 
hundreds. It also bans all magazines over 10 rounds. It excludes from 
banning now or in the future only about 660 specific firearms out of 
all those manufactured, including rifles, carbines, muzzleloaders, 
shotguns, semiauto pistols and revolvers.
  The list of exempted firearms is supposed to be, in the author's 
words, ``every single rifle and shotgun--other than those being 
banned--that has been on the market this year.'' Despite the claim, it 
is no such thing. It fails to mention such popular--even some 
historic--firearms as the M1 Garand, and many others.
  The magazine ban would prohibit even some factory issue magazines for 
a number of the firearms that are supposedly permitted under the bill, 
such as the Ruger mini-14 and many pistols.
  Semi-autos are not a big part of the violence problem. A good 
indicator that assault rifle use is low is the fact that they comprise 
a very small share of all firearms seizures. The highest occurrences 
are 3.9 percent in Oakland, CA; 3.6 percent in Florida; 3 percent in 
Los Angeles and Washington, DC; and 2 percent or less in other major 
areas. And let me stress that these figures--low though they are--
represent all seizures of so-called assault rifles including many that 
may never have been used in a violent crime.
  It is hard to believe that assault rifles are the so-called weapon of 
choice when they are so rarely seized. Either the police are doing an 
atrociously bad job, or we have not been told the truth about 
semiautomatics.
  The reality is that there is no statistically valid evidence of a 
trend toward semiautomatic rifles. Here are the facts behind the 
``weapon of choice'' argument:
  Murders are far more likely to be committed with knives than with any 
sort of rifle.
  Murders are far more likely to be committed with handguns than with 
any sort of rifle.
  Murders are far more likely to be committed with blunt instruments 
than with any sort of rifle.
  Murders are far more likely to be committed with bare hands and feet 
than with any sort of rifle.
  The fact is, rifles--of any type--are used in only a small percentage 
of murders--less than 4 percent of the murders from 1987 through 1992, 
with that number decreasing each year since 1989. The number of murders 
committed with so-called assault rifles is far lower--probably around 1 
percent.
  This will have no significant effect on criminal access to firearms. 
The best available data--from BATF itself--indicates that only 7 
percent of the firearms--all types, not just semiautos--used in crimes 
are obtained legally. Because this figure includes all revolvers, 
shotguns, lever and bolt action rifles, small-bore firearms, and so 
forth, and all firearms used in domestic quarrels, bar disputes, and so 
forth--where the weapon is likely to have been purchased legally--it's 
clear that career criminals, gangbangers and the like actually use 
legally purchased semiautomatics--or any other legally purchased 
firearm for only a small portion of their crimes.
  We have heard many claims by the proponents of this legislation to 
the effect that it is supported by police around the country. Indeed, 
there have been supporting statements made by some police officials. 
But let's look again. That support is not anywhere near as universal as 
the proponents want us to believe. The National Association of Chiefs 
of Police [NACOP] has 11,000 members and feels very much otherwise. In 
fact, NACOP recently surveyed some 18,000 chiefs of police and 3,000 
sheriffs throughout the country.
  With an astounding return of over 15 percent of the mail-out 
surveys--far over the national average of such surveys--NACOP found the 
following sentiments being held by police chiefs and sheriffs: 88.7 
percent do not believe a ban on semiautomatic assault weapons will help 
reduce crime; 97.4 percent believe criminals will still be able to 
obtain illegal weapons, even with a ban; and 90.4 percent believe law-
abiding citizens should be able to purchase any rifle, pistol, or 
shotgun he or she chooses for self-protection or recreation.
  A similar survey was conducted in June 1993 by the Southern States 
Police Benevolent Association, which has approximately 11,000 members, 
who were polled by an independent, objective outside research firm. Of 
those officers surveyed, over 70 percent have been police officers for 
more than 5 years, and nearly two-thirds serve in urban areas where the 
threat of assault weapons is presumably highest.
  Some 65.3 percent thought stricter gun control would be the least 
effective of several options to reduce crime.
  And 96.4 percent strongly supported firearms ownership for self-
protection.


                             hunting issue

  Despite claims to the contrary, many people do use semiautos for 
legitimate hunting. Many Alaskans have contacted me to say they have 
purchased semiautomatic AK-type firearms especially for that purpose--
not because of the rapid fire capacity, although that can help prevent 
the escape of wounded animals, but because they are ideal firearms for 
hunting or personal protection in rugged physical conditions. Their 
legendary reliability and ability to keep operating after being rained 
on, snowed on, dropped in salt water, and generally banged around makes 
them the weapon of choice--not for criminals--but for people whose 
firearms can mean the difference between eating and not eating that 
winter.


                         second amendment issue

  The judicial history of gun control is mixed, even when looking only 
at Federal actions and not court opinions on actions by States or other 
jurisdictions. One persistent issue is whether the second amendment 
bars States from adopting laws that are more narrow, or is solely 
applicable to Federal actions.
  At the Federal level, a key question is whether it only prohibits 
laws that would impede the formation of State militias, which today 
have been supplanted by the National Guard, or is an individual right 
to keep and bear arms for broader purposes.
  In arguing that gun control is not unconstitutional, the case most 
often cited as controlling by gun control advocates is United States 
versus Miller (1939), the only time this century in which the Supreme 
Court heard a directly applicable second amendment case. Miller's 
conviction--for possession of a prohibited sawed-off shotgun outlawed, 
along with machine guns, during the ``gangster'' era--was upheld.
  However, the Miller case is very weak for the gun control lobby. 
Because Miller himself was unable to appear, and no briefs were filed 
nor arguments made on his behalf, the Court heard only one side of the 
case. Even then, when the Court went against Miller, it only said it 
lacked proof that his shotgun was a type of weapon that had military 
value--had it been, Miller would have won.
  In essence, although the Court upheld Miller's conviction, its 
opinion in addressing only whether the shotgun was a military weapon, 
tacitly recognized that the second amendment is an individual right to 
keep and bear arms, regardless of actual membership in a militia. The 
only proviso the Court made was to make it clear that the second 
amendment applies to weapons having military potential or use.
  In looking at what the Founding Fathers intended for the second 
amendment, the Constitution Subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary 
Committee in 1982 drew on the historical writings of the founders and 
their correspondents. It concluded that the framers purpose was to 
establish an individual right that would serve to prevent the 
Government from exercising control by means of a standing army. In 
their mind, the prospect that a Government-backed army would be used 
against citizens who disagreed with the Government was what we might 
today call a ``clear and present danger.''
  They wanted citizens to be able to form their own armed militia 
organizations, absent any Government interference, for the express 
purpose of defending themselves against the Government. In addition, 
they drew from early English common law to explicitly recognize the 
right of an individual to arm himself for protection against outlaws.
  When the Bill of Rights was presented, the Senate passed it in 1 day, 
but first it soundly rejected an amendment that would have limited the 
second amendment to carrying firearms ``for the common defense.'' That 
action shows clearly that the Senate also regarded the second amendment 
to be an individual right.
  Many argue that the second amendment is now outdated--that the intent 
of the Founding Fathers should be ignored by today's Congress, because 
they could not possibly have foreseen the development of today's 
society. That is the purest hogwash. Such an argument demeans those who 
make it and insults those who hear it. We, who are sworn to uphold the 
Constitution, cannot pick and choose the parts we want to honor and the 
parts we want to ignore.
  This country has grown to greatness thorough many fortunate 
circumstances and through the hard work and faith of its residents. But 
most of all it has grown to greatness because the U.S. Constitution 
gave it firm footing. The rights of freedom of speech, of the press, of 
religion and of peaceful assembly formed the base for the growth of a 
healthy, diverse society, along with the rest of the Bill of Rights. 
But the Founding Fathers also knew full well that all those rights are 
delicate ones--easily pushed aside by a Government that becomes 
unbalanced. It is precisely for that reason that they included the 
second amendment.
  Arguing that the second amendment is outdated does not makes it so. 
But more to the point is this: Even if that were true, it is still the 
law of the land. If it is outdated, then let those who believe that--
work to have it changed. But in the meantime, this Congress should 
not--and legal it cannot--simply decide to usurp powers of decision 
that are reserved to all the people
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. GRAMM addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.
  Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, in the last day and a half I have not come 
over to speak on this bill. I have tried to avoid identifying myself 
with the Senate's chaotic indecision. But given that we are now coming 
to the end of the debate, I want to make a few points, then summarize 
my position on the crime bill, and then let others speak.
  First of all, I checked with my office a minute ago and I have had a 
number of calls from Texas about Senator Durenberger's comments about a 
back door at the Alamo. In Texas we are pretty sensitive about the 
Alamo. I want to be sure we straighten those comments out.
  First of all, there were a lot of back doors at the Alamo. In fact 
James Bonham--since our great Senator from South Carolina, Strom 
Thurmond, is here on the floor--I note that he, in Aiken, and James 
Bonham, in Edgefield, were both born in South Carolina. James Bonham 
rode out the back door at the Alamo through the Mexican lines to find 
help. And when he could not get anybody to come back to the Alamo with 
him, he rode back through the Mexican lines into the Alamo to certain 
death.
  So there was a back door at the Alamo. But there were people at the 
Alamo who were committed to what they were doing. They were committed 
to Texas being free. And they started there a fight that ultimately 
made Texas free, brought 11 States into the Union, made America a world 
power, and changed the course of history.
  Mr. President, there are a lot of emotions one can express on a day 
like today. I guess everybody hates to lose. I hate it I guess as much 
as most. It must be a little bit like dying, and even in death I am 
hoping for a reprieve. But I particularly hated losing today. First, as 
I said, I do not like losing. Second, I had no doubt in my mind and my 
heart that we were right.
  It is a very interesting thing how debates evolve in the Senate. 
Often you end up with two straw men that both sides create as to what 
the battle is about. Obviously, to some degree that was the case here. 
But in my mind what it was all about, and I think that it was 
demonstrated what it was all about, is that we had a golden opportunity 
to pass a good crime bill. This crime bill ended up being hijacked. It 
ended up being hijacked and became something that it did not start out 
being, and became something that the American people I think have come 
to understand. They are unhappy about it, and more than unhappy, they 
are frustrated about it.
  First of all, the legislation became something that too often almost 
every bill becomes that passes the Congress, it became the purveyor of 
pork. It became a bill where all kinds of things were added to it to 
spend money, to create political constituencies, to win over votes. We 
had a long debate on this whole question of pork.
  I just simply would like to say that when we have big deficits, when 
the average American family with two little children is sending $1 out 
of every $4 that family earns to Washington, DC, I hated to see $5 
billion spent basically on social programs. Some may have been good. 
Some may have been bad. But basically they did not have anything to do 
with the crime bill.
  I would just like to note that the mayor of Providence, RI is unhappy 
with me and has written me sort of a nasty letter. I am not going to 
read it. But I would just like to say that the other day on the floor 
of the Senate I quoted from the New York Times of August 16, what I 
thought was the award-winning proposal as to how to use the money from 
this bill.
  The mayor of Providence, at least according to the New York Times, 
hoped to use the $3 million he was going to receive from the Local 
Partnership Act, which is part of this crime bill, to retrain graffiti 
violators to be artists. He has subsequently written me a letter--and 
Senator Pell has given a speech pointing that out--that this was not 
his only idea. He had lots of other good ideas. I am sorry we do not 
now know about them. But my guess is we will after all this money is 
spent.
  So I am disappointed that we did not get the pork out. I am 
disappointed that our real anticrime provisions ended up being dropped. 
We have all gone through them--10 years in prison without parole for 
using a firearm in the commission of a violent crime or drug felony; 20 
years for discharging it; life imprisonment for killing somebody; the 
death penalty in aggravated cases.
  I cannot for the life of me understand how we are about to pass a 
bill that bans guns, and yet we are not willing to do anything about 
the people who use those guns to kill people.
  I hear all this talk about new Democrats. But I would have to say 
that when they get behind closed doors in conference committees, and 
when the real decisions are made, these new Democrats turn out to be 
the old-fashioned Democrats who blame society and not the criminal, for 
crime.
  The sad reality is that we know gun control does not work. The 
District of Columbia has an outright ban on handguns and assault 
rifles, and you must register a shotgun. But the District of Columbia 
with the strongest gun ban in America is, per capita, the murder 
capital of the world. Why? Because they ban guns, but they do not do 
much about capital crime. They have crime without punishment. It is 
really an extension of what we have in America.
  We wanted to have an opportunity to vote, to impose sanctions, 
mandatory minimum sentencing against violent criminals that use guns. 
We were not allowed to do that. We wanted 10 years in prison without 
parole for selling drugs to a child or for using children in drug 
felonies. We wanted to remove the Clinton provision in this bill which 
overturns mandatory minimum sentencing for drug felons, and which in 
its original form would have let 10,000 drug felons currently in the 
Federal penitentiary back out on the streets.
  Thanks to Republicans in the House and their courage and their 
leadership, they got rid of the retroactive part of that provision. But 
when this bill becomes law, mandatory minimum sentencing for drug 
thugs, which is the law of the land today, will not be the law of the 
land because judges will then be able to decide whether to impose those 
sentences.
  I want drug thugs to know that if they sell drugs to children, they 
are going to prison for 10 years, and they are going to serve every day 
of the 10 years no matter who their daddy is or how they think society 
has done them wrong. But my view is not going to prevail today.
  What would I like to do on the crime bill? Well, I hope we have a 
Republican majority in the next Congress and, if we do, here is what I 
would like to do. I would like to go back and overturn this bill and 
seize as much of this pork money as is not spent. I would like to start 
building prisons, but I would like to stop building them like Holiday 
Inns. I would like to put people in jail to work. I do not know why in 
this country the working people have to pay to keep criminals in jail, 
but the criminals in jail, by and large, do not work. If we have a 
space problem, let us put prisoners in tents. Let us declare a national 
crime emergency, giving us the ability to go out and string up barbed 
wire around unused military bases.
  Republicans do not claim we have the answer to every part of the 
crime problem, but we have the answer to one part. We do not have to 
get up every morning, open up our newspaper and read about some violent 
predator criminal who has been convicted five or six times of terrible 
crimes, and who is back out on the street, and who has killed 
somebody's child. We can fix that problem, and if we are given the 
opportunity to fix it, we are going to fix it.
  The news tomorrow obviously will be that the President has won. But 
the real news ought to be that a great opportunity has been lost. We 
are going to spend $30 billion, and I admit it, you cannot spend $30 
billion without helping somebody. It is impossible. You cannot spend 
$30 billion without doing some good for somebody. But anybody who looks 
at this bill is going to know that we are not going to do 30 billion 
dollars' worth of good for the people who do the work and pay the taxes 
and pull the wagon in America.
  So I am disappointed about losing today, but I am also disappointed 
about missing a golden opportunity to grab violent criminals by the 
throat, to throw them in prison, and to keep them there. But this is an 
opportunity that is not lost forever, and if people are unhappy about 
this bill, they have an opportunity to do something about it in 
November.
  The interesting thing is, I am amazed at how the American people have 
discovered that this is not a good bill. I am very pleased, on both 
health care and crime, that the American people understand what is 
happening here in Washington, DC. And I do not believe that passing 
this crime bill is going to be the great bonanza, politically, that 
some people think it will be.
  I suspect that many Americans are going to see it as another cruel 
hoax, where our money is wasted and where the problem is not dealt 
with.
  Finally, there is one piece of good news today, and that is that the 
Clinton health care plan is dead. The Clinton plan is dead, Clinton-
Mitchell 1 is dead, Clinton-Mitchell 2 is dead, Clinton-Mitchell 3 is 
dead, and Clinton-Chafee is dead. And all those plans are dead because 
the American people understand that they are bad bills that would let 
the Government run health care in America.
  I believe the President has lost because he underestimated the 
ability of the American people to understand that with all of his 
wonderful talk, the reality is that under his plan, they lost control 
over their health care.
  So the good news today is that while $30 billion is going to be spent 
inefficiently, and America is not going to get its money's worth, we 
have taken a gigantic step today by adjourning without passing the 
Clinton health care bill, and I believe people will have an opportunity 
in November to cast a vote on that health care plan.
  So I believe that today we have given people a clear choice. We had a 
chance to vote on get-tough provisions, and we cast a vote, and we know 
now where 39 of our colleagues stood, and we know where the rest stood. 
It is up to the American people to look at those votes and decide 
whether or not they reflect their will. In 35 States in the Union, 
people have an opportunity this November to say whether they agree or 
disagree on the crime bill and on health care by how they vote at the 
polls for the Senate. So if you are unhappy about how your Government 
is running, you have an opportunity to do something about it. I want to 
urge people to take that opportunity.
  I am very proud of the Republican leader today. He did a great job. 
It was very disappointing for him. In any other city in the world, when 
adults sign a letter saying they are going to do something, you expect 
them to do it. But this is Washington, DC, and that was yesterday.
  In any case, I believe that a good fight was fought. I believe that 
those on our side of the aisle were right. I believe the American 
people will discover that we were right and, hopefully, they will give 
us an opportunity to do right by giving us a majority in the November 
elections.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. THURMOND addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Carolina is recognized.
  Mr. THURMOND. Mr. President, I have spoken against this bill, and I 
shall not take but a few minutes now. I want to say that this bill will 
result in some good, but it is not worth the price we are paying. I am 
opposed to this bill mainly for two reasons. One is the excessive 
Federal spending. There is almost $7 billion in pork for Federal social 
programs which should be cut. Already, billions are being spent in this 
area by the Federal Government. There is no evidence that additional 
handout programs will reduce violent crime.
  We have a debt in this country now of over $4 trillion. Why should we 
spend over $30 billion here when it is not necessary? I just heard the 
distinguished Senator from Texas speak, and he brought out some good 
points.
  I want to say this: We ought to try to reduce this deficit and not go 
spending more of the American taxpayers' money unless it is absolutely 
necessary, and it is not absolutely necessary here in this crime bill.
  The other reason I am opposed to this bill is the multiplications 
which should have been made are quite a number. We should have included 
in this bill a number of things. I will just give a few examples.
  One is mandatory sentences for selling drugs to minors or using 
minors in drug crime. That is a very important matter. It should be 
included in this bill.
  Another is mandatory restitution to victims of violent crime. When 
people commit violent crimes on victims the victims should be allowed 
to collect restitution.
  Another is tough Federal penalties for street gang crimes. We should 
have included that in the bill. We have to have these tough penalties 
for these street gang crimes. These gang crimes are very bad in many 
places.
  Now the prosecution of juveniles 13 and up as adults for Federal 
crimes of violence with a firearm should have been included. Now if 
juveniles have a firearm and commit a violent crime, they should be 
tried as adults. And that was left out of this bill. It is a very 
important matter that should have been included.
  Another is the deportation of criminal aliens upon completion of 
their sentence in the United States. When aliens come here and commit a 
crime and they suffer for it, we should deport them, not allow them to 
stay here. We should have put that in this bill.
  Mr. President, there are so many things that should have been 
included in this bill that are not. For those two reasons mainly I am 
going to oppose it.
  There is another thing I want to mention, too. Have we forgotten what 
federalism is? What is federalism. In other words, the Federal 
Government has certain powers under the Constitution and all the other 
powers not mentioned and delegated to the Federal are reserved to the 
States. That is federalism. And I do not know of any authority here for 
the Federal Government to go down and provide policemen in a city. That 
is the responsibility of each city to do that. That is not a 
responsibility of the Federal Government. And it is just such spending 
as this that caused us to create this tremendous deficit that we have 
today of over $4 trillion.
  Another thing I would mention is this: Now if we establish this 
system here that we go and provide policemen for the cities of the 
Nation, there will be a demand to do more in other ways, and this could 
be the entering wedge for a national police system in this country, if 
this thing goes far enough, and I am concerned for us to enter into 
such a program as this that could be the beginning of a program which 
the American people do not want.
  I think we have to realize this, too, that we have to let the people 
know that society is not responsible for the crimes. Every individual 
is responsible for the crime he commits. I am just amazed at the crimes 
that have increased here. The last figures I have from the FBI are 
this: A violent crime every 22 seconds, a murder every 22 minutes, a 
forceable rape every 5 minutes, armed robbery ever 47 seconds, and 
aggravated assault every 28 seconds.
  This bill will not remedy that. In my judgment, we should have 
focused on crime, crime, crime, and not put all this social money in 
here to be spent and cost the American taxpayers this large sum.
  Mr. President, for that reason, I am going to oppose this bill.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.
  Mr. SIMPSON. Mr. President, the hour is late.
  Mr. President, I simply say that we made this great effort today. I 
was on the conference committee. I watched it operate. I watched the 
fine work of Senator Hatch. It was an extraordinary experience. We see 
the result. Now we are at this final juncture of a cloture vote, and it 
comes down to the issue of the guns, assault weapons.
  I will vote against cloture. I will do that for a variety of reasons. 
But in essence, I will cast this vote because our efforts to enact a 
good, tough, crime bill, have failed.
  We have been thwarted in our efforts to eliminate $5 billion in 
social spending from the conference report.
  My amendment to expedite deportation proceedings against nonpermanent 
resident aliens who have committed certain violent felonies upon 
completion of their prison sentence was passed unanimously by the 
Senate. It was stripped unceremoniously by the conference committee. It 
is a tough law and order provision. But it isn't in this final product.
  Today our efforts to reinsert this legislation into this bill were 
rejected. That is another reason I will vote against cloture.
  Similarly, our efforts to improve this legislation with other 
modifications which passed the Senate overwhelmingly were ``stiffed'' 
by the Democrat majority.
  We Republicans wanted to reinsert the provisions for mandatory 
minimum sentences for selling drugs to children. Likewise, we wanted to 
reinsert mandatory minimum sentences for using children to sell drugs. 
They are called ``mules'' by the drug dealers. We wanted to toughen up 
the prison provisions and ensure that real money was sent to the States 
with minimal Federal strings attached. We wanted to reinsert provisions 
to build real prison cells, not prison ``alternatives''.
  This conference report prohibits law-abiding citizens from owning 
certain guns and, at the same time, our efforts to even get a vote on 
an amendment to enhance penalties for gun-related crimes were 
suffocated by the Democrat majority.
  Criminals who use guns will be treated no worse for their offenses 
after this legislation becomes law. But, the Democrat majority is now 
telling gun owners who do not commit crimes that their previous law-
abiding behavior will now be a violation of the law.
  Law-abiding ownership of certain guns is prohibited. But the Democrat 
majority has refused to allow us to increase punishment for the illegal 
use of firearms.
  I do not understand that logic.
  I have seen polls that indicate that 77 percent of the American 
people want to ban these guns. I can assure you that such polls do not 
reflect the views of the people of the State of Wyoming, because they 
believe the second amendment says the right of the people to keep and 
bear arms shall not be infringed, and there can be no greater 
infringement than an outright ban. I do not know what it could be. If 
there is such a support to limit a constitutionally protected right, 
then it would seem that the proponents might try a constitutional 
amendment next time.
  I submit that they do not follow such a legislative route because the 
statistics showing such so-called ``Great support are highly inflated.
  The Congress, this administration, and the Democrat Party are ``tap 
dancing'' on the Constitution.
  That, Mr. President, is another great tragedy of this legislation.
  Our efforts to increase penalties for violent criminals and to focus 
more of the funding in this bill on building prisons have been 
unsuccessful. Most of my Republican colleagues and some stalwart 
Democrats want to be tougher on violent criminals.
  Instead, this legislation would adopt a policy that will treat law-
abiding citizens ``like'' criminals.
  Let me just conclude by saying that I voted against the gun ban 
amendment when it came before the Senate. I continue to strenuously 
oppose it. But with the exception of this gun ban, the Senate bill had 
every potential of being an improvement in current criminal law.
  We voted on it. It passed here 95 to 4. I thought it merited my 
support then. However, only the worst of the Senate passed bill 
survived the conference process.
  But we were stiffed on tougher penalties for violent criminals and 
for drug-related crimes. We were stiffed on eliminating $5 billion in 
social spending. We were stiffed on getting criminal aliens deported 
more quickly. We were stiffed in our efforts to maintain the 
constitutionally protected rights of law abiding citizens under the 
second amendment.
  But we are now faced with something called reality. The sad fact is 
that those of us who do not support gun control measures do not have 
the votes to defeat this conference report.
  The perception is that this is a tough crime bill. It is not. But 
that perception has shaped this debate. We can stand here for weeks and 
debate the defects of this legislation. That would not be fair. Or we 
could spend until Saturday. That would not be fair. Unfortunately the 
result of this vote tally will not change. It is quite well 
preordained.
  There is a huge gap between what this bill really is and what the 
proponents say it is. Unfortunately, the true extent of that gap will 
only be revealed in the future to the American people over the next 
weeks and before November 8.
  Our priorities are more prisons, tougher penalties, more police, less 
social spending. The bill, as the Senator from Texas says, has been 
successfully hijacked by those who still take the view that the 
criminal is also a victim of society and that the law-abiding citizens 
must suffer and have their constitutional rights trampled on, all 
because of the heinous and illegal acts of some violent criminals.
  It has been a very difficult day for me dealing with lovely friends, 
urging, cajoling. It is not a pleasant experience and it has been a 
very disappointing result. We did our best. We shall lay ourselves 
down, bleed a little, then bind our wounds, and rise to fight again 
with renewed numbers on November 8, restored and refreshed and ready 
for the fray.
  Thank you.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I believe we are down to the last three 
speakers.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the last speakers be 
myself for 5 minutes, the distinguished minority leader 5 minutes, and 
the distinguished majority leader for 5 minutes or less.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Utah is recognized.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I just have a few words to say about this 
in the end.
  There are three reasons why I will vote against cloture and against 
the conference report.
  First is the pork-barrel expenditures which we consider to be 1960's 
type social spending. I have more than adequately described that, and I 
do not see how anybody in America would not be concerned about it.
  Second is the lack of the tough anti-crime amendments that we know 
would have passed had we been given an opportunity. Had he won on the 
point of order we would have won those amendments here on the floor and 
they would have strengthened this bill considerably. I have talked more 
than adequately about that.

  Number three, my colleague from Delaware has argued that the assault 
weapons ban legislation is only a few pages long. In fact, as I 
understand it, he took that particular part of the bill and just ripped 
it right out of the bill. That is the assault ban legislation. He did 
that the other day.
  Mr. President, the Constitution of the United States is only 25 pages 
long. The second amendment to the Constitution is only one sentence 
ensure. It says:

       A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security 
     of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear 
     arms shall not be infringed.

  ``The right of the people.''
  Now this is one of the enumerated rights in the Constitution. We have 
spasms around here about unenumerated rights that the Supreme Court has 
conjured out of penumbras that we uphold every day of our lives, some 
of the people here.
  And here is an enumerated right and we are trashing it by a simple 
statute.
  Should we just tear it out of the Constitution because that one 
sentence does not agree with us? I submit that if we keep passing these 
gun bans, we might as well.
  The assault weapons ban has 20 specific firearms that are banned. 
But, according to the ATF, Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, 179 firearms 
are covered or will be covered by this bill. Of course, that is the 
list as of now.
  I remember the days when the ATF took after decent law-abiding 
citizens until we passed the McClure-Volkmer bill--and I was the leader 
on the floor to do that--to protect our American citizens, law-abiding 
citizens, from an overregulatory, overconfiscatory Government agency 
situation. And now we are going back to the same system, only worse.
  What are they going to ban next?
  Keep in mind, there were 650 weapons that were exempted by this bill. 
Count on it, my fellow citizens, they will be back next year.
  So we intend to the change the nature of the Senate in this election 
and we are going to be back next year and we are going to see if we can 
change this. That is why McClure-Volkmer was passed.
  I feel very deeply about the second amendment. I feel very grieved 
that we are treating it in this shabby fashion. But that is the way it 
is around here, and that is the way this bill has been.
  Mr. President, the various staff members of both the minority and the 
majority staffs should be complimented for their work on this bill. We 
have had dedicated, loyal, hardworking decent staff members. I will not 
name them by name, but I ask unanimous consent that this list be 
printed in the Record to pay appropriate tribute to each and every one 
of them.
  There being no objection, the list was ordered to be printed in the 
Record, as follows:

                         Senator Hatch's Staff

       Mark Disler, Mike Kenncoy, Larry Block, Sharon Prost, and 
     Manus Cooney.

                        Senator Thurmond's Staff

       Thad Strom.

                        Senator Grassley's Staff

       Fred Ansell.

                        Senator Simpson's Staff

       Cordice Strom and Warren Shaeffer.

                          Senator Dole's Staff

       Dennis Shea, Elizabeth Green, and Sheila Burke.

                         Senator Biden's Staff

       Cynthia Hogan, Demetra Lambros, Chris Putala, Tracy 
     Doherty, Ankur Goel, Andrew Pepler, Adam Gelb, Lisa Monaco, 
     and Nelson Cunningham.

  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I have never seen better staffers on either 
side do a better job in any legislation before this body, and I want to 
personally compliment them.
  Mr. President, I made a definite mistake.
  I ask unanimous consent that the unanimous consent agreement we 
agreed to a few minutes ago provide an additional 5 minutes for our 
distinguished chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Senator Biden, to be 
followed by Senator Dole's 5 minutes and then to be followed by Senator 
Mitchell's 5 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware is recognized.
  Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, I do not know that we need to take all of 
the time.
  I would just like to say, I have listened to the debate on this 
portion of the legislation. It started off on a matter that is of 
legitimate concern to a number of Americans, and that is: Is what is in 
this legislation relative to assault weapons either a violation of the 
second amendment or is it the proverbial camel's nose under the tent? 
Is there an agenda that is hidden beyond what is in this legislation 
banning assault weapons and not allowing the manufacture of new weapons 
that have grenade launchers on them or bayonet hooks on them? Is this 
beyond that? What is it?
  A number of people feel very, very strong about those issues and I 
respect their point of view.
  But then I heard the debate sort of go back to this idea that, if you 
listen to the debate, you would think this bill was designed to enhance 
the standing of junkies out in the street, to free felons from our 
jails, and to make sure that we just, under the cover of night, steal 
the taxpayers' money and spend it on politically worthwhile social 
contributions in our communities to endear ourselves to the local 
mayors or the citizenry.
  The fact of the matter is that--I will just say it again and I guess 
we will maybe even say it after this--this whole notion of whether or 
not it is a tough bill, we, in fact, have very stiff penalties in here 
for people who molest and/or people who sell drugs to children.
  We have significant penalties in here to deal with providing women 
with some genuine protection, particularly women who are battered and 
abused by their spouses, their loved ones, those with whom they are 
familiar.
  We have significant legislation in here relative to making sure that 
30,000 violent criminals who were convicted last year but never saw a 
day in jail because there was no prison space, that they serve their 
time in jail.
  I heard my friend from Texas say he wants to be able to put these 
prisoners in jail, and if there is not enough room in jail, string out 
barbed wire and put them in tents.
  Well, that is what we call boot camps, Mr. President. That is in 
here. They were against boot camps. Early this morning, I heard my 
friend from Utah talk about these alternatives to prisons are bad 
ideas. I heard my friend from Texas talk about we ought to be able to 
string up barbed wire and put folks in tents. Under this bill, we can 
string up barbed wire, we can build Quonset huts, and we can put them 
in boot camps. We can do that.
  So, hopefully, what is going to happen is, after this bill passes--
God willing, if there are 60 votes to invoke cloture and the President 
signs it and this bill becomes law--hopefully, what will happen is a 
little bit like what happened when we passed other legislation.
  I heard that if we had passed the President's economic plan a year 
ago, the sky would fall, unemployment would skyrocket, the budget 
deficit would escalate, we would have this awful thing that would 
happen to the economy. There would be apocalypse now.
  In fact, it has gone the opposite way. I do not have anybody calling 
me now. But yet, at the time we voted on it, my phone was ringing and 
people were saying, ``Boy, isn't this awful? What are you going to do 
about it?''
  Now, the deficit has come down compared to what they thought it was 
going to be. Now we have more employment, now the economy is moving.
  The same people with those dire predictions, the same people, by and 
large, who are talking about this bill, are no longer talking about the 
economic plan.
  I respectfully suggest to my colleagues that within 6 months after we 
pass this bill, you will see this is as advertised--a very tough, 
straightforward bill that the cops want, the prosecutors want, and the 
people need.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
  Under the unanimous consent agreement, the Republican leader is now 
recognized.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I think we have all had a lot of 
conversation in here. It has been a tough day. Again, I congratulate 
the winners and also thank my many friends on this side of the aisle 
because I think we have changed the debate.
  When the people wake up tomorrow morning it is going to be sticker 
shock. I do not care what you call it, you can argue about whether it 
is 4 years or 6 years or budget point of order or whatever it is. The 
American people know we are spending a lot of money. So we will mark 
this date down, we will come back in a couple of years and we will see 
what happened to the crime rate and we will see what happened to all 
these prevention programs.
  The American people are going to be focused. They are going to be 
focused in about 2 months on this bill. It is not going to take 2 
years. They are going to be focused. We are going to focus the American 
people on all the ludicrous, ridiculous items in this bill.
  So, we have had a good debate this week. We have not debated as long 
as people on the other side of the aisle, even though they get up and 
say we are stalling. I think the record will show we have had about 35 
percent of the time. But it has been a good debate because it has given 
the American people the opportunity to understand precisely what we are 
talking about. We had some ideas. I would say to the Republicans in the 
House, they supported their leadership and they gave a number of 
Republicans a chance to change the bill. We could not get that support 
on this side. That is the way it goes sometimes.
  But that is the last vote. We always look to the next vote. We had 10 
good amendments. We could have cut $5 billion out of this package and 
still had a $25 billion bill, much of it good. I do not quarrel with 
the Senator from Delaware on every issue. In fact, we worked together 
on domestic violence. We did not touch domestic violence, did not take 
one dime out of the domestic violence program.
  But we will have some examples. They will look good on a 30-second 
spot, because we want the American people to know we are just throwing 
away a big pile of their money and they are going to know it all across 
America--east coast, west coast, Midwest. This is another example.
  Somebody said tonight on Nightline it is going to be, ``What's wrong 
in Washington?'' As I said earlier, this is the example of what is 
wrong. We do not listen to the people. The American people are against 
crime. They do not think the solution is just spend all the money we 
have in the Treasury and borrow money and run up a $13 billion deficit 
for a lot of things that are not going to make any difference--$1.6 
billion for the local partnership program that has nothing to do with 
crime, was taken out of the stimulus package which we defeated last 
year, and a lot of other billions of dollars in my view that really are 
not going to make any great difference.
  As I said, Mr. President, when the American people wake up tomorrow 
morning, they are going to suffer an acute case of sticker-shock, for 
later tonight, the Senate will, no doubt, pass a $30 billion pork-
barrel juggernaut masquerading as a crime bill.
  There is $1.6 billion for something called the Local Partnership Act, 
which was first introduced in 1992, not as a crime-fighting measure, 
but as a way to funnel Federal money into the cities. It is a retread 
of last year's defeated stimulus package. And guess what? There has not 
been a single hearing on this program. Not one. And I suspect there are 
not even five Members of the Senate who could tell me what this program 
is actually designed to do.
  There is $1 billion for a so-called drug court proposal that funds 
health care, education, housing placement, child care, anything, in 
other words, but crime control. And again, no hearings.
  There is $625 million for the model intensive grant program, which is 
designed to address such pressing crime problems as the deterioration 
or lack of public facilities, public transportation, and street 
lighting.
  There is $243 million for something called the family and endeavor 
schools program, which provides grants for sports, arts and crafts, 
social activities, and you guessed it: dance programs.
  There is $270 million for the National Community Economic 
Partnerships, a program administered by the Department of Health 
and Human Services to assist local community groups in order to improve 
the quality of life. That is right: improve the quality of life. There 
is not even the pretense of trying to link the spending to fighting 
crime. And we are talking about $270 million of the American people's 
money.

  The list continues: There is $150 million to develop alternative 
methods of punishment for youthful offenders. These alternatives 
include such get-tough measures as after care, education, projects that 
provide family counseling, other support programs, and get this: 
innovative projects, whatever that may mean.
  There is the ounce of prevention program which is really a $90 
million pound of pure, unadulterated pork.
  There is $50 million for something called the community-based justice 
program. This multimillion dollar boondoggle adopts the criminal-as-
the-victim-of-society approach, requiring prosecutors to, and I quote; 
``focus on the offender, not simply the specific offense, and impose 
individualized sanctions such as: conflict resolution, treatment, 
counseling, and recreation programs.
  There is a $5 million urban recreation program, designed to improve 
recreation facilities in our cities.
  And, of course, there is still midnight basketball.
  Even the pork-meisters have gotten their hands on the money allegedly 
earmarked for prisons. If you read the fine print, you will see there 
is no guarantee that a single dime--not one dime--will be used to build 
a single brick-and-mortar prison cell. All of the prison money can be 
spent on boot camps, halfway houses, and other prison alternatives.
  Now, that is what I call a tough crime bill.
  And let us not oversell the so-called 100,000 cops on the streets 
proposal. If you read the fine print, you will see that the States and 
cities will be picking up most of the police-hiring tab. In fact, one 
expert--Princeton professor, John Diiulio, a registered Democrat and a 
gun-control advocate--estimates that the crime bill fully funds only 
20,000 cops, and only 2,000 around-the-clock police officers.
  So, Mr. President, who is kidding whom? The American people are not 
dumb. They know when they are being sold a crime bill of goods.
  The bottom line is that the crime bill is too much pork and too 
little punch. Too much hype and too little tough-on-crime substance.
  This $30 billion pork package should be defeated, it is not in the 
best interests of the American people. And it is not the tough crime-
fighting plan the American people so very much need and so very much 
deserve.
  I hope, as we look over these alternatives--millions here, $150 
million here, $170 million here, innovative projects, other support 
projects--all these different things sound good. No doubt some will do 
some good. If you spend enough money you will probably do some good. 
Maybe if we had a $100-billion crime bill we would do a little more 
good, or if we had a $200-billion crime bill we would do a little more 
good.
  They have one provision here that says the prosecutors are supposed 
to ``focus on the offender, not simply the specific offense, and impose 
individualized sanctions such as conflict resolution, treatment 
counseling, and recreation programs.''
  That is going to be a big crime preventer. I can already see that 
working all across America. There is not much in here about the 
victims. Forget about the victims: We could not have restitution, the 
amendment by Senator Nickles. That is too bad, to ask the criminal to 
make restitution to some victim's family. Do not do that, that might be 
offensive to somebody who committed a violent crime.
  We said, on the violent crime, you are not going to have to serve 
your time if you only commit one violent crime. It is only if you 
commit two violent crimes. That is going to be a best seller, too, when 
the American people understand how we softened that one up.
  The Senator from New Hampshire went through a whole list tonight 
where we dropped it or weakened it or threw it away or whatever.
  I have heard all this conversation about 100,000 policemen. I am not 
an expert, maybe there are going to be 100,000--if you count them five 
times apiece. But I listened to some expert from New Jersey from 
Princeton, John Diiulio, a Democrat, on C-SPAN when I was doing a 
little treadmill. I do not go too fast so I get to listen a lot. He 
said the most you could get would be 20,000. But the President is going 
to say we are going to get 100,000, the Senator from Delaware, he says 
100,000, so it must be 100,000. We will see what happens a year from 
now.
  I recited yesterday the mayor of Kansas City, MO, who I think in mid-
July calculated the cost and said, ``We do not want this program.'' He 
changed his mind yesterday and came back to Washington, DC, and began 
to understand the merits of it after he talked to a few people.
  But he said it right the first time. You are going to pay 25 percent 
the first year, 50 percent the second year, 75 percent the third year, 
and all of it after that. Many cities cannot afford that.
  So, Mr. President, I know my time has expired but I hope we would 
focus, when we vote on this cloture vote. There is still a chance to 
save a lot of money in this bill by not invoking cloture. There is 
still a chance to help the American taxpayer and help the American 
victims and help those who want a real crime bill. We are going to have 
that vote in about 5 minutes, and I hope we may prevail.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.


                      Unanimous-Consent Agreement

  Mr. MITCHELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to waive the 
live quorum required under rule XXII; that a cloture vote occur 
immediately following my remarks; and that if cloture is invoked the 
Senate vote without any intervening action or debate on adoption of the 
conference report.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. MITCHELL. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays on the 
conference report.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  Mr. MITCHELL. Mr. President, Members of the Senate, tonight's vote 
marks the end of a 6-year effort--6 years. It is important that the 
American people understand that this has been a 6-year effort in 
evaluating the repeated claim that there was no opportunity to amend 
this bill. That claim is without foundation.
  When this bill was before the Senate just a few months ago, it was 
debated for 11 days and 102 amendments were considered and disposed of. 
Before that, in two previous Congresses, the crime bill was in the 
Senate and debated for days and days and days, and many, many other 
amendments were considered and disposed of. So we have been debating a 
crime bill for 6 years. We have had endless discussion on the Senate 
floor. We have considered hundreds and hundreds of amendments. Any 
suggestion to the contrary is simply erroneous.
  We have been debating it long enough. We have been trying to amend it 
long enough. We have been delaying it long enough. Now, finally it is 
time to act.
  Mr. President, I want to make clear, in an effort to accommodate our 
colleagues, we went the extra mile to try to permit a vote to occur on 
what they said was their principal concern and that is the level of 
spending. Although conference reports are not amendable in the Senate, 
we agreed to an extraordinary procedure, not utilized in the time that 
I have been majority leader, to permit a vote on cutting $5 billion 
from the spending provisions of the bill. That was not agreeable to our 
Republican colleagues.
  Prior to that I offered to take up every one of their amendments and 
any other amendments that they wanted in a separate bill at any time 
they wanted, have each one of them voted on and debated on. That was 
not accepted.
  So, Mr. President, I think it is clear that we now are at a point 
where we can finally act on this bill and any action to the contrary, 
of not invoking cloture, will simply contribute to further delay and 
place in jeopardy ever passing this bill.
  Let me repeat what I said earlier. Despite the claims about money, 
money is not the problem in this bill. It never has been. The Senate 
passed a crime bill just a few months ago by a vote of 95-to-4; 42 out 
of 44 Republican Senators voted for that bill. It covered 5 fiscal 
years, from 1994 through 1998. The bill before us covers 6 fiscal 
years, 1995 through the year 2000. In the 4 years that are common to 
the two bills, the amount of money in this bill each year is less than 
the amount of money in the bill that was passed a few months ago. And 
42 out of 44 Republicans voted for that bill. There was not a word 
about money then. There was not a word about pork then. There was not a 
word about social spending then. Mr. President, 42 out of 44 
Republicans voted for a bill that included more spending in each of the 
years that are common to the bill that was passed then and the bill 
that is now before the Senate. The fact of the matter is it is not, was 
not, the issue involved in this debate.
  Now we are told here that we should listen to the people. Seventy-
seven percent of the American people favor an assault weapons ban, the 
very thing that for 6 years has been the driving force in opposition to 
this bill, right to this very moment. Seventy-seven percent of the 
American people favor a ban on assault weapons, and yet for 6 years we 
have had a determined effort to deny the will of the American people on 
that issue.
  Mr. President, I hope my colleagues will vote to invoke cloture and 
to bring this 6-year effort to an end. Six years is long enough to 
consider any bill. Dozens and dozens of days is long enough to debate 
any bill. Hundreds and hundreds of amendments are amendments enough on 
any bill. There must be at some point final action, and this is the 
point.
  I urge all Senators to vote to invoke cloture which, in plain 
English, means stop talking and vote.

                          ____________________