[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 142 (Tuesday, October 4, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: October 4, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
     REEMPLOYMENT OF IMPROPERLY SEPARATED POSTAL SERVICE EMPLOYEES

  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill 
(H.R. 5139) to amend title 39, United States Code, to provide for 
procedures under which persons involuntarily separated by the United 
States Postal Service as a result of having been improperly arrested by 
the Postal Inspection Service on narcotics charges may seek 
reemployment.
  The Clerk read as follows:

                               H.R. 5139

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

     SECTION 1. PROCEDURES.

       (a) In General.--Chapter 4 of title 39, United States Code, 
     is amended by adding at the end the following:

     ``Sec. 414. Provisions relating to certain improperly 
       arrested individuals

       ``(a) Not later than 90 days after the date of the 
     enactment of this section, the Judicial Officer shall by 
     regulation establish procedures under which any individual 
     described in subsection (b)(1)(A) may seek reemployment under 
     this section.
       ``(b) The regulations shall include provisions under 
     which--
       ``(1) a petition for reemployment may be brought--
       ``(A) by any individual involuntarily separated from a 
     position in the Postal Service as a result of having been 
     arrested by the Postal Inspection Service--
       ``(i) after December 31, 1983;
       ``(ii) pursuant to any investigation in which one or more 
     paid confidential informants were used;
       ``(iii) for violating any law of the United States, or of 
     any State, prohibiting the use, sale, or possession of a 
     controlled substance;

     but only if such individual--
       ``(I) is not convicted, pursuant to such arrest, of a 
     violation of any law described in clause (iii); and
       ``(II) has not been reemployed by the Postal Service; and
       ``(B) after all administrative procedures otherwise 
     available to petitioner for seeking reemployment have been 
     exhausted, but not later than 2 years after the date as of 
     which--
       ``(i) the exhaustion requirement is met; or
       ``(ii) if later, any such petition may first be held under 
     this section;
       ``(2) a petition for reemployment under this section shall 
     be considered by a panel of 3 administrative law judges who 
     shall be--
       ``(A) qualified by virtue of their background, objectivity, 
     and experience; and
       ``(B) individuals detailed to the Postal Service, for 
     purposes of this section, on a reimbursable basis;
       ``(3) the provisions of section 556 and 557 of title 5 
     shall apply to any proceeding conducted by a panel under this 
     section;
       ``(4) a panel may require the Postal Service to reemploy 
     the petitioner if, in the panel's judgment, the petitioner 
     was improperly arrested due to the actions of the Inspection 
     Service or its paid confidential informants;
       ``(5)(A) paragraph (4) shall not be considered satisfied 
     unless--
       ``(i) the position in which the petitioner is reemployed is 
     reasonably similar to the position from which the petitioner 
     was separated; and
       ``(ii) the rate of pay for the position in which petitioner 
     is reemployed is not less than the rate which would have been 
     payable to petitioner, as of the date of reemployment, had 
     the petitioner remained continuously employed in the position 
     from which separated; and
       ``(B) the provisions of section 5596(b) (1) and (2) of 
     title 5 shall (for purposes of this section) apply with 
     respect to any separation referred to in paragraph (1)(A) of 
     this subsection, except that the total amount of back pay 
     (including interest) which may be awarded under such 
     provisions by any panel (described in paragraph (2)) may not, 
     in connection with any particular separation, exceed 
     $100,000;
       ``(6) the Postal Service shall be required to contribute to 
     the Civil Service Retirement and Disability Fund for the 
     benefit of petitioner an amount equal to that required (under 
     regulations which the Office of Personnel Management shall 
     prescribe) in order that, with respect to the period 
     beginning on the date of involuntary separation and ending on 
     the date of reemployment, petitioner shall, for retirement 
     purposes, be treated as if such separation had not occurred; 
     and
       ``(7) any payments required under this section shall be 
     payable out of the Postal Service Fund.
       ``(c) A determination under this section shall not be 
     subject to any administrative or judicial review.
       ``(d) For purposes of this section--
       ``(1) the term `Judicial Officer' means the Judicial 
     Officer appointed under section 204;
       ``(2) the term `controlled substance' has the meaning given 
     such term by section 102(6) of the Controlled Drug Abuse 
     Prevention and Control Act of 1970;
       ``(3) the term `administrative law judge' means an 
     administrative law judge appointed under section 3105 of 
     title 5; and
       ``(4) a confidential informant shall be considered to be 
     `paid' if such informant receives, or is to receive, a 
     monetary or nonmonetary benefit (including any forbearance 
     from a civil or criminal action) for the services 
     involved.''.
       (b) Chapter Analysis.--The analysis for chapter 4 of title 
     39, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the 
     following:

``414. Provisions relating to certain improperly arrested 
              individuals.''.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
Missouri [Mr. Clay] will be recognized for 20 minutes, and the 
gentleman from Alaska [Mr. Young] will be recognized for 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Clay].
  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, H.R. 5139 is important and necessary legislation. Since 
at least 1985 the Inspection Service of the U.S. Postal Service has 
been hiring convicted felons as paid confidential informants in its 
narcotics trafficking enforcement operations. Those felons were placed 
in postal positions in postal facilities and given the responsibility 
of handling our mail. Postal inspectors did not supervise their 
informants properly. The informants began running the drug enforcement 
operations. They implicated innocent postal employees who were falsely 
arrested by inspectors who blindly accepted the information furnished 
by their paid informants. The more arrests an inspector made, the 
higher his or her performance rating--an operation known as Collars for 
Dollars. There was no incentive to scrutinize a paid informant who was 
targeting innocent postal employees.
  Proper police procedures were not followed by the Postal Inspection 
Service. Inspectors were given only 2 days' training on the use of paid 
confidential informants in drug enforcement operations. This lack of 
training and expertise showed. Informants made drug buys out of the 
view of inspectors. Innocent employees were arrested during Postal 
Service staged media events during which these innocent employees were 
handcuffed, paraded in front of TV cameras and taken to jail. In Los 
Angeles in 1986, both the judge and jury in one case made statements in 
court that a case against a postal employee should not have been 
brought because the investigation was so poorly conducted. But the 
inspection service continued to hire more felons as paid informants 
throughout the country and continued the same errors. This resulted in 
a 1992 operation in Cleveland in which 19 innocent postal employees and 
one private citizen were falsely arrested. Some were erroneously 
convicted. There were no drug buys in Cleveland. The informants 
pocketed the buy money and provided the inspectors with baking soda. In 
all, over $300,000 of Government funds were wasted and lost, and the 
lives of innocent workers were ruined. They lost income, jobs, 
reputation and self-esteem. Their families shared in that suffering.

  The Committee on Post Office and Civil Service conducted its own 
extensive investigation into Inspection Service drug enforcement 
operations after it learned about the disastrous Cleveland drug sting 
from press reports. The committee found that the Cleveland operation 
was not an isolated case. Innocent employees were falsely ``fingered'' 
by the Inspection Service's paid felons in Los Angeles, West Palm 
Beach, Indianapolis, Boston, Toledo, and Minneapolis. Most of these 
employees were never convicted because of improper actions by the 
inspectors and their paid felons.
  The committee held three separate hearings at which the issues were 
thoroughly aired. We heard from the innocent victims, from attorneys, 
from the Inspection Service and from inspectors. In fact, in West Palm 
Beach, a postal inspector testified that he warned his superiors that 
the paid informant was entrapping postal employees. That inspector was 
reprimanded for his efforts. Because the Postal Service did not control 
its paid felons and made no effort to do so, innocent people suffered. 
These people and their families may never recover from the injuries 
they suffered.
  The Postal Service has compounded their suffering. After removing 
them from their source of income, it fought providing them unemployment 
compensation. It has fought rehiring many of these victims. It has 
forced those it rehired to pay for health insurance during the time 
they were unemployed and did not have health insurance. It has failed 
to help any family members who suffered from its negligent actions.
  The Postal Service's actions have been deplorable. The Postal Service 
must at least reemploy those it wrongly harmed and must cease its 
disregard for the rights of its employees. The House has already passed 
one important piece of legislation, H.R. 4400 creating an independent 
IG for the Postal Service, to help prevent a repeat of these deplorable 
actions. Never again should the Postal Service employ paid felons and 
set them loose on the workroom floor. H.R. 5139 provides a mechanism to 
reemploy these innocent victims. Any individual who was arrested after 
1983 by the postal inspectors for violating a controlled substance law 
as the result of an investigation in which a paid confidential 
informant was used, and was not convicted of violating a controlled 
substance law, may petition a panel of three administrative law judges 
for reemployment and back pay up to $100,000. The panel must determine 
that the petitioner had been improperly arrested due to the actions of 
postal inspectors or their paid informants. The petitioner must have 
exhausted all administrative procedures and not have been reemployed by 
the Postal Service. The Postal Service, not the U.S. Treasury, shall 
fund the costs of the procedures and all payments. Moreover, the costs 
of H.R. 5139 to the Postal Service will be limited. Postal Service 
records to date indicate that since 1988 a maximum of 141 individuals 
are eligible to petition this panel. Those individuals still must 
convince the panel that they were improperly arrested due to the 
actions of the inspection service or their paid informants. If all 
these victims were successful and received the maximum back pay award, 
which is doubtful, the impact on a first-class letter would be less 
than one one-hundredth--1/100--of a cent. There will be no future 
financial impact of H.R. 5139 since the Postal Service is no longer 
hiring paid informants for its drug enforcement operations.

  In closing, the employees who may petition for reemployment under 
this bill are innocent. They are fired by the Postal Service for 
narcotic activities of which they were innocent. Regardless of their 
innocence the Postal Service has refused to rehire them. Innocent 
people should not be so punished. The Postal Service is turning the 
phrase, ``innocent until proven guilty,'' into the phrase, ``guilty 
even if proven innocent.'' This bill provides justice, fairness, and 
equity for innocent postal workers. These victims are innocent and 
should have their livelihood returned.
  I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 5139.

                              {time}  2120

  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  (Mr. YOUNG of Alaska asked and was given permission to revise and 
extend his remarks.)
  Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. Mr. Speaker, I want to take this opportunity to 
say that I share the concerns of many of my colleagues that H.R. 5139 
deserved more specific consideration in our committee than it received. 
However, we did have several hearings on the issue of these postal 
employees who were fraudulently charged with a crime they did not 
commit and were subsequently fired from the Postal Service based on 
those charges, which were later in many cases dropped and still, 
several years later, have not been re-employed.
  Mr. Speaker, this bill does not guarantee these employees their jobs 
back. It simply guarantees that they will receive an impartial hearing 
on the facts of their dismissal before a three-member panel of 
administrative law judges. Should they prevail, they will receive only 
what is due them: their job, their pay, their retirement, their 
attorney fees, and their self-respect.
  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. I am glad to yield to the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania.
  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Missouri mentioned that 
this would cost \1/100\th of a cent on first-class postage. We sell a 
lot of first-class postage in this country. Can we get a little firmer 
figure as to what the cost might be?
  Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. The gentleman said \1/100\th of a cent on first-
class mail. I will yield to the chairman to answer the question and get 
a firmer figure. If my figure is correct, I believe it is 141 
individuals who were involved in this. If they got everything, which is 
questionable, it would be that cost in dollars.
  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. I yield to the gentleman from Missouri.
  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, I would tell the gentleman that it is 
negligible. But the fact is these are innocent people, most of them.
  Let me explain to the gentleman what happened. They were forced to go 
before the Merit Protection Board before they went to the court, and 
the Merit Protection Board found them guilty based on the tainted 
information of the paid informants. They they went to court and were 
exonerated. Now the Postal Service is saying we cannot hire them back 
because the Merit Protection Board found them guilty.
  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, I am trying to get some idea of what kind of 
money we are talking about. One 100th of a penny on a stamp sounds like 
just a little bit of money. We sell a lot of first-class stamps, so 
that could add up to a lot of money. I would like to know what the 
figure is we are dealing with here. That was the complaint as I 
understand of a lot of members of the committee, that there were not 
adequate hearings so that a lot these monies were established.
  Mr. CLAY. If the gentleman from Alaska will yield further, we have 
put a limit on the total amount they can be reimbursed of $100,000. If 
all 141 of them were eligible for the entire $100,000, the most we 
could spend would be $14 million. We are talking about a Postal Service 
budget of $52 billion.
  Mr. WALKER. If the gentleman from Alaska will yield further, so that 
cost of the bill is potentially $14 million?
  Mr. CLAY. If the gentleman will yield, I would answer it this way: 
The Postal Service should not have fired these people and, therefore, 
they did not pay out the $14 million that we are discussing.
  Mr. YOUNG of Alaska. If I may say in the defense of the legislation, 
we have to keep in mind that if an individual has been fired unjustly, 
regardless of the cost of this body or to the taxpayer, then he should 
be reimbursed. It is a panel of law judges that will have the decision 
under this legislation. Even if it costs $14 million, if in fact those 
people have been fired falsely, that is a minimal amount of money. And 
I will defend the right of any individual that has been falsely fired 
by a Merit Protection Board or anyone else.

  It is up to that individual to go before the three-man panel and to 
make his case, and I will be very honest. I doubt if 141 of them make 
their full case. But regardless of the cost, we have to keep in mind 
there is an obligation to fulfill to the justice system of this 
country. Right now they are precluded from doing that. They are 
precluded from going and getting their justice and their reimbursement 
that they should receive if they had not been fired.
  So we can talk about the amount of moneys, but I respectfully suggest 
this is a minimal amount of money, and if there was a wrong done, if it 
is $150 million or $150 billion, that wrong should be turned right.

                              {time}  2130

  Because this body or any body that does injustice, of what occurred 
here in many cases, should not, in fact, be condoned just because of 
the cost factor.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio 
[Mr. Stokes].
  (Mr. STOKES asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. STOKES. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 5139, 
regarding the reemployment of improperly separated postal employees. 
This measure provides a mechanism for reemployment of postal employees 
who where wrongfully terminated as a result of having been improperly 
arrested by the postal inspection service during narcotics 
investigations. As an original cosponsor of H.R. 5139, I want to take 
this opportunity to commend my distinguished colleague, the gentleman 
from Missouri, Chairman Clay, for his leadership in crafting this 
intelligent and thoughtful legislation, and expeditiously bringing it 
before the House for consideration.
  Mr. Speaker, many innocent and good employees of the Postal Service 
who were victimized by the Postal Service will be able to begin to 
piece their lives back together because of this legislation. I 
especially want to thank Chairman Clay and the committee for coming to 
Cleveland to investigate the sting operation which took place in our 
city.
  Mr. Speaker, this committee travelled across the Nation to gather the 
facts and held long hours of hearings around the Nation and here in 
Washington. This bill before us tonight will repair many human lives 
and I urge my colleagues to support it.
  Mr. Speaker, I would like to take a moment to share how my office 
became involved in this issue initially. Last year my office was 
approached individually by several postal employees who wanted me to 
inquire into their discharge from the Postal Service. In each case, 
these individuals had been removed for alleged misconduct relating to 
illegal drug activity.
  After talking amongst themselves, and realizing they all had the same 
problem and all had the same information used against them provided by 
the same U.S. Government paid informant, a group of these same 
individuals came to my office wanting to file a class action suit and 
seeking my advice on the matter. Upon my direction, my staff began to 
collect statements from each of these individuals. Upon receipt of 
these statements, I forwarded these documents to our colleague and 
chairman of the Post Office and Civil Service Committee, Mr. Clay, who 
has congressional oversight on such matters. What we learned, as the 
sordid details of the illegal sting operation have come out, has the 
distasteful makings of some script that one might expect to see used in 
a television show or a movie: The Postal Inspectors hire informants to 
solicit supposed drug trafficking suspects, the informants run a scam 
on the Post Inspectors by implicating innocent employees and the 
Government pays huge sums of money for bogus information.
  It is a sad commentary that this matter is not only a real life 
situation, but that it involves the U.S. Post Office--a Federal 
Government entity and an institution supported by the American 
taxpayers. Moreover, the entire operation was conducted with the 
complete knowledge and control of the top Post Office officials. In 
fact, as more and more information emerged, it became clear that this 
was not the first instance in which such an ill-conceived operation was 
carried out.

  Mr. Speaker, I was also disturbed to discover that this case has some 
serious racial implications. It became clear that all of the affected 
postal employees whose rights had been compromised were African 
American. Furthermore, had it not been for the persistence of many of 
the Post Office and Civil Service Committee, I am almost afraid to 
guess how long it would have been--if at all--before these activities 
were uncovered. I was also shocked to discover that even after the 
involvement of my office and the Post Office and Civil Service 
Committee, there was still a lack of cooperation and willingness by the 
Postal Inspection Service to provide complete and accurate facts. 
Illegal and racially motivated sting operations conducted by Federal 
agencies cannot be tolerated.
  In addition, Mr. Speaker, the real travesty of this entire case is 
that this illegal and ill-advised operation has damaged the characters 
and reputations of many innocent individuals. For many of these 
persons, jobs were lost. That is why this legislation is so important. 
H.R. 5139 establishes a fair and just mechanism for postal employees, 
who lost jobs because of the outrageous and illegal drug stings, to 
seek re-employment with the Postal Service. This measure provides for a 
panel of three administrative law judges to consider each case 
individually so that a determination of re-employment can be made. 
Considering the widespread nature of the illegal activity, and the 
unfair impact of these illegal drug sting operations by the Postal 
Inspection Service, justice demands that we pass this legislation.
  Mr. Speaker, in closing, I want to recognize all of those individuals 
who had the courage to approach me in the first place and those 
countless other innocent people who have also been persecuted unfairly 
and lost gainful employment. H.R. 5139 is a fair and just bill which 
will help right a great wrong. I strongly urge all my colleagues to 
take a stand, and vote for passage of H.R. 5139.
  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Florida [Mr. Hastings].
  (Mr. HASTINGS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the distinguished 
chairman, the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Clay] for holding these 
hearings.
  I rise today in support of H.R. 5139. To answer the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania, what is sought is not so much cost or remuneration, 
rather, it is the restoration of the self-respect and the dignity of 
the individuals who are aggrieved.
  When the chairman brought his field hearings to West Palm Beach, we 
were given a litany of horrors that individuals who appeared before us 
experienced for themselves and their families. One gentleman even 
talked of committing suicide because of being wrongfully arrested and 
paraded on television before his community and his family. His wife is 
a schoolteacher and had to support the family for the entire period of 
time until such time as he could gain some other kind of employment.
  It is clear that in these cases the confidential informants were on 
missions to get people in order that they may feather their own purses 
and to gain relief from their own criminal charges.
  This bill correctly allows redress for persons who were improperly 
arrested for narcotics violations.
  The bill establishes an appropriate forum and a procedure for 
reemployment or reimbursement. It is fair, it is just, and it goes a 
long way toward restoring the self-respect and the dignity of the 
individuals who were aggrieved.
  I commend the Chair for his studious and artful work in bringing this 
legislation to the floor and strongly support it.
  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Let me tell you about the folly of what happened in these raids and 
these false arrests and using as an example what happened in Cleveland.
  The paid felons, the ex-convicts, stole from the Postal Service 
inspection Service $300,000 that they made no accounting for, and they 
had no contact whatsoever with these 19 individual postal employees.
  What happened was that the leader of the scam, the convicted felon, 
had taken most of the money and palmed it. In fact, he got married in 
Las Vegas and honeymooned in Mexico City on the taxpayers' money, or 
the Postal Service's money, $300,000.
  This was duplicated across this country. The Postal Service would not 
give us complete information. Whenever we got some information in the 
newspaper or on television, somebody from another city would call and 
say, ``The same thing happened to us.'' We know about these six or 
seven cities because the people volunteered the information to us. We 
never got a complete reporting.
  So we do not know how many millions of dollars were stolen under this 
procedure.
  Mr. Speaker, I think it is a grave injustice to the 140 or so people 
who were falsely arrested and who lost their jobs, their homes, their 
credit, their names, their reputations, some have lost their families, 
their wives, their children.
  I am saying to you that the only fair and just thing we can do is to 
make it possible for those who were innocent to present their case, to 
have their day in court, and I recommend that, and I urge this body to 
pass this legislation.
  Mr. SAWYER. Mr. Speaker, H.R. 5139, introduced by my good friend and 
colleague, Bill Clay, would amend title 39, United States Code, to 
provide a mechanism for postal employees who were involuntarily 
separated as a result of having been improperly arrested by the Postal 
Inspection Service on narcotics charges, to seek reemployment with the 
U.S. Postal Service.
  This measure is the product of the Committee on Post Office and Civil 
Service's extensive investigation into the Postal Inspection Service's 
drug enforcement operations.
  Since 1984, the Inspection service spent a considerable amount of 
time and money in its effort to eliminate substance abuse in the postal 
workplace. No one quarrels with that goal.
  However, the operation, known as ``collars for dollars,'' was a 
disaster of execution from its inception. Postal Inspectors relied 
heavily on information provided by paid confidential informants, many 
of whom had questionable reputations.
  The committee has been assured that this practice has ended. 
Unfortunately, that doesn't help the many innocent postal employees 
whose lives were disrupted when they were wrongfully arrested by postal 
inspectors, based on fraudulent information supplied by their 
informants.
  H.R. 5139 seeks to correct that injustice. These people were 
wrongfully arrested. Their lives were disrupted. Their reputations were 
tarnished. Their families suffered.
  A year ago, I participated in a committee hearing in Cleveland, and 
listened to the innocent victims of these drug stings tell their 
stories. The testimony was compelling, and put this unfortunate 
incident in human terms.
  For example, one employee testified that his wife left him, that he 
lost his home, and that his daughter had to quit college because he 
couldn't afford to make the tuition payments. Another employee told us 
that because of the stigma associated with her arrest, even though the 
charges were ultimately dismissed, she had to relocate her family.
  The cost of H.R. 5139 to the Postal Service will be limited. The cost 
of the improper drug stings to the victims is immeasurable. The least 
we can do is try to restore them to where they were in their postal 
careers before the Postal Inspection Service stepped in.
  Thank you, Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 5139.
  Mr. PETRI. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 5139. While I 
sympathize with the sponsor's desire to assist those postal employees 
who've been unable to get their jobs back following improper arrests by 
the Postal Inspection Service, this bill bypassed both the subcommittee 
and full committee markup process.
  This procedure sets an unusual and dangerous precedent, particularly 
since the measure amounts to a private relief bill for a specific group 
of unknown size. In addition, no hearings were ever held on the bill, 
and we have no estimates of its cost to the Postal Service Fund or its 
potential impact on postage rates. Postal employees who would regain 
their jobs under this bill would receive both backpay and retirement 
benefits plus interest.
  Mr. Speaker, this bill warrants far closer consideration than it has 
been given thus far. I urge my colleagues to oppose it.
  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I 
yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Poshard1). The question is on the motion 
offered by the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Clay] that the House 
suspend the rules and pass the bill, H.R. 5139.
  The question was taken.
  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 5 of rule I and the 
Chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this motion will be 
postponed.

                          ____________________