[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 143 (Wednesday, October 5, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: October 5, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                  THE LOBBYING DISCLOSURE ACT OF 1994

  Mr. WALLOP. Mr. President, I thank the Chair. I thank the Senator 
from Nevada for giving me just a smidgen more time on a topic which I 
think is terribly important and with which I find enormous fault with 
the structure that the majority leader has set up.
  I am here this morning at my request to let Members know what is 
wrong with S. 349, the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1994 and why cloture 
should not be invoked.
  Mr. President, let me begin by saying I understand the trepidation 
with which Members approach this issue. This is a very bad bill with a 
very good name. The name and its announced purpose is somehow or 
another to keep us all from being corrupted in the future the way we 
have all been in the past from the blandishments of the wealthiest 
lobbyists and all their money and influence. Americans hear these 
comments and those about the gift ban as though all of us have been on 
the take all these years and now finally we will promise the American 
people that we will not take any more. The American public hears us 
talk about ourselves and watches what is taking place, and there is a 
political reaction that is understandable. Certainly people do not want 
to be seen as voting against the gift ban bill.
  But, Mr. President, let me just begin by saying that none of the 
provisions of the lobbying legislation come into play until 1996. So 
there is no hurry to take away the rights of Americans in order to 
correct a perceived wrong that the Congress does not perceive to be so 
wrong as to wait for its provisions to come until 1996.
  I find myself having to explain what is in this conference report in 
20 minutes during morning business. I asked for unanimous consent to 
have 2 hours to discuss it prior to a cloture vote, and the majority 
leader denied that request. He complains about the use of filibusters. 
But how can you call it a filibuster when there is no time at all given 
to discuss the bill or the conference report? We all know that the 
motion to invoke cloture is the vote on this bill, and yet the 
Democratic leadership does not want to give us time to discuss what is 
in it.
  Given the urgency with which we are being asked to act, I can only 
surmise that leadership and the proponents of the bill are fearful that 
too much examination will put it in jeopardy. We are being asked to 
vote without debate on a bill that just came out of conference only 
last week with a provision that was never considered in the Senate 
which will affect hundreds of thousands of Americans, all because the 
majority leader would like to accommodate the schedules of some 
Senators.
  Mr. President, no wonder the American public is dismayed with their 
institution. No wonder we are being held in contempt. No wonder when 
the public is just now beginning to discover what is in this bill, and 
they are informed that somehow or another debate will not be allowed 
and that the title of the bill will be sufficient politics to support 
it, notwithstanding the fact that some of us believe that 
constitutional rights of Americans are seriously jeopardized by some of 
the provisions in this bill. In fact, even its sponsors seem to believe 
that constitutional questions exist because they have included a 
severance clause which says that if any parts are considered to be 
unconstitutional, the rest of it will still be operative.
  Mr. President, what is wrong with that in the eyes of Americans, and 
why should they feel cynical about us? It is going to be incumbent upon 
citizens to prove that their constitutional rights have been violated 
when Congress expects that it already may have violated those rights.
  I want to make clear to my colleagues why I so strongly oppose this 
bill and why I believe that the bill will have a chilling effect on the 
first amendment rights of Americans. Maybe the courts will not say that 
they feel sympathetic to Americans who are intimidated by their 
Government, that they ought to go ahead and exercise their first 
amendment rights. But, Mr. President, one of the great problems that 
Americans now see with their Government is that they cannot afford to 
contest it. Exercise your first amendment right and an arbitrary fine 
comes down by a man who was appointed by the President, and you have to 
find the wherewithal from within your own pockets to prove that you had 
a first amendment right.
  Mr. President, something is desperately wrong with a country that 
guarantees rights under the Constitution and then allows them to be 
chilled by the legislation that it passes and the chill is so great 
that people forego their rights rather than exercise them.
  Mr. President, the devil is in the details. As we saw with health 
care, principles that may sound virtuous can take on an entirely 
different meaning when drafted into bill language. Let me begin by 
saying that the language of this bill is so vague and so badly written 
that it can be interpreted in any number of ways. Sponsors will have 
declared that they can enter into colloquies trying to make clear those 
portions of the bill which we or the courts may find confusing or even 
vaguely drafted.
  The problem is that courts read the language of the bill, not the 
language of the sponsors of the bill. And the problem is that given 
vaguely drafted legislation, this little ``czar'' who is appointed by 
the President--and I am perfectly willingly to cede that a Republican 
or a Democratic President would be tempted by the powers conferred 
under this bill--will have the opportunity to draft the regulations.
  One of the problems that Americans have with their Government today 
is that it is so cussedly anonymous. Nobody knows who drafts 
regulations, and Members of Congress can say: Well, I never intended 
for them to draft it that way. But draft it they have and comply with 
it we must, as citizens. And the Office of Lobbying Disclosure, under 
the President of the United States, has no commission, just one person 
who arbitrarily has the power to assess these fines.
  Mr. President, you do not have to be a wizard to suppose that the 
employee of the President of the United States will exercise the wishes 
of the President of the United States, Republican or Democrat. So those 
whose lobbying activities, grassroots, come crossways with the purpose 
of a given administration of whatever party will be the ones whose 
rights and whose activities will be curtailed, and others who do the 
same thing on the other side will not be effected.
  There is something dreadfully wrong with a situation where having 
been accused and having been fined, your only privilege is to go to 
court to prove that you should not have been fined. And having been 
accused administratively and fined administratively, you must use the 
courts to prove your innocence, not they to prove your guilt.
  Let me draw my colleagues' attention to section 105(B)(5) of the 
conference report. This is the provision at issue--a provision to which 
a diverse group of grassroots organizations from both the right and the 
left are opposed. It is a provision that was changed very significantly 
in conference, and let me make that clear.
  Mr. President, section 105(B)(5) of the conference report was not the 
provision originally approved in the Senate bill. See page 53 of the 
report. The sponsors of this bill have insisted that the intent of the 
legislation is only to require paid lobbyists to register. Who is 
against that? It may very well be true that this was the intent. But no 
matter what the intent, Mr. President, the language of the bill speaks 
for itself.
  I ask my colleagues to read section 105(B)(5) and the definition of 
``client'' in section 103(2), and then tell me how you can interpret 
the language differently. Section 105 requires semiannual reports by 
registered lobbyists. A registered lobbyist is someone who is either an 
employee or a third person retained by a client to make lobbying 
contacts. The definition of ``client'' applies to a coalition or an 
association.
  Now read this carefully. Section 105(B)(5) states that the report 
must contain ``the name, address, and principal place of business of 
any person or entity other than the client who paid the registrant to 
lobby on behalf of the client.''
  Mr. President, let me simply state what this means. The language says 
that any person who is not the coalition or association, but who could 
be a member of that coalition, who donated money to help finance an 
organization's effort, would have to be disclosed. Planned Parenthood's 
contributors, ACLU contributors, National Rifle Association 
contributors, American Chamber of Commerce contributors--everybody will 
have to be disclosed.
  This is not to say that members of these organizations would have to 
register themselves as lobbyists. But in some cases, if you read this 
carefully, they might. More likely, a coalition will have to turn over 
its list of members who contributed to a particular lobbying effort.
  Keep in mind, Mr. President, that there is but one person--an 
employee of the President--who, curiously, is allowed to take gifts 
from lobbyists under this bill--who makes the decision as to what the 
requirements are going to be.
  Just think of all the organizations that, in addition to their annual 
dues, ask for donations to a particular lobbying effort. The Sierra 
Club does routinely. The Right-to-Work people do routinely. Planned 
Parenthood does routinely. The National Organization of Women does 
routinely. The Christian Coalition does routinely. Who, now, is going 
to dare to contribute to these efforts at grassroots lobbying knowing 
that their name will be disclosed, and for which they may find some 
retribution from an vengeful Government? Even the sponsors of the bills 
have acknowledged the problem with this language, because they were 
more than willing to include a colloquy to try and clarify its 
legislative intent.
  But, Mr. President, colloquies do not clear up the issue. I know that 
the sponsors of the bill claim that the intent of the legislation is 
not to require disclosure, but their claim is irrelevant when the 
language of the bill does require it. No colloquy will change the 
language of the bill. Only an amendment will do that.
  Since its provisions do not come into play until 1996, why should we 
wait and chill out the public in the meantime? Why is intent irrelevant 
and a colloquy ineffective? Because a presidentially appointed Director 
of the Office of Lobbying Registration will be the one who interprets 
the law first. Authority to clarify and to interpret is left entirely 
to the discretion of the Director. The Director works for the President 
of the United States, Republican or Democrat. The President, Republican 
or Democrat, is seriously interested in the course and direction of his 
legislation. Guess which way the interpretations are going to flow?
  I merely remind my colleagues of the number of calls they have 
received from constituents that have run afoul of the Internal Revenue 
Service because of ``misinterpretation'' of the laws to understand the 
very real fears these grassroots organization have.
  The fears of these groups are real because, do you know what happens 
if someone violates the law? The Director of the Office of Lobbying 
Registration has in his or her discretion the ability to impose civil 
fines of up to $200,000 for ``failure to register.''
  Mr. President, if anybody thinks that this is going to allow 
grassroots people to function as they have, without fear of their 
Government, they are living in a dream world not related to the 
fanciful Halls of this Congress, but to the real paths of people out in 
the public areas of America.
  It is not just the fines, Mr. President, that worry these grassroots 
organizations, it is the fact that individual Americans who finance a 
cause would have to have their names and addresses and places of 
business submitted to and disclosed by the Federal Government merely 
because they stood up for an issue in which they strongly believe. It 
is a fact that the Federal Government will have a list of the members 
in an organization that can be used for any number of purposes. The 
list is subject to public disclosure. It can be printed in the press. 
And if someone inadvertently fails to register, they could find 
themselves subject to the Federal lobby police.

  The McCarthy hearings may have occurred a while ago, but their 
lessons are not forgotten.
  Mr. President, this language threatens the very rights of privacy of 
Americans who choose to express their beliefs. They have a 
constitutional right to express their free speech and petition their 
Government.
  There is a lack of adequate privacy protection in this bill. Once a 
person is required to register as a lobbyist, the information required 
to be disclosed under section 105 is subject to public review. It can 
and will be published in the newspaper. If a grassroots organization is 
required to publish its membership lists, those lists, containing the 
names of many of our constituents, will be available for public 
dissemination.
  What about the use of this information by other Federal agencies? 
Nothing in this bill prevents the Internal Revenue Service from 
acquiring information filed by 501(C)(3) tax-exempt organizations 
regarding lobbying activities and using that information to conduct an 
audit on the tax-exempt status of these organizations.
  I also find it ironic that a private citizen who violates the rules 
of this bill will be subject to civil penalties, while Members of 
Congress who violate the rules will only be subject to reprimands, if 
any, by the Ethics Committee, an Ethics Committee which in the House 
has not addressed a Post Office scandal of some 8 years' dimension. No 
wonder Congress is held in contempt. Certainly, this legislation will 
not improve this institution nor its reputation in the minds of the 
American public.
  Mr. President, I could spend much longer talking about S. 349. But 
what I want to make clear to my colleagues is that this bill is a 
really bad bill with a good name.
  It raises significant constitutional questions regarding the freedom 
of speech. Section 105(B)(5), added in the conference without debate, 
clearly shows that S. 349 goes beyond regulating the conduct of 
interest groups and seeks to regulate grassroots communications between 
citizen groups and their Members.
  Just read the definition, if you will, of grassroots communications, 
section 103(8) of the bill, to see how far this legislation stretches. 
Regulated grassroots communications include communications sent by a 
group to its members urging them to contact a Member of Congress.
  Clearly, we are not making up these concerns. Or why else would the 
many diverse groups around this country be so up in arms and so 
concerned about the passage of a piece of legislation? Groups as 
diverse as the ACLU, Planned Parenthood [NY], National Association of 
Women, National Restaurant Association, National Realtors Association, 
the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and the Christian Coalition are all 
opposed to this bill and all are very concerned that their rights as 
Americans, and their members and contributors' rights as Americans to 
petition their Government, are being threatened.
  It has been suggested that some Republicans stirred up these groups 
to protest, and all they are doing is creating a smokescreen for their 
high-powered lobbyist friends.
  Mr. President, they are wrong. Members of Congress did not start this 
uproar. The American people started it. The grassroots coalitions 
threatened by legislation that is called Hillary Clinton's revenge are 
speaking out.
  These are the people, the grassroots, Mr. President, of America, who 
defeated socialized medicine in this country.
  So I say to my colleagues, what is so good about this bill that it 
justifies taking away constitutional rights and privileges of 
Americans?
  No amount of perceived good should justify denying Americans their 
rights of freedom of speech or their rights to petition Congress. No 
amount of perceived good should require those Americans to prove in 
court their right to exercise these privileges. No amount of perceived 
good justifies trampling on individual liberties, and certainly no 
amount of perceived good justifies requiring Americans to have to 
litigate.
  If you want to vote to ban gifts to Members of Congress, strip out 
the lobbying reform provisions and vote on the gift provisions, but let 
us not pass a bill that attacks Americans and their right to be heard 
when it does not even come into effect until 1996. There is time to do 
this properly.
  We do not have to demonstrate to Americans that we have no concern or 
interest in their constitutional rights. It is time to show that the 
Senate deserves respect. We can earn that solely by exercising our 
judgment in behalf of the American people and their constitutional 
rights and not in behalf of the political rights of Members of Congress 
to be reelected on a gimmick, which it is.
  Mr. President, I thank the Chair for the time.
  Mr. WELLSTONE addressed the Chair.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Minnesota is 
recognized by the Chair.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, I know we are going to get into a discussion of the 
Elementary and Secondary Education Act in just a moment.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Chair advises the Senator, at 
the time of 9:45 a.m., we will be moving to the conference report to 
accompany H.R. 6.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I spoke to Senator Kennedy. I ask 
Senator Pell that I be given 3 minutes to respond to the Senator from 
Wyoming. Senator Kennedy thought that would be all right.
  Mr. WALLOP. Mr. President, I object. Regular order.

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