[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 22 (Friday, February 3, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H1168-H1191]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                           LINE-ITEM VETO ACT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 55 and rule 
XXIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House 
on the State of the Union for the further consideration of the bill, 
H.R. 2.

                              {time}  1103


                     in the committee of the whole

  Accordingly, the House resolved itself into the Committee of the 
Whole House on the State of the Union for the further consideration of 
the bill (H.R. 2) to give the President item veto authority over 
appropriation acts and targeted tax benefits in revenue acts, with Mr. 
Boehner in the chair.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The CHAIRMAN. When the Committee of the Whole rose on Thursday, 
February 2, 1995, the amendment offered by the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania [Mr. Kanjorski] had been disposed of and the bill was open 
for amendment at any point.
  Are there further amendments to the bill?


                    amendment offered by mr. spratt

  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment, amendment No. 20.
  The CHAIRMAN. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
  The text of the amendment is as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. Spratt: In section 2(a), insert 
     ``or tax incentive'' after ``tax benefit'' the first place it 
     appears.
       At the end of Section 4, insert the following new 
     paragraph:
       (5) The term ``tax incentive'' means any deduction, credit, 
     preference, or exemption from gross income, or any deferral 
     of tax liability, causing tax revenues to be forgone as 
     inducement for taxpayers to pursue or forbear from certain 
     actions or activities.

  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I rise to support the amendment known as 
the Moran-Spratt amendment.
  Mr. Chairman, the advocates of H.R. 2 claim that they have found a 
way to give the President by statute powers that he does not enjoy 
under the Constitution, the power, specifically, of an item veto. They 
claim that this power will allow the President to cut out wasteful, 
unwarranted, spending in appropriations bills that we adopt every year.
  Our amendment simply takes the President's newfound veto power to the 
realm of quasi-spending sometimes known as tax expenditures or tax 
incentives.
  The committee bill already takes a tentative step in this direction. 
It delegates to the President the power to rescind targeted tax 
benefits, special interest tax provisions that benefit 100 or fewer 
taxpayers. But here it stops. It stops, in my opinion, far short of the 
right goal.
  As to spending, this bill boldly covers virtually every item in 13 
different appropriations bills, all with discretionary spending, $540 
to $550 billion a year, but with tax expenditures it turns timid. It 
stops at a limited-interest tax provisions which are really just the 
tip of the iceberg.
  Why is this bill so tough on spending and so easy on special interest 
tax incentives?
  Let me read my colleagues what Newsweek said to explain last week, 
reading from Newsweek.

       The fine print of the item veto bill reveals that though 
     the Republicans are tough on spending, they are lax on 
     special-interest tax giveaways. The vast majority of tax 
     breaks, worth hundreds of billions of dollars, would remain 
     immune from the President's veto. Any lobbyist looking for 
     goodies from the Federal Government in the future could work 
     through the tax code instead of working through spending 
     bills.

  For some years we all know that has been a favorite recourse. That 
has been a practice common here for 20 to 25 years. If we want to give 
people an incentive to install solar heat in their homes, we are not so 
obvious as to hand them out a subsidy. We allow them a tax credit for 
part of the cost.
  If we want to promote oil and gas exploration, we do not fork over 
subsidies to the drillers. That would never be approved in the House, 
appropriating money for the major oil companies. We give them oil 
depletion allowances, or we let them expense costs that other 
businesses would be required to capitalize. Nobody notices because it 
is buried in the Tax Code, and who is to know when we are allowing one 
cost to be expensed rather than capitalized that we actually are giving 
a subsidy to this particular taxpayer.
  Our amendment would give the President the power to police these tax 
expenditures, to comb through the Tax Code the way he will be able to 
comb through spending appropriation bills and cull out questionable 
policies and provisions.
  Under our amendment, the President would have the right to rescind 
so-called tax incentives or tax expenditures.
  What are tax incentives or tax expenditures? Let me read the 
definition we use in our amendment for tax incentives. The term ``tax 
incentive'' means any deduction, credit, preference, or exemption from 
gross income or any deferral of tax liability causing tax revenues to 
be forgone as inducement for taxpayers to pursue or forbear from 
pursuit of certain activities or actions.
   [[Page H1169]] So long as we are going to be tough on spending, as 
this bill certainly will be, let us also be tough on tax giveaways. 
They amount to the same thing. They have the same bottom line impact on 
the deficit.
  And for that reason, Mr. Chairman, I urge adoption of the Moran-
Spratt amendment.
  Mr. MORAN. Mr. Chairman, the Spratt-Moran amendment which we are now 
considering greatly improves upon the Line-Item Veto Act.
  In the Contract on America and every piece of literature touting the 
Line-Item Veto Act, the Republicans are quick to claim that this would 
give the President the authority to cut out pork spending and targeted 
tax benefits. But if you look at the actual legislation, you will see 
that it does not give the President the authority to truly cut targeted 
tax benefits.
  The original Line-Item Veto Act only allowed the President to veto 
tax benefits if they benefited five or fewer taxpayers. This is a joke. 
There is no law, no pork project, and no tax cut, no program enacted by 
this Congress that only benefits five or fewer Americans. This bill was 
amended in committee to increase the number up to 100, but it still is 
worthless. No omnibus tax bill contains a tax cut for John Doe of 
Alexandria, VA, or the Smith family in Fairfax. There are very, very 
few tax benefits targeted to any class with less than 100 persons.
  Tax bills, however, do contain special interest giveaways. They are 
loaded with individual provisions designed to either induce taxpayers 
to do a certain activity or discourage taxpayers from doing another. 
Just last month, the Senate Budget Committee released a compendium of 
tax expenditures that identified $453 billion in individual tax 
provisions for fiscal year 1995 alone. We are making a big deal because 
this bill may open $10 billion in unauthorized spending each year to a 
potential line-item veto. But in the same breath we are passing on an 
opportunity to open $453 billion, nine times that amount, to the same 
authority.
  Many of these individual tax provisions are positive and should be 
continued. But in the same vein, many of the items contained in 
appropriations bills are justifiable and serve the public interest. But 
some of these are questionable. On page 41 of this compendium, CRS 
notes the ``Interest Allocation Rules Exception for Certain 
Nonfinancial Institutions''. This tax benefit classifies a finance 
subsidiary of the Ford Motor Co. as a financial institution and costs 
the Federal taxpayers $200 million. What is the rationale for this tax 
break? Nobody knows, it was not mentioned in the committee reports on 
the Tax Reform Act of 1986. There is no pork project in any 
appropriations act that comes close to $200 million annually. On page 
29 of this compendium is the ``Exclusion of Income of Foreign Sales 
Corporations,'' a tax benefit which allows firms to exclude 15 percent 
of income of exports sold through special foreign subsidiaries set up 
as paper corporations. This tax benefit costs the Federal taxpayers 
$1.1 billion annually.
  Some of these individual tax provisions, such as mortgage interest 
deductions, are positive and benefit almost every American family. But 
some are giveaways that increase our deficit for the benefit of a few 
wealthy corporations.
  If we are serious about reducing the deficit and are serious about 
giving the Executive the ability to cut wasteful spending, we must also 
allow him to cut any and all unnecessary and unjustifiable tax 
subsidies.
  I hope my colleagues will support this amendment.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment. Having to oppose 
the amendment, I regret, because the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. 
Spratt] is certainly one of the most thoughtful, constructive, and 
contributing members of the committee. He has given enormous thought to 
this issue and to all of the issues involved in this legislation. But I 
think that he goes beyond, way beyond what we were attempting to get at 
in this bill, which would allow the President to veto very special, 
very limited, tax perks for special fat cat friends, ``fat cats'' being 
a broad term.
  This, I think, is too broad, because it would allow the President to 
veto things like the homeowners mortgage deduction, the earned income 
tax credit, credits to assist family members in taking care of elderly 
and indigent relations.
  Clearly, Mr. Chairman, this is way outside the scope of what we were 
attempting to have as a very targeted, very precise rifle shot attack 
on those egregious examples of overreaching which we have unfortunately 
seen too many examples of in our Tax Code in recent years.
  This is a much broader policy initiative, and I think it is a worthy 
one. But I think for the purposes of this legislation, it broadens the 
scope of the legislation too much. I must oppose the amendment.
  Mrs. COLLINS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the 
requisite number of words.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this amendment. This amendment 
would make any tax incentive subject to the Presidential line-item 
veto. Tax incentives would include any deduction, credit, preference, 
or exemption from gross income of any deferral of tax liability. For 
example, the mortgage deduction and the exemption for dependents could 
be subject to the Presidential line-item veto.

                              {time}  1110

  A very disturbing trend seems to be developing in this debate. The 
new Republican majority seem to have two contracts with America, one in 
which they protect the tax loopholes of the wealthy and the other under 
which they sacrifice the programs for working people on the altar of 
deficit reduction.
  I think that is wrong. And I think the American people can see 
through it. The majority would like us to believe that it is the 
middle-income tax cut that they want to protect, but in reality they 
are protecting many special interests that feed daily at the Federal 
trough of privilege and preferred treatment.
  I have here, for example, a list that I would like for my colleague 
to know about. One such provision which gets special tax preference 
that the President would not be able to veto under this legislation is 
a provision favoring the oil and gas industry by repealing the minimum 
tax for depletion and intangible drilling costs for independents and 
oil drillers. Since we have more than 100 oil drillers in the country, 
the President could not veto this bill.
  Another provision we have here gave a tax preference for purchasers 
of fuels containing alcohol. Since thousands of people can buy gasohol, 
the President would not line-item veto that provision, even though one 
company, Archer Daniel Midlands, controls about 90 percent of the 
gasohol market.
  A third benefits purchasers of electric cars and cars powered by 
natural gas. Even though this provision really benefits a handful of 
carmakers, the President could not veto it since many people could buy 
the cars.
  Let me cite another example where our Tax Code gives a special tax 
benefit or credit to drug companies doing business in Puerto Rico; 24 
big companies with receipts exceeding $250 million got a total of $2.6 
billion in tax credits from this provision in 1992, but because a total 
of 338 companies got benefits from this provision, the President could 
not veto it.
  You know the Moran-Spratt amendment points out that Republicans like 
giving tax breaks to the wealthy, and there is no reason why those tax 
expenditures should not be subject to the line-item veto in the same 
way spending programs are.
  Mr. Chairman, if deficit reduction is the goal, the benefits wealthy 
Americans and corporations receive must be on the table, not just 
spending programs for the working people in this country.
  I urge my colleague to support the Moran-Spratt amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Spratt].
  The question was taken; and the Chairman announced that the noes 
appeared to have it.


                             recorded vote

  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
  A recorded vote was ordered.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 175, 
noes 243, not voting 16, as follows:

                              [Roll No 89]

                               AYES--175

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Andrews
     Baesler
     Baldacci
     Barrett (WI)
     Beilenson
     Bentsen
     Berman
     Bevill
     Bishop
     Bonior
     Borski
     Brewster
     Browder
     Brown (CA)
     Brown (FL)
     Brown (OH)
     Bryant (TX)
     Chapman
     Clay
     Clayton
     Clement
     Clyburn
     Coleman
     Collins (IL)
     Condit
     Coyne
     Cramer
     Danner
     [[Page H1170]] de la Garza
     Deal
     DeFazio
     DeLauro
     Dellums
     Deutsch
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Doggett
     Dooley
     Doyle
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Engel
     Eshoo
     Farr
     Fattah
     Fazio
     Fields (LA)
     Filner
     Flake
     Foglietta
     Ford
     Frank (MA)
     Frost
     Furse
     Gejdenson
     Gephardt
     Geren
     Gibbons
     Gonzalez
     Gordon
     Green
     Gutierrez
     Hall (OH)
     Hall (TX)
     Hamilton
     Harman
     Hastings (FL)
     Hefner
     Hilliard
     Hinchey
     Holden
     Jackson-Lee
     Jacobs
     Jefferson
     Johnson (SD)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Johnston
     Kanjorski
     Kaptur
     Kennedy (MA)
     Kennedy (RI)
     Kennelly
     Kildee
     Kleczka
     LaFalce
     Lantos
     Laughlin
     Lewis (GA)
     Lincoln
     Lofgren
     Lowey
     Luther
     Maloney
     Manton
     Markey
     Mascara
     Matsui
     McCarthy
     McDermott
     McHale
     McKinney
     Meehan
     Meek
     Menendez
     Mfume
     Miller (CA)
     Mineta
     Minge
     Mollohan
     Montgomery
     Moran
     Nadler
     Neal
     Oberstar
     Obey
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Orton
     Owens
     Pallone
     Payne (NJ)
     Payne (VA)
     Pelosi
     Peterson (FL)
     Peterson (MN)
     Pickett
     Pomeroy
     Rahall
     Rangel
     Reed
     Reynolds
     Richardson
     Rivers
     Roemer
     Roybal-Allard
     Rush
     Sabo
     Sanders
     Sawyer
     Schroeder
     Schumer
     Scott
     Serrano
     Skaggs
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Spratt
     Stark
     Stenholm
     Stokes
     Studds
     Stupak
     Tanner
     Tauzin
     Taylor (MS)
     Tejeda
     Thompson
     Thornton
     Thurman
     Torricelli
     Traficant
     Tucker
     Velazquez
     Vento
     Visclosky
     Volkmer
     Ward
     Waters
     Williams
     Wilson
     Wise
     Wyden
     Yates

                               NOES--243

     Allard
     Archer
     Armey
     Bachus
     Baker (CA)
     Baker (LA)
     Ballenger
     Barcia
     Barr
     Barrett (NE)
     Barton
     Bass
     Bateman
     Bereuter
     Bilbray
     Bilirakis
     Bliley
     Blute
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Bono
     Boucher
     Brownback
     Bryant (TN)
     Bunn
     Bunning
     Burr
     Burton
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Canady
     Cardin
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chambliss
     Chenoweth
     Christensen
     Chrysler
     Clinger
     Coble
     Coburn
     Combest
     Conyers
     Cooley
     Costello
     Cox
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cremeans
     Cubin
     Cunningham
     Davis
     DeLay
     Diaz-Balart
     Dickey
     Dixon
     Doolittle
     Dornan
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Ehlers
     Ehrlich
     Emerson
     English
     Ensign
     Evans
     Everett
     Ewing
     Fawell
     Fields (TX)
     Flanagan
     Foley
     Forbes
     Fowler
     Fox
     Franks (CT)
     Franks (NJ)
     Frelinghuysen
     Frisa
     Funderburk
     Gallegly
     Ganske
     Gekas
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Gilman
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Goss
     Graham
     Greenwood
     Gutknecht
     Hancock
     Hansen
     Hastert
     Hastings (WA)
     Hayes
     Hayworth
     Hefley
     Heineman
     Herger
     Hilleary
     Hobson
     Hoekstra
     Hoke
     Horn
     Hostettler
     Houghton
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson, Sam
     Jones
     Kasich
     Kim
     King
     Kingston
     Klink
     Klug
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     LaHood
     Latham
     LaTourette
     Lazio
     Leach
     Levin
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (KY)
     Lightfoot
     Linder
     Lipinski
     Livingston
     LoBiondo
     Longley
     Lucas
     Manzullo
     Martinez
     Martini
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McDade
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McIntosh
     McKeon
     McNulty
     Meyers
     Mica
     Miller (FL)
     Mink
     Molinari
     Moorhead
     Morella
     Murtha
     Myers
     Myrick
     Nethercutt
     Neumann
     Ney
     Norwood
     Nussle
     Oxley
     Packard
     Parker
     Pastor
     Paxon
     Petri
     Pombo
     Porter
     Portman
     Poshard
     Pryce
     Quillen
     Quinn
     Radanovich
     Ramstad
     Regula
     Riggs
     Roberts
     Rogers
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Rose
     Roth
     Roukema
     Royce
     Salmon
     Sanford
     Saxton
     Scarborough
     Schaefer
     Schiff
     Seastrand
     Sensenbrenner
     Shadegg
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shuster
     Skeen
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (TX)
     Smith (WA)
     Solomon
     Souder
     Spence
     Stearns
     Stump
     Talent
     Tate
     Taylor (NC)
     Thomas
     Thornberry
     Tiahrt
     Torkildsen
     Torres
     Upton
     Vucanovich
     Waldholtz
     Walker
     Walsh
     Wamp
     Watt (NC)
     Watts (OK)
     Weldon (FL)
     Weldon (PA)
     Weller
     White
     Whitfield
     Wicker
     Wolf
     Wynn
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)
     Zeliff
     Zimmer

                             NOT VOTING--16

     Bartlett
     Becerra
     Collins (GA)
     Collins (MI)
     Gunderson
     Hoyer
     Istook
     Kelly
     Largent
     Metcalf
     Moakley
     Sisisky
     Stockman
     Towns
     Waxman
     Woolsey

                              {time}  1131

  The Clerk announced the following pairs:
  On this vote:

       Mr. Hoyer for, with Mr. Bartlett of Maryland against.
       Mr. Towns for, with Mr. Largent against.

  So the amendment was rejected.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  Mr. ARMEY. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.
  Mr. Chairman, I have a few words about the schedule as the day 
proceeds.
  I would like to mention to all the Members of the body that we are 
concerned about the snowstorm that is moving in, especially in the 
Midwest. We have a lot of Members who are anxious to travel. We have, I 
think it is four amendments we believe that we can move fast. We are 
trying to move the amendments as fast as we can. We are hopeful that 
with the cooperation of all the Members we might be able to complete 
our work today even before the scheduled 3 o'clock departure time. I 
think that could be beneficial to a lot of our traveling Members. I 
just wanted to bring to every Member's attention that insofar as we can 
move the debate and the amendments fast we might be able to alleviate 
their travel pressure.
  I want to thank all the Members for their attention.
  The CHAIRMAN. Are there any other amendments to be offered to the 
bill?
  Mr. WISE. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  I would like to ask if the distinguished Chair of the full committee 
would engage in a discussion as to the scheduling.
  The majority leader asked that we run amendments at this point. I am 
not aware of any amendments on the floor at this time. Is it the desire 
of the majority leader and the committee to go out if that is not the 
case, to go to the substitutes? What is the will here?
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. WISE. I yield to the Chair of the full committee.
  Mr. CLINGER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, we have been noticed with a number of amendments that 
have been published in the Record, and we assumed that they would be 
offered in a timely fashion; that is, Ms. Norton has an amendment, Mr. 
Obey has an amendment, Ms. Waters has an amendment, Mr. Tauzin. We had 
anticipated that those amendments would be coming in due course. Our 
objective here would be to complete those amendments today, dispose of 
those amendments today, and deal with the substitutes. I know the 
gentleman from West Virginia [Mr. Wise] has a substitute which he would 
offer on Monday.
  Mr. WISE. At this point it is my understanding, and I will defer to 
our ranking member, but it is my understanding that none of the Members 
are able to offer their amendments at this point or had not expected 
to.
  So the question then becomes if there is concern about the weather, 
is it better to let Members go at this point; if there is concern about 
the weather and getting flights to the West and Midwest particularly 
before they get socked in, is it better, if the amendments are not 
offered, to----
  Mr. CLINGER. If there are no amendments to be offered, I would 
suggest the gentleman who has a substitute would offer his substitute 
at this time and we would deal with that, or else we would move to 
final passage. In that event, we will postpone final passage until 
Monday.
  Mrs. COLLINS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. WISE. I yield to the ranking member.
  Mrs. COLLINS of Illinois. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, if we do not have any amendments here now and if we are 
getting ready to go on the substitute, why would we hold final passage 
until Monday when we might not be able to get here on Monday?
  I have been working here in Washington as long as the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania [Mr. Clinger] has, I believe, and we understand that if 
there is a 12-inch snowstorm there is no way we are likely to be able 
to get here from wherever we are on Monday.

                              {time}  1140

  So it would seem to me, Mr. Chairman, the thing to do would be to go 
on with this legislation today, get it over with, if we possibly can. 
There are two options. One is to rise and come back 
[[Page H1171]] whenever we can if we are stuck someplace because of the 
snow, and the other thing is to complete the bill today.


                         parliamentary inquiry

  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I have a parliamentary inquiry.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman will state his parliamentary inquiry.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, in the event the substitute amendment 
would be offered, a substitute for the bill would be offered at this 
point, would it preclude the offering of other amendments upon the 
disposition of the substitute amendment?
  The CHAIRMAN. In responding to the gentleman's parliamentary inquiry: 
not necessarily.
  If the substitute were adopted, that would stop the amendment process 
with respect to the original-text substitute.
  Mr. CLINGER. I understand.
  Mr. WISE. Excuse me, Mr. Chairman, I could not hear the Chair. What 
was the ruling?
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I would tell the gentleman that I would 
encourage, in view of the fact that there are then no Members presently 
on the floor prepared to offer perfecting amendments, but only the 
gentleman standing who is prepared to offer a substitute amendment--my 
understanding is that if the gentleman's substitute would prevail, it 
would preclude consideration of further amendments. On the other hand, 
if the gentleman's substitute does not prevail, other amendments would 
be in order, and I would encourage the gentleman to present his 
substitute amendment.
  Mr. WISE. In that case, Mr. Chairman, we will be happy to proceed.
  The CHAIRMAN. Are there any other amendments to the bill?


      amendment in the nature of a substitute offered by mr. wise

  Mr. WISE. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment in the nature of a 
substitute. It has been printed in the Record and is amendment No. 31.
  The CHAIRMAN. The Clerk will designate the amendment in the nature of 
a substitute.
  The text of the amendment in the nature of a substitute is as 
follows:

       Amendment in the nature of a substitute offered by Mr. 
     Wise: Strike all after the enacting clause and insert the 
     following:

     SECTION 1. EXPEDITED CONSIDERATION OF CERTAIN PROPOSED 
                   RESCISSIONS AND TARGETED TAX BENEFITS.

       (a) In General.--Section 1012 of the Congressional Budget 
     and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 683) is amended 
     to read as follows:


       ``expedited consideration of certain proposed rescissions

       ``Sec. 1012. (a) Proposed Rescission of Budget Authority or 
     Repeal of Targeted Tax Benefits.--The President may propose, 
     at the time and in the manner provided in subsection (b), the 
     rescission of any budget authority provided in an 
     appropriation Act or repeal of any targeted tax benefit 
     provided in any revenue Act. If the President proposes a 
     rescission of budget authority, he may also propose to reduce 
     the appropriate discretionary spending limit set forth in 
     section 601(a)(2) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 by 
     an amount that does not exceed the amount of the proposed 
     rescission. Funds made available for obligation under this 
     procedure may not be proposed for rescission again under this 
     section.
       ``(b) Transmittal of Special Message.--
       ``(1) The President may transmit to Congress a special 
     message proposing to rescind amounts of budget authority or 
     to repeal any targeted tax benefit and include with that 
     special message a draft bill that, if enacted, would only 
     rescind that budget authority or repeal that targeted tax 
     benefit unless the President also proposes a reduction in the 
     appropriate discretionary spending limit set forth in section 
     601(a)(2) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974. That bill 
     shall clearly identify the amount of budget authority that is 
     proposed to be rescinded for each program, project, or 
     activity to which that budget authority relates or the 
     targeted tax benefit proposed to be repealed, as the case may 
     be. A targeted tax benefit may only be proposed to be 
     repealed under this section during the 10-legislative-day 
     period commencing on the day after the date of enactment of 
     the provision proposed to be repealed.
       ``(2) In the case of an appropriation Act that includes 
     accounts within the jurisdiction of more than one 
     subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, the 
     President in proposing to rescind budget authority under this 
     section shall send a separate special message and 
     accompanying draft bill for accounts within the jurisdiction 
     of each such subcommittee.
       ``(3) Each special message shall specify, with respect to 
     the budget authority proposed to be rescinded, the 
     following--
       ``(A) the amount of budget authority which he proposes to 
     be rescinded;
       ``(B) any account, department, or establishment of the 
     Government to which such budget authority is available for 
     obligation, and the specific project or governmental 
     functions involved;
       ``(C) the reasons why the budget authority should be 
     rescinded;
       ``(D) to the maximum extent practicable, the estimated 
     fiscal, economic, and budgetary effect (including the effect 
     on outlays and receipts in each fiscal year) of the proposed 
     rescission;
       ``(E) all facts, circumstances, and considerations relating 
     to or bearing upon the proposed rescission and the decision 
     to effect the proposed rescission, and to the maximum extent 
     practicable, the estimated effect of the proposed rescission 
     upon the objects, purposes, and programs for which the budget 
     authority is provided; and
       ``(F) a reduction in the appropriate discretionary spending 
     limit set forth in section 601(a)(2) of the Congressional 
     Budget Act of 1974, if proposed by the President.
     Each special message shall specify, with respect to the 
     proposed repeal of targeted tax benefits, the information 
     required by subparagraphs (C), (D), and (E), as it relates to 
     the proposed repeal.
       ``(c) Procedures for Expedited Consideration.--
       ``(1)(A) Before the close of the second legislative day of 
     the House of Representatives after the date of receipt of a 
     special message transmitted to Congress under subsection (b), 
     the majority leader or minority leader of the House of 
     Representatives shall introduce (by request) the draft bill 
     accompanying that special message. If the bill is not 
     introduced as provided in the preceding sentence, then, on 
     the third legislative day of the House of Representatives 
     after the date of receipt of that special message, any Member 
     of that House may introduce the bill.
       ``(B) The bill shall be referred to the Committee on 
     Appropriations or the Committee on Ways and Means of the 
     House of Representatives, as applicable. The committee shall 
     report the bill without substantive revision and with or 
     without recommendation. The bill shall be reported not later 
     than the seventh legislative day of that House after the date 
     of receipt of that special message. If that committee fails 
     to report the bill within that period, that committee shall 
     be automatically discharged from consideration of the bill, 
     and the bill shall be placed on the appropriate calendar.
       ``(C) During consideration under this paragraph, any Member 
     of the House of Representatives may move to strike any 
     proposed rescission or rescissions of budget authority or any 
     proposed repeal of a targeted tax benefit, as applicable, if 
     supported by 49 other Members.
       ``(D) A vote on final passage of the bill shall be taken in 
     the House of Representatives on or before the close of the 
     10th legislative day of that House after the date of the 
     introduction of the bill in that House. If the bill is 
     passed, the Clerk of the House of Representatives shall cause 
     the bill to be engrossed, certified, and transmitted to the 
     Senate within one calendar day of the day on which the bill 
     is passed.
       ``(2)(A) A motion in the House of Representatives to 
     proceed to the consideration of a bill under this section 
     shall be highly privileged and not debatable. An amendment to 
     the motion shall not be in order, nor shall it be in order to 
     move to reconsider the vote by which the motion is agreed to 
     or disagreed to.
       ``(B) Debate in the House of Representatives on a bill 
     under this section shall not exceed 4 hours, which shall be 
     divided equally between those favoring and those opposing the 
     bill. A motion further to limit debate shall not be 
     debatable. It shall not be in order to move to recommit a 
     bill under this section or to move to reconsider the vote by 
     which the bill is agreed to or disagreed to.
       ``(C) Appeals from decisions of the Chair relating to the 
     application of the Rules of the House of Representatives to 
     the procedure relating to a bill under this section shall be 
     decided without debate.
       ``(D) Except to the extent specifically provided in the 
     preceding provisions of this subsection, consideration of a 
     bill under this section shall be governed by the Rules of the 
     House of Representatives. It shall not be in order in the 
     House of Representatives to consider any rescission bill 
     introduced pursuant to the provisions of this section under a 
     suspension of the rules or under a special rule.
       ``(3)(A) A bill transmitted to the Senate pursuant to 
     paragraph (1)(D) shall be referred to its Committee on 
     Appropriations or Committee on Finance, as applicable. That 
     committee shall report the bill without substantive revision 
     and with or without recommendation. The bill shall be 
     reported not later than the seventh legislative day of the 
     Senate after it receives the bill. A committee failing to 
     report the bill within such period shall be automatically 
     discharged from consideration of the bill, and the bill shall 
     be placed upon the appropriate calendar.
       ``(B) During consideration under this paragraph, any Member 
     of the Senate may move to strike any proposed rescission or 
     rescissions of budget authority or any proposed repeal of a 
     targeted tax benefit, as applicable, if supported by 14 other 
     Members.
       ``(4)(A) A motion in the Senate to proceed to the 
     consideration of a bill under this section shall be 
     privileged and not debatable. An amendment to the motion 
     shall not be in 
     [[Page H1172]] order, nor shall it be in order to move to 
     reconsider the vote by which the motion is agreed to or 
     disagreed to.
       ``(B) Debate in the Senate on a bill under this section, 
     and all debatable motions and appeals in connection therewith 
     (including debate pursuant to subparagraph (C)), shall not 
     exceed 10 hours. The time shall be equally divided between, 
     and controlled by, the majority leader and the minority 
     leader or their designees.
       ``(C) Debate in the Senate on any debatable motion or 
     appeal in connection with a bill under this section shall be 
     limited to not more than 1 hour, to be equally divided 
     between, and controlled by, the mover and the manager of the 
     bill, except that in the event the manager of the bill is in 
     favor of any such motion or appeal, the time in opposition 
     thereto, shall be controlled by the minority leader or his 
     designee. Such leaders, or either of them, may, from time 
     under their control on the passage of a bill, allot 
     additional time to any Senator during the consideration of 
     any debatable motion or appeal.
       ``(D) A motion in the Senate to further limit debate on a 
     bill under this section is not debatable. A motion to 
     recommit a bill under this section is not in order.
       ``(d) Amendments and Divisions Prohibited.--Except as 
     otherwise provided by this section, no amendment to a bill 
     considered under this section shall be in order in either the 
     House of Representatives or the Senate. It shall not be in 
     order to demand a division of the question in the House of 
     Representatives (or in a Committee of the Whole) or in the 
     Senate. No motion to suspend the application of this 
     subsection shall be in order in either House, nor shall it be 
     in order in either House to suspend the application of this 
     subsection by unanimous consent.
       ``(e) Requirement To Make Available for Obligation.--(1) 
     Any amount of budget authority proposed to be rescinded in a 
     special message transmitted to Congress under subsection (b) 
     shall be made available for obligation on the day after the 
     date on which either House rejects the bill transmitted with 
     that special message.
       ``(2) Any targeted tax benefit proposed to be repealed 
     under this section as set forth in a special message 
     transmitted by the President shall not be deemed repealed 
     unless the bill transmitted with that special message is 
     enacted into law.
       ``(f) Definitions.--For purposes of this section--
       ``(1) the term `appropriation Act' means any general or 
     special appropriation Act, and any Act or joint resolution 
     making supplemental, deficiency, or continuing 
     appropriations;
       ``(2) the term `legislative day' means, with respect to 
     either House of Congress, any day of session; and
       ``(3) The term `targeted tax benefit' means any provision 
     of a revenue or reconciliation Act determined by the 
     President to provide a Federal tax deduction, credit, 
     exclusion, preference, or other concession to 100 or fewer 
     beneficiaries. Any partnership, limited partnership, trust, 
     or S corporation, and any subsidiary or affiliate of the same 
     parent corporation, shall be deemed and counted as a single 
     beneficiary regardless of the number of partners, limited 
     partners, beneficiaries, shareholders, or affiliated 
     corporate entities''.
       (b) Exercise of Rulemaking Powers.--Section 904 of the 
     Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 621 note) is 
     amended--
       (1) in subsection (a), by striking ``and 1017'' and 
     inserting ``1012, and 1017''; and
       (2) in subsection (d), by striking ``section 1017'' and 
     inserting ``sections 1012 and 1017''; and
       (c) Conforming Amendments.--
       (1) Section 1011 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 
     U.S.C. 682(5)) is amended by repealing paragraphs (3) and (5) 
     and by redesignating paragraph (4) as paragraph (3).
       (2) Section 1014 of such Act (2 U.S.C. 685) is amended--
       (A) in subsection (b)(1), by striking ``or the 
     reservation''; and
       (B) in subsection (e)(1), by striking ``or a reservation'' 
     and by striking ``or each such reservation''.
       (3) Section 1015(a) of such Act (2 U.S.C. 686) is amended 
     by striking ``is to establish a reserve or'', by striking 
     ``the establishment of such a reserve or'', and by striking 
     ``reserve or'' each other place it appears.
       (4) Section 1017 of such Act (2 U.S.C. 687) is amended--
       (A) in subsection (a), by striking ``rescission bill 
     introduced with respect to a special message or'';
       (B) in subsection (b)(1), by striking ``rescission bill 
     or'', by striking ``bill or'' the second place it appears, by 
     striking ``rescission bill with respect to the same special 
     message or'', and by striking ``, and the case may be,'';
       (C) in subsection (b)(2), by striking ``bill or'' each 
     place it appears;
       (D) in subsection (c), by striking ``rescission'' each 
     place it appears and by striking ``bill or'' each place it 
     appears;
       (E) in subsection (d)(1), by striking ``rescission bill 
     or'' and by striking ``, and all amendments thereto (in the 
     case of a rescission bill)'';
       (F) in subsection (d)(2)--
       (i) by striking the first sentence;
       (ii) by amending the second sentence to read as follows: 
     ``Debate on any debatable motion or appeal in connection with 
     an impoundment resolution shall be limited to 1 hour, to be 
     equally divided between, and controlled by, the mover and the 
     manager of the resolution, except that in the event that the 
     manager of the resolution is in favor of any such motion or 
     appeal, the time in opposition thereto shall be controlled by 
     the minority leader or his designee.'';
       (iii) by striking the third sentence; and
       (iv) in the fourth sentence, by striking ``rescission bill 
     or'' and by striking ``amendment, debatable motion,'' and by 
     inserting ``debatable motion'';
       (G) in paragraph (d)(3), by striking the second and third 
     sentences; and
       (H) by striking paragraphs (4), (5), (6), and (7) of 
     paragraph (d).
       (d) Clerical Amendments.--The item relating to section 1012 
     in the table of sections for subpart B of title X of the 
     Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 is 
     amended to read as follows:

``Sec. 1012. Expedited consideration of certain proposed rescissions 
              and targeted tax benefits.''

  Mr. WISE. Mr. Chairman, this amendment, or the substitute that is 
being offered, is the Wise-Spratt-Stenholm substitute. Some call it 
expedited rescission; some would call the Republican version offered by 
the full committee enhanced rescission. Both are forms of line-item 
veto, and that is the first thing we have to get clear.
  There are two goals, it seems to me, with any kind of modified line-
item veto such as we are discussing today. The goals are that the 
President be able to line item items in appropriation bills that he or 
she thinks should be cut and that the President is entitled to a vote 
on those items; second, that all Members be held accountable for 
whether or not they voted to sustain the President, whether they voted 
to cut.
  So, Mr. Chairman, the goals are: the President can veto and the 
Congress must vote. Underline the word ``must.'' Second is that all 
Members be held accountable so that the public knows how Bob Wise voted 
in his district for these cuts and how others voted. In both cases what 
the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Clinger], the distinguished 
chairman, is offering on behalf of the full committee is a form of 
line-item veto, and our expedited rescission bill is a form of line-
item veto, and both have that process.
  Now the Republican version and the Democratic version, the substitute 
version, in both cases the Congress must vote. That is not the present 
situation under current law. Under current law the President may issue 
a rescission, but if the Congress does not take it up and vote 
affirmatively in both Houses, the rescission fails.
  Here it is a different process. In both versions, the Republican 
version and our substitute, the Congress must take the measure up, and 
the Congress must vote. So the President gets his vote.
  There is one major difference between the two versions. The 
difference is what does it take to sustain the President's veto? In the 
case of the Republican version, the full committee version, at the end 
of the day, after working our way through the whole process and the 
President sends it back, at the end of the day it takes two-thirds of 
this body to override a Presidential cut, a Presidential line-item 
veto. Under our substitute, which is essentially the same substitute 
that passed with 342 votes last year from the House, Republican and 
Democrat alike, under our substitute it is a simple majority, a simple 
majority. What our substitute does is to say that one-third plus one 
does not determine the fate of every line-item veto.
  Now there are some other provisions that I think are important. Our 
substitute has the option for the President to allocate the moneys 
saved by the cutting to deficit reduction, in effect a form of lock 
box. That is in our amendment. Our substitute has in it language that 
has already been placed in the other version giving 50 Members on the 
floor the ability to break out a specific rescission for individual 
attention.
  Our substitute also has in it the language that I believe is in the 
present version, the committee version, that permits the line item-ing 
of certain tax benefits to go to a class of 100 taxpayers or less.
  So essentially what we are talking about here is whether or not my 
colleagues believe a majority ought to be all that is required to 
override the President or whether two-thirds. I say to my colleagues, 
``I urge you to look at this carefully and think. We don't know who the 
President will be in 2 years, or 6 years, or 10 years. Do you want to 
have to always be going up 
[[Page H1173]] against a President knowing that one-third plus one in 
this body can overcome you at every opportunity? You can't even argue 
to a majority.''
  Now the argument is made that, if a majority passed an overall 
appropriation bill, then why is it likely to think that a majority 
would be willing to sustain a Presidential veto? In other words, a 
majority passed the bill; then the majority is not going to turn around 
and take items out of it, and I ask all of my colleagues to consider 
how bills, appropriation bills, are passed here. We vote on a total 
package. We may not like certain provisions in it, but we vote for it 
on the basis that the overall bill is preferable to a few of the items 
we disagree with.
  However, when confronted with those individual items coming back by 
themselves, and particularly----
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from West Virginia has 
expired.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Wise was allowed to proceed for 2 
additional minutes.)
  Mr. WISE. But when confronted with individual items coming back in a 
Presidential line-item veto or rescission, if my colleagues will, and 
knowing that the full public scrutiny is, ``How did you vote on this 
controversial area or this controversial project,'' it is very likely 
that a majority would sustain that Presidential line-item veto or 
rescission. So it really gets down to two-thirds, or really gets down 
to whether one wants one-third plus one to run the appropriations 
process or one wants a majority vote. I remind my Republican colleagues 
and Democratic colleagues that 342 Members voted for this language in 
the past Congress.
  So, with the Wise-Spratt-Stenholm substitute, Mr. Chairman, the 
President can rescind, the President is guaranteed a vote in Congress 
within 10 days of it coming to the Congress, and there is total 
accountability because the public sees how we vote on each item. I 
would ask that my colleagues uphold our substitute and guaranteed 
majority rule as opposed to one-third plus one.
  Mr. VOLKMER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. WISE. I yield to the gentleman from Missouri.

                              {time}  1150

  Mr. VOLKMER. Mr. Chairman, as I have reviewed this over the years, as 
the House has deliberated on the line-item veto--and last year we came 
to the conclusion that basically the substitute the gentleman is now 
offering was the one that should become law--the one reason was to 
maintain the balance of power.
  The gentleman has stated this is his opening remarks, and I would 
like to carry that a little further, because I think we really need to 
show this to the Members of the House. If the Republican version would 
ever become law and be held to be constitutional, the House could very 
well have no input at all. No Member of the House would have any input 
because with any President, knowing how this total system works, all he 
needs is 34 Senators. All he needs is 34 Senators, because both Houses 
have to override the veto. Is that correct?
  Mr. WISE. The gentleman is correct.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from West Virginia [Mr. Wise] 
has expired.
  (On request of Mr. Volkmer, and by unanimous consent, Mr. Wise was 
allowed to proceed for 2 additional minutes.)
  Mr. VOLKMER. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will yield further, since 
both Houses have to override, as we have seen in other instances, other 
vetoes, those of us who have been here, with such things as the shoe 
and textile bill we passed and Reagan vetoed and Bush vetoed, all he 
had to do was get 34 Senators. So what we end up with is that the whole 
spending policy of this Nation is governed not by you folks, not by me, 
not by anybody in this House. As long as we have one President and he 
has 34 Senators he can count on, that is it; is that correct?
  Mr. WISE. That is exactly correct.
  Mr. VOLKMER. So 35 people out of this whole country would make the 
decision on spending priorities under the Republican version?
  Mr. WISE. That is correct.
  Mr. DAVIS. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. WISE. I yield to the gentleman from Virginia.
  Mr. DAVIS. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding. I have a 
question.
  I, too, am uncomfortable about the two-thirds in both Houses having 
to override. That is a tremendous transfer of power from the 
legislative to the executive branch. But as I read the gentleman's 
amendment, in this particular case it appears that either House could 
kill the veto; is that correct?
  Mr. WISE. Absolutely not. Both Houses have to vote. You have a vote 
in both Houses. For instance, if it came to the House and the House 
failed to pass the rescission, then obviously it does not go to the 
Senate because it has died here.
  Mr. DAVIS. So in effect if one House approves the rescission but the 
other House does not, in effect one House can kill the rescission?
  Mr. WISE. As is the case with any bill.
  If I may continue to explain it to the gentleman, the difference 
between ours and the Republican version is this: When the President 
sends his rescission, it is introduced as a bill in the House. It goes 
to committee, it must be acted upon within 7 days, and it must be on 
the House floor within 10 days and voted on in the manner of any bill.
  The difference here in the Republican version is that the Republican 
version requires the Congress to act affirmatively to pass a resolution 
of disapproval. Assuming it passes both Houses, it then goes to the 
President, who then presumably vetoes it, and it must then be 
overridden by two-thirds.
  Mr. DAVIS. Let me state my concern to the gentleman and see if he can 
help and tell us what happens when you pork up some of these bills.
  I will take the grant to Lamar University last year in the crime 
bill, which I think Americans looked at and asked, ``Why is that 
there?'' with the other kinds of programs that were in the bill. It did 
not seem to fit.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from West Virginia [Mr. Wise] 
has again expired.
  (On request of Mr. Davis, and by unanimous consent, Mr. Wise was 
allowed to proceed for 1 additional minute.)
  Mr. DAVIS. Mr. Chairman, if I may continue and if the gentleman will 
yield, in that case, that was an appropriation that standing by itself 
probably could not have survived.
  Mr. WISE. I would be happy to talk some more about it, but as I 
recall, in that case it was not even an appropriation.
  Mr. DAVIS. I understand that, but to get the principle once again, 
that was money that in point of fact both Houses would not have passed 
initially. It would not have passed muster. Under this, if it passed 
muster in only one House, it would survive a veto; is that correct?
  Mr. WISE. Correct. And having been here when that was on the floor, 
by the time it got the scrutiny it did--and that is the purpose of the 
rescission process, the line item veto--by the time it got the scrutiny 
it did, both Houses overwhelmingly defeated it.
  Mr. DAVIS. I am still uncomfortable with either House being able to 
overturn the President, but I understand the thrust of this.
  Mr. WISE. But the gentleman might be equally as uncomfortable with 
the fact that one-third plus one in either body can control this whole 
process.
  Mr. DAVIS. I am not comfortable with it.
   Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman.
  Mr. BLUTE. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, I have a great deal of respect for my colleague, the 
gentleman from West Virginia, with whom I serve on two committees in 
this House, but I have to disagree and strongly oppose the Wise 
substitute.
  I believe that we need a procedure strong enough to meet the crisis 
that we face in our budget situation. If we look at the amount of debt 
and the deficits we are running, it would indicate that we need a very 
strong tool to try to discipline that process and to try to end this 
deficit. Clearly this is not the only thing that will help us reduce 
our debt, reduce our deficit, but it is an important tool, and I 
believe we should side with a stronger measure.
  [[Page H1174]] It is clear that the Clinger bill we are now debating 
is prosavings. It leads toward savings, and the Wise substitute is 
prospending. It leans more toward spending than savings, and if we 
eventually want to get our deficit under control, if we want to finally 
deal with the problems we face, I think we need to give the President a 
strong tool, not a weak tool, and I would, therefore, urge opposition 
to the Wise substitute.
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. BLUTE. I yield to the gentleman from Mississippi.
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman please 
inform this body, within the past 12 years how many budgets have been 
submitted by the President of the United States that were even within 
$100 billion of being balanced?
  Mr. BLUTE. Reclaiming my time----
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. No, I asked the gentleman a question.
  Mr. BLUTE. And I am attempting to answer.
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. How many times has the President of the 
United States submitted to the Congress a budget that was even $100 
billion within being balanced?
  Mr. BLUTE. I would say to the gentleman, reclaiming my time, the same 
number of budgets that the Democratic Congress passed that were 
balanced.
  This is not a partisan issue. It is a bipartisan problem that we all 
as a country must face.
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. BLUTE. I yield to the gentleman from Mississippi.
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, if a President, when given 
total authority--and this is one man who can write a budget all by 
himself--cannot submit a balanced budget or even a budget that is 
within $100 billion of being balanced, how on Earth do you think he is 
going to save us from ourselves? I did not come here to give my job 
away. I came here because I was elected to represent the people of 
south Mississippi and fulfill the constitutional duties that were given 
to me. If I had seen a record from the Presidency, from the Presidents 
of the United States, that had showed they are more frugal than us, I 
might think otherwise, but the fact is that over the past 40 years the 
combined Presidential budget requests have actually exceeded what this 
Congress has spent. I do not think those people are capable of saving 
us from ourselves.
  Mr. BLUTE. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time. I would simply respond 
by saying, as somebody from the minority side said yesterday, that we 
are facing a new day. There is plenty of blame to go around in the past 
about who or what or why we have huge deficits and budgets that are out 
of control.
  I certainly was not a Member of Congress during that period. I have 
been elected, and I think many other Members have been elected to try 
to reverse that dangerous trend and try to do something new, something 
that will eventually hopefully lead to a more balanced budget. The way 
to do that is to support the prosavings Clinger bill and oppose the 
Wise substitute.
  Mrs. COLLINS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the 
requisite number of words.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the gentleman's substitute.
  I have very serious reservations about line-item veto authority in 
any form. However, I firmly believe the proposed substitute is by far 
preferable to the authority in H.R. 2.
  H.R. 2 is by Chairman Clinger's own description, the strongest 
possible rescission authority there is. Members have equated it during 
this debate to the authority of many Governors. However, they are 
wrong, and by making that comparison they show how very little they 
know about H.R. 2.
  The authority in H.R. 2 is so strong that even many proponents of the 
line-item veto do not support it. In the Senate, Senator Domenici 
supports taking the approach that our colleague, Mr. Wise, takes in the 
substitute amendment we are now considering.
  In addition, many Members clearly do not understand what H.R. 2 
actually does. Throughout this debate, we have heard time and again 
that 43 Governors have line-item veto authority, so why should not the 
President also have the authority. However, the fact is that only 10 of 
those 43 Governors have authority that even comes close at all to the 
authority given the President that H.R. 2 provides.
  H.R. 2 does not simply let the President veto a particular line of 
spending authority in an appropriations bill, as many Governors can do. 
As the Congressional Research Service said, H.R. 2 would let a 
President reach ``as deep as he likes within an appropriations account 
to propose specific rescissions.''
  As a result, Dr. Robert Reischauer, Director of the Congressional 
Budget Office, testified before our committee that H.R. 2 gives the 
President ``greater potential power than a constitutionally approved 
item veto.''
  The potential for a President to abuse this extraordinary power is 
enormous. He could threaten to curtail funds for a particular Federal 
court, if he decides they are ruling against him too often. Given the 
fact that the executive branch is a party to about 50 percent of all 
cases before Federal courts, there are many reasons the President may 
want to exert influence over judges.
  However, the greatest abuse of power under H.R. 2 is that the 
President is assured of being able to make his rescission effective, as 
long as he has the support of one-third plus one of the Members in 
either the House or the Senate. This makes it highly unlikely that the 
Congress would be able to disapprove a Presidential rescission, except 
on rare occasions.
  The substitute being offered strikes a more responsible balance of 
power between the President and the Congress. The substitute does two 
very important things. Like under current law, the substitute says a 
Presidential rescission cannot go into effect unless the Congress 
approves it.
  Unlike current law, however, the substitute requires the Congress to 
vote on each and every rescission proposed by the President. The 
proposal offered by the gentleman would require the appropriations 
committees to report a bill implementing a President's proposed 
rescission within 7 days, or be discharged from further consideration. 
The rescission approval bill would then be considered on the floor 
within 10 days.
  This is a very reasonable alternative to H.R. 2. It also has a far 
better chance of being upheld by the courts. Under the substitute, 
Congress must fulfill its constitutional responsibility for 
appropriating revenues; the President's rescissions can only become 
effective by act of Congress.
  However, under H.R. 2 the President can sign appropriations bills and 
tax bills into law in a form that Congress never passed. Each Member of 
this body should think very hard before voting to give up his 
constitutional responsibilities for the Federal purse.
  On that point I would note that Assistant Attorney General Walter 
Dellenger challenged the constitutionality of H.R. 2 in testimony he 
gave last week before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Referring to 
authority in H.R. 2 that permits the President to veto targeted tax 
benefit, Mr. Dellenger said, and I quote:

       It does so by purporting to authorize the President to 
     ``veto'' targeted tax benefits after they become law, thus 
     resulting in their ``repeal''. * * * The use of the terms 
     ``veto'' and ``repeal'' is constitutionally problematic. 
     Article I, clause 7 of the Constitution provides that the 
     President only can exercise his ``veto'' power before a 
     provision becomes law. As for the word ``repeal,'' it 
     suggests that the President is being given authorization to 
     change existing law on his own. This arguably would violate 
     the plain textual provision of Article I, clause 7 of the 
     Constitution, governing the manner in which federal laws are 
     to be made and altered.

  Clearly, H.R. 2 has major constitutional problems. If you are for the 
line-item veto, you should, therefore, vote for the Wise substitute. It 
gives the President the authority and flexibility he needs, and it 
allows Congress to fulfill its constitutional responsibilities to tax 
and appropriate Federal revenues.
  I urge my colleagues to support the gentleman's amendment.
                              {time}  1200

  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, I must rise in opposition to the amendment by my good 
friend, the gentleman from West Virginia [Mr. Wise], who is a very 
[[Page H1175]] thoughtful and very helpful member of our committee.
  President Clinton has asked us to send him the strongest possible 
line-item veto. This proposed substitute is not the strongest possible 
line-item veto. This amendment would replace what we have from H.R. 2 
with little more than a very weak, in my view, nonfunctioning 
procedure. There is certainly no guarantee that the procedure would 
function, that which exists in current law and which has contributed to 
pass very wasteful spending.
  An expedited rescissions procedure, which is the procedure 
encompassed within the Wise amendment, simply attempts to speed up the 
current approval process, but it does not do that very efficiently. In 
fact, I think it does it rather poorly.
  The amendment would still permit a single House of Congress to kill 
the President's rescissions and force the release of moneys, which was 
the subject of the dialog with the gentleman from Virginia.
  Although an expedited rescission process would at least on its 
surface require Congress to vote on the President's rescissions 
proposal and therefore improve current law, those assurances are 
illusory. The proposed expedited procedures are offered solely under 
the rulemaking authority of Congress and can be readily waived.
  As we who have served in this body for sometime know, the rules have 
been routinely waived on matters of this sort. So there is nothing in 
this amendment that would ensure us, provide the absolute assurance 
that we would have a vote on these rescissions.
  In fact, that happened in 1992 when the requisite number of House 
Members sought to discharge appropriations of 96 rescissions. The rules 
were waived at that time to prevent the discharge, and Members were 
denied a vote on the President's rescissions proposal. In compliance 
with law the withheld funds were released, and wasteful spending 
occurred.
  I think the same sort of event could happen here by virtue of just 
allowing the rules to be waived. We would not get the assurance of a 
vote.
  While an expedited rescissions process attempts to ensure Members' 
chance to vote, nothing would prevent the Committee on Rules from once 
again waiving House rules and preventing a vote.
  I want to commend the gentleman on his attempt at deficit reduction 
through the inclusion of a lockbox in this amendment. However, that 
benefit will really mean little on the process unlikely to produce 
substantial rescissions in the first place.
  In other words, the lockbox is a good idea. In other words, we can 
get some sort of assurance that if rescissions take place, they will 
not then be subject to the authorizing committee using it for some 
other purpose, but would in fact go toward deficit reduction. I think 
that is a useful contribution.
  But if there is no insurance we are actually going to get the 
rescissions, and I do not think there is one with this process, the 
lockbox really is sort of meaningless.
  So because this amendment does little to improve our failed current 
system of impoundments and maintains the existing bias against spending 
cuts, I urge defeat of the amendment.
  Mr. WISE. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. CLINGER. I yield to the gentleman from West Virginia.
  Mr. WISE. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman made a couple of points, one of 
the same points the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Davis] made. As I 
understand it, it is criticizing our approach on the grounds that a 
single House, if the President's rescission were defeated in the House, 
that it would not even go to the Senate.
  But is it not also true that in the gentleman's proposal, one-third 
plus one in either House can deny a majority who would want to override 
the President's rescission?
  Mr. CLINGER. That is right.
  Mr. WISE. So the gentleman has a one-House veto, in effect, as well.
  Mr. CLINGER. But both Houses would have initially voted by a 
majority.
  Mr. WISE. That certainly is the case.
  Mr. CLINGER. We have a guarantee you get a vote. There is no such 
guarantee in the gentleman's amendment, because it could be waived.
  Mr. WISE. The President's rescission is handled as a bill with a 
guaranteed time within which there must be a vote in the first House it 
is introduced. If it is introduced in the House of Representatives, it 
has to be on the floor within 10 days, it must be voted on, up or down, 
as is the case with any bill. If it fails to get a majority vote, then, 
of course, the gentleman is correct, it does not go to the Senate.
  As I understand the gentleman, at the end of the day, not the 
majority vote that sends it back to the President, but at the end of 
the day, assuming the President vetoes the resolution of disapproval, 
it is true, is it not, that one-third plus one in either House could 
defeat the will of the majority in both Houses?
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. 
Clinger] has expired.
  (At the request of Mr. Wise and by unanimous consent, Mr. Wise was 
allowed to proceed for 3 additional minutes.)
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman is correct. But I think 
fundamentally we have a philosophic difference over how tight this 
provision should be. What we are saying is we want to make it as 
difficult as possible, as difficult as possible, for this House, which 
has proven in the past to not be able to restrain itself, to in fact 
deny the President the ability to cut spending.
  Mr. WISE. If the gentleman will continue to yield for another 
question, I just wanted to make sure it was understood that in our 
substitute, you cannot be tied up in committee. That if the committee 
fails to act within 7 legislative days of having received the package, 
then it is automatically discharged and put on the calendar for the 
next appropriate time. So there has to be full consideration by the 
first House at least.
  Mr. SABO. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. CLINGER. I yield to the gentleman from Minnesota.
  Mr. SABO. Mr. Chairman, I am just curious. I just thought I heard the 
gentleman say that the reason for this bill in this form was the 
inability of the Congress to control appropriated dollars. Is that 
accurate?
                              {time}  1210

  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, I am suggesting that 
the Congress, and I think we can apportion the blame on both sides, 
there has been an inability under existing procedures, certainly under 
the existing empowerment procedure for us to really effect cuts in 
spending, reductions in the deficit.
  Mr. SABO. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will continue to yield, I am 
curious. I heard my friend, the gentleman from Mississippi [Mr. 
Taylor], speak of this earlier. I am curious what the record is over 
the last 40 years in terms of requests for appropriated dollars versus 
what the Congress has appropriated.
  If I am not wrong, Presidents have traditionally, both historically 
and in recent years, whether it be Reagan, Bush or Clinton, they have 
all asked for more appropriated dollars than Congress has appropriated.
  Am I not right?
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, that may well be true, but I am suggesting 
to the gentleman that we are not blameless in this exercise of deficit 
reduction. As I indicated to the gentleman, we had an event in 1992, 
where an effort was made to try and deal with 1996 rescissions. We were 
not able to do that.
  The procedures we have now do not let us deal in an expeditious way 
with the requests to reduce.
  Mr. SABO. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will continue to yield, so I 
can understand this bill and the rationale for it here, to give 
unprecedented power to the President, is that the history is that 
Congress has appropriated less money than Presidents have asked for.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. 
Clinger] has expired.
  (On request of Mr. Sabo, and by unanimous consent, Mr. Clinger was 
allowed to proceed for 2 additional minutes.)
  [[Page H1176]] Mr. SABO. Mr. Chairman, Congress has passed as much or 
more rescissions in total than Presidents have asked for, that in the 
budget process we have strict spending limits on appropriated dollars.
  I am curious if the gentleman could tell me, clearly, where the large 
growth in Federal spending has occurred is entitlement programs. How 
does this bill deal with either existing, expanded, or new entitlement 
authority?
  Mr. CLINGER. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Chairman, this bill does not 
attempt to solve the problem that the gentleman is referring to. I 
think we all recognize that entitlements indeed are a major cause of 
the deficit problem we have. But we are, in this bill, approaching 
discretionary spending. It is a modest start.
  Clearly, the entitlement problem has to be addressed. It cannot be 
addressed in this bill, but I would join the gentleman in efforts to 
deal with what is clearly the burgeoning problem that we face in this 
country and the burgeoning problem that is creating the deficits we 
have which are the entitlement problem.
  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Wise amendment, and I know 
that my friends on both sides of the aisle who feel very strongly that 
for some reason we need a pure line-item veto, pure being defined as 
one-third plus one minority control, and there are those on both sides 
that feel that, I want to point out again that that is not what we are 
voting on in H.R. 2. This is not a pure line-item veto, because it is 
not being constitutionally imposed.
  I respect those who believe that we need to have stronger language 
than what is perceived to be in the modified version that the gentleman 
from West Virginia [Mr. Wise] is offering at this moment. I sincerely 
respect those who believe that the only way we can make this language 
stronger is somehow to give a President one-third plus one minority. I 
could not more sincerely or strongly disagree with that.
  What some have called a modified line-item veto or what we prefer to 
call expedited rescission procedure is the approach that many of us 
have always found preferable, both sides of the aisle. Under this 
scenario, a President still would be given the
 opportunity to propose cuts to individual spending or tax items. That 
is not in dispute with me. That is not in dispute with the substitute 
before us today. We all agree that any President may go into any bill, 
including all of the bills. I believe it ought to be entitlements. I 
believe it ought to be tax bills. I believe it ought to be everything. 
If we are going to do what we all want to do, and that is make it more 
difficult for us to spend money, that is, increase the deficit, we 
ought to, in fact, allow the President to have a more major role in 
doing so.

  The only question is, how much power do you wish to cede to a 
President. That is it.
  Under our scenario, within 10 legislative days after the President 
sent such a rescission package to the Congress, a vote on that package 
would be taken. We keep talking about the world as it has been. The 
world has changed. We are no longer operating under what we used to do.
  I do not anticipate we are going to see supplemental bills this thick 
hurting people's hands when they are dropped on the table. That is not 
going to happen under the leadership on this side, I do not believe.
  If a majority of Members voted to retain fundings--if, in fact, an 
individual Member chooses to differ with what a President suggests 
ought to be vetoed, I believe very strongly that an individual Member 
who differs with the President ought to have the opportunity to get an 
up and down vote on that individual item. The base bill was amended 
yesterday with the Thurman amendment to provide that that can happen. 
If it is a program of the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm] in 
question, if I can get 49 of my colleagues to agree on a separate vote, 
it will be taken separately. That is now in both bills.
  But if the remainder of the rescissions were approved by a simple 
majority of the House, the bill would then be sent to the Senate for 
consideration under the same expedited procedure.
  I want to put a little historical perspective to this amendment, 
because I certainly do not want to stand here and take partisan credit 
on behalf of the Democratic side for this amendment. Because expedited 
rescission legislation embodies an idea which many Members, both 
Democrats and Republicans, have fought hard for over the years. Dan 
Quayle first introduced expedited rescission legislation in 1985. Tom 
Carper and the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Armey] did yeoman's work in 
promoting this legislation. On the Democratic side the gentleman from 
South Dakota [Mr. Johnson], Dan Glickman, Tim Penny, the gentleman from 
Virginia [Mr.  Payne] have spent years, as have Lynn Martin, Bill 
Frenzel, the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon], the gentleman from 
Illinois [Mr. Fawell], and others, made meaningful contributions to the 
language that we are now debating.
  Of course, the language which we voted on last year was the Stenholm-
Penny-Kasich amendment. The deficit reduction prowess of my two cohorts 
in that effort is almost legendary and deservedly so. Thanks to effort 
of these and other Members, the House overwhelmingly passed expedited 
rescission legislation in each of the past 3 years.
  I do not in any way intend to imply that all Members have supported 
expedited rescission to the exclusion of, or even in preference to, a 
pure line-item veto, although this proposal was described a few years 
ago by the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] as a tremendous 
compromise that this House can support overwhelmingly on both sides of 
the aisle. My friend from New York has always made it clear that he 
prefers the one-third plus one approach. And again, I say to those who 
prefer giving the President that much power on any individual item in 
the budget, I respect that. But I differ strongly with that view.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm] has 
expired.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Stenholm was allowed to proceed for 5 
additional minutes.)
  Mr. STENHOLM. What I am saying is that in an overwhelmingly 
bipartisan way, Members have stated, through their words and their 
votes, that the expedited rescission procedure is a very good one, and 
I believe much preferable to the base bill. We must bring greater 
accountability to the appropriations process and the tax benefits 
process so that individual items may be considered on their individual 
merits.
  The current rescission process does not make the President or the 
Congress accountable. We all agree on that. Congress can ignore the 
President's rescissions. The President can blame the Congress, Congress 
can blame the President and nothing happens. But my friend from 
Massachusetts a moment ago, I believe, misunderstands H.R. 2. Because 
under H.R. 2, I will submit to my colleagues, there is not greater 
deficit reduction that will occur because under the base bill, if the 
President chooses to line-item veto x amount of spending and the 
Congress does nothing, that is, lets it take effect, the deficit is not 
removed because the caps on spending are not changed under the base 
bill.

                              {time}  1220

  Therefore, even though Members say it is much preferable, I believe a 
close examination of the language will show that the Wise amendment is 
much preferable if Members are interested in getting the deficit down 
by removing and lowering the caps.
  Another area in which the Wise amendment is much superior to H.R. 2, 
if Members are concerned about getting the deficit down, is the fact 
that we only, on tax items, say that there is a 10-day period in which 
it must be acted upon. Any other spending, the President can do it at 
any time during the year, not within a short period of time immediately 
following the appropriations process.
  If Members are really serious about getting the deficit down, which 
this Member is, it seems to me we would want to allow the President to 
go into these bills at any time and rescind at any point in time those 
spending measures. That seems to be preferable to only having to do it 
within a narrow window.
  I do not understand how H.R. 2 can be submitted as being stronger 
than the 
[[Page H1177]] Wise amendment when in both of these cases I think a 
fair examination would show that the Wise amendment is in fact much 
stronger, if Members are concerned about letting the President go in 
and veto the unnecessary spending items that we all agree need to be 
done. The general public is fed up with finger pointing.
  I guess I would just like to say in conclusion, Mr. Chairman, the 
only area of major disagreement that I have, and I think the debate 
last night on the Skelton amendment suddenly focused a lot of people's 
attention on what we are talking about, do Members really want to give 
any President the right to go into any bill, line item, and then only 
have to get one-third plus one of the Members of this body to agree? Is 
that really what we want to do? Do we really want to change the 
separation of powers to that extent?
  What we are saying in this substitute, let us let any President go 
into any bill, veto as much as he wishes to do, send it to us, and we 
must vote, we cannot duck, we must vote on those particular items. If 
it turns out to be one of our favorite programs, then we must get 49 of 
our colleagues to stand up and separate, so we vote on that 
individually. If it is Charlie Stenholm's favorite project, and I 
cannot get 50 percent of my colleagues to agree that money ought to be 
spent, it is gone, period, teetotaled.
  Therefore, I think it is very important that in this debate we 
understand and we read this legislation, because there is a gross 
misunderstanding of how strong H.R. 2 is for accomplishing the goals 
that we are all saying.
  I believe, upon an honest examination, the work of people going back 
to Dan Quayle in 1985, and going through a bipartisan effort since 
1985, will show that the language in the Wise amendment is much 
preferable if Members really and truly want to get on with line item 
vetoing individual appropriation bills, out of appropriation bills, and 
also going further in the area of tax and even into the area, perhaps 
some day, of entitlements, et cetera. That is not in the amendment 
before us.
  Mr. Chairman, I ask Members again, do they really want to change the 
power of the Constitution regarding the separation of powers? That is 
the only honest-to-goodness argument my colleagues on this side have, 
and some of my friends on this side.
  The only honest difference between the two is whether we want one-
third or 50 percent. The rest of it gets pretty hazy. In fact, I will 
submit again and again, and be glad to discuss privately, why H.R. 2 is 
weaker than Wise if Members in fact want to accomplish the goal of 
lowering the caps and lowering expenditures by congressional action.
  Mr. JOHNSON of South Dakota. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the 
requisite number of words.
  Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm] who has 
very ably explained the complication, the difficulty we have with the 
two-thirds vote.
  If in fact this Congress appropriated specific funds for a weapons 
systems or for a defense appropriations purpose and the President line-
item vetoed that expenditure, the President plus one-third and one vote 
would in fact overrun the will and the priorities of this Congress. The 
same could be said for any area of the Federal budget.
  However, let me say that while all of us are here on the floor today 
ostensibly to talk about ways to reduce the size of the Federal budget 
deficit, it distresses me that as this discussion has gone on, it has 
become very apparent that there are those on the other side, on the 
Republican side, who have consistently said ``Let's subject children's 
and veterans' and senior citizens' programs to reductions in 
spending,'' but have been unwilling to subject special tax favors that 
benefit largely the very wealthy contributors to Congress to the same 
kind of discipline. I think that is unfortunate.
  Here we are again, talking about ways to save money, to reduce the 
size of the deficit, when in fact the tax favors contribute as much to 
the deficit as any of the spending programs. Therefore, I do see this 
as a one-sided debate. Even so, however, I think it is important that 
we go forward as best we can.
  Mr. Chairman, one of the issues that it seems to me needs greater 
stress is this reference to the two-thirds vote as somehow being the 
stronger version. The two-thirds vote approach is not the stronger 
version, unless we are simply talking about enhancing the power of the 
President.
  If we are talking about cutting spending, the Wise amendment is the 
stronger version. The two-thirds vote results in a massive shift of 
authority to the executive branch, of whichever party that President 
might be.
  It will be used, as has often been the case at the State level, not 
to cut spending but in fact to enforce the budget agenda of the 
executive. I can imagine President Bush telling Members, individual 
Members of Congress, that ``Either you support my increase in foreign 
aid, or you will lose every increase in foreign aid, or you will lose 
every project in your State.'' I can imagine President Clinton saying 
``Support my health care plan, or you will lose every project in your 
State.''
  It is vote extortion that the two-thirds rule permits and in fact 
encourages. Better that we have the majority vote so the President can 
lay individual spending items on the table, say ``Congress, if you 
think this is a good thing to spend money on, you vote up-or-down. Go 
home and tell your constituents that you took a recorded rollcall vote 
that you thought that was a good thing to spend money on.''
  If the projects in my State are not meritorious enough to gain a 
majority vote, they should not be passed, but I do not think that a 
two-thirds vote is the proper shift of power. I think that it is 
something that this institution will rue for years to come.
  The question is, what is pork? I think that is fundamental to this 
entire debate. Pork is not something, a budget expenditure, the 
Congress favors over the President. A pork item is a project that is 
nonmeritorious, that would not stand on its own two legs. It would not 
stand a majority vote.
  What we are saying is let us cut them out. Let us have an opportunity 
for a recorded rollcall vote. Let us put the spotlight on them, so we 
reduce that kind of spending, and yet at the same time not give the 
authority to the executive branch, whether it be Republican or 
Democrat, to extort, to coerce votes out of the legislative branch. 
That is what is fundamental in this debate.
  Mr. Chairman, what we have here is a debate partly on reducing the 
deficit, although I think all of us who have looked at the budget 
carefully understand that pork barrel spending, however it is defined, 
is a relatively modest part of the problem; although I think we also 
would agree that if we can save a dollar, we ought to save a dollar, 
and we need to set about doing that.
  But the larger issue is congressional accountability: Will Congress 
be accountable to the people for its individual spending items? The 
Wise amendment does that.
  The other approach, the two-thirds vote approach, does not result in 
accountability. It simply results in greater authority for the 
executive branch to coerce votes for its legislative agenda, rather 
than for saving money, and rather than for enforcing congressional 
accountability.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of the Wise amendment, and 
encourage bipartisan support for this effort, which I think will be a 
very positive step in the direction of greater congressional 
accountability, reducing the Federal budget deficit. This is the 
approach which passed last year, which stands a chance of passing in 
the other Chamber. I think it is a badly needed reform.
  Mr. CLEMENT. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, this has been a great debate. These are things that we 
have needed to talk about for a long time. Going into my eighth year, I 
have had the opportunity to vote on a line-item veto two times now.
  We have passed it in the House of Representatives, but it was blocked 
in the U.S. Senate. I do not think we will ever have a better 
opportunity than now. We have our window of opportunity to pass a line-
item veto, but which one are we going to pass? Are we going to pass the 
Wise-Stenholm- 
[[Page H1178]] Spratt, which I support, or H.R. 2? In my opinion, the 
Wise amendment is the best one for us to consider and pass at this 
particular time.
  Mr. Chairman, it took us all the way from George Washington to Ronald 
Reagan to accumulate a national debt of $1 trillion, and in two 
administrations, in the Reagan and Bush administrations, we tripled 
that debt from $1 trillion to $3 trillion.

                              {time}  1230

  We saw more spending, or more proposed spending than even what the 
Congress authorized in those two administrations. We have seen a lot of 
irresponsibility not only in the presidential administrations, whether 
they be Democrat or Republican, but we have seen it in the U.S. 
Congress. All of us are in agreement that we have got to have more 
discipline than we have had before. But how do we accomplish that?
  In my opinion, the modified line-item veto is the answer to many of 
our problems. Every one of us as a Member of Congress has a laundry 
list of where we want to cut. Unfortunately, every one of us has a 
different list. Therefore, we do not cut anything.
  Now we have an opportunity, where if we pass some legislation, it 
goes to the President, and then he has to contemplate, ``Well, do I 
sign this particular bill or not?'' At least if he finds an area where 
we have waste and mismanagement, he can send that particular part of 
that legislation back to the U.S. Congress where he does not have to 
veto the entire package, and where he can line item and veto a 
particular part of the legislation, send it back to us where we can 
then make a determination, are we going to pass it and override it with 
a simple majority override, or are we going to take a different 
direction?
  But at least we can focus attention in that particular area, and the 
American people are going to come into the picture. Because even with a 
simple majority override, the American people are going to speak. They 
know. They keep up with us. They watch. They know what we are voting 
on, and they will be able to also influence whether we should vote for 
an override or not, whether this is waste or mismanagement, and move us 
toward a balanced budget.
  We have already passed a balanced budget amendment in the House of 
Representatives. Now we have an opportunity to pass the line-item veto. 
We are doing some great things in the U.S. Congress that I have been 
trying to do ever since I have been here, long before I knew what it 
meant when we called it a Contract for America. I did not know what a 
Contract for America was. Many of those things I will support which I 
think are in the best interests of America.
  Let us support the Wise-Stenholm-Spratt amendment. That is the best 
approach when it comes to having a modified line item veto, and what 
the American people need and want to bring about some fiscal discipline 
once and for all.
  Mr. DELLUMS. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, first I rise in support of the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from West Virginia [Mr. Wise], my distinguished colleague. 
But I recognize, as everyone in this Chamber recognizes, this amendment 
will fail, because that is not the nature of how this House is 
presently organized.
  So my remarks will go to the result of what will happen here.
  We are now in the final hours of our discussion and debate on the 
issue of the line-item veto. I would like to place this action in some 
kind of stark reality.
  Mr. Chairman, what we are about to do today and on Monday is going 
to, for the balance of our lifetimes, every single person in this 
Chamber for the balance of our lifetimes, we are changing the nature of 
American Government. And more people are probably watching a murder 
trial at this very moment than are paying attention to what we are 
about to do to the very fragile notion of the balance of power that has 
made this Government a shining light of democracy throughout the world.
  Mr. Chairman, first to the issue of vetoes generally.
  When the Founding persons, the Framers of the Constitution, the 
people who discussed and debated night and day for weeks and months to 
come up with our form of government arrived at a discussion of the 
power of the President to use a veto, they never, Mr. Chairman, 
anticipated that the President would use the veto as an ongoing regular 
instrument of governance, but that the President would use the veto 
rarely, only on rare occasions when the President really believed that 
the fate of the Nation and that the health of the people was in some 
way endangered; and that when the President on those few occasions used 
the veto, it would require two-thirds of the body of the direct 
representatives of the people, the Congress, to overturn that.
  When you read the Federalist Papers, you understand that the Framers 
did not want the President to use the veto on a regular basis because 
it would change the nature of our government.
  You ask the American people: What is the basic principle of American 
democracy? It is majority rule, 50 percent plus 1. The sad reality is 
that many American people are not even aware of the fact that it takes 
two-thirds to override a veto. If you do not believe me, call some town 
meetings, and you will be shocked at the level of sophistication about 
this issue, when people said, ``Wait a minute. You mean it takes two-
thirds to override a veto?''
  Absolutely. And if you have a combination, Mr. Chairman, of a 
President willing to aggressively use the veto as an instrument of 
governance, you can govern this country by what I refer to as the 
tyranny of the minority, because with a President willing to 
aggressively use the veto, one-third plus 1 can dominate the American 
political processes. Dominate it.
  Now we are talking about a line item veto which guarantees that veto 
will be used as an ongoing instrument of governance. Ongoing. Vetoes 
would now be in our lives with even greater flair, greater drama, and 
greater impact, giving one-third plus 1, not a simple majority, the 
ability to shape policy, Mr. Chairman.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from California [Mr. Dellums] 
has expired.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Dellums was allowed to proceed for 3 
additional minutes.)
  Mr. DELLUMS. Mr. Chairman, we are now giving the President of the 
United States, irrespective of party, power far beyond that 
contemplated by the persons who framed the nature of this Government. 
Far beyond it.
  But we are going to do this. As I understand the symbolism, we are 
going to do it by 2 p.m. on Monday, so that you give this legislation 
as a gift to a former President.
  Here is the greater danger. Once you do it, Mr. Chairman, it is not 
going to ever be undone. The American people need to wake up to the 
reality that this Government is being changed at such an extraordinary, 
fundamental level that any reasonable thinking human being should be 
disturbed by what we are about to do.
  Let me tell you why we will not change it. Two years from now, 
another group of people will come in here. Suppose someone says, ``My 
God, we gave the President this enormous power. Let's write a bill to 
rescind it.'' Do you think any President will give back power once you 
have given it to that President? They will veto it. And guess what? 
One-third plus 1 can kill it again.
  So understand, Members of the Committee you are changing American 
Government for all time. For all time.
  Yesterday someone offered an amendment to put a sunset provision in 
the bill. Let us stop this madness in 5 years if it does not work.
                              {time}  1240

  Vote that down so you do not even have an instrument to recapture the 
beauty and the magnificence that made this Constitution and this 
Government as framed by the founding persons, immortalized in the 
Federalist Papers by what we are doing here. We are rushing to judgment 
because a campaign promise was made.
  I believe in making campaign promises. I do not vilify them, but I 
have said before, and will repeat again today and tomorrow and after 
that, that when we move from campaign promise to legislative initiative 
that has this 
[[Page H1179]] kind of extraordinary and dramatic potential impact on 
the form of this Government, and on the American people's lives, the 
fundamental contract to the people is that we enter into a thoughtful 
enough processes to look efficaciously at what it is we are doing.
  What is so sacrosanct about 100 days when we are about to change the 
Government for 100 years? Whatever your politics, left, right, or 
center, that is not my argument here. I appreciate this system brings 
us here with different values and principles.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from California [Mr. Dellums] 
has expired.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Dellums was allowed to proceed for 1 
additional minute.)
  Mr. DELLUMS. So, Mr. Chairman, we can come and debate and engage each 
other substantively on the issues. We do not all have to think alike. 
That is frightening and dangerous anyway. What keeps the body politic 
honest and flowing healthy is when there are competing ideas. I can 
appreciate that.
  But the one place where we ought to come together and stand shoulder 
to shoulder and hip to hip is any time we contemplate changing the 
Government that has brought us over 200 years to this moment.
  Mr. Chairman, I know that my colleagues are going to do this thing, 
and my only hope, my only hope is that enough American people will 
awake even to the reality that their lives have been fundamentally 
altered, because their representatives, their responsibilities have 
been fundamentally changed, the Constitution has been fundamentally 
altered, the balance of power has been fundamentally altered, and if we 
ever want to establish an imperial Presidency and impotent Congress, 
wait until 2:30 on Monday, and that is exactly what we will have and it 
is frightening and disturbing.
  I am happy to engage any Member on this floor in a debate on the 
critical nature of what we are doing.
  Mr. MORAN. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, we have had a constructive debate, and many of the 
points that our colleague from California emphasized have been brought 
up in the course of amendments.
  This side is disappointed that many of those, all of those amendments 
really were defeated. Many of them were not even fully considered by 
most of this body.
  We just killed an amendment, the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. 
Spratt] and I had to apply the line item veto to tax bills as well as 
appropriation bills because those Members who have been around for any 
period of time, particularly in the last two terms, are aware that 
anything that is in an appropriations bill that could be considered 
pork gets subjected not only to the scrutiny of the Committee on 
Appropriations, but invariably we have to debate it and vote on it on 
this floor.
  Not so with tax bills. Tax bills are replete with special provisions. 
Newsweek this week pointed out the fact that this is the biggest 
loophole, and yet a provision to subject tax bills to the same kind of 
scrutiny was killed in committee, and just this morning killed on the 
floor.
  I offered an amendment to try to protect the separation of powers, 
reminding our colleagues that the people that served in this body in 
1939, and it was an overwhelmingly Democratic Congress and obviously a 
Democratic President, passed a law designed to protect the judiciary. 
This line item veto essentially repeals that law.
  When President Roosevelt could not pack the Court and the Court would 
not go along with his New Deal, he started cutting out bailiffs' money, 
he started cutting the money for Court clerks, he took away their 
travel funds. He punished them. He used the power of the Presidency, 
which, in fact, was too much at that time in the view of the 
legislative branch, and so it passed a law saying that the executive 
branch has to pass through whatever request is made for the judiciary. 
The legislative branch, which does not litigate before the Supreme 
Court and thus does not have that conflict of interest, knowing that 
the Justice Department brings more than half of the cases before the 
Supreme Court and has a clear conflict of interest, it has to pass it 
on to the legislative branch, and the legislative Appropriations 
Committee does what- ever is necessary.
  We are talking about a very small amount of money. We are not talking 
about busting the budget, we are not even talking about any courthouse 
construction, just small items that allow the Supreme Court to 
function. But now all of these items are subject to line-item veto.
  That was a mistake. When President Eisenhower called Chief Justice 
Warren and suggested to him it was not time to desegregate the schools 
and Chief Justice Warren said well, I am going to do what I think is 
right, he had that independence because he knew there was no way that 
the President, the executive branch could punish him if he did 
differently than what the executive branch offered.
  But now we are going to repeal that, we are going to give 
extraordinary power to the executive branch.
  I worked for President Johnson, and for President Nixon, and I was on 
the staff of the Senate Committee on Appropriations during the terms of 
President Ford and President Carter.
  I know that President Ford and President Carter would have observed 
the basic principle of separation of powers. They probably would not 
have abused the line-item veto. But let me tell my colleagues that 
President Nixon would have, in my opinion, and President Johnson, 
because he knew where everything was buried or he knew every project 
that had gotten through the Senate, every special tax provision, he 
would have abused it outrageously.
  I think we ought to recognize the threat to the fundamental 
principles that our forefathers put into the Constitution, the 
fundamental principle of separation of powers.
  That is why this kind of amendment is so important, this substitute 
amendment, because it preserves some balance. The bill that is 
invariably going to get enacted because this side is marching in 
lockstep now, does fundamental damage to the basic structure of this 
Government.
  I would just conclude by saying one last thing.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Moran] has 
expired.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Moran was allowed to proceed for 1\1/2\ 
additional minutes.)
  Mr. MORAN. Mr. Chairman, no one in the 21st century even, which is 
about to occur within another 5 years, no one is really going to 
remember our faces or our names or even the words that we utter here on 
the floor of the House. But they will remember what we did, because it 
will affect their lives.
  We represent the most prosperous nation on Earth, the freest nation 
on Earth, the Nation that has the most respect for human rights, for 
civil rights, a legislative body that people all over the world are 
coming to study. All these emerging democracies come over here to see 
how we operate. We are a model for the world, we are a model for the 
20th century. We should be going into the 21st century building upon 
our strength and not eroding it, as this bill does.

                              {time}  1250

  Mr. HOSTETTLER. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number 
of words.
  Mr. Chairman, we are in a crisis in this country, and that crisis is 
one of fiscal irresponsibility.
  We talked about campaign promises, the gentleman from California did, 
and he is exactly right, because there are three constituents back in 
my district, my three children, that I have a great responsibility to 
now.
  And we are hearing all sorts of rhetoric from the other side, but 
there are really two discussions going on on the other side, and I 
would just like to possibly get some clarification on those, the first 
of which is that this proposed line-item veto will give two-thirds 
majority veto power to the President, and that will be too much power. 
But in the campaign, as I ran against a Democrat incumbent, I was told 
through the media, through my opponent and from the Democrat Party in 
general that the reason why my children have such a burden on them is 
because of 12 years of Republican rule, because for 12 years Republican 
Presidents spent too much money.
  [[Page H1180]] So let us just back up one moment to the Constitution. 
The Constitution gives the appropriating powers to the U.S. Congress, 
and if the Congress chooses not to appropriate funds, those moneys are 
not spent.
  So my question is this: As we hear that this will give the President 
too much power, is this more power than supposedly Ronald Reagan had, 
more power than supposedly George Bush had to control spending and, 
therefore, put my children's future in graver risk? Or was it incorrect 
on the campaign trail, which at times we all tend to get a little 
verbose on the campaign trail, but was it not true that it was the 
fault of the appropriating body, according to the Constitution? Was it 
the problem of the appropriating body that my children have this debt?
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. HOSTETTLER. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, it seems to me that anybody who was here at 
that time ought to admit that it was a failure of both institutions, 
the Congress and the President. But I would make quite clear, if the 
gentleman would bear with me, the fact is that since the Impoundment 
Act passed, or since the Budget Act passed, in 1974, the Congress has 
spent $20 billion less, less, than Presidents asked us to spend.
  Mr. HOSTETTLER. Reclaiming my time once again, $20 billion less. But 
how much more in debt? How many times was the debt limit raised?
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Hostettler] 
has expired.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Hostettler was allowed to proceed for 2 
additional minutes.)
  Mr. HOSTETTLER. Mr. Chairman, how many times was the debt limit 
raised as a result of a majority vote of this House?
  Mr. OBEY. If the gentleman will yield further, I was here in 1981. I 
offered the major alternatives to both the Reagan budget and the 
Democratic budget, because I thought that both of them broke the bank. 
Our substitute, which a majority of Democrats voted for, borrowed less 
and spent less than any other alternative before the body.
  I do not think it is useful to get into who shot John in the past. 
But if the gentleman wants to do that, the record is clear.
  Mr. HOSTETTLER. No. But we have today shot John once again in the 
past. I am not running in lockstep, as you all know, with this side, 
but what we must do is we must give the President the power, since this 
body has proven time and time again that it cannot do that. We must 
give the President the power that was supposedly given to him, 
according to the campaign rhetoric that was there, and if that is the 
case, then we will bring fiscal responsibility to this Federal 
Government, and we will not continue down the same path. That is why we 
need to give this two-thirds power, not because we are giving 
overwhelming power to the President, but because we are in a crisis, a 
fiscal crisis.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I ask that the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. 
Hostettler] be allowed 2 more minutes.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from Indiana has time remaining.
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that the gentleman 
from Indiana [Mr. Hostettler] be granted an additional 5 minutes.
  The CHAIRMAN. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from 
Maryland?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will yield further, let me 
simply say I respect the gentleman. I respect the vote he cast last 
week.
  But I want to tell you the same story I told in the Committee on 
Rules.
  The reason that I believe it is so critically important to have 
majority rather than two-thirds decide this issue is because I think 
the most fundamental threat to the long-term liberty of this country 
lies in the unchecked use of Executive power, and I want to give you an 
example.
  I told the Committee on Rules that when I was in the State 
legislature back in 1968 and I was passionately supporting Lyndon 
Johnson's reelection, I wrote a letter to the President and simply told 
him that, in my judgment, if he did not do something to end the Vietnam 
war, that he was going to lose the Wisconsin primary.
  Hubert Humphrey came to town. I showed him the letter, and I told him 
I was about to send it to LBJ. Hubert said, ``Let me give it to him 
myself.'' He said, ``I think you are right on the letter. I would like 
to show it to him.'' I said, ``Look, I will mail it anyway, because I 
do not want you to get in a crack.'' He took a copy of it and presented 
it to the President.
  A couple weeks later I get a call from a friend, ``Obey, what is this 
job you are being considered for in Washington?'' I said, ``What do you 
mean?'' He said, ``Well,'' he said, ``we had a Federal guy by here 
asking questions about you.''
  To make a long story short, if you had Federal people asking 
questions about me, checking me out because I had the temerity to tell 
a sitting President he was going to lose his seat because of a very 
important public issue, now, if you have that kind of tendency on the 
part of any President to use whatever Executive power is around, what 
happens the next time we have a Mexican loan bailout before us and you 
have a two-thirds requirement to overturn a President's decision? And 
that President goes to you, or me, and says, ``If you do not vote for 
that proposition, that $40 billion proposition, I am going to yank 
every single thing out of your State, and I have got one-third 
loyalists in this House, and, baby, you will not get a dime''; it will 
destroy the uniqueness of this Congress.
  Mr. HOSTETTLER. Reclaiming my time, the point is that we are in a 
crisis; this body. You, sir, there is no doubt that you have the 
responsibility to the Constitution and to your constituents, but this 
body as a whole has shown time and time again it does not have that 
responsibility.
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. HOSTETTLER. I yield to the gentleman from California.
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  What we are trying to do is the Presidents, the early Presidents, had 
the right of a two-thirds majority to control that, that a bill came to 
them as a single bill. Now we have got hundreds of bills wrapped up 
into one. Jefferson and Lincoln and the Presidents had to have a two-
thirds vote to override their veto, and that is all we are asking under 
this.
  And, second, we have precedents by our Governors having the same kind 
of a thing, and it has been very successful.
  Mr. KANJORSKI. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  I would appreciate it if the gentleman from Indiana will stay, 
because I think he has brought up a tremendous question, a very, very 
important question, and I think it requires some analysis of history.
  When you talk about the crisis that we are in, I am not sure that 
everyone can appreciate, or whether you appreciate, where we are 
relative to where we have been in the past. I know the gentleman from 
Indiana probably was not born at the end of the Second World War. I 
assume that.
  Well, at the end of the Second World War, do you know what the debt 
of the United States was? Well, I mean, if we can just have a give and 
take.
  Mr. HOSTETTLER. Proportionately it was much greater. You are right.
  Mr. KANJORSKI. The debt at the end of the Second World War was $350 
billion. Do you know what the present value of a 1994 dollar is 
relative to a 1945 dollar?
  Mr. HOSTETTLER. Substantially higher.
  Mr. KANJORSKI. It is about 8 cents. So that means the dollar has 
deflated by 12 times. So if you will multiply $350 billion by 12, you 
will find today that the debt of the United States is about equal in 
amount, in dollar amount, real value amount, as it was when we came out 
of the Second World War.
  Now, I have been here for 10 years, and I have heard my friends on 
the other side talk about debt and dollars and failed to relate real 
dollars and real debt.
  And I want to point out that the magnificence of what happened from 
1945 to 1980 was that this country reduced the real debt of the United 
States by more than 60 percent, even 
[[Page H1181]] though in 1980 the dollar debt of the United States was 
$800 billion. Its real value, relative to 1945 terms, was about $100 
billion.

                              {time}  1300

  We brought that down 60 percent under a Democrat-controlled Congress 
from 1945 until 1980. Ronald Reagan entered the Presidency and sold the 
American people on a campaign that he could double defense 
expenditures, he could reduce taxation on the wealthy of this country, 
coming down from 70 percent to 28 percent ultimately during his 
administration, and he could balance the budget.
  He did keep two of those promises. He doubled the defense 
expenditures of this country. Even though Russia in every study in the 
1980's was shown as ready to collapse, we still doubled our military 
expenses. He also cut the income tax on the wealthiest corporations and 
the wealthiest individuals from 70 percent to 28 percent. He did make 
one little error, one little error: He took the debt of the United 
States from $800 billion to $4.2 trillion in his term of administration 
of office.
  I hear people relating all these dollar terms, you talk about crisis. 
I want to make sure that you understand that the debt of the United 
States coming out of the Second World War was about $350 billion, about 
equal to our debt today. The only difference is that the population of 
the United States in 1945 was 120 million people and today the 
population of the United States is about 260 million people. The number 
of corporations and businesses existing in the United States in 1945 
were less than one-fifth of what they are today. So when anyone in 
America today, and my conservative friends on that side are talking 
about dollars and dollars, 1995 dollars and 1945 dollars, they are 
talking about grapefruits and grapes in size. You cannot have an 
intelligent, intellectual discussion in finance or economics when you 
do not come down to real values. So if you say we are in crisis today 
when we have more than twice the population, we have five times as many 
eceonomic enterprises in the United States, then I cannot imagine what 
terms you would use in a description of 1945.
  The fact of the matter is America is the wealthiest nation on Earth 
and up until the last 10 to 15 years its population has been benefiting 
from the increase in productivity in America, but it has stagnated. It 
has stagnated because of many situations, most of which is the advent 
of the global market.
  Mr. LaHOOD. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. KANJORSKI. I am happy to yield to the gentleman from Illinois.
  Mr. LaHOOD. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, the gentleman from Pennsylvania, I am afraid, like a 
number of other of his colleagues on that side, has been around here 
too long. What he has just said--listen, I am not trying to----
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman will suspend.
  The time of the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Kanjorski] has 
expired.
  Mr. KANJORSKI. I appreciate that the gentleman does not appreciate my 
tenure in office. But I oppose him making an ad hominem attack on the 
House floor.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Kanjorski was allowed to proceed for 5 
additional minutes.)
  Mr. KANJORSKI. Mr. Chairman, instead of an ad hominem attack on the 
floor, let us assume we are both freshmen here.
  Mr. LaHOOD. Let me finish here, let me finish.
  Mrs. COLLINS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, regular order, regular order.
  Mr. KANJORSKI. Let us talk about the facts and the figures that have 
been discussed.
  Mr. LaHOOD. Is the gentleman going to yield?
  Mr. KANJORSKI. I am happy to, but I would appreciate that we not get 
a personal attack because, quite frankly, I enjoy the individual as he 
represents his State and his constituents, and I think the comity of 
the House is that we rise here not for personal purposes or political 
purposes, but to do the people's business. As long as we talk in terms 
of doing the people's business, I am very happy to yield to my friend.
  Mr. LaHOOD. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  First of all, to the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Kanjorski], I 
in no way meant to offend him. If I did, I apologize for doing that.
  Mr. KANJORSKI. No offense.
  Mr. LaHOOD. Here is my point, sir, here is my point. Those of us just 
elected in the last election came here with the idea that this 
institution has not had the discipline to balance its budget for too 
long and for many, many years.
  Mr. KANJORSKI. OK, let us stop there, reclaiming my time. Let us go 
through the discussion. I will recall my time and respond to that. I 
know that the gentleman came here with that intention or that thought 
process. What I am indicating to him, unfortunately the facts of the 
economic history of the United States do not bear out this case.
  Now, if we are really going to talk about what we are doing and what 
the fault of the Government is, what the fault of the position of the 
United States is, there is nothing wrong with discussing the true facts 
and real facts in trying to resolve good policy for the United States 
to be fiscally responsible. We want to do that on our side of the 
aisle, you want to do it your side of the aisle. But to constantly 
discuss grapefruits and grapes because we are talking about 1995 
dollars and 1945 dollars or 1960 dollars and trying to lay down some 
indictment, as I have heard, 40 years of indictment; well, the 40 years 
that you are indicting, my friend, this side of the aisle presided over 
a 60-percent real reduction in the debt of the United States and it was 
only until the election of a President from your party back in 1980 
that that was reversed, and it was reversed on a public relations 
gimmick. He promised the American people three facts and did not keep 
them.
  Mr. LaHOOD. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. KANJORSKI. I yield to the gentleman.
  Mr. LaHOOD. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, the results of the last election speak volumes. May I 
finish, sir? Thank you. The results of the last election speak volumes 
in terms of this particular issue. Many of us were elected on the idea 
that this institution has not had the discipline to balance its budgets 
for whatever reasons. Please let me finish, sir, make my point, and 
then you may continue, sir.
  We believe the way to bring discipline to the institution is to pass 
a balanced budget amendment, to give the President the line-item veto 
so that when we have these monumental bills that some have called 
Christmas trees, where we all load up with our special projects--and it 
has gone on for years on both sides of the aisle, not just your side 
but on our side, too--that there is a mechanism in place to deal with 
it. That is my point.
  Mr. KANJORKSI. I reclaim my time, and I will yield to the gentleman 
from Wisconsin.
  Mr. OBEY. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, let me make something very clear: I am going to offer 
an amendment here very quickly, I hope, that will enable us to get at 
every single project that was adopted last year. But I want to point 
out something to the gentleman: There is not a single earmark that was 
added under our congressional processes that has added one dime to the 
deficit because, as the gentleman very well knows, every subcommittee 
that comes out on this floor, every appropriations subcommittee comes 
out under a fiscal cap imposed by this institution under the 602(b) 
allocation.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time is controlled by the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania [Mr. Kanjorski], who needs to remain on his feet.
  The gentleman may proceed.
  Mr. OBEY. As I was trying to say, every single earmark, because of 
the fact that every single subcommittee comes to this floor under a 
fiscal cap, those earmarks are provided at the expense of other 
spending, but do not add one dime to the deficit. If you want to take a 
look at the root cause of the deficit--you can argue about the 
propriety of those earmarks, and I will share the gentleman's concern 
about many of them--but you cannot, with a straight face, suggest that 
they have added to the deficit because under the 
[[Page H1182]] budget rules, which we all helped write, they do not do 
that. They do not do that. They simply come at the expense of other 
spending. That may not be good practice, but it does not make the 
gentleman's point.
  Mr. WILLIAMS. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  My colleagues, let me begin with the obligatory statement that I, 
too, support the line-item veto. I happen to support it in the manner 
in which it is before us now rather than in the basic bill. That is 
what I voted for a year or so ago and most of my colleagues in the 
House, both Republicans and Democrats, voted that way likewise.
  My colleagues, if Rip Van Winkle fell asleep a couple of hundred 
years ago and then reawakened in this gallery anytime during the last 
30 days, he would probably believe that he has awakened as a witness to 
America's second Constitutional Convention. He probably would not 
recognize this as a Congress legislating individual laws, but rather as 
a convention either mightily tinkering with or dramatically changing 
the basic law of the land. But it is not Rip Van Winkle's ghost I want 
to talk about for a couple of minutes; it is James Madison.
  On that May 3d day 208 years ago, James Madison entered the city of 
Philadelphia, a city of 40,000 people back than, along with several, in 
fact, several dozen of his colleagues. Elbridge Gerry, whose descendant 
was standing in the corner just a few minutes ago, George Mason, 
Colonel Mason, and others. They were attacked by radicals of the day, 
led primarily by Patrick Henry.
                              {time}  1310

  Mr. Chairman, their work, when they finished it, the Constitution of 
the United States, is perhaps understandably still attacked today. It 
is attacked continually by the extreme left, by those who say that it 
excludes ordinary individuals from participation in their government.
  Likewise, Mr. Chairman, it has been attacked, as it has been 
continually during the past 30 days, by the extreme right in this House 
because they believe that it has created a strong central government 
that stifles liberty.
  Those are the same attacks that were leveled against Madison and his 
colleagues 200 years ago.
  Most Americans understand what the Constitution of the United States 
is. It is a basic rule of law. It is not a treaty from which one party 
or the other can withdraw at their convenience. It is not a set of 
agreements which swing is the political wind and can be altered 
according to the latest polling results. It is our principles. It is 
the principles that have been duly established and carefully preserved; 
yes, on the floor of this House at the cost of the seats of some of the 
Members in the past who have fought to preserve it. It is to be changed 
in whole or in part with the greatest care and caution.
  While I would not be arrogant enough to presume what James Madison 
would say were he allowed to stand in the gallery and give us his 
thoughts over this last month, I think he would say, ``Be careful. Be 
careful because you are tinkering with the political law of gravity, 
and when you alter it, you risk throwing out of orbit those items of 
stability that have kept America connected, and at peace, and sound and 
whole.''
  Mr. Chairman, it is not our economic might; it is the simple set of 
principles on that piece of paper that continues the stability of this 
Nation. It is the center of our political gravity, and James Madison 
would probably look on a supermajority required to legislate; yes, even 
to overturn the power of a President; as changing that gravitational 
pull, one branch of government to the other.
  As I said, I would not be arrogant enough to say what James Madison 
might say, so let me say to my colleagues what the gentleman from 
Montana [Mr. Williams] might say:
  Be careful, be careful, be careful.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee, I traveled to Paris, France, 
once in my life--on my own ticket, by the way--and, as a Cajun in 
Paris, Mr. Chairman, I discovered something that I have had to remind 
myself about frequently in the course of my life. We Cajuns call a 
truck a trook. The Parisians call it a camionner. When a Cajun wants to 
agree with someone or indicate that someone has said something he 
agrees with, he says, ``tu kar ray.'' It is just sort of a Cajun 
French-ized expression of ``You're right.'' In French they say, ``Vous 
avez raison.''
  I came to understand, as I struggled to communicate with my fellow 
Frenchmen in ancestry that, while we spoke the same language, we had a 
little trouble understanding each other in that same language, and so 
it is with the English language. Many of us rise today to support the 
concept of a line-item veto. We believe, as our Constitution provides, 
that a supermajority of the Members of this body ought to be had to 
override a President when he vetoes an act of Congress. That is in our 
Constitution right now, and we believe that that extraordinary 
authority ought to be extended when this Congress is irresponsible 
enough to overspend its budget.
  So, Mr. Chairman, this amendment comes before us today, this bill 
comes before us today, in its present form that says the President can 
use the line-item veto now in extension of the veto authority given to 
him by the Constitution. ``The line-item veto to reduce the deficit''; 
that is the language in the bill. In short it says, ``If the Congress 
is irresponsible and does not balance the budget, the congressional 
grant of authority to the President is to use the line-item veto to 
enforce responsibility to bring that deficit down.'' The bill does not 
say, as do a few States of our Nation, that that authority belongs to 
the Governor or this President even when the Congress is responsible.
  That is a serious change of law, a serious change of the balance of 
power between the Executive and the legislative branch.
  I say to my colleagues, ``We have checks and balances in our 
Constitution. If you extend the power of the President to line-item 
veto anything, even when the Congress has been responsible and balanced 
the budget, you no longer have checks and balances. You
 got checkmate and imbalance.''

  So, Mr. Chairman, I suggest to my colleagues that the question of 
whether they want the President to override the--I mean the Congress to 
override the line-item veto by a two-thirds majority or by a simple 
majority, as in the amendment before us, depends mightily upon whether 
or not the bill, in its final form, will remain a bill that gives the 
power to the President to line-item-veto items that constitute deficit 
spending, or whether my colleagues want to go further and give the 
President that power even when the Congress is responsible enough to 
balance the budget.
  Later on in this debate I am going to suggest to the Congress an 
amendment to this bill that would further enforce that notion.
  I must apologize. I confused a couple of analogies in this graph. 
Bear with me. It is called the glidepath amendment to this bill. It is 
called the glidepath amendment because like an airplane coming in for a 
landing it follows a glidepath, and that is what we are obliged to do 
to get to a balanced budget by the year 2002. If we stay on the 
glidepath, on the CBO-projected numbers each year of how much deficit 
we are allowed to incur, as we reach the balanced budget amendment date 
of the year 2002, Mr. Chairman, we will land safely. As to this 
football field, we score the touchdown. Hence my two analogies.
  What I am going to suggest to my colleagues, and I hope that all of 
us really think about this, is that, if this bill is truly a bill to 
enforce responsibility on the Congress, if it is truly a bill as are 
the bills that were passed in 33 of the 43 States that give line-item 
authority to their Governors, then this amendment is vitally necessary. 
Why? Because in the 43 States which give line-item veto authority to 
their Governor, three out of four of those States say that authority is 
limited to the line-item vetoing of items that constitute deficit 
spending. In our case, unlike those 43 States, we cannot, and my 
colleagues know it, I know it, produce a balanced budget this year. We 
cannot do it without enormously destroying entitlement programs, 
[[Page H1183]] many of which, like Social Security, none of us want to 
hurt.
                              {time}  1320

  So it will take us time. We all know it. That is why we passed the 
balanced budget amendment that gives us this glidepath to the touchdown 
at the year 2002.
  If we know that and are honest and realistic about it, what is the 
responsibility of the Congress during the years in which we work toward 
that touchdown of a balanced budget? The responsibility is to stay 
under those CBO numbers. If we do not, we will not reach this goal. If 
we do, we have been responsible according to the balanced budget 
amendment we passed.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Tauzin] 
has expired.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to proceed for 3 
additional minutes.
  The CHAIRMAN. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from 
Louisiana?
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, reserving the right to object, and I 
probably will not object. Let me just take this opportunity to say to 
my good friend that I know we have been on this amendment for a number 
of hours now. We wanted to try to rise by 3 o'clock. There is a 
snowstorm coming. It is hitting out in the Midwest right now in the 
Chicago area and heaven knows where else.
  We have a number of amendments we have to get through, no matter what 
time it takes. I will say to my good friend, the gentleman is debating 
his amendment which is going to come up a little later. We just have to 
move it. Participation on this side is necessary, but let us be as 
brief as we can and get to final passage of this amendment.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. SOLOMON. I yield to the gentleman from Louisiana.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, I am not yet debating this amendment. I am 
saying if we do not adopt this amendment later, we ought to vote for 
the majority override that is before us.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, I withdraw my reservation of objection.
  The CHAIRMAN. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from 
Louisiana?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Chairman, the bottom line is if you are going to pass 
a bill that gives the President line-item veto, even when this Congress 
has been responsible, you are creating all of the problems that many 
have risen to the mike and spoken about today and yesterday. You are 
creating the problems of a President who has the authority to cajole, 
coerce, in some cases even politically blackmail Members of this body, 
even when the Congress has been responsible.
  Now, if you want to give this Congress the same power legislators 
have to protect against that, and at the same time you want to use a 
line-item veto as a tool to enforce congressional responsibility, to 
enforce the balanced budget amendment we recently adopted, this kind of 
an amendment will do it.
  On the other hand, if this bill is changed, as it may be changed, to 
go beyond deficit line-item reduction by line-item veto, to go beyond 
that point, then maybe you better consider the majority override. That 
is my point today.
  I will support a two-thirds majority override as long as the line-
item veto is like the three-quarters of our States provide, designed to 
protect against irresponsibility on the part of the legislature, 
designed to guarantee line-item veto authority to the Governor or the 
President for any deficit spending beyond the area of responsibility, 
as in this case beyond the CBO numbers and eventually beyond the 
balanced budget requirements of the Constitution.
  This will come up later. But I caution you, if this bill is changed 
from a deficit reduction line-item veto into something else, and I am 
told that amendment may be offered later, then I suggest that the 
majority override is the right way to go. Perhaps we should get some 
signal on that before we vote on the amendment pending before us.
  Mr. SKAGGS. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, the question is, majority rule, or minority rule?
  This is my voting card. Each of us is privileged to possess one of 
these. We worked hard for it. It represents a sacred trust, not just 
between us and our constituents, but between us and all who have come 
before us in this body and all who will follow.
  I was not elected, figuratively or literally speaking, to clip about 
one-sixth off of this voting card, walk down Pennsylvania Avenue, and 
throw it over the White House fence. That would be an incredible breach 
of the sacred trust that every Member of this body should try to honor.
  Our responsibility is to the Congresses of the future and to the 
future generations who will be looking to the Congresses of the future 
to provide the principal protection against overreaching by Presidents 
of the United States.
  The gentleman from Montana and the gentleman from Wisconsin have 
given us real reasons to worry about that. This is not some illusory or 
academic point. The threats to liberty in this country have not arisen 
here, and they will not. But we should be mindful of the risk that we 
run by a wholesale transfer of power to the executive branch.
  The issue here ought to be one of accountability. The amendment 
offered by the gentleman from West Virginia [Mr. Wise] meets that 
purpose. It will put us all on record when we need to be put on record 
with regard to particular items of spending.
  But what we do not need to do in the cause of that accountability is 
commit an outrage against the Constitution in a wholesale transfer of 
power, entrusted to us by the Constitution, to the President of the 
United States.
  Let me give one further example of what is really involved here. The 
budgets sent to this Congress by President Reagan, among other things, 
proposed, for example, a zeroing out of direct student loans, a zeroing 
out of aid to public libraries, a zeroing out of Federal-State 
vocational rehabilitation programs, a zeroing out of college work 
study, a zeroing out of funding for education for individuals with 
disabilities.
  Had that President had this power, those programs would be gone, 
because that President would have had the support of a loyal and true 
one-third plus one, if not in this body, then across the building in 
the Senate.
  This is not some imaginary worry. That is what is at issue here. And 
if we are to honor the Constitution and to honor our responsibilities 
and to adhere to our oath of office, the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from West Virginia [Mr. Wise] meets that responsibility and 
does not violate the Constitution.
  The committee's bill represents a profound breach of our oath and our 
duty to ourselves and to the Constitution.
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise as one who supported the constitutional 
amendment to balance the budget. It was the constitutional amendment 
that did not require, however, an extraordinary majority to pay for 
what we buy, unlike spending.
  The gentleman from Illinois rose and said that he was elected and he 
thought the American public had responded to a fundamental issue that 
this body had been fiscally irresponsible. I believe that many voters 
have been misled to come to that conclusion, and I think it is a 
fundamental misunderstanding of the facts of the last 14 years in 
which, as the gentleman from Pennsylvania pointed out, we quadrupled 
the national debt.
  We did so because the President of the United States wanted to buy 
his priorities, and the Congress of the United States wanted to buy its 
priorities. And neither the President nor the Congress made choices to 
bring within revenues its spending objectives.
  The gentleman from Illinois again posited that we were here because 
of congressional irresponsibility
 and that this rescission bill obviously was a response to that.

  It is important for us to remember that for the past 20 years 
Presidents have asked for $72 billion in rescissions. This Congress 
over the last 20 years has rescinded $92 billion, more than the 
Presidents have asked.
  So I suggest to the gentleman from Illinois, to the Congress, and to 
the American public, in fact this Congress 
[[Page H1184]] has been willing to do more than Presidents have asked 
in terms of rescissions.
  Now, rescissions are just another way of line-item vetoes, but it 
does not carry the muscle, which is what the gentleman wants to add.

                              {time}  1330

  But his facts do not support it, or at least the facts do not support 
it.
  I want to say also to my friend from New York, who is a very good 
friend of mine, we agree on much, disagree on some. He wants to move 
this bill along quickly. I respectfully suggest to him, this bill is 
not a birthday present. My friend from California referenced that. This 
is a very fundamental proposition that this Congress is considering.
  The minority for the last 40 years in this House is now the majority, 
but I suggest to them they have not come to grips with majority rule 
because they, for two previous occasions in their rule on tax increases 
and on their constitutional amendment, suggest that it ought to be the 
minority, not the majority, that controls.
  And this is the third time that they have proposed that the majority 
should not rule. That is unfortunate, in a country, as the gentleman 
from California so eloquently stated, that is the beacon for majorities 
throughout this world.
  Katherin Drinker Bowen wrote of the miracle in Philadelphia in 1787, 
when the Founding Fathers came together and, like us, had differences. 
And I am sure that they had great suspicions of what the people might 
do. In fact, the U.S. Senate was juxtapositioned to the House of 
Representatives to try to leaven what the people's House might do in 
fits of passion.
  But the fact of the matter is, the Stenholm-Spratt-Wise amendment 
responds to the concerns of the American public.
  What were they? To some degree the gentleman is right. They believed 
that somehow we were out of control in terms of pork barrel projects. 
In fact, pork barrel projects are a relatively small portion of the 
budget, as any fair analysis of the budget will show. But they were 
concerned about that.
  I remember the Lawrence Welk house, the birthplace of Lawrence Welk. 
Somebody had put in $500,000 to rehabilitate that house and set it 
aside as a national landmark. Most of us did not know it was in the 
bill. The American public found out about it and were outraged. We took 
it out.
  I suggest to my colleagues, that is the reason that the line-item 
veto got a life.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Hoyer] has 
expired.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Hoyer was allowed to proceed for 2 
additional minutes.)
  Mr. HOYER. The American public wanted to say, Mr. President, if you 
see some projects in there that are not wise policy or not needed or 
inappropriate to be in appropriations bills, then take them out, Mr. 
President.
  Now, the President of the United States said, ``I don't have that 
authority. I would have to veto the entire bill.''
  And I think that was a good rationale. That is why I am supporting 
Wise-Stenholm-Spratt, because it says a President can, in fact, take 
that project out, take that expenditure out and highlight it to the 
American public and send it back to the House of Representatives in the 
full light of day, in the open so that the American public can look at 
each one of us on this floor, 435 of us, and say, I do not believe that 
was justified or, yes, it was justified and ask us, again, in an 
accelerated way to vote on that item.
  I think that accomplishes what the American public wants without, as 
the gentleman from California and so many others on this floor have 
articulated so well, undermining the very critical balance of power 
between the executive and the legislative branches of government.
  Since 1789, no other government in the world, no other form of 
government in the world has stood as long and as well since that magic 
day in 1789, when this form of government was adopted and began.
  Let us not in an attempt to respond to that relatively pointed 
concern skew the balance between the President and the Congress to 
undermine the people's House, the U.S. Senate and, more importantly, 
the power of the American people.
  Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the 
requisite number of words.
   Mr. Chairman, in the rush to pass bad legislation, in an attempt to, 
so-called, save the budget, again, I want to remind my colleagues that 
this House for the past 40 years has spent less money than the 
Presidents have asked us to spend. It has been brought to our attention 
that things get buried in bills that were never intended to be there. 
Well, who wrote the bills? And who is in power now? And who can change 
the system?
  For the freshmen, it has not happened yet, but later on this year 
they will be given the chance to vote on the VA and the HUD 
appropriation together. I have a lot of veterans in my district; I 
support them. I do not particularly care for the HUD programs, but they 
are lumped together. So rather than approaching it and saying, maybe we 
should separate the bills and have more than just 13 appropriations 
bills, that let us solve the problem, we are saying, no, we are not 
smart enough, we are going to give it to the President of the United 
States.
  Well, let me give my colleagues a for instance, since I am talking to 
my Republican colleagues, how would they like the idea of Bill Clinton 
on his own deciding whether or not we are going to build any more B-2's 
at $1 billion apiece? How would they like President Bill Clinton to 
say, I am going to veto the 20 B-2's in this year's defense budget and 
that frees up almost $20 billion and if you American people will stick 
with me, we will spend it on health care? Do they really think they are 
going to find two-thirds of the Members of this body to stand up to the 
senior citizens lobby and all the other lobbyists that will be asking 
for more health care? Because B-2's are built in one congressional 
district. There are folks that need health care in 435.
  Aircraft carriers are built in one congressional district. They cost 
$4 billion apiece. Do we want to give Bill Clinton the authority to 
say, if we just kill the next aircraft carrier, I can expand health 
care by $4 billion. Once again, are we going to pit the gentleman from 
Virginia [Mr. Sisisky] against 434 other Congressmen, whose people are 
going to say, give us more health care?
  What Members are asking this body to do is to give the President of 
the United States the authority to dismantle the Defense Department 
line by line.
  The Stenholm approach makes sense, because it makes sense that if a 
majority in this body thinks it makes sense to build an aircraft 
carrier, then a majority can put that carrier back in the budget. If a 
majority thinks it makes sense to put an amphibious assault ship in the 
budget, then we can put it back in.
  But I can tell my colleagues right now, if they search their heart of 
hearts, they know that there are not two-thirds of the Members of this 
body who will stand up to the senior citizens lobby or any other lobby 
when it comes down between a defense program and themselves.
  And what we have ensured by the passage of this, if we do not include 
the Stenholm amendment, is the dismantling of the American military 
industrial base and, in turn, the dismantling of the world's greatest 
fighting force.
  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  I yield to the gentleman from West Virginia [Mr. Wise].
  Mr. WISE. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me.
  I would just like to say this that this has been a very full debate. 
I just want to signal to Members, it is my belief, while we are under 
the 5-minute rule and talking with our side, it is my belief that the 
gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Spratt], who is one of the 
cosponsors of the Wise-Spratt-Stenholm amendment, will be the 
concluding speaker, and Members probably should expect to vote within 
the next 5 to 10 minutes.
  In conclusion, I would also like to say that please remember, I want 
to make sure that we focus on the fact that the Wise-Spratt-Stenholm 
substitute is a majority rule substitute, not a one-third plus one.
  [[Page H1185]] I think that is very significant and needs to be the 
point that is remembered.
                             {time}   1350

  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, this is a creditable substitute. Three 
hundred and forty-two Members of this House said so resoundingly by 
voting for it. One hundred and sixty-nine of those who cast their votes 
``aye'' were Republicans.
  How did this provision, this substitute, attract 342 votes, three-
fourths of the House? First of all, it works, and second, it is 
constitutional.
  Let me take the second point first. Mr. Chairman, this bill, everyone 
will admit, is clearly constitutional. That ought to be an important 
consideration for any bill brought to this floor. We certainly cannot 
say as much for H.R. 2 as it is presently written.
  Last night, Mr. Chairman, the last action we took was to vote on an 
amendment offered by the gentleman from Georgia, Nathan Deal, which 
will provide expedited review by courts of the constitutionality of 
this particular legislation. We would not put, and we rarely put such 
provisions in legislation, except when we have grave and urgent doubts 
about its constitutionality. Therefore, it is tantamount to admitting 
that we have abiding doubts about the validity of H.R. 2, its 
constitutionality. We know we are pushing the envelope. We are taking 
the delegation of powers doctrine to its outer limits in passing this 
bill.
  Mr. Chairman, we know it, because we do not even know the answers to 
these basic questions. We will not until the Supreme Court has spoken. 
Therefore, what we have done, all the huffing and puffing, all the 
touting we have put into this particular piece of legislation may come 
to naught, Mr. Chairman, in the immediate future, because there could 
be a constitutional court challenge to it.
  It could be enjoined. It will not even by used by this President. 
Then it could ultimately be rendered unconstitutional by the court. We 
do not know if the President can repeal or undo or disenact a spending 
law or a targeted tax benefit.
  It was strongly suggested by the Supreme Court that it took an act of 
Congress signed by the President to repeal or undo or disenact a law 
that we have passed, but we are here saying he can do it without our 
intercession.
  We know that Congress can delegate broad powers to the Congress, to 
the President, to carry out laws that we pass, to enact and execute 
policies and purposes that we have laid down legislatively. We know we 
can give him broad discretion to carry out the law, but can we give 
him, as we purport to do here, the power to cancel out our own purposes 
as stated in law?
  We know we can tell him that he can execute our purposes and 
policies, but can he eradicate them, erase the, simply thwart them? We 
do not know the answers to these questions, but we do know this. The 
substitute before us is constitutional.
  Furthermore, and this is vitally important, it works. It gives the 
President all of the powers to comb through spending legislation and 
taxing legislation and to cull and clean out things that he disagrees 
with, that he thinks are unnecessary, unwise, unwarranted. H.R. 2 does 
this, but so does this bill, just as much.
  Second, Mr. Chairman, this gives some additional scope to the 
President that H.R. 2 does not give him. This substitute goes even 
further. For example, it allows the President to take rescissions that 
he sends up and assign them to a deficit reduction account, a lockbox.
  In the last election, in the last few months of the last session of 
Congress, one of the hot and topical issues here was a bill called A to 
Z. It had a feature in it called a lockbox. You could make spending 
cuts and have those spending cuts assigned to a permanent reduction in 
the discretionary spending limit.
  For those who supported A to Z, for those who support the concept of 
a deficit reduction account, a lockbox account, here is you change to 
vote for it. It is in this bill. As Chairman Clinger admitted, it is a 
plus for this bill that is not included in H.R. 2.
  There is another huge advantage to this amendment, this substitute. 
It actually has a scope that is far broader than H.R. 2. That is 
because, Mr. Chairman, in H.R. 2 there is a very narrow time window for 
the President to act, 10 days.
  This bill literally goes backward and forward. It allows the 
President to wield the additional item veto authority we are giving 
him, or rescission authority we are conferring upon him, at any time 
during the fiscal year, backward or forward at any time, and it will be 
guaranteed a vote within 10 days in this House and 10 days in the 
Senate when he sends it up here. Therefore, this particular substitute 
should not be diminished. It is a powerful tool for subjecting or 
resubjecting all discretionary spending, all targeted tax benefits, to 
public scrutiny.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. 
Spratt] has expired.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Spratt was allowed to proceed for 1 
additional minute.)
  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Chairman, this substitute moves cautiously, more 
cautiously, constitutionally, than does H.R. 2, I will admit that, 
because it leans toward the fundamental concept of our Government, 
majority rule over minority rule, but it takes us a long stride forward 
without stepping off a cliff and not knowing where we are going to 
land.
  If we pass this substitute, we can give the President of the United 
States significant new powers to cull spending, to cut our targeted tax 
benefits, without tilting the balance of powers between the Congress 
and the President. Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to support it for 
those reasons.
  (Mrs. ROUKEMA asked and was given permission to revise and extend her 
remarks.)
  Mrs. ROUKEMA. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Wise-Stenholm 
substitute, and I associate myself with the remarks of the gentleman 
from Texas [Mr. Stenholm].
  Mr. Chairman, at the outset I want to associate myself with the 
remarks of the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm], an author of this 
amendment. He has very lucidly analyzed the essential elements of this 
proposal.
  I take to the floor this afternoon as a former teacher of history and 
civics. A constitutionalist, if you will.
  We all recognize the genius of the Framers. The Constitution they 
crafted has stood the test of time. And the foundation of that genius 
has been the separation of powers and the checks and balances of our 
three branches of government.
  They did not want a king or a dictator or an oligarchy--rule of a few 
or the minority--controlling purse strings of this Nation unilaterally. 
So they developed a delicate system of checks and balances. A clear 
separation of powers. A balance of powers.
  I am concerned that H.R. 2 would do serious damage to that balance of 
power and the principle of majority rule by granting important new 
powers to the President. And with those new powers come tremendous 
opportunity for mischief.
  The underlying bill here would allow any President, operating in 
league with 34 Senators, to strip any provision from a bill.
  To my Republican colleagues and at the risk of offending my 
Democratic friends. Can you imagine this power in the hands of a crafty 
and strong-willed President like Lyndon Johnson?
  Mr. Chairman, we are not discussing a genuine line-item veto here 
today. If we were, we would be debating an amendment to the U.S. 
Constitution--requiring a two-thirds vote of the House and the Senate 
and three-quarters of the States. This is a dramatic change, a 
potential rewrite of the balance of powers and should be subjected to 
that higher standard of deliberation.
  I will support the substitute offered by the gentleman from West 
Virginia [Mr. Wise]. While not perfect, it will prevent a minority of 
either Chamber from imposing its will and is perfectly consistent with 
our serious purposes while focusing responsibility, on the record, and 
accountability of the public on our spending policies.
  The Wise substitute establishes an improved expedited recessions 
process that will allow each and every Member of Congress to stand up 
and publicly act on spending and taxing decisions. If that Member can 
convince 50-percent, plus one, of his or her colleagues of the merit of 
that item, the Member wins. If not, the President wins and the item is 
stricken.
  From a practical point of view, let me say this to my Republican 
colleagues. Do we want to give a Democratic President the power to 
strike items from spending and tax bills when he can simply round up 34 
Democratic votes 
[[Page H1186]] in the Senate to prevail? Not that the President would 
do this, but what if he decided to strike only Republican priorities 
from a defense bill, or a tax bill, or an education bill, or a health 
care bill. He could succeed with the assistance of 34 Democratic 
Senators.
  Also to my Republican colleagues, this line-item veto is virtually 
the only proposal in our Contract With America that President Clinton 
agrees with. Isn't that a sobering thought? Doesn't that tell you 
something sobering about the balance of powers and why Presidents want 
that power?
  I would add that I am not the only Republican with similar concerns 
about this potential shift of power. The Senator from New Mexico, the 
chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, Pete Domenici, has expressed 
the same misgivings and has offered an amendment similar to the one we 
debate at this time. And he's not alone. It was Senator Dan Quayle who 
proposed this expedited recession measure a decade ago.
  Mr. Chairman, do we actually want to grant the President the power to 
thwart the will of this institution, no, of this separate-but-equal 
branch of United States Government? I don't think so.
  Vote for the Wise substitute.
  Mr. VISCLOSKY. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of the Wise-
Stenholm-Spratt substitute amendment to H.R. 2. I am voting for this 
plan because I believe it represents an improvement to the current 
rescissions process, while preserving the balance of powers that our 
Founding Fathers so carefully laid out in the Constitution.
  The Wise-Stenholm-Spratt amendment requires that questionable 
spending items stand alone for an up-or-down vote. Projects would have 
to stand on their own merit and port would have no place to hide. If 
our goal is truly to eliminate unnecessary spending, I view this as a 
fundamental improvement to the way we do business.
  Under current law, the President has the authority to request the 
rescission of specific line items. It is Congress' part of the process 
that is under scrutiny. Once a Presidential rescission is received by 
the Congress, we have the option of voting. If nothing is done within 
45 days, the rescission dies. The Wise-Stenholm-Spratt substitute would 
fix this problem by requiring Congress to vote on Presidential 
rescissions within 10 days after their receipt. As a result, the 
President's hand would be strengthened to control spending, and 
Congress would be held accountable for our spending decisions.
  I do want to caution, however, that the line-item veto issue is 
somewhat of a red herring. Proponents of a straight line-item veto say 
that we need it to eliminate wasteful spending. It sounds great, except 
for the fact that it is not true. The fact is that the Congress 
rescinds more spending on average than President's request. Indeed, 
between the years 1974 and 1995, $73 billion in Presidential 
rescissions have been requested, yet $93 billion worth of rescissions 
have been passed by the Congress.
  Also, there is a fundamental danger in going too far to fix a system 
that can be improved, but is not broken. The line-item veto legislation 
encompassed in H.R. 2 goes too far. This bill would require a two-
thirds supermajority of Congress to override Presidential line-item 
vetoes, thereby abrogating majority rule and investing all power in one 
individual, the President. As a legislator, I am not willing to provide 
a Democratic or Republican President with power that our Founding 
Fathers felt were unnecessary.
  The Constitution assigned the power of the purse to the people's 
elected representatives in the Congress. Requiring a supermajority to 
override Presidential budgetary decisions would be a direct affront to 
this fundamental principle. It is not wise public policy to amass such 
discretionary power in one official.
  Let's keep the power with the people and pass the Wise-Stenholm-
Spratt substitute amendment to H.R. 2.
  Mr. MONTGOMERY. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Wise-Stenholm-
Spratt substitute. I voted for this measure last year and it passed the 
House by a wide margin. This procedure will achieve the same thing the 
line-item veto bill does, but it does so without providing a great 
shift in power to the executive branch.
  I agree the President should have the authority to strike out 
wasteful and unnecessary spending items in one bill or another, but 
Congress is still charged with the responsibility of setting spending 
priorities and I think we should have the chance to vote on these 
proposed veto items. This amendment requires Congress to vote, on the 
record, on these proposed cuts. I think that provides a powerful 
incentive to prevent Members from putting special projects and other 
pork barrel spending items in these bills in the first place, because 
they know that the House and Senate could be asked to vote up or down 
on those items.
  There is some question about whether the base provisions of this 
line-item veto bill are constitutional because they shift too much 
power to the executive branch. This substitute provides a much more 
workable alternative that will be a strong tool in controlling Federal 
spending in the future.
  I urge support for the Stenholm-Wise-Spratt substitute.
  Mr. RICHARDSON. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the substitute. 
Since the 104th Congress began its work on January 4, we have spent 
much of our time considering the impact of Government spending on the 
American people. We will likely spend much of the next 2 years doing 
the same thing. In repeated polls and town hall meetings, the public 
has been very clear that they want to eliminate wasteful spending that 
only helps a small segment of the population. The public does not want 
to see narrow special interests control Government spending.
  Mr. Chairman, I strongly believe that the President should have the 
power to rescind wasteful spending. But it's also important that once 
the President flags wasteful line-items and targeted tax benefits, that 
Congress shares the role of acting on wasteful spending and acting 
quickly. Several appropriation bills can reach the President's desk at 
the same time. The President should be able to offer a package of 
rescissions at anytime and Congress should then act to quickly approve 
or disapprove of that package.
  The approach offered by this substitute preserves the balance of 
power between the executive branch and the legislative branch, and that 
is what the public wants. The public wants an efficient government that 
moves quickly to eliminate wasteful spending. The public does not want 
a single person or one-third of Congress to be able to protect targeted 
spending.
  I believe it is ironic that at a time when most of the public does 
not want Washington controlled by a select few with narrow interests, 
and our colleagues from the other side of the aisle keep talking about 
spreading power beyond the beltway, that they keep reverting to 
procedures within Congress that give enormous power to a minority of 
our Members. Let us do something that makes sense. I urge my colleagues 
to support the substitute.
  Mrs. LINCOLN. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of the Wise-
Stenholm-Spratt expedited rescission substitute. There's a valuable 
goal in the line-item veto--to eliminate the practice of burying 
wasteful spending projects in legislative packages where your only 
choice is to vote for the entire bill or nothing at all.
  But the line-item veto would also give the President excessive power 
to influence every aspect of the legislative agenda and therefore shift 
the constitutional balance of power.
  Expedited rescission, on the other hand, accomplishes the goal of the 
line-item veto without fundamentally changing the separation of powers 
designed by our Founding Fathers. If we pass expedited rescission, 
everyone in this room is going to have to go on record for or against 
pet projects. Pork is pork, and I for one have faith that Congress will 
recognize this when voting on specific spending proposals as expedited 
rescission would require.
  Why should we question the Constitution's wisdom when we can 
eliminate pork barrel spending with expedited rescission? I strongly 
encourage my colleagues to support the Wise-Stenholm-Spratt substitute.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment in the nature of a 
substitute offered by the gentleman from West Virginia [Mr. Wise].
  The question was taken; and the Chairman announced that the noes 
appeared to have it.


                             recorded vote

  Mr. WISE. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
  A recorded vote was ordered.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 167, 
noes 246, not voting 21, as follows:
                              [Roll No 90]

                               AYES--167

     Ackerman
     Baldacci
     Barcia
     Beilenson
     Bentsen
     Berman
     Bevill
     Bishop
     Bonior
     Borski
     Boucher
     Browder
     Brown (CA)
     Brown (FL)
     Brown (OH)
     Bryant (TX)
     Burton
     Cardin
     Clay
     Clayton
     Clement
     Clyburn
     Coleman
     Collins (IL)
     Conyers
     Costello
     Cramer
     DeFazio
     DeLauro
     Dellums
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Dixon
     Doggett
     Dooley
     Doyle
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Engel
     Eshoo
     Farr
     Fattah
     Fazio
     Fields (LA)
     Filner
     Flake
     Foglietta
     Ford
     Frank (MA)
     Frost
     Furse
     Gejdenson
     Gephardt
     Gilman
     Gonzalez
     Gordon
     Green
     Hall (OH)
     Hamilton
     Harman
     Hastings (FL)
     Hayes
     Hefner
     Hilliard
     Hinchey
     Holden
     Hoyer
     Jackson-Lee
     Jacobs
     Jefferson
     Johnson (SD)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Kanjorski
     Kaptur
     Kennedy (MA)
     Kennedy (RI)
     Kennelly
     Kildee
     LaFalce
     Lantos
     Levin
     Lewis (GA)
     Lincoln
     Lipinski
     Lofgren
     Lowey
     Maloney
     [[Page H1187]] Manton
     Markey
     Mascara
     Matsui
     McDermott
     McKinney
     McNulty
     Meek
     Menendez
     Mfume
     Miller (CA)
     Mineta
     Mollohan
     Montgomery
     Moran
     Myers
     Nadler
     Neal
     Oberstar
     Obey
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Orton
     Owens
     Pastor
     Payne (NJ)
     Payne (VA)
     Pelosi
     Peterson (FL)
     Pickett
     Pomeroy
     Porter
     Poshard
     Rangel
     Reed
     Reynolds
     Richardson
     Rivers
     Roemer
     Rose
     Roukema
     Roybal-Allard
     Rush
     Sabo
     Sanders
     Sawyer
     Schroeder
     Schumer
     Scott
     Serrano
     Skaggs
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Spratt
     Stark
     Stearns
     Stenholm
     Stokes
     Studds
     Stupak
     Tanner
     Taylor (MS)
     Tejeda
     Thompson
     Thornton
     Thurman
     Torricelli
     Towns
     Tucker
     Velazquez
     Vento
     Visclosky
     Volkmer
     Williams
     Wilson
     Wise
     Woolsey
     Wyden
     Wynn
     Yates

                               NOES--246

     Abercrombie
     Allard
     Andrews
     Archer
     Armey
     Bachus
     Baesler
     Baker (CA)
     Baker (LA)
     Barr
     Barrett (NE)
     Barrett (WI)
     Barton
     Bass
     Bateman
     Bereuter
     Bilbray
     Bilirakis
     Bliley
     Blute
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Bono
     Brownback
     Bryant (TN)
     Bunn
     Bunning
     Burr
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Canady
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chambliss
     Chapman
     Chenoweth
     Christensen
     Chrysler
     Clinger
     Coble
     Coburn
     Combest
     Condit
     Cooley
     Cox
     Coyne
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cremeans
     Cubin
     Cunningham
     Davis
     Deal
     Diaz-Balart
     Dickey
     Doolittle
     Dornan
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Ehlers
     Ehrlich
     Emerson
     English
     Ensign
     Evans
     Everett
     Ewing
     Fawell
     Flanagan
     Foley
     Forbes
     Fowler
     Fox
     Franks (CT)
     Franks (NJ)
     Frelinghuysen
     Frisa
     Funderburk
     Gallegly
     Ganske
     Gekas
     Geren
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Goss
     Graham
     Greenwood
     Gunderson
     Gutierrez
     Gutknecht
     Hall (TX)
     Hancock
     Hansen
     Hastert
     Hastings (WA)
     Hayworth
     Hefley
     Heineman
     Herger
     Hilleary
     Hobson
     Hoekstra
     Hoke
     Horn
     Hostettler
     Houghton
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson, Sam
     Jones
     Kasich
     Kim
     King
     Kingston
     Kleczka
     Klink
     Klug
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     LaHood
     Latham
     LaTourette
     Laughlin
     Lazio
     Leach
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (KY)
     Lightfoot
     Linder
     Livingston
     LoBiondo
     Longley
     Lucas
     Luther
     Manzullo
     Martinez
     Martini
     McCarthy
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McDade
     McHale
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McIntosh
     McKeon
     Meehan
     Metcalf
     Meyers
     Mica
     Miller (FL)
     Minge
     Mink
     Molinari
     Moorhead
     Morella
     Murtha
     Myrick
     Nethercutt
     Neumann
     Ney
     Norwood
     Nussle
     Oxley
     Packard
     Pallone
     Parker
     Paxon
     Peterson (MN)
     Petri
     Pombo
     Portman
     Pryce
     Quillen
     Quinn
     Radanovich
     Rahall
     Ramstad
     Regula
     Riggs
     Roberts
     Rogers
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Roth
     Royce
     Salmon
     Sanford
     Saxton
     Scarborough
     Schaefer
     Schiff
     Seastrand
     Sensenbrenner
     Shadegg
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shuster
     Skeen
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (TX)
     Smith (WA)
     Solomon
     Souder
     Spence
     Stump
     Talent
     Tate
     Tauzin
     Taylor (NC)
     Thomas
     Thornberry
     Tiahrt
     Torkildsen
     Torres
     Traficant
     Upton
     Vucanovich
     Waldholtz
     Walker
     Walsh
     Wamp
     Ward
     Watt (NC)
     Watts (OK)
     Weldon (FL)
     Weldon (PA)
     Weller
     White
     Whitfield
     Wicker
     Wolf
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)
     Zeliff
     Zimmer

                             NOT VOTING--21

     Ballenger
     Bartlett
     Becerra
     Brewster
     Collins (GA)
     Collins (MI)
     Danner
     de la Garza
     DeLay
     Deutsch
     Fields (TX)
     Gibbons
     Istook
     Johnston
     Kelly
     Largent
     Moakley
     Sisisky
     Stockman
     Waters
     Waxman

                              {time}  1404

  The Clerk announced the following pairs:
  On this vote:

       Mr. Moakley for, with Mr. Deutsch against.
       Mr. Becerra for, with Mr. Largent against.
       Mr. Gibbons for, with Ms. Waters against.
       Mr. Johnston for, with Miss Collins of Michigan against.

  Mr. WARD changed his vote from ``aye'' to ``no.''
  Ms. KAPTUR and Mr. STEARNS changed their vote from ``no'' to ``aye.''
  So the amendment in the nature of a substitute was rejected.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
                          personal explanation
  Mrs. KELLY. Mr. Chairman, it was necessary for me to undergo 
important dental surgery today and, in doing so, I missed two recorded 
votes on amendments to H.R. 2, the Line Item Veto Act.
  Had I been present, I would have voted ``no'' on the Wise amendment.
  In addition, had I been present, I would have voted ``no'' on the 
Spratt amendment.
  (Mr. GEPHARDT asked and was given permission to speak out of order.)


                          legislative program

  Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Chairman, I ask to proceed out of order for the 
purpose of inquiring about the schedule for next week and the rest of 
the day.
  Mr. ARMEY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. GEPHARDT. Perhaps, Mr. Majority Leader, I could first ask about 
the schedule for the rest of today so Members will know when we are 
probably going to be leaving.
  Mr. ARMEY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I yield to the gentleman from Texas.
  Mr. ARMEY. We have one or possibly two more amendments we expect to 
be able to complete today. We are going to try to do that.
  In any event, the Members should be advised that we will rise at 3 
o'clock today, and hopefully with those amendments completed.
  Mr. GEPHARDT. As I understand it, there is an Obey amendment and an 
Orton amendment that are likely to come next. Would these two gentleman 
be assured that if we do not finish their amendment by 3 o'clock that 
we could finish it when we come back on Monday?
  Mr. ARMEY. They would, absolutely.
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I thank the gentleman. Perhaps I could inquire about 
next week's schedule.
  Mr. ARMEY. Again, if the gentleman will yield, let me first announce 
the meeting times for the House next week.
  On Monday the House will meet at 12:30 for morning hour. Legislative 
business will begin at 2 o'clock and votes will occur immediately.
  Let me also further advise all of the Members that they should expect 
that every Monday for the remainder of February we would keep to this 
schedule of 12:30 for morning hour and legislative business convening 
at 2 o'clock and votes likely to occur immediately, except for 
Presidents Day.
  On Tuesday the House will meet at 10:30 for morning hour. Legislative 
business will begin at 12 o'clock.
  On Wednesday the House will meet at 11 o'clock. On Thursday and 
Friday the House will meet at 10 o'clock.
  On Monday we will return to complete consideration of H.R. 2, the 
line-item veto.
  On Tuesday, subject to a rule, we will take up consideration of H.R. 
665, the Victim Restitution Act. Depending upon how that legislation 
proceeds, we will also consider H.R. 666, the Exclusionary Rule Reform 
Act, subject again to a rule.
  On Wednesday and the balance of the week we will, again, subject to 
rules being granted, consider H.R. 668, the Criminal Alien Deportation 
Act, and H.R. 667, the Violent Criminal Incarceration Act.
  Again, we would expect to be able to keep our 3 o'clock departure 
time for the following Friday.
  Mr. GEPHARDT. There are two questions or concerns that are being 
expressed by a lot of Members on this side. The first is by Members on 
the west coast who have been afforded the opportunity in the past to 
get here by 5 o'clock on Monday, and if the gentleman is saying we are 
going to be starting at 2 o'clock on every Monday in February, this 
really is a difficulty for many of them on being able to get here. I 
was wondering if perhaps we could plan to work later on Monday to 
accommodate their schedules?
  Mr. ARMEY. I appreciate that observation and there is no doubt the 
concerns for the west coast Members have been taken into consideration. 
Nevertheless, we do have a big change and a heavy schedule. Hard work 
is required and, in our judgment, it is necessary to begin at 2 o'clock 
on Mondays whenever possible through February to complete that work.
  The only solace I can offer is that the contract period is for a 
finite period of time, 100 days. When the 100 days is passed, certainly 
we would be able to give much more consideration to the west coast 
commuters.

[[Page H1188]]

                              {time}  1410

  Mr. FAZIO of California. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the gentleman 
yielding.
  I simply wanted to say it is not really a question of hard work. I 
think the Members want to be able to spend some of their time working 
hard in their districts. There are many of us who are going to have to 
leave and really give up our Sunday efforts in the district, and I know 
that will not necessarily be the impact on many of our colleagues.
  So I wanted to see whether or not we could continue the practice that 
got us to this point which we felt was fair and equitable to the people 
west of the Rockies.
  Mr. ARMEY. Well, I appreciate the gentleman's point. The fact of the 
matter is we have many Members who wish to talk on each and every 
amendment. We want to afford every opportunity for that. That takes a 
lot of time. Still, nevertheless, we have a clear timetable. Committees 
have worked very hard. You ask the members of the committees to get 
their work out of committee in time, so it can make the queue line for 
the floor schedule, and when we have bills on the floor, we really must 
move those bills off so we can make room for the next bill.
  Perhaps if we could find ways for some of us who have so many very 
important things to say on each and every one of these amendments to 
say it less often or more quickly we can compress the time requirements 
and get on.
  Mr. FAZIO of California. I think the issue here is that when people 
feel the need to talk, and I am sure that there will be occasions when 
all of us in both parties will feel that need, one group of people is 
paying the price. One group, those of both parties who have the 
furthest to come, are going to be the ones to pay the price.
  I am saying the gentleman is perhaps, from his partisan standpoint, 
correct. But why do we burden one group of Members because of the 
propensity of others of both parties from all across the country to 
speak at some length?
  Mr. ARMEY. If the gentleman would yield.
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I yield.
  Mr. ARMEY. Let me first admire the deftness of the gentleman from 
California in translating a discussion about geography to one of 
partisan politics. You are to be admired for your deftness.
  Let me acknowledge we all are aware, of course, there are no big 
talkers from the west coast. So if perhaps we can get some of our east 
coast talkers to be as respectful of time concerns of the Members as 
the west coast talkers are, but the fact is we do have a big 
legislative agenda. We do have a queuing order for each of the 
committees.
  Each of the committees must be considered, and that means we must 
move the work off the floor.
  Mr. FAZIO of California. What the gentleman is saying, I gather, is 
that we have a 100-day schedule. We have to meet it. And those people 
who are sacrificed simply have to live with it. Is that correct?
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I would like to ask the majority leader another 
question. There is also a concern on this side, and I assume by many on 
your side, about the issue of predictability of schedule at night. I 
know that Members on both sides are sincere about making this a family-
friendly Congress, and we have a bipartisan group that is meeting to 
try to see if we can reach solutions in that area.
  A couple of times in the last 2 weeks we have thought that we were 
going to leave by a certain time in the evening, and then it ran well 
past that. I realize you are trying to get a schedule completed.
  But do you believe that it might be useful to perhaps reconvene the 
family-friendly task force with you and myself to see if we can find 
some solutions to this? Members tell their families they are going to 
be home by a certain time, are able to meet them at a certain time, and 
they are not able to do that, and it is causing a good deal of 
difficulty.
  Mr. ARMEY. If the gentleman will yield, I think the gentleman from 
Missouri makes an extremely important point, and I can tell you I would 
be more than happy for the two of us to get together with some of the 
people from that task force to see if we can encourage circumstances 
that will allow us to all get home to our families earlier in the 
evening.
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I yield to the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Roybal-
Allard].
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. I thank the gentleman for yielding. The question I 
have is, understanding the necessity and the urgency to get the work 
done, would it be possible to have the work continue from 2 o'clock on, 
but to wait until at least 5 o'clock and bunch the votes so that those 
of us who are on the west coast can at least be here for the votes?
  Mr. ARMEY. The gentlewoman makes a very reasonable request. 
Unfortunately, within the context of the rules, you cannot, as it were, 
roll the votes when you are in the Committee of the Whole, so if we are 
going to meet and work in the Committee of the Whole, we must be 
prepared to vote immediately.
  Mr. GEPHARDT. It is my understanding that we might entertain an idea 
of that kind in future rules, and if we are trying to avoid 2 o'clock 
startups for the rest of February, we would certainly be willing to do 
that. We could also do it by unanimous consent on Monday, and I do not 
know whether we could achieve that, but it would be worth a try, and we 
would offer to try to do that.
  Mr. ARMEY. The gentleman is very generous and very respectful of all 
the rights of all the Members, and I would be happy to sit down and see 
what we can work out.
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I would say to the gentleman we could offer such 
unanimous-consent requests later today before we finish at 3 o'clock, 
and I will try to work with the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] 
and the majority leader in that regard.
  Mr. ARMEY. If the gentleman will yield, I appreciate again the 
generosity of the gentleman from Missouri. The distinguished chairman 
of the Committee on Rules just tells me that at this point in this 
context that is not a workable alternative, and we will have to stay 
with the schedule.
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I will be happy to talk further with the gentleman.
  I yield to the gentleman from Indiana.
  Mr. BURTON of Indiana. I certainly support the majority leader's view 
that we have got a tough work schedule. But many of us have families 
back in our districts. I just checked with the Parliamentarian, and I 
have been informed that, by unanimous consent, even when the Committee 
of the Whole is sitting in this House, you can roll the votes until a 
later time, and so while we may not be able to do that on Monday, I 
wish that the majority leader would take that into consideration for 
those of us that have families back in the districts that we have not 
seen for a long time, if we could get back a few hours later, it would 
help us.
  So I would just say that if there were unanimous consent, for 
instance, on a Monday, maybe not this next Monday, but on a Monday, we 
could roll the votes until 5 o'clock, and then we could still conduct 
the business in the Committee of the Whole.
  Mr. GEPHARDT. The last question has to do with the corrections. I 
have read a report that there would be a corrections day, and I would 
just like to ask under what process would this legislation be 
considered, and would there be hearings and markups prior to floor 
consideration of these ideas?
  Mr. ARMEY. If the gentleman would yield, corrections day is an 
innovation that is being discussed by the Speaker. We are not at this 
point ready to announce such an innovation in the calendar, and we 
would certainly, as we develop the notion into a new innovation in the 
calendar, we would welcome every opportunity to work with the minority 
in terms of defining the best parliamentary procedures for a new 
innovation like corrections day. So I think this is really something 
that we can be excited about, but we are not at the point yet where any 
announcement is ready to be made.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I yield to the gentleman from New York.
  Mr. SCHUMER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  If I might direct a question at the majority leader, two questions, 
relative to the crime bill next week or the 
[[Page H1189]] crime bills. The gentleman mentioned the first four 
bills, but he did not mention 729, the Effective Death Penalty Act, or 
I believe it is H.R. 728, the Block Grants Act. Is it the intention of 
the majority to bring those up the following week? They would not be on 
the floor this next week? Is that correct?
  Mr. ARMEY. If the gentleman will yield further, let me say to my 
friend, the gentleman from New York [Mr. Schumer], yes, you are exactly 
right. That is our intention.
  Mr. SCHUMER. The second question, if I might, if the gentleman from 
Missouri would continue to yield to me, will the crime bill be 
considered under an open and unrestricted rule? I understand the 
chairman of the Committee on Rules, my good friend from New York, Mr. 
Solomon, made an announcement regarding the rules this morning, but I 
believe it would be useful to clarify the majority's intention for the 
Members.
  As you know, the crime bills have been divided. One crime bill was 
divided into six, which limits the amount of amendments, and we were 
told by the chairman of our committee, the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. 
Hyde], and the chairman of the subcommittee, the gentleman from Florida 
[Mr. McCollum], that it was the intention of the majority, and this is 
while we marked up the bills in committee, to bring those six bills 
under an open rule, that anything that was germane to the relatively 
narrow scope of each of those six bills would be available.

                              {time}  1420

  I would appreciate an answer, either from the chairman of the 
Committee on Rules or the majority leader.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I yield to the gentleman from New York.
  Mr. SOLOMON. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, let me just say that it is the intention of the Rules 
Committee to be as open and as fair and as accountable as we possibly 
can. We have every intention of proceeding with open rules. There could 
come a time when on the fifth and sixth bills in the crime package, at 
which time we might have to, because of time constraints we might have 
to limit the time of debate. That would not mean we would veer away 
from the 5-minute rule. It means that any amendment would be in order. 
If I could just briefly, for instance, if we were going to take up H.R. 
729, the effective death penalty bill, it would be 1 hour on the rule, 
1 hour general debate and perhaps 6 hours of amendments, 4 hours of 
walking time. That is about 12 hours on that bill.
  Mr. SCHUMER. If it is on all six bills, the majority's intention, the 
Rules Committee intends to allow all amendments to be offered that are 
germane to each of those bills, is that correct?
  Mr. SOLOMON. Within that timeframe, the gentleman is correct.
  Mr. SCHUMER. The question I have is what does ``within that 
timeframe'' mean? Does it mean that after a certain point of time we 
cannot offer any amendments at all? Does it mean we would be able to 
offer those amendments and not debate them? Or does it mean that we 
could offer those amendments and have a limited amount of time to 
debate them? And then do the House's business and see where the votes 
are that way?
  Mr. SOLOMON. If the gentleman would yield further, that decision has 
not been made. But if we were going to limit the time for consideration 
of amendments, we also have a priority, prefiling offer to you, and I 
would suggest to the gentleman if you have significant amendments that 
you ought to prefile those amendments. Within the 6 hours or whatever 
time we arrive at, you certainly would have ample opportunity to debate 
those amendments, absolutely.
  Mr. SCHUMER. If the gentleman will continue to yield, what are those 
prefling requirements? That is the question I would have.
  Mr. SOLOMON. There are no prefiling requirements at all. It is not a 
requirement.
  It might include a provision giving priority and recognition to 
Members who prefile their amendments. You do not have to come and 
testify, you do not have to prefile.
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts.
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, I would just like to say that the chairman of the Rules 
Committee, he said the first four bills would not be restricted and the 
last two might. I believe that the sixth bill, the one that would redo 
the program and do the block grants is in fact one of the most 
important and in fact took the longest time in the Judiciary Committee. 
So I would hope that they would not be subjected to that kind of 
restriction simply, because it would not make sense just because that 
is the number in which they were ordered to take a more important bill 
and restrict it more just because it comes later rather than earlier 
on.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I yield to the gentleman from New York.
  Mr. SCHUMER. I thank the gentleman.
  Mr. Chairman, the first three bills, two of the three are completely 
noncontroversial, the third has very little controversy to it. The 
whole meat of the thrust of the crime bill we are debating is the 
fourth, fifth, and sixth bills. So I would ask the Rules Committee and 
the majority to do whatever they can to make those as open as possible. 
To only allow 6 hours of debate on the final bill, H.R. 728, which took 
up more time in committee to debate than the first four put together, 
would not be fair at all.
  I would ask, given the commitments in the contract and everywhere 
else, that the rules be as open as possible. The Senate, as I 
understand it, and the gentleman can check me if I am wrong, the Senate 
is not going to get these bills for a month or two. We were told we 
would have this week and next week to finish the six bills, and I do 
not see why such a limitation as the gentleman is proposing would be 
necessary.
  Mr. SOLOMON. I would just say to the gentleman that we would be more 
open and more fair than we have ever been when a crime package has been 
brought to this floor, and you can count on that.
  Mr. VOLKMER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I yield to the gentleman from Missouri.
  Mr. VOLKMER. I thank the leader for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, I inquire of the gentleman from New York, with whom we 
visited on this issue before, it was my understanding from the 
gentleman of New York--and you correct me if I am wrong--that on three 
bills, the bill on the block grant, on what we have passed, called the 
prevention programs, on the prison construction bill, and then on the 
habeas corpus bill, those three bills that the gentleman from New 
York--I cannot remember the exact words, and you correct me if I am 
wrong--this morning said that on those we do in one day. In other 
words, you would have a rule, discussion, debate, and then amendments. 
And when the time came to end on that day on that bill, that any 
amendments pending thereafter would no longer be in order. Is that 
correct?
  Mr. SOLOMON. Over about a 12-hour period.
  Mr. VOLKMER. Over whatever period. So that is basically a closed 
rule. It is; gentleman, it is a closed rule, gentleman. And you are 
telling people that even if you have an amendment in the Record by that 
time, if we would take 3 hours on a substitute and 4 hours on several 
amendments and there are other Members who have amendments that they 
feel are just as important as the other ones, you are saying that when 
the time runs out you do not get to offer your amendment, ``I don't 
care who you are, I don't care how strongly you feel on your idea, you 
are not going to get to express your viewpoint.'' That is what I want 
you to think about.
  Mr. SOLOMON. We will be glad to take the views of the gentleman into 
consideration. I have been pleading on this floor all day to expedite 
this bill. We want to make sure that we are going to be able to finish 
these six crime bills because of the time constraints.
  [[Page H1190]] Mr. WOLF. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I yield to the gentleman from Virginia.
  Mr. WOLF. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, I was in my office and heard the debate, and I ran 
over. As somebody who was asked by Mr. Gingrich to be head of the 
Family Friendly Caucus, let me just make a coupe of comments and 
observations.
  One, I would hope that the votes would be rolled. To ask somebody 
from California to come in by 2, I live here and I do not have to fly. 
I am a half-hour from home. Frankly, I am tired. I just think that 
somehow we all know the ways of working these rules. There ought not be 
votes until 5 o'clock. No one should have to leave their family.
  Second, if I may say two more things, second, we need--and I would 
ask Mr. Armey when we are finished and Mr. Gephardt--I heard your 
exchange about meeting on. Monday, I ask to determine a set hour, so 
that at a certain hour, whether it be midnight you told you wife or 
your kids or whether it be 7 o'clock, there are certain and set hours.
  Third, speaking from this side, perhaps we cannot have open rules. 
Perhaps what we need are fair rules, whereby we give the leadership 
whatever amendments they see fit but it cannot continue to go on. 
Because one Member the other night said to me, and I am not going to 
say who, ``I thought you said we were going to have a family friendly 
Congress.'' Then when I got back to my office, that Member was getting 
up and objecting and tying the place up.
  I cannot make this a family friendly Congress, but we can, all work 
together, make it a family friendly Congress.
  So we do not want to manipulate the rules. I think if we can develop 
a better spirit we can do it. First, no votes before 5, second, let us 
get a set time; or third, frankly, we are probably going to have to do 
away with the open rules and have rules, what I would call fair rules, 
so that we can then have set times. I hope we can do it.
  Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Chairman, if I may reclaim my time, and this would 
be the last statement: I want to commend the gentleman from Virginia 
[Mr. Wolf]. When I was majority leader, he talked to me a lot about his 
concerns, which are sincere, about family life, personal life in this 
institution. I want to work, and I believe our Members want to work, 
with your Members, Mr. Majority Leader, to see if we can do that. 
Obviously, we have had some bad experiences early here with a lot of 
amendments, and we are going to go through a shakedown period here. But 
I think the minority is sincere in wanting to find an accommodation 
with regard to the kind of amendments, the time limits on amendments, 
so that we can make a more predictable schedule.
  Before we leave today, I would like to sit down with the majority 
leader and chairman of the Committee on Rules and see if we can find a 
way as a start to begin our meeting on Monday at 5 o'clock and roll 
vote. I will talk to them in a moment.
  Mr. ARMEY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I will.
  Mr. ARMEY. I thank the gentleman.
  Mr. Chairman, I point out to the chair it has taken us over 15 
minutes to announce the schedule. That I suppose as much as anything 
else validates the need for the kind of schedule that I announced.
  I want to thank the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Gephardt] for his 
kind offer, and certainly we will try to find a way to work around 
that.
  As the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Wolf] said, with a bit of 
cooperation from all of us we can all have a more family friendly life.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. GEPHARDT. I yield to the gentleman from Hawaii.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, I am all for--if you want to complain about how far you 
have to go--I am leaving tonight. I will have to stay overnight in Los 
Angeles, get home tomorrow; leave Sunday night. I do not mind.

                              {time}  1430

  We are doing the business of Congress here.
  Now the Constitution of the United States is being messed with here. 
I say to my colleagues, ``Now you want to be family friendly? I'm all 
for family friendly, but don't anybody come and tell this Member that 
in the name of family friendly that we are not going to do our business 
in a proper fashion. Every Member here is entitled and obligated to 
take his or her concerns to this floor under the rules, and I don't 
want to see 1 second of one Member's obligation and duty compromised in 
any way, shape, or form.''
  Is this the 100-day rule, which is not in this Constitution, but in 
the contract that they signed and I did not sign? I say to my 
colleagues, ``If it takes a thousand days, 10,000 days, that's what it 
takes to protect the Constitution of the United States, and that's what 
we take.''
  Mrs. COLLINS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last 
word.
  Mr. Chairman, I would like to engage in a colloquy with the gentleman 
from Wisconsin [Mr. Obey].
  Mr. Chairman, I noted that the majority leader said that we were 
going to take up some amendments and that, regardless of where we were, 
we are going to be out of here, we are going to rise, at 3 o'clock. My 
concern is that the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Obey] may not have 
sufficient time to offer his amendment with the proper responses, so I 
want to ask Mr. Obey if he feels he can offer his amendment along with 
the time that it will take to get a vote on that and be finished at 3 
o'clock or if he feels his time would be compromised and the quality of 
his debate would be compromised by doing so.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?
  Mrs. COLLINS of Illinois. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I cannot tell how much time it is going to 
take. I do feel a requirement to explain why I am doing this because so 
many Members have been asking me that. But it really is not up to me to 
determine how much time it is going to take. I just do not know.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?
  Mrs. COLLINS of Illinois. I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, if it would be helpful, I would like the 
gentleman to know that we have examined the gentleman's amendment, and 
if it would assist the gentleman from Wisconsin in determining how much 
time might be involved in consideration of his amendment, I would 
inform the gentleman that we think it is an excellent addition to what 
we are trying to do here, which is to get at those elements of pork, 
wherever they may exist and wherever they exist every year.
  Mr. Chairman, we will support the amendment that will be offered by 
the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Obey].
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I only intend to take about 4 minutes to 
explain my amendment, and I do not know of anybody else who wants to 
speak.


                     AMENDMENT OFFERED BY MR. OBEY

  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment. It is No. 15.
  The CHAIRMAN. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
  The text of the amendment is as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. Obey: At the end of section 2, add 
     the following new subsection:
       (d) Special Rule for FY 1995 Appropriation Measures.--
     Notwithstanding subsection (a)(2), in the case of any 
     unobligated discretionary budget authority provided by any 
     appropriation Act for fiscal year 1995, the President may 
     rescind all or part of that discretionary budget authority 
     under the terms of this Act if the President notifies the 
     Congress of such rescission by a special message not later 
     than ten calendar days (not including Sundays) after the date 
     of enactment of this Act.

  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, as Members know, what I am doing is trying to 
ensure that, if we are going to pass this misguided proposal, that at 
least we will be able to give the President the ability to reach any 
and all projects in the 13 appropriation bills which passed last year.
  I have in my hand a packet tagged by subcommittee which is entitled 
``Questionable Fiscal '95 Projects by Subcommittee,'' and I know that a 
number 
[[Page H1191]] of Members do not like the fact that this is being 
offered. But I am offering it because I basically believe this bill is 
flawed.
  First of all, I think it is based on the assumption that the Congress 
spends more than the President, and in fact history will show that in 
this last decade we have spent considerably less than the President has 
asked for. When you take a look at specific Presidential requests for 
rescissions, since 1974, Mr. Chairman, Presidents have asked this 
Congress to rescind $73 billion in appropriations. This Congress has 
actually rescinded $93 billion in appropriations, 27 percent more than 
the President asked us to cut. Those are not my numbers. Those are the 
General Accounting Office's numbers.
  We rescinded double the amount of spending that President Bush wanted 
us to rescind, and to date we have rescinded 33 percent more in 
spending than President Clinton has asked us to.
  So, I think that record should be cleared up, and, as the ranking 
Democrat on the Committee on Appropriations, I feel an obligation to do 
so.
  I say to my colleagues, I think, if you really want to get at 
spending, for instance, you will consider the Orton amendment, which 
comes next, which if it is not adopted will leave a huge loophole in 
the item veto process because it will apply only to appropriations and 
not contract authority, something which I think would be a national 
joke.
  But I am also offering this for a second reason, because I simply 
believe it is fundamentally wrong for us to be making decisions based 
upon what one-third plus one in this place thinks ought to be public 
policy. I believe that this vehicle, as it stands now, is a disgraceful 
and gutless granting of gigantic Executive power by this institution, 
and I am ashamed, I am ashamed to see that kind of willing power 
transfer. Because I think this institution's primary responsibility 
under the Constitution is to protect the American people from the 
excessive abuse of Executive power. And in my view, as it stands now, 
this proposal invites the President to use his powers that are being 
granted under this proposal to greatly expand his ability to leverage 
additional spending into each and every bill that goes through this 
place.
  Mr. Chairman, I will explain more when we debate the amendment to be 
offered by Mr. Stenholm on Monday what I mean by that.
  But if, nonetheless, this institution is hell bent on that kind of a 
reckless transfer of power, then I think we ought to make it apply to 
every single project which right now Members of this body and Members 
of the other body think are safely beyond the reach of Presidential 
veto, and that is why I am offering this, so that the President will 
have a 10-day window after the passage of this misguided proposal 
during which he can examine each and every tidbit in every 
appropriation bill last year.
                              {time}  1440

  Now, I think we did a good job on the Committee on Appropriations 
last year. We eliminated some 40 programs. We cut 408 programs below 
the previous year's spending level. And the earmarks that were provided 
were substantially reduced below the level of the previous year.
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Obey] has 
expired.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Obey was allowed to proceed for 1 
additional minute.)
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, it seems to me nonetheless that the record 
obviously is not perfect. We had to accept many ``suggestions'' from 
the other body, for instance. So I think if this is going to go into 
effect, Members ought not to be allowed to assume that their own 
specific projects are beyond presidential reach. We ought to know in 
concrete terms just what is at risk.
  So I offer this amendment in that spirit and would hope that it would 
be accepted and adopted by this House.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support to the amendment.
  Mr. Chairman, as I indicated before the gentleman offered his 
amendment, we have examined the amendment and want to commend the 
gentleman, frankly, on his willingness to open up his own 
appropriations bills for this line-item veto, appropriations bills 
which were dealt with last year.
  I think when the former chairman of the committee recognizes the need 
of a line-item veto and admits the benefits it provides in eliminating 
unnecessary spending, we should take note and thank him for his very 
good work in this regard.
  I think I would ask the gentleman, if he has indicated he knows where 
the bodies are buried and where the skeletons are, that we would have 
that list as promptly as possible and perhaps we could rescind or 
eliminate that spending and save the President the need to exercise the 
line-item veto.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. CLINGER. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.
  Mr. OBEY. I think all you have to do is take a look at every 
appropriations report, because they are fairly well spelled out. I am 
not suggesting that most of them are bad items. I think the vast 
majority of them are infinitely defensible and, in fact, in the 
national interest. But I just want Members to have very specific and 
concrete understandings beforehand of the kind of power the President 
is going to have.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time.
  As I say, Mr. Chairman, we are pleased to accept the amendment, and I 
yield back the balance of my time.
                         parliamentary inquiry

  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Mr. Chairman, I have a parliamentary inquiry.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman will state it.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Mr. Chairman, is it the Chair's understanding that a 
ruling was arrived at or an understanding was arrived at with respect 
to the votes on Monday and the 2 o'clock versus 5 o'clock time? Because 
that is not clear to me.
  The CHAIRMAN. The Chairman of the Committee of the Whole is not in a 
position to rule on that question.
  Mr. ABERCROMBIE. Mr. Chairman, a further parliamentary inquiry. How 
might I go about making that inquiry? My understanding is that issue 
was not settled.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman should inquire of the leadership who 
makes those decisions.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Obey].
  The amendment was agreed to.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise.
  The motion was agreed to.
  Accordingly, the Committee rose; and the Speaker having assumed the 
chair, Mr. Boehner, Chairman of the Committee of the Whole House on the 
State of the Union, reported that that Committee, having had under 
consideration the bill (H.R. 2) to give the President item veto 
authority over appropriation acts and targeted tax benefits in revenue 
acts, had come to no resolution thereon.

                          ____________________