[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 121 (Tuesday, July 25, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S10583-S10585]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 CONGRESSIONAL GIFT REFORM ACT OF 1995

  The PRESIDING OFFICER [Mr. Campbell]. Under the previous order, the 
Senate will now proceed to consideration of S. 1061, which the clerk 
will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 1061) to provide for congressional gift reform.

  The Senate proceeded to consider the bill.
  Mr. LEVIN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Michigan [Mr. Levin] is 
recognized.
  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, first, let me thank my friend from 
Mississippi for the work he did yesterday in helping to expedite the 
bipartisan conclusion to the lobbying disclosure effort, even though we 
have not technically yet concluded because we still have to vote on 
final passage. I think it is quite clear that after we consider the 
Lautenberg amendment that we will then finally pass a very strong 
lobbying disclosure reform measure.
  This effort has been going on now literally for five decades. When 
that bill was originally passed in 1946, not more than 2 years had 
passed before President Truman noted that it was not working. It just 
simply had so many loopholes in it that even then it was not doing the 
job that was intended. He urged that there be some reform to try to 
close those loopholes.
  There have been efforts made in every decade since. We have made 
efforts in the past few years, and while we do not have a law yet on 
the books, we at least have acted and we have done so in a bipartisan 
manner and a very forthright and very forceful manner.
  There are a lot of people who have been involved in this effort who 
appropriately deserve credit. I do want to thank the majority whip for 
his efforts yesterday in helping to bring us to where we are this 
morning.
  Lobbying disclosure, which we will finally pass later on this 
morning, is one of the three pillars of reform. The other two are gift 
ban and campaign finance reform. It is the gift ban, the so-called gift 
reform bill, S. 1061, which is 

[[Page S 10584]]
now before us. This bill has been introduced by myself, Mr. Cohen, Mr. 
Glenn, Mr. McCain, Mr. Wellstone, Mr. Lautenberg, Mr. Feingold, and Mr. 
Baucus.
  I want to first say just how important the work of Messrs. Wellstone, 
Lautenberg, and Feingold have been in this effort. They have exerted 
very strong leadership on gift ban and on gift reform, and their 
efforts are reflected in this version of the bill. This bill reflects 
the work of many people, but nobody more than the efforts of Senator 
Wellstone, along with Senator Feingold and Senator Lautenberg, who have 
put so much time in forcing the Senate's attention to this bill.
  S. 1061 is now the freestanding bill that is before us. It is that 
bill that we begin debate on this morning.
  Our bill will put an end to business as usual when it comes to gifts. 
It will end the so-called recreational trips for Members who go to play 
in charitable golf, tennis, and skiing tournaments. It will put an end 
to the unlimited meals that are paid for by lobbyists and others. It 
will put an end to tickets to sporting events, concerts, and theater.
  It is hard to see how we can say that we have made the Congress 
accountable and how we have politically reformed the way in which we 
operate in Washington if we continue to allow special interests to pay 
for free recreational travel, free golf tournaments, free meals, free 
football, basketball, and concert tickets. We just simply can no longer 
say that we are changing the way we operate if we continue to allow 
those kinds of gifts.
  Under the current congressional gift rules, Members and staff are 
free to accept gifts of up to $250 from anybody, including lobbyists. 
Gifts of under $100 do not even count. We are free to accept an 
unlimited number of gifts of less than $100 in value. That could be 
football tickets, theater tickets--anything you can think of. If it is 
worth less than $100, we can take it, we do not need to disclose it, 
and we can take an unlimited number of them. There is no limit at all 
on meals. It does not matter who pays for it, how much the tab is, we 
can take it.
  Congressional travel is also virtually unlimited under the current 
rules. Members and staff are free to travel to recreational events, 
such as golf and ski tournaments, even at the expense of lobbyists or 
trade groups. That is business as usual, and it just simply is not 
acceptable anymore. If we are going to restore and enhance the respect 
for Congress, we are going to have to tighten our gift rules.
  Last year when this bill was on the floor, we heard a lot of talk 
about how strict limits, if we adopted them, would shut down the 
Kennedy Center or put restaurant employees out of work throughout the 
Washington area. What an indictment of Congress that would be if it 
were true. Can it really be that we accept so many free meals and 
tickets that entire industries in the Washington area are dependent on 
us continuing to take these gifts? It seems inconceivable that that is 
what some people said about the measure which we voted on last year.
  The basic premise of our bill is that we should start living under 
the same rules as other Americans. Average citizens do not have trade 
groups offering them free trips to resorts; average citizens do not 
have lobbyists treating them to dinners and lunches at fancy 
restaurants; average citizens do not have special interests providing 
them with free tickets to concerts, theater and sporting events; and 
even if some average citizens did--and I am sure there are a few who do 
get such gifts--we have a higher responsibility. We have the 
responsibility to increase public confidence in this institution, and 
we are the only ones really who can do it. Nobody else can do this for 
us. Nobody else can change the rules under which we operate. But what 
the American people are telling us is that they want us to change the 
way we operate here in many ways.
  They want lobbying that is done by paid professional lobbyists to be 
more open. They want to know who is being paid, how much, and by whom, 
to lobby Congress.
  Under the Senate bill that we will vote on later this morning, they 
will get it. They want to restrict the gifts which come to Members of 
Congress, be they tickets to sporting events, meals, or be it the free 
recreational travel available to Members and to our families paid for 
by special interests. They want that done with. I hope when we pass 
this bill, they will get it.
  They want Members to change the way we finance campaigns. They want 
to reduce the amount of money which is raised and the time that is 
spent to raise it. They want to reduce the length of campaigns, and 
they want to try to put some limit on how much money is spent in those 
campaigns. I hope that they will get that, some day soon, as well.
  These are tough, political reform issues. We all know it. If they 
were not difficult, we would have done this a long time ago. These 
measures, these three pillars of reform, address the fundamental 
relationship between Congress and the people.
  Mr. President, the Members of this body will no doubt remember, as 
the public remembers, just how close we were to resolving this issue in 
the last Congress, when right up to the last minute we thought that we 
had reformed both gifts and lobby disclosure.
  When the lobby reform and gift issues were debated last October, the 
opponents of the conference report raised some substantive concerns 
relative to lobby reform, which we have now successfully addressed.
  The opponents of the bill last year repeatedly said, and strongly 
said, that they had no objection whatever to the gift provisions of the 
bill. Those are the provisions which come before the Senate today.
  The majority leader himself said last October:

       I support the gift ban provisions. No lobbyist lunches, no 
     entertainment, no travel, no contribution into defense funds, 
     no fruit baskets, no nothing. That is fine with this Senator. 
     I doubt many Senators partake in that in any event.

  Other Senators made similar statements of their commitment for quick 
enactment of these gift rules. On October 6 of last year, 38 Republican 
Senators cosponsored a resolution, S. 247, to adopt tough new gift 
rules that were included in the conference report that was before this 
body. The Senate Republican leadership at that time stated that 
Republicans were prepared to enact these rules without delay.
  Now, the bill before the Senate contains those same rule changes that 
the vast majority of Members voted for less than a year ago, or about a 
year ago, in May of 1994. I think all Members stated--perhaps a few 
exceptions--that we still supported them last October.
  So now we are put to the test. Did we really mean what we said last 
May and last October? If we are going to improve public confidence in 
this institution, we are just simply going to have to change the way we 
do business in this town.
  Mr. President, the issue today is not whether we can go out to 
dinner. It is not whether we can even go out to dinner with lobbyists. 
The question is: Who is paying for the dinner? Who is paying for the 
tickets? Who is paying for the ski trips?
  Now, that is what the issue is and that is what the public sees. They 
see stories like the one on the TV show ``Inside Edition,'' which ran 
as follows:

       Imagine you and your family spending 3 days and nights at a 
     charming, world class ski resort, top-of-the-line lodging, 
     and cozy chalets with a wonderful mountain of skiing at your 
     doorstep and absolutely no worries about the cost of 
     anything. You will never waste a moment waiting in line for a 
     lift to the top, because, like the people you are about to 
     meet, you are the king of the hill, and this is the sweetest 
     deal on the slopes.

  Now, that is what the public sees. That is what they read, and they 
have had enough. The restrictions in the bill before the Senate are not 
something that we dreamed up. These restrictions, with some modest 
modifications, are taken from the rules that are already applicable to 
executive branch officials. Cabinet Secretaries live with these rules. 
So can we. If these rules are understandable to the executive branch 
and they follow them, so can we. It is time to put an end to the double 
standard, where the executive branch officials are covered by strict 
gift rules--live with them and understand them--but legislative branch 
officials are not covered by strict gift rules.
  The image of this Congress has taken a battering as a result of those 
free meals and those free tickets and those 

[[Page S 10585]]
free recreational trips. We do not need them. It is time to put an end 
to them. If we are going to increase public trust in this institution--
and it is our sacred obligation to do so--we have to end business as 
usual when it comes to these kinds of gifts.
  Mr. President, this issue has been thoroughly debated. It was debated 
at great length last year and in the years before. We came close last 
year. These are difficult issues. Again, if they were not difficult, 
they would have been resolved a long time ago.
  Now is the time that we can resolve these issues. If we address these 
issues in the spirit in which we run for office, if we address these 
issues with the same thoughts in our mind and in our heart as we have 
when we address the people of the United States seeking to reach this 
place, we will adopt tough gift rules, we will enhance public respect 
for this institution, and we will carry out what I believe is an 
obligation to ourselves and to the Constitution that we are sworn to 
uphold.
  When the public believes--public opinion polls show that the public 
believes--that lobbyists have the power in this town and that Congress 
and the President come second and third, when public confidence has 
reached that low, we must act. One of the things we must do is to adopt 
strong gift reform. We must have a gift ban which affects all gifts 
except for certain, obviously excluded categories, which are set forth 
in this bill.
  We have to end the free meals, the free tickets, the free 
recreational trips. I believe it is our obligation. If we address this 
again in the same spirit with which we came here and with which we 
sought to sit here, we can successfully address this in a way which I 
believe the American people will applaud and finally say that Congress 
is acting in the area of political reform the way the people want 
Congress to act.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Carolina.
  Mr. THURMOND. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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