[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 132 (Tuesday, August 8, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S11806-S11810]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                      FAMILY SELF-SUFFICIENCY ACT

  The Senate continued with the consideration of the bill.
  Mr. SIMPSON addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming is recognized.
  Mr. SIMPSON. Mr. President, briefly, because I know we are ready to 
move on with this legislation, I certainly want to speak in support of 
the Work Opportunity Act of 1995. That bill which my fine colleagues, 
Majority Leader Dole and Senator Packwood, have placed before us 
represents, I think, a very good starting point for welfare reform. I 
commend both of them for their work and for working with all of us to 
ensure that our concerns were taken care of.
  It is not a perfect bill. A bill rarely is. But it surely puts us on 
the right track. They have listened to my suggestions, especially with 
regard to recognition of rural areas and amending the bill to include 
vocational training and the definition of work. That is a provision 
Wyoming needed in the bill, and now under the bill, recipients can 
receive vocational training for up to a year. I appreciate that very 
much. That was very attentive to our needs.
  I strongly felt that welfare reform should be a high priority. I 
think we all agree with that. There is much to do. Not only to ``get 
tough'' with those who might best be described as welfare addicts, 
which offend us all, but also to help those who truly want to become 
self-sufficient, which charms us all, and know that these people need 
our attention.
  So, if we can do this in a humane and responsible manner--there is 
not one among us who has a desire to be punitive or destructive to any 
of those who are disadvantaged and most vulnerable in society. I do not 
see that. That is an absurd premise.
  When we talk about welfare reform, it is important that we look at 
the big picture and understand the reasons why people are on welfare. 
It is a very difficult thing. Those who have studied it for decades are 
unable to really come to closure on how these things happen, why is 
this occurring, why is the birth rate here, and what is the rate of 
illegitimacy? Nobody has done more work in that area than the senior 
Senator from New York. We read his studies, his works, and appreciate 
his extraordinary range of and grasp of the issue. It is a giant 
puzzler for us.
  In Wyoming, I know a single parent will tell me that they could get 
by without welfare if they just received the child support they were 
supposed to get in the divorce. I know about that because I did about 
1,500 of those in my practice of law for 18 years. ``If he would pay 
the child support, I would not need to be on welfare.'' That is very 
true. I have often felt we should put teeth in the welfare and child 
support enforcement laws. I applaud the leadership for including 
serious child support provisions in this bill. I am particularly 
pleased by the provisions that improve our ability to track down absent 
parents and streamline the process to make interstate enforcement less 
complicated and unmanageable. This is what has happened for years. You 
get the decree and support order, and the husband takes off. This will 
inject some responsibility in here for a group in society known as 
``fathers'' who are not here on Earth simply to sire the flock and move 
on, and that has to stop.
  Paternity establishment is another high priority in the legislation, 
and we are addressing that. I appreciate the approach in regard to 
block granting. Our very able Governor, Jim Geringer, a very able 
administrator, tells us that they need and require flexibility. We want 
to give that flexibility in the form of block grants so States can 
shape their own programs, make themselves laboratories. I am one who 
just does not believe that the Federal Government, or we here, have a 
monopoly on compassion. I do not see how people can even imagine that 
State officials somehow care any less about families and children than 
the Feds do. I think that these programs and flexibility are very 
important.
  I also agree with Senators Packwood and Chafee in their approach to 
the child welfare provisions included in the bill by not putting child 
welfare and child protection into block grants. They have recognized 
that we should not be too hasty in turning everything over to the 
States at one time.
  There is a consensus here among child welfare administrators that 
Federal protections have led to new improvements to this system and 
critical incentives to the State. It was true in my State where the 
system was in complete chaos until the State had guidelines and 
requirements to follow for receiving the Federal funding. Only then did 
Wyoming develop a child protection and foster care program that takes 
care of its most vulnerable and neglected children. In fact, were it 
not for the standards that Congress enacted--and I know this is strong 
language for a Republican, but in this situation, were it not for the 
standards Congress enacted in 1980, the States and territories with the 
worst track 

[[Page S 11807]]
records, such as the District of Columbia, would have been allowed to 
continue to disregard the basic safety of abused and neglected children 
with complete impunity.
  So I support block grants. I feel that aid to families with dependent 
children, along with the JOBS Program and AFDC child care programs, 
should be block granted. I would like to see States given the 
flexibility to run these programs as they see fit without Congress 
defining specific categories to whom States cannot pay benefits.
  With regard to SSI, we had hearings on supplemental security income. 
I agree that drug addicts and alcoholics should not receive cash 
payment benefits because they have a so-called ``disability.'' It is a 
self-induced one in many cases. However, I do feel that these addicts 
and substance abusers need to receive treatment for their addictions.
  I feel that sensible improvements have been made also in this area of 
children's eligibility for SSI. We had anecdotal examples of parents 
coaching their children to act up in school, and families who have all 
of their family on SSI rolls. However, those are only anecdotal 
evidence, and we should not use them as an excuse for carrying out some 
wholesale purge of children from the SSI rolls. We should make sure the 
low-income families who have children with severe disabilities are 
taken care of, especially if one or both parents must stay at home to 
care for this very troublesome and disabled child--and often they are 
similar and often a tremendous burden upon a parent in a time of 
stress.
  With regard to immigration, we will deal with that in a large area of 
the immigration subcommittee, which I chair. But I think it is very 
important to note here that since our earliest days as a nation, we 
have required new immigrants to be self-supporting. In the year 1645--
and I see my colleague from New York pique his interest, because he 
loves history--Massachusetts refused to admit prospective immigrants 
with no means of support other than public assistance. But America's 
first general immigration law--the big one, before the big influx in 
the early 1900's--was passed in 1882. In 1882, it prohibited the 
admission of ``any person unable to take care of himself or herself 
without first becoming a public charge.'' This restriction still 
exists. Section 212 of the Immigration and Nationality Act excludes 
those who are ``likely at any time'' to become a public charge. Courts 
have come along and interpreted that in a way which made it absolutely 
senseless. But that is the law.
  I think our Nation's welfare law should be consistent with America's 
historic immigration policy. This bill, in conjunction with immigration 
proposals under consideration within the subcommittee, will create a 
long absent commonality.
  Many immigrants--half of the new immigrants in fiscal year 1994, 
according to the State Department--are permitted to enter only because 
a friend or relative in the United States has promised, that is 
sponsored, and said to the U.S. Government that the newcomer will not 
require public assistance. Should this new immigrant then fall on hard 
times, it is the responsibility of the sponsor--that friend or relative 
who promised the support--to provide the aid. This Dole bill will 
require all Federal welfare programs--save a few ``public interest'' 
programs--to include the income of this sponsor when determining a 
recent immigrant's eligibility for welfare.
  The message in this area with regard to welfare is very clear: 
America is serious about our traditional expectation that immigrants be 
self-supporting. Newcomers should turn to the friends and relatives who 
sponsored them for assistance before seeking aid from the American 
taxpayer. Hear that clearly.
  Immigrants who come here and are sponsored must be self-supporting. 
They will not turn to the taxpayers first; they will turn to their 
sponsor first.
  I look forward to a healthy debate on all these issues. We will have 
one. I am happy to see us move forward. We need to move toward this 
program of work and self-sufficiency while leaving States without 
restrictions, giving flexibility.
  I thank the leaders for their fine work in moving this legislation 
forward.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, may I take just a moment of the Senate's 
time to express my gratitude, and I am sure that of Senator Packwood, 
for the substance of the remarks of Senator Simpson and particularly 
for the tone of those remarks.
  We are, indeed, struggling in this effort with forces we do not fully 
understand that have come upon us very suddenly, as history goes.
  The learned Senator can speak of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and its 
regulations in 1645. That is eons of time, as compared to the sudden 
incidence of this problem in our cities.
  I wonder if the Senator could allow me a moment to point out the 
urban dimension of this subject, because urban affairs--cities--are no 
longer a central topic of our concerns as they were, say, 30 years ago.
  President Nixon's first act upon taking office was to create an Urban 
Affairs Council. This will not take 3 minutes. I know the Senator from 
West Virginia is waiting, and he will be heard in just a second. This 
is what has happened in the course of the last few years, suddenly, as 
if it were a tornado out in Wyoming country.
  In the city of Los Angeles, Mr. President, 62 percent of the children 
are supported by aid to families with dependent children; in Chicago, 
43.7 percent; in Detroit, 78.7 percent; in my city of New York, 28.4 
percent; in Houston, TX, 24.6 percent. These are the 10 largest cities. 
There are higher ratios, but these are our 10 largest cities.
  What this does, and I think the Senator from Wyoming can sympathize 
with this, these ratios overwhelm municipal capacity. Going back to 
1912--I will go back that far--the New York Times began a series that 
has been going on until this day called ``The 100 Neediest Cases.'' At 
Christmastime, they give you a list of 100 families; most had 
tuberculosis, or an industrial accident killed the father, or something 
like that. You can cope with 100. There are more than 100, but it gives 
you a sense of dimension.
  How do you cope with the situation where 62 percent of your children 
are on welfare, which means, of course, they are paupers. One of the 
things we have had most application for in waivers was to allow 
families to have a car worth little more than $1,500. In Wyoming, you 
need a car to get to work in most places. That is an element we do not 
talk about often.
  This problem tends to be concentrated. It is an urban problem. It is 
an urban crisis. It is a general problem. What is a problem in Wyoming 
is a crisis in Cook County.
  Therefore, the more do I appreciate the concerns of the Senator from 
Wyoming and the mode in which he has stated them. I thank the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Inhofe). The Senator from West Virginia.
   Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, a lot of the time I wonder what we 
are doing talking on the floor because we just seem to be talking about 
things that do not make a lot of difference and that do not necessarily 
concern Americans as much as they may concern some internal dynamic 
here in the Senate, which may or may not be important.
  This obviously is a very different kind of setting. This time the 
Senate is turning to something that the people of my State, and the 
State of the Presiding Officer, and States all over this country really 
care about and really expect us to do something about. They see a 
welfare system that gives out too much for too little in return. They 
do not like it. They are very clear in their view about it. They are 
right.
  They see too little emphasis on something which I think is sort of 
the byway by which America is either going to come back to our proper 
course or we are not. That is something called personal responsibility. 
We have lost our sense of it in this country--not just the poor, but 
all of our people, I think--what we have an obligation to do ourselves 
as opposed to turning toward the communities or toward the Government.
  Also, something called work ethic, which people are talking a lot 
about, beginning to do something about, something the American people 
want to see badly and something they deserve to see. 

[[Page S 11808]]

  I think people have lost, and rightly so, their tolerance on 
dependency. Dependency is unavoidable in certain circumstances, but in 
most circumstances it is not. The American people know that. There are 
a lot of Americans who pay taxes who were dependent one way or another 
and fought their way out of it and have every reason to look at those 
who do not askance.
  The point is that we are talking about something really serious in 
welfare reform. Tax-paying, hard-working Americans are not the only 
ones who want reform in welfare. Most families on welfare want things 
to change, too, because many of the things that we in Government have 
done has fostered their dependency even against their own will, 
although they have to submit to it. The whole act of submission is one, 
of course, of losing a sense of personal responsibility.
  For all kinds of reasons, some very sad, mothers and fathers find 
themselves living in poverty. For some, attitudes and behavior bring 
them to welfare and keep them on welfare. For many families and many in 
my State of West Virginia, they want to get off welfare as much as the 
middle class wants them to get off welfare and to avoid all the 
problems that are associated with welfare, including the cost of it.
  The father disappears or refuses to pay child support. There are 
billions and billions of dollars out there. Child care costs more than 
a minimum-wage job, so people do not get around to overcoming that 
fact. Or the parent just cannot find a paying job because she or he 
does not have the most basic of skills. That I can remember from 
earlier days. They use to have something, as the ranking member of the 
Finance Committee knows, called the dollar-an-hour program. We had that 
in West Virginia. I am not sure if they had that in all kinds of other 
States, but that was something where, when there really was not 
anything else, you paid somebody $1 an hour and they went out and 
worked on the highways for the department of highways. They got $1 an 
hour. It was really for people who could not do anything else but that 
kind of work.
  It was sad, but it was all that there was, and people did it because 
they had to. These are some of the situations we run into.
  Welfare is also about children. Acronyms and clunky program titles 
keep that basic truth from the picture of welfare.
  But the fact is that 43,000 families in West Virginia who get a 
welfare check every month--there are that many--and the 5 million 
families across America who get a welfare check every month--and there 
are that many--include over 9 million innocent children; 5 million 
families, 9 million children. We are talking about 1-year-olds, 7-year-
olds, 11-year-olds, and everything in between; people who are just 
starting life, in effect. These are not the deadbeats, are they? They 
are totally innocent of whatever can be blamed on the welfare system 
and its recipients. Whatever their parents might have done or not done, 
they are innocent--and they really are.
  I think back to many cases I know of in West Virginia where the 
children of parents who are on welfare simply overcame that and went on 
and now have decent jobs and are raising families. It is a triumphant 
thing to see. It is something to fight for, something to work for, 
something to glory in, if we can get a welfare system that allows that 
to happen more commonly.
  In fact, from every poll that I have seen, while Americans expect 
Congress to reform welfare and are fairly stiff in their views about 
it--us and it--they also expect us to make sure the children are 
protected. On that, they are not equivocal. They want children 
protected. They recognize the difference between the perpetrators and 
victims. They see children as victims and they say so, and they want 
children protected even as they want the adults and the parents to 
work. They want children protected. They are not asking us to be cruel. 
They are asking us to be firm, but not cruel. They are asking us to be 
smart, in other words.
  Because of the anger about the welfare system, it is very tempting 
for politicians to simplify the solutions; because there is always a 
coming election, to say that you were tougher on welfare than the next 
person. There is nothing like being tougher on welfare except, of 
course, if it does not work. If you do something that does not work, 
you may do better in the argument but you should not sleep as well at 
night.
  The test in welfare reform, it seems to this Senator, will be met by 
its results, what we actually do--hopefully come together to do--on the 
floor of this body and the other one. It will not be charts or bumper 
stickers or promises.
  West Virginians want welfare reform because they want to see things 
really change. They know the system is not working as it is. They 
believe the system should work, can work, ought to work, and can be 
made to work by us, who are their representatives, if we will but come 
together. If we do not come together we will all fail, and it will be a 
shame and a sham on this institution. If we come together, Republicans 
and Democrats, we can make this work. We do not have to be tougher, one 
than the other, but simply be smart and make it work. And being smart 
will be plenty tough--plenty tough.
  I think that is what the Senate should spend this week, or whatever 
time we have, sorting through. That is the way to change the welfare 
system in a way which works--on both sides, if that is possible. Every 
single Member of this body should reject the idea that welfare reform 
is some kind of trophy that one party holds over the other. I see some 
of that already and it worries me, as I know it worried the Senator 
from New York. It is a chance to recognize the realities of people on 
welfare, and a system that spits out the wrong results. It is a chance 
to do careful surgery so we get it right. There is not any time for 
anything else. And we can get it right.
  I am still incredibly surprised--and I say this not in a partisan 
spirit, but because I must out with my feelings on this subject--that 
the majority leader thinks that a block grant is welfare reform. I have 
to say that. There is no question, if the Federal Government collects 
$16 billion from the taxpayers and chops it into 50 separate pots for 
the States, welfare will certainly end as we know it. But that is a 
cop-out. What a way to run from the hard decisions and the tough calls 
that we know are required to get the results that will make all of this 
possible. Nobody on either side of the aisle is running from tough 
decisions, but we have to be smart. As a former Governor, I know that 
we have to be practical. What we do has to work.
  I support the Daschle-Breaux-Mikulski bill, because it is an actual 
plan to change the welfare system. It does not just pass the buck to 
Governors. It replaces the current unsatisfactory, maddening welfare 
system with the rules and the steps that will get people into jobs and 
enable them to stay employed. It is not just the getting of the job 
that is important, it is having that job 2 years later that really 
tests the mettle of what we do. But it also remembers the children in 
the right way.
  There is all this talk about values, and properly so. I just hope 
that means that some compassion--a little bit--is carved out for 
something called children, that one really does put them in a separate 
category--children who had nothing to do with where they were born, how 
they were born, or whether their mother is dirt poor or an heiress. I 
mean, most of us really have very little to do with that. Yet, if we 
are in one condition or another, it has an enormous impact on our 
lives. And people have to understand that. The Senate must not 
surrender this country's commitment to children and the idea that 
everybody deserves a chance after they are born.
  There is nothing timid about the Daschle-Breaux-Mikulski bill. It is 
a bold bill.
  AFDC, the letters for the core of today's welfare program, is 
abolished. AFDC--I have been living with that acronym for 35 years--is 
abolished. It is ended, as we know it. In its place we propose 
something called Work First, words that mean what they say. For the 
first time we say financial aid for poor families comes with strings 
attached, and that aid will only last so long a period and then it will 
stop if those conditions are not met. Children will keep getting help 
if they need it, but for adults the help is temporary.
  Parents have to actually sign something called a parent empowerment 

[[Page S 11809]]
  contract. It is a personal agreement outlining how he or she will move 
from welfare to work. The contract is enforceable. All of this is new.
  In return, Work First is a plan that respects what families need to 
go from poverty to independence--what they have to have. That means 
different things for different families. Basically, we make sure there 
is help to find a job, qualify for a job, and stay in a job with backup 
support like child care and, thank heavens, health care. What parent in 
his or her right mind can take a job if there is no one to care for his 
or her children? We put people in jail, you know, for neglecting 
children. It is a Federal offense.
  Again, as a former Governor, I know what happens when the Federal 
Government declares victory over a difficult problem--and now I come 
back to block grants. Block grants, in my judgment, are closer to 
something called surrender: Here, States, come along with us on this 
block grants. It is a sturdy idea, come along. We are going to give you 
a check. But, by the way, the check is going to shrink. And, by the 
way, should there be a recession, or some kind of natural catastrophe, 
or you happen to have many more poor families, then that is kind of a 
problem for you. But people like the idea of block grants, so we are 
going to do block grants.
  This Senator does not like the idea of block grants. This Senator was 
Governor during the first New Federalism in the early 1980's and 
watched the State go from the highest employment in its history to a 17 
percent unemployment rate all in the period of 3 years. That is not 
pretty. That is full of tragedy. That is not all because of the Federal 
block grants. But they symbolized it, and it hurt. It hurt a lot, Mr. 
President.
  That is why I hope that we can find agreement on this Senate floor, 
and why it is so important--and why we have opening statements and then 
two Senators over there who are running against each other for 
President and Senators over here, and then two sides, that we sort of 
forget about some of these things--that we start thinking about what we 
are here for, which is solid welfare reform.
  We have the time if we take it. If we have to stay longer, then I 
guess we should do that. But we have to think about the realities of 
poverty, of welfare, and how to make the whole country a place where 
children do matter.
  For example, in Senator Dole's plan the answer to States hit by a 
recession or depression is a loan fund. Right--States really are going 
to be able to borrow money. Of course, that money has to be repaid in 3 
years with interest, when more of their people face a temporary crisis 
of unemployment and hunger.
  Mr. President, the Senate needs to look behind the rhetoric of that 
welfare plan and deal with facts and come together. The Congressional 
Budget Office says that under a very similar bill--the one passed by 
the Finance Committee--44 States will not be able to meet the bill's 
supposed work requirements. Let me say that again. The bill that we put 
out of Finance will fail in 44 of the 50 States, will fail according to 
the Congressional Budget Office. Common sense says that we, therefore, 
should not do that, and we have to again come up with something that 
works. That is all I am interested in--something that works, that is 
practical and works, that gets people off welfare, that protects 
children, that is tough on personal responsibility, that makes parents 
work, makes them work but works as a plan.
  The bill of Senator Dole really has the same problem. It just does 
not bother to figure out how the work requirements become reality.
  Why should we set our States up to fail? We do not want to do that. 
We may be in a rush. But we do not want to set our States up to fail. 
We do not want to do that. It would be supremely wrong and shameful. I 
would say look at the democratic alternative and you will find a plan 
that will get results, with people actually working, what we all say 
that we want.
  The block grant approach in the Dole bill turns away from the 
Nation's safety net for children, and we are all asked to hope that 
each individual State will step in. Many of them will not. Americans 
are not asking us to abandon children. I repeat and repeat. They are 
asking us to strike a better deal with their parents, to link the 
responsibility to Government help that is also temporary.
  There are areas of agreement in this Chamber on welfare reform, and I 
celebrate those. Members on both sides of the aisle are clearly 
interested in promoting flexibility and in encouraging innovation among 
the States. Again, as a former Governor, I also know the frustration, 
that a Federal bureaucracy that micromanages is annoying, a Federal 
bureaucracy that is too regulated, that stifles creative efforts to 
develop local initiatives to move families from welfare to work. So we 
all agree, 100 of us I suspect, that the States need more flexibility.
  I might add, that is not where you need to look for sudden converts. 
The senior Senator from New York, Senator Moynihan, focused the 
country's attention 8 years ago on the signs of progress that were just 
appearing in a few States that had been given more room to experiment. 
That was the basis of the Family Support Act passed in 1988, and it is 
the reason States this very minute are trying all kinds of new ways to 
move families off of the welfare rolls and to making it on their own.
  I remember in West Virginia we started something back in the 1970's. 
It was called the Community Work Experiment Program [CWEP]. That was 
made a part of the Family Support Act. We were the only State in the 
Nation at the time to be doing that. We started that, and we aimed it 
particularly at some of our southern counties, and it worked. It was 
working. As a result of that, it was kept in the 1988 Family Support 
Act and was deemed to be good, and is still on the books.
  There is partisan agreement on the crucial need to dramatically 
improve child support enforcement. I would say 100 Senators will agree 
on that, again a building block for bipartisan consensus here. The 
tools to force parents to accept financial responsibility for their 
children are not in full use. We know that. They must be, and we do 
that.
  Mr. President, if the Senate sets politics aside and makes results 
our test, and keeps a special place in our hearts for children, we can 
produce and pass a bill that deserves the title ``welfare reform.'' We 
can do that.
  Our debate should focus on how to get the parents of over 9 million 
children to work, while making sure that the victims are not the 
children. Our work and our votes should be based on facts and 
realities, not on the temptation to pretend slogans will solve 
problems, or on trying to outdo each other or to bring home a trophy. 
The only trophy ought to be a bipartisan one that creates a welfare 
system that works, and that is a trophy for our country--not for us.
  As I look ahead to this debate, I intend to respond to West 
Virginians who have been waiting for welfare reform. For the system to 
change so that the rules are the same for everyone--if you can work, by 
golly, you work; if you have children, care for them, take 
responsibility.
  I also hope we will see the country change. We can do better, and it 
does not have to be done by becoming mean or becoming thoughtless. It 
certainly should not be done by abandoning the little that is done for 
children who have so little.
  I recall, Mr. President, Majority Leader Dole's opening statement 
from a March hearing in the Senate Finance Committee. I am going to 
quote what he said. Senator Dole said:

       I do not know anything else as meaningful or as critical as 
     doing our part to help America's children in need, and 
     helping them get the necessary support to remain a part of 
     their family, helping them realize their full potential as we 
     launch into the next century . . . our first concern must be 
     the well-being of the children involved. They are not the 
     instigators, they are the victims of what we see as a growing 
     problem . . .

  If we heed those words, wise words, and work together to achieve real 
reform and insist on getting the surgery right--that is, that we are 
careful and smart and practical in what we do--then we have a 
tremendous opportunity to come through for the American people on 
welfare reform.
  I hope the Senate will surprise the pundits and the skeptics and the 
professional observers of this place by not only passing something 
called welfare reform but a bill of which we can be proud. 

[[Page S 11810]]

  I thank the Presiding Officer and yield the floor.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New York.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. May I just express the appreciation of this Senator for 
the remarks that have been made by the Senator from West Virginia, the 
chairman of the Rockefeller Commission on Children, who spoke so 
carefully and thoughtfully, particularly to his point about dependency.
  The issue of welfare is the issue of dependency, and in a world where 
adults stand on their own two feet, as the phrase has it, we have a 
situation in which the condition of dependency is massive in our 
cities, pervasive in the land, and while we have not been able to solve 
the problem, we are making real steps in addressing it. And I want very 
much to share his sentiments and his concerns.
  I thank the Chair. Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, with the consent of the leaders on this 
issue at the moment, I would, if I could break for a moment, ask 
unanimous consent to speak on another issue for no more than 10 minutes 
as if in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________