[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 135 (Friday, August 11, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Page S12325]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           REGULATORY REFORM

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to talk about 
regulatory reform and to hopefully revive the discussion on regulatory 
reform. We have had a number of debates over the past 5 or 6 weeks 
about regulation reform and what should be done about it. I think those 
debates were healthy. I do not think there was anything wrong with the 
debate, but I think we have kind of lost over the last week or so the 
spirit, the genuine spirit, of regulatory reform.
  I say that because earlier this year an amendment was offered by the 
senior Senator from Oklahoma and the Senator from Nevada to have real 
regulation reform. It was an effort to do something about the 
longstanding problems we have had in this country where the regulators, 
the bureaucrats, have promulgated regulations that we simply have been 
unable to live with, small business in particular.
  So the Senator from Oklahoma and the Senator from Nevada offered an 
amendment that passed this Chamber by a vote of 100 to 0 that in effect 
said that if there is a regulation promulgated by a Federal agency that 
has a financial impact of more than $100 million, it would not become 
effective for 45 days. This would allow the Congress the opportunity to 
review that regulation, and, in fact, if we did not like it, we could 
rescind it.
  Mr. President, the same would apply to regulations promulgated under 
$100 million in financial impact; for those regulations, they would 
become effective immediately. But Congress would have 45 days to look 
at that regulation, and if we did not like it, we could in effect veto 
it.
  That made good enough sense that we passed it by a vote of 100 to 0 
here.
  Mr. President, this was a compromise. We all recognize that. This was 
a compromise because we had received from the other body a moratorium 
basically on all regulations.
  I said then and I say now, our regulatory reform proposal, that is, 
the one Senator Nickles and this Senator offered, is a sensible 
approach to Government oversight. As is evident in the intense debate 
that we all experienced this last month or 6 weeks, there are many who 
consider regulatory reform as essential to improving Government. There 
are some, Mr. President, who many believe do not want any reform. I 
think that is a significant minority, but there are some who want no 
reform in this area.
  We should not allow the entire process to end with so many small 
business owners, homebuilders, manufacturers, retailers, anyone doing 
business with the Government relying on the regulation that we now 
have. There should be a better way of doing what is now in effect. The 
Nickles-Reid measure is a way to do that.
  Just as Congress may pass a law only to have Federal regulation turn 
simple laws into complex regulation, the Reid-Nickles compromise was 
recently swallowed up in the complex regulatory reform package recently 
debated in the Chamber.
  Mr. President, we do a disservice to the Government and the citizens 
of this Government who sent us here when our reform has the potential 
for grave negative effects that conceivably could outweigh the intended 
positive.
  I do not want to get into that today, but I am saying inaction is no 
action. Inaction is doing the country a great disservice.
  So what I say, Mr. President, is that we should realize we have the 
ability to reform the way we handle regulations in this country. It has 
already passed the Senate. And so I say to my friends in the House, 
appoint conferees so that we can go to conference on this issue and 
come up with reasonable regulation reform. It may not be what everyone 
wants but certainly it is a significant step in the right direction.

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