[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 138 (Thursday, September 7, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12805-S12830]
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. DeWINE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DeWINE. Mr. President, I rise today to discuss three amendments 
that I intend to propose later in regard to this bill we are engaged 
today, this week, and probably into the next week with one of the most 
fundamental reforms of the welfare system in over a generation. It 
really is a debate of great historic importance to not only the people 
who are on welfare, but to all Americans.
  The millions of Americans who are trapped in the cycle of welfare 
dependency need a way out. As we work on this bill, I believe that we 
have to make absolutely sure that as we do this, we do, in fact, give 
them a way out and not just put them into another revolving door.
  The purpose of the first amendment that I will offer will be to make 
sure 

[[Page S 12806]]
that the States tackle the underlying problem of the welfare system. 
Quite frankly, Mr. President, too often welfare ends up being quicksand 
for people instead of a ladder of real opportunity.
  The underlying bill that we are working on will certainly help change 
that and helps change it by creating a work requirement that will help 
boost welfare clients into the economic mainstream of work and 
opportunity.
  We need to help people get off welfare. One very important way we can 
do this is by helping them avoid getting on welfare in the first place, 
and that is one thing that sometimes we miss in this whole debate about 
welfare. We do need to worry about how to get people off welfare. But 
if we can take action as a society that keeps them from ever going on 
welfare, that is a great accomplishment as well. It will not only do 
society a lot of good, but it will be very important to the individual 
who we are talking about.
  So this brings me to the specific proposal contained in my first 
amendment.
  This amendment would give States credit for making real reductions in 
their welfare caseload, not illusory reductions based on just ordinary 
turnover.
  What am I talking about? Since 1988, 14 million Americans have gone 
off welfare--14 million. Yet, during that same period, there has been a 
30 percent net increase in the welfare caseload. What this tells us is 
there are a lot of people going on, a lot of people going off, but we 
are getting more people coming on than are going off.
  So we have to make absolutely sure that we keep our eye on the ball 
and, really, the ball that we are trying to keep our eye on is the 
objective of keeping people out of the culture of welfare dependency.
  Under the bill, States will have to meet a work requirement, and that 
is good. But I think this policy will have an unintended side effect, a 
side effect that I believe my amendment will help cure.
  If there is a work requirement, States certainly will have an 
incentive to try to meet that requirement. If States face the threat of 
losing Federal funding for failing to meet the work requirement, I am 
afraid that they could easily fall into the trap of judging their 
welfare policies solely--solely, Mr. President--by the criterion of 
whether or not they help meet just that work requirement.
  I believe that what we have to remember is that the work requirement 
is not an end in and of itself. Our goal must be to break the cycle of 
welfare dependency, and we have found that helping people stay off 
AFDC, never going on, through tools used by the Government--job 
training, job search assistance, rent subsidies, transportation 
assistance, and other similar measures--is a cheaper way of doing this 
than simply waiting for the person to fall off the economic cliff and 
become a full-fledged welfare client. It just makes common sense. If we 
as a society can intervene early, it is going to be cost-effective and 
it is going to work and it is going to make the difference in people's 
lives.
  Under the bill as written, States are really given no incentive to 
make these efforts to help people. If anything under the bill, there 
really is a disincentive to do this. If a State takes an active, 
aggressive, successful effort to help people stay off welfare, then the 
really tough welfare cases will make up an increasingly larger 
proportion of the remaining welfare caseload, and that will make the 
work requirement much tougher for a State to meet.
  Under this bill as written, there is incentive really to wait to help 
people, to wait, to wait until they are actually on welfare. Then the 
States can get credit for getting people off welfare. That really does 
not seem to me to be the right way to do it or the right incentive.
  If States divert people from the welfare system by helping them stay 
off welfare in the first place, then the people who stay on welfare 
will tend to be more hardcore, more hard-to-reach welfare clients, and 
that will make it more difficult for States to meet the work 
requirement.
  That, Mr. President, really is exactly the opposite of what we should 
be trying to do. My amendment would eliminate this truly perverse 
incentive. My amendment would lower the work requirement that States 
have to reach by the very same amount that the States have reduced 
their welfare caseload.
  Helping citizens stay off welfare is just as important as making 
welfare clients work, just as important as moving people off welfare. 
Indeed, the reason we want to make welfare clients work in the first 
place is, of course, to help them get off welfare. But--and this is a 
very important provision in my amendment--we cannot allow this new 
incentive that I propose for caseload reduction to become an incentive 
for the States to ignore poverty.
  Under my amendment, States will be given no credit for caseload 
reductions achieved by the changing of eligibility standards. Ignoring 
the problem of poverty, Mr. President, will certainly not make it go 
away. Arbitrarily kicking people off of relief is not a solution to 
welfare dependency, and States should not--I repeat, not--get credit 
for changing their eligibility to meet this objective.
  Welfare reform block grants are designed to give States the 
flexibility they need to meet their responsibilities. They have to have 
more flexibility. But they must not become an opportunity for the 
States to ignore their responsibilities. States do need to be rewarded 
for solving the problem. Giving States credit for real reductions in 
caseload will provide this reward.
  I believe this amendment will, in fact, yield another benefit. It 
will enable States to target their resources on the more difficult 
welfare cases: the at-risk people who need very intensive training and 
counseling if they are ever going to get off welfare.
  It will not do us any good as a society to pat ourselves on the back 
because people are leaving AFDC, if at the very same time an even 
greater number of people are getting on the welfare rolls, and if the 
ones getting on are an even tougher group than the ones who got off.
  The American people demand a much more fundamental and far-reaching 
solution. They demand real reductions in the number of people who need 
welfare.
  Reducing the number of people on welfare is certainly going to be a 
very tall order. Since 1988, only half a dozen States or so have really 
managed to reduce their caseload. One of them, Wisconsin, has managed a 
very significant reduction. It is going to be tough, but it is 
absolutely necessary.
  This issue simply must be faced, and it will be faced with all the 
creativity at the disposal of the 50 States, 50 laboratories of 
democracy.
  How are States going to do it? There are probably as many ways of 
doing it as there are States. I think that is one of the positive 
things about the underlying bill.
  There is no single best answer. That is the key reason why we need to 
give the States the flexibility to experiment. In Wisconsin, for 
example, the Work First Program, with its tough work requirement, has 
reduced applications to the welfare system. That is a promising 
approach. We have to do other things, such as reduce the number of out-
of-wedlock births and get rid of the disincentives to marriage.
  The bottom line is this, Mr. President: We have to solve the problem 
and not ignore it. States should be encouraged to take action. But they 
should be encouraged to take action early to keep people off of 
welfare, to help them before they drop into the welfare pit. I believe 
this is the compassionate thing to do. I believe it is the cost-
effective thing to do.
  My staff and I, Mr. President, have spent a considerable amount of 
time talking to the people who run Ohio's welfare operation, both at 
the county levels and at the State level. One of the problems that they 
have continued to talk to me about is just what I have talked about, 
and that is, that what we really need to do is keep people off of 
welfare. We do not want to be in the situation that I used to find 
years and years ago when I was practicing law and when I was county 
prosecuting attorney, where we would have situations where people were 
having problems, where people needed help--either job training, or 
education, or just a little help to tide them over--and they could not 
get that help. What the welfare department would have to tell them is, 
wait until you get the eviction notice, wait until they start putting 
your clothes and everything else out on the street, then we can help 
you, then you 

[[Page S 12807]]
can get on welfare. And once you get on welfare, all these things will 
happen and you will get all these benefits. Our director, in the State 
of Ohio, of welfare, Arnold Tompkins, makes an analogy to a light. He 
says you go up with the switch or down, and you are either on welfare 
or you are not. If you are on it, you get all these benefits. If you 
are not, you do not get the benefits. We have a difficult time giving 
people some help to stay off of welfare.
  I think what we must make sure we are doing when we pass this bill--
which is a very, very good bill, and one of the reasons it is a good 
bill, it has a realistic work requirement in it. One of the things we 
have to make sure we are doing is allowing the States the flexibility 
and giving them some incentive to try to take the actions early on 
which will prevent someone actually from ever going on welfare. We must 
make sure that we, as we write this bill, give the States credit for 
having done that.
  Let me turn to the second amendment that I intend to propose. It has 
to do with a rainy day fund. This amendment is a very simple one. It is 
a recognition of economic realities. When a State faces a recession, a 
number of things happen. One of them is that the welfare caseload goes 
up. The other thing that always happens is the revenues going into the 
State go down.
  It is as simple as that. When States are in the middle of a serious 
recession, they are reluctant to borrow from a loan fund because they 
are, frankly, afraid they will be unable to pay the money back. I do 
not blame them. I believe that we need an unemployment contingency 
grant fund to make sure that when a recession hits, the Federal 
Government will remain a partner in the process of taking care of the 
welfare population. You will notice I say ``partner.''
  It should be just as clear, Mr. President, that this rainy day fund 
must not become a back door to the re-Federalization of welfare. The 
threshold for disbursements from this fund, I believe, has to be tough. 
And the threshold in my amendment is, in fact, tough. It has been 
described as follows: A State, under my amendment, will not qualify if 
it has a ``cold.'' It will only qualify if it has ``pneumonia.''
  It is my hope that this amendment will not be controversial. I 
believe it is a necessary precaution for the inevitable downturns in 
the economic cycle. Under this amendment, the State has to meet two 
conditions to qualify for aid from this fund. First, it has to maintain 
its welfare effort at the fiscal year 1994 level. And unemployment has 
to be two percentage points higher than in the previous year. States 
will then have to match these Federal funds at the same rate as the 
matching formula for Medicaid. And they will have to maintain their own 
effort. This is a tough requirement, but I believe it is fair, and I 
believe that it will be of immense help to the States.
  Mr. President, we need this rainy day fund, and we need to make sure 
that it is not abused.
  Let me turn to the third amendment I intend to offer. It has to do 
with a subject that has troubled me in this country for many, many 
years, and that is the issue of child support and child support 
enforcement. When I discuss this issue, I again have to go back, in my 
own mind, at least, to my experience as a county prosecuting attorney. 
One of my jobs, of course, was to try to enforce the child support 
enforcement laws. Mr. President, the third amendment really is an 
attempt to make it easier for States to crack down on deadbeat parents. 
We are all aware that one of the key cost causes of our social 
breakdown is the failure for parents to be responsible for their own 
children. The family ought to be the school for citizenship--preparing 
the children for responsible and productive lives. When the parents do 
not do that, it is very difficult for society to step in and fill the 
gap.
  We need to reconnect parenthood and responsibility. We need to help 
States locate these deadbeats, establish support orders for the 
children, and enforce the orders.
  My amendment attempts to address this problem in two ways. First, it 
provides for a more timely sharing of information with the States. 
Today, the Federal Parent Locator Service, in the U.S. Department of 
Health and Human Services, gives the States banking and asset 
information about potential deadbeats on an annual basis, only once a 
year.
  Mr. President, talk to the people who have to track down these 
deadbeats, and they will tell you and other Members of the Senate how 
difficult that process is. As I mentioned, I used to do this when I was 
a county prosecutor. If you have to wait a whole year to get 
information about a deadbeat, there is a pretty good chance that that 
deadbeat is going to flee your jurisdiction. The information that you 
get may be up to a year old--or even more--and will simply not be 
information that will do any good.
  My amendment is simple. It would change that reporting requirement 
from an annual basis to a quarterly basis.
  Mr. President, these child support enforcers are involved in a very 
difficult but a very important job. I believe that we should cut--by 75 
percent--the amount of time they have to wait for this very important 
information.
  Mr. President, I look forward to the debate on these and the other 
amendments offered by my colleagues. I believe that we have a great 
opportunity in this year's welfare reform bill--an opportunity to 
change the direction of welfare and to really change the direction of 
this country.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, first, I would like to compliment my 
friend and colleague from Ohio, Senator DeWine, for an excellent 
statement. His experience as a Congressman, his experience as 
Lieutenant Governor of the State of Ohio, as well as a Senator, gives 
him a perspective that may be better than most because he has been 
involved in administering these programs. I think he has had some very 
constructive, positive ideas that are really invaluable. I hope our 
colleagues will pay attention. I compliment my friend for his remarks.
  I would also like to say at this time that we requested a list of 
amendments, and the numbers were floating around, whether there was 50 
amendments, 60 amendments, or 70 amendments.
  We are very willing to take up those amendments, see if we can 
incorporate those amendments into the substitute bill that will be 
offered tomorrow, or have people offer their amendments. They can 
debate them. We will set aside the amendment and vote on the amendment 
tomorrow.
  If colleagues have amendments that they would like to be considered 
and disposed of, and frankly I think we are going to be more favorably 
disposed tonight than we will be later on Friday and certainly on 
Monday and Tuesday. I encourage colleagues if they have amendments to 
please bring those to the floor and we will try to assist in any way we 
can as far as disposing of them.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I understand there is a pending 
amendment. I ask unanimous consent that the amendment be set aside.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                Amendment No. 2469 to Amendment No. 2280

 (Purpose: To provide additional funding to States to accommodate any 
               growth in the number of people in poverty)

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from California [Mrs. Feinstein] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2469 to amendment No. 2280.

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent reading of the 
amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       Beginning on page 17, line 16, strike all through page 21, 
     line 3, and insert the following:
       ``(3) Supplemental grant amount for poverty population 
     increases in certain states.--

[[Page S 12808]]

       ``(A) In general.--The amount of the grant payable under 
     paragraph (1) to a qualifying State for each of fiscal years 
     1997, 1998, 1999, and 2000 shall be increased by the 
     supplemental grant amount for such State.
       ``(B) Qualifying state.--For purposes of this paragraph, 
     the term `qualifying State', with respect to any fiscal year, 
     means a State that had an increase in the number of poor 
     people as determined by the Secretary under subparagraph (D) 
     for the most recent fiscal year for which information is 
     available.
       ``(C) Supplemental grant amount.--For purposes of this 
     paragraph, the supplemental grant amount for a State, with 
     respect to any fiscal year, is an amount which bears the same 
     ratio to the total amount appropriated under paragraph (4)(B) 
     for such fiscal year as the increase in the number of poor 
     people as so determined for such State bears to the total 
     increase of poor people as so determined for all States.
       ``(D) Requirement that data relating to the incidence of 
     poverty in the united states be published.--
       ``(i) In general.--The Secretary shall, to the extent 
     feasible, produce and publish for each State, county, and 
     local unit of general purpose government for which data have 
     been compiled in the then most recent census of population 
     under section 141(a) of title 13, United States Code, and for 
     each school district, data relating to the incidence of 
     poverty. Such data may be produced by means of sampling, 
     estimation, or any other method that the Secretary determines 
     will produce current, comprehensive, and reliable data.
       ``(ii) Content; frequency.--Data under this subparagraph--
       ``(I) shall include--
       ``(aa) for each school district, the number of children age 
     5 to 17, inclusive, in families below the poverty level; and
       ``(bb) for each State and county referred to in clause (i), 
     the number of individuals age 65 or older below the poverty 
     level; and
       ``(II) shall be published--
       ``(aa) for each State, annually beginning in 1996;
       ``(bb) for each county and local unit of general purpose 
     government referred to in clause (i),
      in 1996 and at least every second year thereafter; and
       ``(ccb) for each school district, in 1998 and at least 
     every second year thereafter.
       ``(iii) Authority to aggregate.--
       ``(I) In general.--If reliable data could not otherwise be 
     produced, the Secretary may, for purposes of clause 
     (ii)(I)(aa), aggregate school districts, but only to the 
     extent necessary to achieve reliability.
       ``(II) Information relating to use of authority.--Any data 
     produced under this clause shall be appropriately identified 
     and shall be accompanied by a detailed explanation as to how 
     and why aggregation was used (including the measures taken to 
     minimize any such aggregation).
       ``(iv) Report to be submitted whenever data is not timely 
     published.--If the Secretary is unable to produce and publish 
     the data required under this subparagraph for any county, 
     local unit of general purpose government, or school district 
     in any year specified in clause (ii)(II), a report shall be 
     submitted by the Secretary to the President of the Senate and 
     the Speaker of the House of Representatives, not later than 
     90 days before the start of the following year, enumerating 
     each government or school district excluded and giving the 
     reasons for the exclusion.
       ``(v) Criteria relating to poverty.--In carrying out this 
     subparagraph, the Secretary shall use the same criteria 
     relating to poverty as were used in the then most recent 
     census of population under section 141(a) of title 13, United 
     States Code (subject to such periodic adjustments as may be 
     necessary to compensate for inflation and other similar 
     factors).
       ``(vi) Consultation.--The Secretary shall consult with the 
     Secretary of Education in carrying out the requirements of 
     this subparagraph relating to school districts.
       ``(vii) Authorization of appropriations.--There are 
     authorized to be appropriated to carry out this subparagraph 
     $1,500,000 for each of fiscal years 1996 through 2000.

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I rise today to offer an amendment 
that would provide additional funding to States to accommodate growth 
which may occur in their welfare caseloads.
  Legislation which provides the basis for this amendment is included 
in the welfare reform bill already passed by the House of 
Representatives entitled H.R. 4, the Personal Responsibility Act.
  Title 1 of that bill includes a supplemental grant to adjust for 
population increases. In the House version, the grant is $100 million 
annually for each of fiscal years 1997, 1998, 1999, and the year 2000.
  In the Dole bill, the supplemental grant is $877 million over 5 
years. The House supplemental grant is distributed to States based on 
each State's proportion of the total growth. However, the Dole bill 
handles this formula in a very complicated manner which only benefits 
19 out of the 50 States.
  Frankly, by providing zero funding for growth, it does in the State 
of California. I have got to make that very clear.
  The amendment I am proposing today takes the same approach, as the 
legislation that passed the House of Representatives, with respect to 
growth, and would apply it to the Dole bill. California, which is 
projected to experience a significant growth in its poor population 
over the next 5 years, under the present draft of the Dole bill, would 
receive zero--zero.
  There is no additional cost associated with this amendment. In fact, 
there is some reason to believe that this method of accommodating 
growth equitably and objectively among all States might result in some 
cost savings when compared to the underlying bill. In any event, the 
authorization of appropriations, for the supplemental grant for each of 
the fiscal years, remains the same as in the Dole bill, and 
distribution of the additional funds is capped by those amounts which 
total $877 million over 5 years.
  I would add another point. All States will be held harmless under 
this legislation. That is to say, no State's grant will be reduced if 
the State experiences a decline in its poor population. But each and 
every State which experiences an increase in its poor population will 
receive a corresponding increase in its Federal grant to help them 
carry out the mandates of this legislation.
  Let me briefly contrast this with the approach in the underlying 
bill. As I said, only 19 States, meet the definition for use of this 
money under the language of the Dole bill, and that is irrespective of 
their actual growth of in poor youngsters. And, it excludes many States 
that will experience growth in their caseloads.
  Under the Dole bill, 19 States receive automatic additional funding, 
2.5 percent of the fiscal year 1996 grant in each of the years 1997 to 
the year 2000 if, first, their State's welfare spending is less than 
the national average level of State spending and, second, population 
growth is greater than the average national population growth.
  In addition, for reasons which are unclear, certain States are deemed 
as qualifying if their level of State welfare spending is less than 35 
percent of the national average level of State welfare spending per 
poor person in fiscal year 1996. As I understand it, only two States 
qualify. Mississippi and Arkansas are the only two States that would 
qualify under that portion of the drafting.
  This formula penalizes States which have traditionally had higher 
levels of State welfare spending. So, in other words, if you have been 
a high benefit State, you are actually penalized by the bill. And, it 
rewards States, irrespective of their projected, or actual, population 
growth or decline.
  I must say I am astonished that many States which are projected to 
have significant increases in their poor populations do not meet the 
definition required by the Dole bill. It leads me to conclude that this 
supplemental grant is not necessarily to accommodate growth at all.
  Federal taxpayers are being asked to spend almost $1 billion over 5 
years in the name of growth. But, in fact, the result is that States 
which, until now, have spent less than the average in assisting the 
poor will now be subsidized. So, until now, they have not spent much, 
and, now, they are going to be subsidized by the taxpayers of all 50 
States. What kind of a bill is that?
  Let me take a moment to review for you what some of the benefit 
levels have been from some of the States who will be beneficiaries of 
this so-called growth fund. In Mississippi the maximum monthly AFDC 
benefit for one-parent families with two children has been $120. That 
is $120 in combined Federal-State AFDC grants. In Alabama, the combined 
maximum has been $164. In Texas, the maximum benefit has been $188. In 
Tennessee, $185. Louisiana, $190. Arkansas, $204. Kentucky, $228.
  Let us look at one or two States with similar benefit levels. In 
Indiana, the monthly benefit is $288. In Missouri, it is $292. But even 
though these levels are similar to other States, they will receive 
nothing, zero, zip--nothing--to accommodate any increase in their poor 
populations. Why? Who would draw this kind of growth formula?
  Let us look now at some high growth States. Let us see what they 
get--Washington, for example. While the 

[[Page S 12809]]
Bureau of the Census projects a general population growth of almost 10 
percent, the Dole bill provides zero funding for growth. Idaho is 
projected to experience a general increase in its population of almost 
11 percent, Mr. President. Is it a growth State under the Dole bill? 
The answer is no. Finally, let us take a look at California, the most 
populous State in the Nation and one which is projected to grow by 6.25 
percent over the next 5 years. It, too, receives no additional funds to 
meet the anticipated growth in caseload.
  Clearly, the growth fund in the underlying bill is, as I have said, 
not a true growth fund. It is a fund for some other reason, but I do 
not think anyone in this body should call it a growth fund. I believe 
this is a fundamental flaw in the Dole bill, as compared to the House 
version of the welfare reform bill.
  None of us in this body knows what the future holds for our States--
whether it is economic recession in a rust belt State, regional 
downturn in a sunbelt State, natural disaster in any part of our 
country, or even Federal base closures. What we do know is there will 
be unanticipated regional economic conditions and corresponding 
fluctuations in the incidence of poverty. Any State is susceptible to 
these circumstances. This amendment, the amendment I am proposing, 
simply uses the same approach as in the House bill, applies it to the 
$877 million, and says that you receive additional funding for growth 
proportionate to your numbers published by the Bureau of the Census. If 
your poor population goes up, you will get the corresponding 
proportional share of that fund.
  This, to me, is the fair way of doing it. No gimmicks, you use the 
census figures. If you are a growth State, you get extra funding to 
carry out the mandate. Frankly, most of the States, the overwhelming 
number of States, are projected to benefit, and also States with no 
growth, or actual declines in population, are held harmless. And, 
finally again, it costs no more money.
  You will have proposals before you that use a little sleight of hand. 
Some will reduce the base funding level currently in the Dole bill and 
then add to it. This amendment does not alter the initial grant in the 
Dole bill. This takes the initial grant level, applies the poverty data 
supplied by the Bureau of the Census, and simply says, as the House in 
its wisdom did, that that data is used objectively to determine any 
additional funds which are provided to each and every State. So, Mr. 
President, your State would benefit from that. My State would benefit 
from that for sure. That is what this amendment does.
  Let me conclude on this amendment by saying that this is not a matter 
of ``winners'' and ``losers.'' It is a matter of accuracy and fairness 
involving the distribution of Federal funds. I think it is very 
difficult for anyone to argue against that.
  I ask unanimous consent that the amendment be temporarily set aside.
  Mr. NICKLES. If the Senator from California will yield, I appreciate 
her amendment, and I want to thank her for coming to the floor and 
offering her amendment. I see other colleagues, as well as the Senator 
from Illinois. I again urge other Senators, if they have amendments, I 
think we will be lot more receptive and also it will expedite the 
consideration of those amendments for tomorrow or on Monday.
  I do not know that this--as a matter of fact, I doubt that allocation 
amendments are the ones that will be readily agreed upon because some 
States win and some States lose. Allocation formulas are always 
contested in almost any type of bill like this, whether it is a highway 
bill or a welfare bill or other allocations. The allocation formula the 
Senator is proposing under her amendment would be identical to the one 
now currently in the House bill.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. It is the same basis. That is correct.
  Mr. NICKLES. The amendment is directed toward States that have 
increases in welfare population.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. That is correct any and all States.
  Mr. NICKLES. Welfare population being defined as welfare children, or 
just total welfare population of the States.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. It is defined as increase in poor populations 
measured by current census data.
  Mr. NICKLES. The information that the Senator handed out, the 
distribution formula that she is recommending and the impact on the 
States is on actually the second page of the handout but recorded as 
page 4.
  Is that correct?
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I did not bring those with me because we are making 
charts, and we were called, and we came down before the charts were 
ready, I am afraid.
  Mr. NICKLES. I have a couple of charts. I want to make sure. I will 
confer with my colleague and friend.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. There are four charts. If I can take a look at them 
when we finish, I would be happy to.
  The Senator is absolutely correct. I know the formula is going to be 
difficult to change. If it looks like a growth formula, if it is named 
like a growth formula, it ought to talk and walk like a growth formula. 
That is all I am saying.
  More States are benefited by this. I think 27 States fare better than 
in the underlying bill are clearly benefited by this, and States which 
do not experience an increase are held harmless.
  Mr. NICKLES. If my colleague will yield further, she has 27 States 
that would presumably do better under the great portion of the bill, 
not the entire bill.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. That is correct.
  Mr. NICKLES. The Senator's amendment is allocating the money set 
aside for growth States, and under her proposed distribution it would 
increase benefits under that portion of the fund to 27 States as 
compared to 10 States. In other words, under the Dole proposal.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. As compared to 19 States. The Dole proposal, as we 
understand it, benefits only 19 States. My amendment benefits all 
States. I would be happy to debate it. If I am wrong, I would be happy 
to admit it. This is our belief. Our formula would benefit 27 States, 
beyond those in the Dole bill, and would hold everybody else harmless. 
So nobody would go below what their 1996 level is.
  Mr. NICKLES. Let me further try to clarify so I will know and maybe 
just help us tomorrow when we are considering these amendments.
  Under the proposal of the Senator from California, it benefits 27 
States. You do not change the amount of money. So you spread it out 
over a few more States. Senator Dole's proposal would have additional 
for the growth States that have large increases in poverty. It would 
benefit 19 States. So presumably they would do a little bit better. So 
you are dividing up the same amount of money as compared to your growth 
proposal. We will have charts to make an analysis or comparison under 
both proposals.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. They are not necessarily all of the growth States 
that are benefited.
  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I thank my colleague. Senator Dole's 
proposal, I believe, is directed toward States that have significant 
increases in growth in poverty. And my guess is--I have not studied 
these charts--but he talks about the growth funds for States that have 
significant increases in poverty. Yours maybe is a little broader 
distribution.
  I will tell my colleagues that there is a dispute on both sides of 
the aisle. This is probably not a partisan amendment as such because 
people wrestle with distribution formulas, and trying to come up with 
most equitable formula is not always the easiest thing to do, 
particularly if they have a lot of inequities in past distribution 
formulas which we have had with different programs.
  But I, again, want to thank the Senator from California for offering 
her amendment and sending it to the desk.
  Does the Senator also have another amendment?
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. That is correct, for tonight.
  Let me just say what I understand the Dole does in this area. Then if 
I am wrong, I would be happy to know that.
  These funds apply, if two things are met: one, the State's welfare 
spending is less than the national average of State spending; and, 
second, population growth is greater than the national population 
growth. That does not necessarily relate to welfare population growth. 
That is one problem that I have with it.

[[Page S 12810]]



                Amendment No. 2470 to Amendment No. 2280

(Purpose: To impose a child support obligation on paternal grandparents 
               in cases in which both parents are minors)

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. If I may, I now send the second amendment to the desk 
and I ask for its consideration
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the pending amendment is 
temporarily set aside, and the clerk will report.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from California (Mrs. Feinstein) proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2470 to amendment No. 2280.

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading 
of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 654, between lines 15 and 16, insert the following:

     SEC.  . ENFORCEMENT OF ORDERS AGAINST PATERNAL GRANDPARENTS 
                   IN CASES OF MINOR PARENTS.

       Section 466(a) (42 U.S.C. 666(a)), as amended by sections 
     915, 917(a), 923, 965, and 976, is amended by adding at the 
     end the following new paragraph:
       ``(17) Procedures under which any child support order 
     enforced under this part with respect to a child of minor 
     parents, if the mother of such child is receiving assistance 
     under the State grant under part A, shall be enforceable, 
     jointly and severally, against the paternal grandparents of 
     such child.''.

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, as I have listened to the debate, 
there has been a lot of talk about teenage pregnancy, youngsters 
impregnating youngsters, walking away from their responsibility, and 
really young children becoming pregnant, becoming teen mothers often by 
teen fathers. I have heard many Senators say we must stop this. I 
believe we have a way to send a major message to a constituency, and it 
is contained in this amendment.
  What this amendment would do is say that every State must have in 
effect laws and procedures under which a child support order can be 
enforced, where both parents are minors, and, the mother is a minor 
receiving Federal assistance for the child, against the paternal 
grandparents of the child.
  So if you are the mother and father of a boy child, and your boy 
child goes out and impregnates a minor girl who ends up on welfare as a 
result, you will be liable for a child support order against you as the 
parents of that young boy.
  What I find increasingly is that child support is a growing crisis. 
This has also been debated--and, frankly, the lack of child support is 
one of the major causes of children living in poverty in my State; that 
is, the absence of child support--a parent, usually the father, not 
always, but usually it is the father that just walks off and does not 
support his child.
  Well, if this is going to be a tough welfare bill, let us address it. 
Let us say, ``Parents, you are responsible for the behavior of your 
adolescent son. If your adolescent son is going to go out and get a 
young girl pregnant, you are going to have to pay for the uprearing and 
the child support of that offspring.''
  I think the time has come for this kind of amendment. It is strong. 
It is an amendment that attributes family responsibility. It is an 
amendment that says parents of minors have responsibilities and one of 
those responsibilities is to see to it that their sons do not enter 
into this kind of conduct and then walk away from their responsibility.
  So, I would now ask that that amendment be set aside.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The 
amendment will be set aside.
  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, while my colleague from California is 
here, I have not had a chance to totally review her second amendment. I 
am very interested in this amendment. It is a tough amendment. If I 
understand it correctly, if my colleague from California will correct 
me if I misunderstood her statement, but the Senator's amendment would 
basically, if you have a minor with a child, a single parent--the 
paternal grandparents would be liable for what expense?
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. For the child support. A court order would be 
obtained and the parents of the male child would be responsible for the 
child support of that offspring.
  Mr. NICKLES. Let me talk out loud or think out loud. So if you have a 
teenage mother, if you have in this case an unmarried single mother, 
and if there is a court order placed against the father for child 
support, if that is not collectible from the father, then the parents 
of the father in this case would be liable for the child support?
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. That is correct where the father is also a minor.
  Mr. NICKLES. The primary responsibility would still be the father.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. That is correct.
  Mr. NICKLES. But if the father is delinquent, if the father is not 
available or unable to pay, for whatever reason, unemployed, you name 
it, then the parents of the absentee father in this case would be 
liable?
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. That is correct for minor fathers. And I would 
certainly welcome the Senator from Oklahoma looking at this. If there 
is any way he thinks it could be made better, I would be delighted.
  Mr. NICKLES. I compliment my colleague from California for offering 
the amendment tonight. I appreciate that. I am interested in the 
amendment. It looks good from what I have seen. I will study it further 
and see if we can support it.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank the Senator.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I join with the Senator from Oklahoma. 
Senator Feinstein's second amendment, I think, is a positive amendment 
and one that maybe we can work on and get it accepted on both sides. I 
think it is a good amendment.
  I am not as enthusiastic about the first amendment. In defense of 
Senator Hutchison, who really did an outstanding job on this side of 
the aisle in working on the issue of formulas and trying to bring some 
compromise into a very difficult issue, nobody is happy with 
allocations of formulas, as the Senator from Oklahoma said. There are 
States that win; there are States that lose. What we tried to do is 
hold at least everybody harmless. We did under the formula that is in 
the Dole bill and then provided some reasonable amount of money for 
growth. I guess what is really the bugaboo here is how we determine 
what growth is and what is fair.
  I suggest to you that if the Senator from Texas [Mrs. Hutchison], 
were here, what she would say is what is fair should not be based on 
what is--a system that you receive money from the State based on how 
much money you put up, not on how many poor people you have but how 
much money you are willing to give to the poor people in your State. So 
if you are a State like California, which is a high-benefit State and 
puts up a lot of money, you get more Federal dollars. It is a match. 
The more you put up, the more money you get. And so as a result, States 
like California and, I would say, Pennsylvania where I am from, which 
is above average--not as high as California but above-average State as 
far as welfare dollars--get more money from the Federal Government 
because we are willing to put up more State dollars to match the 
Federal funds.
  Now, that is an equitable system the way it exists today, but we are 
changing the system. Effective as a result of this bill's passage there 
is no more Federal match. There is no more every dollar we put up or 
every--I think it is roughly 50-50--every dollar we put up, you put up 
a dollar and we go on together.
  What we do now is send a block grant to the States. Every State gets 
a block grant. What is that? It is an amount of money irrespective of 
anything else. Irrespective of how much you are contributing, we are 
going to give you an amount of money that you will be able to spend on 
AFDC to help mothers with children. It is not dependent anymore on how 
much money you put up. It is just a block grant.
  Now, if we were going to design a block grant program from the start, 
if we did not have the existing AFDC program in place, how would we 
distribute that money? Well, let me tell you how it is distributed 
under the bill. It is distributed based on how much money you got last 
year.
  Think about this. Now we are giving a block grant to take care of a 
population of children and in most cases mothers and we are basing it 
on last year's amount of money that the State got, which, of course, 
from last year, 

[[Page S 12811]]
was based on how much the State was willing to pony up to get Federal 
dollars and match it. It has no relation again to how many more persons 
but to how much the State was willing to spend.
  So what happens, there are many States that are high-benefit States 
that are getting a lot more money per child than low-benefit States are 
getting per child. If we were going to design a program today from 
start--let us say we did not have an AFDC program, we had no poverty 
assistance program at the Federal level; we were going to start a 
program today--how would we design a model for helping children?
  I suggest that what we would do is exactly what the Senator from 
California suggested. We should figure out how many poor people there 
are in the State, people eligible for welfare, for AFDC, and allocate 
so many dollars per person on welfare. We would take the number of 
people on welfare in the country, we would say here is how many dollars 
per person each State will get for that person on welfare and divide it 
up among the States. That would be a fair allocation formula. No child 
in California is worth more than a child in Mississippi or Vermont or 
Oklahoma.
  But that is not what we did. We did not start out and say everybody 
is going to get the same irrespective. What we did was say children in 
California actually get more money because the State in the prior 
legislation, the current AFDC law contributed more so children in 
California get $200 per month per child and a person in Mississippi may 
get $50.
  Now, what the Senator from California says is that, well, we are 
subsidizing these bad States like Mississippi that did not contribute a 
lot of money to help the people in their State.
  I hear a lot from the other side of the aisle about we should not be 
punishing children--except, of course, if they happen to live in a 
State that is not a high-benefit State in this example because that is 
exactly what we do with the Feinstein amendment. We punish children who 
live in low-benefit States that continue to get low benefits under the 
current program.
  What Senator Hutchison did was say, look, let us look at, since we 
now no longer require in this bill any kind of matching State funds--
there is no maintenance-of-effort provision in this bill. California 
can completely pull the plug on every dollar of welfare spending that 
they are now required to spend to get the Federal match. They do not 
have to contribute a cent anymore and they get all the money. And they 
get two or three times as much per child as Mississippi. But now, 
again, California does not have to spend the money to get that money.
  Now, how is it fair to say that California should get, because they 
are increasing in population, even more money per child than 
Mississippi which maybe is not growing as fast? If you look at it from 
the perspective of not what has been but what a fair allocation formula 
should be now based on a completely new model, you would suggest that 
States having low-benefit levels that are growing should be the 
recipients of the increasing growth funds to have their children come 
up to parity with States like California and Pennsylvania and New York 
and others.
  That is what the Senator from Texas is suggesting. I would also 
suggest the Senator from California is doing her duty. She represents a 
mega-State, a State that has been very generous with welfare dollars, 
and under her allocation formula of the pot, I think California--I 
think it is about $1.5 billion, money that would be allocated over the 
next 7 years for these programs. They get roughly half the money in 
California under this program. It is a big chunk. California is a big 
State. It has one-eighth of the population of the country but they get 
about half the increase under this formula allocation.
  If I was from California, I would design a program that got me half 
the money, too. I understand that. But it is not fair when you consider 
the new rules that we have put in place. No longer do we require match. 
That is the key here. California does not have to put up a penny to get 
this money anymore.
  What we are saying is because we do not make them put up a penny 
anymore and because they are getting much more per child than I think 
any other State, with the possible exception of New York, we are not 
going to give them even more money because they happen to be growing. 
We are going to take care of the States that do not get a lot of money 
and that are growing also.
  So that is the basis for this discussion. And so while it may, to the 
virgin ear on this subject, be a very appealing argument from the 
Senator from California that this is only fair, I mean we are growing 
and therefore we deserve more money, I would suggest that if we are 
looking at it for the sake of the child and not looking at where that 
child lives but looking at what the Federal Government's obligation is 
to a child under a new system where State matching dollars are 
irrelevant, then I would suggest that growth fund should be targeted to 
those States where the Federal contribution per child is the lowest. 
And that is what this amendment does.
  I speak against my own interest in this case because Pennsylvania is 
not as high a benefit State as California but it is an above-average 
benefit State that is not going to receive any growth dollars according 
to the estimates. We are not going to receive a penny, and we would 
receive a small amount of increase under the Feinstein bill.
  So it would be in my interest for Pennsylvania to vote for, I think 
it is $6 million. It is not a whole lot of money for Pennsylvania, but 
it is a little bit of money under the Feinstein amendment. That might 
be my benefit, but I do not think it is fair under the new allocation. 
I think it is fair to focus on the child, not where that child lives, 
in what State.
  As the Senator from Connecticut said earlier in the day, this is a 
Federal problem and we should have a Federal solution. I did not agree 
with the second part. It is a Federal problem. We do not need Federal 
solutions, we need local solutions. But the dollars that come from 
Washington should be equitable across the country. That is what this 
growth formula attempts to do, to bring other States with lower 
benefits up to meet the average.
  I know it is going to be a difficult vote. I happen to be from one of 
those States that does not benefit under the current growth funds but 
would under the Feinstein growth fund. You would be very tempted, and I 
know many Members will be, to jump on for your parochial interests.
  No. 1, I think it would be very damaging for the long-term interests 
of this bill. I think it is absolutely unfair when you look at the 
child, not where the child lives and how much the Federal Government is 
paying per child. I think that should be the fundamental test of 
whether this formula is fair.
  I know this is going to be a very heated issue. It is one that is 
going to be talked about tomorrow, and I know the Senator from Texas 
will be far more eloquent than I have been in defending her formula. I 
just want to commend the Senator from Texas, Senator Hutchison, one 
more time, for the tremendous work she did in putting together an 
allocation formula which no one thought could be done. We did not think 
we would be able to work this one out. This was the issue that was 
bogging us down.
  When it comes to money, everybody gets real tightfisted around here. 
We were able to work out something which I think is defensible, not 
only from a political standpoint of folks being able to explain back 
home, but I think it is very defensible from a fairness perspective of 
what this bill actually accomplishes.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.


                Amendment No. 2471 to Amendment No. 2280

    (Purpose: To require States to establish a voucher program for 
 providing assistance to minor children in families that are eligible 
                   for but do not receive assistance)

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Illinois [Ms. Moseley-Braun] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2471 to amendment No. 2280.

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 

[[Page S 12812]]
  reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:
       On page 12, between lines 22 and 23, insert the following:
       ``(G) Assess and provide for the needs of a minor child who 
     is eligible for the child voucher program established under 
     subsection (c).
       On page 15, between lines 19 and 20, insert the following:
       ``(d) Child Voucher Program.--
       ``(1) Eligibility.--
       ``(A) In general.--A State to which a grant is made under 
     section 403 shall establish and operate a voucher program to 
     provide assistance to each minor child who resides with a 
     family that is eligible for but not receiving assistance 
     under the State program as a result of any reason identified 
     by the State, including--
       ``(i) the time limit imposed under section 405(b);
       ``(ii) a penalty imposed under section 404(d); or
       ``(iii) placement on a waiting list established by the 
     State for recipients of assistance under the State program.
       ``(B) Periodic assessments.--The State shall conduct 
     periodic assessments to determine the continued eligibility 
     of a minor child for a voucher under this subsection.
       ``(2) Amount of voucher.--
       ``(A) In general.--The amount of a voucher provided under 
     the program established under paragraph (1) shall be equal 
     to--
       ``(i) the number of minor children in the family multiplied 
     by
       ``(ii) the per capita assistance amount determined under 
     subparagraph (B).
       ``(B) Per capita assistance amount.--For purposes of 
     subparagraph (A), the per capita assistance amount is an 
     amount equal to--
       ``(i) the amount of assistance that would have been 
     provided to a family described in paragraph (1) under the 
     State program; divided by
       ``(ii) the number of family members in such family.
       ``(3) Use of voucher.--A voucher provided under this 
     subsection may be used to obtain--
       ``(A) housing;
       ``(B) food;
       ``(C) transportation;
       ``(D) child care; and
       ``(E) any other item or service that the State deems 
     appropriate.
       ``(4) Delivery of items or services.--A State shall arrange 
     for the delivery of or directly provide the items and 
     services for which a voucher issued under this subsection may 
     be used.
       On page 15, line 20, strike ``(d)'' and insert ``(e)''.
       On page 24, line 24, insert ``(including the operation of a 
     child voucher program described in section 402(c))'' after 
     ``part''.

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, I attempted earlier today to speak 
to this issue in general, and now, I would like to speak to the issue 
of welfare reform and the legislation before us generally as well as 
file several amendments.
  At the outset, I would like to say that, quite frankly, I am very 
pleased with the way this process is working. In spite of all the 
slogans and the political speeches and the hot buttons and the wedge 
issues, the fact is that because of this debate, we are undertaking a 
conversation among ourselves as legislators and, again, indeed with the 
country around the issue of welfare generally, welfare reform and the 
appropriate response to the challenge our current system poses to this 
nation.
  Mr. President, I submit to you that this is an issue that, as the 
French would say--there is an old expression--``plus ca change, plus 
c'est la meme chose,'' the more things change, the more they remain the 
same.
  Quite frankly, I brought to the attention of the Finance Committee, 
on which I serve as a member, an article that had appeared in the 
Chicago History magazine in their spring issue. The article was 
entitled ``Friendless Foundlings and Homeless Half-Orphans.'' The 
caption of the article said:

       In 19th century Chicago, the debate over the care of needy 
     children raised issues of Government versus private control 
     and institutional versus family care.

  The article goes on at great length and, indeed, I have some pictures 
here from the article that showed the condition of poor children in 
turn of the century Chicago sleeping in the gutters and the, turned 
over by their parents to orphanages, unable to be cared for because of 
the poverty of their parents. The homeless half-orphans title refers to 
women who during the turn of the century struggled to raise children 
alone and because of their economic circumstances could not afford to 
do so and were often called upon, compelled even, to turn their 
children over to halfway houses and orphanages and others in order to 
provide just for the basic sustenance of those children.
  I raise this not to inflame this debate because I, again, very much 
appreciate the way and the tenor this debate has taken, certainly this 
evening, but really to begin talking about my amendment which calls on 
the States to establish a safety net for children, and to put that 
amendment in context.
  Essentially, the amendment itself says that when all is said and 
done, if you will, at the end of the day, after the States, under the 
primary legislation, have made all their rules, that in the final 
analysis, no child--no child--in America will be left to fend for 
themselves, will be left without subsistence, will be left homeless, 
will be left hungry.
  Bottom line, this amendment calls on us to make an affirmation of our 
commitment to provide for the children and to make certain that welfare 
reform does not become a subterfuge or outlet for punishing kids for 
the sins of their parents or the misfortune, indeed, of their parents 
to be born into poverty.
  I think it is important for us to talk a little bit about welfare in 
the context of poverty as an issue, because really that is what it is. 
Welfare is not a stand-alone problem, it is not something you just say 
exists over here in a vacuum by itself. Welfare is not, and never has 
been, anything other than a response to poverty. It is a system, a set 
of rules that calls on a Federal-State relationship and cooperation, 
and we can debate, as no doubt we will and will continue to, what that 
relationship must be. But it, essentially, is a relationship between 
Government that calls on our national community to care for the welfare 
of poor children so that we do not have to go back to the friendless 
foundlings and the homeless half-orphans that plagued so many of our 
communities at the turn of the century in America.
  So welfare reform then should, at a minimum--at a minimum--ask the 
question, and answer in the affirmative the question: What about the 
children? We must always have an answer that says that no State, no 
locality, no community, no part of our national community will allow 
for children to go homeless and to go hungry.
  So this amendment requires the States to establish a child voucher 
program to provide services to minor children who reside in families 
that meet the State's income and resource criteria for the temporary 
assistance to needy family block grant, which is the name of the block 
grant in the underlying bill, but who are not receiving assistance. The 
amount of the voucher will be based on a pretime limit, per capita 
rate, and would be a total amount for each child.
  The State would be called on, therefore, even if the parent did not 
qualify for failure to live up to the rules or for cutbacks or whatever 
reason, to assure that the children would be entitled to essential 
services through a voucher system.
  The voucher would be paid to a third party that would provide the 
service. So a child living in a family which no longer qualified for 
assistance would still be assured of essential services. This amendment 
would assure that children, are not punished for their parents' 
behavior.
  Let us talk a little bit about welfare for a moment. I think it is 
important to go back to the big picture issue--welfare as a response to 
poverty.
  Right now, in this country, Mr. President, 22 percent of the children 
live in poverty. This is higher than in any other industrialized 
nation. One in every 5 children in America lives in poverty. That means 
that 15 million children live in poverty--40 million Americans total 
overall, but 15 million children live in poverty. That, Mr. President, 
is greater--frankly, it is 40 percent more than it was even in 1970.
  To talk about what we mean in terms of poverty, for families of 
three, the poverty rate is $12,320 a year. A family of four is 
considered to be poor if they have an income of $14,800 a year. Mr. 
President, 53 percent of female-headed households in this Nation are 
poor, and 23 percent of American families overall are headed by women. 
So this becomes a problem of particular urgency for poor children, and 
particularly for poor women.
  Our child poverty rate here in the United States is two times that of 
Australia and Canada. Our child poverty 

[[Page S 12813]]
rate is four times that of France, Sweden, Germany, and the 
Netherlands. And so we can see that child poverty is a particular 
problem here in the United States. It is a problem that has been 
addressed somewhat by the existence of what is known as welfare, the 
AFDC program. Again, AFDC is simply a response to poverty.
  I have a chart, Mr. President, of child poverty rates among the 
industrialized countries. This is the most recent data available. As 
you can see, here is Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland. It goes 
from 2.5 percent up to the United States, which is 21.5 percent. We 
have a higher rate than Australia, Israel, the United Kingdom, Italy, 
Germany, France, The Netherlands, Austria, Norway, Belgium, 
Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, and Finland.
  Child poverty is a particular problem here in the United States. The 
gap between rich and poor children is greater in our country than in 
any other industrialized country. Affluent households with children in 
the United States--the top 10 percent in terms of wealth--are amongst 
the wealthiest children in the 18 industrialized countries that have 
been surveyed. Of the poorest, the bottom 10 percent of children in the 
United States in terms of wealth, we are the third poorest among the 18 
industrialized countries surveyed.
  So the disparity in the children of the wealthiest in the world and 
the children among the poorest is greater in this country than in any 
other industrialized nation.
  I have another chart here. This depicts poor households with 
children. Here is the United States with $10,923. Affluent households 
average almost $65,536 annually. The length of the bars represent the 
gap between rich and poor children. As we can see, here in the United 
States, this gap is greater than anywhere else in the industrialized 
world.
  So, as we approach the issue of welfare reform, we are approaching an 
issue of dealing with our response to a problem that is unique in the 
industrialized world and a problem that has been getting worse, not 
better.
  The issue of welfare inflames passions in the United States. Without 
getting into the passions, I want to talk a little bit about the facts 
in terms of the AFDC program or what is known as the welfare program. 
As the Chair is no doubt aware, AFDC has been a response to poverty 
that has been with us for a while. The system has come under great 
challenge, and that is really why we are here right now, to debate the 
direction that we are going to take in terms of reforming this program. 
What we generally refer to as welfare is Aid to Families with Dependent 
Children, which was established under the Social Security Act of 1935. 
States obviously play a major role in operating this program. States 
define eligibility, the benefit levels, and actually administer the 
program. So, again, while we will talk further and in greater detail 
about the level of State involvement, the fact is that the States 
already make a huge determination about who will participate in the 
AFDC program.
  Mr. President, presently there are some 14 million people receiving 
AFDC in the country. That is a lot of people. The fact of the matter is 
that that is about 5.3 percent of our total population. But I think a 
more stunning and compelling fact is not just that 14 million Americans 
receive some sort of assistance under the Aid to Families with 
Dependent Children, but that 9 million of those 14 million people are 
children; 9 million of those people are children. So we hear the 
discussion about folks not pulling the wagon and in the wagon having to 
be pulled and about whose fault all of these problems are and the like. 
I think it is important that we remain mindful of the fact that fully 
two-thirds--9 million out of 14 million--who will be the subject of 
what we do here, are children. Only 5 million of those people receiving 
AFDC are adults.
  Of those 5 million adults, Mr. President, states reported that some 
3.6 percent of their caseloads were disabled or incapacitated. That 
encompasses the people who are not able to work. So, really, of the 
folks we are talking about in terms of welfare reform, some 4.1 million 
out of the 14 million are able bodied and able to work. Certainly, we 
start this debate with the notion that anybody who can work should 
work, and anybody who can take care of themselves should be able to do 
so. The question becomes, however, what about the children? What do we 
do about the children?
  I daresay, Mr. President, that right now the way this legislation 
before us is constructed, the children will lose out. There is no 
guarantee or commitment by our national community that the children 
will be protected by the decisions that get made at the State level. On 
the one hand, I think we can all agree that State flexibility is 
something that is a positive change, and States ought to be able to 
make decisions about how they handle their local population.
  At the same time, legislation that does not provide a safety net for 
the children essentially penalizes those children and makes any child 
living here in the United States really at the mercy of their location 
or geography. So a child who lives in New York may well find himself in 
the presence of a benevolent State legislature and Governor and find 
himself cared for and not having to sleep in the streets, as in the 
original picture I showed you. A child in New York may benefit, and in 
another State a child may not. So the children, once again, become 
victims to fortune and victims to the accident of geography and the 
accident of their birth and of their address. It seems to me, Mr. 
President, that that is not a result that we as a national community 
should allow to happen.
  By the way, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a copy of the 
article ``Friendless Foundlings and Homeless Orphans'' be printed in 
the Record.
  There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

           [From the Chicago History magazine, Spring, 1995]

            Friendless Foundlings and Homeless Half-Orphans

                           (By Joan Gittens)

       Editor's note: The debate over the care of dependent 
     children is not new. In the following excerpt, Joan Gittens 
     explores nineteenth-century attitudes towards child care in 
     Illinois and Chicago.
       There is perhaps no greater catastrophe for children than 
     when their families, for whatever reason, no longer functions 
     for them. Not only must they contend with emotional upheaval; 
     they are left without caretakers and must look to the broader 
     society for sustenance and protection. If they are fortunate, 
     relatives or friends will step in and fill the gap--if not 
     emotionally, at least on a practical level. The children 
     unlucky enough to have no surrogate parents must look to the 
     society at large to take an interest in their well-being. 
     That this is at best a tenuous situation for a child is 
     demonstrated by the prevalence of the pathetic and mistreated 
     orphan in folk and popular culture.
       Yet folklore could scarcely exaggerate life's hazards for 
     children dependent on public bounty in Illinois. Despite the 
     citizenry's occasional intense regard--usually when a 
     particularly brutal story hit the newspapers--dependent 
     children have been generally isolated, remote from public 
     consciousness, and without natural allies. ``Their very 
     innocence and inoffensiveness leads to their disregard,'' 
     wrote one observer bitterly. ``They make no loud outcry and 
     menace no one. Since there are so few voices raised in their 
     behalf, it is not surprising that the persons charged with 
     their care should be ignorant of any problems they present, 
     and blind to their real interests.''
       Besides being easy to ignore, dependent children have 
     historically been costly to the state, requiring years of 
     expense before they could become self-sufficient. How much 
     the issue of their poverty has shaped their prospects the 
     State Board of Charities noted late in the nineteenth 
     century, citing the telling fact that as early as 1795 the 
     territory of Illinois had created an orphans' court to deal 
     with the estates of children who had lost their parents. The 
     children most desperately in need, children without means or 
     property, had no court to watch over their interests. They 
     had instead the overseer of the poor, who could apprentice 
     children from destitute families even over their parents' 
     objections.
       Another territorial law underscored the inferior protection 
     accorded to dependent children. The law provided that 
     apprentices and masters could take grievances to a justice of 
     the peace to rule on, thus enforcing on the one hand the 
     master's right to obedience and hard work and on the other 
     the apprentice's right to decent treatment and competent 
     education. The law specifically excluded from protection 
     children apprenticed by the local poor law officials.
       The conscious separation of ``the state's children'' from 
     those with parents continued in the Poor Law of 1819, the 
     social welfare law passed the year after Illinois attained 
     statehood. But revisions of apprenticeship and poor laws in 
     the next fifteen years reflected a growing sense that the 
     state owed a more even-handed treatment to the vulnerable 
     children who looked to them for support. The Apprenticeship 
     Law of 1926 and the 

[[Page S 12814]]
     Poor Law of 1833 made it the concern of the state that dependent 
     children's apprenticeships be monitored to some extent by the 
     probate judge, who was charged to keep the bonds of indenture 
     in his office and to investigate indentured children's 
     situations from time to time. The laws also articulated some 
     of the expectations that the children might have: the right 
     to decent treatment, adequate education, a new Bible, and two 
     suits of clothes (suitable to their station in life) at the 
     end of the apprenticeship. Masters still had great discretion 
     to decide what was fit and proper treatment, but there was at 
     least some sense that children dependent on the state had a 
     right to proper care.
       The Apprenticeship Law of 1826, in addition to voicing some 
     concerns about the protection of dependent children, gave a 
     further indication of an increasing sense of state 
     responsibility by expanding the definition of children 
     requiring state attention. This law gave wide latitude to the 
     overseer of the poor in indenturing children whom he deemed 
     to be inadequately cared for, like the children of beggars, 
     habitual drunkards, and widows of ``bad character.'' This was 
     the first recognition that the state might need to intercede
      even in families who had not turned to the overseers of the 
     poor for help. And it was the first articulation that the 
     state had an interest in doing more than warding off 
     imminent starvation, that it also had an interest in the 
     proper rearing of children and an obligation on some level 
     to step in if such proper rearing was not going forward.
       This concern about proper child rearing was a nineteenth-
     century phenomenon all across Western culture, but in the 
     United States it was especially tied to the republican 
     experiment that must have been very much on citizens' minds 
     in 1826, that fiftieth-anniversary year of the Declaration of 
     Independence. The adequate raising of children was a 
     humanitarian concern, but it was also a practical matter for 
     the survival of the noble but risky political enterprise that 
     was the focus of so much anxiety and so much international 
     attention. In the 1840s, the Illinois Supreme Court gave this 
     rationale for the state's presumption to interfere in family 
     life:
       The power of chancery to interfere with and control, not 
     only the estates but the persons and custody of all minors 
     within the limits of its jurisdiction, is of very ancient 
     origin, and can not now be questioned. This is a power which 
     must necessarily exist somewhere in every well regulated 
     society, and more especially in a republican government, 
     where each man should be reared and educated under such 
     influences that he may be qualified to exercise the rights of 
     a freeman and take part in the government of the country. It 
     is a duty, then, which the country owes as well to itself, as 
     to the infant, to see that he is not abused, defrauded or 
     neglected, and the infant has a right to this protection.
       To some extent the laws dealing with the adult poor 
     reflected increased humanitarian concern as well--Illinois 
     outlawed the practice of auctioning off the destitute to the 
     lowest bidder in 1827, for example--but it is striking that 
     in its increased concern about neglected children, the state 
     paid little or no heed to the rights of poor parents. Earlier 
     poor laws had given the overseer of the poor the right to 
     indenture children without parental consent if the family had 
     become a charge upon the state, even if their poverty was 
     only a temporary catastrophe. The 1826 law expanded the 
     overseer's discretionary powers to decide on the fitness of 
     parents, and while on the one hand that showed an increased 
     concern for the well-being of children, it also reflected a 
     callousness toward the civil rights of poor parents that had 
     always pervaded American poor laws.
       This cavalier approach toward destitute families remained 
     characteristic of those engaged in child welfare right 
     through the nineteenth century, a striking anomaly in a 
     society where the sanctity of family ties was a paramount 
     value. It was not until the end of the nineteenth century 
     that some child welfare theorists would begin to argue for 
     the rights of poor parents and to insist
      that the best care society could offer for children was to 
     support them in their homes rather than removing them.


        urbanization and the growth of the child welfare problem
       The growing awareness of children in need was a key 
     characteristic of nineteenth-century social welfare 
     endeavors. In Illinois, as in other areas of the country, 
     this concern had its roots in a mix of philosophical, social, 
     and practical considerations. The years before the Civil War 
     saw an outpouring of reform efforts on all levels, and 
     because of their vulnerability and dependence on adults, 
     children were prime subjects of this heightened humanitarian 
     sense. They appealed further because during the course of the 
     nineteenth century the concept of childhood as a special 
     stage of development grew apace, drawing the attention of 
     everyone from popular novelists to learned theologians.
       Nineteenth-century culture celebrated childhood's intuitive 
     goodness and innocence, in contrast to the gloomy assessment 
     of earlier centuries, which had seen children at best as 
     profoundly ignorant and at worst as little bundles of 
     depravity. Another reason for the attention to children's 
     needs was the abiding concern that they be trained to be 
     independent, responsible citizens, not merely for their own 
     sake but for the health of the republic. Finally, attention 
     turned to dependent children because their numbers swelled so 
     markedly with the rapid growth of urban centers during the 
     nineteenth century.
       Chicago, a frontier outpost at its incorporation in 1833, 
     grew in the next sixty-seven years to be the second largest 
     city in the United States, an industrial center that 
     attracted immigrants from all over the world. According to 
     the national census, the population of Chicago was 4,470 
     people in 1840; 298,977 in 1870; and 1,698,575 in 1900. The 
     rapid growth of the city brought great wealth to some, but it 
     brought in its wake much suffering as well. Immigrants who 
     came to the city seeking a better life sometimes found 
     Chicago to be a place of opportunity, but many found 
     themselves enmeshed in a web of poverty, depression, and 
     squalor, and the devastating effects of urban life were 
     particularly visible in children. In 1851 the city charter 
     noted a group that greatly concerned officials: ``children 
     who are destitute of proper parental care, wandering about 
     the streets, committing mischief, and growing up in 
     mendicancy, ignorance, idleness, and vice.'' These children, 
     popularly called ``street arabs,'' were viewed as potential 
     trouble makers and therefore received official attention 
     early.
       In addition to these children there were others affected by 
     the disruption of city life. The legislature had made minimal 
     legal provisions for illegitimate children, for example, in 
     the early years of statehood; the presumption was that the 
     mother would keep her baby and the town would support her and 
     her child at subsistence level
      (and with the most grudging of attitudes) if the father 
     could not be held to account and she could not manage for 
     herself. But in the vast, anonymous city, a desperate 
     mother could simply abandon her baby on the streets 
     without busy neighbors discovering the desertion, as they 
     would inevitably have done in a small town or rural 
     setting. The increase of this phenomenon of deserted 
     children, little ``foundlings'' as they were called, was a 
     gruesome measure of the hazards that the city could hold 
     in store for young women and their unwanted children.
       Orphans as a group grew in number as well. All the dangers 
     of disease were compounded by crowded city life, by filthy 
     tenements and equally filthy and dangerous work places. 
     Children could lose one or both parents to a host of diseases 
     such as cholera, small pox, and tuberculosis. The United 
     States suffered through three cholera epidemics, in 1832 and 
     again in the 1840s and 1850s, and the fact that the disease 
     was waterborne insured that the poor, crowded into tenements 
     and using the foulest of water, were among the hardest hit by 
     the recurring plagues.
       ``Half-orphans'' (the standard term for children who had 
     lost one parent) also claimed the reluctant attention of the 
     state. If the mother died, the children might come to the 
     attention of the larger society because they stood in need of 
     care and nurturing. It was possible that they would turn into 
     some of the little ``street arabs'' about whom Chicago city 
     officials expressed such concern. But a father's death, on a 
     practical level, was even more catastrophic. Most poor 
     families patched together their meager income from money 
     brought in by fathers, mothers, and children; working men, 
     although they were paid very little, were routinely paid more 
     than women and children, and they made the largest 
     contribution to the family income. Widowed mothers, ill-
     equipped to provide for their families, might find themselves 
     turning to the city or county for help to support their 
     children. Children were also left ``half-orphaned'' in fact, 
     although not in law, by their father's desertion of the 
     family. Sometimes this desertion was absolute; but Hull-House 
     resident Julia Lathrop wryly noted ``the masculine expedient 
     of temporary disappearance in the face of nonemployment or 
     domestic complexity, or both,'' contending that ``the 
     intermittent husband is a constant factor in the economic 
     problem of many a household.''
       Natural catastrophes like the Great Fire of 1871 were 
     another cause of dependency in children, and family problems 
     and the stresses of urban life were compounded as well by the 
     labor unrest that characterized the last twenty-five years of 
     the century. In addition, the country experienced a financial 
     panic approximately every twenty years: in 1819, 1837, 1857, 
     1873 and 1893. In Chicago, the Panic of 1893 was delayed for 
     a time by the Columbian Exposition, but with the close of the 
     exhibition, jobs disappeared and all the severity of that 
     worst of nineteenth-century depressions was visited on the 
     city. The year 1894 was in many ways a terrible time for the 
     poor of Chicago. Compounding the depression was the violence 
     and bitterness of the Pullman Strike, and the ultimate defeat 
     of organized labor in the prolonged struggle. A small-pox 
     epidemic struck the city; and the winter was one of the worst 
     on record. The dependency rate soared. Families who had never 
     been able to save enough to have
      a cushion against disaster were utterly destroyed by such 
     compounded misfortune and had to turn to the city and 
     country for help.


                The State Response to Dependent Children

       Although the vicissitudes of urban life and economic 
     instability throughout the century greatly expanded both the 
     number and types of children in need of help, public 
     officials resisted innovation in dealing with the needs of 
     dependent children, lumping them with the rest of the 
     dependent population rather than addressing their particular 
     needs as did the private organizations that began to 

[[Page S 12815]]
     flourish in Chicago in the 1850s. In downstate Illinois, dependent 
     children were still primarily indentured through the middle 
     years of the century. An 1854 revision of the apprenticeship 
     law manifested some special attention to children's needs, 
     strengthening their right to basic education and protection 
     by Poor Law officials who were to monitor their treatment and 
     to ``defend them from all cruelty, neglect, and breach of 
     contract on the part of their master.'' An 1874 law further 
     defined the child's rights to proper care, specifically 
     forbidding ``underserved or immoderate correction, 
     unwholesome food, insufficient allowance of food, raiment or 
     lodging, want of sufficient care or physic in sickness, want 
     of instruction in their trade.'' Such bad behavior on the 
     part of the master gave the state sufficient cause to end 
     indentures. These revisions of the original apprenticeship 
     law reflected the state's ambivalence about parental rights. 
     The 1854 revision deleted the clause authorizing the removal 
     of children from parents whom the overseer of the poor deemed 
     unfit. But the 1874 law restored intervention to some degree, 
     allowing the overseers of the poor to apprentice without 
     parental consent any child ``who habitually begs for alms.''
       Although the basic concept of apprenticeship for dependent 
     children was shortly to reappear in social welfare parlance 
     as the innovative notion of ``free foster homes,'' the whole 
     system of formal, legal apprenticeship as a means of caring 
     for dependent children was beginning to die out in 
     nineteenth-century America. In northern Illinois counties, 
     particularly Cook County, poor law officials instead placed 
     children in the poorhouse, and this trend became state-wide 
     by the end of the century. Most often children were in the 
     poorhouse with their mothers, but a few orphans and 
     illegitimate children ended up there as well.
       The presence of children in the almshouse was an enduring 
     affront to reformers. In 1853 a Cook County grand jury found 
     the almshouse to be grossly inadequate, noting with 
     disapproval that ``the section devoted to women and children 
     is so crowded as to be very offensive.'' The physical 
     conditions of this particular poorhouse did improve somewhat 
     over time, but those who concerned themselves with child 
     welfare universally accepted the maxim that the poorhouse was 
     no fit place for children. Forty years and much reform 
     agitation later, the situation was not significantly better. 
     Julia Lathrop, who toured the Cook County poorhouse many 
     times as a member of the State Board of Charities, wrote this 
     description of the children there in 1894:
       There are usually from fifty to seventy-five children, of 
     whom a large proportion are young children with their 
     mothers, a very few of whom are for adoption. The remainder, 
     perhaps a third, are the residuum of all the orphan asylums 
     and hospitals, children whom no one cares to adopt because 
     they are unattractive or scarred or sickly. These children 
     are sent to the public schools across the street from the 
     poor-farm. Of course they wear hideous clothes, and of course 
     the outside children sometimes jeer at them.
       These children, as part of the poorhouse population, were 
     among the most stigmatized and outcast members of nineteenth-
     century society. Nobody went to the poorhouse if they could 
     help it. These institutions were deliberately set up to be as 
     unattractive as possible, a meager social mechanism intended 
     merely to sustain life in the dependent population. The poor, 
     who could pay with no other currency, were expected to pay 
     with their dignity for their board and room. Lathrop spoke of 
     ``the absolute lack of privacy, the monotony and dul[l]ness, 
     the discipline, the enforced cleanliness.'' Nor was enforced 
     cleanliness always the problem. The poorhouse superintendent 
     in Coles County reported in 1880, apparently without 
     embarrassment, that he could not remember one bath having 
     been taken in his sixteen years in charge. The institution's 
     surroundings reflected his laissez faire approach to hygiene.
       It was still possible for poor families to receive some 
     measure of ``outdoor relief'' in most counties of the state 
     in the mid to late nineteenth century, but such support was 
     very limited. Nineteenth-century economic theory, reinforcing 
     the already parsimonious attitude of Americans, posited that 
     handouts merely increased dependency and led to the 
     ``pauperizing'' of families, destroying their initiative and 
     drive to do better. Poorhouses were set up to replace most 
     outdoor relief, created with the notion that they must not be 
     too attractive or they would be crowded with shiftless types 
     simply trying to live on the bounty of the town. In reality, 
     authorities need not have feared such a thing. Anyone who 
     could possibly manage it stayed out of the poorhouse. Those 
     who entered were the unfortunate souls who had no one to 
     protect them or find them a tolerable situation in the 
     outside world. Children shared the poorhouse with the 
     chronically sick, the elderly poor, the insane, and the 
     mentally and physically disabled, as well as the ``paupers'' 
     who simply could not make an economic go of it on the 
     outside. In Cook County, and elsewhere on a less grand scale, 
     the essential misery of the poorhouse was compounded by 
     corruption. The staff jobs were filled by patronage, and 
     those in charge of the various wards were thus unlikely to be 
     much exercised about the humane care of inmates.
       One of the most critical voices raised against the abuses 
     of the poorhouse and the presence of children there was that 
     of the Board of State Commissioners of Public Charities, 
     established by the legislature in 1869 to monitor and 
     coordinate the various social welfare efforts throughout the 
     state. The board's power was originally very restricted. 
     ``The duties required of the commission are quite onerous,'' 
     the First Biennial Report stated ruefully. ``The powers 
     granted are very limited. The board has unlimited power of 
     inspection, suggestion and recommendation, but no
      administrative power whatsoever.'' Still, the State Board 
     could and did register vigorous disapproval, and it made 
     enough impact so that a bill to dissolve the new 
     monitoring agency was introduced into the legislature 
     almost immediately. The bill failed, but hostile 
     legislators were able to limit inspection dramatically at 
     one point by cutting off all travel funds for the 
     commissioners.
       Despite such constraints, the State Board fulfilled an 
     important function as the first official agency in the state 
     to collect and tabulate information about the actual living 
     conditions of dependent members of society, including 
     children. For example, the board reported that in 1880 
     Illinois almshouses housed 386 children; forty were assessed 
     as feebleminded, twenty-four diseased, fourteen defective, 
     and eighty-three had been born in the almshouse. Of that 
     eighty-three, seventy-nine were illegitimate, a fact pointed 
     to by almshouse critics to illustrate their concern about the 
     inadequate separation of the sexes in the institutions. Some 
     poorhouses had schools or arranged that children should 
     attend the public schools in the vicinity; but in many county 
     almshouses, the children did not go to school at all. Still, 
     there was no doubt in anyone's mind that these children were 
     getting an education, a thorough grounding in the seamier 
     side of life.
       In 1879 there was a movement in Cook County to get children 
     out of the almshouse and into private child care 
     institutions. This effort revealed the prevailing attitudes 
     of reformers toward the parents of children who were 
     dependent because of poverty. Much negotiation was necessary 
     to settle which orphanages were to take the children, since 
     religious groups insisted that the children's religious 
     affiliations be respected. Yet in all the negotiations, no 
     one considered that the poorhouse mothers might have an 
     opinion about the removal of their children. The private 
     institutions involved required the termination of parental 
     rights before they would take the children. When the mothers 
     in the Cook County poorhouse learned that their children's 
     well-being was to be bought at the expense of their 
     parenthood, they protested vigorously but without success. 
     Some reformers, in fact, expressed the view that the mothers' 
     unwillingness to give up their children demonstrated their 
     lack of affection for their families. But in the end, the 
     mothers succeeded in making an eloquent statement about these 
     high-handed methods. When the officials from the child care 
     institutions arrived to pick up the children, they found that 
     most of them were gone. To prevent their removal to the 
     orphanages, the mothers had managed to find places outside 
     the poorhouse for all but seventeen out of seventy-five 
     children. The Cook County poorhouse had a rule that no 
     parents who refused to give consent to the adoption of their 
     children could enter the poorhouse, but in 1880, the county 
     agent objected to the rule as inhumane and cruel. He refused 
     to enforce the policy, and his stance meant that children 
     began to enter the Cook County poorhouse again, with and 
     without parents, less than a year after the ``rescue 
     operation'' of 1879.
       The concern that children were growing up in such a 
     wretched setting did not disappear, despite the limited 
     success of the Cook County effort, but it took another forty 
     years for the Illinois legislature to close almshouses to 
     children. In 1895 a law provided that orphan children could 
     be removed from the poorhouse and placed in private homes, 
     but only when a private charity or individual would assume 
     the expenses connected with such placement. By 1900 a dozen 
     states, beginning with Michigan in 1869, had ended the 
     practice of putting children in the poorhouse, but Illinois 
     proved more resistant to thoroughgoing reform. Finally, in 
     1919 the legislature passed a law limiting the time in the 
     poorhouse to thirty days for girls under eighteen and boys 
     under seventeen, after which other arrangements would have to 
     be made for them. This effectively ended the use of the 
     poorhouse as a child welfare institution. By that time the 
     number of children in Illinois poorhouses had shrunk 
     considerably: to 171 children in 1918 compared to 470 at the 
     peak, 1886.


             child care institutions under public auspices

       Although the county poorhouses provided most of the public 
     care of destitute children in nineteenth-century Illinois, no 
     one made much of an argument to counter the accusations 
     leveled against them of pinch-penny meanness and spiritual 
     demoralization. In reality, they existed as the most frankly 
     minimal of offerings for children in need, with a policy set 
     far more by a consciousness of county expenditures than of 
     children's welfare. Noted social welfare thinker Homer Folks 
     remarked in 1900 that ``the states of Illinois and Missouri, 
     notwithstanding their large cities have been singularly 
     backward in making public provisions for destitute and 
     neglected children.'' In fact, Illinois had only two child 
     welfare institutions under public auspices during the 
     nineteenth century, both far more specialized than the catch-
     all poorhouses provided by most counties. These 

[[Page S 12816]]
     institutions were the Soldiers' Orphans' Home and, until 1870, the 
     Chicago Reform School.
       The Illinois Soldiers' Orphans' Home founded in 1865 in 
     Normal, Illinois, was a state-funded institution for the care 
     of children whose fathers had been killed or disabled in the 
     Civil War. An institution with a limited purpose, the 
     Soldiers' Orphans' Home was meant to close once its original 
     population had been cared for. But in the 1870s the 
     eligibility for care was broadened to include children of all 
     Civil War veterans, an act that established the institution 
     on a more permanent basis. Frequently the children were half-
     orphans whose mothers simply could not feed them any more. In 
     1872, for example, 532 out of 642 children had living 
     mothers. In 1879, the superintendent gave this description of 
     the newly arrived children for that year: ``The class now 
     entering are, for the most part, young and in particularly 
     destitute circumstances--those whom their mothers have 
     struggled long and
      hard to keep, but who now find themselves, at the 
     commencement of winter, without the means for support, and 
     know they must either send them away to be cared for 
     elsewhere, or permit them to remain at home to suffer. The 
     state must now take these burdens of care and 
     responsibility where the weary mothers lay them down.''
       The separation of children from mothers unable to provide 
     for them financially was a tragic constant in nineteenth-
     century children's institutions. At least at the Soldier's 
     Orphans' Home there was some connection maintained between 
     children and their families; mothers were not required to 
     terminate their parental rights when they placed their 
     children there, and it was not uncommon for the children in 
     the institution to spend time, sometimes whole summers, with 
     their mothers. The population of the home fluctuated with the 
     season and with the economic climate of the times.
       This enlightened aspect of the place, however, was not 
     typical of the administration. The Soldier's Orphans' Home 
     was often plagued by scandals and investigations, and the 
     treatment of the children was very harsh. The fact that it 
     was a publicly funded institution meant that it was 
     scrutinized fairly intensively by the State Board of 
     Charities, and the board found little to praise in the 
     orphanage. The quality of administrators varied widely, since 
     they were appointed by the governor. The first 
     superintendent, Mrs. Ohr, was a Civil War colonel's widow 
     with small children but no business capacity and a rapacious 
     appetite for elegance, furnished at the expense of the state. 
     In 1869, early in her tenure, both the Springfield Register 
     and the Chicago Times voiced accusations about serious 
     mistreatment of the children. Although Mrs. Ohr and her staff 
     were exonerated, one steward was dismissed on the grounds 
     that he had made sexual advances to a number of little girls 
     in the institution. Mrs. Ohr weathered this upset, kept on 
     because she was ``a mother to these orphans,'' in the words 
     of the investigating committee. But eventually she went too 
     far; a combination of totally ignoring the trustees' 
     instructions, keeping the children from school in order to 
     perform chores around the institutions, and thoroughly 
     profligate spending finally ended her career at the Soldiers' 
     Ophans' Home some twenty years after she had launched it.
       The two superintendents who followed Mrs. Ohr were more 
     business-like in their approach, but they had no training in 
     the care of children, orphans or not; they were strictly 
     political appointments. The most difficult regime for the 
     children up to the turn of the century was that of a 
     Republican politician named J. L. Magner, who was nicknamed 
     ``the cattle driver'' by some of the Bloomington/Normal 
     locals because of his harsh treatment of the children. There 
     was consistent criticism that the children were made to work 
     too hard, at tasks that were sometimes beyond them, and they 
     were often kept home from school to work. One particularly 
     distressing instance of work beyond the children's capacity 
     was the scalding death of a three-year-old child, burned 
     while being bathed by some of the older children of the 
     institution.
       Nor were the superintendents and their policies the only 
     difficulty. The building, planned by a board of trustees with 
     a poetical turn, was gracefully adorned with turrets and 
     ``crowned with a tasteful observatory.'' But Frederick Wines 
     secretary of the State Board of Charities, assessed the 
     building as a thoroughgoing failure on a practical level. 
     There were no closets, no playgrounds, only two bathrooms for 
     over three hundred children, no infirmary, and no private 
     quarters for the superintendent's family. Perhaps worst of 
     all, there was no deep wellspring to supply water. The well 
     went dry after the first year, and water had to be brought in 
     by railroad. The Soldiers' Orphans' Home, beset by scandals 
     and mismanagement, conjured up the worst fears of Illinois 
     citizens about public institutions run badly because of 
     patronage appointments.
       The Chicago Reform School, also a public institution, won 
     approval from most critics for efficient management and 
     humane treatment of its inmates. But the school's involvement 
     with pre-delinquent boys ended with the noted O'Connell 
     decision of 1870, and the institution closed shortly after 
     this. With the exception of the inadequate provision of the 
     poorhouse, the responsibility for dependent children in 
     Chicago, from 1871 to the end of the century, was under 
     private auspices.


         the Growth of Private Institutions in the 19th Century

       The state's minimal response to dependent children was an 
     obdurate problem in the nineteenth century. An equally 
     disorganizing feature of child welfare in Illinois resulting 
     from state reluctance was the proliferation of private 
     agencies to care for children. These institutions mushroomed 
     in the state (particularly in Chicago) in the last half of 
     the nineteenth century, offering a wide variety of services 
     to children, based in part on their religious and cultural 
     identification and in part on the variety of needs that the 
     complex crises of urban life created. These agencies, 
     originally meant to fill the gap left by the inadequacy of 
     state responses quickly because entrenched in the public life 
     of the city. Their presence contributed to the fragmentation 
     that would plague child welfare efforts in Illinois through 
     the twentieth century, resulting in a lack of coordination 
     that left many dependent children unserved. By the end of the 
     nineteenth century, critics in Illinois and around the 
     country began to see the dominance of private agencies as a 
     negative and talk in terms of a stronger state organization; 
     but in the mid-nineteenth century, the private child welfare 
     institutions were autonomous, both organizationally and 
     financially, not always by their own choosing.
       The Chicago Orphan Asylum, founded in 1848 to respond to 
     the crisis of the cholera epidemic of that year, was the 
     first orphanage in Cook County. It was followed in 1849 by 
     the Roman Catholic Orphan Asylum, which aimed to serve 
     Catholic
      children and keep them out of the Protestant Chicago Orphan 
     Asylum. This carving out of religious turf, begun so early 
     in the history of child care institutions was to be a 
     major factor in the development of orphanages in Chicago. 
     In addition to a competition among religions for the care 
     of children, a strong sense of ethnicity motivated 
     founders of these institutions. Chicago had institutions 
     representing all nationalities; there were German 
     orphanages, Irish orphanages, Swedish, Polish, Lithuanian, 
     and Jewish orphanages, as well as institutions founded by 
     ``native Americans'' of English stock.
       Besides motives of religion and ethnicity, institutions 
     developed to respond to a variety of needs among children. 
     Many of them took in the children of the poor but insisted 
     that parents relinquish their rights to the children before 
     they were accepted. A few, like the Chicago Nursery and Half-
     Orphan Asylum, were founded to offer support to working 
     mothers who could not keep their children at home, yet wanted 
     to preserve their families. The children lived at the 
     institution, but mothers were expected to visit them 
     regularly and contribute something toward their children's 
     support. The Chicago Home for the Friendless originally took 
     in homeless and battered women as well as children but soon 
     revised its mission to focus on only on children. The Chicago 
     Foundling Hospital specialized in caring for the abandoned 
     infants found with such appalling regularity on the streets 
     and brought by the police to the institution for what care 
     and comfort it could offer. The mortality rate in foundling 
     hospitals was always shockingly high; the babies had 
     frequently suffered from exposure, and feeding them 
     adequately and safely, in the days before infant formula and 
     pasteurized milk, posed a major problem. The desertion of 
     infants was a disturbing and highly visible form of child 
     mistreatment, provoking an 1887 law that made such 
     abandonment a crime resulting in automatically terminated 
     parental rights. But not all children left at the foundling 
     hospital were abandoned on the streets. Dr. William Shipman, 
     founder of the hospital, witnessed a poignant scene in which 
     a mother and her little boy said a heartbroken farewell to 
     their baby before placing it in the champagne basket used as 
     a receptacle outside the foundling hospital. In typical 
     nineteenth century fashion. Shipman sympathized with a mother 
     pushed to such lengths, yet his assistance took the form of 
     only taking the baby, not of investigating ways that the 
     family might stay together.
       One development among private institutions that especially 
     reflected the growing awareness of children and their needs 
     was the Illinois Humane Society, which began its child saving 
     work in 1877. By the time the population of Cook County had 
     begun its phenomenal growth, going from 43,383 people in 1850 
     to 607,524 in 1880. Both the stresses of city life and its 
     anonymity provoked child abuse, according to Oscar Dudley, 
     director of the Illinois Humane Society, who observed that 
     ``what is everybody's business is nobody's business''; and 
     thus children could be terribly treated
      by parents and guardians even though there were laws in 
     effect to protect them. The Humane Society originally 
     began as the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to 
     Animals, but in 1877, Director Dudley transferred the 
     society's attention to cruelty against children by 
     arresting an abusive guardian. There was, he wrote, ``no 
     reason that a child should not be entitled to as much 
     protection under the law as a dumb animal.'' The Illinois 
     Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals changed 
     its name to the Illinois Humane Society in 1881, 
     recognizing that over two-thirds of its investigations 
     involved cruelty against children rather than animals. 
     Dudley asserted that from 1881, when the Humane Society 
     began to keep records, until the time that he was writing 
     (1893), over ten thousand children had been rescued. 

[[Page S 12817]]

       The rescue operations were broadened from cases of abuse to 
     the protection of children exploited by their employers, 
     particularly when children were forced to beg or were 
     entertainers or victims of the infamous padrone system. 
     Dudley reported great success in finding asylums and homes 
     for these children, a situation receiving tacit approval from 
     the state, which did not at this point assume responsibility 
     for neglected or abused children or supervise private child 
     placement activities.


               State Involvement in the Late 19th Century

       The only real state or city involvement with private 
     institutions originally was that the mayor, acting as 
     guardian for dependent children, had the power to place them 
     in child care institutions. The city of Chicago (where most 
     of the children's institutions flourished), the surrounding 
     countries, and the state of Illinois all proved very 
     reluctant to contribute financially to private institutions. 
     The city did give very occasional assistance, in times of 
     real crisis like the cholera epidemics or the Great Fire of 
     1871, but it was limited in quantity and very episodic. The 
     most the city would do for the Chicago Nursery and Half-
     Orphan Asylum, for example, was to provide that the city 
     could buy or lease the land upon which the asylum would be 
     built. For the Englewood Infant Nursery, the assistance was 
     even more meager: in 1893 the city provided ten tons of hard 
     coal and burial space for dead babies. For the children who 
     managed to survive, the funding had to come from other 
     sources.
       The state did make one major concession in funding when it 
     agreed to provide subsidies for the industrial schools that 
     developed in the last years of the century. The schools were 
     modeled after English institutions made famous by the 
     renowned English reformer Mary Carpenter, who in the 1870s 
     and 1880s enjoyed considerable influence in the United 
     States. The primary point of the schools, reflecting the use 
     of the word ``industrial,'' was to train children to earn 
     their own living in later life, although in fact the training 
     tended to be geared much more toward a traditional 
     agricultural economy than toward anything having to do with 
     industry. Boys learned farming, some shoe and broommaking, 
     woodcarving and academic subjects. Girls were primarily given 
     a common school education and taught domestic skills.
       The willingness to fund the industrial schools was 
     traceable to their mission: they were founded to deal with 
     older, predelinquent street children who threatened the 
     public order by begging, consorting with objectional 
     characters, or living in houses of ill-fame. The law 
     establishing industrial schools added that children in the 
     poorhouse were proper subjects for the schools, which meant 
     that in practice there was a mix of younger veterans of the 
     street. The State Board of Charities, which inspected the 
     schools, objected to this mix, but the industrial schools 
     survived this criticism, as well as a series of court 
     challenges ranging from civil liberties concerns to 
     objections that the schools were sectarian institutions and 
     therefore not appropriate recipients of state funds.
       The development of the subsidy system, the state funding of 
     private institutions on an amount-per-child basis, was a 
     phenomenon noted by Homer Folks in The Care of the Destitute, 
     Neglected and Dependent Children, his end-of-the-century 
     assessment of child care trends in the United States. Neither 
     Folks nor other observers of current philanthropic trends, 
     groups like the national Conference of Charities and the 
     Illinois State Board of Charities, really approved of such an 
     arrangement. They urged Illinois to move in the direction of 
     states like Kansas and Iowa, which had converted veterans' 
     orphans' homes similar to the Illinois Soldiers' Orphans' 
     Home to state institutions that served all dependent 
     children, regardless of religion, ethnicity, or parental 
     status. These states and others around the country were 
     moving toward a point where the state
      assumed primary responsibility for dependent children, not 
     by warehousing them in local poorhouses but by placing 
     them in state-run, central institutions from which they 
     were placed out into foster and adoptive homes. This 
     system of central state control was known as the 
     ``Michigan Plan,'' after the first state to enact the 
     policy. Illinois's neighbors Wisconsin and Minnesota, as 
     well as Michigan, had state institutions for dependent 
     children, winning the approval of child welfare theorists 
     who applauded such centralization. It was, they argued, 
     more efficient and economical, providing children with far 
     better, more consistent care than Illinois's system, where 
     a child might be placed with a superb private agency but 
     might also be made to endure the grim inadequacies of the 
     poorhouse.
       ``The real contest, if such it may be called,'' wrote Folks 
     in 1900, ``will be between the state and the contract or 
     subsidy systems. To put it plainly, the question now being 
     decided is this--is our public administration sufficiently 
     honest and efficient to be entrusted with the management of a 
     system for the care of destitute children, or must we turn 
     that branch of public service over to private charitable 
     corporations, leaving to public officials the functions of 
     paying the bills; and of exercising such supervision over the 
     workings of the plan as may be possible? ``Illinois was seen 
     as nonprogressive in its increasing use of the subsidy 
     system, allowing private agencies to dominate the field while 
     the state remained relatively uninvolved in the care and 
     protection of dependent children.
       This minimal level of state involvement offended against 
     another philanthropic tenet, the idea that the state should 
     have a monitoring function over all agencies, public and 
     private, as well as keeping in touch with children who had 
     been placed in families. The State Board of Charities did 
     visit the industrial schools, which got public funds, but it 
     was not until the Juvenile Court Act was passed in 1899 that 
     the State Board was given responsibility for inspection of 
     private as well as public agencies for children.
       Another significant change from an earlier view, at least 
     among the more ``advanced'' thinkers, was a rejection of 
     institutions as the best substitute for a child's family. In 
     the nineteenth century, institutions and asylums of all kinds 
     had sprung up, not only in Illinois but all across the United 
     States. Asylums were not intended to be a dumping ground for 
     society's unfortunates, as the county poorhouses were, but 
     were rather supposed to be a specialized environment in which 
     the needs of a particular dependent population could be met 
     most effectively. But it was not long before a set of critics 
     arose who stressed the negative effects of institutions and 
     urged that institutional life should be resorted to only 
     under special circumstances or on a very temporary basis. For 
     special cases, like the handicapped, perhaps institutions 
     could provide resources and training that they would not 
     receive elsewhere, these critics agreed; but for children 
     whose greatest problem was that for one reason or another 
     their families were not functioning, the negative effects of 
     institutions far outweighed the positive aspects.
       According to the anti-institutional analysis, the 
     regimentation in institutions was destructive of
      initiative and individuality. The qualities that brought 
     rewards in an institutional setting--mindless obedience, 
     dependence, obsequiousness--were the very traits that all 
     agreed were destructive to the forming of a healthy, 
     independence adult citizen. Furthermore, institutions by 
     their nature seemed to foster abuse and bad treatment. 
     Exposes and investigations of various institutions 
     featured accusations of physical cruelty and psychological 
     debasement.
       Institutions were expensive, physically and psychologically 
     barren, and downright unnatural for children, according to 
     Charles Loring Brace, a minister who worked for the 
     Children's Aid Society of New York. Brace began a program 
     that took the street children of New York City and sought to 
     improve their lives not by placing them in the highly 
     controlled environment of an institution but by resettling 
     them in homes in mid-western and western states such as 
     Illinois. He was convinced that the best solution for 
     children in need of placement was to provide homes in the 
     simplest and most direct way, relying as much as possible on 
     the basic goodness that he believed informed the souls of 
     most Americans, especially those who still lived away from 
     the corrupting city in the virtue-producing agricultural 
     heartland of the nation. The methods of the Children's Aid 
     Society reflected the simplicity of Brace's moral equation. 
     Brace and his associates would arrive in a western town with 
     a trainload of children, and using the medium of the local 
     churches, would call upon citizens to give these needy young 
     people a home. The entire plan of ``free foster homes'' was 
     really only an updated version of apprenticeship, in which 
     the child agreed to work in exchange for care and training, 
     except that this child-placing organization, aided by such 
     technological developments as the railroads, reached much 
     farther afield than the overseers of the poor had done in 
     earlier times. Free foster homes differed further in that 
     they were no legal bonds struck at all between the child and 
     his foster family. Brace firmly believed that a child who 
     brought a willing pair of hands to a family would be valued 
     accordingly and could safely count on good treatment in his 
     new home.
       This notion proved, not surprisingly, to be overly 
     sanguine, as the Children's Aid Society came to discover when 
     the accusations began to grow in the later years of the 
     century that New York was not really solving children's 
     problems by the use of its ``Children West'' program but was 
     merely dumping one of its troublesome populations onto other 
     states. At various times the Children's Aid Society conducted 
     surveys and studies of its ``alumni,'' claiming a very high 
     success rate for the program, but critics questioned the 
     quality of these studies, and oppositions to Brace's program 
     continued. The 1899 Illinois Juvenile Court Act forbade any 
     agencies to bring
      children unaccompanied by their parents or guardians, 
     without the approval of the State Board of Charities. This 
     was partly a protection against the importing of child 
     labor in Illinois, but it was a response as well to 
     organizations like the Children's Aid Society. The law 
     included the provision that any child who became a public 
     charge within five years of arrival in Illinois should be 
     removed to his or her home state.
       The notion of placing children in families and the belief 
     that normal family life was a far healthier situation than 
     institutions was firmly entrenched in child welfare thinking 
     by the end of the century. But the earlier, more naive, 
     notion that foster families could be trusted to care for 
     dependent children without supervision had been replaced in 
     philanthropic thinking by a belief that it was important for 
     an outside agency regularly to check on the child and act in 
     his behalf. Coupled with this was the beginning of 

[[Page S 12818]]
     a move away from ``free'' foster homes to the belief that boarding 
     homes, foster homes in which a family got payment for keeping 
     the foster child, were most productive of humane treatment. 
     Child welfare theorists and practitioners worried that if a 
     family's greatest inducement to take a foster child was the 
     child's potential economic contribution, there might be a 
     strong incentive for them to over-burden him with work, at 
     the expense of his academic education, which reformers were 
     coming more and more to see as the true and proper occupation 
     of childhood.
       One final change in philanthropic theory that saw little 
     reflection in practice but was to bring about a revolution in 
     twentieth-century social welfare was the growing conviction 
     that the best thing that could be done for children was to 
     keep them with their families whenever possible. Students of 
     society came increasingly to regard poverty as a result of 
     faulty economic and social structure rather than of personal 
     failings of feckless or lazy individuals, and they 
     disapproved of the kind of casual invasion of poor families' 
     lives that could demand the sacrifice of parental rights in 
     return for assistance. This belief in the preservation of the 
     family became a basic underpinning of the social welfare 
     faith as it was articulated in the next fifty years, and the 
     state of Illinois, with its experiment in mothers' pension 
     programs, was to be in the forefront of progressive practice 
     in this area.
       In the last decade of the nineteenth century, through, the 
     innovations that would make Illinois notable a few years 
     later were nowhere in sight. Surrounded by vigorous 
     neighbors, Illinois was considered conservative in its 
     reluctance to deal with its child welfare functions and in 
     its willingness to relinquish the charge to private agencies. 
     In fact, the state's attitude toward dependent children had 
     changed very little in the course of the nineteenth century. 
     The first laws and provisions for dependent children had 
     reflected a lack of
      ardor bordering on indifference, and at the end of the 
     century, the state's engagement in child welfare, despite 
     the crisis engendered by rapid growth and economic stress, 
     was tepid at best. The combination of fiscal conservatism 
     and ethnic and religious tensions meant that state action 
     was regarded with suspicion in many quarters and kept 
     efforts fragmented and inadequate to the need. There was 
     also a fear that the patronage and corruption for which 
     Illinois was already famous might make state 
     administration of programs for dependent children less 
     effective than privately run efforts. Ironically, it was 
     in part this very disorganization and inaction that would 
     lead to the founding of the Juvenile Court and bring 
     Illinois, however briefly, within the pale of reformers' 
     approval.


                          For Further Reading

       The Historical Society Library has numerous pamphlets, 
     annual reports, and other materials from institutions such as 
     the Chicago Nursery and Half-Orphan Asylum, the Chicago Home 
     for the Friendless, and the Chicago Foundlings' Hospital. For 
     a broad historical perspective on the United States's care 
     for needy children, see Joseph Hawes's The Children's Rights 
     Movement: A History of Advocacy and Protection (Boston: 
     Twayne Publishers, 1991) and James Leiby's A History of 
     Social Welfare and Social Welfare and Social Work in the 
     United States (New York: Columbia University Press, 1978). To 
     learn more about child welfare reform between the Progressive 
     era and the New Deal, see Mina Carson's Settlement Folk: 
     Social Thought and the American Settlement Movement, 1885-
     1930 (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1990) and 
     Robyn Muncy's Creating a Female Dominion in American Reform, 
     1890-1935 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991). Marilyn 
     Irvin Holt's The Orphan Trains: Placing Out in America 
     (Lincoln: The University of Nebraska Press, 1992) discusses 
     one nineteenth-century solution to the plight of urban 
     orphans.
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. So, Mr. President, in order to make certain that 
we do not have this accident of geography become the difference between 
children sleeping in the streets or children provided for and given 
sustenance--food and shelter--I have proposed this amendment, which 
says that the safety net will, in any event, be there for the children. 
And that child poverty, which is a national issue for us as Americans, 
will not then become balkanized in terms of the response that is given 
by the Government, that our national community recognizes that child 
poverty is a national issue, and child welfare, in the final analysis, 
has to have at least a national safety net. And that is what this first 
amendment provides.
  Mr. President, with regard to this amendment I understand that these 
amendments will be taken up tomorrow. Let me say also that there are 
tables that I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record 
showing the number of children who will be denied or who are in 
jeopardy of being denied assistance by virtue of the operation of the 
underlying legislation.
  There being no objection, the tables were ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

PRELIMINARY ESTIMATE OF THE NUMBER OF CHILDREN DENIED AFDC DUE TO THE 60
        MONTH TIME LIMIT IN THE SENATE REPUBLICAN LEADERSHIP PLAN       
------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                              Percentage
                                                  Number of       of    
                                                   children    children 
                                     Projected   denied AFDC    denied  
                                     number of   because the     AFDC   
               State                children on     family      because 
                                      AFDC in      received   the family
                                     2005 under    AFDC for    received 
                                    current law   more than    AFDC for 
                                                  60 months    more than
                                                               60 months
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alabama...........................      122,000       37,000          30
Alaska............................       30,000        8,000          27
Arizona...........................      170,000       46,000          27
Arkansas..........................       63,000       20,000          32
California........................    2,241,000      807,000          36
Colorado..........................      101,000       28,000          28
Connecticut.......................      136,000       41,000          30
Delaware..........................       28,000        8,000          29
District of Columbia..............       56,000       21,000          38
Florida...........................      605,000      156,000          26
Georgia...........................      348,000      116,000          33
Hawaii............................       48,000       15,000          31
Idaho.............................       17,000        4,000          24
Illinois..........................      598,000      203,000          34
Indiana...........................      177,000       56,000          32
Iowa..............................       82,000       25,000          30
Kansas............................       73,000       22,000          30
Kentucky..........................      187,000       59,000          32
Louisiana.........................      235,000       81,000          34
Maine.............................       55,000       19,000          35
Maryland..........................      185,000       59,000          32
Massachusetts.....................      256,000       82,000          32
Michigan..........................      553,000      217,000          39
Minnesota.........................      155,000       50,000          32
Mississippi.......................      153,000       53,000          35
Missouri..........................      218,000       73,000          33
Montana...........................       28,000        7,000          25
Nebraska..........................       39,000       12,000          31
Nevada............................       30,000        9,000          30
New Hampshire.....................       24,000        7,000          29
New Jersey........................      302,000      100,000          33
New Mexico........................       72,000       19,000          26
New York..........................      917,000      303,000          33
North Carolina....................      281,000       88,000          31
North Dakota......................       15,000        5,000          33
Ohio..............................      597,000      171,000          29
Oklahoma..........................      111,000       37,000          33
Oregon............................       97,000       30,000          31
Pennsylvania......................      517,000      194,000          38
Rhode Island......................       52,000       16,000          31
South Carolina....................      135,000       37,000          27
South Dakota......................       18,000        6,000          33
Tennessee.........................      246,000       75,000          30
Texas.............................      670,000      185,000          28
Utah..............................       45,000       12,000          27
Vermont...........................       22,000        7,000          32
Virginia..........................      166,000       50,000          30
Washington........................      237,000       75,000          32
West Virginia.....................       93,000       33,000          35
Wisconsin.........................      205,000       61,000          30
Wyoming...........................       14,000        4,000          29
Territories.......................      173,000       47,000          27
                                   -------------------------------------
      Total.......................   12,000,000    3,900,000          33
------------------------------------------------------------------------
HHS/ASPE analysis. States may not sum to total due to rounding.         
The analysis shows the impact at full implementation.                   
It assumes States utilize a 15 percent hardship exemption from the time 
  limit as permitted under the bill.                                    

           Child poverty rates among industrialized countries

                                                                Percent
Finland.............................................................2.5
Sweden..............................................................2.7
Denmark.............................................................3.3
Switzerland.........................................................3.3
Belgium.............................................................3.8
Luxembourg..........................................................4.1
Norway..............................................................4.6
Austria.............................................................4.8
Netherlands.........................................................6.2
France..............................................................6.5
Germany (West)......................................................6.8
Italy...............................................................9.6
United Kingdom......................................................9.9
Israel.............................................................11.1
Ireland............................................................12.0
Canada.............................................................13.5
Australia..........................................................14.0
United States......................................................21.5

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, in my State of Illinois, quite 
frankly, it suggests some 34 percent of the children may be denied AFDC 
or may be denied subsistence if the family violates the time limitation 
rule, which would translate, Mr. President, in some 203,000 children 
being at risk of homelessness, being at risk of hunger.
  I do not believe, Mr. President, that we can take the kind of chances 
to allow our children to once again end up as homeless half-orphans and 
friendless foundlings. We have to assure our national commitment is to 
child welfare, and that the safety of our children is a paramount 
concern and one that will not be abrogated without regard to what we do 
with regard to this legislation overall. It is for that purpose that I 
file and submit this first amendment.


                      Unanimous-Consent Agreement

  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I make a unanimous consent agreement 
request. I ask unanimous consent that all amendments to H.R. 4 must be 
offered by 5 p.m. tomorrow; that if cloture is filed in relation to 
H.R. 4 or an amendment thereto that the vote not 

[[Page S 12819]]
occur on that cloture motion prior to 6 p.m. on Wednesday, September 
13; that no amendment be given more than 4 hours equally divided; and 
the two leaders have up to 10 relevant amendments that would not have 
to be offered by 5 p.m. tomorrow.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Burns). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I thank my friend and my colleagues on 
both sides of the aisle.
  I announce that there will be no further rollcall votes until 
morning. There will be votes tomorrow morning, votes starting at 9:30. 
We may have as many as three or four amendments we will be voting on, 
for Senators' information, so we ask them to be prompt. Again, no more 
votes tonight.
  We will stay here for some additional time if Senators have 
additional amendments they wish to have considered. We will be happy to 
consider those. We have taken up a lot and we are setting those aside 
and so I think we are making some good progress on the bill.
  Again, no further rollcall votes tonight, and we will have rollcall 
votes stacked tomorrow morning beginning at 9:30. I thank my friend and 
colleague from Illinois for allowing me to interrupt.
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, I want to submit all of my 
amendments at this time. I want to make certain that I have enough time 
to discuss and file my amendment this evening.


                Amendment No. 2472 to Amendment No. 2280

(Purpose: To prohibit a State from imposing a time limit for assistance 
if the State has failed to provide work activity-related services to an 
   adult individual in a family receiving assistance under the State 
                                program)

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, my second amendment speaks to the 
issue of State responsibility. I call it a State responsibility 
amendment. I send the amendment to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Illinois [Ms. Moseley-Braun] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2472 to amendment No. 2280.

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:
       On page 40, between lines 16 and 17, insert the following:
       ``(4) Failure of state to provide work-activity related 
     services.--The limitation described in paragraph (1) shall 
     not apply to a family receiving assistance under this part if 
     the State fails to provide the work experience, assistance in 
     finding employment, and other work preparation activities and 
     support services described in section 402(a)(1)(A)(ii) to the 
     adult individual described in paragraph (1).

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. The second amendment I call the State 
Responsibility Act. Essentially it says that States shall not just 
knock somebody, a family, off for failing to meet the work requirement 
unless they have helped them to try and find a job.
  It is kind of basic. I will read it:

       The limitation described . . . shall not apply to a family 
     receiving assistance under this part if the State fails to 
     provide the work experience, assistance in finding 
     employment, and other work preparation activities.

  Mr. President, the underlying legislation, has a cutoff for 
assistance and rules regarding work. For individuals who do not go to 
work, they will not receive any support.
  That is fine, Mr. President. I think we can all agree again, anybody 
who can work should work and anybody who has children ought to be 
responsible in the first instance to take care of them.
  However, Mr. President, it is also a reality that there are parts of 
this country in which frankly there are not the employment 
opportunities available that people can even take jobs.
  The absence of jobs in some areas I think is a major problem and 
frankly defies some of the suggestions made here that the problem with 
people receiving public assistance is that they just do not want to 
work. The fact of the matter is that the problem in very many instances 
is that there are no jobs for people to work at. Even if they wanted to 
work there are no jobs.
  In fact, in my own State, we have areas of my State in which 
unemployment ranges from 20 to 40 percent. The statistics indicate that 
80 percent, frankly, of African-American males between the ages of 16- 
and 19-years-old in the city of Chicago are currently unemployed.
  Mr. President, 55 percent of the 20- to 24-year-olds are out of work. 
It is not possible to move recipients into permanent private-sector 
jobs if there is no effort to provide or create those jobs and if the 
jobs are not there and if individuals have not been given some 
assistance in terms of transitioning.
  Under the bill that we have before the Senate, the number of people 
participating in the work/job preparation activities is estimated to 
increase by over 161 percent by the year 2000. Again, that means that 
States like Illinois will receive some $444 million less in AFDC funds, 
but on the other hand be required to increase by 122 percent the number 
of people participating in work and job preparation activity.
  Those numbers just do not fit. Eight into three will not go. The 
numbers do not add up therefore, I think it really is a real concern 
that States not be allowed to just kick people off without having done 
what the bill says they should do in providing people with transition 
to work.
  The text of the legislation says that the State has to outline how 
they intend to ``provide a parent or caretaker in such families with 
work experience, assistance in finding employment and other work 
preparation activities and support services that the State find 
appropriate.''
  Now, that is fine language. I have no problem with that. But the 
question becomes what if the State does not do this? What then happens 
to the families? What then happens to the children?
  Again, this amendment simply, I think, seeks to clarify that in the 
event the State has not done that, has not provided work experience 
assistance in finding employment or the work for the work preparation 
activities, that the individual then will not be penalized for 
circumstances frankly that then are legitimately and, in a way that can 
be documented, beyond their control.
  So that is the second amendment that I submit for consideration of my 
colleagues.
  Mr. NICKLES. I appreciate the Senator offering her amendments 
tonight. Would the Senator please give us a copy of the amendments? I 
have a copy of your first amendment and comments or questions I might 
ask. If the Senator would like to go ahead, if we could have copies of 
both the second and third amendments, that would help.
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Absolutely. I thought I had provided the Senator 
with a copy, but I will give it to him right now.
  This is the third amendment and this is the second.


                Amendment No. 2473 To Amendment No. 2280

    (Purpose: To modify the job opportunities to certain low-income 
                          individuals program)

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. If there is no objection, the previous 
amendment will be laid aside.
  The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Illinois [Ms. Moseley-Braun] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2473 to amendment No. 2280.

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that 
reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 122, between lines 11 and 12, insert the following:

     SEC. 111. MODIFICATIONS TO THE JOB OPPORTUNITIES FOR CERTAIN 
                   LOW-INCOME INDIVIDUALS PROGRAM.

       Section 505 of the Family Support Act of 1988 (42 U.S.C. 
     1315 note) is amended--
       (1) in the heading, by striking ``DEMONSTRATION'';
       (2) by striking ``demonstration'' each place it appears;
       (3) in subsection (a), by striking ``in each of fiscal 
     years'' and all that follows through ``10'' and inserting 
     ``shall enter into agreements with'';
       (4) in subsection (b)(3), by striking ``aid to families 
     with dependent children under part A of title IV of the 
     Social Security Act'' and inserting ``assistance under the 
     State program funded part A of title IV of the Social 
     Security Act in the State in which the individual resides'';
       (5) in subsection (c)--

[[Page S 12820]]

       (A) in paragraph (1)(C), by striking ``aid to families with 
     dependent children under part A of title IV of the Social 
     Security Act'' and inserting ``assistance under the State 
     program funded part A of title IV of the Social Security 
     Act''; and
       (B) in paragraph (2), by striking ``aid to families with 
     dependent children under title IV of such Act'' and inserting 
     ``assistance under the State program funded part A of title 
     IV of the Social Security Act'';
       (6) in subsection (d), by striking ``job opportunities and 
     basic skills training program (as provided for under title IV 
     of the Social Security Act'' and inserting ``the State 
     program funded under part A of title IV of the Social 
     Security Act''; and
       (7) by striking subsections (e) through (g) and inserting 
     the following:
       ``(e) Authorization of Appropriations.--For the purpose of 
     conducting projects under this section, there is authorized 
     to be appropriated an amount not to exceed $25,000,000 for 
     any fiscal year.''.
       Redesignate the succeeding sections accordingly.

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, I am actually delighted that the 
Senator from New York is on the floor at this moment, because this next 
amendment essentially makes permanent a part of the Family Support Act 
that establishes what is called the Job Opportunities for Low-income 
Individuals Program.
  The JOLI Program--that is what it is called, JOLI, Job Opportunities 
for Low-income Individuals--is to create job opportunities for AFDC 
recipients and other low-income individuals. Grants can be made to 
private, nonprofit corporations to make investments in local business 
enterprises that will result in the creation of new jobs. This 
amendment authorizes appropriations for a program that is already in 
place as a demonstration program. This would make it permanent.
  The rationale for the amendment is that the underlying bill does not 
provide any support at all for job creation. Even though S. 1120 
requires some kind of work activity within 24 months, and eligibility 
for assistance ends after some 60 months, whether the individual has 
found a job or not. So, there is no question but that we will need to 
see a great creation of thousands of private-sector jobs in order to 
absorb the influx of new workers.
  So the JOLI Program actually helps. It is working. It helps 
individuals to become self-sufficient through the development of 
microenterprises for economic development and other kinds of job 
training. The really good news about JOLI is that this is not 
reinventing the wheel. It is already in place. It was authorized under 
section 505 of the Family Support Act of 1988.
  Under a recent evaluation of JOLI, the first 20 JOLI intermediaries--
that is, community-based organizations that are the grantees--have 
assisted some 334 individuals to start or stabilize their own 
businesses, and it has assisted an additional 535 people to secure 
employment in jobs paying an average wage of about $8 an hour, which is 
really quite remarkable. Of the 869 low-income individuals benefiting 
from the demonstration program, most of them had become economically 
self-sufficient within a year of their involvement or interaction with 
the program.
  So the JOLI Program addresses the scarcity of jobs in many urban as 
well as rural communities and recognizes the need to ensure that 
welfare recipients and other low-income people have access to 
employment opportunities in the private sector. It utilizes the 
capacity of community-based organizations and the private sector to 
develop jobs so individuals who right now are mired in poverty will 
have some options and have some hope, and will have the ability to take 
care of themselves and their families.
  Again, we are talking about the 5 million people who are adults who 
are presently receiving public assistance and who will, therefore, 
hopefully, be given a hand up as opposed to a handout--will be given 
the ability to work, will be given the ability to care for themselves 
and their children. I think job creation is an integral part of any 
honest welfare reform that we undertake to have in this session of the 
Senate.


                Amendment No. 2474 to Amendment No. 2280

  (Purpose: To prohibit a State from reserving grant funds for use in 
    subsequent fiscal years if the State has reduced the amount of 
    assistance provided to families under the State program in the 
                         preceding fiscal year)

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, I have a last amendment I send to 
the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. If there is no objection, the pending 
amendment will be set aside.
  The clerk will report the amendment.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Illinois [Ms. Moseley-Braun] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2474 to amendment No. 2280.

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that 
reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 25, strike lines 13 through 18, and insert the 
     following:
       ``(3) Authority to reserve certain amounts for 
     assistance.--
       ``(A) In general.--A State may reserve amounts paid to the 
     State under this part for any fiscal year for the purpose of 
     providing, without fiscal year limitation, assistance under 
     the State program operated under this part.
       ``(B) Exception.--In any fiscal year, a State may not 
     exercise the authority described in subparagraph (A) if the 
     State has reduced the amount of cash assistance provided per 
     family member to families under the State program during the 
     preceding fiscal year.

  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Mr. President, this last amendment--again, this is 
one of these efforts to keep the worst from happening. Again, we all 
hope it does not happen, that the States are not less than responsible 
in their execution of the underlying bill. This amendment is designed 
to serve as a buttress against what has been characterized as the race 
to the bottom.
  Essentially, if a State decides to cut its cash assistance benefits, 
to cut the amount that it spends to address the issue of poverty within 
that State, then that State will be prohibited from carrying forward 
unused block grant funds.
  This is called--I call this the race-to-the-bottom amendment. The 
notion is, if we send the States this money in a block grant, there is 
nothing to prohibit that State from saying we do not want to have 
assistance for poor children. We are not going to address the issue of 
job creation. We are not going to train people to go back to work. We 
are not going to provide the children with any assistance. We are just 
going to further squeeze the amount of resources devoted to the whole 
issue of poverty in our State and we are going to take the money we get 
from the Federal Government and use that to go from year to year to 
year to year and not maintain our own effort.
  If one State does it, then the next State would be incentivized, if 
you will, to do as much, which will then start--hopefully not, but 
might well start, if you will--a race to the bottom and a cycle of the 
States trying to underbid one another in terms of the amount of 
assistance that they provide for poor people who live in that State.
  I think that would be a real tragedy. As a result, this amendment 
simply says that a State may not carry over funds from one year to the 
next if they have reduced the amount of benefits that are available for 
poor children and for poor families in that State.
  Again, this stops the States from penalizing poor people in ways that 
would be inconsistent with the legislation. So it is, in that regard, 
simply a preventive, protective, prophylactic amendment, if you will.
  The other reason for this legislation, just to be real candid in 
terms of the dollars, frankly, is that this legisla- tion--because of 
the level of appropriations, it has been estimated that the States 
will, overall, have to cut. They will not have enough money, frankly, 
to do what is required of them in the legislation. CBO has already 
advised that most States will not have the money to provide for the 
kind of job training, the kinds of transition services--or certainly 
child care in this legislation. So, that being the case, there should 
not be any money left over. But in the event there is, I think we 
should put a buttress and a stop that says we are not going to allow 
States to engage in this race to the bottom, engage in this effort to 
see who can be the most punitive with regard to poor people in that 
State.
  So that is the last amendment.
  Mr. President, I want, in closing--and I have wanted to give my 
colleague a chance, so I kind of rushed through a little bit to try to 
speed up so he would 

[[Page S 12821]]
have the opportunity to present his amendment--to talk about this issue 
in another context.
  I had occasion, back in my State, to meet with and work with a task 
force members came from all sectors--from the business sector, from the 
community activist sector, people who were advocates, actual welfare 
mothers served on the panel--to talk about the issues having to do with 
our response to poverty. I started my conversation this evening saying 
welfare is not and has never been anything other than a response to 
poverty; a response that engenders strong feelings, certainly, but that 
is what it is. We must not lose sight of the underlying issue as we 
approach the question of how well the response works.
  The point is that I believe we have, when all is said and done--we 
can talk about differences in philosophy about block grants and whether 
or not there is too much Federal bureaucracy. Although, frankly, the 
numbers, by the way, do not support the notion that a whole lot of 
money that is presently dedicated to the AFDC Program goes into 
administration on the Federal level.
  In fact, most of the administrative expenses take place at the State 
level. I think it is important that we make that point.
  I think it is also important--and I am digressing here--to point out 
that because most of the administration takes place at the State and 
local level, it is likely that by operation of this new law, should it 
pass, the States will in fact be stuck with what has been called a huge 
unfunded mandate in that they will be called on to administer and to do 
things that they do not presently have the resources to do. And they 
are going to have to find the resources to do that from places other 
than the Federal Government. We will not be there to help out with 
State efforts to create jobs. We will not be there to help out with 
child care. We will not be there to help out with the administration of 
whatever the State response is. That is a fundamental problem I think 
with the underlying bill.
  But the point that I really want to make is one that the Senator from 
New York I think has eloquently spoken to, and it does go to the 
fundamental issue of debate in all of this. That is the question of 
common ground. That is the issue of whether or not we have a commitment 
as a national community to address the issue of poverty, to address the 
issue of child welfare, or whether or not we are prepared to balkanize 
as a country into 50 different welfare systems, into 50 different 
responses to poverty, into 50 different approaches to child welfare, 
and whether or not the welfare and the well-being, the possibility of 
potential for hunger, the possibility of the potential for homelessness 
of a child in this country will depend on an accident of geography. It 
is bad enough that a child who is born into poverty suffers the 
accident of having been born poor. As a friend of mine once said, ``It 
is your own fault for being born to poor parents.'' I could not 
disagree with that point.
  But the fact of matter is, we have to make sure that the accident of 
being born to poor parents is not exacerbated by where that took place.
  The question is whether or not, as Americans, we will have the 
foresight to recognize that through this as the very central issue of 
the nature of our Federal Government, the nature of Federalism and the 
nature of our Nation and the kind of country that we will have. Will we 
have a country in which everyone recognizes that the welfare of a child 
in Oklahoma, in Nevada, or Iowa is as important to the Senator from 
California and the Senator from Illinois and the Senator from New York 
as the welfare of a child in his or her own State, or will we have a 
situation in which by virtue of the balkanization provided by this 
underlying bill, the only children about whose welfare you or I can 
have a say about are the children in the State from which we are 
elected?
  I do not think, Mr. President, that is a direction that the American 
people want to see us fall off to.
  As we talk about the devolution in Government, the devolution that we 
ought to consider to welfare work better, making it work efficiently, 
giving people opportunity, giving people an opportunity to go to work, 
giving children the kind of care and the kind of safety net that they 
need to have so that they will have opportunities, so they possibly 
will not have to be born to poor children, and their children, whether 
or not they will have to be born to poor parents, that their children 
will have a chance to do better.
  That is, it seems to me, consistent with the American dream and is 
consistent with the whole concept of what this Nation is about.
  I therefore hope that a direction that this bill takes in the final 
analysis, when all is said and done, and the amendments are put on it, 
that we reaffirm and not reject and walk away from our national 
commitment to address the issue of poverty and to provide for the 
welfare of all of our children.
  Thank you.
  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, will the Senator yield for a question?
  I compliment my colleague, one, for her interest in her State, her 
constituents, and also for the fact that she has I think four or five 
amendments, and she was waiting to offer those tonight and discuss 
those. I have not had a chance to review all of them. I have looked at 
a couple of them.
  I know my colleague from Pennsylvania has an amendment he wishes to 
offer. We may have other amendments. So I will be very brief. I will 
review these amendments a little more in detail over the night and talk 
about them possibly tomorrow.
  But the first amendment that the Senator has is a big one. It is an 
important one. Our colleague should be able to understand it. So I ask 
this question: I am reading under ``eligibility.'' This is talking 
about the underlying bill. But also I might mention under the Daschle 
bill, there was a time limit for welfare payments from the Federal 
Government, 5 years. Under the amendment of the Senator from Illinois, 
it says after the 5 years should expire and a welfare recipient still 
has a dependent child, the State would be mandated to provide a voucher 
program to provide assistance to the minor child.
  Is that correct?
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. That is correct.
  Mr. NICKLES. The Senator also mentions that she did not want to have 
unfunded mandates in one of the other amendments but this would be--
correct me, if I am wrong, you do not fund this program. You just 
mandate that the States after 5 years would have to provide a voucher 
program to provide assistance even though we do not give them any 
money?
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. We will not give them the money. In fact, if 
anything, the welfare of those children in those families, if anything, 
should have first dibs on the block grants that we at the Federal 
Government level are providing the money that goes to the States that 
is calculated to, and the whole idea is to provide for the welfare of 
minor dependent children.
  So if that minor dependent child has a parent who does not comply 
with the work requirement or misses some other test that is set up, 
that child will still be provided for first.
  So, if anything, I call this the child voucher, but really, if 
anything, it should be called the Child First amendment.
  Mr. NICKLES. I wanted to make sure, though, that we understood. 
Because this has a benefit, it would not have been provided under the 
Daschle substitute.
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Yes, it would have. This particular safety net for 
children was provided for in the Daschle substitute.
  Mr. NICKLES. I will be happy to review it. I appreciate my colleague.
  I just looked at the other amendment. She has one amendment that says 
you want to have a pilot program and you wanted to authorize $25 
million for the job opportunities for certain low-income individuals. 
Is that correct?
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. That is correct.
  Mr. NICKLES. That is a program we have ongoing now.
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. That is correct.
  Mr. NICKLES. How much are we appropriating for that program at this 
point?
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. We are right now at about 5.6. So $5.6 million.
  Mr. NICKLES. Just for my colleagues' information, according to 

[[Page S 12822]]
  CRS, we have 154--I have heard now 155--various employment and training 
programs. This is one program that you would like to maybe take out of 
the block grants and increase its funding by fivefold. Is that correct?
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. This is a demonstration. This is not just about 
training. There is a demonstration program that is already in existence 
for micro-enterprises development, for a variety of approaches to 
economic development and job creation for low-income individuals. This 
already exists. Yet the increase is $5.4 million in fiscal year 1995.
  Yes, there is a fivefold increase in the funding for this job 
training and job creation program for low-income individuals. It is 
that increase.
  But I would point out to my colleague that there is no question--
again, in the eyes of what we are with doing here--that there is a 
suggestion that you cannot do welfare reform and put people to work on 
the cheap. You are going to have to make investment in those counties, 
in those States such as Wisconsin where there is a successful welfare 
reform experiment under way. There is no question that to transition 
people from welfare to work requires that we give them something to 
work at, give them skills, training, and micro-enterprise loans to 
start businesses or whatever. But there is some assistance required to 
leverage human capability to provide that they get back into the 
private sector and to get back to work.
  There are two counties in Wisconsin in which there have been work to 
welfare, a work transition pilot program. There is no question but that 
the investment is made on the front end to give individuals the ability 
to transfer off of welfare and to transfer from dependency to 
independency.
  The JOLI Program has done that. It has done it successfully. It was 
initiated as a part of the Family Support Act. It works. It is not like 
trying something brand new. It has worked.
  It seems to me that in light of the fact that job creation is not 
addressed at all in the underlying legislation--and it is not. There is 
no ability for creating jobs in the bill without this amendment.
  Mr. NICKLES. Will the Senator yield on that?
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Let me finish my point. In light of that fact that 
there is no effort to leverage private activities to create jobs, this 
amendment says let us take something that works and let us expand it so 
that since the States have to have, since individuals who live in these 
various States will have to comport and comply with work requirements, 
let us give the States some assistance in providing job creation and 
private sector entrepreneurial activity.
  Mr. NICKLES addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I will just make a brief statement, not 
necessarily continue the colloquy.
  I appreciate the commitment of my friend and colleague from Illinois. 
Just a couple of comments pertaining to this amendment.
  This second amendment we have been discussing is rather small. It 
says we would have a $25 million pilot program to continue a program we 
already have and quadruple its costs or multiply it by five.
  That is directly contrary to what we are trying to do in this bill. 
As I mentioned before, according to CRS we have 154--I put this in the 
Record earlier today--Federal job training programs, some of which--and 
I know my colleague from New York is the author and sponsor of some--
some of which have probably done some good. A whole lot of them 
probably have not. And so to think that we have 155 and my colleague 
from Illinois has picked out one----
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Will the Senator yield for just a comment?
  This is not a job training program. This has nothing to do with job 
training. The JOLI Program is job creation. It gives poor people the 
opportunity to access money, equity capital in order to start their own 
businesses and start their own jobs. It is not job training.
  That is why it was distinct from the job training debate. That is a 
whole other debate. If you take a look at what the Family Support Act 
language that created the JOLI program you will see that it is not a 
job training program. This amendment says let us give poor people the 
opportunity to create their own jobs.
  Mr. NICKLES addressed the Chair.
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. If I may just respond to my colleague, since we 
are in a colloquy, some of the initiatives under JOLI have come from 
other parts of the world. There has been a famous experiment that 
started actually in India, I say to the Senator from New York, in which 
poor people were given tiny loans called microloans to start their own 
businesses.
  So it is not job training, and it is to be distinguished from the job 
training debate.
  Mr. NICKLES addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma has the floor.
  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I again appreciate my colleague's 
initiative, her commitment to her cause. I will just state that this 
Senator is going to vote against it, and this will probably be one we 
will have a rollcall vote on tomorrow. It does increase the 
authorization of this program by fivefold. One may not call it a jobs 
program. I would have to look and see if it was included on the list 
according to CRS as a Federal employment and/or job training program. 
Maybe it is a lending program. I am not sure it belongs--if it is a 
lending program and financing program, maybe it should or should not be 
in this bill. I do not know that I want to multiply programs by that 
kind of multiplier at this point.
  The overall scope of this bill says we are going to be saving--if we 
pass this bill, we are going to be saving $70 billion. Now, we are 
talking about big money. I will go back to the amendment that our 
colleague from Illinois raised before, but I wish to be really brief 
because I know our colleague from Pennsylvania has an amendment.
  But the initial amendment is a very big amendment. And I will have to 
compare it--and I appreciate her statement that it was in the Daschle 
substitute, but as I understand it, it is a bill that would basically 
waive the 5-year requirement or time limit.
  President Clinton said that he wanted to have a time limit, and we 
are talking about Federal payments--have a time limit on how long an 
individual or family can receive money from the Federal Government. If 
we are to end welfare as we know it, we are going to have to have some 
limitations. As I read the first amendment, as long as there is a 
dependent minor child, you would continue to have assistance.
  Now, the assistance from the Federal Government would be terminated 
after 5 years, cash assistance. Under the Senator's amendment, the 
State would provide vouchers for supplemental assistance. That is an 
unfunded mandate. Maybe the States could take it from other savings in 
the program. I will try to study that a little more. But the essence of 
it is the family can be on welfare forever if they continue to have 
children. And that is not the thrust of what we are trying to do in the 
bill which is to have real incentive to get off welfare, to break the 
welfare dependency cycle and to make some improvements.
  I do appreciate my colleague's introduction of the amendments and her 
statements and also her dedication to some of the things she is trying 
to do. But at least as far as this Senator is concerned, I do not think 
we will be, at least I will not be able to accept the first amendment 
as well. I will look at the other couple of amendments that our 
colleague introduced and will consider those. So again I would like to 
inform my colleagues tomorrow morning at 9:30 my guess is we will have 
several rollcall votes. And again I thank my colleague from Illinois 
for introducing her amendments.
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. I wish to thank my colleague from Oklahoma, except 
I would just say one thing. I do not mind the Senator taking issue with 
the amendment one way or another, but I think it is real important not 
to misrepresent what the amendment is about. It is not about keeping 
families on welfare forever. It is a child-first amendment. It has to 
do with children. If the State decides to have a shorter time limit 
than the bill or the family is cut off because the parent will not go 
to work, then we have to I think maintain some kind of a safety net for 
that child. 

[[Page S 12823]]

  I do not believe the President of the United States or any other 
Member of this body wants to set up a set of rules that would leave us 
with 6-year-old children sleeping in streets homeless and hungry. I do 
not believe anybody wants to do that. But we do not have any guarantee 
in the underlying legislation, and that is what this amendment seeks to 
fix.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. SANTORUM addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. SANTORUM. I thank the Chair. I rise to offer an amendment. Before 
I do that, I just want to make a couple of comments about what the 
Senator from Illinois stated and characterized the Republican 
leadership bill, which I am very hopeful will be adopted by the Senate. 
She says that the bill balkanizes welfare reform into 50 separate 
programs and that this is bad, that everyone should be treated the 
same.
  I happen to believe that that is the problem with this system, that 
everybody is treated the same and not particularly well, and the 
balkanization into 50 separate programs is a bad idea. But 
balkanization into a million individual efforts to help poor people in 
our society is a good idea. And that is what this bill does.
  Sure, it gives a lot of flexibility to the States, but there are many 
provisions in this bill which tell the States and direct the States and 
encourage the States to go farther; to go down to the local level and 
to the community level and make this a program that is a program that 
talks about communities and neighborhoods helping neighborhoods and 
friends helping friends. And that is the dynamism that is in this bill 
that has never been tried from a Federal perspective before.
  So, yes, it is balkanization but not to 50 but to 50 times 50 times 
50 and more. And that is the excitement about this bill. That is why we 
are so committed to seeing this happen.
  The Senator from Illinois also said that there is nothing in this 
bill about job creation, and I have heard this over and over and over 
again. And I feel like a broken record getting up and responding to it. 
But I will say several things.
  The Senator from Illinois said there is nothing about job creation. 
What she is referring to, I assume the Senator is referring to is that 
there is no Federal dollars to place people in employment. There is no 
specific pot of Federal dollars to say we will pay for employment slots 
and for supervision and for paying their stipend while they are 
working.
  What I would say is that the Governors of the States, the Republican 
Governors of the States, I believe 29 out of 30 of the Governors have 
said that this bill is an acceptable bill to them; that they do not 
need a big pot of money if they can run their own program; that they 
can do it cheaper and better, put more people to work, get more people 
off the rolls if they have the flexibility to run their own program 
without all the tripwires and redtape that is involved in the Federal 
system.
  That is Governors, as I said before, Republican Governors, who 
represent 80 percent of the welfare recipients in this country. 
Republican Governors are from States that represent 80 percent of 
welfare recipients and they say this is a good deal; they can live with 
this; they want this. And they can create the jobs to put the people to 
work as required by this legislation.
  I would also say that we eliminate, in the Dole bill we eliminate the 
provision in current law, which was maintained in the Daschle bill,
 we eliminate the provision that says if you are a city or State or any 
other kind of municipality, you can no longer fill a vacancy with a 
welfare recipient. That is current law. You cannot fill a vacancy with 
a welfare recipient in a courthouse or school or any other municipality 
or government entity.

  What we say is, if there is a vacancy there and you want to give 
someone on welfare a chance, you can fill that vacancy with someone. I 
used the example earlier today, when we talked about this, of folks on 
a road crew standing there with that sign: ``Slow,'' ``Stop.'' You 
cannot fill that vacancy, if it occurs, with a welfare recipient.
  You can today under the Dole provision. That is creating jobs. You 
want to talk about creating job slots, that creates a lot of job slots 
in communities across this country that are illegal today. So we do 
expand the opportunities for people on welfare to get jobs under this 
piece of legislation.
  Mr. President, one other comment. The Senator from Illinois said that 
children should not suffer because of being born accidentally into 
poverty. Unfortunately, in this country and every other country in the 
world, poverty exists. The difference between other countries and this 
country is that when you are born into poverty, you are not frozen into 
poverty by the Government which does not allow you to rise in society.
  There are many cultures and civilizations in this world that doom you 
to the life in which you were born, but we do not have a caste system 
in this country. We do not have levels of classes in this country. The 
greatness of this country is that the grandson of a coal miner who 
lived in a company town outside of Johnstown, PA, can be a U.S. 
Senator, as I am.
  That is the greatness of this country, that we still offer 
opportunity, and that is what is lacking in the current system. We 
disincentivize people from getting off the welfare roll by providing, 
as Franklin Roosevelt said, the subtle narcotic to the masses of 
welfare. We are going to get rid of the subtle narcotic and turn that 
into Powerade, into a system to give them the energy and the 
opportunity to move forward and rise.


                Amendment No. 2477 to Amendment No. 2280

    (Purpose: To eliminate certain welfare benefits with respect to 
 fugitive felons and probation and parole violators, and to facilitate 
  sharing of information with law enforcement officers, and for other 
                               purposes)

  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending 
amendment be set aside, and I send an amendment to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The 
pending amendment will be set aside. The clerk will report the 
amendment.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Pennsylvania [Mr. Santorum], for himself 
     and Mr. Nickles, proposes an amendment numbered 2477 to 
     amendment No. 2280.

  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading 
of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 42, line 2, insert ``, Social Security number, and 
     photograph (if applicable)'' before ``of any recipient''.
       On page 42, between lines 21 and 22, insert the following 
     new subsection:
       ``(e) Denial of Assistance for Absent Child.--Each State to 
     which a grant is made under section 403--
       ``(1) may not use any part of the grant to provide 
     assistance to a family with respect to any minor child who 
     has been, or is expected by the caretaker relative in the 
     family to be, absent from the home for a period of 45 
     consecutive days or, at the option of the State, such period 
     of not less than 30 and not more than 90 consecutive days as 
     the State may provide for in the State plan;
       ``(2) at the option of the State, may establish such good 
     cause exceptions to paragraph (1) as the State considers 
     appropriate if such exceptions are provided for in the State 
     plan; and
       ``(3) shall provide that a caretaker relative shall not be 
     considered an eligible individual for purposes of this part 
     if the caretaker relative fails to notify the State agency of 
     an absence of a minor child from the home for the period 
     specified in or provided for under paragraph (1), by the end 
     of the 5-day period that begins on the date that it becomes 
     clear to the caretaker relative that the minor child will be 
     absent for the period so specified or provided for in 
     paragraph (1).
       On page 130, line 8, insert ``, Social Security number, and 
     photograph (if applicable)'' before ``of any recipient''.
       On page 198, between lines 14 and 15, insert the following 
     new section:

     SEC. ____. DISQUALIFICATION OF FLEEING FELONS.

       Section 6 of the Food Stamp Act of 1977 (7 U.S.C. 2015), as 
     amended by section 319(a), is further amended by adding at 
     the end the following new subsection:
       ``(o) No member of a household who is otherwise eligible to 
     participate in the food stamp program shall be eligible to 
     participate in the program as a member of that or any other 
     household during any period during which the individual is--
       ``(1) fleeing to avoid prosecution, or custody or 
     confinement after conviction, under the laws of the place 
     from which the individual flees, for a crime, or attempt to 
     commit a crime, which is a felony under the laws of the place 
     from which the individual flees, or which, in the case of the 
     State of New Jersey, is a high misdemeanor under the laws of 
     such State; or

[[Page S 12824]]

       ``(2) violating a condition of probation or parole imposed 
     under Federal or State law.''.
       On page 302 after line 5, add the following new section:
     SEC. 504. INFORMATION REPORTING.

       (a) Title IV of the Social Security Act.--Section 405 of 
     the Social Security Act, as added by section 101(b), is 
     amended by adding at the end the following new subsection:
       ``(f) State Required To Provide Certain Information.--Each 
     State to which a grant is made under section 403 shall, at 
     least 4 times annually and upon request of the Immigration 
     and Naturalization Service, furnish the Immigration and 
     Naturalization Service with the name and address of, and 
     other identifying information on, any individual who the 
     State knows is unlawfully in the United States.''.
       (b) SSI.--Section 1631(e) of such Act (42 U.S.C. 1383(e)) 
     is amended--
       (1) by redesignating the paragraphs (6) and (7) inserted by 
     sections 206(d)(2) and 206(f)(1) of the Social Security 
     Independence and Programs Improvement Act of 1994 (Public Law 
     103-296; 108 Stat. 1514, 1515) as paragraphs (7) and (8), 
     respectively; and
       (2) by adding at the end the following new paragraph:
       ``(9) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the 
     Commissioner shall, at least 4 times annually and upon 
     request of the Immigration and Naturalization Service 
     (hereafter in this paragraph referred to as the `Service'), 
     furnish the Service with the name and address of, and other 
     identifying information on, any individual who the 
     Commissioner knows is unlawfully in the United States, and 
     shall ensure that each agreement entered into under section 
     1616(a) with a State provides that the State shall furnish 
     such information at such times with respect to any individual 
     who the State knows is unlawfully in the United States.''.
       (c) Housing Programs.--Title I of the United States Housing 
     Act of 1937 (42 U.S.C. 1437 et seq.), as amended by section 
     1004, is further amended by adding at the end the following 
     new section:

     ``SEC. 28. PROVISION OF INFORMATION TO LAW ENFORCEMENT AND 
                   OTHER AGENCIES.

       ``(a) Notice to Immigration and Naturalization Service of 
     Illegal Aliens.--Notwithstanding any other provision of law, 
     the Secretary shall, at least 4 times annually and upon 
     request of the Immigration and Naturalization Service 
     (hereafter in this subsection referred to as the `Service'), 
     furnish the Service with the name and address of, and other 
     identifying information on, any individual who the Secretary 
     knows is unlawfully in the United States, and shall ensure 
     that each contract for assistance entered into under section 
     6 or 8 of this Act with a public housing agency provides that 
     the public housing agency shall furnish such information at 
     such times with respect to any individual who the public 
     housing agency knows is unlawfully in the United States.''.
       At the appropriate place, insert the following new section:

     SEC. ____. ELIMINATION OF HOUSING ASSISTANCE WITH RESPECT TO 
                   FUGITIVE FELONS AND PROBATION AND PAROLE 
                   VIOLATORS.

       (a) Eligibility for Assistance.--The United States Housing 
     Act of 1937 (42 U.S.C. 1437 et seq.) is amended--
       (1) in section 6(l)--
       (A) in paragraph (5), by striking ``and'' at the end;
       (B) in paragraph (6), by striking the period at the end and 
     inserting ``; and''; and
       (C) by inserting immediately after paragraph (6) the 
     following new paragraph:
       ``(7) provide that it shall be cause for immediate 
     termination of the tenancy of a public housing tenant if such 
     tenant--
       ``(A) is fleeing to avoid prosecution, or custody or 
     confinement after conviction, under the laws of the place 
     from which the individual flees, for a crime, or attempt to 
     commit a crime, which is a felony under the laws of the place 
     from which the individual flees, or which, in the case of the 
     State of New Jersey, is a high misdemeanor under the laws of 
     such State; or
       ``(2) is violating a condition of probation or parole 
     imposed under Federal or State law.''; and
       (2) in section 8(d)(1)(B)--
       (A) in clause (iii), by striking ``and'' at the end;
       (B) in clause (iv), by striking the period at the end and 
     inserting ``; and''; and
       (C) by adding after clause (iv) the following new clause:
       ``(v) it shall be cause for termination of the tenancy of a 
     tenant if such tenant--

       ``(I) is fleeing to avoid prosecution, or custody or 
     confinement after conviction, under the laws of the place 
     from which the individual flees, for a crime, or attempt to 
     commit a crime, which is a felony under the laws of the place 
     from which the individual flees, or which, in the case of the 
     State of New Jersey, is a high misdemeanor under the laws of 
     such State; or
       ``(II) is violating a condition of probation or parole 
     imposed under Federal or State law;''.

       (b) Provision of Information to Law Enforcement Agencies.--
     Section 28 of the United States Housing Act of 1937, as added 
     by section 504(c) of this Act, is amended by adding at the 
     end the following new subsection:
       ``(b) Exchange of Information With Law Enforcement 
     Agencies.--Notwithstanding any other provision of law, each 
     public housing agency that enters into a contract for 
     assistance under section 6 or 8 of this Act with the 
     Secretary shall furnish any Federal, State, or local law 
     enforcement officer, upon the request of the officer, with 
     the current address, Social Security number, and photograph 
     (if applicable) of any recipient of assistance under this 
     Act, if the officer--
       ``(1) furnishes the public housing agency with the name of 
     the recipient; and
       ``(2) notifies the agency that--
       ``(A) such recipient--
       ``(i) is fleeing to avoid prosecution, or custody or 
     confinement after conviction, under the laws of the place 
     from which the individual flees, for a crime, or attempt to 
     commit a crime, which is a felony under the laws of the place 
     from which the individual flees, or which, in the case of the 
     State of New Jersey, is a high misdemeanor under the laws of 
     such State; or
       ``(ii) is violating a condition of probation or parole 
     imposed under Federal or State law; or
       ``(iii) has information that is necessary for the officer 
     to conduct the officer's official duties;
       ``(B) the location or apprehension of the recipient is 
     within such officer's official duties; and
       ``(C) the request is made in the proper exercise of the 
     officer's official duties.''.

  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, the amendment that I sent to the desk I 
hope is going to be a noncontroversial amendment. I believe it is one 
that should get broad support, hopefully unanimous support, of this 
body. It is an amendment that is very similar in nature to one that was 
adopted in the House of Representatives on their bill offered by 
Representative Blute of Massachusetts having to do with fugitive felons 
who receive welfare.
  Yes, that is right. There are people who are fleeing the law, felons 
in which warrants are out for their arrest, who are hiding from the law 
on the welfare rolls. You say, ``How does that happen?'' Someone has 
been convicted of a felony and has escaped or violated parole or has 
been issued a warrant for their arrest on a felony charge and is 
eluding the law. While eluding the law, they sign up for welfare to 
support their eluding the law.
  You say, ``Well, how can this happen?'' It is very easy to happen, 
because in most States in this country, if you are on the welfare rolls 
and the police department wants to find out if you are on the welfare 
rolls and they have a felony warrant for your arrest, the welfare 
department cannot tell the police department that you are receiving 
benefits. Why? Because your rights to privacy are protected. If you are 
on the welfare rolls, you have a right of privacy.
  You may be a murderer. In fact, one of the reasons I offered this 
amendment is just last year in Pittsburgh--I have a July 29, 1994, 
article about a man who was on the welfare rolls. When they found this 
guy in Philadelphia, they found him and searched him, obviously, and 
they found a welfare card with his photo on it, his correct name. He 
did not even bother to lie about what his name was. He was protected by 
privacy. You say this must be an odd occurrence. This was a murderer, 
fleeing the law for years and collecting Government benefits.
  In Cleveland, they did a sting operation, and they rounded up a lot 
of felons at this sting operation and searched them, and they found out 
that a third of the people they caught in the sting operation that had 
existing warrants were on welfare.
  I visited the police department in Philadelphia and talked to their 
fugitive task force. They have a fugitive task force in the police 
department in Philadelphia. They have some 50,000 outstanding fugitive 
warrants in the city of Philadelphia. Historically, what the police 
officers have said is anywhere from 65 to 75 percent of the felons they 
catch are on welfare of some sort, whether it is food stamps or AFDC, 
SSI, you name it, they are collecting money while eluding the law. Not 
having to sign up for legitimate work where they might be caught, they 
can stay home and run around with their buddies at night and collect 
welfare. So you support them while the Federal Government and the State 
and local counties try to track them down. This is absurd.
  So what we are suggesting is that the welfare offices, when contacted 
by the police department, must give the police department, if they have 
a warrant--I am not talking about people just wanting to search who is 
on the welfare rolls, but if you have a warrant 

[[Page S 12825]]
for someone's arrest, a felony warrant, that you can contact the 
welfare office and say, ``Has such and such signed up for welfare?'' 
You can give the name and address. And you will find, at least the 
police told me, when it comes to receiving welfare benefits, they give 
the correct address to receive those benefits. They do not lie about 
what address those benefits go to. So you get the name, the address--we 
have the name--the address, the Social Security number and a photo 
because a lot of these folks just have police sketches. You might have 
what their name is, but you may not have a good photo or it may not be 
a recent photo.
  So what we do is give police a tremendous advantage, at least 
according to the police departments I have talked to and the research I 
have done, in tracking down fugitive felons.
  As I said before, I do not think this is a controversial measure. I 
think this is something that can and should be supported by everyone.
  There is an additional provision in the bill that deals with another 
problem on AFDC, and that is the term ``when a child is temporarily 
absent from the home.'' What happens there? This is a separate issue 
than the fugitive issue, but it is included in the amendment.
  We have situations where you have a mother and children or a child 
who, unfortunately, may be sent to prison or sent to detention, or 
whatever the case may be, but be out of the home for a period of years. 
Under the laws in most States, because the Federal law does not define 
``temporarily absent,'' what happens is that mom continues to receive 
welfare benefits for that child, even though the child has not lived in 
the home for years or months because they are in jail.
  We think that is sort of a silly idea. If the child is being 
otherwise detained because of incarceration as a runaway, whatever the 
case may be, we should not continue to pay the mother the benefits for 
the child who is no longer living there. That, you would think, is 
pretty much common sense, but under the Federal law today, that is not 
common sense. So we define what ``temporarily absent'' is.
  Again, I am hopeful this amendment will be agreed to and adopted, but 
I am going to ask at this point for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I wish to compliment my colleague from 
Pennsylvania. I think this is an excellent amendment. It is kind of 
bothersome to think that there might be thousands of fleeing felons 
receiving welfare, and maybe because there is a lack of coordination 
between law enforcement and welfare agencies and offices, they are able 
to get away with it. I do not doubt my colleague's homework. It is 
probably quite accurate. To think that that is happening, it needs to 
be stopped. His amendment would go a long way toward stopping it.
  I ask unanimous consent to be added as a cosponsor, and I hope my 
colleagues support it.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
pending amendment be temporarily set aside.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                    Amendment No. 2469, As Modified

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I want to modify a prior amendment and also introduce 
two additional amendments. I will try to be brief. I call up amendment 
No. 2469 and send a modification to the desk. Once the amendment has 
been modified, I ask unanimous consent that it be laid aside in the 
previous order of consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The amendment is so modified.
  The amendment (No. 2469), as modified, is as follows:
       Beginning on page 18, line 22, strike all through page 22, 
     line 8, and insert the following:
       ``(3) Supplemental grant amount for poverty population 
     increases in certain states.--
       ``(A) In general.--The amount of the grant payable under 
     paragraph (1) to a qualifying State for each of fiscal years 
     1997, 1998, 1999, and 2000 shall be increased by the 
     supplemental grant amount for such State.
       ``(B) Qualifying state.--For purposes of this paragraph, 
     the term `qualifying State', with respect to any fiscal year, 
     means a State that had an increase in the number of poor 
     people as determined by the Secretary under subparagraph (D) 
     for the most recent fiscal year for which information is 
     available.
       ``(C) Supplemental grant amount.--For purposes of this 
     paragraph, the supplemental grant amount for a State, with 
     respect to any fiscal year, is an amount which bears the same 
     ratio to the total amount appropriated under paragraph (4)(B) 
     for such fiscal year as the increase in the number of poor 
     people as so determined for such State bears to the total 
     increase of poor people as so determined for all States.
       ``(D) Requirement that data relating to the incidence of 
     poverty in the united states be published.--
       ``(i) In general.--The Secretary shall, to the extent 
     feasible, produce and publish for each State, county, and 
     local unit of general purpose government for which data have 
     been compiled in the then most recent census of population 
     under section 141(a) of title 13, United States Code, and for 
     each school district, data relating to the incidence of 
     poverty. Such data may be produced by means of sampling, 
     estimation, or any other method that the Secretary determines 
     will produce current, comprehensive, and reliable data.
       ``(ii) Content; frequency.--Data under this subparagraph--
       ``(I) shall include--
       ``(aa) for each school district, the number of children age 
     5 to 17, inclusive, in families below the poverty level; and
       ``(bb) for each State and county referred to in clause (i), 
     the number of individuals age 65 or older below the poverty 
     level; and
       ``(II) shall be published--
       ``(aa) for each State, annually beginning in 1996;
       ``(bb) for each county and local unit of general purpose 
     government referred to in clause (i),
      in 1996 and at least every second year thereafter; and
       ``(cc) for each school district, in 1998 and at least every 
     second year thereafter.
       ``(iii) Authority to aggregate.--
       ``(I) In general.--If reliable data could not otherwise be 
     produced, the Secretary may, for purposes of clause 
     (ii)(I)(aa), aggregate school districts, but only to the 
     extent necessary to achieve reliability.
       ``(II) Information relating to use of authority.--Any data 
     produced under this clause shall be appropriately identified 
     and shall be accompanied by a detailed explanation as to how 
     and why aggregation was used (including the measures taken to 
     minimize any such aggregation).
       ``(iv) Report to be submitted whenever data is not timely 
     published.--If the Secretary is unable to produce and publish 
     the data required under this subparagraph for any county, 
     local unit of general purpose government, or school district 
     in any year specified in clause (ii)(II), a report shall be 
     submitted by the Secretary to the President of the Senate and 
     the Speaker of the House of Representatives, not later than 
     90 days before the start of the following year, enumerating 
     each government or school district excluded and giving the 
     reasons for the exclusion.
       ``(v) Criteria relating to poverty.--In carrying out this 
     subparagraph, the Secretary shall use the same criteria 
     relating to poverty as were used in the then most recent 
     census of population under section 141(a) of title 13, United 
     States Code (subject to such periodic adjustments as may be 
     necessary to compensate for inflation and other similar 
     factors).
       ``(vi) Consultation.--The Secretary shall consult with the 
     Secretary of Education in carrying out the requirements of 
     this subparagraph relating to school districts.
       ``(vii) Authorization of appropriations.--There are 
     authorized to be appropriated to carry out this subparagraph 
     $1,500,000 for each of fiscal years 1996 through 2000.''
                           Amendment No. 2478

 (Purpose: To provide equal treatment for naturalized and native-born 
                               citizens)

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk and 
ask for its immediate consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from California [Mrs. Feinstein] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2478.

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading 
of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:
       On page 274, lines 23 and 24, strike ``individual (whether 
     a citizen or national of the United States or an alien)'' and 
     insert ``alien''.
       On page 275, line 5, strike ``individual'' and insert 
     ``alien''.
       On page 275, line 10, strike ``individual's'' and insert 
     ``alien's''.
       On page 275, line 11, strike ``individual'' and insert 
     ``alien''.
       On page 275, line 14, strike ``individual'' and insert 
     ``alien''.
       On page 275, line 20, strike ``individual'' and insert 
     ``alien''.
       On page 275, line 21, strike ``individual'' and insert 
     ``alien''.

[[Page S 12826]]

       On page 276, lines 2 and 3, strike ``individual (whether a 
     citizen or national of the United States or an alien)'' and 
     insert ``alien''.
       On page 276, line 14, strike ``individual'' and insert 
     ``alien''.
       On page 278, line 1, strike ``NONCITIZENS'' and insert 
     ``ALIENS''.
       On page 278, line 8, strike ``a noncitizen'' and insert 
     ``an alien''.
       On page 278, line 13, strike ``a noncitizen'' and insert 
     ``an alien''.
       On page 278, line 16, strike ``a noncitizen'' and insert 
     ``an alien''.
       On page 278, line 22, strike ``a noncitizen'' and insert 
     ``an alien''.
       On page 279, line 4, strike ``a noncitizen'' and insert 
     ``an alien''.
       On page 279, line 6, strike ``A noncitizen'' and insert 
     ``An alien''.
       On page 279, line 8, strike ``noncitizen'' and insert 
     ``alien''.

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, the Dole bill requires that income and 
resources of an immigrant sponsor be deemed as available to the 
immigrant when determining eligibility for all federally funded, means-
tested programs. This is the case, whether or not the immigrant is a 
United States citizen. In other words, it creates two classes of 
citizens. A naturalized citizen, under the Dole bill, could not be 
eligible for any form of assistance. I believe this is unprecedented 
and, as I said, creates two classes of American citizens, which will 
surely be challenged in the courts on constitutional grounds.
  So I rise today to offer an amendment to this bill to provide equal 
treatment for naturalized and native-born U.S. citizens. This amendment 
is cosponsored by Senators Kohl and Simon. It is supported by the 
National Governors Association, the National Conference of State 
Legislatures, the National Association of Counties, the National League 
of Cities, the United States Catholic Conference, and the Leadership 
Conference on Civil Rights, as well as several other organizations.
  The amendment simply removes any reference to citizens in all places 
in the underlying bill that require deeming, and leaves in place the 
deeming requirements for benefits to legal aliens.
  I think the question before the Senate is this: Does the Constitution 
of the United States of America provide for two distinct classes of 
United States citizens--those who are naturalized and those who are 
native-born? I know of only one benefit which is denied by the 
Constitution to citizens of our country who were not born in this 
country, and that one thing is the Presidency of the United States. 
Article II, section 1 of the Constitution expressly states that ``no 
person, except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United 
States at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, shall be 
eligible to the office of President.'' That is where the line is drawn 
for me.
  I do not believe that, absent a constitutional amendment, the 
Constitution gives this body the authority to deny outright any 
benefits, save that one, to naturalized citizens. Article I of the 
Constitution does contain one other distinction with regard to 
naturalized citizens and their qualifications to be Members of 
Congress. It says, ``No person shall be a representative who shall not 
have attained the age of 25 years and been 7 years a citizen of the 
United States.'' That is whether they are native-born or naturalized. 
It also says, ``No person shall be a Senator who shall not have 
attained the age of 30 years, and been 9 years a citizen of the United 
States.''
  I do not believe our forefathers necessarily foresaw the specifics of 
the debate which is before us today. But I do believe they considered 
what distinctions should be made between naturalized and native-born 
citizens. And the result of that consideration is reflected in the 
Constitution.
  The Department of Justice has expressed serious concerns about the 
constitutionality on the proscription of benefits as applied to 
naturalized citizens in this bill. In a letter to Senator Kennedy, 
dated July 18, a copy of which was also provided to me, Assistant 
Attorney General, Andrew Fois states:

       The deeming provision, as applied to citizens, would 
     contravene the basic equal protection tenet that ``the rights 
     of citizenship of the native born and of the naturalized 
     person are of the same dignity and are coextensive.''

  The letter goes on to say:

       To the same effect, the provision might be viewed as a 
     classification based on national origin; among citizens 
     otherwise eligible for government assistance, the class 
     excluded by operation of the deeming provision is limited to 
     those born outside the United States. A classification based 
     on national origin, of course, is subject to strict scrutiny 
     under equal protection review, and it is unlikely that the 
     deeming provision could be justified under this standard.

  At this time, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the full 
text of the letter from the Justice Department be printed in the 
Record.
  There being no objection, the letter was ordered to be printed in the 
Record, as follows:

                                       U.S. Department of Justice,


                                Office of Legislative Affairs,

                                    Washington, DC, July 18, 1995.
     Hon. Edward M. Kennedy,
     U.S. Senate,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Kennedy: This letter follows your question to 
     Attorney General Janet Reno regarding the constitutionality 
     of the deeming provisions in pending immigration legislation 
     at the Senate Judiciary Committee's oversight hearing on June 
     27.
       You have asked for our views regarding the ``deeming'' 
     provisions of section 204 of S. 269, Senator Simpson's 
     proposed immigration legislation. Our comment here is limited 
     to the question raised by application of section 204 to 
     naturalized citizens.
       We have serious concerns about section 204's 
     constitutionality as applied to naturalized citizens. So 
     applied, the deeming provision would operate to deny, or 
     reduce eligibility for, a variety of benefits including 
     student financial assistance and welfare benefits to certain 
     United States citizens because they were born outside the 
     country. This appears to be an unprecedented result. Current 
     federal deeming provisions under various benefits programs 
     operate only as against aliens (see, e.g., 42 U.S.C. Sec. 615 
     (AFDC); 7 U.S.C. 2014(i) (Food Stamps)) and we are not aware 
     of any comparable restrictions on citizen eligibility for 
     federal assistance. As a matter of policy, we think it would 
     be a mistake to begin now to relegate naturalized citizens--
     who have demonstrated their commitment to our country by 
     undergoing the naturalization process--to a kind of second-
     class status.
       The provision might be defended legally on the grounds that 
     it is an exercise of Congress' plenary authority to regulate 
     immigration and naturalization, or, more specifically, to set 
     the terms under which persons may enter the United States and 
     become citizens. See Mathews v. Diaz, 426 U.S. 67 (1976); 
     Toll v. Moreno, 458 U.S. 1, 10-11 (1982). We are not 
     convinced that this defense would prove persuasive. Though 
     Congress undoubtedly has power to impose conditions precedent 
     on entry and naturalization, the provision at issue here 
     would function as a condition subsequent, applying to 
     entrants even after they become citizens. It is not at all 
     clear that Congress' immigration and naturalization power 
     extends this far.
       While the rights of citizenship of the native born derive 
     from Sec. 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment and the rights of the 
     naturalized citizen derive from satisfying, free of fraud, 
     the requirements set by Congress, the latter, apart from the 
     exception noted [constitutional eligibility for President], 
     becomes a member of the society, possessing all the rights of 
     a native citizen, and standing, in the view of the 
     constitution, on the footing of a native. The constitution 
     does not authorize Congress to enlarge or abridge those 
     rights. The simple power of the national Legislature, is to 
     prescribe a uniform rule of naturalization, and the exercise 
     of this power exhausts it, so far as respects the individual.
       Schneider v. Rusk, 377 U.S. 163, 166 (1964) (internal 
     quotations omitted) (statutory restriction on length foreign 
     residence applied to naturalized but not native born citizens 
     violates Fifth Amendment equal protection component).
       Alternatively, it might be argued in defense of the 
     provision that it classifies not by reference to citizenship 
     at all, but rather on the basis of sponsorship; only those 
     naturalized citizens with sponsors will be affected. Again, 
     we have doubts about whether this characterization of the 
     provision would be accepted. State courts have rejected an 
     analogous position with respect to state deeming provisions, 
     finding that the provisions constitute impermissible 
     discrimination based on alienage despite the fact that they 
     reach only sponsored aliens. See Barannikov v. Town of 
     Greenwich, 643 A.2d 251, 263-64 (Conn. 1994); El Souri v. 
     Dep't of Social Services, 414 N.W.2d 679, 682-83 (Mich. 
     1987). Because the deeming provision in question here, as 
     applied to citizens, is directed at and reaches only 
     naturalized citizens, the same reasoning would compel the 
     conclusion that it constitutes discrimination against 
     naturalized citizens. Cf. Nyquist v. Mauclet, 432 U.S. 1, 9 
     (1977) (``The important points are that [the law] is directed 
     at aliens and that only aliens are harmed by it. The fact 
     that the statute is not an absolute bar does not mean that it 
     does not discriminate against the class.'') (invalidating 
     state law denying some, but not all, resident aliens 
     financial assistance for higher education).
       So understood, the deeming provision, as applied to 
     citizens, would contravene the basic equal protection tenet 
     that ``the rights of citizenship of the native born and of 
     the naturalized person are of the same dignity and are 
     coextensive.'' Schneider, 377 U.S. at 

[[Page S 12827]]
     165. To the same effect, the provisions might be viewed as a 
     classification based on national origin; among citizens 
     otherwise eligible for government assistance, the class 
     excluded by operation of the deeming provision is limited to 
     those born outside the United States. A classification based 
     on national origin, of course, is subject to strict scrutiny 
     under equal protection review, see Korematsu v. United 
     States, 323 U.S. 214 (1944), and it is unlikely that the 
     deeming provision could be justified under this standard. See 
     Barannikova, 643 A.2d at 265 (invalidating state deeming 
     provision under strict scrutiny); El Souri, 414 N.W.2d at 683 
     (same).
       The Office of Management and Budget has advised that there 
     is no objection to the submission of this letter from the 
     standpoint of the Administration's program.
           Sincerely,
                                                      Andrew Fois,
                                       Assistant Attorney General.

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, to a great extent, we are a Nation of 
immigrants. There are very few of us in this body who could claim not 
to have been a product, in some way, of immigrants.
  My mother was born in St. Petersburg, Russia. She left that country 
hiding in a hay cart during the revolution. They crossed Siberia on 
their long journey to California. My grandmother was widowed shortly 
after arriving in this country, left with four small children. My uncle 
was a carpenter. My mother did not enjoy good health as a child and was 
hospitalized for many years. There was no widow's pension then, no 
AFDC. And I am not one that believes that immigrants should come to the 
United States to get on the dole. But we do have a naturalization 
process which, after the designated waiting period, and after meeting 
certain requirements, immigrants take an oath, they become citizens of 
the United States, with all of the privileges and benefits accorded to 
native-born citizens, save the one spelled out in the Constitution that 
I have read today.
  This bill essentially says that even if naturalized--even if a 
naturalized citizen for 20 years, your sponsor's income will be deemed 
as yours, and you will not be eligible for Federal benefits.
  Even if that sponsor is dying from cancer, and no matter what happens 
to the naturalized citizen, that naturalized citizen is exempted from 
coverage under this bill.
  I believe that violates the equal protection clause of our 
Constitution and jeopardizes the fairness of the legislation. So the 
amendment that I am submitting is essentially equal treatment for 
naturalized and native-born citizens.
  Mr. NICKLES. Will the Senator yield for a question?
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Yes.
  Mr. NICKLES. I will be brief. I think I understand the amendment. The 
Senator is saying that immigrants to the country should be able to 
receive welfare benefits just as any other citizen can, is that 
correct?
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Only if they have become United States citizens. In 
other words, the deeming provision does not apply if you are 
naturalized.
  In this bill, the deeming provision extends even to naturalized 
citizens. Therefore, they would not be eligible.
  Mr. NICKLES. If an immigrant comes into the country and goes through 
the processes to be a naturalized U.S. citizen, they are required now 
to have a sponsor, a sponsor that states that they will make sure that 
they will not be a ward of the Government for some period of time.
  Does the Senator know what that period would be?
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I did know and I cannot remember what it was.
  Mr. NICKLES. I will review that.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. This is not just a legal immigrant, but a naturalized 
citizen too.
  We are not talking here about removing that requirement for legal 
immigrants in this amendment. This is just for naturalized citizens.
  Mr. NICKLES. I am happy to have the Senator's amendment. I have not 
seen it before. I will be happy to review it and we will take it up 
tomorrow morning.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank the Senator from Oklahoma very much.


                Amendment No. 2479 to Amendment No. 2280

   (Purpose: To provide for State and county demonstration programs)

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I send another amendment to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The previous amendment shall be laid aside. 
The clerk will report.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from California, [Mrs. Feinstein], proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2479 to amendment No. 2280.

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading 
of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 69, strike lines 18 through 22, and insert the 
     following:

     ``SEC. 418. STATE AND COUNTY DEMONSTRATION PROGRAMS.

       ``(a) No Limitation of State Demonstration Projects.--
     Nothing in this part shall be construed as limiting a State's 
     ability to conduct demonstration projects for the purpose of 
     identifying innovative or effective program designs in 1 or 
     more political subdivisions of the State.
       ``(b) County Welfare Demonstration Project.--
       ``(1) In general.--The Secretary of Health and Human 
     Services and the Secretary of Agriculture shall jointly enter 
     into negotiations with all counties or a group of counties 
     having a population greater than 500,000 desiring to conduct 
     a demonstration project described in paragraph (2) for the 
     purpose of establishing appropriate rules to govern 
     establishment and operation of such project.
       ``(2) Demonstration project described.--The demonstration 
     project described in this paragraph shall provide that--
       ``(A) a county participating in the demonstration project 
     shall have the authority and duty to administer the operation 
     of the program described under this part as if the county 
     were considered a State for the purpose of this part;
       ``(B) the State in which the county participating in the 
     demonstration project is located shall pass through directly 
     to the county the portion of the grant received by the State 
     under section 403 which the State determines is attributable 
     to the residents of such county; and
       ``(C) the duration of the project shall be for 5 years.
       ``(3) Commencement of project.--After the conclusion of the 
     negotiations described in paragraph (2), the Secretary of 
     Health and Human Services and the Secretary of Agriculture 
     may authorize a county to conduct the demonstration project 
     described in paragraph (2) in accordance with the rules 
     established during the negotiations.
       ``(4) Report.--Not later than 6 months after the 
     termination of a demonstration project operated under this 
     subsection, the Secretary of Health and Human Services and 
     the Secretary of Agriculture shall submit to the Congress a 
     report that includes--
       ``(A) a description of the demonstration project;
       ``(B) the rules negotiated with respect to the project; and
       ``(C) the innovations (if any) that the county was able to 
     initiate under the project.

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, throughout the welfare debate it has 
often been stated that people closest to the problem know how to best 
deal with it.
  In fact, many States assign administration of Federal welfare 
programs to counties. As a former mayor, and a former county 
supervisor, that certainly is the case in California.
  Many of the innovations and successes currently under discussion have 
been initiated at the local level. In my earlier remarks on welfare 
reform, I mentioned several of them--initiatives made by counties to 
put people to work, to devise programs to really run their programs 
with efficiency, and appropriate for their local communities.
  This amendment affirms that there will be no limitation on the 
ability of a State to conduct innovative and effective demonstration 
projects in one or more of its political subdivisions.
  It empowers the Secretary of Health and Human Services to jointly 
negotiate with any county or group of counties having a population 
greater than 500,000 to conduct a demonstration project where the 
county would have the authority and duty to administer the operation of 
the welfare program covered by this bill.
  In essence, what it is saying, for large counties, or a group of 
small counties, like in Wisconsin for example, the Secretary would have 
the authority to be able to negotiate so that the grant would go 
directly from Washington to the counties.
  What does this mean? It means you take the State out of it. Why do I 
want to take the State out of it? Because I know what States do. They 
charge a cost, they set up a bureaucracy, and therefore a portion of 
the money will end up in the State. The State can often not send that 
money to the counties, or find a reason not to send it, and even use it 
for other purposes.
  So in this amendment, the State in which the demonstration county is 
located would pass directly to the county the portion of the grant 
determined by 

[[Page S 12828]]
the State as attributable to the residents of that county.
  The duration of the demonstration project is 5 years, after which 
time the Secretary is directed to report to the Congress on the 
description, rules, and innovations initiated under the project. 
Essentially, the block grants of the large counties could go directly 
to the counties, thereby I believe, based on my experience, it would 
save money and be more efficiently used.
  This was in the bill, my understanding is, as it was originally 
drafted, and it was removed. We would by this amendment place it back. 
It is similar to an amendment which was in the prior Daschle bill.
  I thank the Chair. I yield the floor.
  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I ask that the pending amendment 
temporarily be set aside so I can offer two amendments which I expect 
will be ultimately accepted.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the amendment will be set 
aside.
  Mr. FEINGOLD. The first relates to a study of the impact of changes 
on the child care food program on program participation and family day 
care providers.
  I have worked with the majority and minority on the Agriculture 
Committee on the language of the amendment, and I expect it will be 
accepted by the floor managers.
  Mr. President, This amendment is very simple and it addresses an 
issue of great concern raised by my constituents in Wisconsin.
  A few months ago, the House of Representatives repealed the 
entitlement status for the Child and Adult Care Food Program and placed 
its funding in a block grant of other child nutrition programs. The 
10,000 family day care home sponsors in the United States worried the 
program would be swallowed up by the larger, more well-known programs 
such as the Special Supplemental Food Program for Women, Infants and 
Children.
  The Family Day Home sponsors, who administer aspects of the CACFP 
knew the House proposal effectively meant the end of this very 
important program. Mr. President, the CACFP is a relatively small 
program that affects a very large number of children in this country. 
In addition to providing reimbursements to providers for meals served 
to low-income children in child care centers, it provides a blended 
reimbursement for meals served in all participating family day care 
homes--those with six children or fewer. Most children in the United 
States that currently receive day care are cared for in small family 
day care homes. Even more significantly, according to Congress's Select 
Panel for the Promotion of Child Health, pre-school age children 
receive about three-quarters of their nutritional intake from their day 
care providers. Those two facts emphasize the importance of ensuring 
children receive nutritious meals while they under the supervision of a 
family day care home provider.
  Early this year, the operator of Wisconsin's smallest non-profit 
sponsor in my State, Linda Leindecker of Horizon's Unlimited in Green 
Bay, met with me to discuss her specific concerns about the proposals 
to modify the program she helps deliver. The CACFP, she pointed out, 
has greater benefits than might meet the eye. While the clear goal of 
the program is to enhance the nutritional status of children receiving 
care by family day care homes, it has many less obvious benefits. Linda 
pointed out that the program provides a strong incentive for small 
family day care homes to become licensed by the State. A recent survey 
of over 1,200 day care homes in Wisconsin found that over 70 percent of 
those surveyed became licensed because of CACFP benefits. That means 
children are more likely to be in day care homes that provide a safe 
and more healthy environment with more nutritious meals than 
unregulated day care homes. These so-called ``underground'' homes are 
not only operating without health or safety standards, but they are 
also better able to evade compliance with income tax laws as well.
  Not only must family day care homes participating in the CACFP comply 
with State regulations, they are also subject to random inspections of 
all their homes by the CACFP sponsors. CACFP care providers must also 
undergo extensive nutrition education and training programs conducted 
by sponsors to ensure that the children in participating homes are 
eating nutritious meals as required by the program. In total, Wisconsin 
family day care providers are serving nearly 12.5 million healthy 
breakfasts, lunches, suppers and snacks annually.
  Mr. President, the message I have heard loud and clear from Linda and 
other Family Day Care Home sponsors in Wisconsin is that while the 
primary benefit of the family day care home portion of the CACFP is the 
enhanced nutritional status of children in small day care homes, the 
second most important benefit is the role of this program in creating 
more licensed and regulated family day care homes. That benefits 
parents, taxpayers, and children alike.
  Mr. President, I am pleased that the Senate Agriculture Committee did 
not take the drastic approach endorsed by the House. In particular, I 
am pleased that the Senator from Indiana [Mr. Lugar] and the Senator 
from Vermont [Mr. Leahy] recognized how important CACFP is to this 
Nation's children by maintaining the identity and entitlement status of 
the program in S. 904 as approved by the Agriculture Committee
  However, the legislation before us, which incorporates the 
Agriculture Committee's bill S. 904, does make some fundamental changes 
to the reimbursement structure for family day care homes. The bill 
establishes an area-wide means test for full reimbursement, tier I, of 
meals served in family day care and provides a much smaller 
reimbursement for meals served in homes that do not fall within a 
qualifying geographic area, tier II. The Democratic alternative to the 
majority leader's bill also provides for geographic based means testing 
for CACFP but provides a slightly higher second tier reimbursement.
  Wisconsin's day care home sponsors are alarmed by the small tier II 
home reimbursement and worry that this lower level of reimbursement 
will eliminate the incentive for family day care homes to become 
licensed and approved by the State. As some homes drop out of the 
program and operate underground, even fewer will enter the program at 
all, making regulated day care less accessible and less affordable to 
parents of young children. Sponsors are also worried that the 
nutritional quality of meals served in tier II homes will decline as 
well. Fifteen cents, they point out, doesn't buy much of a healthy mid-
day snack.
  I share those concerns, Mr. President. I am concerned that the 
marginal benefit of day care home participation may no longer justify 
the cost of being regulated or licensed by the State. If that is the 
case, I am concerned that not only the quality of day care will 
decline, but that the quantity of affordable day care will fall as 
well. While we are debating a bill that proposes to send more low-
income parents to work, it is important that there be an adequate 
supply of safe and affordable day care for their children.
  Mr. President, my amendment tries to address those concerns by 
requiring USDA to study the impact of the changes to CACFP made in this 
bill on program participation, family day care home licensing and the 
nutritional quality of meals served in family day care homes. Since the 
impact of these changes will likely be felt within the first year or 
two following enactment, my amendment calls for a one-time study of 
this matter, rather than an annual review.
  I think it is critical that Congress have access to the information 
they need to conduct proper oversight of Federal programs. While the 
changes made to the CACFP in S. 1120 are intended to maintain program 
integrity while achieving fiscal responsibility, it is important that 
Congress find out whether the legislation actually achieves those 
goals.
  That is the intent of my amendment. It is simple and straightforward 
but it is important.
  The second amendment, Mr. President, relates to authority to allow a 
housing project in Madison, Wisconsin to conduct a demonstration 
project that waives the current take-one, take-all section 8 
requirement that requires a project which accepts a single section 8 
resident to take any other section 8 applicant. 

[[Page S 12829]]

  The unfortunate result of this policy, Mr. President, is that 
sometimes it is meant that a project will not accept any section 8 
residents at all. This demonstration program would not entail any 
Federal cost.
  I understand that neither the administration nor the authorizing 
committee has any objection to this amendment and that they support 
moving in this direction in order to provide greater flexibility for 
these types of housing programs.
  I offer this amendment along with my senior colleague from Wisconsin, 
Senator Kohl. The amendment would provide an opportunity for Madison, 
WI, to demonstrate an innovative and emerging strategy in the operation 
of the Department of Housing and Urban Development assisted housing 
program by eliminating the take-one, take-all requirement.
  That provision requires the manager or owner of multifamily rental 
housing to make all units available to residents who qualify for 
section 8 certificates or vouchers under the National Housing Act as 
long as at least one unit is made available to those residents under 
the terms of the long-term, 20-year section 8 renter contracts.
  The availability of low-income housing is being seriously threatened 
across this Nation. This is especially true when private property 
owners are considered who are increasingly choosing to opt out of the 
HUD section 8 program for a variety of reasons, as their long-term 
contracts expire.
  The situation in this case in Madison is typical of these problems 
that are being experienced nationwide. HUD itself recognizes this and 
has actually proposed, Mr. President, that we eliminate the take-one, 
take-all language.
  They project an elimination of the requirement will provide an 
incentive to attract new multifamily low-income housing developer 
owners and also retain existing ones.
  Local government officials, private institutions, residents and 
apartment owners in Madison in this case, Mr. President, have agreed to 
a plan for the Summer Society Circle Apartments that will reduce the 
concentration of low-income families and densely populated in 
circumscribed areas.
  They believe it will reduce crime and drug and gang activity and 
stabilize development in neighborhoods by encouraging a mix of low- and 
moderate-income families. We believe the amendment provides an 
opportunity to demonstrate that public-private collaborative planning 
can result in increased, Mr. President, increased availability of 
quality housing for low- and moderate-income families.
  Accordingly, we urge the support of the body. There is no additional 
cost associated with this demonstration project, which simply allows 
this community to have greater flexibility in operating in housing 
projects which meet the needs of the communities.
  As I understand the parliamentary situation, it is the desire of the 
managers to have as many of these amendments offered tonight as 
possible, and they will be disposed of in due course.


                           Amendment No. 2480

(Purpose: To study the impact of amendments to the child and adult care 
  food program on program participation and family day care licensing)

  Mr. FEINGOLD. As I said, I expect both of these ultimately to be 
accepted, and to expedite consideration I now send the first amendment 
to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. Feingold] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2480 to amendment No. 2280.

  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 283, after line 23, insert the following:
       (f) Study of Impact of Amendments on Program Participation 
     and Family Day Care Licensing.--
       (1) In general.--The Secretary of Agriculture, in 
     conjunction with the Secretary of Health and Human Services, 
     shall study the impact of the amendments made by this section 
     on--
       (A) the number of family day care homes participating in 
     the child and adult care food program established under 
     section 17 of the National School Lunch Act (42 U.S.C. 1766);
       (B) the number of day care home sponsoring organizations 
     participating in the program;
       (C) the number of day care homes that are licensed, 
     certified, registered, or approved by each State in 
     accordance with regulations issued by the Secretary;
       (D) the rate of growth of the numbers referred to in 
     subparagraphs (A) through (C);
       (E) the nutritional adequacy and quality of meals served in 
     family day care homes that--
       (i) received reimbursement under the program prior to the 
     amendments made by this section but do not receive 
     reimbursement after the amendments made by this section; or
       (ii) received full reimbursement under the program prior to 
     the amendments made by this section but do not receive full 
     reimbursement after the amendments made by this section; and
       (F) the proportion of low-income children participating in 
     the program prior to the amendments made by this section and 
     the proportion of low-income children participating in the 
     program after the amendments made by this section.
       (2) Required data.--Each State agency participating in the 
     child and adult care food program under section 17 of the 
     National School Lunch Act (42 U.S.C. 1766) shall submit to 
     the Secretary data on--
       (A) the number of family day care homes participating in 
     the program on July 31, 1996, and July 31, 1997;
       (B) the number of family day care homes licensed, 
     certified, registered, or approved for service on July 31, 
     1996, and July 31, 1997; and
       (C) such other data as the Secretary may require to carry 
     out this subsection.
       (3) Submission of report.--Not later than 2 years after the 
     effective date of Sec. 423 of this Act, the Secretary shall 
     submit the study required under this subsection to the 
     Committee on Economic and Educational Opportunities of the 
     House of Representatives and the Committee on Agriculture, 
     Nutrition, and Forestry of the Senate.

  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I ask the pending amendment be set aside 
so I may offer my second amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The pending amendment is set aside.


                           Amendment No. 2481

       (Purpose: To make an amendment relating to public housing)

  Mr. FEINGOLD. I send my second amendment to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. Feingold], for himself and 
     Mr. Kohl, proposes an amendment numbered 2481 to amendment 
     No. 2280.

  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       At the appropriate place in title X, add the following:

     SEC. 10  . DEMONSTRATION PROJECT FOR ELIMINATION OF TAKE-ONE-
                   ONE-TAKE-ALL REQUIREMENT.

       In order to demonstrate the effects of eliminating the 
     requirement under section 8(t) of the United States Housing 
     Act of 1937, notwithstanding any other provision of law, 
     beginning on the date of enactment of this Act, section 8(t) 
     of such the United States Housing Act of 1937 shall not apply 
     with respect to the multifamily housing project (as such term 
     is defined in section 8(t)(2) of the United States Housing 
     Act of 1937) consisting of the dwelling units located at 
     2401-2479 Sommerset Circle, in Madison, Wisconsin.
       Amend the table of contents accordingly.
  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I believe the Senator from California 
wished to speak.
  I was mistaken. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask the pending amendment be laid aside.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The pending amendment will be set aside.


                Amendment No. 2482 to Amendment No. 2280

 (Purpose: To provide that noncustodial parents who are delinquent in 
 paying child support are ineligible for means-tested Federal benefits)

  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask 
for its immediate consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from California [Mrs. Boxer] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2482 to amendment No. 2280.

  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with. 

[[Page S 12830]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       On page 712, between lines 9 and 10, insert the following:

     SEC. 972. DENIAL OF MEANS-TESTED FEDERAL BENEFITS TO 
                   NONCUSTODIAL PARENTS WHO ARE DELINQUENT IN 
                   PAYING CHILD SUPPORT.
       (A) In General.--Notwithstanding any other provision of 
     law, a non-custodial parent who is more than 2 months 
     delinquent in paying child support shall not be eligible to 
     receive any means-tested Federal benefits.
       (b) Exception.--(1) In general.--Subsection (a) shall not 
     apply to an unemployed non-custodial parent who is more then 
     2 months delinquent in paying child support if such parent--
       (A) enters into a schedule of repayment for past due child 
     support with the entity that issued the underlying child 
     support order; and
       (B) meets all of the terms of repayment specified in the 
     schedule of repayment as enforced by the appropriate 
     disbursing entity.
       (2) 2-year exclusion.--(A) A non-custodial parent who 
     becomes delinquent in child support a second time or any 
     subsequent time shall not be eligible to receive any means-
     tested Federal benefits for a 2-year period beginning on the 
     date that such parent failed to meet such terms.
       (B) At the end of that two-year period, paragraph (A) shall 
     once again apply to that individual.
       (c) Means-tested Federal Benefits.--For purposes of this 
     section, the term ``means-tested Federal benefits'' means 
     benefits under any program of assistance, funded in whole or 
     in part, by the Federal Government, for which eligibility for 
     benefits is based on need.

  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I believe this amendment is quite 
straightforward. It basically says that, if a noncustodial parent is 
delinquent on child support payments and gets into arrears extending 
beyond 2 months, that individual, that deadbeat dad or deadbeat mom, as 
the case may be, will not be entitled to means-tested Federal benefits.
  I think it is very important that we do this. I do not think we 
should be in the business of giving benefits to people who are 
neglecting their children. Many families go on welfare because 
noncustodial parents are not paying their child support.
  What we do in this amendment is we give people a second chance. We 
say if they agree to sign a schedule and commit themselves to the 
repayment of the arrears and continue the payments on time, then they 
can get these benefits. But if they fail again, they will have to wait 
2 years before they get a chance at those benefits again.
  I hope we will have broad support for this amendment.
  Only about 18 percent of all cases result in child support 
collections across this Nation.
  And we have to remember we have 9.5 million children counting on AFDC 
for support. We could really take people out of poverty quickly if the 
deadbeat parent, be it a mom or a dad--usually it is a dad but 
sometimes it is a mom--came through with their child support payments.
  This amendment is just another way for us to stand up and be counted 
and say: Look, you are not going to be entitled to get job training, 
vocational training, food stamps, SSI, housing assistance, and the 
other means-tested Federal benefits if you are behind on those child 
support payments. But we are ready to help you. If you will sign a 
schedule of payments and you live up to that schedule, we will make an 
exception.
  It is interesting to note that America's children are owed more than 
$34 billion in unpaid child support. Talk about lowering the cost of 
welfare, collecting unpaid support would be one of the quickest ways to 
do it. Welfare caseloads could be reduced by one-third if families 
could rely on even $300 a month, or less, of child support. Mr. 
President, $300 a month would add up to more than $3,000 a year.
  So my amendment would crack down on the deadbeat dads or the deadbeat 
moms, and basically say you have to pay support or you are not going to 
get the Federal assistance you would otherwise be entitled to.
  So, Mr. President, I do not think I need to continue this dialog with 
my colleagues. I think at this point I can rest on what I have said. I 
think the Boxer amendment sends a tough message that we will have 
little tolerance for people who fail to meet their child support 
commitments. And we should be tough on these people because they 
jeopardize the health and well-being of their children by failing to 
pay support, and they are making the taxpayers pay money that they, in 
fact, owe to these children. So I rest my case on this amendment. I 
look forward to its being voted upon.
  I ask my friend from Oklahoma and my friend from New York, is it 
necessary to ask for the yeas and nays at this time, because I 
certainly would like to have a vote on the amendment?
  Mr. NICKLES addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I will be happy to respond to my 
colleague from California. Certainly she has a right to request the 
yeas and nays. I will support that effort.
  I have a couple of comments. I had not seen the amendment. I may well 
support the thrust of it. Others may as well. We are going to have a 
couple of rollcall votes in the morning and then have some debate over 
Senator Moynihan's proposal, have the rollcall vote on his, and we may 
have several other rollcall votes. It will certainly be the Senator's 
opportunity, if she wishes to ask for the yeas and nays tomorrow. And 
that will also give her the opportunity to modify the amendment if it 
would make it more agreeable and more acceptable. That would be my 
recommendation. But, certainly, if she wishes to ask for the yeas and 
nays tonight she has that opportunity.
  Mrs. BOXER. I thank my friend for his honest answer. I appreciate it. 
I will withhold because I do believe this is an excellent amendment and 
if there are small technical problems I will be happy to work with my 
friends to straighten them out.
  So I will withhold, but I look forward to voting on this as soon as I 
can and I will be back in the morning to debate that, discuss it, at 
what time my colleague thinks is appropriate.
  Mr. NICKLES. I appreciate my colleague from California doing that.
  Mr. President, I know of no other Senators having amendments, and my 
colleague from New York as well. I suggest the absence of a quorum. It 
will be my intention that the Senate stand in recess until tomorrow 
morning shortly. But I will withhold for that for the moment. I suggest 
the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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