[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 143 (Thursday, September 14, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S13558-S13575]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      FAMILY SELF-SUFFICIENCY ACT

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of H.R. 4, which the clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 4) to restore the American family, reduce 
     illegitimacy, control welfare spending, and reduce welfare 
     dependence.

  The Senate resumed consideration of the bill.

       Pending:
       Dole modified amendment No. 2280, of a perfecting nature.
       Subsequently, the amendment was further modified.
       Daschle amendment No. 2672 (to amendment No. 2280), to 
     provide for the establishment of a contingency fund for State 
     welfare programs.
       Faircloth amendment No. 2608 (to amendment No. 2280), to 
     provide for an abstinence education program.
       Wellstone amendment No. 2584 (to amendment No. 2280), to 
     exempt women and children who have been battered or subject 
     to extreme cruelty from certain requirements of the bill.
       Faircloth amendment No. 2609 (to amendment No. 2280), to 
     prohibit teenage parents from living in the home of an adult 
     relative or guardian who has a history of receiving 
     assistance.
       Conrad amendment No. 2528 (to amendment No. 2280), to 
     provide that a State that provides assistance to unmarried 
     teenage parents under the State program require such parents 
     as a condition of receiving such assistance to live in an 
     adult-supervised setting and attend high school or other 
     equivalent training program.
       Jeffords amendment No. 2581 (to amendment No. 2280), to 
     strike the increase to the grant to reward States that reduce 
     out-of-wedlock births.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will be 10 
minutes, to be equally divided, on the Wellstone amendment No. 2584, to 
be followed by a vote on or in relation to the amendment.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. 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.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. 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for the quorum call be rescinded.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. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, there being some spare time in our 
schedule just now, I would like to take the occasion, and exercise the 
privilege, as I see it, of reading to the Senate the lead editorial in 
the Washington Post this morning. It is entitled ``Welfare Theories.'' 
This is an editorial page which has been dealing thoughtfully, 
supportively, with welfare problems for 35 years.

       On the opposite page, columnist George Will musters a most 
     powerful argument against the welfare bill now on the Senate 
     floor. The bill purports to be a way of sending strong 
     messages to welfare recipients that it is time for them to 
     mend their ways. But as Mr. Will notes, ``no child is going 
     to be spiritually improved by being collateral damage in a 
     bombardment of severities targeted at adults who may or may 
     not deserve more severe treatment from the welfare system.''
       The bill is reckless because it could endanger the well-
     being of the poorest children in society in the name of a 
     series of untested theories about how people may respond to 
     some new incentives. Surely a Congress whose majority proudly 
     carries the mantle ``conservative'' should be wary of risking 
     human suffering on behalf of some ideological driven 
     preconceptions. Isn't that what conservatives always accused 
     liberals of doing?
       The best thing that can be said of this bill is that it is 
     not as bad as it might have been. Some of the most obviously 
     flawed proposals--mandating that States end welfare 
     assistance to children born to mothers while they are on 
     welfare and that they cut off assistance to teen mothers--
     have been voted down. There will be at least some 
     requirements that States continue to invest resources in 
     programs for the poor in exchange for their current Federal 
     budget allocations. But they are still not strong enough, and 
     are potentially loophole-ridden. Some new money for child 
     care may also be sprinkled onto this confection.

  May I repeat a powerful image, Mr. President:

       Some new money for child care may also be sprinkled onto 
     this confection. 

[[Page S 13559]]

       But the structure of the bill is wrong, and a fundamental 
     untruth lies at its heart. Congress wants to claim that it is 
     (1) doing something about a whole series of social and 
     economic pathologies, while at the same time (2) cutting 
     spending. But a welfare reform that is serious about both 
     promoting work and helping children in single-parent homes 
     will cost more than writing checks,
      especially given the extremely modest sums now spent by so 
     many States on the poor.
       Going to a block grant formula would destroy one of the few 
     obvious merits of the current system, which is its ability to 
     respond flexibly to regional economic upturns or downturns. 
     On top of this, the bill's provisions on food stamps and its 
     reductions in assistance to disabled children under the 
     Supplementary Security Income Program go beyond what might 
     constitute reasonable reforms. And its provisions cutting aid 
     to legal immigrants would backfire on states with large 
     immigrant populations.
       Many Senators will be tempted to vote for this bill anyway, 
     arguing that it has been ``improved'' and fearing the 
     political consequences of voting against anything labeled 
     welfare reform. But many of the ``improvements'' will 
     disappear once the bill goes to a conference with the House, 
     which has passed an even more objectionable bill. In any 
     event, voting this bill down would be exactly the opposite of 
     a negative act. It would be an affirmation that real welfare 
     reform is both necessary and possible. To get to that point, 
     a dangerous bill posing as the genuine article must be 
     defeated first.

  That is the end of the editorial.
  Mr. President, what I cannot comprehend is why this is so difficult 
for the administration to understand. The administration has abandoned 
us, those of us who oppose this legislation.
  Why do we not see the endless parade of petitioners as when health 
care reform was before us in the last Congress, the lobbyists, the 
pretend citizen groups, the real citizen groups? None are here.
  I can recall, Mr. President, the extraordinary energy that went into 
any change in the welfare system 30 years ago, 25 years ago. Fifteen 
years ago, if there was a proposal to take $40 out of some 
demonstration project here on the Senate floor, there would be 40 
representatives of various advocacy groups outside.
  There are very few advocacy groups outside. You can stand where I 
stand, Mr. President, and look straight out at the Supreme Court--not a 
person in between that view. Not one of those flaunted, vaunted 
advocacy groups forever protecting the interests of the children and 
the helpless and the homeless and the what-you-will. Are they 
increasingly subsidized and therefore increasingly co-opted?
  Are they are silent because the White House is silent? They should be 
ashamed. History will shame them.
  One group was in Washington yesterday and I can speak with some 
spirit on that. This was a group of Catholic bishops and members from 
Catholic Charities. They were here. They were in Washington. Nobody 
else. None of the great marchers, the great chanters, the nonnegotiable 
demanders.
  There is one police officer that has just appeared, but otherwise the 
lobby by the elevators is as empty this morning as it was when I left 
the Chamber last night about 10 o'clock.
  I read in the New York Times this morning, the front page, lead 
article:

       And the White House, exceedingly eager to support a law 
     that promises to change the welfare system, was sending 
     increasingly friendly signals about the bill.

  I see my friend from Indiana, Senator Coats, is on the floor. I know 
his view will be different from mine on the bill. But I recall that 
extraordinary address he gave yesterday on civil society, citing such 
as Nathan Glazer and James Q. Wilson, I, in response, quoted some of 
their observations that we know we have to do these things, but we do 
not know how to do them. We are just at the beginning of recognizing 
how profound a question it is, as the Senator so brilliantly set forth. 
But first, do no harm. Do not pretend that you know what you do not 
know. Look at the beginnings of research and evaluation that say, 
``Very hard, not clear.'' Do not hurt children on the basis of an 
unproven theory and untested hypothesis.
  That is what the Senator was citing, persons yesterday who said just 
that. This morning, the Washington Post, in its lead editorial, speaks 
of the structure of the bill being wrong, that a fundamental untruth 
lies at its heart.

       Congress wants to claim that it is (1) doing something 
     about a whole series of social and economic pathologies, 
     while at the same time (2) cutting spending. The nostrums, 
     the unsupported beliefs, the unsupported assertions, are 
     quite astounding.

  White House spokesman Rahm Emanuel yesterday told us things are going 
well. I say once again there is such a thing as resigning in 
Government, and there comes a time when, if principle matters at all, 
you resign. People who resign on principle come back; people whose real 
views are less important than their temporary position, ``their brief 
authority,'' as Shakespeare once put it, disappear.
  If that brief authority is more important than the enduring 
principles of protecting children and childhood, then what is to be 
said of those who prefer the one to the other? What is to be said of a 
White House that was almost on the edge of excess in its claims of 
empathy and concern in the last Congress but is now prepared to see 
things like this happen in the present Congress?
  All they want is, and I quote the Washington Post, ``some new money 
for child care that may be sprinkled onto this confection.''
  It will shame this Congress. It will spoil the conservative 
revolution. The Washington Post makes this clear. If conservative means 
anything, it means be careful, be thoughtful, and anticipate the 
unanticipated or understand that things will happen that you do not 
expect. And be very careful with the lives of children.
  I had no idea, Mr. President, how profoundly what used to be known as 
liberalism was shaken by the last election. No President, Republican or 
Democrat, in history, or 60 years' history, would dream of agreeing to 
the repeal of title IV A of Social Security, the provision for National 
Government for children. Clearly, this administration is contemplating 
just that.
  I cannot understand how this could be happening. It has never 
happened before.
  I make no claim to access. Hardly a soul in the White House has 
talked to me about this subject since it arose. They know what I think 
and they know what I would say; not about the particulars, but about 
the principle--the principle. Does the Federal Government maintain a 
commitment to State programs providing aid to dependent children?
  It is not as if we had just a few. Ten million is a round number, at 
any moment.
  As George Will observes in his column, and the Washington Post 
editorial refers to his column--the numbers are so extraordinary:

       Here are the percentages of children on AFDC at some point 
     during 1993 in five cities: Detroit (67), Philadelphia (57), 
     Chicago (46), New York (39), Los Angeles (38).

  Then he cites this Senator:

       ``There are * * * not enough social workers, not enough 
     nuns, not enough Salvation Army workers'' to care for 
     children who would be purged from the welfare rolls were 
     Congress to decree [and then Mr. Will says] ``(as candidate 
     Bill Clinton proposed) a two-year limit for welfare 
     eligibility.''

  The citation of Nicholas Eberstadt--I have the honor to have been a 
colleague of Mr. Eberstadt in a course entitled, ``The Social Science 
and Social Policy,'' which was taught in the core curriculum at Harvard 
University. Nicholas Eberstadt, of Harvard and the American Enterprise 
Institute, says:

       Supposing today's welfare policy incentives to illegitimacy 
     were transported back in time to Salem, MA in, say, 1660. How 
     many additional illegitimate births would have occurred in 
     Puritan Salem? Few. Because the people of Salem in 1660 
     believed in hell and believed that what today are called 
     disorganized lifestyles led to hell. Congress cannot 
     legislate useful attitudes.

  I can say of my friend Mr. Eberstadt, I do not know where his 
politics would be, save they would be moderate, sensible, based on 
research. He is a thoughtful man; a demographer. He has studied these 
things with great care. And he, too, cannot comprehend national policy 
at this point.
  Scholars have been working at these issues for years now, and the 
more capable they are, the more tentative and incremental their 
findings. I cited yesterday a research evaluation of a program, now in 
its fifth year, of very intensive counseling and training with respect 
to the issue of teen births--with no results. No results. It is a very 
common encounter, when things as profound in human character and 
behavior are dealt with. The capacity of external influences to change 
it is so very small.
  And that we should think otherwise? That men and women have stood in 

[[Page S 13560]]
  this Chamber and talked about a genuine crisis--and there is that. And 
I have said, if nothing else comes out of this awful process, at least 
we will have addressed the central subject. But if it is that serious, 
how can we suppose it will be changed by marginal measures? It will 
not.
  Are there no serious persons in the administration who can say, 
``Stop, stop right now? No. We won't have this. We agree with the 
Washington Post that, `It would be an affirmation that real welfare 
reform is both necessary and possible. To get to that point, a 
dangerous bill posing as the genuine article must be defeated first.' 
'' If not, profoundly serious questions are raised about the year to 
come?
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have Mr. Will's column 
printed in the Record and I yield the floor.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                       Women and Children First?

                          (By George F. Will)

       As the welfare reform debate begins to boil, the place to 
     begin is with an elemental fact: No child in America asked to 
     be here.
       Each was summoned into existence by the acts of adults. And 
     no child is going to be spiritually improved by being 
     collateral damage in a bombardment of severities targeted at 
     adults who may or may not deserve more severe treatment from 
     the welfare system.
       Phil Gramm says welfare recipients are people ``in the 
     wagon'' who ought to get out and ``help the rest of us 
     pull.'' Well. Of the 14 million people receiving Aid to 
     Families with Dependent Children, 9 million are children. 
     Even if we get all these free riders into wee harnesses, the 
     wagon will not move much faster.
       Furthermore, there is hardly an individual or industry in 
     America that is not in some sense ``in the wagon,'' receiving 
     some federal subvention. If everyone gets out, the wagon may 
     rocket along. But no one is proposing that. Instead, welfare 
     reform may give a whole new meaning to the phrase ``women and 
     children first.''
       Marx said that history's great events appear twice, first 
     as tragedy, then as farce. Pat Moynihan worries that a 
     tragedy visited upon a vulnerable population three decades 
     ago may now recur, not as farce but again as tragedy.
       Moynihan was there on Oct. 31, 1963, when President 
     Kennedy, in his last signing ceremony, signed legislation to 
     further the ``deinstitutionalization'' of the mentally ill. 
     Advances in psychotropic drugs, combined with ``community-
     based programs,'' supposedly would make possible substantial 
     reductions of the populations of mental institutions.
       But the drugs were not as effective as had been hoped, and 
     community-based programs never materialized in sufficient 
     numbers and sophistication. What materialized instead were 
     mentally ill homeless people. Moynihan warns that welfare 
     reform could produce a similar unanticipated increase in 
     children sleeping on, and freezing to death on, grates.
       Actually, cities will have to build more grates. Here are 
     the percentages of children on AFDC at some point during 1993 
     in five cities: Detroit (67), Philadelphia (57), Chicago 
     (46), New York (39), Los Angeles (38). ``There are,'' says 
     Moynihan, ``not enough social workers, not enough
      nuns, not enough Salvation Army workers'' to care for 
     children who would be purged from the welfare rolls were 
     Congress to decree (as candidate Bill Clinton proposed) a 
     two-year limit for welfare eligibility.
       Don't worry, say the designers of a brave new world, 
     welfare recipients will soon be working. However, 60 percent 
     of welfare families--usually families without fathers--have 
     children under 6 years old. Who will care for those children 
     in the year 2000 if Congress decrees that 50 percent of 
     welfare recipients must by then be in work programs? And 
     whence springs this conservative Congress's faith in work 
     programs?
       Much of the welfare population has no family memory of 
     regular work, and little of the social capital of habits and 
     disciplines that come with work. Life in, say, Chicago's 
     Robert Taylor housing project produces what sociologist Emil 
     Durkheim called ``a dust of individuals,'' not an employable 
     population. A 1994 Columbia University study concluded that 
     most welfare mothers are negligibly educated and emotionally 
     disturbed, and 40 percent are serious drug abusers. Small 
     wonder a Congressional Budget Office study estimated an 
     annual cost of $3,000 just for monitoring each workfare 
     enrollee--in addition to the bill for training to give such 
     people elemental skills.
       Moynihan says that a two-year limit for welfare 
     eligibility, and work requirements, might have worked 30 
     years ago, when the nation's illegitimacy rate was 5 percent, 
     but today it is 33 percent. Don't worry, say reformers, we'll 
     take care of that by tinkering with the incentives: There 
     will be no payments for additional children born while the 
     mother is on welfare.
       But Nicholas Eberstadt of Harvard and the American 
     Enterprise Institute says: Suppose today's welfare policy 
     incentives to illegitimacy were transported back in time to 
     Salem, Mass., in 1660. How many additional illegitimate 
     births would have occurred in Puritan Salem? Few, because the 
     people of Salem in 1660 believed in hell and believed that 
     what today are called ``disorganized lifestyles'' led to 
     hell. Congress cannot legislate useful attitudes.
       Moynihan, who spent August writing his annual book at his 
     farm in Delaware County, N.Y., notes that in 1963 that 
     county's illegitimacy rate was 3.8 percent and today is 32 
     percent--amost exactly the national average. And no one knows 
     why the county (which is rural and 98.8 percent white) or the 
     nation has so changed.
       Hence no one really knows what to do about it. 
     Conservatives say, well, nothing could be worse than the 
     current system. They are underestimating their ingenuity.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Shelby). The Senator from Minnesota.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I will be very brief. I thank my 
colleague from New York. For me, personally, having an opportunity to 
be on the floor while Senator Moynihan speaks is a real honor. We 
actually go back a ways--not that we knew each other personally, but I 
assigned many of his books in my classes, ranging from ``Maximum 
Feasible Misunderstanding'' to ``The Politics of the Guaranteed 
Income.''
  It is interesting, once upon a time, back in 1970 or thereabouts, we 
were not on the same side. We had disagreements. He was the one who was 
nationally renowned then. I was a college teacher and I always 
respected Professor Moynihan, and Senator Moynihan, for his views. But 
at this point in time, having just listened to what he said, I cannot 
even begin to tell him how much respect I have. His voice is a very 
powerful and eloquent voice.
  I must say, I think the silence from the White House on this question 
is deafening. Let me just repeat that one more time: The silence from 
the White House on this question is just deafening. You just cannot 
have it both ways, Mr. President. You cannot keep talking about 
children and you cannot keep talking about how you are for children and 
turn your gaze away from this process and what we are about to do here 
in the U.S. Senate.
  Colleagues are coming in. It may be difficult to take a lot more 
time. I do not want to delay this process. But as we have gone forward 
in this debate, I think the thing that saddens me and also angers me--
sometimes I am more saddened than angered, sometimes I am more angered 
than saddened--is not just the question that Senator Moynihan has 
raised, which is, we do not know, we are about to make policy without 
understanding, coming anywhere close to understanding the effects of 
what we are doing. That is, I think, what George Will was trying to say 
today. But I also feel, and I will be a little bit more, not harsh, but 
critical of some of my colleagues, I also feel that all too often 
Senators have come to the floor and have repeated essentially the same 
stereotypes.
  It is not just what we do not know. In fact, we do know some things. 
It is as if people do not, kind of, want to face up to this at all. All 
this discussion about out-of-wedlock births and what I consider to be 
and what I think every colleague considers to be a fundamental problem, 
a challenge to be dealt with, or question, why children have children, 
that is a complicated question. That is a complicated question. That is 
what my colleague from New York is trying to say.
  But from a lot of the statistics that have been recited out on the 
floor and a lot of the discussion, you would think that we are talking 
about exclusively a problem with AFDC. It is societal wide, yet it gets 
mixed up, apples and oranges, all the time.
  I have heard figures spelled out on the cost of welfare where I think 
everything was lumped in. You would think it was the aid to families 
with dependent children that built up $5 trillion of debt and was 
responsible for the annual budget deficits and all the rest. This is 
not true.
  You would think from this discussion that these enormously high 
benefits--when not one State has welfare benefits combined with food 
stamps, even up to the official definition of poverty--were causing 
women to plan to have more children. But there is no evidence for that 
at all.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. None.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. In fact, yesterday I asked my colleague, I said, let 
us take a look at some correlations State by State. I asked, ``Is there 
any correlation?'' We learned, in fact, there is an inverse 
correlation. Those States 

[[Page S 13561]]
with the lowest benefits tend to have families with more children.
 The lowest benefit States have the highest rates of illegitimate 
children.

  So, Mr. President, I think that we are being very reckless with the 
lives of children. I think what the Senate is about to do over the next 
couple of days, barring major changes for the better, is very reckless 
with the lives of children. And in many ways I think it is amounting to 
nothing more than just bashing because, as I have said before, these 
mothers do not have the resources to get on NBC, CBS, and ABC and fight 
some of these stereotypes.
  We want reform. But I have heard precious little discussion about the 
whole issue of job training, jobs, affordable child care, and moving 
forward on health care reform, not just for welfare mothers but other 
families as well. I have heard precious little of that.
  So, Mr. President, for me the bottom line is--and I understand the 
climate. It has been just a one-sided flow of information. I said, 
earlier, I say to my colleague, I was at the Minnesota State Fair. I 
love to be at the State fair. Almost half of the State's population is 
there in 12 days. I like interacting with people. It is my nature to 
like people. I had lots of people come up to me and talk about welfare. 
And people really do believe we have to drive all these cheaters off 
the rolls and slackers back to work. People do not necessarily realize 
that 9 million of those 15 million on welfare are children. But I think 
when you talk to people they will say to you we are for the reform but 
we do not want you to punish children.
  The direction we are going in is going to punish children. It will--
and I do not exaggerate--end up taking food out of the mouths of hungry 
children. It is not what we should be about. And if there ever was a 
moment for the President to show leadership, it is now. If there ever 
was a moment for the President of the United States of America to show 
leadership--and leadership to me is calling on people to be their own 
best selves, not appeal to the fears and to the frustrations of 
people--and spell out for people the facts and provide an education for 
people in the United States of America about what real reform would be 
which would benefit children as opposed to hurting children, it is now. 
The silence of the White House on this question is deafening.
  As a Senator from Minnesota, I feel that I owe a lot to the Senator 
from New York for his courage, his wisdom, his eloquence, and his 
power.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I do not want to keep the floor further 
than to say no one has given more of his career to this subject than 
the Senator from Minnesota. He has been at the barricades and in the 
lecture halls and the State fairs on the subject. He is an authority on 
this subject. He speaks with profound conviction.
  I thank him for his courtesy to me, and I plead. There is no one in 
the White House to hear what he has said. Before the day is ending, we 
will perhaps know more. But we began the day on the right track.
  Mr. President, I see my friend from Pennsylvania has arrived. I do 
believe our procedures can commence.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, not to disappoint the Senator from New 
York, but 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. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                    Amendment No. 2584, As Modified

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to send a 
modified amendment to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The 
amendment is so modified.
  The amendment (No. 2584), as modified, is as follows:

       At the end of the amendment, insert the following new 
     title:

              TITLE   --PROTECTION OF BATTERED INDIVIDUALS

     SEC.   01. EXEMPTION OF BATTERED INDIVIDUALS FROM CERTAIN 
                   REQUIREMENTS.

       (a) In General.--Notwithstanding any other provision of, or 
     amendment made by, this Act, the applicable administering 
     authority of any specified provision may exempt from (or 
     modify) the application of such provision to any individual 
     who was battered or subjected to extreme cruelty if the 
     physical, mental, or emotional well-being of the individual 
     would be endangered by the application of such provision to 
     such individual. The applicable administering authority may 
     take into consideration the family circumstances and the 
     counseling and other supportive service needs of the 
     individual.
       (b) Specified Provisions.--For purposes of this section, 
     the term ``specified provision'' means any requirement, 
     limitation, or penalty under any of the following:
       (1) Sections 404, 405 (a) and (b), 406 (b), (c), and (d), 
     414(d), 453(c), 469A, and 1614(a)(1) of the Social Security 
     Act.
       (2) Sections 5(i) and 6 (d), (j), and (n) of the Food Stamp 
     Act of 1977.
       (3) Sections 501(a) and 502 of this Act.
       (c) Definitions and Special Rules.--For purposes of this 
     section--
       (1) Battered or subjected to extreme cruelty.--The term 
     ``battered or subjected to extreme cruelty'' includes, but is 
     not limited to--
       (A) physical acts resulting in, or threatening to result 
     in, physical injury;
       (B) sexual abuse, sexual activity involving a dependent 
     child, forcing the caretaker relative of a dependent child to 
     engage in nonconsensual sexual acts or activities, or threats 
     of or attempts at physical or sexual abuse;
       (C) mental abuse; and
       (D) neglect or deprivation of medical care.
       (2) Calculation of participation rates.--An individual 
     exempted from the work requirements under section 404 of the 
     Social Security Act by reason of subsection (a) shall not be 
     included for purposes of calculating the State's 
     participation rate under such section.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will be now 10 
minutes of debate equally divided on the Wellstone amendment, as 
modified, to be followed by a vote on or in relation to the amendment.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, I shall be brief because I believe we have now worked 
this out and that this amendment will be accepted. I am in fact very 
pleased about it.
  Mr. President, let me just for a moment kind of spell out for my 
colleagues what this amendment does. Every 15 seconds a woman is beaten 
by a husband or a boyfriend in the United States of America. That is a 
horrible statistic. But unfortunately, it is a fact. Over 4,000 women 
are killed every year by their abuser and every 6 minutes a woman is 
forcibly raped.
  My concern, when I introduced this amendment last night with Senator 
Murray, was that with our various requirements we would not unwittingly 
put States in a position where they essentially end up forcing women 
back into very dangerous homes.
  In other words, the way to summarize it, it took Monica Seles 2 years 
to get back on the tennis court. Imagine what it would be like if you 
were beaten over and over and over again. When would you be able to get 
into a job program? When would you be able to get back on your own two 
feet? Quite often children are also severely affected by this.
  My amendment allows States to exempt people who have been battered or 
subjected to extreme cruelty from some of these rules that we now have 
within the welfare system without being penalized for not meeting their 
participation rate. In other words, if States want to make an exemption 
for a woman, or sometimes a man, who has come from a very violent home 
and has been battered, a State will be able to do so and a State will 
be penalized in no way.
  Mr. President, this is extremely important because I believe that in 
order for us to make sure that we do not send battered women back into 
violent homes, States absolutely have to be able to do this without 
being penalized in any way, shape, or form.
  I also believe this amendment being passed will enable our States to 
put a focus on this question for not only battered women shelters and 
the advocates, but I think increasingly the larger number of citizens.
  So I thank my colleagues for accepting this amendment.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN addressed the Chair.
  Does the Senator wish to urge adoption?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator yield back the remainder of 
his time?
  Mr. WELLSTONE. I do. 

[[Page S 13562]]

  I urge adoption of my amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania has 5 minutes.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I rise to say we accept the amendment, 
as modified, and allow the Senator to continue with the adoption of the 
amendment.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I urge adoption of the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is now on agreeing to amendment 
No. 2584, as modified.
  The amendment (No. 2584), as modified, was agreed to.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote by which 
the amendment was agreed to.
  Mr. NICKLES. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.


                           Amendment No. 2609

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be 10 
minutes of debate equally divided on the Faircloth amendment, No. 2609, 
to be followed by a vote on or in relation to the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Carolina.
  Mr. FAIRCLOTH. Mr. President, my pending amendment modifies a 
provision in the Dole bill which allows Federal funds to be used for 
cash aid to unmarried teenage mothers.
  The sole purpose of this amendment is designed to disrupt the pattern 
of out-of-wedlock childbearing that is passing from one generation to 
the next. My amendment seeks to stop giving cash aid that rewards 
multigenerational welfare dependency.
  Let us be clear what the Dole bill currently does. The bill says you 
can use Federal funds to give vouchers or inkind benefits to an 
unmarried teenage mother or you can use funds to put the mother in a 
supervised group home. That is fine, and we have all agreed upon that.
  The Dole bill then goes on to say that you can use Federal funds to 
give cash benefits to unmarried teenage mothers if that mother resides 
with her parent.
  We need to be very clear what type of household we are putting cash 
into. In this household, there will be three people. First, the newborn 
child; second, the unmarried teenage mother of that child; and third, 
the mother of the teenager who has the child, or the grandmother, the 
adult, in other words, in charge of the household.
  The problem with this scenario is that the adult woman, the mother of 
the teenager, the grandmother of the new child, the person in charge of 
the operation, the one we are depending upon for supervision of the 
unmarried teenage mother is very likely either to be or have been an 
unmarried welfare mother herself. It is very likely that this adult 
mother gave birth to the teenager out of wedlock some 15 to 16 years 
ago and raised her at least partly on welfare. The young teenager 
giving birth out of wedlock is simply repeating the pattern and model 
which her mother laid down.
  Let me remind you of a few public statistics to confirm what I am 
saying. A girl who is raised in a single-parent home on welfare is five 
times more likely to have a child out of wedlock herself than is a girl 
raised in a two-parent home without welfare. Roughly two-thirds of all 
the unwed teenage mothers were raised in broken or single-parent homes.
  The amendment I am offering is intended to break up the lethal 
growing pattern of multigenerational illegitimacy and welfare 
dependency. That is the purpose, to try to break the cycle. The current 
amendment follows the same basic rule on teenage mothers as the Dole 
bill, which says you cannot use Federal funds to give cash aid, a check 
in the mail to a teenage mother unless that teenage mother resides with 
her parents or another adult relative.
  My amendment maintains that same rule but adds only the one 
limitation, and the limitation states that an unmarried teenage mother 
cannot receive Federal aid, that is a check in the mail, if the parent 
or adult relative the teenager is living with herself had a child out 
of wedlock and has recently received aid to families with dependent 
children.
  The teenage mother cannot get cash aid, cannot get a check in the 
mail if she is residing with a parent who herself has had a child out 
of wedlock and was a welfare mother and has recently received aid to 
families with dependent children.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The time of the Senator from North Carolina 
has expired. The Senator from North Carolina had 5 minutes.
  Mr. FAIRCLOTH. I ask unanimous consent for an additional minute.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The 
Senator from North Carolina.
  Mr. FAIRCLOTH. The teenager in those circumstances could receive a 
voucher or federally funded inkind aid, but she could not get a Federal 
welfare check in the mail.
  I want to stress that this does not prevent teenage mothers from 
living at home or from receiving noncash benefits. Of course, this 
restriction applies only to Federal funds. A State can use its money to 
send a check in the mail to anyone it wants.
  If you vote against this amendment, you are voting to give cash aid 
to multigenerational welfare households. If you vote against this 
amendment, you are voting to subsidize and promote multigeneration 
illegitimacy.
  I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who yields time? The Senator from 
Pennsylvania.
  Mr. SANTORUM. 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.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays on the 
Faircloth amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  Mr. SANTORUM. I yield back the remainder of my time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is now on agreeing to the 
Faircloth amendment. The yeas and nays have been ordered. The clerk 
will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Thomas). Are there any other Senators in 
the Chamber who desire to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 17, nays 83, as follows:
                      [Rollcall Vote No. 422 Leg.]

                                YEAS--17

     Ashcroft
     Brown
     Faircloth
     Gramm
     Grams
     Helms
     Inhofe
     Lott
     McCain
     McConnell
     Nickles
     Pressler
     Shelby
     Smith
     Stevens
     Thompson
     Thurmond

                                NAYS--83

     Abraham
     Akaka
     Baucus
     Bennett
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Bradley
     Breaux
     Bryan
     Bumpers
     Burns
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Chafee
     Coats
     Cochran
     Cohen
     Conrad
     Coverdell
     Craig
     D'Amato
     Daschle
     DeWine
     Dodd
     Dole
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Exon
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Ford
     Frist
     Glenn
     Gorton
     Graham
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Harkin
     Hatch
     Hatfield
     Heflin
     Hollings
     Hutchison
     Inouye
     Jeffords
     Johnston
     Kassebaum
     Kempthorne
     Kennedy
     Kerrey
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Kyl
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lugar
     Mack
     Mikulski
     Moseley-Braun
     Moynihan
     Murkowski
     Murray
     Nunn
     Packwood
     Pell
     Pryor
     Reid
     Robb
     Rockefeller
     Roth
     Santorum
     Sarbanes
     Simon
     Simpson
     Snowe
     Specter
     Thomas
     Warner
     Wellstone
  So the amendment (No. 2609) was rejected.
                           Amendment No. 2528

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be 10 
minutes of debate, equally divided, on the Conrad amendment No. 2528, 
to be followed by a vote on or in relation to the amendment.
  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that we be able to 
temporarily set aside the Conrad-Lieberman amendment because we have a 
request from the other side that we do that so that we perhaps have a 
chance to work things out before a vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? 

[[Page S 13563]]

  Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 2581

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will be 10 
minutes of debate, equally divided, on the Jeffords amendment No. 2581, 
to be followed by a vote on or in relation to the amendment.
  Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Vermont is recognized.
  Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I offered this amendment on behalf of 
myself, Senator Simpson, Senator Snowe and, I believe, Senator Chafee. 
I have not had time to gather others who, I am sure, want to cosponsor 
it.
  This is an important amendment. I hope that my colleagues will listen 
carefully to what this does. It is an amendment with all the good 
intentions in the world and something that we all believe in--that we 
should reduce the out-of-wedlock births. It hopes to do this by giving 
an incentive to States to do things to try and reduce it and be 
rewarded if they are successful. What it does is says we shall 
carefully--keep track of what I say--set as a baseline the year 1995, 
and we will draw the baseline for each State on the number of abortions 
which were performed in that State and also the number of out-of-
wedlock births that occur during that period of time. That might be 
well, but I would have to point out that such statistics do not exist 
in any valid form. So we will be establishing a baseline, first of all, 
that really we do not have any idea whether it is valid or not.
  Then it says that if you reduce your out-of-wedlock births by 1 
percent and you do not increase your abortions, then you will be 
rewarded with a 5-percent increase in the amount of money you receive 
across the board for welfare. If you do it by 2 percent, you will get a 
10 percent. That may sound good, too, but remember, to start with we do 
not have any baseline that we have any accuracy with.
  What it does is also create an incentive for the States to find all 
sorts of things to do in order to try and get below that. CBO scores it 
at a cost of $75 million over 7 years. In their view, nothing will 
happen, basically, because if it is successful, the cost will be $1.6 
billion a year--$1.6 billion a year for which there is no 
appropriation; so it will come out of something else because it is an 
entitlement.
  I point out that both the pro-life groups, if not all of them, but 
also pro-choice groups are opposed to this amendment for many different 
reasons. First of all, since we have no baseline, it is going to be 
difficult to know as to whether or not anything happened. Second, since 
it refers only to in-State abortions and in-State out-of-wedlock 
births, that does not include those that go across the border. So you 
open up serious problems with respect to manipulation of statistics.
  There is no reporting process now for abortion. There is no 
definition of what an abortion is in the bill.
  What is an abortion? Is it an IUD? Is it a D and C? What is it? We do 
not know. The statistics are all over the place.
  The States will see that goal out there--and keep in mind that if it 
is totally successful, it will cost $1.6 billion a year and we will 
only reduce the out-of-wedlock births by 2 percent over the whole 
period of time.
  If you are successful the first year and you stay at that level below 
the baseline, you pick up this thing for the whole 7 years, the 5 years 
of the bill and accomplish nothing more.
  And, I point out, you have letters given to you from the Catholic 
Charities, who are very much against this. They think it will increase 
the number of abortions. The pro-choice have looked at this as an 
intervention into privacy.
  Also, it includes not just welfare individuals; it includes all of 
your population. This means you will have to report out-of-wedlock 
births from every family that has that occur.
  These things are really disruptive. I hope that we will defeat this 
provision of the bill. I ask for support of my amendment.
  I reserve the remainder of my time.
  Mr. ABRAHAM. I yield myself 2 minutes. Mr. President, if this 
amendment succeeds, we will have nothing left in this bill geared to 
the problem of illegitimacy that virtually every Member of this Senate 
has talked about and described is a problem in their State.
  This portion of the bill creates incentives for States to attack this 
issue head on. I believe the criticisms, although well intentioned, do 
not justify turning our backs on this problem. The fact that it may 
cost more if States across America, every single State brings down its 
illegitimacy rate, it may cost $1 billion more in bonuses, does not 
reflect the total price tag and the success we would have if this were 
to be achieved.
  The fact is this is a priority issue. It deserves, in terms of our 
funding priorities, to be placed high on the priority list. If we 
succeed, I think we will save more in dollars and lives than any 
bonuses we will pay to the States.
  Further, I think some of the concerns that have been raised as to 
definitions are addressed in the legislation as it has been brought to 
the floor. The Secretary has given quite a bit of latitude to determine 
definitions as well as to determine whether or not the numbers have 
been in any way gained in order to allow States to capture advantage of 
the bonus undeservedly.
  Finally, I just would say if we strip this provision from the bill, 
we will have to go back and explain to our constituents why we did not 
do one significant thing to address the No. 1 social problem in America 
today. Arguments in favor of this amendment do not, in my judgment, 
justify turning our backs on this issue.
  Mr. President, I yield 2 minutes to the Senator from North Carolina.
  Mr. FAIRCLOTH. Thank you, Mr. President. We are now debating a 
provision of the Dole bill that addresses illegitimacy but is not at 
all directive or proscriptive. The provision which the amendment by 
Senator Jeffords seeks to strike is a simple provision that rewards a 
State for reducing its illegitimacy ratio, the percentage of total 
births which are out of wedlock.
  This provision taken from the House welfare reform bill says if a 
State decreases its illegitimacy ratio without increasing its abortion 
rate, we will increase the AFDC block grant by up to 10 percent.
  That is what we all agree that we want. We want a reduction in out-
of-wedlock births as long as it is not accomplished by an increase in 
abortions.
  We do not tell the States how to reduce illegitimacy. We simply say, 
``You come up with a successful way to reduce it, and we will give you 
more money.''
  The provision has three elements. We set a goal: reducing 
illegitimacy. We give the States maximum flexibility in meeting that 
goal. Third, we provide a financial reward for meeting the goal.
  If the Jeffords amendment succeeds, the illegitimacy reduction bonus 
mechanism is struck, the Dole bill will have no provision to reduce 
illegitimacy at all. We will not have real welfare reform.
  We do not address the crisis of out-of-wedlock births. I thought that 
is what we came to address and to do something about, was illegitimacy, 
and everything that comes up to reduce it we vote down.
  I urge my colleagues to vote against the Jeffords amendment.
  Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, I yield 1 minute to the Senator from 
Texas.
  Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, it was argued yesterday that no one could 
establish a relationship between giving people money to do something 
and then seeing them do it.
  In fact, the proponent of this argument stated that if you believe 
that people do more of something when you pay them to do it, then you 
must also believe in the tooth fairy. No more nonsensical statement was 
ever made on the floor of the U.S. Senate than that.
  One-third of all the babies born in America today are born out of 
wedlock. The largest single explanation of why that is the case is that 
we give larger and larger cash payments to people who have more and 
more babies on welfare. 

[[Page S 13564]]

  Yesterday, we lost on our effort to stop that suicidal national 
policy. Now we have an effort to strike the last remaining provision in 
this bill, a provision that says simply that if States are able, 
through their own reforms, to deal with the greatest welfare crisis we 
face, illegitimacy, that we will give them a bonus for their success.
  Now we have an amendment that says strike that bonus and eliminate 
the last remaining effort to deal with illegitimacy. It is very 
important that this amendment be defeated.
  I urge my colleagues to reject it.
  Mr. JEFFORDS. I yield the balance of my time to the Senator from 
Wyoming.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 30 seconds.
  Mr. SIMPSON. Mr. President, I rise today in support of the amendment 
introduced by my colleague from Vermont. This amendment would strike 
the so-called ``illegitimacy ratio'' from the welfare bill. Let me just 
say obviously it is a difficult amendment, obviously a difficult area, 
a laudable pursuit, but I represent a state that values confidentiality 
and privacy and am greatly concerned about the inaccuracy of the data 
collection.
  I do agree with the Senator from Vermont when he says that ``federal 
strings often do not produce the desired behavior modifications and can 
even produce unintended negative results.'' I think this ratio is a 
clear example of just that.
  We all agree that the intentions of such a provision are in every way 
laudable, however, the implementation of such a ratio is what concerns 
me. We all want to reduce the number of out-of-wedlock births in this 
country. Every one of us. This issue is of major concern and needs to 
be addressed at all levels of government. I want to commend my 
colleagues for bringing this important issue to our attention.
  However, as a legislator who is pro-choice, I remain concerned that 
this ratio will actually hinder women from receiving abortions if and 
when they choose to do so. States possibly could actually restrict 
access to abortions in order to ensure that their abortion rate does 
not increase. Making abortions more difficult to obtain would obviously 
help to lower the abortion rate and that is the part that greatly 
concerns me.
  In addition, coming from a state that so greatly values 
confidentiality and privacy--the right to be alone. I am greatly 
concerned about the inaccuracy of the data collection. We do not have 
reporting requirements on abortions in my State for physicians or 
public health officials. The physicians in Wyoming fiercely value their 
anonymity in this matter. The State does not seek more accurate 
reporting from them for fear of violence.
  Wyoming has four abortion providers and access is very much a huge 
problem. In fact, most women in Wyoming travel to Colorado or Montana 
if they choose to have an abortion. Privacy is such an overwhelming 
concern in Wyoming, especially in our small towns. This ``ratio'' 
simply would not be an accurate indicator of abortions in any State for 
this very reason. Colorado and Montana's ratios would be skewed since 
they would have to account for the women who do travel to their States 
to have abortions. This is not a problem isolated to the Rocky Mountain 
States--this occurs across the country in every single rural and 
frontier area.
  So I remain deeply concerned about the lack of reporting procedures 
that currently exist, and this amendment will only aggravate this 
problem. It does not provide for any additional funding for States to 
set up the extensive reporting procedures that will be needed in order 
to calculate this ratio. If we pass this ratio provision, we will in 
fact be passing on another unfunded mandate to the States.
   We should all deal honestly with the issues of teenage pregnancy and 
illegitimacy, but there are so many other ways to address these matters 
including appropriate sex education in the schools, if I might add.
  For these reasons, I urge passage of this amendment.
  Mr. ABRAHAM. I yield the balance of my time to the Senator from 
Pennsylvania.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Let me say there is always an excuse not to deal with 
this issue. If we do not adopt this amendment, there will be nothing on 
illegitimacy in this.
  We have heard great speeches, what an important problem this is. If 
we do not reject the Jeffords amendment, there will be nothing in this 
bill to deal with what everybody thinks is the most pressing problem 
that we have to face.
  We should quit finding excuses to do nothing.
  Mr. DOLE. If I may use 2 minutes of my leader time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has that right.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, let me speak to my colleagues on both sides 
of the aisle.
  I think there is a tendency for amendments offered by Democrats being 
voted for by Democrats, and maybe the other way, too.
  This amendment makes a great deal of sense, not the amendment of the 
Senator from Vermont but the amendment in the bill. It was worked out 
very carefully after a lot of consultation by a lot of people to make 
certain that we were not doing some of the things that have been stated 
here.
  It is up to the States; it is up to the Governors. We have talked 
about returning power to the Governors, power to the States. Democrat 
or Republican Governors--we have not made any distinction.
  Everybody has railed about illegitimacy. Mr. President, one out of 
three births is out of wedlock.
  This is a very important amendment. It is in the House bill. We do 
not see any reason it should not be in this bill. That is why we put it 
in the Dole amendment to start with.
  I would hope my colleagues on both sides of the aisle would take a 
look at what we are trying to do. Why not reward a State? Why not 
reward a Governor, Governor Edgar from Illinois or Governor Thompson or 
Governor Romer, whoever it may be, if they can devise a plan to reduce 
the illegitimacy rate?
  That is what this amendment is all about. It is straightforward.
  I do not see any pitfalls described by the Senator from Wyoming or 
the Senator from Vermont. I hope we could defeat the amendment of the 
Senator from Vermont and keep this provision in the bill.
  I can tell you, I will be a conferee when we ever go to conference on 
this. This is going to be very important. If we are serious about 
illegitimacy, this is an opportunity to demonstrate it. It is not 
partisan; not Democrat, not Republican, not conservative, not anything, 
as far as I know, except an honest effort to deal with a very serious 
problem.
  Several Senators addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Florida.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Will the Senator from Kansas yield for a question?
  Mr. DOLE. Yes.
  Mr. GRAHAM. The Senator from Kansas yields for a question? As I read 
the amendment that is in the bill, it provides a bonus of 5 percent of 
your State grant if you reduce illegitimacy by 1 percent, and 10 
percent if you reduce it by 2 percent. Is that correct?
  Mr. DOLE. That is correct.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Does that mean that, for instance in the District of 
Columbia, they would get 11 times as much actual money for the 
reduction of illegitimacy as would, for instance, the State of 
Mississippi, since they get 11 times as much block grant per poor child 
in the District of Columbia than in the State?
  Mr. DOLE. I would have to check that. I am talking about principle. 
You are talking about formula.
  Mr. GRAHAM. The principle? If the goal is to accomplish the 
objective, why could it not have been stated in an absolute amount as 
opposed to a percentage of a block grant, which is very different from 
State to State?
  Mr. DOLE. We might entertain a modification if the Senator has one.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Is there a policy reason why the State has a percent of a 
block grant as opposed to an absolute number?
  Mr. DOLE. I think it is going to be more difficult to administer, 
too, if you make it absolute. But I want to stick to the principle. 
Maybe the Senator has an idea. He can offer an amendment later on. But 
in my view, this is a very simple straightforward amendment. It is in 
the bill. 

[[Page S 13565]]

  I do not have an answer to the Senator from Florida without checking, 
whether it might be a good idea or might not be a good idea. But let us 
vote on the amendment and then, if the Senator has some change he would 
like to make, I will be happy to entertain it.
  Mr. KERRY. Will the Senator yield for a question?
  Mr. DOLE. No, I am ready to vote.
  Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on the Jeffords 
amendment No. 2581, up or down. This will be a 10-minute vote.
  The yeas and nays have been ordered. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk called the roll.
  The result was announced--yeas 37, nays 63, as follows:
                      [Rollcall Vote No. 423 Leg.]

                                YEAS--37

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Bradley
     Breaux
     Campbell
     Chafee
     Cohen
     Dodd
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Ford
     Glenn
     Harkin
     Hatfield
     Hollings
     Inouye
     Jeffords
     Johnston
     Kassebaum
     Kennedy
     Kerrey
     Kohl
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Mikulski
     Moseley-Braun
     Moynihan
     Murray
     Packwood
     Pell
     Robb
     Sarbanes
     Simon
     Simpson
     Snowe
     Specter
     Wellstone

                                NAYS--63

     Abraham
     Ashcroft
     Bennett
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Brown
     Bryan
     Bumpers
     Burns
     Byrd
     Coats
     Cochran
     Conrad
     Coverdell
     Craig
     D'Amato
     Daschle
     DeWine
     Dole
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Exon
     Faircloth
     Frist
     Gorton
     Graham
     Gramm
     Grams
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hatch
     Heflin
     Helms
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Kempthorne
     Kerry
     Kyl
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lott
     Lugar
     Mack
     McCain
     McConnell
     Murkowski
     Nickles
     Nunn
     Pressler
     Pryor
     Reid
     Rockefeller
     Roth
     Santorum
     Shelby
     Smith
     Stevens
     Thomas
     Thompson
     Thurmond
     Warner
  So the amendment (No. 2581) was rejected.
                           Amendment No. 2535

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order there will now be 10 
minutes of debate equally divided on the Dorgan amendment, numbered 
2535, to be followed by a vote on or in relation to the amendment.
  The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. I thank the Chair very much.
  This is amendment No. 2535. Mr. President, this amendment is a sense-
of-the-Senate, modeled after the requirement in the new unfunded 
mandate law that we passed earlier this year. The Congressional Budget 
Office under this amendment that I offer on behalf of myself, Senator 
Glenn, and Senator Graham is asked to report to the Senate prior to a 
vote on the conference report on the cost to the States of complying 
with the work requirements and any other mandate compared to the amount 
of money provided in the bill for complying with the requirements, and 
as well they are asked to give us an estimate of the number of States 
which would opt to pay the penalty rather than raise the additional 
revenue necessary to meet these requirements.
  Mr. President, the reason this is necessary is the Department of 
Health and Human Services has estimated that the cost to the States of 
meeting the work requirement in this bill will exceed the funds 
provided in the Dole plan by about $17 billion over 7 years. So the 
States will be forced to either raise some taxes or cut some spending 
in other areas by $17 billion in order to comply with the requirements 
in the Dole bill.
  Alternatively, they could simply abandon the work requirement. They 
could abandon the effort to meet these work requirement goals and they 
could instead pay a modest penalty--modest as compared to the $17 
billion. The penalty would be about $6 billion.
  The Congressional Budget Office has concluded that most States will 
opt to pay the penalty. In fact, the Congressional Budget Office has 
estimated that probably only 10 to 15 States will meet the work 
requirements, meaning 35 to 40 States will pay the penalty.
  What does that mean? It means that we will not accomplish the central 
function of one of the things we want to do in this bill, and that is 
move people from the welfare rolls to work. This is in my judgment 
either then an unfunded mandate of significant quantity or it will fail 
in the primary objective of moving people off welfare and to a job.
  The law we passed a few short months ago indicated we ought not do 
any of these things unless we understand what we are asking others to 
do in terms of unfunded mandates. This amendment is very simple. Before 
we vote on the conference report, let us have a report by the CBO of 
what kind of an unfunded mandate exists here, how many States will 
comply with the work requirement and what we can expect from this 
legislation.
  Mr. President, how much time do I have remaining?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 2 minutes and 25 seconds.
  Mr. DORGAN. Let me yield 1\1/2\ minutes to Senator Glenn from Ohio.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio.
  Mr. GLENN. I thank my colleague. I am glad to be a cosponsor of this 
amendment. What the Senator has said is that early this year we passed 
the unfunded mandates bill. We said no longer were we going to just 
throw things back on the States and say you take care of it; we are 
putting the requirement out there with no money. And yet that is 
exactly what we are doing right now in this bill.
  I know the unfunded mandates bill does not kick in with all of its 
requirements until January 1 next year. With this bill, we are 
requiring States to place 50 percent of welfare recipients on the work 
rolls by 2002. We are requiring job training, placement, education. 
Work requirement will be another $1.9 billion on State governments per 
year, 3.3 to cover child care costs, and so on, required for the Dole 
bill.
  I do not know how the balance comes out, where increased flexibility 
lets them save some money and how this balances out, but this could 
wind up as a giant, giant unfunded mandate on the States, and so I am 
very glad to support my colleague's proposal. If we are in keeping with 
the philosophy and principles of S. 1, the first bill that we passed 
this year, we should not be saddling State and local governments with 
these new welfare requirements without knowing exactly what we are 
doing.
  I thank the Senator.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I happen to agree with the Senator from Ohio 
and the Senator from North Dakota. We ought to find out what it costs, 
whatever impact it may have.
  I am prepared to accept the amendment. I yield back my time.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I am satisfied with that. I appreciate the 
cooperation of the majority leader.
  I yield back my time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment 
2535.
  The amendment (No. 2535) was agreed to.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. FORD. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.


                           Amendment No. 2589

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will be a 10-
minute debate equally divided on the McCain amendment No. 2589 to be 
followed by a vote on or in relation to the amendment. That will be a 
10-minute vote.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, as I understand it, we are on the McCain 
amendment which I believe is acceptable on both sides. So I yield back 
the time on this side.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. If there is no objection----
  Mr. CHAFEE. Could we have a description of the McCain amendment?
  Mr. DOLE. I have been advised the purpose of the amendment is to 
provide for child support enforcement agreements between the States and 
Indian tribes or tribal organizations.
  It provides for child support enforcement agreements between the 
States and Indian tribes and tribal organizations. I think the same 
thing that applies to States now applies to tribal organizations. As I 
understand, there is no problem with the amendment.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I am pleased today to join Senators 

[[Page S 13566]]
  McCain and Inouye as a cosponsor of an amendment that would further the 
goals of strengthening child support enforcement activities by 
encouraging State governments with Indian tribes within their borders 
to enter into cooperative agreements for the delivery of child support 
enforcement services in Indian country.
  Mr. President, this amendment would give the Secretary of the 
Department of Health and Human Services, in specific instances, the 
authority to provide direct Federal funding to Indian tribes operating 
an approved child support enforcement plan. This approach is consistent 
with the government-to-government relationship between tribal 
governments and the Federal Government. Further, this approach to child 
support enforcement in Indian country is supported by the National 
Council of State Child Support Enforcement Administrators.
  Mr. President, title IV-D of the Social Security Act was enacted to 
assist all children in obtaining support and moving out of poverty. Yet 
it has been of little assistance to Indian children residing in Indian 
country because under title IV-D, only States are eligible to receive 
Federal funds to operate title IV-D programs. The regulations 
implementing this act restrict States from providing services to Indian 
children on reservations.
  State child support program administrators have attempted to meet the 
goals of child support enforcement by extending their efforts to Indian 
country, but the administrative and jurisdictional hurdles have made it 
all but impossible to get these services to need Indian children.
  Finally, Mr. President, in 1992, the Interstate Commission of Child 
Support Enforcement recommended that the Congress address this problem 
through Federal legislation. It is time for America's neediest children 
to receive child support enforcement services.
                           amendment no. 2589

  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I thank my colleagues, Senators Inouye, 
Wellstone, Domenici, and Daschle, for joining me in offering this 
important amendment. The amendment that I and my colleagues are 
offering today would further the goals of enforcing child support 
enforcement activities by encouraging, not mandating, State 
governments, with Indian lands within their borders, to enter into 
cooperative agreements with Indian tribal governments for the delivery 
of child support enforcement services in Indian country. The amendment 
provides funding to achieve these purposes within the overall spending 
allocated to this effort. It gives the Secretary the authority, in 
specific instances, to provide direct Federal funding to Indian tribes 
operating an approved child support enforcement plan. This approach is 
consistent with the government-to-government relationship between 
tribal governments and the Federal Government, and the other provisions 
contained in the Dole substitute bill.
  Mr. President, title IV-D of the Social Security Act was enacted to 
assist all children in obtaining support and moving out of poverty. 
Under this title, State child support offices are required to provide 
basic services to parents who apply for these services, including those 
that receive welfare assistance. These services include collecting and 
distributing child support payments from dead beat dads. Yet this 
program has been of little assistance to Indian children residing in 
Indian Country because under title IV-D, only States are eligible to 
receive Federal funds to operate IV-D programs under Federal 
regulations which, as a practical matter, all but prohibit them from 
providing services to Indian children on reservations. Because of this, 
Indian children have lost, and will continue to lose necessary 
services.
  Mr. President, there is a great need for child support enforcement 
funding and services in Indian country. There are approximately 554 
federally recognized Indian tribes and Alaska Native villages in the 
United States. According to the most recent Bureau of the Census data, 
children under the age of 18 make up the largest age group of Indians. 
Approximately 20.5 percent of American Indians and Alaska Natives are 
under the age of 10 compared to 14 percent for the Nation's total 
population. In addition, one out of every five Indian households are 
headed by single females. This data reveals that the need for 
coordinated child support enforcement and service delivery in Indian 
country exceeds the need in the rest of America.
  There are also jurisdictional barriers to effective service delivery 
under IV-D programs on reservations. Federal courts have held that 
Indian tribes, not States, have authority over Indian child support 
enforcement issues and paternity establishment of tribal members 
residing and working on the
 reservation. These jurisdictional safeguards, although necessary, have 
hampered State child support agencies in their efforts to negotiate 
agreements for the provision of services or funding to Indian tribal 
governments. The types of services provided under title IV-D include 
paternity establishment, including genetic blood testing, the 
establishment of support obligations and the enforcement of support 
obligations through wage withholdings and tax intercepts. These 
activities fall within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Indian tribes. 
Yet there is no mechanism to enable tribes to receive Federal funding 
and assistance to conduct these activities.

  This amendment in no way forces or compels an Indian tribe or State 
to act, nor does it affect well-established State or tribal 
jurisdiction to establish paternity or support orders. It merely 
recognizes the problems of child support collection and distribution 
between States and tribes as they exist under the current system. 
Simply put, this amendment encourages cooperative agreements between 
two governments to satisfy the goals and purposes of uniform child 
support enforcement. Let me just point out that some of these 
agreements are already in place in States like Washington and Arizona.
  State administrators, such as in my own State, have attempted to meet 
the goals of uniform child support enforcement by extending their 
efforts to Indian Country, but the administrative and jurisdictional 
hurdles make it all but impossible to get these services out to the 
children in need.
  These obstacles have led to costly litigation. For example, the 8th 
and 9th circuit courts have issued inconsistent rulings in addressing 
the ability of Indian children to access title IV-D services. A 1991 
Federal court ruling summed up the problem by holding--

       . . . the State must give children of absent Indian parents 
     the same degree of child support enforcement services as 
     other children, when there is reasonable access to the tribal 
     courts.

Yet, that court's ruling is inconsistent with the Department of Health 
and Human Services interpretation of title IV-D in which the Department 
significantly restricts the States. Let me remind my colleagues that 
States are trying to be fair in providing child support enforcement 
services and funding to Indians. Their ability to provide these 
services is quite limited because Indian tribes are not mentioned in 
title IV-D. This amendment would clarify that Indian children are 
entitled to the same protections from deadbeat dads as all other 
children in our country.
  Mr. President, this problem is not new to those involved in State 
child support enforcement agencies or national organizations concerned 
with these issues. For instance, in 1992, the American Bar Association 
and the Interstate Commission of Child Support recognized the problems 
created by the omission of Indian tribes from IV-D legislation. In 
fact, the American Bar Association issued a handbook for States and 
tribes to use in attempting to negotiate State/Tribal cooperative 
agreements for child support enforcement. Also in an elaborate report 
issued in 1992, the Interstate Commission on Child Support Enforcement 
recommended that the Congress address this problem in Federal 
legislation. Until the amendment under consideration was offered, no 
legislative initiative to include Indian tribes has occurred.
  More recently, I received a copy of a letter, dated May 15, 1995, 
from the president of the National Council of State Child Support 
Enforcement Administrators. The letter advises the Department of Health 
and Human Services that a resolution was passed by the IV-D directors 
that favors direct Federal funding to Indian tribes for child support 
services. Let me quote from a passage of the letter ``The states that 
are concerned about this 

[[Page S 13567]]
issue believe that the most effective way to provide comprehensive 
services to Native American children is for the federal government to 
deal directly with sovereign tribal governments.'' The amendment that I 
am offering will do just that.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, if all time is yielded 
back, the question is on agreeing to the amendment 2589.
  The amendment (No. 2589) was agreed to.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.


                           Amendment No. 2525

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be a 
10-minute debate equally divided on the Exon amendment 2525, to be 
followed by a vote on or in relation to the amendment.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, the Senator from Nebraska is on his way. 
He is expected to be here soon. I wonder if I could place a quorum 
call----
  Mr. DOLE. Maybe better yet, as I understand, the Nickles amendment 
numbered 2556, I was advised by Senator Nickles that had been worked 
out to the satisfaction of both sides.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. To my knowledge, I do not know of any objection.
  Mr. BRADLEY. Mr. President, Senator Nickles has spoken to me about 
this amendment and as I understand he has modified his amendment. At 
this moment, I do not know if he has modified it.
  Mr. DOLE. Maybe we will put in a quorum call and we will find Senator 
Nickles. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                    Amendment No. 2556, as modified

  Mr. DOLE. I now ask unanimous consent we move to consideration of 
2556, the Nickles amendment, and I send a modification to the desk 
which has been cleared by the distinguished Senator from New Jersey 
[Mr. Bradley].
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The 
amendment is so modified.
  The amendment (No. 2556), as modified, is as follows:

       Section 913, page 602 of the amendment, strike line 22 
     through page 603 line 5 and insert in lieu thereof the 
     following:
       ``(d) Civil Money Penalties on Noncomplying Employers.--The 
     State shall have the option to set a State civil money 
     penalty which shall be less than--
       ``(1) $25; or
       ``(2) $500 if, under State law, the failure is the result 
     of a conspiracy between the employer and the employee to not 
     supply the required report or to supply a false or incomplete 
     report.''

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. If there is no further debate, the question is 
on agreeing to the amendment 2556, as modified.
  The amendment (No. 2556), as modified, was agreed to.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on the Exon amendment 
2525.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. EXON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the quorum call 
be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 2525

  Mr. EXON. Mr. President, I apologize to the managers of the bill. I 
did not mean to delay them. I stepped off the floor for the first time 
for 10 minutes assuming there were other measures ahead of mine. But I 
am now prepared to offer my amendment.
  I offered this amendment last week. I made a concise statement at 
that time. I believe that I have 5 minutes under the unanimous-consent 
agreement.
  Is that correct?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there is allowed 10 
minutes of debate equally divided.
  Mr. EXON. I thank the Chair.


                    Amendment No. 2525, As Modified

  Mr. EXON. After introducing the amendment last week, I have a very 
minor addition to the amendment that was suggested by my friend and 
colleague, Senator Simpson from Wyoming, with whom I have worked on 
this matter for a long, long time.
  I ask unanimous consent that this minor addition be announced and 
considered, and the amendment itself be considered at this time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. If there is no objection, the amendment is 
modified.
  The amendment, as modified, is as follows:

       On page 302, between lines 5 and 6, insert the following:

     SEC. 506. PROHIBITION ON PAYMENT OF FEDERAL BENEFITS TO 
                   CERTAIN PERSONS.

       (a) In General.--Notwithstanding any other provision of law 
     and except as provided in subsection (b), Federal benefits 
     shall not be paid or provided to any person who is not a 
     person lawfully present within the United States.
       (b) Exceptions.--Subsection (a) shall not apply with 
     respect to the following benefits:
       (1) Emergency medical services under title XIX of the 
     Social Security Act.
       (2) Short-term emergency disaster relief.
       (3) Assistance or benefits under the National School Lunch 
     Act.
       (4) Assistance or benefits under the Child Nutrition Act of 
     1966.
       (5) Public health assistance for immunizations and, if the 
     Secretary of Health and Human Services determines that it is 
     necessary to prevent the spread of a serious communicable 
     disease, for testing and treatment of such disease.
       (c) Definitions.--For purposes of this section:
       (1) Federal benefit.--The term ``Federal benefit'' means--
       (A) the issuance of any grant, contract, loan, professional 
     license, or commercial license provided by an agency of the 
     United States or by appropriated funds of the United States; 
     and
       (B) any retirement, welfare, Social Security, health, 
     disability, public housing, post-secondary education, food 
     stamps, unemployment benefit, or any other similar benefit 
     for which payments or assistance are provided by an agency of 
     the United States or by appropriated funds of the United 
     States.
       (2) Person lawfully present within the united states.--The 
     term ``person lawfully present within the United States'' 
     means a person who, at the time the person applies for, 
     receives, or attempts to receive a Federal benefit, is a 
     United States citizen, a permanent resident alien, an alien 
     whose deportation has been withheld under section 243(h) of 
     the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1253(h)), an 
     asylee, a refugee, a parolee who has been paroled for a 
     period of at least 1 year, a national, or a national of the 
     United States for purposes of the immigration laws of the 
     United States (as defined in section 101(a)(17) of the 
     Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(17)).
       (d) State Obligation.--Notwithstanding any other provision 
     of law, a State that administers a program that provides a 
     Federal benefit (described in section 506(c)(1)) or provides 
     State benefits pursuant to such a program shall not be 
     required to provide such benefits to a person who is not a 
     person lawfully present within the United States (as defined 
     in section 506(c)(2)) through a State agency or with 
     appropriated funds of such State.
       (e) Verification of Eligibility.--
       (1) In general.--Not later than 18 months after the date of 
     the enactment of this Act, the Attorney General of the United 
     States, after consultation with the Secretary of Health and 
     Human Services, shall promulgate regulations requiring 
     verification that a person applying for a Federal benefit, 
     including a benefit described in section 506(b), is a person 
     lawfully present within the United States and is eligible to 
     receive such benefit. Such regulations shall, to the extent 
     feasible, require that information requested and exchanged be 
     similar in form and manner to information requested and 
     exchanged under section 1137 of the Social Security Act.
       (2) State compliance.--Not later than 24 months after the 
     date the regulations described in subsection (1) are adopted, 
     a State that administers a program that provides a Federal 
     benefit described in such subsection shall have in effect a 
     verification system that complies with the regulations.
       (3) Authorization of appropriations.--There are authorized 
     to be appropriated such sums as may be necessary to carry out 
     the purposes of this section.
       (f) Severability.--If any provision of this title or the 
     application of such provision to any person or circumstance 
     is held to be unconstitutional, the remainder of this title 
     and the application of the provisions of such to any person 
     or circumstance shall not be affected thereby.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who yields time?
  
[[Page S 13568]]

  Mr. EXON addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from 
Nebraska.
  Mr. EXON. Mr. President, I will make some brief remarks on this. I 
believe there is strong support on this. I will be asking for the yeas 
and nays. And I would agree to have the yeas and nays ordered at any 
time that the managers of the bill think are in order.
  Mr. President, last Friday I offered an amendment to the welfare 
reform bill which states that Federal benefits shall not be paid or 
provided to any person who is not lawfully present within the United 
States. I have introduced measures to address this problem in the past 
and the Senate accepted a very similar amendment in 1993 by a vote of 
85 for and only 2 against, and only to see it unfortunately dropped in 
conference.
  My amendment specifically defines who is a person lawfully present 
within our country. Previous prohibitions on the payment of benefits to 
illegal aliens have been weakened by expansive agency regulations and 
court decision. My amendment also provides for a number of exceptions. 
Illegal aliens would still be eligible for elementary and secondary 
education, emergency medical services, disaster relief, school lunches, 
child nutrition, and immunization.
  Also, States would not be obligated to provide benefits to those not 
lawfully present in our country, and funds would be provided for States 
to set up systems to verify the status of the applicants. As we 
continue to debate welfare reform, I believe it is evidence that we 
must not pass up this opportunity to stop, once and for all, providing 
scarce Federal benefits to illegal aliens.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor and reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. GRAHAM addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Florida.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I yield 3 minutes to the Senator from 
Florida.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I would first, if I could, ask the Senator 
from Nebraska if he would yield for a question?
  Mr. EXON. Certainly.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I would say to the Senator, I was 
particularly concerned about the issue of elementary and secondary 
education. The Senator stated that his amendment would not deny the 
child of a person who was in the country illegally access to elementary 
and secondary education?
  Mr. EXON. That is correct.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Could the Senator tell me where in the amendment that was 
mentioned?
  Mr. EXON. It may well be that the Senator from Florida did not 
understand. That was incorporated in the amendment and was suggested as 
an exception by the Senator from Wyoming. And I think it satisfies the 
concerns of the Senator from Florida. It is in the amendment on which 
we are now discussing and on which we will vote. If you are talking 
about the amendment that I offered last Friday, it is not in there. But 
it is in the amendment that we will be voting on.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, the answer to that question allayed one of 
my principal concerns about this amendment, because in the original 
form, the form that was at the desk, there was no recognition of the 
children of persons who were in the country illegally in terms of their 
participation in elementary and secondary education.
  In fact, there was a provision which would have allowed the States to 
have terminated educational assistance to those children as well as the 
Federal Government terminating whatever assistance it provides. With 
that modification, I will reserve final judgment as to how I will vote 
on this amendment. But I would like to raise the fundamental issue, the 
Federal Government has the total constitutional responsibility for the 
enforcement of our borders, and for our immigration and naturalization 
law. It is written almost in those terms in article 1 of the U.S. 
Constitution. The States have no authority in either of those two 
areas.
  Second, when the Federal Government fails to carry out its 
responsibility and to enforce the borders, it is the States and the 
local communities who have the principal obligations and consequences 
of that failure.
  Third, those consequences are heavily focused in about six States. 
Six States have over 80 percent of those persons who are in the country 
illegally living within their borders.
  So, fourth, the consequence of this legislation is to say the Federal 
Government failed to carry out its exclusive constitutional 
responsibility: To protect the borders and enforce the immigration 
laws, allow large numbers----
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Coverdell). The Senator's time has 
expired.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I ask the manager for 1 additional minute.
  Mr. EXON. How much time do I have remaining?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nebraska has 2 minutes 57 
seconds remaining.
  Mr. SIMPSON. May I inquire whether I may receive 30 seconds from the 
Senator from Nebraska?
  Mr. EXON. I yield 30 seconds to my colleague from Wyoming.
  Mr. SIMPSON. I do not want to interrupt the Senator from Florida.
  Mr. EXON. I yield to the Senator from Wyoming when he gets the floor.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I yield an additional minute to the 
Senator from Florida and 1 minute to the Senator from Massachusetts.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, to conclude, we are about to set up what I 
think is a very unsafe situation: The Government fails to carry out its 
constitutional responsibility, and for the people who are illegally in 
communities across America, we are saying the Federal Government is 
going to deny any benefits to those people, which means those 
communities already the most heavily impacted now, out of their 
resources, have to pick up those responsibilities.
  As a humanitarian society, we are still going to face providing 
health care, delivering babies to pregnant women, and the negative 
aspects of operating a criminal justice system and the other 
requirements when that illegal population acts in ways that are 
antithetical to the society in which they are living.
  Reserving the right to review the amendment in its final form, I 
raise for my colleagues the potential consequences of this amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from 
Massachusetts.
  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I, too, want to express that Senator 
Exon's amendment does not include the elementary and secondary 
education. Under the initial amendment, there is about $225 million 
that goes into States, into local communities to respond to Supreme 
Court holdings with regard to their requirements to educate these 
children. But this has eliminated that.
  I welcome the opportunity to work with the Senator. We have, for 
example, 11,000 temporary nurses that come here to work in many of our 
urban area hospitals. Under this requirement, their residency 
requirements are such that they would not be able to get nursing 
licenses the way this is being interpreted, which would put a severe 
pressure on many of the inner-city hospitals in underserved areas.
  I know that is not the intention of the Senator. I welcome the 
opportunity as this legislative process moves forward in some of these 
areas that we can work through to try to not have unintended 
consequences that would provide a hardship rather than to achieve the 
objectives of the amendment.
  Mr. SIMPSON addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from Wyoming 
for 30 seconds.
  Mr. SIMPSON. Mr. President, I want to thank my friend, my colleague. 
Senator Exon came to the Senate when I did. His consistency on this has 
been clear through the years, and we have taken care of the problems 
brought up by Senator Graham and by Senator Kennedy.
  I look forward to working with the Senator on these issues, as with 
Senator Kennedy, the ranking member of the subcommittee, which I chair.
  We have also taken care of in this amendment veterans issues. There 
will be no diminution of veterans benefits, no denial of veterans 
benefits to someone who may have been illegal but 

[[Page S 13569]]
served the country. So it takes care of that and takes care of the 
education issue.
  I thank the Senator from Nebraska.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nebraska has 2 minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. EXON. I am prepared to yield back my time to move things ahead.
  I ask for the yeas and nays on the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  Mr. EXON. Mr. President, is there remaining time in opposition to the 
amendment?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. All time in opposition has been yielded back.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Will the Senator from Nebraska yield 1 minute to me?
  Mr. EXON. I will be glad to yield a minute.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I rise in support of the Senator's 
amendment because I think this is a very important part of the Federal 
Government's responsibility to control our borders.
  I am one of the States that is affected by the illegal aliens that 
come across the border, and they do take not only from our State and 
local coffers, but from the Federal coffers as well. This is something 
that we must stop. I think the Senator from Nebraska has a very good 
amendment, and I think it should be part of an overall illegal 
immigration reform measure that the Senator from Wyoming and the 
Senator from California, Senator Feinstein, are working on. But until 
that time, it is very important that we speak in this welfare reform 
bill to the cost of illegal aliens.
  So I appreciate what the Senator from Nebraska has done, and I 
support his amendment.
  Mr. EXON. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Texas very much for 
the kind statement and support. Since no one is seeking time, I yield 
back the remainder of my time, and the yeas and nays have already been 
granted.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question now occurs on agreeing to the 
Exon amendment No. 2525, as modified. The yeas and nays have been 
ordered. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 94, nays 6, as follows:
                      [Rollcall Vote No. 424 Leg.]

                                YEAS--94

     Abraham
     Akaka
     Ashcroft
     Baucus
     Bennett
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Bradley
     Breaux
     Bryan
     Bumpers
     Burns
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Chafee
     Coats
     Cochran
     Cohen
     Conrad
     Coverdell
     Craig
     D'Amato
     Daschle
     DeWine
     Dodd
     Dole
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Exon
     Faircloth
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Ford
     Frist
     Glenn
     Gorton
     Graham
     Gramm
     Grassley
     Harkin
     Hatch
     Hatfield
     Heflin
     Helms
     Hollings
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Inouye
     Jeffords
     Johnston
     Kassebaum
     Kempthorne
     Kennedy
     Kerrey
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Kyl
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lott
     Lugar
     Mack
     McCain
     McConnell
     Mikulski
     Moseley-Braun
     Moynihan
     Murray
     Nickles
     Nunn
     Packwood
     Pell
     Pressler
     Pryor
     Reid
     Robb
     Rockefeller
     Roth
     Santorum
     Sarbanes
     Shelby
     Simpson
     Smith
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stevens
     Thomas
     Thurmond
     Warner
     Wellstone

                                NAYS--6

     Brown
     Grams
     Gregg
     Murkowski
     Simon
     Thompson
  So the amendment (No. 2525), as modified, was agreed to.
  Mr. DOLE. 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.
  Mr. DOLE. 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. DOLE. Mr. President, the Democratic leader asked me to institute 
a quorum call, which I did, but I think we have an amendment of the 
Senator from California, Senator Feinstein, which can be accepted. We 
will be prepared to do that.
  Then the amendment of the Senator from North Dakota was set aside. 
Apparently he is prepared to proceed on that. It is part of our list, 
so I think it will be appropriate to do that. So I will work to clear 
it with Senator Daschle.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. That is correct.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from 
California.


                           Amendment No. 2470

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 2470.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from California [Mrs. Feinstein] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2470.

  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 text of the amendment is printed in the Friday, September 8, 
1995, edition of the Record.)
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I believe this amendment has been 
cleared on both sides. What the amendment does is require procedures 
for a child support order for the child of minor parents, where the 
mother is receiving assistance for the child, to be enforceable against 
the paternal grandparents of the child.
  For just a moment--what the Dole bill does is require a minor mother 
and her child to live at home with her parents, so the maternal parents 
are responsible. What my amendment would do is say, where it is 
possible, a child support order should be obtained against the parents 
of the male involved. It takes two to tango in this instance, and the 
responsibility for the care of the child should not only belong to the 
maternal grandparents but the paternal as well.
  So this solves the other half of the problem.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, we have no problem with the amendment. It 
has been cleared on this side.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. It has been cleared on this side.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. If there be no further debate, the question is 
on agreeing to the amendment.
  The amendment (No. 2470) was agreed to.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. DOLE. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. DOLE. Are there any other amendments that have been cleared? I 
think the Senator from Massachusetts has one or two minor amendments 
that I do not see any problem with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from New 
Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I had amendment No. 2483, which I 
thought might have been cleared by now. I will be prepared to offer 
that if it has been cleared.
  Mr. DOLE. I say to the Senator from New Mexico, if he will let me 
check that--what is the number?
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Amendment No. 2483. I believe that is going to be 
acceptable. If it is, I am ready to offer it at any time.
  Mr. DOLE. Let me check and I will be right back with the Senator.
  I think the Senator from Massachusetts has two amendments.
  Mr. KERRY addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from 
Massachusetts.


                 En Bloc Amendments Nos. 2662 and 2664

  Mr. KERRY. I thank the Chair. We are just ascertaining the numbers. 
Mr. President, I ask amendment No. 2662 and amendment No. 2664 be 
called up.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. Kerry], proposes 
     amendments numbered 2662 and 2664, en bloc.

  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the 
amendments be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (The texts of the amendments are printed in the Friday, September 8, 
1995, edition of the Record.)

[[Page S 13570]]

  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, these are two amendments which I thank the 
distinguished manager and majority leader and the Senator from New York 
for accepting.
  Mr. President, as we trudge toward the rhetorical goal of ending 
welfare as we know it, we as a country must do better; we must embrace 
whole new ideas of how to accomplish this--if not now, at least in the 
future--primarily by investing in impoverished children and secondarily 
by providing a safety net for their parents. The guiding principle of 
our new system should be to summon the very best effort this country 
can mount to enable children who are victims of poverty to become self-
sufficient adults capable of contributing to our society in a positive 
way and leading happy, fulfilling lives.
  Dependency--whether it be on the foster care system when a person is 
a child, or on Government institutions such as the welfare or criminal 
justice systems if a person is an adult, or on drugs at any age--is a 
tragic waste of human potential and imposes costs we as a nation need 
not suffer and cannot afford to pay.
  In many ways, welfare works--it is perhaps the cheapest means of 
getting the bare minimum of resources to the neediest slice of the 
American public; but in critical ways, it does not--it can perpetuate 
dependency rather than inculcate self-sufficiency. At the very least, 
by itself, it does not promote movement toward self-sufficiency.
  The way to make the most of the current welfare reform movement is--
without ignoring the good welfare may have done over the years--to 
design our priorities and construct a better system able to meet the 
minimal needs of today's recipients while doing everything possible to 
ensure that children on welfare don't become adults on welfare and that 
adults on welfare move whenever possible toward self-sufficiency.
  The focal points for any effort to replace welfare with an 
intervention program which targets children must be our Nation's 
schools. There is a vital role that schools must play that they can't 
play without greater resources, voluntarism, and attention.
  In cities beset by crime and violence, and in rural areas with little 
to inspire or occupy children, the neighborhood public school must 
become a beacon--a warm, safe haven of learning, of values, of 
friendship, of intellectual growth.
  No school in such areas should shut its doors at 3 p.m. and stop its 
contribution to children's and parents' lives.
  Case in point is teenage mothers, especially those who fail to avoid 
having children because they see no worthwhile future that awaits them 
if they avoid having children.
  We must invest in efforts to educate these children about the costs 
and realities of parenthood, and we must invest in education programs 
that provide real futures for school-age pregnant girls and new mothers 
and, where they can be identified, new fathers.
  We must think in the longterm, and understand that money dedicated to 
ending welfare dependency by investing in children will not only save 
money in the long run, it will
 help save this country.

  We are throwing away our future by ignoring the children of this 
country. One day all who can read this article will be senior citizens, 
fully dependent on the babies we neglect today. So will be our Nation 
and its future.
  If we fail to meet the needs of these children, not only will we fail 
to maintain this country's status as leader of the democratic world to 
which we have contributed so much, but we will devolve into a country 
consumed by crime and poverty the likes of which this Nation cannot 
imagine.
  We have already fallen deeper into crime than our parents would have 
ever dreamed. It will not matter that parents have raised their own 
children well if they raise them so they are alone in that distinction. 
Without concerted, collective effort, even children raised with love 
and concern--whether in low income or high income families--will not be 
safe and secure.
  We have already lost a frightening number of a complete generation of 
children to unambitious welfare programs, inadequate schooling, and 
societal neglect. Nothing less than the survival of our Nation depends 
on our collective assumption of our responsibility of this Nation's 
young.
  Parents, schools, communities, and the Government need to become 
immersed in the development and enculturalization of children.
  I believe we need to face the reality that this welfare debate is 
part of a much larger debate that we will be forced to have in this 
country in the not-too-distant future. It is a debate that speaks to 
the soul of America, and ultimately will have to come from our hearts 
as well as from our heads. It is a debate about not only solving our 
fiscal deficit, but also about addressing the cultural and spiritual 
deficits that seem to be tearing at the fabric of our society.
  It is about a welfare mother who can't read and a system that doesn't 
care. It is about a teenager with a child she cannot care for and a 
community that will not help. It is about what we ultimately decide is 
the legitimate cost of failing to care, and about what we are willing 
to invest in the effort to manifest the care we claim.
  We need to address the basic philosophical issue of responsibility to 
each other as a community of people.
  The battle is over how we do this. How do we stop children from 
having children? How do we solve the problem of mothers who cannot work 
because they have no daycare for their children and no extended family 
able to help them? What do we do about young teenagers growing up in 
increasingly violent neighborhoods--kids with diminished valves and an 
increasingly diminished sense of right and wrong? We are seeing the 
rise of a generation of Americans who think there's more power in the 
barrel of a gun than in the memory of a computer.
  The true question is how do we prepare for a better future in this 
Nation? The answer, I believe, is to invest in people and to seek long-
term solutions to welfare problems to improve our collective future 
rather than succumb to simple-sounding, quick fixes that carry 
tremendous unseen burdens for our future.
  But, Mr. President, the bill we have before us simply does not do 
what needs to be done.
  I offer two amendments today that invest in children, education, and 
families, reaching toward the objective that no one will be isolated 
from the mainstream of productive society.
  Mr. President, it is well-established that some children of welfare 
dependent parents are subjected to inadequate care, supervision, and 
parental love and attention, to unsafe environments and undesirable 
influences. It should come as no surprise that many of these children 
fail to develop into responsible, self-sufficient adults who are 
contributing members of society. Too often welfare becomes a repetitive 
cycle extending over multiple generations rather than a temporary 
situation.
  Part of the answer to breaking this pathological cycle is to require 
parents seeking welfare to take an active role in the supervision, 
education, and care of their children. Another part is to make better 
and more efficient use of existing public resources and investments for 
the benefit of at-risk children. Notable among those resources and 
investments are our public school facilities.
  While I do not believe it is possible for our Nation to successfully 
and acceptably resolve our current welfare problems wholly without 
further public investment, neither of these two partial answer to those 
problems entails significant additional cost.
  We cannot afford to neglect children when we know full well that 
improving their surroundings helps prevent their long-term dependence 
on government aid. All the nations with which we are competing in the 
new global marketplace are acting in recognition of that fact--except 
us. We must boldly pursue the long-term benefits promised by concerted 
efforts to make maximum use of our schools and educational facilities, 
and by insisting that all welfare recipient parents accept basic 
parental responsibilities--that many of them routinely perform 
admirably under difficult circumstances but some appear to ignore.
  My amendments would move in these directions.
  My first amendment would provide funds for demonstration projects so 
keep schools that serve at-risk children open for more hours and to 
initiate 

[[Page S 13571]]
new programs so that schools can offer an alternative to the street for 
our Nation's unsupervised youth. This companion program would 
complement the Community Schools Program.
  My second amendment would require parents to sign a parental 
responsibility contract that would demand, in exchange for benefits, 
that parents take an active role in the supervision and education of 
their children.
  Mr. President, these two amendments are only first steps. But they 
are steps in the right direction: toward the brighter future of this 
Nation.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I have no objection to the amendments.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. There is no objection on this side. To the contrary.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. If there be no further debate, the question is 
on agreeing to the en bloc amendments.
  The en bloc amendments (Nos. 2662 and 2664) were agreed to.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. KERRY. I thank the majority leader and thank the Senator from New 
York.
  Mr. DOLE. As I understand it, the Senator from California has a 
demonstration amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from 
California.


                           Amendment No. 2479

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 2479.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from California [Mrs. Feinstein] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2479.

  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 text of the amendment is printed in the Friday, September 8, 
1995, edition of the Record.)
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, what this amendment does is 
essentially assures that, in those large counties or groups of counties 
with a population greater than 500,000, that there be provision, with 
permission of the State--this is the modification in the amendment--
that the money, the block grant, go directly to the county. So we have 
modified the amendment from its original presentation. My understanding 
is that it is agreeable to both sides.
  The purpose of the amendment is, really, so many of the innovative 
demonstration projects that are initiated by counties, which I pointed 
out in my opening remarks on this amendment, can go ahead without an 
additional element of bureaucracy.
  Again, the State would have to approve this, but for those counties 
that do their own administration, this would continue to be the case.
  Mr. DOLE. Has the modification been sent to the desk?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair reports the modification does not 
appear to be at the desk.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. LEVIN. 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. LEVIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the amendment of 
the Senator from California be temporarily laid aside so I can make a 
unanimous-consent request and have my amendment considered. It has been 
cleared.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
                    Amendment No. 2486, As Modified

  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I now ask unanimous consent that a 
modification to my amendment, No. 2486, be sent to the desk and be in 
order.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment (No. 2486), as modified, is as follows:

       On page 12, between lines 22 and 23, insert the following:
       (G) Community Service.--Not later than 3 years after the 
     date of the enactment of this Act, consistent with the 
     exception provided in section 404(d), require participation 
     by, and offer to, unless the State opts out of this provision 
     by notifying the Secretary, a parent or caretaker receiving 
     assistance under the program, after receiving such assistance 
     for 6 months--
       (i) is not exempt from work requirements; and
       (ii) is not engaged in work as determined under section 
     404(c),

     in community service employment, with minimum hours per week 
     and tasks to be determined by the State.

  Mr. DOLE. As I understand, the amendment, as modified, is acceptable 
on this side.
  Is that correct?
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. It most assuredly is on our side.
  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, if I could spend 30 seconds, I have long 
believed that work requirements should be clear, strong, and applied 
promptly. For too long we have permitted welfare dependency to 
undermine the potential productivity of too many able-bodied Americans. 
We have allowed too many able-bodied welfare recipients not to work. 
That is wrong.
  The amendment which I am offering would add a requirement that 
welfare recipients be in job training and school or working in private 
sector jobs within 6 months of receipt of benefits, and if private 
sector jobs could not be found they be required to perform some type of 
community service employment. The requirement would be phased in over 3 
years to allow States the chance to adjust administratively. We have 
added in this modification a opt-out provision for States by 
notification of the Secretary of Health and Human Services, and also to 
make clear the intent to conform to the modifications which Senator 
Dole made to his amendment No. 2280 last week.
  The bill before us requires recipients to work within no more than 2 
years of receipt of benefits. Why wait that long? Why wait 2 years? 
Unless an able-bodied person is in school or job training, why wait 
longer than 6 months to require that a person have a private job or be 
performing community service?
  My amendment says 6 months instead of 2 years.
  There is no doubt that there is a great need in local communities 
across the country for community service workers. Last year, the demand 
for community service workers from the President's AmeriCorps Program 
was far greater than the ability to fund them. According to AmeriCorps, 
of the 538 project applications requesting approximately 60,000 
workers, only applications for about 20,000 workers could be funded. 
Projects ranged from environmental cleanup, to assisting in day care 
centers, to home health care aides. It is clear that there is no 
shortage of need for workers in community service.
  The Daschle amendment which was narrowly defeated last week contained 
a similar provision which was added as a modification at my request. It 
would require that recipients work in community service employment if 
not employed in the private sector, engaged in job training or in 
school, and it would require that States offer the community service 
option to such recipients.
   Mr. President, I have long been concerned about the cycle of 
dependency and the need to return welfare recipients to work. As long 
as 14 years ago, in 1981, I was the author, along with Senator Dole, of 
legislation which was enacted into law that put some welfare recipients 
back to work as home health care aides, thereby decreasing the welfare 
rolls and increasing the local tax base.
  This demonstration project called for the training and placement of 
AFDC recipients as home care aides to Medicaid recipients as a long-
term care alternative to institutional care, and was subject to 
rigorous evaluation in both the demonstration and post-demonstration 
periods.
  The independently conducted program evaluation found that during six 
of the seven demonstration projects, trainees' total monthly earnings 
increased by 56 percent to more than 130 percent. Evaluations in 
following years indicated similarly positive and significant income 
effects. Consistent with the increase in employment, trainees also 
received reduced public benefits. All seven States moved a significant 
proportion of trainees off of AFDC. In 

[[Page S 13572]]
four of the States, a significant proportion of the trainees also were 
moved off of the Food Stamp Program or received significantly reduced 
benefit amounts.
  Additionally, the program evaluation indicated that it significantly 
increased the amount of formal in-home care received by Medicaid 
clients and had significant beneficial effects on client health and 
functioning. The evaluation also indicated that clients benefited from 
marginally reduced costs for the services they received.
  As the 1986 evaluation shows, this type of demonstration had great 
potential in allowing local governments to respond to priority needs 
and assist members of their community in obtaining the training 
necessary to obtain practical, meaningful private sector employment and 
become productive, self-sufficient members of their community.
   Mr. President, I want to highlight a particularly wise provision in 
Senator Dole's bill. It is a provision which states that any recipient 
may be treated as participating in community service employment if that 
person provides child care services to other individuals participating 
in the community service program. This is a good idea. It opens a way 
for many able-bodied persons currently on welfare, to provide a service 
to others, meet work requirements, and, at the same time, free others 
to work who may otherwise have difficulty locating affordable child 
care. I hope that many States will vigorously exercise this provision 
and that recipients will heed the encouragement to provide child care 
services as a way of engaging in community service employment.
   Mr. President, I am hopeful that in the 104th Congress, we will take 
the necessary steps to get people off welfare and working, in the 
private sector, if possible, but in community service, if necessary. 
Experience has shown we must be more aggressive in requiring recipients 
to work. I believe my amendment is a firm step in the right direction.
  Mr. President, I thank Senator Moynihan and Senator Dole and their 
staff for working with us on this.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I urge adoption of the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the amendment is agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 2486), as modified, was agreed to.
  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote by which the 
amendment was agreed to.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DOLE. 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. DOLE. Mr. President, I think they are working out a modification 
on the amendment of the Senator from California, Senator Feinstein. I 
understand there are four or five amendments that will be cleared here 
momentarily.
  I would like to indicate that I will consult with the Democratic 
leader and hopefully have a cloture vote here within the next hour. I 
do not think we are going to reach an agreement. And we are not going 
to pass the bill if we have to accommodate every request from the other 
side.
  So I am prepared to have a cloture vote. If we do not get cloture, 
this bill will go into reconciliation.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. 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. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I see the Senator from California has 
risen.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from 
California.


                    Amendment No. 2479, As Modified

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I send a modification to amendment No. 
2479 to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the amendment is so 
modified.
  The amendment (No. 2479), as modified, is as follows:

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

     ``SEC. 413. 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 providing that such 
     State contains more than one country with a population of 
     greater than 500,000.
       ``(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 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 the 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 then 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.
       ``(5) eligible countries are defined as:
       ``(A) a county that is already administering the welfare 
     program under this part;
       ``(B) represents less than 25% of the State's total welfare 
     caseload.''
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I believe, Mr. President, that these modifications 
have been cleared, and are as I reported earlier.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. I believe that is the case on our side, Mr. President.
  Mr. DOLE. The amendment has been cleared on this side.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the amendment is agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 2479), as modified, was agreed to.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote by which 
the amendment was agreed to.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, in an effort to protect the rights of the 
Senator from North Dakota [Mr. Conrad], I ask unanimous consent that in 
the event of a cloture vote, if cloture was invoked, his amendment 
would still be in order under the same conditions, the same time limit 
as previously ordered.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I thank the majority leader for his usual 
gracious consideration.
  I thank the Chair. I yield the floor.
  I note the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Kyl). Without objection, it is so ordered.


Amendments Nos. 2578, 2481, 2670; 2542, as modified; 2551, as modified; 
  2601, as modified; 2507, as modified; and 2280, as further modified

  Mr. DOLE. I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now proceed to the 
following amendments en bloc, that the 

[[Page S 13573]]
amendments be considered modified where noted with modifications, which 
I will send to the desk at the appropriate time: D'Amato No. 2578, 
Feingold No. 2481, Kerrey of Nebraska No. 2670, modified McCain 2542, 
modified Kohl 2551, modified Faircloth 2601, modified Wellstone No. 
2507.
  And then finally a further modification to amendment No. 2280.
  I send the modifications to the desk.
  The amendments (Nos. 2542, 2551, 2601, 2507) as modified, are as 
follows:

                           Amendment No. 2542

       On page 216, line 4, strike ``6 months'' and insert ``1 
     year''.
                                                                    ____


                           Amendment No. 2551

       On page 158, between lines 14 and 15, insert the following:

     SEC. 801. DECLARATION OF POLICY.

       Section 2 of the Food Stamp Act of 1977 (7 U.S.C. 2011) is 
     amended by adding at the end the following: ``Congress 
     intends that the food stamp program support the employment 
     focus and family strengthening mission of public welfare and 
     welfare replacement programs by--
       ``(1) facilitating the transition of low-income families 
     and households from economic dependency to economic self-
     sufficiency through work;
       ``(2) promoting employment as the primary means of income 
     support for economically dependent families and households 
     and reducing the barriers to employment of economically 
     dependent families and households; and
       ``(3) maintaining and strengthening healthy family 
     functioning and family life.''.
       On page 189, between lines 17 and 18, insert the following:
       (d) Additional Matching Funds.--Section 16(h)(2) of the Act 
     (7 U.S.C. 2025(h)(2)) is amended by inserting before the 
     period at the end the following: ``, including the costs for 
     case management and casework to facilitate the transition 
     from economic dependency to self-sufficiency through work''.
       On page 189, line 18, strike ``(d)'' and insert ``(e)''.
                                                                    ____


                           Amendment No. 2601

       On page 190, between lines 17 and 18, insert the following:
       ``(2) Rules and procedures.--If a disqualification is 
     imposed under paragraph (1) for a failure of an individual to 
     perform an action required under part A of title IV of the 
     Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 601 et seq.), the State agency 
     may use the rules and procedures that apply under part A of 
     title IV of the Act to impose the same disqualification under 
     the food stamp program.
       On page 190, line 18, strike ``(2)'' and insert ``(3)''.
       On page 202, line 15, strike the closing quotation marks 
     and the following period.
       On page 202, between lines 15 and 16, insert the following:
       ``(3) Rules and procedures.--If the allotment of a 
     household is reduced under this subsection for a failure to 
     perform an action required under part A of title IV of the 
     Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 601 et seq.), the State agency 
     may use the rules and procedures that apply under part A of 
     title IV of the Act to reduce the allotment under the food 
     stamp program.''.
                                                                    ____


                           Amendment No. 2507

       On page 161, strike lines 8 through 12 and insert the 
     following:
       (a) In General.--Section 5(d) of the Food Stamp Act of 1977 
     (7 U.S.C. 2014(d)) is amended by striking paragraph (11) and 
     inserting the following: ``(11) a one-time payment or 
     allowance made under a Federal or State law for the costs of 
     weatherization or emergency repair or replacement of an 
     unsafe or inoperative furnace or other heating or cooling 
     device,''.
       Beginning on page 161, strike line 24 and all that follows 
     through page 162, line 3, and insert the following:
       (B) in paragraph (2), by striking subparagraph (C) and 
     inserting the following:
       ``(C) a payment or allowance described in subsection 
     (d)(11);'';

  The modification to the amendment (No. 2280, as further modified) is 
as follows:

       Add the following to the end of subsection (D): ``, state 
     funds expended for the Medicaid program under title XIX of 
     this Act or any successor to such program, and any state 
     funds which are used to match federal funds or are expended 
     as a condition of receiving federal funds under federal 
     programs other than under title I of this Act.''

  Mr. DOLE. Further, that the amendments be considered agreed to and 
that any statements relating to them be placed at the appropriate place 
in the Record.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  So the amendments (Nos. 2578, 2481, 2670, 2542, as modified; 2551, as 
modified; 2601, as modified; and 2507, as modified) were agreed to.
  Mr. DOLE. I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
                           amendment no. 2507

         certain liheap expenses should be excluded from income

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, the amendment I am offering today is 
designed to address a potentially serious oversight in the majority 
leader's version of the welfare reform bill which must be clarified. 
The Dole substitute would repeal the longstanding provision in the 
current Federal food stamp law which excludes from income measurements 
any regular Low-Income Energy Assistance Program benefits provided by 
State and Federal energy assistance programs, such as monthly utility 
payments. LIHEAP is the major Federal fuel subsidy program, which has 
in my State been a cold-weather lifeline for vulnerable unemployed 
people, the elderly, and children for many years.
  As many of my colleagues know, Minnesota is often called the icebox 
of the Nation, where bitterly cold weather is the norm. In fact, 
Minnesota is the third coldest State, in terms of heating degree days, 
in the country, after Alaska and North Dakota. Especially in cold-
weather States like Minnesota, funding for LIHEAP is critical to 
families with children and vulnerable low-income elderly persons, who 
without it could be forced to choose between food and heat. The LIHEAP 
program assists approximately 110,000 households in Minnesota, and 
provides an average energy assistance benefit of about $360 per heating 
season.
  In the frenzy of getting this bill modified in the final days before 
it hit the floor, as was often the case with many of these so-called 
reforms, the net may have unintentionally been cast too widely. That is 
why some have urged that this repeal be corrected and clarified to 
ensure that it would only apply to regular energy assistance payments 
for heating and cooling, such as monthly utility payments, and not to 
the types of emergency furnace repair or replacement payments, or 
weatherization, or other similar payments, that are provided to many 
low-income Americans through State and Federal energy assistance 
programs.
  My amendment will do just that. It explicitly excludes energy 
assistance payments for things like emergency furnace repairs and 
replacement, and weatherization expenses, from being counted as income 
for purposes of calculating eligibility for food stamp benefits. Unsafe 
and inoperative heating systems can pose serious problems, including 
fires, monoxide poisoning, and other life-threatening hazards. This 
amendment is designed in part to prevent people in my State, and across 
the country, from being forced to choose between eating, and heating, 
when their furnace breaks down or their home needs to be weatherized to 
protect them from severe cold. It is designed to allow them to make 
their homes safe and habitable, and protect their families from the 
cold, when faced with these immediate and urgent needs. Of necessity, 
my State has a strong and vital weatherization program, though efforts 
to slash LIHEAP funding over the years have required them to scale back 
substantially the services they can provide and the numbers of 
Minnesotans they can serve. Vastly more people in my State are eligible 
for LIHEAP than can be served in any given year. And these are very 
low-income people, including many seniors on fixed incomes. More than 
two-thirds of LIHEAP households have annual incomes less than $8,000; 
more than one-half have incomes below $6,000. Further, the average 
LIHEAP recipients spend 18.4 percent of their income on energy, 
compared with 6.7 percent for all households.
  While there are other provisions of the Food Stamp Act which could be 
construed to exclude lump sum payments for things like emergency 
furnace repairs and replacement, and weatherization, I wanted to make 
certain that an explicit exclusion was contained in this bill for these 
kinds of expenses, to avoid any potential confusion or ambiguity on 
this matter down the road. I appreciate the support of Senator 
Feingold, and his work on this amendment, and I am grateful that my 
colleagues from Indiana and Vermont are willing to accept the 
amendment.
  Very simply, then, my amendment makes explicit an exclusion for 
certain State and Federal energy assistance payments, including those 
made to repair or replace broken furnaces, or to 

[[Page S 13574]]
weatherize homes by weatherstripping leaky windows and doors, by 
installing insulation, or by taking other steps as necessary to protect 
families from the cold. By excluding from income measurement all such 
one-time repair or weatherization payments, as distinguished from 
regular, ongoing LIHEAP utility payments, from
 the calculation of eligibility for food stamp benefits, of course I do 
not intend to have counted as income assistance payments made in 
situations where a family's furnace may need repair more than once in a 
winter, or may need certain types of weatherization more than once in a 
year. It is basically to exclude from income calculation energy 
assistance payments or allowances that are occasional and urgent, like 
a furnace repair, not those which are regular and ongoing, like a 
regular LIHEAP subsidy.

  It is very simple, and will ensure that families are not, by a quirk 
of the bureaucratic rules, forced off the food stamp rolls because 
their furnace explodes, or goes off in the middle of a dark, cold 
night, and they replace it with help from LIHEAP. This amendment will 
prevent this bizarre result. When it is 30 degrees below zero, Mr. 
President--not uncommon in my State--that is a real emergency. And it 
must be dealt with immediately. We should make sure we do not build 
into the system disincentives for people to get furnaces fixed in a 
crisis, or incentives for elderly people or parents to risk themselves 
and their families in dangerous situations with unventilated space 
heaters or other hazards, simply because they are unable to afford, for 
example, modest furnace repairs.
  As my colleagues from cold-weather States know, furnace repair and 
replacement can be very expensive, often costing several thousand 
dollars. This large and unexpected expense should not knock otherwise 
eligible families off the food stamp rolls simply because they need 
help for LIHEAP. We do not want to have people heating their kitchens 
with their stoves, or with leaky and dangerous kerosene space heaters, 
or with charcoal grills--all of which is done--because they could not 
afford to get their heat turned back on, or their furnace repaired or 
replaced, in the face of bitter cold weather. Each winter we read in 
the papers of people who die in such tragic situations. We must do all 
we can to ensure that does not happen, and this amendment takes another 
step in that direction.
  Finally, let me say that I am still very concerned about the impact 
of the general provision in this bill, which repeals altogether the 
exclusion for ongoing, regular LIHEAP fuel subsidies for food stamp 
calculations, on thousands of people in my State. In Minnesota, LIHEAP 
does not even come close to paying the average $1,800-$2,000 costs of 
heating a home in the winter; people are still carrying most of these 
costs. But this particular amendment is crafted more narrowly, to meet 
the objections of those who insist that the general LIHEAP exclusion 
for food stamps be repealed outright. It is designed to make explicit 
an exclusion for that narrow category of energy assistance payments 
that are for the purposes I have described. I believe it is a real 
improvement to the bill, and I urge its adoption.
  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I am pleased that this amendment offered 
by my colleague from Minnesota [Mr. Wellstone] is being accepted, and 
am proud to join him as an original co-sponsor. I believe that this 
amendment clarifies the bill to specifically exclude one-time capital 
improvement payments for home weatherization or repair or replacement 
of unsafe and inoperative heating and cooling equipment from counting 
as income when figuring food stamp benefits.
  Under the Dole proposal as originally drafted there may have been 
ambiguity as to whether LIHEAP moneys received by individuals for one-
time capital improvements count as income when figuring food stamp 
benefits. With this amendment, it is clear that this bill does not 
intend to affect such payments. LIHEAP is perhaps best known as the 
program that assists eligible individuals by subsidizing a portion of 
the costs of their home utility bills. However, as many in this body 
whose States have active LIHEAP programs are aware, LIHEAP moneys are 
also used by States, such as my home State of Wisconsin, in emergency 
situations to purchase new home heating and cooling devices and to 
weatherize homes.
  My State is involved in two capital improvement programs funded by 
LIHEAP. Participants in these two programs would have been dramatically 
affected by the underlying bill if it were not amended. About $5.9 
million of the LIHEAP grant funds received by my State of Wisconsin, 
about 15 percent of the total received, are combined with State funds 
and other Federal funds from the Department of Energy's weatherization 
program into a pool to conduct audits of eligible homes for one-time 
weatherization improvements, such as window replacement and weather 
stripping. At the same time these home weatherization audits are being 
undertaken, the State might also act to replace or repair a furnace 
which is found to be in disrepair. In fiscal year 1994, the last full 
year for which data are available, 5,800 homes were audited in 
Wisconsin, and of those 1,600 had their heating systems replaced.
  In addition, the LIHEAP program in my State keeps $1 million in 
reserve, which it matches with oil overcharge funds, to conduct 
emergency activities in homes that it has not audited under its more 
routine audit program. In fiscal year 1994, 1,440 dangerous or 
inoperative furnaces were repaired or replaced on an emergency basis. 
This past summer, Mr. President, it was this program that responded to 
the blistering heat in the upper Midwest that claimed the lives of so 
many this summer.
  This amendment is very simple, and I believe it makes a substantive 
improvement in the underlying proposal. Someone should not become 
ineligible for food stamps in a given program year, Mr. President, 
because their furnace breaks and the price of a new furnace, paid for 
by the LIHEAP program, would push them out of the eligible income 
bracket. Furnaces are extremely costly purchases for anyone, Mr. 
President. Even an average middle class Wisconsin family would have to 
budget in order to afford to replace one. Last year, the average cost 
of a new furnace provided by the LIHEAP program was $2,000. This 
expense could bump people on the margins out of the program, while 
their living standard, except for the fact that they may have averted 
both a house fire and personal injury by replacing their furnace, does 
not change at all.
  I joined with my colleague from Minnesota because I am concerned that 
the counting of one-time LIHEAP payments as income may create a 
disincentive among food stamp recipients to undertake needed emergency 
repair activities. Some have argued throughout the debate on welfare 
reform that individuals receiving food stamp, AFDC, and other benefits 
make behavioral decisions that affect their benefit level. By their 
nature, Mr. President, these capital improvements are often unplanned 
and unpredictable. Every Senator in this body should be sensitive to 
the fact that sometimes the furnace just stops working, and these 
families, as hard as they might be working and trying to comply with 
the program as proposed, simply would not have the extra funds on hand 
to cover the repair. We should be very mindful of that fact that as 
individuals begin to move from welfare to work, as proposed by the 
measure before us, they are generating the primary support for them and 
their families--not savings. Without LIHEAP support there may be no 
other source of funds to act in these emergency situations.
  While I am concerned about including LIHEAP utility bill subsidies as 
additions to income, I understand that excluding these rate subsidy 
payments would be a very controversial proposal. In my State, as in 
many others, LIHEAP never pays the whole heating bill. The amount of 
the bill paid ranges from 18.5 to 72 percent of the total, the 
individual always has the responsibility to pay a portion of the bill. 
Because they pay a portion, recipients are encouraged to conserve and 
to maintain a responsible payment schedule. As it is, Mr. President, in 
my home State of Wisconsin, the average LIHEAP household heating fuel 
cost is 10.6 percent of the recipient's total income, and after 
receiving assistance it is 5.7 percent of income; the average Wisconsin 
citizen's household heating fuel cost is 2.6 percent of their income. 

[[Page S 13575]]

  To address the concerns that some have about the LIHEAP utility bill 
subsidy, however, this amendment is narrowly crafted to just address 
the issue of one-time LIHEAP payments. I believe that for safety 
reasons this amendment is also justified. As my colleagues know, old 
furnaces are extremely dangerous, as are the alternatives, such as 
space heaters. In crisis situations, my State LIHEAP program informs 
me, individuals resort to a whole host of heating techniques, including 
using charcoal grills indoors and relying on an electric or gas stove 
as a primary heat source. Despite the fact that this is 1995, Mr. 
President, 4 percent of Wisconsin LIHEAP program homes, or 5,720 
households, are still wood heated, and 10 percent are trailer housing 
dependent upon propane tanks for their heat, another 14,300 households. 
Additionally, there is the concern of in-home carbon monoxide poisoning 
which, according to an article in the New York Times on May 14, 1995, 
sends 5,000 people each year to the emergency room with nonfatal 
illnesses and claims the lives of 250 people annually.
  I think, Mr. President, that just as some in this body believe it 
would be a failed reform of the welfare system to continue to encourage 
people on the margins to engage in certain behaviors to increase their 
benefits, it would also be a failed reform if we were to encourage 
unsafe behavior by individuals for fear of losing benefits. This 
amendment avoids the classic heat or eat dilemma by clarifying that the 
Senate does not intend for one-time energy improvement payments to 
count as income, and I am pleased that it will be added to the 
underlying measure.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I think we have made a lot of progress in 
the last hour, hour and a half. We have taken a lot of amendments, and 
I think right now I understand some of our colleagues are negotiating 
certain aspects of the bill. It is my understanding the Democratic 
leader would like to have us at this point have a quorum call so we 
would not be engaged in any--unless somebody wished to speak. We do not 
want any rollcall votes.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. 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. MOYNIHAN. I ask unanimous consent that the two amendments that 
were laid aside yesterday, the Faircloth amendment No. 2608 and the 
Daschle amendment No. 2672, be considered in order postcloture under 
the same restraints as previously agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. MOYNIHAN. I thank the Chair. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  Mr. President, may I say we do not anticipate votes between now and 2 
o'clock.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DORGAN. 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. DORGAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 5 
minutes as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The 
Senator is recognized for 5 minutes.

                          ____________________