[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 154 (Friday, September 29, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H9716-H9717]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   REGULATION OF POLITICAL EXPRESSION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Colorado [Mr. Skaggs] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. SKAGGS. Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned first thing this morning, 
there was a very interesting hearing yesterday before the Committee on 
Government Reform and Oversight on investigations having to do with the 
so-called Istook-McIntosh-Ehrlich proposal that masquerades as if it 
were 

[[Page H 9717]]
doing some kind of completely unobjectionable thing, namely making sure 
that Federal moneys that go to organizations that receive Federal 
moneys that go to organizations that receive Federal grants cannot use 
those funds for lobbying. That is already against the law; make no 
bones about that. But this hearing showed, I think, one of the many, 
many reasons why in fact this is a proposal that would grossly 
interfere with the free exercise of political expression, and free 
speech, and freedom of association, all profoundly important rights 
under the Constitution of the United States as protected in the first 
amendment.
  Mr. Speaker, one of the more instructive witnesses yesterday was the 
director of political affairs for the YMCA of America, a lady named 
C.J. Van Pelt, and she gave a very, very interesting presentation about 
exactly how burdensome, intrusive, and chilling for the involvement of 
the YMCA, hardly a radical organization, in the political life of this 
country, and we should understand that we are not talking about 
lobbying Congress. This bill goes way beyond that to deal with any, 
quote, political advocacy activities of any individual or organization 
in this country that may happen to receive anything of benefit or any 
grant money from the Federal Government. The restriction on any such 
organization, in this case the YMCA, and I say to the gentleman, ``Mr. 
McIntosh, I have only 5 minutes so I'm not going to have time to yield. 
I apologize.''
  Mr. Speaker, let me just take this moment. I would love it if perhaps 
the sponsors of this legislation would agree to a full hour of special 
orders sometime and we could really engage on this.
  Mr. McINTOSH. I think that would be beneficial.
  Mr. SKAGGS. Terrific; I thank the gentleman.
  Ms. Van Pelt made the following point: Under this proposed 
legislation the YMCA would be prohibited because it happens to engage 
in such things as provision of day care, dealing with prevention 
of crime, drug-aversion education, any number of other things for which 
it receives some Federal grant funding. Under this legislation it would 
be prohibited from spending more than 5 percent, probably significantly 
less than that in the case of the Y, more than 5 percent of its 
privately raised funds, on being involved in the political life of this 
country, appearing before a board of county commissioners to, for 
instance, argue with them about a drug-prevention program in their 
county or also appearing before Congress to talk about legislation that 
we may be considering.

  But Ms. Van Pelt explained that under their proposal, in order for 
her, as she would be required or as the YMCA would be required to 
certify every year adherence to this 5-percent limit, the YMCA of 
America would have to make inquiry of 140,000 vendors with which they 
do business around the country. Why in the world would they have to do 
that? Well, because one of the little known, but most perverse, aspects 
of this legislation would count anything that the YMCA spends with 
anybody else that happens to have exceeded another limit on political 
advocacy buried in this bill, and anything that the YMCA spends with 
anybody else that happens to have exceeded another limit on political 
advocacy buried in this bill, and anything they spent with somebody 
that violated this other limit would count against their 5-percent 
limit, and the only way they could certify that they complied was to 
find out from all 140,000 others with whom they do business to make 
sure that those 140,000 organizations and businesses had not exceeded 
their limit on political advocacy. My colleagues can imagine the kind 
of incredible paperwork burden, not to mention the intimidating and 
chilling effect on constitutionally protected speech in this country 
that comes out of just this small part of this ill-advised and perverse 
legislation.
  The extent to which some who advocate this legislation are willing to 
go was also demonstrated at the hearing yesterday in which 
unfortunately it came to light that the staff of this committee had 
engaged in an act of forgery, of concocting what was going to be a 
poster that was put out on the press table that misrepresented on 
facsimile letterhead vital information about one of the organizations 
that was to testify, did it with official funds in violation of any 
standard of decency.

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