[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 188 (Tuesday, November 28, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H13661-H13662]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                THE SHUTDOWN OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Barr). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of May 12, 1995, the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia 
[Ms. Norton] is recognized during morning business for 5 minutes.
  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, if we ask the average American what got shut 
down 25 days ago, They will say that the Federal Government got shut 
down 25 days ago. Well, I am here to tell my colleagues, Mr. Speaker, 
that the city in which the Congress does its business got shut down 
completely 25 days ago. The city got shut down with its own money.
  Mr. Speaker, because of limitations on home rule, our entire budget 
has to come here, although 85 percent of that budget is raised in the 
District of Columbia from District taxpayers. The District got shut 
down with its own money, although the District of Columbia is second 
per capita in taxes paid to the Federal Treasury among the 50 States 
and the District of Columbia.
  Suppose you represented people who paid that much tax and got shut 
down because they got caught in the middle of a debate that had nothing 
to do with them? I think you would be pretty mad, and so am I.
  Mr. Speaker, I am asking on day 18, as we move toward December 15, 
that whatever quarrels the Federal Government and the President get in 
among themselves, that you not shut down my city again. This is a city 
in the midst of an awesome financial crisis, and the most that the 
Congress of the United States has been able to think to do to it is to 
allow it to be shut down.
  Our appropriation is caught up here, 85 percent of that money, of 
course, being our own. What the Federal Government contributes is not a 
grant but is only a payment in lieu of taxes, because we cannot build 
on land occupied by the Federal Government and because we cannot build 
very high because of limitations put on us by the Congress of the 
United States. So who in the world would shut down people who are 
already in the midst of a financial crisis, except people who are 
unaccountable to the people in that city, the 600,000 people that I 
represent?
  Of course we, like the Federal Government, had to pay our employees, 
because they were put on forced administrative leave; and, thus, we 
have to pay for all of that lost productivity. Mr. Speaker, because of 
the fiscal crisis, these employees had already given back 6 furlough 
days and had already given back 12 percent of their pay because the 
city is in crisis.
  This city is not a Federal agency. We are demanding that we be 
treated like a city and not like a Federal agency--like a city that 
pays its own way.
  Mr. Speaker, I am asking that if we get to Day Zero and another 
continuing resolution is necessary, that D.C. not be put in another 
short-term continuing resolution. Do you realize what it is like to 
have to calibrate on a 2- or 3-week basis so that you do not 
overobligate your own money?
  My continuing resolution will say look, you can spend your own money; 
we are holding back part of the Federal payment. That is the least you 
can do if you want to insert onto our appropriation stuck up here on 
provisions you want to insert onto our appropriation that have been 
undemocratically put there by Members unaccountable to the voters of 
the District of Columbia. Free the D.C. appropriation.
  The chairman of the subcommittee, Mr. Davis has cosponsored an 
independent D.C. continuing resolution with me. Congress has already 
done damage, incalculable damage in shutting the District down. All I 
am asking now is if you cannot get our appropriation out, and I would 
not bet on getting it out by December 15, that the Congress not do more 
to hurt the innocent bystanders.
  Those are the people who pay the highest taxes, barring none, if you 
combine local taxes and Federal taxes in the United States. Those are 
the people who contribute more to the Federal Treasury than Members who 
represent any jurisdiction in the United States, except New jersey. We 
are second in Federal taxes only to New Jersey. So if you are not from 
New Jersey, you have to get behind the people I represent, get way 
behind them.
  Let us keep our city open. Can you imagine that the Federal 
Government was delivering mail, but we could not pick up the trash in 
the District of Columbia for a week because of a dispute between the 
President and the Congress? That is your business. Stay out of our 
business. Let us keep our city open. Do us no harm. Do not get caught 
in the middle.
  Shut down the Federal agencies if you must. That is your money. Do 
not shut down D.C. We have already paid for our city.

[[Page H 13662]]


           AMERICAN TROOPS IN BOSNIA A DANGEROUS PROPOSITION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of May 
12, 1995, the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Buyer] is recognized during 
morning business for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BUYER. Mr. Speaker, I am compelled to come to the House floor 
today, being a leader in this Congress, to speak against placing United 
States ground troops in Bosnia. Having listened to the President's 
address last night, I feel compelled to speak to not only the Members 
listening back in their offices but to the American people as well.
  On October 30, 1995, this House voted overwhelmingly in a bipartisan 
fashion on the Buyer-McHale resolution, and it was approved by a vote 
of 315 to 103. Ninety-three members of the Democratic caucus, almost 
half, supported the proposition that expressed a sense of this Congress 
that U.S. ground troops should not be a part of a peace agreement in 
the Balkans. This resolution passed because the President's plan is 
ill-conceived, poorly defined, and highly dangerous.
  It is ill-conceived because, over 2 years ago, the President promised 
25,000 U.S. troops to enforce a future peace agreement. The President 
made this commitment without knowing the mission or the conditions of a 
peace agreement.
  Peacing 25,000 United States troops on the ground to implement an 
agreement and to make an enforced peace is ill-conceived because the 
United States forces have lost the protection of neutrality after 
having bombed the Bosnian Serbs and promising to arm and train the 
Bosnian Moslems. U.S. troops, having lost this protection of 
neutrality, will become targets and casualties on the ground.
  The implementation plan has been poorly defined. What is the mission 
of the NATO force? We need very clear objectives. What are the criteria 
for success? What is the exit strategy? A date set for withdrawal in 1 
year is no exit strategy. Will the rules of engagement allow the force 
to accomplish the mission? How do we prevent the ``mission creep'' that 
we learned in Somalia that may escalate United States involvement in 
the Balkans beyond the time period which the President has set, and how 
do we keep United States troops from conducting nation-building 
exercises?
  This implementation plan is also highly dangerous in that the United 
States and NATO forces will enforce an agreement that is politically 
unsustainable in a region of the world that has a long history of all 
sides exercising vengeance and retribution on one another. This is a 
long-term ethnic and religious conflict that could take generations to 
cure.
  That is why the President of France has indicated that NATO's 
involvement in the Balkans could be 20 years, 20 years. Now the 
President is saying, we are only going in for 1 year, and we have this 
exit strategy. Twenty years. Think of this. It is generational.
  Now, the President last night made a good speech, but I would submit 
a good speech does not make good foreign policy. Whether it is mass 
murder or ethnic cleansing, the rape and the pillage and the plunder, 
the destruction are all violent to America's values. But if our foreign 
policy followed our heart and emotion, then U.S. troops would become 
the world's policeman and we would find ourselves in over 67 hot spots 
throughout the world. I do not believe America wants U.S. troops to be 
the world's policeman.
  That is why, Mr. Speaker, we tie U.S. troops and their commitments on 
foreign soil to vital national security interests. Mr. Speaker, that is 
a lesson we learned in Somalia, that when a nation, when one of our 
own, our finest sons or daughters take an oath to lay down their life 
for this country for liberties and economic freedoms that many people 
take for granted, we in this Congress must ensure, and that we believe 
in their solemn oath to make sure that their life is not given in vain, 
that it is tied to national security interests.

  I am extremely disappointed to be standing here and have the 
President of the United States ignore the will of this Congress, for we 
have voted twice on this issue of Bosnia in saying no to sending 
troops. I resent the position that the President of the United States 
has placed the American people in, I resent the position in which he 
has placed these American troops, and I resent the position that he has 
placed this U.S. Congress in. I remain highly skeptical of this 
deployment, and I recognize that the President, as Commander in Chief, 
can send these troops.
  The Framers of the Constitution created friction between the 
legislative body and the President. Do we have to have the friction? We 
are going to. We are going to, because the President has on the 
blinders. He has ignored the will of the American people and this 
Congress, and he is sending the troops.
  We control the purse stings. So what are we going to do? Well, I do 
not agree with the President's foreign policy with regard to placing 
ground troops in Bosnia. I believe that we have a key and vital role to 
play in the peace process and that we should be providing our air power 
and sea power and logistics on the ground in Bosnia but not sending the 
troops; and we have a duty to support our troops, but will narrow the 
parameters, define the criteria to minimize the loss of life.

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