[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 206 (Thursday, December 21, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H15550]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 PROPOSED RULE CHANGE ON BOOK ROYALTIES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from Connecticut [Ms. DeLauro] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. DeLauro. Mr. Speaker, last week the bipartisan House Committee on 
Standards of Official Conduct unanimously passed a resolution in 
response to a complaint involving Speaker Gingrich's $4.5 million book 
deal with Harper Collins. Together, five Republicans and five Democrats 
agreed that the Speaker's book deal gave the appearance of capitalizing 
on public office. The committee has proposed changing the rules of this 
House to avoid any future allegations of Members cashing in on public 
office in this manner.
  The rule change would limit outside royalty income to $20,400 a year, 
and the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct promised that that 
proposal would come up on to the floor before Christmas. I might add 
that the $20,400 is the amount of outside earned income that Members 
cannot earn from a variety of different kinds of professions that they 
might be in.
  The only exception has been the book royalty exemption, and what this 
resolution is about is to try to close that loophole which was 
heightened by the fact that the Speaker was in the process of a $4.5 
million book deal with Harper Collins last year.
  The Committee on Standards of Official Conduct is charged with 
establishing the bounds of acceptable behavior for Members of this 
institution. That bipartisan committee has made a unanimous decision 
that accepting millions of dollars of outside income in the form of 
book royalties is beyond the bounds of acceptable behavior. I might add 
that after weeks and weeks of delay in this effort of bringing this 
resolution to the floor, that I understand from the colloquy that was 
held on the floor tonight with the majority leader, that in fact the 
resolution will come up tomorrow, and I applaud that decision. There 
had been a fair amount of stonewalling on this issue, despite the work 
of the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct and the work of the 
chairperson of the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct.
  It is time to allow this Committee on Standards of Official Conduct 
to do its job. Bring this rule change to the floor of the House for a 
vote, and I know that I will follow the recommendations of the 
Committee on Standards of Official Conduct members, and I suspect that 
most Members of this House, of the people's House, will follow the lead 
of Committee on Standards of Official Conduct members.
  My hope is that that resolution will be on the floor tomorrow morning 
before we depart here for the holidays. We must deal with this issue; 
we must remove any cloud or anything that puts into question whether or 
not a Member is using his or her office for personal gain. That is not 
why people in our districts give us the faith and trust that they do to 
come here and vote on their behalf. Our time, our effort, has to be 
focused on their interests, what their concerns are in their lives. 
That is why we hold these offices.
  So I am pleased that this will come up tomorrow. We do not need any 
more delays. Finally, I do believe that the majority of this house will 
vote and follow the lead of the Committee on Standards of Official 
Conduct members.

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