[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 212 (Saturday, December 30, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H15641-H15642]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




            ASSURING ALL FEDERAL EMPLOYEES WORK AND ARE PAID

  Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent for the immediate 
consideration of the Senate bill (S. 1508) to assure that all Federal 
employees work and are paid.
  The Clerk read the title of the Senate bill.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Missouri?
  Mr. EMERSON. Mr. Speaker, reserving the right to object, I yield to 
the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Gephardt].
  Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, it is my purpose today to try to bring up the bill that 
has already been passed in the Senate, S. 1508, which as I understand 
it would put the Federal employees back to work, promising that they 
would be paid retroactively immediately and would get the Government up 
and running right away without any other conditions which might 
interrupt the passage of this legislation.
  Mr. EMERSON. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I yield to the 
gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Hoyer].
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. 
Emerson] for yielding to me.
  Mr. Speaker, we have now been in a crisis mode for some weeks, the 
longest that Federal employees have been placed at risk in the history 
of our country. Families are disrupted and in fear. Fathers and mothers 
are wondering how they are going to pay January's mortgage payment, how 
they are going to keep their families together, how they are going to 
run their lives. They realize, as every American realizes, that there 
is a confrontation between the White House and the Congress, between 
Republicans and Democrats on how to resolve the reconciliation bill, 
the so-called budget bill.
  What the majority leader of the Senate did, Senator Dole, was to say 
to the Senate, ``As we debate the differences between us, let us not 
shortchange either the Federal workers or the American taxpayer. Let us 
have our workers come to work. Let us have them be perceived as 
essential for doing America's business,'' and then, because the Speaker 
and the majority leader have said we are going to do it, we will pay 
them when we come out of this crisis.
  That is appropriate to do. It is important to give them that 
confidence. But it is also important for the American taxpayer that 
they work, and they want to work. I have had literally thousands of 
calls to my office of people who want just simply to do their job, to 
go to work, to contribute, not to have a backlog, and to give their 
families confidence in the new year.
  Mr. Speaker, this request of the minority leader, S. 1508, is a 
request by our side to unanimously pass what the majority leader, the 
Republican leader of the U.S. Senate, has put before the Senate and the 
Senate has passed overwhelmingly. I would hope that my friend, the 
gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Emerson], would not object, because it is 
my understanding that the alternative to this is placing S. 1508 on the 
unanimous-consent calendar for 

[[Page H15642]]
the purposes of amending it and sending it back to the Senate with 
something that the Senate has said they will not take. I do not think 
our side is going to object to that, but it is a false hope, I fear, 
for our Federal employees, and for their families.
  Mr. EMERSON. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I yield to the 
gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Moran].
  Mr. MORAN. Mr. Speaker, I thank my good and very decent friend, the 
gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Emerson], for yielding to me.
  Mr. Speaker, 1995 should be the year of the Federal employee. From 
the bombing in Oklahoma City to the fact that we have now reduced 
117,000 jobs from the Federal Government, and now to the longest 
furlough, shutdown, in the history of the Federal Government, Federal 
employees have been punished through no fault of their own. It is time 
we brought an end to the real suffering that these families are 
experiencing. And not only is it the anxiety, it is what we have done 
to the perception of public service.
  A recent poll was taken of all the honor roll students in the 
country. Only 10 percent chose public service as a career they wanted 
to enter. This may be why, what we in the Congress have done to the 
Federal civil servant. So I would hope that we would seize this 
opportunity before us right now to accept legislation that passed by 
unanimous consent in the Senate.
  If we agree to this, we can now put Federal employees back on the 
job. By January 3 we will have paid out or agreed to pay out $1.6 
billion to Federal employees for not performing work on the job. This 
is just to the Federal employees who have been furloughed, who have 
been locked out of their jobs. Some Federal employees have tried to get 
back into their offices, because they felt guilty about the fact that 
their colleagues were having to do their work. They were told it is 
illegal even to volunteer to perform their job.

  They do not want to get paid for not working, they want to work. They 
should get paid for working. What this will do will ensure that they 
are put back on the job. All Federal employees will be considered 
essential employees, and then we will ensure that they get compensated 
for their work. This is the right thing to do, it is overdue.
  I appreciate the fact that we have colleagues on the other side who 
would support this, and will recognize the value of civil servants. I 
appreciate the leader of my party offering this amendment. I would hope 
that we would now agree to it, by unanimous consent, just as was done 
by the Senate, and Federal employees can be back on the job by Tuesday, 
if we will do this.
  Mr. EMERSON. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I yield to the 
distinguished gentleman from Fairfax County, VA [Mr. Davis].
  Mr. DAVIS. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman yielding to me.
  I just want to rise in support of the minority leader's request. We 
have introduced a companion bill to S. 1508 which the gentlewoman from 
Maryland [Mrs. Morella], the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Wolf], the 
gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Moran], the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. 
Hoyer], and others have cosponsored here. This would simply call that 
up. This would put Federal employees back to work. We have said we are 
going to pay them. Let us let them earn their way the way they would 
like to do.
  It just seems that if we want to recruit and maintain the best and 
brightest for Federal service, given the fact that they are undergoing 
downsizing and their benefits are being cut, these furloughs and unpaid 
Christmases are just not the way to go. This will put them back to 
work. I support the request.
  Mr. EMERSON. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I yield to the 
gentlewoman from Montgomery County, MD [Mrs. Morella].
  Mrs. MORELLA. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me.
  Mr. Speaker, I think it is very important that we let our people go 
back to work. It has been much too long that we have had this partial 
shutdown No. 2. I know that Federal employees want to go back to work. 
I know many of them, despite the fact that they are furloughed, are 
showing up at laboratories and going in the back entrances in order to 
perform the critical work. I know of two-parent families where both of 
them are furloughed because one is with Commerce and one is with Labor, 
or one is with Education, or the other areas where we have not come up 
with appropriations for them.
  It also has a critical adverse effect, consequences for the private 
sector, too. So many people are touched by this. It is important that 
we get our Federal employees back to work so they recognize that they 
are essential, they are excepted from furloughs, they are emergency, 
they are important to our country. What has happened with this shutdown 
has been demoralizing at the very least, so I support getting our 
Federal employees back to work, and this bill that we are looking at 
today mirrors exactly the bill that we put in on Wednesday.
  Mr. EMERSON. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I yield to the 
gentleman from Fairfax County, VA [Mr. Wolf].
  Mr. WOLF. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this, too. I will have more to say 
a little later about the whole issue, but this would get Federal 
employees back, and when we think in terms of Federal employees, I 
think it is important to think in terms of the mission, perhaps; the 
FBI agent, that if everyone here had a husband or a wife or a son or a 
daughter kidnaped today, the first person you would call would not be 
your local police, it would be the FBI, or a Federal employee.
  Members claim that they are concerned about drugs in the schools and 
drugs coming out of Mexico and places like that, but the people that we 
look to to keep drugs out of the country are the DEA agents, all 
Federal employees. My mom and dad both died of cancer. Cancer runs in 
my family. The cancer researcher at NIH is a Federal employee.
  I think we have gotten so wrapped up, focusing on the words ``Federal 
employee,'' and forgetting the individual mission. Who in the country 
wants to not have cancer researchers working at NIH? Who does not want 
the DEA to be active and involved to stop drugs coming in? Who does not 
want the FBI to be on the job and working? I heard the Chaplain talk 
about mercy and justice. I think this is an opportunity for mercy and 
justice. This resolution and the next resolution would get us on the 
way.
  The last thing I want to say as a Republican and as a conservative 
Republican, and I am very proud to be called a conservative Republican, 
and I send my entire voting record out to every household in my 
district, there is nothing inconsistent, there is nothing inconsistent 
with being a strong supporter of a balanced budget in 7 years, scored 
by the CBO, and putting Federal employees back to work. There is 
nothing, nothing inconsistent. The day people believe there is an 
inconsistency there, then I think the thinking in this country has gone 
astray. To put an FBI agent back, a cancer researcher back, a DEA 
researcher back, a Social Security worker back is not inconsistent.
  I am committed and have voted to see that we bring a balanced budget 
in, scored by the CBO, and that in the process, we do not do the other 
thing. As we hear, the end never justifies the means. The ends never, 
never justify the means.
  Mr. EMERSON. Mr. Speaker, in consideration of certain procedural 
amenities that must be followed, I reluctantly object.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Schiff). Objection is heard.

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