[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 214 (Tuesday, January 2, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S19338-S19339]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      UNANIMOUS-CONSENT AGREEMENT

  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate 
receives from the House a bill entitled ``A bill to provide for deficit 
reduction and achieve a balanced budget by fiscal year 2002,'' and the 
majority and minority leaders are in agreement, that the bill should be 
considered under the reconciliation process, and then once the Senate 
begins consideration, the bill be deemed a reconciliation bill, and all 
provisions under the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 apply to the 
bill.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection? Without 
objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, let me just comment briefly here, because 
this is a matter of some contention. Even though it is a Senate matter, 
the reason we had expedited procedure in the other provision is we 
tried to get consent on the Senate side and it was objected to. So the 
House put in a bill and sent it over here. I think the concern was if 
we did reach some agreement with the President and the Democratic 
leaders in the House and Senate and Republican leaders in the House and 
Senate, that when it came to the Senate, it could be subject to 
filibuster and might take 2 weeks or 3 weeks.
  So I have discussed this at length with the Democratic leader, 
Senator 

[[Page S19339]]
Daschle, and we have agreed that if we have an agreement with the 
President and leadership, we will, in effect, say it is considered in 
the reconciliation process and be a reconciliation bill.
  Under those procedures, I can move to reduce the time to 15 hours, to 
20 hours, whatever, and it would speed up the process considerably. I 
hope my colleagues in the House appreciate the fact that we think we 
have moved along the process here considerably if, in fact, there 
should be an agreement. That is why we have stricken the expedited 
process language out of the previous bill.

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