[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 1 (Wednesday, January 3, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H58-H59]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   SPEAKER GINGRICH MAY RECESS HOUSE SUBJECT TO THE CALL OF THE CHAIR

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Kingston] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, first, I want to go over a resolution 
which has raised the eyebrows of a number of our colleagues here that 
the House leadership filed with the Committee on Rules today. It has 
been described as a resolution which will allow the House to go on 
vacation or recess until the 23d of January, and I wanted to make the 
point to my colleagues, because I think there is genuine concern about 
this, that that is not what the resolution does.
  It says that the Speaker may declare a recess subject to the call of 
the Chair on January 5 through Tuesday, January 9; and then the Speaker 
may declare a recess subject to the call of the Chair from January 9 to 
January 12, and it goes on from January 12 to January 16, and from the 
16th through the 19th, but it does not call for a recess. It gives the 
Speaker the power to make the call on that, and I wanted to assure my 
colleagues----
  Mr. HEFNER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. KINGSTON. I yield to the gentleman from North Carolina.
  Mr. HEFNER. Mr. Speaker, I would ask the gentleman, if this passes 
until when, until January 23d?
  Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, I would tell the gentleman, no, this is 
the 5th.
  Mr. HEFNER. But it would be a continuing. He can only do it for 3 
days, and then he has to have the authority to do it for 3 more days. 
Is that the understanding?
  What I want to get at is how many legislative days would from now, 
until when, the 23d or whatever, how many legislative days would that 
entail? I say that for this reason; for people that would be filing 
discharge petitions or what have you.
  Would the gentleman explain to me exactly what it does one more time.
  Mr. KINGSTON. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I will show the 
gentleman the wording on this, because as it was described at the Chair 
to me, I was confused about it also.
  As I see it, it goes on a week-to-weekend, week-to-weekend time 
period, and it would give the Chair some discretion, yet, at the same 
time, we would not be going on vacation or recess unless the Chair had 
that----
  Mr. HEFNER. What I want to get at is, we would have what, in essence, 
would be a recess for 2 or 3 weeks, but there would only be 2 or 3 
legislative days that would be counted, if somebody wanted to file a 
discharge petition or what have you here in the House. Am I correct?
  Mr. KINGSTON. Reclaiming my time once again, I would say to my 
learned colleague, who has more experience at this than I do, that I am 
not certain how this impacts discharge petitions, and I assume the 
discharge petitions he is referring to are ones that affect the 
continuing resolution. Am I correct on that?
  Mr. HEFNER. Mr. Speaker, I understand the discharge petition has to 
lay for, say, so many days, but they have to be legislative days. Under 
this we could be in recess for 3 or 4 days but we would only have 1 
legislative day.
  Mr. KINGSTON. Is the gentleman saying discharge petitions 
specifically?
  Mr. HEFNER. I want to know how many legislative days it would entail 
if this authority was granted and the Speaker exercised it, as is his 
authority to do that.
  Mr. KINGSTON. As I read this, it allows the Speaker to declare a 
recess subject to the call of the Chair through the 9th, and then goes 
on from the 9th to the 12th and the 12th to the 16th.
  Mr. HEFNER. And he would have to do it again on the 9th through the 
following week.

[[Page H59]]

  Mr. KINGSTON. Let me say this, I will give this to the gentleman so 
that he can read it, because I had not read it earlier today when it 
was being made.
  Mr. HEFNER. When will this take place? Will this be tomorrow?
  Mr. KINGSTON. Should the House vote on it? It has been filed with the 
Committee on Rules. And, as the gentleman knows, I am not on the 
Committee on Rules and I do not choose to represent them. I just wanted 
to make sure that my colleagues and friends on that side of the aisle 
knew that there was more to it than that we were going home until the 
23d. Because I, like many of my colleagues, have a lot of concerns 
about the situation right now and would like to engage with them, if 
they care to dialog on the budget.
  What I am concerned about right now is that the interest on the 
national debt is the third largest expenditure in our entire budget 
right now. And that interest will exceed military spending in the next 
2 years if we do not get it under control.
  I will be happy to yield in a minute or two on the subject of the 
budget, because, as I said earlier, I do not want to represent the 
Committee on Rules on all the fine print of this.
  Mr. HEFNER. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would again yield for 30 
seconds for me to ask this question.
  Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield to my friend for 30 seconds, with 
the abundance of recognition from that side of the aisle that, 
ordinarily, it is hard for them to yield to us in special hour, so I am 
doing this in the camaraderie that I think this House needs more than 
ever.
  Mr. HEFNER. What I am getting at is this is the same procedure, if 
this passes, the same procedure we have been using for the past 12 
days; am I correct?

                          ____________________