[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 3 (Friday, January 5, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H226-H240]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1630
PROVIDING FOR DISPOSITION OF SENATE AMENDMENT TO HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION 
   134, MAKING FURTHER CONTINUING APPROPRIATIONS FOR FISCAL YEAR 1996

  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I 
call up House Resolution 336 and ask for its immediate consideration.
  The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:

                              H. Res. 336

       Resolved, That upon adoption of this resolution the House 
     shall be considered to have taken from the Speaker's table 
     the joint resolution (H.J. Res. 134) making further 
     continuing appropriations for the fiscal year 1996, and for 
     other purposes, with the Senate amendment thereto, and to 
     have concurred in the Senate amendment with an amendment 
     consisting of the text printed in the report of the Committee 
     on Rules accompanying this resolution.
       Sec. 2. House Concurrent Resolution 131 is hereby adopted.
       Sec. 3. The Clerk shall not transmit to the Senate a 
     message regarding H.J. Res. 134 until the House has received 
     a message that the Senate has agreed to House Concurrent 
     Resolution 131 as adopted by the House.

  The text of the Senate amendment and the motion are as follows:
       Senate amendment:
       
[[Page H227]]

       Strike out all after the resolving clause and insert:

                                TITLE I

 AID TO FAMILIES WITH DEPENDENT CHILDREN AND FOSTER CARE AND ADOPTION 
                               ASSISTANCE

     That the following sums are hereby appropriated, out of any 
     money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, and out of 
     applicable corporate or other revenues, receipts, and funds, 
     for the several departments, agencies, corporations, and 
     other organizational units of Government for the fiscal year 
     1996, and for other purposes, namely:
       Sec. 101. (a) Such amounts as may be necessary under the 
     authority and conditions provided in the applicable 
     appropriations Act for the fiscal year 1995 for continuing 
     the following projects or activities including the costs of 
     direct loans and loan guarantees (not otherwise specifically 
     provided for in this joint resolution) which were conducted 
     in the fiscal year 1995:
       All projects and activities funded under the account 
     heading ``Family support payments to States'' under the 
     Administration For Children and Families in the Department of 
     Health and Human Services;
       All projects and activities funded under the account 
     heading ``Payments to States for foster care and adoption 
     assistance'' under the Administration For Children and 
     Families in the Department of Health and Human Services;
       Such amounts as may be necessary for the medicaid program 
     under title XIX of the Social Security Act for the second 
     quarter of fiscal year 1996; and
       All administrative activities necessary to carry out the 
     projects and activities in the preceding three paragraphs:

     Provided, That whenever the amount which would be made 
     available or the authority which would be granted under an 
     Act which including funding for fiscal year 1996 for the 
     projects and activities listed in this section is greater 
     than that which would be available or granted under current 
     operations, the pertinent project or activity shall be 
     continued at a rate for operations not exceeding the current 
     rate.
       (b) Whenever the amount which would be made available or 
     the authority which would be granted under the Act which 
     included funding for fiscal year 1996 for the projects and 
     activities listed in this section as passed by the House as 
     of the date of enactment of this joint resolution, is 
     different from that which would be available or granted under 
     such Act as passed by the Senate as of the date of enactment 
     of this joint resolution, the pertinent project or activity 
     shall be continued at a rate for operations not exceeding the 
     current rate or the rate permitted by the action of the House 
     or the Senate, whichever is lower, under the authority and 
     conditions provided in the applicable appropriations Act for 
     the fiscal year 1995.
       (c) Whenever an Act which included funding for fiscal year 
     1996 for the projects and activities listed in this section 
     has been passed by only the House or only the Senate as of 
     the date of enactment of this joint resolution, the pertinent 
     project or activity shall be continued under the 
     appropriation, fund, or authority granted by the one House at 
     a rate for operations not exceeding the current rate or the 
     rate permitted by the action of the one House, whichever is 
     lower, and under the authority and conditions provided in the 
     applicable appropriations Act for the fiscal year 1995.
       Sec. 102. Appropriations made by section 101 shall be 
     available to the extent and in the manner which would be 
     provided by the pertinent appropriations Act.
       Sec. 103. No appropriation or funds made available or 
     authority granted pursuant to section 101 shall be used to 
     initiate or resume any project or activity for which 
     appropriations, funds, or other authority were not available 
     during the fiscal year 1995.
       Sec. 104. No provision which is included in the 
     appropriations Act enumerated in section 101 but which was 
     not included in the applicable appropriations Act for fiscal 
     year 1995 and which by its terms is applicable to more than 
     one appropriation, fund, or authority shall be applicable to 
     any appropriation, fund, or authority provided in this joint 
     resolution.
       Sec. 105. Appropriations made and authority granted 
     pursuant to this title of this joint resolution shall cover 
     all obligations or expenditures incurred for any program, 
     project, or activity during the period for which funds or 
     authority for such project or activity are available under 
     this joint resolution.
       Sec. 106. Unless otherwise provided for in this title of 
     this joint resolution or in the applicable appropriations 
     Act, appropriations and funds made available and authority 
     granted pursuant to this title of this joint resolution shall 
     be available until (a) enactment into law of an appropriation 
     for any project or activity provided for in this title of 
     this joint resolution, or (b) the enactment into law of the 
     applicable appropriations Act by both Houses without any 
     provision for such project or activity, or (c) January 3, 
     1996, whichever first occurs.
       Sec. 107. Expenditures made pursuant to this title of this 
     joint resolution shall be charged to the applicable 
     appropriation, fund, or authorization whenever a bill in 
     which such applicable appropriation, fund, or authorization 
     is contained is enacted into law.
       Sec. 108. No provision in the appropriations Act for the 
     fiscal year 1996 referred to in section 101 of this joint 
     resolution that makes the availability of any appropriation 
     provided therein dependent upon the enactment of additional 
     authorizing or other legislation shall be effective before 
     the date set forth in section 106(c) of this joint 
     resolution.
       Sec. 109. Appropriations and funds made available by or 
     authority granted pursuant to this title of this joint 
     resolution may be used without regard to the time limitations 
     for submission and approval of apportionments set forth in 
     section 1513 of title 31, United States Code, but nothing 
     herein shall be construed to waive any other provision of law 
     governing the apportionment of funds.

                                TITLE II

                          DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

     That the following sums are hereby appropriated, out of the 
     general fund and enterprise funds of the District of Columbia 
     for the District of Columbia for the fiscal year 1996, and 
     for other purposes, namely:
       Sec. 201. (a) Such amounts as may be necessary under the 
     authority and conditions provided in the applicable 
     appropriations Act for the fiscal year 1995 for continuing 
     projects or activities including the costs of direct loans 
     and loan guarantees (not otherwise specifically provided for 
     in this title of this joint resolution) which were conducted 
     in the fiscal year 1995 and for which appropriations, funds, 
     or other authority would be available in the following 
     appropriations Act:
       The District of Columbia Appropriations Act, 1996;

     Provided, That whenever the amount which would be made 
     available or the authority which would be granted in this Act 
     is greater than that which would be available or granted 
     under current operations, the pertinent project or activity 
     shall be continued at a rate for operations not exceeding the 
     current rate.
       (b) Whenever the amount which would be made available or 
     the authority which would be granted under the Act listed in 
     this section as passed by the House as of the date of 
     enactment of this joint resolution, is different from that 
     which would be available or granted under such Act as passed 
     by the Senate as of the date of enactment of this joint 
     resolution, the pertinent project or activity shall be 
     continued at a rate for operations not exceeding the current 
     rate or the rate permitted by the action of the House or the 
     Senate, whichever is lower, under the authority and 
     conditions provided in the applicable appropriations Act for 
     the fiscal year 1995: Provided, That where an item is not 
     included in either version or where an item is included in 
     only one version of the Act as passed by both Houses as of 
     the date of enactment of this joint resolution, the pertinent 
     project or activity shall not be continued except as provided 
     for in section 211 or 212 under the appropriation, fund, or 
     authority granted by the applicable appropriations Act for 
     the fiscal year 1995 and under the authority and conditions 
     provided in the applicable appropriations Act for the fiscal 
     year 1995.
       Sec. 202. Appropriations made by section 201 shall be 
     available to the extent and in the manner which would be 
     provided by the pertinent appropriations Act.
       Sec. 203. No appropriation or funds made available or 
     authority granted pursuant to section 201 shall be used to 
     initiate or resume any project or activity for which 
     appropriations, funds, or other authority were not available 
     during the fiscal year 1995.
       Sec. 204. No provision which is included in the 
     appropriations Act enumerated in section 201 but which was 
     not included in the applicable appropriations Act for fiscal 
     year 1995 and which by its terms is applicable to more than 
     one appropriation, fund, or authority shall be applicable to 
     any appropriation, fund, or authority provided in this title 
     of this joint resolution.
       Sec. 205. Appropriations made and authority granted 
     pursuant to this title of this joint resolution shall cover 
     all obligations or expenditures incurred for any program, 
     project, or activity during the period for which funds or 
     authority for such project or activity are available under 
     this title of this joint resolution.
       Sec. 206. Unless otherwise provided for in this title of 
     this joint resolution or in the applicable appropriations 
     Act, appropriations and funds made available and authority 
     granted pursuant to this title of this joint resolution shall 
     be available until (a) enactment into law of an appropriation 
     for any project or activity provided for in this title of 
     this joint resolution, or (b) the enactment into law of the 
     applicable appropriations Act by both Houses without any 
     provision for such project or activity, or (c) January 3, 
     1996, whichever first occurs.
       Sec. 207. Notwithstanding any other provision of this title 
     of this joint resolution, except section 206, none of the 
     funds appropriated under this title of this joint resolution 
     shall be expended for any abortion except where the life of 
     the mother would be endangered if the fetus were carried to 
     term or where the pregnancy is the result of an act of rape 
     or incest.
       Sec. 208. Expenditures made pursuant to this title of this 
     joint resolution shall be charged to the applicable 
     appropriation, fund, or authorization whenever a bill in 
     which such applicable appropriation, fund, or authorization 
     is contained is enacted into law.
       Sec. 209. No provision in the appropriations Act for the 
     fiscal year 1996 referred to in section 201 of this title of 
     this joint resolution that makes the availability of any 
     appropriation provided therein dependent upon the enactment 
     of additional authorizing or other legislation shall be 
     effective before the date set forth in section 206(c) of this 
     joint resolution.
       Sec. 210. Appropriations and funds made available by or 
     authority granted pursuant to this title of this joint 
     resolution may be used without regard to the time limitations 
     for submission and approval of apportionments set forth in 
     section 1513 of title 31, United States Code, but nothing 
     herein shall be construed to waive any other provision of law 
     governing the apportionment of funds.
       Sec. 211. Notwithstanding any other provision of this title 
     of this joint resolution, except section 206, whenever the 
     Act listed in section 201 as passed by both the House and 
     Senate as of 

[[Page H228]]
     the date of enactment of this joint resolution, does not include 
     funding for an ongoing project or activity for which there is 
     a budget request, or whenever the rate for operations for an 
     ongoing project or activity provided by section 201 for which 
     there is a budget request would result in the project or 
     activity being significantly reduced, the pertinent project 
     or activity may be continued under the authority and 
     conditions provided in the applicable appropriations Act for 
     the fiscal year 1995 by increasing the rate for operations 
     provided by section 201 to a rate for operations not to 
     exceed one that provides the minimal level that would enable 
     existing activities to continue. No new contracts or grants 
     shall be awarded in excess of an amount that bears the same 
     ratio to the rate for operations provided by this section as 
     the number of days covered by this resolution bears to 366. 
     For the purposes of this title of this joint resolution, the 
     minimal level means a rate for operations that is reduced 
     from the current rate by 25 percent.
       Sec. 212. Notwithstanding any other provision of this title 
     of this joint resolution, except section 206, whenever the 
     rate for operations for any continuing project or activity 
     provided by section 201 or section 211 for which there is a 
     budget request would result in a furlough of Government 
     employees, that rate for operations may be increased to the 
     minimum level that would enable the furlough to be avoided. 
     No new contracts or grants shall be awarded in excess of an 
     amount that bears the same ratio to the rate for operations 
     provided by this section as the number of days covered by 
     this resolution bears to 366.
       Sec. 213. Notwithstanding any other provision of this title 
     of this joint resolution, except sections 206, 211, and 212, 
     for those programs that had high initial rates of operation 
     or complete distribution of funding at the beginning of the 
     fiscal year in fiscal year 1995 because of distributions of 
     funding to States, foreign countries, grantees, or others, 
     similar distributions of funds for fiscal year 1996 shall not 
     be made and no grants shall be awarded for such programs 
     funded by this title of this resolution that would impinge on 
     final funding prerogatives.
       Sec. 214. This title of this joint resolution shall be 
     implemented so that only the most limited funding action of 
     that permitted in this title of this resolution shall be 
     taken in order to provide for continuation of projects and 
     activities.
       Sec. 215. The provisions of section 132 of the District of 
     Columbia Appropriations Act, 1988, Public Law 100-202, shall 
     not apply for this title of this joint resolution.
       Sec. 216. Notwithstanding any other provision of this title 
     of this joint resolution, except section 206, none of the 
     funds appropriated under this title of this joint resolution 
     shall be used to implement or enforce any system of 
     registration of unmarried, cohabiting couples whether they 
     are homosexual, lesbian, heterosexual, including but not 
     limited to registration for the purpose of extending 
     employment, health, or governmental benefits to such couples 
     on the same basis that such benefits are extended to legally 
     married couples; nor shall any funds made available pursuant 
     to any provision of this title of this joint resolution 
     otherwise be used to implement or enforce D.C. Act 9-188, 
     signed by the Mayor of the District of Columbia on April 15, 
     1992.

                               TITLE III

                           VETERANS' BENEFITS

     That the following sums are hereby appropriated, out of any 
     money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, and out of 
     applicable corporate or other revenues, receipts, and funds, 
     for the several departments, agencies, corporations, and 
     other organizational units of Government for the fiscal year 
     1996, and for other purposes, namely:

     SEC. 301. ENSURED PAYMENT DURING FISCAL YEAR 1996 OF 
                   VETERANS' BENEFITS IN EVENT OF LACK OF 
                   APPROPRIATIONS.

       (a) Payments Required.--In any case during fiscal year 1996 
     in which appropriations are not otherwise available for 
     programs, projects, and activities of the Department of 
     Veterans Affairs, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs shall 
     nevertheless ensure that--
       (1) payments of existing veterans benefits are made in 
     accordance with regular procedures and schedules and in 
     accordance with eligibility requirements for such benefits; 
     and
       (2) payments to contractors of the Veterans Health 
     Administration of the Department of Veterans Affairs are made 
     when due in the case of services provided that directly 
     relate to patient health and safety.
       (b) Funding.--There is hereby appropriated such sums as may 
     be necessary for the payments pursuant to subsection (a), 
     including such amounts as may be necessary for the costs of 
     administration of such payments.
       (c) Charging of Accounts When Appropriations Made.--In any 
     case in which the Secretary uses the authority of subsection 
     (a) to make payments, applicable accounts shall be charged 
     for amounts so paid, and for the costs of administration of 
     such payments, when regular appropriations become available 
     for those purposes.
       (d) Existing Benefits Specified.--For purposes of this 
     section, existing veterans benefits are benefits under laws 
     administered by the Secretary of Veterans Affairs that have 
     been adjudicated and authorized for payment as of--
       (1) December 15, 1995; or
       (2) if appropriations for such benefits are available 
     (other than pursuant to subsection (b)) after December 15, 
     1995, the last day on which appropriations for payment of 
     such benefits are available (other than pursuant to 
     subsection (b)).

     SEC. 302. EXPIRATION DATE.

       Section 301 shall expire on January 3, 1996.

       Motion offered by Mr. Livingston:
       Mr. Livingston moves that the House concur in the Senate 
     amendment with an amendment, as follows:
       (1) In lieu of the matter proposed by said amendment, 
     insert:

                                TITLE I

       That the following sums are hereby appropriated, out of any 
     money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, and out of 
     applicable corporate or other revenues, receipts, and funds, 
     for the several departments, agencies, corporations, and 
     other organizational units of Government for the fiscal year 
     1996, and for other purposes, namely:
       Sec. 101. (a) Such amounts as may be necessary under the 
     authority and conditions provided in the applicable 
     appropriations Act for the fiscal year 1995 for continuing 
     the following projects or activities including the costs of 
     direct loans and loan guarantees (not otherwise specifically 
     provided for in this Act) which were conducted in the fiscal 
     year 1995:
       All nutrition services for the elderly under the account 
     heading ``Aging services programs'' under the Administration 
     on Aging in the Department of Health and Human Services;
       All grants to States for child welfare services, authorized 
     by title IV, part B, subpart 1, of the Social Security Act, 
     under the account heading ``Children and families services 
     programs'' under the Administration for Children and Families 
     in the Department of Health and Human Services;
       All Federal Parent Locator Service activities, as 
     authorized by section 453 of the Social Security Act, under 
     the account heading ``Children and families services 
     programs'' under the Administration for Children and Families 
     in the Department of Health and Human Services;
       All State unemployment insurance administration activities 
     under the account heading ``State unemployment insurance and 
     employment service operations'' under the Employment and 
     Training Administration in the Department of Labor;
       All general welfare assistance payments and foster care 
     payments, as authorized by law, funded under the account 
     heading ``Operation of Indian programs'' under the Bureau of 
     Indian Affairs in the Department of the Interior;
       All projects and activities funded under the account 
     heading ``Family support payments to States'' under the 
     Administration For Children and Families in the Department of 
     Health and Human Services;
       All projects and activities funded under the account 
     heading ``Payments to States for foster care and adoption 
     assistance'' under the Administration For Children and 
     Families in the Department of Health and Human Services;
       All administrative activities necessary to carry out the 
     projects and activities in the preceding two paragraphs;
       All projects and activities funded under the account 
     headings ``Dual benefits payments account'', ``Limitation on 
     administration'' and ``Limitation on railroad unemployment 
     insurance administration fund'' under the Railroad Retirement 
     Board;
       All projects and activities necessary to accommodate 
     visitors and to provide for visitor services in the National 
     Park System, the National Wildlife Refuges, the National 
     Forests, the facilities operated by the Smithsonian 
     Institution, the National Gallery of Art, the John F. Kennedy 
     Center for the Performing Arts, and the United States 
     Holocaust Memorial; and
       All projects and activities necessary to process visas and 
     passports and to provide for American citizen services, 
     notwithstanding section 15 of the State Department Basic 
     Authorities Act of 1956: Provided, That whenever the amount 
     which would be made available or the authority which would be 
     granted under an Act which included funding for fiscal year 
     1996 for the projects and activities listed in this section 
     is greater than that which would be available or granted 
     under current operations, the pertinent project or activity 
     shall be continued at a rate for operations not exceeding the 
     current rate.
       (b) Whenever the amount which would be made available or 
     the authority which would be granted under the Act which 
     included funding for fiscal year 1996 for the projects and 
     activities listed in this section as passed by the House as 
     of the date of enactment of this Act, is different from that 
     which would be available or granted under such Act as passed 
     by the Senate as of the date of enactment of this Act, the 
     pertinent project or activity shall be continued at a rate 
     for operations not exceeding the current rate or the rate 
     permitted by the action of the House or the Senate, whichever 
     is lower, under the authority and conditions provided in the 
     applicable appropriation Act for the fiscal year 1995.
       (c) Whenever an Act which included funding for fiscal year 
     1996 for the projects and activities listed in this section 
     has been passed by only the House or only the Senate as of 
     the date of enactment of this Act, the pertinent project or 
     activity shall be continued under the appropriation, fund, or 
     authority granted by the one House at rate for operations not 
     exceeding the current rate or the rate permitted by the 
     action of the one House, whichever is lower, and under the 
     authority and conditions provide in the applicable 
     appropriations Act for the fiscal year 1995. 
     
[[Page H229]]

       Sec. 102. Appropriations made by section 101 shall be 
     available to the extent and in the manner which would be 
     provided by the pertinent appropriations Act.
       Sec. 103. No appropriation or funds made available or 
     authority granted pursuant to section 101 shall be used to 
     initiate or resume any project or activity for which 
     appropriations, funds, or other authority were not available 
     during the fiscal year 1995.
       Sec. 104. No provision which is included in the 
     appropriations Act enumerated in section 101 but which was 
     not included in the applicable appropriations Act for fiscal 
     year 1995 and which by its terms is applicable to more than 
     one appropriation, fund, or authority shall be applicable to 
     any appropriation, fund, or authority provided in this Act.
       Sec. 105. Appropriations made and authority granted 
     pursuant to this title of this Act shall cover all 
     obligations or expenditures incurred for any program, 
     project, or activity during the period for which funds or 
     authority for such project or activity are available under 
     this Act.
       Sec. 106. Unless otherwise provided for in this title of 
     this Act or in the applicable appropriations Act, 
     appropriations and funds made available and authority granted 
     pursuant to this title of this Act shall be available until 
     (a) enactment into law of an appropriation for any project or 
     activity provided for in this title of this Act, or (b) the 
     enactment into law of the applicable appropriations Act by 
     both Houses without any provision for such project or 
     activity, or (c) September 30, 1996, except for the projects 
     and activities under the headings ``Family support payments 
     to States'' and ``Payments to States for foster care and 
     adoption assistance'', for which date shall be March 15, 
     1996, whichever first occurs.
       Sec. 107. Expenditures made pursuant to this title of this 
     Act shall be charged to the applicable appropriation, fund, 
     or authorization whenever a bill in which such applicable 
     appropriation, fund, or authorization is contained is enacted 
     into law.
       Sec. 108. No provision in the appropriations Act for the 
     fiscal year 1996 referred to in section 101 of this Act that 
     makes the availability of any appropriation provided therein 
     dependent upon the enactment of additional authorization or 
     other legislation shall be effective before the date set 
     forth in section 106(c) of this Act.
       Sec. 109. Appropriations and funds made available by or 
     authority granted pursuant to this title of this Act may be 
     used without regard to the time limitations for submission 
     and approval of apportionments set forth in section 1513 of 
     title 31, United States Code, but nothing herein shall be 
     construed to waive any other provision of law governing the 
     apportionment of funds.
       Sec. 110. For the purposes of this title of this Act, the 
     time covered by the title of this Act shall be considered to 
     have begun on December 16, 1995.
       Sec. 111. Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act, 
     except section 106, funds appropriated under section 101 for 
     the payment of vested dual benefits under the Railroad 
     Retirement Act shall be made available so as to fully fund 
     the payments made on January 1, 1996, and the payments to be 
     made within the period covered by this Act including those 
     payments to be made on the first day of each month within the 
     period covered by this Act. In addition to the funds 
     appropriated under section 101 of this Act, $12,800,000 is 
     appropriated to restore full funding for payments made for 
     the period prior to January 1, 1996.
       Sec. 112. Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act, 
     except section 106, the authorities provided under subsection 
     (a) of section 140 of the Foreign Relations Authorization 
     Act, Fiscal Years 1994 and 1995 (Public Law 103-236) shall 
     remain in effect during the period of this Act, 
     notwithstanding paragraph (3) of said subsection.

                                TITLE II

                            Veterans Affairs

       That the following sums are hereby appropriated, out of any 
     money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, and out of 
     applicable corporate or other revenues, receipts, and funds, 
     for the several departments, agencies, corporations, and 
     other organizational units of Government for the fiscal year 
     1996, and for other purposes, namely:
       Sec. 201. Ensured Payment During Fiscal Year 1996 of 
     Veterans' Benefits in Event of Lack of Appropriations.
       (a) Payments required.--In any case during fiscal year 1996 
     in which appropriations are not otherwise available for 
     programs, projects, and activities of the Department of 
     Veterans Affairs, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs shall 
     nevertheless ensure that--
       (1) payments of existing veterans benefits are made in 
     accordance with regular procedures and schedules and in 
     accordance with eligibility requirements for such benefits; 
     and
       (2) payments to contractors of the Veterans Health 
     Administration of the Department of Veterans Affairs are made 
     when due in the case of services provided that directly 
     relate to patient health and safety.
       (b) Funding.--There is hereby appropriated such sums as may 
     be necessary for the payments pursuant to subsection (a), 
     including such amounts as may be necessary for the costs of 
     administration of such payments.
       (c) Charging of accounts when appropriations made.--In any 
     case in which the Secretary uses the authority of subsection 
     (a) to make payments, applicable accounts shall be charged 
     for amounts so paid, and for the costs of administration of 
     such payments, when regular appropriations become available 
     for those purposes.
       (d) Existing benefits specified.--For purposes of this 
     section, existing veterans benefits are benefits under laws 
     administered by the Secretary of Veterans Affairs that have 
     been adjudicated and authorized for payment as of--
       (1) December 15, 1995; or
       (2) if appropriations for such benefits are available 
     (other than pursuant to subsection (b)) after December 15, 
     1995, the last day on which appropriations for payment of 
     such benefits are available (other than pursuant to 
     subsection (b)).
       Sec. 202. Section 201 shall cease to be effective on 
     September 30, 1996.
       Sec. 203. For the purposes of this title of this Act, the 
     time covered by this title of this Act shall be considered to 
     have begun on January 4, 1996.

                               TITLE III

       That the following sums are hereby appropriated, out of any 
     money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, and out of 
     applicable corporate or other revenues, receipts, and funds, 
     for the several departments, agencies, corporations, and 
     other organizational units of Government for the fiscal year 
     1996, and for other purposes, namely:
       Sec. 301. Such amounts as may be necessary under the 
     authority and conditions provided in applicable 
     appropriations Acts for the fiscal year 1995 for paying 
     salaries of Federal employees excepted from the provisions of 
     the Antideficiency Act (31 U.S.C. 1341 et seq.) who are 
     continuing projects and activities conducted in fiscal year 
     1995 who work during periods when there is otherwise no 
     funding authority for their salaries.
       Sec. 302. Appropriations made by section 301 shall be 
     available to the extent and in the manner which would be 
     provided by the pertinent appropriations Act.
       Sec. 303. No appropriation or funds made available or 
     authority granted pursuant to section 301 shall be used to 
     initiate or resume any project or activity for which 
     appropriations, funds, or other authority were not available 
     during the fiscal year 1995.
       Sec. 304. No provision which is included in the 
     appropriations Act enumerated in section 301 but which was 
     not included in the applicable appropriations Act for fiscal 
     year 1995 and which by its terms is applicable to more than 
     one appropriation, fund, or authority shall be applicable to 
     any appropriation, fund, or authority provided in this Act.
       Sec. 305. Appropriations made and authority granted 
     pursuant to this title of this Act shall cover all 
     obligations or expenditures incurred for any program, 
     project, or activity during the period for which funds or 
     authority for such project or activity are available under 
     this Act.
       Sec. 306. Unless otherwise provided for in this title of 
     this Act or in the applicable appropriations Act, 
     appropriations and funds made available and authority granted 
     pursuant to this title of this Act shall be available until 
     (a) enactment into law of an appropriation for any project or 
     activity provided for in this title of this Act, or (b) the 
     enactment into law of the applicable appropriations Act by 
     both Houses without any provision for such project or 
     activity, or (c) January 26, 1996, whichever first occurs.
       Sec. 307. Expenditures made pursuant to this title of this 
     Act shall be charged to the applicable appropriation, fund, 
     or authorization whenever a bill in which such applicable 
     appropriation, fund, or authorization is contained is enacted 
     into law.
       Sec. 308. No provision in the appropriations Act for the 
     fiscal year 1996 referred to in section 301 of this Act that 
     makes the availability of any appropriation provided therein 
     dependent upon the enactment of additional authorizing or 
     other legislation shall be effective before the date set 
     forth in section 306(c) of this Act.
       Sec. 309. Appropriations and funds made available by or 
     authority granted pursuant to this title of this Act may be 
     used without regard to the time limitations for submission 
     and approval of apportionments set forth in section 1513 of 
     title 31, United States Code, but nothing herein shall be 
     construed to waive any other provision of law governing the 
     apportionment of funds.
       Sec. 310. All Federal Employees Deemed To Be Excepted 
     Employees.
       (a) In general.--Section 1342 of title 31, United States 
     Code, is amended for the period December 15, 1995 through 
     January 26, 1996--
       (1) by inserting after the first sentence ``All officers 
     and employees of the United States Government or the District 
     of Columbia government shall be deemed to be performing 
     services relating to emergencies involving the safety of 
     human life or the protection of property.''; and
       (2) by striking out the last sentence.
       Sec. 311. Excepted Employees Under Normal Leave Policy.--
     Federal employees considered excepted from furlough during 
     any period in which there is a lapse in appropriations with 
     respect to the agency activity in which the employee is 
     engaged shall not be considered to be furloughed when on 
     leave and shall be subject to the same leave regulations as 
     if no lapse in appropriations had occurred.
       Sec. 312. Eligibility for Unemployment Compensation.--
     Notwithstanding any other provisions of law, beginning on 
     January 2, 1996, any Federal employee who is excepted from 
     furlough and is not being paid due to a lapse in 
     appropriations shall be deemed to be 

[[Page H230]]
     totally separated from Federal service and eligible for unemployment 
     compensation benefits under subchapter I of chapter 85 of 
     title 5 of the United States Code with no waiting period for 
     such eligibility to accrue.
       Sec. 313. For the purposes of this title, Federal employees 
     returning to work under the provisions of section 310 shall 
     be deemed to have returned to work at the first regularly 
     scheduled opportunity after December 15, 1995.
       Sec. 314. Appropriations made pursuant to section 301 are 
     made notwithstanding section 15 of the State Department Basic 
     Authorities Act of 1956, section 701 of the United States 
     Information and Educational Exchange Act of 1948, section 313 
     of the Foreign Relations Authorization Act, Fiscal Years 1994 
     and 1995 (Public Law 103-236), section 53 of the Arms Control 
     and Disarmament Act, and section 10 of Public Law 91-672.

                                TITLE IV

       That the following sums are hereby appropriated, out of the 
     general fund and enterprise funds of the District of Columbia 
     for the District of Columbia for the fiscal year 1996, and 
     for other purposes, namely:
       Sec. 401. (a) Such amounts as may be necessary under the 
     authority and conditions provided in the applicable 
     appropriations Act for the fiscal year 1995 for continuing 
     projects or activities including the costs of direct loans 
     and loan guarantees (not otherwise specifically provided for 
     in this title of this Act) which were conducted in the fiscal 
     year 1995 and for which appropriations, funds, or other 
     authority would be available in the following appropriations 
     Act:
       The District of Columbia Appropriations Act, 1996: 
     Provided, That whenever the amount which would be made 
     available or the authority which would be granted in this Act 
     is greater than that which would be available or granted 
     under current operations, the pertinent project or activity 
     shall be continued at a rate for operations not exceeding the 
     current rate.
       (b) Whenever the amount which would be made available or 
     the authority which would be granted under the Act listed in 
     this section as passed by the House as of the date of 
     enactment of this Act, is different from that which would be 
     available or granted under such Act as passed by the Senate 
     as of the date of enactment of this Act, the pertinent 
     project or activity shall be continued at a rate for 
     operations not exceeding the current rate or the rate 
     permitted by the action of the House or the Senate, whichever 
     is lower, under the authority and conditions provided in the 
     applicable appropriations Act for the fiscal year 1995: 
     Provided, That where an item is not included in either 
     version or where an item is included in only one version of 
     the Act as passed by both Houses as of the date of enactment 
     of this Act, the pertinent project or activity shall not be 
     continued except as provided for in section 411 or 412 under 
     the appropriation, fund, or authority granted by the 
     applicable appropriations Act for the fiscal year 1995 and 
     under the authority and conditions provided in the applicable 
     appropriations Act for the fiscal year 1995.
       Sec. 402. Appropriations made by section 401 shall be 
     available to the extent and in the manner which would be 
     provided by the pertinent appropriations Act.
       Sec. 403. No appropriation or funds made available or 
     authority granted pursuant to section 401 shall be used to 
     initiate or resume any project or activity for which 
     appropriations, funds, or other authority were not available 
     during the fiscal year 1995.
       Sec. 404. No provision which is included in the 
     appropriations Act enumerated in section 401 but which was 
     not included in the applicable appropriations Act for fiscal 
     year 1995 and which by its terms is applicable to more than 
     one appropriation, fund, or authority shall be applicable to 
     any appropriation, fund, or authority provided in this title 
     of this Act.
       Sec. 405. Appropriations made and authority granted 
     pursuant to this title of this Act shall cover all 
     obligations or expenditures incurred for any program, 
     project, or activity during the period for which funds or 
     authority for such project or activity are available under 
     this title of this Act.
       Sec. 406. Unless otherwise provided for in this title of 
     this Act or in the applicable appropriations Act, 
     appropriations and funds made available and authority granted 
     pursuant to this title of this Act shall be available until 
     (a) enactment into law of an appropriation for any project or 
     activity provided for in this title of this Act, or (b) the 
     enactment into law of the applicable appropriations Act by 
     both Houses without any provision for such project or 
     activity, or (c) September 30, 1996, whichever first occurs.
       Sec. 407. Notwithstanding any other provision of this title 
     of this Act, except section 406, none of the funds 
     appropriated under this title of this Act shall be expended 
     for any abortion except where the life of the mother would be 
     endangered if the fetus were carried to term or where the 
     pregnancy is the result of an act of rape or incest.
       Sec. 408. Expenditures made pursuant to this title of this 
     Act shall be charged to the applicable appropriation, fund, 
     or authorization whenever a bill in which such applicable 
     appropriation, fund, or authorization is contained is enacted 
     into law.
       Sec. 409. No provision in the appropriations Act for the 
     fiscal year 1996 referred to in section 401 of this title of 
     this Act that makes the availability of any appropriation 
     provided therein dependent upon the enactment of additional 
     authorizing or other legislation shall be effective before 
     the date set forth in section 406(c) of this Act.
       Sec. 410. Appropriations and funds made available by or 
     authority granted pursuant to this title of this Act may be 
     used without regard to the time limitations of submission and 
     approval of apportionments set forth in section 1513 of title 
     31, United States Code, but nothing herein shall be construed 
     to waive any other provision of law governing the 
     apportionment of funds.
       Sec. 411. Notwithstanding any other provision of this title 
     of this Act, except section 406, whenever the Act listed in 
     section 401 as passed by both the House and Senate as of the 
     date of enactment of this Act does not include funding for an 
     ongoing project or activity for which there is a budget 
     request, or whenever the rate for operations for an ongoing 
     project or activity provided by section 401 for which there 
     is a budget request would result in the project or activity 
     being significantly reduced, the pertinent project or 
     activity may be continued under the authority and conditions 
     provided in the applicable appropriations Act for the fiscal 
     year 1995 by increasing the rate for operations provided by 
     section 401 to a rate for operations not to exceed one that 
     provides the minimal level that would enable existing 
     activities to continue. No new contracts or grants shall be 
     awarded in excess of an amount that bears the same ratio to 
     the rate for operations provided by this section as the 
     number of days covered by this Act bears to 366. For the 
     purposes of this title of this Act the minimal level means a 
     rate for operations that is reduced from the current rate by 
     25 percent.
       Sec. 412. Notwithstanding any other provision of this title 
     of this Act, except section 406, whenever the rate for 
     operations for any continuing project or activity provided by 
     section 401 or section 411 for which there is a budget 
     request would result in a furlough of Government employees, 
     that rate for operations may be increased to the minimum 
     level that would enable the furlough to be avoided. No new 
     contracts or grants shall be awarded in excess of an amount 
     that bears the same ratio to the rate for operations provided 
     by this section as the number of days covered by this Act 
     bears to 366.
       Sec. 413. Notwithstanding any other provision of this title 
     of this Act, except sections 406, 411, and 412, for those 
     programs that had high initial rates of operation or complete 
     distribution of funding at the beginning of the fiscal year 
     in fiscal year 1995 because of distributions of funding to 
     States, foreign countries, grantees, or others, similar 
     distributions of funds for fiscal year 1996 shall not be made 
     and no grants shall be awarded for such programs funded by 
     this title of this Act that would impinge on final funding 
     prerogatives.
       Sec. 414. This title of this Act shall be implemented so 
     that only the most limited funding action of that permitted 
     in this title of this Act shall be taken in order to provide 
     for continuation of projects and activities.
       Sec. 415. The provisions of section 132 of the District of 
     Columbia Appropriations Act, 1988, Public Law 100-202, shall 
     not apply for this title of this Act.
       Sec. 416. Notwithstanding any other provision of this title 
     of this Act, except section 406, none of the funds 
     appropriated under this title of this Act shall be used to 
     implement or enforce any system or registration of unmarried, 
     cohabiting couples whether they are homosexual, lesbian, 
     heterosexual, including but not limited to registration for 
     the purpose of extending employment, health, or governmental 
     benefits to such couples on the same basis that such benefits 
     are extended to legally married couples; nor shall any funds 
     made available pursuant to any provision of this title of 
     this Act otherwise be used to implement or enforce D.C. Act 
     9-188, signed by the Mayor of the District of Columbia on 
     April 15, 1992.

                                TITLE V

                Clarification of Certain Reimbursements

       Sec. 501. Clarification of Reimbursement to States for 
     Federally Funded Employees.
       (a) If a State used State funds to continue carrying out a 
     Federal program or furloughed State employees whose 
     compensation is advanced or reimbursed in whole or in part by 
     the Federal Government--
       (1) such furloughed employees shall be compensated at their 
     standard rate of compensation for such period;
       (2) the State shall be reimbursed for expenses that would 
     have been paid by the Federal Government during such period 
     had appropriations been available, including the cost of 
     compensating such furloughed employees, together with 
     interest thereon due under section 6503(d) of title 31, 
     United States Code; and
       (3) the State may use funds available to the State under 
     such Federal program to reimburse such State, together with 
     interest thereon due under section 6503(d) of title 31, 
     United States Code.
       (b) For purposes of this subsection, the term ``State'' 
     shall have the meaning as such term is defined under the 
     applicable Federal program under subsection (a).
       (c) The authority under this section applies with respect 
     to any period in fiscal year 1996 (not limited to periods 
     beginning or ending after the date of the enactment of this 
     Act) during which there occurs a lapse in appropriations with 
     respect to any department or agency of the Federal Government 
     which, but for such lapse in appropriations, would have paid, 
     or made reimbursement relating 

[[Page H231]]
     to, any of the expenses referred to in subsection (a) with respect to 
     the program involved. Payments and reimbursements under this 
     authority shall be made only to the extent and in amounts 
     provided in advance in appropriations Acts.
       (2) Amend the title so as to read: ``Making appropriations 
     for certain activities for the fiscal year 1996, and for 
     other purposes''.

  The text of House Concurrent Resolution 131 is as follows:

                            H. Con. Res. 131

       Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate 
     concurring),

     SECTION 1. NOTIFICATION OF COMPLIANCE.

       The Committee on House Oversight (pursuant to clause 
     4(d)(1) of rule X of the Rules of the House of 
     Representatives) shall not present to the President the joint 
     resolution (H.J. Res. 134) making further continuing 
     appropriations for the fiscal year 1996, and for other 
     purposes, until the Speaker of the House notifies that 
     committee that the requirements of this concurrent resolution 
     have been met.

     SEC. 2. PRESIDENT'S SUBMISSION OF 7-YEAR BALANCED BUDGET.

       The Speaker shall submit to the Committee on House 
     Oversight the notification described in section 1 only if the 
     following conditions have been satisfied:
       (1) The President has submitted to the Congress a plan to 
     achieve a balanced total budget not later than fiscal year 
     2002, which includes the following:
       (A) The proposed text of a budget plan for fiscal year 1996 
     and each fiscal year thereafter through fiscal year 2002 that 
     includes total new budget authority and budget outlays, total 
     Federal revenues, and new budget authority and budget outlays 
     for each major functional category, including a breakdown 
     between discretionary and mandatory spending within each such 
     category.
       (B) The proposed text of legislation to implement the 
     budget described in subparagraph (A).
       (C) A detailed summary setting forth the policies 
     underlying the budget described in subparagraph (A) and the 
     proposed legislation described in subparagraph (B).
       (2) The Director of the Congressional Budget Office has 
     certified in writing to the Speaker of the House and the 
     President pro tempore of the Senate that the plan described 
     in paragraph (1) achieves a balanced total budget not later 
     than fiscal year 2002, as estimated by the Director using the 
     economic and technical assumptions specified in or consistent 
     with the Congressional Budget Office Memorandum entitled 
     ``The Economic and Budget Outlook: December 1995 Update''.

     SEC. 3. SUBMISSION OF COPY OF CONCURRENT RESOLUTION TO 
                   PRESIDENT.

       Upon the adoption of this concurrent resolution, the Clerk 
     of the House of Representatives shall transmit a copy to the 
     President.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Kingston). The gentleman from New York 
[Mr. Solomon] is recognized for 1 hour.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, for the purposes of debate only, I yield 
the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from California [Mr. 
Beilenson], pending which I yield myself such time as I might consume. 
During consideration of the resolution all time yielded is for debate 
purposes only.
  Mr. Speaker, this rule makes in order the adoption by the House of an 
amendment to the Senate amendment to House Joint Resolution 134, a 
continuing appropriations resolution for fiscal year 1996.
  House Joint Resolution 134 was initially passed by the House back on 
December 20. It dealt with emergency appropriations for veterans' 
benefits. The resolution was passed by the Senate with an amendment on 
December 22.
  However, those veterans benefits were provided for in another 
continuing resolution which this House adopted on December 22.
  The House amendment which this rule would self-execute to adoption 
would simply provide for a governmentwide continuing appropriation 
through January 26, 1996.
  The rule further provides for the self-executed adoption of House 
Concurrent Resolution 131 introduced by the chairman of the Budget 
Committee.
  The concurrent resolution provides that the continuing resolution 
shall not be transmitted to the President for his signature until the 
Speaker notifies the Committee on House Oversight that the President 
has submitted to the Congress a 7-year balanced budget as certified by 
the Congressional Budget Office.
  Mr. Speaker, the President could reopen the rest of this Government 
today or tomorrow simply by sending us that 7-year balanced budget that 
he and the Congress committed by law to enacting at the end of the 
first session of this Congress--last Wednesday.
  I regret that there has not been substantial movement in that 
direction by the President since he signed that balanced budget pledge 
into law last November 20.
  It was therefore decided by our leadership and conference to provide 
the President with an incentive to finally produce what he is legally 
obliged to produce. That incentive is to reopen the entire Government 
through January 26 if he takes this good-faith step in the direction of 
a balanced budget.
  Once the Congress and President are negotiating from the same 
numbers, it should be much easier for those talks to reach a final 
agreement on a balanced budget.
  We have been reaching out to the President not once but twice today 
to signal our good faith and willingness to get down to serious 
negotiations. We have already voted to put Federal workers back to work 
with pay and fund certain emergency programs. And now we are offering a 
reopening of the rest of the Government.
  The ball is now in the President's court. He can reopen the 
Government. It won't require any heavy lifting since there are already 
several balanced budget proposals in writing by members of his own 
party. He need only bring one of them, send it to us, get it certified 
by CBO, and the Government is reopened. It is just that simple.
  Then, over the next few days the President and Congress can get down 
to the real unfinished business from last year of giving the American 
people the best gift we could--a brighter future for them and their 
children and grandchildren by balancing our Nation's budget.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] for 
yielding me the customary 30 minutes of debate time.
  Mr. Speaker, we are pleased that the Republican leadership is finally 
willing to allow the House to consider legislation which would reopen 
all the Federal agencies that have been shut down and keep them open 
until January 26. The continuing resolution that would be passed by 
adoption of this rule is certainly far more rational and sensible than 
the targeted continuing resolution that the House passed earlier today.
  However, we oppose this self-executing rule because it prohibits the 
House from considering any alternative version of the legislation, 
including the alternative that we continue to believe is the best way 
to end the Government shutdown, a continuing resolution that has no 
conditions attached.
  Under the terms of this rule, Mr. Speaker, the continuing resolution 
which would reopen the Government would be sent to the Senate only 
after the Senate also agrees to requiring the President to submit a 
plan that balances the budget in 7 years as is scored by the 
Congressional Budget Office. In other words, after adopting this 
continuing resolution it would stay here, in the House of 
Representatives, until the Senate agrees to the terms of this plan.
  Requiring the President to submit a balanced budget plan would most 
certainly delay ending the shutdown because of the time it would 
necessarily take for the White House to develop a plan and for CBO to 
analyze it.
  Our distinguished chairman of the Committee on Rules, the gentleman 
from New York [Mr. Solomon], has suggested that this measure would 
allow the Government to be reopened perhaps as soon as Monday morning, 
but that is probably a far too optimistic view.
  Many of us on this side of the aisle, I would guess the majority of 
us, would very much like to see an agreement on balancing the budget in 
7 years. A number of us voted for a plan, the so-called coalition 
budget that would, in fact, provide for a balanced budget in 7 years. 
However, we think that requiring the President to submit a balanced 
budget proposal is completely unnecessary and demeaning. Not only is 
President Clinton fully committed to reaching agreement on a plan to 
balance the budget in 7 years, but he has also personally spent 
approximately 40 hours himself at the negotiating table pursuing that 
goal. By all accounts the President is working extremely hard to 
resolve the differences with Congress over the budget, and it is 
insulting to him and to the majority of Americans who support his 
position on this matter 

[[Page H232]]
to demand that he do more than he is already doing simply as a price 
for reopening the Government.
  Mr. Speaker, it appears that finally nearly all of us are in 
agreement that the Government shutdown should end. Let us just do it. 
Let us stop the terrible and absurd waste of taxpayers' money and lost 
government services that has resulted from the shutdown, a shutdown 
that is costing $50 million, or thereabouts, each business day and 
causing an incalculable amount of hardship and disruption, and let us 
stop it as soon as possible.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to defeat the previous question. If 
the previous question is defeated, we shall offer an amendment. The 
amendment would send the clean continuing resolution to the President 
immediately, stopping the delay mechanism in the concurrent resolution 
unless House Republicans live up to their part of the deal and lay on 
the table a 7-year balanced budget that protects Medicare and Medicaid, 
education, agriculture, national defense, and veterans. The last 
continuing resolution made a commitment to enact a balanced budget that 
provides adequate funding for all of those programs. Now the majority 
are adding a new requirement, that the President must put forth a 
proposal that meets the conditions for the measure to be enacted.

  Mr. Speaker, we say to our colleagues on the majority side,

       If you now would require the President to submit a proposal 
     in advance, it is only fair that you submit something in 
     advance that lives up to the agreed-upon goals.

  The budget the President vetoed is woefully inadequate. The budget 
submitted was vetoed precisely because it did not achieve the goals and 
protect the programs the House Republicans committed to achieve and 
protect. The effect of this new section is to provide for the immediate 
transmission of a clean continuing resolution unless the House 
Republicans can submit a new budget that does, in fact, meet those 
goals.
  This amendment would put the budget negotiations on terms that are 
fair. The majority would have to decide either allow the continuing 
resolution to go forward without delay or delay it until both the 
President and the majority submit a balanced budget that meets the 
terms of the budget negotiations that have already been agreed to.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

                              {time}  1645

  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
northern Virginia [Mr. Davis], an outstanding Member of this body from 
close by.
  Mr. DAVIS. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman yielding time to 
me.
  Mr. Speaker, let me first of all say I am grateful we have gone part 
of the way to opening up the Government. I want to go the full way. I 
believe we ought to have a clean resolution. Barring that, I think this 
is a very good step in that direction.
  Let me just say, all we are saying here, as I understand it, there 
would not have to be any unnecessary delays because there are a number 
of balanced budget provisions that have been put out there by 
Democratic Members of the House and Senate: the Blue Dog budget here in 
the House, the Senate Democrats. If the President adopted any of those, 
which have already been scored by CBO, we could open the Government by 
Monday. I would ask the gentleman from New York, am I right?
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. DAVIS. I yield to the gentleman from New York.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman is absolutely correct. There 
are now 21 days provided by this legislation. If the President were to 
submit any one of those budgets, the full Government would be 
functioning 10 minutes from now.
  Mr. DAVIS. Mr. Speaker, this does not require the President, as I 
understand it, to support any tax cut. He could have full funding for 
Medicare. He could add money to Medicare over and above what the law 
allows, add more money to the environment, add more money to education. 
I guess the bottom line is it just requires the numbers to add up by 
the year 2002. Is that correct?
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman is absolutely correct.
  Mr. DAVIS. My friend, the gentleman from California [Mr. Beilenson], 
who I think is a very able man, has mentioned that this would be 
demeaning to the President to ask him to submit a balanced budget. I do 
not think it is demeaning at all. He campaigned on it. We have 
submitted our balanced budget. He has found tremendous fault with that, 
which is his prerogative, but we need to have a dialog. It is very 
difficult to engage in discourse, dialogue, and negotiation when the 
goalposts keep getting moved back every time we get close. That is our 
great frustration. If we could have the president to submit his budget, 
we submit ours, and then we could move, I think that would help and 
further the negotiation.
  I would just say to my friend, the gentleman from New York, there is 
nothing really to prevent the government from opening fully on Monday 
if this were to pass, if the President were to embrace already one of 
the plans that has been submitted by different Democratic groups in the 
Congress.
  Mr. SOLOMON. If the gentleman will continue to yield, that is 
correct, Mr. Speaker. I am told that the Congressional Budget Office 
could, even with a whole new proposal by the President, score it within 
10 hours, and certainly if it is one that has already been scored they 
could do it in a matter of minutes.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from 
Wisconsin [Mr. Obey], our distinguished ranking member of the Committee 
on Appropriations.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, as we have heard many times today, a large 
portion of the Government has now been closed for 21 days. We have just 
passed a resolution which partially opens some of those agencies and 
partially provides some of the services those agencies are supposed to 
be providing.
  Now we have before us a second proposition which says that the 
Government will open fully between now and the end of January only if 
the President submits a new budget which is balanced in 7 years, as 
scored by the Congressional Budget Office. The justification of our 
Republican friends for that position is that they claim that the 
President agreed to do that when he signed the previous continuing 
resolution.
  That is not what the President agreed to do. The President and the 
Congress both agreed to enact a resolution which balanced the budget in 
7 years, as scored by CBO, provided that it met certain other tests. 
This is the text of the agreement reached in the last budget 
resolution. It says: ``The President and the Congress shall enact 
legislation in the first session of the 104th Congress,'' and that is 
already by the boards on both sides, ``to achieve a balanced budget no 
later than fiscal year 2002, as estimated by the Congressional Budget 
Office.''
  However, what this resolution would do is knock out the rest of the 
agreement. The rest of the agreement says that that 7-year balanced 
budget amendment  scored  by  CBO  must adequately protect Medicare, 
must adequately protect Medicaid, must adequately protect education, 
must adequately protect the environment, must adequately protect 
veterans services, and several other items.
  They assert on the Republican side of the aisle that the President 
has an obligation to offer as part of his negotiating position what he 
agreed to sign onto as a final proposition. OK, let us take you at your 
word. If you say that he has an obligation to do that, then all we want 
you to do is to buy into our motion which we would offer if we can 
defeat the previous question on the rule. We want you to buy into the 
idea that you have a concurrent obligation to meet the same test, 
because a lot of us on this side of the aisle are tired of seeing you 
on your side of the aisle each day want to grade the President's 
performance that day, when you will not be prepared to take the same 
test you are asking him to take. All we want you to do is to say, ``OK, 
what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.''
  If the President is going to be required to submit a 7-year balanced 
budget which meets the test of this agreement, then so are you. You 
keep asking, ``Where is the President's 7-year balanced budget?'' We 
ask, ``Where is yours? Where is your 7-year balanced budget that meets 
these 

[[Page H233]]
tests?'' You have submitted no budget so far that adequately protects 
Medicare, that adequately protects States on Medicaid, that adequately 
funds investments in education and the environment, and adequately 
protects all veterans services.
  You have not submitted any budget that meets that test, so all we are 
saying is if you want the President to meet his half of that test, you 
meet yours. You can vote for that by voting down the previous question 
so we can offer our resolution.
  Mr. SABO. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. OBEY. I yield to the gentleman from Minnesota.
  Mr. SABO. Mr. Speaker, one of the interesting things in the 
Republican budget is the change of capital gains. Forgetting the 
merits, somehow it costs $9 billion in the year 2001, costs nothing in 
the year 2002, when we are supposed to be in balance, and then costs 
$10 billion in 2003. Is that not sort of a little weird, strange 
arithmetic in 2002?
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, it is the same kind of wackiness, it seems to 
me, that has caused us to miss budget targets each year since Ronald 
Reagan promised that if we just passed his budget, which we did, the 
budget would be balanced in 4 years.
  Mr. SABO. I thank the gentleman.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I would urge the House to vote against the 
previous question on the rule so we can have an approach to this which 
requires the same thing of the Republican majority that they want to 
require of the President of the United States.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute and 30 seconds to the 
gentleman from Georgia, Mr. John Linder, a distinguished member of the 
Committee on Rules, on the capital gains tax cut.
  Mr. LINDER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to 
me.
  Mr. Speaker, we just heard the colloquy on this side of the aisle 
regarding capital gains, and the gentleman wonders how it could have a 
$9 billion number 1 year, none the next year, and a $10 billion the 
next year.
  I do not know how CBO scores this, but no matter how it scores it, it 
is wrong, because reducing capital gains every time we did it has 
increased revenues. When Jimmy Carter cut the capital gains tax in 1977 
there were $50 million in venture capital pools. The revenues from the 
capital gains category increased in every succeeding year until 1986, 
when the venture capital pools had more than $5 billion in them. That, 
frankly, is what funded the increase in jobs during the Reagan 
revolution.
  When you raised the revenues in the capital gains category, 
immediately the revenue fell off the table because it is too expensive 
to transact business when the Government takes its large share out. We 
know there is somewhere between $6 trillion and $9 trillion in this 
country being held by mom and pop stores and farmers, and just people 
who would like to sell their assets. There are $6 to $9 trillion being 
held captive by the high cost of government that would become 
transactions that would increase revenues dramatically in the capital 
gains category, so the scoring system used by the CBO, the system is 
wrong, and we would have more revenues than we ever dreamed. This 
happened twice in the last 30 years. It will happen again. I thank the 
gentleman for yielding time to me.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from Texas [Mr. Frost].
  (Mr. FROST asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, it is curious that suddenly we are at the end 
of the day and we are going to be gone until the 23d. I had some 
questions about why are we going to be gone until the 23d. I think I 
have the answer. I would like to share with the House the Speaker's 
fundraising schedule for the next 2 weeks.
  On January 9 he will be in Colorado Springs, CO. On January 9, he 
will be in Bloomington, MN. On January 10, he will be in Boise, and 
then Indiana. On January 10 he will be in Seattle, WA. On January 11 he 
will be in Baskerfield, CA. On January 12 he will be in Napa, CA. On 
January 15 he will be in Detroit, where people are being charged 
$10,000 to have their picture taken with the Speaker. He will also be 
in Dallas, TX, on January 15.
  On January 17 he will be in Fort Wayne, IN. On January 17 he will be 
in Evanston, IN. On January 19 he will be in Knoxville, TN. On January 
19 he will be in Memphis, TN.
  There have been some questions about good-faith negotiating and 
wanting to keep the President negotiating. It is going to be very 
difficult, I would think, for the Speaker to negotiate with the 
President while he is traveling around the country raising money for 
Republican Members of Congress and for the Republican National Campaign 
Committee. I know these are all tentative dates and something might 
change in the schedule, but these have appeared in the press and there 
have been discussions of these. The Speaker certainly has a very busy 
schedule raising money in the next 2 weeks.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I 
thank the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Frost] for advising us on the 
Speaker's schedule. I know there are a great many people in this 
country who are going to be interested in attending some of those 
events.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the distinguished gentleman from 
Colorado [Mr. McInnis], a member of our committee.
  Mr. McINNIS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to 
me.
  Mr. Speaker, I wonder where the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Frost] is 
going to be, chairman of the DCCC, what kind of fundraising he has been 
attending in the last couple of months.
  Mr. Speaker, I think that the people in this Chamber should be aware 
of the fact that the gentleman from Texas is head of the DCCC, and 
certainly he is out there doing fundraising under his duties as well. 
That is the issue here. The issue is we have to get to a balanced 
budget. Quit trying to divert on some of this sidelight stuff, unless 
you want to implicate yourself.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to 
the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Frost].
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, in response to the gentleman, I am not one of 
the designated negotiators. I have not been designated by the 
Democratic side to negotiate the budget. The Speaker is one of the 
designated negotiators. Therefore, I would expect him to be here.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from 
Massachusetts [Mr. Moakley], our distinguished ranking member of the 
Committee on Rules.
  Mr. MOAKLEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from California for 
yielding time to me.
  Mr. Speaker, this rule is typical of the politics-as-usual we're 
getting so used to these days.
  Today, on the 21st day of the Federal Government shutdown, we are 
looking at another attempt to back the President into a corner, to 
force him to cut Medicare to pay for tax cuts, and he won't do it.
  He won't get tripped up by the strings attached to this continuing 
resolution and my Republican colleagues shouldn't even be bringing it 
up.
  As we are speaking, the Rules Committee is meeting to consider the 
third continuing resolution to come before the House today. They say 
three's a charm but from what I hear, Mr. Speaker, they still haven't 
got it right.
  This third continuing resolution opens up a few more Government 
services, services that should not have been stopped in the first 
place, but it does not go all the way.
  My Republican colleagues say they want to run the Government like a 
business. This business is making the former Soviet postal service look 
good. Republicans are sending people back to work. And they are paying 
people to go back to work, which they certainly should do, and which 
they should have done 3 weeks ago. But they still won't let everyone do 
their work.
  They are willing to pay for meals for senior citizens, but will not 
provide for their delivery. They will give us meals but no wheels and, 
Mr. Speaker, that's not enough, the Government should be completely 
opened, and it should be completely opened now.
  It's time to do a clean continuing resolution. It's time to reopen 
the Government, send everyone back to work, pay them, and let them do 
their Jobs. At the rate we're going, the rate of a 

[[Page H234]]
few programs a day, it will take about 3 weeks before the Government 
reopens, and, Mr. Speaker, the American people want it open now.
  My colleagues say they want the President to yield to their demands, 
they want him to propose cuts in Medicare just as they have. But they 
will not agree to his request to protect Medicare.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to defeat the previous question. We 
need a balanced budget but not at the expense of Medicare, education, 
and the environment.

                              {time}  1700

  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I would like to point out that Senator Domenici just called and said 
when the Congressional Budget Office rescored our figures, they came up 
with $135 billion, which added back to the very things our good friend, 
Mr. Obey, was asking for: the environment, education, Medicare, 
Medicaid.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York, my 
good friend [Mr. Lazio].
  Mr. LAZIO of New York. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New 
York for yielding me this time.
  I rise today in strong support of this continuing resolution that 
requires the President to submit a CBO-scored balanced budget within 7 
years. My friends, doublespeak in our Nation's Capital is alive and 
well. We are expected to believe that the President now has to rush 
around to put the numbers together for a balanced budget. Well, my 
friends, the President's campaign pledge was to have a balanced budget 
in 5 years; not in 7 years, not in 8 years, not in 10 years, but in 5 
years.
  My friends, let us get it straight. When the President signed the 
continuing resolution in November, he signed a legal commitment to send 
Congress a 7-year balanced budget, but 7 weeks have passed and we are 
still waiting for him to live up to his promise.
  In the past, the President has repeatedly said he supports a balanced 
budget. He said he would support one in 10 years, 8 years, 9 years, 7 
years and everything in between. But now it is time to recognize the 
reality that in spite of all of the President's public rhetoric, he 
does not now, probably never has, and most likely never will support a 
balanced budget. So we have to operate in that reality.
  We in Congress need to use the tools available to us under the 
Constitution to help the President honor his commitment to the American 
people and obey the law that he signed on November 20.
  Earlier today we voted to bring unpaid Federal employees back to work 
and to provide them with their back pay. We also helped to fund through 
September 30 essential programs for seniors, veterans, the needy, 
unemployed, as well as visa, passport and consular services for 
American citizens abroad. By passing this continuing resolution before 
us now, we will also fulfill our responsibility to reopen the 
Government through January 26.
  Mr. Speaker, we are acting in good faith to reopen the Government, 
but we only ask that the President keep his word and submit a balanced 
budget to the Congress, even using his own program priorities. The idea 
that somehow we have to be mindreaders of the President and honor his 
own priorities is absolutely absurd. Now it is up to the President to 
fulfill his moral commitment and send us a balanced budget.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from 
Virginia [Mr. Moran].
  Mr. MORAN. Mr. Speaker, the Kendall School which is the predecessor 
of Gallaudet University for the Deaf, has been fully funded by the 
Federal Government since 1858. But because we did not do our job today, 
it will close down, and those deaf children in kindergarten through 
elementary school and high school will have to be sent home because we 
did not do our job.
  The East Coast Migrant Head Start Program just called the office. 
Those children who are infants and small children, who have to be in 
school because both of their parents are working out in the fields, 
that program will be closed down because it is fully funded by the 
Federal Government. What are those children going to do? What are their 
parents going to do who have to be working in the fields?
  We have not done our job, so we have to have a continuing resolution, 
a full continuing resolution.
  Obviously, it should not be tied to a 7-year balanced budget plan. 
The majority leader of the Senate, Senator Dole understood that. All we 
had to do was take his bill and everything would be all set now; we 
would have done our job. But because we have extremists who say our way 
or no way, we have not done our jobs. We have no business recessing 
until we do it.
  Now, I am going to vote for this resolution, and the reason is that I 
do not think it is such a problem to have a 7-year balanced budget, 
even using CBO numbers, because that is not the problem. I think the 
President is going to submit a balanced 7-year plan with CBO numbers. 
But it is not going to be one that the Republican side will accept, 
because it will not gut the Medicare Program, it will not dismantle the 
Medicaid Program. It will not cut student loans.
  Mr. LINDER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield for an honest 
question?
  Mr. MORAN. If you will give me an extra 30 seconds to make my point, 
I would be happy to. I will continue, because there may be other points 
that the gentleman may wish to respond to.
  I understand what the gentleman is going to say, that you do not have 
to accept it, and that is why I am going to vote for the resolution, 
because that is not the problem. When the President submits it, he is 
not going to sacrifice Medicare and Medicaid and student loans and 
environmental regulation, because you do not have to; because you do 
not have to cut taxes by $245 billion or $200 billion or even $100 
billion, and we should not.
  Businesses do not pay out dividends when they are operating at a 
loss, and we should not cut taxes when we are operating at a deficit. 
If we are at a surplus and we can afford to, we can go ahead and do it. 
We cannot now. That is why we are in the situation we are in now.
  It was President Reagan's tax cut in 1981 that created the debt that 
we are burdened with. That is why we are here, we are stuck, why the 
Government is shut down. If it was not for the interest on the debt 
that was accumulated by the 1981 tax cut, we would be in a surplus 
today.
  Mr. LINDER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. MORAN. I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.
  Mr. LINDER. Mr. Speaker, first, I would like to point out that the 
revenues to the Treasury doubled between 1980 and 1990. Tax cuts 
doubled revenues; that can add to debt.
  Let me just say about the President's budget, the gentleman says it 
was one that the Republicans could not agree with. That is not the 
point. It is one that we want to negotiate.
  That is what we have not had. We do not know where he stands, because 
we have never seen a budget that he has put on the table, a balanced 
budget in 7 years, with his priorities. All we want to do is say, you 
can open the Government tomorrow, Mr. President; just put your 
priorities on the table. We will then negotiate within those 
parameters. That is all.
  Mr. MORAN. I understand that, I say to the gentleman that I do not 
think that is the problem. That is why I am going to vote for this 
resolution, because the issue is not a 7-year balanced budget; the 
issue is how you get there, whether you cut taxes when you cannot 
afford to, and what we do to people dependent upon Medicare and 
Medicaid and student loans. That is the issue. We ought to clarify the 
issue.
  I think that issue ought to be a national referendum. But in terms of 
submitting the budget, I think that will be done, I think it should be 
done, and I think that the Democrats will support that.
  Mr. SABO. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. MORAN. I yield to the gentleman from Minnesota.
  Mr. SABO. Mr. Speaker, I would say to my friend from Virginia, there 
was some reference to what was promised in 1981 and what happened. The 
promise was that by 1984 the budget would be in balance. Instead, there 
was a deficit of $175 billion. Reagan projected that revenues would be 
19.3 percent of the gross national product by 1984; they 

[[Page H235]]
were actually 18 percent because of the tax cut.
  Mr. MORAN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman very much. In fact, 
President Reagan, rightfully so, said that any President who cannot 
submit a balanced budget ought to be impeached, and he never submitted 
a balanced budget.
  The problem with this plan that we have before us is that it 
increases the deficit in the first year. In the first 3 years there is 
virtually no reduction in the deficit. The last 3 years, we reduce it 
every year. So we cannot support one that is fiscally responsible, but 
we ought to have a balanced budget that is fiscally responsible.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Virginia [Mr. Goodlatte], someone who is probably more responsible for 
forcing the President to bring a balanced budget to this body than 
anyone I know, and we really appreciate the efforts of the gentleman.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for his kind remarks 
and for yielding me this time.
  Mr. Speaker, this is an effort on our part to open the Government 
back up to show the President and the American people that we are doing 
everything possible to negotiate in good faith, while moving forward on 
our commitment to finally balance the Federal budget. It is always 
easier to criticize a proposal, to complain without offering a positive 
solution.
  We, on the other hand, have worked very hard over the last 2 days in 
fashioning this positive solution to get the Government back to work 
and to balance our budget. That is what my goal has been as I have 
worked to find a solution; that is what we are going to do here today. 
Now it is time for the President to fulfill his responsibility.
  Mr. Speaker, all that we ask is that President Clinton meet himself 
halfway. He signed into law back in November an agreement that by the 
end of the first session of the 104th Congress, 2 days ago, we would 
have a balanced budget using CBO scoring. All we ask of him today is 
that he put down his marker, that he tell us where his balanced budget 
with CBO scoring is. Let us see what his priorities are.
  We cannot settle this until we have the ability to compromise. You 
cannot compromise when the other side does not have a position to 
compromise with. So we are asking him to put it on the table and then 
we can work this out and work out the priorities.
  The President said when he ran that he could balance the budget in 5 
years. He said during this crisis that we could balance the budget in 7 
years. All we ask is that the President meet himself halfway by putting 
his version of that on the table so that we can move this negotiating 
process forward and fully reopen the government.
  I am pleased that we have already voted to put Government workers 
back to work. Now let us reopen the Government fully once the President 
does what his responsibility is: Put your budget on the table.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Texas [Mr. Coleman].
  Mr. COLEMAN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this 
time.
  I guess my question is, did you all put on blinders over there on the 
Republican side of the aisle? Do you stick your head in the sand? You 
stop reading when you want to stop reading, right? The agreement says, 
in full, the only underlined part that I got from you all was the 
President, according to the gentleman from Virginia, has to meet 
himself halfway. That is it.
  Is that it? Some negotiation. I thought that the Congress, the 
Republican-led Congress of the United States was supposed to be at the 
table presenting its budget that did the following. It is in the 
agreement you signed, is it not?
  It did the following: It is going to protect Medicare, Medicaid, 
education, the environment, veterans.
  Your budget was woefully inadequate. It did not do that and that is 
why it got vetoed. You know that and I know that. Do not for 1 minute 
come up here and tell us that only one person at the table has to meet 
somebody halfway. That is not how it works.
  I do not know in Virginia where you have been. I do not know if you 
have served on a legislature or not or been in any other governmental 
body, or been in any business that required compromise, but usually 
compromise is when both people sit down and agree to meet.
  The President has spent fully 40 hours in negotiations with the 
Republican leadership of the House and the Senate. That is right. That 
is what has happened. Some of us were around here when President Bush 
met with Members of the Congress, and believe me, it did not probably 
exceed 40 minutes. It was not any 40 hours; it was about 40 minutes.
  So I want to tell my colleagues right now, this President of the 
United States is seeking a balanced budget. In fact, his first budget 
reduced the deficit by $700 billion. Nobody wants to talk about that 
over there on your side, do they? You think this is a one-way street. I 
am astounded that you stop reading the agreement when you want to stop 
reading it. That is not the way to do business.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. COLEMAN. I yield to the gentleman from Virginia.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  The fact of the matter is, we have a specific budget on the table 
that you can look to.
  Mr. COLEMAN. No, sir; I am going to reclaim my time. Let me reclaim 
my time for this reason: Your budget did not protect Medicare and 
Medicaid, the seniors, and the veterans. It did not. That is why it got 
vetoed. It was absolutely slashing the budget for those people.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, 
just to point out to the previous speaker that we have bent over 
backward to try to be fair to this President. We have told him that if 
he will present a 7-year balanced budget, scored by CBO, we are not 
going to dictate to him whether he has so many dollars for Medicare, 
education or the environment, for defense or anything else. We simply 
want him to put a balanced budget on the table so that we have dollars 
and cents in each function that we can compare, so that we can sit down 
and begin serious negotiations. That is what this debate is all about 
here today.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. 
Roth], a great fan of the Green Bay Packers.
  Mr. ROTH. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for yielding me this time.
  Mr. Speaker, at some point we have to stop shouting at each other and 
get down to business. I think this is a good bill, because it is a win/
win bill. You can say you won something; we on our side can say that we 
have balanced the budget, and we have.
  Now, the President has said that he is for a balanced budget, and we 
did submit a balanced budget to the President, and he vetoed it. 
Historically, the President has always presented a budget to the 
Congress.

                              {time}  1715

  All we are asking the President to do is to walk his talk. He has 
made a commitment. Let him come forward with his budget.
  The President vetoed the first balanced budget that we sent to him in 
26 years. Now, no business, no family can operate in the red for 26 
years like our Government has. Think about it. We pay $20 billion a 
month, $20 billion a month to the bondholders. Do we want to sell our 
children into financial bondage. I do not think so.
  That is why this bill before us is a good bill. I have heard some of 
the people on the other side of the aisle say they are going to vote 
for this bill. I think it is a good positive step. We must start, 
Republican and Democrat, to come together. Remember, two mountains can 
never come together but two people always can. I think we can come 
together.
  I would like to see the President come forward with his balanced 
budget. We cannot have everything. We cannot have everything on our 
side. You quite frankly cannot have everything on your side. Every time 
we make a good faith proposal, you keep moving the goal posts. Like my 
good friend from New York had mentioned, the Green Bay Packers. Well, I 
hope the Packers win tomorrow, but if 49'ers keep moving the goal 
posts, keep changing the rules to suit the 49'ers the Packers can't 
win. And so, too, here.

[[Page H236]]

  We have got to have the same rules, my friends. We cannot have one 
rule for one side and another rule for the other side. This is a good 
bill. Vote for it. Do this for your kids and for the future of America.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Colorado [Mr. Skaggs].
  Mr. SKAGGS. I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time.
  Mr. Speaker, if we are going to have an agreement--and I very much 
want an agreement, I believe the President has demonstrated that he 
very much wants an agreement, given the amount of time he has spent 
trying to reach one--if we are going to get to an agreement, it is 
going to take good faith and compromise on all sides.
  I support a 7-year balanced budget. I voted for the coalition 
proposal. I expect that is roughly where we are likely to end up in all 
of this. But if that is what we want, this bill is not the way to get 
there. Why not? Because it simply does not demonstrate the kind of good 
faith that is going to be required if a negotiation will succeed.
  A little while ago one of the reporters asked me this question: ``Is 
this simply a way to box the President in?'' That is it. That is 
exactly what it is. As many have pointed out, there were two conditions 
in the November CR that were to have been met: one, a 7-year balanced 
budget scored by CBO; second, paying greater respect to Medicare, 
Medicaid, veterans, education, the environment, and so on.
  Either both of these conditions have to be met ahead of time, before 
negotiations begin, or neither of them need to be met ahead of time. 
You cannot have it both ways. You cannot say one must be met before we 
start negotiations but we will only meet our side of the deal later on. 
It is misleading and I think disingenuous to suggest that the President 
has not honored the terms in the November agreement and will not honor 
his promise.
  If the President has to table the 7-year balanced budget scored by 
CBO before we can make any progress, then so must the Republicans table 
a new budget that addresses the questions of Medicare, Medicaid, 
education and the environment. If you claim that you are obliged to 
meet your part of the November bargain only at the end of the 
negotiation, then that is when the President needs to meet his part of 
the November agreement, You cannot have it both ways.
  This bill, because it tries to have it in a one-sided way, will hurt, 
not help, this process. We should defeat the previous question.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from New Mexico [Mr. Schiff].
  Mr. SCHIFF. I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the resolution and of the bill. I 
want to address first the charge that has been made on the House floor 
that the Republicans are asking the President to agree to cuts in 
Medicare or to some specific tax policy. It is absolutely not true. We 
are asking the President to abide by the agreement that he made with 
the Congress in November, which is to put out a balanced budget in a 7-
year timeframe, using the Congressional Budget Office economic 
projections for such things as government revenue and inflationary 
impact on programs.
  The possibilities from that point are limitless. The President can 
put the spending priorities on any program he wants. He can propose tax 
reduction, he can propose tax increases or he can propose no change 
whatsoever in the U.S. tax policy, as long as it meets the criteria of 
7 years and Congressional Budget Office scoring.
  The House reaffirmed its commitment to using the Congressional Budget 
Office recently with 341 votes, and I hope all 341 of those Members, 
Republicans and Democrats alike, will support this resolution.
  I want to address the second point, that there is another part of the 
agreement, and that part of the agreement that there be adequate 
funding for certain programs. That is a correct statement. The problem 
is, what is adequate funding for those programs?
  There are several budgets already in existence that meet the 7-year 
Congressional Budget Office requirement. The Republicans have offered a 
budget. A number of Democrats have offered a budget on the House floor. 
A number of Democrats have offered a balanced budget in the other body.
  Which one of those budgets, if any, does the President believe meets 
the requirement of adequate funding for programs? If none of them do, 
here is the opportunity for the President to offer a balanced budget 
proposal that shows us, with exact figures, how much spending there 
should be for certain programs for him to call it adequate.
  Without those figures on the floor, it is impossible to negotiate any 
further, because it is impossible to determine what figures are the 
exact amount of adequate funding.
  The reasons negotiations have not been successful between the White 
House and the President is that the Republican leadership has put out a 
budget. I do not agree with all its provisions but they have done so. 
The President has not put out a budget.
  Once both sides have put out a budget that says we believe that this 
is how we meet the priority in funding and under the 7-year 
Congressional Budget Office economic projections, then the American 
people can decide whose priorities they prefer. Until that happens, 
negotiations can go on forever and they will never be productive.
  Therefore, I urge passage of this resolution, passage of the bill, 
and I respectfully urge the President of the United States to present 
his budget so we can see his priorities.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
West Virginia [Mr. Wise].
  Mr. WISE. Mr. Speaker, in all this quibbling that is going on about 
what was the language in the November 20 resolution, whether it was 7 
years, CBO, or whether you should pay attention to the protection of 
the programs such as Medicare and Medicaid, I am struck by 
misdirection. Because if the goal here is to punish the President for 
not coming forward, it seems to me the wrong people are getting 
punished.
  If you want to punish the President, the way to do that is to say 
that half the Head Start children are not going to be able to go to 
Head Start? If you want to punish the President you instead deny small 
businesses loan guarantees, $40 million a day? You want to punish the 
President, so you go ahead and make it rough on Federal workers after 
January 26? You want to punish the President, so you deny Medicare 
vendors getting paid denying services to senior citizens? This is a 
pretty tough crowd if that is the way you think you punish the 
President.
  The fact of the matter is it is like a carrot and a stick. This is 
the first organization I have ever seen, the carrot and the stick, the 
old thing where you have got the horse out in front of the wagon, you 
hold the carrot in front of the horse, then you have got people on the 
wagon trying to get the horse to move forward. In this crowd if the 
carrot does not work they turn around and shoot all the passengers on 
the wagon.
  The fact is, let us do this out of mutual respect. The thing to do is 
go back into negotiations. I am a bit offended when I hear the 
President has not negotiated in good faith.
  I was here in 1990 when President Bush and Republicans and Democrats 
had the budget summit, many, many days. This President has spent 40 
hours meeting with Republican leaders at the White House. If President 
Bush measured his time in minutes meeting with those conferees, I will 
be very, very surprised. Forty hours. Second, if there is no 
Presidential budget, then what was it we voted on the floor about 2 
weeks ago in which the Republican leadership took great glee in putting 
on the floor and having everybody vote against it, calling it the 
President's budget? What is it that is being discussed in these 40 
hours of negotiations? I hear figures coming back, somebody has come 
down on Medicare, somebody has come down on taxes, so clearly 
negotiations are taking place.
  Mr. Speaker, the American people are smart enough to know whether 
there are good-faith negotiations, they are smart enough to measure the 
result. Do not punish the American people for the frustrations that may 
be on both sides.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to one of the real 
leaders of this House, the gentleman from Texas [Mr. DeLay], the whip 
for the majority. We would be interested in what he has to say.

[[Page H237]]

  Mr. DeLAY. I thank the chairman and I appreciate the good work that 
he and his committee do, under terribly tough circumstances.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this conditional continuing 
resolution. Republicans call this a conditional CR because it goes into 
effect based upon one simple condition, that the President present a 
certified budget that reaches balance in 7 years. I call this 
legislation the trust-but-really-verify temporary spending resolution.
  We have tried other approaches before, as the people know, and those 
approaches have failed to dislodge this President from his defense of 
the status quo. All we are asking is for Bill Clinton to give fiscal 
responsibility a chance. But we have heard through the grapevine that 
the President will work to oppose this bill based on his opposition to 
a real balanced budget. If the President actively opposes this CR, he 
presents the American people a vivid contrast between his words and his 
deeds.
  He of course has mouthed with numbing regularity his support for the 
goal of a balanced budget. But he has worked to kill every balanced 
budget initiative, including the balanced budget amendment to the 
Constitution and the coalition balanced budget with every ounce of his 
being.
  President Clinton may think he can fool all the people all the time 
but if he fails to fulfill the conditions of this continuing 
resolution, he will finally be unmasked as the big-spending liberal 
that he really is.
  The President has the ability to either put up a balanced budget or 
shut down the Federal Government once again.
  I just urge my colleagues to give the President a chance to expose 
his true intentions. Pass this conditional CR and let us see if the 
President will ever present a real balanced budget.
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I am happy to yield 1 minute to the 
distinguished gentleman from the home of the Independence Bowl, 
Shreveport, LA [Mr. McCrery], of the Committee on Ways and Means.
  Mr. McCRERY. I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time.
  Mr. Speaker, it is hard to negotiate when one of the parties will not 
put on the table an opening offer.
  Therefore, this House tonight will pass a resolution which will 
implicitly ask the question that the press and the media in this 
country should have been asking for the last several weeks:
  Mr. President, where is your balanced budget?
  Mr. President, where is your balanced budget?
  Mr. President, where is your balanced budget?
  Mr. President, where is your balanced budget?
  Mr. President, where is your balanced budget?
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from 
North Carolina [Mr. Hefner].
  Mr. HEFNER. ``Where is your balanced budget?'' That is a nice speech, 
Mr. Speaker. It should make the news tonight.
  Mr. Speaker, I just want to make one point. My friend from Texas in 
his closing remarks, he said the President puts a budget on the table 
and we can negotiate but what we are hearing coming out of 
negotiations, the conditions are set down that the Speaker has said 
that he will not let a budget come to the floor here that cannot get 
218 Republican votes.

                              {time}  1730

  The majority leader says that there is no budget going to pass this 
House if the taxes are changed. So some negotiations you have got 
there.
  And the gentleman from Texas says, ``Mr. President, if you do not do 
what we want to do on our terms, we will shut the country down again.'' 
So what we are going to do, what we have here, you are going to have a 
recess where the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Gingrich] can go raise a 
lot of money and we are going to have the people dispersing, going on 
trips and what have you, and saying we have put the ball in the 
President's court, and then, ``If you don't do it like we want it, we 
will shut the Government down and put people out of work and 
inconvenience the American public,'' and ``that ain't right.''
  Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Walker], vice chairman of the 
Committee on the Budget and chairman of the Committee on Science.
  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this 
time.
  Back in November the President made a promise in law that he would 
produce a balanced budget, he would enact a balanced budget by January 
3. That was a guarantee that we thought he meant. Maybe we were wrong. 
Maybe he did not really mean it. Maybe he thought that negotiations 
would suffice for producing a balanced budget, that maybe there were 
all kinds of confusions that resulted from this.
  One of the confusions there should not be is nobody has ever 
suggested that the President needed to produce a balanced budget on our 
terms. All we have ever asked the President to do is produce a balanced 
budget that fits his terms. We want his balanced budget. We are willing 
to negotiate with him based upon what we say should be in a balanced 
budget and what he says is in a balanced budget. But you cannot 
negotiate with nothing.
  We are asking the President in this CR to put forward his balanced 
budget. As soon as his balanced budget, scored by CBO, is certified at 
the desk, he will get a continuing resolution to do what he says is 
important, and that is to put the full operation of the Federal 
Government back in place until January 26.

  If the President signed that law making a promise that he would 
produce a balanced budget, there should be absolutely no problem with 
him signing this CR and sending us his balanced budget. No problem at 
all. Why would there be a problem? All we are saying to him is, ``Do 
what you told us you would do 45 days ago,'' and then the Government 
can be reopened, all the programs can be functioning, and there is no 
problem.
  But if the President does not send a balanced budget and does not 
bring the Government back up, we will know that what he signed in 
November was simply a charade, that he had no intention of producing a 
balanced budget, that he has no intention in the future of producing a 
balanced budget.
  If you vote against this rule and vote against this item, what you 
are saying is we have no intention of producing a balanced budget.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from Florida [Mr. Gibbons].
  Mr. GIBBONS. Mr. Speaker, I think everyone knows that this particular 
resolution is going absolutely nowhere. It will go to the Senate, and 
they will never consider it.
  But I think we ought to tell the truth about what we are talking 
about. Balancing the budget in 7 years requires the reduction of 
expenditures of about $750 billion, a doable amount. Where we really 
disagree is the method in which that money is subtracted from the 
budget.
  The Republicans' priorities, as I read them, put the balance of the 
budget burden upon the elderly sick, the young sick, the elderly in 
general, upon the working poor, and to a certain extent upon middle-
class America. The thing that is causing all of this trouble but no one 
will really admit is the proposal to reduce taxes by $250 billion on 
the Republican side, and the President's mistake of reducing taxes 
about $100 billion. That makes the balancing of the budget extremely 
cruel. You have got to do some things that you would not do if you were 
operating in a normal environment.
  So both sides ought to throw on the floor and put behind them the 
reduction of taxes during this period of time. It is a shame that we 
are in this environment.

  I do not think we ought to go home. I think we ought to stay here and 
continue working on the substance of all of this.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman 
from San Diego, CA [Mr. Cunningham], a truly great American who has 
served in our Armed Forces.
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Speaker, my colleagues on the other side of the 
aisle said that the contract was signed by both, and there are some 
things that we need to attend to in Medicare and education and so on.
  Let me cover the education facts. As a subcommittee chairman on 
education, I think there is a difference on 

[[Page H238]]
what is really good. We increased student loans by 50 percent. We 
increased Pell grants to the highest level ever.
  But what we did not protect is your precious bureaucracy that only 
allows 23 cents on a dollar to get down into the classroom because of 
that bureaucracy.
  We eliminated the President's direct student loan program, that, 
according to GAO, cost a billion dollars more must to administer, and 
those fees are not even calculated on what it cost to receive those 
monies. You want the power here. We have eliminated the bureaucracy and 
the power.
  Goals 2000, you say, ``Well, look, you cut Goals 2000.'' On a Federal 
level where you have Federal control instead of the State, yes, we did. 
Goals 2000, there are 45 instances that say State will, and you have 
got to have groups and members in different groups that put together 
the requirements. It is only voluntary if you do not want the money.
  But yet we send the money directly back to the State, and if a State 
wants to do Goals 2000, they can.
  The Department of Education, $32 billion in its budget, and the 
President's direct loan program would make it the largest lending 
institution, if he had this way, in the United States. That is wrong. 
We have protected education.
  Your welfare system has failed education.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman 
from New York [Mr. Engel].
  Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding this time 
to me.
  Let me just say that I am going to vote against this rule and against 
this resolution because I consider this to be political chicanery of 
the worst kind, an arrogant attempt to tell the President, ``Play by my 
rules or we won't play at all.'' That is what the majority party is 
doing. It is an attempt to trap the President, to rape the President, 
to say again, ``If we think that you are doing what we deem you ought 
to be doing, then we will open the Government, but if we do not, then 
we will keep it shut.''
  You know, my colleagues, it took 12 years of Reagan and Bush budgets 
to get us into this mess of deficits, and it is going to take 7 years 
to get us out of it.
  The President agreed to support a 7-year balanced budget as an end 
product of the negotiations. But the Republicans also agreed to protect 
Medicare and Medicaid and education and the environment, things that we 
believe are dead in their budget. Their budget kills Medicare and kills 
Medicaid and kills the environment and hurts working families and kills 
education.
  We have not seen them change their budget. That was supposed to be 
part of their end of the deal.
  So this is simply trying to change the rules. It is an attempt to 
shift the dialog because the Republicans are taking a beating for 
shutting the Government down, and so they need to try to shift the 
dialog, and by trying to shift it, they are saying to the President, 
``We demand that you produce a balanced budget according to our rules, 
not as you agreed to the end game.'' We ought not to play by these 
games or by these rules.
  This is only going to come out of both sides getting together, 
working together for a compromise.
  Reject this nonsense, this chicanery.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Kentucky [Mr. Rogers]. The State of Kentucky has a lot of outstanding 
Congressmen, as you know, sir, but the gentleman from Kentucky [Mr. 
Rogers] is one who is very outstanding, our good friend from Somerset, 
KY, a member of the Committee on Appropriations, doing an outstanding 
job.
  Mr. ROGERS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding this time 
to me.
  Mr. Speaker, we have had enough of the blame game on who is to blame 
for shutting down the Government. You say it is our fault. We say it is 
your fault, the President's fault.
  This resolution settles it all. This is the end game here. What this 
resolution says is regardless of who caused the shutdown, we are 
prepared to end it, Mr. President. All we want to do, as we have been 
doing for months now, is just put your offer on the table. How can you 
make a deal for a piece of land if you go to the owner and say, ``I am 
willing to pay you $1,000 an acre,'' and he says, ``I want to sell it 
to you,'' and you say, ``How much do you want for it,'' and he says, 
``I am not going to tell you.'' How can you negotiate if you cannot get 
the other party to put some offer on the table?
  All this resolution does, Mr. Speaker, is to say we are willing to 
open up the entire Government, business as usual, provided, Mr. 
President, you tell us what your balanced budget proposal is. It does 
not matter how you come up with it so long as it balances in 7 years 
using CBO numbers. Then we can negotiate.
  As it stands now, we simply cannot negotiate with you. You will not 
tell us what you want for your acre of land.
  So this resolution is calculated to finally decide who is at fault 
with keeping the Government shut down. We are saying open it up 
entirely, and all you have got to do to do that, Mr. President, is just 
lay on the table your proposal for a balanced budget in 7 years so that 
we can negotiate in good faith. We are asking for good faith, Mr. 
President, and this is the only way we know how to do it.
  If there is a better way, please tell us and we will try to do that.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman 
from Texas [Mr. de la Garza].
  (Mr. de la GARZA asked and was given permission to revise and extend 
his remarks.)
  Mr. de la GARZA. Mr. Speaker, my colleagues, I am concerned that we 
are again dealing in a vacuum with numbers only. We are not attaching 
faces and places. The debate and the obsession about what the President 
did or did not do is leaving out what we should be discussing.
  I am going to attach one name to this discussion. Her name is Elisa 
Izquierdo, a little girl that died in New York for lack of attention, 
that what we do here could take away from other children, and I quote 
from an article that I am putting at this point in the Record, ``How 
Cold Is America Prepared To be? How much can you take from children who 
have so little?''
  We should attach names, faces and places and get over this obsession 
of what the President did or did not do.
  Mr. Speaker, concerning the debate on what we do as a Congress to 
protect the children of our country we share with you an article by 
Jonathan Kozol. I would like to strongly recommend the last paragraph 
which reads as follows:

       Like most Americans, I do not tend to think of a society 
     that has been good to me and to my parents as ``evil.'' But 
     when he said that ``somebody has power,'' it was difficult to 
     disagree. It is possible that icy equanimity and a self-
     pacifying form of moral abdication by the powerful will take 
     more lives in the long run than any single drug-addicted and 
     disordered parent. Elisa Izquirdo's mother killed only one 
     child. The seemingly anesthetized behavior of the U.S. 
     Congress may kill thousands. Now we are told we must `get 
     tougher' with the poor. How much tougher can we get with 
     children who already have so little? How cold is America 
     prepared to be?

  Mr. Speaker, I am enclosing the article at this point, as follows:

                [From the Time magazine, Dec. 11, 1995]

                        Spare Us the Cheap Grace

                          (By Jonathan Kozol)

       It is hard to say what was more shocking about the death of 
     Elisa Izquierdo--the endless savagery inflicted on her body 
     and mind, or the stubborn inaction of the New York City 
     agencies that were repeatedly informed of her peril. But 
     while the murder of Elisa by her mother is appalling, it is 
     hardly unexpected. In the death zones of America's postmodern 
     ghetto, stripped of jobs and human services and sanitation, 
     plagued by AIDS, tuberculosis, pediatric asthma and endemic 
     clinical depression, largely abandoned by American physicians 
     and devoid of the psychiatric services familiar in most 
     middle-class communities, deaths like these are part of a 
     predictable scenario.
       After the headlines of recrimination and pretended shock 
     wear off, we go back to our ordinary lives. Before long, we 
     forget the victims' names. They weren't our children or the 
     children of our neighbors. We do not need to mourn them for 
     too long. But do we have the right to mourn at all? What does 
     it mean when those whom we elect to public office cut back 
     elemental services of life protection for poor children and 
     then show up at the victim's funeral to pay condolence to the 
     relatives and friends? At what point do those of us who have 
     the power to prevent these deaths forfeit the entitlement of 
     mourners?
       It is not as if we do not know what might have saved some 
     of these children's lives. We know that intervention programs 
     work when well-trained social workers have a lot of time to 
     dedicate to each and every child. We 

[[Page H239]]
     know that crisis hot lines work best when half of their employees do 
     not burn out and quit each year, and that social workers do a 
     better job when records are computerized instead of being 
     piled up, lost and forgotten on the floor of a back room. We 
     know that when a drug-addicted mother asks for help, as many 
     mothers do, it is essential to provide the help she needs 
     without delay, not after a waiting period of six months to a 
     year, as is common in poor urban neighborhoods.
       All these remedies are expensive, and we would demand them 
     if our own children's lives were at stake. And yet we don't 
     demand them for poor children. We wring our hands about the 
     tabloid stories. We castigate the mother. We condemn the 
     social worker. We churn out the familiar criticisms of 
     ``bureaucracy'' but do not volunteer to use our cleverness to 
     change it. Then the next time an election comes, we vote 
     against the taxes that might make prevention programs 
     possible, while favoring increased expenditures for prisons 
     to incarcerate the children who survive the worst that we 
     have done to them and grow up to be dangerous adults.
       What makes this moral contradiction possible?
       Can it be, despite our frequent protestations to the 
     contrary, that our society does not particularly value the 
     essential human worth of certain groups of children? 
     Virtually all the victims we are speaking of are very poor 
     black and Hispanic children. We have been told that our 
     economy no longer has much need for people of their caste and 
     color. Best-selling authors have, in recent years, assured us 
     of their limited intelligence and low degree of 
     ``civilization development.'' As a woman in Arizona said in 
     regard to immigrant kids from Mexico, ``I didn't breed them. 
     I don't want to feed them''--a sentiment also heard in 
     reference to black children on talk-radio stations in New 
     York and other cities. ``Put them over there,'' a black 
     teenager told me once, speaking of the way he felt that he 
     and other blacks were viewed by our society. ``Pack them 
     tight. Don't think about them. Keep your hands clean. Maybe 
     they'll kill each other off.''
       I do not know how many people in our nation would confess 
     such contemplations, which offend the elemental mandates of 
     our cultural beliefs and our religions. No matter how 
     severely some among us may condemn the parents of the poor, 
     it has been an axiom of faith in the U.S. that once a child 
     is born, all condemnations are to be set aside. If we now 
     have chosen to betray this faith, what consequences will this 
     have for our collective spirit, for our soul as a society?
       There is an agreeable illusion, evidenced in much of the 
     commentary about Elisa, that those of us who witness the 
     abuse of innocence--so long as we are standing at a certain 
     distance--need not feel complicit in these tragedies. But 
     this is the kind of ethical exemption that Dietrich 
     Bonhoeffer called ``cheap grace.'' Knowledge carries with it 
     certain theological imperatives. The more we know, the harder 
     it becomes to grant ourselves exemption. ``Evil exists,'' a 
     student in the South Bronx told me in the course of a long 
     conversation about ethics and religion in the fall of 1993. 
     ``Somebody has power. Pretending that they don't so they 
     don't need to use it to help people--that is my idea of 
     evil.''
       Like most Americans, I do not tend to think of a society 
     that has been good to me and to my parents as ``evil.'' But 
     when he said that ``somebody has power,'' it was difficult to 
     disagree. It is possible that icy equanimity and a self-
     pacifying form of moral abdication by the powerful will take 
     more lives in the long run than any single drug-addicted and 
     disordered parent. Elisa Izquierdo's mother killed only one 
     child. The seemingly anesthetized behavior of the U.S. 
     Congress may kill thousands. Now we are told we must ``get 
     tougher'' with the poor. How much tougher can we get with 
     children who already have so little? How cold is America 
     prepared to be?

  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  Mr. Speaker, in closing, let me simply urge my colleagues to vote 
``no'' on the previous question.
  If the previous question is defeated, we shall offer an amendment 
that would send a clean continuing resolution to the President 
immediately, stopping the delaying mechanism in the concurrent 
resolution unless House Republicans live up to their part of the deal 
and lay on the table a 7-year balanced budget that actually protects 
Medicare, Medicaid, education, agriculture, national defense, veterans 
and others. The amendment would put the budget negotiations on terms we 
believe are fair.
  The majority would have to decide either to let the continuing 
resolution go forward without delay or delay it until both the 
President and majority submit a balanced budget that meets the terms of 
the budget negotiations that have already been agreed to.
  Mr. Speaker, in ending, I am inserting at this point in the Record 
the amendment I intent to offer if the previous question is defeated.
  The proposed amendment is as follows:

                 Amendment to the Rule on H.J. Res. 134

       In section 2 of the resolution, after ``House Concurrent 
     Resolution 131'', insert ``, as modified by the amendment in 
     section 4 of this resolution,''.
       At the end of the resolution add the following:
       ``Sec. 4. At the end of the concurrent resolution self-
     executed by section 3 of this resolution, add the following 
     new section:
       ``Sec. --. The preceding sections delaying the transmission 
     of the joint resolution shall have no effect and the joint 
     resolution shall be promptly transmitted to the President 
     unless the Majority Leader, on behalf of all House 
     Republicans, causes to be printed in the Congressional Record 
     a new seven-year balanced budget in accordance with the 
     strictures set forth in section 203 of Public Law 104-56 such 
     that the Republican budget achieves ``a balanced budget not 
     later than fiscal year 2002 as estimated by the Congressional 
     Budget Office and, unlike the reconciliation measure vetoed 
     by the President, H.R. 2491, ``protects future generations, 
     ensures Medicare solvency, reforms welfare and provides 
     adequate funding for Medicaid, education, agriculture, 
     national defense, veterans, and the environment * * * [and] 
     adopts tax policies to help working families and to stimulate 
     future economic growth.''.''''

  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  Mr. Speaker, we have spent a lot of time, both sides, throwing arrows 
at each other, blaming each other.
  Let me quote from an editorial which is not Republican or Democrat. 
It is a liberal newspaper, usually. It is the Philadelphia Inquirer. 
The headline on this editorial says, ``Your Turn, Bill. Clinton Must 
Offer the Serious Budget He Promised.''

                              {time}  1745

  The text of the editorial goes on to say, ``The country is still 
waiting for Mr. Clinton's plan.''
  The last paragraph of this editorial says, ``Congress should pass 
stopgap funding as soon as the President provides the missing 
ingredient of serious bargaining: A credible White House plan to 
balance the budget in seven years.''
  Mr. Speaker, that is exactly what we are doing. The last paragraph of 
this editorial from a liberal newspaper in Philadelphia. We are 
offering a clean resolution, which is what everyone has been asking 
for.
  This clean resolution puts all of the Government back to work, all of 
the employees, all of the functions of Government, but it holds that 
bill here at the desk until the President does what the last paragraph 
of this editorial says, until the President gives us a balanced budget 
certified to be balanced by the Congressional Budget Office in 7 years. 
It is as simple as that.
  Our Speaker Gingrich has bent over backwards trying to cooperate with 
the President. So has Senator Dole. Yet no progress has been made. This 
gives all of them 21 more days without any problem in between to allow 
them to sit down, give each other their figures, and let us get down to 
some serious negotiations and do what the American people want.
  Every day we stand here, the interest to pay on that national debt 
goes up $667 million. That is so uncompassionate. Think what we could 
do for people with $667 million a day extra if we did not have this 
deficit.
  I ask Members to come and vote for the previous question, and then 
vote for this bill. I believe that Senator Daschle in the other body is 
going to accept this and send it on to the President. Let us not try to 
stop him from doing that.
  Mr. Speaker, I move the previous question on the resolution.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Bunning of Kentucky). The question is on 
ordering the previous question.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the ayes appeared to have it.
  Mr. BEILENSON. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a 
quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not 
present.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Evidently a quorum is not present.
  The Sergeant at Arms will notify absent Members.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 226, 
nays 183, not voting 24, as follows:

                              [Roll No. 9]

                               YEAS--226

     Allard
     Archer
     Bachus
     Baker (CA)
     Ballenger
     Barr
     Barrett (NE)
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bass
     Bateman
     Bereuter
     Bilbray
     Bilirakis
     Bliley
     Blute
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     
[[Page H240]]

     Bonilla
     Bono
     Brownback
     Bryant (TN)
     Bunn
     Bunning
     Burr
     Burton
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Campbell
     Canady
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chambliss
     Chenoweth
     Christensen
     Clinger
     Coble
     Coburn
     Collins (GA)
     Combest
     Cooley
     Cox
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cremeans
     Cubin
     Cunningham
     Davis
     Deal
     DeLay
     Diaz-Balart
     Dickey
     Doolittle
     Dornan
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Ehlers
     Ehrlich
     Emerson
     English
     Ensign
     Everett
     Ewing
     Fawell
     Flanagan
     Foley
     Forbes
     Fowler
     Fox
     Franks (CT)
     Franks (NJ)
     Frelinghuysen
     Frisa
     Funderburk
     Gallegly
     Ganske
     Gekas
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Gilman
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Goss
     Graham
     Greenwood
     Gunderson
     Gutknecht
     Hall (TX)
     Hancock
     Hansen
     Hastert
     Hastings (WA)
     Hayworth
     Hefley
     Heineman
     Herger
     Hilleary
     Hobson
     Hoekstra
     Hoke
     Horn
     Hostettler
     Houghton
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Istook
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson, Sam
     Jones
     Kasich
     Kelly
     Kim
     King
     Kingston
     Klug
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     LaHood
     Largent
     Latham
     LaTourette
     Laughlin
     Lazio
     Leach
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (KY)
     Linder
     Livingston
     LoBiondo
     Longley
     Lucas
     Manzullo
     Martini
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McDade
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McIntosh
     McKeon
     Metcalf
     Meyers
     Mica
     Miller (FL)
     Molinari
     Moorhead
     Morella
     Myrick
     Nethercutt
     Neumann
     Ney
     Norwood
     Nussle
     Oxley
     Packard
     Parker
     Paxon
     Petri
     Pombo
     Porter
     Portman
     Pryce
     Quinn
     Radanovich
     Ramstad
     Regula
     Riggs
     Roberts
     Rogers
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Roth
     Roukema
     Royce
     Salmon
     Sanford
     Saxton
     Schaefer
     Schiff
     Seastrand
     Sensenbrenner
     Shadegg
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shuster
     Skeen
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (TX)
     Smith (WA)
     Solomon
     Souder
     Spence
     Stearns
     Stump
     Talent
     Tate
     Tauzin
     Taylor (NC)
     Thomas
     Thornberry
     Tiahrt
     Torkildsen
     Upton
     Vucanovich
     Waldholtz
     Walker
     Walsh
     Wamp
     Watts (OK)
     Weldon (FL)
     Weldon (PA)
     Weller
     White
     Whitfield
     Wicker
     Wolf
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)
     Zeliff
     Zimmer

                               NAYS--183

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Andrews
     Baesler
     Baldacci
     Barcia
     Barrett (WI)
     Becerra
     Beilenson
     Bentsen
     Bevill
     Bishop
     Bonior
     Borski
     Boucher
     Brewster
     Browder
     Brown (CA)
     Brown (FL)
     Brown (OH)
     Cardin
     Clay
     Clement
     Clyburn
     Coleman
     Collins (IL)
     Collins (MI)
     Condit
     Conyers
     Costello
     Coyne
     Cramer
     Danner
     de la Garza
     DeFazio
     DeLauro
     Dellums
     Deutsch
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Dixon
     Doggett
     Dooley
     Doyle
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Engel
     Eshoo
     Evans
     Farr
     Fattah
     Fields (LA)
     Filner
     Flake
     Foglietta
     Ford
     Frank (MA)
     Frost
     Furse
     Gejdenson
     Gephardt
     Geren
     Gibbons
     Gonzalez
     Gordon
     Green
     Gutierrez
     Hall (OH)
     Hamilton
     Harman
     Hastings (FL)
     Hefner
     Hilliard
     Hinchey
     Holden
     Hoyer
     Jackson (IL)
     Jackson-Lee (TX)
     Jacobs
     Jefferson
     Johnson (SD)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Kanjorski
     Kaptur
     Kennedy (MA)
     Kennedy (RI)
     Kennelly
     Kildee
     Kleczka
     Klink
     LaFalce
     Lantos
     Levin
     Lewis (GA)
     Lincoln
     Lipinski
     Lowey
     Luther
     Maloney
     Manton
     Markey
     Martinez
     Mascara
     Matsui
     McCarthy
     McDermott
     McHale
     McKinney
     McNulty
     Meehan
     Meek
     Menendez
     Mfume
     Miller (CA)
     Minge
     Mink
     Moakley
     Mollohan
     Moran
     Murtha
     Nadler
     Neal
     Oberstar
     Obey
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Orton
     Owens
     Pallone
     Pastor
     Payne (NJ)
     Payne (VA)
     Pelosi
     Peterson (FL)
     Peterson (MN)
     Pickett
     Pomeroy
     Poshard
     Rahall
     Rangel
     Reed
     Richardson
     Rivers
     Roemer
     Roybal-Allard
     Rush
     Sabo
     Sanders
     Sawyer
     Schroeder
     Schumer
     Scott
     Serrano
     Sisisky
     Skaggs
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Spratt
     Stenholm
     Stokes
     Stupak
     Tanner
     Taylor (MS)
     Tejeda
     Thompson
     Thurman
     Torres
     Torricelli
     Towns
     Traficant
     Velazquez
     Vento
     Visclosky
     Volkmer
     Ward
     Waters
     Watt (NC)
     Waxman
     Williams
     Wise
     Woolsey
     Wynn
     Yates

                             NOT VOTING--24

     Armey
     Baker (LA)
     Berman
     Bryant (TX)
     Chapman
     Chrysler
     Clayton
     Fazio
     Fields (TX)
     Hayes
     Johnston
     Lightfoot
     Lofgren
     Montgomery
     Myers
     Quillen
     Rose
     Scarborough
     Stark
     Stockman
     Studds
     Thornton
     Wilson
     Wyden

                              {time}  1806

  The Clerk announced the following pair:
  On the vote:

       Mr. Armey for, with Mr. Johnston of Florida against.

  So the previous question was ordered.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Bunning of Kentucky). The question is on 
the resolution.
  The resolution was agreed to.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to section 2 of House Resolution 
336, House Concurrent Resolution 131 is considered adopted.

                          ____________________