[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 33 (Tuesday, March 12, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H2084-H2095]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
CONFERENCE REPORT ON H.R. 1561, FOREIGN RELATIONS AUTHORIZATION ACT,
FISCAL YEARS 1996 AND 1997
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 375, I call up
the conference report on the bill (H.R. 1561) to consolidate the
foreign affairs agencies of the United States; to authorize
appropriations for the Department of State and related agencies for
fiscal years 1996 and 1997; to responsibly reduce the authorizations of
appropriations for U.S. foreign assistance programs for fiscal years
1996 and 1997, and for other purposes.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution, 375, the
conference report is considered as having been read.
(For conference report and statement, see proceedings of the House of
Friday, March 8, 1996, at page H1987.)
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from New York [Mr. Gilman] and
the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Hamilton] will each be recognized for
30 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from New York [Mr. Gilman].
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
(Mr. GILMAN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, I bring before the House, the conference
agreement on H.R. 1561, the Foreign Relations Authorization Act for
fiscal years 1996 and 1997.
We bring to the floor a bill that eliminates at least one Federal
agency, cuts spending $500 million before FY 1995 levels, and achieves
savings of $1.7 billion over four years.
The conference agreement requires the abolition of at least one
agency from among the four international affairs agencies--the Arms
Control and Disarmament Agency, the Agency for International
Development, and the United States Information Agency and its
consolidation into the Department of State.
This consolidation--and the President is certainly encouraged to
consolidate more than one agency--together with other provisions of the
bill, will result in a savings in fiscal years 1996 through 1999 of at
least $1.7 billion in the authorizations for programs under the control
of the Committee on International Relations.
The bill reauthorizes the Department of State and related agencies
for fiscal years 1996 and 1997. Further, it authorizes, at reduced but
manageable levels, the salary and expense accounts for the Departments
of State, USIA, ACDA, and AID through 1999.
In this manner we are able to ensure that savings in these accounts
are planned for and achieved, as will be seen in the accompanying
spreadsheet.
Regrettably, the President already has stated his intention to veto
this bill, which provides for the first measure of reform in our
foreign affairs agencies in 50 years, including reforms his own
administration proposed.
With regard to consolidation, Secretary of State Warren Christopher
last year suggested consolidating three outdated foreign affairs
agencies into the State Department. Our bill requires the consolidation
of only one agency.
Our bill also provides for a number of foreign policy principles
important to U.S. national interests.
Our bill puts the Taiwan Relations Act at the center of our
relations, allowing the United States to fully support Taiwan. The
President, siding with the Chinese Communist government, seeks to limit
our support for Taiwan by asserting that an Executive Agreement takes
precedence over legislation by the U.S. Congress.
On Vietnam, our bill conditions the expansion of United States
relations with Vietnam on POW-MIA progress. The President, by
disagreeing with this bill, stands with the Vietnamese Government and
against the families of missing Americans.
On the international housing program, our bill follows the GAO's
advice and ends the AID Housing Guarantee Program, except in South
Africa. By vetoing our bill, the President would continue this
``international S&L,'' despite the GAO's warnings that the program will
cost the taxpayers over $1 billion in loan losses.
Our bill, for the first time, also provides that recipients of grants
from the International Fund for Ireland abide by the MacBride
Principles of fair employment in the North of Ireland.
Our bill condemns Turkey's misguided policy of obstructing aid to
Armenia by prohibiting assistance to any country that bars or obstructs
delivery of U.S. humanitarian aid.
Our bill contains a bipartisan provision requiring that foreign aid
funds not spent after three years following their appropriation be
returned to the U.S. Treasury.
Our bill also contains 20 provisions to improve management of the
State Department that the administration requested.
They include authority to collect fees for visas and use the funds to
improve our border security operations, and authority to collect from
insurers for providing free health care to U.S. diplomats and their
families at overseas posts, to name a few.
We also provide higher spending levels for a very few programs, such
as the Peace Corps and International Narcotics Control programs.
H.R. 1561 also provides for reforms in the United Nations to refocus
the U.N. on its traditional development and peacekeeping roles,
preserves organizational flexibility for the agencies, provides for the
humanitarian assistance and resettlement for refugees, promotes the
rapid implementation of broadcasting into the non-democratic countries
of Asia, and terminates United States participation in obsolete
international organizations.
Mr. Speaker, this conference agreement reflects a number of
compromises between the House and the Senate and accommodates many of
the most serious concerns raised by the administration and the
minority.
While the minority chose not to participate in the process, we made a
sincere effort to meet their concerns.
It was disappointing that we could not build within the
administration and among many of our colleagues a consensus to organize
the foreign affairs functions to meet the coming century.
While we are bringing a solid Department of State and related
agencies bill to the floor, many of us are disappointed that we could
not build a consensus within the administration and among our
democractic colleagues to organize the foreign affairs functions to
meet the coming century.
Because of bureaucratic inertia and a lack of vision, the Clinton
administration has engaged in an all-out assault on any effort to
revitalize, reinvigorate, reorganize, reform, restructure, or
reconsider the foreign affairs programs of our Nation.
[[Page H2085]]
The tragedy is that this bill reflects the failure of the Clinton
administration to provide the foreign policy leadership in the early
years of the post-cold-war era that was once provided by another
Democratic administration--Harry Truman's--in the early years of the
cold war era.
Truman's administration--including the President, the Secretary of
State, the Secretary of Defense, and hundreds of other competent and
courageous public servants--were concerned with building institutions
and about the quality and effectiveness of the institutions of
government entrusted to them.
The Truman years were years of an openness to new ideas and a
willingness to experiment.
Faced with a world situation and an American role in the world
radically different from those that existed before the Second World
War, President Truman, Secretary Marshall, Secretary Forrestal,
Secretary Acheson, and others did what was necessary to adapt to the
new era.
This was the era in which the State Department was reformed from top
to bottom, in which new agencies like USIA and the foreign aid agency
were created, in which the Air Force was created, and authority over
the Army, Navy, and Air Force was consolidated into one new Department
of Defense. Intelligence matters were consolidated and placed in a
newly created Central Intelligence Agency. The National Security
Council was created.
I could go on.
The point is that in the years after the Second World War, our
country was fortunate enough to have as the leaders of its foreign
policy institutions great public servants who were concerned not only
with creating a new policy for the new era, but in building the
institutions to carry out the new policy.
Today, the institutions of foreign policy built for the cold war era
demand serious attention and will require hard work if the institutions
are to serve our policy objectives in this post-cold-war era.
The end of the cold war is not the only reason why these institutions
need attention. Massive changes in the external environment in which
these agencies operate also demand that these institutions be reformed
and revitalized.
The revitalization of the foreign policy institutions does not have
to be an adversarial process with Congress imposing upon a reluctant
bureaucracy reforms that the bureaucracy itself is unable to adopt.
We were prepared, as the new Republican majority in Congress, to work
collaboratively with the President and his Secretary of State to
develop and carry out a program of reform and revitalization of these
institutions.
We in Congress were prepared to work in that great spirit of
bipartisanship and executive-legislative collaboration that
characterized the post-World War II era.
Regretably our offers of cooperation were spurned.
But the day will surely come--in less than a year, I believe--in
which the leadership will be there to engage in a program of
revitalizing the foreign affairs functions of our Government. There
will eventually be leadership in foreign affairs who have the vision to
create the foreign policy for the post-cold-war era and the courage to
implement such a vision through institutional changes. Those whose
vision is too unfocused and whose courage is too uncertain must give
way to those who can provide the leadership that is so desperately
lacking today.
Those who oppose the reform and revitalization of the foreign affairs
programs are the real isolationists because they have allowed
themselves and their thinking to become isolated from the great changes
that have taken place.
They recognize the change in the world, but want to isolate
themselves from the serious, hard work of adapting public institutions
to the changes in the world.
In a now-infamous memo, the A.I.D. Agency said its aim was to--and I
quote--``delay, obfuscate and derail'' this bill.
This conference report is a downpayment on our pledge to streamline
and consolidate our foreign affairs apparatus for the first time in 50
years to make them more effective and efficient.
In his State of the Union speech 7 weeks ago, the President stated
that, in his words, ``the era of big government is over.'' When
Congress sends this bill to his desk in the Oval Office, we will see if
the President truly meant what he said.
FOREIGN RELATIONS AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEARS 1996 AND 1997
[In fiscal years]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1995 1996 1996 1996 1996 1996 1997 1997 1997
International Affairs, Budget --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Function 150, Account Actual Request H.R. 1561 Approps. S. 908 Final H.R. 1561 S. 908 Final
authority authority authority conferences authority conference authority authority conference
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Administration of Foreign Affairs:
Transition Fund................ ........... ........... ........... ........... 125,000 ........... ........... 100,000 ...........
Diplomatic and Consular
Programs...................... 1,748,000 1,758,438 1,728,797 1,719,220 1,688,500 1,719,220 1,656,903 1,612,000 1,710,000
Salaries and Expenses.......... 383,972 374,350 366,276 365,146 368,000 365,146 335,287 373,000 357,000
Capital Investment Fund........ 0 32,800 20,000 16,400 32,800 16,400 20,000 32,800 16,400
Protection of Foreign Missions
and Officials................. 9,579 8,579 9,579 8,579 8,579 8,579 9,579 8,579 10,000
Emergencies in the Diplomatic
and Consular Services......... 6,500 6,000 6,000 6,000 6,000 6,000 6,000 6,000 6,000
Payment to the American
Institute in Taiwan........... 15,465 15,465 15,165 15,165 15,400 15,165 13,710 15,400 14,165
Buying Power Maintenance....... (5,223) 0 0 0 ........... 0 0 ........... 0
Office of the Inspector General 23,850 24,250 23,469 27,369 23,350 27,369 21,469 23,000 27,000
Security & Maintenance of U.S.
Missions...................... 391,760 421,760 391,760 385,760 401,760 385,760 369,860 401,760 380,000
Representation Allowances...... 4,780 4,800 4,780 4,500 4,500 4,500 4,780 4,500 4,500
Repatriation Loans Program
Account....................... 776 776 776 776 776 776 776 770 776
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subtotal..................... 2,579,459 2,647,218 2,566,602 2,548,915 2,674,665 2,548,915 2,438,364 2,577,809 2,525,841
====================================================================================================================
Assessed Contributions for
Peacekeeping...................... 518,687 445,000 445,000 225,000 445,000 445,000 300,000 375,000 375,000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subtotal..................... 518,687 445,000 445,000 225,000 445,000 445,000 300,000 375,000 375,000
====================================================================================================================
International Conferences and
Contingencies..................... 6,000 6,000 6,000 3,000 7,000 3,000 5,000 5,000 3,000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subtotal..................... 6,000 6,000 6,000 3,000 7,000 3,000 5,000 5,000 3,000
====================================================================================================================
Assessed Contributions to
Internat'l Orgs................... 872,661 923,057 873,505 700,000 777,000 850,000 828,388 777,000 840,000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subtotal..................... 872,661 923,057 873,505 700,000 777,000 850,000 828,388 777,000 840,000
====================================================================================================================
Payment to the Asia Foundation..... 15,000 10,000 10,000 5,000 5,000 5,000 9,000 3,000 10,000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subtotal..................... 15,000 10,000 10,000 5,000 5,000 5,000 9,000 3,000 10,000
====================================================================================================================
Migration and Refugee Assistance:
Refugee Assistance............. 591,000 591,000 590,000 671,000 591,000 590,000 590,000 671,000 590,000
Refugees to Israel............. 80,000 80,000 80,000 ........... 80,000 80,000 80,000 ........... 80,000
Burmese Refugees............... ........... ........... 1,500 ........... ........... 1,500 1,500 ........... 1,500
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subtotal..................... 671,000 671,000 671,500 671,000 671,000 671,500 671,500 671,000 671,000
====================================================================================================================
International Narcotics Control.... 105,000 213,000 213,000 115,000 ........... 115,000 213,000 ........... 213,000
Peace Corps........................ 231,345 234,000 219,745 205,000 ........... 210,000 215,000 ........... 234,000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subtotal..................... 336,345 447,000 432,745 320,000 0 325,000 428,000 0 447,000
[[Page H2086]]
Arms Control and Disarmament
Agency:
Core programs.................. 40,878 45,300 44,000 35,700 22,700 35,700 39,500 0 30,000
Chemical Weapons Convention
(CWC)......................... 9,500 17,000 0 ........... ........... ........... ........... ........... ...........
Cobra Dane Radar............... ........... 14,000 0 ........... ........... ........... ........... ........... ...........
Subtotal....................... 50,378 76,300 44,000 35,700 22,700 35,700 39,500 0 30,000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
U.S. Information Agency:
Board for International
Broadcasting.................. 229,735 0 0 ........... ........... ........... 0 ........... ...........
BIB--Grants and Expenses....... 7,290 0 0 ........... ........... ........... 0 ........... ...........
Salaries and Expenses.......... 475,645 496,002 445,645 445,645 429,000 445,645 402,080 387,000 440,000
Technology Fund................ 0 10,100 5,050 5,050 10,100 5,050 5,050 9,500 5,050
East-West Center............... 24,500 20,000 15,000 11,750 20,000 11,750 8,000 8,000 11,750
North-South Center............. 4,000 1,000 4,000 2,000 ........... 2,000 3,000 ........... 3,000
Radio Construction............. 69,314 85,919 70,164 40,000 83,000 40,000 52,647 79,500 35,000
International Broadcasting
Operations.................... 238,338 395,340 311,191 325,191 310,000 325,191 246,191 300,000 330,000
Broadcasting to Cuba........... 24,809 0 24,809 24,809 ........... 24,809 24,809 ........... 24,809
RFE/RL......................... ........... ........... ........... ........... 75,000 ........... ........... 75,000 ...........
Israeli Relay Station.......... (2,000) ........... ........... ........... ........... ........... ........... ........... ...........
Subtotal..................... 1,071,631 1,008,361 875,859 854,445 927,100 854,445 741,777 859,000 849,609
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Educational & Cultural Exchange
Programs:
Fulbright...................... 135,753 130,799 112,484 200,000 109,500 102,500 88,681 101,000 98,000
S. Pacific Exchanges........... 900 0 900 ........... ........... ........... 900 ........... ...........
East Timorese Scholarships..... 0 0 800 ........... ........... ........... 800 ........... ...........
Cambodian Scholarships......... 0 0 141 ........... ........... ........... 141 ........... ...........
Tibetan Exchanges.............. 0 0 500 ........... ........... ........... 500 ........... ...........
Other Programs................. 177,352 121,877 77,266 ........... 118,322 97,500 57,341 107,300 85,000
Unspecified cuts............... (40,726) ........... ........... ........... ........... ........... ........... ........... ...........
Subtotal..................... 273,279 252,676 192,091 200,000 227,822 200,000 148,363 208,300 183,000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
National Endowment for Democracy... 34,000 34,000 34,000 30,000 32,000 32,000 32,000 29,000 30,000
Radio Free Asia.................... 5,000 0 10,000 (5,000) ........... 10,000 10,000 ........... 10,000
Eisenhower Exchange Fellowship
Prog. Trust Fund.................. 2,800 300 ........... 300 ........... ........... 0 ........... ...........
Office of the Inspector General.... 4,300 4,593 4,300 State IG 4,100 State IG 3,870 3,900 State IG
Subtotal..................... 46,100 38,393 48,300 25,300 36,100 42,000 45,870 32,900 40,000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Agency for International
Development:
USAID Operating Expenses....... 515,500 529,000 465,774 465,750 432,000 465,000 419,196 389,000 465,000
Operating Expenses--USAID
Inspector General............. 39,118 39,118 35,206 30,200 35,000 30,200 30,685 31,500 27,000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subtotal..................... 554,618 568,118 500,980 495,950 467,000 495,200 449,881 420,500 492,000
Housing Guarantee Program Account:
Subsidy Appropriation.......... 19,300 16,760 0 4,000 ........... 4,000 0 ........... 0
Operating Expenses............. 8,000 7,240 7,000 7,000 ........... 7,000 6,000 ........... 6,000
Subtotal..................... 27,300 24,000 7,000 11,000 0 11,000 6,000 0 6,000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Internat'l Relations
Committee total............. 7,022,458 7,117,623 6,673,582 6,095,310 6,260,387 6,486,760 6,111,643 5,929,509 6,472,950
====================================================================================================================
Function 300 HIRC Jurisdiction
State Department
International Commissions:
International Boundary Waters
Comm. (S&E)................... 12,858 13,858 13,858 12,058 12,500 12,058 19,372 12,300 19,372
International Boundary Waters
Comm. (Constr)................ 6,644 10,398 10,393 6,644 10,000 6,644 9,353 10,000 9,000
American Sections: IBC......... 740 740 740 640 740 640 666 720 666
American Sections: IJC......... 3,550 3,550 3,500 3,360 3,500 3,360 3,195 3,500 3,195
International Fisheries
Commissions................... 14,669 14,669 14,669 14,669 14,669 14,669 13,202 14,400 13,202
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subtotal..................... 38,461 43,215 43,160 37,371 41,409 37,371 45,788 40,920 45,435
====================================================================================================================
HIRC bill total.............. 7,060,919 7,160,838 6,716,742 6,132,681 6,301,796 6,524,131 6,157,431 5,970,429 6,518,385
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished
gentleman from Florida [Mr. Hastings].
Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I thank the ranking member for
yielding me this time.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to express my opposition to the conference report
on H.R. 1561.
Before I point out what I believe to be mistaken undertakings on
behalf of our committee, I would like to point out that my friend, the
gentleman from Florida [Mr. Goss], who happens not to be on the floor
at this time, made a statement earlier regarding this bill which is not
correct.
He stated that this would be the first State Department authorization
bill since 1985. Our research shows that that simply is not accurate.
There has been a State Department authorization bill every year for the
last 15 years authorized in 2-year increments.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. I yield to the gentleman from New York.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, I think what the gentleman meant, if we
adopt this, it would be the first State authorization bill to be
adopted, foreign aid authorization bill to be adopted since 1985.
Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Reclaiming my time, that is not what he
said. I want it clearly understood there has not been an authorization
bill for foreign aid since 1985, but that does not relate to this bill
since the foreign aid authorization has been deleted from this measure.
{time} 1830
I just wanted to point that out. I think that that will reflect
accurately, and the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Goss] needs to be
mindful of that.
This report has a myriad of problems, as illustrated by the fact that
not one Democrat on the conference committee supported the final
product. The President, as the chairman a moment ago has pointed out,
has promised to veto it and correctly so. It reorganizes and eliminates
foreign policy agencies because of political concerns, not because the
changes will make operations more efficient.
The report also cuts spending on our foreign aid programs too deeply.
The minimal amounts that we spend in the first place reap benefits for
us in expanded trade, better relations, a greater sphere of influence,
just to mention a few things. But to cut back on our meager assistance
is just plain shortsighted.
This conference report is just another example of this Congress
micromanaging foreign policy and preventing the President from doing
his job. Foreign policy obviously is important. We cannot wish the
world's problems away. Instead of retreating, we must have the
flexibility to get involved so that we can help those in trouble and
promote our own interests. The two goals are not incompatible, but they
will be unachievable if this report is passed.
Mr. Speaker, I want to point out one more thing, and that is the
provision dealing with Taiwan. This simply is not the right time to
bring this kind of provocative measure to the floor. The fact of the
matter is, Taiwan is getting
[[Page H2087]]
ready to have an election and China is rumbling all over the place. For
us to deal with this kind of measure stops us from being able to take
the kinds of measures that are vitally necessary.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from New
Jersey [Mr. Smith].
Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the
gentleman what in the Taiwan Relations Act does he object to? In the
language passed duly by the Congress, it is the law of our land. What
does the gentleman object to?
Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield,
the repudiation at this time would destabilize what we have done, I
would remind my friend. We have a longstanding policy that this United
States has, both Republican and Democrat, toward China. What we will be
doing is increasing the risk at the time of heightened tensions. I am
not opposed to us talking about this, but I am talking about the
timing.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the
distinguished chairman of the Committee on Economic and Educational
Opportunities, the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Goodling].
(Mr. GOODLING asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the conference
report to H.R. 1561, the Foreign Relations Authorization Act.
I would like to express my thanks to Chairman Ben Gilman and his
staff for guiding this bill through rough waters and rocky terrain. It
has not been easy, and he and his staff have done an admirable job.
I would also like to thank Chairman Chris Smith for all of his work
concerning a provision I will discuss in a moment concerning coercive
population control policies.
Before I do so, however, I would like to address some of the
criticisms I have heard about this bill. We have before us today a bill
that represents a genuine compromise on some very difficult issues.
I certainly did not get everything I wanted in this bill. I thought
my provision concerning U.N. voting coincidental was worthy of support
and inclusion in the conference report. Dozens of Members could say the
same thing about many of their provisions that have been left behind.
Chairman Gilman went so far to leave his provisions concerning
microenterprise projects out of the bill.
But we all agreed to compromise in order to move the bill forward.
That is called governing. It is a product of the democratic process. So
when I hear people complain we have been unwilling to give in, and when
I learn the President has pledged a veto of this bill despite all of
our efforts, I begin to wonder who is serious about governing.
This ``my way or the highway'' approach to Government is not going to
cut it. The other side must be willing to give in on some issues. We
have given in on the population issue. We have given in on foreign
assistance provisions. We have given in on eliminating three agencies
to only one. In contrast, I do not recall one single issue where the
minority has compromised.
I say this not out of malice but simply as a point of reference. I
would hope we could move forward.
This conference report contains a provision of particular
significance which I alluded to earlier. It addresses the coercive
population control policies employed by the Chinese Government.
For over 1,000 days, a group of Chinese men have been held in the
York County jail, which happens to be in my district. Their crime?
These men fled China in fear of China's coercive abortion and
sterilization policies.
Had these individuals fled China for the United States during the
years President Reagan and President Bush were in office, they would
likely have been granted asylum in the United States years ago. Under
Presidents Reagan and Bush, fear of repressive, coercive population
control policies, which China clearly employs, was grounds for asylum.
Under Reagan-Bush, these individuals would likely have been set free,
and the Federal Government is paying over $1 million in taxpayer money
each year to keep them locked up.
Unfortunately, President Clinton changed the policy when he took
office in the belief that fear of forced abortion or sterilization does
not merit asylum in this country.
H.R. 1561 would change U.S. law back to the Reagan-Bush policy that
was the law of the land for years and which hardly resulted in our
Nation being overrun by hordes of asylum seekers.
The House will next week consider legislation to crack down on
illegal immigrants. I am the first to say that illegal immigrants who
have no grounds for asylum must be sent away. But it is wrong to make
an example of these Chinese men and women who fear coercive population
policies.
This provision is supported by the Family Research Council, and
various churches. This provision is humane, and most of all, it speaks
well of America and Americans.
Mr. Speaker, I again want to thank Chairman Gilman and Chairman Smith
for their work on this bill and I urge all Members to support this
conference report.
Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished
gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Wynn].
Mr. WYNN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding me time.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to strongly oppose this piece of legislation, the
conference report. This is a bad bill. It is a bad bill for several
reasons.
First, we have to understand this is not foreign aid. This is a
budget for the State Department, USAID, our own agencies.
Under the Constitution, the President is empowered to conduct the
U.S. foreign policy. This bill hamstrings the President in the exercise
of that responsibility.
First, it abolishes an agency indiscriminately. They do not tell us
which agency. They do not say why. They do not indict the agency for
malfeasance or any other problems. They just say abolish an agency. It
is not real reform. It is reform purely for the sake of saying we had
reform. It does not make any sense.
We cannot manage a foreign policy by these kinds of arbitrary
changes, moving boxes around without any meaningful purpose.
Second, is deep and unreasonable cuts. This budget, this program,
will hamstring the President in terms of his ability to retain
qualified people. This budget and the cuts they propose will result in
RIF's, layoffs, and the loss of highly talented people. We cannot run a
foreign policy without qualified people. We have international
responsibilities as a world leader.
A couple of final very important points: This bill discourages burden
sharing. We found out through Desert Storm that we need multilateral
action. But by discouraging and inhibiting U.S. participation in the
United Nations and other multilateral organizations, we discourage
burden sharing, because other countries will say, ``If the United
States does not participate, if the United States does not pay its
dues, then why should we? If the United States is trying to pull back
on its financial commitment, why should we commit when we are a much
smaller country?''
It discourages burden sharing at a time when we need to involve other
countries.
Finally, it limits U.S. population assistance programs. One of the
biggest problems we will confront in the year 2000 and beyond is the
question of an exploding population. Under this bill, as many as 7
million couples will be denied the opportunity to get family planning
assistance. I am not advocating any kind of coercive abortions, but I
am saying people ought to be able to get information and assistance to
engage in family planning.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 5\1/2\ minutes to the
gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Smith], a senior member of our Committee
on International Relations and the chairman of our Subcommittee on
International Operations and Human Rights.
Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for yielding
me time.
Mr. Speaker, I just want to advise the body that the gentleman's
statement a moment ago was entirely wrong. There is nothing authorizing
or providing for population control funds in this bill either way. It
simply is silent on the issue. There is no foreign aid in this bill.
That was dropped at
[[Page H2088]]
the insistence of the Democrats during the House-Senate conference
committee, and it would have led to a filibuster beyond any doubt on
the Senate side had we insisted that be in there. So it was dropped. It
is not there.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to address some of my remarks this evening
to my Democratic colleagues, because, frankly, I am astonished again by
some of the disinformation going on about what is in the bill or not in
the bill.
I am also a little bit hurt by the suggestion this was not a
bipartisan bill. The budget savings in the consolidation provisions are
there, but they have been modified. There has been compromise with a
capital ``C'' with regards to this bill to meet what we thought were
the administration's objections. But the goal posts keep moving back.
Let me speak primarily, however, to the human rights provisions which
we have worked very, very hard in my Subcommittee on International
Operations and Human Rights and in the full committee with the
leadership of the gentleman from New York [Mr. Gilman].
Opposition to the violation of fundamental human rights is not a
partisan issue, and this bill contains stronger human rights provisions
than any previous foreign relations authorization act that I have seen
on this floor during my 16 years as a Member of this House. Frankly,
they were even stronger when the bill passed the House, but we had to
moderate some of them and we dropped others to meet the objections of
the administration.
I am very pleased that the Humanitarian Corridors Act is in this
report. I offered that bill as a freestanding bill and as an amendment
to the bill when it came up. It seems to me a very modest proposal to
say that those countries that receive U.S. foreign assistance cannot
impede or inhibit or proscribe the transiting of humanitarian aid to
another country.
I speak, of course, to Turkey and the fact they have disallowed
humanitarian assistance to Armenia. It is important if we have
relations and provide foreign aid that we say to our allies, allow
these medicines and other kinds of assistance to get to our friends in
Armenia.
There is also the McBride Principles championed by our good and
distinguished chairman, the gentleman from New York [Mr. Gilman]. That
is in here. I just notice and would say parenthetically, Mr. Clinton
just got the Irishman-of-the-Year award. He should not veto this bill.
This will be the first time we codify the McBride Principles that many
of us have talked about. Now we are going to do something about it in
this legislation.
There is also an authority to provide the Special Envoy to Tibet. It
is not mandatory. I think it is a step forward in the right direction,
so that human rights can be further recognized in that very troubled
region of the world.
The Migration and Refugee Assistance provisions come under our
subcommittee. We, after hearings and hearing from all of the refugee
community, have decided that it was very important that we hold
harmless the refugee budget. The world is awash with refugees. We have
to at least provide, I think, this modest amount of money to provide
for them. There is $671 million in each of the fiscal years for refugee
programs, $500,000 higher than the administration's 1996 request, and
substantially higher than the estimates that the administration's
requests were based on for 1997. So we held those refugee assistance
accounts harmless.
There is also allocation of funds for certain Burmese refugees and
for the resettlement of refugees to Israel. They are carried over from
the prior year. We have also authorized such funds that are necessary
for the resettlement of certain Southeast Asia refugees in the high
risk categories identified by the Lautenberg amendment, primarily those
that served with the United States forces in the former government of
South Vietnam, religious refugees and members of the Hmong ethnic
minority from Laos.
Subsection 1104(b) prohibits expenditures on programs involving
repatriation to Vietnam, to Laos or Cambodia, unless the remaining
asylum seekers have been or will be interviewed by United States
immigration officers, and unless resettlement offers have been made or
will be made to those found to be refugees under United States law.
This provision was modified in conference to make it clear that the
refugee status interviews can, under certain circumstances, be held in
the asylum seeker's country of origin. This is to accommodate the
administration's so-called Track Two plan for interviews in Vietnam.
This plan will only work if we can somehow guarantee the safety of the
asylum seekers during the interview process. We are not there yet, but
this provision, which did pass the House 266 to 156 in a broad
bipartisan vote, will help us with those boat people, so that we close
out the comprehensive plan of action with honor and kindness, and not
cruelty.
The section on the Cuban immigration policies, and this is I think
very timely, Mr. Chairman, this would require periodic reports on the
Cuban Government's methods of enforcing its 1994 and 1995 anti-
immigration agreements with the United States, and on the treatment of
persons returned by the United States to Cuba.
section 1252, extension of certain adjudication provisions
Mr. Speaker, this section extends the Lautenberg amendment, which
identifies certain high-risk refugee categories and provides that
applicants in these categories are presumed to be refugees if they
assert both a fear of persecution and a credible basis for their fear
of persecution. The high-risk categories include nationals or residents
of an independent state of the former Soviet Union or Estonia, Latvia,
or Lithuania who are Jews or evangelical Christians, as well as certain
Southeast Asians. (See section 1104 above.) The provision would also
extend until October 1, 1997, the Attorney General's ability to adjust
the status of aliens who are nationals of an independent state of the
former Soviet Union, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Vietnam, Laos, or
Cambodia and were granted parole into the United States after August
14, 1988, to the status of aliens lawfully admitted for permanent
residence.
section 1253, U.S. policy regarding the involuntary return of refugees
The House-passed provision would have provided that no funds
authorized by this act be used for the involuntary return of any person
to a country in which he or she has a well-founded fear of persecution.
This provision has been modified to meet DOS concerns. The conference
provision omits the prohibition against using DOS funds to assist or
promote such returns--to meet the argument that the House-passed
provision might have been violated if a DOS official made a phone call.
Also, the provision is now limited to refugee accounts, not all DOS
accounts. The effect of this provision, therefore, is to provide that
funds for refugee protection may not be used to forcibly repatriate
people unless it has been determined that they are not refugees.
section 1255, persecution for resistance to coercive population control
methods
This section would provide that forced abortion, forced
sterilization, or persecution for resistance to such measures are
persecution on account of political opinion within the meaning of the
refugee definition in the Immigration and Nationality Act. It would
effectively reinstate the prior interpretation of the law, which was
reversed by an INS order on August 5, 1994.
sec. 1256, u.s. policy with respect to the involuntary return of
persons subjected to torture
This section would prohibit the use of funds authorized by this act
in the involuntary return of any person to a place in which he or she
is in serious danger of subjection to torture. This provision has been
substantially modified to meet DOS concerns. The section now
specifically subjects the definition of torture to all reservations,
understandings, etc., adopted by the United States when it ratified the
Convention Against Torture. The conference also eliminated the assist
or promote language to which DOS objected. (See section 1254 above.)
sec. 1304, responsibilities of bureau charged with refugees
The House-passed provision would have established. This provision
would have established a coordinator for human rights and refugees
within the Office of the Secretary of State. It would also have
established a statutory bureau of Refugee and Migration assistance.
Under the House provision, the coordinator for human rights and
refugees would supervise the Bureau of Refugee and Migration Assistance
and the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, and would report
directly to the Secretary of State. The conference substantially
modified this provision to meet DOS concerns. The Department had argued
that human rights and refugee protection are distinct functions
requiring two separate bureaus, and also that the institution of a co-
ordinator who reported to the Secretary rather than an Undersecretary
might have the unintended effect of isolating these bureaus. The
[[Page H2089]]
conference therefore modified the provision to specify only that the
bureau with responsibility for refugee and migration and refugee
assistance be independent of the bureau charged with responsibility for
population policy. The department can, of course, still maintain a
population office in another bureau, as it did prior to 1993. The
present provision is designed to reinforce the principle that refugees
are linked primarily to human rights problems, not demographic
problems.
Related human rights issues:
sec. 1102(e), limitation on funding for undp programs in burma
Reduces funding to the UNDP in each fiscal eyar by the estimated cost
of UNDP projects in and for Burma, unless the President certifies that
all such projects are directed toward the needs of the poor; are
conducted through international or private voluntary organizations
independent of the SLORC; do not benefit the SLORC; and are endorsed by
the democratic leadership of the Burmese people.
sec. 1408, conduct of certain exchange programs
This section requires that exchanges with countries whose people do
not enjoy freedom and democracy be carried out in cooperation with
human rights and pro-democracy leaders in these countries. The
administration successfully argued for the deletion of language that
would have extended eligibility for scholarships and exchanges in such
countries--including China, Viet Nam, Cambodia, Laos, and East Timor--
to exiles from these countries.
sec. 1410, educational and cultural exchanges for tibetans and burmese
This section carries over a provision of prior law to require that
exiles from these countries be eligible for scholarships and exchange
programs. In the absence of this provision, exiles would be excluded
from eligibility for such programs, and the selection process would
necessarily be conducted in cooperation with the regimes that rule
Burma and Tibet.
sec. 1611, reports to congress on bosnia and herzegovina
This section requires periodic reports on human rights protection
under the Dayton agreement, the status of refugees, and the treatment
of the Albanian ethnic majority in Serb-held Kosova.
Mr. Speaker, we have heard about how this bill is pro-fiscal
responsibility. It is also pro-human rights. I urge a ``yes'' vote on
the conference report.
Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished
gentleman from Florida [Mr. Johnston].
Mr. JOHNSTON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I address this bill on two
levels: No. 1, my interest in Africa; and, No. 2, just general foreign
policy.
{time} 1845
First, the bill cuts back the development funds for Africa. There is
$800 million for 600 million people, and now that is gone.
Next, the bill does not want to send peacekeeping forces to Africa,
and we saw 400,000 people die in Rwanda because of that. Next, in spite
of what the gentleman said, and I am sure the gentleman from Wisconsin
[Mr. Roth] will address this, too, the housing development funds are
not there for future operations in South Africa.
Now, by not addressing the problems created in the foreign ops
appropriations bill, we are going to cut back population assistance
funds, family planning. As the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Wynn] said,
7 million couples in the world in developing countries will not have
any access to family planning information. People will starve in Africa
because of this, and unwanted babies will be born.
Now, let us talk about foreign policy. I almost feel that I am in a
time warp going back to 1919 when they were voting to get out of the
League of Nations here. Mr. Speaker, we are slipping into isolationism,
if there ever was one. There are more provisions in this bill that will
stymie the President from having and operating foreign policy, and we
cannot operate with 435 Secretaries of State here.
We cannot micromanage foreign policy. This was not done by this body
during the Bush administration. It was not done by this body in the
Reagan administration. It is wrong, and we should kill this bill.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to point out that we do allow the housing
program in South Africa. We have not eliminated it. Apparently, the
gentleman has some misinformation.
Mr. JOHNSTON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield so
that I may respond, the gentleman's bill has not eliminated what is in
progress right now; but has eliminated any future allocations to the
housing project.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, no, that is not correct.
``The provisions of this subsection shall not apply to guarantees which
have been issued for the benefit of the Republic of South Africa,'' and
I am quoting from the bill itself.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin
[Mr. Roth], the distinguished chairman of our Subcommittee on Economic
Policy and Trade.
Mr. ROTH. Mr. Speaker, I compliment the chairman of our Committee on
International Relations and all the conferees for the excellent work on
this bill. I think what has been lost sight of here today is that this
bill is really a reform bill. We have included in this legislation, for
example, two provisions that every Member of this House should support
and can support.
The first of these provisions will at long last curtail the foreign
aid pipeline. When I bring up these issues, this is not something that
we have taken out of the paper. This is our GAO accounting office which
has made a recommendation to us, and this is where we are getting the
initiatives for this particular legislation.
For example, how many of our colleagues know that AID has a huge
backlog of funds, some $8.5 billion at last count? These funds are left
over from previous years going all the way back to 1987. Here we do not
know where the next nickel is coming from, and we have a foreign aid
pipeline that has money in it since 1987. That is nearly a decade.
These funds are sitting there waiting for some foreign aid bureaucrat
to dream up some way of spending the money. In 1991 the General
Accounting Office did an investigation of the foreign aid pipeline, and
here it is. This is what we are talking about. They concluded that
these funds remaining should not be remaining for more than 2 years.
They ought to be deauthorized after 2 years because it is an open
invitation to waste, fraud, and abuse if we do not do that.
For 5 years I have sponsored legislation to cut off the pipeline.
This House passed that pipeline twice. Today it is incorporated into
this bill, and I thank the conferees and the chairman of the Committee
on International Relations for having the foresight and the intestinal
fortitude to move forward with this plan.
This provision alone will save nearly a half a billion dollars to our
taxpayers. That has been sitting around in the pipeline, in this slush
fund, for almost 10 years. This reform is long overdue, and today the
House has a chance to do something about it. I say thank God. Let us
put a halt to this foreign aid pipeline.
Second is the termination to some degree of the AID Housing Guarantee
Program, and we are quoting from the GAO report on the housing
guarantee program. Now, the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Johnston], my
good friend, was talking about this in the well of the House. I think
the reason that he got it wrong, Mr. Speaker, and that is not his
fault, is that the White House the other day said that they were going
to veto some bill because it cut out all the money for South Africa.
The truth of it is that South Africa has been exempted, as the chairman
of the committee has quoted from the bill itself.
This is a loan guarantee program now where the American taxpayer
cosigns for loans around the world. One hundred percent guarantees.
Listen to this: 100 percent guarantees. We do not do that for our own
people, but we are doing it all over the world.
But what really aggravates a number of us is that when a borrower
defaults anywhere in the world, the American taxpayer pays off the loan
without question. We do not do that for our own home buyers here in the
United States, yet we are doing it all over the world.
In my subcommittee we conducted a 2-year bipartisan investigation of
this plan, and here is what we found. The GAO also found this, and
right here it is. They found unbelievable losses caused by
incompetence, waste, and fraud.
Here is the bottom line. We have some $2.7 billion in guarantees. The
United States has already lost $542 million to cover the bad loans in
23 other
[[Page H2090]]
countries, foreign countries. What is worse, GAO estimates right here
in this report to our Congress that we are going to be losing another
$500 million, half a billion dollars, just on these existing loans.
What does that mean? It means we are losing about a billion dollars.
What this means is that we have a billion-dollar loss here on $2.7
billion in guarantees. That is a 40-percent loss that the American
taxpayer is picking up for home loans around the world.
This bill ends the program and imposes tough penalties on foreign
governments which would default on these loans. This is a provision
which my subcommittee originated. It will stop the losses and collect
the money that is owed to us.
I cannot see why this Congress would want to continue to spend
hundreds of billions of dollars that we know will go into waste, fraud,
and abuse. We should not, and therefore we should vote for this
conference report.
Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from
Colorado [Mr. Skaggs].
Mr. SKAGGS. Mr. Speaker, when this bill came before the House last
spring, it was titled then ``The American Overseas Interest Act.'' At
the time I voted against the bill, and I will have to vote against this
conference report. A better title then, as now, would have been ``The
American Leadership Reduction and Avoidance Act.''
The House-passed bill sought to force a reduction in American
leadership in the world. It cut funding below levels needed to conduct
foreign policy effectively. It placed severe limitations on population
assistance programs and was riddled with policy directives designed to
restrict the President's ability to conduct foreign policy.
Just as bad, the bill included provisions to eliminate the U.S.
Information Agency, the Agency for International Development, and the
Arms Control and Disarmament Agency.
I had hoped the conferees might fix the bill's defects enough so I
could support the conference report. Unfortunately, that has not
happened. The conference agreements funding provisions are no better
than those in the original House version. It still contains devastating
restrictions on population assistance, and there remain a variety of
attempts to micromanage foreign policy at the expense of necessary
Presidential prerogative.
And with respect to the elimination of the three agencies, the only
difference is that it contains a waiver now which gives the President
the right to pick the victim and to protect any two agencies he chooses
from elimination. Some may argue that this is an acceptable compromise
because the President will be able to save USIA and AID, agencies that
have the broadest mandates and constituencies.
The assumption is that only the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency
will be sacrificed to the forces of isolation and retrenchment. I do
not believe that that is a compromise in any case that we can or should
accept.
Effective foreign policy should represent the pursuit of enlightened
self-interest. And certainly one of the most pressing interests in
American foreign policy right now is controlling the spread of weapons
of mass destruction. This becomes all the more important as regional
and ethnic conflicts continue to explode across the planet.
Today more than ever before it is in our critical self-interest to
maintain an independent agency that advocates, negotiates, implements,
and verifies effective arms control agreements and those connected with
nonproliferation disarmament policies generally. That agency is the
Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. We will do this country a great
disservice if we sacrifice it under the wrong-headed choices that are
required under this bill.
Mr. Speaker, because of its independent status, ACDA brings to the
policy table an expert and undiluted arms control viewpoint. Often,
this viewpoint differs from the State Department's perspective, which
cannot focus solely or primarily on arms control issues. This is why
ACDA was created and that is why ACDA has continued to prove its worth
to U.S. national security over the years.
This bill would probably eliminate ACDA's independent voice on arms
control. By presumably submerging some vestige of ACDA in the State
Department, direct access to the President, the National Security
Adviser, and the Secretary of State on arms control issues, now
authorized to the Director of ACDA, would be gone, along with direct
ACDA participation in the interagency policymaking process where
significant arms control and nonproliferation decisions are made.
The supporters of the bill claim that ACDA is a cold-war relic that's
no longer relevant. This claim shows them to be out of touch with the
realities of the foreign policy environment we face. Given the threat
of a revival of Russian nationalism and military expansion, and the new
dangers of the post-cold-war world, ACDA is a relic today only if
weapons of mass destruction are a rumor and the threats of
proliferation are a myth.
The authors of H.R. 1561 claim that it would save money by
eliminating an independent ACDA. In fact, according to
the Congressional Research Service, it will cost $10 million to
eliminate ACDA.
ACDA's basic annual budget is $50 million. According to the U.S.
Strategic Command, existing strategic arms treaties save about $100
billion a year. Since these treaties took about a decade to negotiate,
you could argue that there's a payoff of 200 to 1 from ACDA. That
argument may be a bit of a reach, but I suspect that the impact of this
ill-conceived legislation may well be the reverse--one bill and 200 new
problems caused by the disruption, dislocation, and crippling
reductions contained in this bill.
The compromise in this conference agreement to sacrifice ACDA alone
comes at exactly the wrong moment--as the U.S. Government is pursuing
the biggest and broadest arms control and nonproliferation agenda in
history. Now is not the time to be dismantling the one agency whose
sole mandate is to formulate, negotiate, and verify arms control, and
nonproliferation policies and agreements.
Now is the time to retain ACDA and to let it build on its past
successes. I urge a vote against this conference report.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from
Nebraska [Mr. Bereuter], a senior member of our Committee on
International Relations and the distinguished chairman of our
Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific.
(Mr. BEREUTER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. BEREUTER. Mr. Speaker, this Member rises in support for the
conference report on H.R. 1561. As vice chairman of the Committee on
International Relations, this Member has worked over a period of some
months with his colleagues to craft this conference report; however, no
one has worked harder than the distinguished gentleman from New York,
Chairman Gilman, who has skillfully navigated a difficult process to
produce this legislation.
There are many important provisions in this conference report, many
of which my colleagues will discuss. This Member will discuss only a
few key provisions.
First, it should be remembered that many of the Members elected to
the 104th Congress came to this body with a strong commitment to reduce
government and eliminate unnecessary agencies. Attempt have been made,
and overall spending has been reduced somewhat, but all sizable Federal
agencies thus far have seemed impervious to elimination.
But with this conference report, Mr. Speaker, the Congress will be
consolidating and eliminating agencies. It is true that the President
is given the discretion to decide which of three agencies--AID, USIA,
or ACDA--would be folded into the State Department, but the net effect
would be to eliminate at least one unnecessary and duplicative agency.
Each Member of this body who votes for this legislation will be able to
return to their district and point to the elimination of at least one
agency while preserving those important functions now performed by
ACDA, USIA, or AID.
And, this Member would tell his colleagues on the other side of the
aisle that the conference report's plan to reduce agencies is wholly in
keeping with Secretary of State Christopher's initial proposals to
overhaul the U.S. foreign policy apparatus--a plan that regrettably
fell by the wayside early in this administration.
Another major accomplishment of H.R. 1561 is the elimination of the
Housing Guarantee Program as it operates in most countries. This
program, which was created to guarantee loans made by U.S. investors to
support shelter-related projects in developing countries, has evolved
into a terribly inefficient and badly mismanaged fiasco that is losing
tens of millions of dollars
[[Page H2091]]
annually. Indeed, a recent study by the General Accounting Office
estimates that the Housing Guarantee Program may end up costing the
United States $1 billion in loan default and other costs. It is a
program that deserves to die, Mr. Speaker, and enactment of this
conference report would terminate it in most areas.
Yet another major foreign policy concern drafted by this Member and
by the H.R. 1561 conference report is aimed at ensuring that the
Congress retains some measure of responsibility for our relations with
North Korea. Mr. Speaker, in its haste to ensure that North Korea
receives assistance in the construction of lightwater nuclear reactors,
this administration has effectively bypassed the normal congressional
review of foreign assistance. This legislation ensures that future
funds for North Korea for this particularly effort receive proper
congressional scrutiny. This legislation also ensures that further
progress in United States-North Korean relations are also dependent
upon progress in the North-South dialog, progress on the final
accounting for American MIA's in the Korean war, and cessation of North
Korea's proliferation of ballistic missiles and support for
international terrorism. This is an important policy message that this
body needs to deliver.
Last, Mr. Speaker, this Member would point to the resolution of
longstanding claims, against frozen Iraqi assets. The H.R. 1561
conference report ensures that American exporters and financial
institutions with legitimate claims against the Government of Iraq for
commercial activities initiated before the conflict will receive
compensation out of Iraqi assets held since the Persian Gulf war. The
result is that, after almost 6 years of arbitrary decisions, arrogance,
and intransigence by the State Department's Office of Foreign Assets
Control, these outstanding claims will be resolved. This is a matter of
basic fairness, Mr. Speaker, but these are also important pro-growth,
pro-trade provisions. It also should be noted that these provisions are
not mentioned as one of the President's listed objections to this
legislation.
Finally, Mr. Speaker, this Member would urge his colleagues to
support the conference report on H.R. 1561. There are certainly some
provisions in this legislation, like some of the southeast Asia refugee
provisions and the Tibet Envoy, which this Member cannot support.
However, legislation is subject to necessary compromises and it is
important that the Congress attempt to pass this authorization
legislation.
Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished
gentlewoman from New York [Mrs. Lowey].
(Mrs. LOWEY asked and was given permission to revise and extend her
remarks.)
{time} 1900
Mrs. LOWEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of the MacBride
Principles and the provision in H.R. 1561 that embodies the MacBride
Principles. Regrettably, the provision dealing with the MacBride
Principles is one of the only positive portions of this terribly flawed
bill. As a result, I will not be able to cast my vote in support of
H.R. 1561.
The MacBride Principles consist of nine fair employment principles.
They are a code of conduct for United States companies doing business
in Northern Ireland, and they call for nondiscriminatory United States
investment in Northern Ireland.
I strongly support greater accountability of organizations receiving
United States assistance in Ireland, and I have demanded that these
organizations comply with the MacBride Principles. During consideration
of the Foreign Operations Appropriations Act for fiscal year 1996, I
offered an amendment that urged all organizations receiving funding
from the International Fund for Ireland to comply with the MacBride
Principles. My amendment was included in the final version of the bill
that was signed into law by President Clinton earlier this year.
Recipients of United States aid must not be allowed to violate the
human rights--including religious freedoms--of Catholics living in
Northern Ireland. I offered my language on the MacBride Principles in
the Foreign Operations bill out of deep concern for continued religious
discrimination in Northern Ireland. But now, the MacBride Principles
provision in this bill is being held hostage by the other unacceptable
provisions of H.R. 1561.
The administration has said it will veto this bill, and I will vote
against it. H.R. 1561 does not eliminate all of the restrictions placed
on international family planning assistance in the Foreign Operations
Appropriations Act. These harmful provisions will severely impact women
and children in developing nations. In fact, a study released last week
by several populations assistance groups estimates that the decrease in
international family planning funds will result in an increase of more
than 1.5 million abortions worldwide.
The bill also forces the administration to consolidate or eliminate
several critically important foreign affairs agencies: it undercuts the
United States ability to maintain its interests overseas, and it
negatively impacts the U.S. leadership role in the United Nations by
providing inadequate levels of funding and requiring unworkable
notification requirements.
Mr. Speaker, the MacBride Principles should be a cornerstone of
United States foreign policy in Northern Ireland. That is why I
strongly support efforts to tie U.S. assistance to these Principles.
However, H.R. 1561 is a bad bill. I would hope that when President
Clinton vetoes H.R. 1561--as he has promised to do--we can pass the
MacBride Principles as an independent piece of legislation.
Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished
gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Moran].
Mr. MORAN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Indiana for
yielding this time to me. I thank him for his consistent leadership in
opposition to this bill.
Mr. Speaker, as my colleagues know, we are at a crossroads in world
history, really, and we find ourselves with tremendous responsibility
on our shoulders. The whole rest of the world looks to us as the single
superpower to lead them to a safer, to a fairer, a more prosperous
world, and a world that reflects our principles of democracy, of
freedom of expression, of freedom of religion, of respect for human
rights, and three principal instruments that we have available to use
to achieve these objectives are the Agency for International
Development, U.S. Information Agency, and the Arms Control and
Disarmament Agency.
The Agency for International Development has, in fact, developed
quite a pool of unspent money, as was cited earlier, but they have done
that because they also want to use that agency for leverage, to get
recipients to respect human rights, to respect the democratic process,
to develop economically without exploiting the people. They Agency for
International Development, in fact, generates far more profit revenue
for American firms than we would ever invest in AID. What they are
doing is developing the purchasing capability, particularly in Third
World countries, that present market opportunities for American firms.
They are streamlined, they are focused, they are a good agency.
The U.S. Information Agency represents the opportunity to spread
truth, which oftentimes is that it makes the difference between
genocide and peaceful resolution of problems. We need more truth,
unbiased truth. If we had more of it in Bosnia or in Rwanda, we might
well not have had the genocide that happened. We need to be putting
more investment in the U.S. Information Agency because it deserves
credibility, and at a time when we see the proliferation of nuclear
weapons and chemicals, biological weapons of mass destruction, why
would we ever think of cutting back on the Arms Control and Disarmament
Agency?
So if we want a safer, a more productive, a fairer world that
reflects our principles of democracy and freedom of expression, then we
want to vote against this bill, and, if anything, we want to strengthen
these three agencies.
This is not a good bill; this is an isolationist bill. We ought to be
moving forward and accepting the mantle of leadership that is thrust
upon us now. It is a great opportunity. Let us not miss it.
Mr. GILCHREST. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman
from New Jersey [Mr. Smith].
Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I just hope my colleagues,
particularly those who may be listening to this debate back in their
offices, are very clear that there is nothing in
[[Page H2092]]
this bill that authorizes population control funding. There is no
policy guidance either way. The Mexico City policy is not in here. I
wish it had been, but it is not, and I would like to ask my friends on
the Democratic side, perhaps the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Hamilton],
if he can just clarify so that everyone knows, when the Democratic
substitute was offered in the conference committee, did it have
language in it dealing with the population issue, did it authorize
population or not?
My understanding was it simply did not have section C, which is
exactly what the conference report of the gentleman from New York [Mr.
Gilman] does not have, so that there is no authorization, population is
not advanced, it is not pushed backwards. It is simply not in this
bill.
Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. I yield to the gentleman from California.
Mr. BERMAN. The gentleman is correct in that this bill does not deal
with a number of the foreign aid issues.
But where the gentleman is wrong is this was an opportunity to get
rid of the harsh and unfair restrictions on the existing program.
Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Let me make it very clear, Mr. Speaker. I
offered during the time that we were in the conference committee, and
this really fleshed out where some people, particularly on the
proabortion side, is on family planning. We would be more than happy to
life any percentage restriction on population provided it has the very
principled Mexico City policy that says no organization that performs
abortions except for rape, incest or life of the mother gets money.
Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished
gentleman from New York [Mr. Engel].
Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this bill. I might
say that the bill is better than the original bill that came before the
House, and I know that the gentleman from New York [Mr. Gilman] has
worked very hard to make the bill better, but it still is not good
enough.
I believe that American diplomacy is essential. I believe, as the
world power that we are, we need to remain engaged in the world. This
bill, in my opinion, goes in the opposite direction. It slashes money
for foreign affairs agencies, it slashes money for foreign aid, it
slashes money for arms control, it slashes money for peacekeeping. The
people that serve our country in the Embassies around the world are
very demoralized, and rightfully so. The bill has a serious
isolationism bent.
We cannot have it both ways, my colleagues. We cannot be the leader
of the free world, indeed the leader of the world, and tell other
countries that we want them to emulate us in terms of being more open,
more democratic, a free society, and at the same time we are pulling
back, putting our heads in the sand and being isolationist. We cannot
have it both ways, and this clearly, in reducing the level of aid, in
reducing the importance of foreign affairs and foreign involvement, we
are truly going back to the days when the United States was an
isolationist country. I do not think that is the direction in which we
ought to go.
Family planning; it pulls back in family planning as well. The
country programs; it pulls back as well there.
It seems to me that we spent so much money in the era of the cold
war. We won that cold war. We beat the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union
and the Eastern bloc countries crumbled. Did we spend billions and
billions and billions of dollars on an arms race only to throw it all
away? Now that we have won? To say that we do not want to stay engaged
in the world? To say that we want to retrench and pull back?
The American public believes that foreign aid is about 15 percent of
our budget when in reality it is less than 1 percent of our budget, and
in my opinion that is certainly not enough if we want to say that we
are the leaders of the world, and we are. Nobody anointed us and said
that we were the leaders. We choose to be the leaders, as well we
should.
I believe with leadership comes responsibility. I believe that, if we
want to ensure that the fledgling democracies in this world continue to
prosper and grow, then we have got to provide the help, we have got to
provide the aid, especially with the developing countries. A little bit
of aid goes such a long, long way.
But what are we telling the world with this? We are saying that we
want to step backwards into the era of isolationism.
Now we have problems with the U.N. The U.N. has not always been an
ideal or done what we like it to do, but I would think that the world
would be a lot worse if we did not have a U.N., and here we are
retrenching even there.
So let me just say, if I may conclude to my colleagues, I think this
bill goes in the wrong direction and it ought to be defeated.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from
Kansas [Mr. Brownback], a member of our Committee on International
Relations.
Mr. BROWNBACK. Mr. Speaker, I congratulate our chairman on a fine
bill, and I also want to congratulate the ranking member for his
leadership for many years in this field.
I rise in strong support of the conference report. The American
people clearly want us to balance the budget, they want us to cut
foreign aid bureaucracy, and this bill does that.
This is not an isolationist bill. The United States cannot and should
not engage in isolationism. But the world has changed. The cold war is
over, and we need to reduce the apparatuses that are associated with
that cold war in this time of tight budgets.
And I have to disagree with some of my colleagues on the Democrat
side of the aisle, that they would suggest that we are pulling back and
being isolationist by some of the reforms of the cold war institutions
and suggesting that the United States' leadership in the world is
dependent upon having the United States Information Agency, and AID and
ACDA when our real tools for leadership in the world and the reason the
United States is the leading country of the world is a strong, vibrant,
growing economy, a strong military apparatus and standing for
principles, principles of freedom, and justice, and liberty, and those
are the things that give the United States leadership. It is not
bureaucracies, and there are fine people that are in these agencies,
and they work hard, and they do a good job.
But the truth of the matter is we are broke. We are $5 trillion in
the hole, and the American people are far more concerned about health
care for our children than they are about a foreign aid bureaucracy,
and we should be far more concerned about Medicare than about foreign
aid, and that is what this is about. This is about making tough
decisions during times of tight budgets.
I think this is a good bill in doing that, in changing the
apparatuses. I think it should have eliminated the three international
affairs agencies that were involved. But they compromised and went to
one of the three and told the executive branch, ``You decide in working
with this of what you think works best in your foreign policy decisions
that you have.'' That seems prudent to me. They cut the operating
budget of the State Department and related agencies by $1.3 billion,
and in a time of tight budgets, when we are trying to increase health
care for our children in this country, when we are trying to balance
our own budget so we can have a strong economy, a strong military and
stand for principle, those seem to me to be prudent and wise things to
do. It reduces the program budgets of the State Department and related
agencies by $500 million below the fiscal year 1995 funding levels.
These are all things that are going to be necessary, that are
necessary, to balance the budgets so the United States can continue to
have the global leadership by virtue of having a strong economy, a
strong military and standing for the principles that we always have.
That is why I think this is a good bill. I congratulate the chairman
on it.
{time} 1915
Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4\1/2\ minutes to the
distinguished gentleman from California [Mr. Berman].
Mr. BERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the bill and urge
the House to defeat this measure.
I would like to just put this in the context of the history that I am
aware of since I was elected to this House back in 1982. In every
single Congress, with the Democrats controlling half of that in the
House the entire period of time, the Republicans controlling the
[[Page H2093]]
Senate for the first 4 years that I was here, a Republican President
for the first 12 of those 14 years, every single time the chairman of
then the Committee on Foreign Affairs, working with the ranking member,
and on a bipartisan basis, put together a State Department
authorization bill that was bipartisan in nature, that had the support
of the administration. Each and every time the State Department
authorization bill was passed by a Congress, in some cases split, in
some cases Democrat, and signed by a Republican President.
Every effort was made to provide more executive branch flexibility in
the operations of our foreign affairs, not less. At the same time, in
the area of foreign aid, with the exception of one Congress, each and
every Congress that I served in in this House, and again, that is since
1983, the House passed a bipartisan foreign aid authorization bill that
frequently got waylaid over in the Senate. One year we got a bill. In
one of those Congresses on the issue of family planning and the
abortion controversy, we failed here, but again, the fundamental
approach was to do it on a bipartisan basis.
When this bill came through this Congress last year, there was not
one whit of effort to try and do a bipartisan bill. Everyone but 12
Democrats voted against this bill. Now we come forward and we hear
foreign aid has been dropped, but that is not quite an accurate
statement. Foreign aid has been dropped except where a Member of the
majority on the committee had a particular priority, so foreign aid was
dropped, except we eliminated housing guarantees. Foreign aid
authorization was dropped, except where we wanted to write something in
on North Korea, or on humanitarian corridors, or on MacBride
principles. We cherry-picked a few issues, the majority did, put them
into a bill that was supposed to be just a State Department
authorization bill, and then shoved it to the administration without
one moment of time to talk about the pros and cons of forced
consolidation against executive branch wishes.
Should ACDA be consolidated and folded into the State Department or
should it be separate? There is an argument, maybe it is not
persuasive, but at least it takes a second to pause and think, that we
want an independent arms control proliferation agency that is not going
to be run by the State Department with a direct voice to the National
Security Council to raise issues of arms control and nonproliferation
when economic pressures that might exist otherwise cause the State
Department to be less clear on those kind of issues.
Should USIA be consolidated? There is at least an argument that
having an independent agency involved in articulating the American
point of view and a voice of truth and freedom to the world should not
be under the direct control of our diplomatic services. Maybe it is not
a compelling argument, but it is an argument.
Should AID, the agency primarily focused with development assistance,
be subordinated into the diplomatic service? Maybe, maybe not, but
there are some good arguments against doing that, but the majority
refused to spend time discussing the debate. They wanted to take home a
trophy.
They decided, as one Member of the majority just said on this floor.
If this bill passes, all of you can go home and say you
collapsed one of our international relations agencies. It is
a trophy. No substantive arguments underlying the reason,
just let us do it to do it, to hell with the executive
branch, who cares what they want; forget the tradition of
bipartisan approaches to this issue.
I think that is wrong. I think we ought to be providing sufficient
resources, sufficient flexibility, and an underlying bipartisan
approach to these critical issues around the world and the critical
issues that are funded by the 150 accounts. This bill does not do it,
so I urge a ``no'' vote.
Mr. GILLMAN. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 30 seconds to the
gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Smith].
Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, very briefly, we have tried to
make this bipartisan. I have had markups in my subcommittee, because
much of this is from my subcommittee. We had no-shows at the
subcommittee markups. At full committee we had lack of participation,
and the same thing happened in the House-Senate conference committee.
The substitute offered by the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Hamilton],
the Democratic alternative, said exactly what this bill says on the
issue of population control, nothing. His bill said it, our bill says
it, nothing, so it is not an issue here.
The issue of isolationist is absurd. When you have groups backing
provisions of this bill like the United Israel Appeal, the American
Jewish Committee, the American Legion, Disabled American Veterans, and
a whole host of other groups, this is not an isolationist bill at all.
Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Camp). The gentleman from Indiana [Mr.
Hamilton] has 7 minutes remaining, and the gentleman from New York [Mr.
Gilman] has 2 minutes remaining.
Mr. HAMILTON. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the conference
report. I do so because I think it fundamentally constrains the
President's ability to conduct American foreign policy. It is an
improvement over the previously passed House bill, but I think it has a
long way to go before it becomes law.
First, I think the conference report mandates a very far-reaching
reorganization of the U.S. foreign policy apparatus. That, as far as I
have been able to discern, has no real connection to the problems of
American foreign policy. Second, I think the conference report does not
give the President the flexibility he needs to conduct U.S. foreign
policy and protect and promote U.S. interests.
Third, I think it cuts too deeply into spending across the board for
foreign policy, making it much more difficult to promote and protect
U.S. interests.
The President, of course, has promised to veto this conference report
in its present form. I urge my colleagues to support the President and
to defeat the conference report.
With respect to reorganization, the conference report, as others have
said, dictates to the President how he should organize the foreign
policy agencies. -It dictates that at least one agency be eliminated.
My view on this is that in the absence of any compelling evidence of
the advantages of reorganization, which I really do not find here, I
think the President should have the discretion to determine how to
structure the foreign policy agencies.
The Administration has already instituted several significant
streamlining and reorganization proposals for the foreign policy
agencies. For example, the State Department alone has cut 1,300 jobs.
On the second point, the reduced funding for U.S. foreign policy I
think damages our ability to carry out that policy. This conference
report damages U.S. interests overseas by continuing to reduce funds
available to operate overseas by about a half a billion dollars from
1995 levels. That would force the United States to retreat from its
presence overseas and reduce U.S. influence. Areas that would be hurt
include diplomatic posts, payments for international organizations and
peacekeeping, sustainable development, and public diplomacy.
I think the point I would like to make on the funding dollars is that
the cuts required by this conference report do not occur in a vacuum.
For more than a decade now, the Congress has slashed spending for all
categories of international affairs. Funding for economic and security
assistance has been cut 10 percent in the last year alone, and that
follows a 40 percent cut over the last decade. Spending for all
international affairs accounts has been cut 45 percent in real terms in
the last decade.
Our ability to use the United Nations to further our interests has
been hurt by our unwillingness to pay our share of the budget or to pay
over $1 billion in arrears, and the United Nations, therefore, is on
the brink of a financial crisis.
I think all of us agree that we are in tight budgetary times. I have
supported many of the cuts that I have indicated, but my sense now is
that we have cut these accounts enough. We should draw the line before
we take away too many resources and impair the President's ability to
conduct foreign policy.
Finally, the conference report damages U.S. foreign policy by
imposing
[[Page H2094]]
too many restrictions on the President. This is not the time to be
amending the Taiwan Relations Act. This is not the time to be tying the
President's hands on relations with Vietnam. This is not the time to
undercut U.S. efforts to reform the United Nations.
The conference report does all of those things. It does undermine the
ability of the President to conduct policy. We have many different
views in this body on the policy restrictions. I am certain that there
are provisions that many of my colleagues support, but when we add it
all up, when I examine the impact of all of these policy restrictions
provisions, I conclude that they constitute a serious infringement on
the President's power to conduct foreign policy.
So as we vote on this conference report, Mr. Speaker, I think Members
should ask themselves this question: Does this bill help or does it
hinder the President's ability to confront the many challenges we face
in the world? I think the answer is that it hinders the President's
ability to do that.
Members of Congress expect the President to provide leadership in
foreign policy, but at the same time, we should not deny the President
the resources to provide that leadership. This conference report
weakens the President's ability to lead at a time when the world badly
needs U.S. leadership. That is not the way for the Congress to play a
responsible role in the conduct of American foreign policy, and I urge
my colleagues to defeat of the conference report.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
In closing, Mr. Speaker, my colleagues have heard many important
reasons in support of this conference report. This measure delivers on
the President's pledge that the era of big government is over, and at
the same time, this measure improves the State Department and the
management of the United Nations, and at the same time supports our
vital U.S. diplomatic missions.
With regard to the MacBride principles included in the report,
President Clinton, while Governor and candidate, stated
I like this principle. I believe in it. I would encourage
my successor to embrace it. As President, I would encourage
all Governors to look at it and embrace it. I think it is a
good idea. I like them very much. I think it is a way to
encourage investment, because it is a way to stabilize the
political and economic climate in the work force by being
free of discrimination. The argument is made against the
principles in a country in which there is discrimination. I
just do not buy that.
Accordingly, Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this
conference report. It enhances our Government abroad.
Mr. ACKERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to the
conference report to accompany H.R. 1561. This bill is veto bait and
ought to be sent back to committee.
H.R. 1561 requires the elimination of three foreign policy agencies,
the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency [ACDA], the United States
Information Agency [USIA], and the Agency for International Development
[AID], merging their functions into the Department of State. Under the
bill the President must submit a plan to accomplish this reorganization
by October 1 of this year in order to abolish these agencies by March
1, 1997. The President's plan must save $1.7 billion over the next 4
years.
Mr. Speaker, the problems with this bill are many. H.R. 1561 forces
the President to consolidate agencies, even though he is provided with
waiver authority for two of the three, the funding levels are low
enough that he will be forced to consolidate other functions in order
to adhere to the authorization levels in future years. In addition, the
bill requires an unrealistic timetable for presenting a plan and then
actually closing agencies within a year from now. The transition
provisions are so inadequate that they do not even provide for useful
methods of downsizing such as employee buy-outs, which have proven
popular at other agencies.
H.R. 1561 also contains a variety of provisions which will harm our
ability to participate in a number of international organizations
ranging from the United Nations to the Inter-American Indian Institute.
By either terminating our membership outright or requiring that we
withhold a significant portion of our assessment, the bill ties the
President's hands and hinders our ability to play an effective role in
the international arena. There are many Members who agree that the
United Nations is in need of reform. Many will agree that our
assessment should be lower and most will agree that an independent U.N.
Inspector General would be a valuable step. But to withhold our
contributions and in effect bully the United Nations to go along will
likely jeopardize progress already made in the areas of U.N. budgetary
and management reform.
Mr. Speaker, the President has said that he will veto the conference
report. I say let's save him the trouble by defeating a bad bill and
bringing back a genuine bipartisan State Department authorization bill
that we can all support and the President can sign.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Without objection, the previous question is
ordered.
There was no objection.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the conference report.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Mr. HAMILTON. 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 172, not voting 33, as follows:
[Roll No. 59]
YEAS--226
Allard
Andrews
Archer
Armey
Bachus
Baker (CA)
Baker (LA)
Ballenger
Barr
Barrett (NE)
Bartlett
Bass
Bateman
Bereuter
Bilbray
Bilirakis
Bliley
Blute
Boehlert
Boehner
Bonilla
Bono
Brownback
Bryant (TN)
Bunn
Bunning
Burr
Burton
Buyer
Callahan
Calvert
Camp
Campbell
Canady
Castle
Chabot
Chambliss
Chrysler
Clinger
Coble
Coburn
Collins (GA)
Cooley
Cox
Crane
Crapo
Cremeans
Cunningham
Davis
Deal
Diaz-Balart
Dickey
Doolittle
Dornan
Dreier
Dunn
Ehlers
Ehrlich
Emerson
English
Everett
Ewing
Fawell
Flanagan
Foley
Forbes
Fowler
Fox
Franks (CT)
Franks (NJ)
Frelinghuysen
Frisa
Funderburk
Ganske
Gekas
Gilchrest
Gilman
Goodlatte
Goodling
Goss
Graham
Greenwood
Gunderson
Gutknecht
Hancock
Hansen
Hastert
Hastings (WA)
Hayes
Hayworth
Hefley
Heineman
Herger
Hilleary
Hobson
Hoekstra
Hoke
Horn
Hostettler
Houghton
Hunter
Hutchinson
Hyde
Inglis
Istook
Jones
Kasich
Kelly
Kennedy (RI)
Kennelly
Kim
King
Kingston
Klug
Knollenberg
Kolbe
LaHood
Largent
Latham
LaTourette
Lazio
Leach
Lewis (CA)
Lewis (KY)
Lightfoot
Linder
Livingston
LoBiondo
Lofgren
Longley
Lucas
Maloney
Manton
Manzullo
Martini
McCollum
McCrery
McHugh
McInnis
McIntosh
McKeon
Metcalf
Meyers
Mica
Miller (FL)
Molinari
Moorhead
Myers
Myrick
Nethercutt
Neumann
Ney
Norwood
Nussle
Oxley
Packard
Parker
Paxon
Peterson (MN)
Petri
Pombo
Porter
Portman
Poshard
Pryce
Quillen
Quinn
Radanovich
Ramstad
Regula
Riggs
Roberts
Rogers
Rohrabacher
Ros-Lehtinen
Roth
Roukema
Royce
Salmon
Sanford
Saxton
Scarborough
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
Thomas
Thornberry
Tiahrt
Torkildsen
Torricelli
Upton
Vucanovich
Waldholtz
Walker
Walsh
Wamp
Watts (OK)
Weldon (FL)
Weldon (PA)
Weller
White
Whitfield
Wicker
Wolf
Young (AK)
Young (FL)
Zeliff
Zimmer
NAYS--172
Abercrombie
Ackerman
Baesler
Baldacci
Barcia
Barrett (WI)
Becerra
Beilenson
Bentsen
Berman
Bevill
Bishop
Bonior
Borski
Boucher
Browder
Brown (CA)
Brown (FL)
Brown (OH)
Cardin
Clay
Clayton
Clement
Clyburn
Collins (MI)
Combest
Condit
Conyers
Costello
Coyne
Cramer
Danner
DeFazio
DeLauro
Dellums
Deutsch
Dicks
Dingell
Dixon
Doggett
Dooley
Doyle
Duncan
Edwards
Engel
Ensign
Eshoo
Evans
Farr
Fattah
Fazio
Fields (LA)
Filner
Foglietta
[[Page H2095]]
Ford
Frank (MA)
Frost
Furse
Gejdenson
Geren
Gillmor
Gonzalez
Gordon
Gutierrez
Hall (OH)
Hall (TX)
Hamilton
Harman
Hastings (FL)
Hefner
Hilliard
Hinchey
Holden
Hoyer
Jackson (IL)
Jackson-Lee (TX)
Jacobs
Jefferson
Johnson (CT)
Johnson (SD)
Johnson, E. B.
Johnston
Kanjorski
Kaptur
Kennedy (MA)
Kildee
Kleczka
Klink
LaFalce
Lantos
Levin
Lewis (GA)
Lincoln
Lipinski
Lowey
Luther
Markey
Martinez
Mascara
Matsui
McCarthy
McDermott
McHale
McKinney
McNulty
Meehan
Meek
Menendez
Miller (CA)
Minge
Mink
Mollohan
Montgomery
Moran
Morella
Murtha
Nadler
Neal
Oberstar
Obey
Olver
Orton
Owens
Pallone
Pastor
Payne (NJ)
Payne (VA)
Pelosi
Peterson (FL)
Pickett
Pomeroy
Rahall
Rangel
Reed
Richardson
Rivers
Roemer
Roybal-Allard
Sabo
Sanders
Sawyer
Schroeder
Schumer
Scott
Serrano
Sisisky
Skaggs
Skelton
Slaughter
Spratt
Stenholm
Stupak
Tanner
Taylor (MS)
Thompson
Thornton
Thurman
Torres
Towns
Traficant
Velazquez
Vento
Visclosky
Volkmer
Ward
Waters
Watt (NC)
Williams
Wise
Woolsey
Wynn
Yates
NOT VOTING--33
Barton
Brewster
Bryant (TX)
Chapman
Chenoweth
Christensen
Coleman
Collins (IL)
Cubin
de la Garza
DeLay
Durbin
Fields (TX)
Flake
Gallegly
Gephardt
Gibbons
Green
Johnson, Sam
Laughlin
McDade
Moakley
Ortiz
Rose
Rush
Stark
Stockman
Stokes
Studds
Taylor (NC)
Tejeda
Waxman
Wilson
{time} 1947
The Clerk announced the following pair:
On this vote:
Mr. DeLay for, with Mr. Ortiz against.
Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas changed her vote from ``yea'' to ``nay.''
Ms. LOFGREN and Mr. DICKEY changed their vote from ``nay'' to
``yea.''
So the conference report was agreed to.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
____________________