[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 62 (Tuesday, May 7, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H4467-H4493]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  CRIMES AGAINST CHILDREN AND ELDERLY PERSONS INCREASED PUNISHMENT ACT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Foley). Pursuant to House Resolution 421 
and rule XXIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the 
Whole House on the State of the Union for the consideration of the 
bill, H.R. 2974.

                                   1654


                     In the committee of the whole

  Accordingly, the House resolved itself into the Committee of the 
Whole House on the State of the Union for the consideration of the bill 
(H.R. 2974) to amend the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act 
of 1994 to provide enhanced penalties for crimes against elderly and 
child victims, with Mr. LaTourette in the chair.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The CHAIRMAN. Pursuant to the rule, the bill is considered as having 
been read the first time.
  Under the rule, the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] will be 
recognized for 30 minutes and the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers] 
will be recognized for 30 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum].
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Chairman, this bill, introduced by Mr. Chrysler of Michigan, 
would increase the length of the sentence for violent crimes against 
children 14 years of age and younger, seniors 65 years and older, and 
vulnerable persons. I would do so by directing the Sentencing 
Commission to provide a sentencing enhancement of not less than five 
levels above the offense level otherwise provided for a crime of 
violence against a child, an elderly person, or an otherwise vulnerable 
person. The term ``crime of violence'' was amended at the subcommittee 
markup by Ms. Lofgren, and broadened to have the same meaning as that 
given in section 16 of title 18 of the United States Code, which is:

       An offense that has as an element the use, attempted use, 
     or threatened use of physical force against the person or 
     property of another, or any other offense that is a felony 
     and that, by its nature, involves a substantial risk that 
     physical force against the person or property of another may 
     be used in the course of committing the offense:

  Mr. Chrysler introduced this bill to provide additional deterrence 
and punishment for those who victimize the most vulnerable in society. 
The impetus for this legislation also arises from the Sentencing 
Commission's failure to provide any sentencing enhancement in response 
to a directive in the 1994 Crime Act. The act directed the Commission 
to ensure that the applicable guideline range for a defendant convicted 
of a crime of violence against an elderly victim is sufficiently 
stringent to deter such a crime, and to reflect the heinous nature of 
such an offense. The Commission determined to make no sentencing 
enhancement in response to this directive. I believe that H.R. 2974 is 
an appropriate and measured attempt to ensure that the guideline 
penalty accomplished the goals Congress established in its 1994 
directive.
  While the bill applies only to Federal crimes, another purpose of 
this legislation is to establish a model for State criminal justice 
systems. Only a uniform approach which communicates society's 
intolerance for these heinous crimes will provide sufficient 
deterrence.
  I am pleased that it received the bipartisan support of the Crime 
Subcommittee, and the full Judiciary Committee. I want to thank Mr. 
Chrysler for his leadership in this area.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
California [Ms. Lofgren], a distinguished member of the committee.
  Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Chairman, no person should be a victim of crime 
particularly a crime of violence. But we are particularly offended when 
a victim is especially vulnerable, when that victim of violence crime 
is a child, when that victim is a frail person or another person who is 
particularly unable to protect themselves.
  I think this bill speaks to that and says that as a society we are 
going to make sure that we have raised the standard of protection for 
the most vulnerable among us. Although criminal law serves many 
purposes, one of the functions of criminal law, be it at the State or 
Federal level, is to set the standards for what society expects of each 
of us.
  Mr. Chairman, I am pleased that I was able to work on a bipartisan 
basis with members of the committee to strengthen the bill, to broaden 
the definition of violent crimes as suggested by the Justice 
Department, to raise the definition of the child from 11 to 14 so it 
would include those up to but not including 15-year-olds, as well as to 
add a provision about other vulnerable persons. Mr. Chairman, I think 
this bill is sound.
  Mr. Chairman, I would also note that the Justice Department has just 
released a Bureau of Justice Statistics report on sentencing patterns 
in violent crime, and note that on average, offenders who commit 
violence against a child serve and are sentenced to shorter sentences 
than those who victimize adults, which is confusing and inexplicable. 
This bill would help remedy that anomaly.
  Mr. Chairman, there will be at least two amendments that I am aware 
of that will strengthen the bill and are measures that I support 
wholeheartedly, but world not, I believe, have been germane in 
committee. But I did want to address the overall bill and congratulate 
those who have worked on it, and to urge my colleagues to support it.

                              {time}  1700

  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Nebraska [Mr. Christensen].
  (Mr. CHRISTENSEN asked and was given permission to revise and extend 
his remarks.)
  Mr. CHRISTENSEN. Mr. Chairman, today I rise in support of the 
gentleman from Michigan's bill, H.R. 2974, the Crimes Against Youth and 
Elderly Increased Punishment Act of 1995.

[[Page H4468]]

  For too long, the most vulnerable groups in our society have been 
preyed upon by hardened criminals.
  Our children should not be forced to walk home from school in fear.
  Our senior citizens should not live in a society that fails to punish 
those who perpetrate heinous crimes against them.
  These two groups desperately need us to provide for their safety and 
security.
  I believe this legislation will help reduce crimes against them.
  Though crime may be going down in some isolated areas, it is still 
getting worse in our smaller cities and in our towns. For tight-knit 
communities like Omaha, NE, this new wave of crime is a shock.
  It seems as though nothing can stop the victimization of our innocent 
citizens.
  There has been a steady increase in crime as penalties have 
softened--and criminals have hardened.
  For example: Crimes against our senior citizens doubled between 1985 
and 1991, a mere 6 years, and have steadily risen since.
  In the past Congress has doubled penalties against drug dealers in 
protected areas around our schools. Now it is time to put a protected 
area around our Nation's seniors and children, wherever they may be.
  Let us double penalties for these cowardly criminals that prey upon 
the very young or those who have reached their golden years, which 
should be care-free.
  Crime is the enemy of our modern-day society.
  It is time to send a message to the criminals, to their slick 
criminal defense attorneys that push them to freedom through legal 
loopholes, and to our entire criminal justice system that all too often 
favors the criminals over their victims.
  That message is that America has a zero-tolerance for crime and the 
outlaws that commit them.
  Again, Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank the gentleman from 
Michigan for introducing this thoughtful and timely piece of 
legislation. A vote for H.R. 2974 is a vote for the protection of 
America's children and America's senior citizens.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from 
Indiana [Mr. Buyer], a member of the committee.
  Mr. BUYER. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the gentleman's leadership on 
this issue. I also thank the gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Dick 
Chrysler, for his thoughtful time and concern on this bill.
  Mr. Chairman, I support the hill before us, which provides enhanced 
penalties for crimes where the victim is a child or a person over the 
age of 65. We want to take care of those who are most vulnerable in our 
society, especially when we look back at some of the crime statistics 
and see that from 1985 to 1991, there was a 90 percent increase in 
personal crimes committed against senior citizens; that is, from 
627,318 to 1.1 million. While the overall homicide rate decreased from 
1985 to 1993, there was a 47 percent increase in the homicide rate for 
children. And in 1992, one out of every six reported rape cases was a 
female under the age of 12.
  When criminals see our children or the elderly, perhaps, as the enemy 
or as ripe targets for a successful outcome to violent behavior, I 
believe it is very deserving of our contempt. They are also deserving 
of harsher sentences. They are preying upon the most vulnerable members 
of our society and very often they are not able to defend themselves. 
It is very appropriate that we should provide enhanced penalties 
against such reprehensible attacks.
  Let me also thank the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Lofgren] for 
her amendments to this bill that in fact improved the bill. There are 
only so many tools before us that we can use in guidance and leadership 
to the States. Right now, under our sentencing guidelines, we have the 
philosophies of education, prevention, retribution, deterrence, and 
rehabilitation. We have been involved in this trend toward greater 
prevention and rehabilitation, and we are asking, victims of our 
society are asking, what about retribution, what about deterrence? And 
if we do not begin to move toward harsher penalties against these 
criminals, then the victims are going to say, what about me?
  If they do not feel the retribution, it begins to breed contempt with 
regard to vigilantism. That is not good and it is not healthy in a free 
and lawful society. if people live in fear, then they are really not 
free. So what we are trying to do on the Committee on the Judiciary, 
not only with this bill but with others, is to enhance the penalties 
and go after the real thugs, the criminals, whether it is in the gun 
legislation, if they use weapons in the commission of a crime, they 
should feel our contempt. They should feel our harsh penalties. Go 
after the thugs.
  If these thugs prey upon the elderly and prey upon the children, they 
should feel our contempt. They should feel the harsh penalties. If they 
are going to commit a rape against a female under the age of 12, we 
should have these Federal judges enhance the penalties against them. 
Let us pass this bill.
  Mr.CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from 
Arkansas [Mr. Hutchinson].
  Mr. HUTCHINSON. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in strong support of this 
bill which seeks to give more protection to our most vulnerable and 
innocent citizens--our children and our seniors.
  More specifically, H.R. 2974 would amend the 1994 crime bill by 
requiring the U.S. Sentencing Commission to issue tougher punishment 
for crimes against children and the elderly, due to an increase in 
crimes targeted at these two populations. According to the Department 
of Justice factsheet on missing children, every year there are between 
1,600 and 2,300 stranger abductions of children under age 12 in the 
United States.
  Mr. Chairman, this is tragic and unacceptable. We must send a clear 
message to criminals who prey on the defenseless--their actions will 
result in swift and certain punishment.
  Last summer in my congressional district in Arkansas, Morgan Nick, a 
6-year-old girl, was abducted from the Alma ballpark while attending a 
little league baseball game. After 11 months of tireless searching, 
Morgan has still not been found.
  Mr. Chairman, I can assure you that there has not been a day that has 
passed in which Morgan's family and friends haven't pursued every 
avenue that may lead them to Morgan's recovery. Morgan's mother, 
Colleen Nick, has been in touch with me on several occasions since last 
June to appeal for my assistance in this heartbreaking situation.
  At Christmastime, Mrs. Nick appeared on an Oprah Winfrey segment 
about the recovery of missing children. She has also met with the 
President in Little Rock to ask for his assistance. Additionally, 
information about the case has been broadcast on two segments of the 
television show ``America's Most Wanted.''
  Children in Arkansas, and everywhere in America, deserve the full 
protection for the law. They are virtually defenseless, yet they are 
the future. Adopting tougher penalties is a vital part of ensuring 
greater protection of society's most vulnerable citizens, while sending 
a clear message to the violent criminals of tomorrow.
  Mr. Chairman, I believe that those who are truly committed to our 
children and to the elderly--to citizens like little Morgan Nick--will 
support H.R. 2974. I urge a ``yes'' vote on this legislation.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the 
gentleman from New York [Mr. Manton] in support of the bill.
  Mr. MANTON. Mr. Chairman, every day in New York City criminals seek 
out those most vulnerable to attack. it is no surprise that these 
victims are often too young, or too old, to effectively defend 
themselves. As a result, many young and elderly Americans live in 
constant fear, remaining in virtual isolation, too afraid to leave 
their apartments for groceries or a walk in the park.
  It is an unfortunate fact that todays cities are plagued by violence 
and crime. Unless we as legislators address these problems, tragedy 
will continue to befall those least able to help themselves.
  Mr. Chairman, our Nation's children and seniors look to law 
enforcement officials for protection, and to the judicial system for 
justice. Increasing the

[[Page H4469]]

penalties for violent crimes committed against vulnerable people will 
ensure that these criminals do not get away with their heartless and 
cowardly behavior.
  As a cosponsor of this legislation, I urge my colleagues to 
demonstrate their commitment to the safety and well-being of the young 
and the old in their districts by supporting this most important bill.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania [Mr. Gekas], a member of the committee.
  Mr. GEKAS. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to 
me. We as a society, and the Congress as a microcosm of that society, 
have very few tools at our disposal with which to fight crime except 
the power of making laws which could be very significant. I believe 
that the current crime statistics, which seem to show a slowdown in 
some of the major crimes, are as a result of the tougher stands that 
local and Federal officials have taken over the past 10 years, with 
tougher penalties and tougher ways of dealing with the criminal in a 
deterrent way. If we cannot make our laws constitute a deterrent to 
crime, then we have failed miserably.
  We believe that the legislation that is now at hand with respect to 
the crimes to be committed in the future against children, that these 
elements will act as a deterrent. What is special about this is that, 
if a criminal about to commit a crime on a young person realizes 
through the broadcasting and through the dissemination of the 
information that is going to come from our action here today, we may be 
able to prevent serious crimes against our children. It is worth a 
chance for the deterrent value alone.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Chairman, we are considering the Crimes Against Children and 
Elderly Persons Prevention and Protection Act. There have been comments 
and criticisms raised that this legislation was necessary because the 
Commission on Sentencing did not implement adequately the congressional 
directive found in the violent crime bill of 1994. I wish to review 
this for the edification of the Members because the legislative 
language that we instructed the Sentencing Commission was thought to 
not require specific amendment action on the part of the Sentencing 
Commission but, rather, required an analysis, a thorough analysis, of 
certain areas of the guidelines to ensure that those identified 
objectives were going to be obtained.
  The Sentencing Commission conducted that analysis as instructed and, 
contrary to assertions that have been made here on the floor, it also 
additionally amended the guidelines to better address the desired 
objectives.
  I am suggesting that the Sentencing Commission has not been sleeping 
on the job but as a matter of fact has been doing precisely what the 
committee, through the Congress, has instructed them to do.
  The crime bill, at a particular section, 240002, of the 1994 crime 
bill, specifically directed the commission to ensure the guidelines 
provided sufficient and stringent punishment for those convicted of the 
crime of violence against an elderly victim. The directive established 
that the following objectives that the guidelines should achieve are as 
follows: One, increasingly severe punishment commensurate with the 
degree of physical harm caused to the elderly victim; two, an enhanced 
punishment based upon the vulnerability of the victim; and, three, 
enhanced punishment for a subsequent conviction for a crime of violence 
against an elderly victim.
  In response to the directive, the Sentencing Commission then analyzed 
the available sentencing data, the relevant statutory and guideline 
provisions. They also solicited the views of all interested parties on 
other amendments that might be relevant to the guidelines.

                              {time}  1715

  All of the commentators asserted that, in their view, the existing 
guidelines sufficiently account for the congressional concerns that 
were embodied in the directive. Nevertheless, the Commission, in 
addition, identified two ways in which it believed the guidelines could 
be amended more fully and effectively and addressed those concerns 
about the harm to children and elderly victims to see that they are 
appropriately punished.
  Here is what the commission did: It clarified the commentary of the 
vulnerable-victim guideline to broaden it applicability. Then they 
added an application note specifying that a sentence above the 
guideline ranges may be warranted if the defendant's criminal history 
includes a prior sentence for an offense that involves the selection of 
a vulnerable victim.
  These amendments became effective November 1, 1995, following 
congressional review. Thus, while it may be that some of us now believe 
that the commission should have done more, I think the record should 
reflect that the directive, while it required most specific amendment 
action, nevertheless in two significant respects the commission, in 
fact, did amend the relevant guidelines. And so the Congress presumably 
reviewed these changes, and I think we did, and raised no issues as to 
their inadequacy at the time.
  So we now are operating under the false assumption that the 
Sentencing Commission has not been cooperating or working with us in 
terms of the directives that we gave them, and I think that the 
opposite is the case.
  Under these circumstances, Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my 
time.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 30 seconds.
  Mr. Chairman, I just would like to respond slightly to the gentleman 
from Michigan in making the point that while he is correct that the 
Sentencing Commission did indeed make some adjustments in the 
guidelines to the extent of language describing those conditions under 
which greater penalties might be appropriate, they were not literal 
sentence enhancement in terms of the levels that the Sentencing 
Commission establishes for the various crimes that would take into 
account the specifics of the age of the person who was the victim, 
which is what this does, and it is that which distinguished this 
legislation.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. 
Hyde], the distinguished chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary.
  Mr. HYDE. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 2974, 
the Crimes Against Children and Elderly Persons Increased Punishment 
Act, which was introduced by my good friend from Michigan, Dick 
Chrysler. This bill was introduced because the U.S. Sentencing 
Commission failed to satisfy the mandate of the 103d Congress for cases 
involving elderly victims.
  In 1994, Congress specifically directed the Sentencing Commission to 
``ensure that the applicable guidelines range for a defendant convicted 
of a crime of violence against an elderly victim is sufficiently 
stringent to deter such a crime, to protect the public from additional 
crimes of such a defendant, and to adequately reflect the heinous 
nature of such an offense.'' This provision was enacted because 
Congress believed that the sentencing ranges for crimes against the 
elderly were inadequate and need to be raised. At that time, bowing to 
the argument that the Commission should be left to decide the level to 
which the sentences should be increased, Congress provided the 
Commission with some flexibility.

  Unfortunately, nothing has happened other than the Commission 
providing an explanatory note that a departure from the guidelines 
might be warranted in cases involving a second crime against a 
vulnerable victim. This provides no deterrent effect because guideline 
departures are purely discretionary.
  Thus, the Commission has disregarded the clear desire of Congress to 
increase the penalties for crimes against the elderly. So, as is our 
right, Congress is now directing the Sentencing Commission to raise the 
sentences by specific levels.
  This bill not only directs the Sentencing Commission to raise the 
guideline levels for crimes committed against the elderly, but also to 
raise the applicable guidelines for those crimes committed against 
those under the age of 14. The bill adds five levels to each guidelines 
calculation, which is used to determine a criminal defendant's 
sentence. This works out roughly to increasing the defendant's sentence 
by another 50 percent.

[[Page H4470]]

  This is appropriate, given that additional deterrence and punishment 
must be provided to protect the most vulnerable in our society. From 
1985 to 1991 there was a 90 percent increase in personal crimes 
committed against senior citizens. There was also a 47 percent increase 
in the homicide rate of children. In 1992 alone, one out of every six 
rape victims was a female under the age of 12.
  Not even those providing dissenting views in the committee report on 
H.R. 2974 argue against the substance of this measure. Instead, they 
want to continue to leave this decision to the discretion of the 
Sentencing Commission.
  We have been there and done that.
  The Sentencing Commission has had 2 years to follow the expressed 
will of Congress and has failed to act. Their virtual inaction 
following enactment of the 1994 law justifies legislative action now to 
increase these penalties.
  I urge adoption of this bill.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Chairman, this measure before us, there seems to be a little 
amnesia in the committee. This bill before us is operating as if the 
Sentencing Commission never acted upon our directives. If my colleagues 
will examine the records of the Committee on the Judiciary, the action 
that the Sentencing Commission took pursuant to our directives was 
submitted to the Committee on the Judiciary's Subcommittee on Crime, it 
went to the full Committee on the Judiciary, it was accepted by 
everybody on both committees, and now we come to the floor criticizing 
the Sentencing Commission as if they had never acted.
  So I want to point out that we ought to at least show that there was 
no one that objected, at least during the time that I was present in 
both the subcommittee and the full committee, on the inadequacy of the 
way that they, the Sentencing Commission, dealt with the directives 
that we gave them.
  They acted, they sent them back, we accepted them, it became part of 
the law, and now today we meet under the anxious gentleman from 
Michigan [Mr. Chrysler], who has determined that there must be more 
done and that somehow the Sentencing Commission, not the Committee on 
the Judiciary, has failed in its responsibility.
  Mr. Chairman, I think that that is an inaccuracy, and no matter what 
we do here today, the least we can do is acknowledge the correct 
chronology of what has taken place that has led us to this point in the 
creation of criminal law at the Federal level.
  Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 30 seconds.
  Mr. Chairman, I simply wish to respond to the gentleman from Michigan 
by pointing out once again that what the Sentencing Commission did that 
we did not disagree with was to improve, qualify, change the commentary 
with regard to sentencing guidelines concerning the use of those 
guidelines with respect to children and the elderly.
  It did not in any way enhance the penalties. It did not change the 
levels that would require the courts to impose greater penalties in 
those cases involving children and elderly, which is what this bill 
does today.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Ohio, [Mr. 
Chabot], a member of the committee.
  (Mr. CHABOT asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. CHABOT. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of the bill 
offered by my good friend from Michigan, Mr. Chrysler.
  As a member of the Subcommittee on Crime, I can tell my colleagues 
that the gentleman from Michigan has done just outstanding work in 
putting this bill together and in shepherding it through the 
legislative process. I would also like to commend the gentleman from 
Illinois [Mr. Hyde] and the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] for 
their leadership in this bill.
  Tough punishment deters crime, and we need to be tougher with the 
criminal scum who prey upon the most vulnerable members of our society, 
our children and our senior citizens. In passing this bill, Congress 
will be doing that it is supposed to do under the Constitution, setting 
policy. We should not blindly delegate that responsibility. It is our 
job as policymakers to direct the Sentencing Commission when we think 
the guidelines need improvement.
  They need improvement, Mr. Chairman, to provide greater protection 
for children and the elderly, and therefore I strongly urge adoption of 
this bill.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the 
distinguished gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. Watt].
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I thank the ranking member 
for yielding me this time on general debate.
  Mr. Chairman, I am not real sure what this is all about, since the 
Sentencing Commission seems to have done what this Congress requested 
them to do, and one suspects that it may be more about election-year 
politics and beating oneself on the chest about how hard we are on 
crime than it is about the actual penalties that go for these kinds of 
offenses.
  Having said that, I mean I think there is nobody who can argue with 
the notion that penalties should be more severe for bullies who beat up 
on young people and the elderly. I do not think anybody in this body 
disagrees with that. What we do disagree with, Mr. Chairman, however, 
is that the Sentencing Commission and the policy underlying the 
establishment of the Sentencing Commission is that we want to get 
politics out of making a determination of what appropriate sentences 
should be in criminal cases.
  The primary purpose of having a sentencing commission was to create a 
fair and equitable set of sentencing guidelines free of political 
considerations, and, notwithstanding that, we have several times in the 
context of this Congress made an effort to undermine that primary 
purpose and to make ourselves appear harder on crime and, presumably, 
make ourselves more electable.
  So what I intend to do at the point in which we get to the amendment 
process is to try to correct the real problem with this bill. If we 
want sentences enhanced, we have a process by which that can happen. It 
should happen as a matter of policy through the U.S. Sentencing 
Commission. They ought to make an orderly evaluation, as they 
apparently already have. They ought to enhance the penalties, which 
they already have enhanced the process, for getting to a more stringent 
penalty when the offense is against young people and elderly people, 
and we ought to let them do their job and stay out of the way.
  Mr. Chairman, I hope that we can overcome our desire to gain 
political points and, hopefully, we can send a request to the 
Sentencing Commission to review this matter again, if that is what we 
want to do; that is what my amendment would do.

                              {time}  1730

  However, let us not forget about the underlying public policy 
rationale for setting up the Sentencing Commission in the first place, 
that public policy rationale being to accept politics and our desire to 
appear tougher on crime, sometimes irrationally, sometimes rationally, 
but the objective should be always to have a rational decision made 
about these things outside of the context of political considerations; 
and in that way, a consistent set of principles can be applied without 
all of the emotion that sometimes gets us inflicted in the political 
process.
  Having said that, I will wait until I offer my amendment to discuss 
this matter further.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Chrysler], the author of this piece of 
legislation.
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank Chairmen McCollum 
and Hyde for all of their hard work in helping to pass this important 
bill in their committees.
  Mr. Chairman, today I am offering what I believe is very important 
and much-needed legislation, the Crimes Against Children and Elderly 
Increased Punishment Act.
  Day after day, we see news accounts of criminals committing violent 
acts throughout our communities, only to walk away with little or no 
punishment. You only need to watch the local evening news on any given 
night to see the havoc criminals create in our neighborhoods.

[[Page H4471]]

  Too often, these criminals are not deterred from their violent 
actions because they know the expected benefits of their crimes far 
outweigh any possible penalties they might suffer.
  If we are to decrease the rate of crime in our country, I believe it 
is time for the criminals to be more afraid of punishment, than we are 
afraid of the criminals. Quite simply, it is time to put punishment 
back into the criminal justice system.
  While crimes of any degree are unacceptable, it is especially 
disturbing when violent criminals hurt those least able to defend 
themselves: children, senior citizens, and the disabled. That is why I 
introduced the Increased Punishment Act.
  The premise behind the legislation is simple: we must say to every 
criminal who thinks of going after an easy target: if you are such a 
coward that you would prey upon the most defenseless in our society, 
then you will face an automatic increase in your punishment. You will 
spend more time behind bars--almost double the normal sentence--for 
your cowardly, violent actions.
  The Crimes Against Children and Elderly Increased Punishment Act 
provides for an automatic increase in the length of the criminal 
sentence for crimes committed against victims 14 years of age and 
under, those age 65 years and older, or those with a physical or mental 
disability.
  For example, someone convicted of the robbery of a senior citizen 
would face a minimum prison sentence of 2\1/2\ to 3\1/2\ years under 
current guidelines. Under the Increased Punishment Act, the minimum 
sentence becomes 4\1/2\ to 6 years, adding another 2 to 3 years behind 
bars.

  Mr. Chairman, crimes against children and senior citizens across the 
country today are serious, and remain at intolerable levels. This must 
not continue.
  The 1994 crime bill suggested increased penalties for crimes 
committed against children and the elderly, but the Sentencing 
Commission did not take action on this recommendation. It is clear that 
we must now insist upon stricter sentences for crimes against these 
vulnerable victims.
  Increasing the penalties for those who would hurt children, senior 
citizens, or the disabled will provide the needed protection for these 
citizens, while giving criminals the punishment they deserve. This 
legislation will send a clear signal to those who commit these cowardly 
acts that their actions will not be tolerated and they will face 
certain and severe punishment. Criminals must know that if they are to 
inflict harm upon our children, seniors, or the disabled, there will be 
a heavy price to pay.
  The 104th Congress has already passed a series of crime bills that 
require prisoners to serve at least 85 percent of their sentences, 
limit death row appeals, and require restitution to the victims of 
crime. This bill is another step in the right direction toward a safer, 
more secure America.
  American families have a right to be safe in our homes, on our 
streets, and in our neighborhoods. If criminals seek to violate this 
right, they should expect swift and severe punishment. The Crimes 
Against Children and the Elderly Increased Punishment Act seeks to send 
this very message to criminals.
  Mr. Chairman, I urge support for this important bill for our 
families.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Chairman, I would ask the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Chrysler] 
for his attention for a moment, please. Mr. Chairman, I would like the 
gentleman to indicate to us if he is familiar with the Sentencing 
Commission's process in terms of enhancing or adding penalties to the 
crimes that he complains of.
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. CONYERS. I yield to the gentleman from Michigan.
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Yes, Mr. Chairman. There are 43 levels in the increased 
Federal Crime Commission right now. What we do is increase the 
penalties by five levels with this bill. In 1994, in the crime bill----
  Mr. CONYERS. The gentleman is familiar with the process. I am glad to 
know that. Did the gentleman know that Congress directed the Sentencing 
Commission to address the problem of which he complains?
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Yes. If the gentleman will continue to yield, and if he 
would have continued to listen, I was going to say that in 1994 in the 
crime bill, which I did say in my remarks, by the way----
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I need my colleague to respond to my 
questions on my time. Is he aware of the fact that we directed the 
Sentencing Commission to deal with the problem of which he complains 
today?
  Mr. CHRYSLER. There was a suggestion. They did not choose to 
implement it. I am trying to answer the gentleman's question, if he 
will yield and allow me to do that. In my prepared remarks I addressed 
that.
  Mr. CONYERS. Tell me the answer, sir.
  Mr. CHRYSLER. The answer is that in the 1994 crime bill, it was 
suggested that they increase the penalties. The commission chose not to 
do that. That is why this legislation is necessary.
  Mr. CONYERS. Is the gentleman aware of the fact that the Sentencing 
Commission's recommendations cannot go into effect without the Congress 
acquiescing in them? And when they came back to the Subcommittee on 
Crime, unfortunately of which the gentleman is not a member, but is 
probably always welcome, and when they came to the full Committee on 
the Judiciary, the committee members, the gentleman from Florida [Mr. 
McCollum], myself, and even our chairman, the gentleman from Illinois 
[Mr. Hyde], all acquiesced in the Sentencing Commission's response to 
the directive that we issued. Is the gentleman aware of that?
  Mr. CHRYSLER. If the gentleman will continue to yield, in the 103d 
Congress that did in fact happen. This is the 104th Congress and we are 
going to make it a law.
  Mr. CONYERS. I would like to find out if the gentleman understood the 
question. Is the gentleman aware of the fact that we accepted the 
recommendations of the Sentencing Commission?
  Mr. CHRYSLER. In response, I answered the question. I am aware it 
happened in the 103d Congress. This is the 104th Congress. It did not 
become law in the 103d Congress, it became a suggestion. I am answering 
the gentleman's question. By asking the question over and over, you 
will not get a different answer.
  Mr. CONYERS. Just a moment, sir. May I remind the gentleman of the 
date when the Sentencing Commission returned their reply to our 
directive? It was November.
  Mr. CHRYSLER. That was in the 103d Congress, sir.
  Mr. CONYERS. I would say to the gentleman, Mr. Chairman, it was the 
104th Congress, and he was a Member of it.
  Mr. Chairman, I find that my colleague and dear friend, the gentleman 
from Michigan, thought that this occurred in the 103d Congress. The 
fact of the matter is that it occurred in the Congress in which he was 
a Member. We were all here in November 1995, we were sober, it was in 
broad daylight, they sent it over from the Sentencing Commission. It 
came to the Subcommittee on Crime, chaired by the gentleman who wishes 
me to yield time for him to explain, and then we took it up to the full 
committee. It was accepted. That is the only way the Sentencing 
Commission's guideline directives can become law, sir. It cannot become 
law unless the Congress allows it. We permitted it.
  Nobody, including the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Chrysler], 
objected to it. The gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers] did not; the 
gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hyde] did not; the gentleman from Florida 
[Mr. McCollum] did not. Neither did the gentleman.
  Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Chairman, I simply wish to respond to the gentleman from 
Michigan. I think he is carrying this, with all due respect, to an 
extreme degree here in this case, because the truth of the matter is 
yes, the Sentencing Commission set up a recommendation that we 
accepted. The gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Chrysler] accepted it. Our 
committee did. We did not even bring it out on the floor for him to 
vote on because

[[Page H4472]]

he is not a member of the Committee on the Judiciary.
  The truth of the matter is that what they proposed to do did not 
enhance the penalties, which is what the bill of the gentleman from 
Michigan [Mr. Chrysler] does. All they did is write some commentary. I 
have it here, chapter and verse, in this book that is before me, the 
Guidelines Manual, November 1, 1995.
  What they have done in this is they have left the levels of increase 
for the type of crimes against children and adults or senior citizens, 
like we have here, at exactly the same level as they were before they 
sent their recommendations out. Yes, they did change the commentary. 
The commentary is what they give as general discussion about, oh, well, 
we think you might do this or consider that in these certain 
circumstances, but the levels, which are the technical levels of 
increasing the penalties that make requirements upon the judges, were 
not changed.
  So, yes, I embrace and I am sure the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. 
Chrysler], and everyone else would, the change in commentary which 
helped a little bit, that the Sentencing Commission did, but they did 
not at any point increase the actual penalty for crimes against those 
who are 14 and under and those 65 and over, and that is precisely why 
we are here today with this bill, to increase those penalties up to 5 
levels, which is what the gentleman from Michigan proposes, which means 
an average of 2 years more jail time for every single crime at the 
Federal level that is committed against a child or an elderly person in 
this country, and it could be as high as 4 years in some cases, again 
depending upon the crime.
  I think what we are doing today is talking about mixing apples and 
oranges; the apples, of course, being in this case the gentleman from 
Michigan knowing full well that the Sentencing Commission sent 
something up on the commentary of this, sort of elaborating on the 
existing law, encouraging judges to impose certain penalties in certain 
situations, but not actually demanding or requiring the level increases 
that the Chrysler bill that we are voting on today would do.
  I would submit that the Sentencing Commission did not do what at 
least I intended by the directive in 1994, or what I would think and 
would suggest that most of the Members would have interpreted it to 
mean. They did not increase the punishment for those who had committed 
these kinds of crimes.

                              {time}  1745

  Mr. HYDE. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. McCOLLUM. I yield to the gentleman from Illinois.
  Mr. HYDE. I would just like to ask my friend from Michigan, when he 
stops gesticulating, if he would tell me, is he opposed to enhancing 
the sentences for crimes of violence against minors, children, and 
elderly?
  Mr. CONYERS. No, sir.
  Mr. HYDE. I did not think so.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. McCOLLUM. I yield to the gentleman from North Carolina.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I just want the Chairman to 
know what I am opposed to is political posturing, and I think that is 
what we are doing here, because the response that we got from the 
Sentencing Commission indicates that this matter has been addressed. We 
can all kind of go home and run on various things, but our obligation 
is to make public policy here, and not just stand up and give the 
gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Chrysler] or any other member of this body 
something to go home and run on.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Reclaiming my time, there is no political posturing 
going on at this point. There is the reality. The reality is, the 
Sentencing Commission recommendation that they sent up that we approved 
did not mean that anybody is going to get another day in jail because 
they commit a crime against a juvenile or an elderly person on a 
Federal reservation.
  This bill would guarantee they would get that under any sentence that 
they were given. It would guarantee they would be increased by 5 
levels, which means in most cases at least 2 years more in jail. But 
what the Sentencing Commission did would not guarantee that, would not 
require it, and would not mandate it. We are mandating that today.
  Anything they sent up and anything that they say to the contrary 
notwithstanding, it is an interpretation that the chairman of the 
Subcommittee on Crime, myself and a lot of other people who worked on 
it have made, and I believe that I am 100 percent accurate about that, 
with all due respect to my colleagues.
  Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  It is funny how memory comes and goes in the course of a busy 
congressional session. Our dear friend from Michigan Mr. Chrysler, 
thought this all took place in the 103d Congress. Now we have brought 
him back into reality. This took place in the Congress that he was in 
and a Member of.
  The problem with the analysis of the gentleman from Florida [Mr. 
McCollum], which I largely agree with, the one thing that was omitted 
that I have to draw to his attention, we did not direct the Sentencing 
Commission to enhance the penalties. We told them to look at it and see 
if they could do some things with it to build it up. That is what they 
did.
  The gentleman from Michigan, my colleague in the Michigan delegation, 
would not know that. He is not on the committee. But you know it. And 
the reason we did not object when the directives from the Sentencing 
Commission came back was because they complied with what we had asked 
them to do, to enhance and make it tougher for people who commit crimes 
against young people and elders.
  The problem is, and we might as well confess it, the error may have 
been made in the Committee on the Judiciary and not in the sentencing. 
Because we gave them directions, they complied, and we accepted, 
unbeknownst to the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Chrysler]. Here we are. 
He is assuming that the Sentencing Commission miserably failed.
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. CONYERS. I yield to the gentleman from Michigan.
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Certainly the 103d Congress did pass the 1994 crime 
bill and this was part of the 1994 crime bill. It was a recommendation 
or a suggestion that they increase the penalties. If there was a 
recommendation that came back to the committee, certainly I would not 
be aware of that as I am not on the committee. But I do not think this 
is really about anything more than just doing the right thing.
  Mr. CONYERS. Well, I want you to do the right thing, but if you do 
not do it against the background of an accurate understanding of what 
has happened, I mean, for example, if you want to blame the Sentencing 
Commission when the Sentencing Commission is not to blame, you might 
want to correct it.
  I have already confessed publicly that I want to make these crimes 
subject to greater penalties. But would you not agree with me that 
there is a procedure set up, yes, before you got here, but you are 
bound by the rules like everyone else, that the Sentencing Commission 
shall do this? In other words, what possessed you, of all the Members 
in the House, and you are one of our most valuable, but what possessed 
you to invent these new crime penalties without the benefit of the 
Committee on the Judiciary, without the benefit of the Sentencing 
Commission, without the benefit of what?
  I mean, it is a wonderful exercise when any one of us 435 Members can 
cruise down to the well and introduce a bill raising more penalties on 
anything we want, child molesters, violators of seniors. And, by the 
way, I notice you did not say much about the fraud that is being 
practiced on seniors that could be covered, and perhaps you might 
entertain a modification of your proposal to include that, or the 
environmental fraud that is committed on youngsters through pollution 
that corporations deal with. You might want to consider that while you 
are at it. But how do these great criminal justice notions occur to 
persons like yourself deeply concerned with this subject?
  Mr. CHRYSLER. If the gentleman will yield further, we are not blaming 
any commission. We are just trying to offer good legislation, trying to 
take

[[Page H4473]]

the most vulnerable people in our society and protect them and take the 
biggest cowards in our society and put them in jail.
  Mr. CONYERS. OK. So the Sentencing Commission, as far as the 
gentleman is concerned, has no role in this process.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina 
[Mr. Watt].
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I just think it is 
important for us to understand exactly what the Sentencing Commission 
is saying about this, so I want to read some selected excerpts from 
what the Sentencing Commission has said.
  It says, first of all, ``The commission takes very seriously its 
responsibilities to promptly and fully implement any directives enacted 
by Congress.''
  In response to this directive in the crime bill encouraging or 
directing them to review this and to increase penalties, it says,

       In response to this directive, the commission analyzed 
     available sentencing data and relevant statutory and 
     guideline provisions. The commission also solicited the views 
     of interested parties on needed amendments in the relevant 
     guidelines. All commentators asserted that in their view the 
     existing guidelines sufficiently account for the 
     congressional concerns apparently embodies in the directive. 
     Nevertheless, the commission identified two ways in which it 
     believed the guidelines should be amended to more fully and 
     effectively address concerns that those who harm child and 
     elderly victims are appropriately punished.

  First the Commission clarified the commentary and then they did some 
other things. Then the Commission in its own letter to us says,

       Currently the commission's chapter 3 adjustment for 
     vulnerable victims requires an increase in the defendant's 
     sentence if a victim of the offense was unusually vulnerable 
     due to age or was otherwise particularly susceptible to the 
     criminal conduct.

  Then they go on to say,

       For example, the proposed threshold age enhancement would 
     require a defendant who assaulted a 65-year-old victim to be 
     sentenced almost twice as severely as a defendant who 
     assaulted a 64-year-old victim.

  That is what we are doing in this bill.
  And then finally and most importantly on a policy basis, the 
Commission, says,

       If the Congress feels that additional measures need to be 
     taken in this area, it should direct the commission to take 
     them without micromanaging the commission's work.

  And then here is the kicker:

       The commission was designed to take the politics out of 
     sentencing policy and to bring research and analysis to bear 
     on sentencing policy.

  So here we are doing exactly the opposite of what we set up the 
Sentencing Commission to do, inserting politics into this, playing 
politics, political posturing, giving our colleagues something to go 
home and run on because this is an election year, and saying the heck 
with the public policy that is involved here. That is what the problem 
is here. This is not about sentencing. The Commission has done what we 
asked them to do. This is about politics.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume. I just want to make one quick comment in response to all of 
this.
  It is pretty obvious that the gentleman from North Carolina and the 
gentleman from Michigan do not believe that Congress should take into 
its hands, when it does not think the Sentencing Commission has done 
the right job, the completeness of that job, to come in here on the 
floor of the House and actually do the job that we think is right.
  I do not have any problem with the Sentencing Commission, what it has 
done or what it usually does. It just did not go far enough. It did not 
suit my taste, it did not suit the taste of the gentleman from Michigan 
[Mr. Chrysler]. We happen to think that we ought to be punishing much 
more severely those who commit crimes against children and the elderly 
than anybody else, to set an example.
  The Sentencing Commission had a charge. The charge from us says under 
the directive we passed before, they shall ensure that the applicable 
guideline range for a defendant convicted of a crime of violence 
against an elderly victim is sufficiently stringent to deter such a 
crime, to protect the pubic from additional crimes of such a defendant.
  I am sure that the Sentencing Commission thinks they did a fine job 
and I have no problem with what they did. What I think is they did not 
go nearly far enough, and that is why we are here today, because they 
did not go as far as I believe or the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. 
Chrysler] believes, or I suggest the majority of this body and 
certainly the public would believe is necessary to ensure that the 
applicable guideline range for a defendant convicted of a crime of 
violence against an elderly victim or a child is sufficiently stringent 
to deter such a crime.
  That is what this debate is about. I cannot believe that that side of 
the aisle over there thinks that what we are doing today is too severe.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Hyde], the 
chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary.
  Mr. HYDE. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Chairman, I just want to say two things. I have listened to the 
gentleman from North Carolina extensively on this bill and on hundreds 
of bills, and I have listened to him speak extensively on this bill and 
hundreds of bills, I would defer to his superior knowledge of political 
posturing. I would say to the Democrats that I thought I had seen it 
all, but to listen to them squabbling over enhanced penalties for 
criminals who violate elderly and children, it is a new revelation to 
me. You just never know it all, do you? You learn every day.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. McCOLLUM. I yield to the gentleman from North Carolina.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I just want to express my 
thanks to the gentleman for deferring to my political rhythm. I hope he 
is going to vote with me on this.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] has 1\1/2\ 
minutes remaining and the right to close debate. The gentleman from 
Michigan [Mr. Conyers] has 30 seconds remaining.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  The Chairman may have heard the gentleman from North Carolina on 
hundreds of bills. I have heard the chairman of the Committee on the 
Judiciary on thousands of bills and listened to him extensively and, 
believe me, he was politicizing this debate one bit when he attempted 
to characterize Democrats as being not as strong on crime as they are 
because we dare to raise the role of the U.S. Sentencing Commission, 
which we created out of the Committee on the Judiciary.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to 
the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Chrysler], the author of this bill.

                              {time}  1800

  Mr. CHRYSLER. Mr. Chairman, this legislation is certainly not about 
the commission and whether they did their job or did not do their job. 
This is really about cowardly criminals that are committing crimes on 
our streets every day, every night, purposely preying on the most 
vulnerable people in our society, the elderly, the children, the 
disabled, waiting for them to come out of their homes to rob them, beat 
them, and mug them.
  This is what we are talking about in this country. America is tired 
of it, America wants change, America wants these criminals punished, 
and it is time that we put the word ``punishment'' back in the criminal 
justice system.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  Mr. Chairman, I simply want to say this is a fundamentally sound bill 
the gentleman from Michigan, [Mr. Chrysler], has tailored. We need to 
increase these punishments. We need to have deterrence against those 
criminals who would prey on children and the elderly. I would urge all 
of my colleagues to support this bill.
  Mrs. COLLINS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, one of the hallmarks of 
civilized society is the measure to which it protects the young, the 
disabled, and the elderly. Yet, even in our great democracy, we witness 
daily accounts of torture, abuse, murder, and mistreatment of those 
vulnerable people in our society.
  In an effort to prevent this horrible treatment of vulnerable 
persons, we put more police on the streets, we developed early 
childhood programs and family support services, and we implemented 
Federal sentencing guidelines to

[[Page H4474]]

provide a certainty in punishment for similar crimes. However, as we 
continue to witness crimes against the vulnerable among us, we have 
seen that the deterrent effect of Federal sentencing guidelines has not 
been enough to stop those sick people that believe that hurting the 
less fortunate and weaker among us will make them be more powerful. 
There has to be a way to stop the madness.
  Mr. Chairman, in a perfect world we wouldn't need increased penalties 
for sentencing guidelines. In a perfect world, we wouldn't need Federal 
sentencing guidelines at all.
  Unfortunately, we don't live in a perfect world. Increased penalties 
for vicious, violent crimes against the helpless, the weak, the young, 
the old, the disabled is what we will decide here today.
  If one person is saved the pain of being the victim of these violent 
acts by an increase in the potential penalty for a crime of rape, 
robbery with violence, and murder, then I will vote in favor of this 
bill and encourage my colleagues to do likewise.
  Mr. GILMAN. I rise in strong support of H.R. 2974, the Crimes Against 
Children and Elderly Persons Increased Punishment Act and I commend the 
distinguished gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Chrysler] for his efforts in 
bringing this measure to the floor.
  H.R. 2974 amends the 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement 
Act to require the U.S. Sentencing Commission to strengthen its 
existing sentencing guidelines with regard to crimes against vulnerable 
persons such as children, the elderly, and those who are mentally or 
physically disabled. I can think of no more important responsibility 
for the Members of this body than to protect those who are often unable 
to protect themselves. It is our duty to do everything in our power to 
keep those who victimize the most vulnerable members of society off our 
streets.
  Accordingly, Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to strongly support 
this important measure.
  Mr. CLINGER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of H.R. 2974, the 
Crimes Against Children and Elderly Persons Increased Punishment Act. 
At the outset, I would like to commend my colleagues, Chairman Hyde, 
Chairman McCollum, and Mr. Chrysler for bringing this important 
legislation to the floor today and the Rules Committee for allowing it 
to be fully debated.
  As you know, H.R. 2974 will increase the length of the sentence for 
violent crimes against children 14 years of age, or younger, seniors 65 
years, or older, and vulnerable persons. It will accomplish this by 
directing the U.S. Sentencing Commission to provide a sentencing 
enhancement of not less than five levels above the offense level 
otherwise provided for a crime of violence against such victims.
  The premise underlying this legislation is simple, and one with which 
I am in complete agreement--that physical assaults against people who 
cannot defend themselves should be punished more severely than similar 
crimes committed against people who have the ability to mount some sort 
of defense.
  Victims of crime who are particularly vulnerable due to their age or 
mental or physical handicap, in my opinion, deserve special protection 
under the law.
  During the debate on the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement 
Act of 1994, I attempted to offer an amendment to the bill that would 
have imposed stiffer penalties to those who commit crimes of physical 
violence against the elderly, similar to protections provided for 
children under the original bill.
  Just as our Nation's children deserve better protection, my concern 
at the time, as it is now, is also for older Americans. Physical 
injuries sustained by an elderly person take longer to heal than those 
inflicted on someone in their thirties or forties. The emotional 
response is different, too, and many older people find it difficult to 
recover that sense of well-being that all of us need in order to lead 
independent, productive lives.
  Though my specific amendment was not made in order at the time, the 
1994 crime bill that was ultimately enacted into law included language 
directing the U.S. Sentencing Commission to rewrite existing sentencing 
guidelines with respect to crimes against vulnerable persons, including 
children and the elderly. Like many of my colleagues, I viewed this as 
a positive step.
  Unfortunately, however, as my esteemed colleagues have already 
pointed out, the Commission has failed to take any action in response 
to this important directive. And through its failure to respond, the 
Commission is sending what is in my opinion a false message that 
current guidelines are sufficient to deter such crimes.
  With personal crimes against the elderly and child homicide rates on 
the rise, I do not agree with that message, and I hope that all of my 
colleagues will join me in supporting H.R. 2974. Because those that 
prey on the most defenseless in our society should have their sentences 
increased.
  Mr. LaTOURETTE. Mr. Chairman, today I rise in strong support of H.R. 
2974, the Crimes Against Children and Elderly Persons Increased 
Punishment Act.
  This measure will amend the Violent Crime Control Act of 1994 and 
toughen the penalties against those who commit crimes against our 
nation's most vulnerable--our children and senior citizens. It will 
cover crimes of assault, homicide, rape and--perhaps most important of 
all to our Nation's seniors--adds the crime of robbery to the Federal 
definition of violent crime.
  Under current Federal sentencing guidelines, sentencing is determined 
by pre-set guidelines where each criminal act is ranked and given an 
appropriate sentence. Right now there are 43 different levels. This 
measure will automatically increase the severity of a crime by five 
sentencing levels, and in most cases nearly double the minimum and 
maximum sentences for these thugs.
  Also, a judge can take into account a host of other circumstances 
when determining an appropriate sentence, such as if a gun was used, or 
if a person was assaulted during the commission of another crime, or if 
the criminal has previously been convicted of a serious crime. All 
these circumstances would add months or years to the base sentence.
  I was a county prosecutor before coming to Congress. I distinctly 
remember a case my office tried involving the rape of an elderly woman. 
This woman was alone in her mobile home, some thug broke in, shoved a 
pillow over her face to muffle her cries, and viciously raped her. The 
victim, in her seventies, played ``possum'' so her deranged attacker 
would think she was dead. It worked. The rapist fled, thinking he had 
not only raped but killed the woman. Fortunately, he later was 
apprehended and convicted. In fact, this was the first case in my 
county when DNA evidence was used.
  While this crime was heinous and despicable under any circumstance, 
it truly was--in this instance--a crime against the truly helpless. 
While we were able to put the rapist away for a long time, it is 
inherently wrong that he was eligible to receive the same sentence as 
if he had attacked a strapping 40-year-old teamster who at least has a 
prayer of defending himself.
  We have heard such horror stories of crime in our country, crimes 
where our children are shot and killed in gang-related violence and 
drive-by shootings, and raped by the most perverse in our society. We 
also hear alarming tales of our senior citizens living in fear, unable 
to protect themselves in their own homes, where their personal safety 
should be secure.
  We need to focus our efforts on punishing those who choose to violate 
others, who cannot abide by the thin blue line that separates our law-
abiding society from those bent on harm and destruction. We also need 
to send a serious message to anyone who thinks they can commit crimes 
and be treated with a slap on the wrist: Those days were over.
  By doing this, we can send a message to our Nation's children and our 
elderly--we are trying to make your world as safe as possible, and we 
will do all within our power to protect you. If you are victimized, at 
the very least we must assure you that the criminals get the punishment 
they deserve.
  The CHAIRMAN. All time for general debate has expired.
  The amendment in the nature of a substitute printed in the bill shall 
be considered by sections as an original bill for the purpose of 
amendment, and pursuant to the rule, each section is considered read.
  During consideration of the bill for amendment, the Chair may accord 
priority in recognition to a Member offering an amendment that he has 
printed in the designated place in the Congressional Record. Those 
amendments will be considered read.
  The Clerk will designate section 1.
  The text of section 1 is as follows:

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Crimes Against Children and 
     Elderly Persons Increased Punishment Act''.

  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that the 
committee amendment in the nature of a substitute be printed in the 
Record and open to amendment at any point.
  The CHAIRMAN. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from 
Florida?
  There was no objection.
  The text of the remainder of the committee amendment in the nature of 
a substitute is as follows:

     SEC. 2. ENHANCED PENALTIES FOR VULNERABLE VICTIMS.

       Section 240002 of the Violent Crime Control and Law 
     Enforcement Act of 1994 is amended to read as follows:

[[Page H4475]]

     ``SEC. 20002. ENHANCED PENALTIES FOR VULNERABLE VICTIMS.

       ``(a) In General.--The United States Sentencing Commission 
     shall amend the Federal sentencing guidelines to provide a 
     sentencing enhancement of not less than 5 levels above the 
     offense level otherwise provided for a crime of violence, if 
     the crime of violence is against a child, elderly person, or 
     other vulnerable person.
       ``(b) Definitions.--As used in this section--
       ``(1) the term `crime of violence' has the meaning given 
     that term in section 16 of title 18, United States Code;
       ``(2) the term `child' means a person who is 14 years of 
     age, or younger;
       ``(3) the term `elderly person' means a person who is 65 
     years of age or older; and
       ``(4) the term `vulnerable person' means a person whom the 
     defendant knew or should have known was unusually vulnerable 
     due to age, physical or mental condition, or otherwise 
     particularly susceptible to the criminal conduct.''.

  The CHAIRMAN. Are there amendments to the bill?


                     amendment offered by mr. frost

  Mr. FROST. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
  The text of the amendment is as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. Frost:
       Amend H.R. 2974 by adding at the end thereof new sections 3 
     and 4 to read as follows:

     SEC. 3. SHORT TITLE.

       The following sections may be cited as the ``Amber Hagerman 
     Child Protection Act of 1996''.

     SEC. 4. INCREASED PENALTIES FOR FEDERAL SEX OFFENSES AGAINST 
                   CHILDREN

       (a) Aggravated Sexual Abuse of a Minor.--Section 2241(c) of 
     title 18, United States Code, is amended--
       (1) by inserting ``whoever in interstate or foreign 
     commerce or'' before ``in the special'';
       (2) by inserting ``crosses a State line with intent to 
     engage in a sexual act with a person who has not attained the 
     age of 12 years, or'' after ``Whoever''; and
       (3) by adding at the end of the following: ``If the 
     defendant has previously been convicted of another Federal 
     offense under this subsection or under section 2243(a), or of 
     a State offense that would have been an offense under either 
     such provision had the offense occurred in a Federal prison, 
     unless the death penalty is imposed, the defendant shall be 
     sentenced to life in prison.''.
       (b) Sexual Abuse of a Minor.--Section 2243(a) of title 18, 
     United States Code, is amended--
       (1) by inserting ``whoever in interstate for foreign 
     commerce or'' before ``in the special'';
       (2) by inserting ``crosses a State line with intent to 
     engage in a sexual act with a person who, or'' after 
     ``Whoever'';
       (3) by adding at the end the following: ``If the defendant 
     has previously been convicted of another Federal offense 
     under this subsection or under section 2241(c), or of a State 
     offense that would have been an offense under either such 
     provision had the offense occurred in a Federal prison, 
     unless the death penalty is imposed, the defendant shall be 
     sentenced to life in prison.''.

  Mr. FROST. Mr. Chairman, Amber Hagerman was a little 9-year-old girl 
who loved to ride her bicycle. She was bright and pretty, and was out 
riding that bicycle on January 13 in Arlington, TX, when someone came 
along and took her away. That person or persons molested her and killed 
her. We do not know who took her, but we do know that a little girl, 
just a child, was brutally murdered and her body left to be found.
  Mr. Chairman, this case occurred in my congressional district, but I 
am sure that events like this have happened, sadly, in every corner of 
our country, in our cities and in the heartland.
  Whoever took Amber did not know and did not care that she was an 
honor student who made all A's and B's. They did not care that she was 
a Brownie, who had lots of friends, and who loved her little brother 
dearly. They did not care that her whole life was ahead of her, and 
that her parents wanted to watch her grow into the lovely young woman 
she promised to be.
  Mr. Chairman, this amendment that I am offering is named for Amber. 
This amendment would increase the number of child sex abuse cases that 
can be brought in Federal court. It imposes a two-strikes-and-you-are-
out penalty by requiring that any sex offenders whose cases are in 
Federal court will be sentenced to life imprisonment without the 
possibility of parole upon their second conviction.
  I had hoped through the introduction of a broader bill to extend 
these provisions to the states, but, for now, I believe this is a good 
first step. However limited the jurisdiction of the Federal Government 
might be in these cases, if just one child is saved from Amber's fate, 
then this amendment will have served its purpose.
  Mr. Chairman, I am outraged to think that convicted sex offenders are 
out in our streets, where they are free to prey upon our children. I 
hope that the Committee on the Judiciary will hold hearings later this 
year on another part of my broader bill which is also crucial to 
protecting our children from sex offenders. I have proposed a 
centralized information system to allow law enforcement to track sex 
offenders across state lines, and that new tool, along with these new 
stiffer penalties, will make it safe for little girls like Amber to 
ride their bicycles without being afraid.
  Mr. Chairman, this amendment is an important step in protecting our 
children. I urge my colleagues to support this effort and to vote for 
the Amber Hagerman Child Protection Act.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the amendment.
  Mr. Chairman, I think this is a very fine amendment. It is very 
narrowly crafted and tailored in order to get us to a position where we 
can now find a way to do what is known as ``two strikes and you are 
out'' against somebody who commits these kinds of sexual crimes against 
a minor. It is something that I think is very important.
  The underlying crime that was the first one of the two might 
potentially be a state crime rather than a Federal crime, but the crime 
for which the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Frost] is seeking the 
additional punishment, which conforms with the kind of thing we are 
doing in this bill and in the underlying bill, requires that that 
second crime, the crime we would be seeing in Federal court to be one 
that is a Federal violation at the time it occurs. I believe that this 
is extremely well-written, very well-crafted, narrowly crafted to be 
appropriate to this bill, and it adds to the bill that we have in the 
sense that it gives us further deterrence against those who would prey 
upon the children, in this particular case, and I certainly strongly 
support this amendment and urge its adoption.
  Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.
  Mr. Chairman, I would like to commend the gentleman from Texas [Mr. 
Frost] for offering his amendment. I am a cosponsor of his bill, the 
Amber Hagerman Act, which the amendment is based upon.
  Last year, when the Congress approved the Sexual Crimes against 
Children Prevention Act, I raised the issue that the sentences 
instituted in that legislation were insufficient. I think this 
amendment goes a long way towards remedying that problem.
  I am a freshman in this House, but throughout my career here and in 
local government, I have been very much committed to rehabilitation 
programs and to assisting people in improving their behavior so that 
they would no longer pose a threat to society. But I find myself 
supporting life imprisonment on the second conviction for pedophiles, 
though, because I think that while rehabilitation works in some 
categories of offenses, I recognize that there are predators among us 
who simply must be kept away from potential vulnerable victims. I 
believe that the law must play a role here. I would argue as well that 
keeping predators, pedophiles, away from their future victims is also 
important in preventing a cycle of crime.
  When we look at who is a pedophile and their chances of improving 
themselves, unfortunately we find a situation that is, indeed, grim. In 
1981, I commissioned an analysis of California's mentally disordered 
sex offender program. I was concerned to find that for those pedophiles 
who had been through the mandatory counseling program, their recidivism 
rate was actually higher than for those who had been merely imprisoned. 
I would also note that a 1992 Minnesota study of rapists and child 
molesters again found that the counseling and rehabilitation programs 
simply did not work with this offender group.
  The Bureau of Justice Statistics has found that those who victimize 
children through sexual mistreatment are twice as likely to have 
multiple victims as those who have victimized adults, and further that 
those who victimize children are likelier to have themselves been 
victimized as children.

[[Page H4476]]

  In fact, violent offenders who victimized children sexually were 
twice as likely as other violent criminals to have been physically or 
sexually abused as a child. Nearly one quarter of the child victimizers 
were sexually victimized when they themselves were children. Further, 
31 percent of the female prisoners in this country were victims of 
child sexual abuse and some 75 percent of those who are prostitutes in 
this country were also sexually abused as children.
  We consequently have a situation where we have a crime that tends to 
be repeated over and over again. The rehabilitation efforts that we 
have in place seem to do nothing whatsoever. We also have a crime that 
repeats in its cycle of violence so that the innocent victims too often 
go on to victimize other innocent people as adults.
  I am someone who actually opposed California's ``three strikes, you 
are out'' law because the net effect of that measure is often to send 
people who have stolen a six-pack to prison for life. That is a misuse 
of resources. However, it is a good use of our resources to put 
pedophiles in prison for life to save their future victims, until we 
find some other method to deal with this group of offenders, which we 
have yet to do.
  Mr. Chairman, I am glad that this bill and this amendment are before 
us today. One of the things that I was committed to doing when I came 
to Congress was to make sure, if nothing else, that we put children 
first, that we ensure their safety is our highest priority, that we 
interrupt the cycle of childhood violence and sexual abuse.
  Mr. Chairman, I commend the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Frost] and hope 
my colleagues will join me in approving this amendment.
  Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, unfortunately, Texas is not the only community in the 
country that has been affected by what really can only be described as 
the worst possible actions of a human being to another human being. In 
south Florida, within the last 12 months, a case that unfortunately I 
stood on this House floor before we knew what happened to a young boy 
named Jimmy Rice, where I had a picture right here of him when he was 
still missing, where his body had not yet been found, and the gruesome 
tale of what happened to him in the last few hours of his life had not 
yet been heard. But there was an end to the Jimmy Rice story, an end 
that occurs too often in the United States.
  Mr. Chairman those victims, and the victims clearly are not just the 
victim, but the parents, the family, the community, really have a right 
to protect themselves. I have heard the debate in terms of our 
involvement in the Sentencing Guidelines Commission and whether or not 
we should direct them to do certain things. I think this is a case 
where we need to direct them to do certain things, where we as a 
society need to make a statement, a very strong statement, in fact the 
strongest possible statement, that this is behavior outside the bounds, 
and in fact so far outside the bounds, of human decency, of what we 
expect as a society, that we are willing to do what we need to do to 
protect ourselves.
  That is exactly what the Frost amendment does. What it does is 
expands the jurisdiction in terns of including a broader Federal 
jurisdiction of sexual exploitation of children, so in cases where 
people are coming from out of state to commit such an act it can be 
brought into the Federal court system.
  That clearly is a major factor in terms of what would occur, bringing 
Federal resources. But as importantly, what it does is we are no longer 
even talking about three strikes and you are out. We are really talking 
about two strikes and you are out in this amendment. And really it 
should be, to the extent in this type of case, one strike and you are 
out, and we need to highlight this type of exploitation.
  The message can be no clearer, the punishment can be no more severe. 
We know from our own experience, we know from analytical experience, 
that as a society we protect ourselves, we send a message, we do 
punishment. That is what the crimes are about, to make it clear that 
there is a punishment side, and hopefully not just by this legislation 
but by other actions that we can take, that there will be no victims of 
crimes like this in America, that we can all live in America some day 
where there will not be victims of crimes like this, which I think is a 
hope in the work that this Congress can do in many areas. It is a much 
broader question than just the punishment side. But I think we need to 
be as strong as we possibly can on the punishment side, as we will be 
today.
  Mr. Chairman, I compliment the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Frost] and 
this Congress, whom I assume very shortly will adopt this amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from Texas [Mr. Frost].
  The amendment was agreed to.

                              {time}  1815


                   amendment offered by ms. slaughter

  Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Amendment offered by Ms. Slaughter.
       Page 4, line 2, after ``conduct'' insert ``, or is a victim 
     of an offense under section 2241(e) of title 18, United 
     States Code''.
       Add at the end the following new section:

     SEC. 5. FEDERAL JURISDICTION OVER RAPE AND SEXUAL ASSAULT 
                   CASES.

       Section 2241 of title 18, United States Code, is amended by 
     adding at the end the following:
       ``(e) Punishment for Sexual Predators.--(1) Whoever, in a 
     circumstance described in paragraph (2) of this subsection--
       ``(A) violates this section; or
       ``(B) engages in conduct that would violate this section, 
     if the conduct had occurred in the special maritime and 
     territorial jurisdiction of the United States, and--
       ``(i) that conduct is in interstate or foreign commerce;
       ``(ii) the person engaging in that conduct crossed a State 
     line with intent to engage in the conduct; or
       ``(iii) the person engaging in that conduct thereafter 
     engages in conduct that is a violation of section 1073(1) 
     with respect to an offense that consists of the conduct so 
     engaged in; shall be imprisoned for life.
       ``(2) The circumstance referred to in paragraph (1) of this 
     subsection is that the defendant has previously been 
     convicted of another State or Federal offense for conduct 
     which--
       ``(A) is an offense under this section or section 2242 of 
     this title; or
       ``(B) would have been an offense under either of such 
     sections if the offense had occurred in the special maritime 
     or territorial jurisdiction of the United States.''.

  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I reserve a point of order.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] reserves a 
point of order.
  Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Chairman, today we are considering legislation to 
increase penalties for violent crimes against children, the elderly, 
and other vulnerable individuals in our society.
  The House has adopted Representative Frost's amendment which 
establishes a Federal crime for repeat sexual offenses against 
children. I now ask my colleagues to go further to protect the other 
vulnerable members of communities who are terrorized by repeat sexual 
predators.
  My amendment would allow Federal prosecution for offenders accused of 
a second rape or other serious sexual assault. If convicted under this 
Federal prosecution, the sexual predator would be imprisoned for life 
without parole.
  This amendment is designed to change our approach to repeat sex 
offenders. The American people are outraged that our criminal justice 
system releases these obsessive criminals after just a few years. Some 
national statistics indicate that rapists are 10 times more likely than 
other convicts to repeat their crimes. Yet the average convicted rapist 
serves only about 5 years in jail.
  Even the repeat sexual offenders themselves recognize the problem. 
The convicted killer of Polly Klaas has been quoted as saying that he 
should not have been on the street.
  Since we cannot change the behavior of these sexual predators, we 
need to keep them behind bars. The amendment does just that. Repeat 
rapists would receive life sentences in Federal prison.
  It seems you open the newspaper every week and read about another 
monster committing a horrific crime. In the last several years, 
residents of California, Florida, Massachusetts, Indiana, Texas, 
Virginia, Washington, Vermont, Oregon, Idaho, New York, and Maryland 
have experienced the terror of serial rapists and molesters.

[[Page H4477]]

  Too often these fiends have long histories of preying on women and 
children, but they have been released to attack again and again.
  For example, in California Leo Anthony Goodloe began his grisly 
career by raping and severely beating a 17-year-old woman in 1956. Over 
the next 39 years, he served 16 years in prison for 10 felonies, but 
was released to rape again and again. Even with such a record, he 
served less than 2 years for a rape and sodomy conviction in 1990. Four 
months after his release, he raped and beat yet another victim. While 
he has finally been sentenced to 43 years in prison without the 
possibility of parole, his reign of terror continued far too long.
  Similarly, in 1994, police in New York City arrested Robert Daniels 
for four rapes. Daniels had been paroled 10 months earlier after 
serving less than 10 years for his second rape conviction. Besides his 
first rape conviction in 1969, he had also been convicted of sex 
offenses in 1974 and 1976.
  This sickening litany is all too common.
  In my hometown of Rochester, we know all too well the horror of 
serial rapists. Arthur Shawcross had served less than 15 years for the 
sexually motivated murders of two children. A model prisoner, Shawcross 
was released and his parole officer lost track of him. Before he was 
caught again, Shawcross had raped and killed 10 women.
  In the last Congress we instituted a Federal data base of sexual 
offenders, first proposed in the protection from sexual predators bill 
I introduced in 1994. That was an important first step in giving police 
departments the resources needed to catch repeat sexual predators, like 
Shawcross.
  Today we have taken another step by providing a means to protect our 
communities from the monsters that sexually attack children.
  But as legislators, our job is not yet complete. When I speak with my 
constituents they are especially worried about the threat posed by 
violent, repeat offenders--and particularly by the sexual predators who 
seem to be released from prison over and over, only to commit the same 
sickening crimes once more.
  These monsters prey on the most private aspect of our lives. They 
often invade the sanctity of our homes as well as our streets, and 
unfortunately, no community is safe from this threat.
  It is time to stop fooling ourselves and to lock up these repeat 
offenders for good. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.
  It will give prosecutors across the Nation the ability to ensure that 
our communities are safeguarded from these revolving door rapists.
  It will tell the victims of these sexual fiends that we do not find 
this behavior a minor aberration; that we understand that the lives of 
the victims of rape are forever changed, and that we, as a society will 
not stand by and let the same person wreak this havoc and destroy life 
after life after life.
  In the name of past and future victims of these unspeakable rapists, 
I urge my colleagues to vote for this amendment.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, while I recognize what the gentlewoman is 
attempting to do with this amendment and realize that the close call 
might have been there on the point of order, I do not think that this 
is appropriate to this bill, even though I have concluded that it would 
be germane.
  The reason why I do not think it is appropriate to this bill is that 
the underlying bill that we are dealing with today involves violent 
crimes against children and the elderly. This particular effort that we 
have got here today that the gentlewoman from New York [Ms. Slaughter] 
is bringing forward would mean that we would have a new Federal crime 
involving virtually any situation where there have been two rapes, 
having any kind of interstate nexus at all and we would have two 
strikes and you are out, regardless of the age of the victim.
  Mr. Chairman, the very fact that we have got a person who is 
vulnerable, and I realize that the word ``vulnerable'' is in our 
language, is stretched to the limit I think by this amendment. And I 
also question some constitutional questions with regard to whether we 
are going too far, whether there is truly a nexus here that can be 
attached to the full Slaughter amendment that would be appropriate at 
the Federal level.
  Mr. Chairman, let me describe this briefly, because I understand the 
idea and I want to discourage these type of crimes. I certainly think 
two strikes and you are out is appropriate against anybody who commits 
a rape under the conditions that the gentlewoman described, but I do 
not think it is appropriate for Federal law under this bill, or Federal 
law for that matter at all under some of the conditions that she is 
describing.
  Under the amendment of the gentlewoman from New York, the first 
offense must be a violation of section 2241, or it must be the 
equivalent of that. It could be a State law violation, which in essence 
means an aggravated sexual abuse.
  The Frost amendment we had a while ago was the sexual abuse of 
children. Or under the Slaughter amendment it could be simply sexual 
abuse which is not limited to children, or a State offense that would 
have been an offense under either of such sections if the offense had 
occurred in a special maritime or territorial jurisdiction of the 
United States.
  The second offense for which you could get the two strikes and you 
are out could be either a violation of section 2241, which is an 
aggravated sexual abuse Federal crime, and not limited to children, or 
a State offense that would be a violation of section 2241 if the 
conduct had occurred in a special maritime and territorial jurisdiction 
of the United States and either, first, that the conduct was in 
interstate or foreign commerce or, second the offender crossed the 
State line intending to engage in the conduct, or third after 
committing this State offense, travels in interstate commerce with the 
intent to avoid prosecution or confinement after conviction for a 
capital crime or felony under a State law.
  Mr. Chairman, I submit that this is stretching considerably the 
constitutional bounds of where we should be having or even thinking 
about Federal jurisdiction. Federal courts already have an enormous 
workload. And I know occasionally I have come to the floor and argued 
in the past for expanding that workload in certain instances. But, 
essentially, the second time rapist in the United States, no matter who 
he is and where he has committed that rape, is most likely going to be 
covered by this, and Federal law would be involved in prosecuting 
second time rape cases, even if there has never been one piece 
of Federal jurisdiction before in the underlying rape crime.

  Mr. Chairman, I just frankly think that there is, first, a 
considerable constitutional question, but as a matter of policy I 
cannot support that because it is too broad. And I reluctantly oppose 
the Slaughter amendment for that reason, even though I understand that 
the gentlewoman means well by it.
  And I, too, Mr. Chairman, want to discourage this sort of thing and I 
would love to see the States adopt two strikes and you're out, for rape 
crimes. And in certain appropriate Federal crimes where you limit it to 
the Federal jurisdiction as the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Frost] has 
done, I think that would be a good idea too, although I frankly do not 
think it was a good idea to include it in this bill that was confined 
originally primarily to children and the elderly.
  Nonetheless, my objection is not specific to the age or the youth 
question, but with rather to the issue of whether we are just going way 
too far in encompassing far too many crimes for Federal jurisdiction 
which have traditionally been State jurisdictions, and I see no public 
policy reason nor do I think there is a constitutional basis for doing 
this.
  Again, Mr. Chairman, I reluctantly oppose the amendment.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.
  Mr. Chairman, we have a difficulty here. We have passed the Chrysler 
amendment that enhanced the penalties for crimes against children and 
adults. We passed the Frost provision that increased penalties for sex 
offenses against children, and now we come to the amendment of the 
gentlewoman from New York [Ms. Slaughter] where repeat violent sex 
crimes against women are now being rejected on the basis that there is 
a constitutional problem.

[[Page H4478]]

  Give me a break. What constitutional problem?
  Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Chrysler], 
my wonderful colleague, to ask him to edify us on this provision. Can 
the gentleman join me in supporting the Slaughter amendment?
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. CONYERS. It is a perfect privilege and pleasure to yield to the 
gentleman from Michigan.
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Mr. Chairman, I believe that this amendment is very 
well intended. I believe that we need to lock up people that have a 
second offense of a rape. But I also agree with the gentleman from 
Florida [Mr. McCollum] that this bill that we have introduced really is 
aimed at crimes against children, the elderly, and the disabled. This 
amendment probably better belongs in another crime bill that may come 
to the floor.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, that is a possibility. 
I thank the gentleman for his response. Does he additionally think it 
might be referred to the U.S. Sentencing Commission?
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Mr. Chairman, I do not know.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for his candor.
  Mr. Chairman, if my colleagues loved Chrysler, if they liked Frost, 
what in the devil is wrong with Slaughter? I mean, are women subject to 
violent sex crimes? To second offenses? Are those criminals not to be 
given the enhanced penalties that have gone through this House like Ex-
Lax?
  Now, Mr. Chairman, we get to women and we say: Well, wait a minute. 
Slow down. Let us study it. My dear colleague suggests it should go 
into another bill. The chairman of my subcommittee tells me that there 
is a constitutional problem seen in this measure.
  Look, we are either for toughening penalties against vicious repeat 
criminals against children and the elderly or we are not. Let us not 
exclude women.
  Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. CONYERS. I yield to the gentlewoman from New York.
  Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Chairman, I absolutely agree with the gentleman 
from Michigan [Mr. Conyers]. If there is no constitutional prohibition 
to what we have done already, surely protecting women in the United 
States should not be prohibited.
  The bill speaks to the vulnerable. Mr. Chairman, I do not know of 
anyone more vulnerable than a woman alone in her apartment when a 
rapist wakes her up, having broken in through the window, or the woman 
who gets into her car or a woman who is leaving work who gets in an 
elevator who is accosted by a rapist who changes her life forever.

                              {time}  1830

  Certainly, if we are going to protect the people of the United States 
against this awful crime of rape and we say that the people who commit 
this crime are not people that we can rehabilitate and indeed since 
their recidivism rate is so high, why would we leave out of this bill 
the women? Why should they not be protected? Without question, they are 
the major sufferers of this awful crime.
  In cases of serial rape, the rapist often goes across State lines to 
commit his awful crime. Again, without question, this is a Federal 
jurisdictional problem.
  There are four sources for Federal jurisdiction that I have to this 
amendment. I would like to read them. The first is one the gentleman 
from Florida [Mr. McCollum] mentioned about special maritime and 
territorial jurisdiction; the second, if it occurred in interstate or 
foreign commerce; third, where the criminal crossed the State line with 
intent to engage in the conduct, which is frankly often the case; or 
the criminal fled across State lines after engaging in the conduct, 
which again is the case.
  Why in the world would we differentiate between our citizens if we 
are trying to protect them? Why not include women? This is certainly a 
case again where the person in the prison is a model prisoner. There 
are no women to rape. There are no children to molest. But we have 
learned over and over again, through tragedy after tragedy, that once 
these people are released back on the street they often, within days, 
have repeated their awful crime.
  Why do we not try to make everybody in the country safe from this 
hideous experience? Why in the world, how can we exclude women? 
Frankly, on the face of it, it makes no sense to me.
  I urge my colleagues not to do this thing to the women of the United 
States.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I beg my colleagues to support the 
Slaughter amendment and not discriminate against women.
  Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Slaughter amendment. It is 
based on the Protection From Sexual Predators Act, which I have 
cosponsored.
  I would like to note, in response to the issues raised about 
germaneness or correctness, not as a technical matter since the 
amendment is germane, that this proposal is also about enhancing 
sentences for those offenders whose behavior is not amenable to 
improvement by any means that we have yet been able to devise. As with 
pedophiles, we have yet to find a method or program that in the case of 
most rapists changes their behavior so that they will cease being a 
threat to other innocent victims in the future. I think for this reason 
the penalty proposed by the author of the amendment is as appropriate 
as the punishment adopted previously by the Frost amendment.
  I would note further that this bill is about enhancing penalties in 
selected cases for sound reasons. This amendment is as sound as the 
Frost amendment; it is as sound as the Chrysler bill. It deserves 
support. For a Congress that has allowed logging in the Tongass 
National Forest as part of an appropriations bill to now say that this 
amendment is not connected enough with a bill to enhance sentences is, 
I think, rather curious--very curious.
  Mr. Chairman, I know that not every Member has had a chance to read 
through the jurisdictional basis that the gentlewoman from New York 
[Ms. Slaughter] has referred to, but I would urge Members to do so. I 
know that there are genuine concerns that can be expressed about the 
jurisdictional issues and the scope and breadth of Federal law, but I 
think that Members who do have reservations, if they will read through 
the amendment, will be reassured that in fact this measure is well in 
keeping with the Chrysler bill and the Frost amendment.
  I would urge that we step back, think again, and approve the 
Slaughter amendment.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the 
requisite number of words.
  Mr. Chairman, I think my colleagues now should begin to understand 
exactly why we gave jurisdiction for these decisions to the U.S. 
Sentencing Commission. Once you get on this slippery slope, once you 
start on the House floor, we are going to have maybe 435 Members of 
Congress coming in saying, hey, we ought to enhance penalties for this 
offense, that offense, against this vulnerable person, against this 
vulnerable group, and there is no way to get off of the merry-go-round.
  Exactly the reason that we gave the authority to the Sentencing 
Commission away from the politics and cameras and give-and-take of 
having to run in political contests, to go in and spend the time that 
it takes to make reasonable judgments about sentencing policy, that is 
exactly the reason we gave the Sentencing Commission this job. And 
here, my colleagues, they do not know how to deal with this because 
this amendment, the truth of the matter, got offered by a Democrat. 
That is the only difference it is.
  It is politics now. As long as it is offered by the other side, it is 
good public policy. But let a Democrat come up with the proposal, all 
of a sudden it is politics. We do not know where to draw the line, or 
it is unconstitutional, or any irrational basis for making the decision 
that we should have, should not even be discussing in the first place.
  We ought to take this whole bill, with the Frost amendment, with the 
Slaughter amendment, with the Chrysler business that we started with 
and send it over to the Sentencing Commission to do their job with it. 
They can hold extensive hearings. They can solicit public comment. They 
can analyze how this compares with other sentencing decisions. They can 
rationalize the process. They can tell us, hey, somebody ought not get 
a double sentence

[[Page H4479]]

just because they assaulted somebody who is 65 years and in good health 
than they would get for someone who is 64 years, 364 days, and in 
terrible health, even lying in a bed in a hospital.
  It makes no sense to do this. That is exactly the reason, my 
colleagues, that we gave this responsibility to the Sentencing 
Commission. that is exactly the reason I am going to give Members an 
opportunity to vote on giving it back to them, so that they can make 
some rational decisions, because the decisions we are making right now 
do not make one iota of sense.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. I yield to the gentleman from Michigan.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I commend the gentleman's logic, because 
when we send it to the Sentencing Commission, they must send it back to 
us and then we can approve or then make any modifications we choose.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Chairman, the 
gentleman is absolutely right. That is the way the process is supposed 
to work, away from the cameras, away from the politics of it. Rational 
decisionmaking. We still get a shot at it. We will still get our shot.
  It might be next year, when we are not running for office, and that 
is the way it should be. That is exactly the way it should be. We ought 
not be making these very important, very intricate, very difficult 
decisions haphazardly. Some years ago, on a bipartisan basis, 
Republicans and Democrats came to the conclusion that we ought to give 
the responsibility to the Sentencing Commission. I move that we send it 
back there.


                      announcement by the chairman

  The CHAIRMAN. The Chair would first remind those spectators in the 
Gallery that they are guests of the House of Representatives, and 
demonstrations of appreciation or disfavor of any speaker are not 
permitted by the rules.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of the amendment by the 
gentlewoman from New York.
  As many in this Chamber know, I do not always see eye to eye with the 
gentleman from North Carolina on crime issues. Sometimes I am a little 
more closely aligned with the gentleman from Florida. But on this one, 
this is a no-brainer.
  First, the gentleman from North Carolina is exactly right. We cannot 
have it both ways. If we are for drawing these kinds of bills and 
federalizing more crimes and putting in tougher penalties, as I am and 
have done in the past, why draw the line at women? And if we are not 
for it, then do not do it for the elderly and children but not for 
women.
  Either way, we can be consistent on either side of the line. Most of 
us are, I think, being consistent on this side on making things tougher 
and better. But how can we say that it is a horrible thing to and the 
sentencing should take into account someone is elderly or someone is 
young but not women?
   Mr. Chairman, a few hours ago we had good debate. I do not even 
think a vote was called for on Megan's law because we talked about the 
fact that, particularly in crimes where sexual predators are involved, 
they can spend 5, 10, 15 years in jail. They can go through the most 
up-to-date rehabilitation, and, unfortunately and terribly, more times 
than not, they commit the same crime when they get out even though they 
are 15 or 20 years older. Who are the victims of those crimes? Is it 
just children? No. Much of the time it is women.
  What is good to be done, because children have to be protected from 
these types of predators, is just as good because women and to be 
protected from these types of predators. When I heard that the 
gentlewoman from New York was doing her amendment, I thought to myself, 
this is a good idea. It will be accepted by the majority, and that will 
be it.
  Mr. Chairman, I am utterly amazed that this amendment is being 
opposed on the other side. I am surprised. It does not fit with their 
philosophy. It does not fit with, you do not have a view, neither do I, 
frankly, that the gentleman from North Carolina does, that the 
Sentencing Commission ought to be deferred to through thick and thin.
  I have had too much of judges and others who are not elected 
officials making the criminal law. I feel a little differently than the 
gentleman from North Carolina about that. I feel the balance may be too 
far against the victim. But all of a sudden, and this is not the first 
time this has happened, Members from the other side who are generally 
law and order fined a reason to pull back on the terrorism bill, fear 
of wire taps? That was something new from the other side. And now fear 
of making laws too tough because women are involved?

  Mr. Chairman, I think I have to agree with my colleague from North 
Carolina. The only reason that this amendment is being opposed by my 
good friend from Florida and my good friends on the other side of the 
aisle who I work with closely and who I have enormous respect for is 
very simply because it was proposed by someone on this side of the 
aisle. That is not how we should legislate.
  Let us make this bill a better bill. Let us take the idea that was a 
good idea when it applied to children and elderly and extend it to 
women. There is no logical argument against doing that, none at all. 
That is why I must reluctantly come to the conclusion that the only 
reason it is being opposed is politics.

                              {time}  1845

  Mr. Chairman, I want to salute the gentlewoman from New York [Ms. 
Slaughter] for putting this amendment in. It certainly is consistent 
with the bill, it is consistent with my philosophy in terms of the 
criminal law, and I hope we will get bipartisan support when a record 
vote is called for to pass this amendment and improve and make a good 
bill better.
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum], 
the chairman of the subcommittee.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I simply would like to respond very 
briefly on the gentleman from Michigan's time to some of the comments 
that have been made by this amendment and the proposal on it.
  My concern and my opposition that I have expressed earlier do not 
have anything to do with the fact that I believe we are doing anything 
incorrectly by expanding some of the Federal jurisdiction in certain 
areas. But it does have to do with the facts that the underlying bill 
that we brought out of committee did not do that.
  The underlying bill we brought out in committee was to enhance 
penalties, and if the gentlewoman from New York had made her amendment 
simply to expand the term vulnerable to include women, victims of rape, 
and Federal law, I would not have particularly a problem. But we are 
creating a new crime in her amendment. The new crime is going to be a 
new Federal crime that does not exist today, and that is not what the 
underlying legislation does.
  In other words, this amendment would create a Federal life 
imprisonment sentence for a two-time rapist who drove 3 miles on 
Interstate 495, crossing from Maryland into Virginia, in order to 
commit a second offense under the statute.
  I think that is wrong in the sense that I believe that it is probably 
unconstitutional, but I can assure the gentleman from New York [Mr. 
Schumer] that I am not going to vote against this in a recorded vote; I 
doubt if anybody on this side of the aisle in this room is, because it 
will be misinterpreted as to what we intended and what we are concerned 
about.
  I believe that it is true that we should be punishing with life 
imprisonment the person who does that. I do not doubt it for a minute. 
But I do not believe that we should have been doing it in this bill. 
The bill, when it came out here, was to enhance penalties, not designed 
to create new crimes. The bill did not do that. It simple enhanced 
penalties for those who are vulnerable, children and elderly 
particularly, but if we included women, we did it in the broad sense of 
that word. I do not have that problem with that.
  Mr. Chairman, I do not have the time to yield because the gentleman 
yielded

[[Page H4480]]

to me for the moment and I would like to conclude.
  We have not, in my judgment, done real justice tonight by expanding 
it, but we will expand it. I do not doubt for a minute it will pass. I 
am not going to object to it, and I again ultimately believe that 
whoever the criminal, he will get his just deserts.
  But, again, the process has not been well served through or committee 
structure even by bringing a bill out that we expand new crimes in out 
here today when all we were trying to do is do penalties, and I do not 
think it has been well served to add this enormously to the Federal 
jurisdiction without having it made it into committee.
  I also realize that when the other side was in the majority, many of 
the same arguments had been presented to the chairman at that point in 
time, and it can be presented when the shoe is on the other foot quite 
frequently. So that is why I expect this to pass tonight, and I expect 
it to become law, but I also suspect that there may be some serious 
constitutional difficulties.
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Mr. Chairman, I think I need to reiterate what the 
gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] said. We are certainly not 
against women. We certainly are for increasing penalties against repeat 
offenders that are committing rape in this country. I just believe that 
this is really probably not the right bill for it to be on. There will 
be another bill, I am sure, and I think that is where it should be 
offered.
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number 
of words.
  I will be happy in a minute to yield to the gentleman. Let me just 
say a couple of words, and I will be happy to yield.
  As my colleagues know, both my daughters, when we talked about 
Megan's law a minute ago, and with the gentleman from New York [Mr. 
Schumer], I agree, as my colleagues know, that they should be locked up 
for a long time and there is a high recidivism, and the reason I agree 
with the gentlewoman from New York [Ms. Slaughter] is that just because 
they are at a young age right now when they are attacked, they are 
going to be young ladies before long, and I would think that the same 
kind of penalty would follow on even though they grow older in age.
  I do not know the Constitution. I am not a lawyer. But I just think 
that by logic that it would be a good idea.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. I yield to the gentleman from North Carolina.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I just want to take a 
moment to express my utter dismay that a Member of this body would come 
on this floor and say, ``I believe this bill, this amendment, is 
unconstitutional, yet if you put me to a vote, I'm going to vote for 
it.''
  That is just absolutely, that is exactly the reason we ought not be 
dealing with this in this process, because then it becomes only 
politics.
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Chairman, I yield to the 
gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum].
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I would like to say, in response the 
gentleman, I am sure he is talking about the gentleman from Florida, 
but I did not say that I believe this was unconstitutional. I believe 
there is a serious constitutional question. I think there is a good 
chance that it will be ruled unconstitutional, but I do not know 
whether it is or not.
  We know the Lopez case was unconstitutional. That was the case we 
passed and I supported a number of years ago which would make it a 
Federal crime for a certain gun transaction within so close a 
proximity. I happen to think it was a good law. I would like to see it 
in law. But it unfortunately was ruled unconstitutional.
  I have just done my duty by pointing out that there is a serious 
question about it in the way Ms. Slaughter's has been crafted.
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Chairman, as long as we are not in attack mode, 
if we are going to stick to the issue, I yield to the gentleman from 
Michigan [Mr. Conyers].
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  I just want to go back to my colleague from Michigan, Mr. Chrysler, 
and just point out to him that some of these ships are turning around 
gently in the evening, and we do not want to leave him out there 
dragging along and waiting for this measure to come up in a separate 
bill. I would urge that he look at the merits of this measure and join 
with us that are in a bipartisan spirit, with nothing personal, are 
going to follow the consistency and the logic of his provision which 
passed earlier, the Frost provision which passed right after that, and 
now we are talking about applying that same enhancement of penalties to 
vicious women crimes.
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from New York 
[Mr. Schumer], and I am going to support it in either fashion of the 
bill.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. Chairman, I just wanted to reiterate one point made 
by the gentleman from Michigan and then make another. We did add a new 
Federal law, I would say to my friend from Florida, when we accepted 
the Frost amendment. We crossed that bridge. We did not stay with the 
concept of just enhancing the penalty. We made a new Federal crime, as 
I understand it, with Frost.
  Mr. Chairman, the second point I would make to my friend from 
Florida, with the gentleman from California's gracious yielding to me, 
is this:
  The gentleman made an argument, well, if it was just for rape or just 
for some kind of, I think he mentioned, sexual crime, he would be for 
it. Well, we do not limit the base bill to children for that. We do not 
say if it was just a crime against children, a sexual crime. We have 
any child, we would ask the Sentencing Commission to enhance the 
penalty, and we are saying the same thing here for women who tend all 
too often to be the victims of crimes committed by men.
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, I yield to the 
gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum].
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I just would like to respond by making a 
note that the amendment offered by the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Frost] 
while it created a new Federal crime, it created a crime that is there 
because of Federal law; that is, the crime that Mr. Frost is talking 
about, the ``two times and you are out,'' would have to occur on 
Federal property and maritime jurisdiction or wherever.
  This particular effort the gentlewoman from New York [Ms. Slaughter] 
has created here could be two State crimes, the only nexus being 
interstate transportation from somebody crossing the State line to 
commit it. And that is a big difference.
  Mr. Chairman, that is my point. But nonetheless I am going to support 
this tonight. I have already indicated that I am not going to vote 
against it. But I do have great reservations about it.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield for just one more 
point?
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. I yield to the gentleman from New York.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from the dukedom of 
California. I would say to the gentleman, if one reads the language of 
Frost, ``If the defendant'', this is section 4(B), numeral three, ``If 
the defendant has previously been convicted of another Federal offense 
under this subsection.''
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from California [Mr. 
Cunningham] has expired.
  (On request of Mr. Schumer, and by unanimous consent, Mr. Cunningham 
was allowed to proceed for 2 additional minutes.)
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from New York.
  Mr. SCHUMER. ``Or under another section, 2241(c), or of a State 
offense that would have been an offense under either such provision had 
occurred in a Federal prison unless the death penalty is imposed.'' So 
they are involving State offenses, too.
  The other point I would make to the gentleman again: The gentleman 
said he would accept this provision if it were limited to sexual 
crimes, and I just wanted to get his provision, why that is different 
for children.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I think perhaps both of these points can

[[Page H4481]]

be addressed in the same answer. What I was trying to say earlier in 
the evening was that had this amendment been crafted so that we were 
talking about sexual crime, a rape crime against a woman, or whatever, 
that was a Federal crime for the second crime, just as Mr. Frost's is a 
Federal crime that we are dealing with. Although an underlying 
predicate crime was a State crime, the second crime had to be a Federal 
crime, and that is not the case with Ms. Slaughter's, then I would be 
much happier, let us put it that way, with what we are doing tonight 
because I feel that the nexus would be there; there would not be any 
question of even a doubt about the constitutionality, and so forth.
  That is not what we are doing. The second crime under Ms. Slaughter 
does not have to be a Federal crime to get the Federal jurisdiction, 
and we are thus proceeding otherwise.
  But I did not mean to mislead the gentleman. All of the crimes that 
she has described, as long as they are Federal, would not have bothered 
me if that had been the case.
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Chairman, all I know is that, as a nonlawyer, 
that too many times our own laws prevent us from doing the right thing. 
I think the amendment offered by the gentlewoman from New York [Ms. 
Slaughter] is a good amendment, and I ask to support it.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentlewoman from New York [Ms. Slaughter].
  The question was taken; and the Chairman announced that the ayes 
appeared to have it.


                             Recorded Vote

  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
  A recorded vote was ordered.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 411, 
noes 4, not voting 18, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 146]

                               AYES--411

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Allard
     Andrews
     Archer
     Armey
     Bachus
     Baesler
     Baker (CA)
     Baker (LA)
     Baldacci
     Ballenger
     Barcia
     Barr
     Barrett (NE)
     Barrett (WI)
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bass
     Bateman
     Becerra
     Beilenson
     Bentsen
     Bereuter
     Berman
     Bevill
     Bilbray
     Bilirakis
     Bishop
     Bliley
     Blute
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Bonior
     Bono
     Borski
     Boucher
     Browder
     Brown (CA)
     Brown (FL)
     Brown (OH)
     Brownback
     Bryant (TN)
     Bryant (TX)
     Bunn
     Bunning
     Burr
     Burton
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Campbell
     Canady
     Cardin
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chambliss
     Chapman
     Chenoweth
     Christensen
     Chrysler
     Clay
     Clayton
     Clement
     Clinger
     Clyburn
     Coble
     Coburn
     Coleman
     Collins (GA)
     Collins (MI)
     Combest
     Condit
     Conyers
     Cooley
     Costello
     Cox
     Coyne
     Cramer
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cremeans
     Cubin
     Cummings
     Cunningham
     Danner
     Davis
     de la Garza
     Deal
     DeFazio
     DeLauro
     DeLay
     Dellums
     Deutsch
     Diaz-Balart
     Dickey
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Dixon
     Doggett
     Dooley
     Doolittle
     Dornan
     Doyle
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Ehlers
     Ehrlich
     Emerson
     Engel
     English
     Ensign
     Eshoo
     Evans
     Everett
     Ewing
     Farr
     Fattah
     Fawell
     Fazio
     Fields (LA)
     Fields (TX)
     Filner
     Flake
     Flanagan
     Foglietta
     Foley
     Forbes
     Fowler
     Fox
     Frank (MA)
     Franks (CT)
     Franks (NJ)
     Frelinghuysen
     Frisa
     Frost
     Funderburk
     Furse
     Gallegly
     Ganske
     Gejdenson
     Gekas
     Gephardt
     Geren
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Gilman
     Gonzalez
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Gordon
     Goss
     Graham
     Green (TX)
     Greene (UT)
     Greenwood
     Gutierrez
     Gutknecht
     Hall (TX)
     Hamilton
     Hancock
     Hansen
     Hastert
     Hastings (FL)
     Hastings (WA)
     Hayworth
     Hefley
     Hefner
     Heineman
     Herger
     Hilleary
     Hilliard
     Hinchey
     Hobson
     Hoekstra
     Hoke
     Holden
     Horn
     Hostettler
     Houghton
     Hoyer
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Istook
     Jackson (IL)
     Jackson-Lee (TX)
     Jacobs
     Jefferson
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson (SD)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Johnson, Sam
     Johnston
     Jones
     Kanjorski
     Kaptur
     Kasich
     Kelly
     Kennedy (MA)
     Kennedy (RI)
     Kennelly
     Kildee
     Kim
     King
     Kingston
     Kleczka
     Klink
     Klug
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     LaFalce
     LaHood
     Lantos
     Largent
     Latham
     LaTourette
     Laughlin
     Lazio
     Leach
     Levin
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (GA)
     Lewis (KY)
     Lightfoot
     Lincoln
     Linder
     Lipinski
     Livingston
     LoBiondo
     Lofgren
     Longley
     Lowey
     Lucas
     Luther
     Maloney
     Manton
     Manzullo
     Markey
     Martinez
     Martini
     Mascara
     Matsui
     McCarthy
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McDermott
     McHale
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McIntosh
     McKeon
     McKinney
     McNulty
     Meehan
     Meek
     Menendez
     Metcalf
     Meyers
     Mica
     Millender-McDonald
     Miller (CA)
     Miller (FL)
     Minge
     Mink
     Moakley
     Montgomery
     Moorhead
     Moran
     Morella
     Murtha
     Myers
     Myrick
     Nadler
     Neal
     Nethercutt
     Neumann
     Ney
     Norwood
     Nussle
     Oberstar
     Obey
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Orton
     Owens
     Oxley
     Packard
     Pallone
     Parker
     Pastor
     Paxon
     Payne (NJ)
     Payne (VA)
     Pelosi
     Peterson (FL)
     Peterson (MN)
     Petri
     Pickett
     Pombo
     Pomeroy
     Porter
     Portman
     Poshard
     Pryce
     Quillen
     Quinn
     Radanovich
     Rahall
     Ramstad
     Rangel
     Reed
     Regula
     Richardson
     Riggs
     Rivers
     Roberts
     Roemer
     Rogers
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Rose
     Roukema
     Roybal-Allard
     Royce
     Rush
     Sabo
     Salmon
     Sanders
     Sanford
     Sawyer
     Saxton
     Scarborough
     Schaefer
     Schiff
     Schroeder
     Schumer
     Seastrand
     Sensenbrenner
     Serrano
     Shadegg
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shuster
     Sisisky
     Skaggs
     Skeen
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (TX)
     Smith (WA)
     Spence
     Spratt
     Stark
     Stearns
     Stenholm
     Stockman
     Stokes
     Studds
     Stump
     Stupak
     Talent
     Tanner
     Tate
     Tauzin
     Taylor (MS)
     Tejeda
     Thomas
     Thompson
     Thornberry
     Thornton
     Thurman
     Torkildsen
     Torres
     Torricelli
     Towns
     Traficant
     Upton
     Velazquez
     Vento
     Volkmer
     Vucanovich
     Walker
     Walsh
     Wamp
     Ward
     Watts (OK)
     Waxman
     Weldon (FL)
     Weldon (PA)
     Weller
     White
     Whitfield
     Wicker
     Wilson
     Wise
     Wolf
     Woolsey
     Wynn
     Yates
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)
     Zeliff
     Zimmer

                                NOES--4

     Scott
     Waters
     Watt (NC)
     Williams

                             NOT VOTING--18

     Brewster
     Collins (IL)
     Dunn
     Ford
     Gibbons
     Gunderson
     Hall (OH)
     Harman
     Hayes
     McDade
     Molinari
     Mollohan
     Roth
     Solomon
     Souder
     Taylor (NC)
     Tiahrt
     Visclosky

                              {time}  1918

  So the amendment was agreed to.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.


                          personal explanation

  Mrs. COLLINS of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, this evening, May 7, 1996, I 
was unavoidably absent for rollcall No. 146, on a Slaughter amendment 
to H.R. 2974, the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 
1994.
  Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.''


                    amendment offered by mr. deutsch

  Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. Deutsch: Page 3, line 14, after 
     the period insert ``If the crime of violence is also a sex 
     crime against a child, the enhancement provided under the 
     preceding sentence shall be 6 instead of 5 levels.''

  Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Chairman, earlier this evening this House adopted an 
amendment where I mentioned an incident that had occurred in Florida 
unfortunately within the last 12 months and has occurred in Florida and 
everywhere unfortunately in this country on many occasions, and that is 
the exploitation of young children. Specifically I mention the name of 
Jimmy Rice, who was a young boy who was missing from his home for 
several weeks and actually several months in south Florida, which 
really became the focus of our entire community. He was missing and 
then subsequently found to have been sexually abused and murdered.
  It is a crime that occurs in America far too often, as I said, and it 
is a crime where I think as an individual, as a society, as a 
community, we can think of probably nothing worse that can happen to a 
young child and to their family.
  Mr. Chairman, we have had a discussion for several hours now about 
our role in sentencing and our role as a United States Congress in 
sentencing and setting up penalties for crimes. There has been a debate 
that has gone on literally for several hours now. I would say to my 
colleagues that for anyone who has ever spoken to a parent of a victim 
in a circumstance like this, at that point they would want to be 
involved in determining the penalty for perpetrators of crimes like 
this.
  We can talk about all the theory we want about judges being impartial 
and

[[Page H4482]]

unsensitized, and the Sentencing Guidelines Commission being impartial, 
and policymakers, but the truth is in our political process, the fact 
that we are elected officials, that we represent constituents, that we 
have to face real people, real parents, and talk to them and try to 
explain to them why a victim and why a perpetrator are treated 
differently, and why perpetrators are not punished to the extent that 
they can be and should be under the law.
  This amendment is really an attempt to do exactly that, to say in the 
case of sexual abuse of a child that we are saying that crime is so 
heinous, so awful, so indescribable from our perspective as a society, 
as a collective society that this Congress represents, that we are 
speaking as Americans, as this collective community of America, and 
saying to the world, and saying to people as a deterrent and as a 
punishment, ``If you are someone who is going to commit that kind of 
crime, the we are going to treat you as harshly as we possibly can.''

                              {time}  1930

  This amendment does that, combined with the prior amendment which 
creates essentially a two strikes and you are out provision. As I 
mentioned, I would support a one strike and you are out provision in a 
case like this.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.
  Mr. Chairman, I strongly urge my colleagues to support the Deutsch 
amendment. It makes imminent sense. He is adding an additional level of 
punishment for those who commit sex crimes against children. It seems 
to me it is perfectly consistent with what we are trying to do with the 
underlying bill, and that is send a message to anybody who perpetrates 
a crime on a child that they are going to get an extra amount of time 
in prison for doing that at a Federal level for a Federal crime.
  This is a Federal crime. He is dealing with a sex crime on top of 
that. It seems only appropriate that you add an additional level when 
you are dealing with a sex crime against a child. I think most of us 
would concur in that without dispute. I urge adoption of the amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from Florida [Mr. Deutsch].
  The amendment was agreed to.
  The CHAIRMAN. Are there further amendments to the bill?


                    amendment offered by mr. conyers

  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. Conyers: Page 3, line 13, before 
     the first comma, insert ``or a crime involving fraud or 
     deception''.
       Page 3, line 13, strike ``of violence''.

  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I reserve a point of order against the 
amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from Florida reserves a point of order.
  The gentleman from Michigan is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, this amendment would merely add crimes of 
fraud and crimes of deception to those crimes against children and 
women and the elderly that would receive enhanced penalties.
  This amendment would add crimes of fraud and deception to those 
crimes against women, children, and the elderly that would receive 
enhanced penalties.
  The reason is that fraud against the elderly has become a significant 
problem, particularly telemarketing fraud. Law enforcement officials, 
the AARP research, and much anecdotal evidence from telemarketers 
confirm the belief that many older Americans are being wrongly targeted 
by telemarketing fraud.
  The Federal Bureau of Investigation recently documented this pattern 
of victimization in its recent telemarketing investigation, which used 
AARP members and others to obtain undercover tapes with fraudulent 
telemarketers.
  The investigation showed that 78 percent of the targeted victims were 
in fact older Americans. Given the expected growth in the Nation's 
elderly population, the number of consumers considered vulnerable to 
telemarketing fraud is quite likely to increase in the future. But 
telemarketing is not the sole source of the problem. The Internet, 
while not yet commonly used as a method of conducting fraudulent 
methods of transaction, is a growing source of concern. Although 
commonly believed to be a tool of the young, we are now finding many 
elderly people beginning to surf on the net.
  The National Consumers League and the National Fraud Information 
Center estimate that senior citizens lose at least half of the $60 
billion annually that is lost due to fraud. Unfortunately, fraud 
strikes elderly victims the hardest. Many of these individuals are 
living on fixed incomes and are easy prey because they lack the 
defenses necessary to withstand smooth-talking promoters who sound and 
act like friends of the victims' families.
  Mr. Chairman, we need to treat fraud against the elderly not as 
isolated cases, but as a widespread social problem and a serious crime 
that must be addressed. I urge that we add this important provisions to 
protect our most vulnerable citizens from those who are continuing to 
prey on them through telemarketing, the Internet, and other white 
collar crimes. I urge the support of the amendment.


                             point of order

  The CHAIRMAN. Does the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] insist 
upon his point of order?
  Mr. McCOLLUM. I do, Mr. Chairman.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman is recognized in support of his point of 
order.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, this amendment is not germane to the 
bill. The underlying bill involves only crimes of violence, whether 
against an elderly victim, a child, or other vulnerable person. 
Consequently, this amendment, which deals with crime and deception and 
not involving crimes of violence, is beyond the scope of the bill. I 
would urge that it be ruled out of order. It is inappropriate under the 
circumstances.
  Even though we may like to give crimes against the elderly involving 
fraud and deception and nonviolent matters additional punishment, this 
is simply not what this bill is about.
  The CHAIRMAN. Does the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers] desire 
to be heard on his point of order?
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I do.
  The CHAIRMAN. The Chair will hear the gentleman.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I cannot understand why the distinguished 
chairman would want to raise a point of order against the amendment, 
because we have been given a bill which purports to protect children, 
women, and the elderly.
  They have allowed the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Frost] to offer what 
was clearly a non-germane amendment relating to sex offenses against 
children, and now, suddenly, when it comes to protecting the very same 
elderly against pervasive and damaging telemarketing fraud, we raise a 
technical objection. So I think this is a very misplaced sentiment in 
an attempt to allow white collar crime to continue to victimize 
seniors, while crimes of violence are all of a sudden made germane, 
even when an argument can be made against it.
  The amendment is germane, because the fundamental purpose of this 
bill is to enhance penalties for those crimes that target our most 
vulnerable citizens, the elderly and the young and women. For those 
reasons, I urge that the point of order be turned aside.
  The CHAIRMAN. Does any other Member wish to be heard on the point of 
order?
  If not, the Chair is prepared to rule.
  The bill, as amended, enhances penalties for violent crimes against 
vulnerable persons. In addition, it establishes criminal liability for 
certain crimes of violence against vulnerable persons.
  The amendment as offered by the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers] 
would disturb the coherence among the provisions of the bill. It is not 
confined to the subject of violent crimes against vulnerable persons 
and punishments therefor.
  Accordingly, the amendment is not germane, and the point of order is 
sustained.
  Are there further amendments to the bill?


                    Amendment Offered by Mr. CONYERS

  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. Conyers: Page 3, 13, before the 
     first comma insert ``or an environmental crime''.

[[Page H4483]]

       Page 3, line 13, strike ``of violence''.

  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I reserve a point of order against the 
amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from Florida reserves a point of order.
  The gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers] is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I think we have to recognize that this 
amendment would simply add environmental crimes to those crimes against 
the children and the elderly that would receive enhanced penalties.
  Now, why is that critical? The reason is that environmental crimes, 
for example, the knowing pollution or contamination of our environment, 
tend to have a much more severe impact on our most vulnerable citizens, 
namely children and the elderly.
  For example, the severe impact environmental crimes can have is 
dramatically brought to bear in Woburn, MA, in the case where numerous 
children died of leukemia after drinking water where toxic waste was 
dumped by subsidiaries of two of our country's most influential, 
multinational corporations.
  If we are going to say crimes of violence against children and the 
elderly are deserving of more serious punishment, it is only fitting 
that we so treat environmental crimes, which have a disproportionate 
effect on children and the elderly and which can be equally or more 
deadly. A refusal to treat environmental crimes as seriously as crimes 
of violence really indicates that it is not really the effect of crime 
with which we are concerned, but the perpetrator.
  I see that as a serious mistake in the development of this criminal 
justice bill. Environmental crimes are generally committed by large 
corporations. In contrast, crimes of violence usually are created by 
less influential individuals. So it is important to treat all crimes 
that harm youngsters equally, to treat all crimes that have a 
significant adverse impact on children and the elderly with equal 
seriousness.
  I offer the amendment, and hope that the Members will join me in 
supporting this amendment.
  Another example of the kind of behavior that this amendment would 
speak to is several years ago two 9-year-old boys were killed by fumes 
from hazardous waste illegally disposed of in a dumpster. It was a 
clear case of criminal misconduct. The jury awarded the families $500 
million in damages against the defendant, the largest wrongful death 
lawsuit in the history of the Nation, but they have not paid it because 
they declared bankruptcy. So far, the fine of the Federal court has not 
been paid either.
  The only way to punish the wrongdoers in a case like this is to 
subject the defendants in the corporation to significant jail time. 
Under current sentencing, under the guidelines, the perpetrators served 
a mere 27 months.

  It is fine to say you are tough on crime, but let us make sure we 
punish all the criminals who place the children and elderly at risk.
  A few month sentence for hazardous dumping that costs children their 
lives needlessly is simply not enough, and should be subject to the 
sentence enhancements that are going on in the several amendments 
underlying the Chrysler bill that is still on the floor.
  I urge Members to support this commonsense amendment.


                             point of order

  The CHAIRMAN. Does the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] insist 
upon his point of order?
  Mr. McCOLLUM. I do, Mr. Chairman.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman is recognized in support of his point of 
order.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, as with the previous amendment, I do not 
believe that this amendment is germane, because the underlying bill's 
scope involves crimes of violence against children, elderly persons, or 
other vulnerable persons. This amendment involves an environmental 
crime. We do not even know by definition what an environmental crime 
is. I know of no definition under title 18 of an environmental crime. 
Whether or not that is in and of itself a reason for this to be 
nongermane, it certainly is equally as nongermane as the fraud and 
coercion efforts made a moment ago, because it does not involve the 
underlying crime of violence this bill speaks to and the bill is not 
broader than that.
  The CHAIRMAN. Does the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers] wish to 
be heard on his point of order?
  Mr. CONYERS. I would like to be heard in opposition to the point of 
order.
  The CHAIRMAN. The Chair will hear the gentleman.

                              {time}  1945

  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I would like to appeal to the Chair to 
consider adding environmental crimes to the measure before us as a 
germane provision.
  Mr. Chairman, as written, the bill refers to crimes of violence which 
include, of course, physical force. Now, at first glance, environmental 
crimes might not appear to be involving physical force. But then one 
need only recall that murder is a crime of violence and that murder can 
be accomplished by nonphysical means like poison. Even though the 
perpetrator may not be even present at the time of the actual ingestion 
of the poison, poisoning someone is no less murder because there is no 
physical contact.
  Likewise, Mr. Chairman, the adding of environmental crimes as an 
appropriate and germane part of the provisions and the objectives 
sought in H.R. 2974, would make, I think, quite rational sense. 
Environmental crimes are similar if not identical to the example of 
poisoning by murder. A company, for example, deliberately dumps 
chemicals that it knows are dangerous into a water supply. Is that a 
physical crime? Inevitably harm results to the people who drink the 
water, sometimes resulting in death. In Woburn, MA, we saw numerous 
children develop leukemia and eventually die from the disease 
contracted as a direct result of the poisoned water they consumed. 
Would a rule of germaneness take a crime of that nature and that level 
of violence out of the provisions of enhancing crimes to children in 
this measure? I would argue that it should not. Is that company any 
less responsible for these deaths than a murderer is for his? I think 
not.
  Mr. Chairman, if my colleagues are concerned about the level of 
intent, whether the company intended the children to die, well, intent 
is a question that in every murder investigation or trial will be 
determined in a court of law.
  Using my example, Mr. Chairman, I have attempted to make a 
distinction from the previous measure that I offered, and I argue that 
the environmental crimes are violent in effect and are too important 
and serious for it to be ruled out of order because such crimes have 
not historically been considered in this genre.
  I urge the Chairman to dismiss the point of order.
  The CHAIRMAN. The Chair is prepared to rule. As was the case with the 
ruling on the previous amendment, this particular amendment also 
disturbs the coherence among the provisions of the bill. It is not 
confined to the subject of crimes of violence as that term is given 
meaning in section 16 of title 18 of the United States Code, and it 
does not cover violent crimes against vulnerable persons and 
punishments therefore.
  Accordngly, the ruling of the Chair is that the amendment is not 
germane and the point of order is sustained.
  Are there further amendments to the bill?


                    amendment offered by mr. conyers

  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. Conyers: Page 3, 13, before the 
     first comma insert '', including those crimes of violence 
     involving the environment''.

  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I reserve a point of order.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] reserves a 
point of order.
  The gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers] is recognized for 5 minutes 
in support of his amendment.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I now have an amendment that would make it 
clear that environmental crimes of violence are included in the 
definition of crimes of violence to which enhanced penalties will 
attach.
  Mr. Chairman, in another previous amendment I would have added 
environmental crimes as a distinct class of crimes in addition to 
crimes of violence for which there could be enhanced penalties. But 
this amendment

[[Page H4484]]

differs in that it merely specifically provides for the definition of 
crimes of violence to include crimes of violence that are environmental 
in nature.
  Again, let us use the crime of murder by poison. Poisoning is 
considered and is a crime of violence. Similarly, if a company 
contaminates a community's water supply, thereby poisoning residents 
with death resulting to some young and old victims, this amendment 
would require that enhanced penalties attach.
  So, Mr. Chairman, I believe without my amendment, even a prosecutor 
could justifiably argue that the contamination of a water supply 
resulting in deaths could be a crime of violence qualifying for 
increased penalties. But this amendment would dispel those doubts and 
make it clear that environmental crimes resulting in physical harm 
should have the same penalties as other crimes resulting in physical 
harm.
  In fact, there is little or no difference. Let me describe the kind 
of behavior that would be prosecutable in the event my amendment wins 
passage.
  Several years ago two 9-year-old boys were killed by fumes from 
hazardous waste illegally disposed of in a dumpster, and the jury made 
an award in a wrongful death lawsuit, but they have never been able to 
recover. The corporation merely declared bankruptcy.
  Unless we are able to go to the corporate personal defendants who 
could be eligible for significant incarceration under this provision, 
there is no way that they can be reached. And so, I think it is 
wonderful to say we are tough on crime, but let us make sure that we 
punish the full range of people who commit criminal acts, who place our 
children and elderly at risk.
  A 27-month sentence for hazardous dumping that costs a number of 
children their life is simply not strong enough, and the sentencing 
enhancements that have been discussed on this floor in the underlying 
bill should apply to the circumstances that I have raised as an example 
in support of this amendment.
  Mr. Chairman, I urge the Committee to support the amendment and add 
this very important part of criminal conduct to be subject to enhanced 
penalties.


                             point of order

  The CHAIRMAN. Does the gentleman from Florida insist upon his point 
of order?
  Mr. McCOLLUM. I do, Mr. Chairman.
  Mr. Chairman, the underlying bill is, yes, a question of defining a 
crime of violence, and it talks about a crime of violence against a 
child, elderly person, or other vulnerable person and it explicitly 
defines a crime of violence: the meaning given that term in section 16 
of title 18 of the United States Code.
  Mr. Chairman, I can read section 16 of title 18. It says: The term 
``crime of violence'' means an offense that has as an element, the use, 
attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against a person or 
property of another or any other offense that is a felony and that by 
its nature involves substantial risk that physical force against a 
person or property of another may be used in the course of committing 
the offense.
  Mr. Chairman, I do not know what in the world a crime of violence 
involving the environment means. I think that this amendment is not 
germane to this bill because it inherently goes outside the definition 
of a crime of violence that is written. I would submit that no court in 
this land could interpret what the gentleman has written and that it is 
therefore destructive of the underlying premise of this bill and, 
therefore, beyond the scope and inappropriate to this bill.
  Mr. CONYERS. May I be heard, Mr. Chairman?
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from Michigan is recognized.
  Mr. CONYERS. The arguments against germaneness coming from the 
chairman of the Subcommittee on Crime would carry much more resonance 
if, through his agreement, and the Committee on Rules, we have already 
made measures germane that would have clearly been nongermane.
  The question is: What shall we make germane and what shall we make 
not germane? And to argue that these kinds of crimes that clearly call 
out for criminal penalties should not be included merely because they 
are not violent in the traditional sense of violence, there are many 
crimes that occur that are not physically violent. There is no physical 
act of violence when a person is murdered by poisoning. There is none. 
They are not excluded. They do not fall to the argument of being 
nongermane.
  And so, Mr. Chairman, I would say that this amendment relates to the 
subject matter as the legislation does before us. The subject before 
us, of the bill before us, is limited to crimes of violence which are 
committed against the elderly, young people, and other vulnerable 
persons. My amendment is limited to these same precise categories. The 
crime involved must be a crime of violence and it must be committed 
against a child, elderly person or other vulnerable person. On that 
basis, I urge that the point of order be rejected.
  The CHAIRMAN. The Chair is prepared to rule.
  This amendment offered by the gentleman from Michigan ensures that 
the definition of a crime of violence under section 16 of Title 18 may 
include a crime involving the environment as a subset of a crime of 
violence for the purposes of the pending bill. As such, the amendment 
does not disturb the coherence among the provisions of the bill. It is 
confined to the subject of violent crimes against vulnerable persons 
and punishments therefor, unlike the prior amendment.
  Accordingly, it is the rule of the Chair that the amendment is 
germane and the point of order is overruled.
  For what purpose does the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] rise?
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman will suspend.
  Mr. CONYERS. Regular order, Mr. Chairman. Should I not be recognized 
in support of my amendment?
  The CHAIRMAN. With all due respect, the gentleman was recognized 
after the designation of the amendment prior to the point of order.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Florida.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I am not going to oppose the amendment, 
though I think that it is a superfluous amendment. It is oratory in 
nature, by the ruling of the Chair. I can sit here and list other 
crimes of violence involving all kinds of things beyond the environment 
as long as they involve something having to do with violence. And I can 
think of A, B, C, D, E, and F and add them to this bill. The gentleman 
wants to make this point and he has had the opportunity. He is getting 
to add his language to this bill to do that.
  Mr. Chairman, I think it is interesting and ironic that the gentleman 
spends time in committee arguing that we should not incarcerate 
nonviolent offenders. Tonight he attempted earlier to expand the 
definition of violence to include dumping waste in the ocean, spilloff 
into the rivers, and dirty car exhausts.
  Mr. Chairman, I would submit that those are not crimes of violence. 
obviously, if one can figure out what a crime of violence is that 
involves the environment or involves anything else, then of course if 
it is truly a crime of violence involving murder, rape, robbery, and 
assault, I would suggest that it would come with the scope of the bill, 
obviously. But certainly it is not simply going to be dumping waste in 
the ocean, spilloffs into rivers, or dirty car exhausts. There may be 
other Federal laws that are violated, but not crimes of violence laws.
  Anyway, Mr. Chairman, based upon the ruling of the Chair that we are 
not actually adding any scope to this bill, I will not object to this 
amendment.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the 
requisite number of words.
  Mr. Chairman, I wish I could do imitations because if I could, I 
would imitate former President Reagan when he said, ``Here we go 
again.'' Because we are on this slippery slope and we cannot get off. 
We keep adding things that make no sense. And with all respect, this 
makes as much sense as everything else.
  But the point I want to make is that we should not be doing this in 
the context of this bill. This bill should not be here. We should be 
allowing the process that we have set up and have followed for a long, 
long time to get the politics and irrationality out of sentencing, out 
of the process.

[[Page H4485]]

  We should be allowing the Sentencing Commission to do exactly what we 
set up the Sentencing Commission to do. And despite that, here we go 
again. As President Reagan would say, ``There you go again.''
  We are going to add any kind of conceivable thing and the reason we 
are going to add it is because politicians like politically to be 
viewed as tough on crime. I do not have any problem with that. But we 
need to have some rational underlying basis by which we are proceeding, 
and this bill now does not have that. It did not have it when it first 
started out, and every time we have added some new violation that 
triggers this kind of vulnerable mentality, then we have made this more 
a mockery. We are now doing an injustice, a severe injustice to public 
policy.

                              {time}  2000

  There are a bunch of vulnerable people, and we could add all of them 
to this bill. There is really no place to cut is off. That is why we 
gave this responsibility to the Sentencing Commission, to get it out of 
the irrational political, reactionary process that we are now following 
this evening.
  Mr. Chairman, I hope my colleagues will come to the realization that 
what we are doing is just bad, bad, bad public policy and will 
reconsider this entire bill and allow the Sentencing Commission to 
continue the job it has been set up to do.
  Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  I yield to the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers].
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Michigan for 
yielding to me.
  I want to thank the gentleman from Florida, the chairman of the 
Subcommittee on Crime, for agreeing to accept the amendment. I also 
want to thank the gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. Watt] for 
continuing to object to the entire procedure.
  Let me first remind the chairman of the Subcommittee on Crime that 
one of the measures that led me to introduce environmental crimes is 
the fact of the two 9-year-old boys in his State, if not his district 
in Florida, who were killed from a wreck of hazardous waste illegally 
disposed of in a dumpster. The two individual defendants, the plant 
manager and the shop foreman, were convicted of hazardous waste 
felonies. Each was sentenced to serve 27 months in prison under the 
terms of a guilty plea that included knowing endangerment. They went to 
5 years probation.
  I think the gentleman would agree that these kinds of crimes are as 
serious as all the others that we have dealt with. Now, that does not 
in the least detract from the validity of the arguments offered by the 
gentleman from North Carolina. I am placed in the precarious position 
of agreeing with the gentleman from North Carolina, but we are here 
adding these measures tonight. To leave out crimes of an environmental 
nature where there is deliberate, reckless endangerment, knowledge and 
intention, would, to me, be an incredibly wrong thing to do.
  This is the slippery slope that we are on. I am on it. I am not going 
to leave out environmental crimes because of the irrationality of what 
the majority of the Members have willed here today.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. STUPAK. I yield to the gentleman from North Carolina.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I just want to make it 
clear to the gentleman that his amendment is just as rational as the 
underlying bill. I am not singling out his amendment. If I had to think 
of crimes that I would want to include on this, this would probably be 
one of them. But it illustrates, again, how irrational the process is 
we have embarked upon when we start down this slippery slope. There is 
no way to get off of it. I hope the gentleman understands that this 
does not have to do with his amendment. It has to do with the process, 
which is what I have been talking about all night.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will continue to yield, I 
hope that the gentleman understands that this does not have to do with 
my disagreeing with his basic contention, but it has to do with the 
fact that we find ourselves tonight on this slippery slope. If we are 
on the slippery slope for all its irrationality, I do not want to 
exclude environmental crimes.
  I thank my colleague from Michigan for yielding me this opportunity 
to express my agreement with both the gentleman from Florida and the 
gentleman from North Carolina.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers].
  The amendment was agreed to.
  The CHAIRMAN. Are there further amendments to the bill?


                    amendment offered by mr. stupak

  Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. Stupak: At the end of the bill, 
     add the following:

     SEC.  . PROHIBITIONS RELATING TO BODY ARMOR.

       (a) Short Title.--This section may be cited as the ``James 
     Guelff Body Armor Act of 1996''.
       (b) Sentencing Enhancement.--The United States Sentencing 
     Commission shall amend the Federal sentencing guidelines to 
     provide an appropriate sentencing enhancement for any crime 
     of violence against a vulnerable person (which for the 
     purpose of this section shall include a law enforcement 
     officer) as defined in section 240002 of the Violent Crime 
     Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 in which the 
     defendant used body armor.
       (c) For purposes of this section--
       (1) the term ``body armor'' means any product sold or 
     offered for sale as personal protective body covering 
     intended to protect against gunfire, regardless of whether 
     the product is to be worn alone or is sold as a complement to 
     another product or garment; and
       (2) the term ``law enforcement officer'' means any officer, 
     agent, or employee of the United States, a State, or a 
     political subdivision of a State, authorized by law or by a 
     government agency to engage in or supervise the prevention, 
     detection, investigation, or prosecution of any violation of 
     criminal law.

  Mr. STUPAK (during the reading). Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous 
consent that the amendment be considered as read and printed in the 
Record.
  The CHAIRMAN. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from 
Michigan?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I reserve a point of order against the 
amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] reserves a 
point of order.
  Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, let me address the substance of my 
amendment and also the point of order being reserved by the majority.
  Mr. Chairman, I do believe that my amendment is germane to H.R. 2974. 
Whereas 2974 seeks to provide enhanced penalties for crimes against 
elderly and children, it also specifies crimes against, and I quote, 
vulnerable persons. These are defined in the bill as individuals who, 
due to age, physical or mental condition or otherwise, are particularly 
susceptible to criminal conduct.
  When it is a situation where law-abiding citizens and laws 
enforcement officers are confronted by criminals wearing body armor, 
especially police officers, then I think it is fairly obvious to 
everyone except maybe the criminal that the police officer is in a 
vulnerable position. As such, this amendment is highly relevant and 
germane to the legislation before us today.
  Mr. Chairman, my amendment seeks to control the growing use of body 
armor by criminal elements and impose penalties for those who wear body 
armor while committing Federal crimes. Body armor, the protective 
personal devices commonly utilized by those in law enforcement, are 
vests and helmets made from Kevlar. Other advanced materials are 
increasingly becoming a common tool used by those who seek to break the 
law and victimize innocent citizens.
  This amendment is very similar to legislation I introduced last year, 
H.R. 2192, the James Guelff Body Armor Act. I act now today because we 
have been unable for more than a year to get even a hearing on this 
legislation.
  Mr. Chairman, to illustrate the point that we are at, Mr. James 
Guelff was gunned down on the streets of San Francisco on the night of 
November 14, 1994, following a violent shootout with a heavily armored 
and well-protected criminal. This criminal and killer was decked out in 
a bullet-proof vest and helmet. He was virtually unstoppable by more 
than 100 San Francisco police officers as he unloaded more than 200

[[Page H4486]]

rounds of ammunition into a residential neighborhood.
  Only a strategically aimed shot by a marksman was able to bring a 
night of violence to an end but not soon enough for Officer Guelff. I 
have heard from law enforcement officers all across this country about 
the increasing occurrences of drug dealers and other suspected suspects 
possessing body armor. From Baltimore to Texas, from Michigan to Los 
Angeles, criminal elements are being transformed into basically 
unstoppable terminators with virtually no fear of police of other crime 
fighters.

  These heavily protected criminals are capable of unleashing total 
devastation on civilians and police officers alike. The increasing 
availability of body armor in the wrong hands can only direct a greater 
danger to America and greater danger to the American people and a 
growing threat to our institutions. Quite simply, my amendment seeks to 
impose penalties when body armor is used in committing a violent crime.
  Mr. Chairman, penalties will be determined by the Sentencing 
Commission. Although technological advancements have helped law 
enforcement officers fight crime and counter terrorism, these same 
high-technology advancements when ending up in the wrong hands pose new 
challenges and a growing danger to police officers and all others who 
seek to protect and safeguard our citizens.
  I have received very positive feedback from those in law enforcement 
in support of this measure. I would hope that the majority would see 
the need for providing enhanced safety and penalties and my amendment 
would achieve this goal.
  This amendment as has been drafted and appears before us now, the 
amendment is supported by the Fraternal Order of Police, the National 
Sheriffs Association, National Troopers Association, and by police 
departments from Boston to Los Angeles and other major cities and 
jurisdictions across this country.
  I ask that there be support for this law enforcement amendment and 
support for this important bill not just for women and children and 
elderly but for everyone.
  The CHAIRMAN. Does the gentleman from Florida [Mr. McCollum] insist 
on his point of order.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I withdraw my reservation of a point of 
order.
  Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.
  Mr. Chairman, I think what the gentleman wants to do here, now that I 
have examined his revised amendment from what he had earlier produced, 
is a positive thing. It does not go to children. It does not go to 
women. It does not go to the elderly. It really should go, and I think 
he is trying to make it go, to the police. It obviously does not go to 
every police officer.
  I would certainly engage the gentleman, if he would, so we can 
clarify this. It would involve a law enforcement officer, I presume, 
based upon the Federal sentencing guidelines and the fact that all of 
the underlying crimes that we are dealing with here today are Federal 
crimes, that it would be a Federal law enforcement officer for whom 
this would apply, when you have indicated in your parenthetical, which 
for the purposes of a vulnerable person, which for the purposes of this 
section shall include a law enforcement officer. Would we not just 
inherently conclude that we are dealing with Federal law enforcement 
officers by the nature of the underlying bill and the nature of the 
Federal sentencing guidelines?
  Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. McCOLLUM. I yield to the gentleman from Michigan.
  Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, because of the issue here and the term 
``law enforcement officer,'' we actually defined it in the bill as 
being an officer, agent or employee of the United States, a State or 
political subdivision authorized by law or government agency.
  I mean when we take a look at this, I think this would include any 
law enforcement officer in the United States.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Well, I have a question. Reclaiming my time, if you do 
include any police officer involving this, the question I guess 
involves one of whether or not there will be a crime where that is a 
Federal crime at the beginning that would include a police officer who 
is not a Federal officer that is a criminal crime, and there may be 
some cases like that, that is a Federal crime to begin with.
  My reason for the puzzlement is even though I have read the 
definition, I think your original construct and your intent and you 
would have done it by separate legislation, had you had the 
opportunity, and it is not a bad idea, is to make it a Federal offense 
or crime to actually commit a certain type of activity and crime 
against, violence against law enforcement officers generally in the 
country using these kind of vests, these kind of devices. But the way 
you have reconstructed this to fit it and make it germane to this bill 
is in such a way that I would believe, though I could be wrong, because 
I do not have all of the Federal criminal laws out in front of me now 
with all the sentences to go over tonight, there are numerous of them, 
but I would believe it would be very rare cases in which the underlying 
crime for which the enhanced sentence would occur would involve a local 
law enforcement official. But in any event, I am not going to oppose 
the amendment. I am just trying to work through it in my own mind.
  Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman will continue to yield, 
for the enhancement aspect of it, the underlying crime would have to be 
a Federal crime. The individual who may be in pursuit of this criminal 
could be a law enforcement officer from any jurisdiction, but the 
Federal crime that they are in pursuit of this criminal for would have 
to be a Federal crime as defined in the Violent Crime Control and Law 
Enforcement Act of 1994. So the underlying crime, you are absolutely 
correct, the protection would extend to anyone investigating that 
Federal crime where they met such an individual wearing this protective 
device.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Fair enough. I think with that clarification, it helps 
a lot. So we understand, we are not creating any new Federal crimes, as 
we did on an earlier amendment. With this in mind and believing as I do 
and wanting to protect the police officers of our Nation and anybody 
else, for that matter, in terms of the situation where you might be 
wearing a vest like this, a body armor, I would support this amendment.
  Mr. STUPAK. Mr. Chairman, I would ask, this was a small step here we 
are doing here tonight, but we do have the main underlying bill. And we 
have been trying to find a vehicle and even have some hearings on it. I 
would ask that the chairman give us due consideration of the full bill, 
the James Guelff Body Armor Act of 1996, so we can get to extend it to 
all police officers, not just Federal crimes but also State and local 
violations of law. So I would once again ask the chairman at a time 
hopefully very soon that we could address this issue further. This is 
just a small step tonight. I would like to take it one step further.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Chairman, I know the gentleman 
is very sincere in wanting to press his entire full bill, and I respect 
that and, assuming we can work it into the crime agenda, I am not 
adverse to having a hearing on it, as I indicated before. We are in the 
process now of trying to figure out our schedule for the balance of the 
year. I thank the gentleman.
  Mr. Chairman, I urge the adoption of this amendment.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent 
that the reporter be allowed to read back my arguments on the Slaughter 
and Conyers amendment so that I do not have to repeat them on this 
amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN. Unfortunately, the Chair cannot entertain that 
unanimous-consent request.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Then, Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the 
requisite number of words.
  Mr. Chairman, I will not take the 5 minutes. I will simply say ditto, 
here we go again, and yield back the balance of my time.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Stupak].
  The amendment was agreed to.
  The CHAIRMAN. Are there further amendments to the bill?


                    amendment offered by ms. delauro

  Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

[[Page H4487]]

  The Clerk read as follows:

       Amendment offered by Ms. DeLauro: At the end of the bill, 
     add the following:

     SEC. 3. AMENDMENT OF SENTENCING GUIDELINES TO PROVIDE FOR 
                   ENHANCED PENALTIES FOR A DEFENDANT WHO COMMITS 
                   A CRIME WHILE IN POSSESSION OF A FIREARM WITH A 
                   LASER SIGHTING DEVICE.

       Not later than May 1, 1997, the United States Sentencing 
     Commission shall, pursuant to its authority under section 994 
     of title 28, United States Code, amend the sentencing 
     guidelines (and, if the Commission considers it appropriate, 
     the policy statements of the Commission) to provide that a 
     defendant convicted of a crime of violence against a child, 
     elderly person, or other vulnerable person (as such terms are 
     defined in section 240002(b) of the Violent Crime Control and 
     Law Enforcement Act of 1994) shall receive an appropriate 
     sentence enhancement if, during the crime--
       (1) the defendant possessed a firearm equipped with a laser 
     sighting device; or
       (2) the defendant possessed a firearm, and the defendant 
     (or another person at the scene of the crime who was aiding 
     in the commission of the crime) possessed a laser sighting 
     device capable of being readily attached to the firearm.

  Ms. DeLAURO (during the reading). Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous 
consent that the amendment be considered as read and printed in the 
Record.
  The CHAIRMAN. Is there objection to the request of the gentlewoman 
from Connecticut?
  There was no objection.
  (Ms. DeLAURO asked and was given permission to revise and extend her 
remarks.)
  Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to offer an extremely 
important amendment to improve the protections that are already 
included in this measure for our Nation's children, elderly and other 
vulnerable citizens. Public citizens today are facing a deadly new 
threat on the streets of my home State of Connecticut and across the 
Nation: the new threat is the emergence of laser sighting devices that 
are aimed at our law-abiding citizens.
  These laser sights, mounted on the barrel of a gun, emit a tiny red 
beam of light that the shooter uses to line up the targets. In the 
hands of a criminal, these high-technology weapons turn ordinary street 
thugs into sharpshooters.
  My amendment directs the U.S. Sentencing Commission to increase 
penalties for individuals convicted of crimes of violence involving 
laser sighting devices when that crime is against a child, a senior, or 
a vulnerable person as defined by the bill. The amendment will deter 
the use of laser sight technology in street crime and require the 
Sentencing Commission to collect data on laser sighting devices in 
violent criminal activity throughout the Nation.

  It is narrowly crafted legislation. It focuses on the criminal to 
crack down on violent crime. It is a noncontroversial approach that 
Members can support regardless of their views on gun legislation in 
general.
  I offered a similar, but broader, amendment to the antiterrorism 
legislation in March. The amendment had wide bipartisan support and 
passed by voice vote. Unfortunately, the amendment was removed in 
conference.
  Let me stress the amendment does not ban laser sight technology, nor 
does it ban guns equipped with laser sights. Again, it does not ban 
laser sight technology, nor does it ban guns equipped with laser 
sights. This is not about gun control, it is about crime control and 
justice for the victims of violent crime.
  Mr. Chairman, I crafted this legislation with the help of local law 
enforcement in Connecticut.
  With their input, this legislation has won endorsements from the 
National Fraternal Order of Police, the International Brotherhood of 
Police and others.
  Let me read directly from the letter of support that I received from 
the National Fraternal Order of Police regarding the legislation.

       The citizens of this nation already suffer far too much 
     from tragedies precipitated by firearms crime. This problem 
     is exacerbated by criminals using laser sights to make their 
     criminal activity even more deadly.

  Proliferation of this new technology is growing at an alarming rate 
among street thugs in communities across America. On Christmas Day of 
last year and during the first weeks of the New Year, guns equipped 
with laser sights have taken lives and evoked fear amongst families in 
my district. That is why I am offering in this amendment today.
  The enhanced accuracy that these laser sighting devices generate in 
the hands of the violent criminal create a ``Super-gun,'' which aimed 
directly or indirectly at a target, make victims of innocent children, 
our seniors and other community members as they live and work in our 
neighborhoods.
  In closing, let me read to my colleagues from a letter I received 
from the Connecticut Police Chiefs Association's president, Chief James 
Thomas, in strong support of my amendment:

       Your legislation is a step in the right direction to 
     reaffirm that society will not tolerate the use of 
     sophisticated weapons by criminals against its citizens.

  This bill punishes the criminal, not law-abiding gun users or gun 
owners, and I urge its immediate passage. I urge my colleagues to 
protect our most vulnerable citizens from violent crimes involving 
laser sights.
  Mr. Chairman, I ask for a favorable vote on this amendment.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman I move to strike the last word.
  Mr. Chairman, I am not going to oppose this amendment, because, 
obviously, if anybody commits a crime against a vulnerable person like 
a child or a senior citizen using a firearm equipped with a laser 
sighting device, I do not think any of us would want to argue that that 
person ought not to get the book thrown at him. But I would like to 
think we are going to throw the book at him for a lot of things that 
are less even than that in scope or seriousness, using a gun and lots 
of other things.
  But I would submit that there are very, very few crimes that would be 
committed that would come under the jurisdiction of this law that would 
involve somebody possessing a firearm equipped with a laser sighting 
device. I do not, in fact, know of any crimes against children or the 
elderly that have been committed with them, although that is always 
possible, and I am not going to oppose this amendment.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentlewoman from Connecticut [Ms. DeLauro].
  The amendment was agreed to.
  The CHAIRMAN. Are there further amendments to the bill?


            amendment offered by mr. watt of north carolina

  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. WATT of North Carolina: Page 4, 
     line 2, at the end, delete the ``.'' and insert ``, by virtue 
     of residence in any neighborhood in which the incidence of 
     violent crime is above the national average, is particularly 
     susceptible to criminal conduct.''

  Mr. McCOLLUM. I reserve a point of order, Mr. Chairman, on the 
amendment offered by the gentleman.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, there really is no more 
vulnerable population in America in terms of being exposed to criminal 
conduct than the people who live in the lowest-income areas in America, 
and when we start talking about who is vulnerable, sure, the elderly 
are vulnerable; sure, children are vulnerable, sure police officers are 
vulnerable. The list can go on, and on, and on, and on.
  But there really is no more vulnerable population than the population 
that lives in areas of our country where the incidence of crime is far 
above the national average.
  Mr. Chairman, this kind of illustrates how insane the process is we 
have embarked upon this evening. If we are going to set out to define 
who the vulnerable people were in our country--who is vulnerable to 
crime--we would have started with this amendment that simply says a 
vulnerable person under this bill is one who lives in a neighborhood 
where the incidence of violent crime is above the national average.
  I am the first to stand here, even though it is my amendment, and 
confess to my colleagues that it makes no sense. But it makes just as 
much sense to do this in this bill as the bill when we started out as 
the Frost amendment when he added it, as the Slaughter amendment when 
she added it, as the Conyers amendment when he added it, as the Stupak 
amendment when he added it, and my friend from Connecticut, the last 
amendment, when she added hers.

[[Page H4488]]

  What we are doing is a gross violation of the public safety and the 
trust that we owe to the citizens in this country. We are talking a 
very serious issue, and we are politicizing it. We are bringing it in 
here and saying let us make fun of these things, in effect, because we 
are in a political year, let us beat on our chest and show America how 
hard on crime we are,instead of following a responded policy that 
Republicans and Democrats alike on a bipartisan bases have agreed upon 
for years.
  So I offer this amendment to show how slippery that slope is. Where 
do we draw the line? How do we draw the line? What makes sense on who 
is vulnerable and who is not vulnerable in our country if we do not get 
to the underlying cause of violent crime in the first place? Why signal 
one group out and exclude another?
  But, most importantly, why do we bring this into this context, into a 
political context, this serious debate, and take it away from the 
nonpolitical, reasoned, rational process that we have set up?
  We are supposed to be setting public policy here. That is what we all 
were elected to do. And I have heard on this floor tonight people say, 
``Okay, well, it sounds good, even if it is unconstitutional, I am 
going to vote for it if you make me do a recorded vote, because I know 
that if I don't do it, there are political consequences.''
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. 
Watt] has expired.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Watt of North Carolina was allowed to 
proceed for 1 additional minute.)
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, we have had a series of 
amendments that illustrate faithfully how absurd what we are doing is, 
and this one is no worse. It is simply designed to point out to my 
colleagues that we cannot get off of this slope once we get on it, and 
that is why we gave the responsibility in the first place to the 
Sentencing Commission. We have got to be rational about this, and, my 
colleagues, we cannot be rational about it playing politics with it.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment 
offered by the gentleman from North Carolina.
  The CHAIRMAN. Does the gentleman from Florida insist on his point of 
order?
  Mr. McCOLLUM. No, Mr. Chairman, I withdraw my reservation of a point 
of order.
  The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman from Florida is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman from North Carolina is 
offering this amendment, I believe, almost on the face of what he is 
saying, because he is trying to make this bill absurd on its face. Once 
this passes, I suspect he will have succeeded if indeed it passes, 
because, first of all, he is saying that anybody is a vulnerable person 
and, therefore, there will be a sentence enhancement if that person is 
a victim of a violent crime in this country if that person is a 
resident in any neighborhood in which the incident of violent crime is 
above the national average.

                              {time}  2030

  I would suggest that there are a lot of people, who are residents of 
neighborhoods where the violent crime rate is above the national 
average, who may very well the very people where the criminal element 
is most strong in. In other words, we may very well find the guy who is 
dealing in arms, the fellow who has a whole warehouse full of 
ammunition; terrorists may be living in the neighborhood. I do not 
think neighborhoods are the way we should go about trying to define who 
is vulnerable or who is not vulnerable.
  There are classes of people, rather than characteristics of 
geography, which this bill addresses. This bill addresses the issue of 
children and women and the elderly and, in a stretch, the police who 
happen to be vulnerable. They are people, not neighborhoods; not 
Washington, DC, not Orlando, FL, not Jacksonville, FL, not Florence, 
SC, not New York City. We are not geographically bound by this bill.
  I think we make a mockery of this bill to take it to the extreme that 
this does, to charge the Sentencing Commission with coming back with 
enhancements of penalties, making penalties greater if you commit a 
crime against somebody because they happen to be in a neighborhood that 
statistically has an incidence of violent crime that is above the 
national average.
  I do not even know if we have averages for violent crime in 
neighborhoods. We do have in cities. We do have it by counties, in some 
cases. We certainly have by States. But I do not know that we have 
statistics that measure neighborhoods. We do not even have a definition 
of a neighborhood, so we are going to expect the Sentencing Commission 
to derive through some regulatory process what a neighborhood is and 
how to relate existing statistics to neighborhoods. I do not think that 
it can probably be done, because I do not think the data is available 
that would allow us to have the information that would make this 
amendment meaningful.
  By adopting this amendment, Mr. Chairman, the gentleman is doing what 
he really wants to do, and that is to try to make this bill impossible 
to become law, to make it one that will never see the light of day in 
the other body, to make it one which is rendered meaningless.
  I think that is kind of sad, because what we are trying to do 
tonight, what we have been trying to do all afternoon since this bill 
has been considered that the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Chrysler] 
drafted, is to send a message, particularly to those who commit crimes 
against the most vulnerable people in our society--children under the 
age of 14 and the elderly--that if you do, then you are really going to 
be in trouble.
  Maybe we should have brought this bill out of here under a modified 
closed rule instead of an open rule, because we should have recognized 
that there would be a lot of mischief being played by people who did 
not agree with the basic idea; who do not believe Congress ought to be 
telling the Sentencing Commission, when we do not agree with it, that 
we think their punishment should be stronger and different than what 
they came back with when we suggested to them that they enhance 
penalties in the area of those who are particularly vulnerable, who are 
children and elderly, which is what we did in the last Congress. Maybe 
we should have foreseen that and not presented this out here under an 
open rule tonight.
  Nonetheless, we did, Mr. Chairman. I would submit that my colleagues 
need to have the common sense and courage to vote down this amendment; 
to understand that it is wrong, to understand that it is way too broad; 
to understand there is no way to define a neighborhood in the first 
place; and in the second place, we do not have the statistics that 
would be applicable to make a person vulnerable; and in the third 
place, I suspect we are going to make a lot of people come under this 
definition who you would not want to have come under it even if you 
thought about it and even if you did adopt this, for those who may be 
truly a little more vulnerable because of somewhere they live than you 
might imagine.
  It is just an unworkable amendment that, if nothing else, I think is 
designed, quite frankly, to kill this bill. I would urge a ``no'' vote 
in the strongest of terms. Somewhere we have to draw the line. I have 
to draw the line myself, as the chairman of the subcommittee, on what 
we accept here tonight, and I am drawing the line here and saying this 
is going way, overboard. I urge in the strongest of terms a ``no'' 
vote.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. Watt].
  The amendment was rejected.


            amendment offered by mr. watt of north carolina

  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Amendment offered by Mr. Watt of North Carolina: Page 3, 
     beginning on line 9, strike subsection (a) and insert the 
     following:
       ``In General.--The United States Sentencing Commission 
     shall review the Federal sentencing guidelines to determine 
     an appropriate sentencing enhancement for crimes of violence 
     committed against vulnerable persons.

  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, this amendment simply

[[Page H4489]]

would request the U.S. Sentencing Commission to review this matter and 
make recommendations about enhancements for the areas that are covered 
by this bill.
  Mr. Chairman, it is time for us to get a grip. It is time for us to 
get a grip. We have taken a bill which should never have come to this 
floor, and it has gone from the ridiculous to the sublime, as somebody 
used to say to me when I was growing up. We have added a new Federal 
crime for crossing State lines to engage in sexual acts or sexual abuse 
of a child under age 12. We have added sex crimes against women. We 
have increased the enhancement from five levels to six levels. I do not 
know what the rational basis for that was, if there, in fact, was any. 
But everybody was afraid to vote against it, so it must have been a 
good idea, because politically, it is expedient.
  We have added environmental crimes when they do violence. We have 
added mail order sale of body armor, and police officers. We have added 
laser sighting devices. We have refused to add the most vulnerable 
populations in our country, those who live in low-income areas, but I 
submit to the Members that that was no less or more rational than any 
of the others.
  In the process we have illustrated, time after time after time, how 
slippery this slope is. We have illustrated, time after time after 
time, why on a bipartisan basis Republicans and Democrats alike joined 
to establish the U.S. Sentencing Commission and to give it authority to 
study the issues, to make very difficult judgments, to make our 
sentencing policy consistent, to take testimony outside the political 
context, and to rationalize something that ought to be rational, rather 
than irrational and political.
  Mr. Chairman, I beg of my colleagues to get a grip and give this 
authority back to the Sentencing Commission. I know this is an election 
year, but our ultimate responsibility is to make sound public policy. 
We are making a joke of it this evening, because this is a slippery 
slope we cannot get off.
  Mr. Chairman, I ask my colleagues to please pay heed and pass this 
amendment. let us get a grip and give the authority back to the body 
that we set up long ago to make these difficult decisions. Let us play 
public policy, not politics.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
  Mr. Chairman, I oppose the amendment for pretty obvious reasons, 
because this amendment that the gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. 
Watt] offers is one he offered in committee. I know it is offered 
sincerely, but it does gut the bill. His objective here is to send 
everything back to the Sentencing Commission and say that Congress, in 
this bill, is not going to tell you what to do with regard to the 
enhancement of sentences against those who are most vulnerable: 
children and women and the elderly. We are going to leave it up to you.
  Frankly, Mr. Chairman, I know in principle that is great, but not 
always does the Sentencing Commission do what we want them to do. In 
this particular case they did not, at least not what I wanted them to 
do. They came back with some language that was directional to judges in 
considering certain matters in the sentencing guidelines, but they did 
not increase, pursuant to what I thought was the direction of Congress 
in the last session, in the language we passed directed to them, they 
did not increase the levels of sentence that would be given to those 
who commit crimes against the children and the elderly of this Nation.
  I am not happy with that. The gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Chrysler] 
is obviously not happy, the author of this bill. I do not think, again, 
the majority of the American public would be happy without having these 
punishments enhanced in the sense that they are by the underlying bill 
we are dealing with here today.
  That underlying bill essentially raises by five levels the amount of 
the sentence that somebody is going to get for any Federal crime they 
commit against any child or any other defined vulnerable person: the 
elderly; in certain cases, women. That means on average somewhere a 
little over 2 years more time in jail for somebody who commits a crime 
against one of these vulnerable persons, these children or these 
elderly and certain women, than they are going to get if they commit 
crimes against somebody else in the average course of affairs.
  The important point of this, Mr. Chairman, is we want to send a 
deterrence specifically that says: ``If you do a crime against somebody 
who is at the weak end of our system and most vulnerable, like a child 
or like an elderly person, then we are going to punish you more 
severely.'' And hopefully, just hopefully, there will be a few less 
crimes committed against those very vulnerable people. If not, we are 
certainly going to lock those folks who commit those crimes up for 
longer periods of time.
  The message also is to the States and to the local communities in 
saying, We are going this by example at the Federal level. We hope that 
you will follow our lead and increase specifically the punishment for 
those crimes against the very vulnerable in our society in your States 
and your local communities by a like measured response, making a 
distinction and sending a deterrent message, and taking one more step 
that this Congress has been taking, which is the first Congress in 
years to do this, along the road of putting swiftness and certainty of 
punishment and deterrence back into our criminal justice system; 
sending a message to the criminal that is meaningful, in order that we 
might, in a few cases, deter crime, and in other cases, take these 
really, really bad apples off the streets for a long period of time.
  Mr. Chairman, I think this is a good underlying bill. The amendment 
of the gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. Watt] would destroy it 
completely. He would say, ``We do not agree to do that. We are simply 
going to redirect the Sentencing Commission to look at all of this 
again and come out with their recommendations again next year.'' That 
is not what this bill does. I urge a ``no'' vote on this amendment.
  Mr. SCOTT. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. Watt]. The last series of votes 
points out the reason why the Sentencing Commission is so important. It 
provides a rational determination of sentence. Without the Sentencing 
Commission looking at each of these sentences, we can expect life 
without parole and longer sentences for virtually every crime. 
Politicians will decorate their brochures with bills that address high 
profile crimes of the day, or to codify new slogans as they come up.
  Mr. Chairman, the answer to crime will always be more time to be 
served, without regard of what the punishment is without a new bill, 
just more time. There will be no rational pattern. Should a drunk 
driver get more than a rapist, or more or less than someone guilty of 
telemarketing fraud who steals senior citizens' life savings, or more 
or less than someone involved in a barroom brawl? The Sentencing 
Commission can make that determination in the context of whether 
someone caught with a small amount of drugs should serve more time than 
a murderer.
  The legislative process, however, is to deal with the crime of the 
day or the latest slogan, always more time to be served. Mr. Chairman, 
it is interesting to see where we are after decades of this process. On 
an international basis, the United States has the highest rate of 
incarceration of any country on Earth. Japan and Greece both lock up 
less than 50 people per 100,000 population; Canada and Mexico, about an 
average of about 100. There are only two countries in the world that 
lock up more than 400 people per 100,000 population: Russia and the 
United States, both around 500 and some. In inner cities in this 
country today, we lock up 3,000 people per 100,000 population, compared 
to the international average of about 100.
  That incarceration is not free. Virginia, which has tripled the 
prison population since I was first elected to the house of delegates 
in the State legislature; in addition to that, recently we have gone on 
a prison construction binge that will cost $100 million for each 
congressional district every year for the foreseeable future.

                              {time}  2045

  That is because we keep increasing the time to be served for the 
crime of the day or the slogan of the day.
  Mr. Chairman, if we are going to be serious about crime, we should be

[[Page H4490]]

spending that money on initiatives which would actually reduce crime: 
education, jobs, recreation, drug rehabilitation, not decorating 
campaign brochures with expensive, haphazard, ineffective rhetoric. 
That is why we have the Sentencing Commission, to provide a rational, 
deliberate process to determine sentences, and that is why we should 
support the Watt amendment.
  Mr. BUYER. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, let me just say to the gentleman from North Carolina, 
he would have my greater attention, perhaps support of this amendment 
if in the 1994 crime bill we did not ask the Sentencing Commission to 
look at it. When in fact that was done, the Sentencing Commission chose 
not to increase these penalties.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. BUYER. I yield to the gentleman from North Carolina.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, is the gentleman aware that 
the Sentencing Commission did in fact respond to what we asked them to 
do and made some major adjustments in the process for evaluating 
whether to enhance or not?
  Mr. BUYER. Reclaiming my time, they chose not to enhance the 
penalties. So what I am saying here is I agree with your point about 
reverent, I agree with your point about deference.
  What we have here, though, are victims in our society who are asking 
the Congress to respond. We did it in the 1994 crime bill, whether it 
was three-strikes-and-you're-out. We have also done it with this bill 
on increasing the penalties.
  We asked them to take a look at increasing the penalties against the 
most vulnerable in our society, the children and the elderly, and they 
chose not to increase it. So when they chose not, I think it is now 
very appropriate and I applaud the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. 
Chrysler] for bringing the bill.
  I am also concerned, though, on how this bill in fact is getting 
saddled down with a lot of other things. The point of the gentleman 
from North Carolina [Mr. Watt] is very well taken. But I do not believe 
we should be redirecting the Sentencing Commission to do that which is 
highly predictable, which they will do, and that is, they are not going 
to take the action. I think the impetus for the legislation is in fact 
their failure to act and we are now telling them what they have to do.
  His amendment in fact kills this bill, and I agree with the chairman 
of the Subcommittee on Crime and Criminal Justice that we must vote 
down the Watt amendment.
  Mr. BECERRA. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, let me begin by first thanking the gentleman from North 
Carolina for raising so many important constitutional and civil rights 
questions in this particular bill. I know a number of us thought this 
legislation would move through the course of this evening very quickly 
and a number of issues have been raised.
  I must say that the gentleman from North Carolina raises some 
extremely important points, and this particular amendment unfortunately 
I know will not get the attention from Members that it deserves, but it 
should. This is an amendment that says we have a process, let us follow 
it.
  Too often these days we find that the public, particular 
constituencies, particular communities, are not really pleased with the 
American process, whether it is judicial or legislative process. We can 
say the same thing about our political process. People are in many 
cases fed up. We can talk about certain high-profile jury verdicts that 
have come down, where people have said perhaps we should totally undo 
the jury process.
  But we have a process and fortunately we have a Constitution that 
says we have to stick to a process. The Congress quite some time ago 
said we need a process to make sure we legislate appropriately when it 
comes to criminal matters. We have to make sure that people who are 
committing crimes are swiftly punished and appropriately punished for 
what they do.
  We set up a Commission. That Commission was free of the politics that 
occurs day in and day out in this Chamber. We said, ``We will charge 
you to tell us what you think we should do on these particular issues 
that we bring to your attention.''
  That is what we have been doing, is bringing these issues to their 
attention, directing them to take a look at certain things and get back 
to us. We have every right, as the gentleman from Florida has said, to 
disagree with the Commission and do something differently. That is what 
we have before us in this case with this bill.
  The Congress, or a majority of Members, I suspect, in this Congress 
object to what the Commission has done. Does that mean it is right? 
Well, chances are what we are going to see happen is passage of this 
bill, and then we are going to have to revisit this in a few years 
because we are going to find that much of this is unworkable. Why? 
Because right now I think people are looking at November 1996, not May 
7, 1996.
  We charged a particular set of experts to tell us how best to conduct 
ourselves when legislating on issues of criminal law violations and we 
are telling them, ``You've done your work, we set a course for you, but 
we wish to ignore it.'' To me, that is the worst type of legislating, 
because what are we saying to folks is, ``Give us something that we can 
show folks, that we can hold up and say we've had something to look 
at,'' but then we just disregard it.
  So we are acting like the experts, and I suspect most of the people 
who are going to push their button pretty soon on this bill will not 
even have heard the debate that is taking place on this floor, but that 
is where we have gone. We are now at the point of telling the 
Commission, you have done your work, and I have not even heard anybody 
say the work of the Commission was not good, but what we have decided 
to do is totally disregard it.
  The Commission did take substantial measures, as it was requested to 
do so by this Congress two years ago, to see what we needed to do to 
make sure that people who committed crimes against the elderly and our 
young were severely and adequately punished, but we are going to ignore 
that right now because a majority of Members are going to vote to pass 
this bill. That is they way things are done these days, especially 
during an election year.

  It is unfortunate, and it is most unfortunate when a Member is 
willing to bring this up, knowing full well that the chances of getting 
just a few votes or more than a few votes are unlikely. It is important 
at least because somewhere there will be a record that on May 7, 1996, 
somebody decided to speak up, have a rational voice and say this is not 
the way we conduct business, and certainly this is not the way the 
Constitution of the United States or the Founders of this country 
expected us to conduct ourselves in these hallowed Chambers.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of 
words.
  Mr. Chairman, I believe this may be the last amendment to this 
measure. I would like to make a case that what we have done here, 
although it is outside the Sentencing Commission's responsibilities, it 
really has not been that bad.
  Now, having said that, I would like to point out that the Sentencing 
Commission has not failed. The Sentencing Commission did what we asked 
it to do. As the chairman of the Subcommittee on Crime agreed with me 
earlier in the debate, the Sentencing Commission's work came back to 
this committee and was ratified.
  I would argue that what we have done tonight is far less worse than 
many things that have happened on the criminal justice field, but that 
let us now repair the amendment that is on the floor, that is not a lot 
different from the controlling language in the Chrysler bill.
  The Chrysler bill says the U.S. Sentencing Commission shall amend the 
Federal sentencing guidelines. The Watt amendment says the U.S. 
Sentencing Commission shall review the Federal sentencing guidelines to 
determine appropriate sentencing enhancement for crimes of violence 
committed against vulnerable persons.
  In other words, all he does is take the work that we are about to 
report tonight and pass it back through the Sentencing Commission. Is 
that so bad? What is wrong with that? We now have a work product that 
can now go

[[Page H4491]]

back to the Sentencing Commission. Guess what? It has got to come back 
to us, anyway. Nothing that the Sentencing Commission can do has any 
viability till it has passed through the House of Representatives.
  I argue that much of the work tonight, I believe, will pass muster 
with the Sentencing Commission, and so I fail to see any great harm 
done in connection with this amendment.
  Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. 
Watt], the author of the amendment.
  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. I thank the gentleman for yielding, 
because he has made the very point I have been trying to make. We 
really are not opposing enhancements of sentences for people who commit 
crimes against vulnerable people. I do not think there is anybody who 
really opposes that, and certainly not the Sentencing Commission 
opposes that.
  What we are talking about is public policy and how we set it. I think 
it is appropriate to read the last few lines of the letter from the 
Sentencing Commission to us and remind ourselves and let it resonate as 
we try to close this debate.
  This is what they say. It says,

       The Commission was designed to take the politics out of 
     sentencing policy and to bring research and analysis to bear 
     on sentencing policy. This bill sets a bad precedent for the 
     Congress with respect to the Commission. There are other ways 
     for Congress to speak on sentencing policy while still 
     maintaining the integrity of sentencing reform as embodied by 
     the Sentencing Reform Act.

  That is it.
  Mr. CONYERS. I thank the gentleman. Let me ask the gentleman from 
Michigan [Mr. Chrysler], the author of the measure, that were this 
amendment to prevail, namely, that the Commission shall review our 
collective works tonight as opposed to us directing the Sentencing 
Commission to amend the guidelines, would that work an irreparable 
injury on the objectives that the gentleman has worked so hard to bring 
to the floor?
  The CHAIRMAN. The time of the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Conyers] 
has expired.
  (By unanimous consent, Mr. Conyers was allowed to proceed for 1 
additional minute.)
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Michigan 
[Mr. Chrysler].
  Mr. CHRYSLER. Mr. Chairman to answer the gentleman's question, yes, 
it would. It would gut the bill.
  Mr. CONYERS. In what respect, sir? It would not change a line in the 
bill. It would take the bill, assuming that it is passed, send it to 
the commission, and guess what? Anything that the commission does that 
we do not approve of, guess what we can do? Change it. So for that 
reason I suggest that it would not do any harm at all to the 
gentleman's work here tonight and the work that others have done to add 
on to it.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the 
requisite number of words.
  Mr. Chairman, I wanted to comment on the present legislation as we 
have it before the Chair, and I noted earlier the rising concern, not 
only on the sense of violent crimes but the fact that it results in the 
murder of our children. I have noted previously that the FBI cited 
generic statistics that said that children under the age of 18 
accounted for 11 percent of all murder victims in the United States in 
1994, and between 1976 and 1994 an estimated 37,000 children were 
murdered. Half of all murders in 1994 were committed with a handgun and 
about 7 in 10 victims age 15 to 17 were killed with a handgun.
  In my community in Houston and surrounding, we have certainly had our 
share of children being murdered, one very heinous crime where the 
individual who murdered that child happened to be a neighbor.
  But I think the important point is the ability of law enforcement to 
track down the offenders of this particular crime, whether it is a sex 
offense, or a sex offense that results in murder, or a murder of a 
child. I note that the legislation before us does not include the 
ability for the FBI to maintain a separate database of information on 
child sex offenders, and one that I would like to raise through 
legislation, a separate database on child murderers.
  It is difficult in our local jurisdictions, when we find individuals 
who have a propensity for these acts, to find out that we have no basis 
of tracking them from one State to the next or from one incident to the 
next. I would like to work on legislation to address these particular 
data base gathering efforts by the FBI.

                              {time}  2100

  If I might, I would like to inquire of the chairman of the committee 
to raise this issue of concern about our FBI gathering data. We do 
realize they have been an important and useful tool in helping local 
communities in incidents like this. I would offer to say that if we 
could raise this issue before our Subcommittee on Crime or find a way 
for this legislation to be presented through a hearing process, and 
then, of course, to the floor, I think we are certainly missing an 
important element by not providing or allowing for the FBI to maintain 
or to enhance the keeping of a separate data base, one, on child sex 
offenders, but then on child murderers.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.
  Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, John Walsh, the father of Adam Walsh, one 
of the more famous victims in sad cases in this Nation involving a 
child, has testified before our subcommittee that we do need to enhance 
these data bases that the FBI has, and certainly this chairman is 
willing to look into that, is currently examining that issue, and 
perhaps there will be either a hearing opportunity or legislative 
opportunity later this year.
  I would be delighted to have the gentlewoman work with me and the 
subcommittee staff to accomplish what we can in this session of 
Congress along these lines.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, I thank 
the gentleman for his input on that. I would simply say just in the 
name of a 4-year-old, Monique Miller, in my community, who lost her 
life both by being sexually assaulted and then brutally attacked 
resulting in her very tragic and violent death, that I think it would 
be extremely helpful that we proceed through hearings as well as 
legislation to ensure that we have labeled those individuals who are 
sex offenders and child murderers.
  Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of H.R. 2974, the Crimes 
Against Children and Elderly Persons Increased Punishment Act, which 
would provide enhanced penalties for violent crimes committed against 
children, the elderly and other vulnerable individuals.
  Unfortunately as we all know, the most vulnerable in our society are 
often in the most danger of abuse. Strengthened penalties for criminals 
who prey on the vulnerable will send a clear message that crimes 
against children and the elderly will not be tolerated.
  According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics and the FBI, children 
under the age of 18 accounted for 11 percent of all murder victims in 
the United States in 1994. Between 1976 and 1994 an estimated 37,000 
children were murdered. And half of all murders in 1994 were committed 
with a handgun; about 7 in 10 victims aged 15 to 17 were killed with a 
handgun. I will be offering legislation that will help local law 
enforcement in preventing child murders and sexual assaults by 
requiring the FBI to keep separate and distinct data on child sex 
offenders and child murderers nationwide.
  And a National Victim Center survey estimated that 61 percent of rape 
victims are less than 18 years of age, 29 percent are less than 11. A 
recent U.S. Department of Justice study of 11 jurisdictions and the 
District of Columbia reported that 10,000 women under the age of 18 
were raped in 1992 in these jurisdictions. At least 3,800 were children 
under the age of 12.
  Similarly, according to the U.S. Department of Justice, in 1992, 
persons 65 or older experienced about 2.1 million criminal 
victimizations. Furthermore, injured elderly victims of violent crime 
are more likely than younger victims to suffer a serious injury. 
Violent offenders injure about a third of all victims. Among violent 
crime victims age 65 or older, 9 percent suffer serious injuries like 
broken bones and loss of consciousness.
  Elderly victims of violent crime are almost twice as likely as 
younger victims to be raped, robbed, or assaulted at or near their 
home. Half of the elderly victims of violence are victimized at or near 
their home. Public opinion surveys conducted during the last 20 years 
among national samples of persons age 50 or older consistently show 
that about half of those persons feel afraid to walk alone at night in 
their own neighborhood.
  Clearly, we must do more to protect our children and senior citizens. 
H.R. 2974 is an

[[Page H4492]]

important step in deterring the victimization of children, senior 
citizens and vulnerable individuals in our communities and putting an 
end to senseless violence across the country. I urge my colleagues to 
support this legislation.
  The CHAIRMAN. The question is on the amendment offered by the 
gentleman from North Carolina [Mr. Watt].
  The question was taken; and the Chairman announced that the noes 
appeared to have it.


                             RECORDED VOTE

  Mr. WATT of North Carolina. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
  A recorded vote was ordered.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 41, 
noes 370, not voting 22, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 147]

                                AYES--41

     Barrett (WI)
     Becerra
     Bishop
     Campbell
     Clay
     Clayton
     Clyburn
     Collins (MI)
     Conyers
     Coyne
     Cummings
     Dellums
     Dixon
     Fattah
     Fields (LA)
     Flake
     Hastings (FL)
     Hilliard
     Jackson (IL)
     Jefferson
     Lewis (GA)
     McDermott
     Meek
     Millender-McDonald
     Payne (NJ)
     Pelosi
     Rangel
     Rohrabacher
     Roybal-Allard
     Rush
     Scarborough
     Scott
     Serrano
     Stokes
     Thompson
     Towns
     Velazquez
     Waters
     Watt (NC)
     Williams
     Wynn

                               NOES--370

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Allard
     Andrews
     Archer
     Armey
     Bachus
     Baesler
     Baker (CA)
     Baker (LA)
     Baldacci
     Ballenger
     Barcia
     Barr
     Barrett (NE)
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bass
     Bateman
     Bentsen
     Bereuter
     Berman
     Bevill
     Bilbray
     Bilirakis
     Bliley
     Blute
     Boehlert
     Bonior
     Bono
     Borski
     Boucher
     Brewster
     Browder
     Brown (FL)
     Brown (OH)
     Brownback
     Bryant (TN)
     Bryant (TX)
     Bunn
     Bunning
     Burr
     Burton
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Canady
     Cardin
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chambliss
     Chapman
     Chenoweth
     Christensen
     Chrysler
     Clement
     Clinger
     Coble
     Coburn
     Coleman
     Collins (GA)
     Collins (IL)
     Combest
     Condit
     Cooley
     Costello
     Cox
     Cramer
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cremeans
     Cubin
     Cunningham
     Danner
     Davis
     de la Garza
     Deal
     DeFazio
     DeLauro
     DeLay
     Deutsch
     Diaz-Balart
     Dickey
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Doggett
     Dooley
     Doolittle
     Dornan
     Doyle
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Ehlers
     Ehrlich
     Emerson
     Engel
     English
     Ensign
     Eshoo
     Evans
     Everett
     Ewing
     Farr
     Fawell
     Fazio
     Fields (TX)
     Filner
     Flanagan
     Foley
     Forbes
     Fox
     Frank (MA)
     Franks (CT)
     Franks (NJ)
     Frelinghuysen
     Frisa
     Frost
     Funderburk
     Furse
     Gallegly
     Ganske
     Gejdenson
     Gekas
     Gephardt
     Geren
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Gilman
     Gonzalez
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Gordon
     Goss
     Graham
     Green (TX)
     Greene (UT)
     Greenwood
     Gutierrez
     Gutknecht
     Hall (OH)
     Hall (TX)
     Hamilton
     Hancock
     Hansen
     Hastert
     Hastings (WA)
     Hayworth
     Hefley
     Hefner
     Heineman
     Herger
     Hilleary
     Hinchey
     Hobson
     Hoekstra
     Hoke
     Holden
     Horn
     Hostettler
     Houghton
     Hoyer
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Jackson-Lee (TX)
     Jacobs
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson (SD)
     Johnson, E.B.
     Johnson, Sam
     Johnston
     Jones
     Kanjorski
     Kaptur
     Kasich
     Kelly
     Kennedy (MA)
     Kennedy (RI)
     Kennelly
     Kildee
     Kim
     King
     Kingston
     Kleczka
     Klink
     Klug
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     LaFalce
     LaHood
     Lantos
     Largent
     Latham
     LaTourette
     Laughlin
     Lazio
     Leach
     Levin
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (KY)
     Lightfoot
     Lincoln
     Linder
     Lipinski
     Livingston
     LoBiondo
     Lofgren
     Longley
     Lowey
     Lucas
     Luther
     Maloney
     Manton
     Manzullo
     Markey
     Martinez
     Martini
     Mascara
     Matsui
     McCarthy
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McHale
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McIntosh
     McKeon
     McKinney
     McNulty
     Meehan
     Menendez
     Metcalf
     Meyers
     Mica
     Miller (CA)
     Miller (FL)
     Minge
     Mink
     Moakley
     Montgomery
     Moorhead
     Morella
     Murtha
     Myers
     Myrick
     Nadler
     Neal
     Nethercutt
     Neumann
     Ney
     Norwood
     Nussle
     Oberstar
     Obey
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Orton
     Oxley
     Packard
     Pallone
     Parker
     Pastor
     Paxon
     Payne (VA)
     Peterson (FL)
     Peterson (MN)
     Petri
     Pickett
     Pombo
     Pomeroy
     Porter
     Portman
     Poshard
     Pryce
     Quillen
     Quinn
     Radanovich
     Rahall
     Ramstad
     Reed
     Regula
     Richardson
     Riggs
     Rivers
     Roemer
     Rogers
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Rose
     Roth
     Roukema
     Royce
     Sabo
     Salmon
     Sanders
     Sanford
     Sawyer
     Saxton
     Schaefer
     Schiff
     Schroeder
     Schumer
     Seastrand
     Sensenbrenner
     Shadegg
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shuster
     Sisisky
     Skaggs
     Skeen
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (TX)
     Smith (WA)
     Solomon
     Spence
     Spratt
     Stearns
     Stenholm
     Stockman
     Stump
     Stupak
     Talent
     Tanner
     Tate
     Tauzin
     Taylor (MS)
     Taylor (NC)
     Tejeda
     Thomas
     Thornberry
     Thornton
     Thurman
     Tiahrt
     Torkildsen
     Torres
     Torricelli
     Traficant
     Upton
     Vento
     Volkmer
     Vucanovich
     Walker
     Walsh
     Wamp
     Ward
     Watts (OK)
     Waxman
     Weldon (FL)
     Weldon (PA)
     Weller
     White
     Whitfield
     Wicker
     Wilson
     Wise
     Wolf
     Woolsey
     Yates
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)
     Zeliff
     Zimmer

                             NOT VOTING--22

     Beilenson
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Brown (CA)
     Foglietta
     Ford
     Fowler
     Gibbons
     Gunderson
     Harman
     Hayes
     Istook
     McDade
     Molinari
     Mollohan
     Moran
     Owens
     Roberts
     Souder
     Stark
     Studds
     Visclosky

                              {time}  2123

  Messrs. GUTKNECHT, BOUCHER, and PORTER, Ms. BROWN of Florida, and Ms. 
EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON of Texas changed their vote from ``aye'' to 
``no.''
  Messrs. FATTAH, CAMPBELL, and TOWNS changed their vote from ``no'' to 
``aye.''
  So the amendment was rejected.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  The CHAIRMAN. Are there further amendments to the bill?
  If not, the question is on the committee amendment in the nature of a 
substitute, as amended.
  The committee amendment in the nature of a substitute, as amended, 
was agreed to.
  The CHAIRMAN. Under the rule, the committee rises.
  Accordingly the Committee rose; and the Speaker pro tempore (Mr. 
Hobson) having assumed the chair, Mr. LaTourette, Chairman of the 
Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union, reported that 
that Committee, having had under consideration the bill, (H.R. 2974), 
to amend the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 to 
provide enhanced penalties for crimes against elderly and child 
victims, pursuant to House Resolution 421, he reported the bill back to 
the House with an amendment adopted by the Committee of the Whole.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the rule, the previous question is 
ordered.
  Is a separate vote demanded on any amendment to the committee 
amendment in the nature of a substitute adopted by the Committee of the 
Whole? If not, the question is on the amendment.
  The amendment was agreed to.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the engrossment and third 
reading of the bill.
  The bill was ordered to be engrossed and read a third time, and was 
read the third time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the passage of the bill.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the noes appeared to have it.


                             RECORDED VOTE

  Mr. BUYER. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.
  A recorded vote was ordered.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 414, 
noes 4, not voting 15, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 148]

                               AYES--414

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Allard
     Andrews
     Archer
     Armey
     Bachus
     Baesler
     Baker (CA)
     Baker (LA)
     Baldacci
     Ballenger
     Barcia
     Barr
     Barrett (NE)
     Barrett (WI)
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bass
     Bateman
     Bentsen
     Bereuter
     Berman
     Bevill
     Bilbray
     Bilirakis
     Bishop
     Bliley
     Blute
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Bonior
     Bono
     Borski
     Boucher
     Brewster
     Browder
     Brown (CA)
     Brown (FL)
     Brown (OH)
     Brownback
     Bryant (TN)
     Bryant (TX)
     Bunn
     Bunning
     Burr
     Burton
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Campbell
     Canady
     Cardin
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chambliss
     Chapman
     Chenoweth
     Christensen
     Chrysler
     Clay
     Clayton
     Clement
     Clinger
     Clyburn
     Coble
     Coburn
     Coleman
     Collins (GA)
     Collins (IL)
     Collins (MI)
     Combest
     Condit
     Conyers
     Cooley
     Costello
     Cox
     Coyne
     Cramer
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cremeans
     Cubin
     Cummings
     Cunningham

[[Page H4493]]


     Danner
     Davis
     de la Garza
     Deal
     DeFazio
     DeLauro
     DeLay
     Dellums
     Deutsch
     Diaz-Balart
     Dickey
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Dixon
     Doggett
     Dooley
     Doolittle
     Dornan
     Doyle
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Ehlers
     Ehrlich
     Emerson
     Engel
     English
     Ensign
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                                NOES--4

     Becerra
     Scott
     Waters
     Watt (NC)

                             NOT VOTING--15

     Beilenson
     Ford
     Gibbons
     Gunderson
     Harman
     Hayes
     McDade
     Molinari
     Mollohan
     Owens
     Souder
     Stark
     Studds
     Visclosky
     Yates

                              {time}  2143

  Mr. JOHNSTON of Florida changed his vote from ``no'' to ``aye.''
  So the bill was passed.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________