[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 130 (Thursday, September 19, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H10646-H10647]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      A HUGE CLOUD OVER THIS HOUSE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Volkmer] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. VOLKMER. Mr. Speaker, we have just been through a little charade 
here in the House. The last two votes on motions to table were purely 
what I call a charade as part of the total coverup that is going on in 
the ethics investigation of our Speaker.
  You know, they, majority Republicans, were advised that the minority, 
the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Bonior] and the gentleman from Georgia 
[Mr. Lewis], are going to be offering a resolution that would require 
the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct to make public, to give 
all Members of the House and the public, the press, a copy of the 
report that was filed back around August 12 with the Committee on 
Standards of Official Conduct by the special counsel.


                             point of order

  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, I have a point of order.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman will state his point of order.
  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Volkmer] is 
discussing matters that are not appropriately addressed under the rules 
of the House.
  Mr. VOLKMER. I am just going over what was going on in the House.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair will sustain the point of order 
inasmuch as the gentleman may not discuss such matters not currently 
pending.
  Mr. VOLKMER. The Speaker, I am just talking about what went on in the 
House.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman may proceed in order.
  Mr. VOLKMER. That is very interesting, very, very interesting that 
the majority does not even want us to talk about what we just did 
earlier this afternoon.
  When they heard about this resolution that is going to be offered, 
the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Linder--and according to an AP story 
that was just out today--in an admitted act of retaliation Mr. Linder 
introduced a resolution to force the ethics panel to hire an outside 
counsel to investigate House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephart in an 
ethics complaint filed 7 months ago that he concealed profits gained 
through vacation home real estate deals. Linder says----


                             point of order

  Mr. WALKER. Point of order, Mr. Speaker: The gentleman from Missouri 
[Mr. Volkmer] continues to be out of order.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair will sustain the point of order 
and share at this point the ruling of November 17, 1995:
  The prohibition against references in the debate to the official 
conduct of other Members where such conduct is not under consideration 
in the House includes reciting the content of a resolution raising a 
question of the privileges of the House which is no longer pending, 
having been tabled by the House.
  The gentleman may proceed in order.
  Mr. VOLKMER. Now the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Linder] goes on and 
says that the Lewis resolution reflected an ongoing and desperate 
action with a small band of Democrats who refused the ethics process by 
filing one baseless claim after another.
  Now those claims are not baseless, those claims are legitimate. They 
are based on acts that were performed by the Speaker and that have been 
filed with complaints, and part of those complaints were investigated 
by the special counsel, and the special counsel filed the report way 
back over a month ago. But none of us have seen the report, none of us 
can get a copy of the report, and on the tabling motion there is no 
question----


                             point of order

  Mr. WALKER. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman continues to be out of order, 
and it is an embarrassment to the House to have the gentleman continue 
to disobey the rules knowingly and completely with malice.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair sustains the point of order and 
requests that the gentleman proceed in order as indicated by the Chair 
earlier.
  Mr. VOLKMER. Mr. Speaker, you know, there is a huge cloud over this 
House, and it has been here for over a year, almost 2 years, and it is 
all because of inaction of the Committee on Standards of Official 
Conduct on the complaints on Newt Gingrich, and it has brought 
discredit on this House.


                             point of order

  Mr. WALKER. Point of order Mr. Speaker.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman will state his point of order.
  Mr. WALKER. The gentleman is obviously attempting to simply disobey 
the rules, and the gentleman obviously has no comport to the Oath of 
Office that he took earlier in this Congress and, you know, is 
embarrassing the House with his present disobeying of the rules, and I 
insist on my point of order.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The point of order by the gentleman is 
sustained, and the Chair would remind the gentleman from Missouri that 
he may not speak to matters which are now under consideration by the 
Committee on Standards of Official Conduct or to the motivation of 
Members who bring questions before the House.
  Mr. VOLKMER. I appreciate the ruling of the Chair, and it is very 
apparent to me and, I hope, to Members of this House that the majority 
does not want any of the minority, anybody, talking about ethics 
questions on the floor of the House. They just do not want us to 
discuss it. They want to keep it secret, they do not want anybody to 
know anything about it, they want it all to go away until after the 
election.
  Well, there are those of us who feel that we in this House of 
Representatives, which has been a stalwart in the world as far as 
democracy is concerned, have a right to voice our opinion on the floor 
of the House on this subject because we feel that this subject is one 
that has to do with the image of the people, how the people look at the 
United States House of Representatives.
  I do not think that the public really appreciates a House of 
Representatives

[[Page H10647]]

where Members cannot even discuss on the floor those things--I can walk 
right out in that hall, I can go up into the press gallery, I can go up 
the steps and go back in my district, I could do it in my home, I could 
do it in my office, I can do it anyplace else. I can discuss all the 
problems that the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct has and 
Newt Gingrich has and the fact that the chairman of the Committee on 
Standards of Official Conduct has just stalled this whole process. I 
can do it all there, but I cannot do it here.
  That is the ruling of the Chair. They do not want me to say it, 
folks. They do not want me to talk about it.
  But guess what? We are going to continue to do it until that report 
is released to the public. They paid $500,000, Mr. Speaker, for that 
report, and they are keeping it quiet.


                             point of order

  Mr. WALKER. Point of order, Mr. Speaker.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman will state his point of order.
  Mr. WALKER. The gentleman continues to be out of order.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair sustains the point of order.
  Mr. VOLKMER. Would the gentleman from Pennsylvania like to take down 
my words?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair would remind the gentleman that 
Speakers in prior Congresses have also supported these rulings.
  The gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Volkmer] may proceed in order.
  Mr. VOLKMER. Mr. Speaker, I would just like to continue to say that 
it is just not me that is being gagged, it is everbody out in the 
public, the media, everybody else in this whole country. Nobody knows 
what is in that report, and you are never going to know what is in that 
report because they are not going to let you have it.

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