[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 16 (Monday, February 10, 1997)]
[House]
[Pages H398-H401]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             SPECIAL ORDERS

                                 ______
                                 

                STATUS OF GUAM'S QUEST FOR COMMONWEALTH

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Collins). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 7, 1997, the gentleman from Guam [Mr. Underwood] is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. UNDERWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I take this opportunity today to share 
with the American people and the Congress a compelling story about my 
home island Guam's quest for an improved political status with the 
United States.
  There is no more pressing political issue for the people of Guam and 
our island than a political status change from the existing 
unincorporated territorial status to something which we call 
commonwealth; a very elastic political term, a term that is used in 
reference to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania or the Commonwealth of 
Massachusetts, but also the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the 
Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas.
  The commonwealth we seek is embodied in a piece of legislation and is 
one which carries out the principles of democracy, self-governance, and 
economic stability and fairness. We are on a long journey and our goal 
is an improved relationship with the United States.
  Now this year, 1997, is the year before 1998 which will represent the 
100th anniversary of the Spanish-American

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War, and that of course will finish off the 105th Congress. As many of 
you will recall from your history classes, Puerto Rico, the 
Philippines, and Cuba were spoils of that war nearly 100 years ago but, 
perhaps not often recognized, so was Guam. And for the people of Guam 
the past 100 years has been representative of a continual colonial 
status, a status which does not lead to clarity or surety in the final 
resolution of our relationship with the United States.
  How we will commemorate the 100th anniversary of 1898 in many 
respects will be a measure of how we see ourselves as a society. It is 
clear that Cuba has been independent for a number of years. The 
Philippines were independent after World War II. Puerto Rico has a 
political status, and a defined process may be on the horizon for 
Puerto Rico as it seeks either independence, continued commonwealth or 
accession to statehood.
  For Guam it is not clear, and for Guam, Guam will then remain the 
last piece of the puzzle of 100 years that has come from the results of 
the Spanish-American War.
  It is interesting to note that when Spain lost the Spanish-American 
War, Spain had claims to not only the Philippines but a number of 
islands in Micronesia, including the Northern Marianas, much of the 
Caroline Islands, which includes Palau, Yap, and Truk.
  Even though the United States had the opportunity to inherit those 
claims, it chose not to and it only took one island out of the whole 
Micronesian region, and that island was Guam, and Guam then had the 
American flag raised over it. The islands to the north of Guam, and 
which Guam is a part of this chain of islands, the Mariana Islands, and 
which we are the same ethnic group as those people from the Northern 
Marianas, subsequently were sold to Germany until the end of World War 
I. They were then inherited as a League of Nations mandate by Japan as 
a result of World War I, and then after World War II they became part 
of the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands.
  It is interesting to note that those islands that went through that 
entire routing process from Spanish claims to German administration, to 
Japanese administration under the League of Nations mandate, to 
American administration under the watchful eyes of the United Nations 
as a trust territory, have all finally resolved their political status 
issues. Guam, which has been the longest associated with the United 
States, since 1898, is the last remaining area of that group which has 
yet to finally resolve its political status with the United States.
  And although there are many benefits to be gained by being associated 
with the United States for a much longer period of time, apparently 
resolving the political status box is not one of them. So today our 
neighboring islands, including the Northern Marianas as now a 
commonwealth of the United States, a status which is seen as a better 
status and more autonomous status than the one we have, even though 
they have only been associated with the United States since the end of 
World War II, for a little over 50 years.
  In addition to that, there are three independent republics that came 
out of the trust territory which are in free association with the 
United States, namely the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic 
of Palau, and the Republic of the Marshall Islands. It is with some 
sadness that I point this out because it is really the responsibility 
of the United States to move this process, as well as it is the 
responsibility of the people of Guam to make clear their desires in 
terms of their relationship with the United States.
  It is particularly incumbent upon this body, in Congress, because 
Congress is constitutionally mandated to make all decisions regarding 
material acquisitions and the future political status, rules, 
regulations, and laws which appertain to those territories.
  So that we keep in mind what we are discussing, there are a number of 
small territories still associated with the United States. They are the 
Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern 
Marianas, and of course the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, which is seen 
as different not only because it is much larger than the small 
territories but because it is also often discussed in terms of a 
statehood option.
  For more than 300 years prior to the Americans coming to Guam in 
1898, Guam was a Pacific colony of Spain and as such is marked a little 
bit different than other Pacific islands. We adopted many Spanish 
customs, we learned to live with Spanish rulers, we adopted primarily 
Catholicism as our major religion and we incorporated many Spanish 
spoken words into our native Chamorro language. And as a result of that 
we are proud to continue to identify ourselves as proud people, 
indigenous people, of the Pacific islands, but certainly indeed with a 
great touch of Hispanicization woven into the cultural and societal 
fabric of our lives.
  One hundred years ago, as I pointed out, the United States took Guam 
from Spain and established a military government of Guam. Now, Guam was 
considered at that time a possession of the United States, and it is a 
mark again of the lack of clarity in the relationship between small 
territories and the Federal Government, the terms that are used.
  Sometimes we are referred to as the territory of the United States, 
the unincorporated territory of the United States. I have seen 
documents which refer to us as a protectorate, as a possession, as if 
we were a thing to be owned and moved around, but in reality the actual 
term and the appropriate legal term is unincorporated territory of the 
United States.
  An unincorporated territory of the United States means that we are 
owned by the United States but that we are not fully part of the United 
States. And until we change that status, congressional authority, 
congressional plenary authority remains in full effect and the 
Constitution applies to Guam only to the extent that Congress sees fit 
to apply it to Guam.
  So one of the main elements of great discussion about political 
theory today and the appropriate relationship between the Federal 
Government and the local government is the use of the 10th amendment, 
where certain powers are reserved to the States or the people. And the 
concept of devolution in that uses, as a core article, obviously faith 
in the application of the 10th amendment.
  Congress of course, in its wisdom, has made sure that the 10th 
amendment does not apply to territories. So any powers that are 
forfeited, in a sense, or acknowledged by the Federal Government to be 
reserved to local authorities or local governance, it is clearly not 
the case with the territories.
  It was not until after World War II that Guam was referred to as an 
unincorporated territory, with the passage of the Organic Act of Guam. 
And the Organic Act of Guam is the governing document, and an organic 
act simply means an act by Congress to organize a government.
  The Navy, for the first 50 years of association with the United 
States, was the primary instrument of government over Guam, and all of 
the officers, the commanding officer of the naval station of Guam was 
also the Governor of Guam. The commander of the marines was also the 
head of the Department of Public Safety. The Navy chaplain was 
automatically the head of the Department of Education.
  They had a kind of a little system devised that virtually treated 
people as if they were wards, as if they were people who needed a great 
deal of tutelage before they were even trusted with the most 
rudimentary forms of government. And of course the citizenship status 
of the people was the part that was most cloudy. People were not U.S. 
citizens but they were not aliens. The Navy had an interesting order 
called Court Martial Order No. 1923 that held while the natives of Guam 
are not citizens of the United States, nor are they aliens. There were 
no means by which they could become citizens.
  So unlike aliens who have the opportunity to become citizens, the 
people of Guam were in a kind of permanent anomalous status, if you 
will. But they were most often referred to as nationals until the 
passage of the Organic Act in 1950, and the people of Guam became U.S. 
citizens.
  Prior to the Organic Act in 1950, I guess the historical incident 
which most marks Guam, at least in the consciousness of most people in 
the United States today, is the experience during World War II. Guam 
was the only American territory with people in it to be occupied by an 
enemy during World

[[Page H400]]

War II, and, in fact, if you go back into the war of 1812, it has been 
the only American territory that has been invaded and occupied by a 
foreign power and actually had people in it.
  I know a couple of the Aleutian Islands were taken during World War 
II, but all the civilians, all the people were evacuated from those 
islands. As it was on Guam, the people were not evacuated and the 
people endured a very horrific occupation for which in many respects 
the people still bear scars from that experience.
  The one thing that united the people in that experience is that 
people never lost hope in the Americans coming back to relieve them of 
the burden that they were experiencing as a result of the Japanese 
occupation, and many, many stories have come from that, not only for 
the experience of the people who endured the occupation, but certainly 
for the incoming marines and sailors who performed many heroic deeds in 
terms of liberating the island from the Japanese.
  In 1950, when the Organic Act of Guam was passed by the U.S. 
Congress, citizenship was passed along to the people of Guam. And the 
Organic Act granted the people of Guam a limited form of American 
citizenship, commonly referred to as statutory citizenship, meaning 
that Congress also has the authority to take it away. Not that it is 
going to, but that legally it has the authority to take that 
citizenship away. And this is very unlike others, the vast majority of 
American citizens who are so-called constitutional citizens.
  Certainly unlike the citizens of any of the 50 States or even the 
District of Columbia, the citizens of Guam do not enjoy all the full 
protections of the U.S. Constitution. And by being and by remaining an 
unincorporated territory, in its current form, the United States has 
broad powers over the affairs of Guam and ultimately the future of the 
Chamorro people of Guam.

                              {time}  1430

  What this relationship has meant is that the United States can 
continue to enjoy the benefits for which Guam was intended. It was no 
accident that Guam was picked up in 1898 over the other islands. Guam 
was the largest island in Micronesia. It had the most contact with 
outside people at that time, and it also was seen as an adequate 
coaling station for the level of naval technology at the time. And 
since that time of course we have seen Guam perform a number of roles 
as a strategic area. It is a major logistical point today, it can be a 
forward--an area for forward deployment and projection of American 
power into Asia and the Pacific, and if the military planners did not 
have the security of knowledge that Guam over any other location in the 
Pacific and in Asia is a stable and friendly environment for the 
projection of American military forces, they would have more insecurity 
in their sleep at night.
  Guam is sometimes treated as a part of the United States, and at 
other times it is treated as if it were a foreign country, and that is 
part of the anomalous status, but most of the time it is not ignored--
it is not ignored at all. I always point this out, that in the course 
of trying to do legislative work here in Congress, frequently when 
legislation is passed, unless it specifically mentions Guam or it 
specifically mentions territories, it is normally ignored, and over the 
course of the 4 years that I have been here I have always asked this 
question when legislation is being passed, and I will always hear the 
reply that it was an oversight to not include Guam, forgive me for my 
oversight in not thinking about the small territories, an oversight.
  I have heard this term many, many times, and I always joke back that 
maybe we ought to have one big oversight hearing over all the 
oversights that Guam and some of the small territories have 
experienced.
  Well, the next milestone for Guam politically beyond the Organic Act 
was in 1970. For the first time the chief executive of the island was 
elected by the people of Guam. So it has only been approximately 27 
years since the people of Guam have had the opportunity to elect their 
own Governor, and in 1972 the people of Guam were afforded an 
opportunity to have a delegate, a nonvoting delegate, in the U.S. House 
of Representatives, of which I am the third such individual to be 
elected to this body. Sending a delegate to Congress meant that our 
interests could be more effectively protected by someone that the 
people of Guam sent here, and of course electing our own Governor gave 
us a great sense of control over local affairs.
  But Guam's political status as an unincorporated territory continues 
to prove unsatisfactory, as we have a number of issues of contention 
with the Federal Government. As a result of this great discussion that 
we had in Guam in the late 1960's and through the 1970's, a series of 
political status hearings were held, and there was a great deal of 
discussion, and there were a number of elections that took place, and 
the major political status was held in 1982 to determine what general 
direction Guam wanted to go if the status quo was to be changed. From a 
list of six status options the people of Guam choose statehood and 
commonwealth as the two desired options, and those were put together in 
a runoff, and as a result of the runoff the overwhelming choice was a 
commonwealth with 73 percent.
  So this led to the task then of drafting the Commonwealth Act, what 
piece of legislation should we present to Congress as the embodiment of 
our desires? That resulted in 12 separate sections of the act; each one 
of those sections were, in turn, ratified by the voters of Guam, and 
finally in 1988, in February 1988, the Guam Commonwealth Act was given 
to the leaders of the House and the Senate as well as the executive 
branch of the Federal Government. And my predecessor, Congressman Ben 
Blaz, a retired Marine Corps general of whom we are very proud, was the 
first one to introduce that. He introduced it twice. I have been here 
three terms; I have had the honor, distinct honor, of introducing it 
three times. But in all that time since 1988 we have really had only 
one congressional hearing on the proposal, and that was held in 
Honolulu in December 1989.
  I might add that despite the enormous distances Honolulu is still 
3,500 miles away from Guam. Hundreds of our island residents and 
leaders went to Honolulu to express their hopes and aspirations. At 
that time congressional leadership said that before they really could 
address this, since there were a number of complicated provisions to 
the Commonwealth Draft Act, they suggested that we work with the 
executive branch in order to narrow the differences and to enter into 
formal discussions.
  Throughout the Bush and the Clinton administrations interagency task 
forces of Federal officials have tinkered with the draft commonwealth 
proposal, and we have seen several constitutional arguments raised, and 
there have been arguments about specific provisions, and for almost 7 
years the people of Guam and their representatives through the 
Commission on Self Determination have met with Guam officials, and the 
Federal officials continue to raise objections.
  Unfortunately, even though there was a little progress during the 
administration of President Bush, the interagency task force on the 
last day of the Bush administration issued a negative report on the 
draft commonwealth proposal, in effect reneging on many important 
provisions of the draft act.
  When I was first elected in 1992 and sworn into office in 1993, the 
first piece of legislation which I introduced was the Guam Commonwealth 
Act, and last month I reintroduced the very same bill, which is now 
known as H.R. 100, hoping to draw a connection between the 100th 
anniversary of 1898 coming up next year, in which I hope that we will 
see final resolution of the political status process for small 
territories, and in particular Guam.
  H.R. 100 is now under review by the President's Special 
Representative for Guam Commonwealth who is Deputy Secretary of 
Interior John Garamendi, and he is doing this in conjunction with White 
House officials and Cabinet level officials. Governor Gutierrez, who is 
the chairman of the Commission on Self Determination, and I have met 
with a number of White House officials and various members of the 
administration on this proposal. It is clear that the manner in which 
we are approaching this, in which we are hoping to secure the support 
of the administration, makes the most sense and will clear away most of 
the problematic

[[Page H401]]

provisions, and hopefully it will eliminate many of the objections 
before we move this legislation here in Congress.
  But the people of Guam must not make the mistake of placing their 
faith in this process without some hope of success. If we do this, we 
will pursue commonwealth in a manner which will totally frustrate us. 
The frustration with the current process, since it has gone on for over 
7 years, is sapping some of the strength to our commitment to 
commonwealth and is leading to the unfortunate feeling of a lack of 
confidence in the Federal Government's sincerity. But I remain 
confident, and certainly most of the people of Guam do, that we should 
not give up on commonwealth. Despite the lack of support and clarity of 
both administrations and from Washington in general, the people of Guam 
still remain remarkably united behind commonwealth.
  The administration negotiations has gone on rather intensely for the 
past year, and we have seen a number of time deadlines set, but 
realistically I think the people of Guam have reached the point that if 
we do not see this make progress by spring, the people of Guam will be 
in a position to reevaluate whether the current process that we are 
engaged in is really the way that we want to go about it and whether 
indeed we want commonwealth or the kind of commonwealth that we 
propose.
  So this is a very critical time in the negotiation process, and while 
I commend the Clinton administration for their forthrightness in 
bringing it to this point, and I also want to commend Governor 
Gutierrez and all the elected leadership of Guam for bringing it to 
this point, we have been near this point in the past, and we need to 
get on with it, and we need to get a clear, strong signal from the 
administration about their sense of what commonwealth for Guam means 
and whether they agree with our proposal.
  Next year will mark the 100th anniversary of Guam being first a 
possession of the United States and now an unincorporated territory, 
but this process with the Clinton administration is not really the 
culmination of the Commonwealth Draft Act because, as most people in 
Congress know, and certainly I hope all of them will know by the time 
we deal with this piece of legislation, Congress retains plenary 
authority over the territories of the United States through the 
Constitution.
  This is really a congressional call. Political status change is 
really a congressional call. Progress in the territories and the 
policies which the Federal Government adopts in the territories is 
really a congressional call. So I am really requesting the Members of 
Congress, and particularly the leadership of Congress and those who are 
particularly responsible for the insular areas, both in the House and 
in the other body, to take a good strong look at the commonwealth 
proposal of Guam, to make it see the light of day, to allow the debate 
on its provisions to go forward, to give a clear and sensible answer to 
the people of Guam why their aspirations to be fuller Americans, 
Americans with more autonomy over their lives, continues to be 
frustrated after 7 years of discussions.
  We have an opportune time in this Congress. We are facing the 100th 
anniversary of a war that most of us probably do not think about much. 
But I am certainly going to bring it to the surface as much as I can. 
In that war the Treaty of Paris of 1898 specifically entrusted the 
Congress of the United States with the exact obligation to determine 
the political status of the native inhabitants of Guam. We have not 
done that in a clear and concise manner, we have not done that in a 
respectful manner, and I do not think we have done that in a way that 
is commensurate with the value that Guam has been to the United States 
through its strategic location for the intervening 100 years.
  I hope that as we see the 100th anniversary of the Spanish American 
War, I pray that the Members of Congress will bring attention to this 
issue, as I certainly will in collaboration with the leadership of the 
other territories, as well as, of course, the Commonwealth of Puerto 
Rico. The 100th anniversary of the Spanish-American War marks an 
important time period for the United States to, in a sense, come face 
to face with its imperial past and come face to face with what 
hopefully will be in the next century a more perfect union not only for 
the 50 States and the District of Columbia, but all the people who live 
under the American flag.

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