[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 57 (Tuesday, May 6, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4038-S4040]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




        SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS AND RESCISSIONS ACT OF 1997

  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, before I go to the closing statement, I want 
to talk a little bit about where we are on the supplemental 
appropriations bill.
  We began the debate on the supplemental appropriations bill on 
Monday, yesterday, and we have been on it today. We did have one 
recorded vote at about 2:30 this afternoon, I believe it was, and I 
expected that we would continue then to work through the amendments, 
with some recorded votes being

[[Page S4039]]

required throughout the afternoon and even now late in the afternoon.
  I understand some of the amendments are efforts to strike language in 
the bill. Perhaps they have been worked out and we will have some 
accommodation, perhaps, on the census issue. I understand the amendment 
of Senator Wellstone was worked out in some way or the other, and he is 
not going to offer his.
  Then I received word that the Democrats decided they were not going 
to offer any more motions to strike, amendments to strike, or any 
amendments, until something was worked out with regard to the emergency 
continuing resolution.
  Mr. President, I say to the ladies and gentlemen of America, this is 
supposed to be emergency supplemental appropriations. This is a piece 
of legislation, appropriations, to provide funds for our troops in 
Bosnia--and the funds that are involved there have been offset in this 
bill--and to provide disaster assistance to States all across America 
that have disaster needs.
  What has happened? No. 1, the Democrats say, ``We're not going to 
offer any more amendments until we get our way. We want to change the 
bill that was reported out of the Appropriations Committee, and unless 
it is changed to suit our desires, we won't come forward with any more 
amendments.''
  Then, we have before the Senate 109 amendments--109 amendments. Now, 
are we serious about this supplemental emergency appropriations or not? 
I do not believe there are 109 problems existing in this supplemental 
appropriations bill. That is certainly not the way to get this 
legislation moving quickly.
  We will have a vote in the morning on cloture, I guess at 10 o'clock, 
to accommodate a request from the Democratic side. If we get cloture, 
then there will be 30 hours left on the supplemental. Under the rules 
of the Senate, you can have up to 1 hour on an amendment. That is only 
30 amendments. There are 109 pending. I presume some of those will be 
wiped off the board if we get cloture.
  I want to move the legislation. I am willing to work with the 
Democrats and with the White House on the issues where they have 
concerns, as we have on the census issue that has been before us.
  But I want to serve notice now--and I am sending word to the 
Democratic leader--that we are going to have a cloture vote in the 
morning, but I am not filing another cloture motion tonight. I am not 
going to try to cut off debate on this supplemental. We need to get 
this work done. If we do not get the cloture motion passed tomorrow, if 
we do not invoke cloture and stop what appears to be sort of a slowdown 
filibuster, then we will just go to other issues or we will stay on 
this bill as long as it takes.
  I have been told that we need to pass it right away because there are 
thousands of farmers and other people, small businesses in States in 
the Midwest and in the Dakotas, and my own State of Mississippi, that 
are going to need this help. It is throughout the country--in the 
Midwest, in the South, in the Far West. And yet now we are ready to go. 
It has been reported out of the Appropriations Committee last 
Thursday--or maybe it was Wednesday--but we only had 1 day go by 
legislatively before we brought this bill to the floor.
  I want to emphasize, Republicans are ready to move this disaster 
relief bill now. We can complete it tomorrow. We should complete it 
tomorrow so that we can then go on to the comp time/flextime bill and 
do a little something to help the working mothers of America before we 
have Mother's Day. But we are prepared to work on the disagreements.
  The way it works is the Senate acts, the committee acts, and then the 
Senate acts. The House, by the way, has to complete their work before 
we can pass the supplemental anyway. We go to conference and we 
continue to work out the disagreements.
  The way it does not work is, if you do not get your way you stop, you 
know, offering amendments and you slow down the process.
  So we will have the cloture vote tomorrow, and hopefully we will have 
an agreement to cut off the filibuster and we can move this bill 
through. But I want to talk a minute about what the problem is.
  The President has indicated that he does not want legislation 
included in the bill that would prevent or avert another Government 
shutdown. This is not something that just was discovered last year. We 
have had problems over the years of getting to the end of the fiscal 
year and Presidents or Congresses not being satisfied with the state of 
the situation, and the President would veto a bill or the Congress 
would not send a bill to the President. We would run out of funds, and 
you would have these shutdowns.
  We had them during the Reagan years. We had them during the Bush 
years. And now we have had them during the Clinton years. I think this 
is an irresponsible way to do business. We need to work through the 
process, but we should not endanger the people with the threat of a 
manmade disaster, which is what happens at the end of the fiscal year.
  It does not have to be in this bill and it does not have to be a 
specific way, but what we need to do is to make sure that the American 
people know that we are working together on a budget agreement, we are 
going to be working together on the appropriations, each one of the 13 
that comes through, and that they will know what they can count on.
  If you are in education, you want to know what part the Federal 
Government is going to pay on it; if you want to visit a national 
monument, you would like to know that it is going to be open; if you 
are a private business man or woman, and you do business with some 
Federal facility, you would like to know that it is going to be open.
  So all we want is some process that makes sure when we get to the end 
of this fiscal year that the numbers we have agreed to will be honored. 
But in the process we are not going to go through these, what I 
consider to be very irresponsible games, whether or not the Government 
is open or shut down.
  So I hope that when we have--I am not going to file a cloture motion. 
I reiterate that. Generally speaking, if I do not have to file a 
cloture motion, that is well received. What I am saying is, we are 
ready to go. We need to work on a number of amendments that are still 
pending--amendments to change the bill, amendments to pay for the cost 
of the bill, amendments to strike various and sundry sections in the 
bill.

  I think we have a good supplemental here the way it came out of 
committee. Probably nobody would say it was perfect. But it is time 
that we work out the disagreements, have debate, have votes, and move 
to final passage. We can do that tomorrow, or we can do it Friday, or 
we can do it some other time. But I want to make it clear that we are 
ready to go and we are ready to have the debate and have the votes, and 
then we will go on from there.
  Mr. President, before I go to the closing script, would the Senator 
from South Dakota like to make some comments on these eloquent remarks 
I have been trying to deliver on this occasion?
  Mr. DASCHLE addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader.
  Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I appreciate very much the chance to 
respond to the eloquence of my friend, the majority leader. And indeed 
his remarks are eloquent, although misinformed. And so I felt the need 
to come to the floor to clarify for the Record and for his information 
our position with regard to the bill.
  First of all, there is no Democratic position with regard to not 
offering amendments. I do not know where that information was 
generated, but I must tell you our hope is to expedite consideration of 
the bill.
  The current amendment offered by the Senator from Nevada, Mr. Reid, 
is being negotiated, as the majority leader indicated, and he was asked 
by Members on his side not to press for a vote until this can be 
negotiated. So in compliance with the request from the Republicans, we 
have not pursued a vote. But our desire is to offer amendments, to lay 
this one aside if the need may be, but, regardless, to move the bill 
along.
  If a cloture motion is filed, I will encourage every member of our 
caucus to support it. And my expectation is they

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will. So we want to work with the majority leader in getting this 
legislation passed.
  I share his concern about the large number of amendments. I urge our 
colleagues to be prudent in offering amendments. I must say, some 
people did not have the same opportunity as those in the committee to 
offer extraneous legislation. And that extraneous legislation is the 
source of some concern to many of us. I am hopeful that negotiations 
can lead ultimately to a successful elimination of many of these 
matters prior to the time we reach final passage.
  I do not want to shut the Government down either. We have been 
through some very difficult times in the past Congress with regard to 
shutting the Government down. If that were the only concern, I do not 
think we would have a problem.
  Our concern is the degree to which deep cuts are made in investments 
that we have already negotiated. And really it renders null and void 
the very budget agreement that I have enthusiastically endorsed that 
has culminated from our discussions last week. To say we are going to 
agree to certain levels of investments, and then deeply cut those in 
the very year that they were agreed upon, is not keeping very good 
faith. That would be the first concern we have with regard to this 
particular automatic continuing resolution provision.
  The second concern was addressed by some of our colleagues on the 
other side, as reported in Inside Congress on April 18. It says 
Republicans support the automatic continuing resolution because it, 
would remove President Bill Clinton's upper hand in this year's budget 
talks and remove his ability to influence current appropriations 
bills. Those kinds of statements cause us to be very wary, frankly, 
about what the real motivation is here. We do not want to put the 
Congress on automatic pilot. We do not want to cut out the role the 
President ought to have as he negotiates with us what levels of 
investments we make in many of these areas. I do not know if there are 
political considerations here or not.

  The best way with which to have a debate about this very important 
piece of legislation is to do it outside an emergency spending bill. I 
know the majority leader is working in good faith to see if we can find 
a reasonable compromise. I hope we can work together to make that 
happen.
  As to the bill itself, nothing could be more important than for us to 
successfully conclude consideration of this legislation early this week 
and to get it off to the President as quickly as possible. The bill 
ought to enjoy the support of every Member of this body. The sooner we 
can get it off to the President, the better. The only way we can get it 
off to the President, without a veto, is to successfully conclude some 
negotiation with regard to the continuing resolution and these other 
very sticky issues that were not added on the floor but were added in 
the committee, even though they are extraneous to this particular bill. 
We would not be in the delay that we are now in were they not added in 
the first place. Because they were added, we now have to deal with 
that. They knew they were controversial when they were added, but they 
were added anyway. Now we have to contend with it. We are doing our 
best to work with the majority leader to do so successfully.
  I thank the majority leader for his statement today and hope he will 
recognize that there is no delay on our side with regard to the 
consideration of this bill, and we will work with him as best we can 
under these circumstances to get it done as quickly as possible.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I have to say I am very pleased to hear the 
Democratic leader say they are not delaying and they do not intend to 
delay. In this body, if you have one Senator who prefers not to vote 
for a while, he can pretty much make that happen. But if it is the 
Democratic leadership's intent not to delay, that is good news, and I 
am glad to hear that.
  I presume, then, that based on that we will probably pass cloture 
tomorrow, and we can move on to dispense with the amendments that are 
pending in a reasonable time.
  I think the Senator probably has the list of amendments that have 
been filed. As a matter of fact, there are only about 9 or 10 that 
state any purpose at all. Most of them have no statement of purpose on 
file.
  Mr. DASCHLE. There are 54 Republican amendments out of the 120 
amendments filed.
  Mr. LOTT. I thought it was 61 Democrats and 48 Republicans.
  The point I am making is I have a list here, 10 amendments indicated 
by 1 on our side, with no statement of purpose, and on the next page, 
10 by your side. I think there is a lot of positioning and 
placeholding, and we understand that is the way it happens around here. 
I think if we could get cloture passed tomorrow and then work through 
the amendments that are still legitimately filed and we are concerned 
about, we can get those done tomorrow and bring this to a conclusion. 
If not tomorrow, at a reasonable time on Thursday so we can move on to 
other legislation. Of course, another thing, obviously, we would like 
to still hold the final passage until the House has acted. We may not 
actually be able to completely have the final passage until Thursday if 
the House has not acted by Wednesday, but we could complete everything 
and then have final passage on Thursday.
  Now, with regard to the quote about not wanting the President to have 
the upper hand, that is right. I do not want him to have the upper 
hand. What we need to have is for nobody to have the upper hand. We 
need to have coequal positions: Congress has a certain responsibility, 
and the President has a certain responsibility and advantages. We need 
to find a way to work through that, where neither side can hold the 
other hostage, neither side. I am hoping we will find a way to do that 
over the next 24 hours or next 2 days.

  With that, Mr. President, I am prepared to go to close.

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