[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 109 (Tuesday, July 29, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8216-S8218]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




DEPARTMENTS OF COMMERCE, JUSTICE, AND STATE, THE JUDICIARY, AND RELATED 
                   AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 1998

  The Senate continued with the consideration of the bill.
  Mr. WELLSTONE addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota is recognized.


                         Privilege of the Floor

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, first of all, I ask unanimous consent 
that Elise Gould, a fellow in my office, be granted the privilege of 
the floor during today's session.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 1032

(Purpose: To clarify the income eligibility requirements for victims of 
                           domestic violence)

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk in 
behalf of myself, Senator Torricelli, Senator Landrieu, and Senator 
Akaka.

[[Page S8217]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Minnesota [Mr. Wellstone], for himself, 
     Mr. Torricelli, Ms. Landrieu, and Mr. Akaka, proposes an 
     amendment numbered 1032.

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       At the appropriate place in title V of the bill, insert the 
     following:
       Sec. 5  . For fiscal year 1998 and subsequent fiscal years, 
     in establishing the income or assets of an individual who is 
     a victim of domestic violence, under section 1007(a)(2) of 
     the Legal Services Corporation Act (42 U.S.C. 2996f(a)(2)), 
     to determine if the individual is eligible for legal 
     assistance, a recipient described in such section shall 
     consider only the assets and income of the individual, and 
     shall not include any jointly held assets.

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I understand that this amendment will 
be accepted. I am very pleased. I think there is strong bipartisan 
support for it. We worked very hard to make sure it was kept in 
conference.
  I would like to thank Senator Hollings and Senator Gregg for their 
support, and Senator Torricelli who is out here on the floor.
  Mr. President, let me briefly summarize this amendment. This 
amendment essentially ensures that no one who is a victim of domestic 
violence will be denied legal representation because of the economic 
status of her or his abuser.
  Mr. President, I am saddened to have to really on the floor of the 
Senate make the point that what we have right now in the country is 
something close--it is a staggering problem. We have an estimated 4 
million American women who experience a serious assault by a husband or 
boyfriend each year. In 1993 alone, over 1,300 women were reportedly 
killed by abusive partners or former partners.
  I want to make it clear that Legal Services has done a wonderful job. 
They have handled over 250,000 cases involving domestic violence; 
50,000 of those cases involved clients seeking protection from abusive 
spouses.
  The problem is that all too often those on the receiving end of 
grants in some cases--I know in Minnesota this happens--they really do 
everything they can and extend the rules or figure out ways of 
providing legal representation. Most of the time it is for a woman. But 
sometimes what happens in other situations is they don't because it is 
a horrible catch-22 situation where the income of the husband or assets 
of the husband which are the assets of the household makes this woman 
who has been abused and beaten up ineligible for any legal 
representation. By the same token, she can't afford to have legal 
representation on her own, in which case she is without protection. 
This is critically important. I actually don't think that this is an 
exaggeration to say that this quite often is a life or death situation.
  So when we are talking about obtaining orders of protection, child 
support, and other kinds of protection, this is critically important.
  I again thank both of my colleagues for their support of this 
amendment. I want to thank Senator Torricelli who has been very active 
and a real leader in this area for his support.
  This is an important clarification. One more time, and I will finish.
  The legal services community in the country is doing the very best 
job. But, if we had a debate, I would have brought out to the floor 
many examples--very telling examples--of women who have not been able 
to receive the protection. Legal Services lawyers want to provide it 
but are not at all clear that they can because of the income of the 
husband and sometimes the income of a wife. This is a tragedy.
  This is a huge step forward. It is a very significant amendment. I 
thank both of my colleagues for their support.
  Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I think it is an excellent amendment, and 
it is an appropriate amendment. We have no objection to it.
  I urge its adoption.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who yields time?
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I know that we have amendments. But I 
yield some time to my colleague from New Jersey, who has been a real 
leader in this area.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey is recognized.
  Mr. TORRICELLI. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Minnesota for 
yielding. And I want to offer my thanks to Senator Hollings and Senator 
Gregg for agreeing to this amendment.
  Mr. President, this is not the first time that I have joined with 
Senator Wellstone in legislation to help women who are the victims of 
domestic violence.
  In the last Congress we successfully led an effort to deny access to 
handguns to people who have convictions of domestic violence. We return 
here today because the plague of domestic violence has not abated. It 
is believed that there are 3 to 4 million women every year in America 
who are subjected to domestic violence. Every 18 seconds another victim 
is struck. Indeed, during the course of a lifetime, half of the women 
in this country will be abused by a husband or a boyfriend or someone 
with whom they live.
  One of the tragic ironies of this terrible situation is that in the 
moment when women need the help of the law the most they are denied. 
The Legal Services Corporation last year handled a quarter of a million 
cases of domestic violence and yet those women who may have needed the 
help the most could not get Legal Services assistance because the 
income of their husbands, the very people who might be striking them, 
the person from whom they are seeking a restraining order or a divorce, 
made them ineligible.
  The amendment we offer today would eliminate this tragic 
contradiction. I believe it is a good statement by this Senate, a 
realistic recognition of a terrible national problem and the ending of 
this real dilemma for American women, that in the future it can be said 
any woman, regardless of her husband's income, will be able to get 
legal assistance because of her own vulnerability, based on her own 
lack of resources. So she gets the protection she needs.
  I am very pleased to be offering this amendment with Senator 
Wellstone today and once again offer my thanks to Senator Gregg and 
Senator Hollings for their support.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I think we can go forward with the 
vote. I thank my colleague from New Jersey.
  Please, I say to both of my other colleagues, this is a very 
important amendment. It really is connected to many people's lives, and 
many of them are women--some men but I am sad to say mainly women. This 
is an extremely important protection that we are now providing to these 
women with children. I hope we will keep this in conference committee.
  I thank, Mr. President, the National Task Force on Violence Against 
Women and NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund, for their help on this 
amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I yield back the remainder of our time and 
ask unanimous consent the amendment be agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, the 
amendment is agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 1032) was agreed to.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. HOLLINGS. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.


                           Amendment No. 1033

(Purpose: To require the Legal Services Corporation to conduct a study 
   regarding persons prohibited from receiving legal representation 
              regarding efforts to reform welfare systems)

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Minnesota [Mr. Wellstone], for himself and 
     Mr. Kennedy, proposes an amendment numbered 1033.

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

[[Page S8218]]

  The amendment is as follows:

       At the appropriate place in title V of the bill, insert the 
     following:
       Sec. 5  . The Legal Services Corporation shall--
       (1) conduct a study to determine the estimated number of 
     individuals who were unable to obtain assistance from its 
     grantees as a result of the enactment of section 504(a)(16) 
     of the Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, the 
     Judiciary, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 1996 
     (Public Law 104-134:110 State. 1321-55), during the six month 
     period commencing with the enactment of this Act; and
       (2) not later than 30 days thereafter, submit to Congress a 
     report describing the results of the study conducted under 
     paragraph (1).

  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I can be very brief on this. This is 
really just a study.
  Basically, what this amendment asks is that as we go forward with the 
welfare bill and it is implemented in States around the country, the 
Legal Services Corporation compile data on what kinds of appeals might 
be made by women and their families dealing with the welfare law as it 
is implemented.
  It is simply a study to document numbers of people who come to them 
with a variety of different grievances so that we get a clear record of 
what is happening. Right now, in many cases, these lawyers are not able 
to take up these cases.
  This does not mandate anything. It just simply calls for a study.
  I thank my colleagues for their support.
  Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the amendment be 
agreed to, and I yield back the remainder of our time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the amendment is agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 1033) was agreed to.
  Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. HOLLINGS. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I thank my colleagues.
  Is the amendment agreed to?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The amendment is agreed to.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. As to this amendment, I think what we want to make 
sure of, whatever differences we have about the welfare bill, what I 
think is a kind of bipartisan consensus is that it work well as it gets 
implemented at the State level. And so whether it is food-nutrition 
programs or whether it is a mother trying to find child care or whether 
someone who is in a job training program and trying to stay in that 
program or whether it is an issue of public transportation, we want to 
make sure that all of our citizens, even if they are poor, even if they 
are women and children, have legal representation and that the due 
process rights are maintained. I think this study will give us a 
clearer picture as to where we are in relation to these issues.
  I thank both my colleagues.
  Mr. President, I would also like to thank them for their patience. I 
was at Justice Brennan's service and that is why I was a little late in 
getting back.
  Mr. President, I yield back the remainder of my time.


   Restrictions on INS Fingerprinting in the CJS Appropriations Bill

  Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, I would like to raise with the 
distinguished chairman of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, 
Justice, State, and the Judiciary, an important issue related to 
restrictions included in the CJS bill that reform the taking and 
processing of fingerprints by the Immigration and Naturalization 
Service for criminal background checks. At the outset, I would also 
like to thank Senator Gregg for his work on this issue, which has been 
of significant concern to me as chairman of the Immigration 
Subcommittee. I know it is also of great concern to the ranking member 
on our Subcommittee, Senator Kennedy.
  In fact, I chaired a hearing on this issue earlier this Congress and 
am considering legislation to address some of the very serious faults 
in the INS's conduct of criminal background checks. I have also raised 
this issue with the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, 
who expressed serious concerns--in terms of both quality and 
integrity--with the INS's use of outside entities to take fingerprints. 
Accordingly, I am pleased that the CJS bill will take us away from the 
current system, although I know that much remains to be done in this 
area.
  The language in the manager's package will permit fingerprints for 
INS purposes to be taken only by offices of the INS or by law 
enforcement agencies, which may collect a fee for the service of taking 
and processing the fingerprints. The INS has indicated that it is 
moving to a new fingerprint processing system under which it would take 
all of the fingerprints at INS offices, and has indicated that it can 
do so without unduly delaying the naturalization process. However, the 
INS will not be able to bring its new system up and running by the 
start of the next fiscal year. Even with the ability to also utilize 
the services of law enforcement agencies, I believe that a delayed 
effective date of 9 to 12 months will be required so there can be an 
orderly transition to the new system and so that the processing of 
naturalization applications can continue without complete disruption to 
the system.
  Mr. KENNEDY. I agree wholeheartedly with the chairman of the 
Immigration Subcommittee, and I share his concerns. The backlog in 
citizenship applications continues to grow. Without a significant delay 
in the effective date, we will have serious and possibly irreversible 
disruption in the naturalization process.
  Mr. ABRAHAM. I thank the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts for 
his remarks. I would simply like to confirm with Senator Gregg my 
understanding that the effective date will be looked at in conference 
so that the effect of this provision can be delayed--I would hope in 
the range of 9 to 12 months--to an appropriate point.
  Mr. GREGG. Yes. In conference, we will certainly examine the 
effective date of this provision and modify it as needed to make this 
transition work.
  Mr. ABRAHAM. I thank the chairman in advance for his careful 
consideration of this issue in conference, and for the modifications to 
the provision that he has already made. I look forward to continuing to 
work with him in addressing the very serious problems in the INS's 
processing of citizenship applications.


             U.S./Israel Science and Technology Commission

  Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I would like to clarify report language 
on page 65 concerning the committee's willingness to permit the 
technology administration to undertake certain international economic 
development initiatives, particularly as it affects the United States/
Israel Science and Technology Commission. I have long been a supporter 
of the work of the Commission, a binational program that promotes 
economic and technological collaboration between the United States and 
Israel that has already provided numerous benefits to both countries. 
It was not our intention to affect in any way the current or future 
activities and operations of the Commission, and I would like to 
clarify with the chairman of the subcommittee that it was not his 
intention either.
  Mr. GREGG. The Senator is correct.

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