[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 124 (Wednesday, September 17, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9514-S9515]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        PETITIONS AND MEMORIALS

  The following petitions and memorials were laid before the Senate and 
were referred or ordered to lie on the table as indicated:

       POM-227. A resolution adopted by governing body of the City 
     of Absecon, New Jersey relative to ocean dumping; to the 
     Committee on Environment and Public Works.
       POM-228. A resolution adopted by Commission of the City of 
     Miami, Florida relative to the U.S. Immigration and 
     Naturalization Service; to the Committee on the Judiciary.
       POM-229. A joint resolution adopted by the Legislature of 
     the State of Nevada; to the Committee on Environment and 
     Public Works.

                            Joint Resolution

       Whereas, Congress is currently considering the 
     reauthorization of the Intermodal Surface Transportation 
     Efficiency Act of 1991; and
       Whereas, the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency 
     Act of 1991 established a new vision for transportation in 
     the United States by declaring that the national 
     transportation system should be intermodal in character, 
     economically efficient, environmentally sound and socially 
     responsive; and
       Whereas, the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency 
     Act of 1991 provides for the funding of transportation 
     enhancement projects, or activities related to transportation 
     that are designed to strengthen the cultural, aesthetic and 
     environmental aspects of the country's transportation system; 
     and
       Whereas, transportation enhancement projects add community 
     or environmental value to any active or completed 
     transportation project, and include:
       1. Facilities for pedestrians and bicycles;
       2. The acquisition of scenic easements and scenic or 
     historic sites;
       3. Scenic or historic highway programs;
       4. Landscaping and other scenic beautification;
       5. Historic preservation;
       6. The rehabilitation and operation of historic 
     transportation buildings, structures or facilities, including 
     railroad facilities and canals;
       7. The preservation of abandoned railway corridors and the 
     conversion of such corridors to other uses;
       8. The control and removal of outdoor advertising;
       9. Archaeological planning and research; and
       10. The mitigation of water pollution resulting from 
     highway runoff; and
       Whereas, transportation enhancement projects enjoy broad 
     popular support and have benefited the cities and counties of 
     Nevada by improving the quality of life and economic 
     development of those cities and counties: Now, therefore, be 
     it
       Resolved by the Assembly and Senate of the State of Nevada, 
     jointly, That the members of the 69th Session of the Nevada 
     Legislature urge Congress, in considering reauthorization, to 
     maintain the course set by the Intermodal Surface 
     Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991 through dedicated 
     funding for transportation enhancement projects within the 
     successor to the act; and be it further
       Resolved, That the Chief Clerk of the Assembly prepare and 
     transmit a copy of this resolution to the Vice President of 
     the United States as the presiding officer of the Senate, the 
     Speaker of the House of Representatives and each member of 
     the Nevada Congressional Delegation; and be it further
       Resolved, That this resolution becomes effective upon 
     passage and approval.
                                                                    ____

       POM-230. A joint resolution adopted by the Legislature of 
     the State of Nevada; to the Committee on Foreign Relations.
       Whereas, throughout the world, an estimated 200 million 
     children are at work, with many of them working under 
     intolerable conditions; and
       Whereas, child labor distorts and degrades an entire 
     society, where children are cheated out of their childhoods, 
     denied even the most basic education and set out, often at an 
     early age, to difficult and dangerous work at pitifully low 
     wages; and
       Whereas, this abuse of children prevents many grown men and 
     women from finding

[[Page S9515]]

     work because employers would rather hire and exploit their 
     sons and daughters; and
       Whereas, children as young as 6 years of age work 15 hours 
     a day, 7 days a week, scrambling for food, drugged to enable 
     them to work longer and faster and often bent, cowed and 
     crippled from overwork, accidents and starvation; and
       Whereas, at a time when new technologies allow monetary 
     investments to cross national borders with a keystroke on a 
     computer and where capital can shop the world for the least 
     expensive and most vulnerable workers, citizens of the United 
     States must ensure that human values such as the dignity of 
     working men and women and the dreams for their children 
     continue to be honored; and
       Whereas, international economic competition must not be 
     allowed to degenerate into a race to the bottom where 
     standards under which most people live are sacrificed for the 
     private profit of a privileged few; and
       Whereas, companies in the United States must be held 
     accountable for the actions of their contractors at home and 
     abroad; and
       Whereas, persons in business, labor and government in our 
     country need to do more by taking action against sweatshops 
     and child labor in our own country as well as in other 
     countries in the world; now, therefore,
       The People of the State of Nevada, represented in Senate 
     and Assembly, do enact as follows:
       Section 1. 1. The Nevada Legislature hereby urges:
       (a) Congress to address the problem of child labor, both in 
     the United States and abroad;
       (b) Congress to support the adoption of the International 
     Labor Organization convention on the elimination of child 
     labor resulting from the 86th and 87th congressional sessions 
     of the International Labor Organization in 1998 and 1999, 
     respectively; and
       (c) Businesses in the State of Nevada not to sell products 
     made through the labor of children.
       2. The Secretary of the Senate shall prepare and transmit a 
     copy of this act to the Vice President of the United States 
     as the presiding officer of the Senate, the Speaker of the 
     House of Representatives and each member of the Nevada 
     Congressional Delegation.
       Sec. 2. This act becomes effective upon passage and 
     approval.

                          ____________________