[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 157 (Sunday, November 9, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12230-S12234]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  UNANIMOUS-CONSENT REQUEST--H.R. 2676

  Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate 
proceed immediately to H.R. 2676, the IRS Restructuring Act of 1997 by 
discharging this legislation from the Senate Finance Committee to which 
it was referred on Thursday; that the bill be read a third time and 
passed and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. ROTH. Mr. President, I rise to object to the unanimous-consent 
request made by my distinguished colleague, Senator Bob Kerrey. The 
process of his seeking a UC agreement and my objecting is into its 
fourth day now. I do want to say publicly that I appreciate the civil 
and courteous manner in which the process has unfolded.
  It is my opinion that what unites Senator Kerrey and me is more 
significant than what divides us. His successful commission has done 
essential work in uncovering weaknesses and shortcomings within the 
IRS. The 3 days of hearings we held in the Finance Committee disclosed 
others. Both of us are well aware of the changes that must be made 
within the agency.
  Senator Kerrey is right when he says the vast majority of our 
colleagues would vote to pass the legislation which passed the House by 
a vote of 426 to 4. Indeed, when one looks at the abuses and 
inefficiency of the IRS, it is hard to resist the argument that any 
reform is better than no reform at all. Senator Kerrey is correct in 
saying that the legislation he proposes would make important reforms to 
the IRS, but he is also right in saying that the legislation is not 
complete. It has weaknesses, and I must emphasize very, very serious 
weaknesses.
  Mr. President, the simple truth is that I am not willing to 
compromise on real reform. I am not willing to rush into legislation 
that does not go far enough to address the changes that must take place 
within the agency, especially when rushing in will adversely impact the 
potential of passing real reform later. The fact is, this reform falls 
short of what we need to accomplish.
  The New York Times reports that ``tax experts across the country say 
the practical benefits of the [legislation advocated by Senator Kerrey] 
will be minor.'' According to Stuart E. Seigel, a former chief counsel 
of the IRS, ``Most of the bill's provisions are very limited and will 
not have a significant impact on most taxpayers.''
  Senator Kerrey suggests that each day the Senate delays in passing 
what the New York Times calls minor changes, some 150,000 people will 
be affected as they continue to receive notices from the IRS. Yet, 
another report in the Times makes it clear that ``the provisions in 
[this `watered down'] bill are [so] narrowly drawn [that it] would 
affect relatively few people.''
  Senator Kerrey himself has made it clear that ``this [bill] doesn't 
go far enough.'' The Wall Street Journal of November 3, 1997. And 
Newsweek reports that the strong measures aimed at reform have been 
eviscerated.
  The question all of this begs is simple: Why compromise? If Senator 
Kerrey suggests this bill doesn't go far enough, if we have a growing 
consensus among tax practitioners, taxpayers, and the media that the 
bill is deficient, and if we have the conviction in Congress and the 
sentiment at home that something significant must be done, why are we 
willing to compromise?
  The bottom line, Mr. President, is that I am not willing to 
compromise. Some would suggest that half a loaf is better than none; 
that we can come back and stiffen up this legislation later.
  Well, we know where that will lead. If we pass this reform 
legislation, then those who are not anxious to pass further reforms 
will resist a new bill. The truth is that we will get only one real 
chance to reform the IRS, and we had better do it right.

  There are several significant issues we need to address. We should 
begin by giving the oversight board called for in this legislation, and 
if we adopt such a board, the authority to look at audit and collection 
activities. More than 70 percent of Americans think poor treatment in 
audits occurs fairly regularly, yet this legislation expressly 
prohibits the oversight board from having jurisdiction over audits and 
enforcement.

[[Page S12231]]

  This is just the beginning, Mr. President. Let's include a provision 
to ensure that all taxpayers have due process and that the IRS does not 
abusively use its liens-and-seizure authority. Let's give the taxpayer 
advocate greater independence. Likewise, the IRS should have the 
benefit of an independent inspector general. Let's strengthen the 
legislation to require signatures on all IRS-generated correspondence, 
and let's curb the use of false identifications by agency employees and 
ban the use of statistics and goals in determining their performance.
  These changes are only a beginning of what needs to be done. Yet, the 
legislation advocated by my distinguished colleague does not address 
even these most fundamental needs. If we are unprepared at this time to 
add these things, then let's be patient. Let's not pass a bill that 
Senator Kerrey has already suggested ``doesn't go far enough.''
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  Mr. KERREY addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nebraska.
  Mr. KERREY. Mr. President, first of all, let me return the 
compliment. I have high praise for the chairman. He has done 
exceptional work on this issue, especially the 3 days of hearings which 
penetrated the section 6103 veil and issues that are protected under 
normal circumstances by privacy laws.
  Let me also respectfully disagree with his characterization of this 
as a watered-down bill, citing the Washington Post, the New York Times, 
et cetera. They are apt to object to many of the things that the 
distinguished Senator from Delaware wants to do as well.
  This piece of legislation has the full endorsement of America's 
accountants, America's enrolled agents, the National Federation of 
Independent Business, the National Treasury Employees Union. It is by 
no means small reform. I intend this afternoon to go through the bill. 
It was sitting at the desk a couple of days ago. We could have taken 
this thing up a couple of weeks ago and had a full debate on it. We 
would have had plenty of opportunity to amend it, to improve it and to 
change it, but we didn't. I am going to go through this bill and let my 
colleagues decide on behalf of their taxpayers whether or not they want 
to change the law.
  It looks like we only have a day or two left, but all we have to do 
is bring it up here to the floor. All we have to do is have no 
objection raised, and we can pass this piece of legislation. I am going 
to show some of the new things this law would provide to the American 
taxpayers as they consider whether or not this piece of legislation is 
watered-down.
  Mr. REID. Will the Senator yield without losing his right to the 
floor?
  Mr. KERREY. I will be pleased to yield.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I appreciate my friend yielding. I have 
another matter to attend to in a short period of time. I wanted to come 
to the floor and spread on the Record of this Senate that the Senator 
from Nebraska should be commended and applauded for the work that he 
has done on this issue. He chaired the Entitlement Commission, of which 
I had the good fortune to serve as a member. It was a tremendous 
experience. One of the things I will never forget is the testimony that 
was taken during those hearings about the Internal Revenue Service.
  We have heard figures that it costs at least $200 billion a year just 
for people to fill out their forms. That is only part of it. We had 
testimony during those hearings that the cost of the Internal Revenue 
Code itself is up to $400 billion. It is lots of money, we recognize 
that.
  I worked hard to write the taxpayer bill of rights. It is now the 
law. It was a help, but it didn't go far enough. We need to do better.
  What this legislation will do--which has received the almost 
unanimous support of the House of Representatives, 426 to 4, and the 
President of the United States supports this legislation--this 
legislation would give the Internal Revenue Service some meaning. The 
employees of the Internal Revenue Service support this legislation, 
former Commissioners of the Internal Revenue Service support this 
legislation. The Senator from Nebraska has done the right thing by 
moving beyond the Entitlement Commission, to the Kerrey-Portman 
Commission which studied specifically the Internal Revenue Service, and 
now is responsible for the bill having passed the House and now in the 
Senate where it should pass.
  This is good, elementary legislation. It is legislation that will 
make the American people feel good about an important institution of 
Government, the Internal Revenue Service, which is now a hiss and a 
byword. People should not feel that way about the Internal Revenue 
Service, even though they do. This legislation, which should be passed 
by unanimous consent, would allow the American public to feel better 
about the Internal Revenue Service.

  So I say to my friend from Nebraska, you are on the right track again 
with this legislation. This is something that is necessary, it is 
important, it is important because it creates this oversight board. It 
is important because it allows recovery of attorneys fees. It allows 
recovery of damages. There is a toll free number to register 
complaints. It improves the operation of the Taxpayer Advocate Office. 
It is good legislation. I do hope the Senator will go through this 
legislation and explain to the American public why it is so important 
we pass it and pass it now.
  Mr. KERREY. I thank the Senator from Nevada, especially for his 
earlier work on the taxpayer bill of rights and taxpayer bill of rights 
II. Prior to the enactment of those laws, the taxpayer had almost no 
authority at all coming up against the IRS. With the enactment of those 
two bills, the taxpayer now has a substantial amount of power which was 
previously denied, and those who predicted there would be a big decline 
in collections --which, as you know, was the case--those predictions 
did not turn out to be true.
  This really gets right to the heart of it. This is not just an agency 
collecting money in order for us to be able to pay the bills, whatever 
it is we declare in law we are going to use taxpayer money to pay for. 
This really gets to the heart of Government of the people, by the 
people, and for the people. If people don't trust that they are getting 
a fair shake with the tax laws, with those 8 out of 10 who voluntarily 
comply--actually 83 percent of the American taxpayers comply, down from 
93 percent 10 years ago. To those 83 out of 100 who voluntarily comply, 
they need to know, are they going to get the information they need to 
pay their taxes; are they going to get a fair shake if there is a 
dispute; are they going to face an agency that has the capacity to be 
managed in a way that is comparable to what the private-sector 
financial institutions demonstrate on their behalf?
  The answer right now is no in all three cases. More people pay taxes 
than vote in this country and their dissatisfaction with this agency is 
broad, it is deep and it is urgent, not just for the sake of being able 
to say we have done all we can to get this agency running correctly, 
but it is essential for the sake of people's confidence in their 
Government that we enact these changes.
  I heard, again, the distinguished chairman of the committee, whose 
willingness to hold hearings on this subject has been terribly 
important to examine beyond the privacy veil some of the additional 
problems that go on with the IRS, say this is a watered-down piece of 
legislation. That is not true, Mr. President. It may be true in the 
eyes of people who are opposed to the bill. Indeed, of the four 
opponents of the legislation in the House--426 voted in favor of it, 4 
voted against--the people who voted against it thought it went too far.
  He cited yesterday, and again today, editorials that were objecting 
not to the bill because it didn't do enough, but because it went too 
far. These are people who don't want change at all. That don't want any 
change in the way the IRS is run. They think it is run just fine.
  So for those of us who have heard our citizens say that they call the 
IRS up and they can't get an answer to what becomes one of the most 
important questions they have when they are doing financial planning--
which is, how much do I owe the Government? --for those citizens who 
find themselves in receipt of a notice of collection because they have 
been told that

[[Page S12232]]

they haven't paid enough and find themselves wondering whether or not 
they are going to be able to withstand the IRS's assault on them, and 
for those who watch this agency continue to try to come into the 
electronic world and fail time after time after time, for all those and 
many more besides, this piece of legislation solves their problems. It 
solves their problems, Mr. President.

  I suspect that it is not likely that my colleagues on the other side 
of the aisle are going to come down here and say, ``For gosh sakes, 
let's get this thing passed.'' I mean, on the House side it has the 
support of the Speaker, of Dick Armey, of Bill Archer. In fact, the 
percentage of Republicans supporting it in the House is 100 percent. 
The only people who opposed it are those who believe this legislation 
has gone too far, not that I did not go far enough.
  There are five titles, Mr. President, in this piece of legislation. 
It is again worth noting, for those who say, ``Well, can't we just hire 
a private-sector person, as we just did with Mr. Rossotti to run the 
IRS? Isn't that enough? Don't we just need to manage it a little 
better?'' you know, this is a nation of laws. The IRS doesn't exist 
because somebody decided to put it out there. It was created by the 
U.S. Congress. It operates as a consequence of what the law says, not 
just the Tax Code but the other laws that enabled that agency to be 
created in the first place. So it is a creature of law. It is the law 
that determines whether or not we are going to be able to get 
satisfaction for our citizens.
  So for those who are wondering why we are talking about the law here, 
we are talking about the law because the IRS was created by the law, 
and many things that people have come and asked for, the IRS can't do 
because the law does not allow it. So we have to change the law in 
order to be able to do the things that people have been coming to us 
saying needs to be done.
  Mr. President, title I is called the ``Executive Branch Governance 
And Senior Management of the Internal Revenue Service.'' It sounds 
innocuous enough. Indeed, most of the debate about this piece of 
legislation, regrettably, has been focused on the first half of title 
I, and that is the executive branch governance.
  There was resistance early to having a public board governing the IRS 
and have control and authority over the IRS. We finally persuaded the 
President that this was a good idea. This public board does have real 
authority to develop a strategic plan to make budget recommendations 
and make comment on the acceptability of the IRS Commissioner--
tremendous authority under the law.
  There are some people who would like to go further. As I said, most 
of the people that have looked at this, if they have any objection at 
all, they object to it going too far. They object and say that the 
President should not have agreed to it, that he should not have said 
yes to us in this regard.
  We felt that having a public board--in this case a 9-person public 
board--with authority over the developing and strategic plan was 
crucial in order to be able to develop some consensus between the 
Congress and the executive branch about what the IRS was going to do.
  What is the plan? If you don't have a plan, then it is going to be 
very, very difficult to have any kind of an implementation strategy.
  The distinguished chairman says they want to be able to go and look 
at audit information. I do not believe this board ought to be looking 
at returns, nor do I think it ought to be getting into the details of 
audits. Should it be able to look at the standards of audits? 
Absolutely.
  Indeed, in one of the other titles of this legislation we require the 
IRS to publish the standards of audits. If people say, ``Gosh, don't 
they already?'' I say, no. I say to citizens who are concerned about 
this, we had only one full study on the basis of audits, the way audits 
are conducted by the IRS, only one study by a woman at the University 
of Syracuse who got the information through a Freedom of Information 
Act request.
  And every time she publishes her report, which is highly critical of 
the IRS--saying that the audit is done on one basis in Arizona and a 
different basis in Nebraska, that their subjective determinations are 
rampant throughout, that there does not appear to be consistency from 
one State to another, that it depends on where you live as to whether 
or not you are going to be audited, all kinds of criticism of this 
audit-- every time she surfaces those criticisms, the IRS attacks her. 
``Oh, no. You're wrong. You're just some flake up there at Syracuse. 
Don't trust the information.'' We have all heard that before.
  When you have an agency like the IRS, they are able to say they have 
the power. Since they have the information, they can just say the 
citizen is wrong.
  This law requires the IRS to publish the standards of their audits. 
Let us decide. Let the citizens decide. Let the people examine this 
information to determine whether or not there is an objective basis for 
the audit and whether or not the public supports it. Don't let the IRS 
sort of do it on their own because it leaves open the possibility that 
you get what we have right now, which is a very substantial lack of 
confidence from one State to the next as to whether or not the citizen, 
the taxpayer is getting a fair shake. Again, back to what I said 
before, this is the way the IRS strikes at the heart of 
citizen confidence in Government of, by, and for the people.

  We are not talking about reform in the EPA here or the USDA that 
touches a much smaller number of people or even the Federal Election 
Commission that touches only individuals who chose to run for office. 
This agency touches almost every single household. Every single 
American has some contact with the IRS on an annual basis.
  The second half of this title which is crucial--and this is one that 
if I ever come down here and offer my unanimous consent request, and 
the bill gets discharged, and we vote on it, my guess is it is going to 
go 100 to nothing, or close to it. And one of the reasons I believe 
that is the section in title I that deals with management of the 
Internal Revenue Service senior management.
  People are surprised when they hear that the Commissioner has no 
authority to hire, to fire, to bring on their own team. Now, we make 
certain that veteran preferences are maintained, that the Commissioner 
has to follow the employment regulations of the Federal Government, 
especially the civil rights regulations. But significantly, though, 
this strengthens the Commissioner's ability to be able to manage, to be 
able not only to use punitive penalties for those who are not doing a 
good job but put positive incentives in place.
  Mr. Rossotti is from the private sector who came and talked to the 
Senate Finance Committee, when we held his confirmation hearings, and 
told us all the wonderful things he was going to do to manage the 
agency. The law does not give him the authority to do it, does not 
enable him to do the things he wants to do. We said, you can hire 25 
more people. We gave him the authority to hire 25 more people, the only 
thing is they won't have any authority.
  Those of us who have had the opportunity to serve our country in the 
Armed Services understands one of the first things we were taught is 
the difference between responsibility and authority; that I can 
delegate authority, but responsibility always stays with me. One of the 
worst situations you can have in life is to be given a lot of 
responsibility but no authority.
  And that is what he has. He has the responsibility--everybody comes 
to him and complains when the agency isn't being run right--but he does 
not have the authority under the law to manage the agency, either with 
penalties or with affirmative incentives in place to reward people for 
doing a good job, to reward people for their high-performance in 
meeting the objectives and performance standards that he has set out in 
this law to present to the board and to present to the Congress.
  Title II deals with electronic filing. I can see why some people who 
have been commenting on this bill, as if they have read it, ignore this 
particular section. It is kind of boring--electronic filing. Electronic 
filing does not sound like it is a very exciting piece of information.
  I tell you, for the American people who pay for this agency, $7.3 
billion a year to run it, and for those who are filing tax returns out 
there, who spend $200 billion a year to complete the forms, electronic 
filing is a big deal.

[[Page S12233]]

  Why? It is a big deal, Mr. President, because we discovered --our 
restructuring commission that held 12 public hearings and thousands of 
meetings with employees and with former employees, as well as with all 
the people that help private-sector people, citizens to fill out their 
tax returns--we discovered that the error rate in the paper world is 25 
percent and the error rate in electronic filing is less than 1 percent. 
And we change that in this law.
  We still have a provision in there that requires under law that you 
have to actually put a signature document with your electronic filing, 
even though when we went down and visited the service centers and we 
talked to service center employees about this signature document--this 
piece of paper that has to still be filed, it is a requirement of the 
Department of Justice. The truth is, if you sign in black, the copiers 
are not so good anymore and it will not stand up in a court of law as 
to whether it is the real signature or a copy. So these stacks of 
papers they have down there are not worth anything. It is still 
required under law, but it is a nuisance to the taxpayer. Even with 
that paper having to be filed, the error rate is less than 1 percent.
  Mr. President, when it comes to doing any piece of work, whether it 
is preparing your own or trying to make the tax collection agency run 
efficiently, an error is money. It costs the taxpayers twice. It costs 
them first in an agency that is more inefficient than it ought to be, 
and it costs them a second time because it adds to the $200 billion. 
Some fraction of that $200 billion is there because it is inefficient, 
because it is difficult to get the information, because it takes longer 
than it otherwise would have.
  For those who sort of are trying to, in their own minds, scratch 
their head and figure out what I am talking about--which is not 
altogether easy sometimes--most of us in our billfolds, our purses will 
have a thing called an ATM card, a little piece of plastic that the 
private sector has developed. They developed it to make it easier to 
make financial transactions, to do business with your bank or financial 
institution. Lord knows, it is a lot easier. It is lots more 
convenient. It enables you to do things that otherwise you would have 
to actually physically go in while the bank was opened to get done.

  Well, you ask yourself, ``How come the IRS has not done that?'' The 
answer, Mr. President, again, is the law. There are insufficient 
incentives and there is no way to achieve consensus.
  We started this thing in 1995, 2 years ago, when Senator Shelby and I 
stood on the floor managing the Treasury-Postal bill. And we fought 
against the IRS because they had just been determined by the General 
Accounting Office to have wasted $4 billion in purchasing computers.
  We discovered in our restructuring commission these computers can't 
even talk to one another. You have a stove pipe organization, and one 
stove pipe doesn't talk to the other stove pipe, and it doesn't talk to 
the other stove pipe, and you can't get the information you need. It 
can take months and months and months to get information you need.
  Mr. President, time for the American taxpayer is money. And they pay 
for it twice. So this section in here, electronic filing. Again, I 
understand why it has been ignored by people who write editorial 
pieces, because it is not very glamorous. It is not, you know, a very 
hot issue. It is not the sort of thing that sort of gets the blood 
boiling. But it is the sort of thing that will save taxpayers an awful 
lot of time and an awful lot of money.
  Let me get to the third title. Those who say, ``Well, how about all 
those concerns we hear in the Finance Committee that taxpayers were 
raising?'' Title III deals with taxpayer protection and rights. I am 
willing to go further. Had this bill been brought to the floor a couple 
weeks ago, we could have, in fact, strengthened the Taxpayer Advocate 
Office.
  I am willing to make it more independent than it currently is even in 
this law, which gives the Taxpayer Advocate a lot more independence and 
a lot more power than they currently have. Hardly watered down, hardly 
insufficient, hardly minor if you are one of the taxpayers who get 
affected in here. We shift the burden of proof when you go to Tax 
Court--a big deal.
  Today the presumption is that the taxpayer is guilty. If you get a 
notice, if you are one of the 135,000 people every single day who 
received, in addition to other sorts of things in the mail, a little 
thing that says ``Internal Revenue Service,'' there isn't any feeling 
quite like that to wake you up in the morning. You get that little 
piece of notice in the mail and your hands shake. And you open it up, 
and it says, you owe $100, you owe $500, $1,000, whatever the number 
is.
  Under current law, the presumption is you are wrong; they are right. 
The burden is on you. You have to prove they are wrong, if you want to 
try to prove it. If you agree with them, fine, you send them a check. 
But if you say, ``My gosh, I did this myself. I had an accountant help 
me. I had somebody else help me. I didn't make any mistake. I don't owe 
any additional money,'' welcome to the club. Now it is for you to prove 
that you are right, they are wrong.
  We did not go as far as some would have liked to say, that you go 
immediately and shift the burden of proof so that the IRS has to prove 
you are wrong, because we felt that would punish and penalize the 83 
out of 100 people who voluntarily comply who aren't receiving a notice; 
but we said, if you reach Tax Court, if you are unable to settle this 
thing and you reach Tax Court, it does shift now to the IRS. They have 
to prove that you are guilty, as is the case in every other court of 
law. This is not a minor change. Even though it was only several 
thousand people a year that end up in Tax Court, Mr. President, I will 
guarantee you, if you are one of those several thousand people, this is 
not a small change. This is a big change. And it will likely have a 
tremendous impact on your capacity to get a fair hearing before a U.S. 
Tax Court.
  In subtitle B of title III there are a number of things dealing with 
what is called proceedings by taxpayers. It expands the authority to 
award costs and fees. We earlier had a discussion yesterday of this.
  Today, you cannot get your attorney fees if you are found not to owe 
anything. Under this provision, the answer would be you would get 
attorney fees. You have the opportunity to be awarded up to $100,000 of 
civil damages if the IRS can be demonstrated to be negligent. Today, if 
the IRS is negligent or the IRS makes a mistake or the IRS is at fault, 
they don't have to worry about it. There is no penalty in place under 
the law to the IRS if they make a mistake.
  Under this law there would be. It changes their attitude. It puts 
them in the frame of mind of saying, ``My gosh, if I'm going to send a 
letter out to somebody and say they owe money, I better make sure they 
owe money, I better be reasonably certain I can make the case in Tax 
Court and better be reasonably certain, because if I'm demonstrated to 
be wrong, we could be out of some dough here. And if I'm negligent,'' 
which is very often the case, ``if I'm negligent, we're going to have 
to pay a price for it.''
  We all understand that there needs to be some sort of negative 
sanction against behavior that could put people at risk. This law does 
that in a reasonable, responsible way, but certainly not in an 
insignificant way for those individuals out there--again, 135,000 every 
single working day--that are going to receive a notice of collection. 
This is not a small item for them.
  There is a title in here called ``Elimination of Interest Rates 
Differential on Overlapping Periods of Interest on Income Tax 
Overpayments and Underpayments.'' I will not go into this at length on 
the floor here this afternoon. Again this is not a small item. We have 
taxpayers out there saying, ``My gosh, I don't understand it. You have 
given me a bill, I am in dispute, and I have to settle early because if 
I don't there is a possibility I could end up with a huge penalty.'' In 
no court of law do you have that. In no court of law do you have a 
situation where a citizen says, ``I better make up my mind in a hurry 
here, otherwise I could end up with an enormous penalty. I could be 
penalized as a consequence of trying to make my case.''
  Other titles here are ``Protections for Taxpayers Subject to Audit or 
Collection Activities,'' ``Privilege of confidentiality extended to 
taxpayer's

[[Page S12234]]

dealing with nonattorneys authorized to practice before Internal 
Revenue Service,'' ``Expansion of authority to issue taxpayer 
assistance orders,'' ``Limitation on financial status audit 
techniques,'' ``Limitation authority to require production of computer 
source code,'' ``Procedures relating to extensions of statutes of 
limitation by agreement,'' or ``Offers-in-compromise,'' ``Notice of 
deficiency to specify deadlines for filing Tax Court petition,'' 
``Refund or credit of overpayments before final determination,'' 
``Threat of audit prohibited to coerce Tip Reporting Alternative 
Commitment Agreements.''
  Mr. President, these are not small items. I would be surprised if 
there is a single Senate office that has not heard a taxpayer bring 
one, if not several, of these things to the attention of a Member. 
These are not small. These are not insignificant. These are changes 
that could shift and cause taxpayers to say, ``Finally, you are doing 
something that makes sense.'' The IRS cannot do it today. They are 
prohibited from doing these things. Again, we are a nation of laws, and 
once the laws are changed, the IRS will behave in the way the law 
directs.
  There is a subtitle, ``Disclosures to Taxpayers.'' What is the big 
deal? We had at least one witness before the Senate Finance Committee, 
a woman, who came and said she was surprised to discover that after her 
husband had divorced her and hit the road, she ended up being liable 
for his tax bill. We all heard it and said it was terrible, it 
shouldn't be the case. She was terrorized by the IRS. They put her and 
her new husband in jeopardy. She ended up getting divorced, Mr. 
President, over this because she was better off divorced. It is 
terrible. Change the law.
  Well, bring the bill up and vote on it. You want to wait until next 
year? You want to put these people at risk? You don't want to solve a 
problem you know you can solve by changing the law? I don't understand 
it. I simply don't understand it. I don't understand what benefit is 
gained by delaying. We have a bill that we can bring up today--today. 
All it would take is the majority leader persuading the Republicans on 
that side. Every single Democrat is ready to bring it up. As I say once 
it is here for a vote, my guess is it is unanimous. Once people start 
looking at the details of the bill and see what is in this bill itself, 
I don't think they will object to this. I don't think they will come 
down here and say, gee, these are small, these are insignificant, these 
aren't anything that is going to have an impact on people.
  Subtitle G is called ``Low Income Taxpayer Clinics.'' I say there are 
people who are working, people in the work force, people out there 
trying to figure out how to read the Tax Code. There must be something 
out there available to them. The answer is there is not. We are not 
spending a lot of money, but we are saying keep the playing field 
level, give people the opportunity to get their questions answered in 
the same way you can get a question answered if your income is high 
enough that you can hire an accountant to get the job done for you.
  Mr. President, these are not small items in this legislation.
  The next title in this bill is ``Congressional Accountability for the 
Internal Revenue Service.'' As I said earlier, as much praise as I got 
from the chairman after 3 days of hearings, we discovered for the first 
time in 21 years the subcommittee held a hearing. We had people 
criticize us. I guess every 21 years is too often. This is a 
requirement every 6 months for the Joint Tax Committee to meet and hold 
a hearing with this new public board. Why? Not just for oversight, but 
so we can get consensus on what the strategic plan is going to be.
  Every single private-sector person, every other government agency 
that talked to us about the technology investments, Mr. President--that 
is the key question. How do you make an investment in computers, and 
especially the software and operating system, for this 110,000-person 
agency that processes over 200 million returns a year? How do you do it 
when the processing occurs over a 150- or 180-day period? Every person 
that came to us said, unless you know where you are going, unless you 
have consensus on a strategic plan and understand the IRS currently has 
a board of directors that includes every single Member of Congress, 535 
people on its board of directors--we heard witness after witness come 
to us and say the problem very often is not the IRS, but the Congress.

  You have to give better oversight, more consistent oversight so they 
know what they are supposed to do. Congress is giving permission. We 
are not saying there will be a blank check. Congress still retains the 
authority to cut, to do whatever it wants, in response to things it 
sees the IRS doing or not doing. Congress still retains the authority 
to authorize and appropriate money. We have to have a mechanism to 
improve the oversight that Congress gives the IRS.
  You say it is a small item. It is a big item. Mr. Rossotti will tell 
you it is a big item. There is one speed bump, and he is heading for 
Niagara Falls. When he will have 200 million returns filed, he hits one 
speed bump and he will come before six committees--three in the Senate 
and three in the House--to answer questions about what he did or didn't 
do and why he didn't solve the problems that he was supposed to solve.
  Mr. President, this piece of legislation has many other things, and I 
will probably have an opportunity to talk further about this. Members 
need to understand what is in the bill. You have heard complaints and 
concerns coming from citizens at home. This piece of legislation will 
solve an awful lot of those concerns. You will go home and your 
taxpayers will say to you, ``For gosh sakes, what did you gain by 
delay?'' I stand here and predict the statements didn't go far enough. 
We need to do more. My guess is all we are doing by waiting another 150 
or whatever the days are, and we will pass a piece of legislation 
roughly the same. This is a very strong piece of legislation.
  I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an IRS reform 
index that shows the cost of delay and shows the kind of support it has 
on the House side and the kind of support it has in the private sector.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                          The IRS Reform Index

       As of Sunday, November 9, number of consecutive days on 
     which Senate Republican leadership has blocked Senator Bob 
     Kerrey's attempt to bring up his IRS reform bill: 4.
       Number of Senate Democrats who have urged Majority Leader 
     Trent Lott to pass Kerrey bill before adjournment: 42.
       Number of collection notices the IRS has mailed since 
     Senate Republican leadership first blocked consideration of 
     Kerrey bill: 396,000.
       Number of taxpayers who have tried to call the IRS during 
     that time: 825,000.
       Number of collection notices that will be mailed before 
     Senate returns January 26, the next date at which IRS reform 
     could be considered if Republican leaders continue to block 
     consideration of Kerrey bill: 9,504,000.
       Number of taxpayer calls before Senate reconvenes: 
     19,800,000.
       Number of those callers who, according to national 
     averages, will be unable to get through: 9,702,000.
       Number of those who do get through whose questions will be 
     answered incorrectly: 807,840.
       Vote by which House version of Kerrey bill passed: 426-4.
       Percentage of House Republicans, including Newt Gingrich, 
     Dick Armey and Bill Archer, supporting that bill: 100.
       Amount Majority Leader Trent Lott called the ``teeny'' 
     price of a phony ``poll'' Republicans propose to send out 
     with all tax returns to assess taxpayer attitudes toward the 
     same IRS they are objecting to reforming: $30 million.
       Number of Nebraskans whose entire annual income tax bills 
     would be required to finance that ``teeny'' sum: 11,033.
       Number of members of Congress who ought to know their 
     constituents are fed up with the IRS without spending between 
     $30 and $80 million on an unscientific survey: 535.

  Mr. KERREY. I hope in the time remaining, all it will take is my 
friends on the Republican side simply not objecting to bringing this 
bill up, for us to act on it and get it to the President with his 
signature.

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