[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 29 (Tuesday, March 17, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Page S2094]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             CLOTURE MOTION

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, pursuant to rule 
XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, 
which the clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

                             Cloture Motion

       We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the 
     provision of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, 
     do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to 
     proceed to H.R. 2646, the Education Savings Act for Public 
     and Private Schools:
         Trent Lott, Paul Coverdell, Craig Thomas, Rod Grams, 
           Chuck Hagel, Tim Hutchinson, Kay Bailey Hutchison, Mike 
           DeWine, Bob Bennett, John McCain, Don Nickles, Chuck 
           Grassley, Mitch McConnell, Wayne Allard, Phil Gramm, 
           John Ashcroft.


                            Call of the Roll

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the quorum call has been 
waived.


                                  Vote

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate 
that debate on the motion to proceed to the consideration of H.R. 2646, 
the Education Savings Act for Public and Private Schools, shall be 
brought to a close? The yeas and nays are required under the rule. The 
clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. FORD. I announce that the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Conrad) 
and the Senator from Hawaii (Mr. Inouye) are necessarily absent.
  The result was announced--yeas 74, nays 24, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 34 Leg.]

                                YEAS--74

     Abraham
     Allard
     Ashcroft
     Bennett
     Biden
     Bond
     Boxer
     Breaux
     Brownback
     Bryan
     Bumpers
     Burns
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Chafee
     Coats
     Cochran
     Collins
     Coverdell
     Craig
     D'Amato
     Daschle
     DeWine
     Dodd
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Enzi
     Faircloth
     Feinstein
     Frist
     Gorton
     Graham
     Gramm
     Grams
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Hatch
     Helms
     Hutchinson
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Jeffords
     Johnson
     Kempthorne
     Kerry
     Kyl
     Leahy
     Lieberman
     Lott
     Lugar
     Mack
     McCain
     McConnell
     Moynihan
     Murkowski
     Nickles
     Robb
     Roberts
     Rockefeller
     Roth
     Santorum
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Smith (NH)
     Smith (OR)
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stevens
     Thomas
     Thompson
     Thurmond
     Torricelli
     Warner

                                NAYS--24

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Bingaman
     Cleland
     Durbin
     Feingold
     Ford
     Glenn
     Harkin
     Hollings
     Kennedy
     Kerrey
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Levin
     Mikulski
     Moseley-Braun
     Murray
     Reed
     Reid
     Sarbanes
     Wellstone
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--2

     Conrad
     Inouye
       
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 74, the nays are 
24. Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in 
the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
  Mr. KOHL. Mr. President, my vote in opposition to the motion to 
proceed to H.R. 2646 was unrelated to the merits of this education IRA 
proposal. I voted with Senator Durbin on this procedural issue to 
protest the lack of floor action on two noncontroversial judicial 
nominees from Illinois.
  While the Senate should consider how to make quality education more 
affordable, it also should not neglect its duty to fill judicial 
vacancies. The Senate's failure to act on these nominees is 
particularly egregious--one of these positions has been vacant for five 
years, and the other has been vacant for almost three and a half years. 
There are currently 82 judicial vacancies, and continued inaction and 
delay in the Senate is likely to compromise the quality of justice 
available to crime victims and other injured persons throughout the 
U.S.

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