[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 46 (Thursday, April 23, 1998)]
[House]
[Page H2297]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          LEGISLATIVE PROGRAM

  (Mr. B0NIOR asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. BONIOR. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. 
DeLay) to inquire from the distinguished Majority Whip the schedule for 
today, the rest of the week, and next week.
  Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my friend the gentleman from 
Michigan (Mr. Bonior), the distinguished Minority Whip, yielding to me.
  I am pleased to announce, Mr. Speaker, that we have concluded 
legislative business for the week. The House will next meet on Monday, 
April 27, for a pro forma session. There will be no legislative 
business and no votes that day.
  On Tuesday, April 28, the House will meet at 12:30 p.m. for the 
morning hour and 2 p.m. for legislative business.
  On Tuesday, we will consider a number of bills under suspension of 
the rules, a list of which will be distributed to Members' offices. 
Members should note that we do not expect any recorded votes before 
5:00 on Tuesday, April 28.
  On Wednesday, April 29, and Thursday, April 30, the House will meet 
at 10 a.m. to consider the following legislation:
  A bill to establish a prohibition regarding illegal drugs and the 
distribution of hypodermic needles; H.R. 6, the Higher Education 
Amendment of 1998; H.R. 1872, the Communications Satellite Competition 
and Privatization Act of 1997; H.R. 3546, the National Dialogue on 
Social Security Act of 1998; and S. 1502, the District of Columbia 
Student Opportunity Scholarship Act of 1997.
  Next week, we also hope to consider the conference report to the 
Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act.
  Mr. Speaker, we hope to conclude legislative business for the week by 
6 p.m. on Thursday, April 30.
  I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. BONIOR. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, would the gentleman 
entertain a few questions?
  Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Speaker, I would be glad to.
  Mr. BONIOR. Campaign finance reform. When? When do we expect to have 
that before the body?
  Mr. DeLAY. Well, as the gentleman knows, we are all excited about 
bringing campaign finance reform to the floor.
  Mr. BONIOR. I can tell on your face that you are just overjoyed.
  Mr. DeLAY. And we hope to bring the campaign finance reform when it 
has had open and fair discussion sometime in May. Certainly, I would 
expect we would hope before the Memorial Day recess.
  Mr. BONIOR. We do not know that it is going to be before the Memorial 
Day recess? Is that still in doubt?
  Mr. DeLAY. Anything in this body is in doubt, as the gentleman knows. 
We are working on it. We hope the committees to work on the bill and 
bring it to the floor as soon as we can.
  Mr. BONIOR. I would encourage my friend, the gentleman from New York 
(Mr. Solomon), the chairman of the Committee on Rules, to engage in 
this if he would like. Are we expecting an open rule on campaign 
finance?
  I yield to my friend from New York.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Yes, we are. The arrangement that was made on both sides 
of the aisle on a bipartisan basis was to have a freshmen bipartisan 
bill as the base text and then allow any of the germane substitutes 
that would be offered to it.
  Mr. BONIOR. Repeat the last part.
  Mr. SOLOMON. Would allow any germane substitutes that are credible to 
be allowed to be debated for at least 1 hour.
  Mr. BONIOR. And does my colleague expect the Shays-Meehan piece to be 
a part of that?
  Mr. SOLOMON. The Shays-Meehan, if it stays in the form it is in now, 
it would be germane and it would be allowed to be brought to the floor.
  Mr. BONIOR. Let me ask this question of the gentleman.
  Some of us on this side of the aisle and on your side of the aisle 
think another approach that might be worth debating and discussing is 
the constitutional approach, trying to correct some of these problems 
through the constitutional route, given the court rulings with respect 
to participation in the system and limitations on spending.
  Would the gentleman be entertaining opportunities for us to offer 
those type of remedies to our present predicament?
  Mr. SOLOMON. Constitutional amendments are joint resolutions, as the 
gentleman knows. And we can talk about it, but that is not a part of 
the arrangement that was allowed.
  Mr. DeLAY. If the gentleman would yield. Certainly the gentleman is 
not talking about limiting the jurisdiction of judges, is he?
  Mr. BONIOR. No, that was your exercise today.
  My friend from New York said that this was an arrangement that was 
made by both sides. Can he apprise us who he talked to on our side, who 
his leaders talked to with respect to agreeing on what the base bill 
was? I mean, I do not know of anybody on our side of the aisle that 
participated in any discussions with him on this.

  Mr. SOLOMON. I will tell the gentleman, I do not know who else was 
spoken to. I see my good friend Sean Connery, no, that is not Sean 
Connery, that is the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Moakley) 
standing over there; and I sat down with him and explained what we had 
in mind and it would be open and fair and every single Member of this 
House will be able to work their will as long as they have a credible 
plan, which we can discuss. And, as I told the gentleman from 
Massachusetts (Mr. Moakley), we will make those substitutes in order.
  Mr. BONIOR. Well, we are hoping that when the committee meets, the 
Committee on Rules, that the options available for a full debate and 
opportunities to debate the wide variety of proposals that are out 
there, including constitutional provisions, will be available to 
Members.
  And that is all we have asked for with the discharge petition that we 
initiated, and we hope that we can move on and have a good debate on 
those issues.
  Mr. SOLOMON. I think my colleague will be excited and happy with the 
rule that the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Moakley) and I will 
bring to the floor.
  Mr. BONIOR. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Texas, and I wish 
both my colleagues a very pleasant weekend.
  Mr. DeLAY. I wish my colleague a very pleasant weekend. I hear the 
weather is nice in Michigan.
  Mr. BONIOR. Great mellow moments in the House of Representatives.

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