[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 51 (Thursday, April 30, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H2614-H2623]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




 PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF S. 1502, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA STUDENT 
                  OPPORTUNITY SCHOLARSHIP ACT OF 1997

  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the 
Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 413 and ask for its 
immediate consideration.
  The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:

                              H. Res. 413

       Resolved, That upon the adoption of this resolution it 
     shall be in order to consider in the House the bill (S. 1502) 
     entitled the ``District of Columbia Student Opportunity 
     Scholarship Act of 1997''. The bill shall be considered as 
     read for amendment. The previous question shall be considered 
     as ordered on the bill to final passage without intervening 
     motion except: (1) two hours of debate on the bill equally 
     divided and controlled by the Majority Leader or his designee 
     and a Member opposed to the bill; and (2) one motion to 
     commit.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Washington (Mr. Hastings) 
is recognized for 1 hour.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, 
I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. 
Frost) pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During 
consideration of this resolution all time yielded is for the purpose of 
debate only.
  Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Committee on Rules met and granted a 
closed rule for S. 1502 which provides for 2 hours of debate equally 
divided between the majority leader or his designee and an opponent of 
the bill. The rule also provides for one motion to commit.
  Mr. Speaker, let us make no mistake about it. The intent of this bill 
is to provide a better education for the children of Washington, D.C. 
The bill allows the most needy families of this city to choose what 
school is best for their child, and it provides them the resources to 
do it. In short, the bill empowers the families of Washington, D.C., 
who now have no choice but to send their child to an often inadequate 
local school.
  At the same time, though, this bill will help the children who remain 
in the District's public school system. It provides Federal funding to 
help local public school students pay for private tutors. In addition, 
as some students begin to choose scholarships, spending per pupil in 
District public schools may go up, while class sizes go down.
  Our intent is not to drain Federal funds from public schools. 
Instead, we are striving to help out accountability back into the 
public school system. A parent who notices that a neighbor's child has 
blossomed under the scholarship program will have the same opportunity 
for their child.
  The scholarship funds in this bill are in addition to the more than 
$568 million that Congress provides every year to the District of 
Columbia public schools, a school system that spends more money per 
pupil than almost any other school system in the country, approximately 
$10,000 per pupil.
  Mr. Speaker, the D.C. Student Scholarship Act helps the children of 
this city. I strongly support this legislation because I firmly believe 
that it enables parents to send their children to a more structured, 
more disciplined environment. It is their choice. At the same time, the 
bill allows the local public schools to focus on the children who 
remain and allows each school to spend more money for each child.
  I urge my colleagues to support this rule and the underlying 
legislation.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, the Republican leadership just does not get it. We do 
not get better public schools by shifting public money to private and 
parochial schools; and that is, in the end, what the Republican 
leadership wants to do. They just want to start this grand social 
experiment in the District of Columbia and use the bill before us to do 
it.
  Mr. Speaker, no one denies that there is a need for vast improvement 
in the schools of the District. But providing vouchers for 2,000 
students just will not get it done.
  And, Mr. Speaker, to make matters worse, this rule shuts out any 
debate on this matter. This closed rule prohibits the delegate from the 
District of Columbia (Ms. Norton) from offering an amendment to a bill 
that ostensibly affects only her constituents.
  This rule is unconscionable and deserves to be defeated.
  Mr. Speaker, the Republican leadership will use words and phrases 
like school choice, accountability, object lesson to promote school 
vouchers. The Republican leadership will say that, first and foremost, 
school vouchers are about the children. Mr. Speaker, if that is, in 
fact, the case, why have not we seen legislation to provide schools 
districts with the funds they need to hire more teachers so that we can 
reduce class size and more readily promote structure and discipline in 
the classrooms across this country?
  (Mr. CONYERS asked and was given permission to speak out of order for 
1 minute.)


       Circumvention Of Committee On The Judiciary's Jurisdiction

  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I have sent the Speaker, the gentleman from 
Georgia (Mr. Newt Gingrich) a letter that I want to put in the Record 
which deals with the fact that he has asked for a special committee to 
review any reports submitted by the independent counsel, Kenneth Starr. 
In my view, I say to him any such circumvention of the Committee on the 
Judiciary's historic duty would set a poor precedent and clearly 
indicate an intent to politicize this matter, rather than give it any 
sober and objective scrutiny.
  Coming several months before the midterm elections, I believe the 
American public would also see the abandonment of regular order as 
signaling a partisan witch-hunt. This is especially important in light 
of the bias that you, you being the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. 
Gingrich), have demonstrated in your recent public comments.
  The letter referred to is as follows:

                                         House of Representatives,


                                   Committee on the Judiciary,

                                   Washington, DC, April 29, 1998.
     Hon. Newt Gingrich,
     Speaker, U.S. House of Representatives,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Mr. Speaker: During the course of the past several 
     months, news reports have repeatedly quoted you and your 
     office as contemplating the circumvention of the House 
     Judiciary Committee and the formation of a special committee 
     to review any report submitted by Independent Counsel Kenneth 
     Starr pursuant to 28 U.S.C. 595(c).
       In my view, any such circumvention of the Judiciary 
     Committee's historic jurisdiction would set a poor precedent 
     and clearly indicate an intent to intensely politicize this 
     matter rather than give it any sober and objective scrutiny. 
     Coming several months before the midterm elections, I believe 
     the American public would also see the abandonment of regular 
     order as signaling a partisan witch hunt. This is especially 
     important in light of the clear bias you have demonstrated in 
     your recent public comments concluding the existence of 
     illegal conduct prior to your even reading or considering the 
     report to the House.
       In fact, if one looks closely at this matter, it is hard to 
     see how one could contemplate any other venue than the House 
     Judiciary Committee, which clearly has both the expertise and 
     experience to handle any such report.
       The Independent Counsel Statute itself (the Ethics in 
     Government Act, 28 U.S.C. 591, et seq.) is the legislative 
     product of the House Judiciary Committee. The Committee 
     continues to be engaged in oversight of the Act, has 
     conducted hearings on the Act, and shortly will be 
     responsible for reauthorization of the Act.
       Discussion of any underlying criminal statutes that may be 
     contained in the report are under the jurisdiction of the 
     Committee, and again, are subject to continuing scrutiny.
       The House Judiciary Committee is the one Committee with the 
     experience of handling grand jury materials, the secrecy of 
     which both federal law and House precedents require.
       As you know, I have repeatedly questioned Kenneth Starr 
     both because of the tactics he employs and due to the 
     numerous conflicts of interest that have beset his 
     investigation from the start. If this matter is to be 
     transferred to the House, it would be most unfortunate to 
     taint any process from the outset

[[Page H2615]]

     with partisanship or political gamesmanship. Such a process 
     would be widely viewed as a kangaroo court which 
     illegitimately forms conclusions prior to hearing facts, and 
     whose sole objective is the politicization of allegations to 
     influence the fall Congressional elections.
       Thank you for your attention to this matter.
           Sincerely,
                                                John Conyers, Jr.,
                                                 Ranking Democrat.

                              {time}  1030

  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, if it is about the well-being of children, 
why have we not seen legislation that promotes the best possible public 
education we can provide in this rich and affluent Nation of ours?
  Mr. Speaker, I can only guess that the Republican leadership believes 
that Democratic opposition to school vouchers is a good campaign issue. 
But I will state unequivocally that the education of the children of 
this country is not something that should be used to serve a political 
agenda. Public education is the cornerstone of this great country of 
ours, and I stand second to no one in my support and commitment to 
public education.
  The congressional Republican leadership can politicize the education 
of the boys and girls of this country all they want, but Democrats, as 
well as a good many Republicans, know that public education is good for 
our children and good for our country. This does not mean, Mr. Speaker, 
that there are not problems that all of us from the Congress to our 
Governors, school boards and every parent needs to face squarely, but 
this proposal does not address any of the problems we find in our 
public schools.
  In fact, the National Alliance of Black School Educators has said 
that this proposal constitutes an abandonment of the real issues that 
affect quality teaching and learning in the worst of our public 
schools. If the District of Columbia represents some of the worst of 
our public schools, then how can this Congress turn its back on its 
children?
  I would suggest that instead of using the $7 million for a school 
voucher program, that it would be far better to use half of that money, 
as the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton) proposes, 
for reading tutors for the 73 poorest-performing schools in the city.
  I am not standing here as an apologist for the administration of the 
school system in this city, but I am standing here as someone who is 
committed, as are my constituents, to strong and effective public 
education. I fear that this proposal of the Republican leadership is 
just a first step in the dismantling of public education.
  Mr. Speaker, this closed rule is unfair to the people of the District 
of Columbia because their elected Representative of this body has been 
precluded from offering an alternative to legislation which affects 
only them, and this bill is unfair to public education throughout this 
country. I urge the defeat of the rule and the defeat of the bill
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the 
gentleman from Staten Island, New York (Mr. Fossella).
  Mr. FOSSELLA. Mr. Speaker, I urge the adoption of this rule and also 
the underlying legislation. Let me just point out why.
  While we are all in favor of improving education, let us just look to 
the status and the state of the Washington, D.C. school system. In a 
report in the Washington Post, they claim that the system is a well-
financed failure. Despite spending $9,000 per student, more than half 
of the tenth-graders test below basic in reading, and fully 89 percent 
of the tenth-graders test below basic in math.
  Mr. Speaker, there is the old fairy tale about Peter Pan leading the 
children into Never Never Land, and I would submit that that is 
exactly, unfortunately, what has been happening in the Washington, D.C. 
school system. We have been leading these children into Never Never 
Land, never having them to become productive members of society.
  When we think what it would be like back in our hometown, whether it 
is Staten Island or anywhere across America, to have 89 percent of the 
tenth-graders test below average in math and to some extent reading, I 
think we would call for a rapid change. To me, it is not a fairy tale, 
it has become a Shakespearean tragedy, it is a rotten weed, and we must 
root it out.
  I think that is what we are talking about here, because when we think 
about the system, two words come to mind, and that is, what we hear 
today, awful, to describe the system, and opportunity, to describe how 
we can help these children escape the abyss, the trap that they will be 
in for the rest of their lives.
  Let us put a face on it. Beginning in September, there will be a 5-
year-old boy or girl who will begin kindergarten. That 5-year-old will 
soon become a 7-year-old, a 10-year-old, a 12-year-old, and that 
person, that little boy or girl, will not have the same opportunity or 
hope that we should provide. We talk about, well, we know what is best.
  There was recently a private scholarship fund funded by a man named 
Ted Forstmann, a good American who saw that common sense would prevail; 
that if parents were given a choice to send their children to a 
different school, a better school, they would do so. And indeed, 1,000 
scholarships were made available to the parents of the city school 
system; 7,500 applied. If that does not tell us that there are parents 
out there who care about their children, who care about sending their 
children to quality schools, I do not know what does.
  Well, perhaps this will. In New York City, there are similar types of 
scholarships we have tried with raising private funds. Again, in the 
last couple of years, 1,300 children have received scholarships; more 
than 22,000 parents have applied to bring their kids and put them into 
schools that will provide them with the best education possible.
  We talk about the entrenched bureaucrats and the special interests 
who put themselves first. Let us put the children and families first of 
this country when it comes to education. Let us provide them with the 
hope and opportunity they rightfully deserve and expect.
  There was a famous battle at the beginning of World War I where the 
French general said, ``They shall not pass,'' as referred to the German 
troops. Well, they did. But in the meantime during that battle we lost 
over a million lives, and I suggest strongly that if we allow the 
status quo and the defenders of the status quo to win this argument, we 
will see them not pass, that being the children, but we will lose too 
many lives in the meantime.
  Let me just close, Mr. Speaker, with one last thing. Again, we have 
argued that for years, we even heard the acknowledgment by those who 
oppose this rule and oppose this legislation that there are problems. 
Well, I would say strongly that everybody else, the special interests, 
the bureaucrats, those who like the status quo, have had their chance. 
I say, give the people and the children of the Washington, D.C. school 
system a chance for once. Put them first.
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).
  Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to this closed 
rule and this misguided bill. As we move into the 21st century, 
Congress must work to ensure the success, not just of individual 
students, but of all of our young people.
  My mother worked in a sweatshop earning 2 cents for each collar she 
stitched onto a shirt. She never dreamed that one day her child would 
be a member of the United States Congress. But education is a great 
equalizer in this Nation. It affords the child of a garment worker the 
same opportunities as the children of university professors and 
business leaders.
  Our public school system needs help, but siphoning Federal money, 
public money from our public schools will not solve the problems. We 
must improve public schools for all of our children, not to provide an 
out for a select few which will further degrade the educational quality 
for those who remain. We need to reduce class size. We need to create 
an environment where children will learn, put computers in the 
classroom, enacting high standards to make sure that our kids are 
learning, and create that environment, as I have said. And when we 
reduce that class

[[Page H2616]]

size, when we put more reading teachers in the classroom, we give our 
kids a greater opportunity.
  But that is not what the Republican leadership in this House is 
talking about. They have no interest in improving public education in 
this country. Instead, they would take money from the public schools, 
give it to private schools. They would provide vouchers for just 2,000 
students in the District of Columbia, 3 percent of the kids who go to 
school here. This is an experiment which they want to carry across the 
country.
  Vouchers have been voted down in State referendums, declared 
unconstitutional by our State courts, even declared a failure in towns 
where the experiment has been tried. In Cleveland, test scores for 
students who moved to private schools with vouchers did not improve. 
Even more disturbing, an audit found that the biggest beneficiaries in 
the Cleveland area to this experiment were the taxi drivers, because 
they were taking these children to schools, private schools, by taxi.
  Vouchers will not solve the problems in our public schools, they will 
just create new ones. If our goal is truly to improve public education 
in this country, vouchers just do not make the grade. Let us abandon 
this experiment, an experiment on our children. We do not need any more 
experiments on our children in this country. We need to make sure that 
they get the finest education. Let us improve our public schools. Let 
us cut down the class size. Let us make more reading teachers 
available. Let us make sure they are wired up to computers and the 
Internet. That is where the future of our children lie, not in the 
voucher experiment on the kids of this country.


                Announcement By The Speaker Pro Tempore

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Hulshof). Again, the Chair must remind 
all persons in the gallery that they are here as guests of the House 
and that any manifestation of approval or disapproval of proceedings is 
in violation of the Rules of the House.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the 
gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Bob Schaffer).
  Mr. BOB SCHAFFER of Colorado. Mr. Speaker, the Constitution gives the 
Congress the direct authority to play a managerial role in only one 
school district in the entire country, and that is the District of 
Columbia. Only the District of Columbia is designated by the 
Constitution again as a place where this Congress has direct authority 
to deal with the matters at the classroom level of public education.
  Now, that authority has been decentralized quite a bit. It has been 
decentralized to a large unionized government and bureaucracy that is 
failing children and stranding them, denying them any kind of hope or 
opportunity for achieving the American dream and getting ahead through 
academic progress and academic proficiency.
  Mr. Speaker, I find it remarkable that anyone would come here and try 
to defend the comparative record of the District of Columbia public 
school system when compared with the rest of the country. If we are 
willing to do that on an intellectually honest level, one will find 
very clearly and directly that the children in the District of Columbia 
schools are at a decided disadvantage over children throughout the rest 
of the country.
  Now, the left wing of the Democrat party, as estabished and enshrined 
here in the District of Columbia, is one that remarkably favors 
bureaucracy and institutions rather than children. This debate here 
today and the rule before us is about whether we are going to get 
serious about putting children first, putting children ahead of 
bureaucrats, making sure that the comfort of children and engaging in 
economic competitiveness and prosperity is more important than the 
economic comfort of the bureaucrats who run the worst school system in 
the entire country.
  I would suggest the following, Mr. Speaker, that our goal and 
objective here in Washington with respect to the District of Columbia 
ought to be to treat parents like real customers, to treat teachers 
like real professionals, to, in fact, liberate the education system 
here in the District of Columbia, to focus on the freedom to teach and 
the liberty to learn. That is what we are offering through this 
scholarship program, to empower parents to make the educational 
decisions for their children, not the bureaucrats who have left them 
behind for so long.
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I yield 7 minutes to the gentlewoman from the 
District of Columbia (Ms. Norton).
  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. Let me 
begin by making a point that I hope everyone who comes to the floor 
understands.
  The Member who just spoke indicated a prerogative he thinks he has in 
the District of Columbia that he does not have in anyone else's 
district. May I say to him that he has no prerogative to manage anybody 
who is not accountable to him at the ballot box, and neither he nor any 
Member of this House manages anything in the District of Columbia; and 
under the Constitution of the United States, no Member should ever 
claim to manage any people who cannot vote for him. The gentleman has 
no prerogatives, and I will accept none, nor will I accept pejorative 
language with respect to our schools. Let me just start this debate 
with that understanding to Members who want to come to the floor that 
way.
  The District of Columbia public schools are poor, very, very poor. 
But they are no better and they are no worse than every big-city school 
system in the United States of America. So if my colleagues want to 
help the youngsters of the District of Columbia, help them. But they 
are tired of hearing Members of this body, who have not compared my 
school system to theirs or any others, describe it as the worst in the 
United States, and I will not have it on this floor today.
  I oppose this rule, and I oppose it because the real needs of the 
children in my district are too serious to engage in a political 
exercise. I recognize that that is not the intent of every Member who 
favors vouchers, but whether intended or not, that is exactly what we 
will engage in this morning.
  The reason that I call this a political exercise is that the voucher 
bill before us is exactly like the vouchers that have already been 
declared unconstitutional in two States; two courts, one in Ohio, 
another in Wisconsin, in the only court tests of publicly funded 
vouchers have held them unconstitutional as recently as last year.

                              {time}  1045

  President Clinton will veto this bill because it will drain funds 
from the public schools to parochial and private schools. I have his 
statement of administration policy before me as I speak. Let me quote 
from it.

       S. 1502 would create a program of federally funded vouchers 
     that would divert critical resources, that should be devoted 
     to our public education priorities, to private schools with 
     little or no public accountability for how funds are used. 
     Moreover, the bill is apparently designed to ensure that 
     receipt of these vouchers, unlike other Federal funds, would 
     not require schools to comply with Federal civil rights laws 
     that protect students from discrimination on the basis of 
     race, color, national origin, sex, or disability.

  Mr. Speaker, I sought to convert the interest of Members in the 
school system of the District into legislation which could be signed. 
To that end, because of the almost certain constitutional demise of 
this bill coupled with the assured presidential veto, I went to the 
Committee on Rules yesterday feeling that we had an obligation to come 
forward with a substitute all could support if we seriously meant to 
help these kids.
  My substitute would have directed the $7 million into objectively 
approved reforms in the D.C. public schools, chosen because they would 
have the greatest impact on the largest number of students. 
Specifically, I asked for $3.5 million to be given to the D.C. Control 
Board to be passed on for reading tutors in the District's 73 lowest 
performing schools. I then asked that the other half be provided to the 
Secretary of Education to fund proven reforms that fit the District's 
70 lowest performing schools.
  I drew that section of my substitute from the Porter-Obey bill that 
we passed last year on school reform demonstration projects. Beyond the 
quality controls now being implemented by the District's impressive new 
superintendent, Arlene Ackerman, the Porter-Obey program requires 
approval by the Department of Education, and thus I thought that that 
kind of substitute

[[Page H2617]]

would guarantee precisely the kind of controls and the kind of 
outcomes, and the substitute met all the issues that I believe 
Republicans and Democrats say mean most to them; the emphasis on 
devolution for Republicans that has been thrown over to the side, as if 
the people of the District of Columbia were wards of this body, or 
colonists before the Declaration of Independence. Mr. Speaker, I am 
here this morning to warn every Member that this Member will not be 
treated as if she represents colonials.
  The substitute would also, of course, not only have satisfied 
devolution concerns but the concerns of Democrats to reach the majority 
of the kids in the D.C. public schools.
  Now, the substitute was not made in order, nor was an amendment by 
the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott) made in order that would apply 
the civil rights enforcement mechanism to these vouchers.
  What the majority has done is to create a fiction, saying that public 
funds in these 100 percent Federal funded vouchers are not State aid 
for purposes of civil rights enforcement. Thus, if there has been a 
violation of civil rights under these vouchers, the only recourse would 
be to file a suit in Federal court, which of course, would be 
impossible for the low-income residents to whom these vouchers are 
directed.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask Members to oppose this rule, whether Democrats or 
Republicans. I ask them to respect the people of the District of 
Columbia who have voted in a percentage of 89 percent against vouchers.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the 
gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston).
  Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Washington (Mr. 
Hastings) for yielding me this time.
  Mr. Speaker, first of all let me say to the gentlewoman from the 
District of Columbia (Ms. Norton) that this is not and should not be 
seen as a Washington, D.C. bashing bill. The delegate from Washington, 
D.C. is very passionate in representing her area and does a great job.
  I served on the Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on the 
District of Columbia. We worked with the Control Board, we worked with 
Marion Barry, we worked with a lot of people in the years I was on that 
committee and tried to be as sensitive as possible. And I believe that 
the gentlewoman would agree that there were lots and lots of rhetorical 
charges about what the big bad Republicans were going to do, and yet in 
the final analysis, much of what she pushed for was actually put into 
law on all aspects of the District.
  So I think it is very important to say that we have worked on a 
bipartisan basis and on a slow basis in terms of any reform effect in 
Washington, D.C. because, as one of the appropriators said, it is a 
free vote for us to the degree that nobody is going to answer to the 
people in Washington, D.C. except for the delegate. But I think rather 
than abusing that, the Republican Congress has taken all kinds of extra 
steps so, though, that we can be fair and so forth. This is not and is 
not designed to bash Washington, D.C. schools.
  However, let me say this. As the son of an educator, as the brother 
of an educator, as the brother-in-law of an educator, I come from a 
family of educators. And I believe one thing that I have learned around 
the family dinner table is that education should be dynamic. We should 
focus not on the system always, not on the teachers always, not on the 
structure, certainly not on the politics, but we should focus on the 
classroom, the child and the teacher, and that relationship.
  As we focus on it, we should ask, will this legislation or will this 
matter help that child out there achieve a better education so that he 
or she can go on to compete with children from Miami to New York to San 
Francisco to Stockholm to Tokyo? And I believe that if we ask those 
questions and put the children first, we can see that this is a 
reasonable approach.
  Mr. Speaker, this is not a hard ball approach. This is a choice. 
Think about it on a small business basis. If we said one particular 
type of small business would have the monopoly, there would be no more 
pet stores except for the ones that were in existence. There would be 
no more barber shops except for the ones in existence. There would be 
no more restaurants except for the ones that are in existence. People 
would say, ``What are you doing? That is going to kill the quality of 
the product,'' and I would agree with them.
  Why is education so special that we are afraid to put in that same 
element that drives the American economy of small businesses? Why is 
education above a little competition? I believe education is sacred 
enough that competition will enhance it. I think it is very important.
  Last night I had the occasion to go to a dinner for Gulfstream 
Aerospace, which Ted Forstmann is the Chairman of the Board, and they 
were receiving the Collier Award for Excellence in Aviation, and he 
talked about competition and he talked about being an American and, 
yes, the subject of the D.C. Scholarship Fund came up, which he is the 
author of.
  Mr. Speaker, I have and I will submit for the record testimony of one 
woman, and I am going to quote directly a Mrs. Jones, because she 
competed as one of the 8,000 people who wanted the 1,000 scholarships 
and she did not make it and she was crying. And then Mr. Forstmann 
called her later on and said instead of giving out a thousand 
scholarships, he was going to give out 1001 scholarships. Here is what 
she said: ``And when they tell me that I won, I was screaming and 
yelling and acting like a fool. You do not know how I prayed for that 
scholarship.''
  That is what this is about. It is about this woman and her child.
  The question of constitutionality has come up. Let me say this, and I 
will submit this for the Record, Mr. Speaker, but the scholarship 
program fully satisfies the constitutional requirements under the first 
amendment. The Supreme Court has held that assistance such as the 
scholarships provided in this bill is permissible if, one, the choice 
where to use the assistance is made by the parents of the students, not 
the government; number two, the program does not create a financial 
incentive to choose private schools; and, number three, it does not 
involve the government in the schools' affairs. This, like the GI Bill, 
Pell Grants, and Federal day care assistance is a choice of funds where 
the choice is made by the recipients and not by the government.
  I will also submit a letter to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Armey) 
Majority Leader, from Clint Bolick, the vice president of the Institute 
for Justice, where he cites five different cases, and I will submit 
this for the Record, Mr. Speaker:

       Myth: The voucher program violates the separation of church 
     and state and is unconstitutional


                                  fact

       The scholarship program fully satisfies the constitutional 
     requirements under the First Amendment. The Supreme Court has 
     held that assistance such as the scholarship provided for in 
     the bill is permissible if: (1) the choice where to use 
     assistance is made by the parents of students, not the 
     government; (2) the program does not create a financial 
     incentive to choose private schools; and (3) it does not 
     involve the government in the school's affairs.
       The D.C. scholarship program fulfills these criteria. Like 
     the G.I. Bill, Pell Grants and federal day care assistance, 
     the choice of where the funds are expended is made not by the 
     government but by the scholarship recipients. Because the 
     amount of the scholarship is equal to or less than the cost 
     of tuition, the program does not create a financial incentive 
     to choose private schools. Scholarships are also made 
     available under this legislation to pay costs of supplemental 
     services for public school students, who already receive a 
     free education. Moreover, the program involves only those 
     regulations necessary to ensure that reasonable educational 
     objectives are met, and does not create entanglement between 
     the government and religious schools. The scholarship program 
     does not impermissibly establish religion, but instead serves 
     to expand educational opportunities for children who 
     desperately need them.
                                  ____



                                        Institute for Justice,

                                                  October 3, 1997.
     Hon. Richard K. Armey,
     U.S. House of Representatives, Cannon House Office Building, 
         Washington, DC.
     Re constitutionality of District of Columbia Student 
           Opportunity Scholarship Act of 1997.
       Dear Mr. Armey: Thanks and congratulations to you and your 
     colleagues for sponsoring legislation that would create 
     unprecedented educational opportunities for economically 
     disadvantaged children in the District of Columbia. Having 
     defended parental

[[Page H2618]]

     choice programs in Milwaukee and Cleveland, I can attest to 
     their enormous contribution toward the goal of equal 
     educational opportunities.
       Critics of parental choice have raised the red herring of 
     constitutionality. They contend that the moment a dollar of 
     public funds passes the threshold of a religious school, it 
     violates the constitutional prohibition against religious 
     establishment--a position repeatedly rejected by the U.S. 
     Supreme Court. Of course, such reasoning also would 
     invalidate the G.I. Bill, Pell Grants, daycare vouchers, and 
     the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, all of which 
     allow the use of public funds in religious schools. It is 
     true that state courts have divided over the 
     constitutionality of parental choice, usually ruling on state 
     rather than federal constitutional grounds. The Cleveland 
     program, which was upheld by the state trial court but struck 
     down by the court of appeals on First Amendment grounds, has 
     been allowed to continue--including religious schools--by the 
     Ohio Supreme Court pending review.
       For our purposes, only the First Amendment is relevant. In 
     an unbroken line of cases since 1983, the U.S. Supreme Court 
     has held that programs that allow the use of public funds in 
     religious schools or religiously-sponsored activities are 
     permissible so long as (1) the decision where to use the 
     funds is made not by the government, but by parents or 
     students; and (2) religious schools are only one among a 
     range of options, and no financial incentive is created to 
     choose private schools.
       The following U.S. Supreme Court decisions have developed 
     these principles:
       Mueller v. Allen (1983): The Court upheld a state income 
     tax deduction for educational expenses, even though the vast 
     majority (roughly 96 percent) of the deductions were used for 
     religious school expenses. The Court noted that the deduction 
     was available for expenses incurred either in public or 
     private schools, and that public funds are transmitted to 
     religious schools ``only as a result of numerous choices of 
     individual parents of school-age children.'' The independent 
     choices of third parties render the aid ``indirect,'' as 
     opposed to direct subsidies of religious schools.
       Witters v. Washington Department of Services for the Blind 
     (1986): The Court unanimously upheld the use of college 
     benefits by a blind student to study for the ministry at a 
     divinity school. The state transmitted funds directly to the 
     school at the student's direction. Again, the Court found 
     that ``[a]ny aid provided by Washington's program that 
     ultimately flows to religious institutions does so only as 
     the result of the genuinely independent and private choices 
     of aid recipients,'' and that the program ``creates no 
     financial incentive for students to undertake sectarian 
     education.''
       Zobrest v. Catalina Foothills School District (1993): The 
     Court upheld the use of a publicly funded interpreter by a 
     deaf student in a Catholic high school. The interpreter 
     translated religious as well as secular lessons. ``By 
     according the parents freedom to select a school of their 
     choice,'' the Court reasoned, ``the statute ensures that a 
     government-paid interpreter will be present in a sectarian 
     school only as a result of the private decision of individual 
     parents.''
       Rosenberger v. Rector and Visitors of University of 
     Virginia (1995): The Court approved the direct funding of a 
     religious student publication because other non-religious 
     activities were funded as well. ``A central lesson of our 
     decisions,'' the Court declared, ``is that a significant 
     factor in upholding governmental programs in the face of 
     Establishment Clause attack is their neutrality toward 
     religion.''
       Agostini v. Felton (1997): The Court overturned previous 
     adverse Supreme Court precedents and allowed the use of 
     public schoolteachers to provide remedial instruction inside 
     religious schools. Again, the decision relied heavily on the 
     program's neutrality between religious and secular schools.
       The District of Columbia scholarship bill was carefully 
     drafted to meet the applicable constitutional standards. Just 
     like Pell Grants and other current federal programs, it 
     places funds at the disposal of beneficiaries, who may use 
     them in public, private, or religious schools. The program 
     does not create an incentive to choose religious schools; in 
     fact, all except the poorest families receiving scholarships 
     will have to contribute to tuition if they choose private 
     schools. Unquestionably, the primary effect of the 
     scholarship program is not to establish religion, but to 
     expand educational opportunities to children who desperately 
     need them.
       I hope these comments are helpful to you and your 
     colleagues as you proceed toward passage of this program. It 
     is an essential part of the effort to empower parents and 
     improve public education in our nation's capital.
           Very sincerely,

                                                 Clint Bolick,

                                                Vice President and
                                           Director of Litigation.

  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from 
the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton).
  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I would just like the record to show that 
the quotation just cited did not apply to vouchers but to tax schemes, 
not vouchers to parents. But the decisions from which I quoted, where 
vouchers were found unconstitutional, applied directly to vouchers of 
precisely the kind at issue here.
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from 
Indiana (Mr. Roemer).
  (Mr. ROEMER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. ROEMER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Frost) 
for yielding me this time.
  Mr. Speaker, I believe it was Socrates that said the living are to 
the dead as the educated are to the uneducated. In our society today, 
an education is a person's future and their future extends from cradle 
to grave, and we all will be learning our entire lifetime in this next 
millennium.
  I have to agree with the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia 
(Ms. Norton) when she said that D.C. has some of the finest schools in 
the country, and D.C. has, just as every other school system in our 
country has, some schools that are in dire need of help.
  I have visited D.C. schools and met with Vera White, a principal at 
Jefferson Junior High School. She knows every single name of every 
single student and knows where they live and keeps them after school 
for homework. They have a space lab in the basement. They have honor 
roll students and people clamoring to get into that public school. It 
is a great school.
  They have the charter school, the Options charter school in D.C. that 
may be the best charter school that I have been in in the country.
  But we also have problem schools in D.C., and in Chicago, and in 
L.A., and in New York, and in Indiana. And we can get up on the floor 
and point fingers and say we have got a better solution than our 
opponents, just as we did with the budget and we said it was President 
Reagan's fault or it was the Democratic Congress' fault.
  Mr. Speaker, it is time for us to work together on the issue that the 
American people are the most keenly interested in and come up with 
bipartisan solutions to solve this Nation's problems.
  Mr. Speaker, this bill does not do it. It does not give our party 
anything but a motion to recommit. I strongly urge our side and the 
Republican side to vote for the motion to recommit to be offered by the 
gentlewoman from the District of Columbia, for full, whole school 
reform and for more reading tutors in our schools.
  My problem with the vouchers is twofold. We have heard the 
Republicans accuse the Democrats, and sometimes rightly so, of trying 
to redistribute wealth in our country through the tax system. That is 
exactly what this bill does. It takes $7 million that is going to go to 
the public education system and diverts it to private schools.
  If we want to raise $50 million like they are doing in San Antonio, 
Texas in the private sector, that is great. I support those programs, 
but do not redistribute money from public schools that is intended to 
go to public schools and have it go to private schools.
  Secondly, when we have said we want to work in a bipartisan way to 
fix the IRS, we do not say we are going to fix it for 2,000 people and 
leave the rest of the people on their own. That is what the voucher 
program does today. This bill says we have got a problem with 78,000 
schoolchildren and we are going to fix it for 2,000 of those 78,000.
  The Democratic Party, or I guess I am speaking for myself from 
Indiana, we are not happy with the status quo. That is why we passed 
charter school reform. That is why later today in the higher ed bill I 
have included an amendment in the bill that is for alternative teacher 
certification, so that new teachers can come through the system that 
have military experience, that have experience in the private sector.
  I am for closing down poorly performing schools, reconstituting 
schools.

                              {time}  1100

  I am for new ideas in our schools, but the voucher program is not big 
enough to help our Nation's schools. It is experimental only on D.C. 
school children and 2,000 of them.
  I encourage my Republican colleagues, let us work together, as we did 
on balancing the budget, on education. Let us work together on what the 
American people think is the key issue

[[Page H2619]]

out there, providing good quality, affordable education to children in 
D.C., Indiana, and California.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to 
the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Neumann).
  Mr. NEUMANN. Mr. Speaker, I would like to make a couple of very 
specific points here. What this is really all about, what we are 
talking about today is allowing poor and moderate income families to 
make the same and have the same choices in where they send their kids 
to school as middle and upper income families.
  My friend, the gentleman from Indiana, who I agree with on so many 
different things, on the other side of the aisle, I do agree with him 
that this idea of fixing it for 2,000 is not the right solution.
  I think what we should be doing here today is taking the education 
dollars that are already being spent and empowering parents all across 
America to be making the decision for where they send their kids to 
school.
  I would like to make a second point, because we have heard a lot 
about how this is transferring public education dollars to private 
schools and somehow this is a new idea in America. That is just plain 
not right.
  We have a system for higher education in America today called a Pell 
Grant system. Pell Grants are college scholarships that are literally 
given to students that go to teacher and pastor training schools, all 
sorts of different religious schools all across the United States of 
America.
  These Pell Grants are not given with strings attached that the 
government is telling these teacher and pastor training schools for 
religious institutions across America what or how to teach; they simply 
give them the Pell Grant. Those are Federal tax dollars that are 
already being handled in this manner. This is not even a new idea that 
we are talking about here today. It already goes on all across America.
  I think the number one social problem facing America today is 
education. The fact that our kids rate somewhere in the twenties in the 
world is just plain unacceptable. We need to as a Congress, we need to 
as a Nation retarget our ideas that our kids become, again, the best 
educated kids in the entire world.
  To do that, one idea is more Washington involvement, more Washington 
tax dollars, and more strings from here; and that is wrong. It does not 
work. The right idea to solve the education problems facing America 
today is to empower our parents to once again be actively involved in 
the decisions on what our kids are taught, where it is taught and how 
it is taught.
  The way we empower our parents to be able to make those decisions, in 
wealthy families they can make those decisions already, but in poor and 
moderate income families the way to do this is to empower and have this 
sort of voucher system.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to take 30 seconds to point out that if we are 
successful at empowering our parents to be actively involved in the 
choice of where their kids go to school, what they are taught and how 
it is taught, there is a very interesting side benefit. Studies show, 
of 12,000 teenagers that were looked at, if parents were more involved 
in these teenagers' lives, the immediate impact is less crime, fewer 
drugs are used, fewer teen pregnancies, and teen smoking goes down 
immediately.
  As we are solving the problem of education by allowing our parents to 
be more involved in what their kids are learning, where it is taught 
and how it is taught, we expect side benefits in other areas that will 
benefit this Nation greatly.
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I would inquire the time remaining on each 
side.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Hulshof). The gentleman from Texas (Mr. 
Frost) has 11\1/2\ minutes remaining. The gentleman from Washington 
(Mr. Hastings) has 14 minutes remaining.
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Maryland (Mr. Wynn).
  Mr. WYNN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this 
time.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise to very strongly oppose this rule and also this 
very misguided bill. My colleagues on the Republican side come up and 
they tell us this is a noble experiment. Folks, this is not an 
experiment. This is a plan masquerading as a policy.
  The gentleman who preceded me made a very cogent point. This bill 
only helps 2,000 students in the District of Columbia. That leaves 
75,000 students in the District of Columbia who get no help whatsoever. 
This bill only appropriates money for one year, so at the end of this 
year it is very uncertain as to whether this noble experiment will even 
be able to continue. More importantly, this so-called noble experiment 
has been rejected already by 20 States. In fact, three States in public 
referenda rejected this idea twice.
  This is a very poorly thought out idea. Here is why: We did a study 
and looked at some of the private schools in the District of Columbia. 
What we found out was that approximately 90 percent of the private 
schools in the District of Columbia charged tuition far in excess of 
what is being provided.
  So this notion that there is going to be this great choice for 
families is really a mistake. It is really a fraud. They are not going 
to have the choice to go to the Sidwell Friends or the St. Albans and 
the great private schools.
  Let us be candid. Sure, if we gave someone the money to go to the 
best private school in America, would they get a good education? Yes. 
The fact of the matter is the Republicans cannot do that and are not 
planning to do it. It is not practical. The money does not exist.
  What they are basically doing is patronizing the citizens of the 
District of Columbia by saying we know what is best for them, and we 
are going to take money away from their school system and put it into 
this experiment. But no, no, it is not their money; it is new money.
  Look, here is the reality. The District of Columbia needs money for 
discipline programs, for reading tutors, for aftercare programs. If we 
want to fundamentally improve education in the District of Columbia or 
if we want to fundamentally improve education in America, what we need 
to do is invest in public schools. If there is new money, do not 
experiment, put it into the school system where it can really be used.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3\1/2\ minutes to 
the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Talent).
  Mr. TALENT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding this time 
to me.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to begin my comments here today by quoting 
something Lyndon Johnson said, but before that, the Bible said it. He 
said: ``Let us reason together.'' That is what I hope we can do in this 
debate.
  I do not want to bash the District of Columbia schools. I think we 
owe these kids and their parents who care so much about this debate the 
truth. I think we should be candid. I think we should reason, then, 
about the truth.
  The truth of the matter is that the District of Columbia schools are 
not safe, and the kids are not learning, and everybody knows it. The 
longer they stay in the District of Columbia schools, the less they 
learn. The longer high school students stay in the D.C. schools, the 
more their test scores drop below the national average. Thirty-three 
percent of the third graders in the D.C. public schools score below 
basic levels in reading and math, and 80 percent of the fourth graders 
score below basic levels in reading and math.
  For kids who come from these neighborhoods and have as few options as 
these kids have, if they are not learning how to read, it means they 
are ending up in gangs or on drugs or many of them dead. That is what 
it means to these kids. Those are facts that annihilate all these other 
facts and the rest of this debate. Let us tell the truth about the 
situation these kids are in. If we cannot give them anything else, let 
us give them the truth.
  The second point, Mr. Speaker, this bill will help at least these 
kids. Do not show disrespect to their parents, who are lining up by the 
thousands for these scholarships, by saying it is not going to help 
them. They know it is going to help them. It is exactly what any of us 
would do. That is the reason they wanted the scholarships. So we know 
the schools are failing. We know we can help these kids.
  Then the other argument, which I respect because we have got to do 
something about the public schools, is what about the other kids? What 
about the rest of the public schools? This is not the way to help them.

[[Page H2620]]

  Mr. Speaker, this may be the only way to help them. This kind of 
choice program is operating in other schools, and that is what they are 
telling us. This is what the former superintendent of Milwaukee public 
schools says:

       So what I am arguing is that we have got to support the 
     changes that will make the difference for kids both inside 
     and outside the existing system. But it is the existence of 
     an option outside that will help you fight, make the 
     improvements inside, because no matter what people say 
     rhetoric-wise, I can tell you, you can stand up and talk all 
     you want about what needs to be done, but if people know this 
     is the only game in town, there is absolutely nothing you can 
     do other than run your mouth off about what needs to happen. 
     It is not going to happen for the majority of kids.

  This is exactly the kind of leverage that will support the reformers 
and give them the opportunity to change a system that is bogged down in 
bureaucracy and entrenched interest. The District of Columbia schools 
have three times as many administrators per teachers as other city 
schools around the country.
  What else can we do if we do not do this? I will just close by saying 
this: We appointed a general as the czar of the District of Columbia 
public schools, and he tried for a year, and he quit.
  This is a program that addresses a need we all know exists. It will 
help the kids who get these scholarships, and it is going to help the 
kids who remain. Let us do something for these kids. Let us reason 
together about this process, and then send this bill to the President.
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
Florida (Ms. Brown).
  Ms. BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition of this so-
called District of Columbia Opportunity Scholarship Act.
  This piece of legislation would put our educational system at risk. 
Supporters of this bill argue a chance for a better education; however, 
93 percent of the students in our Nation's Capital will not benefit 
from this $45 million bill.
  There is no evidence that vouchers are an effective way to improve 
education. In fact, it leaves those students who cannot benefit from 
this voucher system worse off.
  Every child in the District of Columbia and across the Nation 
deserves our assistance for a quality education. I urge my colleagues 
to listen to the people of our Nation's Capital who want to build their 
community and not dismantle a public education system of which many of 
us have been beneficiaries. Make no mistake about it. The Republicans 
want to dismantle public education in this country and not work to 
strengthen it.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, how much time is remaining 
on each side?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Washington (Mr. Hastings) 
has 10\1/2\ minutes remaining. The gentleman from Texas (Mr. Frost) has 
8\1/4\ minutes remaining.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to 
the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Mrs. Myrick).
  Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I very much respect the gentlewoman from 
the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton), and I know how hard she works to 
face the problems that are in the District, which everybody 
acknowledges. So I do want to say that this bill is in no way an attack 
on the D.C. school system. This bill is a way to look for solutions to 
help and to solve some of the problems.
  Most of the people will agree, and I think it has been well 
documented in the press, that there are a lot of problems in this 
school system. There are problems, yes, in school systems all over the 
country. It seems to be the number one issue that parents say they are 
concerned about, is the education of their children.
  What we are looking at doing with this bill is providing some choice 
for those parents. This bill would give those parents in D.C. the same 
opportunity as parents in other communities across the country have.
  Last fall when the private scholarship fund, the Washington 
Scholarship Fund was announced, this was only for 1,000 scholarships 
that would be paid for privately. There were 7,573 children who 
applied. That is one out of every six eligible children in the District 
applied.
  I think that sends a very strong message that there are parents in 
the D.C. school system who would like and appreciate their child to 
have that choice. This does not take any money away from the school 
system. This is additional money, additional dollars that are going 
into this program.
  Competition is what has driven America. Competition works with 
students. Students thrive on competition. Business thrives on 
competition. There is no reason our school system could not thrive on 
competition. It is very healthy in America, and it makes things run.
  I would also like to just say for the record that my understanding is 
that the constitutional issue was a State constitutional issue in both 
of those cases. This is not something Federal.
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from 
the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton).
  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, let me correct the gentlewoman from North 
Carolina on both of the decisions, both the Wisconsin and the Ohio 
decisions. The courts looked both to their State constitution and 
specifically, specifically grounded their decisions on the Constitution 
of the United States of America as well.

                              {time}  1115

  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Minnesota (Mr. Vento).
  Mr. VENTO. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the rule and the 
bill. Quite frankly, the District of Columbia, in my judgment, is a 
city in trouble, with deep problems. We have individuals in trouble, 
families in trouble, and reduced population. Families are, in fact, 
moving out.
  I think some of the initiatives that have been made to try to invest 
in the public schools in terms of reading and some of the other 
voluntary efforts are good but not nearly enough considering what we 
really have to accomplish.
  This bill, frankly, indicts the D.C. public schools. The D.C. public 
schools are not the problem. They are the solution. The problem is in 
the broader community. And by taking dollars away and not facing up to 
this and suggesting we are going to abandon those schools, we are 
sending the wrong message.
  One of the messages was to let a military general run it. Well, after 
a year he quit. It is a tough job. He could not handle any more of this 
task. I appreciate that. I understand it. I taught for about 10 years 
myself, and I do not know I want to go back into the St. Paul 
Minneapolis, schools today and try to teach much less administrate the 
whole district.
  But the fact is, we have to invest in these kids. We have to invest 
in this community. The old paradigm of getting by that worked when I 
was in school or when I was teaching does not work.
  Look at what is happening in Chicago. Seven in the morning till seven 
at night. We talk about kids entering school, and they actually go 
backwards. The fact is, if you try to plot those kids in some of these 
schools, we will find the population of students in September is 
practically 100 percent different in May. There is no continuity. How 
can anyone teach under those circumstance?
  These are the types of problems we face as they come through the 
door. Does anyone in this Chamber or in this country seriously believe 
that the people that have devoted their lives to public education are 
somehow not interested in kids? That is fundamentally what these 
statements on the floor of Congress are saying.
  We have public education for democracy to educate the people in this 
country, to bring them forward. But the type of students we are 
getting, the kids we are getting, have more problems, and we have to 
meet those needs.
  It is a big investment. It may mean choosing between weapon systems 
and investment in people, but Congress has not been willing to do that. 
We are trying to buy off on the cheap with these vouchers. I think 
these kids are worth a decent investment not a gimmick which only 
offers cosmetic pseudo solutions.
  There is perhaps no issue more important to the future of this 
country than education. As an educator, it has always been a priority 
of mine to ensure that our children are given the

[[Page H2621]]

chance to partake in a quality learning environment. While I understand 
that confidence in our public school system has eroded, the solutions 
proposed don't address the problem. A voucher program is not a 
reasonable or adequate solution to current challenges and problems in 
the public schools of D.C. and our nation.
  All Americans have a stake in our public schools. Public schools were 
established to provide equality of the most basic and important 
opportunity--the opportunity to learn. However, voucher programs would 
make schools more inequitable than they already are and widen the gap 
between some privileged and the vast majority underprivileged students.
  Proponents of the school voucher initiatives maintain that this 
system would bring healthy competition into the educational system. 
This is an unfair assumption, however, because public schools have 
greater limitations and restrictions than their private counterparts. 
For example, private schools are allowed to pick and choose and exclude 
students, while public schools must accept every student, regardless of 
past academic achievements. Also, it is unclear that physically and 
mentally disabled students would be considered in such plans. 
Currently, private schools are not required to include special services 
for these students.
  Make no mistake, a voucher program redirects public funds from public 
schools to private schools. This shift leaves public schools--which far 
outnumber private schools--with less sufficient resources. Expanding 
educational choice for some students should not come at the expense of 
others. Rather than siphoning students away from public schools, and 
the abandonment of the D.C. public schools, we should be focusing our 
efforts on the important mission of improving such schools and the 
schooling within. This legislation provides a select few students with 
vouchers, while providing no answers for the 76,000 students left 
behind in the D.C. public schools.
  Accept the implicit statement that Congress has given up on D.C. 
schools. The same money spent on vouchers could be better used for 
teacher training, smaller classes, expanded support systems and a host 
of other important improvements. Instead of this political solution, we 
ought to help all 78,000 children improve their skills with the same 
money that would provide just 2,000 children with private school 
educations. Vouchers anticipated under this act help only 3% of the 
children in D.C. schools.
  The consideration of choice options will no doubt be influenced by 
many factors. However, let's keep in mind that children are our 
nation's most precious resource--all of our future. Rather than voting 
for a program that will only benefit a select number of students, we 
must ensure that all of our children are provided with the best 
possible opportunity to learn so that they are prepared for the 
challenges of the new millennium. Let's can the new B-2 bombers or the 
missile defense system and put students first. Let's invest to make 
every child in D.C. a winner.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the 
gentleman from New York (Mr. Forbes).
  Mr. FORBES. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this 
time, and I rise in support of the District of Columbia Student 
Opportunity Scholarship Act. If ever there was a national priority to 
do something about the state of education in this country, K through 
12, it is now. That is why I rise in support of this initiative as well 
as supporting the initiative laid out by President Clinton.
  I am a product of the public school systems. I went to a public 
college. I do not indict the public school system; in fact, I revere 
it. But there are problems.
  And in the District of Columbia, where this is supposed to be the 
shining beacon of opportunity, of democracy, we have a serious problem. 
We are saying it is okay for children of people who work in the 
administration, whether it be the Democrat administration or the 
Republican administration before it, it is okay for the children of 
Members of Congress all to go to private schools, because we can do 
something about it, but let us trap in a failing public school those 
kids who come from families who do not have the means to escape a 
failing system.
  Now, that is not an indictment of all public schools, but here in the 
District of Columbia, that shining beacon of democracy, we cannot get 
our hands around the problem. So we say to these parents, sorry, your 
kids must go to these failing schools, but I, as a Member of Congress, 
will send my kids to private schools. I, as a member of the Clinton 
administration, will send my kid to private schools.
  Why do we not embrace, all of us, Republicans and Democrats alike, 
the vast initiatives that will put this Nation on record as making a 
priority over the next 25 years of improving the excellence of public 
schools across this country?
  Let us go for voluntary testing standards. Let us go for 100,000 more 
teachers in the classroom to reduce the size. Let us put subject matter 
back in the Ed schools, not just method. Let us go for teacher training 
and do the kinds of things that will build success and assure that the 
United States of America remains number one in the global economy for 
our children and our grandchildren to come and that we do not rest on 
the laurels of success of the last 100 years and think that everything 
will be all right.
  We have serious problems in our education system K through 12, and we 
have an obligation as a Nation to deal with those problems. Keep 
decision-making local, keep control in our States, but let us put the 
Federal Government on record as wanting to do something about 
deteriorating schools and overcrowded schools and crowded classrooms.
  If we care about our children, we will put this initiative forward. 
We will pass this initiative to give some choice to kids who are 
trapped in a failing system.
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds.
  The preceding speaker may be speaking for Republican Members of 
Congress, but my three children graduated from public schools, and I 
know many Members on my side of the aisle whose children attend public 
schools.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. 
Velazquez).
  (Ms. VELAZQUEZ asked and was given permission to revise and extend 
her remarks.)
  Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to this bill.
  Mr. Speaker, look at this little girl, one of nine children. Her 
father was a sugar cane cutter. Her mother sold food to the sugar cane 
workers in the sugar cane plantations to help make ends meet. This 
little girl would have never gone to college if we had turned our backs 
on public schools. This little girl would certainly never have become a 
Member of Congress if we had turned our backs on public schools.
  My colleagues, do not be fooled. This bill is an abandonment of our 
Nation's commitment to public schools and public education. This bill 
tells that little girl and millions and millions of children like her 
that we are giving up hope on providing them with a quality education.
  The Republican leadership wants to take $45 million away from public 
education to provide 3 percent of D.C. schoolchildren with vouchers 
that they do not want and will not be able to use. That is so shameful. 
That is not the way that we strengthen public schools in our Nation. We 
strengthen public schools and public education by investing more 
resources, not taking it away from them.
  What sense does that make? It makes sense if we want to kill public 
education. That is what the Republicans intend to do under this bill, 
kill public education. Vote ``no'' on this terrible bill.
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  This is a terrible rule. This is a terrible bill. This is a closed 
rule. We have been denied the opportunity for the one representative 
from the District of Columbia to even be heard on this matter, to offer 
an amendment.
  I urge this rule be rejected and this bill be rejected.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I yield the balance of my 
time to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Watts).
  Mr. WATTS of Oklahoma. Mr. Speaker, I have heard several statements 
made this morning and I want to make an effort, hopefully, to correct 
the record and set the record straight.
  One of the things that I heard earlier in argument concerning this 
rule was that this legislation would only help so many students, about 
2,000 students, and that this is an experiment for D.C. public schools. 
And the essence of the comments were that why just do it here in D.C.? 
If we are not going to do it elsewhere, then it is a bad experiment.

[[Page H2622]]

  Well, I would like to note for the record that our former colleague, 
Floyd Flake, a Democrat from New York, and the gentleman from Missouri 
(Mr. Jim Talent) and myself, all three of us offered a scholarship 
program about, I guess, last October. That was defeated. And that 
scholarship program would have been nationwide. We were proposing to do 
the same thing in all 50 States that we are proposing doing here in the 
District of Columbia this morning. And just for the record, about 90 
percent of Republicans supported that and about 95 percent of Democrats 
voted against it.
  But there are several other things that I would like to make note for 
the record. The question was asked, does the scholarship bill not drain 
D.C. public schools of the resources they desperately need?
  And the answer to that is an emphatic no. The legislation would not 
take one dime away from D.C. public schools. It is over and above what 
money goes to D.C. public schools. The funding for this proposal would 
not come out of the district school budget. In fact, under the bill, 
per-student spending for public schools would increase, because the 
budget will remain the same, but there will be 2,000 fewer students in 
the public school system.
  Another question is, is the amount of the scholarship not too small 
for the parents to afford to send their children to all but a handful 
of schools?
  Well, there are 88 private schools inside the Washington Beltway that 
cost less than $4,000 per student, including 60 that cost less than 
$3,200. These schools include Catholic, Protestant, Muslim and private 
nonsectarian schools.
  Another question that has been raised this morning is, will private 
schools not just cherrypick the brightest students and leave the public 
schools with the students who need the most help?
  Well, the scholarships do not go to the schools. They are awarded to 
parents. The parents decide where the children go. So the parents, if 
there is any cherrypicking, the parents will be the ones doing the 
cherrypicking. They will pick the best schools. The parents will. Not 
the teachers, not the school system, not the government, but the 
parents will determine where their children go to school.
  There is another question under the bill, is will schools not be able 
to discriminate against children, African American children, or against 
any other group of children that the legislation does not protect?
  Section 7 of this bill specifically prohibits discrimination. It 
reads, ``An eligible institution participating in the scholarship 
program under this subtitle shall not engage in any practice that 
discriminates on the basis of race, color, national origin or sex.''
  It also specifically states in section 8 that nothing in the bill 
shall affect the rights of students or the obligations of the District 
of Columbia public schools under the Individuals With Disabilities Act. 
Nothing in the bill waives any current Federal, State or local statute 
protecting civil rights. In fact, private and religious schools in the 
District today are already subject to D.C. civil rights laws, one of 
the most expansive in the country.
  Mr. Speaker, I say to my colleagues, good public schools should not 
be threatened by this legislation. We talk about how money is going, 
that we are taking money from public schools and putting it into the 
private school system. We fail to overlook that the money from this 
program is over and above the D.C. public school funding.
  And we talk about how we are taking money from public schools. Let me 
tell my colleagues, when I went to Congressman Flake's district and 
looked at his school system up there, and I have traveled around the 
country and looked at different private school programs and what they 
are doing and what the Catholics in New York are doing, and we talk 
about cherrypicking, there are private schools in America today where 
they take the lowest on the totem poll.

                              {time}  1130

  Say, give us the most challenging student that they have. We will 
take them. We will prepare school just for them. But we talk about 
cherry-picking, we talk about where the money is going and how we are 
taking money from public schools.
  And I heard Floyd Flake. Floyd Flake reminded me of something very 
important that I think we all should note and all should remember. He 
said this. He said, we are talking about taking money from public 
schools. He said, our prison system is what is taking money from public 
schools, because rather than spending the money on our kids to read, 
write, and do the arithmetic, putting them in quality venues, we end up 
spending $25,000 or $30,000 a year because they cannot read, write, or 
do the arithmetic but put them in prison.
  So I support my colleagues on the Democratic side and Republican side 
as well to say, let us support this rule. Let us support this 
legislation. This is good public policy.
  Mr. GOSS. Madam Speaker, I rise in support of the rule. As this 
legislation is the result of a negotiated compromise and the work of 
both Houses, I do believe that a closed rule is appropriate.
  No one can deny the children of our Capitol City are in trouble. 
Almost every measurable statistic proves that the D.C. school system is 
failing these children. One in particular, though, is staggering--85 
percent of D.C. public school graduates who enter the University of 
District Columbia need remedial coursework before beginning their 
college studies! But our focus should be on children and families, not 
statistics. These families should not be forced to tolerate failure--
they should be empowered with choice so that their kids can succeed.
  Given the dismal state of the D.C. school system and the common sense 
approach this legislation takes, it is difficult to understand why some 
of my colleagues are so opposed to this bill. S. 1502 is straight 
forward--it adds $7 million of new money so that 2,000 kids can receive 
scholarships to attend the school of their choice and an equal number 
of students may receive tutorial assistance. That means more money per 
pupil, not less. This is not about taking away from public education, 
it is about returning accountability to public education!
  Mr. Speaker, school choice is working in my district because it 
returns accountability to parents and families, rather than education 
bureaucrats. Low-income D.C. residents support scholarships by a 59 to 
17 margin. The demand is there, the need has been proven beyond 
question and today we are acting. I commend Mr. Armey, Mr. Lipinski, 
and others for their bipartisan leadership on this issue.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I move the previous question 
on the resolution.
  The previous question was ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Hulshof). The question is on the 
resolution.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the ayes appeared to have it.
  Mr. FROST. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a 
quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not 
present.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Evidently a quorum is not present.
  The Sergeant at Arms will notify absent Members.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 224, 
nays 199, not voting 9, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 117]

                               YEAS--224

     Aderholt
     Archer
     Armey
     Bachus
     Baker
     Ballenger
     Barr
     Barrett (NE)
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bass
     Bereuter
     Bilbray
     Bilirakis
     Bliley
     Blunt
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Bono
     Brady
     Bryant
     Bunning
     Burr
     Burton
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Campbell
     Canady
     Cannon
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chambliss
     Chenoweth
     Christensen
     Coble
     Coburn
     Collins
     Combest
     Cook
     Cooksey
     Cox
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cubin
     Cunningham
     Davis (VA)
     Deal
     DeLay
     Diaz-Balart
     Dickey
     Doolittle
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Ehlers
     Ehrlich
     Emerson
     English
     Ensign
     Everett
     Ewing
     Fawell
     Foley
     Forbes
     Fossella
     Fowler
     Fox
     Franks (NJ)
     Frelinghuysen
     Gallegly
     Ganske
     Gekas
     Gibbons
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Gilman
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Goss
     Graham
     Granger
     Greenwood
     Gutknecht
     Hansen
     Hastert
     Hastings (WA)
     Hayworth
     Hefley
     Herger
     Hill
     Hilleary
     Hobson
     Hoekstra
     Horn
     Hostettler
     Houghton
     Hulshof
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Istook
     Jenkins
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson, Sam
     Jones
     Kasich
     Kelly
     Kim
     King (NY)
     Kingston
     Klug
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     LaHood
     Largent
     Latham
     LaTourette
     Lazio
     Leach
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (KY)
     Linder
     Livingston
     LoBiondo
     Lucas

[[Page H2623]]


     Manzullo
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McDade
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McIntosh
     McKeon
     Metcalf
     Mica
     Miller (FL)
     Moran (KS)
     Myrick
     Nethercutt
     Neumann
     Ney
     Northup
     Norwood
     Nussle
     Oxley
     Packard
     Pappas
     Parker
     Paul
     Paxon
     Pease
     Peterson (PA)
     Petri
     Pickering
     Pitts
     Pombo
     Porter
     Portman
     Pryce (OH)
     Quinn
     Radanovich
     Ramstad
     Redmond
     Regula
     Riggs
     Riley
     Rogan
     Rogers
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Roukema
     Royce
     Ryun
     Salmon
     Sanford
     Saxton
     Scarborough
     Schaefer, Dan
     Schaffer, Bob
     Sensenbrenner
     Sessions
     Shadegg
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shimkus
     Shuster
     Skeen
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (TX)
     Smith, Linda
     Snowbarger
     Solomon
     Souder
     Spence
     Stearns
     Stump
     Sununu
     Talent
     Tauzin
     Taylor (NC)
     Thomas
     Thornberry
     Thune
     Tiahrt
     Traficant
     Upton
     Walsh
     Wamp
     Watkins
     Watts (OK)
     Weldon (FL)
     Weldon (PA)
     Weller
     White
     Whitfield
     Wicker
     Wolf
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)

                               NAYS--199

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Allen
     Andrews
     Baesler
     Baldacci
     Barcia
     Barrett (WI)
     Becerra
     Bentsen
     Berman
     Berry
     Bishop
     Blagojevich
     Blumenauer
     Bonior
     Borski
     Boswell
     Boucher
     Boyd
     Brown (CA)
     Brown (FL)
     Brown (OH)
     Capps
     Cardin
     Carson
     Clay
     Clayton
     Clement
     Clyburn
     Condit
     Conyers
     Costello
     Coyne
     Cramer
     Cummings
     Danner
     Davis (FL)
     Davis (IL)
     DeFazio
     DeGette
     Delahunt
     DeLauro
     Deutsch
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Doggett
     Dooley
     Doyle
     Edwards
     Engel
     Eshoo
     Etheridge
     Evans
     Farr
     Fattah
     Fazio
     Filner
     Ford
     Frank (MA)
     Frost
     Furse
     Gejdenson
     Gephardt
     Goode
     Gordon
     Green
     Gutierrez
     Hall (OH)
     Hamilton
     Harman
     Hastings (FL)
     Hefner
     Hilliard
     Hinchey
     Hinojosa
     Holden
     Hooley
     Hoyer
     Jackson (IL)
     Jackson-Lee (TX)
     John
     Johnson (WI)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Kanjorski
     Kaptur
     Kennedy (MA)
     Kennedy (RI)
     Kildee
     Kilpatrick
     Kind (WI)
     Kleczka
     Klink
     Kucinich
     LaFalce
     Lampson
     Lantos
     Lee
     Levin
     Lewis (GA)
     Lipinski
     Lofgren
     Lowey
     Luther
     Maloney (CT)
     Maloney (NY)
     Manton
     Markey
     Martinez
     Mascara
     Matsui
     McCarthy (MO)
     McCarthy (NY)
     McDermott
     McGovern
     McHale
     McIntyre
     McKinney
     McNulty
     Meehan
     Meeks (NY)
     Menendez
     Millender-McDonald
     Miller (CA)
     Minge
     Mink
     Moakley
     Mollohan
     Moran (VA)
     Morella
     Murtha
     Nadler
     Neal
     Oberstar
     Obey
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Owens
     Pallone
     Pascrell
     Pastor
     Payne
     Pelosi
     Peterson (MN)
     Pickett
     Pomeroy
     Poshard
     Price (NC)
     Rahall
     Rangel
     Reyes
     Rivers
     Rodriguez
     Roemer
     Rothman
     Roybal-Allard
     Rush
     Sabo
     Sanchez
     Sanders
     Sawyer
     Schumer
     Scott
     Serrano
     Sherman
     Sisisky
     Skaggs
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Smith, Adam
     Snyder
     Spratt
     Stabenow
     Stark
     Stenholm
     Stokes
     Strickland
     Stupak
     Tanner
     Tauscher
     Taylor (MS)
     Thompson
     Thurman
     Tierney
     Torres
     Towns
     Turner
     Velazquez
     Vento
     Visclosky
     Waters
     Watt (NC)
     Waxman
     Wexler
     Weygand
     Wise
     Woolsey
     Wynn
     Yates

                             NOT VOTING--9

     Bateman
     Dixon
     Gonzalez
     Hall (TX)
     Jefferson
     Kennelly
     Meek (FL)
     Sandlin
     Smith (OR)

                              {time}  1152

  Ms. WATERS changed her vote from ``yea'' to ``nay.''
  So the resolution was agreed to.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________