[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 80 (Thursday, June 18, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H4727-H4739]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




CONFERENCE REPORT ON H.R. 2646, EDUCATION SAVINGS AND SCHOOL EXCELLENCE 
                              ACT OF 1998

  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 471, I call 
up the conference report on the bill (H.R. 2646) to amend the Internal 
Revenue Code of 1986 to allow tax-free expenditures from education 
individual retirement accounts for elementary and secondary school 
expenses, to increase the maximum annual amount of contributions to 
such accounts, and for other purposes.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Ney). Pursuant to the rule, the 
conference report is considered as having been read.
  (For conference report and statement, see proceedings of the House of 
Monday, June 15, 1998, at page H4551.)
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. 
Goodling), and the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) each will 
control 30 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Goodling).


                             General Leave

  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their 
remarks and include extraneous material on the conference report on 
H.R. 2646.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the conference report on H.R. 2646, 
the

[[Page H4728]]

Coverdell A-plus Education Savings Account legislation. These new 
education accounts will allow parents, grandparents, friends and others 
to open an education IRA for a child's educational needs.
  The accounts will encourage saving for the future. It moves us from 
last year's post-secondary account down to a K-through-12 savings 
account.
  Some may ask why am I supporting it since it does not include the 
testing prohibition language and the answer is very clear. In order to 
prevent this legislation from getting bogged down in the Senate, we 
took a different route.
  Mr. Speaker, I have a letter of assurance from the Speaker and from 
the Majority Leader of the Senate which make its very, very clear that 
the text of the fiscal year 1999 Labor, Health and Human Services and 
Education Appropriation bill, and any supplemental or any other such 
legislation, will not, I quote, will not leave Congress without a 
testing provision that I find to be satisfactory, which of course means 
no test, no new national test.
  If the appropriation bill, as I said, does not make it to the 
President's desk, then every effort will be made to include this in a 
continuing resolution or any other must-pass legislation.
  Mr. Speaker, I will include a copy of the letter that I received from 
the Speaker and the Senate Majority Leader in the Record after my 
remarks.
  Mr. Speaker, I thank Speaker Gingrich and Majority Leader Lott for 
their careful attention to this important issue. Senator Ashcroft and I 
have labored long and hard to protect against top-down, Washington-
based testing. Senator Ashcroft's amendment and my testing prohibition 
bill have passed the Senate and the House, respectively, on recorded 
votes. Members are on record as opposing new Federal testing that is 
not specifically authorized by Congress. With our leadership's help, we 
will continue to pursue a ban on funding for the President's testing 
plan during the appropriations process.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Texas (Chairman 
Archer) and the other conferees for their support in retaining the 
Reading Excellence Act in the final conference report. This act, which 
the administration now supports, will provide $210 million in funding 
for new research, teacher training, and individual grants to help 
improve K-through-12 reading instruction.
  The act is the House Republican counterproposal to President 
Clinton's America Reads program, which aims to send semi-trained 
volunteers into the classroom. Our reading bill will bolster the 
reading skills of children by providing more resources, research, and 
training to teachers, not untrained volunteers.
  I also want to state that there is a technical error in the report 
regarding the participation of private schools in the program. I want 
to assure my colleagues that we will do everything possible to correct 
this error.
  Mr. Speaker, a few of the other important education provisions 
included in the final bill are: Incentive grants to schools that 
produce academic excellence, public schools; incentive grants for 
States that implement merit pay for teachers; the allowance of the use 
of Federal dollars to be used for same-gender schools where comparable 
educational opportunities are offered for students of both sexes; and 
allowing weapons to be admitted as evidence in internal school 
disciplinary proceedings.
  Finally, I would note that the Gordon block grant proposal was 
dropped from the bill, again in an effort to protect the bill from 
getting bogged down in the other body. However, I expect the Committee 
on Education and the Workforce will be taking action on some block 
grant initiative in the future.
  The letter referred to is as follows:


                                Congress of the United States,

                                     Washington, DC, June 5, 1998.
     Hon. Bill Goodling,
     Chairman, Committee on Education and the Workforce, House of 
         Representatives, Washington, DC.

     Hon. John Ashcroft,
     U.S. Senate,
     Washington, DC.
       Gentlemen: We are grateful to the two of you for taking the 
     lead on requiring that testing of students remain at the 
     state and local level. The administration's proposal to 
     control student testing at the federal level necessarily 
     would result in government control of the curriculum. 
     Stopping this central government control of student testing 
     is a very important part of our Republican plan to return our 
     schools to the control of the parents and teachers at the 
     local level.
       We have worked with you and voted with you to pass a 
     federal testing prohibition bill in the House and to add an 
     amendment to H.R. 2646, the Education Savings Act for Public 
     and Private Schools. Obviously, since this bill is under the 
     threat of a veto by the administration and a filibuster by 
     Senate Democrats, it does not serve our interests to pursue 
     the ban on federal testing in this bill.
       Therefore, in order to ensure that Congress will pass and 
     send to the President a ban on federal testing, you have our 
     commitment to support inclusion of your testing prohibition 
     language (H.R. 2846/Amendment 2300 to H.R. 2646) in the base 
     text of the FY1999 Labor, Health and Human Services, and 
     Education Appropriations bill. This language will be 
     maintained through floor action and the conference committee 
     process. You have our commitment that this bill will not 
     leave the Congress without a testing provision that you find 
     to be satisfactory.
       If for some reason the Labor/HHS/Education Appropriations 
     bill does not make it to the President's desk, then we will 
     support efforts to include this provision in any Continuing 
     Resolution(s), or other ``must pass'' legislation in both 
     bodies. We appreciate your leadership over the past months on 
     this most important issue and look forward to continuing to 
     work closely with you.
           Sincerely,
     Trent Lott.
     Newt Gingrich.

  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I am so surprised that my Republican friends on the 
Committee on Ways and Means, the tax writing committee, have distanced 
themselves so far from this bill. This is a tax bill. No one challenges 
that this is a tax bill.
  My Republican friends are saying that this code is so complicated, so 
unfair, that it ought to be pulled up by its roots. And yesterday it 
said after we get rid of President Clinton, we will get rid of the 
code, which is good talk before an election. But if the code is so 
complicated, why would the Republicans add this fertilizer to the roots 
that they want to pull up?
  This is supposed to be an education bill? What does it say? The 
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Goodling), my good friend, never even 
talked about that. He talked about all of the fine efforts that we have 
to make to have our kids to read.
  Mr. Speaker, let us talk taxes. Let us say what we are going to do 
for the American parents here. Because the gentleman and I agree that 
one of the most important things that we have to do to maintain 
America's competitive position is to educate our young people so that 
they will be able to meet the challenges of the next century.
  So while all America is paused waiting to hear what is the Republican 
plan to better equip our children, they send a man who knows how to 
educate our children, who chairs the committee, who really sincerely 
has proven over the years his dedication for educating our children, 
they send him to this floor with a tax bill. So let us see the merits 
of the tax bill.
  Mr. Speaker, if an American child has an income less than $150,000, 
this bill allows an account to be opened in the child's name.

                              {time}  1045

  If the child has friends, relatives, corporate figures, or anybody 
that loves this poor child enough, they can deposit into an account up 
to $2,000. There is no provision in the bill of what happens if you do 
not make the $2,000, but that is not important, because the government 
does not give you the $2,000. The government gives you a tax-free 
status on the interest. So if you are lucky, you can make, out of this 
bill, anywhere between $7 a year upwards to $37 a year, depending on 
your accounting system.
  For those who do not want to complicate the code, what does this all 
mean? It is an educational bill. It means that, out of the $2,000, you 
can use this money to further the education of your child.
  Let us take a closer look at the bill and find out. Is education 
schools, the renovation of schools, the construction of schools? Does 
it mean adding teachers to the school? Does it mean buying books and 
equipment for the school? No, no, no, Mr. Rangel, this is a tax bill.
  What do you expect in a tax bill? Oh, I got it. The bill says that 
you can deduct and pay for, under this, if you

[[Page H4729]]

have a tutor for your child, or, if you do not have a tutor, if anyone 
is teaching your child, or, if you do not have anyone to teach your 
child, baby-sitting can be considered a part of instructing your child, 
or it could be transportation for your child to school. You could pay 
for the school bus. You could pay for the cab. You could pay for the 
scooter bike to get there.
  There are other provisions in this bill that perhaps make a lot more 
sense, and that is that you can buy books. You can buy tablets. You can 
buy pens and pencils for your children.
  I do not know whether the rest of the family can use these things, 
because, after all, this tax legislation means that these things have 
to be bought for the child. So we have to make certain that you have 
the school equipment on one side and what the parents would use on the 
other side.
  If you want to get a television set, because you can get a lot of 
education on TVs these days, they have got educational channels, I 
suspect we may have to get an opinion from the Internal Revenue 
Service, that is, before you throw that out with the rest of the tax 
code, to see whether you can buy a TV.
  It is disgraceful. It is embarrassing. It is a terrible hoax to play 
on the American people to have education associated in any way with 
this bill. Let me tell you one of the reasons is because nobody has 
given any thought to this thing. Has this thing gone to any committee 
for consideration? Did we not have hearings on this? Were there 
teachers coming down saying, for God's sake, pass this so that I can 
educate the children, or were the parent-teacher associations marching 
around the Capitol saying pass this education initiative?
  My God, even the Republican National Committee is not supporting 
this. But it is closer to election time. Legislation is more designed 
for bumper stickers than it is to be passed into law. So the President, 
in his wisdom, will not allow the Internal Revenue Service to have to 
add this to the complicated code which my colleagues want to pull up by 
the roots. The President will spare my colleagues the embarrassment of 
having to administer this bill.
  However, there are bills here that have been passed that make a lot 
of sense. In my motion to recommit, I am going to ask that we give an 
opportunity for Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, 
to do something constructive; and that is to ask the committee to go 
back in and to commit themselves, not to tax laws, but to education, to 
rebuild our schools, to vitalize our schools.
  We need $172 billion for the new schools and to bring back our 
decrepit schools. So let this be the last time before election that we 
try to get bumper-sticker type of legislation.
  When you say education, look somewhere and, instead of just bringing 
the distinguished gentleman here who has dedicated his life to 
education, if it is going to be taxes, bring the chairman from the 
Joint Committee on Taxation, and let us talk about this bill and how 
effective it is going to be.
  Other than that, I want to see whether anybody else wants to stand up 
and support this.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield what time he may consume to the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. English) from the Committee on Ways 
and Means.
  Mr. ENGLISH of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I am delighted with the 
opportunity to appear here on behalf of this conference report. Let me 
tell you why I think this is important. I believe very strongly that 
families who save to put their kids through school, whether it is 
primary, secondary school, or college, whether it is a private 
institution or a public institution, should be able to save without 
having those savings taxed.
  It is not a big tax break. It is a very important principle that we 
are beginning to enshrine in the law, and this conference committee 
report moves strongly forward in that direction.
  I believe anyone in this chamber who shares that principle and shares 
that belief should be prepared to support this legislation. It is 
perfectly consistent, I might add, with tax reform, because this is 
just the beginning of the kind of tax change and tax incentive that tax 
reform should enshrine more broadly in the tax code.
  So we have heard some rhetoric here today from the opposition to this 
legislation: disgraceful, embarrassing, fertilizer. Mr. Speaker, I am 
going to leave the fertilizer on the other side of the aisle, and, 
instead, rise in strong support of this conference committee report 
that will promote education savings and promote education excellence.
  This conference agreement will allow tax-free expenditures from 
education IRAs for elementary and secondary school expenses as well as 
higher education costs. The agreement would increase the maximum annual 
amount of contributions for education IRAs to $2,000, which is what it 
should have been in the first place.
  One extremely important provision in this conference report addresses 
the need for tax relief for prepaid tuition programs, an issue that I 
have advocated since I came to this Congress. I believe that people 
should be able to use State prepaid tuition programs for postsecondary 
education without a tax penalty; that we move in the direction of 
liberalizing the tax treatment of those programs.
  This legislation will also allow both the contributions and earnings 
on distributions from qualified State tuition programs to be tax free, 
provided funds are used for higher education purposes.
  In addition, private colleges or a group of private colleges may 
ultimately offer similar prepaid tuition programs. I have long 
advocated the equal treatment for private colleges and universities. 
While we still have a ways to go to establish tax equity for these 
schools, this recognition puts a mark in the law moving in that 
direction.
  There are several other important provisions in this conference 
report, including the extension of section 127, employer provided 
education assistance through 2002. That in itself makes this 
legislation worth voting for, even if you do not agree or are not 
enthusiastic with all of the other provisions.
  Mr. Speaker, this is important legislation. It may be disgraceful or 
embarrassing to the other side of the aisle to have this kind of bill 
coming out under Republican authorship. I can tell you this, I think 
this moves us in the right direction of making higher education more 
affordable, of making basic education more easy to save for with a 
better tax treatment.
  We are moving in the right direction. I think it will be instructive 
to see how many people in the end stand up against this legislation.
  Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the chance to participate in this debate.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New 
York (Mr. Hinchey).
  Mr. HINCHEY. Mr. Speaker, it seems that the leadership of this House 
has taken another poll; and in that poll, they discovered that the 
people of this country are concerned about the quality of education 
that their young family members are getting. So they come up with this 
brilliant idea to provide a tiny little tax cut for private schools.
  This tiny little tax cut would amount to somewhere in the 
neighborhood of between $5 and $10 a year to families in my district. 
That is not even enough to buy a single textbook. That is how 
meaningless and disgraceful this piece of legislation is. Instead of 
doing what we need to do, this offers a false hope to people.
  We know what is wrong with education in our country. We know that we 
need more teachers. This bill does not do a thing to provide more 
teachers. We know that we need smaller class sizes. This legislation 
does not do a thing to provide us with smaller class sizes.
  We know that we need an infrastructure improvement program to build 
classrooms and to upgrade schools and existing classrooms. So many of 
the classrooms, most of them, are so old in this country, they cannot 
even be wired for the Internet. They need a complete overhaul in the 
wiring of the school system. This is what we need, and this is what the 
ranking member of the Committee on Ways and Means is offering us in his 
motion to recommit.
  What this Congress ought to be doing is investing appropriate 
resources to reduce class sizes, to educate more teachers, and, most of 
all, to build the classrooms and build the schools and

[[Page H4730]]

upgrade the system so that we can modernize our schools, modernize our 
classrooms so that we can modernize education in America. That is what 
the motion to recommit would do.
  The bill before us would do none of that. That is why we need to vote 
for the motion to recommit and defeat the legislation.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Illinois (Mr. Weller).
  Mr. WELLER. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my friend from Pennsylvania 
for yielding this time to me.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this conference report. What 
is terrific about this conference report is it not only helps public 
schools, but it also helps private and parochial schools in the 
district that I represent.
  I represent the south suburbs of Chicago, and we are fortunate to 
have a very strong Catholic school system in Joliet in the south 
suburbs as well as other faith-based and also public schools. This 
legislation helps both. That is what is really great about this 
legislation. We are helping all sorts of families, and we are helping 
all sorts of parents who make different choices for their kids. I 
realize there is some that do not want to do that, and that is why they 
oppose this bill.
  As I look at what you can do if you set aside $2,000 a year in this 
education savings account, I think of the parents and public school 
kids who are faced with fees for textbooks and faced with whether they 
need to buy a laptop computer so their son or daughter can do better in 
a public school.
  Of course, as a result of these savings accounts, they have a 
mechanism where they can set aside money just like an IRA and use that 
to meet these costs of local, public education. Of course, the kids 
that go to the Catholic school system in Joliet would benefit as well. 
That is good.
  We raised those contribution limits from the current $500 to $2,000, 
allowing the family to set aside up to $10,000 by the time a child is 
ready to enter first grade.
  We are concerned about public education. This legislation also makes 
a pretty good commitment. Right now, only 70 cents on the dollar of 
every Federal education dollar that we appropriate actually reaches the 
classroom. That means almost 30 cents of every education dollar that we 
appropriate here in Washington is consumed by the bureaucracy in 
Washington before it reaches the classroom.
  This legislation makes a commitment to raise that to 95 cents on the 
dollar so that the money that we spend and provide to help public 
education back home actually reaches the classroom. That is a pretty 
important goal.
  I also look at another provision which was also, I think, pretty 
significant. This legislation allows private colleges and universities 
to offer prepaid tuition programs that will benefit the students that 
go to Olivet Nazarene University in Kankakee County as well as Saint 
Francis and Lewis.
  This is good legislation. It helps public schools, and it helps 
private schools. It deserves bipartisan support.

                              {time}  1100

  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Maryland (Mr. Wynn).
  Mr. WYNN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York for 
yielding me this time. I rise in strong opposition to the conference 
report.
  Today, we are being treated to yet another episode in the continuing 
Republican saga of tax relief for the rich. It is also known as Robin 
Hood in reverse; take from the poor to give to the rich. When we look 
behind all the rhetoric, what we find is that the people who benefit 
from this bill are not everyday citizens. They only get about $7 a year 
out of this bill. The people who benefit are, again, the wealthiest 20 
percent of Americans.
  There is nothing wrong with private schools. There is nothing wrong 
with savings accounts. I think it is a great idea. What is wrong is 
when we take tax dollars away from public education, and that is what 
this bill does. Tax relief for the rich.
  We have some problems in education. If the Republicans were serious 
about dealing with education, they would look inside our public school 
systems. Ninety percent of the students in America go to public 
schools. Sixty percent of Americans think we here in Congress ought to 
be spending more money on public education. It would seem to me that 
what we ought to be doing is putting our money where the students are: 
in public education.
  How should we do this? There is a Democratic alternative that says, 
number one, we need smaller classes in grades 1 through 3. We need to 
reduce class size by hiring more teachers. I think that is a good idea. 
We need to build our infrastructure. We need to repair our schools. We 
have schools that have asbestos problems. We have schools with leaking 
roofs. About a third of all the schools in America have major repair 
problems that need to be addressed, not by some savings account gimmick 
but by a serious commitment of Federal funds for public education.
  We also need to invest in our public schools by enabling them to have 
access to the Internet. Fifty percent of our schools are not capable of 
being wired to the Internet because they cannot accommodate the new 
technology. We need to address that infrastructure concern.
  So when we talk about aid to education, there are two ways to go. We 
can go the way of tax relief for the rich or we can look at a serious 
commitment to repairing our education infrastructure. That is the 
approach the Democrats embody in their motion to recommit.
  I urge rejection of the conference report. I urge adoption of the 
motion to recommit.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Archer), the chairman of the Committee on 
Ways and Means.
  Mr. ARCHER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this 
time.
  I am somehow puzzled over and over again as I listen to comments from 
the other side of the aisle, and I just listened to our previous 
colleague say that this takes dollars away from public education. That 
is totally, totally false, and he must know it if he has read the bill. 
Not $1 in this bill is taken away from public education. But we listen 
to this rhetoric spoken over and over again, on issue after issue, and 
I am sure that many Members might believe some of it. It just happens 
to not be true.
  What this bill does do is give parents an opportunity to save for 
their children's education, which they already have the opportunity to 
do so, and spend that money on college education. Those programs have 
not destroyed the public universities of this country, nor have they 
taken $1 away from the public universities to put into private 
universities. But for some reason, the Members on the other side of the 
aisle want to make people believe that what we are doing here today 
will destroy public elementary and secondary education.
  And nothing could be farther from the truth because all of the 
evaluations of this bill are that the savings that parents will put 
freely into accounts for their children will be used 75 percent for 
children in public education and only 25 percent for children who go to 
private schools. Now, that is the Congressional Budget Office's 
analysis of this bill.
  So let us get the facts straight. These savings accounts can be used 
to help children with disabilities, whether they are in public school 
or in private school, for their special needs. These savings can be 
used for tutors to help children in public schools, who desperately 
need it, in those schools that are not attaining the same levels as we 
see in many other schools.
  And, by the way, we should not forget that most American children are 
getting an outstanding education. And thanks to local school boards, 
good teachers and smart kids, many Americans receive a world class 
education. And that is one of the reasons why our Nation is the envy of 
the world, and we should all be proud of it. But, yes, it is true that 
there are other schools that are not attaining that same level and we 
need to be concerned about it.
  But when I listen to the rhetoric from the other side of the aisle, I 
wonder, what am I really hearing? Am I hearing rhetoric that has been 
prompted by large, powerful special interests or by a concern for the 
children of this country? I wonder. Why do they not want choice for 
children in elementary and secondary education? Oh, they are

[[Page H4731]]

happy to give it in college. Why do they not want it for children in 
elementary and secondary education? I wonder. Why do they not want a 
higher degree of personal responsibility and local control of our 
elementary and secondary schools, rather than having greater and 
greater Federal intrusion which ultimately will take away that 
flexibility? Again, I wonder.
  This is a good bill. It permits parents to do what we already permit, 
savings for college education, and gives those parents the opportunity 
to also use that funding, where necessary, to help their children in 
elementary and secondary education get a better opportunity and end up 
being better equipped to go out into this world.
  Despite how helpful this plan is for children's education, I know 
President Clinton is under intense pressure from special interests to 
oppose our bipartisan plan. And I say to the President, ``Mr. 
President, do not veto this bill. Do not put the needs of special 
interests ahead of the needs of our children and our schools. If you 
support Federal money through HOPE scholarships for public and private 
universities, why would you oppose Federal money for public and private 
secondary and elementary schools?''
  And if HOPE scholarships do not destroy public universities, why 
would educational savings accounts harm public high schools? They will 
not. They simply will not. But they will give another tool, not a 
complete answer to all of educational problems, but another tool to 
help parents secure a better education for their children. And that is 
why many Democrats, including Senator Torricelli and former Congressman 
Floyd Flake support this bill, because it is good for our children.
  This legislation also expands the definition of ``qualified tuition 
program'' under the present law provision granting qualified State 
prepaid tuition plans favorable tax treatment to prepaid tuition plan 
sponsored by private educational institutions. Because of revenue 
constraints, we were not able to make this change effective 
immediately. However, in making this change, no inference was intended 
as to the treatment of certain prepaid tuition plans sponsored by 
private institutions under present law.
  I urge a vote against the motion to recommit and a vote for this 
conference report, which will begin a pattern of helping to develop 
better education for our children.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to 
agree with the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Ways and 
Means, and say that he is right, that the cost of this bill is not 
taking away from appropriations for the public schools. This is not an 
education bill. This is a tax bill, and he is right, it does give tax 
cuts to those people that have enough money to deposit in a bank 
account.
  And I have to admit that the chairman is right when he says that we 
are driven by special interests. That special interest are those very 
special children who need so badly to get a decent education. And so, 
once again, I agree with my chairman. But perhaps we do not end up at 
the same place, at the same time, with the same bill.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. 
Ford).
  (Mr. FORD asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. FORD. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this 
time.
  To my dear friend, the chairman of the Ways and Means, I would remind 
him, as he talks about special interests, that it was yesterday in the 
United States Senate where our majority leader in the Senate and others 
rejected a tobacco bill that was sponsored by Mr. McCain and which many 
Democrats and Republicans had worked so tirelessly on. It was special 
interests, namely cigarette makers, that caused us to reject that bill 
and might cause us to retard public health efforts on behalf of 
children in this Nation.
  But I rise in opposition to this conference report. I would agree 
with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle that reform is needed 
sorely in our public school system, in our education system in America. 
But if we listen to educators and we listen to parents and we listen to 
students, they talk tirelessly about the need to have more teachers in 
schools, about reducing class sizes.
  I come from a district where the average class size is 35 pupils per 
teacher. I come from a district where, in the final 2 weeks of school, 
3 dozen schools had to close early because they had no air-
conditioning. The only reason they stayed open for half the day was to 
still qualify for funding, Mr. Speaker, for state funding for their 
school system for the following year.
  Without a doubt, all we are talking about as Democrats will not solve 
all the problems. But, clearly, savings accounts will not do it alone. 
Thomas Jefferson said that any Nation which expects to be free and 
ignorant at the same time, expects what never was and never will be.
  Let us work together, Democrats and Republicans, and do what is right 
for our kids, do what is right for parents, do what is right for 
America.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Sam Johnson).
  (Mr. SAM JOHNSON of Texas asked and was given permission to revise 
and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. SAM JOHNSON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, last year the President signed 
with great fanfare the Taxpayer Relief Act, which allowed parents to 
invest up to $500 of their own money in education savings accounts to 
help send their kids to the college of their choice.
  Now we are asking the President to give these same parents the 
ability to use that same money for elementary and high school expenses 
as well. And this bill gives parents, grandparents and friends the 
ability to invest up to $2,000 to send their children to the best 
schools available, from kindergarten through college.
  I do not know about the President, but we should want every child to 
succeed. We ought to give him that chance. It is the American way. With 
this additional flexibility, parents can send their children to the 
safest, most academically challenging schools in America. But the 
President says he is going to veto this pro-family, pro-education bill 
because he cares more about the teachers' unions than the children 
stuck in bad schools.
  This bill has strong bipartisan support and it is time for our 
President to give every child in America the same chance to succeed 
that his daughter was given. We must pass this conference report.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
New York (Mrs. Lowey), who has dedicated her political career to 
improving the quality of education for our young people.
  (Mrs. LOWEY asked and was given permission to revise and extend her 
remarks.)
  Mrs. LOWEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York (Mr. 
Rangel), our leader on this important issue, for yielding me this time. 
And I rise in strong opposition to this conference report and in 
support of the school modernization motion.
  My colleagues, just come visit some of the schools in our 
communities. The classrooms are overflowing and the students are trying 
to learn in hallways. Is Congress addressing this crisis? No. The 
leadership of this Congress has chosen, instead, to push through a 
flawed bill that will please their favorite special interests but do 
practically nothing for the majority of American families. The solution 
is not an arcane tax change, it is investing in education.
  Last year, 120 Members of this Congress showed their commitment to 
America's children by cosponsoring the Partnership to Rebuild America's 
Schools. This session we have a similar proposal, which the gentleman 
from New York (Mr. Rangel) and I and others introduced, called the 
Public School Modernization Act. Our program will make interest-free 
loans available to school districts across the country through the Tax 
Code. Under the bill, school districts will be able to issue special 
bonds at no interest to fund the construction or renovation of school 
buildings, and the Federal Government will pay the interest on these 
bonds.
  My colleagues, we simply cannot ignore the poor physical conditions 
of our schools any longer. The GAO found that $112 billion is needed 
nationwide to just bring our schools into adequate condition. Rural, 
suburban and urban districts all face serious problems. It is

[[Page H4732]]

common sense. Children cannot learn in severely overcrowded schools and 
when classroom walls are falling down around them.
  In New York, where the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) and I 
come from, a survey my office conducted found that 25 percent, one in 
four, of New York City public schools hold classes in bathrooms, locker 
rooms, hallways, cafeterias and storage areas. Almost half of our 
school buildings have roofs, floors and walls in need of repair.
  A report by the New York City Commission on School Facilities 
revealed some startling realities: nearly half of the City's school 
children are taught in severely overcrowded classrooms. Two hundred and 
seventy schools need new roofs. Over half of the City's schools are 
more than 55 years old, and approximately one-fourth still use coal 
burning boilers.
  Quite recently, Congress overwhelmingly passed a $200 billion bill to 
build and maintain our nation's highways. I support this investment. 
But shouldn't we also be investing in the future of our children? 
Regrettably, the Republican leadership has time and time again refused 
to support efforts to rebuild our schools.
  This bill is the wrong approach. Investing in our schools is the 
right one. Support the school modernization motion. It is time that we 
come to the aid of our schools and our children.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to reject this bill and support the 
motion to recommit.

                              {time}  1115

  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Kentucky (Mr. Bunning), a member of the Committee on Ways and Means.
  (Mr. BUNNING asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. BUNNING. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of this conference 
report for the Educational Savings Act.
  I am especially gratified that the report includes $1.5 billion in 
tax cuts for students enrolled in state prepaid tuition plans. And I 
thank my chairman the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Archer) for his help 
with this.
  Last year, in the Balanced Budget Act, we cut taxes by $2 billion for 
these families. Now this report wisely gives further tax relief to 
those families who are investing for their children's future.
  Unfortunately, it sounds like the President is going to veto this 
bill. That would be a real shame, Mr. President. These tax cuts would 
help over 3,000 Kentucky students to attend college. Their families 
have already invested over $7 million in our state prepaid tuition 
plan, and I think we need to do what we can to help them.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge a vote for the conference report and for these 
students who need our help.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
California (Mr. Filner).
  Mr. FILNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  I, too, rise in opposition to the conference report, the so-called 
education savings account legislation. This bill is simply private 
school vouchers by another name. Who do we think is going to be taking 
advantage of these accounts? Not the majority of our parents, who have 
little left after their monthly expenses. These IRA type accounts will 
obviously favor privileged families who are more likely to have more 
money to put into the account.
  This bill will be an encouragement for well-to-do families to send 
their children to private schools, offering taxpayer financial 
subsidies for private schools, while doing nothing, nothing, Mr. 
Speaker, to improve America's public schools.
  This bill diverts urgently needed funds from our public schools. 
Opposite to the thrust of this legislation, we should be passing 
Federal legislation to direct our limited resources into public 
schools, where over 90 percent of American children are educated.
  Instead of subsidized education for the wealthy, we need to put our 
resources toward reducing class size in our public schools, modernizing 
and refurbishing our public schools and improving teacher training for 
our public schools.
  As Julian Bond, Chairman of the Board of the NAACP, said recently, we 
should not take Federal dollars out of public education just when it 
needs help the most. This bill is just the latest in a long series of 
attempts to benefit the wealthy and to do nothing to help our middle 
class and lower income families.
  As a matter of conscience and in support of the vast majority of 
Americans and their children, I urge my colleagues to oppose this ill-
conceived legislation.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from 
Alabama (Mr. Bachus).
  (Mr. BACHUS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. BACHUS. Mr. Speaker, one does not have to be a rocket scientist, 
one does not have to be an economics professor to know that many 
families today are struggling to pay their child's college education. 
Both sides of the aisle would agree with that.
  In fact, college tuitions have increased 234 percent since 1980. Now, 
this prices many families out of a college education. Others have had 
to go deep in debt to send their children to college.
  As a matter of fact, parents and children attending college have 
borrowed more money for college education in the 1990's than in the 
1960's, 1970's, and 1980's.
  Now, I was an elected member of the Alabama State School Board, and 
we were faced with this problem in Alabama, one of our poorer states, 
people unable to send their children to college. And we were one of the 
first 3 states to devise a prepaid tuition plan where parents could put 
away a little money each month and when their children reached college 
age they could take that fund and then pay for their college tuition.
  I am glad to say today that 43,000 Alabama children are enrolled in 
our prepaid college tuition plan. 18 other states have made similar 
moves and have prepaid tuition plans.
  We have heard about Kentucky from the gentleman from Kentucky. And it 
is my understanding that most other states expect to start their own 
plans in the near future and these plans will help make college a 
reality for many, many children.
  It is because of that that I rise today in strong support for this 
conference report, for this conference report is good news for all 
those families and all those children enrolled in those prepaid tax 
plans.
  There was bipartisan support for this provision, a provision which I 
introduced originally in this Congress 2 years ago and again last year 
and has been included in the conference report which makes savings and 
state prepaid tuition plans tax free. Can we all not agree that no tax 
makes less sense than one that punishes families for saving for their 
children's college education?
  We should be rewarding families who save for their child's college 
education, not penalizing then. The current law penalizes them. When 
they draw that money out, they have to pay taxes on it. This conference 
report changes that.
  For that reason, I congratulate the conferees and I urge my 
colleagues to support this legislation.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman 
from California (Ms. Roybal-Allard).
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the 
conference report and in support of the motion to recommit. There is no 
question that parents have the right to choose the best possible 
education for their children. Unfortunately, this bill does not 
accomplish this goal.
  Instead of opening doors to a better education for all of America's 
working families, this bill primarily benefits a small percentage of 
families who could afford to save as much as $2,000 a year and send 
their children to private schools. To meet the needs of the majority of 
American children, we do not need another tax shelter for the wealthier 
Americans, what we need is to invest our scarce Federal resources in 
our public schools, where over 90 percent of American children are 
taught.
  Our Nation's public schools need funds for books, computers, and 
well-trained teachers and they critically need funding for repairs and 
school construction in urban and rural communities where our public 
schools are overcrowded and literally falling apart.
  According to the American Society of Civil Engineers, our public 
schools are in worse shape today than any part

[[Page H4733]]

of our Nation's infrastructure. And based on current growth, it is 
estimated that we will need to build 6,000 new schools over the next 10 
years just to maintain current class size.
  The motion of the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) addresses this 
crisis by creating a tax credit to help state and localities build new 
schools and make desperately needed repairs. Investing in our public 
schools benefits all of America's children, not just a few.
  I ask my colleagues to defeat the conference report.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished 
majority leader, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Armey).
  Mr. ARMEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, let me say from the outset, what the American people 
want and need for their children and what this Congress wants and needs 
for the children of America with respect to education is exactly the 
same thing. We need to have the most effective public school system in 
the world.
  I believe that it was not very many years ago when we could stand up 
proudly in this Nation and say that. I believe when I was a child going 
through public schools that this Nation could stand up and say before 
the world, we have the best, most accessible public education for the 
children of America than any nation in the history of the world. I 
believe at that time in America we were in fact the envy of the world 
for what we were able to do and were in fact doing in the education of 
our children.
  But something has changed, Mr. Speaker. Something has changed, and it 
is a matter of enormous concern and heartbreak to the American people. 
We cannot say that anymore. And our children are paying the cost. We 
are not concerned here with children who fail in school so much as we 
are concerned with schools that are failing America.
  And while throughout America we still have some fine examples of good 
schools, public and private, where the parents are pleased and the 
children are proud and the teachers are caring, we need to cherish them 
and we need to have a way to get them to be more a model for the other 
schools.
  Because tragically, Mr. Speaker, we have schools in America that are 
failing the children. We have got to ask ourselves what is missing 
here. Why is it that some schools can succeed and so many other schools 
can fail, sometimes a school with a lesser budget can succeed? It is 
not always about money. I think it is about something more important 
than money. I think it is about a lot of things.
  This bill that we have before us today is about one of the things. 
And if anybody thought, and certainly I do not, that this was the 
entire solution to the problem, they would be naive. But part of the 
solution is accountability. When schools are accountable to parents, 
schools do better.
  How do parents make a school accountable to them? Well, first through 
local control. When the parents in their local community elect a school 
board and hold a school board accountable, as a school is held 
accountable by the school board, it works. But also by direct control.
  When the school administrator and the teachers know that the parents 
can and will and have the resources to pick up their child, take the 
child from the school that is letting the child down and put that child 
into school where the child will do better, it perks up their 
attention. They realize the need.
  One principal not too far from Washington, D.C., when faced with 
parents that had choices and were using those choices to move their 
children, said very clearly, ``we have got to do better or we will lose 
the children.''
  Now, what does this bill say? It says to some of those parents, if 
you have the means to save your own money so that you can in your own 
savings put together a scholarship opportunity for your child and move 
your child, you should get a tax break for that, the earnings from that 
savings should be tax exempt.
  We have had other bills on this floor, bills that were equally 
resistant, that said to some parents of low incomes, if you do not have 
those means, we will provide with you scholarships. They, too, were 
resistant.
  We are not here to defend the public schools. Of course, we know they 
are all precious. But we are here to improve the public schools. We are 
here to give them the opportunity to see the challenge that lies before 
them and respond to it in a meaningful way by emphasizing to them 
through the actions of the parents that they must be accountable to the 
parents and the service in the lives of the children.
  Why should we trust the parents, Mr. Speaker? Very simple. The 
parents are and will be and always have been the first best most 
dedicated teacher in that young child's life. Nobody cares more. Nobody 
lives more with the consequences of that child's education other than 
the child himself. And when the parents are able to affirm that, the 
schools will respond to it and we will again some day have the best 
public schools in the world, what our children deserve.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished 
gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Etheridge).
  Mr. ETHERIDGE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New York for 
yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise today to call on this House to reject the 
conference report on the latest voucher bill.

                              {time}  1130

  Make no mistake about it. This is a bad bill. We have heard talk 
about all kinds of things. It really is about a voucher bill and it is 
not about the good things that happen in our public schools. There are 
a lot of good schools. I am so tired of coming and hearing people bad-
mouth our teachers and bad-mouth our schools. That is why I ran to come 
here, and I really thought I would see the rhetoric change. I am sorry 
to say that from some in this body, it has not changed.
  As a former elected chief of North Carolina's public schools, I know 
that using taxpayers' money to finance private school tuition is the 
wrong way to improve public schools in this country. It will absolutely 
not do it. This bill takes the taxpayers' money, almost $2 billion, to 
subsidize private schools at the expense of our neighborhood public 
schools who badly need the money, and that is wrong.
  I call on this Congress to pass legislation to address the school 
construction crisis in this country. I will not go over the details. My 
colleagues have already heard them. I have introduced H.R. 3652. There 
are other bills that will provide revenue from this voucher bill to be 
used for school construction bonds in some of the fastest growing and 
most critically needed communities in this country.
  If we want to help public schools, do something about it and quit 
talking about it and put the money out there to help children and not 
to help a select few but help all of them because all of them are part 
of this great country we call America.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
New York (Mr. Fossella).
  (Mr. FOSSELLA asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. FOSSELLA. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania 
for yielding me this time.
  Mr. Speaker, let me just state out front that I have heard repeatedly 
that this is going to take money away from public education. I just 
urge those who are curious to read the bill and determine and find out 
for themselves that this does not take money away from public 
education. Indeed what it does is serve to improve education. Clearly 
there has been no stronger fighter in my mind than I am in this 
Congress, and before this I was elected to the New York City Council 
and served on the Education Committee and continually fought to improve 
education for the people of my community in Staten Island and Brooklyn 
and across this country.
  In the last couple of weeks, we have seen, I guess, a critical point 
in terms of discussing the future of education, and, if you will, a 
line in the sand has been drawn. Our majority leader the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Armey) introduced a bill to provide, as he stated earlier, 
to the low-income people of Washington, D.C., 2,000 scholarships. There 
were parents who prayed that they would actually be able to send their 
child to a school of their choice. This House passed that legislation. 
It was quietly vetoed by the President,

[[Page H4734]]

thereby depriving some of those most vulnerable out there the 
opportunity to send their kid to a school of their choice.
  Now we have another great opportunity before us today. Here we again 
continue to question the common sense of ordinary Americans. We just 
throw it out there, folks. Is it the folks here in Washington or the 
folks in your local towns, whether it is Capitol Hill or your State 
capital or city hall that is in the best position to determine where to 
send your child? Or is it the parents of America? All this bill does is 
allows the parents the opportunity that they have been deprived of for 
far too many years to send their child to the school of their choice so 
that they can invest in their most precious resource, their children.
  If we really believe in the future of this country and we believe in 
education, we will pass this conference report.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New 
Jersey (Mr. Menendez).
  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. Speaker, the conference report before us is what 
the Republican agenda for education boils down to: providing education 
tax credits for a limited population of parents who chose and have the 
money to send their children to private schools versus helping the 90 
percent of the students that are in public schools today, 90 percent, 
which is where the educational future of the Nation will be determined.
  Public schools face much pressure from the growing rates of 
enrollment, large class size, increased violence and finding qualified 
teachers. As they face all of these pressures, we need to make sure 
they have the capability to impart knowledge and learning skills to our 
children. That is not what this bill does. I do not understand how 
taking money away from public schools provides for accountability. With 
limited resources, teaching children is not easy to do. We have an 
obligation to see that the schools do their job, but this bill 
certainly does not do it.
  In New Jersey, my home State, we have schools in crucial need of 
modernization as reported by the New Jersey Supreme Court. I have 
visited public schools throughout the State. I have seen the crumbling 
ceilings, the exposed pipes, the fading blackboards, the lack of 
ability to connect to the new technology that will make us competitive 
in the next century. These tours indicate that we simply cannot ignore 
the needs of our students any longer when it comes to the poor physical 
condition of our schools.
  New Jersey public elementary and secondary schools will see an 
increase of over 100,000 students in the next 10 years requiring over 
4,000 more new classrooms or else we will have even greater class 
sizes. We know that over a thousand of our schools are over 50 years 
old, many more from the turn of the century, and these statistics are 
replicated across the country. This bill does nothing to meet the needs 
of those schools or those students.
  Let us vote for the Rangel motion to recommit so we can help our 
public schools, where 90 percent of the public's interest and the 
educational future of the Nation will be served. That is the way we 
should be voting. Vote for the motion to recommit.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas 
(Mr. Bentsen).
  (Mr. BENTSEN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. BENTSEN. Mr. Speaker, is it not a little bit ironic that 
yesterday the House voted to repeal the Federal income tax code and yet 
today we are going to vote on legislation to create yet another 
loophole in the income tax code. We are kind of going in the wrong 
direction.
  My dear colleague from Texas, the majority leader, I think put it 
best about this legislation when he said, ``If you have the means.'' 
That is what this is about. This legislation is not going to help 
middle-class families. It is not going to help families that are 
struggling, that may be in difficult school districts. It is going to 
help families that have the means to set aside $2,000 a year which they 
are going to have to let sit for a while until they get enough income 
to pay for private schools. This is a band-aid approach to a real 
problem.
  The gentleman from New York has an approach to try and address the 
school problem for a larger number of American students and that is the 
approach we ought to be taking. This is nothing but a tax break for 
people who are not asking for it and who do not need it, and we do not 
even know how we are going to pay for it. I am afraid this is a 
precursor to what we are going to see with Social Security and 
everything else, is if you have the means, you are okay but if you do 
not, you are on your own.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from 
Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).
  Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to the 
conference report. This bill is yet another attempt by the Republican 
leadership to gut public education and tear desperately needed dollars 
away from our public schools. The legislation will do nothing to 
improve the education of millions of middle- and working-class kids in 
this country. The average middle-class family would find itself with a 
measly $10 benefit a year, not nearly enough for a working family to 
afford the cost of a private high school.
  We need to focus on improving the schools that serve 90 percent of 
America's children, the public schools. We need to invest in technology 
and computers for our classrooms. That is what the motion to recommit 
by the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel) does. If we are serious 
about improving education in our country, we will reject the dangerous 
bill before us. Passing this bill is like waving a white flag. Passing 
the bill means giving up on public education, abandoning millions of 
children who only want that opportunity to succeed. Having a chance in 
America means having access to a first-rate education.
  Let us not turn our backs on these children. Let us deal with 
legislation that helps America's children, not just a token few. Reject 
the conference report. Vote for the motion to recommit.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield the balance of my time to the 
gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), our distinguished minority 
leader.
  (Mr. GEPHARDT asked and was given permission to revise and extend his 
remarks.)
  Mr. GEPHARDT. Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``no'' vote on the conference 
report, and I urge an ``aye'' vote on the Rangel motion to recommit. I 
believe with all my heart that this issue, education and child rearing, 
is the most important issue that faces us as a people. We have never 
needed more in our history to have well-educated, mentally capable 
young people.
  In my home State of Missouri, the only issue that really dominated 
the State legislature was how we could go from 30,000 to 60,000 prison 
cells over the next 5 years, a symbol of failure of our child rearing 
and our education system in this country.
  I am tough on law and order and so are my constituents. But I say to 
my constituents, you cannot afford what we are doing. We cannot afford 
to hold a million and a half people in prison, to carry them, to keep 
them because they are unsafe to have in our society. We also know that 
if we raise children correctly, they will not get into trouble. They 
will not be dysfunctional citizens. But we also know our society has 
changed dramatically. People are not at home to raise children as they 
once were. That is a fact of life. We are not going to change that. And 
so we have to put the investment into education so that children are 
raised correctly.
  What this bill misses entirely is that there is a whole revolution 
going on out in public schools to fix the schools to meet the need. In 
my district, I have a school in the inner city that is getting great 
results. The kids get great grades. I went there and I asked them how 
they are doing it. They said, we have parents as first teachers in the 
public school to teach parents how to be better parents and how to 
raise children. They have preschool in the public school. They have 
after-school in the public school, so children are engaged even at age 
zero, age 6 months, age 1 year, age 3 years in constructive, 
professionally run activities so they can be productive citizens when 
they come out of the education process.
  Does this bill support that effort that is going on in Shepherd 
School in my district? I daresay not. What this bill offers is $7 a 
year to the families that

[[Page H4735]]

are sending those kids to Shepherd School. No, what Shepherd School 
needs is not this bill. This is a silly bill. It is a frivolous bill. 
It is not serious about public education. Seven dollars a year to 
families in my district fighting to get their kids a good education is 
frivolous.
  The Rangel substitute would offer real help to the people at Shepherd 
School. What do they need? They need bigger classrooms. They need a 
competent building. They need computers in the classrooms. They need 
help, real help. Listen to Paul Vallas, CEO of the Chicago Public 
Schools. This is somebody that is on the line every day. Mayor Daley in 
Chicago said, ``Give me the schools, give me the responsibility, and we 
will fix them,'' and he is fixing them. He put his best person on this 
job. Here is what Paul Vallas says. He says this bill, the Coverdell 
bill, is really designed to give more affluent people compensation for 
decisions they already made to go private. That is all it is. This does 
not help public education. It does not help the people that are out 
there in the crucible of the fight to fix public education. It helps 
just a few people who have already chosen to send their kids to private 
schools. What a shame this is. What a missed opportunity this is.
  I urge Members to vote for the Rangel substitute, which gives real, 
tangible help to the real revolution that is going on out there in the 
real world to fix the public schools so all of our kids are productive 
citizens, and vote against a frivolous, unserious, ridiculous piece of 
legislation that does nothing but help the privileged few.

                              {time}  1245

  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of the time.
  First of all, I want to make sure everybody understands it does not 
take 1 penny from public education. If it did, I would not support it.
  But secondly, all these people who are down here now crying about how 
much we need, how much help we need to repair schools, to reduce class 
size.
  For 20 years I sat here in the minority and said, ``Would you put 
your money where your mouth is on your one mandate, your curriculum 
mandate for special education where you would get millions and millions 
of dollars into school districts, where the pairs are needed,'' and I 
could not get 1 penny from that majority.
  Now they talk about trying to do something to help public schools. 
Well, let me tell them, if we put our 40 percent of excess costs into 
special education, which is where the mouth was, but the money was not 
put there, Los Angeles school district would get an additional $74 
million. New York City would get about $50 million. Chicago would get 
$40 million. Just in 1 year, just in 1 year, and they talk about coming 
here, telling us they are doing a dispirited kind of thing. They are 
not helping public education.
  I have tried, I have tried, I have tried to get them to put their 
money where their mouth was for 20 years, and then we would not have 
the problems we have with school districts where buildings are falling 
down and where classes are way too large.
  So I would remind everyone there is not 1 penny going to public 
schools in this bill except in reading excellence. They talk about 
helping schoolchildren. If 40 percent of the children are not doing 
well in reading in public schools by the end of third grade, what do we 
do about it? Not what the President wanted, but he got an agreement 
with the Committee on the Budget that said that much money would be put 
there. We rewrote the bill in a bipartisan manner to help those 
children because, if 40 percent are not doing well, obviously we have 
to start with teacher training. Obviously we have to deal with the lack 
of ability of the parent to help the child become reading ready. 
Obviously we have to deal with reading readiness programs before the 
child comes to school.
  So let us put our money where our mouth is, and then we can solve all 
of those problems back in the local level because the millions those 
districts that need it the most would get is just unbelievable, and 
that is just in 1 year.
  So I would encourage my colleagues, this is one step, and the second 
step is to do the funding in the special ed mandate that we promised we 
would do, and then we can make the changes, not by having more 
programs. That is what we have done those 20 years. Everybody came with 
another program. They watered them down to the point where we got 
pennies here, pennies there if there was someone that could fill out 
the appropriate papers in order to get the grant in the first place. 
Nobody ever said anything about quality. Nobody ever said anything 
about the problems that they had back in the local districts. We said 
we know from the Federal level this is the way it should be done, do 
it, and send them pennies to do it.
  So let us start with this little piece today and let us really work 
on how to help local school districts take care of the needs they have 
as far as buildings are concerned, as far as reading readiness is 
concerned, as far as class size is concerned. They can do it, if we 
give them the money that we promised them 25 years ago.
  So I would ask all to support this legislation, and then let us move 
forward to do the things that have to be done to make sure those public 
schools that may not be doing as well as they should be, and I will be 
the first to say that most public schools are doing well, but those 
that are not, we can give them the kind of help that they need.
  Mr. PAUL. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to explain why I 
oppose the Conference Report of the Parent and Student Saving Account 
Act (H.R. 2646). This, despite having been an original cosponsor, and 
having been quite active in seeking support, of the original House 
bill. I remain a strong supporter of education IRAs, which are a good 
first step toward restoring parental control of education by ensuring 
parents can devote more of their resources to their children's 
education. However, this bill also raises taxes on businesses and 
expands federal control of education. I cannot vote for a bill that 
raises taxes and increases federal power, no matter what other salutary 
provisions are in the legislation.
  I certainly support the provision allowing parents to contribute up 
to $2,000 a year to education savings accounts without having to pay 
taxes on the interest earned by that account. This provision expands 
parental control of education, the key to true education reform as well 
as one of the hallmarks of a free society. Today the right of parents 
to educate their children as they see fit is increasingly eroded by the 
excessive tax burden imposed on America's families by Congress. 
Congress then rubs salt in the wounds of America's hardworking, 
taxpaying parents by using their tax dollars to fund an 
unconstitutional education bureaucracy that all too often uses its 
illegitimate authority over education to undermine the values of these 
same parents!
  I also support the provisions extending the exclusion of funds 
received from qualified state tuition programs, and excluding monies 
received from an employer to pay for an employee's continuing education 
from gross income. Both of these provisions allow Americans to spend 
more of their resources on education, rather than hand their hard-
earned money over to the taxman.
  Returning control over educational resources to the American people 
ought to be among Congress' top priorities. In fact, one of my 
objections to this bill is that is does not go nearly far enough in 
returning education dollars to parents. This is largely because the 
deposit to an education IRA must consist of after-tax dollars. Mr. 
Speaker, education IRAs would be so much more beneficial if parents 
could make their deposits with pretax dollars. Furthermore, allowing 
contributions to be made from pretax dollars would provide a greater 
incentive for citizens to contribute to education IRAs for others' 
underprivileged children.
  Furthermore, education IRAs are not the most effective means of 
returning education resources to the American people. A much more 
effective way of promoting parental choice in education is through 
education tax credits, such as those contained in H.R. 1816, the Family 
Education Freedom Act, which provides a tax credit of up to $3,000 for 
elementary and secondary expenses incurred in educating a child at 
public, private, parochial, or home schools. Tax credits allow parents 
to get back the money they spent on education, in fact, large tax 
credits will remove large numbers of families from the tax roles!

  Therefore, I would still support this bill as a good first (albeit 
small) step toward restoring

[[Page H4736]]

parental control of education if it did not further expand the federal 
control of education and raise taxes on American businesses!
  In order to offset the so-called ``cost to government'' (revenue 
loss) H.R. 2646 alters the rules by which businesses are taxed on 
employee vacation benefits. While I support efforts to ensure that tax 
cuts do not increase the budget deficit, the offset should come from 
cuts in wasteful, unconstitutional government programs, such as foreign 
aid and corporate welfare. Congress should give serious consideration 
to cutting unconstitutional programs such as ``Goals 2000'' which runs 
roughshod over the rights of parents to control their children's 
education, as a means of offsetting the revenue loss to the treasury 
from this bill. A less than 3% cut in the National Endowment for the 
Arts budget would provide more funding than needed for the education 
IRA section of this legislation.
  Mr. Speaker, we in Congress have no moral nor scientific means by 
which to determine which Americans are most deserving of tax cuts. Yet, 
this is precisely what Congress does when it raises taxes on some 
Americans to offset tax cuts for others. Rather than selecting some 
arbitrary means of choosing which Americans are more deserving of tax 
cuts, Congress should cut taxes for all Americans.
  Moreover, because we have no practical way of knowing how many 
Americans will take advantage of the education IRAs, or the other 
education tax cuts contained in the bill, relative to those who will 
have their taxes raised by the offset in this bill, it is quite 
possible that H.R. 2646 is actually a backdoor tax increase! In fact, 
the Joint Committee on Taxation has estimated that this legislation 
would have increased revenues to the Treasury by $24 million over the 
next eight years!
  It is a well-established fact that any increase in taxes on small 
businesses discourages job creation and, thus, increases unemployment! 
It is hard to see how discouraging job creation by raising taxes is 
consistent with the stated goal of H.R. 2646--helping America's 
families!
  Mr. Speaker, this bill not only raises taxes instead of decreasing 
spending, it increases the federal role in education. For example the 
conference report on H.R. 2646 creates a new federal program to promote 
literacy, the so-called Reading Excellence Act. This new program bribes 
the states with monies illegitimately taken from the American people, 
to adapt programs to teach literacy using methods favored by 
Washington-based ``experts.''
  Mr. Speaker, enactment of this literacy program will move America 
toward a national curriculum since it creates a federal definition of 
reading, thus making compliance with federal standards the goal of 
education. I ask my colleagues how does moving further toward a 
national curriculum restore parental control of education?
  This bill also creates a new federal program to use federal taxpayer 
funds to finance teacher testing and merit pay. Mr. Speaker, these may 
be valuable education reforms; however, the federal government should 
not be in the business of education engineering and using federal funds 
to encourage states to adopt a particular education program.
  While the stealth tax increase and the new unconstitutional programs 
provide significant justification for constitutionalists to oppose this 
conference report, the new taxes and spending are not even the worst 
parts of this legislation. The most objectionable provision of H.R. 
2646 is one that takes another step toward making the federal 
government a National School Board by mandating that local schools 
consider a student's bringing a weapon to school as evidence in an 
expulsion hearing.
  The issue is not whether local schools should use evidence of 
possessing a weapon as evidence in a discipline procedure. Before this 
Congress can even consider the merits of a policy, we must consider 
first whether or not the matter falls within our constitutional 
authority. The plain fact is as the tenth amendment to the Bill of 
Rights makes clear, Congress is forbidden from dictating policy to 
local schools.
  The drafters of the United States Constitution understood that to 
allow the federal government to meddle in the governance of local 
schools, much less act as a national school board, would inevitably 
result in the replacement of parental control by federal control. 
Parents are best able to control education when the decision making 
power is located closest to them. Thus, when Congress centralized 
control over education, it weakens the ability of parents to control, 
or even influence, the educational system. If Congress was serious 
about restoring parental control on education, the last thing we would 
even consider doing is imposing more federal mandates on local schools.
  In conclusion, although the Conference Report of Parent and Student 
Savings Account Act does take a step toward restoring parental control 
of education, it also raises job-destroying taxes on business. 
Furthermore, the conference report creates new education programs, 
including a new literacy program that takes a step toward nationalizing 
curriculum, as well as imposes yet another mandate on local schools. It 
violates the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution and reduces parental 
control over education. Therefore, I cannot, in good conscience, 
support this bill. I urge my colleagues to join me in opposing this 
bill and instead support legislation that returns education resources 
to American parents by returning to them monies saved by deep cuts in 
the federal bureaucracy, not by raising taxes on other Americans.
  Mr. HASTERT. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of the Conference 
Report accompanying H.R. 2646, the Parent and Student Account PLUS Act 
of 1998 (PASS A+) and wish to commend Chairman Archer and Senator 
Coverdell for their work on this important bill. As an original 
cosponsor of this legislation I am pleased that today Congress is 
taking a positive step forward toward helping America's families with 
their efforts to educate their children.
  Mr. Speaker, our nation's schools face a growing crisis and it is 
clear that improvements need to be made. Consider the following 
evidence: Nearly 40% of students do not feel safe in school and 2000 
acts of violence take place in schools each day; U.S. eighth-graders 
recently placed 28th in the world in math and science skills; almost 
one out-of-three college freshman require some remedial instruction; 
and 40% of all 10 year-olds cannot meet basic literacy standards.
  Mr. Speaker, the current state of America's K-12 education system is 
a serious threat to the health of the economy and to the future 
prosperity of American children. Thus far, school reform initiatives 
have focused on increasing funding to public schools. Since 1983, 
government funding to public K-12 schools has increased by 44 percent 
and average per-student spending has increased by 32 percent. Total 
spending for public K-12 education now totals nearly $300 billion per 
year. Yet for all these increases in federal government spending, our 
children are falling farther behind the children of other nations. In 
short, Washington-based solutions to our school's problems have not 
worked; nor are they likely ever to work.
  Mr. Speaker, to combat the pressing problem of a troubled educational 
system, I co-sponsored the Parent and Student Savings Account Plus Act 
(PASS A+). This bill allows parents, grandparents, or scholarship 
sponsors to donate up to $2,000 a year per child with the buildup of 
interest within that account to be tax-free if used for the child's 
education. Money from this fund could be used to pay for tuition, 
books, supplies, computer equipment, transportation, and supplementary 
expenses required for the enrollment or attendance of a student in an 
elementary or secondary public, private, or religious school--even 
associated costs for home schooling are covered.
  Mr. Speaker, the PASS A+ legislation is important because it provides 
American families with the one educational tool we know works--a 
choice. While our Nation's K-12 public schools have fallen farther and 
farther behind, our higher education system of colleges and 
universities continues to be the envy of the world. Why? simply put, 
colleges and universities must compete for students and their education 
dollars. This competition has forced colleges and universities to focus 
on excellence and improvement and the results speak for themselves.
  Mr. Speaker, PASS A+ works for parents and families because it helps 
them help themselves. If their local school will not provide the 
education their children need, this legislation will allow them to 
choose an alternative. In the same vein, if their public school is 
working, the proceeds from these accounts can help parents provide 
important educational tools for their kids--like a computer. In short, 
this bill is a ``win-win.'' It helps all kids, in all schools. I urge 
my colleagues to vote for our kids and support the Conference Report.
  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, the tax scheme contained in this bill is 
nothing more than a back door vehicle for subsidizing families who want 
to send their children to private elementary and secondary schools. It 
is designed to create a tax shelter for families of high incomes, while 
leaving nothing for families that don't even have enough to pay for 
their retirement.
  According to the Department of Education, these tax provisions would 
give an average tax break of $96 for families earning $150,000. 
However, for poor families, the average benefit would be only $1.
  Rather than pursuing this shamefully regressive tax scheme, we should 
strengthen our public schools, where 90 percent of our Nation's 
children attend. We should address the problems of leaky roofs and 
overcrowded classrooms. We should target funds for school renewal in 
our country's poorest school districts. Finally, we should move to 
reduce class sizes--a proven strategy for enhancing student 
achievement.
  Mr. WELDON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, the American people expect all of 
us--

[[Page H4737]]

Democracts and Republicans--to work together to improve the education 
for our children. This bill, the A-PLUS Savings Accounts for children, 
will expand education opportunities for all children in grades K-12. We 
owe this to our children. As Washington Post columnist Charles 
Krauthammer put it, the ``great crisis in American education is not at 
the university level. It is at the elementary and high school levels, 
where thousands of kids--particularly inner-city minority kids--are 
getting educations so rotten that their entire life prospects are 
blighted.'' Indeed, do any Members of this Congress send their sons and 
daughters to D.C. public schools? Does the Vice-President? Does the 
President? No, they do not. Why, because they know that their children 
will not be prepared for college or the workforce. As one of Jesse 
Jackson's campaign organizers has noted. I believe that the Clintons 
should not be the only Americans in public housing with an opportunity 
to send their children to a private school.
  This bill will help all parents send their kids to any school they 
choose so that their children can get the best education possible. All 
children will benefit because any relative, individual, or business 
could contribute up to $2,000 in annual contributions per child to an 
account that will help pay for educational expenses. The money could be 
used for any school: public, private, parochial, or home school, or it 
could be used for tutoring, school uniform costs, or children with 
special needs. In addition, this bill addresses other problems in our 
classrooms which sorely need help; literacy programs, phonics, teacher 
testing and merit pay, and tax-free state college savings programs. The 
bill has all the right elements for education success: common sense, 
more dollars directly to the classroom, scholarships for needy 
students, and strategies that will lead to better teaching and 
learning. Let's put the interests of all children first, not Washington 
lobbyists and special interest. Let's pass H.R. 2646.
  Mr. FAZIO of California. Mr. Speaker, the Republican 105th Congress 
has failed to act on legislation to improve American schools and 
instead has wasted time on extreme anti-public education legislation. 
The Coverdell private school savings account bill is just one of a 
number of efforts that serve only to undermine the education of many in 
order to benefit a few. Costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of 
dollars, Coverdell essentially subsidizes upper income families who 
already send their children to private and religious schools.
  Let's put that money into improving the institutions which educate 
more than 90 percent of our elementary and secondary students. 
Specifically, construction for our nation's schools should be a top 
priority in our education initiatives. The Department of Education 
recently released a report highlighting the need for expanding our 
nation's classroom space. America's K-12 enrollment will be at an all 
time high of 52.2 million this fall, and by 2007 this number will reach 
54.3 million.
  However, despite this cause for action, this Republican Congress has 
refused to heed the call for a school construction initiative which 
calls for $5 billion in federal support to deal with the current crisis 
both in overcrowding and in crumbling school facilities. It is our 
responsibility to provide our children with an environment that is 
adequately equipped and conducive to learning.
  Whether it be a push for vouchers or private school savings accounts, 
Republicans continue to ignore and undermine the needs of the majority 
of our nation's children. Time and time again, real concerns such as 
school construction are sacrificed in the Republican's narrow agenda.
  Mr. RILEY. Mr. Speaker, the most important thing we can do for the 
future of our nation is to insure that each and every child in America 
is given the opportunity to receive the best education possible. I 
believe that it is our duty to prepare the next generation to meet the 
challenges of the 21st Century. The Parents and Students Savings 
Account Plus Act does just that. By allowing Educational Savings 
Accounts to be used for primary, secondary or higher education, this 
legislation gives our children the opportunity they deserve.
  First and foremost, this legislation expands tax free expenditures 
from Education Savings Accounts to include elementary and secondary 
school expenses. Savings from these accounts can be used for tuition, 
tutoring, transportation, books, uniforms, and computers.
  Most importantly, the measure increases to $2,000 per year the 
maximum amount of contributions that may be made to an Educational 
Savings Account. Contributors can include relatives, friends and 
corporations as parties who may contribute to this account.
  Mr. Speaker, this legislation gives parents more control over their 
children's education and is an important tool in making schools more 
accountable to parents. Parents, not government will decide how to best 
spend their money on their child's education.
  I urge all of my colleagues to vote in favor of the Conference 
Report.
  Mrs. MINK of Hawaii. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong opposition 
to the Conference Report on H.R. 2646, a bill which will provide tax 
breaks to benefit the wealthy in order to send their children to 
private schools.
  There is nothing better we can do for this nation than to improve 
education, and assure that all children in all communities across this 
nation have access to quality education. Unfortunately, the Republican 
Majority has once again failed to put forth legislation that will help 
us accomplish this goal.
  This Conference Report--the cornerstone of the Republican Education 
agenda--does absolutely nothing to improve education. It will give a 
few wealthy families a tax break on the money they save to send their 
children to private schools, or buy additional items such as computers. 
But it will do absolutely nothing to improve education in this country 
overall.
  It will have no impact on our public school system which serves 90% 
of all elementary and secondary students. Instead it spends scarce 
federal dollars--$2.2 billion over the next five years--to subsidize 
families that already send their children to private schools. It will 
be those who can already afford private education with or without this 
tax break that will benefit from this bill.
  Low- and middle-income families are struggling just to keep 
themselves above ground financially. This type of assistance, which 
requires families to have their own money in order to benefit, does 
nothing for families who cannot afford to put money away for education.
  An analysis by the Treasury Department found that 70% of the tax 
benefits in H.R. 2646 will go to families in the top 20% of the income 
brackets, while all other families will get virtually nothing.
  The Congress' own Joint Committee on Taxation found that 50% of the 
tax benefits in this proposal will go to the 7% of families who are 
already sending their children to private and religious schools.
  Schools need our help. They need help in renovating crumbling school 
buildings and constructing new ones to keep up with student growth. 
They need our help in obtaining the latest technology and training 
teachers to use that technology. They need our help in reducing class 
size, so that children can have more individualized attention. Families 
need our help in providing before- and after-school programs, so that 
parents know their children are safe and in a learning environment 
during those non-school hours during the day.
  Instead this bill concentrates on the central Republican education 
goal which is to abandon the public school system and help the few who 
can attend private schools. This bill would allow for the first time 
religious schools to benefit from federal dollars. Though not as direct 
as a voucher program, the tax-free interest received in these IRA 
accounts can be used to pay the tuition of private and religious 
schools.
  This Conference Report does nothing to solve our most pressing 
problems in education today. It is simply political maneuvering to help 
a specific population in this country.
  In addition to the tax provisions in this bill, there are other items 
of concern in this bill. First the conference report would for the 
first time allow federal money to be used to support single-sex 
education. It includes a qualifier that says the education offered to 
students of both sexes most be comparable. However, there is no 
requirement that such schools must comply with equal educational 
opportunity laws such as Title IX of the Education Act Amendments of 
1972, the equal protection clause under the constitution, or state 
laws.
  This broadly worded permission to use federal funding for single sex 
education ventures down a dangerous path that could turn us back to the 
time of separate and unequal education for female students.
  The Conference Report also includes a Sense of the Congress 
Resolution that 95% of federal elementary and secondary education funds 
be spent in the classroom.
  While no one can argue that we need to assure that students receive 
the full benefits of education funding, this resolution is deeply 
flawed in its findings and setting an arbitrary requirement of 95% of 
funds that must be spent in the classroom does not consider the 
practical aspects of providing education.
  The findings in this resolution are not statements of fact, but 
conjecture, opinion or they are simply not true. Take for example the 
clause which states that there are ``more than 760 Federal education 
programs, which span 39 Federal agencies at the price of nearly $100 
billion.''
  Let's set the record straight. The Department of Education 
administers 183 education programs.
  Based on an analysis by the U.S. Department of Education, the list of 
760 includes 305 which are identified as Department of Education 
programs. Of these programs 122 are unauthorized, unfunded or simply 
not programs. That leaves 183 Department of Education programs.
  The Majority disparages the debate on education policy in this 
country by using such

[[Page H4738]]

false information which misleads the American public of the true nature 
of federal investment in education.
  Federal education programs already drive money down to the local 
level. Less than 2% of the US Department of Education budget is spent 
on Federal administrative costs. This raises the question; is this a 
problem with federal administration or is it a state and local problem?
  There are legitimate uses for education dollars that may not be spent 
directly in the classroom, but go to assure that children can take full 
advantage of the learning experience in our schools. For example, 
professional development is necessary to assure quality teachers in our 
classrooms, but teacher training does not occur in the classroom. Is 
the expense considered ``dollars to the classroom''?
  One of the major education goals of the Republican Majority that I 
agree with is to send more money to the states for special education. 
However, are support services for children with disabilities considered 
``dollars to the classroom''?
  Funds on technology may need to be spent on infrastructure outside 
the classroom so that the school is wired for new technology, also 
training teachers on using technology takes place outside of the 
classroom. More and more schools are forming consortium and 
partnerships with other schools or community groups to improve 
technology in their schools. Funds to support such partnerships may not 
be spent directly in the classroom. Is this type of technology funding 
considered ``dollars to the classroom''?
  Assuring that children have a safe and drug free environment in 
school may include expenditures outside the classroom. Are Safe and 
Drug Free School funds considered ``dollars to the classroom''?
  Libraries are an important component of our educational system, and 
supplement classroom learning. Is library funding considered ``dollars 
to the classroom''?
  Mr. Speaker, the Dollars to the Classroom resolution is flawed, as is 
the underlying bill. Ask my colleagues to reject this conference report 
which will do nothing for education in this country.
  Mr. GOODLING. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I 
move the previous question on the conference report.
  The previous question was ordered.


                Motion to Recommit Offered By Mr. Rangel

  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to recommit with 
instructions.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is the gentleman opposed to the conference 
report?
  Mr. RANGEL. Yes, I am, Mr. Speaker.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Clerk will report the motion to 
recommit.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Mr. Rangel moves to recommit the conference report on the 
     bill H.R. 2646 to the committee of conference with 
     instructions to the managers on the part of the House to 
     agree to provisions relating to tax-favored financing for 
     public school construction consistent, to the maximum extent 
     possible within the scope of conference, with the approach 
     taken in H.R. 3320, the Public School Modernization Act of 
     1998.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The motion is not debatable.
  Without objection, the previous question is ordered on the motion to 
recommit.
  There was no objection.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion to recommit.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the noes appeared to have it.
  Mr. RANGEL. 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.
  Pursuant to clause 5 of rule XV, the Chair will reduce to a minimum 
of 5 minutes the period of time within which a vote by electronic 
device, if ordered, will be taken on the question of agreeing to the 
conference report.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 196, 
nays 225, not voting 12, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 242]

                               YEAS--196

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Allen
     Andrews
     Baesler
     Baldacci
     Barcia
     Barrett (WI)
     Becerra
     Bentsen
     Berman
     Berry
     Bishop
     Blagojevich
     Blumenauer
     Bonior
     Borski
     Boswell
     Boucher
     Boyd
     Brady (PA)
     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
     Dixon
     Doggett
     Dooley
     Doyle
     Edwards
     Engel
     Eshoo
     Etheridge
     Evans
     Farr
     Fattah
     Fazio
     Filner
     Forbes
     Ford
     Frank (MA)
     Frost
     Furse
     Gejdenson
     Gephardt
     Gordon
     Gutierrez
     Hall (OH)
     Hamilton
     Harman
     Hefner
     Hilliard
     Hinchey
     Hinojosa
     Holden
     Hooley
     Hoyer
     Jackson (IL)
     Jackson-Lee (TX)
     Jefferson
     John
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson (WI)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Kanjorski
     Kaptur
     Kennedy (MA)
     Kennedy (RI)
     Kennelly
     Kildee
     Kilpatrick
     Kind (WI)
     Kleczka
     Klink
     Kucinich
     LaFalce
     Lampson
     Lantos
     Lee
     Levin
     Lewis (GA)
     LoBiondo
     Lofgren
     Lowey
     Luther
     Maloney (CT)
     Maloney (NY)
     Manton
     Markey
     Martinez
     Mascara
     Matsui
     McCarthy (MO)
     McCarthy (NY)
     McDermott
     McGovern
     McHugh
     McIntyre
     McKinney
     Meehan
     Meek (FL)
     Meeks (NY)
     Menendez
     Millender-McDonald
     Miller (CA)
     Mink
     Mollohan
     Moran (VA)
     Morella
     Murtha
     Nadler
     Neal
     Oberstar
     Obey
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Owens
     Pallone
     Pascrell
     Pastor
     Payne
     Pelosi
     Pickett
     Pomeroy
     Poshard
     Price (NC)
     Rahall
     Rangel
     Reyes
     Rivers
     Rodriguez
     Roemer
     Rothman
     Roybal-Allard
     Rush
     Sanchez
     Sanders
     Sandlin
     Sawyer
     Schumer
     Scott
     Serrano
     Sherman
     Sisisky
     Skaggs
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Smith, Adam
     Snyder
     Spratt
     Stabenow
     Stark
     Stenholm
     Stokes
     Strickland
     Stupak
     Tanner
     Thompson
     Thurman
     Tierney
     Towns
     Traficant
     Turner
     Velazquez
     Vento
     Visclosky
     Waters
     Watt (NC)
     Waxman
     Wexler
     Weygand
     Woolsey
     Wynn
     Yates

                               NAYS--225

     Aderholt
     Archer
     Armey
     Bachus
     Baker
     Ballenger
     Barr
     Barrett (NE)
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bass
     Bateman
     Bereuter
     Bilbray
     Bilirakis
     Bliley
     Blunt
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Bono
     Brady (TX)
     Bryant
     Bunning
     Burr
     Burton
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Campbell
     Canady
     Cannon
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chambliss
     Chenoweth
     Christensen
     Coble
     Coburn
     Collins
     Combest
     Cook
     Cox
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cubin
     Davis (VA)
     Deal
     DeLay
     Diaz-Balart
     Dickey
     Doolittle
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Ehlers
     Ehrlich
     Emerson
     English
     Ensign
     Everett
     Ewing
     Fawell
     Foley
     Fossella
     Fowler
     Fox
     Franks (NJ)
     Frelinghuysen
     Gallegly
     Ganske
     Gekas
     Gibbons
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Gilman
     Goode
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Goss
     Graham
     Granger
     Greenwood
     Gutknecht
     Hall (TX)
     Hansen
     Hastert
     Hastings (WA)
     Hayworth
     Hefley
     Herger
     Hill
     Hilleary
     Hobson
     Hoekstra
     Horn
     Hostettler
     Houghton
     Hulshof
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Istook
     Jenkins
     Johnson, Sam
     Jones
     Kasich
     Kelly
     Kim
     King (NY)
     Kingston
     Klug
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     LaHood
     Largent
     Latham
     LaTourette
     Lazio
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (KY)
     Linder
     Lipinski
     Livingston
     Lucas
     Manzullo
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McDade
     McHale
     McInnis
     McIntosh
     McKeon
     Metcalf
     Mica
     Miller (FL)
     Minge
     Moran (KS)
     Myrick
     Nethercutt
     Neumann
     Ney
     Northup
     Norwood
     Nussle
     Oxley
     Packard
     Pappas
     Parker
     Paul
     Paxon
     Pease
     Peterson (MN)
     Peterson (PA)
     Petri
     Pickering
     Pitts
     Pombo
     Porter
     Portman
     Pryce (OH)
     Quinn
     Ramstad
     Redmond
     Regula
     Riggs
     Riley
     Rogan
     Rogers
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Roukema
     Royce
     Ryun
     Sabo
     Salmon
     Sanford
     Saxton
     Scarborough
     Schaefer, Dan
     Schaffer, Bob
     Sensenbrenner
     Sessions
     Shadegg
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shimkus
     Shuster
     Skeen
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (OR)
     Smith (TX)
     Smith, Linda
     Snowbarger
     Solomon
     Souder
     Spence
     Stearns
     Stump
     Sununu
     Talent
     Tauscher
     Tauzin
     Taylor (MS)
     Taylor (NC)
     Thomas
     Thornberry
     Thune
     Tiahrt
     Upton
     Walsh
     Wamp
     Watkins
     Watts (OK)
     Weldon (PA)
     Weller
     White
     Whitfield
     Wicker
     Wolf
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)

                             NOT VOTING--12

     Cooksey
     Cunningham
     Gonzalez
     Green
     Hastings (FL)
     Leach
     McNulty
     Moakley
     Radanovich
     Torres
     Weldon (FL)
     Wise

                              {time}  1209

  Mr. BATEMAN, Mr. FAWELL, and Mrs. ROUKEMA changed their vote from 
``yea'' to ``nay.''
  Messrs. GUTIERREZ, JOHNSON of Wisconsin, and WYNN changed their vote 
from ``nay'' to ``yea.''

[[Page H4739]]

  So the motion to recommit was rejected.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.


                          personal explanation

  Mr. RADANOVICH. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall No. 242, I was inadvertently 
detained. Had I been present, I would have voted ``no.''


                          personal explanation

  Mr. LEACH. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall No. 242, I was inadvertently 
detained. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea.''
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Ney). The question is on the conference 
report.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the ayes appeared to have it.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 225, 
nays 197, not voting 12, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 243]

                               YEAS--225

     Aderholt
     Archer
     Armey
     Bachus
     Baker
     Ballenger
     Barr
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bass
     Bereuter
     Bilbray
     Bilirakis
     Bishop
     Bliley
     Blunt
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Bono
     Brady (TX)
     Bryant
     Bunning
     Burr
     Burton
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Campbell
     Canady
     Cannon
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chambliss
     Chenoweth
     Christensen
     Clement
     Coble
     Coburn
     Collins
     Combest
     Cook
     Cox
     Crane
     Crapo
     Cubin
     Cunningham
     Danner
     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
     Gingrich
     Goode
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Goss
     Graham
     Granger
     Greenwood
     Gutknecht
     Hall (OH)
     Hall (TX)
     Hansen
     Hastert
     Hastings (WA)
     Hayworth
     Hefley
     Herger
     Hill
     Hilleary
     Hobson
     Hoekstra
     Horn
     Hostettler
     Hulshof
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Hyde
     Inglis
     Istook
     Jenkins
     John
     Johnson, Sam
     Jones
     Kasich
     Kelly
     Kim
     King (NY)
     Kingston
     Klug
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     LaHood
     Largent
     Latham
     LaTourette
     Lazio
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (KY)
     Linder
     Lipinski
     Livingston
     Lucas
     Manzullo
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McDade
     McHale
     McInnis
     McIntosh
     McKeon
     Metcalf
     Mica
     Miller (FL)
     Moran (KS)
     Moran (VA)
     Myrick
     Nethercutt
     Neumann
     Ney
     Northup
     Norwood
     Nussle
     Oxley
     Packard
     Pappas
     Parker
     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
     Shadegg
     Shaw
     Shays
     Shimkus
     Shuster
     Skeen
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (OR)
     Smith (TX)
     Smith, Linda
     Snowbarger
     Solomon
     Souder
     Spence
     Stearns
     Stump
     Sununu
     Talent
     Tauscher
     Tauzin
     Taylor (MS)
     Taylor (NC)
     Thomas
     Thornberry
     Thune
     Tiahrt
     Upton
     Walsh
     Wamp
     Watkins
     Watts (OK)
     Weldon (PA)
     Weller
     White
     Whitfield
     Wicker
     Wolf
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)

                               NAYS--197

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

                             NOT VOTING--12

     Baldacci
     Cooksey
     Gonzalez
     Green
     Hastings (FL)
     Leach
     McNulty
     Moakley
     Sessions
     Torres
     Weldon (FL)
     Wise

                              {time}  1219

  So the conference report was agreed to.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________