[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 81 (Friday, June 19, 1998)]
[House]
[Page H4843]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


    BEST WISHES TO THE MEMBERS UNDERTAKING THE STUDY OF OUR CURRENT 
              RELATIONSHIP WITH CHINA IN AN ELECTION YEAR

  (Mr. SNYDER asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. SNYDER. Mr. Speaker, yesterday this House voted to fund a $2.5 
million study of our current relationship with China. The newly-
appointed chairman, a Republican, the gentleman from California (Chris 
Cox) and the ranking member, a Democrat, the gentleman from Washington 
(Norm Dicks), two well-respected Members of this body, deserve our 
support and respect as they begin investigating whether our decades-
long policy and current procedures allowing commercial American 
satellites to be launched by Chinese rockets have inadvertently allowed 
transfer to the Chinese of information useful to the Chinese missile 
program. These are issues deserving thoughtful analysis, but 
unfortunately for the gentleman from California and the gentleman from 
Washington they undertake this investigation at a time of intense 
rhetoric and prejudgment, and of course elections are 4\1/2\ months 
away.
  Mr. Speaker, I encourage this body to let these Members do their work 
unobstructed by the hot rhetoric that sometimes overtakes this body. 
The gentleman from California (Mr. Cox) and the gentleman from 
Washington (Mr. Dicks) and the other members of this committee, we wish 
them well.

                          ____________________