[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 72 (Tuesday, May 18, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5444-S5445]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   UNANIMOUS CONSENT REQUEST--S. 254

  Mr. LOTT. So for the sake of discussions, I ask unanimous consent 
that the Senate now resume consideration of the juvenile justice bill, 
and there be 10 amendments in order per side to be selected from the 
amendments in order pursuant to the previous consent of May 14, and 
passage occur by 12 noon, Wednesday, May 19.
  Mr. LEAHY. Reserving the right to object--and my distinguished friend 
from Mississippi discussed this with me before during the vote--and as 
I have told my friend from Mississippi and my friend from Utah, we are 
continuing to work to whittle down the number of amendments certainly 
on our side. As I had assured my friend from Utah over the weekend, I 
and my staff have spent a lot of time talking to Democratic Members, 
and we have cut out a number of amendments.
  I do want to see this bill completed. I do want a good juvenile 
justice bill. Also, I want to get us on to Y2K, as the distinguished 
Democratic leader, Senator Daschle, said he is in favor of the Y2K 
bill. He is in favor of going immediately, after juvenile justice, to 
the Y2K bill.
  The distinguished majority leader is absolutely right in what he said 
about the supplemental. I suspect--I have not talked with Senator 
Stevens and Senator Byrd--that is going to go fairly rapidly.
  We are going to have our caucus luncheons. The distinguished Senator 
from North Carolina wishes to begin a series of justly-deserved 
tributes to the admiral. I ask the distinguished leader if he would 
withdraw for now the unanimous consent agreement, let us work during 
our caucus luncheons with other Members to try to get this up so we can 
accommodate both the Republican and Democratic side, get amendments 
voted up or down, and get the bill voted up or down.
  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, based on that request and a full measure of 
trying to be reasonable and get an agreement to get this worked out and 
completed, because I think juvenile crime in this country is a very 
serious issue, for the Senate to not deal with it seriously and to 
complete action would be indefensible.
  My problem, as the majority leader, is that we have the supplemental, 
which is not going to be completed in 2 hours. This bill is going to 
take some discussion. I think it is a tragedy that we are not going to 
do the Y2K issue, but I am interested in getting a result. I think if 
we can get some cooperation, we can achieve that.
  Keep in mind that we have had some 25 amendments, I believe, that 
have been offered and debated. This would call for 20 more. That is 45 
amendments on a bill that has been in the making for 2 years. So I 
think my request is reasonable, and it is my third or fourth attempt to 
find some sort of time agreement.
  I thought and was assured that we would work to complete this bill 
last Thursday. That didn't work out. And I understand. Sometimes the 
leadership on both sides of the aisle has goals we wish to achieve, but 
the rest of the troops don't necessarily follow and fall in line, so we 
can't quite fulfill that commitment. But the suggestion was made, well, 
we will have amendments Friday and Monday, and we would vote on a 
series of amendments Tuesday morning, final passage by noon. That was 
objected to. Then we said, how about 5, with more amendments after the 
stacked votes on Tuesday morning. That was objected to. Then I said 6. 
That was objected to.
  Now I am saying, how about getting what we have standing, 20 more 
amendments, and complete it by noon on Wednesday so we can go to the 
supplemental. I think I am bending over backwards, not because I want 
more of the type of debate that I heard last week where Senators even 
object to a Senator amending their own amendment. I didn't realize that 
happened in the Senate. I was very disappointed with that action. But 
instead, we must come together and seriously try to deal with this 
problem.
  I know there are Senators on both sides of the aisle who want to do 
that, and I am anxious to find a way to get it done and get it 
completed. I will withhold this request. I hope the managers will work 
through this, while we are having this very well-deserved tribute to 
Admiral Nance, and then after the luncheon hopefully we can wrap up 
some agreement.
  Mr. LEAHY. If the distinguished leader will yield further, I will be 
very brief. In my 25 years here, I have seen majority leaders, 
distinguished majority leaders, both Republican and Democrat, try to 
whittle down bills in time, and usually when they propose time 
agreements, the number of amendments has expanded. In this case, I say 
the good news for the distinguished Senator from Mississippi is, each 
time he has done this, actually the numbers have dwindled, and dwindle 
and dwindle.
  I suggest that perhaps the distinguished Senator from Utah and I 
continue our efforts and report to our respective leaders after the 
caucus where we stand.
  I see the distinguished Senator from Utah on the floor. I know that 
he wants the floor, and so I will yield.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I really appreciate the majority leader and 
his patience and forbearance, because this bill is now in its sixth 
day. That is more than we give to most bills in the Senate, unless they 
are just hotly contested. This is one that should not be hotly 
contested. Everybody ought to be for this bill.
  Mr. President, yesterday I read a quote from a recent New York Times 
editorial, and I would like to read it again, prior to the time for 
Senator Helms.
  This is from the New York Times editorial:

       In the past it was not hard to be struck by the way time 
     seemed to roll over a tragedy like a school shooting, by the 
     disparity between the enduring grief of parents who lost 
     children in places like Paducah and Jonesboro and the swift 
     distraction of the rest of us. This time, perhaps, things may 
     be different. The Littleton shootings have forced upon the 
     nation a feeling that many parents know all too well--that of 
     inhabiting the very culture they are trying to protect their 
     children from. . . . The urge to do something about youth 
     violence is very strong . . . but it will require an urge to 
     do many things, and to do them with considerable ingenuity 
     and dedication, before symptomatic violence of the kind that 
     occurred in Littleton begins to seem truly improbable, not 
     just as unlikely as the last shooting.

  That was the New York Times, May 11, 1999. While I may not agree with 
the Times on everything, I doubt I could have described any better the 
task we have taken on. This issue is a complex problem and one which 
requires dedication, a spirit of cooperation, and an agreed upon set of 
objectives.
  I believe that spirit of cooperation has been lacking somewhat as 
this is the sixth day we are on this bill and, as of this morning, my 
colleagues on the other side of the aisle still had over 25 amendments. 
Now, my friend from Vermont has indicated that he is working to try and 
get those cut down. I hope he is successful. I have spent several days 
urging Republicans not to offer their amendments--most have been 
agreeable--in the hopes that my colleagues on the other side would 
reciprocate. I spent the weekend here, and my staff was here working 
around the clock. We heard nothing from the other side during that 
time. Indeed, we were told by them that staff would not be coming in to 
meet with us at that time.
  Now, perhaps they were trying to work on the Democrat amendments. 
Certainly, the distinguished Senator from Vermont says that is what he 
was doing. But frankly, we were prepared to work and cut these matters 
down and get this whole matter completed.
  In fairness, we have been given some suggested changes to the 
underlying bill. We were given those suggestions late yesterday. I 
would be willing to accept a number of them if it meant we

[[Page S5445]]

could pass this bill by a date certain. As well, staff has been working 
to clear several amendments as part of a managers' package of 
amendments, which I hope Senator Leahy and I can do. Still, we have 
been given no commitment, assurances, or even a hint that my colleagues 
will agree to a vote on a time or date certain. This bill is too 
important to be treated this way. The problem of juvenile crime and the 
victims of juvenile crime deserve better.
  We should pass this bill, but there are a number on the other side 
who want to pull this bill down. You hear a lot of posturing about the 
gun lobby, which is complete nonsense. Let's just review the facts.
  The President's gun package was framed as essentially containing the 
following elements: Gun show loopholes; permanent Brady; one gun a 
month; juvenile Brady; juvenile possession of assault weapons, increase 
the age to 21; child access to guns, liability; safety locks; increase 
penalties for guns to juveniles; firearms tracing; youth crime gun 
initiative; gun kingpins penalties; and a clip ban.
  More than half of the President's so-called ``plan'' has been acted 
on by the Senate or is contained in a pending amendment. In other 
words, we have agreed to a unanimous consent agreement limiting 
amendments which allows for the remaining elements of the President's 
plan to be offered.
  So the question is, Where is the President on this issue? Republicans 
want to let this plan be voted on, but his allies in the Senate do not 
appear eager to move forward. I hope they will.
  I believe my colleague from Vermont when he says that, given some 
time and through the caucuses today, we probably can get this resolved, 
or at least he hopes we can. I do also. We have to get it resolved.
  We are not trying to avoid the gun issue. I think some are concerned 
how this bill, with its reforms of the entertainment industry, will be 
received by their friends in Hollywood. That is something I think 
really bothers some on the other side. It bothers me, too. But we are 
doing some things that really are valuable, really viable, really 
worthwhile, and really allow for voluntary compliance and an approach 
that really will work in the best interests of the entertainment 
industry.
  Given the seriousness of this problem, and the number of warning 
signs that future tragedies may be imminent--we are announcing them 
daily--we cannot afford to filibuster this bill through amendment. We 
should not play politics with this bill. Instead, we should come 
together and pass this bill. I am certainly hopeful that that is what 
we are going to get done either today or tomorrow.
  I think the majority leader has been more than accommodating on this. 
He has indicated that he can only give so much time to this because 
there are so many other pending bills. The distinguished Senator from 
Vermont and I both know that we have to bring up the bankruptcy bill, 
the Satellite Home Viewer Act, in addition to all these very important 
issues that involve the national defense and our people who are serving 
in the Balkan crisis, and, of course, the supplemental appropriations 
bill. We only have a limited time in which to do it.

  So it is good that we get together today and get this matter 
resolved. I don't think we could have had a more cooperative majority 
leader, under the circumstances. We stand ready, willing, and able to 
work with our colleagues on the other side to try to narrow these 
amendments and, of course, work with them to try to get some of these 
problems solved that they think are so serious.
  I might add that a number of these gun amendments were already in the 
bill; juvenile Brady is a prime example. We had that already in the 
bill. You would think, from the President's remarks, that it wasn't 
part of our bill. We have worked on this bill for 2 years. I want it to 
be bipartisan; I want our Democratic colleagues to be part of this; I 
want them to feel good after it is all done. We have made every effort 
to try to accommodate them. But to have this thing go on for another 
day or two is basically not right, under the circumstances.
  So I hope we can get together, and I hope we will work together and 
get our staffs together, and I hope we will resolve this either today 
or tomorrow.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I know the distinguished Senator from Utah 
would not want to leave a wrong impression about what has happened, so 
perhaps I might flesh out his remarks just a tad.
  One, it should be noted that every single Democratic Senator wants to 
see a juvenile justice bill passed. The comments about pulling the bill 
down have all come from the Republican side of the aisle, not from the 
Democratic side of the aisle.
  As far as working on this, I am not sure to what the Senator is 
referring. I don't know when I have spent so much time on the phone, 
the computer and e-mails, and on a bill as I have this past weekend. 
Our staffs have worked late into the night. We were given a wish list 
from the Republican staff, as was appropriately done at the beginning 
of the weekend. We worked on that all weekend long, calling Senators 
all over the country on it. As of last night, we had cleared 40 
amendments. That is progress. That is very significant progress.
  Now, the distinguished Senator from Utah said on the talk shows this 
weekend that they need seven amendments on the Republican side. Four 
were introduced yesterday, but this morning there are suddenly 10. We 
have kind of floating numbers here. But the facts are such that we have 
been working and we have cleared a very large number of amendments that 
Senators never have to see.
  The last crime bill took 12 days. There were 99 amendments. We walked 
through it, and we did it. I remember being on that committee of 
conference, and the distinguished Senator from Utah may recall that we 
were there until 3, 4, 5 o'clock in the morning. These were complex 
issues, but we got it done. The crime rate has been coming down for 6 
years--something that I have not seen under any other administration 
before--Republican or Democrat. So we can get somewhere on this.
  We have significant issues in here. Every single Member on this side 
of the aisle is committed to seeing a juvenile justice bill passed. We 
want to go on to debate and vote on Y2K. The majority leader is correct 
in saying the supplemental has to be passed. We are not trying to delay 
it. I assure my friend from Utah that an enormous amount of work was 
done this weekend, and it was done until very late last night. I think 
my last e-mail on this came through to me at about 12:30, 12:45 this 
morning. We are getting it done.
  Now, the distinguished Senator from North Carolina has been sitting 
here patiently and wishes to speak about a lifetime friend, a man who 
deserves a great deal of honor and praise by this Senate from both 
sides. I think we would do the Senate well and the memory of the great 
man well by both of us holding this debate until after the caucus. I 
thank the distinguished Senator from North Carolina for his courtesy, 
which was doubly helpful this morning because I know this is a 
difficult time for him.
  I yield the floor.

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