[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 108 (Wednesday, July 28, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9450-S9459]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  JUVENILE JUSTICE REFORM ACT OF 1999

  The Senate resumed consideration of the bill.
  Pending:

       Lott amendment No. 1344, in the nature of a substitute.
       Lott amendment No. 1345 (to amendment No. 1344), to provide 
     that the bill will become effective one day after enactment.
       Lott amendment No. 1346 (to amendment No. 1345), to provide 
     that the bill will bcome effective two days after enactment.
       Lott amendment No. 1347 (to the language proposed to be 
     stricken), to provide that the bill will become effective 
     three days after enactment.
       Lott amendment No. 1348 (to amendment No. 1347), to provide 
     that the bill will become effective four days after 
     enactment.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Mr. SMITH of New Hampshire. Mr. President, I see the minority leader 
coming on the floor. I was just going to try to get about 3 minutes 
before the vote. Would that be agreeable with the minority leader?
  Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, it would be entirely agreeable. I would 
just ask that prior to the time we have a vote, I be able to use some 
of my leader time for a couple of comments. But I would be happy to 
yield the floor so that the Senator from New Hampshire can speak.
  Mr. SMITH of New Hampshire. I very much appreciate the minority 
leader's consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Mr. SMITH of New Hampshire. Mr. President, I want to make a point on 
the legislation before the cloture vote we are going to have shortly 
because, according to the rules, I am not going to be able to debate 
this until after the vote, which is really not the best process in the 
world. But I want my colleagues to know what we will be voting cloture 
on in a very few moments is the Senate substitute for the underlying 
House bill. So when we go to cloture on that, what we are doing is 
substituting gun control for the House bill.
  I want all of my colleagues to understand that H.R. 1501 is a return 
to traditional values.
  This bill brings morals back into the school. It brings values back 
into the school. It focuses on the cultural problems that are facing 
us. It allows a display of the Ten Commandments. It allows individual 
religious expression. It allows prayer at school memorial services. It 
allows faith-based groups to compete for Government juvenile justice 
grants. That is the underlying provision. That is what I wanted to vote 
on, and that is what I did not have the opportunity to vote on.
  What is being substituted is gun control. It imposes strict limits on 
gun shows. It requires the sale of trigger locks with guns, and it puts 
new limits on juvenile gun possession, even juveniles who are law-
abiding citizens who might like to have hunting licenses.
  The bottom line is, the bill passed by the Senate is a good cultural 
bill. Gun control is being substituted. If my colleagues vote for 
cloture, they are voting to substitute gun control for a very good bill 
that focuses on the cultural and moral problems in our schools.
  I will close on this point. There is a fictitious story being 
circulated on the Internet where a Columbine High School student writes 
a letter to God and says:

       Dear God: I'm very angry with you. I don't understand why 
     you allowed 13 of my fellow students to be killed by two of 
     my fellow students. Please answer me as soon as possible. 
     Columbine High School student.

  A letter comes back from God:

       Dear student: Let me remind you, I'm not allowed in your 
     high school.

  We need to think seriously because this is a major decision we are 
making. If my colleagues vote for cloture, they are substituting gun 
control for values, prayer in school, the Ten Commandments, religious 
expression, and prayers at memorial services. That is what they are 
substituting, one for the other.
  Let's make it clear: If you are for gun control, vote for cloture. If 
you are for values and prayer and the Ten Commandments in school, vote 
against cloture.
  I yield back the remainder of my time. I thank the minority leader 
for his courtesy.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader.
  Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I will use a few minutes of my leader 
time to comment.
  We intend to support the effort to move this legislation to 
conference. In fact, I endorse the actions taken by the majority leader 
in this case in so-called filling the tree.
  For the purpose of record and drawing a distinction on this bill from 
other bills where our majority leader has filled the tree prior to the 
time we have had any debate, this bill, S. 254, has been debated now 
for 8 days, from May 11 through May 20. We conducted 32 rollcall votes. 
The Senate considered 38 amendments--18 Democratic amendments, 20 
Republican amendments. We had 10 Democratic amendments agreed to, 17 
Republican amendments agreed to, and then we had 10 Democratic and 
Republican amendments that were not agreed to, and 1 Republican 
amendment was withdrawn.
  The point I am making is that we have had a very good debate on S. 
254. We had that debate. We brought it to conclusion. We had a final 
vote. Now it is time to move it on to conference. I fully respect the 
Senator from New Hampshire and his determination to slow this process 
down because he objects to some of the aspects in this bill, and that 
is his right. But I will say I support the effort made by the majority 
leader to move this bill to conference and the method he has employed 
to do so.
  Again, this is not the same as laying a bill down for the first time, 
filling the tree and precluding Democratic amendments. We have had a 
very good debate on this bill. We have had an opportunity to offer 
amendments. I cite S. 254 as the model I wish we would follow on all 
bills, a model that we historically and traditionally have always 
followed, which is to lay a bill down, allow it to be subject to 
amendments, have a good debate on amendments, have the votes, have the 
final vote, and then go to conference.
  I hope we can do more such of this in the future as we consider other 
authorizing bills. I urge my Democratic colleagues and my Republican 
colleagues to support the effort this morning to move this legislation 
forward to conference so we can resolve what differences there are with 
the House--and there are many very important differences. I am hopeful 
we can bring

[[Page S9451]]

this bill back from conference in time and that we can be as supportive 
of it as we were of the bill when it passed on May 20.
  Mr. President, I encourage my colleagues to be supportive this 
morning. I yield the floor.


                             Cloture Motion

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, pursuant to rule 
XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, 
which the clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

                             Cloture Motion

       We the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the 
     provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, 
     do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the substitute 
     to Calendar No. 165, H.R. 1501, the juvenile justice bill:
         Trent Lott, Frank H. Murkowski, Chuck Hagel, Bill Frist, 
           Jeff Sessions, Rick Santorum, Ben Nighthorse Campbell, 
           C.S. Bond, Orrin G. Hatch, John Ashcroft, R.F. Bennett, 
           Pat Roberts, Jim Jeffords, Arlen Specter, Judd Gregg, 
           Connie Mack.


                            Call Of The Roll

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum 
call under the rule has been waived.


                                  Vote

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate 
that debate on the substitute amendment No. 1344 to H.R. 1501, the 
juvenile justice bill, shall be brought to a close? The yeas and nays 
are required under the rule. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from Ohio (Mr. Voinovich) is 
necessarily absent.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Grams). Are there any other Senators in 
the Chamber desiring to vote?
  The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 77, nays 22, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 224 Leg.]

                                YEAS--77

     Abraham
     Akaka
     Ashcroft
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Bennett
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Breaux
     Bryan
     Byrd
     Chafee
     Cleland
     Cochran
     Collins
     Conrad
     Daschle
     DeWine
     Dodd
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Fitzgerald
     Frist
     Gorton
     Graham
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Harkin
     Hatch
     Hollings
     Inouye
     Jeffords
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Kerrey
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Lott
     Lugar
     Mack
     McCain
     McConnell
     Mikulski
     Moynihan
     Murkowski
     Murray
     Reed
     Reid
     Robb
     Roberts
     Rockefeller
     Roth
     Sarbanes
     Schumer
     Sessions
     Smith (OR)
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stevens
     Thompson
     Thurmond
     Torricelli
     Warner
     Wellstone
     Wyden

                                NAYS--22

     Allard
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burns
     Campbell
     Coverdell
     Craig
     Crapo
     Enzi
     Gramm
     Grams
     Grassley
     Helms
     Hutchinson
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Kyl
     Nickles
     Santorum
     Shelby
     Smith (NH)
     Thomas

                             NOT VOTING--1

       
      Voinovich
       
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote the yeas are 77, the nays are 22. 
Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in the 
affirmative, the motion is agreed to.


                           Amendment No. 1347

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is now on amendment 1347. The 
Senator from New Hampshire is recognized for up to 1 hour.
  Mr. SMITH. Mr. President, I yield whatever time he may consume to the 
Senator from Idaho.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho is recognized.
  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, I thank my colleague for yielding. It is 
obvious from the Senate vote we just had that we could only have 
delayed this process for several days, but we could not have stopped 
the ultimate result, which would be sending a flawed Senate bill to a 
conference with the House. Since that is the case, I see no reason to 
burn up good will by forcing the Senate to vote again and again with 
the same result on the various procedural steps that lie before us.
  If this is where the Senate will ultimately make its stand, I am 
willing to let the process move forward.
  However, some may be asking why we even made the attempt to stop this 
action.
  Sometimes it can be unclear why a Senator cast the vote he or she 
did.
  That's especially true for procedural votes like the cloture vote we 
just had.
  So let me be clear why I voted the way I did--against cloture, 
against cutting off the debate on this measure, against moving this 
version of S. 254 to a conference with the House.
  It's not because I oppose the juvenile justice bill. Quite the 
opposite: it's because I support good juvenile justice reform.
  I support the many provisions of this legislation that truly address 
criminal violence, such as: Making sure violent juveniles are held 
accountable for their criminal actions; providing resources to states 
and localities to combat juvenile crime; toughening enforcement of the 
laws already on the books; helping communities promote school safety; 
helping parents and the media do more to limit the exposure of children 
to violence in the entertainment industry.
  I support these reforms, and I could support the version of juvenile 
justice reform passed by the House.
  However, the reason I opposed the Senate bill, and why I voted 
against cloture just now is because this is not a juvenile justice 
reform measure. It's also a gun control measure.
  Gun control has nothing to do with stopping youth violence and crime.
  Gun control of the kind proposed in this bill is not just 
ineffective--it is counterproductive because it would cut off lawful 
and beneficial uses of firearms.
  And what may be the most important thing for anyone watching this 
debate to understand: gun control is something the House of 
Representatives has already said--with a bipartisan vote--it will not 
accept.
  This is a set-up, folks. The House has said it will not accept gun 
control, and the Clinton-Gore Administration, along with its cronies in 
Congress, have said they won't accept a juvenile justice bill without 
gun control.
  Does anybody else see a problem here? The problem is obvious. I don't 
see how the conference committee will fashion a version of juvenile 
justice that both the House and Senate can live with--but I can tell 
you one thing: whatever comes out of this conference won't have enough 
gun control in it for the Clinton-Gore administration.
  In fact, I'm going to make a prediction here and now that whatever 
emerges from the conference committee will instantly be criticized--and 
maybe even threatened with a veto--because it doesn't have enough gun 
control in it for Bill Clinton and Al Gore, and the folks who work with 
him. That is because they need gun control as a political issue, and 
they are not interested in juvenile crime unless they have their 
political issue along with it.

  I said, folks, that is ``politics,'' and I mean it, plain and simple.
  Since the day the Senate took its vote, and since the day the House 
has taken its votes, we have watched the political maneuvering down at 
the White House and with the Vice President on this issue. Their debate 
isn't about controlling violence and violent youth. It is about a 
narrow political agenda of the far left.
  It was a campaign kicked off by the President when he blamed the 
Littleton, Colorado killings on--and I quote from the speech that was 
later released by the White House and printed on its web page--``the 
huge hunting and sport shooting culture in America.''
  What did the hunting culture and the sport-shooting culture in 
America have to do with the killings in Littleton, CO? In the mind of 
this President and this Vice President, it was politics. It was their 
entry once again into this debate.
  That's right--the President wasn't talking about the cultural crisis 
that distresses all of us on all sides of this issue and the breakdown 
of families, the powerlessness of communities, the alienation of young 
people, the violence and brutality promoted by the entertainment 
industry.
  It was all politics narrowly focused. No, what the President chose to 
blame was American hunters and spot shooters.
  According to the Clinton-Gore administration, those who lawfully 
exercise a right protected by the United States Constitution--those 
people are responsible for the brutal, senseless killings at Columbine 
High School.

[[Page S9452]]

  Shame on you, Mr. President. If you are one of the tens of thousands 
of adult volunteers who have helped train Boy Scouts and other young 
people in marksmanship, in one of the most successful youth sporting 
programs in history--according to the President, you're part of the 
problem.
  If you take your family on an annual hunting trip, a ``bonding 
experience'' for yourself and your kids--according to the Clinton-Gore 
administration, you're part of the problem.
  If you represented the United States of America in the Olympic 
shooting events, the gun control community wants you to know that 
you're part of the problem.
  If you hunt for food to put on your table for your family, according 
to the Clinton and Gore administration, because of Littleton, CO, you 
are part of the problem.
  But it wasn't enough to insult millions of law-abiding Americans by 
accusing them of responsibility for what happened in Littleton. The 
President went a step further to suggest that if these law-abiding 
citizens don't go along with his gun control agenda and give up more of 
their liberty, then they don't care about the lives of children.
  I find that unbelievable. But that is what was implied very clearly 
by this President--the leader of the free world accusing those who 
uphold the law of being responsible for those who break the law, 
accusing those who would passionately defend their civil liberties as 
being bad citizens, accusing those who may have a firearm for the sole 
purpose of recreation or defending themselves and their families, 
accusing these people of not wanting to save children's lives.
  And since that kickoff back in April, what have we seen?
  We have seen an all-out public relations campaign headed by the White 
House against lawful firearm use.
  We have seen political candidates of the left trying to outdo each 
other on gun control ideas. It is called have a gun control idea a week 
and somehow it may elect you in November of 2000.
  Maybe this political campaign is scoring points with the gun control 
community. But I can tell you the people who I have been hearing from--
the people outside the Capital Beltway who really have to deal with 
youth violence in their communities and in their schools--are saying 
gun control misses the point entirely.
  They are saying the solution to youth violence is far more 
complicated than adding one more layer to the 40,000 gun control laws--
40,000, that is right--that are already on the books.

  They are saying they need real help and real ideas from Washington, 
DC, and not a political placebo for the 2000 election.
  They are saying it is time to stop pushing political agendas and 
start pushing a law enforcement crime control agenda.
  The Senate had a choice today between a bill that focused on juvenile 
justice reform and a bill that serves a political agenda.
  I think the Senate's vote today has made the job of the conference 
committee harder and perhaps impossible.
  My choice would have been a clean bill that prioritized law 
enforcement and focused on solving the problem of youth violence.
  That is the kind of bill I hope to see coming out of the conference. 
That is the kind of bill I will work for coming out of the conference--
the kind of bill that I could support and I believe that America wants.
  They don't want politics in this issue. They want safer schools and 
safer streets and they want to know their children are safe from 
violent juveniles who would otherwise make these environments unsafe.
  I thank my colleague from New Hampshire for yielding.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Mr. SMITH of New Hampshire. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from 
Idaho for his remarks.
  I say for the Record that I agree with everything he said.
  Mr. President, we have had a very unusual set of circumstances this 
morning.
  We had a vote on an issue involving gun control, yet we don't get to 
speak until after the vote. Knowing what the result is, it does take 
out a little bit of the steam.
  As most of my colleagues know, and I think most American people know, 
I have filibustered this bill now for about a week by asking for this 
cloture vote. As Senator Craig said, to simply have dilatory motions 
between now and the time this goes to conference makes no sense because 
the result of this bill going to conference has already been decided by 
the vote of the Senate.
  Under this rule, each Senator, myself now being the one on the floor, 
has an hour to discuss the reason for their vote on this issue. I think 
it is important to discuss it, even though the vote has occurred, 
because the American people need to understand what we did. I tried in 
a very few brief minutes, thanks to the consideration of the minority 
leader who was kind enough to allow me 3 minutes of his time to do this 
prior to 9:45 when we had the vote, to point out what we were about to 
do. Apparently not too many people were listening. I will point out 
again what we did.
  The House passed H.R. 1501 and sent it here. That is a cultural bill 
that allows the display of the Ten Commandments in schools. It allows 
individual religious expression. It allows prayer in school memorial 
services. It allows faith-based groups to compete for Government 
juvenile justice grants. A good bill.
  The purpose of that bill was to make a statement about juveniles that 
perhaps the issue is not guns but, rather, a cultural problem in our 
schools that we need to address. It was a well-thought-out bill. When 
that bill came to the Senate, I tried to get a vote up or down on it. 
Because of procedures by those who felt the bill should not be passed, 
I could not do it. I was shut out by the so-called legislative tree, a 
parliamentary tree, so I could not offer the bill and get a vote on it.
  Next comes gun control, the Senate provisions. We have a House bill 
and a Senate bill. The Senate bill imposes strict limits on gun shows. 
It requires the sale of trigger locks with guns. It puts new limits on 
juvenile gun possession, the kinds of juveniles that Senator Craig 
spoke about, young teenagers who perhaps might go hunting or sports 
shooting. These are needless restrictions on law-abiding American 
citizens, young and old.
  I think it is important to understand what has happened. This was 
substituted for this as a result of the vote we just had. This bill 
will go to conference. Someone said quite some time ago: If you saw how 
laws and sausage were made, you would probably get sick and wouldn't 
want a part of either.
  There is a lot of truth to that. I have never had a lot of confidence 
in those who say: We will clean this up in conference, or we will get a 
good bill out of conference, or let the conferees work their will.
  We will see what kind of will is worked when this comes back. This is 
gun control, a violation of the second amendment. We voted by 77-22 to 
put more gun control on the American people. Call it what it is. When 
this comes out of conference, it will have gun control.
  During the Senate's consideration of S. 254, I was very upset that 
the gun control lobby in this country took advantage of a terrible 
tragedy. They did a good job of it. This was a very emotional time, a 
horrible tragedy, and the gun control people used it to the hilt and 
scared off a lot of people.
  What happened at Littleton was a terrible tragedy. People used this 
on the Senate floor and mounted an unprecedented assault on the second 
amendment rights of law-abiding American gun owners. Not one law-
abiding American citizen had anything to do with Columbine, not one. 
Not one law-abiding American citizen, not one gun owner or juvenile who 
is a law-abiding citizen had anything to do with Columbine. They were 
law breakers who did that at Columbine. They cast the blame, though, on 
the law-abiding gun owner, while leaving the movie moguls and video 
gamemakers who promote violence to children unscathed, with no mention. 
The problem is guns, they said, not the culture.
  It is interesting that we take prayer and values out of the schools. 
What comes in? Violence, drugs, condoms. Hello, America, wake up.
  It was well done; it was well orchestrated. It scared off enough 
people. It

[[Page S9453]]

scared off the 19 or so votes we needed to block cloture on this bill. 
The House did the right thing; we did the wrong thing.
  We need to take a hard, introspective look at our Nation's culture. 
That bill did that. This bill does not do that. We see video games 
designed for young people that glorify violence. I say to the American 
people taking a few moments to listen, look at those video games your 
kids are watching. Take a look at what they are watching on the 
Internet. Take a look at some of the movies they are bringing home from 
Erol's and watching after you go to bed. Parents might want to take a 
look and see what is going on in their children's lives.
  They glorify violence. They invite children to engage in fantasy 
killings. They never show the opposite. When somebody is shot in one of 
the video games, they don't mention the fact that the person who was 
killed may have a family. They don't talk about that. The only thing 
shown is the glorification of violence.
  We see unconscionably violent movies such as ``The Basketball 
Diaries'' in which killings bear a striking resemblance to the 
Littleton massacre. It doesn't mean every kid who watches that kind of 
a movie would do that. Of course it doesn't. Some kids can handle it, 
but some can't. Why expose children to this?
  We see music such as that of the so-called Marilyn Manson character 
that glorifies murder, suicide, sodomy. As a matter of fact, Platinum 
Records has big sales on those records glorifying murder, suicide, and 
sodomy. Our kids are listening to this in America and we blame guns. We 
blame guns with this vote.
  We see the marketing of violence in many forms over the Internet. As 
I said, every child is not going to go to school and murder his 
classmates or his teacher because he watches or plays some video game 
or listens to violent music. Some will be influenced by that culture.
  I had a shotgun next to my bed for as long as I can remember. At 8 or 
9 years old, I knew how to use it. I was trained to use it in the 
proper way. I never thought about going to school and using it on 
anybody, and neither did my classmates who also had shotguns. I 
remember hearing it said when I grew up that if you read good books, 
good things might happen. By the same token, if a young person watches 
a bad film or plays an evil video game, bad things may happen. Why take 
a chance? But it is easier to blame the gun. Blame the gun; blame 
somebody else. Don't look at what is going on in America. Wake up, 
America, before it is too late.
  This is the second amendment to the Constitution that we just 
violated. It is not guns that caused this violence.
  The first gun came over on a ship probably in 1607. Most likely 
somebody had a gun coming into Jamestown. For 375 years we had no 
school shootings, not one. Now we have gun control. In America, we have 
40,000 laws, according to Senator Craig, and now we have school 
shootings. Hello. Anybody listening? What is going on here? Is it guns? 
If it is, how come we didn't have school shootings for 375 years when 
everybody had a gun?
  I believe we should take a look at the news media. The news media has 
a distressing tendency to engage in sensationalism, the mindless 
pursuit of greater ratings. On April 20 this year when the children 
came tumbling out of Columbine High School with blood on their clothes, 
some children wounded and crying, what happened? With microphones in 
their face, they were asked: What was it like to witness your 
classmate's death? Did he say anything as he died?
  What they needed when they came out of that high school, my fellow 
Americans, was a hug.
  Do you know what would have really made me feel good? If one of those 
in the news media had laid down the microphone and laid down the camera 
and walked up to one of those kids and put his arms around them or her 
arms around them and said, ``I'm sorry. We love you.''
  But, oh, no, we cannot do that. We have to get right in the face with 
the microphone and the camera and sensationalize this kind of violence. 
And then we blame guns.
  When are we going to wake up, America, before it is too late? This 
bill addressed this--tried to. You cannot address these kinds of things 
with laws, but you can at least make an attempt. You take these things 
out of the schools and the kids don't have any choice. They can't pray; 
they can't talk about values. If somebody gets killed and the teachers 
try to comfort their kids by saying a prayer, the teacher gets fired. 
And we take away guns and blame guns.
  H.R. 1301 declares that State and local governments have the power to 
display the Ten Commandments on public property. This would allow the 
public schools to post those Ten Commandments. Does anyone seriously 
argue that the display of the Ten Commandments in a public school 
wouldn't help kids at least think a little bit? They do represent the 
moral foundation of our entire civilization. Does anybody have a 
problem with, ``Thou shall not kill?'' Does anybody have a problem 
with, ``Thou shalt not steal?'' ``Thou shalt not bear false witness?'' 
``Honor thy father and mother?'' Does anybody have a problem with 
those? Is that going to threaten Western civilization, to put those up 
on the wall of the school? Really? Come on.
  H.R. 1501, this bill, declares that the expression of religious faith 
by individual persons is protected by the Constitution of the United 
States. This provision would allow greater freedom for individual 
students to express their religious faith, whatever it is, as well as 
to organize and participate in student-led religious activities in 
public school.
  Does anyone seriously believe that greater religious freedom in the 
public schools would not improve the cultural environment in these 
schools? We spend more time trying to deny religion and values in our 
schools than we spend with our own kids. Think about it. If we spent as 
much time with our kids, loving our kids, as we do trying to deny them 
these kinds of things, we might have a better America. But let's go 
back and blame guns. That is what we did here; we just blamed guns. We 
put in gun control and substituted it for this.
  Faith-based organizations can compete for Government grants under 
this bill. Does anyone doubt that involving faith-based organizations 
in juvenile justice would improve our Nation's juvenile justice system? 
These cultural approaches to solving the problem of youth violence 
offer great promise. This bill offers great promise. This bill offers 
gun control. This is the coward's way out. This is the ostrich vote. 
Put your head in the sand. Blame the gun. Don't deal with this issue. 
We wouldn't want to have to do anything as controversial as perhaps 
posting the Ten Commandments in a school.
  I was disappointed during the Senate's consideration of this bill. I 
was disappointed, frankly, in some of my conservative colleagues in the 
Senate, some of my pro-gun conservative colleagues in the Senate. I am 
disappointed. We had a chance to stop this. I spent a great deal of 
time over the past 2 weeks as we debated S. 254, arguing privately with 
these colleagues, trying to persuade them to hold the line against this 
onslaught of more gun control.

  Gun shows, do you know what the goal is here? It is not instant 
background checks. It is the elimination of gun shows--eliminate the 
shows, don't allow any gun shows. After all, punish the law-abiding 
American who comes to a gun show, as millions do all across America 
every year. Punish them. That is the easy thing to do. Do not deal with 
this. Do not deal with the criminal. Punish the people who go to gun 
shows, the law-abiding American citizens.
  You say, what if somebody, a bad person, gets a gun? Bad people are 
not going to come and get a gun there; they can get it easier somewhere 
else. Even if they do, if they commit a crime with it, we put them in 
jail and put them away as we do anybody else who commits a crime.
  I am very disappointed about what the Senate did with respect to 
these gun shows. It seems evident to me, the practical effect of the 
Lautenberg amendment, adopted when Vice President Gore sat in the chair 
and proudly cast the tie-breaking vote: This will ruin the gun shows, 
put them out of business. That is the aim of the amendment, and that is 
the aim of this legislation that we just substituted in order

[[Page S9454]]

to send it to conference. Everybody says we will get it out in 
conference. We will see about that. Don't hold your breath.
  I am very concerned about the effects of this so-called trigger lock 
amendment. Even though the amendment appears only to require trigger 
locks to be sold with guns, the legal effect may well do great damage 
to the second amendment rights of law-abiding gun owners because courts 
may construe the amendment as creating a new civil negligence standard 
under which gun owners will be seen as having a legal obligation to use 
their trigger locks or face legal liability if their gun is misused by 
some third party. What are we going to create now, a trigger lock 
inspector? ``Knock, knock, knock. Hello, I'm the Government trigger 
lock inspector. I want to see if you have your trigger lock on your 
weapon.''
  Some people say, no, it doesn't require they put it on their weapon; 
it just requires they buy it. Where is individual and personal 
accountability and responsibility? If you are dumb enough to leave a 
weapon without a trigger lock lying around where a kid can reach it, 
then you ought not own the gun. But that is personal responsibility and 
accountability. It is not the Government's responsibility. It is 
certainly not even workable. But maybe it will come to that. We have 
Government bureaucrats who do just about everything in America. We 
might as well have 400,000 or 500,000 trigger lock inspectors, and they 
can knock on the door, ``Mr. Smith, do you have a gun?'' ``Yes, but I'm 
not going to give it to you.'' ``Well, I wanted to see whether you have 
a trigger lock on your gun.'' It may come to that. Don't laugh.
  If the law develops such that gun owners have a legal obligation to 
use these trigger locks, they may be forced to put their safety and 
that of their families at risk. It is not unreasonable to imagine a 
single mother of a small child, depending on her gun for safety, panic 
stricken, struggling unsuccessfully with her trigger lock, at night, 
after hearing a burglar in the house. If she has no trigger lock, and 
she has that thing up on a 10-foot shelf, that is her choice. 
The Government tells her she has to use a trigger lock--or buy a 
trigger lock she doesn't even need.

  What in the world is happening to this country, to the second 
amendment, to the Constitution? It is amazing how we pick some 
amendments, such as the first amendment, and say we must protect that 
amendment at all costs, but when it comes to the second amendment, no, 
we can skip that one.
  These are two examples of the grave harm gun control amendments 
adopted by the Senate would do to second amendment rights. When the 
heat of the moment is gone and the passions so shamelessly stirred up 
by the gun control lobby have subsided, many of those who have 
supported these amendments will realize they have done the second 
amendment serious and lasting harm. But I don't want to see any tears; 
I don't want to hear any whining; I don't want to hear any, ``I'm 
sorry''; I don't want to hear any, ``My gosh, why did I do that? What 
happened? Where was I when they took the second amendment rights away? 
Where was I when they took the Constitution?'' I don't want to hear it. 
It is too late.
  Great experts have repeatedly shown that criminals do not go to gun 
stores, complete the necessary forms, and leave with legally purchased 
weapons. ``Hello, I'm a criminal. I am going to use my gun tonight in 
an armed robbery. I would like to purchase it, please. Where do I fill 
out the forms?'' Criminals are going to buy their guns on the black 
market or they are going to steal them. I have had people tell me flat 
out: I might as well buy the guns on the black market. It is a lot 
safer to me. The Government doesn't know I have it.
  That is pretty scary. Gun control has not been shown to reduce crime. 
Washington, DC, where we are now, has the most crime in all America. 
The only people who own guns in Washington are the criminals. They have 
them. You cannot have one. You are an honest citizen. But they have 
them. Crime has really gone down dramatically in Washington, hasn't it? 
Gun control has really worked here. Gun control attacks a serious 
problem from the wrong angle. Sixty million Americans own 200 million 
firearms. That is a very interesting statistic. Sixty million Americans 
own 200 million firearms, including 60 million handguns.
  Yet four-tenths of 1 percent of those handguns will be used to commit 
a crime. So 99.6 percent of all handguns are used legally; 99.6 
percent, the good folks; four-tenths of 1 percent, the bad guys. We 
substituted S. 254 for H.R. 1501, right here on the floor of the 
Senate.
  Some argue the crime problem is the result of too much personal 
freedom. It is not personal freedom that is the problem. It is moral 
decadence. This bill tries to at least help us deal with it. It is 
moral decadence. It is a cultural, moral problem and it is getting 
worse by the day.
  We look, in this body, for any excuse--guns, whatever--to look the 
other way. Maybe we will have a bill tomorrow to ban knives and then 
baseball bats, maybe cars. They kill about 45 million people a year. 
Maybe we ought to ban them.
  It is a revolving door criminal system. That is what the problem is, 
moral decadence and a revolving door criminal justice system that puts 
the average murderer on the street in 7 years. That is right. The 
average murderer walks out of prison, if he goes to prison--some like 
Mr. Simpson never go to prison when they should. Yes, that is right, 
some like Mr. Simpson never go to prison when they should. But the 
average murderer in this country, if he goes to jail, serves 7 years 
for murder. But it is the gun's fault, isn't it? We cannot blame the 
judges, cannot blame the prosecutors, cannot blame the court system. We 
have to blame guns; blame the peaceful citizen who has the right to own 
a gun to protect himself.
  I am proud I voted the way I did against cloture. I am proud I voted 
for H.R. 1501 and against S. 254. I am proud to stand up for the second 
amendment in the Chamber of the Senate, and I will stand up here again 
and again, year after year, month after month, whatever it takes to 
make this case because I know I am right, and I am going to continue to 
do it.
  When this bill comes out of conference, I am going to filibuster it 
again for as long as I can. I am going to do everything I can to kill 
it, whatever I can do. I am only one person.
  In the movie ``Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,'' another Mr. Smith, 
Jimmy Stewart, dropped on the floor of the Senate after several hours, 
23 I think. I think he even beat Strom Thurmond, if I am not mistaken, 
in the filibuster. He dropped on the floor of the Senate amongst a pile 
of newspapers. Maybe that is what I have to do. Maybe I will do that. I 
don't know.
  I know one thing, S. 254 is wrong and H.R. 1501 is right. I am going 
to fight to preserve, protect, and defend the constitutional right, all 
of the Constitution and all of the constitutional rights of Americans, 
including the right to keep and bear arms. Many of us who are veterans 
in the fight to protect the second amendment know the bold and clear 
words of the second amendment by heart. We cannot say them often enough 
if we are to educate our fellow citizens about the unmistakable meaning 
and intent behind those words of that most besieged provision of the 
Bill of Rights.
  It is pretty clear:

       A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security 
     of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear 
     Arms, shall not be infringed.

  Tell me where there is anything in that amendment that allows us to 
do this under the Constitution of the United States of America? I stood 
right there where the pages are sitting and took the oath twice when I 
came to the Senate to protect and defend the Constitution of the United 
States, and that is what I am doing now, and that is what I will 
continue to do.

  There is nothing in those words about background checks. There is 
nothing in there about the people having a right to keep and bear 
certain kinds of arms. There is nothing in there that says handguns can 
be kept or not kept where shotguns can. Nothing. I sure do not see 
anything in there that gives Congress any leeway whatsoever to infringe 
second amendment rights whenever some group of anti-gun zealots think 
what they like to call the ``public interest'' requires it. The public 
interest is to preserve and protect the Constitution of the United

[[Page S9455]]

States of America. That is what the public interest is and nothing 
else. You trample on the Constitution; you trample on the public 
interest.
  Mr. President, how much time do I have remaining?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire has 30 minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. SMITH of New Hampshire. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, these 
solemn words that all of us revere in the second amendment could not be 
more clear. There is no discussion about what those words mean. I am 
fascinated as the days go by, the more I am in politics, the more I 
read about constitutional scholars making unconstitutional arguments. 
Frankly, I am sick of it. The more recognition these constitutional 
scholars get, the more unconstitutional their arguments get.
  How can anybody read the second amendment to the Constitution of the 
United States and come up with gun control? It is just simply not 
possible to do in any rational way. Yet many of the self-appointed 
leading lights of constitutional law continue to try to throw the 
second amendment into oblivion, to throw it on the trash heap. Boy, 
they are doing a good job.
  There are 40,000 gun laws already. We can pass a few more and stop 
law-abiding Americans from going to gun shows. Let's just keep sitting 
back, America, keep sitting back on your hands--I might use another 
word if I were not on the Senate floor--and let it happen. Don't do 
anything. Don't stand up.
  You need to start voting, my fellow Americans. You need to start 
looking at who is doing this to you and to the Constitution of the 
United States of America, and you need to start throwing those people 
out of here. That is what you need to do. I do not care with what party 
they are. It is irrelevant.
  These are the same legal scholars who find a constitutional right to 
abortion, to solicitation, to contributions, to expression, to travel, 
to privacy, and to a wall of separation between church and state, none 
of which are mentioned anywhere in the text of that hallowed document. 
Nowhere. But, oh, they find it. Abortion, where is that in the 
Constitution?
  I do not know if the scholars have read what our founders have said, 
but somehow I think it is reasonable to accept the premise that those 
who wrote the Constitution might have known what they were talking 
about; maybe they knew what they intended; maybe they knew what they 
intended since they wrote the document.
  It is interesting to read some of their words on the second 
amendment. I am not sure the scholars have read them. If they have, 
they are not listening. I have read them. Let me quote a few.
  The father of the Constitution, James Madison, made absolutely clear 
what the second amendment means. Mr. Madison declared that the 
Constitution preserves ``the advantage of being armed[,] which 
Americans possess over the people of almost every other Nation. . . .''
  Thomas Jefferson, who wrote the Declaration of Independence, put it 
this way. Because of the second amendment, Jefferson proclaimed: ``No 
free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms.''
  Another Founding Father, George Mason of Virginia, upon whose 
Virginia Bill of Rights the Federal Bill of Rights was based, explained 
that the second amendment means that the militia shall ``consist now of 
the whole people, except a few public officials.''
  The whole people will now have the right in the case of tyranny to go 
to their homes and pick up their arms and protect themselves. That is 
the purpose of the second amendment. It is not about sport shooting. It 
is not about hunting. It is about protection, the right of a person to 
protect himself or herself from tyranny, from enemies.
  Sadly, the modern day enemies of the second amendment choose to 
ignore what the founders said. I do not think they chose to ignore 
it. I think they deliberately ignored it. They knew exactly what they 
were doing.

  They are trampling on the Constitution--it is a design--and the 
American people are going to sit back until it is too late--not if I 
have anything to do about it; not as long as I have a voice; and as 
long as I can stand on the Senate floor I am going to stop it.
  Today they are unrelenting in their attacks on the second amendment, 
and they have a big advantage. They have a huge advantage because they 
have the major news media solidly on their side.
  I am not much on polls, but it would be interesting to take a little 
poll to find out how many of the news media pack a little sidearm 
somewhere to protect themselves in their homes. Do you want to take any 
bets?
  More than 6 years ago, I was driving to work, coming in here to 
Washington. I did not have a gun on my person because I am traveling in 
Washington, DC, where by law I am not allowed to have one. I did not 
think it would look good for a Senator to break the law. I do not like 
that law. I witnessed two people murdered in front of my eyes before 
the CIA.
  When I got back to Washington, the press found out I had witnessed 
the murder, and the first question was not: Is your son OK? I just 
dropped him off at school 2 minutes before down the road. Not: How is 
your son? Is he OK? Is he handling it all right? Not: How are you? Are 
you OK? No. That was not the first question. That was not the second, 
either.
  The first question was: Have you now changed your position on gun 
control? I witnessed a murder 20 minutes, 30 minutes before. That was 
the first question: Well, Senator, you're a conservative Republican, 
pro-gun. Have you now changed your position on the second amendment? I 
said: No, I have not. I wish I had had a gun. I might have saved two 
people from being killed by an individual standing in the middle of a 
highway with an AK-47 weapon, shooting innocent people in their cars.
  Time and time again, the media has asked me the same question about 
that very incident. The obsessive focus of those questions on gun 
control demonstrates how much the media is in the back pockets of the 
anti-gun zealots. And they are. They are working together. Frankly, 
they are winning, if you want my honest opinion. They won here today. 
They won again. Time and time again--again and again and again--we 
trample on the Constitution of the United States of America.
  You know what I said to the media? We ought to stop worrying about 
the terrorist's gun and start worrying about tracking him down, trying 
him, convicting him, and getting rid of him so he can never do it 
again. Finally, after several years, he was tracked down. He was 
convicted. He is now on death row.
  The man who committed those murders outside the CIA was an alien 
terrorist who fled overseas. In thinking about the right to keep and 
bar arms in international terms, I find a certain irony. We live in a 
time in which nearly all of the totalitarian communist regimes, which 
kept all of the guns in the hands of the government and out of the 
hands of the people they tyrannized, have collapsed--almost all but not 
all. Yet their utterly discredited philosophy of gun control still 
finds a great number of sympathizers and supporters in the world's 
oldest democracy.
  Two of my close friends escaped Castro's Cuba in the late 1950s, 
early 1960s. The first thing Castro did when he took over was go door 
to door, house to house, literally, confiscating every weapon he could 
get. Because once he did that, his people were defenseless, and he knew 
it.

  It is interesting: Tyrannical governments taking our guns; Members of 
the Senate and the media taking our guns. A bitter irony, isn't it?
  Seen in the light of the second amendment's wording, and the meaning 
of that provision of the Constitution, as illuminated by the comments 
of our Nation's founders, it is clear to me that the gun control 
amendments to S. 254 that were adopted by the Senate are a serious 
attack on the second amendment rights of all Americans.
  The cloture vote we just took bringing debate on this bill to a 
close--which is what cloture is--shows where the votes are in the 
Senate. The Senate has sided with gun control, and they went against 
the cultural approach.
  You are not going to cut down a big tree by snipping the leaves off 
of it. We are not going to solve this problem with gun control. We are 
going to solve this problem when we understand here in America that we 
have some severe cultural and moral problems.
  We need to put values back in schools. We need to put God back in

[[Page S9456]]

schools. We need to allow kids to have the right to pray and the right 
to talk about these things with their teachers so their teachers do not 
have to worry about being fired for giving comfort.
  A teacher in, I believe, New York was fired. When her children were 
agonizing over the fact that one of their classmates had died, and she 
offered to have them say a little prayer to comfort them, she was 
fired. The same people who advocated her firing support gun control.
  I sought an opportunity to offer an amendment. I wanted to have a 
vote on H.R. 1501. I was not allowed to get it. All I wanted was a 
vote. I wanted the House bill. I wanted the Senate to be on record as 
to whether or not they supported this alternative, H.R. 1501, or this 
alternative, S. 254.
  I stand right here at the desk of Daniel Webster. Webster was in many 
debates at this desk in the Old Senate Chamber. He was born in New 
Hampshire and represented New Hampshire in the Congress; and in a 
moment, I guess, when he wasn't thinking properly he moved to 
Massachusetts, and he represented Massachusetts in the Senate. But this 
desk now for evermore belongs to the senior Senator from New Hampshire.
  I can imagine what Webster would think and say in the great eloquence 
that he was able to deliver so many times on the floor of the Senate at 
this desk. I think about it often. But I can imagine what he might have 
thought had he been here in this debate this morning, after a vote, 
with a bunch of rules that nobody put in the Constitution, with us 
getting a chance to say why it was a bad vote. I wonder what Webster 
would have said. Those are the rules.
  I wonder also what he would have said if he knew we took away part of 
the second amendment rights of law-abiding American citizens--probably 
the same thing he would have said if we tried to take the first 
amendment rights away or any other rights away under the Constitution. 
He would be appalled.
  I am devastated by this vote personally because I have traveled all 
over America these past 2 years, and I know what is in the hearts of 
most of the American people out there because I have talked to them 
one-on-one, literally one-on-one, from California to Maine, to Florida, 
to Alabama. You name it, I have probably been in the State. And they 
are disgusted with what we do here. I am a Member of this body. I am 
not criticizing colleagues, but they get so sick and tired of it, 
watching the Constitution get trampled on, watching their taxes go up, 
watching their rights being taken away, watching 35 million of their 
fellow citizens aborted and murdered.

  When we talk about culture, what do we tell the shooters in Columbine 
and the kids who do these terrible things? We say, go to school today, 
be good kids, and while you are gone, we will abort your brothers and 
your sisters--35 million of them since 1973. We just can't continue to 
do this. It will be business as usual. We will kill another 30 million 
over the next 25 years. It won't stop.
  It is not going to stop, and this isn't going to stop, until the 
American people understand fully what is happening. When they do, 
hopefully, they are going to change the Government and get us back to 
the Constitution of the United States. That is what we swore to uphold, 
that is what we took the oath to defend, and that is what we ought to 
do: Defend it and support it. Anything less than that, I don't care if 
it is the 2nd amendment, the 4th amendment, the 16th amendment, the 
22nd amendment, or the body of the Constitution itself, we should 
defend it all, because that is what we are here for.
  It is with great sadness and regret that I have to say to the 
American people, you lost today. The second amendment today took 
another hit, and it will continue to take more until we finally realize 
that enough is enough and we are going to change the people who do this 
to us time and time again. I hope it happens before it is too late 
because once we lose the Constitution and respect for it, we lose 
America.
  I had a citizen tell me--I will not mention the name, for obvious 
reasons--just recently, about a week ago, that he talked to a high-
ranking Member in the House of Representatives. I will leave it at 
that. That high-ranking Member said, in a discussion with that 
individual: ``The Constitution is nothing but a piece of paper.''
  If that is true, there is not much hope. The last hope for America is 
the American people. It is not the Senate; it is not the House; it is 
not the White House; it is the American people.
  Mr. President, I yield back the remainder of my time.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Hutchinson). The Senator from California.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I rise to claim time to speak on this 
bill.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator may speak up to 1 hour.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, I rise to offer my support to both the majority and 
the minority leaders in their ongoing efforts to get the juvenile 
justice bill to conference. I believe it is about time. I was an 
original cosponsor of the juvenile justice bill and helped write the 
gang abatement provisions of that bill. These provisions are really 
designed to provide a helping Federal hand to State and local 
governments for those gangs, criminal gangs, who are now crossing State 
lines and illegally conducting criminal activities in various States 
all across this great country.
  Both Houses of Congress passed this legislation weeks ago. There are 
a few commonsense measures, targeted and precise, that provide some 
regulation of firearms in this country. They are not sweeping, they are 
actually rather small, yet they have become the focus of debate and 
stopped a good bill from moving further. The issue of the bill has 
remained essentially in legislative purgatory, and the will of the 
Congress and the American people has so far been denied.
  I will speak for a moment about the few so-called gun pieces that are 
in this bill. The first is a bill by Senator Ashcroft in the Senate 
which essentially says that juveniles can't possess or buy an assault 
weapon, assault weapons which were created for military use to kill 
large numbers of people in close combat--that is the purpose of these 
weapons, clearly. They were not made for civilian defensive purposes. 
It is a no-brainer to say that juveniles shouldn't be able to buy them 
or possess them.
  Secondly, trigger locks should be put on weapons sold to the American 
public. We know they can be. We know they are not costly, and we know 
they will save lives in instances such as the one that happened a few 
weeks ago, when a youngster 8 years old picked up a gun, playing a war 
game with a 7-year-old, and shot the 7-year-old, not knowing the gun 
was loaded. Again, a no-brainer. Why not sell a gun with a trigger lock 
if it is going to save innocent lives?
  Thirdly, we would close certain gun show loopholes. Does anyone in 
America really believe that a juvenile should be able to go to a gun 
show and, unidentified, surreptitiously, buy a gun and not even have a 
background check? I don't think so.
  Finally, I authored a piece of legislation which to me was another 
no-brainer. We have in prior legislation prohibited American 
manufacturers from making the big banana clips, large ammunition-
feeding devices, some of them as large as 250 rounds, which are used in 
the so-called grievance killings, 9 of which have taken place in high 
schools all across this great country in recent years.
  That is the law of the land. You can't make them domestically. You 
can't sell those that are made domestically, and you can't possess 
them, if they were made following the assault weapons legislation which 
became part of the crime bill in 1994.
  There is a loophole. The loophole is that they can be imported to 
this country. Last year alone, from almost 20 different countries, 11.4 
million large-capacity, ammunition-feeding devices, over 50,000 of them 
of more than 250 rounds, came into this country. The President couldn't 
stop it by executive order; we had to legislate; and, in fact, we did. 
Twenty Republicans voted for this. We had 59 votes in the Senate. The 
chairman of the House Judiciary Committee moved it as an amendment on 
the floor, which was passed by unanimous consent in the House.

[[Page S9457]]

  I will talk more about that in a moment because something rather 
dastardly has happened to it.
  At Columbine High School earlier this year, 13 innocent children died 
from gunshot wounds. We were all horrified. Since that time, dozens, if 
not hundreds, of other children across this Nation have also died from 
gunshot wounds. Congress has done nothing to solve the problem, no 
measures to try to prevent this from happening in the future.
  On August 16, the children of Columbine will return to the very 
school that witnessed one of the worst incidents of gun violence this 
Nation has ever seen. When they return, they are going to be asking 
themselves, their parents, their teachers, and even us a lot of 
questions:
  What has been done to make our school safer?
  Is it harder for kids to get guns today?
  What has Congress done to help us?
  And who is really trying to make a difference?
  Many of those same children came here from Littleton this month, and 
they asked us those same questions. I believe their questions went 
largely unanswered.
  The children received assurances from leadership on both sides of the 
aisle that Congress is working hard to reduce or eliminate future 
school shootings and that Members of Congress sympathized with them and 
would do anything they could to help. But as one child from Littleton 
put it bluntly: ``It is one thing for them to say they sympathize with 
our pain; it is quite another to look down a gun barrel and think that 
maybe you are going to die.''

  This was from a girl just 17 years old, but a girl forced to grow up 
very quickly after the events of this past year. This is what the issue 
is all about--the boys and girls out there who fear for their lives 
every day because of gun violence.
  I have asked fourth graders in California schools what is their 
greatest fear. Do you know what it is? Getting shot on the way to 
school.
  Yet still we wait and we do nothing.
  We spent more than a week in this body debating and voting on dozens 
of provisions to stem the tide of youth violence in this country, and--
as much as some would still refuse to accept it--to curb the flood of 
guns reaching criminals and children.
  This debate isn't all about just controlling guns. I think this 
debate really has three pertinent parts to it: One, improving 
parenting. Parents need to spend more time with their children. They 
need to set limits and they need to see that they are observed. They 
need to spend a lot of time with the young people. This has become less 
and less in a world that requires two parents to work. That is one 
thing--better parenting.
  There is a second thing. Youngsters left alone are more often more 
dependent on media than I was when I was raised. In my younger days, 
there wasn't even television, believe it or not. Today, media is 
surrounded by a culture of violence--even video games. So youngsters 
are much more exposed to violence today than I was when I was growing 
up in this country.
  Third, the Nation is awash in guns. These three things make a very 
combustible mix, and we need to deal with it.
  But still we wait and we do nothing.
  The delays have come in many forms, as I have said--political 
maneuvering, parliamentary tactics, and others. Just recently, in a 
virtually unprecedented move, anti-gun control forces in the House of 
Representatives raised a last-minute ``blue slip'' challenge to the 
amendment I just spoke about, which would stop the importation of these 
big clips--over 11 million of them last year.
  It is my understanding this may have been the first time in history 
that such a challenge was raised to an amendment under Title 18, the 
criminal code. The first time in history--but that didn't stop the NRA 
or its supporters in this Congress.
  The clear goal of this amendment, and of the overwhelming majority of 
Members in both Houses of Congress who voted for it, is to keep those 
foreign-made, high-capacity ammunition clips off our streets and out of 
the hands of children and criminals. That is the intent. You can't use 
them for hunting. They are not good for defensive purposes. They are 
offensive in their use.
  For most people, stopping these big clips from flowing into our 
country and into the hands of children and criminals is simply common 
sense. But not for the NRA. They have tried to kill this measure for 
years. They supported the loophole in the first place. This most recent 
attempt, the blue slip challenge, popped up at the last minute--after 
the amendment had passed the Senate, after it had passed the House 
unanimously, and after we had already waited for weeks for a conference 
to start the juvenile justice bill.
  Essentially, the challenge raised to the bill involves the 
constitutional prerogatives of the House of Representatives to 
originate all revenue bills. Several Members of the House argue that 
because the importation of large-capacity, ammunition-feeding devices 
creates some revenue for the Treasury, the prohibition of such 
importation would cost us money, and thus the entire juvenile justice 
bill becomes a revenue bill. Because no similar measure was in the 
House bill, it was proclaimed that the Senate had illegally originated 
a revenue bill. After little debate and much misinformation, the House 
voted to send the juvenile justice bill back to the Senate so that we 
could remove the clip provision.

  I don't believe such action was warranted, and I would have liked an 
opportunity to make my case before the vote took place, but there 
wasn't time. In the end, I had little choice, and I picked up the 
telephone and called the Speaker of the House of Representatives, who 
was most gracious. He took my call. He said he did not want to kill the 
clip ban. He did not believe the House of Representatives--the 
majority--wanted to kill the clip ban, and he would support its 
reinstitution. I then called the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, 
the very distinguished Henry Hyde of Illinois, and he had made the clip 
ban amendment on the floor, which passed unanimously in separate 
legislation. He said he was supportive of the clip ban. He said he 
would move to put it back in conference and that he believed a 
conference committee that he would appoint on the House side would 
support its reinstitution into the bill.
  Put plainly, we were sideswiped, and we were given no time to 
recover. But make no mistake, the juvenile justice bill is not a 
revenue bill, and this challenge, I believe, was simply an attempt to 
further delay the will of the American people.
  I want to explain why I don't believe the clip import ban is a 
revenue measure, as it is meant by the Constitution, despite what the 
House Parliamentarian has said. I want to put my views on the record in 
the hope that this type of cynical maneuver won't happen again in the 
future.
  I am not a constitutional scholar, but to me, this is simple common 
sense. In my view, the mere fact that a small part of a very large bill 
may incidentally effect some revenue doesn't make the bill a revenue 
bill. The Constitution states that all bills for raising revenue shall 
originate in the House. This has been interpreted to mean all bills 
affecting revenue, I guess, because although the clip ban does not 
raise revenue, it does affect revenue in a small way by causing the 
Treasury to lose the proceeds from a 4.2-percent tariff on ammunition 
clips that are used in certain types of firearms--I believe, handguns.
  I don't believe the intent of this constitutional provision was to 
prevent the Senate from ever passing a bill that somehow affects 
revenue. After all, almost everything we do, in some way, affects 
revenue. We constantly pass bills establishing or eliminating fees. We 
put new requirements on the executive branch that will clearly lead to 
increased costs. We establish programs that will bring extra money to 
the Treasury in ways many people find hard to imagine. Our Founding 
Fathers wanted the House to originate legislation that raises taxes, 
and that I understand and concur with. But I don't believe they meant 
for the House to originate every bill in Congress, which would be the 
logical extension of the arguments made during this very short debate.
  The juvenile justice bill was clearly not a bill for raising revenue, 
and neither was the clip ban amendment

[[Page S9458]]

itself. The juvenile justice bill was a bill to stop crime. The clip 
ban was an amendment to eliminate large-capacity, ammunition-feeding 
devices from our streets. Any revenue affect was incidental, and any 
claim to the contrary is simply mistaken.

  In fact, the revenue effect of this bill was so incidental that 
nobody even realized that tariffs would be lost until a few short weeks 
ago. Not when the amendment came to the Senate floor and passed. Not 
when the amendment came to the House floor and passed. Not during the 
days and weeks that the juvenile justice bills sat on the calendar.
  Only when the pressure was finally getting too great--only when the 
Senate Majority leader and the House Speaker promised conferees that 
week--only then did this issue come up for the first time, at the very 
last minute, before a rushed vote.
  Mr. President, in at least two Supreme Court cases--U.S. versus Munoz 
in 1990 and another as far back as 1897--the Court has held that 
``revenue bills are those that levy taxes in the strict sense of the 
word, and are not bills for other purposes which may incidentally 
create revenue.''
  Clearly, Mr. President, the juvenile justice bill is not a bill that 
levies taxes ``in the strict sense of the word,'' but rather it is 
precisely the type of bill the Supreme Court agrees is not a revenue 
bill--one that is, and I quote it again, ``for other purposes which may 
incidentally'' affect revenue.
  Unfortunately, the House of Representatives never had a chance to 
review those Court cases, because this issue came up so quickly.
  In the end, whether or not a Senate bill is a revenue bill boils down 
to the opinion of a majority of House Members, and those Members have 
spoken by returning the juvenile justice bill to us for correction. But 
I firmly believe that if the House had been given an opportunity to 
study the facts and review the precedent, the outcome would have been 
different. Instead, the issue was rushed, the debate cut off, and the 
outcome predetermined.
  I can only hope that we have now overcome the remaining hurdles and 
we can quickly move to conference on these bills, because we are 
running out of time.
  With fewer than 8 legislative days left before the children of 
Columbine High go back to school, the future of this bill rests 
squarely with the Republican leadership in both the House and Senate. 
They have said they want to make progress with our gun laws, and they 
now have it within their power to do so.
  I am encouraged that it now appears that the logjam has been broken, 
but the inventive and imaginative delays we have faced so far leave me 
wary of future shenanigans.
  The question is, Will those who claim to support reasonable gun 
control finally put their money where their mouths are, or will they 
continue to use unprecedented parliamentary maneuvering to avoid the 
issue and give the NRA its very own Christmas in July?
  I, for one, certainly hope that the American people win out, and I 
thank the majority leader for getting this process moving.
  I also would like to extend my thanks to the Speaker of the House of 
Representatives and the chairman of the Judiciary Committee for their 
support. Chairman Hyde was very supportive of the assault weapons 
legislation, which was moved as an amendment to the crime bill in 1994, 
and his integrity has remained strong and unchallenged in that regard.
  That is the one confidence that I have that this clip ban has a 
chance to fly once again. That rests on the integrity of the chairman 
of the Judiciary Committee, which I believe is unblemished, and also on 
the Speaker of the House of Representatives, both of whom have given me 
their firm assurances.
  I thank the Chair. I yield the floor.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, today we have another opportunity to 
proceed to conference on the Hatch-Leahy juvenile justice bill. Or 
today we can be delayed, again, by those who prefer no action and no 
conference to moving forward on the issues of juvenile violence and 
crime.
  I came to the floor this Monday and last Wednesday to demonstrate the 
seriousness with which Senate Democrats take the matters included in S. 
254, the Hatch-Leahy juvenile justice bill.
  On Monday the majority leader was able to vitiate the cloture vote 
that had been scheduled and proceed to take up the House juvenile 
justice bill, H.R. 1501. He then offered amendment number 1344 to 
insert the text of S. 254, the Hatch-Leahy juvenile justice bill that 
passed the Senate after two weeks of open debate and after significant 
improvements on May 20, by a strong bipartisan vote of 73-25. In so 
doing, he struck Title VII of the Senate bill, which contained the 
amendment on the import ban for high capacity ammunition clips.
  It was this provision that the House used to justify its decision to 
return S. 254 to the Senate on the ground that it contains what they 
consider a ``revenue provision'' that did not originate in the House. 
This, too, is consistent with the unanimous consent request that I 
first propounded last Wednesday and that the Majority Leader sought 
last Thursday.
  I trust that once we obtain cloture on substituting the Senate bill 
for the House text, which is standard practice before seeking a 
conference, that the Majority Leader will move to instruct the 
conferees to reinsert the language that has been omitted from the 
Senate text to cure the technical objection of the House. That, too, 
would be consistent with the unanimous consents previously sought.
  We will then be in position to have the Senate request the long-
delayed conference and appoint its conferees.
  One week ago, I took the extraordinary step of propounding a 
unanimous consent request to move the Senate to a House-Senate 
conference. I talked to the Majority Leader and the Chairman of the 
Judiciary Committee in advance of making the unanimous consent request. 
I noted the history of this measure and the need to move to conference 
expeditiously if we are to have these programs in place before school 
resumes in the fall in the course of my colloquy with the Majority 
Leader last week.
  Two weeks ago, Republican leaders of the House and Senate were 
talking about appointing conferees by the end of that week. Instead, 
they took no action to move us toward a House-Senate conference but, 
instead, were moving us away from one. By propounding the unanimous 
consent last week, I was trying on behalf of congressional Democrats, 
to break the logjam. The unanimous consent would have cured the 
procedural technicality and would have resulted in the Senate 
requesting a conference and appointing conferees without further delay.
  While I regret that Republican objection was made to my request last 
Wednesday, I thank the majority leader for the steps he is taking. 
Senate Democrats have been ready to go to conference. Unfortunately, 
objection from the other side of the aisle has extended the normal 
process from literally seconds into days and possibly weeks before we 
can conference this important matter.
  Today, the Senate takes the second step outlined in my unanimous 
request, moving toward substituting the Senate bill for the text sent 
to us by the House. Senators can cooperate in taking the additional 
steps outlined in my consent request to get to a conference and the 
Senate could proceed to appoint its conferees and request a conference 
without further delay, even today.
  Alternatively, Senators can exercise their procedural rights to 
obstruct each step of the way and require a series of cloture petitions 
and votes. I hope that in the interests of school safety and enacting 
the many worthwhile programs in the Hatch-Leahy juvenile justice bill, 
they will begin to cooperate. The delay is costing us valuable time to 
get this juvenile justice legislation enacted before school resumes 
this fall.
  I spoke to the Senate before the July 4th recess about the need to 
press forward without delay on this bill. I regret that it is beginning 
to look like I will be repeating that speech again as we approach the 
August recess and maybe even into September.
  I have contrasted the inaction on the juvenile justice bill with the 
swift movement on providing special legal protections to certain 
business interests. In just a few months, big business

[[Page S9459]]

successfully lobbied for the passage of legislation to protect 
themselves against any accountability for actions or losses their 
products may cause to consumers. This week the Senate is moving rather 
briskly on corporate welfare and other proposals.
  Some on the other side of the aisle are dragging their feet and now 
actively obstructing the House and Senate from moving to appoint 
conferees on the juvenile justice bill that can make a difference in 
the lives of our children and families. New programs and protections 
for school children could be in place when school resumes this fall. 
The Hatch-Leahy juvenile justice bill is a firm and significant step in 
the right direction. The passage of this bill shows that when this body 
rolls up its sleeves and gets to work, we can make significant 
progress. But that progress will amount to naught if the House and 
Senate do not conference and proceed to final passage on a good bill.
  Every parent, teacher and student in this country is concerned this 
summer about school violence over the last two years and worried about 
the situation they will confront this fall. Each one of us wants to do 
something to stop this violence. There is no single cause and no single 
legislative solution that will cure the ill of youth violence in our 
schools or in our streets. But we have an opportunity before us to do 
our part. It is unfortunate that the Senate is not moving full speed 
ahead to seize this opportunity to act on balanced, effective juvenile 
justice legislation.
  I want to be assured that after the hard work we all put into 
crafting a good juvenile justice bill, that we can go to a House-Senate 
conference that is fair, full, and productive. We have worked too hard 
in the Senate for a strong bipartisan juvenile justice bill to simply 
shrug our shoulders when a narrow minority in the Senate would rather 
we do nothing. I urge all Senators to work to make today the day that 
we finally can request the overdue House-Senate conference on the 
Hatch-Leahy juvenile justice bill.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I hope and expect that cloture will be 
invoked shortly. It is my understanding that we will then proceed to 
the appointment of conferees for the juvenile crime bill, which is 
something I have been working on with the majority leader for some 
time. I commend the leader for his commitment to this bill, and I thank 
my colleague from New Hampshire for allowing the Senate to work its 
will.
  I appreciate the arguments my colleagues have made and agree with 
much of what they said. But, in the end, the Senate and House have 
passed different juvenile crime bills, and it is a conference 
committee's task to reconcile those differences. It will be a difficult 
challenge since the Senate has an obligation to advocate for its 
position. Yet--at the same time--we must recognize that the House 
passed a bill which contains different cultural reform proposals, less 
spending, and no gun control provisions. In fact, the House defeated a 
separate gun control bill.
  We must do our best to reconcile these bills. In the end, I hope and 
trust that this conference committee will produce a vehicle that the 
House, the Senate, and the President can support. If, however, some in 
positions of leadership and responsibility are unwilling to search for 
common ground and are content to simply politicize this issue, the 
change to do something meaningful for our Nation's children may slip 
through our hands. I hope that does not happen and I hope that we can 
come together for the sake of our children.
  I want to say yet again that this is one of the most important bills 
that Congress will consider this year. The Judiciary Committee has 
worked on juvenile crime legislation for more than two years. The 
committee marked up the predecessor to S. 254 for nearly two months 
last Congress. And as you are aware, the Senate spend 2 full weeks this 
spring debating S. 254.
  In 1997, juveniles accounted for nearly one-fifth of all criminal 
arrests in the United States. Juveniles committed 13.5 percent of all 
murders, more than 17 percent of all rapes, nearly 30 percent of all 
robberies, and 50 percent of all arsons. In particular, schools are 
becoming more and more dangerous. Fifteen percent of students have 
reported being victimized at school. Additionally, more than half of 
the Nation's public schools have reported that a crime had been 
committed on the premises.
  Sadly, the killings at Columbine High School last Spring are not an 
isolated event. Similar shootings have occurred in recent years at 
schools in Pearl, Mississippi, which left two dead, West Paducah, 
Kentucky, which left three dead, Jonesboro, Arkansas, which left five 
dead, Edinboro, Pennsylvania, which left one dead, and Springfield, 
Oregon, which left two dead.
  S. 254 provides an infusion of funds to state and local authorities 
to combat juvenile crime and youth violence. While juvenile crime is 
largely a state and local issue, the federal government can play a 
valuable role in assisting the States fight juvenile crime and violence 
through flexible block grants. S. 254 provides $1 billion a year to the 
States to fight juvenile crime and prevent juvenile delinquency. 
Specifically, S. 254 includes a $450 million juvenile accountability 
incentive block grant to the States. States can use this grant to 
implement graduated sentencing sanctions; build detention facilities 
for juvenile offenders; drug test juvenile offenders upon arrest; and 
require juvenile offenders to complete school or vocational training, 
among other reforms. S. 254 also includes the ``juvenile Brady'' 
provision, which prohibits the possession of a firearm by persons who 
commit a violent felony as a juvenile and $75 million annually to help 
States upgrade juvenile felony records and provide school officials 
access to such juvenile felony records in appropriate circumstances. In 
addition, S. 254 provides more than $500 million annually to the States 
for prevention programs, some of which are specifically targeted toward 
gangs in schools, and it extends the Violent Crime Reduction Trust Fund 
through 2005 to ensure adequate funding of administration of justice 
programs.
  In closing, I hope that we can proceed to the appointment of 
conferees. This will give us the opportunity to accomplish a great deal 
over the August recess, and I believe that it will allow us to approve 
a conference report the week after Labor Day. It would be fitting for 
Congress to wrap up this historic juvenile crime legislation when 
America's children are returning to school from the summer recess.
  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending 
amendment be agreed to, the remaining amendments be withdrawn, the bill 
be advanced to third reading and passage occur, all without intervening 
action or debate.
  I further ask consent that the Senate insist on its amendment, 
request a conference with the House, the conferees be instructed to 
include the above described amendment No. 343 in the conference report, 
and the Chair be authorized to appoint conferees on the part of the 
Senate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Amendment (No. 1344) was agreed to.
  The Amendment (Nos. 1345, 1346, 1347, and 1348) were withdrawn.
  The Amendment was ordered to be engrossed and the bill to be read a 
third time.
  The bill (H.R. 1501), as amended, was read the third time and passed.
  (The text of the amendment No. 1344 was printed in the Record of 
Monday, July 26, 1999.)
  The Presiding Officer (Mr. Hutchinson) appointed Mr. Hatch, Mr. 
Thurmond, Mr. Sessions, Mr. Leahy, and Mr. Kennedy conferees on the 
part of the Senate.
  Mr. LOTT. Before I go to the next unanimous consent request, I again 
express my appreciation for the patience and for the cooperation of 
Senator Smith in working through this process.
  Personally, I believe very strongly that we need to have a good 
juvenile justice bill, which includes a lot of very important 
provisions with regard to how we try juveniles who commit crime, how we 
incarcerate them, how we deal with school security, including metal 
detectors. It also has programs included for alcohol and drug abuse, 
and it has some values provisions in it.
  The House has passed a good bill which did not include the gun 
provisions. I hope this will be a juvenile justice bill when it comes 
back from conference.
  I do think the right thing to do is to go to conference. I appreciate 
cooperation in making that happen.




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