[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 143 (Wednesday, October 20, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12861-S12863]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       PARTIAL-BIRTH ABORTION BAN ACT OF 1999--MOTION TO PROCEED

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will now 
resume debate on the motion to proceed to S. 1692, which the clerk will 
report by title.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       Motion to proceed to the consideration of S. 1692, a bill 
     to amend title 18, United Sates Code, to ban partial-birth 
     abortions.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will be 20 
minutes for debate equally divided and controlled between the majority 
and minority leaders.
  The Senator from Pennsylvania is now recognized.
  Mr. SANTORUM. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, we will be voting on a motion to proceed to a bill 
that we have brought up in the Senate now for the third session of the 
Senate, third Congress in a row. I do not believe there is much 
controversy with respect to considering this bill. Obviously, this bill 
is going to pass, and it is going to pass by an overwhelming vote.
  The concern that was voiced last night, and I think will be voiced 
today, is that we are moving off campaign finance reform to the 
partial-birth abortion bill. I am hopeful we can recognize that we had 
a good debate on campaign finance reform; amendments were offered; 
there were several days for those amendments to be offered; and it is 
apparent there is not enough votes to overcome cloture, to break a 
filibuster, if in fact that was going to be called for, and that it is 
time to move on to other business, whether it is partial birth or 
bankruptcy or appropriations bills and the like, and that a week, 
almost a week-long debate on the issue of campaign finance reform was, 
in fact, sufficient.
  We know where the votes are going to come out. I don't think anyone 
is going to be changed by further debate and further amendments. It is 
time to move on to the other business at hand. I hope we can have some 
sort of comity here that would allow the business to continue. I think 
that would be good for all of us, particularly those of us who would 
not like to be here through the holidays for a long period of time, who 
would like to get back home after we finish our business to spend some 
time with our constituents in our States.
  So, again, I think a fair debate was had, the votes are clear, and 
further debate will do nothing other than take up

[[Page S12862]]

the time of the Senate and delay action on important matters that we 
have to get to before we adjourn for the end of the year.
  So with that, I am hopeful my colleagues, frankly, on both sides of 
the aisle will support moving off campaign finance reform.
  With that, I reserve the remainder of my time.
  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, do I understand there are 10 minutes for 
this side?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is correct.
  Mr. LEVIN. The majority leader has authorized me to allocate time to 
myself. I yield to myself 4 minutes.
  A majority of the House and a majority in the Senate support campaign 
finance reform. It was clearly indicated yesterday that we have a 
majority in favor of campaign finance reform. A minority of the Senate 
is not in favor of campaign finance reform, and they have decided to 
try to block the will of the majority, which is their right. They can 
filibuster this legislation to which they are so strongly opposed, and 
I defend their right to oppose this legislation with all their might, 
although I disagree with them with all my might.
  The supporters of campaign finance reform have every right to try to 
pass the bill. That means we have every right to not agree to withdraw 
campaign finance reform legislation just because we didn't get cloture 
on the first, second, or third vote. It took four votes to get civil 
rights legislation passed in the late 1960s and 7 weeks to get that 
legislation passed. It wouldn't have passed had the supporters of civil 
rights legislation, after they did not get the necessary votes to adopt 
cloture the first time, backed off from their cause.
  We, the supporters of campaign finance reform, are just as 
passionately in support of closing the soft money loophole as the 
opponents are passionate in their opposition. We do not need to 
withdraw as long as we are in the majority. We don't have to go quietly 
into that good night after a failed cloture vote.
  This vote we are about to take on a motion to proceed to another item 
of business, this motion to end the Senate's consideration of campaign 
finance reform in the face of a filibuster by the opposition, is the 
vote that really counts on campaign finance reform. This is the moment 
of truth. A cloture vote simply decided that we did not succeed in 
breaking the filibuster. Today the majority will decide whether to give 
in to that filibuster. That is what this vote is about, whether or not 
a majority of this Senate which favors closing the campaign loopholes 
in the law that are supposed to put limits on how much a person can 
contribute to a campaign or candidate, gives in to a filibuster, 
whether those laws which have been so totally undermined by the soft 
money loophole, in effect, will be restored to good health. That is the 
decision we are going to make.
  This is the vote that tests the determination of supporters of 
campaign finance reform against the determination of the opponents--
whether the majority which went on record yesterday as favoring 
campaign finance reform will say we are going to give up our cause for 
whatever length of time because we haven't gotten 60 votes yet. We 
would not have had civil rights legislation if that were the position 
taken by the supporters of civil rights--8 long weeks on just one of 
the civil rights bills in the 1960s and four cloture votes, which 
finally, with the help of a bipartisan group, were able to take them 
over the finish line.
  Yes, the opponents have a right to filibuster, a right to tie up the 
Senate. However, we in the majority on campaign finance reform do not 
have to back down. This is the vote that counts: Whether we in the 
majority agree we will move to something else or whether we will say to 
the filibusters they may do what they are doing under our rules and we 
will defend that right, but we need not and will not back down to that 
filibuster.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, how much time remains on the Democratic 
leader's time?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Six minutes.
  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I ask I be yielded such time as I shall 
consume.
  I especially thank the Senator from Michigan for his great 
determination on this issue. I am certainly going to join him on this.
  I will vote ``no'' on the motion to proceed in a few minutes, but it 
is not because I oppose moving to the late-term abortion bill at this 
time. Supporters of campaign finance reform are prepared to move that 
bill by consent, which keeps the campaign finance bill as the pending 
business of the Senate--that is all we are trying to do--and thereby 
allows the Senate to return to it once the late-term abortion bill is 
completed.
  This vote we are going to have in a few minutes is not about whether 
we will debate late-term abortion. Everybody here is prepared to do 
that. It is about whether we will keep working on the campaign finance 
bill after a short hiatus to do other business.
  I want to be clear: Senator McCain and I are ready to move forward in 
debating our bill. I thought we had an exciting series of votes 
yesterday, the upshot of which is, we have three new supporters of 
reform. We need to keep up the pressure for reform. We did not have 
adequate time on the floor to do that. The majority leader promised on 
the record 5 days of debate. We had 4 days, and 1 of the days was 
yesterday when all we did was vote on cloture.
  I say to my Republican colleagues who say they want the chance to 
offer amendments, now that we have had those two cloture votes, we can 
do that. There is every opportunity now to offer amendments. There are 
a variety of ways to clear places on the amendment tree so the debate 
can proceed and we can see if we can work something out and actually 
pass the bill.
  I appreciate the candor of the Senator from Pennsylvania, who just 
said, as I understand it, we had a fair debate. This is not what some 
of the other Republicans said. He also indicated there had been an 
opportunity to offer amendments. That is what the Senator said. That is 
the opposite of what many of the opponents of reform said. Which is it? 
Was there an opportunity to offer amendments or not? Maybe it is an 
academic debate at this point. It is a very interesting difference in 
the way the last few days have been characterized.
  What really counts is that amendments can be offered right now. If 
there is any Senator out there who is saying he has not had that chance 
to offer amendments, they should vote to have the Senate continue on 
the campaign finance reform bill and come down and offer an amendment. 
Now is not the time to put campaign finance reform back on the 
calendar, which in this case means the back burner. It is time to come 
together and work to find a consensus.
  Whatever different spin is put on this issue, the bottom line is 
this: The soft money system is wrong and it must be ended. Mr. 
President, 55 Members of this body have now voted for reform. The time 
has come to finish the job.
  I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this motion to proceed and 
help the Senate take a step toward doing that.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum and ask the time be equally 
divided.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, again I ask my colleagues to join with 
me in voting to move to proceed to the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act. 
It is a bill that is important business. It is something that has 
overwhelming support in the Senate. I hope we can move to this issue.
  If there is a need to debate campaign finance reform in the future, 
then that is a matter for the leaders to work out, whether we want to 
come back to that issue. I think we have spent enough time on this 
bill. It is very clear where this issue is going. At least the issues 
of McCain-Feingold and Shays-Meehan do not have the necessary votes to 
pass in this Senate. Maybe there are other kinds of campaign finance 
that could, and maybe we could use this time over the next several 
months to find some middle ground to get a compromise.

[[Page S12863]]

  We are not there right now. It is time to move on with the business 
of the Senate and the American people.
  I yield the remainder of my time.
  Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, I rise to comment briefly on why I will 
vote against the motion to proceed to S. 1692, the Partial-Birth 
Abortion bill. I support this legislation. I have voted for passage of 
this bill in the past, and I have twice voted to override the 
President's veto. I think we should take up this bill in the Senate, 
and I am quite certain we will get to it. Yesterday, in fact, we 
offered to move to this bill by unanimous agreement and, had that been 
accepted, we would be on it now.
  The problem with this procedural tactic of having a recorded vote on 
this motion is that it ends the Senate's work on campaign finance 
reform, and we are not finished with that bill yet. We started debating 
campaign finance reform last week, and we have a chance to make some 
genuine improvements in American politics. We should finish what we 
have started.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I intend to vote against the motion to 
proceed to S. 1692, legislation to ban partial birth abortions.
  This is an unnecessary parliamentary maneuver designed solely to 
displace S. 1593, the campaign finance reform bill, from the floor. A 
unanimous-consent agreement was offered, with no known opposition, to 
temporarily lay aside the campaign finance reform bill so that the 
Senate could consider the partial birth abortion ban legislation. Under 
that procedure, when the Senate finishes its work on the latter bill, 
we could then return to complete the debate on campaign finance reform. 
But if this procedural vote is successful, the McCain-Feingold bill 
will be returned to the Senate calendar, effectively cutting off the 
debate, well short of the time promised to consider this important 
issue.
  I want to make very clear, my strong support for this bill and my 
unequivocal and long-standing opposition to the practice of partial 
birth abortion. I am pro-life and oppose abortion except in the case of 
rape or incest, or when the life of the mother is in danger. Partial 
birth abortion is a repugnant procedure and an abomination, which 
should be outlawed.
  I am a cosponsor of this legislation, as I was in previous years. I 
have voted five times over the past 5 years to ban this repugnant and 
unnecessary procedure, including two votes to overturn the President's 
veto of this legislation. When the Senate votes on S. 1692, I will 
again vote for the ban.
  As I stated yesterday, I will not give up the fight to enact 
meaningful reform of our campaign finance system. If the McCain-
Feingold bill is pulled from the floor today, I will return to the 
Senate floor with amendments on campaign reform this year, next year, 
and as long as it takes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion to 
proceed. The yeas and nays have been ordered. The clerk will call the 
roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Grams). Are there any other Senators in 
the Chamber who desire to vote?
  The result was announced, yeas 52, nays 48, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 332 Leg.]

                                YEAS--52

     Abraham
     Allard
     Ashcroft
     Bennett
     Bond
     Breaux
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burns
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Cochran
     Coverdell
     Craig
     Crapo
     DeWine
     Domenici
     Enzi
     Fitzgerald
     Frist
     Gorton
     Gramm
     Grams
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Hatch
     Helms
     Hollings
     Hutchinson
     Inhofe
     Kyl
     Landrieu
     Lott
     Lugar
     Mack
     McConnell
     Murkowski
     Nickles
     Roberts
     Santorum
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Smith (NH)
     Smith (OR)
     Specter
     Stevens
     Thomas
     Thompson
     Thurmond
     Voinovich
     Warner

                                NAYS--48

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Boxer
     Bryan
     Chafee
     Cleland
     Collins
     Conrad
     Daschle
     Dodd
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Graham
     Harkin
     Hutchison
     Inouye
     Jeffords
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Kerrey
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     McCain
     Mikulski
     Moynihan
     Murray
     Reed
     Reid
     Robb
     Rockefeller
     Roth
     Sarbanes
     Schumer
     Snowe
     Torricelli
     Wellstone
     Wyden
  The motion was agreed to.
  Mr. OTT. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. COVER DELL. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  Mr. LEVIN. I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second? There is a 
sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion to 
lay on the table the motion to reconsider. The yeas and nays have been 
ordered.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 53, nays 47, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 333 Leg.]

                                YEAS--53

     Abraham
     Allard
     Ashcroft
     Bennett
     Bond
     Breaux
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burns
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Cochran
     Coverdell
     Craig
     Crapo
     DeWine
     Domenici
     Enzi
     Fitzgerald
     Frist
     Gorton
     Gramm
     Grams
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Hatch
     Helms
     Hollings
     Hutchinson
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Kyl
     Landrieu
     Lott
     Lugar
     Mack
     McConnell
     Murkowski
     Nickles
     Roberts
     Santorum
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Smith (NH)
     Smith (OR)
     Specter
     Stevens
     Thomas
     Thompson
     Thurmond
     Voinovich
     Warner

                                NAYS--47

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Boxer
     Bryan
     Chafee
     Cleland
     Collins
     Conrad
     Daschle
     Dodd
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Graham
     Harkin
     Inouye
     Jeffords
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Kerrey
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     McCain
     Mikulski
     Moynihan
     Murray
     Reed
     Reid
     Robb
     Rockefeller
     Roth
     Sarbanes
     Schumer
     Snowe
     Torricelli
     Wellstone
     Wyden
  The motion was agreed to.

                          ____________________