[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 32 (Tuesday, March 21, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1475-S1480]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE JUVENILE JUSTICE CONFERENCE
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I will speak on a matter involving the
juvenile justice conference--or, perhaps more accurately, I should say
the lack of a conference on the juvenile justice bill. It is a matter
that concerns me greatly because I was the floor leader on this side
and the distinguished Senator from Utah was the floor leader on the
other side when we had over a week of debate on the juvenile justice
bill. We had a very solid debate. We then passed the bill with 73 votes
in the Senate. It went to conference, and it was like going into the
Bermuda Triangle; we haven't seen it since.
Actually, this Congress has kept the country waiting too long for
action on juvenile justice legislation and has kept the country waiting
too long on sensible gun safety laws. We are fast approaching the
first-year anniversary of the shooting at Columbine High School in
Littleton, CO. It has been 11 months since 14 students and a teacher
lost their lives in that terrible tragedy on April 20, 1999. It has
been 10 months since the Senate passed the Hatch-Leahy juvenile justice
bill. As I said before, it was an overwhelming vote of 73-25.
Our bipartisan bill includes modest--and I believe effective--gun
provisions. It has been 9 months since the House of Representatives
passed its own juvenile crime bill, which was on June 17, 1999. Then
the leadership in the Congress delayed action on calling a conference
all summer. It has been 8 months since the House and Senate juvenile
justice conference met for the first and only time. The Republican
majority in the Congress convened the conference on August 5, 1999.
They did that less than 24 hours before the Congress adjourned for a
month's vacation.
Now, you don't have to be a cynic to recognize this for what it was.
It was a transparent ploy to deflect criticism for delay, but also to
make sure the conference could not do anything. They would not have
enough time to prepare comprehensive juvenile justice legislation to
send to the President before school began in September. But we did have
time to do it before children went back to school in January. We didn't
do that. Now I wonder if we will ever do it.
The Senate and House Democrats have been ready for months to
reconvene the juvenile justice conference. We have told the Republicans
we would meet with them on a minute's notice. We want to work with
Republicans to craft an effective juvenile justice conference report
that includes reasonable gun safety provisions. But even though the
Senate passed this legislation by a 3-to-1 majority, no conference; the
Republican leadership has decided not to act.
I think this is particularly shameful because the Congress has spent
more time in recess than in session during the last meeting of this
conference. Think about that. We have been out on vacation more time
than we have actually been here working since we had that last
conference. Let's take a couple days off one of these recesses and have
a conference.
Two weeks ago, the President invited House and Senate members of the
conference to the White House, both Republicans and Democrats. He urged
us to proceed to the conference and to have final enactment of
legislation before the anniversary of the Columbine tragedy.
Unfortunately, the Republican majority has rejected the President's
plea for action. I think more than rejecting the President's plea for
action, they have rejected the American people's plea.
On April 22 of last year, barely 2 days after the killings at
Columbine High School, I came to the Senate to urge action. I praised
the Democratic leader, Senator Kennedy, and others for their thoughtful
comments on these matters and for reaching out to the families of those
who were killed that week. At that time, almost a year ago, I urged the
Senate to rededicate itself to the work of assisting parents, teachers,
the police, and others in stemming school violence. I suggested that S.
9, the Safe Schools, Safe Streets, and Secure Borders Act of 1999,
provided a good place to start.
Responding to our efforts to turn the Senate's attention to the
problems of school violence, on April 27 the Republican leader came to
the floor and said if we withheld for 2 weeks, he could provide a
legislative vehicle ``that we could take up, and the Senate would then
have an opportunity for debate, have amendments, and have votes.''
Senator Lott returned to the floor the following day to repeat his
commitment to provide the Senate with the ``opportunity to debate and
vote on those issues dealing with school violence.'' To Senator Lott's
credit, he proceeded to S. 254, the juvenile justice bill, which was
then pending on the Senate calendar, and he did that on May 11. We then
had 2 weeks of real debate on it--one of the few we have had recently--
and then the Senate worked its way through this bill. The Hatch-Leahy
juvenile justice legislation, which passed the Senate on May 20, passed
with a strong bipartisan majority and 73 votes, with both Democrats and
Republicans voting for it. No one should forget it was a Republican
majority that decided to make the juvenile justice legislation the
vehicle for the antiviolence amendments adopted by the Senate last
May. Three-quarters of the Senate voted for our legislation.
Following the action by the other body, I urged a prompt conference
on the juvenile justice legislation. I took the unusual step of coming
to the Senate to propound a unanimous consent request to move to
conference on the legislation, which initially encountered Republican
objections. But eventually this request provided a blueprint for moving
the Senate to agreeing to conference on July 28 of last year.
Unfortunately, that conference was convened for only a single
afternoon--not with votes but of speeches. Democrats in both the House
and Senate tried to offer motions about how to proceed to begin some of
the discussion. But that was ruled out of order by the Republican
majority.
Then I spoke on the floor several times last year--on September 8,
September 9, and October 21--urging the majority to reconvene the
juvenile justice conference. I joined with fellow Democrats to request,
both in writing and on the floor, the majority to let us
[[Page S1476]]
finish our work on the conference and then send a good bipartisan bill
to the President. On October 20, 1999, all the House and the Senate
Democratic conferees sent a letter to Senator Hatch and Congressman
Hyde calling for an open meeting of the juvenile justice conference.
The following year, on March 3, 2000, after yet another shocking school
shooting involving 6-year-old classmates in Michigan, Representative
Conyers and I wrote again to Senator Hatch and Congressman Hyde
requesting an immediate meeting of the conference. The response has
been resounding silence.
Two weeks ago, I felt honored to be invited to a White House summit
by the President of the United States. I joined Senator Hatch,
Congressman Hyde, and Congressman Conyers in an Oval Office meeting
with the President--a very substantive meeting. It went on well over an
hour on what was a very busy day for the President. He urged the
reconvening of the conference. He urged action by the Congress to send
him a comprehensive bill before the 1-year anniversary of the Columbine
tragedy. I met with the President again that evening. He said again:
Please, will you just meet and send me a bill, especially before the 1-
year anniversary of Columbine. His entreaties, which I thought were
well intentioned and were done seeking bipartisan support, were
rebuffed. No conference has been scheduled.
This is only the latest in a long series of delays that have plagued
this legislation. We had to overcome technical obstacles and threatened
filibusters just to begin the juvenile justice conference, and,
unfortunately, I see no sign of abating the delays. We worked hard on
the Hatch-Leahy juvenile justice bill, S. 254, and passed it by a vote
of 73 to 25, but we cannot get a conference.
What I worry about is the impression we give the country. We will
stand here and debate symbolism. We will take long recesses. We will
talk about everything but the thing that is on the minds of parents and
schoolchildren.
I am blessed with representing a State that I believe has the lowest
crime rate in the Nation. We are a State where most of us don't even
lock our doors. But it is interesting, when I go to schools in my State
and talk to parents, to teachers, and to the children, they worry. Then
I go into some of these other larger, urban States, and the concern is
enormous.
We have become a terribly violent nation notwithstanding that the
vast majority of Americans are good and law-abiding people. I come from
a State where a majority of the people own firearms. I own many myself.
We don't have gun control laws in our State. We teach people to respect
the weapons they have. But the people in Vermont have the same sense of
revulsion that I do when they see some of these shootings and they see
a Congress unwilling to even stand up to a powerful gun lobby.
Can anybody forget what was probably one of the most terrible
pictures I have seen, and terrible in what it said, at the Jewish day
center in California where a man went in attacking and shooting? You
remember the photograph of the heavily armed police officers leading
the little children out across the street. Every one of us has children
and has been with children. We have seen them in grade school with a
teacher leading the group of children. All the children hold hands.
They hold hands with the teacher. And what a happy, cheerful time: We
are going to recess. We are going to class. We are going to learn. And
they are protected and safe because they are with their teacher or
their parents. But this time police officers led these children. They
did not know what was going on with the heavily armed officers bringing
them to safety. The police officers must have children of their own, or
grandchildren of their own, and were thinking about what was going on.
These are images that frighten people in this country. It is
reasonable that they are frightened. We ought to respond. We are
talking about a juvenile justice bill that has a whole lot of things
way beyond any question of gun control. It has in it only modest gun
control. It closes some loopholes in the law where you can't go to a
flea market in the middle of a Saturday afternoon, and buy a gun
without a real check on your background.
We have an opportunity in the conference to cut through partisan
differences to make a difference in the lives of our children and
families. We need to meet in the conference to debate our motions, and
vote them up or vote them down, but at least meet and vote. We are paid
to vote yes or no. We are not paid to pass the buck. That is what is
happening here.
I don't know what my friends on the Republican side worry about.
There are more of them than there are of us. They control the schedule.
They have the votes. They can vote down anything they want. The
procedural hurdles and the delays that plague this legislation are
simply because of the opposition of the gun lobby to any new firearm
safety laws.
Unfortunately, the leadership is being held hostage by the extreme
views of the NRA and other special interests. If they really wanted to
pass effective juvenile justice reforms and protect our children
against gun violence, they could do it tomorrow. The President would
sign the Hatch-Leahy bill in a second if it reached his desk.
Last year, the Y2K Act conference only took 2 weeks to complete, and
a bill was sent to the President to provide legal protections for
business--legal protections, as it turned out, that they didn't need.
But when it comes to protecting our children where there is a real
need, we can't act unless the NRA tells us we are allowed to act. That
is wrong.
I didn't come to the Senate to have any group or any special interest
group on the right or the left tell me what I can do or not do. Only
the voters of my State can make a decision that they don't like the way
I vote. They can throw me out. But we should not allow this great body
to be held hostage by special interest groups--no matter how many
Members they have, no matter how much money they spend on television,
or no matter how outrageous a claim they make.
I have stood on this floor many times, but some of the proudest times
I have had in public service were as a prosecutor in law enforcement.
Let's listen to our Nation's law enforcement officers. They say pass a
strong and effective juvenile justice bill. Ten national law
enforcement organizations, representing thousands of law enforcement
officers, have endorsed the Senate-passed gun safety amendment. They
support loophole-free firearm laws.
I remind Senators of the time Members of this Congress turned their
back on police officers when the NRA said don't ban cop-killer bullets.
Do you remember that? Law enforcement said: Wait a minute. We put our
lives on the line for you. How about protecting us?
Here are the organizations that have endorsed the gun-safety
amendment and that support loophole-free firearm laws:
The International Association of Chiefs of Police, the International
Brotherhood of Police Officers, Police Executive Research Forum, Police
Foundation, Major Cities Chiefs, Federal Law Enforcement Officers
Association, National Sheriffs Association, National Association of
School Resource Officers, National Organization of Black Law
Enforcement Executives, Hispanic American Police Command Officers
Association.
These law enforcement officers need help in keeping guns out of the
hands of people who should not have them. I am not talking about people
who use guns for hunting and sport but about criminals and unsupervised
children. These organizations want Congress to move.
We recognize 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. We have an obligation to do our part. It is time to act.
This list represents organizations that endorse the Senate-passed gun
safety amendments. These are not organizations that take a pie-in-the-
sky attitude. These organizations represent people who work in an
increasingly violent society, putting their lives on the line to
protect all Americans, just as the police officers in the Capitol put
their lives on the line every day to protect everyone. Since I have
been here two have died doing that.
These organizations ask: Will you at least stand up for us as we
stand up for the quarter billion Americans?
[[Page S1477]]
I see the distinguished senior Senator from Rhode Island on the
floor, Mr. Reed. I applaud Senator Jack Reed for his resolution for the
juvenile justice conference to report a final bill by April 20 of this
year, the 1-year anniversary of the Columbine High School shooting.
I am proud to cosponsor this resolution. I am proud to work with my
good friend. I admire him for his initiative. I yield the floor to the
distinguished senior Senator from Rhode Island.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island is recognized.
Mr. REED. I commend the Senator from Vermont for his eloquence and
his passionate support of this vital legislation. It is vital to the
children and to the families of this country.
As the Senator pointed out, it has been 11 months since the tragic
incident at Columbine High School. Last April 20, we witnessed with
horror and revulsion an attack on children who were just going to
school. The entire country stood up as one and said: We have to do
something. We have to stop this senseless gun violence. We have to
create a country in which easy access to firearms and the resulting
violence is something of the past.
However, it has not stopped. The violence continues every day with
tragic consequences throughout this country--in Seattle, WA; in
Atlanta, GA; in Los Angeles, CA; in Honolulu, HI; in Ft. Worth, TX; in
Sidney, OH; in Wilkinsburg PA; in Mount Morris township in Michigan;
and thousands of other places where, regrettably and tragically, gun
violence is so common in this country that it doesn't make the front
page because the incidents aren't that graphic or that violent.
The first anniversary of the tragedy at Columbine High School is just
around the corner, April 20. Still, the conference committee on
juvenile justice has not yet discharged their duty and sent back a bill
that contains common, safe, gun safety measures that were passed by
this Senate. In fact, as the Senator from Vermont pointed out, the
committee has met only once, last August. For 8 months we have waited.
We have waited; the American people have waited. We have waited for
commonsense protections that have been frustrated and thwarted by the
Republican leadership at the behest of the NRA. They have ignored the
will of the American people and the overwhelming desire of the American
people to protect the safety of their children and the safety of their
communities.
I believe the American people have waited long enough. Today, along
with my colleagues, Senator Boxer of California, Senator Leahy, and
others, I will introduce a sense-of-the-Senate resolution calling for
the juvenile justice conferees to complete and submit the conference
report before April 20, the first anniversary of the Columbine
shooting, and to include in this conference report the amendments
passed by this Senate seeking to limit access to firearms by juveniles,
by convicted felons, and by other persons.
Will the passage of this legislation stop gun crime in this country?
No, it won't. But it will represent a step forward to impose reasonable
controls on the easy access to firearms for those who should not have
them: Children, criminals, those whose mental capacity is diminished
enough so they resort to violence with these weapons.
Within the core of this juvenile justice legislation are simple,
commonsense approaches to ensure we have a safer society: Closing the
gun show loophole, requiring safety locks to be sold with handguns,
banning the importation of large capacity ammunition clips, and
outlawing juvenile possession of assault weapons.
We will bring common sense to our gun laws with these measures and,
hopefully, reduce the avalanche of violence that is engulfing so many
in this society.
In my home State of Rhode Island, in the city of Providence alone, 26
people were murdered in 1999. That is up from 15 in 1998. Firearms were
used in the vast majority of the killings in both years: 19 out of the
26 people who were killed last year were killed with firearms, 11 of
the 15 the year before. And Providence, my capital, is a small city of
roughly around 200,000 people.
Last year, when we were talking about Columbine High School, if any
Member came to this floor and said: I predict a 6-year-old child will
walk into first grade and kill another 6-year-old child with a handgun,
we would have been lambasted as extremists, hysterical, provocateurs,
irresponsible, reckless. Guess what. It happened. Incidents such as
that happen each and every day.
Just a few weeks ago in Providence, RI, two young boys were rough-
housing with each other--a 17-year-old and a 13-year-old friend--doing
what boys have been doing for a long, long time. They were razzing each
year, wrestling with each other, seeing who was the most tough. They
went on and on and on. One of them got frustrated. Now, when I was
younger, that frustration might have led to a punch in the nose, a
bloody nose, and some hard feelings, but that was all. Somebody in the
crowd had a gun and this young boy recklessly and without thought
grabbed that gun just to show how tough he was, pointed the gun at the
13-year-old, pulled the trigger, thinking nothing would happen, and
shot that 13-year-old in the head. That shooter, that young man--not a
criminal, just a kid rough-housing around in the neighborhood--was so
overcome with remorse that he fled to an adjacent backyard and shot
himself in the head.
That is gun violence in America today. That is the cost of easy
access to firearms. These aren't criminals. These were kids doing
something stupid. But because they had guns, it resulted in death and
destruction.
We are not kids here. We are supposed to be adults. We are supposed
to be responsible. We are supposed to represent the best values and
ideals of this country. That means we must stand up and vote on
measures such as this juvenile justice bill.
I ask on behalf of the 12 children killed each day by gun violence
that we bring this conference bill back to this floor with those
reasonable gun control measures included. Someone has to speak for
them. Someone must speak for them. Someone must demand these measures
come before the Senate.
We cannot continue to listen to the siren song of the NRA in this
Chamber. We cannot be hypnotized by all the spin and the hype and all
the misinformation and misdirection. We have to respond to the reality
of kids easily getting handguns and unwittingly and, tragically,
killing each other.
We have a country in which the homicide rate by handguns far
surpasses that of any other country in the world. In Japan, in 1996,
there were 15 people killed with handguns, in a country of 126 million
people. That is 1 person in every 8.4 million. The ratio in the United
States? One person out of every 27,000. What is the difference?
Cultural? Genetic? Demographic? They have gun laws that make it
difficult for anyone and everyone, willy-nilly, to own handguns.
It is the same story the world over. Canada, perhaps the country
closest to us in culture, in demographics and ethnicity, is also a
country that had a great frontier, a country that had the same kind of
challenges we had opening up their great west. It is a country of
outdoors men and women; it is a country, in many respects, with the
same cultural values we have. Yet in that country, in 1996, 106 people
were killed out of a population of 30 million. That is 1 person in
every 284,000--many, many, many times fewer people killed by gun
violence in a country so similar to ours. The difference? Once again,
they have sensible laws that govern access to handguns.
We could go on and on. But as long as a criminal can walk into a gun
show and buy a gun without a background check and walk out before any
type of check can be done, as long as kids can get access to firearms
without safety locks on them so they can use them, as we have seen
happen too often, as long as it is harder for a kid to open a bottle of
aspirin than it is to shoot a gun, because we have childproof tops on
aspirin containers, we are going to have these problems.
It is our responsibility to act. It is our responsibility to stand
up. We have not done that. Time is drawing close to April 20, 1 year
after Columbine. I cannot think of a better way, not only to
memorialize the victims of that shooting but to give meaning to that
senseless tragedy, than for this body and the House to send to the
President a gun control measure that will provide the sensible,
reasonable controls that are so critical.
[[Page S1478]]
I see the Senator from California. There is no one in this body who
is not only sensitive but more forcefully engaged in this effort than
my friend and colleague, Senator Boxer, someone who I am proud to say
will cosponsor this resolution, someone I am proud to say will continue
her valiant efforts to lead the way for sensible gun control in this
country.
I yield the floor.
Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, how much time remains in the morning
business period?
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Enzi). Thirty minutes remains under the
control of Senator Durbin.
Mrs. BOXER. I will take 60 seconds at this time, and then I will
yield to Senator Daschle, who will speak on his leader time. I am so
proud he has come over to the floor.
I wish to say in this minute, before my friend from Rhode Island
leaves, what an amazing addition he is to this Senate. I say that from
the bottom of my heart. I served with him in the House and he was a
great House Member. I predict he has an unbelievable future in the
Senate. Why do I say that? Because he has courage, because he has
conviction. He is not afraid to take the floor on issues that are
difficult; to take on, perhaps, some of the special interests that,
believe me, do not take kindly when you stand up and speak from your
heart about issues that impact on their bottom line. In this case, it
is the bottom line of groups out there that want us to take no action
against gun violence.
We have a plan. We have a great plan that passed the Senate. It is
endorsed by so many law enforcement groups and the vast majority of the
American people. I can think of no more appropriate speaker than our
Democratic leader to tie the pieces together and to talk about why the
time is ripe.
I did offer a similar resolution to that of Senator Reed. I am proud
to cosponsor his. It got 49 votes--49-49. We didn't know that or Vice
President Gore would have broken the tie. Next time we will be ready.
I yield the floor, and I will reclaim it when my leader is finished.
Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I will use my leader time and allocate
that time to my comments on the floor this morning.
Let me begin by acknowledging, as well, the extraordinary leadership,
not only of Senator Reed, but of Senator Boxer. Everything Senator
Boxer has said about Senator Reed is a view that I think is shared by
Republicans and Democrats alike. He has come to the Senate and in a
very short period of time established himself as an authority on a
number of key issues, including education and defense matters, as well
as now, on neighborhood safety. I applaud him again for taking the
leadership, as he has.
Senator Boxer, on this, as well as on so many other issues, comes to
the floor, grinds it out, and speaks as passionately and as eloquently
as anybody in this Chamber. It is an extraordinary privilege to work
with her as well.
I have heard the proposal made by the Senator from Rhode Island that
we set for ourselves a date by which we must act with respect to
juvenile safety, and that we choose a date that we all ought to
remember--April 20th. Last year, that date, the date of the Columbine
tragedy, triggered our commitment to better safety and prompted the
Senate to act. We left with an expectation that, as a result of that
action in the Senate, things were going to happen, that we could send a
message of hope to the people of Colorado and to the people of this
Nation that we will not tolerate the violence that exists in this
country. We sent the message that we will respond to tragedy with
careful, commonsense approaches that will make schools and
neighborhoods safer, such as balanced gun legislation. That is what we
said and that is how we voted. We are on record as having supported
such commonsense legislation.
In poll after poll, it is remarkable the degree to which the American
people support the actions taken by the Senate and the amendments
offered by our Democratic colleagues. It is overwhelming.
There has been a sea change, an attitudinal progression on this issue
in the country--a sea change. I represent a Western State where, after
you are born, on your first or second birthday, virtually, you get a
shotgun--because that is what we do. I am proud I have shotguns. I love
to go hunting. I love to walk and take in nature in all of its splendor
in the fall. That is part of the culture of the West. It is a part of
the culture of growing up in South Dakota of which I am very proud and
I love. I will defend it, and I will work to ensure that my children
and grandchildren and great grandchildren have these same experiences.
But there is a difference. That difference is becoming even more
extraordinarily evident as we read about experiences such as we read
this morning in the Washington Post, an agonizing description of what
kind of setting created this despicable act in Michigan. A young boy, 6
years old, takes a gun, walks into a school full of children, his
school, picks out a girl, says, ``I don't like you,'' and shoots her to
death. That story generated a front page article and a spread, inside
the paper, of two full pages--and it should have. Why? Because this
incident illustrates the magnitude of the torturous existence that now
is becoming more and more prevalent all across this country in schools
and in neighborhoods.
But you could put that kind of story on the front page of the
Washington Post every single day. It happened in Michigan, but it
happened yesterday somewhere else. It happened in Rhode Island shortly
after that. It happens every day. Those of us who appreciate the
culture of a good pheasant hunt recognize there is a huge difference
between that and the disastrous consequences of this proliferation of
guns that now has become a real threat to the safety and well-being of
children in virtually every school in America today.
All the Senator from Rhode Island is suggesting is that at long last
we say: Look, we've talked enough. Let's act. We took the first step
last May. We expected that we would take additional steps. We have not.
We have talked. We have positioned. We have wrung our hands in agony as
one shooting after another has been pasted on the pages of every single
newspaper in the country.
The litany of additional Columbines has continued all across the
country. These new shootings may not have claimed as many lives. But
they are tragedies nonetheless. They ought to trigger action.
Let us act. Let us meet in conference and work through our
differences so that we can finally say: We are not only going to talk
about this. We are going to do something about it.
We recognize that passing the modest gun safety measures in the
Juvenile Justice report will not completely solve the problem of gun
violence. There may be other things that can be done. I am very
grateful to HUD Secretary Andrew Cuomo, and others in the
administration, for having worked out a remarkable and historic new
agreement with Smith & Wesson.
What a statement: for Smith & Wesson to acknowledge that guns are
inherently dangerous, and that they are going to do something about it.
Regardless of what their motivation may be, the fact is, they are going
to do something about it. In making this commitment, they are setting a
precedent. I would love to see every gun manufacturer follow Smith &
Wesson's lead. It is common sense.
I have long admired President Ford, for many reasons. My admiration
for him increased again this past week when he spoke about the need for
this Congress to respond in a commonsense way to the gun violence that
is claiming too many of our children.
The American people are looking to us. They want to know that we hear
them. They want us to give them some hope that we can solve the real
problems facing families and communities--not only in Columbine, but in
South Dakota, Michigan, Rhode Island, California, and all across
America. The American people want to know that our democratic process
works.
In these days before the first anniversary of the Columbine tragedy,
we ought to take President Ford's wise counsel to heart. For the sake
of our children, we need to come together and pass common-sense gun
safety laws.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from
California.
Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I thank my Democratic leader for his
comments and his continual leadership on
[[Page S1479]]
the gun issues that impact the people of our Nation.
I want to set into the Record a series of facts, a series of
statistics, a series of numbers. I know sometimes when you lay down a
series of numbers such as this, people's eyes glaze over and they lose
track of what you are talking about.
I urge everyone listening to this to think not about the numbers so
much as the people behind the numbers.
In the year 1997, which is the last year for which we have
statistics, 32,436 people died from gunshots in America--more than
32,000 people. I want everyone to think about what it would mean to you
if any of these 32,000 people were from one of your families, what it
would mean to you if it was your dad, if it was your mom, if it was
your child, if it was your grandma, if it was your grandpa.
Twelve children die every single day from gunfire. Actually, if you
average it out, it is between 12 and 13 children under the age of 18--
each and every day.
Our children are dying. And what are we doing? We are dithering
around doing nothing about it.
I understand that this week we are going to take up a flag
desecration amendment. There are those who believe we need to protect
the flag by authoring an amendment changing the Bill of Rights for the
first time in our history to specifically spell out an antidesecration
flag amendment. I will be supporting a statute, a bill, to protect the
flag. I do not think we need to go to such a step as amending the Bill
of Rights. But be that as it may, flag desecration is an issue.
In over 200 years, there has been an average of one flag desecration
a year, and we are acting again. Mr. President, 32,436 people died in
1997--in 1 year--and we are doing nothing. Why can't we protect the
flag and take care of protecting the people? Why can't we protect the
desecration of the flag by a statute that is easy to do and then bring
up the juvenile justice bill and protect the thousands of people who
are dying each and every year? What about the desecration of the
children, of the families?
In the 11 years of the Vietnam war--one of the most tragic periods in
our history--58,168 fine, wonderful, glorious Americans died in combat.
There is a number, a number that is enshrined on the wall on that
beautiful memorial down here that we all go to often--and we should go
to often--to pay our respects. It was a war that destroyed so many
families; and so many veterans who came back then committed suicide
because of that war. It was a time in our history when our country came
to its knees; 58,168 Americans died in Vietnam over an 11-year period.
Let me tell you how many Americans have died over an 11-year period
from gunshots not related to any war: 395,441 Americans.
Mr. President, 58,168 Americans died in the Vietnam war; 395,441
Americans died from gunshots in an 11-year period. What are we doing
about it? Nothing. That is the equivalent of almost seven Vietnam wars
over an 11-year period. What are we doing about it? Nothing.
We hear the NRA President say: We should do nothing. His answer is
give more guns to people.
For every American who dies from gunfire, another three are injured.
Over that 11-year period, we have almost a million people injured
from gunfire. They could be paralyzed. These could be very serious
injuries, and sometimes they are. Fifty people killed or injured in
school shootings in America in the last year. Thirty-one percent of
children age 12 to 17 know of someone their age who is carrying a gun--
gun-packing children. We are to blame. They are not to blame. We are
the grown-ups. We set the rules. This is a society of law and order.
What are we doing about it in the Senate? Nothing.
Fifty percent of children age 9 to 17 are worried about dying young.
What kind of America do we have now? When I was growing up, I didn't
think I was going to die young. I thought I was going to go to school,
get an education, have a family, work, have a life of fulfillment. I
never thought for one minute that that could all be ended by a gunshot
from a friend, a classmate on the street, in a McDonald's, in a drive-
by shooting, road rage.
We had better face our problems. We have the greatest country in the
world, but we have problems. We need to face them. We are not here to
ignore problems. We are not here to say everything is great. We need to
act on our problems. This is a problem.
Listen to the law enforcement groups that back us on this when we say
bring out the juvenile justice bill.
The juvenile justice bill; that is the one bright spot. We passed it
in a bipartisan fashion about a month after Columbine, with Al Gore
casting a tie-breaking vote on one of the most important amendments.
This is what we passed.
We closed the gun show loophole--Senator Lautenberg's amendment--that
allowed criminals to walk into a gun show and simply get it. He could
be crazy. He could be a felon. He could be intending to kill people on
the street, to kill people in a school, to harm himself. He could walk
into a gun show without having a background check. But if he went into
a gun store, he would have to have a background check. All we did was
close that loophole. What is the Senate doing about it now? Nothing. It
is languishing in the committee.
We banned the importation of high-capacity clips which are used in
semiautomatic assault weapons. That was Senator Feinstein's amendment,
a very important amendment.
We prohibit the domestic manufacture of those clips, but the
importation continues. These clips are coming in. We simply say: End
that importation. We passed that.
We passed the Kohl amendment requiring that child safety locks be
sold with every handgun.
We passed the Boxer amendment which required the Federal Trade
Commission and the Attorney General to study the extent to which the
gun industry markets its products to juveniles. These companies are
manufacturing guns that resemble toys, that are sold to youngsters and
get them interested.
We made it illegal with the Ashcroft amendment to sell or give a
semiautomatic assault weapon to anyone under the age of 18.
Five amendments, we passed them in a bipartisan way. They went off to
conference, and they have been languishing for now 9 or 10 months. It
is the same with Senator Reed's amendment.
It is time to stop the dithering. It is time to stop bowing to the
National Rifle Association and bowing to the gun lobby. It is time to
stand up and be courageous, bring those amendments forward, protect our
children, and stop the carnage that is happening in our country.
Who supports these five sensible gun control amendments? Senator
Leahy, in his wonderful opening remarks today, put them forward: The
International Association of Chiefs of Police, International
Brotherhood of Police Officers, Hispanic American Police Command
Officers Association, Police Executive Research Forum, Police
Foundation, Major Cities Chiefs, Federal Law Enforcement Officers
Association, the National Sheriffs Association, the National
Association of School Resource Officers, the National Organization of
Black Law Enforcement Executives.
We cannot have a more diverse group of law enforcement.
We have five important, sensible gun control laws that passed the
Senate, that went into a conference committee.
If one reads how a bill becomes law, they know how it is done: A bill
has to pass the House; a bill has to pass the Senate. The juvenile
justice bills passed both bodies. You then go to the conference
committee. Both sides sit across from each other and talk about what
belongs in the bill. They bring the bill forward, and we vote up or
down. This bill has languished for 10 months.
Now, what is some good news? Senator Daschle alluded to the Smith &
Wesson agreement. Smith & Wesson is the largest manufacturer, if not
one of the largest, of handguns. They have made an agreement as part of
a lawsuit because gun manufacturers are now being sued for these
deaths. They have agreed that all their handguns and pistols will now
be shipped with child safety devices. Within 2 years, the handguns will
be manufactured with internal locks. If a child picks up a gun and they
don't know the combination, they will not be able to turn and hurt
anyone--sensible.
[[Page S1480]]
Within 1 year, all pistols will be designed so they can't be readily
operated by a child under the age of 6. Handguns must pass a
performance test. That gets to a bill I have about banning junk guns.
They will drop these guns down. They will see if they go off. A lot of
these handguns are so cheaply made, they fire when you don't want them
to, and when you need them to, they jam up. They are not good products.
They are junk guns. Smith & Wesson is going to put forward a test.
Every handgun will be designed with a second hidden serial number so
they can be traced in a crime--another very important point. The
company will sell only to authorized distributors and authorized
dealers who adhere to a strict code of conduct. That means they will
perform the background check. They will make sure the person coming in
is not inebriated, is not high on drugs, doesn't have a criminal
record, isn't under age. They will not sell any gun at any gun show
unless every seller at the gun show conducts a background check. They
will not sell their guns until that background check is completed, and
they say it may well take 3 days.
They will not sell any high-capacity magazines or semiautomatic
assault weapons. They will not sell products to anyone who has not
taken a certified firearms safety course. And Smith & Wesson dealers
will only allow purchasers to take one gun with them at a time.
They will have to wait a couple of weeks before they get their other
gun. The company will devote 2 percent of its revenues to development
of smart guns and within 3 years the smart gun technology, which allows
only the authorized person to shoot it, will be in place. All new
models will not be able to accept magazines with a capacity of over 10
rounds. There will be an oversight commission to enforce this, which
will include representatives from the city and State governments, and
one from the gun industry.
So what I have laid out in this presentation, first of all, is the
facts on violence in America--irrefutable facts. I give these facts out
and my colleagues come up and say: Could this be true? Could it be true
that in 11 years more than 300,000 Americans have been killed by gun
violence? Could it be true that every day 12 or 13 children are killed?
They can't believe it. And we send the facts to the Centers for
Disease Control. We send them to the people who keep these terrible
statistics, and they come back to me and say: Senator, you are right.
We doubted you. We are sorry. We can't believe this is happening in
America today. But it is.
So we have laid out the data, the facts on gun violence in America.
We have laid out the five gun provisions languishing in the conference.
Commonsense gun control that passed this Senate in a bipartisan way is
suddenly being smothered over there in the conference committee, and we
can't get it to the floor of the Senate and the House.
Day after day we read about 6-year-olds shooting 6-year-olds, 10-
year-olds shooting 10-year-olds, 12-year-olds shooting 12-year-olds.
We don't deserve to be here if we don't do this. We don't deserve to
be here, let alone be reelected, if we don't do this. The Vietnam war
brought the country to its knees. We lost 58,000 people-plus in that
war. It was a most tragic period of time. I remember that time. But we
now have 300,000 people-plus dying from guns in an 11-year period
compared to 58,000, and we sit here dithering around doing nothing
while law enforcement tells us to please act. ``We are outgunned,''
they tell us. ``We are losing people. We are losing this war.'' We have
a war in our streets. I laid out the organizations that are backing
these five sensible amendments.
Finally, I laid out the good news of the Smith & Wesson agreement. I
call on every single gun company that wants to stay in business to go
ahead and duplicate what Smith & Wesson has done. I thank them for
acting. They are taking the heat for acting. I think Senator Daschle is
right. Maybe they acted only because they had a lawsuit. Maybe they
acted only because they thought they would go bankrupt if they didn't
act and people would continue to sue them. The fact is, they acted;
they acted on each and every point we have made on this Senate floor.
So, yes, we are going to see flag desecration brought up. We know
over the last 200 years there has been one flag desecration a year on
average, while every day 12 children are killed by guns; and over the
past 11 years 300,000-plus Americans have been killed, and we do
nothing. The juvenile justice bill is languishing--languishing--in the
committee. I call on the Senators who are in charge of that
conference--and they are my friends--to break the logjam and bring this
legislation to the Senate floor. It passed with a bipartisan vote.
Overwhelmingly, people want us to do it.
The Smith & Wesson agreement proves the point that the time is ripe
for these measures. I say if we do it, we will be proud; we will have
done something to protect our children, protect our people, protect our
communities, and turn around a blight on our country at a time of great
prosperity and great hope.
I see the Senator who has done such an amazing job in the
Presidential race. I welcome him back. I thought the issues he raised
were vital. I am glad to see him back, and as a result of his
appearance on this floor, I am happy to yield at this time.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona is recognized.
Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from California for
her kind remarks. I appreciate, obviously, the time that I was able to
spend in her great State. I hope she appreciates the economic input
that our campaign made, and I hope I can get some rebate from the
numerous campaign commercials we purchased in her State. I thank her
for the hospitality shown to me by all of the citizens of the State of
California.
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