Congressional Record, Volume 146 Issue 62 (Thursday, May 18, 2000)

[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 62 (Thursday, May 18, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4172-S4177]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

FOREIGN OPERATIONS, EXPORT FINANCING AND RELATED PROGRAMS
APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2001--MOTION TO PROCEED--Continued

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wisconsin.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I rise to speak with regard to the
MOTION TO PROCEED and share my concerns that we should not be moving to
an ``S'' numbered appropriations bill at this time. In fact, it is a
practice simply we should not be involved in at all. For this reason I
rise to speak for a bit about care for the Senate in general.
The Senate is a special place. It is a place steeped in history.
Around this chamber stand the desks of Daniel Webster and Robert
LaFollette, of Robert Taft and Richard Russell, of Everett Dirksen and
Hubert Humphrey. The drawers of these desks still bear their names,
etched in the wood. The polished mahogany still reflects their memory.
Their voices still echo from these marble walls.
I am honored to have been able to serve with some of the Senate's
living legends. It is with pride that I will tell my grandchildren that
I worked with the likes of Ted Kennedy, Bob Dole, and Robert Byrd. No
honest history of the Senate will omit their names.
It is in a modest attempt to follow in the tradition of remarks by
Senator Byrd that I rise today. All Senators are aware of Senator
Byrd's encyclopedic four-volume treatise on the Senate. And none can
forget the series of addresses that Senator Byrd gave on the history of
the Roman Senate, which have been reprinted in another volume. His
discussions of the special nature of the Senate inspire us all to hold
this institution more dearly.
The Senate is an almost sacred place, consecrated by the will of the
people, hallowed by the expression of the people in free elections. In
this room, our 50 separate States each find expression. Every region of
our vast continental nation here finds voice.
In a country as large and as diverse as ours, disputes will naturally
arise. The Senate, almost like a court of law, provides a means for our
society to resolve those disputes in peace. Courts allow private
parties to resolve their disputes without resort to fist fights. And
the Senate allows significant sections of our society to resolve their
disputes without resort to the battlefield or the street.
For the Senate, as for a court of law, to work this magic, it must do
justice. As with a court, as Gordon Hewart, the Lord Chief Justice of
Great Britain, wrote, it is:

Of fundamental importance that justice should not only be
done, but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be
done.

For the Senate, as for a court of law, to advance the perception of
justice and the fair resolution of disputes, it must air disagreements
fully. It must give opposing parties their day. It must allow all to
approach on an equal footing and make their case.
Justice is not cursory. Justice is not offhand. Doing justice can
take time. That is how the Founders wanted this great system to work.
In the debates of the Constitutional Convention, James Madison said
of the Senate:

In order to judge of the form to be given to this
institution, it will be proper to take a view of the ends to
be served by it. These were first to protect the people
against their rulers: secondly to protect the people against
the transient impressions into which they themselves might be
led.

Madison warned that the people's representatives might be ``liable to
err also, from fickleness and passion.'' Madison's answer was that
Senators, because of their ``limited number, and firmness[,] might
seasonably interpose against impetuous counsels.'' He thus called the
Senate: ``A necessary fence against this danger.''
Time and again, in the history of our country, the Senate has served
as that ``necessary fence.'' And the firm pillars and posts supporting
that fence have been the Senate Rules. The Senate Rules have helped the
Senate to do justice. It is because of the Senate Rules that the
British Prime Minister William Gladstone is said to have called the
Senate:

That remarkable body, the most remarkable of all the
inventions of modern politics.

The Senate Rules make it one of the few places in government where
disagreements can be fully aired. The Senate Rules give opposing
parties their day. And the Senate Rules allow every Senator to make his
or her case.
As Senator Dole said in his speech in the Leader's Lecture Series
March 28:

We all continue to learn that this institution can only
survive if it operates by rules.

The two fundamental pillars of those rules are the right to debate
and the right to amend. It is these rights that distinguish the Senate
from the House of Representatives and from other parliaments. It is
these rights of Senators that allow the Senate as a body to preserve
the rights of minorities.
Rule XIX of the Standing Rules of the Senate provides that ``the
Presiding Officer shall recognize the Senator who shall first address
him.''

[[Page S4173]]

Precedent, of course, gives priority of recognition to the Leaders.
Once the Presiding Officer has recognized a Senator, Senate rule XXII
allows that Senator to speak for as long as humanly possible, unless 60
Senators vote to cut off debate. As my Colleagues well know, the mere
threat of extended debate--called a ``hold''--can detain legislation.
As well, the Senate Rules give Senators the right to offer
amendments. The Senate Rules do not require Senators to go hat-in-hand
to a leadership-dominated Rules Committee to ask permission to offer an
amendment, as Members of Congress must do in the House of
Representatives. This ability to bring up a subject with which the
majority does not want to deal provides a check and balance on the
agenda-setting power that is vested in the majority leader.
These powers to debate and amend make every single Senator a force to
be reckoned with. Every Senator--whether a member of the majority or
the minority--can be a player. And Leadership cannot neglect or exclude
any single Senator without substantial risk. As a result, Senators do
well never to burn bridges with any other Senator. Because any one
Senator can disrupt the Senate, every Senator has good reason to show
comity for every other Senator.
These rules honor the sentiments of committed minorities. They give
dedicated groups of Senators substantial power. And they give any group
of 41 Senators the absolute right to kill a bill.
The Senate Rules thereby force consensus. When these rules are
honored, no major change in our government's laws may come about
without the concurrence of a three-fifths majority. When these rules
are honored, policy changes are likely to be more moderate and more
incremental.
As Nobel Prize-winning economist James Buchanan has argued, societal
efficiency may be served by a Congress that has a hard time enacting
laws. Under such circumstances, laws change less often--less frequently
disrupting peoples' lives, less often intruding into them. If you agree
with Thoreau that the best government is that which governs least, then
the most efficient government for society is the one with the most
checks and balances.
Unfortunately, the Senate is not honoring its rules. The Senate is
breaching its longstanding traditions of comity and respect for the
minority. Too often, in the name of expediency, today's Senate is
cutting corners on the Senate rules. When we give in to expediency it
can be disappointing. When we indulge in expediency in this, the place
where deliberation is most sacred, it can be deplorable.
Although some of the trends of which I speak have, of course, their
roots in past Senates and other majorities, the Senate's current
majority has brought the level of honor for the Senate's unique ideals
to a new low.
The current majority has diminished the Senate by abusing and
overusing cloture. The application of the rules of cloture have changed
dramatically since President Woodrow Wilson, infuriated by an 11-
Senator filibuster that blocked the rearming of merchant ships during
World War I, complained of ``[a] little group of willful men,
representing no opinion but their own,'' who he said ``have rendered
the great government of the United States helpless and contemptible.''
Cloture used to be a rarity. The Senate conducted only 45 rollcall
votes on cloture in the entire half century from 1919 to 1969.
In 1975, the Senate changed the filibuster rule, reducing the two-
thirds vote requirement to a vote of 60 Senators, although one still
needs two-thirds to cut off debate on changes to Senate rules. With
that change in the rules, the leadership began invoking cloture more
frequently.
As the chart behind me shows, the process of invoking cloture has now
reached what I call a fevered pitch. The Senate conducted 99 rollcall
votes on cloture in the 1970s. It conducted 138 in the entire decade of
the 1980s, and it conducted fully 234 in the 1990s.
As this next chart shows, the number of cloture votes has increased
in every year of the current majority, nearly doubling, from roughly 20
in 1995 to nearly 40 in 1999.
Even by 1984, a select committee on procedure chaired by then-Senator
Dan Quayle concluded: ``Cloture is not only invoked too often, it is
invoked too soon.'' Senator Quayle's criticism is all the more true
today. In the Congress when Senator Quayle made his remark, the 98th
Congress, there had by this time been 10 rollcall votes on cloture
motions. In the comparable time period in this 106th Congress, we have
held more than four times as many--43 rollcall votes on cloture. Add to
that another 11 cloture motions that were withdrawn, vitiated, or
otherwise disposed of without a vote.
As Senator Quayle noted, the problem with cloture is not just how
often, but when. The form of a motion to invoke cloture reads: ``We the
undersigned Senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule XXII of
the Standing Rules of the Senate, hereby move to bring to a close the
debate'' upon the bill.
But on bill after bill, from tax cuts to trade bills to
constitutional amendments, the majority no longer tolerates even a
day's worth of debate before moving ``to bring to a close the debate''
upon the bill. Indeed, filing cloture without any debate has now become
the norm. We proceed to the bill and the cloture motion is filed in the
time that it takes the majority leader to draw one breath and make the
request.
As an example, I have a chart that shows the entire verbatim
transcript of the debate on the motion to proceed to S. 2285, the gas
tax bill, prior to the filing of cloture. The ``debate''--if you would
call it that--was the 11 words the majority leader uttered to make the
motion to proceed. In the same breath, the cloture motion was upon us.
The practice of filing cloture without any debate at all has made a
mockery of the motion.
Beyond limiting debate, the majority is also using the blunt
instrument of cloture to bludgeon the minority into forgoing its right
to offer amendments. All too often, the majority leader now makes a
take-it-or-leave-it offer to the minority leader: Either muzzle your
right to amendment or we will paint you as obstructionist. Either clear
your amendments with us in advance, or have no amendments at all.
I am afraid too often, the minority's leadership can get caught up in
the business of helping the majority make the trains run on time, in a
sense, playing the role of Alec Guinness's Colonel Nicholson in ``The
Bridge on the River Kwai,'' building bridges that should not be built.
This is not how the Senate was meant to act.
Recall that the Senate has often addressed a number of amendments on
a single piece of legislation. The Senate conducted 121 rollcall votes
on amendments to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It conducted 127
rollcall votes on the Natural Gas Policy Act in 1977. Now the idea that
a bill might elicit more than ten amendments appears to be anathema to
the majority.
The current majority has also diminished the Senate by changing the
rule that limits what can be incorporated into a conference report.
Late in 1996, to secure last-minute passage of a version of the Federal
Aviation Authorization Act that included a special provision for the
Federal Express Corporation, the Senate voted 56-39 to overturn the
Chair and nullify the rule. At the time, Senator Specter called the
change ``a very, very serious perversion of Senate procedures.''
As conference reports are privileged, Senators cannot engage in
extended debate to block getting to them. As well, conference reports
are not open to amendment. And after the 1996 precedent, Senators have
no recourse if a conference committee exceeds the scope of what the
Senate committed to it.
The majority in a conference committee need not work with the
minority, and the majority often does not. Conference committees
usually work in secret. Senate rules require no open meetings. House
practice has generally required one such meeting, but that tends to be
a photo opportunity. Thereafter, Senators' signatures on the conference
report constitute their votes, and nothing further need be done in
public.
Last July, the Democratic leader offered an amendment to restore the
rule with regard to conference reports, but the majority would not
allow it. The

[[Page S4174]]

majority voted it down 51-47 in a nearly party-line vote.
The current majority has also diminished the Senate by extending and
contorting the congressional budget process far beyond any expectations
that its drafters may have had.
Once again, of course, the roots of the current abuse of the budget
process lie in earlier Congresses. Participants in the Federal budget
process initially underestimated the power of the budget process. They
failed completely, however, to foresee the power of reconciliation
bills.
The Congressional Budget Act of 1974 originally provided for two
budget resolutions: The first would advise, and the second, passed
closer to the start of the fiscal year, would bind. The Budget Act
provided that the second budget resolution could instruct committees of
Congress to reconcile substantive laws passed within their jurisdiction
over the summer to the new priorities of the second budget resolution.

Of course, the reconciliation process has not turned out that
modestly. Rather, in 1981, in an effort to expedite President Reagan's
first budget, the budget resolution included instructions for years
beyond the first fiscal year covered by the resolution, extending the
reach of reconciliation bills to more permanent changes in law.
Since then, reconciliation has become a regular feature of most
budget resolutions. Since then, Congress has accomplished most
significant deficit reduction through the reconciliation process.
Because reconciliation bills limit debate, Senators cannot filibuster
them. A simple majority can pass their policies. Because reconciliation
limits amendments, Senators must stick to only the narrow subjects
chosen by the majority in the committee process.
The reconciliation process is so powerful that the Senate chose in
the mid-1980s to adopt the Byrd Rule, named after Senator Robert Byrd,
to limit reconciliation solely to deficit reduction.
But the current majority dramatically extended reconciliation in
1996. The new Republican Congress sought to move three reconciliation
bills--on welfare, Medicare, and tax cuts. And in a marked departure
from past practice, the budget that year devoted one of the three
reconciliation bills--the one to cut taxes--solely to worsening the
deficit, not cutting the deficit but making it worse.
The Democratic leader formally challenged the procedure, but to no
avail. Through a series of exchanges with the Presiding Officer, the
Democratic leader demonstrated that the new reconciliation procedure
has few limits. After the Democratic leader appealed the ruling of the
Chair, the Senate sustained the procedure on a straight party-line
vote.
In the wake of that precedent, the majority party has repeatedly
created reconciliation bills to worsen the deficit or spend the surplus
by cutting taxes, and the same logic would allow fast-track
reconciliation bills to increase spending. The majority has taken to
using the reconciliation process to move its fiscal legislative agenda
through the Senate with simple majority votes and few distractions. The
result is plain to see: Congress passes extravagant tax bills that do
not command a national consensus and that cannot become law.
As well, in this most recently-adopted budget resolution, the
majority has even chosen by majority vote to require 60 votes to offer
sense-of-the-Senate amendments to future budget resolutions. Though by
no means an earth-shaking change in and of itself, it shows yet another
instance of how the majority abuses majority-vote vehicles to create
yet another variance from the Standing Rules of the Senate. Once again,
the current majority seeks to muzzle debate.
The current majority has also diminished the Senate by bringing S.-
numbered appropriations bills to the floor.
That is what is happening right now. That is what prompted, in part,
these remarks. The majority wants to go to these S.-numbered
appropriations bills. They want to do it on the foreign ops bill.
The Senate just considered the military construction appropriations
bill as a Senate-numbered bill, not--as is usually the case with
appropriations bills--a House bill with Senate Committee-reported
amendments. And what does this do? It has a purpose. This posture
deprives Senators of the ability to offer legislative amendments. It is
yet another way to deny the duly elected Members of this body a chance
to offer amendments--an absolutely basic right of every Senator.
Not infrequently, the House chooses to attach legislation to an
appropriations measure. In that case, if as is usually done, the Senate
considers the House bill with Senate amendments, a Senator can also
offer amendments with legislative language. If another Senator raises a
point of order under rule XVI against legislating on the appropriation
bill, the amendment's proponent can raise the defense of germaneness.
The idea is that the House opened the door to legislation on this
appropriations bill, and the Senate must be able to respond with
germane amendments.

If, on the other hand, as is being attempted here, the Senate takes
up a Senate-numbered appropriations bill, as it did with the military
construction bill, then there is no House bill to provide a basis for
the defense of germaneness. Under this circumstance, if a Senator
offers a legislative amendment and another Senator raises a point of
order against legislating on an appropriation bill, then the Chair
simply rules the amendment out of order and the amendment falls. The
Senator does not have a chance, again, to offer an amendment.
Through this device, the majority once again deprives the minority of
opportunities to legislate. As well, the majority deprives the full
Senate of its ability to respond to riders that the House attaches to
appropriations bills. Once again, the majority has diminished the
deliberation of the Senate.
And now, we see the spectacle of the majority standing ready to shut
down the Senate for over 4 hours, as they did, on Tuesday, just to
prevent a sense-of-the-Senate vote on gun safety.
And now, we see the majority leader appealing the ruling of the
Chair, and by a majority vote, changing the Standing Rules of the
Senate, so as to have the Presiding Officer rule out of order
nongermane amendments to appropriations bills.
This in itself was a remarkable thing. Rule XVI, which creates the
prohibition against nongermane amendments, states in part:

[A]ll questions of relevancy of amendments under this rule,
when raised, shall be submitted to the Senate and be decided
without debate.

And as my colleagues know, it takes a two-thirds vote to invoke
cloture on a change to the Senate rules. But by a party-line, majority
vote Wednesday, the Senate just erased those words from the Standing
Rules of the Senate. And why? For the same reason all these other
things were done--all to make it more difficult for Senators to offer
amendments on appropriations bills.
What has become of our right to debate? What has become of our right
to amend?
The traditional Senate, I am afraid, is becoming a thing of the past.
I have seen this change just from the time I got here in 1993 to now.
Some may say, ``Good riddance.'' After all, as a Democratic Member of
Congress once said, ``In the Senate, you can't go to the bathroom
without 60 votes.''
But the character of this Senate, I am afraid, has been unmistakably
altered. The majority's actions are transforming the Senate into a much
more majoritarian institution. And that is not how the founders wanted
it.
Recall that the Constitution itself manifests a belief in
supermajorities. Supermajority requirements are evident in the veto
power, in the ratification of treaties, in the constitutional amendment
process, and in a number of other places.
Recall, as well, that the founders who created this Senate also
expressed a healthy distrust of simple majority rule.
James Madison said that:

[i]n Republics, the great danger is, that the majority may
not sufficiently respect the rights of the minority.

In a letter to James Monroe, Madison also wrote:

There is no maxim, in my opinion, which is more liable to
be misapplied, and which, therefore, more needs elucidation,
than the current one, that the interest of the majority is
the political standard of right and wrong.

[[Page S4175]]

In his first inaugural address, Thomas Jefferson said:
Though the will of the majority is . . . to prevail, that
will, to be rightful, must be reasonable. . . . The Minority
possess their equal rights, which equal laws must protect,
and to violate which would be oppression.
And John Adams wrote:

That the desires of the majority of the people are often
for injustice and inhumanity against the minority, is
demonstrated by every page of the history of the whole world.

More recently, Senator J. William Fulbright said:

The greatest single virtue of a strong legislature is not
what it can do but what it can prevent.

In 1984, retiring Congressman Barber Conable told Time Magazine:
``Congress is `functioning the way the founding fathers intended--not
very well.' He explain[ed], `They understood that if you move too
quickly, our democracy will be less responsible to the majority. I
don't think it's the function of Congress to function well. It should
drag its heels on the way to decision.' ''
And Senator Byrd, who has stood on both the giving and receiving end
of many a filibuster, writes in his Senate history:

The Senate is the only forum in the government where the
perfection of laws may be unhurried and where controversial
decisions may be hammered out on the anvil of lengthy debate.
The liberties of a free people will always be safe where a
forum exists in which open and unlimited debate is allowed.

For all their inconvenience, the Senate traditions of deliberation
and amendment serve our Nation. It is through those traditions that the
Senate protects liberty. It is through those traditions that the Senate
can effect justice.
When we stand and look back at the Senate's glorious history, we can
be forgiven when we do not measure up to the standards of our greatest
predecessors. We cannot be forgiven--and we should not be forgiven--
when so often we do not even care to try.
We can be forgiven if, after considering the traditions of the
Senate's hallowed past, we choose to depart from those traditions. We
can not be forgiven--and we should not be forgiven--if we depart from
those traditions unaware or oblivious of what we leave behind.
I invite my colleagues to look around this Senate Chamber, to read
the inscriptions in the marble reliefs over the doors. To the east is
written ``Patriotism.'' To the west is inscribed ``Courage.'' And to
the south is carved ``Wisdom.''
These are the icons under which we walk whenever we come into this
Chamber and whenever we leave it. These walls do not speak of ``ease.''
The marble does not memorialize ``rapidity.'' These sculptures do not
enshrine ``convenience.''
This Senate advances the love of country that is patriotism when it
struggles to deliver justice. The Senate serves the people not when it
avoids difficult issues but when it acts with courage to address them
fully. And it is only through the crucible of debate and amendment that
this Senate can come, as come it must, to wisdom.
Mr. President, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Enzi). The Chair recognizes the Senator
from Minnesota.
Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, first of all, let me thank my colleague
and my neighbor from Wisconsin, Senator Feingold. I have a very strong
feeling and belief that this speech, which has been given at 5 o'clock
this Thursday afternoon, will end up being one of the more memorable
speeches given on the floor of the Senate. I think the speech was
eloquent and powerful. It went way beyond political party. I thank my
colleague from Wisconsin.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I thank my friend from Minnesota for his
efforts on each and every issue I tried to raise to try to constantly
point out that this place is supposed to be where we can deliberate and
actually talk about these issues and offer amendments. He is probably
the best example of a person who understands the need to do that.
Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I won't be--I can't be--as eloquent,
but I actually thought I would come to the floor and try to basically
speak to what I think are some important questions for the Senate.
This is, in part, the discussion we had yesterday; and especially
with the majority leader not on the floor, I will make sure that what I
say, I say in such a way that if he wants to respond later, he can. In
any case, I intend to say it at least in the best possible way I can.
I know the majority leader today, in a couple of interviews--it has
come my way from several journalists--has said that yesterday he sort
of believed that I was responsible for this exchange that we had on the
floor--in getting it started. I believe he also mentioned Senator
Durbin.
I want to say that, actually, if that is the case, I would be proud
to accept the blame. I think it is a discussion we needed to have,
albeit what I hope is that something positive will come out of it. That
is to say--and this is what Senator Feingold was trying to say--I came
here to do my very best to represent the people in Minnesota. I think
when you are a Senator, and also when you pass amendments or bills, it
can have implications for people all across the country.
What I have always loved about the Senate in the time I have been
here is that individual Senators can matter and can make a difference.
We are really much more of an amendment body. I think the Senate is at
its best when bills come to the floor and Senators bring amendments out
and we start early in the morning and--we don't need to go until
midnight; that is not good for families. But we can go until 7 or 8
o'clock at night.
We are about the work of democracy. That is what we are doing. We
have votes up or down, and we are all held accountable; we are able to
come out here and introduce amendments that speak to the concerns and
circumstances, in our view, of the people we represent. That is why I
came here.
Yesterday, on the floor of the Senate, in response to some of what
the majority leader said--I will make sure I do not make the response
personal--I said I felt that we have had a pattern here--and Senator
Feingold has spoken about this--over and over and over again where
bills are considered and the majority leader and others make it clear
that only certain amendments are acceptable--not very many--for debate.
If there is no agreement on the minority side, then the majority leader
files cloture and usually doesn't get it. The bill is pulled and no
legislation is passed. This has been happening over and over and over
again.
From my point of view, a point of order challenge for the first time
in 16 years, or thereabouts, which prevented Senators from introducing
even sense-of-the-Senate resolutions to appropriations bills--the
argument that was made was, well, hey, we have to do business and we
have to get going. You know what. Every year we have appropriations
bills--last year and the year before that and the year before that.
Never before--at least in the last 16 or 17 years--has this been done.
My view was that all of this added up to an effort to basically run
the Senate like the House of Representatives. That is what I have said,
and that is what I believe. I have said it many times. I think that is
detrimental to the Senate. I think it takes away the vitality that we
have and robs us of some of the capacity for debate, for deliberation,
for honest differences of opinion, which need to be expressed out here
on the floor of the Senate, and for individual Senators to be able to
speak to their priorities.
Now, some of my colleagues on the other side may want to talk about
tax cuts or about this or that and the other. I may want to talk about
the poverty of children and the need to have affordable child care and
the need to make sure we have food and nutrition programs so children
don't go hungry. We all have things about which we care the most.
Nobody is better than anybody else. But do you know what. I want the
right to be able to do that. What I was trying to say yesterday--and I
will say it, given what the majority leader said to several
journalists--was I actually didn't intend to be silenced.
So I will continue to issue challenges and speak out. I think that
Senator Daschle spoke probably for every single Democrat yesterday. I
think it is going to be important for us to move forward, and I hope we
will. Sometimes what happens on the floor of the Senate is that people
speak with some indignation because that is what they

[[Page S4176]]

feel, and they may feel very strongly. So the words are uttered in that
way, and some of the discussion takes place that way. Do you know what?
I think there comes a time when that is necessary.
Frankly, I think it is important that the minority party makes sure
we maintain our rights. It is important that the minority maintains its
voice. It is important that Senators have opportunities to bring
amendments out here and do their very best to legislate for people back
home, to introduce amendments, have debate, to win or to lose, but to
be at the work of democracy. I just think that the Senate doesn't do
the work of democracy when we basically go through bills that are laid
out, and then cloture is filed and the bills are pulled, and that is
about it. And we really aren't about doing the work I think we ought to
be doing. That is my own view.
Again, in responding to some of what has been said today, listen, if
the majority leader feels that I am the blame for getting this debate
started yesterday, I am proud to accept that. I think we needed to have
the debate. But the most important thing is that we all figure out a
way we can move forward from it.
I will tell you that I feel very strongly that we have to get back to
some debate out here on the floor of the Senate. We have to get back to
the deliberation.
I would be interested in the Senator's response, frankly, if he can
help me a moment.
To me, the work of democracy is when Senators come out here with
amendments. As I said earlier, we should start early in the morning, go
to 8 or 9 at night, and have at it. We would have good deliberations
and good debate, and we would vote amendments up or down. Senators
would be able to raise the kinds of questions they want to raise and
speak to the kinds of issues they think are so important to the people
they represent; we are all accountable. But it is substantive. It is
real. It is about issues, and nobody is gagged; nobody is blocked. That
is the Senate and the vitality of the Senate.
I wonder what my colleague thinks about that.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I couldn't agree more.
First, I thank the Senator from Minnesota for his discussion of the
problems we are having in the Senate, and for that important statement.
But I also certainly will not accept his apology for what he did
yesterday, for what he did was right.
Mr. WELLSTONE. I wasn't trying to apologize.
Mr. FEINGOLD. I understand. What the Senator did was absolutely
essential. We need to get out here and talk about what is happening.
I remember when I first came here. The Senator from Minnesota was
here several years before I was--I believe two. But I remember when we
were in the majority, Senators on the other side were allowed to freely
amend bills.
I learned a great deal from my colleagues, the Senators on the other
side. When they offered an amendment, I sometimes agreed with them.
Usually I wouldn't. I learned a great deal about what they were
thinking, and about what my constituents might think. I, in particular,
give credit to the Senator from Texas, Senator Gramm. He is a superb
Senator in terms of his ability. For us to be deprived because of this
kind of a process of benefiting from the knowledge and thinking and
sentiments of our colleagues on the other side is a terrible loss to
the Senate. I have not been here that long, but I remember when it used
to be different that it was better.
Mr. WELLSTONE. I will ask my colleague another question. It is
interesting that he mentioned Senator Gramm from Texas because I
remember that several years ago, we were in the majority. We were in
the office because I know it was July 21. It was my birthday, and we
had the cake and candles. Somebody said: Senator Gramm is out there
with an amendment on legal services that you don't agree with. You have
to go out there and debate him.
I didn't know he was going to bring that amendment up. I had to end
the birthday party, get the notes, and run down here. There was a 2- or
3-hour debate on it.
But that is what I love about being a Senator. It is not a game. He
was serious about what he was doing, and I was serious in opposition.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I find it hard to believe in these few
years that the nature of what we do out here has changed this much. I
wonder if there is any way that the number of Senators on both sides of
the aisle, who remember, who valued that, could sort of come together
and talk about restoring this institution to what it was.
Mr. WELLSTONE. I would like to ask the Senator from Wisconsin another
question. This has not been brought up. I think the Senator gave a
speech that, as I said, will be memorable for many years to come. This
is a little bit away from the framework. The Senator can respond in any
way, of course, that is appropriate from the Senator's point of view.
One of the things that I think in part caused me to raise these
questions with the majority leader yesterday was that I was little
worried. Back home, people meet with you, and they believe because of
the chance of meeting with you that something positive can happen, that
it will make a difference in lives, that it will help them.
I get worried that if you can't offer amendments and you are shut
out, you are not able to respond to people.
For example, take agriculture and dairy farmers in Wisconsin and in
Minnesota, much less other farmers. For them, time is not mutual. They
really believe when I meet with them that I can do something right now
about the abysmally low prices, whether it is the livestock producers,
or whether it is the corn growers. You meet with people. With what is
going on in farm country with crops, people are in such pain. They
still come out to meetings because they still believe you are their
Senator, and by meeting with you and talking about what is happening to
them, somehow since you are their Senator you can do something to help.
But I can't do anything to help right now.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Again, Mr. President, looking back over the last
several years, I have worked a great deal on agriculture issues, as
well, and I remember these kinds of meetings and being able to honestly
say to a group of farmers I didn't know if we were going to be able to
pass a bill. But I could say there was a decent chance to be able to
bring it up on the floor, either as a bill or as an amendment. Maybe we
would win; maybe we would lose.

It is an odd feeling now to tell a bunch of farmers that we are not
allowed to offer amendments anymore. They look at you as if you have
lost your mind. But that is what we have to tell them. We aren't
allowed anymore in the Senate to bring up ideas and have amendments and
have bills because they have to be cleared with the majority leader. We
have to show him the amendment first. If he doesn't like it, we can't
offer it. I try to be candid with people. That is a candid comment.
That is truly different from the way things were. And I have served
both in the majority and in the minority in the short years that I have
been here.
Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I wonder what the response of the
Senator from Wisconsin would be. I even found myself saying to people--
I can think of different meetings, but I will stay with agriculture. I
want to talk about some of the other issues where I literally sometimes
slip into, if you will, I guess, what I call ``Washington language,''
and say to people I don't know if there will be a vehicle. People are
thinking: Wait a minute; we are losing our farms.
They do not know what you are talking about. They have no health care
coverage, and can't there be more support for child care, teachers talk
about what will make a difference in the schools--pick your issue. And
you are at a meeting with people, you are moved by people, and you want
to do something to help.
Other Senators might have a very different viewpoint, in which case
we can have the debate. I find myself saying I just hope there will be
a vehicle. People do not know what you are talking about. What do you
mean, there is no vehicle? Don't you have an opportunity as a Senator
to try to legislate and to be out there representing people and
fighting for people?
That is what I am worried about. That is what yesterday was about.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota has the floor.

[[Page S4177]]

Mr. WELLSTONE. I asked the Senator from Wisconsin whether or not he
has been in a similar experience. I have the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota may accept
questions when he has the floor.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I wonder if the Senator from Minnesota
would respond to a question.
Mr. WELLSTONE. I would be pleased to.
Mr. FEINGOLD. If he will yield for a question, I suggest to the
Senator that if I tell a group of my constituents that I cannot find a
vehicle, they would offer me a ride. They would say: Do your job; here
is your ride. That is the problem.
I ask the Senator if he would agree, if we are forced to talk to our
constituents about the minutia of Senate procedure, and if that is the
kind of conversation we have to have with our dairy farmers in
Wisconsin instead of talking to them about what we should be talking
about, the substance of the legislation--let us worry about the Senate
procedure--then really the opponents of any kind of change have won
because that is not something they should have to concern themselves
with. It is very interesting; great. But that is not what dairy farmers
in Wisconsin need. They have some great ideas about how to do things
differently, and we should be able to come out here and have an
amendment or a bill.

In fact, I ask the Senator from Minnesota if he would agree with
this. We are not used to getting a lot of votes sometimes. Sometimes we
don't get many votes on our amendments. Sometimes there is a little
laughter about how Wellstone and Feingold only got 10 or 12 votes. But
at least we got a chance to get some votes.
Mr. WELLSTONE. The Senator should speak for himself.
Mr. FEINGOLD. That is right. I would ask the Senator how he would
react to that.
Mr. WELLSTONE. I would say to my colleague from Wisconsin that I have
two answers. The first answer is part of what I have been trying to
say, which is I am really in a debate with the majority leader. I think
other Democrats are with me. I hope some Republicans are. It is not a
debate for the sake of debate because what I worry about the most is to
go back home all the time and to have people meet with you to talk
about their lives and have the hope that you as a Senator can make a
difference, and you can't make a difference. If there is this effort
basically to silence you and if there is this effort basically to block
amendments and block debate, Senator Feingold is right. Sometimes you
win; sometimes you lose. But you have to have that opportunity to be
out here advocating and legislating and fighting for people.
That is important to me.
Second, this didn't come up in yesterday's debate. I ask my colleague
in the form of a question, part of what is going on I think is whether
or not the Senate becomes just a nondecisionmaking body. Whether that
is good or bad very much depends on one's view about government. If one
thinks there is no positive role that government or public policy can
play in the lives of people and in improving the lives of people, it
would not bother Members that Senators cannot introduce amendments and
that we don't debate these issues.
I ask my colleague whether or not he thinks that is in part what is
going on. If one believes there is nothing the government can or should
do to respond to dairy farmers, family farmers, by way of making health
care more affordable, or improving educational opportunities for
children, then denying Senators the opportunity to debate and offer
amendments and moving forward is not a problem. If one believes there
is a role for government to be doing this, I think it is a problem.
I ask my colleague whether he thinks there is a philosophical debate.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I suggest that is one way that a person
can come to the conclusion that the Senate should operate this way.
However, there are others who would believe that government sometimes
has to stop things that are bad that other levels of government or
perhaps the other body would want done.
I ask the Senator if he does not agree that the Senate has a role
from another philosophical point of view; I think it is called the
``saucer'' that Thomas Jefferson spoke of, the saucer that goes with
the cup in order to cool the Senate.
Whether this reflects a belief that government does not have a
function, or whether it reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of what
the Senate is supposed to be, I wonder if the Senator would react.
Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank my colleague from Wisconsin. I am a political
scientist and taught American politics classes, but I think the Senator
from Wisconsin is my teacher.
I talked about it from the point of view we ought to be about the
business of legislating and deciding, not about the business of not
deciding and not moving forward.
I think what my colleague from Wisconsin is saying is, but also,
Senator Wellstone, the other critical role of the Senate is by
definition, two Senators from every State, regardless of population of
State. It is not straight majority or majoritarian principles. The
Senate is there to defend the rights of minorities, sometimes to
represent unpopular causes, and sometimes to make sure that if there is
a rush to pass a piece of legislation which has cataclysmic
consequences in people's lives, such as the bankruptcy bill, there is
an opportunity for Senator or Senators to say: Wait a minute; I insist
this not move through. I will be out here fighting, even if it is an
unpopular cause. I want the public and the country to know. Sometimes
there is much to be said for deliberation. Sometimes there is much to
be said for the Senate as a deliberative body, and therefore there is
much to be said for a Senator's rights or a group of Senators' rights
to represent this viewpoint.
I thank my colleague from Wisconsin for his comments, and I yield the
floor.
Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Minnesota. This
was a useful opportunity to discuss very serious problems in the
Senate.

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