[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 138 (Saturday, October 28, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S11297-S11298]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE WORK OF CONGRESS
Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, I have sought recognition to comment on
the pending status of the work of the Congress. Yesterday, Senator
Stevens took the floor and outlined the work of the Appropriations
Committee, making it plain that nothing could be done on the last bill
on appropriations for Labor, Health, Human Services, and Education,
until Tuesday because there had to be a reading of the bill and the
other procedural matters which had to be attended to, even if the
conferees came to agreement on Friday.
Senator Stevens suggested that there was no point in having the
Senate and the House in session on Saturday and Sunday and Monday.
Notwithstanding that, and notwithstanding Senator Stevens' contacts
with the President and the President's men, we are here. We are here
for absolutely no reason. I chair the subcommittee which has
jurisdiction over that appropriations bill and we have been in
negotiations with the White House for weeks. We have not been able to
come to an agreement because of the intransigence of the White House.
They may say it is the intransigence of the Congress. We have a way of
saying the other party is intransigent. But there is no doubt that they
are at least 50 percent responsible for the fact that we have not been
able to come to terms on this bill.
On this bill, the subcommittee that I chair met the President's
figure of $106 billion. It was hard to do. My colleagues in this body
and the Republicans in the House didn't like that figure; they thought
it was too much money. But the chairman of the House committee and I
prevailed to meet the President's figure so we can come to terms and
have an accommodation and get the bill passed. We put $600 million in
that bill--more for education than the President did. And the President
asked for $2.7 billion for school construction and teachers. It was the
view of many colleagues that that was not a Federal responsibility, but
we gave this figure. We put an addendum on that if the local school
boards decided they wanted it for something else, they could use it for
something else, so that there would be local control, which is the
essence of education in America, contrasted with the Washington, DC,
bureaucratic straitjacket.
Notwithstanding that, the White House, his negotiators, wanted every
semicolon their own way. So that bill is still languishing in
negotiations. But it is certainly not the fault of the Congress.
We are here today and we will be here tomorrow. The Members --535 of
us--had thought we would have concluded our business a long time ago. I
can tell the American people--if anybody watches C-SPAN II--that the
fault is not that of the Congress that we are still here. The President
has decided that we will be in session on 1-day continuing resolutions,
as his way of trying to make a political point. He is not making a
governmental point, he is making a political point. He is making a
political point to try to blame the Congress as a ``do-nothing''
Congress, when that is not the fact. He is trying to blame the Congress
for a situation the White House is really responsible for--at least 50
percent responsible.
We have come to a situation where the quality and parity between the
Congress and the executive branch has long since evaporated. When the
Government was closed down at the end of 1995, that was an enormous
shift of power, so that now the Congress is really over a barrel to
yield to whatever the President has to say.
Being aware of that, we structured this final bill on Labor, Health,
Human Services, and Education to finish it so that it could be
presented to the President in September. The Senate acted on it on June
30, which established a record, going back to 1976 for the earlier set
of action on this bill. Then we finished the conference report on July
27. It should have been presented to the President in September, and
that projection was made so that we would be able to present it to the
President and, if he vetoed it, have a national debate; and we thought
we would be in a position to make our priorities stand up because the
Constitution does give the Congress the responsibility and authority to
establish the priorities.
Mr. President, the essential point that I am coming to is that if we
were not over a barrel in our relations with the President, we would
submit to the President a continuing resolution for 3 or 4 days. But we
are not doing that because it would be unseemly. We are not doing that
because we don't want to engage in what might be viewed by the American
people as a childish food fight.
If we sent him a continuing resolution for 4 days, which would be
reasonable under the circumstances, since we can't get anything done
until Tuesday, and there was a stalemate and there was a closing of the
Federal Government, the American people would say a plague on both of
your houses. But the reality is that the Congress is being intimidated
by the President and we are, in fact, being humiliated by what the
President is doing. There needs to be some semblance of good will and
comity between the Congress and the President. It doesn't exist and
hasn't existed.
This Senator has gone out of his way to try to work with the White
House and try to find accommodations. But when you have this
intimidation and what is really humiliation, it lingers. It has to be a
factor considered, as we have so many delicate relationships with the
executive branch of the Government. Frankly, I would like to see us
submit a continuing resolution for 4 days and lay down the gauntlet to
the President, if he wants to keep us around here doing nothing. But
the parity between the branches has been lost and we are here wasting
the time of 535 Members of Congress.
We are wasting the time of the Congressmen, and we are also putting
the people of America to a disadvantage because we have
responsibilities to our constituents that will not be attended to
today, or tomorrow, or Monday, or thereafter. I think it is high time
that the Congress stood up and confronted the President because of this
situation, which is simply intolerable.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, first of all, I certainly understand the
frustration of the Senator from Pennsylvania. He does a good job of
chairing that subcommittee. But his facts are wrong.
Here it is 9 days until the election, and we are still in session. We
are here because the leadership of the majority has simply refused to
move this Congress along like it is supposed to. Since the first of
September, we have passed only three or four appropriations bills. We
struggled through the month of September, and nothing happened.
Mr. SPECTER. Will the Senator from Nevada yield?
Mr. REID. I yield for a question.
Mr. SPECTER. What facts are wrong?
Mr. REID. I was just laying those facts out.
Mr. SPECTER. Does the Senator from Nevada deny the fact that the
President and the White House, or at least the people in question, are
responsible for the failure to come to agreement on the one outstanding
appropriations bill?
Mr. REID. We have 13 appropriations bills. This debate cannot relate
around one appropriations bill. The Senator from Pennsylvania worked
hard on the Labor-HHS appropriations bill. A number of us have worked
on it. But the Republicans have left this bill to the last bill so they
can attach everything to it that has not been done and that should have
been done previously.
Mr. SPECTER. Will the Senator yield for a question?
Mr. REID. No. I will not.
I say to the Chair and to those Members listening that the President
doesn't need to take any blame for what is taking place here in
Congress. We have a constitutional framework that gives him separate
but equal power with the Congress. He is exerting that now. Thank
goodness he is able to exert that because what has gone on here,
according to pundits and according to what I believe having been here
for almost 20 years, is a travesty.
Here we are trying to work our way through Congress 8 days before an
election. This should have been completed a long time ago. We have not
been able to have debates on issues in this Congress. Why? Because the
majority has
[[Page S11298]]
taken the position they don't want to have to take any difficult votes.
As a result of that, we don't take any votes. We don't have debates.
It is interesting to note that we haven't done anything on a
Patients' Bill of Rights. We have done nothing on prescription drugs.
On education, for the past 2 years in this Congress, we only have spent
parts of 6 days dealing with education. The American people say it is
the most important issue facing the American people. Members of
Congress say it is the most important issue. It seems to me that we
could spend more than 6 partial days talking about education.
We need help with school construction. In Las Vegas, we have the
sixth largest school district in America. We have to build one new
school every month to keep up with growth.
In the small State of Nevada, last year we spent $112 million just on
interest on the money we borrowed to build schools. We need help with
school construction and modernization. Schools all over America need
help. The average age of schools in America is over 40 years. We also
need to reduce class size. Unfortunately, we haven't had a meaningful
debate that has allowed us to discuss how important and successful
class size reduction is for our schools.
A year and a half ago, following the Columbine massacre, we passed
what we felt was minimal gun safety legislation. Nothing has happened
since then to move that forward. We have not had a conference. The
result is that we still have pawnshop loopholes where just anyone can
go in and buy guns. They can be felons. The same happens not only in
pawnshops but at gun shows. We need that legislation cleared for
further action. We have been unable to do that.
I say to my friend from Pennsylvania that, again, I appreciate his
frustration. I appreciate his hard work.
But the fact is that constitutionally the President has a role, and
he is fulfilling that role. I repeat that I am glad he is fulfilling
that role.
We have so many things that we need to do in this Congress that we
have simply been unable to do.
As a result of our friend, Paul Coverdell, having unexpectedly passed
away, the composition of the Senate changed. As such, we felt there
should be another vote on the Patients' Bill of Rights. We were denied
that.
There are so many things that have been taking place here that has
prevented the Senate from operating as the Senate.
My friend from Pennsylvania is frustrated as a result of his dealings
with the subcommittee.
I am frustrated as a Member of the Senate that we are not able to
talk about issues that I think are important. We have been prevented
from being able to talk about those issues.
In America today there are 3,000 children dropping out of school
every day. Shouldn't we be allowed to talk about that? The answer has
been no. We haven't been able to have a meaningful debate about the
serious problem of children dropping out of school.
The fact is the President is concerned about this $250 billion tax
bill. The minority has been shut out of all negotiations. The ranking
member of the Finance Committee has not been involved in anything, let
alone any other members of the Finance Committee.
We have conferences that are uniquely held with only one party.
There is a lot of frustration to go around.
I want to reassert and reemphasize that the President is doing the
right thing. I believe he is doing the right thing, which is supported
totally by the minority. He is doing the right thing by having us work
every day.
What good does it do? We should have been having 24-hour continuing
resolutions 2 weeks ago. If so, we would have already completed our
work 2 weeks ago. So, we are doing 24-hour continuing resolutions right
now. If, in fact, we had a 4-day continuing resolution, people would
fly out of here and back to their parades and campaigning and leave the
work that needs to be done here in Congress undone.
I am supportive of what the President is doing. It is good for
Congress. It is good for the American people.
Does the Senator from Pennsylvania have any questions of the Senator
from Nevada?
Mr. SPECTER. No. I can have some time of my own.
Mr. President, may I inquire of the majority leader if I may have 5
minutes at this time?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.
____________________