[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 38 (Wednesday, April 10, 2002)]
[Senate]
[Page S2465]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




             EQUAL PROTECTION OF VOTING RIGHTS ACT OF 2001

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, on behalf of the majority leader, under the 
authority granted to the majority leader on March 22, and with the 
concurrence of the Republican leader, I now ask unanimous consent the 
Senate resume consideration of Calendar No. 239, S. 565, the election 
reform bill.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, it is 
so ordered.
  The clerk will report the bill by title.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 565) to establish the Commission on Voting 
     Rights and Procedures to study and make recommendations 
     regarding election technology, voting, and election 
     administration, to establish a grant program under which the 
     Office of Justice Programs and the Civil Rights Division of 
     the Department of Justice shall provide assistance to States 
     and localities in improving election technology and the 
     administration of Federal elections, to require States to 
     meet uniform and nondiscriminatory election technology and 
     administration requirements for the 2004 Federal elections, 
     and for other purposes.

  Pending:

       Clinton amendment No. 2906, to establish a residual ballot 
     performance benchmark.
       Dodd (for Schumer) modified amendment No. 2914, to permit 
     the use of a signature or personal mark for the purpose of 
     verifying the identity of voters who register by mail.
       Dodd (for Kennedy) amendment No. 2916, to clarify the 
     application of the safe harbor provisions.
       Hatch amendment No. 2935, to establish the Advisor 
     Committee on Electronic Voting and the Electoral Process, and 
     to instruct the Attorney General to study the adequacy of 
     existing electoral fraud statutes and penalties.
       Hatch amendment No. 2936, to make the provisions of the 
     Voting Rights Act of 1965 permanent.
       Smith of New Hampshire amendment No. 2933, to prohibit the 
     broadcast of certain false and untimely information on 
     Federal elections.
  Mr. REID. I ask unanimous consent the previous agreement with respect 
to S. 565 be modified to provide that all amendments remaining in order 
to the bill, first and any second-degree, must be offered and debated 
during today's session; and that any votes ordered to occur with 
respect to these amendments be stacked to occur at a time to be 
determined by the two leaders, in the sequence in which the amendments 
were offered; that prior to each vote there be 2 minutes of closing 
debate with the time equally divided and controlled in the usual form 
without further intervening action or debate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. REID. On behalf of the majority leader, let me say, while the 
minority leader is here, the two managers of this bill, Senator Dodd 
and Senator McConnell, are to be applauded. What they have done is 
extraordinary. They should know that. This is tremendous for the 
country. It has been done on a bipartisan basis. These two Senators are 
to be congratulated.
  There will be no more rollcall votes tonight. I have been advised by 
the majority leader to announce that.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican leader.
  Mr. LOTT. If the Senator from Nevada will yield, just for a comment--
and also to agree with him. I want to say to the Senator from 
Connecticut, Mr. Dodd, and Senator McConnell, they have been 
persistent. It would have been very easy to just let this reform effort 
slide off the end of the table, like so much else has, unfortunately, 
in the Senate. But they continued to work together. They continued to 
try to find substantive agreements and also a procedural process to get 
this done on sort of a second-track process. So I am pleased we have 
this unanimous consent agreement, and I commend them both. I think we 
are going to wind up with a product that the Senate can be proud to 
support.
  Let me just ask Senator Reid if he will yield to clarify how we 
proceed. Under the agreement, there were a number of amendments that 
were identified with time limits. All those amendments will be 
considered tonight under this unanimous consent agreement, and then 
tomorrow, at a time we will agree to and announce later, all votes, if 
any--either on final passage or the amendments--would be stacked?
  So that would occur in the morning and Senators need to know, if they 
are interested in these amendments, they will need to come to the 
Chamber in the next couple of hours to deal with them. Is that correct? 
Is that your understanding?
  Mr. REID. That is right, I say to the leader.
  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, if I could be recognized before we begin, 
now, under leader time?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican leader.

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